[BTS] Prepare to DIE! #2

[Gwaja]

No.... not really.

It is nowhere near the atrociousness and brutality of the first one. Not even close. But this has its own charms, I assure you.

Please DO NOT open the following spoilers UNLESS you have no interest in a blind playthrough. The spoiler contains the general setup of the map and what to expect. It simply gives away too much information for a blind playthrough. You have been warned!

Spoiler :

First, you are Frederick. Your uniques come really late in the game, so they are completely a non factor at the beginning. Your starting techs are hunting and mining, which, in most situation, isn't considered that great of a combo. Your traits do not give you any militaristic advantages, and they are more of mid-game traits rather than early traits.

You are semi-isolated with... well you will find out very soon. He will have access to that one resource that leads to one of the highly rated military unit in the game. His immediate surroundings are surely better than yours. He is imperialistic, so he will expand much faster. He is an aggressive warmonger. Being semi-isolated with such AI means tech trading situation is not optimal and you will sooner or later have to think war, offensive OR defensive.

Meanwhile, you are only stuck with ONE strategic resource nearby, and you are literally far away from metal. You do have space to expand peacefully, in the direction away from your neighbor, but the land will not be kind. You will have time to expand though, and expansion may be necessary if only to ensure that you are not cut off from strategic resources that will grant you access to better military units.

One extra AI has been added to this map. In one way or another, they will be capable of reaching and being aware of the others amongst that group that do not start on your continent. Having played this map and having the foreknowledge of the map, it may be said that 2 of the AI may have been given too much land to expand peacefully. This factor was not doctored. One of the AI really got screwed with bad start.... unusually bad for a map generation that I had nothing to do with.

One of my personal major weakness in my Civ 4 games is semi isolation where my neighbor has better land and is quick to push towards me, while having aggressive tendencies towards the human player. This map served me quite well, so I am sure it will be the same for many who attempt this map.

I apologize in advance that, in order to open this save, BAT mod is required. It is a great mod imo though, and I recommend that everyone install this "as a mod" so it can be loaded or unloaded at will. If enough requests are made to convert into a WB save, either I or anyone else who may be more capable, can upload that for convenience, I suppose.

Difficulty: Deity
AI: 7, instead of the normal 6
Map Type: Continents
Map Size: Normal
Speed: Normal
Chosen Leader: Random --> Frederick

The Start: At least the capital site is quite good. It will be a great capital. But that is all the positive I can say about the surrounding areas.

 

[BornInCantaloup]

I apologize in advance that, in order to open this save, BAT mod is required.

Thank you for the kind reminder. I will try to sort that out tomorrow.
Isn't that the mod with the funny graphics ? It's all good.

Continents, Freddy, Soundjata may be better at this than I.
Shakabrade has deemed Iso to be unlosable, I expect this to be semi or else.

 

[jnebbe]

Is there an immortal save? Loved reading the first thread and I'd love to give it a try

 

[Gwaja]

Thank you for the kind reminder. I will try to sort that out tomorrow.
Isn't that the mod with the funny graphics ? It's all good.

Continents, Freddy, Soundjata may be better at this than I.
Shakabrade has deemed Iso to be unlosable, I expect this to be semi or else.

I am not sure if there is a way to clean out the BAT mod in an existing save, but I don't know of such a way. Since I play with BAT mod all the time, all I had was the initial starting save that was generated with the BAT mod already active. I apologize for the inconvenience though, because I know many people don't use it. I personally like the funny graphics and the civilization-specific units and national flags.

As for isolation being unlosable.... It doesn't apply to me just yet. However, what is worse than iso, imo, is semi-isolation.

Is there an immortal save? Loved reading the first thread and I'd love to give it a try

I apologize that I cannot make the BAT mod requirement go away without screwing up civ colors and flags, so I kept it as is. However, all AI starting units and techs should be adjusted properly, as well as barbarian starting techs as well, for Immortal. I actually needed this myself as well, seeing as Deity isn't always fun.

 

[soundjata]

Sorry I ain't got too many things working on my comp except Vanilla BTS.
Would appreciate a WB save

 

[Gwaja]

Sorry I ain't got too many things working on my comp except Vanilla BTS.
Would appreciate a WB save

@soundjata and @BornInCantaloup

Since the initial game save was made while running the game with BAT mod on, the national flags and civ colors will come out all funky without the BAT mod running. I don't know how to fix that, but at least the game should work without the mod installed. The files are for both Immortal and Deity, with appropriate techs and starting units for the AI. You will have to manually adjust the barbarian techs yourself though.

 

[Gwaja]

For those interested in the starting position screenie:

Spoiler :

 

[soundjata]

This starts screams @obsolete tactics

 

[krikav]

Good opportunity to try out bat. I do that all too seldom.
Map is nice, I give my seal of approval!

 

[krikav]

Spoiler T70 :

Went south on the hill with the scout, saw Rice and decided to go for the stone. Speeded westward and met Julius soon. Plan at this point was to go early settler and try to found a blocking city.

I founded a half-baked idea of utilizing the early stone to perhaps finish SH to get a Phi-prophet early and bulb a religion to buddy up with Julius which I seem to be in semi-isolation with.
Julius was fast with his settler and took a spot... He settled where my warrior stands, effectively destroying my chance for a good blocking city. The hill SW of the incence would have been awesome, likely making Julius attack over the river later on.
So I went east to the oasis instead, and there was gold there!!

Decided against SH, need the failgold to tech. The game is so kind and give me some 1F2H tiles so I make a run for TGW instead.

TW to connect cities and gold.

Julius reached writing and opened borders with me this turn, the next turn he declares...

Sacrificed a warrior here to make sure he attacks the city and doesn't enter my territory and wrecks havoc.

He still refused to attack, so now I have to block this forest with an archer. That made him attack, afterwards a lingering archer who won his fight against a warrior, and the axe which was late to the party danced around a bit. The axe then died and I wounded the archer with a warrior and finished it off with an archer.

Second wave, involving prets went OK. Third wave likewise and by then he was willing to talk, and I had a settler ready.

There is a slim chance I can get Pyramids... Also urgent is to rush down a settler south to block off some land...
Then I need some settlers as tribute for my violent neighbour.

 

[Gwaja]

This starts screams @obsolete tactics

I was a big fan of his back in the day and enjoyed reading his writeups. I am sure that he would do something really funky with this start and I am curious how he could have played this out.

@krikav

BAT mod graphics is fun. I can't play Civ 4 without it personally.

Spoiler :

So you went for the stone settle. I am sure that if the initial scout were moved east and revealed that gold, the option to settle on marble may also have been entertained. Both are on plains hill, and they both have fresh water and at least one source of food. The stone site has more desert tiles in the BFC, but with the foreknowledge of the map, it is closer to JC.

JC is a bad neighbor to have in a semi iso map. Getting him to friendly may not be all that impossible though? Maybe? Pleased is useless since he can still declare. I reckon a shared religion, like you planned, plus a gifted city, open borders, resource trade gifts, (maybe even saying yes to tech demands) and running Representation may help but I didn't get to test that myself. May be too situational or luck dependent. Settling on the stone means making early Pyramids possible for Representation, plus The Great Wall especially since barbarians, at least in my game, were a big problem.

That blocking site.... I gave up on that. He settles that spot so quick it is frustrating. I later found out why he was quick to settle there when he had plenty of other sites.

But my hunch is that in most games, we won't even get a chance to get JC to friendly before he declares on us. Worker stealing and choking him out of metal and horses may work, but I personally almost never worker steal so....

In my game, JC declared on me TWICE before I did the same to him. Later on, I realized that it is either getting him completely eliminated ASAP or making him friendly ASAP, or the game gete more difficult from there.

 

[krikav]

@Gwaja

Spoiler :

Getting Julius to pleased is not at all useless, the chances that he will start to plot is reduced dramatically if you get up to pleased!
Also, if you get pleased, you can try to beg for fish, or for part of a tech or something, getting 10 turns guaranteed peace.

Hmm, yeah depending on how starting scout moves, I think either stone or marble will be the most enticing choice, if you see rice you want to go for stone, if you see gold you want to go for marble. Either option has it's advantages!
Some oracle play might be possible with marble+gold!

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Question(s) to @krikav

Spoiler :

Why did you choose to settle on the stone instead of the marble? I understand that, on deity and possibly immortal, to get the Stonehenge and The Great Wall, either we have to settle on the stone, or that it is connected to the capital without roads. But how often do we want those wonders? In contrast, The Oracle would be nice to have in most games.

Oracle for Confucianism, or even lightbulb for Taoism, would have been useful to get him to friendly.

 

[krikav]

@sylvanllewelyn
Answer to how I reasoned T0 (Only T0 spoilers!)

Spoiler :

Starting screenshot.
Here I see two possible candiates for settlement, either on stone or on marble.
Marble is with available information abit better (Oasis), so thats candidate #1 and my working hypothesis.
I then look for information to disprove my decision so I move the scout south.

And with that information, irrigated rice wins over oasis by a wide margin, so stone is the better choice.
Looking at it now, I did a error to now move the scout S to the hill 1E of the oasis instead. Would reveal all the same tiles and also the tile 2S of oasis.

 

[soundjata]

T0

Spoiler :

I sipped

Spoiler :

just to check krikav reasonning

 

[soundjata]

T61

Spoiler :

Suicidal strat : Let's pretend Julius is just a lovely neighbour

This turn we land Pyramids and lay a road to Julius.

We prioritized a couple of archers (before and after Hamburg settler) and we could deal with the waves of barbs with ease...

Spoiler :

I mean with reloads

We improved Corn > Marble > Stone (road) > Rice
then 4 chops + 4 mines.
I wish we were Bizmark

Now maybe I could roll a 80% dice for the next 50 turns and attack Julius by surprise

 

[soundjata]

@Gwaja

Spoiler :

Getting Julius to pleased is not at all useless, the chances that he will start to plot is reduced dramatically if you get up to pleased!

Spoiler :

Reduces the chances for plotting ?
I dismissed the option of an early city gift thinking otherwise
Will do now.

T75

Spoiler :

Liberation is a good city for Julius. He's got 9 cities and Hanging Gardens , partially thanks to my stone gift

Next turn I'll have 2 libraries
I am in Julius favorite civic (but he ain't lol)


MOM next?

 

[BornInCantaloup]

BAT mod already active. I apologize for the inconvenience

It's all good. I downloaded the mod. I'll take some time to install it next week.
I'll be out of town for a few days, so I'm saving this map for later.

This starts screams @obsolete tactics

Yes, there are a number of things that can be done, here.

Spoiler :

On T0, I'm willing to consider :
- archers to choke a neighbour (nice way to risk an early loss) ;
- Stonehenge ; with PHI + high commerce, there are some dirty tricks to be done with a GP bulb (bulb Monarchy, Oracle Feudalism, for one) ;
- GLH ; if this is coast 2S ;
- Any amount of other wonders, starting with the Pyramids but also looking at you, Temple of Artemis. Stonehenge, ToA, Pyramids is the dream opening to any OCC game ;
- an early Library if we can get in the 10H/t in Berlin (plains cows would be great).
- just standard play, setting up early granaries.

As with any forest spam / high production start (which we have) and especially if commerce is limited (which may be the case),
Then managing the expansion rate vs tech pace is a stake. In the absence of luxury resources, there are probably ways, here, to crash the economy before Pottery/Writing. The absence of riverside is conspicuous (free commerce, free traderoutes).

Archers, wonders, settlers... There's quite a tension between all of those. Thankfully, we have a scout to acquire early info.
This start looks more like The FUNK to me than Prepare to DIE. Clicking turns is made to find that out.

 

[krikav]

A chart for plotting etc:

Spoiler :

I don't know exacly how "NoWarProbs" work, but I think it's a check that happends after a likely plotting-start.
The AIs who doesn't plot at pleased have 100% NoWarProbs at pleased so that doesn't happen at all.
But look at the difference on for example Alexander who has 20% at Cautious but 80% at pleased.
He DOES plot at pleased, but the odds reduce significantly.

Julius here has 50% at cautious and 90% at pleased. So he is kind of unlikely to start plotting at all compared to the warmongerers, and if he is at pleased he is as nice as Mansa Musa at pleased.

Special mention... note that notorious backstabber Cathy is 100% at friendly. She will never her self start plotting at friendly. It's possible that some other AI will bribe her against you though!

 

[soundjata]

T116

Spoiler :

Surprisingly I haven't popped any resource on the mines.
Too bad, they are being turned into windmills now.

JC just got his 16th city (juicy barb city) while I've just got my 4th

GP#1 was an engineer, which was kept till this turn
GP#2 and #3 were scientists, used for Machinery & Engineering bulbs.

JC is a moron and we haven't traded anything. (except for a city gift that he still values at +4 attitude )
Couldn't get him to friendly because he pressured our borders
I'm starting to build an army

Notre Dame OP