Same Start Challenge: Pick Your Leader

[Htadus]

I guess it is high time I regularly play at immortal level. I am not too fond of it since I do not get to build my fill of Wonders. Oh well.

So I opened the immortal zip file, closed my eyes, moved the curser around and double clicked. I missed all the targets. But on the second try the game started and I was Periclise. I renamed him to Htaclise .

SIP

Spoiler :

Settled in place, started a worker and Agri followed by AH and on to BW. I will habitually settle toward AI and when I saw Jo, I knew I needed to be fast at settling toward him.

Expansion

Spoiler :

At size 3 started a settler and when the Horses were shown to east with sheep and floodplains nearby, my second city site was selected. The Second city had another marble in its BFC and as of 500 AD it is still not developed.

After Founding that city and growing to size 4 I started another settler. City 3 calimed, a corn, elephant, oasis site to north east to block off Jo. Then settled a city toward Hammy claiming an oasis, cow, horses (which is yet to be developed) and sevral hills and rive tiles. I need a worker or two but claiming land has always been my style of game.

Next city claimed the gold and shared corn with the capital. And the last city was a captured riverfront barb city that had 2 dyes, and 2 other plantation resources. By now it was about 500BC and my economy was in a deep dark hole. But Cheap library scientists were saving the day. Also I was getting annoyed at Ai demands and 2 were from Jo. Just because his ranking was above me, this is no reason to treat me thusly.

War

Spoiler :

So I finally started to build units. I want some of Jo's cities and technologies butI think there is a chance for a dogpile. Jo was number 2 I am number 3 and many wan-a-bee's can be a problem. mainly Rags. So my chariots went on a recon mission to Portugal and realized what I expected to be true. His cities are defended by few units. Dowed him with 2 stacks and took 2 cities next turn. FYI each stack was only 7 strong so I knew this was to be a cripling blow not a kill. 2 turn later I took another of Jo's cities northwest of my Elephant city. And then all hell broke loose. HC, Rags and Pete dog piled on me. Oh poor me. Killed off the small stack of 8 units HC sent and I sent 3 unit to pillage. Jo wanted peace and I gave for some gold and techs. HC did not want to loose his improvements, so he gave 200+ gold for peace. Peter was crying like a baby and I had no choice but to give him peace for like all the gold and the techs he had....12g and no techs.

Rag--you scum

Spoiler :

Rags was a different story all togather. his stack was about 20 strong and eventually captured my second undeveloped horse city. 3 turns later we took it back. I lost a library and a granary in the city and my 3rd GS. Grrr. I sent 3 unit to pillage him but he was sending another stack of 20 to say hello to me. So I gave him Aesthetics for peace. He will know me again. Note to self....stop denying Immortal AI of all their demands and requests.

Current State of State

Spoiler :

Itis just past 500AD. Number 2 in power and only behind Hammy. Hammy with his few cities in running away with techs. Rags is in a 3 way war and Izzy is holding her own against him. I am looking at Jo at the moment. I have 12 cities and 5 workers. Dohp. Capital built TGLib and NE. Ivory city has the HE and just starting to build elephants. I wonder what I am planing.

Jo and Pete does not have LB's yet and I do not have CS yet. Not my normal game.

 

[wylem]

Was able to play a bit more and it has been a tough game so far but I am doing pretty well. Probably won't be able to play much now until later on Christmas day.

I re-installed BUG mod recently and forgot that I had to turn on automtaic logging so I apologize as as I am pretty much jumping to the early AD years.

General expansion to 25 AD

Spoiler :

SIP, Techs -> AGR, AH, BW

Normally I don't tech this agressively towards both AH and BW but in this case my scouting found a nice gold city site near capital, I wanted to work the plains cows, and I wanted to chop. I figured I could do this and then work on pottery/writing once I got to the gold site. I teched mysticsm fairly early as well, I think it was before pottery too.

I expanded very fast on this map which really hurt early tech.

Alot of AI tension right off the bat. Was worried about Ragnar so I had to see who he might be targetting.


Ragnar's stack isn't that impressive, but my defending warriors seem to think so...


Ragnar enters my borders without declaring so it looks like he is heading for Joao. I seem to notice Ragnar doing the cross continental war efforts in most maps he's in.


By 450 BC I had 8 cities which was a little too much and started to slow my tech rate. I was just hopping I could set up for enough deficit research to get me out of this hole I have started to dig myself into. I came up a little short...


I decalred war on Joao just to help Ragnar out (why, because he asked). I sent some axes over to cause some trouble. Didn't take any cities, I had a secondary small stack going to southeast to take a tundra city from him.

I had to micro to get enough commerce and scientists to get me through Aesthetics and keep Joao occupied.


After this I decided it was best to bail out on Ragnar because he wasn't doing anything to Joao. Was teching towards constuction just in case I needed it.

25 AD to 1110 AD

Spoiler :

Managed to buil Pyramids, I wasn't really gunning for it, and switched to rep. Gave Joao Aesth in peace deal and had to do build research to keep me going. Went through CoL and Currency this way. It looked like it would be Hinduism vs Buddhism so at this point I was leaning towards adopting Hinduism.


Not sure if this was the best play but used my first (and a bit late I might add) great scientist to bulb philosophy.


Tech at 325AD heading to CS:


Map at 325 AD:


Decided to start trading philosophy around once AI's were ready and I didn't want to lose out too much on it.



Head through paper and education and Isabella comes knocking. With so much AI hate going on I figured I should join the "west" since the east didn't like me much anyways. HC was already running free religion.


Managed a few more tech trades, can't rememebr what I did but I got 500 gold for trading something, put some of that cash into machinery.


Bulbed Education:


Run on Liberalism:


Joao finally gets peace with Ragnar and has a sizeable army.



One turn to lib, decide to detour for gunpowder. I couldn't decide what else to go for here.


Hammurabi techs education so I need to make some more trades.


I switch research back to get liberalism.


Joao's military power has managed to scare the rest of the world. HC peace vassals, Spain and Russia will not declare on him because they fear his power. Ragnar's war has slowed his tech pace so I hope I can get to rifles before HC helps him catch up.


Looking back I did have a chance to bribe Spain into a war against HC and I probably should have done that. It may have been able to keep Joao from peace vassaling HC. Although I guess that could have backfired and he could have capped both of them and then I would really be in trouble.

And this is where I have to stop:

 

[Htadus]

25 AD to 1110 AD

Run on Liberalism:

Spoiler :

wylem, it appers that you took PP from Lib. I would consider PP to be a GS bulb tech and would have chosen Nationalism in this case. Am I missing some logical thinking in this case?

 

[mtr12]

Spoiler :

wylem, it appers that you took PP from Lib. I would consider PP to be a GS bulb tech and would have chosen Nationalism in this case. Am I missing some logical thinking in this case?

Spoiler :

The purpose of Nationalism is for the Draft, for Tradebait, Hermitage for Culture players, and for the way to MiliTrad for Cuirs. If you don't have any good draft cities, that defeats the first point. If the AI already has Nationalism, that defeats the second point. If you're not going Culture, then you rarely need Hermitage. If you're not planning a Cuirs rush, well,

That's just how I understand it.

And Printing Press leads to Replaceable Parts, which leads to Redcoats!

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You missed the marble ----> taj mahal reason .

 

[mtr12]

You missed the marble ----> taj mahal reason .

Ugh, Nationalism just has too many uses. I forget them sometimes.

Spoiler :

Which is surprising, since in my game I used Taj Mahal along with MoM and 2 other golden ages from Artists and Spies to get to Conquistadors as fast as possible.

 

[Giant Wolfman]

First game I've posted on the forums
Roosevelt 1285 AD Domination, Prince, Epic (No huts/events, choose religions)

Spoiler :

SIP. Stupidly thought the BFC Marble was stone, so given the two corns and already having Ag opened up going Myst for early Stonehenge ->AH ->Mining ->BW -> Wheel ->Masonry. Looped warrior down to south then west and encountered Hamm. With him so close, figured I'd try a warrior rush. Saw that he wasn't on a hill and attacked with only 3 warriors vs his 2 aggressive warriors (completely forgot he was agg too) but got incredibly lucky, getting his second warrior down to .4 str even though I only had ~10% odds. Took Babylon on next turn in 2575 BC


From there, REXed and wonderwhored like crazy and was able to grab 11 cities. Izzy was exceptionally odd. She founded 3 religions but was only at 1 city for a very long time. Because of this, I was able to expand almost to the northern coast. Built lots of wonders in Washington (CoL from Oracle), plus a few more elsewhere by the end of the game. (Note-This is from the post game & includes the three shrines Izzy built)

Total of three Golden Ages spanning 15yrs a piece b/c of Mausoleum.

As the world was split between Christianity & Confus. I was originally thinking culture, but by the time I got to Lib I was so far ahead I decided on Cuirassier stomping.


Whipped/Police State out a ton of Curs. Got a HCapac peacevassal during build up, destroyed Izzy, then chaincapped Ragnar & Joao and was about to add Peter before:


Final Score:

A personal best!

Builds:


& Washington (Capital):

Of note not in this image: National Epic & Mausoleum

I've been following the forums but had been unable to play for a few months until this week, so I've been building up on Prince. Sloppy beginning (going Myst & declaring on Hamm with only 3 warriors) was glossed over by the lower difficulty setting & great RNG luck.

Next game, I'm gonna go up to Monarch, so feedback would be welcome

 

[Wulf38]

I went with Napoleon. He has my favorite trait combo for early war, though the nature of the map made that a non-issue. 1470AD domination on Immortal/Normal.

Spoiler :

My warrior happened to pass one of Hammurabi's workers, so I took the opportunity to steal it and speed my opening. This helped me put out 3 quick settlers before building the oracle. I took Alphabet and used that to trade for early techs, and bribe Ragnar and Peter into wars.

I out-expanded all the AIs, claiming 12 cities (2 captured from barbs) and 20% of the land without war. From there it was a simple matter of lib -> military tradition -> whip cuirassiers -> stomp everyone.

Spoiler :

 

[Ric]

Mehmed II, Immortal/normal

Conquest/(domination) victory 1575 AD

Spoiler :

Settled in place. Tech path was mining, BW, don't quite remember anymore after that. I think it was AH, fishing, hunting, pottery, writing, masonry.
Ofcourse during all this expanding to 7 cities. Went with aestetic route trade bait, followed by currency and code of laws, CS.
After that I hit literature seeing nobody else was going for it. During all that I got the pyramids wich I got surprisinly late without putting a real effort into it.
The early representation I could use because of that was quite nice, wich helped my teching even more. That also with some resource trades and the hammam allowed for some nice vertical growth.

As for the AI, they were more interested in fighting each other. Either by themself or bribed by me. This kept them all busy allowing me to tech without problems to cuirs.
This must have also caused them to have a bad tech rate, even joao despite the ammount of land he had. Easely libbed military tradition and none of the AI were even close to lib yet, didn't even have paper and only Ragnar had philosophy.

While teching further to rifling to get cavalry I whipped and build a nice cuir stack, wich were used to run over hammurabi and Ragnar. After rifling all of them got upgraded to cavalry.
Then continued to stomp over the AI who never got any better troops then cuirs and muskets.

So all in all my game ended up being rather easy despite Joao getting a huge ammount of land.

 

[mtr12]

Spoiler :

So basically everyone used Cuirs except for TMIT, who used Draft Rifles. And I guess the Churchill guy will too.

 

[Htadus]

Spoiler :

And Printing Press leads to Replaceable Parts, which leads to Redcoats!

Spoiler :

If thats the focus, then bulbing PP with a GS and getting RP with Lib would be mutch better. Also what TMIT said. Also on this map and, If I am paying attention, I would get Steel from Lib.

 

[Gwynnja]

Immortal Darius Culture 1802.

Spoiler :

I decided to give my neighbors a clinic on Sistine Chapel border trolling. I flipped six cities in all including the Christian holy city from Isabella, Taoist holy city from HC, a wonder-filled city from HC, and satellites from Joao and Hammurabi. I was kept safe by A. Ragnar DOWing Ham in BCs and fighting for 1000+ years, B. massive Buddhist spread/AP safety net by Izzy vs. not much Hindu from HC, and C. defensive pact with Joao. I didn't plan on going culture until Ham beat me to the Great Library.

 

[Lewarks]

Gandhi, Immortal, 1894 AD Domination Victory.

Spoiler :

Since my last post, I went for Rifles and attacked Joa (30% of the land...) -> Peter (after Jao peace vassaled to him) -> HC -> Isa.

 

[Tempesta13]

Hatshepsut, Immortal, 1390 Domination

Spoiler :

SIP and go for AH>Mining>BW. War Chariot rush Babylon and Portugal. Eliminate Babylon and stop after taking Lagos from Joao. Take peace for Math. He caps to Huayna for awhile then leaves him. Peter and Huayna have defensive pact so I finish off Joao (with Cuirs) after Izzy peace vassals to me. Huayna breaks defensive pact when he peace vassals Joao. I bribe Peter on Huayna, eliminate Joao and capitulate Huayna. Then cap Peter, wait for some border pops and get domination.

Used Babylon for Great Library, National Epic and bulbed Philosophy, Education, Printing Press, used a scientist GA and scientist/merchant GA. Had 36 turns of GA with 3 GPs, Taj and MoM. I also built Parthenon in capital.


Tech at 1 AD

 

[Bockwurst]

Otto von Bismarck, Immortal, normal speed, 1680 AD culture

Spoiler :

I wanted an EXP-leader (forested hill was in sight) and added a pinch of patriotism, so my choice was obvious

Settled in place and discovered marble and another corn. Great!


Research was agri -> hunting ->TW -> pottery -> BW. First city was NE of Berlin Hamburg (discovered copper later in BFC), third Munich NW to claim the gold. As I found horses in the south I thought about a cuirs war, but with marble, stone and IND ... well, I couldn't resist to wonderspam
So the named three cities became my culture sides as Munich was cottaged, Berlin became a GP farm with GLib and NE running artists and Hamburg spammed wonders and got culture bombs.

I joined the jewish block with the Portuguese and Russian. Hammurabi was Hindu and Cathy Buddist. So there were some religious wars but I managed to stay out of them until near the end, when Hammy declared. At this time I was running culture already but switching to reasearch meant rifling in 6 turns without oxford. He could then be convinced that we should live in peace again.

Economy-wise building the mids got me Rep despite 3 AIs love monarchy. It would've make diplo much easier but a Rep-Culture approach works fine.

I built ToA, Parthenon, Sistine ofc and MoM. From then on I fired 3 GA by great people supported by Taj Mahal resulting in 48 turns of GA . I libbed Divine Right (anyone ever did that?) founding islam, my 5th religion. I also got UoS and Spiral Minaret to power up all religious buildings. From then on it was the usual "all culture plan".

The game was quite fun. I haven't seen the other approaches yet but I think a cuirs rush would be a viable option. I would've been able to do that whenever I want.

Overview 1680 AD:

Great series! Looking forward to another challenge.

 

[Bockwurst]

First game I've posted on the forums
Roosevelt 1285 AD Domination, Prince, Epic (No huts/events, choose religions)

Spoiler :

SIP. Stupidly thought the BFC Marble was stone, so given the two corns and already having Ag opened up going Myst for early Stonehenge ->AH ->Mining ->BW -> Wheel ->Masonry. Looped warrior down to south then west and encountered Hamm. With him so close, figured I'd try a warrior rush. Saw that he wasn't on a hill and attacked with only 3 warriors vs his 2 aggressive warriors (completely forgot he was agg too) but got incredibly lucky, getting his second warrior down to .4 str even though I only had ~10% odds. Took Babylon on next turn in 2575 BC


From there, REXed and wonderwhored like crazy and was able to grab 11 cities. Izzy was exceptionally odd. She founded 3 religions but was only at 1 city for a very long time. Because of this, I was able to expand almost to the northern coast. Built lots of wonders in Washington (CoL from Oracle), plus a few more elsewhere by the end of the game. (Note-This is from the post game & includes the three shrines Izzy built)

Total of three Golden Ages spanning 15yrs a piece b/c of Mausoleum.

As the world was split between Christianity & Confus. I was originally thinking culture, but by the time I got to Lib I was so far ahead I decided on Cuirassier stomping.


Whipped/Police State out a ton of Curs. Got a HCapac peacevassal during build up, destroyed Izzy, then chaincapped Ragnar & Joao and was about to add Peter before:


Final Score:

A personal best!

Builds:


& Washington (Capital):

Of note not in this image: National Epic & Mausoleum

I've been following the forums but had been unable to play for a few months until this week, so I've been building up on Prince. Sloppy beginning (going Myst & declaring on Hamm with only 3 warriors) was glossed over by the lower difficulty setting & great RNG luck.

Next game, I'm gonna go up to Monarch, so feedback would be welcome

Forget warrior-rushing and build fewer wonders. Then build/whip cuirs

 

[Ric]

Are there going to be more maps hosted by this principle or is it staying with just this one?
I wouldn't mind seeing more of them as it's an interesting concept.

 

[JSS]

Gandhi, 1550AD Conquest, Emperor, Normal

Cuirassier/Cavalry stomps on pangaea maps are getting very boring for me... With a start like this (and I've noticed that almost all of these forum games tend to have great starts) there's so much room for error. I just clicked at stuff and ended up with an overwhelming advantage over the AIs in the BC's and proceeded to win easily without having to put any thought into the game. Maybe I should try and notch the difficulty up to Immortal the next time for these games.

 

[obsolete]

Hmmm... Haven't been playing on these forums in ages so I know i'm rusty. Gave immortal a try, and seems despite getting DoWed on by a surprise attack from Mr. GIANT next door (who already had a vassal too)... I was able to recover and did a 3-city break-out.. .to topple him while he was still defending with....... longbows and I'm attacking with...... Cavalry.

Hmmm...

Unfortunately Firaxis' code is stripping off the GUI, so there isn't much to see here.

Spoiler :

 

[cbucks]

Pre 1400 domination Victorys are awesome. Congrats gents