Replay #8 4 µ m8s <3

[sinimusta]

Actually mediaevil is spelled correctly. It is British English. It is used often in the novel The Doomsday Book, a science fiction time travel story to the mediaevil era around the time of the black death in a small village not far from Oxford University; highly recommended for science fiction fans also interested in that era and how the peasants there lived in the time of the black death, often attributed to grave sins of those afflicted.

Sun Tzu Wu

In that case sorry for my ignorance. English isn't my native language. Might check that book, history and scifi both interest me.

 

[Seraiel]

Nice to see an update for this game. I'd like to see more of "the Heroes in action"- story, that was really funny.

Thx... I already thought that the heroes came a little bit too short in the past updates, but someone said I shouldn't write so much about them but only bring them in for humor in certain situations... At least there was a text-part about Jester Fool but I'll try to implement the hero story in the screenshots again...

 

[AutomatedTeller]

Actually mediaevil is spelled correctly. It is British English. It is used often in the novel The Doomsday Book, a science fiction time travel story to the mediaevil era around the time of the black death in a small village not far from Oxford University; highly recommended for science fiction fans also interested in that era and how the peasants there lived in the time of the black death, often attributed to grave sins of those afflicted.

Sun Tzu Wu

That is a fine book - everything she writes is excellent.

Seraiel - this is a great writeup. I may have to find all your other write ups

 

[Jwitti]

In that case sorry for my ignorance. English isn't my native language. Might check that book, history and scifi both interest me.

English isn't my native language either, I'm American ^_^

Keep up the great work on the writeup!

 

[totteswede]

I'm happy to see this write-up got another chapter as I have been waiting anxiously for it !

I never really abused the drafting mechanic like you display here, but the power of it is obscene and makes me wanna roll a new map asap
Kinda funny that you have about 20 happiness available and Coventry is still unhappy at pop 5 !

Looking forward to the next chapter, keep up the good work !

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Hehe, just got into reading these myself. I might have 20k posts but I can still learn a thing or two . Too bad I'll never learn the patience to match such spectacular micro, but there are some interesting tidbits otherwise.

The read itself was very fun though. Looking forward to the conclusion, even if you sac me more. Watch me turn into an ironclad (even though you never made cannons) or some other such nonsense .

 

[Roswinon]

Hi,

Actually mediaevil is spelled correctly.

Now I'm confused, did you focus on the media part of the word and ignored the evil in it? My dictionary says it is medieval and british mediaeval.

Non native speaker as well.

Back to topic: epic write-up so far

R

 

[Seraiel]

I'm happy to see this write-up got another chapter as I have been waiting anxiously for it !

I never really abused the drafting mechanic like you display here, but the power of it is obscene and makes me wanna roll a new map asap
Kinda funny that you have about 20 happiness available and Coventry is still unhappy at pop 5 !

Looking forward to the next chapter, keep up the good work !

Thx, and astonishingly good observation, I had to search again myself to spot where it could be seen that one city was . I actually really "abused" the drafting mechanic as much as possible, meaning I accepted a temporary citizen in a specified city for a few turns if I knew that that city wouldn't miss out on any too important tiles to push the wars as hard as possible.

Don't forget, the end of the round is in somewhat like 40T and you've seen the development of the military- or power-graph and what the cities are building. You can all prepare for some furious endgame that's gonna show some really very extremely good coordination, that's gonna be funny again and that'll also feature some cunning and ferocious attacks.

Hehe, just got into reading these myself. I might have 20k posts but I can still learn a thing or two . Too bad I'll never learn the patience to match such spectacular micro, but there are some interesting tidbits otherwise.

The read itself was very fun though. Looking forward to the conclusion, even if you sac me more. Watch me turn into an ironclad (even though you never made cannons) or some other such nonsense .

Hihi .

I already had a slightly bad conscience for the way I made you appear in the writeup . Good to see that you don't have a problem with it.

Regarding micro: Micro is really not that difficult, it just costs a lot time and the benefits cannot be seen immediately or directly and that's what makes it so hard. Fighting for a few or making a city grow just 1T earlier seems like it brings nothing in the situation at which one does that, but doing it multiple thousand times in a round of these dimensions is really helpful in getting an awesome victory date, like I think I have achieved, because what imo must not be forgotten, is, that this game was without any real workerstealing, and stealing Workers is a tactic that's a lot more game-changing or powerful than doing micro.

Of course, both is even more awesome. I've currently finished the turnset I had to play for SGOTM and have continued on my "normal round" which is a Marathon Spacerace with a non-Incan Civ, and I'm at 17 cities 1300 BC and stole almost 20 Workers. It's still hard to believe for me that something like that would be / is even possible, but playing the current SGOTM with Kakumeika, which btw. is also a very interesting read, did change a lot with me again.

Hi,



Now I'm confused, did you focus on the media part of the word and ignored the evil in it? My dictionary says it is medieval and british mediaeval.

Non native speaker as well.

Back to topic: epic write-up so far

R

Thx .

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Now I'm confused, did you focus on the media part of the word and ignored the evil in it? My dictionary says it is medieval and british mediaeval.

You are right!

My apologies to sinimusta for my stating that mediaevil is british for medieval. It is not. It is the result of my poor memory; The Doomsday Book spells mediaeval correctly. It looks like the words media and eval concatenated together, but I remembered it as media and evil, probably due to a notable number of evil appearing characters in that book.

My apologies to Seraiel for polluting his thread of epic war mastery with my pathetic inability to spell medieval/mediaeval in my native language. My feeble defense is I'm not British.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Brilliant read Seraiel, hope you will find the time to finish this write-up!

 

[Seraiel]

Hi again

The SGOTM is over and I'm currently recovering from the traumatic stress that it caused .

No, seriously: SGOTM 18 was an amazing and horrible experience together. It was one of the most interesting games I ever played and I learned some really amazing things.

First, I learned that "I really am truely good at this game already" , but what I always suffer from are my "stupid rules" , like "I will only work improved extremely good tiles" , or "I don't build Farms" or "For a whip, a city must always be just before Growth, otherwise I'm wasting Food" .

SGOTM helped me overcome all of those rules. I learned that working unimproved tiles for a longer time in the beginning is absolutely ok, if one i. e. intends to steal a lot of Workers. I also learned that Farms are actually really good in games that don't go far. I experienced again how "the way is really important" , like, you build a Farm, because you now need Growth. You then build a Cottage, because you want that city to focus on Commerce. Some Cottages and Mines later, Windmills and Workshops have become powerful, so you continue building those. In the end, the city has 2 Farms, 4 Cottages and 5 Workshops. It got a University because it was an early city that could build one, and it doesn't matter that it has so little Commerce, what matters is that it helped unlock Oxford in the Capital giving 1xx .
I also learned a lot about good decisions again, and I was amazed to see some of the strategies which I used in my Marathon-Sushi-games to also work on normal Speed. Check that game out if you want, SGOTM really is "the superior source of learning about CIV" .

Let's now get back to the superior illustrated source of learning about CIV and having fun!

1010 AD: The heroes chewing themselves through the last remaining cities of De Gaulle:



1020 AD (1T later) , De Gaulle's last city is surrounded:



And it falls! (1030 AD)



De Gaulle dead!

American front also looking good:



AIs just not being able to stop the way stronger Rifles and Cavs.

Only thing AI can do is annoy me with settling in the new world:



And of course that's not all:



For those interested / following btw.: Still remember Kaitzilla saying that my screens had a very good quality, that was beyond what's normal for him? I just found out, that the quality of screens from CIV is higher, when pasting the screen directly into MS Paint. CIV screenshot utility seems to cause fog itself.

Pushing forward as hard as possible:



Against 2 cities!



Endless Carnage:



Wait, Methos died?



Just 3 more turns...

1080 AD: Trades like I like them:



And at last, something interesting again: Economy without Communism:



And with big changes due to State Property and different tile micro: (1030 AD)



Enjoy discussing, and don't forget to ask a question if you have one.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

I liked your comments about SGOTM-18. It is a great source of information about playing BtS. However, there are players usually in the three top finishing teams (in every SGOTM - not just this one) that overstate their analysis and (likely) come to incorrect conclusions. Just because a team won or nearly won a SGTOM, doesn't by itself validate their analysis techniques. My point is always independently verify anything you find in SGOTM team threads. There is a treasure trove of good stratagies, tactics anx logistics, and the vast majority are correct, but not 100%. For example, different teams sometimes come to incompatible conclusions. For example, State Property is not always better than corporations or visa versa; such things are often dependent on the actual game situation.

Seraiel, keep up your great game commentaries! The strategy tips are priceless and your humor is very entertaining.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[Ben Lehman]

Hey Seraiel I heard you were retiring from Civ so I thought I'd post and tell you how much I've enjoyed all your write-ups. I'm not (and probably won't ever be) a Deity or HOF player but I've learned a ton from your stuff and it pretty much took me from Monarch to Immortal.

Best of luck on whatever your next project is.

yrs--
--Ben

 

[Seraiel]

Thx for that post, Ben.

Regarding you not beating Deity, you might add a "yet" to that .

I plan to finish this Writeup at sometime, but more importantly, Replay #9 is going online part after part on Youtube, and with it, I had the plan to leave some sort of legacy from me towards the CIV players, by enabling them to beat Civilization 4 on Deity.

Let's see, how far I will come with that aim .

Link to Youtube-channel.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I'm not (and probably won't ever be) a Deity or HOF player but I've learned a ton from your stuff and it pretty much took me from Monarch to Immortal.

If you can play Immortal you can play HoF - you could even try for Elite Quattromaster at that level - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=260592

 

[The Diocletian]

Retiring? Why, if I maybe ask?

In any case, I love reading your writeups, and I'm always impressed by how much micromanagement you put into your games, something I can only dream of.

 

[Seraiel]

Time to tell that I've not forgotten what I started, and that things will continue getting better. You'll see:


The chinese now got Communism, which gives them a decisive advantage in production. The now lower maintenance of the cities doesn't play a big role, what matters is, that endless streems of units reach the southern, american front, aswell as the eastern front where the evilish Mayans must be stopped before gaining even more power.

The chinese have become tremendously strong through keeping their cities small, and using the whip as harsh as possible. The new method of drafting Rifles is so cheap, that their numbers are rising and rising:





100 Cavarlies and Rifles are impressive, but 500 killed enemies at the expense of less than 100 troops is even more so!

Both fronts are advancing fast:





And even top-defenders are no match for the CR3-promoted Rifle-heroes:



Though that doesn't mean, that there are no challenges, look at the defenders of this city for example:



Or this list, showing the battles of 1140 AD:



"To victory" they shout everywhere, conquering multiple cities / turn...



... with courage so great, that they even attack cities having more defenders than attackers, leaving some very frightened defenders for the next round, where they strike again:









A group of cavalries stinged deep into the Mayan empire in order to take the GLH + the Mahabodi from the Mayans, this means that the Mayans are not able to put up any real form of resistence anymore!





This is all to get you a feel for the speed of the war. Next screen shows the Mayan's empire only 1T later!



All screens you saw from the beginning of this update to now are in 50y of inGame time! (5 turns)

And the tactic that the chinese follow is ultimately simple:

City size 6 -> Draft
City smaller -> either whip, or let grow to size 6!

But what even the chinese cannot do anything against, is, the continously rising war weariness that comes from being in war with 2 empires:







Size 6-7 cities being almost unhappy is at the edge, but what's interesting is, that the Chinese are sneaky! They are aware of that Roosevelt and Pacal have no Astro, and therefor cannot settle oversea's, so they're sewing for peace to fasten up their Conquest...





... and directly switch towards the next target(s) again only 1T later!



We said 100 Cavalries / Rifles in the beginning of the Post? Be amazed, this is 8T after the beginning!





1.5 times the military of before, and only a good of 6h of playtime passed .

And on top: Airships are also available now!



But the really awesome thing, is still just happening: Take a look at this:



So Washington's troops have gathered and are walking through the chinese empire, but what is Methos doing there with all those Cavs? What's his plan there, he won't ... No... Will he... ?

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

[to be continued]

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Thanks for another great chapter of this story. Thanks for the wonderful cliff hanger at the end!

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[Seraiel]

Retiring? Why, if I maybe ask?

In any case, I love reading your writeups, and I'm always impressed by how much micromanagement you put into your games, something I can only dream of.

TESO (The Elders Scrolls Online) is coming out in April, and I got plans on ruling that game with a Group of old friends that I met during my 10y of MMO-gaming. I have the chance to play a healer, and I have the chance to spend time again with my girlfriend, she and me are seperated by a distance of 500 km.
Playing MMOs is also a very good way imo to release some stress. CIV sometimes can really lead one to the edge of sanity, with all those blind-calls one has to make during the game. MMOs have no RNG so training brings the victory. The people I play with all have 10y of MMO-gaming like me too, the chances that we'll lose any fights almost seems like unimaginable to me.
But even if there would be a really good other group, we'd still have lots of fun, because MMOs got that really awesome atmosphere, when one runs through a large world in where ones own decisions influence the ones of others, it's basically like RL, only so much better, except for the small part, that it's of course not real, which gets really small though, because everything just seems so real, with real people talking, real people acting, and the world being mostly interactive.

Thanks for another great chapter of this story. Thanks for the wonderful cliff hanger at the end!

Sun Tzu Wu

Thx for always motivating me by being grateful and by also always being one of the first who posts, while not holding against me that this writeup already took a really long time, and isn't finished still.

I'll try to find some time after the current Gauntlet is over, so in 3 days. That's anyhow then also gonna be the time when I will want to publish the next part of the video, but next chapter in 1-1.5 weeks seems very possible imo. I'll try to find a way to morely show the epicness of the game I played back then, I know there are some truely epic moments, that I of course cannot spoil atm., but let's see where walking my new way while reporting over an epic game gets us.

 

[Mitchum]

Do you realize that there is a yellow tick mark showing the 1-pop whip ammount? There is no need to calculate. The picture shows you can build for 3 more turns and still whip 2. On the 4th turn, you've gone too far.

I have this enabled and use it all the time. I was trying to help someone else figure out how to turn this feature on but couldn't do so. Does anyone know where the option is to enable this?