Playing with unpopular civs

[zerksees]

Yes, but I was not aware of the global conflict. I figured if all were against one, then whack the one and the others could get on to doing science for you. 8 AI at peace could do better than 9 AI at war - at least from the armchair I am watching from.

 

[Tone]

Yes. Sorry, I got a bit lazy with my report. Still thinking of how it could have been a bit better I guess.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

even so, if you take one out, maybe the others will calm down.

I have noticed, though, that on higher levels, around the industrial age, the world goes nuts - has to do with the MPP's, I assume.

 

[zerksees]

Yes. Sorry, I got a bit lazy with my report. Still thinking of how it could have been a bit better I guess.

I have been known to mis-read things so I wondered if it was that. It seemed like the AI were dogpiling against one of their own.

Bottom line is I have no idea how to make them stop fighting each other and get back to the business of research. Maybe next time a few non-scientific low aggression level civs to "keep the peace"

 

[Tone]

Just trying to get a submission in before the update.

I lost the Korea saves when I had some problems with my computer. I needed some more large/huge map games and so I went with the Zulu for another fast research game.

Huge Monarch had a date of 1600AD so I went for that. The plan was to get out a number of scouts and combat the high research costs of the Huge map by trying to pop as many techs as possible. I had every scientific civ in the game except Russia (plus a few other civs) as I wanted to pop the huts but on reflection I wished that I had included them. After all, who cares who gets the techs as long as they are available-right?

It was a nice starting position. I moved my settler off the cow to give a coastal start. It ended up giving me a four turn settler-warrior factory which is always welcome in the early game. The rivers in the south-east helped early research and I had gems and spices nearby.

When I popped Writing, I chose the next research project to be Philosophy, hoping to pop CoL before it was completed. In the end I had to shut research off for a few turns until I finally got the luck I needed but that bad luck was countered by a two turn revolution.

By 1000BC I was just a few turns from getting Construction and I had met all the scientific civs.

I entered the MA in 900BC IIRC and managed to trade for all three first tier techs once I had gifted a number of scientific civs into the new age. I left Korea in the AA though as once all three techs were available, Republic was more than enough to buy them all.

I didn't play the next part too well though. I had used the EXP trait reasonably but I hadn't used the MIL trait to my advantage. I was trying not to hurt my scientific neighbours but research was so slow. They gave me Invention just before I finished Banking but I should have been building troops rather than libraries. In the end I took a small force south-west and declared on the French and a defending Impi soon kicked off my GA.

This improved my research a bit and also gave the cash to buy the first tier techs when I gifted the scientifics into the IA. Having not traded with Korea last time also helped as I had three government techs to trade with them for Nationalism. They still wanted more than this but it was a cheap trading round and I got all my cash back.

The Industrial Age was very quiet. The AI is normally useless in this period and so I let them research the optionals. They did provide me with Rep Parts though. I managed to save ToE until I entered Modern Times although the poor timing of my prebuild meant that I had to wait a turn once I entered the new age. I didn't get a good draw with the AI freebies this time; five of them got Ecology and no one got Rockets. I took Rockets when ToE was completed, traded for the other 1st tier techs and then took Miniaturisation as my second free tech. I was hoping that once I had gifted all of these to them, they would go for Space Flight but in the end they gave me nothing. Maybe I had taken too much cash from them?

The Babylonians decided to attack me near the end. I was quite happy with that as it gave me War Fever and enabled me to take their border uranium town without any problems.

Another game without an SGL and I paid the price for failing to conquer more lands. My research crawled towards a spaceship launch in 1390AD. Still, it beats the current number 1 in this catagory.

 

[Tone]

This game was an unintentional HOF submission. I've just been playing around with a few quick OCC games at lower levels but as I started playing this one, I thought that it might qualify so I started to take a few screenies. It happened to hit a table that I haven't got a game in and also was with a civ that I've not used in the HOF before. Nowhere near a #1 slot but that would be some OCC game if it did. Then again maybe someone could do it by targeting one of those empty tables.

Settings:
Demi-God. Tiny 'pelago (60&#37. No barbs.
Normal/Temperate/4BYO IIRC
No AI respawn. SGLs on.
Low AI aggression.
Rivals: 3. (America, Maya, Mongols)

I wanted to launch a spaceship but if you read on you'll find that I failed to meet that challenge.

The plan was to get a couple of curraghs out whilst researching Writing at minimum. I would use Masonry to get BW plus whatever else I could so that I could build the Colossus asap. Pyramids would serve as a good prebuild until I could trade on favourable terms. Alphabet would stay in my hands for as long as possible. For some reason the AI doesn't seem to want to research Alphabet with any great urgency but once they've got it, Writing never seems to take them that long.

Well the early game went OK although it was clear that the AI had met each other. As my pair of curraghs explored further, I fould that I was really playing a game with one major landmass with a couple of minor islands dotted about. So much for trying to set up a game where the AI had limited contacts during the expansion phase.

At the dawn of 2150BC I got my first wonder.

Spoiler colossus :

My next plan was to get a couple of vet mercs and then start on a prebuild for the GLib. I was playing on what was effectively a pangea map and so the tech pace in the middle ages was going to test me until I could get Shakespeare.

After Writing came in I went full speed ahead for the Republic ss and got a nice surprise on the way:

Spoiler CoL SGL :

This changed this a bit. I could now use the Pyramids build for MoM and use my SGL when I got around to researching Lit. Another wonder attempt did not work out so well though

Then came the less eventful stage. The GLib helped me keep up in the tech race. The AIs loved me bacause of the frequent trading and I loved them because they were willing to give me resources for very little cash in return. Small can be beautiful.

I blazed along the top trail heading for Free Art (well, perhaps blaze is the wrong word but anyway) whilst the AI did Feudalism, Engineering, etc. I was a bit stupid in researching Education before Printing Press as it meant that I didn't get quite as many free techs. However I got a second SGL for Education and so I used my Shakespeare's prebuild for Copers when the AI had researched Astronomy.

With my single metro really starting to pump out commerce at a fair rate I actually started to pull away from the AI, helped by the fact that they got sidetracked with the other optionals. My prebuild for Newton's became an very expensive bank when an AI cascade took out all remaining wonders when I was just a couple of turns from researching ToG. However I started my build again and still managed to snag my second science boosting wonder.

Spoiler city view in 760AD :

Once I had entered the IA, I was no longer worried about keeping up in the tech race as the AI gets sidtracked by the top row. However resources were not coming my way. I soon found out that each of the AIs had one source of coal each so I wasn't going to get rails unless there was a resource depletion or a war. In fact I never got rails and my sole resource was horses.

I used Hoover to kick off my GA, entered Modern Times well ahead of the AI. For some reason I built the UN to avoid a Diplo defeat but then realised that being the smallest civ on the planet my veto would stop any civ getting a majority.

Once I was ready to build Apollo, I gifted the AI into the space race and bought up the spare uranium and aluminium. Unfortunately the Mongols were starting to get a bit aggressive with the Americans and Mayans and I sometimes lost resources part way through the deals. More seriously though, my goal of launching my spaceship was under greater threat from my own culture!

I could have got rid of some of my culture builds to slow the arrival of 20K but it would have been too little too late. I still had three ss parts to build when I gained a 20K victory.

Spoiler victory :

As you may be able to see from the MapStat page, I probably wouldn't have succeeded with my ss anyway. The Mongols were starting to knock the Americans back. They were on the verge of Domination and also had above 60K culture and, with America on the verge of collapsing, close to getting more than double the culture of any other civ. In that situation I'll take the win, thank you very much.

 

[Elear]

Mongols tend to do really well or really crappy in games, I find. Never inbetween... well, usually