News: GOTM 118 - Alexander, Monarch - Starts 9 Sept

[DynamicSpirit]

GOTM 118: Alexander of Greece.

This month you play Alexander on a map that is modified to be somewhat different in nature from the normal game-script maps. But in every other respect it plays like a normal game. Good luck!

Game settings:
Playing as: Alexander of Greece
Rivals: 6 AIs
Difficulty: Monarch
Starting Era: Ancient
Speed: Normal
Options: All goody huts have been removed
Victory Conditions: All enabled

Map settings:
Map: Modified terra (Don't assume you can follow normal terra strategies on this map!)
World Wrap: Cylindrical
Mapsize: Standard
Climate: Tropical
Sea level: Medium


Alexander is Philosophical and Aggressive, and you start with Fishing and Hunting.

The Philosophical trait gives +100% great people birth rate and double production speed of University

The Aggressive trait gives free Combat I promotion for melee and gunpowder units and double production speed of Barracks and Drydock

Unique unit: Phalanx (replaces Spearman)
The Phalanx benefits from: base strength = 5. This compares with the Spearman which has: base strength = 4.


Starting screenshot

This is the start of the game (click for a bigger image):




There are no adventurer or challenger games this month.

To Enter the Competition:

This competition will open at 00:01 am on 9 Sep 2015, server local time (UTC-6:00). From that date and time, you'll be able to get your chosen starting save >>>here<<<.

Submit the save after your victory (or defeat) here, by 9 Oct 2015.

Here is a link to a list of the differences between Vanilla, Warlords and BtS.

Software Versions

Windows: This game MUST be played in Civ4 Vanilla (NOT Beyond the Sword or Warlords), patched to version 1.74, and with the HOF mod version 1.74.004 installed. You can download the HOF mod here. Players using Windows Vista or Windows 7 are encouraged to read the notes on Vista fixes here.

If you have not installed BtS, you will need to update the relevant DLL files in order to match the Locked Assets checks. These are available here.**

Macintosh: This game MUST be played in Civ4 Vanilla (NOT Beyond the Sword or Warlords), patched to version 1.74, and with the Mac HOF mod version 1.74.002 installed. You can download the Mac HOF mod here.

While playing...

Remember - for your entry to be accepted, it MUST be your first attempt to play this game, and you MUST NOT replay any turns. If you make a mistake while playing, you have to live with it, learn from it, and carry on the game without replaying.

We will open 'spoiler' threads during the month for players to discuss what happens in their games. Do not discuss any details of your game outside those threads.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

And by the way, apologies for the late start on this game (GOTMs are supposed to start on the 1st of the month but I was away and didn't see the scheduled and was then slightly unwell - but now getting better so no sympathy required ) Hopefully next month will be back to normal...

 

[lymond]

You must've been unwell when you designed that start

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Hmmmph!

Careful - if you offend me - it's not too late for me to make some last minute edits to the map just outside the visible starting area. I could remove some resources - jungle over some tiles, change some grassland to desert... Now I think about it, it's getting quite tempting...

 

[High King J.J.]

Hmmmph!

Careful - if you offend me - it's not too late for me to make some last minute edits to the map just outside the visible starting area. I could remove some resources - jungle over some tiles, change some grassland to desert... Now I think about it, it's getting quite tempting...

It looks like everything fogged is already jungled, however if we find jungled desert we will know you've edited that.
I'm having trouble deciding where to settle. It seems iron working is going to be an important tech to clear the jungles. I'm guessing we'll have GKhan as our close neighbour, just to make us need those Phalanxes.

 

[Deckhand]

... if we find jungled desert we will know you've edited that.

Thanks for the suggestion.
I don't have time to play currently, but I am preparing a couple maps tonight.

 

[haphazard1]

Will definitely require some thought on the best spot to settle. Add the early jungle...ick. Getting going will be tougher than normal. Curious to find out just what you have done with the map.

 

[High King J.J.]

Any Windows user using a disc-based (not Steam) Civ4 is unable to start the Vanilla or Warlords Civ4 if they have updated their Windows with the auto update. This includes other Windows systems, not just Windows 10 which does not work in even before this. The reason is update KB3086255 which disables the secdrv.sys which is needed, probably to confirm that the key disc is indeed copy-protected. Without it the program will not run. If you encounter this problem go to your Windows Update, check the update history (or somesuch) and click on KB3086255 to get thw web page where Microsoft informs what it has done to sabotage your Civ4 experience. Basically you can run the command prompt as a system administrator, type the command to start the secdrv.sys and then start Civ4. After that you may wish to disable it again. The commands are listed in the article "MS15-097: Description of the security update for the graphics component in Windows: September 8, 2015" although one command has a typo, there is supposed to be an empty space between "=" and "auto".

As always with Windows, use at your own risk. I've tried it and it works. I found out about this from other helpful Civfanatics, see this post:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=13958362&postcount=6
All hail Calibar for posting it

 

[DynamicSpirit]

As per High King J.J.'s post above, if you are having trouble starting civ to play this game, please refer to this thread.