SGOTM 23 - Unallocated

haphazard1 · Aug 16, 2016

Thanks for the positive thoughts, Sun Tzu Wu! I am feeling better again, thankfully. More complications and ongoing issues from some serious health problems last year, just have to deal with them as they arise.

I don't see an extension as a bad thing, I guess. The main concern would be if one or more teams has rushed/is rushing to finish, sacrificing careful game play to meet the deadline, and then other teams get the benefit of more time for more careful play. Obviously we are not in a position to evaluate this -- someone who has been following all the teams would have a much better idea of whether this is a legitimate concern or not. From the progress graphs we and Unusual Suspects are the farthest along in game turns/years. But who knows how the others are really doing? Most of them showed power and score spikes earlier than we did, so may be further along towards the goal. Or maybe not...further on conquest/land control but perhaps not on tech? Again, only the lurkers know at this point.

Given that the SGOTM is down to only 5 teams, it would be unfortunate if one or more teams just run out of time. But eventually all good things come to an end -- Civ IV is quite old in gaming terms, and participation wanes. It gets harder just to keep the game running, much less get a team together with time to participate.

Hopefully Civ VI will be fantastic and will bring fresh life into the community. :please:

Sun Tzu Wu · Aug 16, 2016

Thanks for your comments, haphazard!

I suspect that Turbo Ants and Phoenix Rising are both close to finishing the game. They probably went for a massive military build up and captured several AIs; With a huge number of cities captured early in the game, their research rate probably skyrocketed. Turbo Ants were probably able to get Hatshepsut to vassal early, maybe even peace vassal.

I'd like to hear how other team members feel about a time extension.

BTW, I don't believe we selected a team captain. Unless someone objects, I am willing to fill that role.

haphazard1 · Aug 16, 2016

No objection from me, Sun Tzu Wu. Please do, in fact. :thumbsup:

This reminds me that I need to get the scibe stuff at the start of thread up to date, too -- soon, I hope.

Earlier conquest is certainly a strong possibility. But wiping out or severely weakening the AIs earlier does mean less tech from them via trade or espionage, plus less foreign trade route income. So it is not all positive to do so, although players as strong as many playing can get more out of the cities than AIs would at this difficulty level. We shall have to see once the game is over and we can examine the other team threads to learn how they handled everything.

For now we need to finish our own game.

ikotomi · Aug 16, 2016

Taking a break, but uploaded the save. If there are no objections, I'm planning on trading printing press to Gandhi for 320 gold and Civil Service, and Engineering to Churchill for 300 gold as well. Printing press is researched, and I will research Guilds next, while waiting for a galley to finish to send spies to London. Gandhi now has paper and is one step closer to Liberalism.

Lost double fish for one turn because of an overseas invasion wiping out our warrior stationed there so we didn't have the galleys were expecting.

We have the option to vassal Mehmed now. This might actually be a pretty good value, as his land and stack splits our forces, and is quite troublesome.

I wouldn't object if haphazard would like the save as well, as it's a bit difficult for me right now to find enough time to get through these turns. This game is turning out to be quite tedious as it's a mid game conquest on a huge map with no Cuirassiers

.

ikotomi · Aug 16, 2016

Spoiler :

ikotomi · Aug 16, 2016

Spoiler :

marbe166 · Aug 17, 2016

I'm back, sorry for the long period of being away without having time or internet access. I have no objection to an extension of the deadline, and I will try to catch up as soon as possible.

Packers5280 · Aug 17, 2016

I'm back as well, although I've been lurking a bit. Getting a new job and moving is pretty time consuming. I have no objection to an extension either.

Sun Tzu Wu · Aug 17, 2016

I would have preferred to steal Guilds and Banking from Churchill, but if we don't have 4-5 spies and Islam in one of Churchill's cities now, we might as well research Guilds and Banking ourselves.

I'm fine with selling technologies to the AIs for wealth, as long as we don't sell Steel or a similarly powerful military technology. I just need to be careful what units we allow the AIs to upgrade to and build.

I suggest that we avoid vassaling Mehmed II. It can be virtually impossible to get rid of a vassal. We may need to do that, if we decide to vassal someone else. Stalin may be a better AI to vassal.

In my opinion, we need to build as many Cannons as we have Musketeers and attack all AIs that border us now. Then keep expanding our borders until we own the entire world and have built The Orient Express.

Sun Tzu Wu · Aug 17, 2016

It looks like most members would be ok with an extension. So that is what I will tell the scenario builder.

Sun Tzu Wu · Aug 17, 2016

PSPollux's PM box is full, so I could not send him the following message:

Unallocated has no objection to a time extension for SGOTM-23.

PSPollux, hopefully you will read this post and understand Unallocated's position on the dead line extension.

haphazard1 · Aug 17, 2016

Found time to look over the latest save. Lot going on....

I agree we do not want to vassalize Mehmed. We may need/want to take someone else as our one permitted vassal. And we should be able to finish him off, anyway.

I think we need to finish off some of the people we are currently at war with, so we can concentrate our forces more effectively. So we need a period of "consolidation" warfare, simplifying our strategic position a bit, then focus on crushing more enemies in focused bursts.

There are a number of techs availiable via trade that could be worthwhile. Civil Service (needed for Nationalism and drafting), Lierature and Drama (open Music, needed for Military Tradition if we decide to go there later, Heroic Epic would be nice and is very cheap with marble), Compass (opens Optics for better ships to deal with the trireme threat, although that will hopefully soon be no longer a concern as we kill the naval powers rather than fight their ships). We don't want to give up Education (let's keep the AIs away from Liberalism), but maybe Printing Press? Did we already trade this to Gandhi, or was that just proposed? If it is a monopoly, maybe we don't let that AIs have it yet.

We have a great general -- what to do with him? Another super medic? If we get Literature, then we could use him as an instructor in our Heroic Epic city. Of course, we would need to decide where to put the HE first....

I should have some time tomorrow to play some turns, if no one else wants to grab the save first. (Please go ahead, if you have time and can do so.) If no one else does, I will grab it in maybe 12-14 hours and try to play 10-12 turns (or whatever seems appropriate, depending on events).

ikotomi · Aug 17, 2016

We have 4 super medics I think. I was planning on settling it in Berlin after I finish chopping the university there, for the beakers and 2 xp.

Haven't made the trade yet with Gandhi, the trades with Gandhi and Churchill are proposed, as 600 gold is pretty rare to get from monarch ai.

BSPollux · Aug 18, 2016

Sun Tzu Wu said:
PSPollux's PM box is full, so I could not send him the following message:

Unallocated has no objection to a time extension for SGOTM-23.

PSPollux, hopefully you will read this post and understand Unallocated's position on the dead line extension.

Seen, I'll delete some stuff, thanks

haphazard1 · Aug 18, 2016

ikotomi said:
We have 4 super medics I think. I was planning on settling it in Berlin after I finish chopping the university there, for the beakers and 2 xp.

Where do we want to put the Heroic Epic (potentially, anyway)? That should be where we settle the Great General, since we have super medics already.

ikotomi said:
Haven't made the trade yet with Gandhi, the trades with Gandhi and Churchill are proposed, as 600 gold is pretty rare to get from monarch ai.

I had not checked the gold available -- this is a good point. That much cash will speed our research for a couple turns, and would be a nice pick up along with the techs.

ikotomi · Aug 18, 2016

If we build a Heroic Epic, I would put it in Berlin. It's also one of our best science cities because it has an academy, but I think it's still worth whipping it.

haphazard1 · Aug 18, 2016

Will play some turns starting in about an hour. Not sure how many yet, have to see how everything goes and how long each turn takes at this point in the game. Last call for comments.

haphazard1 · Aug 18, 2016

OK, have been playing the first turn...lots and lots of stuff to figure out what is going on, what units are where (ours and the various AIs)...took a while.

A couple things, in case anyone has time to offer advice:

- Rheims - I guess this was supposed to be gifted to an AI as a spy target? Now we seem to be stuck with it.

- Darius and Joao are showing the clenched fist..we may end up being at war with even more AIs at one time.
- I have held off on tech trading for the moment. Printing Press is a monopoly, and we do not have immediate use for anything we would get right now. We can make a deal later, possibly a better one.
- So many units, scattered all over the place. Lots of shuffling and consolidation in progress, along with moving to finish off the Ottomans and Greece. We need to simplify our situation a bit, then finish off Hatshepsut as well. Russia is going to take a bit longer, but I hope to have a couple big cities from them within a few turns. :evil:

- Why do I always seem to have musketeers where I want canons, and canons where I want musketeers? Such is life, I guess. :lol:

- Lots of empty cities needing a defender, just to prevent raids or counter-attacks. Will work on this also.

OK, now that I think I finally have an idea what is happening, time to actually hit end turn and see what happens.

More to come.....

ikotomi · Aug 18, 2016

Also, I have two spies on the city building a galley and should be able to board and get to london the turn it pops. Don't remember if it whipped.

haphazard1 · Aug 18, 2016

Thanks, ikotomi! :thumbsup:

I saw the spies, wasn't sure of what you had planned for them. We can send them to Churchill, but I don't know if there is anything they will be able to usefully do there. I will check.

I also need to remember to check the vote balance in the AP. Some more religion spreading might be useful, although it is a bit lower priority if we are not in danger of getting big votes against us.

SGOTM 23 - Unallocated

Dancing Bear

Deity

Dancing Bear

Prince

Prince

Prince

Chieftain

Deity

Deity

Deity

Deity

Dancing Bear

Prince

Deity

Dancing Bear

Prince

Dancing Bear

Dancing Bear

Prince

Dancing Bear

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