Not far to go now...

[adrianj]

The way things sit right now, I'm two games away from becoming a Quartermaster! Assuming my recent submissions are accepted and the HOF doesn't change too dramatically.

My problem is, as you can guess, my remaining two games must be at Demigod difficulty and above, certainly not my comfort zone.

My next game I'm planning a 20k culture win at Demigod level. I'm currently reading T-Hawk's 20k guide.

My gameplan will be to play a scientific civ, possibly Babylon since they're also rel, or Byzantines because Dromon's are great and they start with alphabet. My 20k city will not be my capital, since the palace pre-build seems essential to me. My research will beeline for Philo -> Literature, and hopefully pick up Republic through the GLIB. From there it'll be standard pre-building for good culture wonders, and rushing culture buildings in between.

Does anybody have any thoughts they would like to share, re opening moves? Map size/type? Other useful 20k articles/game writeups? Civ selection?

Any help is much appreciated

 

[AutomatedTeller]

probably the easiest is:

Byzantium (all coastal starts plus alpha + collosus immediately available)
Arch map.
No commercial or seafaring civs.
Probably the fewest number of opposing civs you can.
No barbs.
With those settings, you should be able to get the slingshot, pretty easily and kickoff a GA with the Glib.

Dont' remember what the demigod maps are like for 20K - I'd pick a smaller map, cause it's faster.

If you end up with an AI on your island, debate restarting.

Make sure you have food bonuses.

Easiest opponents would be militaristic, expansionist and religious civs. Industrious are good - gives you trade options for masonry.

It's sometimes good to spread out - make sure there is a religious civ, an expansionist one, an industrious one. Japan, Egypt, Mongols, Zulu, China all make good opponents.

One problem with this is that if you end up alone on an island with a demigod civ in a 20K game, you are going to be very vulnerable and may get wiped out. I'd probably just restart if that happened.

Another problem is that you need to prioritize the lighthouse high, or one of the other civs will get it and out expand you.

Just some thoughts. Good luck 20K games are much fun....

 

[adrianj]

Thanks AutomatedTeller.

I'm not one to spend a great deal of time with MapFinder, and I had this one come up pretty soon.

Opponents are Japan, Egypt, Mongols, and Zulu. I'm the Byzantines on an Arch map with 80% water.

What would be a useful set of opening moves? I'm thinking warrior, curragh to explore, then settler asap to found my 20k city. Research straight for writing hoping to trade CB fairly soon? If I get it, then temple first, otherwise straight to Colossus.

And if I'm sharing my island with an AI, I probably will restart.

Here I go...

 

[RFHolloway]

Ouch - no freshwater (unless thats a lake) - that means that you don't actually have any food bonuses for early growth (cattle tiles are both 2/2 in despot)

I'm in a similar situation to you - going for my first demigod win on 100k. I have found its not that much harder, you just need most things to break in your favour (slingshot coming off, a SGL for the ToA, getting to cavalry before they can upgrade too many units to knights and muskets in my case). I now have the game under control - not won yet, and certainly behind where I would like to be on culture, but thats not the point the DG tables aren't too crowded if you are just aiming to grab a spot

 

[adrianj]

I ended up forfeiting that particular map after finding I was sharing it with another civ.

Currently busy with a new map. I've made a lot of mistakes already, but learning as I go. Currently researching Refining with an estimated win date of 1900, and I'm pretty well placed to stop any other civ winning (I think...)

It's fun though, I think I'll play a few more Demigod games before moving up. I always feel like it's an achievement to build wonders on the higher difficulties.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

You absolutely need fresh water, preferably a river.

I generally make collosus my first build after I get a warrior and curragh out. You should be able to get it pretty easily, but if you run into another civ that has a good start, they can beat you to it. It's not like Sid, where collosus almost has to come before a curragh and even then it's 50/50 - but I think the AI will tend to start building wonders once they get 2 or 3 cities out, and they grow very fast.

 

[Marsden]

You could try this thread: Idiots guide to 20k

This can help too, but not specifically for 20k: Educational HoF Threads


BTW, why do both of the games have to be demigod or higher, you only need one of each level and you can win with only the lowest 6, diety and sid are not required.

 

[Elear]

I agree with what they've said.

Good luck with your Quartermasters!

 

[adrianj]

Yay! I won!

My date of 1892 wasn't good enough to make the table for a standard size map, but I learnt a lot. Thanks everyone for your help

 

[AutomatedTeller]

good that was a very fast played game!!

 

[Bartleby]

Congrats!. Will you stick with Standard maps and try to improve the date [get more SGL's], or look at another table?

 

[adrianj]

I'm trying different sized maps. Still archiplego with the byzantines.

The silly thing with that last game is that I probably could have won by a spaceship victory, which would have made the HOF table. I'm actually quite surprised at how much focussing my attention on my 20k city benefits the rest of my empire. I think I'm developing a small addiction to the great library though

Do any of you have useful techniques for slowing the AI tech pace down at demigod level? Particularly for arch maps where the AI is so hopeless at fighting wars with eachother.

 

[superslug]

Do any of you have useful techniques for slowing the AI tech pace down at demigod level?

I've found genocide useful from time to time.

 

[Marsden]

The archepelago itself does slow down research, but after astronomy gets around it isn't too much of a barrier. But I never got the hang of slowing the AI research either. I've seen other people mention selling to them for high gold per turn deals limiting their money for research, but I haven't been able to pull it off. Give it a try.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

on demigod, the AI can actually help you - while you focus on getting the good wonders, the AI can research the rest of the techs, which can get you to the IA (and rails, factories, etc) faster

the key is to manage the tech pace -only research things that the AI won't, don't let techs that have important wonders go until the wonder is built, etc.

Important wonders include shakespeares, collosus, all the Copernicus, newtons, GLib, Bach's, Sistine. SoZ is important, but you can't always get it. Oracle is nice, as is Hanging Gardens.

basically, any wonder where it costs less than 100 shield per culture point is one that you should be unhappy to lose. SoZ is an exception, because you can't control having ivory and Oracle is an exception, cause you can't always control getting it.

if you must slow down the tech pace:

Build the lighthouse.
Send out dromons and bombard any galley you see - the AI will retreat to it's shores and not come out until magnetism.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

the slug is correct, though - the best way to slow down the tech pace is to kill the AI. This has another advantage - it gives you MGL's, which can be used to rush small wonders, like Heroic Epic or the forbidden palace