PW-01: Holy word

[pawelo]

@Stuge

I like your list It will surely make this game an interesting one till the end, knowing how Alex likes to expand and JC likes to back-stab friends

@TriviAl

Another one to crack. Is it my shadow look or unbeatable argument ?
Great to count you in anyway.

@both
With your vote, we have half of the roster voting Gandhi. I will start to rewrite the intro

As for the Pangea, for me it's rather a no-brainer as we should be able early on to know who's teching what - just to screen if someone is about to get one of the 3-4 late religions. This way, we can still tech some other stuff in-between, without fearing one foreign pagan bulbs us Theo or Philo in the face.

Regarding wonders, I think Oracle is a no-brainer. Stonehenge would be good too, but both will be difficult without masonry ( unless we start ON a stone-plain-hill-riverside ) and chopping.
Pyramids are nice, but will spoil our GP odds, so they should go to a side-city.

Standard size and normal is nice for me. As we are up for a nice speedy one, no need to do large/epic.

I would avoid goody huts for religion-from-a-goody issue, but if you agree on alternate, 11th, commandement saying : "Shall thou miss a belief, thou must conquer the holy city", it's ok for me to include goodies.

Anyway, I'll be rolling (and surely re-rolling) the start @4PM GMT today. I'll post it with the save asap and discuss it before playing the first 45 (if epic) / 30 (if normal) tomorrow morning. After we go a traditional 15 (@peace) / 10 (@war ) way.

 

[stuge]

I would avoid goody huts for religion-from-a-goody issue, but if you agree on alternate, 11th, commandement saying : "Shall thou miss a belief, thou must conquer the holy city", it's ok for me to include goodies.

Sounds good, although this would be more consistent with Asoka...

Sorry, sorry! I'll stop messing with your head now.

 

[TriviAl]

Hehe - it's just some harmless e-stalking.

Sounds like great settings there!

If we do lose a religion, we could make it heathen. Must wipe all traces of it from the earth - raze the holy city and any cities it infects... A suitably unpleasant penalty for us if we miss one?

Figure masonry will be quite a priority - we'll need it for Judeism? Which IMO we'll want to beeline for pretty promptly?

As for goodies, it's a random gamble - an early worker tech would be amazing for us? Happy either way...

 

[·Imhotep·]

@pawelo:

You can't pop religions from goody huts - only prereq techs like Mysticism.

Imhotep

 

[pawelo]

@-Imhotep-
Thanks for the info, I actually thought I had popped Meditation from a hut in my obscure game in the past.
If it's not the case, I think we can drop the "no goody huts" and prey for BW or Agr/AH/Pottery

@all
Anyway, I have read the great story by Kylearan and advise a read to the group (shouldn't you already have done it). Thanks to Atlas for the link:
http://www.compoundeye.net/civ/nonviolent/index.html

Though the no-military-at-all makes the game a little bit different, the fact is that he has managed six out of seven without a single military built.
Major work in terms of religion and diplomace - may give us some ideas

 

[pawelo]

Here goes my vote, as the deadline approaches. Meet my AI roster:

Alexander
Stalin
Shaka
Gilgamesh
Mao

Some explanations:

Alex and Stalin are a must for me. Both guarantee an entertaining game course and Stalin should make some wonders a little harder to get.

Shaka, sorry Pholkhero, is an early killer which will be quite a challange in the beginning.

I would like to drop JC anyway, tempted to face a culture pressure from a guy like Gilgamesh. We already have an early and a late warmonger in the roster, I see no need for a treatrous back-stabber coming with a praetorian SoD after his buddy in faith.

Mao for me is a nice choice. His cho-ku's might be annoying, and he tends to spread his empire widely (like Alex) . It might be a challange to face two land-grabbers like them.

Vote to be closed in 3h30 then rock&re-roll.

 

[r_rolo1]

No tech crazy dude? But I like your list ( in spite of IMHO Cathy the backstabber would be there better than Stalin )

P.S Are you really sure that you don't want to use a Egyptian leader? The obelisks would be very handy for the prophet generation......

 

[TriviAl]

I think that looks like a fun line up. All good to me!

Should we consider switching the agressive AI on, or is that going too far?


Excellent read as well - neatly highlights some of the issues we will face. It's the lack of early worker techs that really does hurt!

Looking at it, his plan was excellent: founding the Shrine for the 'true faith' early and the others after the AIs have converted. We don't want to muddy the diplomatic situation with the wrong religion spreading?

The capital growth at the start is a winner. Extra commerce to feed the early religion rush.

The tech path was great as well - although I'd be tempted to slip in a single worker tech after polytheism/meditation - agriculture or fishing would pay itself back really fast with the right resource?

 

[pawelo]

@r_rolo1:

Egypt doesn't start with Mysticism...
But I agree on usefulness of Obelisks. Still, with cheap temples and religion founding, we should be able to pump priests pretty fast for shrines and bulbing.

Also, I would grab Oracle at all price, and try to land Stonehenge also - just to be sure no one gets a priest in the early game.

Btw, who's list do you like ?

@TriviAl:

I think it would be wise to put a worker tech or two after Mono.
Personally, if the start as forest, I would go for BW for two GProphet wonders in capital.

Given Alex, Stalin and Mao or JC, I don't think we need aggressive AI

Btw, if you check the Decalogue:

Thou will spread thy initial religion to every known city in the world by any mean.

I think it goes in line pretty well with his buddhism spread.

 

[r_rolo1]

The list I was talking about was pawelo's one.....

One question: Most likely, we'll have a golden op to build the AP ( first to Theo, hopefully ). Any idea of how we're going to use it ( things can be quite nasty if we make the AP buddhist ) ? I'm specifically thinking on war vs the Heatens ( not covered by our rules: AP declaration, not ours )

 

[TriviAl]

Btw, if you check the Decalogue:

Thou will spread thy initial religion to every known city in the world by any mean.

I think it goes in line pretty well with his buddhism spread.

But also:

2 – Thou will build every single holy shrine for all thy beliefs.

We may want to delay acting on this until a little later... to avoid the 6 other religions spreading around before Buddhism can get a grip?

 

[pholkhero]

w/all you people being across the pond, i need to play catch up!

- Alexander for his epic "The Last Phalanx Standing"
- Augustus Caesar and his full-action "Rush Praetorians"
- Cyrus for "The Road To Immortality"
- Darius and his documentary "Rich Immortal Is Better Than A Dead One"
- Genghis Khan and the war essay "The Horde"
- Gilgamesh with his first comedy "Why Fear The Gods As I'm A God Myself"
- Hammurabi and an autobiographic movie "How a creative and religious has-been becomes an organized warmonger in 30 steps"
- Hannibal in his major achievement "Mercenaries Rule The World Better Than The Elephants"
- Julius Caesar in "Since I Was Back-Stabbed, I Do The Same Myself"
- Mao Zedong for a short film "Pagan Powerhouse"
- Pericles and a philosophical essay on "Why Art Is Better Than Religion?"
- Ragnar, well no need to present his work, "The Berserker" is top in the Box Office
- Shaka for a drama entitled "Early Dying Neighbors"
- Sitting Bull and his family movie "Little Totem In The Prairie"
- Stalin and a propaganda work "Comrade God Works For Me"

too funny! I particularly enjoyed "Early Dying Neighbors" ~ i've read it multiple times already

if you manage the latter a little bit, in a few years you will be able to lurk forums from your work as 100% of working civfanatics do

how else did i get my post-count so high??

In terms of layout, I think this would be most fun with some early friends to play with? Pangea might be a bit too vicious, perhaps snaky continent archipelago or one of the oddball maps? Or just see what the RNG produces.

might be good to play something like Lakes or one of those other land-based maps ~ though, if so, we should cut the size down to small since there's so much land in them.

@-Imhotep-
Thanks for the info, I actually thought I had popped Meditation from a hut in my obscure game in the past.
[snip]
Anyway, I have read the great story by Kylearan and advise a read to the group (shouldn't you already have done it). Thanks to Atlas for the link:
http://www.compoundeye.net/civ/nonviolent/index.html

I think, though may've popped Meditiation, Buddhism was probably already founded at that point. You can pop religious techs, just not be the first to get the tech w/them. Also, i just reread that game the other day ~ great game, but as Kylearan pointed out, things have come a long way in Civ since then. It'll be tough to do it, i think. Prince, to me, is the upward limit for the game.

Should we consider switching the agressive AI on, or is that going too far?

Excellent read as well - neatly highlights some of the issues we will face. It's the lack of early worker techs that really does hurt!

too far! in the early going, if we concentrate on the religious techs, we should go with warriors and settlers until we can get some worker techs researched. If our worker can only improve one resource, i'm not sure it would be worth risking missing the early religions for it.

I'm specifically thinking on war vs the Heatens ( not covered by our rules: AP declaration, not ours )

oh, that's not in the spirit of the rules, though of course, there are heathens . . .

i'm fine with any leaders (even Shaka), and like the normal setting for speed.

i think that's everything! now, when it's night here, i'm going to have to post 4 or 5 times just so that you all wake up and have to reply to them all at once.

 

[pawelo]

@r_rolo1:

As they probably won't be any Heathens, we won't have to vote it
Anyway, should it arise, we can group vote or have the Light show us the way.

@TriviAl:

Decalogue (C) precises that we must have shrines in all holy cities, not when. You're right that it surely will be worth a try to let the non-Buddhist beliefs aside. Also we need 2 GProphets earlier to bulb Theo and DR.

@Pholkhero

Sorry for the Zulu - it was just too tempting
Btw, I'm ok with any one-land map. We just have to focus (i.e. get Alpha rather early - straight after CoL methinks ) on what the AI has and set our research accordingly in order to get all the seven.
I have never rolled a Lakes map before - I think I will run several in worldbuilder before rolling our start in two hours from now (have to do my weekly shopping first ).

@all

Thanks for votes guys.
If everyone agrees on my list, I'll start it shortly. We can still go for an additional AI (JC for instance - as he seemed to have your sympathy) as there is plenty of land in normal size low level pangea (or Lakes, I assume).

 

[r_rolo1]

@ pawelo

Our rules say that we have to convert every civ until the end of the game, but does not give precisions about who we convert, when we convert or who is alive in the end ( If you didn't notice yet, I love to be the lawyer ). We can convert on propose a civ to other religion just to destroy it.... The Light-given rules on stone does not say that we need to keep the initial religion all the time ( strongly suggests it , but does not state it explicitely ), a thing that can lead to some nasty spy tricks ( change religion, spy force civ to change religion, resume original religion, get AP vote on war against the heatens, destroy and enjoy... ) or even gift/mass send non-buddhist missionaries to other civ to tilt them to the evil side ( that does not requires changing religion or spy moves ). We can acheive our goal of converting everyone to our religion by killing all the heatens......

Other issue: the city rule of only keeping 1/3 of cities.... Can we make a colony with the rest? If we kill a neighbour, this law still applies ( it would be extremely stupid if it does: to who we gift the cities ? ) ? Does that count with razed cities ( keep the good cities, burn the rest and return nothing ) ?

Another thing: What is a "peaceful win" ? Dom and Conquest can be peaceful ( hardly, but they can: conquest can be won by the vassalization of all ( not necessarily by war) and dom can be acheived by spaming settlers )..... Needs clarification

Sorry for this long list of lawsuit things, but you know, rules written in stone normally leave huge grey areas

 

[pholkhero]

Also we need 2 GProphets earlier to bulb Theo and DR.

you actually need 2 prophets to bulb DR completely. course, we could research the rest.

but you know, rules written in stone normally leave huge grey areas

just ask the People of the Book(s)

 

[Zargon]

Ghandi will definitely be a stronger leader with the number of prophets we need to churn out. I think that will give us a bit more leeway when it comes to how strong our start needs to be.

 

[pawelo]

@r_rolo1

Rules given by the Light surely leave us with many open doors, though:

- thou shall remain peaceful supposes a peaceful game - no nasty wars, if AI wants peace - settle to it

- btw, there is NO EVIL RELIGION because we are founders of all of them

- only culture, space, religious and diplomacy are allowed - it's in victory types, sorry

As long as the game spirit remains (peaceful & religious), we can exploit grey areas - the Light won't mind

 

[pawelo]

"Wake up and rise messenger, enough resting under thy palmtree" shouted the Light again, blinding everyone around.

Well, it would have blinded everyone around, but our Asoka prefered to isolate himself and get his thoughts back in the right place. After this striking pain from the last Light's visit (and the earlier mixture, but Asoka was not keen on admiting it to himself), he was struggling to get well. It almost passed, when the horrible voice shouted at him again.

"Thou, Asoka, art not wise enough yet to rule thy peaceful and spiritual people"

Cool, though Asoka, hoping that the Light will definitely go away, leaving him for his farniente under the palmtree.

"Still, thy folk need the leader and thou happen to be a royal descendant of thy wise father. Therefore, thou shall rule thy tribe to the great glory I foresee to thy people."

"You said I wasn't wise enough" tried Asoka painfully, rubbing his forehead. "How can I rule them?"

"Thou shall be enlighten!" shouted the Light.

Holy sh, started to think Asoka, when a striking pain travelled all over his body, stretching every single muscle, making him feel like if his life was suddenly accelerating at an incredible rate.

He tried to look better at what was happening, but couldn't beacuse of the blinding powerful LIGHT. He started to feel dizzy, more fragile but his brain was exploding with wisdom his head was still trying to assimilate.

After an eternity, at least that's how Asoka felt about it, he felt on the sand and started to feel better. The pain was gone, but he was feeling weird, like if something changed. Seeing nothing ( the Light was still there ), he spoke:

"What happened to me?"

"Thou shall raise and stand to this holy mission, O Mahatma the Wise!" the Light groaned.

"What ? But I'm Asoka, the unwise guy you mentionned earlier. I don't know who this Mahatma is... I know Mahatabi, the hunter, and Makthani, the nice young shaman's daughter, whom I like to.... But, wait, it's not the point. Why did you call me Mahatma ?"

"Thou art not Asoka any more, thy wisdom is immense, and thou shall inspire thy folk to achieve greatness for ages to come. Remember thy mission, and spread my word" the Light said, and suddenly everything appeared as if nothing happened.

Asoka, or Mahatma, got up to his feet struggling a little bit. His body seemed to have aged at least 40 years. His legs ached a little, but he managed to get to the river shore, just to see his sight.

What he saw made him feel even more dizzy, shaking from every member and fell unconscious.

When he awake, a new era began.


--------------------------------------------------

After some re-rolling (16 to be precise - someone got the right number ?) I managed to get a start.

But first, our settings:



First AI being Alex of course.

I settled ( enlightened by pholk and the Light ) to add an extra civ to my list, beacause we play a standard size Lakes map.

Our As..., hmm, Mahatma buddy:



And, what everybody is waiting for, the start:



This was the best try of all, and the second to give us an oasis in BFC. I think it's nice, given the floodplains seem to continue in the hidden part of the cross.

So, any thoughts about where to settle, where to move the warrior etc?

I'll play my 30 turns later - in 2 hours - or tomorrow morning, just to let everyone give input on the start.

I think if the neighborhood sucks, we can still re-roll another one.
Paticular game, particular start needed

Save included.

 

[Jamesds]

I'll certainly be lurking on this one - nice to see you doing an SG pawelo, it's excellent! Great storyline, interesting (but I think possible) goals. The starting position above looks very good. I can't wait to see this take off - all the best!

 

[pawelo]

@jamesds

Too bad you came several hours too late... I look forward to another SG with you anyway. Mind if I put you on a reserve list ?
I hope you'll (and we'll ) enjoy it!