News: WOTM 45 -- Starts 1 Aug

[neilmeister]

WOTM 45: Egypt

Ramesses..... in random land

Game Details:

Game settings:
Civilization: Egypt (Leader: Ramesses; Traits: Industrial and Spiritual)
Rivals: 6 Random AIs
Difficulty: Prince
Map: Fractal
Climate: Random
Sea Level: Random
Starting Era: Ancient
Speed: Normal
Options: No Tribal Villages
Victory Conditions: all enabled.

Ramesses:
Ramesses is good at building wonders and smashing AI with powerful War Chariots. He gets a fairly lame UB, from memory. Seriously, you should look them up.

The map is completely random, it is literally the very first roll.

Good Luck!

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



Contender Class ONLY

To Enter the Competition:

This competition will open on 1 August 2012. From that date, you'll be able to get the starting saves -->Here<--.

Submit the save after your victory (or defeat) here, by 14 September 2012.

Civ version

This game MUST be played in Warlords (NOT Beyond the Sword or Vanilla Civ), patched to version 2.13, as modified by BtS version 3.13, and with the correct HOF mod version installed.

Windows players
You can download version HOF-2.13.004 of the HOF mod here. Note that this is the new version of the HOF mod, first used for WOTM 25. For game security reasons this HOF mod version requires you to be logged in with an account that has admin privileges when you are playing for your game to be a valid entry to the GOTM competition. You'll see a warning dialog if you attempt to start a session without appropriate privileges.

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

Mac players will also require the 2.13 patch, with HoF Mod version HOF-Mac-2.13.001.

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 the game outside those threads while it is in progress.

Please post in this thread or send me a Private Message for any technical queries, eg. if you have trouble opening the game. Do NOT post in this thread once you have successfully opened the starting save.

 

[Greeder]

Fast research: War Chariots= 5 strenght, immunity to first strikes, ideal for rush.
UU Obelisk = 2 priest slots? Nice for early GP

Starting techs: Agri+The Wheel

Start kind of suck. No visible food...
I'm considering 1N from Warrior as a place for capitol. 3-4 floods, river, 1 plain hill and Gold. First Pottery and Worker so all floods will be cottaged early.
But 2 desert tiles in capitol... it sucks too. It's Prince, so maybe I'll wander a little before settling.

 

[matthew9890]

Hmmm, no food visible, and the warrior is too far away from the settler to see if SIP will give any food (well, more than a single tile at least). Has this map been modified at all? If it hasn't there is probably food hidden there somewhere, and if it has been I think that any food has magically disappeared somehow If the map is unmodified then I will probably send the warrior 1N to see if there is anything else nice near the gold to tempt me closer to it, but if there isn't anything good I'll just SIP and hope that there is food. I think you generally get a source of food, though I think sometimes if there is a lot of flood plains you don't, this is from my experience in BtS so that might be wrong.

 

[FiveRings]

What's the rationale behind the waiting till 1 August?

 

[matthew9890]

What's the rationale behind the waiting till 1 August?

To annoy us I imagine, for the short amount of time I've been playing they generally start before the previous one ends. I guess people are busy with RL

 

[Conquistador 63]

If this is truly an unedited map, I think there must be food in at least one of the 3 fogged tiles S/SW of the settler.

I'll SIP (2h city center on marble) and pursue a Culture victory this time, Ramesses screams for it. Might even chase an early religion if there is an agri resource in the BFC (so the initial worker won't be idle), else will go for pottery or AH instead.

 

[neilmeister]

We usually have a delay of 5 days between the announcement thread and the game starting. It gives us time to sort out a few things about the game.

Warlords is also the variant we have decided the release randomly generated, contender only games. So we aren't as organised as for Vanilla & BtS.

edit: and yes, the map is completely unedited in any way.

 

[High King J.J.]

I wonder if anyone remembers Lethal Weapon 2 and achieves both CONquest and DOMination victories?
Should maybe rename leader to Ramses Extra?

 

[Htadus]

^^
I am shocked to see these forums turned to a history quiz.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

We usually have a delay of 5 days between the announcement thread and the game starting. It gives us time to sort out a few things about the game.

Warlords is also the variant we have decided the release randomly generated, contender only games. So we aren't as organised as for Vanilla & BtS.

edit: and yes, the map is completely unedited in any way.

The other way of looking at it is it isn't so much a delay before starting the game, but that as a bonus, we've made the game announcement 5 or so days before the game was due to start. That's really the original intention too: It means that people have a chance to look at the starting map and compare planned strategies, where they think they should settle etc. before everyone downloads the save, preventing fair participation in further discussions. If we didn't post the game announcement until the game was ready to be downloaded, and due to be released, I imagine that community aspect of the games would suffer quite badly.

 

[Htadus]

SIP look the best. At least 3 FP and hope for pigs/sheep/cows in the BFC. AH before heading to BW. Then must consider Pyramids for an Egyption leader. Also WC begs for early wars. Maybe steal some workers for a change.

As for VC, i am tempted to go culture but feel like mongering. Who knows? maybe both.

Plan for second city very early to claim gold and FP's. Since this is a fractal map, it is very likely we need galleons to reach all the AI for a war game. So, is CS sling a good or bad thing to do? Hummmm

 

[Jastrow]

Just downloaded the save and am about to open it and start. Will likely settle in place simply because this is a non-modified map, and I usually trust the generator to make SIP at least a reasonable option, and I dont see anything obvious to change this. Have not decided yet if I will rush early with war chariots (if horses exist; if not, that will make the decision for me), or bealine education and sweep the continent with something like knights.

 

[Jouzou]

My 2 cents: I'd really like to settle 1S to be able to work the quarry. I think I'll send both warrior and settler 1S to see how much food they see. If they don't see any food resources, I might just move back to the original location. If they find just one, I might settle for it if it's really good. That flat non-forested tile in the fog really bugs me. I'm pretty sure it's either food or a strategic resource, so I would be losing out on that one (well, in the capital at least).