No ranged units challenge, masochistic version

[sufficiency]

The original idea was from here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=489866

But there seems to be some confusion about what are allowed and what are not allowed. After trying this a bit and got some experience, I pose the following set of rules for a different, vastly more difficult challenge.


Rules:
1. At least play on Immortal difficulty (I doubt this is even remotely possible on Deity, but feel free to try!), Pangaea, standard speed, standard setting for everything else.
2. All victory conditions enabled, but you must win by domination.
3. You cannot own any ranged units (defined by units with ranged attack strength; this includes archers, chariot archers, siege units, and some naval units), airplanes, guided missiles, and nuclear weapons. In case you do get such a unit (from CS, for example), you will immediately disband it. The only exception is:

Spoiler :

If your first scout becomes an archer from a ruin, you may keep that archer so long as you do NOT use it to attack. Seriously you need this exception for your sanity and mine, I've "lost" too many scouts this way...

EDIT: to be clear, the Triplane lines are banned because they are aircrafts (and they are pretty much ranged no matter how you use them). AA guns and SAMs are OK because they are basically melee units with no ranged attack.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

going to allow Japan for this? theyre a no brainer first choice. also, you can gift any archers to CSs for points.

 

[The Pilgrim]

Lol. We haven't seen many successful attempts for a not masochistic version, let's see what we get here. Old Peter will jump on this opportunity, I believe.
Good luck everybody! Don't wait for me. I'm going to fail (likely) again, so can't imagine myself contributing a playthrough for this one. Hopefully I'm wrong, but the chances are against me.
Japan is the obvious choice. Germany, Aztecs, Ottomans. Many civs can fit. Sufficiency, maybe post a save? I haven't done that, and people seem a bit lost.

 

[kirbdog]

I like Sweden more than any other for this, even more than Japan and Germany, for the Carolean and the healing promotion (healing even after moving or attacking). Other civs will be faster, though.

Alternatively, Babylon or Korea just for the science. Giant Death Robots FTW.

I tried a game with Catherine this morning. When enemy cities got to be over 40 defense, and my opponent had both the Great Wall and Himeji's and the largest army, I decided it was time to retire.

I did find that getting the Statue of Zeus, Heroic Epic, Discipline, and a Great General all help. That adds up to +60% attacking power, making infantry reasonable siege units.

 

[Matthew.]

Do fighters on intercept count as ranged? Or AA guns for that matter? I haven't had a chance to really give these challenges a good try, but I'd imagine a game where AI manages to spam a ton of bombers would be beyond masochistic.

 

[budweiser]

I know!

Choose Babylon and build the Great Wall.

 

[Monthar]

Instead of Pangaea, how about Oval? It is still a Pangaea map, but won't end up as one of those snaky Pangaea maps that have lots of narrow 1-2 land tile choke points. I swear 9 out of 10 times I pick Pangaea, I get those ridiculous snaky versions.

 

[The Pilgrim]

Do fighters on intercept count as ranged? Or AA guns for that matter? I haven't had a chance to really give these challenges a good try, but I'd imagine a game where AI manages to spam a ton of bombers would be beyond masochistic.

AA guns by no means can be counted as ranged, I think.

Instead of Pangaea, how about Oval?

And very very very centered start please! Marquise de Sade would be so proud of you!

Although seriously, I have no clue how oval maps work. Is it possible to spawn right in the center? If so, I'd avoid that at any cost.

 

[BBMorti]

Agreed, Oval map would fit a no ranged unit challenge pretty well. Also AA should not be counted as ranged, it is pretty much a 'melee' unit with massive bonus damage vs air.

Mass medics would be desirable, I guess hehe

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

oval is a good map choice for anti-snaky maps but you might also get large mountain ranges and lots of lake. pangea plus will push the CSs to the outer perimeter and maybe some islands. might help prevent the crowding but also allows a lot of expansion.

not sure who i want to try this with. persia, germany, japan, and rome particularly sound tempting. really there are a lot of one worth trying it with.

 

[Matthew.]

I'm thinking China myself. Yeah, CKN's are wasted, but I want the extra 15% on GG and the early gold from paper makers.

 

[sufficiency]

Do fighters on intercept count as ranged? Or AA guns for that matter? I haven't had a chance to really give these challenges a good try, but I'd imagine a game where AI manages to spam a ton of bombers would be beyond masochistic.

AA guns are not ranged because they don't have ranged attack (iirc). Triplane lines are banned.

Btw, I think I am going to try this on Emperor (or even King) instead. Immortal feels hopeless for me.

As many have mentioned, Japan, Germany, and Sweden probably have a huge edge.

Sufficiency, maybe post a save? I haven't done that, and people seem a bit lost.

Perhaps. I'll see to it maybe tomorrow.

 

[Tabarnak]

I can see a Germany civ dominating this kind of game.

2 cities--->BW--->Philo. Rush buy some spearmen and beat some barb camps for extra units. After libraries(and NC) start building them by your own. Then when Civil Service is online upgrade everyone for a cheap price and spread 3 armies of 8-9 landsnechts for each side of the world.

Then Horseback Riding to help them later with more units to kill.

I predict a sub 150 turns win under these rules.

 

[Unresolved]

I can see a Germany civ dominating this kind of game.

2 cities--->BW--->Philo. Rush buy some spearmen and beat some barb camps for extra units. After libraries(and NC) start building them by your own. Then when Civil Service is online upgrade everyone for a cheap price and spread 3 armies of 8-9 landsnechts for each side of the world.

Then Horseback Riding to help them later with more units to kill.

I predict a sub 150 turns win under these rules.

I'd love to see a video on that. I'm sure it'd help me and other fellow domination failures to learn how to utilize melee units more effectively.

 

[Old Peter]

Matthew and Kirbdog are very right when it comes to civ choice .

I would prefer Babylon anyday before Japan on ANY map on ANY challenge

Add Ethiopia as a decent civ choice (just remember they do not get the 20 % bonus vs cities though, but still)

 

[Old Peter]

And btw guys, look at the diety challenge with Aztecs, I did a domination victory with no archer units before turn 150 or so I think. I posted some pics, have a look. Later I had planes and siege sure. But the map was very easy later on and these units would not been needed.

 

[Old Peter]

And btw, I love this masochistic challenge .

I use a lot of siege and planes normally in all my games, but hardly any pure ranged units. I completed all challenges and post a lot of pics. And I think you can not find any crossbows, gatling guns or such in any pics (exeption of Arabia ofc! ), simply because I do very rarely use these.

 

[Moriarte]

Lovely proposition, sufficiency! I rolled a fantastic salty starting location with Boudicca (immortal) and played 70 turns already. Basically, i started with 3 cities, early NC & something like 10 Picts. Just finished with my first victim, Catherine. No idea what to do next.. Will probably upgrade them into pikes and try killing the rest. Scary, haha.

What promotions are good for this type of game, guys?

Recorded my game here, feel free to criticize .

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

yikes, spain isnt a good idea on immo/pangea. pikes and horses arent a good city taking strategy. i waited to have pikes and conquistadors and took my first cap at t135. i lost 4 (1 pike 1 warrior 2horses) of 12 units (4pikes 2warriors 6 horses) doing it against a 24 def city too. it was Egypt popping them with chariots and spears. theres no way they can take a 30+ def city.

im gonna take an iron melee path or go with babylon for tech advantage in the mid-game.

 

[sufficiency]

Here's what I got so far on Pangaea/Immortal.

After thinking about it, I decided to roll Carthage. My reasoning is that with a whale/crab start, I can quickly improve all my luxuries and grow really fast; also, Carthage UA will solve the mountain problem and the elephants are very strong. After rerolling a couple of times, I got an 8 (!!!) sea resource start with river.

I made the mistaken of DoFing Theodora after getting the colours mixed up. It turned out she was my best target. Luckily, I managed to bait her into dow'ing me...

I managed to take one of her cities with 7 elephants (but I lost 3 myself), but I couldn't go on because I literally had nothing else -- my starting point has ZERO horses and ZERO iron (which is also why I had to beeline to Education instead of early military tech). I dow'ed her again after getting 8 muskets + 3 pikes and took her capital (it went surprisingly well considering Constantinople had 40+ defense. She surrendered to me and yielded me an 11 pop city for free.

At this point I am second in tech and third in military. Sejong has a tech lead and already in industrial era, but Harum al-Rashid just dow'ed him and with his top rank in military will hopefully crush Sejong. I also got Statue of Zeus from Theodora (YAY!). If this was a normal game I would have certainly won by this point, but with no ranged units, at least I can say I am doing OK on this no-range challenge on Immortal.

I have the initial save uploaded. I can also upload the current save if anyone else want to try it.

Bonus pic:

Spoiler :

Elephant vs Cataphract. Who will win?

Spoiler :

Heroic Epic is sweet. Honor SP is sweet.