SGOTM3 Rome - Team handy

[mad-bax]

SGOTM3 Rome - Game Thread.

Hi everyone, and welcome to your game thread.

Here is the start position.


Here are a couple of links you might find useful.

The Original GOTM16 Announcement.
The Draft Constitution

This Months' sponsored variant is Xenophobic NOW
The rules are as follows.
1. Non-Oscillating War variant. You keep a list of opponents and the order in which you meet them.
2. You must declare war on the first Civ you meet before leaving the diplomacy screen for the first time.
3. You must stay at war with that Civ until one of you have been eliminated.
4. You must declare war on the second Civ you met on the same turn that the first Civ was eliminated or 20 turns has elapsed (whichever happens sooner). This is to prevent sandbagging.
5. After each opponent is eliminated or 20 turns elapse you must declare war on the next civ in the list.
6. If you run out of opponents because you haven't met them yet and 20 turns have elapsed, you must declare war on the next opponent you meet before leaving the diplomacy screen for the first time with them

The Xenophobic part of the variant runs as follows.
7. You may never own a foreign worker. You must never buy or sell one, and if you capture them they must be disbanded on the tile on which they were captured.
8. All deals must be at face value. No haggling.
9. You will not establish embassies.
10. You will never retain a town that contains foreign citizens. Such towns must be razed and any workers spawned disbanded.

Also there is a puzzle involving some non-standard Barbarian Units. The puzzle is framed in the same way as it was for the original GOTM16, but the solution is different.

The save will be available from >>HERE<< when the timelock is released. All of your teams save files will eventually be available from this link.

When you finish your turn, you may upload your save to >>THIS<< link

Have fun, and good luck everyone!

 

[handy900]

Hello all and welcome to the team! We are playing PTW 1.27f patch. This will be a very hard variant and should be large fun. Mad-Bax thinks less than 50% of the variant attempts will succeed. Let’s make sure we are in the 50% that does win.



Sign-in with a post below so I’ll know you have found the team thread.

Draft Play Order subject to change. We may have players I don’t know about.
1. Handy
2. coletite
3. T_McC
4. Tinkez
5. Yom

Here are the game parameters:
Civilization: Rome
Difficulty: Emperor
World size: 5000 tiles (Standard 100x100)
Landmass: Mystery - atypical - 52% Water - not Pangaea
Geology: young and rough (3 billion)
Environment: temperate, normal
Barbarians: Roaming, graphically enhanced, regionally intense**
Rivals: 11 Preset (no added bonuses)

We are playing the variant - Xenophobic Non Oscillating War

SGOTM etiquette boilerplate (blatantly plagiarized from Mad-Bax & Greebley)

Don’ts
Don’t look at other teams game threads. This is strictly forbidden, and the staff will know about it.
Don’t automate workers.
Don’t use city governors.
Don’t leave units on go-to orders that extend beyond your set of turns.
Don’t change build orders wholesale on your inherited turn without an explanation as to why you did it. If you have questions, post & get answers before you play.
Don't leave significant units (like leaders) fortified. Other problems are things like workers fortified in town, boats fortified, etc. Since we will be at war, use the “Y” key to place units on sentry. If AI units approach the sentry, the unit automatically wakes up, alerting you to the AI’s presence. This is very important when at war so you notice AI sneak attacks away from the front lines.
Don't ruin our reputation by breaking trades without team permission. This is a not likely in this variant.

DOs
Do read Narcissistic Nehru if you have not played a war variant like we are attempting in this game.
DO make sure you use PTW patch 1.27f.
DO be polite and constructive on you comments on game play. (if your sentence starts: "Who was the idiot that ... ", or “WTF…”; its a bad sign).
DO ask for a “skip” if real Life (RL) gets in the way of playing. Ask to be skipped, or play your turns on time. Please don't just go missing in action.
DO finish all your turns and upload the game saved at the END of the last turn. The upload link is in my signature.
DO follow the GOTM Rules.
DO include the turn number and the in-game date for each turn in your log. Note: the game begins with 4000 BC as turn zero, 3950 is turn 1, etc.
DO include reasons you made wholesale changes to city build orders (definitely called for in certain circumstances – like war. Just supply a good reason for your decision in the log. The other players may learn something new.
DO include a “NOTES” summary at the end of the turn log that communicates your intentions. (Where is that galley going? Where did the AI attack? What should the next player try to accomplish.)
DO read any previous discussion and the previous players turn. (Hopefully the previous player summarized very important parts in the final notes). This will avoid having good plans started by one player being ignored by the next.
DO check F1 each turn to make sure cities will not riot next turn.
DO stop in the middle of your turns, post a save and ask for the team’s opinion if you are unsure what to do. Post a save if you want some help. If something comes up during your turn which is a difficult decision, then it is completely appropriate to stop playing so a discussion can occur on the best path to follow.
DO ask players why they did something you don't understand. That's how you learn & get better.
Do feel free to explain in your post why you did something. Also feel free to ask players to comment on your decisions. Such as, I'm not sure if I should do X or Y, I chose X because of ___, was this okay?
DO forgive Handy for his typos and avoid commenting on his obnoxious habit of renaming cities.
Do make it a priority to saddle T_McC with all anarchy turns in the game.

I’ll try to begin play Tuesday night, so you have 24 hours to post opening play comments.

 

[coletite]

Hello team!

I wasn't planning on doing the varient (have never even attempted Emporer) but the team assignments were already posted before I could ask MB to put me in another team. After reading Handy's post, I'm inspired to give it a shot.

I'm still learning to play well on Monarchy, just to let everyone know.

Looking forward to hearing what everyone's ideas for the varient strategy will be.

Let's hope for a noncorrupted save!!!

 

[handy900]

Hello team!

I wasn't planning on doing the varient (have never even attempted Emporer) but the team assignments were already posted before I could ask MB to put me in another team. After reading Handy's post, I'm inspired to give it a shot.

I'm still learning to play well on Monarchy, just to let everyone know.

Looking forward to hearing what everyone's ideas for the varient strategy will be.

Let's hope for a noncorrupted save!!!

Glad to have you coletite. If you want to switch to a non variant team I think Mad-Bax would allow it since we have not played yet, but I'd encourage you to gove it a shot. We've got a strong team, and will give you lots of specific instructions if you like, so I think you'll be okay.

I recommend you browse some of the Always War links in my signature for ideas. In particular, look @ T_McC01. That game was always war ultra-xenophobic.

 

[mad-bax]

Yes... Gird your loins coletite. You will have a lot of fun. Trust me

 

[coletite]

Ok, I'm game.

Since it sounds like we'll be fighting a lot, I like the starting location. We have access to wine and game, 5 BG tiles, and a good number of hills for production. Plus, being on the hill, our capitol will have a defense bonus. Nice in case we have an expansionist neighbor and make early contact. I will take a look at the save when I get home and look at the mini-map.

Since we will be unable to capture workers, Rome is a good civ. The industrious trait will make our workers more effective.

[edit] You know, I've read through some AW games and it seems like a common strategy is to keep exploration to a minimum so as to try and hold off on contact with other civs. Will we want to follow the same strategy?

 

[T_McC]

I'm here.

Don't worry about the variant. Whatever mistakes people make, I'll just assume it's Handy's fault. He's old enough to know better. I can see Handy has already slotted himself in just ahead of me, to make me clean up his messes.

Let's talk a lot. Well-reasoned, meticulous, horrible plans are better than no plan at all.

First thing: Rome is Commercial and Militaristic, not Industrious. That was a typo in the Civ III vanilla manual. (Unless they've been modded for this game.) Cheap Barracks and Walls, lower corruption. We should start with Warrior Code and Alphabet. Pottery should be an early research target, and as Coletite mentioned, limited exploration would be wise. We should settle as though this is an AW game.

Since this is PtW, military great leaders can rush Great Wonders. Exceptionally limited trade opportunities make the Great Library a significant target. The other uber-wonder will be the Pyramids and Sun Tzu's. The Great Wall would be interesting, if not as useful as in Conquests. No embassies means no MA's vs anyone, so that sneaky trick is out. The other great use we'll have for an MGL is an early, well-placed FP.

Should be interesting.

 

[T_McC]

First criticism of Handy.

Do we want yourself, Yom and I all in a row? I'm not familiar with Tinkez, we may want to break up the 2 non-AW players. (How about you, coletite, me, tinkez, yom?)

Oh, and is there some sort of anal-retentive rule like only 1 person can download a save? Or can we all look at it between turns?

 

[Yom]

Checking in.

I think we should found on the starting spot as well. With just 20-turns to destroy a civ we'll be at war with the world almost as fast as we can contact them, so it'll be very similar to AW, just a little less harsh with no faraway opponents sending units.

I was sort of confused by Handy's roster too. It would probably be better if we separated Coletite and Tinkez's turns.

 

[handy900]

Forgot to post the "Fart Luck" candle.



We can all download the save & comment between each player's turns. Last game we had a new player stop during his turns to ask for direction, and then continue. I'll confirm with Mad-Bax this is still ok. I think it is still allowed.

As far as the order goes, that's not set, so we can kick around ideas to get what we think is the best possible order. We'll want to sandwich coletite between 2 experienced players. Not sure if Tinkez has played an always war game (he can post & tell us) but I'm pretty sure he said in SGOTM2 that he beats Emperor regularly.

How about you (handy), coletite, me(T_McC), Tinkez, Yom?)

The above looks okay, or perhaps switch coletite to 4th and Tinkez to 2nd. Not sure where to place coletite, but I'm glad he decided to stick around. Being 4th he could find himself in a dogfight for survival with 2 spears against an archer 8-pack. Honest opinions are welcome.

I won’t play until tomorrow. By then we’ll have a mini-map, which may tell us what our odds of a 2-front war are.

I agree we basically approach this as an always war game. Given the xenophobic variant, it’s perhaps harder than straight AWE. I’m lighting a lucky candle for the pyramids off an early defensive elite win.

Couple of discussion questions:
#1 Do we go for pottery first over bronze working? Reading the variant rules again, we must declare on the first Civ immediately. We get a 20-turn breather for each of the remaining Civs assuming we are already at war with someone. Early war with no spears would be a bummer. F10 will tell us who we are playing, and help us guess our chances for an early first contact trade for the 3 techs we really want - masonry, BW and pottery.

#2 If we delay contact too long we may have no trade opportunities with our first victim before we declare. After the first victim scouting should be scaled back, but until then we need to at least find out where the likely iron resources are. Archer rush for Iron on emperor is a bummer, and since we can’t build Zeus in PTW, Iron (or at least horses) is vital to our survival.

Then of course we’ll need math for cats, and Lit for the GL, and currency since our economy will suck, and …

 

[coletite]

Put me wherever you want. I played with Handy and Tinkez in SGOTM2, so they are fairly knowledgeable about my abilities (or lack thereof).

Are we going for a quick domination win? I assume since we will be at war a lot, that would be the best bet.

#1. Not sure. On the surface, bronze working seams like the best choice, but it all depends on how close we are to the nearest neighbor. What about starting with pottery while keeping exploration limited to finding the first few city sites, then ramping up exploration once we start on bronze working? Just brainstorming.

#2. Guess I answered this in #1.

 

[Tinkez]

Checking in.

I normally beat Emperor, as Handy remembered. However, this will be my first AW game, but I've been lurking on several AW games Currently I'm playing on Jumpmasters 1A - No research variant C3C 1.22 Emperor.

I trust this game will be great, I'm looking forward to this!

I give my vote on settling on the spot, we'll have the river, many BG's and the wines. Worker I would move west. About the research : As I haven't been playing AW-games, I would take it safely and go for BW. I trust our first contact will have pottery which we can grab before declaring war.

I also have an announcement to make for the team : I will be traveling from work for 11 days, starting next Saturday(17/07). I will have Internet connection whenever I'm staying at one place, but there might be a few days when I'm out of reach. Please feel free to skip me if I've been quiet for a while and my turns are up.

 

[mad-bax]

Oh, and is there some sort of anal-retentive rule like only 1 person can download a save? Or can we all look at it between turns?

The only restriction in this respect is that each player must play his own turns. If things get a little difficult you are not allowed to skip less experienced players. Stopping to ask advice midway through turns is permitted and part of normal SG play. It's not a problem.

 

[Tinkez]

Do we want yourself, Yom and I all in a row? I'm not familiar with Tinkez, we may want to break up the 2 non-AW players. (How about you, coletite, me, tinkez, yom?)

I think T_McC's suggestion is good, let's let Handy to start and have the roster like this:

Handy => UP!
Coletite
T_McC
Tinkez => I might have to be skipped if it takes a long time to start the game (because of my trip)
Yom

 

[Tinkez]

One thing that popped my mind worth mentioning. It's quite obvious, but I say it anyway:

If such situation occurs that we are about to eliminate a civ before 20 turns are up and we still haven't declared on all of the remaining contacted civs, we might want to postpone the elimination of the first civ in order to reduce the number of opponents and build up our military there between. This will ease our war preparations and allow easier troop movement before declaring and giving us an edge on the first fights when we can choose the ground.

Just to share my thoughts and maybe get some discussion

 

[handy900]

If such situation occurs that we are about to eliminate a civ before 20 turns are up and we still haven't declared on all of the remaining contacted civs, we might want to postpone the elimination of the first civ in order to reduce the number of opponents and build up our military there between. This will ease our war preparations and allow easier troop movement before declaring and giving us an edge on the first fights when we can choose the ground.

Good idea. I think We will want to postpone war as long as possible.

I should be able to get us started tonight.

I'll settle on the spot. Hill on a river with lux & game (after expansion). My inclination is to road & mine the BG to the NE, then road the wines. After expansion we can work the game which will act like a mined BG, so mining another BG before we hook up the wines can wait. Looks like we may only have 1 forest tile to chop inside Rome's 21 unless there are others under the fog.

Build 2 or 3 warriors & from there see what our build options are.

Looks like the concensus for the order is:

Handy
coletite
T_McC
Tinkez
Yom

Has anyone looked at the save to see what our chances of trading for pottery are?

 

[Tinkez]

10. You will never retain a town that contains foreign citizens. Such towns must be razed and any workers spawned disbanded.

Does this mean that we can sell existing buildings from a captured town before disbanding the town? In the game thread there was indication that you can check wheter or not the town has foreign citizens or not. This would allow us to get money from their buildings before disbanding.

Also there is a puzzle involving some non-standard Barbarian Units. The puzzle is framed in the same way as it was for the original GOTM16, but the solution is different.

Did anyone from our team play the original GOTM16? What was this puzzle there?

 

[T_McC]

We'll definitely want to chop and irrigate the Game forest. That will take us to +4 food and allow for settlers every 6 turns (with a Granary, and a military unit between each settler).

Agreed that should a situation arise where it is possible, we should delay a war declaration. These rules allow us to make a gpt or lux deal when we meet a civ and we're not already involved in a war.

 

[handy900]

These rules allow us to make a gpt or lux deal when we meet a civ and we're not already involved in a war.

EDIT See next post for the answer.

Agree on chopping & irrigating bambi.

Does this mean that we can sell existing buildings from a captured town before disbanding the town? In the game thread there was indication that you can check wheter or not the town has foreign citizens or not. This would allow us to get money from their buildings before disbanding.

See next post

 

[handy900]

Questions & Answers

Question 1

Also - Are we correct in assuming we can agree to gpt deals as long as we will not be required to break the gpt deal during the next 20 turns? In other words, can I pay Civ X 5gpt since I don't have to declare war on them for 30 more turns because Civ Y is next in line with a declaration due in 10 turns?

Answer 1

If you say to a civ "what do you want for steam?" and they reply "Democracy +127g + 55gpt +WM". Then you can accept it and declare war befor leaving the trade screen if you like. Your rep is yours to do as you wish with.

Question 2

Does this mean that we can sell existing buildings from a captured town before disbanding the town? In the game thread there was indication that you can check wheter or not the town has foreign citizens or not. This would allow us to get money from their buildings before disbanding.

Answer 2

As for disbanding towns. No you can't do what you ask. The idea is this... When you kill the last defender in a city, you get the choice of keeping the city, or razing it. You must always raze it. The exception is if the city was originally built by you. In this case you are allowed to see if there are any foreigners in the city. If there are you raze it, if not then you may keep it. No selling buildings.