Game settings:
Chieftain - Tiny
Arid - Cool - 5 billion - Pangaea (80%)
Sedentary barbarians
Persians against Maya and Iroquois.
Culturally linked and AI respawn on, all the rest default.
I wanted a fast movement map with few jungle and other obstructions that hamper road building. Also I wouldn't need fields of grassland, but would need some bonus food, these are generated regardless.
The huts were included to get an early settler. The impact on trying to get a science leader would be minimal since there aren't many huts available on a tiny map. (For reference I counted about 6 total, counting one I didn't see but did see the resulting barbarian.)
I played Persians because they have the best swordsman UU in the game, and to improve the chance of getting a science leader. Another civ I tried was the Celts, which worked well also.
My enemies were chosen for their agricultural trait which would speed up their settling as well as potentially have them build cities with capture potential. Also I planned to research down the Burial path so no religious. Nor expansionist because of the inclusion of huts.
Plan
The plan was threefold. The first and very important step was to get a close hut that could be popped by my worker, or an early warrior. To get a settler or city. This is easily achieved and I found many maps where I got this. The better the location nearby this free settler the better the game will be. That is, if you can get this second city producing settlers quickly you have doubled your domination speed.
The second step was to take out the early civ locations, the closer they are and the less their cities are defended the better. Most times if you get there before 20 turns have gone they will have no defenders or a mere warrior. A warrior I will take a risk, but I am hoping for nothing.
The third step is getting a science leader to rush ToA, on larger maps you might be able to build it instead and still compete but with tiny there is little chance you can build it in time and still dominate early.
Playing
Phase One
I've attached the start that this thread describes. MapFinder got this one for me, my settings were only to find a cow and a river. The gold looked promising but I never actually got a chance to develop and use it. I did manage a very fast research time, without deficit spending. I needed gold to do some upgrades of the early warriors.
I started building a couple warriors while my worker started irrigating the cow. Once done irrigating my worker popped a hut and got a settler. The settler I sent northwest since to the south I saw jungle and in reality all I cared about was getting the city out enough so I used culture expansions most efficiently, and of course settling as fast as possible. In other words the long term thoughts of city placement aren't needed here. In this game I figured on one expansion for all cities and two for the capital. At any rate this settler managed to find some wheat, but far from freshwater it took a while to develop (Still quicker than the jungles to the south, which I never touched).
Phase Two
Since I had two more mountains to explore that determined the directions of my warriors, and the direction of my game as I was to discover. In each case my warriors spotted borders, both to the southwest and the north, so they set out to monger.
My first warrior, moved next to the iroquois capital blind, to see his worker alongside the city, thus when Hia complained I declared war. He then retreated his worker to his undefended city. This I took next turn. (~3500 BC)
My second warrior declared war and captured a worker in his move alongside the Mayan capital. The following turn, he earned his keep by defeating a defending warrior and capturing the Mayan capital. Although it was somewhat lucky, it was close, the warrior was 1/3.
I got peace, ~200 gold and 3 techs and another slave from the Mayans and Iroquois a few turn later.
Itza was positioned surrounded by floodplains and a developed floodplain wheat, which is no doubt why I had to deal with Mayan oppression for a number of turns. I set this city to start worker building, with the intents of settlers once I got some more development, meaning shields in this case. Salamanca had a single floodplain which was developed but was surrounded by shieldlands and forests, I started a worker here also, but was to then build a barracks (with the help of some forest clearing).
Although in my trek my warrior spotted another good settling position to the south, a cow, and shieldlands and a floodplain. My first settler went there.
After getting Pottery and my first settler out I began construction of a granary in my capital. This was helped greatly by the nearby forest which I cut down two, and a third for the settler that was to follow. I also cut down two to speed up the barracks in Salamanca, so the change in Conquests have really made forest clearing a valuable strategy IMO.
Phase Three
Completed Burial a few turns short of 10, IIRC. Then began Mysticism, completing it in 3000 BC I got my first and only science leader. At this point the game seemed *highly* likely to beat my earlier fast domination attempt, I immeidately began research on Polytheism, which would take 18 turns by my advisors estimate.
Finale
I've included a minimap image from some selected times, the first two were described below. The 2150 date was once ToA was completed and my expansion by settler and sword was in full swing.
Made a few mistakes, one is I wasted my time researching Iron (about 8 turns), because 2 turns short of finishing CivAssist lets me know the AI have it. I needed this to began my conquests, but naturally I also wanted to begin getting iron connected. As luck would have it, I already had it connected by road to another city, but this did nothing for me really. But these turns delayed me getting Republic by some amount. After this I began the Philosophy slingshot to Republic, with the intents of trading it to the AI and then began taking their cities, where they can no longer pop rush.
I did get Wheel from a hut, but this didn't affect me, it did make it cheaper for the AI to research, but Hia (the only one I cared to prevent getting Horses) never got it.
Once I got Republic (I don't make the mistake of switching anymore.) I gave it to Smoke and then declared war, taking one of his cities. I only had 6 immortals at this point, one died taking the city and another was set up to kill a Mayan exploring unit far to the south. (As a side note, it seems the AI are less likely to complain to you while in anarchy, or at least the turn they start.)
The other immortals were in position to attack Iroquois cities which I began shortly thereafter. Immortals cut thru spearman like butter, well mostly. I took two Iroquois cities and made another mistake, somehow I overlooked a warrior near the Iroquois borders, and in the turn I expected domination (or turn prior) he captured and destroyed one of undefended cities! He was getting me back for doing the same to him 2000 years prior.
The problem was I placed the cities too close because my timing was off, I had to delay an attack to get a defender in place. The AI may only have 1-2 units floating around, but they will always be at the worst location when you want to declare war, like adjacent to your capital, not in this case. But I didn't want to lose an undefended city that is contributing 21 squares, so I had to move a unit to attack this exploring unit before I declared. But I decided to settle anyway.
Fortunately, the gap opened by that city loss was already roaded and I had some nearby settlers to quickly settler and take back the 6 squares that were left (after taking his city). Placing another settler to get another 4 tiles or so I achieved domination in 1450 BC, after about an hour and a half of playing.
Mistakes
Wasting my time on Iron was pure waste, it delayed by eventual mongering and was a simple mistake. The AI just about *always* research Iron, and I know this.
I think I was so happy when I got the science leader and finished Polytheism that when it came time to rush the ToA, I was too excited and didn't think about what I was doing. At any rate, this 8 or so turns had some major effects, it delayed the warring by something in that range, it also allowed the Mayans to found another city (he was moving his settler a turn or two before I was prepared to declare). And this city's borders took a few territory from me.
Not paying attention to defense in the endgame cost me a city and its squares. I was fully expecting to win after I hit the space bar. And if not then, then the following turn. Which may be why I wasn't paying attention to defense.
Future Improvements
I'm hoping some others have ideas here. I feel this was a pretty good game and while there were mistakes, I expect most games to have a few, at least *my* games.
One thing I may try in the future is do more midgame mongering. I planned the first cause it is easy on chieftain to take cities with warriors. And the endgame was using immortals and gifting Republic to keep the cities from devastation. But I could try some midgame capital capturing, as long as they have culture they will stay and you could do this every 10 turns with AI respawning.
Play with 3 civs instead of two. I played two because I had no intention of building more than 2 warriors, and figured with enough games and luck 2 early warriors equals two early enemy capitals.
The map was pretty good, the start was moderate. Both could be improved upon, I didn't realize but this map has another little island on it. Getting a map with one solid landmass would make the domination limit easier. From the limited maps I've seen domination of 292 is pretty low.
Another area thats very dependant on map layout is not getting peace immediately and trying to get another free city. Instead of 5 cities by 3000 BC, you'd have 7, or 6 and 9 (with 3 civs). Thats the theoretical maximum by my estimation, assuming you are building a granary in the capital. The problem is you want then close to get to them quick, but then you want them to spawn far enough away that you never see their retribution since you will not likely have defenses in place to fend off their free units. These goals may be impossible to achieve, that is they only spawn close on a tight small map, so can't respawn much further away. I've yet to achieve any of this in any game, I only known an early capture like this weighs big in the AI's mind so you can get alot for it.
Now someone depending on huge luck can use a leader for pyramids and save about 10 turns (and build 2 more settlers in that time). So assuming some kind of perfect luck, free settler, 3 nearby civs, an early pyramids leader and cites for peace you could have 1 + 1 + 3 + 3 + 3 = 11 cities by 3000 BC. As a comparison all the other top games have had about 3, a couple have captured one. None seem to have gotten any free hut settlers, and since they aren't rare I suspect they are fishing for science leaders and not using huts.
Anyway to beat this game, spend that leader on pyramids and hope for another. I couldn't do it, my first good game testing this technique I didn't get one until more than 50 turns, this one came earlier but I still couldn't bring myself to spend it on pyramids.
Another thing I started researching Poly, and ending up spending a lot of time here, when I could have spent less time overall if I waited for more cities and a faster tech rate, this is since I had other require research goals like Iron and Republic. You do not need this early, you need it for 5 turns and this could even be your last 5 turns. In the future, even with an early leader, I'll hold off rushing into Poly and move along as planned getting Poly when I can research it faster. Other games I've done it in 8 turns, which is a large savings over 18.
Summation
For those that just want an insight to the game and its success, what follows are what I think the keys to success are.
1. The most obvious is building ToA, I do not think this is time critical, as long as you plan ahead on your city placements.
2. Use the power of forests, early on since you'll have a lot of undeveloped cities than can only build workers, use that to your advantage and clear forests. In this game, I cut down at least 10 forests to help build a granary, a barracks, a few settlers and even some immortals.
3. Take advantage of the AI city building, especially early on. Note this is slowly less useful as you increase difficulty and map size.
4. Early hut settler, in my opinion, is more powerful than pyramids for the early game. And since I lack the patience to play for two leaders, I planned my strategy ignoring pyramids.
These are ordered by importance, 2 and 3 you should be able to do in every game. Number 4 is easily likely, if you expect to see about 2 huts near your start spot you can expect half your games to have a settler or city. And finally if you play scientific and you research an average of 10 techs you can expect to get a leader in half your games, although in practice its a rare game I play on tiny that doesn't give at least one in AA (then again maybe that is anecdotal since I probably abandon many games after not getting any in the first few techs.)
Chieftain - Tiny
Arid - Cool - 5 billion - Pangaea (80%)
Sedentary barbarians
Persians against Maya and Iroquois.
Culturally linked and AI respawn on, all the rest default.
I wanted a fast movement map with few jungle and other obstructions that hamper road building. Also I wouldn't need fields of grassland, but would need some bonus food, these are generated regardless.
The huts were included to get an early settler. The impact on trying to get a science leader would be minimal since there aren't many huts available on a tiny map. (For reference I counted about 6 total, counting one I didn't see but did see the resulting barbarian.)
I played Persians because they have the best swordsman UU in the game, and to improve the chance of getting a science leader. Another civ I tried was the Celts, which worked well also.
My enemies were chosen for their agricultural trait which would speed up their settling as well as potentially have them build cities with capture potential. Also I planned to research down the Burial path so no religious. Nor expansionist because of the inclusion of huts.
Plan
The plan was threefold. The first and very important step was to get a close hut that could be popped by my worker, or an early warrior. To get a settler or city. This is easily achieved and I found many maps where I got this. The better the location nearby this free settler the better the game will be. That is, if you can get this second city producing settlers quickly you have doubled your domination speed.
The second step was to take out the early civ locations, the closer they are and the less their cities are defended the better. Most times if you get there before 20 turns have gone they will have no defenders or a mere warrior. A warrior I will take a risk, but I am hoping for nothing.
The third step is getting a science leader to rush ToA, on larger maps you might be able to build it instead and still compete but with tiny there is little chance you can build it in time and still dominate early.
Playing
Phase One
I've attached the start that this thread describes. MapFinder got this one for me, my settings were only to find a cow and a river. The gold looked promising but I never actually got a chance to develop and use it. I did manage a very fast research time, without deficit spending. I needed gold to do some upgrades of the early warriors.
I started building a couple warriors while my worker started irrigating the cow. Once done irrigating my worker popped a hut and got a settler. The settler I sent northwest since to the south I saw jungle and in reality all I cared about was getting the city out enough so I used culture expansions most efficiently, and of course settling as fast as possible. In other words the long term thoughts of city placement aren't needed here. In this game I figured on one expansion for all cities and two for the capital. At any rate this settler managed to find some wheat, but far from freshwater it took a while to develop (Still quicker than the jungles to the south, which I never touched).
Phase Two
Since I had two more mountains to explore that determined the directions of my warriors, and the direction of my game as I was to discover. In each case my warriors spotted borders, both to the southwest and the north, so they set out to monger.
My first warrior, moved next to the iroquois capital blind, to see his worker alongside the city, thus when Hia complained I declared war. He then retreated his worker to his undefended city. This I took next turn. (~3500 BC)
My second warrior declared war and captured a worker in his move alongside the Mayan capital. The following turn, he earned his keep by defeating a defending warrior and capturing the Mayan capital. Although it was somewhat lucky, it was close, the warrior was 1/3.
I got peace, ~200 gold and 3 techs and another slave from the Mayans and Iroquois a few turn later.
Itza was positioned surrounded by floodplains and a developed floodplain wheat, which is no doubt why I had to deal with Mayan oppression for a number of turns. I set this city to start worker building, with the intents of settlers once I got some more development, meaning shields in this case. Salamanca had a single floodplain which was developed but was surrounded by shieldlands and forests, I started a worker here also, but was to then build a barracks (with the help of some forest clearing).
Although in my trek my warrior spotted another good settling position to the south, a cow, and shieldlands and a floodplain. My first settler went there.
After getting Pottery and my first settler out I began construction of a granary in my capital. This was helped greatly by the nearby forest which I cut down two, and a third for the settler that was to follow. I also cut down two to speed up the barracks in Salamanca, so the change in Conquests have really made forest clearing a valuable strategy IMO.
Phase Three
Completed Burial a few turns short of 10, IIRC. Then began Mysticism, completing it in 3000 BC I got my first and only science leader. At this point the game seemed *highly* likely to beat my earlier fast domination attempt, I immeidately began research on Polytheism, which would take 18 turns by my advisors estimate.
Finale
I've included a minimap image from some selected times, the first two were described below. The 2150 date was once ToA was completed and my expansion by settler and sword was in full swing.
Made a few mistakes, one is I wasted my time researching Iron (about 8 turns), because 2 turns short of finishing CivAssist lets me know the AI have it. I needed this to began my conquests, but naturally I also wanted to begin getting iron connected. As luck would have it, I already had it connected by road to another city, but this did nothing for me really. But these turns delayed me getting Republic by some amount. After this I began the Philosophy slingshot to Republic, with the intents of trading it to the AI and then began taking their cities, where they can no longer pop rush.
I did get Wheel from a hut, but this didn't affect me, it did make it cheaper for the AI to research, but Hia (the only one I cared to prevent getting Horses) never got it.
Once I got Republic (I don't make the mistake of switching anymore.) I gave it to Smoke and then declared war, taking one of his cities. I only had 6 immortals at this point, one died taking the city and another was set up to kill a Mayan exploring unit far to the south. (As a side note, it seems the AI are less likely to complain to you while in anarchy, or at least the turn they start.)
The other immortals were in position to attack Iroquois cities which I began shortly thereafter. Immortals cut thru spearman like butter, well mostly. I took two Iroquois cities and made another mistake, somehow I overlooked a warrior near the Iroquois borders, and in the turn I expected domination (or turn prior) he captured and destroyed one of undefended cities! He was getting me back for doing the same to him 2000 years prior.
The problem was I placed the cities too close because my timing was off, I had to delay an attack to get a defender in place. The AI may only have 1-2 units floating around, but they will always be at the worst location when you want to declare war, like adjacent to your capital, not in this case. But I didn't want to lose an undefended city that is contributing 21 squares, so I had to move a unit to attack this exploring unit before I declared. But I decided to settle anyway.
Fortunately, the gap opened by that city loss was already roaded and I had some nearby settlers to quickly settler and take back the 6 squares that were left (after taking his city). Placing another settler to get another 4 tiles or so I achieved domination in 1450 BC, after about an hour and a half of playing.
Mistakes
Wasting my time on Iron was pure waste, it delayed by eventual mongering and was a simple mistake. The AI just about *always* research Iron, and I know this.
I think I was so happy when I got the science leader and finished Polytheism that when it came time to rush the ToA, I was too excited and didn't think about what I was doing. At any rate, this 8 or so turns had some major effects, it delayed the warring by something in that range, it also allowed the Mayans to found another city (he was moving his settler a turn or two before I was prepared to declare). And this city's borders took a few territory from me.
Not paying attention to defense in the endgame cost me a city and its squares. I was fully expecting to win after I hit the space bar. And if not then, then the following turn. Which may be why I wasn't paying attention to defense.
Future Improvements
I'm hoping some others have ideas here. I feel this was a pretty good game and while there were mistakes, I expect most games to have a few, at least *my* games.
One thing I may try in the future is do more midgame mongering. I planned the first cause it is easy on chieftain to take cities with warriors. And the endgame was using immortals and gifting Republic to keep the cities from devastation. But I could try some midgame capital capturing, as long as they have culture they will stay and you could do this every 10 turns with AI respawning.
Play with 3 civs instead of two. I played two because I had no intention of building more than 2 warriors, and figured with enough games and luck 2 early warriors equals two early enemy capitals.
The map was pretty good, the start was moderate. Both could be improved upon, I didn't realize but this map has another little island on it. Getting a map with one solid landmass would make the domination limit easier. From the limited maps I've seen domination of 292 is pretty low.
Another area thats very dependant on map layout is not getting peace immediately and trying to get another free city. Instead of 5 cities by 3000 BC, you'd have 7, or 6 and 9 (with 3 civs). Thats the theoretical maximum by my estimation, assuming you are building a granary in the capital. The problem is you want then close to get to them quick, but then you want them to spawn far enough away that you never see their retribution since you will not likely have defenses in place to fend off their free units. These goals may be impossible to achieve, that is they only spawn close on a tight small map, so can't respawn much further away. I've yet to achieve any of this in any game, I only known an early capture like this weighs big in the AI's mind so you can get alot for it.
Now someone depending on huge luck can use a leader for pyramids and save about 10 turns (and build 2 more settlers in that time). So assuming some kind of perfect luck, free settler, 3 nearby civs, an early pyramids leader and cites for peace you could have 1 + 1 + 3 + 3 + 3 = 11 cities by 3000 BC. As a comparison all the other top games have had about 3, a couple have captured one. None seem to have gotten any free hut settlers, and since they aren't rare I suspect they are fishing for science leaders and not using huts.
Anyway to beat this game, spend that leader on pyramids and hope for another. I couldn't do it, my first good game testing this technique I didn't get one until more than 50 turns, this one came earlier but I still couldn't bring myself to spend it on pyramids.
Another thing I started researching Poly, and ending up spending a lot of time here, when I could have spent less time overall if I waited for more cities and a faster tech rate, this is since I had other require research goals like Iron and Republic. You do not need this early, you need it for 5 turns and this could even be your last 5 turns. In the future, even with an early leader, I'll hold off rushing into Poly and move along as planned getting Poly when I can research it faster. Other games I've done it in 8 turns, which is a large savings over 18.
Summation
For those that just want an insight to the game and its success, what follows are what I think the keys to success are.
1. The most obvious is building ToA, I do not think this is time critical, as long as you plan ahead on your city placements.
2. Use the power of forests, early on since you'll have a lot of undeveloped cities than can only build workers, use that to your advantage and clear forests. In this game, I cut down at least 10 forests to help build a granary, a barracks, a few settlers and even some immortals.
3. Take advantage of the AI city building, especially early on. Note this is slowly less useful as you increase difficulty and map size.
4. Early hut settler, in my opinion, is more powerful than pyramids for the early game. And since I lack the patience to play for two leaders, I planned my strategy ignoring pyramids.
These are ordered by importance, 2 and 3 you should be able to do in every game. Number 4 is easily likely, if you expect to see about 2 huts near your start spot you can expect half your games to have a settler or city. And finally if you play scientific and you research an average of 10 techs you can expect to get a leader in half your games, although in practice its a rare game I play on tiny that doesn't give at least one in AA (then again maybe that is anecdotal since I probably abandon many games after not getting any in the first few techs.)
