Sam_Yeager
Another Original Geezer
I agree strongly with both of you.
I must admit I thought that was one of the purposes of the test game. 
SGOTM 06 - Geezers
- Thread starter AlanH
- Start date
I agree strongly with both of you.
I must admit I thought that was one of the purposes of the test game. 
Harbourboy
Deity
Man! We can't even do a test game properly!!
I did not have the time, yet to compare our starts in detail. Maybe I find the time at the weekend. However basically I was curious to see what each of you would do with the starting position and liked to see your reasoning for your moves and maybe setting a longterm goal.
HB's research went through fishing, was about to finish his first settler (played 50 turns)
AgedOne took the wonder route, 2 cities at turn 100, two wonders
Thrallia, 3 cities at turn 100, 1 wonder
Erik rexed, 4 cities at turn 100, building mids, first one to set a goal : Cutting off the southern half of the continent and backfilling with COL. Obviously you have not checked Sumeria carefully.
You already have cheap courts with priesthood, so you do not have to wait for COL. 
Mark also took the wonder route, 2 cities at turn 100, two wonders. Goal would have been establishing 6 - 8 cities peacefully.
@HB : I think we misunderstood each other. In a real test game I should have stated a certain goal to be achieved like a certain victory condition or an oracle slingshot, being first to liberalism, etc.. With my save I think you could do anything.
HB's research went through fishing, was about to finish his first settler (played 50 turns)
AgedOne took the wonder route, 2 cities at turn 100, two wonders
Thrallia, 3 cities at turn 100, 1 wonder
Erik rexed, 4 cities at turn 100, building mids, first one to set a goal : Cutting off the southern half of the continent and backfilling with COL. Obviously you have not checked Sumeria carefully.
You already have cheap courts with priesthood, so you do not have to wait for COL. Mark also took the wonder route, 2 cities at turn 100, two wonders. Goal would have been establishing 6 - 8 cities peacefully.
@HB : I think we misunderstood each other. In a real test game I should have stated a certain goal to be achieved like a certain victory condition or an oracle slingshot, being first to liberalism, etc.. With my save I think you could do anything.
AgedOne
Emperor
I think this was an interesting exercise in some ways.
It was not a test game that was going to help us develop our methods of playing as a team. However, it could be the first stage in a process to do so.
What it did do is give each of us an identical position and let us go without any pre-stated objective. From that we could see a few things:
So the next stage in the process could be to find a way to mould these different ways of playing into a team. We could play another position independently but with pre-agreed objectives for each period of 50 turns, maybe.
However, I still don't think that we failed to communicate or to plan as a team this last time out. I think our biggest failing was the way that several sharp objects (admittedly some sharper than others) became one blunt object when we worked as a team.
If I can think of anything we really need, it is to find a way to work like this:
It was not a test game that was going to help us develop our methods of playing as a team. However, it could be the first stage in a process to do so.
What it did do is give each of us an identical position and let us go without any pre-stated objective. From that we could see a few things:
- We each found a different way of approaching the same position
- We all had a different way of thinking about the way we plan the game
- Some of us plan longer term, some short term
So the next stage in the process could be to find a way to mould these different ways of playing into a team. We could play another position independently but with pre-agreed objectives for each period of 50 turns, maybe.
However, I still don't think that we failed to communicate or to plan as a team this last time out. I think our biggest failing was the way that several sharp objects (admittedly some sharper than others) became one blunt object when we worked as a team.
If I can think of anything we really need, it is to find a way to work like this:
- Someone comes up with an idea of how to treat the position
- They explain clearly and convincingly how their plan would work and why their plan would work
- We all agree to go for one idea (Not a mixture of the two best ideas)
- We carry out the plan until the next position arises
erikthecelt
Old, Geezer, Unoriginal
Isn't that what we did?
Wasn't our real problem that we played the Brennus game just before this one and we got into trouble because we went BW-IW. So we played this one too defensively. We lost because we were afraid of losing.
Sam_Yeager
Another Original Geezer
I'm not entirely convinced. Looking back over the last three SGOTMs a common theme has been that we've let at least one or two of the AI get so far ahead of us in power and tech that we couldn't catch them up. In both SGOTM04 & SGOTM05 we were fairly aggressive but getting rid of that first civ took too long.
AgedOne
Emperor
It's interesting to look back over the first few pages of this thread and see just what did happen (rather than my faded recollections).
We spent a while searching for the ideal start location. We seemed to be happy enough to do this, at least no-one was outspoken in opposing it, and chose a location that was on all of our high preferences. No problems there.
It turned out, of course that we had missed the copper by doing this. But that was just unlucky, and not bad play.
The first turn-set started, and we met Mansa and Hannibal.
Interestingly, the first discussions about caution v aggression started at that point. markh suggested the need for early archery. There was HB making a cautious statement about avoiding an early defeat. On the other side, erik started talking about the possibility of an early rush - or even finding a capital empty. Sam was reluctant to delay things by switching to archery. Hawk came in with some relatively positive thoughts about getting axes or chariots and going visiting. (I don't know where I had disappeared off to during this)
At that point HB brought us all back to think about the situation and outline our strategy.
In this, erik outlined an interesting gambit for drawing the AI onto our waiting military. The rest of us seemed to talk more about a balance of growing our economy, scouting, getting resources and attacking. The upshot of this was that we all decided to wait until AH came in before making any further decisions.
We then had a big discussion about whether to use erik's 'ring of fire' trap. I don't think there was ever a resulting decision from this discussion, but we weren't going to use it.
Then an even bigger discussion about BW or Archery. This one ran and ran!
I think a lot of us changed our minds, being swayed by the extra bonuses that archers get using the Protective trait. There was another thought from erik that there probably wouldn't be copper nearby anyway. We went for archery.
The point of my repeating all of this is to look again at the way we operated together. Lots of discussion. Sometimes some confusion - but usually cleared up. Some interesting ideas were put forward, but the group generally shied away from them. There seemed to be lots of thoughts of avoiding a humiliating disaster.
I still don't know what to suggest, as our way out of this. I think we did opt for more solid and growth-based choices. Compare that with some of the other teams who just knew that the thing to do was find the enemy capitals and head straight for them.
We spent a while searching for the ideal start location. We seemed to be happy enough to do this, at least no-one was outspoken in opposing it, and chose a location that was on all of our high preferences. No problems there.
It turned out, of course that we had missed the copper by doing this. But that was just unlucky, and not bad play.
The first turn-set started, and we met Mansa and Hannibal.
Interestingly, the first discussions about caution v aggression started at that point. markh suggested the need for early archery. There was HB making a cautious statement about avoiding an early defeat. On the other side, erik started talking about the possibility of an early rush - or even finding a capital empty. Sam was reluctant to delay things by switching to archery. Hawk came in with some relatively positive thoughts about getting axes or chariots and going visiting. (I don't know where I had disappeared off to during this)
At that point HB brought us all back to think about the situation and outline our strategy.
In this, erik outlined an interesting gambit for drawing the AI onto our waiting military. The rest of us seemed to talk more about a balance of growing our economy, scouting, getting resources and attacking. The upshot of this was that we all decided to wait until AH came in before making any further decisions.
We then had a big discussion about whether to use erik's 'ring of fire' trap. I don't think there was ever a resulting decision from this discussion, but we weren't going to use it.
Then an even bigger discussion about BW or Archery. This one ran and ran!
I think a lot of us changed our minds, being swayed by the extra bonuses that archers get using the Protective trait. There was another thought from erik that there probably wouldn't be copper nearby anyway. We went for archery.
The point of my repeating all of this is to look again at the way we operated together. Lots of discussion. Sometimes some confusion - but usually cleared up. Some interesting ideas were put forward, but the group generally shied away from them. There seemed to be lots of thoughts of avoiding a humiliating disaster.
I still don't know what to suggest, as our way out of this. I think we did opt for more solid and growth-based choices. Compare that with some of the other teams who just knew that the thing to do was find the enemy capitals and head straight for them.
I haven't had a chance to look through the thread for this past game yet, but will do so at the first opportunity.
In my opinion, everyone on this team is a good player. Individually, each of us probably could have won most of the SGOTM games(dunno how many would have won this one, since AW always leaves a lot of good players in trouble, I wouldn't have won it)
I also feel that the majority of us are builder-type players...which leaves us at a disadvantage in most of these games, since warfare has tended to be the fastest victory type in every SGOTM except for the first and 3rd ones(in which warfare wasn't really an option for a victory).
Most teams that took risks didn't know if they would pay off or not for sure, but felt that the rewards outweighed the risks. Most likely, from what I've heard from you guys, last time around you played too timidly, not taking risks for fear of messing up and getting an early conquest defeat(I can understand that...I had that same fear in every other AW game I've played).
My last thought for now, is that there are specific areas that we all probably need to work on: warfare, Great People(generation and bulbing, for each type), and overcoming our builder tendencies. The top two finishes for Geezers were in the two SGOTMs where a builder victory(diplo) was the fastest way to go.
Perhaps after we've done some more comparison of our games, we should post another test game, and we all do some strategic thinking together on it before playing individually, see how we do at understanding the strategy we talked about, and at overcoming our weaknesses.
In my opinion, everyone on this team is a good player. Individually, each of us probably could have won most of the SGOTM games(dunno how many would have won this one, since AW always leaves a lot of good players in trouble, I wouldn't have won it)
I also feel that the majority of us are builder-type players...which leaves us at a disadvantage in most of these games, since warfare has tended to be the fastest victory type in every SGOTM except for the first and 3rd ones(in which warfare wasn't really an option for a victory).
Most teams that took risks didn't know if they would pay off or not for sure, but felt that the rewards outweighed the risks. Most likely, from what I've heard from you guys, last time around you played too timidly, not taking risks for fear of messing up and getting an early conquest defeat(I can understand that...I had that same fear in every other AW game I've played).
My last thought for now, is that there are specific areas that we all probably need to work on: warfare, Great People(generation and bulbing, for each type), and overcoming our builder tendencies. The top two finishes for Geezers were in the two SGOTMs where a builder victory(diplo) was the fastest way to go.
Perhaps after we've done some more comparison of our games, we should post another test game, and we all do some strategic thinking together on it before playing individually, see how we do at understanding the strategy we talked about, and at overcoming our weaknesses.
Harbourboy
Deity
Are we clear on what exactly did go wrong in this game? We have to look past the copper location, because that can't be the whole story. We must have done several things really poorly to have ended up in such a mediocre position.
Always War was a bit of a factor, but not much. We didn't get wiped out early, and we didn't have an oversized army. The main factor was the war weariness and the fact that we had to try and self-research every single things (exacerbating the lack of great people who could help bulb some of the key techs?).
Always War was a bit of a factor, but not much. We didn't get wiped out early, and we didn't have an oversized army. The main factor was the war weariness and the fact that we had to try and self-research every single things (exacerbating the lack of great people who could help bulb some of the key techs?).
erikthecelt
Old, Geezer, Unoriginal
I like Thrallia's suggestion
We should plan to play 150 turns toward a specific objective and compare the outcome.
@Thrallia - Welcome aboard!
We should plan to play 150 turns toward a specific objective and compare the outcome.
@Thrallia - Welcome aboard!
In my opinion our basic mistakes were as follows :
- Moving the settler, it was a perfect starting position
- Too slow expansion
- For a long time we just had one worker for 3 cities
- Our tech choices were not AW-like. We never researched currency or engineering which are crucial
- We kept too far cities too early killing our economy. With a big army as in AW this is a killer
- Moving the settler, it was a perfect starting position
- Too slow expansion
- For a long time we just had one worker for 3 cities
- Our tech choices were not AW-like. We never researched currency or engineering which are crucial
- We kept too far cities too early killing our economy. With a big army as in AW this is a killer
AgedOne
Emperor
I've been having a look at the comparison of the top 5 teams, made by Leif Erikson in the XTeam thread, and plotting our own progress against them.
For what it's worth, these were my thougts:
Start
One Short Straw, Xteam and CRC settled on turn 0.
Murky Waters and Smurkz settled on turn 1.
On turn 2, we were the last to settle.
However the starting location might have been more significant.
Well, not really, apart from the luck of missing the unseen copper. We all settled on adjacent tiles.
View attachment 172560
We all made sure we got the eastern gold and left the western gold for later. The only slight surprise was Smurkz leaving the cattle to another city. The rest all included it in London's borders.
Research order
OSS, Smurkz and CRC went for Agriculture first - as did we.
Murky and Xteam went directly for Bronze Working.
Murky went BW=>Agri=>AH=>Wheel=>Mysti
OSS went Agri=>AH=>BW=>Wheel=>Pottery
XTeam went BW=>Agri=>AH=>Wheel=>IW
Smurkz went Agri=>BW=>IW=>Hunting=>AH
CRC went Agri=>AH=>BW=>Writing=>Mysti
We went Agri=>AH=>Hunting=>Archery=>BW
So there is a clear difference - we were the only ones to go for Archery in the first 5 techs.
We were also the last to get BW. We got there on turn 59.
(Murky on turn 21, OSS T42, XTeam T19, Smurkz T35, CRC T42)
Getting it hooked up showed even more extreme differences - but again I would put that down to bad luck.
Foreign Relations
We all met Mansa, Hannibal and Alex early on.
We knew them all by turn 30.
(Murky turn 20, OSS turn 14, Xteam turn 38, Smurkz turn 14, CRC turn 44)
Some attacked them in the very early stages.
Murky had taken Timbuktu by turn 48 !! The benefit of researching BW first, finding copper in London's borders, detecting Mansa's land by turn 30 and hooking the copper at the same time!
XTeam took Timbuktu on turn 56. They also researched BW first, hooked up their copper on turn 31, produced their first axe on turn 38. Went to visit Mansa, and would surely have taken it earlier but for a bear attack on their axe which necessitated 4 turns healing!
But not everyone went for that early a rush.
CRC went for Alex first, taking him out between turns 130 and 159.
Smurkz too went for Alex, and his cities died between turns 99 and 159.
OSS were pretty early in their demolition of Hannibal. He only had 2 cities when they came visiting on turns 80 and 86!
However, of course, that's where we deviate completely from the top teams. We didn't feel powerful enough to attack any city until turn 141, when Corinth went. Then nothing until 157 when we took Kumbi. Notice we were also attacking cities within range at this stage, rather than feeling able to take out an opponent.
We didn't really start cutting down the opposition until after turn 200 - and then of course they were quite powerful themselves.
Overall
I think we were unlucky, but we were also unadventurous.
Had we gone for BW earlier, and possibly missed out archery, we might have found ourselves initially frustrated at the copper being out of reach of London's borders, but we would have been an attacking force much earlier.
We should have ventured out and found the AI civ's borders sooner.
The other teams were having discussions about how to quell 3 opponents in AW - they were more confident knowing they were in a strong military position - we discussed defence, and a more limited expansion by taking small bites out of the enemies.
For what it's worth, these were my thougts:
Start
One Short Straw, Xteam and CRC settled on turn 0.
Murky Waters and Smurkz settled on turn 1.
On turn 2, we were the last to settle.
However the starting location might have been more significant.
Well, not really, apart from the luck of missing the unseen copper. We all settled on adjacent tiles.
View attachment 172560
We all made sure we got the eastern gold and left the western gold for later. The only slight surprise was Smurkz leaving the cattle to another city. The rest all included it in London's borders.
Research order
OSS, Smurkz and CRC went for Agriculture first - as did we.
Murky and Xteam went directly for Bronze Working.
Murky went BW=>Agri=>AH=>Wheel=>Mysti
OSS went Agri=>AH=>BW=>Wheel=>Pottery
XTeam went BW=>Agri=>AH=>Wheel=>IW
Smurkz went Agri=>BW=>IW=>Hunting=>AH
CRC went Agri=>AH=>BW=>Writing=>Mysti
We went Agri=>AH=>Hunting=>Archery=>BW
So there is a clear difference - we were the only ones to go for Archery in the first 5 techs.
We were also the last to get BW. We got there on turn 59.
(Murky on turn 21, OSS T42, XTeam T19, Smurkz T35, CRC T42)
Getting it hooked up showed even more extreme differences - but again I would put that down to bad luck.
Foreign Relations
We all met Mansa, Hannibal and Alex early on.
We knew them all by turn 30.
(Murky turn 20, OSS turn 14, Xteam turn 38, Smurkz turn 14, CRC turn 44)
Some attacked them in the very early stages.
Murky had taken Timbuktu by turn 48 !! The benefit of researching BW first, finding copper in London's borders, detecting Mansa's land by turn 30 and hooking the copper at the same time!
XTeam took Timbuktu on turn 56. They also researched BW first, hooked up their copper on turn 31, produced their first axe on turn 38. Went to visit Mansa, and would surely have taken it earlier but for a bear attack on their axe which necessitated 4 turns healing!
But not everyone went for that early a rush.
CRC went for Alex first, taking him out between turns 130 and 159.
Smurkz too went for Alex, and his cities died between turns 99 and 159.
OSS were pretty early in their demolition of Hannibal. He only had 2 cities when they came visiting on turns 80 and 86!
However, of course, that's where we deviate completely from the top teams. We didn't feel powerful enough to attack any city until turn 141, when Corinth went. Then nothing until 157 when we took Kumbi. Notice we were also attacking cities within range at this stage, rather than feeling able to take out an opponent.
We didn't really start cutting down the opposition until after turn 200 - and then of course they were quite powerful themselves.
Overall
I think we were unlucky, but we were also unadventurous.
Had we gone for BW earlier, and possibly missed out archery, we might have found ourselves initially frustrated at the copper being out of reach of London's borders, but we would have been an attacking force much earlier.
We should have ventured out and found the AI civ's borders sooner.
The other teams were having discussions about how to quell 3 opponents in AW - they were more confident knowing they were in a strong military position - we discussed defence, and a more limited expansion by taking small bites out of the enemies.
AgedOne
Emperor
I like this too.
Although perhaps we could adapt slightly? What if we all made a start - explored and made just the opening 30 turns or so. Then all stop. Make our strategy up from that point once we know our surroundings and neighbours. Possibly we all play on from once savegame rather than each our own. But we play on for 150 turns and then see how we all went.
1. I don't necessarily agree. None of the top teams settled in place. Admittedly, they didn't wait as long as us. I think moving is reasonable and we were just painfully unlucky.In my opinion our basic mistakes were as follows :
- Moving the settler, it was a perfect starting position
- Too slow expansion
- For a long time we just had one worker for 3 cities
- Our tech choices were not AW-like. We never researched currency or engineering which are crucial
- We kept too far cities too early killing our economy. With a big army as in AW this is a killer
2. Yep.
3. Yep.
4. I'm not experienced enough with AW to comment. Perhaps I should have practiced more
5. I'm beginning to realise just how important this is. I always suffer from economic melt-down if I'm not careful. Now I'm beginning to go even more towards small 'huddles' of cities in the early stages - sometimes just 3 tiles apart.
Sam_Yeager
Another Original Geezer
on doing this comparison AgedOne. I kept meaning to do this but I'm not sure if I would ever have got around to it. 
As I said in an earlier post, I wasn't that bothered about how long it took us to get BW. Principally because I think one of our key mistakes was not hooking it up earlier and making use of the copper for military units. I think this was mainly because we settled York first. IIRC this was because we had decided as a team to build up a solid core of cities before going after the AI. In retrospect this was a
decision, but none of us seriously disagreed with it at the time as I recall. Skulks in the corner trying not to be noticed.
Seems like the main lesson is that we need to be bolder in the next SGOTM. Whilst there is the risk that we may crash out early on I suppose it's no different from RL where you often learn more from the mistakes.
erikthecelt
Old, Geezer, Unoriginal
Seems like the main lesson is that we need to be bolder in the next SGOTM. Whilst there is the risk that we may crash out early on I suppose it's no different from RL where you often learn more from the mistakes.
At least if we crash out quickly we'll have longer to navel gaze.
Harbourboy
Deity
Nice work, Aged One.
nice comparisons(although you stopped just short of my old team, GK 
)
Perhaps the biggest thing to learn from this is that in an AW game, it is more important to take down the AI early, before it gets itself a set of core cities, than it is to get a core set of cities yourself.
as for another test game...I think I could use the advanced start feature in BtS to set up a game that is not at the very beginning, thus giving us a game that we could talk strategy about that isn't at the very beginning of the game(we've got some technologies, more than 1 city, and could conceivably be able to work GP strategies into the game as well)
)Perhaps the biggest thing to learn from this is that in an AW game, it is more important to take down the AI early, before it gets itself a set of core cities, than it is to get a core set of cities yourself.
as for another test game...I think I could use the advanced start feature in BtS to set up a game that is not at the very beginning, thus giving us a game that we could talk strategy about that isn't at the very beginning of the game(we've got some technologies, more than 1 city, and could conceivably be able to work GP strategies into the game as well)
AgedOne
Emperor
Thanks everyone who appreciated my efforts.
I found myself at home with some time on my hands...
@Thrallia
Oops! GKs weren't on the copy of the comparison file that I took. Have they been added since?
I like the idea of the advanced start. That would do exactly what I was trying to describe. Are you likely to have enough time in RL to do this?
Out of interest, I went back to the start and tried replying SGOTM06 a few times. I was interested mainly in trying to duplicate the feats of the early attackers. It made me realise just what a narrow window of opportunity the successful teams were hitting!
To settle on turn 0, research BW, build a worker, hook up the copper, build an axeman takes not much less than 38 turns. Then you have to have spotted Mansa's border. About 12 turns to walk the axeman over to Timbuktu.
If you do this to arrive about turn 47-48, you are met by 2 warriors and a poor cultural defence. Leave it so that you arrive about turn 53, and you are met by a skirmisher as well, and the cultural defence has gone up to the point where your lone axeman isn't going to make it!
Another problem you can run into is leaving the warrior who discovers Timbuktu within sight of the city. This scares the inhabitants so much that they put all their efforts into producing a skirmisher even sooner.
Obviously, the early rush is still achievable if you run into these problems, but you just need to ramp up production of axemen and try again a bit later than intended.
My last attempt was really pleasant, and showed just how well the game could have gone. Took out both Mansa and Hannibal by turn 107 (895BC) and turning attention to little Alex in the corner!
I guess the vital bit of knowledge I was lacking when we all started this game was just how good a defence should be expected from the AI in an AW prince game. That just comes from experience, I suppose.
I found myself at home with some time on my hands...
@Thrallia
Oops! GKs weren't on the copy of the comparison file that I took. Have they been added since?
I like the idea of the advanced start. That would do exactly what I was trying to describe. Are you likely to have enough time in RL to do this?
Out of interest, I went back to the start and tried replying SGOTM06 a few times. I was interested mainly in trying to duplicate the feats of the early attackers. It made me realise just what a narrow window of opportunity the successful teams were hitting!
To settle on turn 0, research BW, build a worker, hook up the copper, build an axeman takes not much less than 38 turns. Then you have to have spotted Mansa's border. About 12 turns to walk the axeman over to Timbuktu.
If you do this to arrive about turn 47-48, you are met by 2 warriors and a poor cultural defence. Leave it so that you arrive about turn 53, and you are met by a skirmisher as well, and the cultural defence has gone up to the point where your lone axeman isn't going to make it!
Another problem you can run into is leaving the warrior who discovers Timbuktu within sight of the city. This scares the inhabitants so much that they put all their efforts into producing a skirmisher even sooner.
Obviously, the early rush is still achievable if you run into these problems, but you just need to ramp up production of axemen and try again a bit later than intended.
My last attempt was really pleasant, and showed just how well the game could have gone. Took out both Mansa and Hannibal by turn 107 (895BC) and turning attention to little Alex in the corner!
I guess the vital bit of knowledge I was lacking when we all started this game was just how good a defence should be expected from the AI in an AW prince game. That just comes from experience, I suppose.
I dunno if GK was added to the spreadsheet, I said it mainly because GK will likely be 6th this time around, and you stopped at 5th place
I think I'll have time to do an advanced start creation some time this next week, but not this weekend(have a test to study for...)
I think I'll have time to do an advanced start creation some time this next week, but not this weekend(have a test to study for...)
erikthecelt
Old, Geezer, Unoriginal
GK was not on the spreadsheet when I looked at it.
Zara Yaquob is an interesting leader, Justinian is also an interesting choice.
I haven't tried quick starts before. Are the techs pre-chosen or do we have a choice?
Zara Yaquob is an interesting leader, Justinian is also an interesting choice.
I haven't tried quick starts before. Are the techs pre-chosen or do we have a choice?
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