Some Deity Fun with Mao

[Lain]

Used to read here all the time, although I never posted. Forgot about the forum and the game for years. Came back a few weeks ago and finally want to "master" Deity, only being able to fluke like 10-20% of games so far.

My Settings:

Deity
Fractal
Standard Speed
No Huts
No Events
Random Leader (going to post my latest game with Mao)

Really want to win this kind of setup on a regular basis. Taking first start position I get. Currently I am caught in a vicious cycle of cruising through five games on Immortal with increasingly sloppy play, building up confidence and then... getting stomped on Deity. I have to fix this somehow or my therapist will be a rich man soon.

Anyway, here goes (will try to insert Screenshots and Save in the end, hope it works out?), Turn 100:



Boxed in to 6 (soon 7) cities in a corner with Bismarck as neighbour. Hate the land and research is pitiful. Tech situation is decent, just got in GBL and finished NE. Some embarrassing Micro I barely deserve to live for , but in my defence, Immortal is just so forgiving with that. Also feeling irritated since I don't have a particular goal in mind for my economy, wasting some turns.



I know exactly how this game is going to unfold (if I keep on playing) and I basically lose motivation. Will somehow crawl to Cuirs at a pitiful date, take out 2 (3 at a stretch) cities from Bismarck without making any more progress. My so-called economy will crash and that's game over.

Absolutely lacking the nous to get out the best of my land. I already feel quite uncomfortable without a "classical" buro capital. But this is even more meh. No idea where the beakers are going to come from. Some basic questions:

1) Do I even build libraries in the coastal cities? Or just grow max pop and run Caste? Spiritual would be cool. SE is not my forte anyways, but where is my research going to come from otherwise?

2) Is it even possible or viable to tech to, say, Cannons here? Feel like I will be fighting at tech parity (at best). And it's just going to be a huuuge grind. There must be a more elegant way to do this, surely?

3) Position right now should be winnable in theory?

Can provide the Startsave too, if anyone is interested. Feel like posting some more on here and discussing gameplay, shadowing games and all that good stuff. Because no way in hell am I going to play Civ V or VI. Need to master Deity first so I can move on with life

 

[georgjorge]

1. With land like this, and cities like this...you did get the Great Lighthouse, right?

2. I would be very interested in playing from the starting save, although I can't say how much time I will find for it.

3. To answer your question about libraries - not needed in the coastal cities. When you have Great Library + National Epic in one city, your other cities won't generate a single Great Person just by running two scientists. Grow them for mass specialists with Caste, or don't bother.

 

[Lain]

1. Sadly, no Great Lighthouse. Didn't see clam and just SIP. 2nd city had to block Bismarck inland. But seems like a good move. Would settle one east or on Silk in hindsight and go for GL.

Probably made the game harder than necessary right there. Pretty sure it's still winnable, but I probably can't do it. Or maybe I could with 1950 AD Nukes or something like that, but seems silly.

2. Uploading it

3. So just grow everything to its cap and live off trade routes and Caste? Don't know how to get to something like Cannons without Oxford-Buro-Capital and things like that. Feels hopeless (with my current skillset)

 

[DrCron]

Ah, a fellow 10%-20% Deity winner! Great, I also need more posts like this! I don't think I can win with Mao on Deity or give you good advice so I won't play the game, but will follow the thread.

How come you are at war with Mansa?

 

[Fippy]

I think you played mostly right, GLH is not something i would like to try here.
Getting cities early is more important with close AIs, and with marble it's better going for Lit like you did

I would not have settled Nanjing, fish + horsies instead like marked.
(7th city costs you *much* gold, try to always stay at 6 on such maps).
Bejing can use 2 food resis with National Epic.
Esp. cos you do not have other cities for GP generation (and not much need also with Glib + NE).

No libraries other than in Bejing imo.
Shanghai should work gold always (after Oasis growth), and other cities for settlers.

Imo what hurt you most here is settling order, Chengdu def. city 3.
Guanghou + Nanjing are not good early settles (you can then also skip AH).

6 cities is not boxed in imo, that's quiet nice for a relaxed deity game

After Lit, goal should usually be Caste + Philo (bulb) for Paci.
(Currency or Music sometimes, if not teched by AIs faster).
That's mostly why no libraries needed (Caste).
Let's also remember Chengdu earlier settled, with 2 seafood you can prepare the city for Paci.

 

[georgjorge]

I've started playing on from your 375BC save to 100AD, and I don't think it's hopeless at all. Good old Cuirassier rush could work. First to Philo and decent cities for whipping out an army.

Some remarks on your current situation:
- you seem to overvalue Libraries, as I said before
- I re-negotiated resource trades - your were almost at health cap but far below happy cap. Got some extra gold out of the trades
- Settling the first Great Scientist is sometimes good, not sure about it here
- I don't know how you got to be at war with Mansa. Did you bribe someone onto him before or after he already was at war? Mansa in a pointless war is fine for slowing him down, but he's also a great trading partner so not sure if you should have joined the war. And he might crack under the pressure of two attackers and vassal to the Mongols in which case you'll have a hard time attacking them

 

[DrCron]

No libraries other than in Bejing imo.

What about culture? I tend to build libraries early mostly to get the border pop when I don't have a neighbor that will spam missionaries.

In this map Shanghai could lose the gold to Essen if it doesn't produce enough culture, right?

 

[Fippy]

You are right, no libs was a bit too general.
If you think it's better than a monument, and no reli spread, they can be okay.

Forests would help Shanghai building it, not a bad investment probably.

 

[georgjorge]

To Military Tradition at 580AD...

Spoiler :

Since Mansa did well in the war and Kublai made peace with him, I had the idea of bribing Bismarck onto Mansa to slow him down and reduce his army. Not so good though: he didn't open borders with Sury to get to him (even though he could since they are both fighting the same target, and he actually should be Cautious with him and not Annoyed as far as I can tell). Then Kublai joined the war again, let's see how it goes.

I still have eight turns to Gunpowder. Making some War Elephants and a Great Merchant to upgrade them, and then planning to bulb Printing Press with another Great Scientist. Bismarck will be tough if he won't send his army towards Mansa but it might be doable. Or who knows, maybe the AP will declare a holy war on him

 

[Izuul]

If you know you are going to run Caste early you can get artist border pops. It just depends on how soon you really need the border pop and how useful the library would be.

 

[DrCron]

If you know you are going to run Caste early you can get artist border pops. It just depends on how soon you really need the border pop and how useful the library would be.

I always get the feeling that CoL comes too late (except for Oracle games, of course). And on Deity usually most of my cities are close to enemy land and I end up getting libraries in maybe 4 or 5 of my 6 cities at least. Maybe that's something I should review in my strategy though.

 

[Lain]

Thanks for all the comments very helpful things mentioned. Definitely going to post some more in the next days. Rolled a very interesting Charley game to feature next while waiting to play this one more slowly and discussing stuff (if I'm alive after Cuirs rush I guess). Going to continue this tomorrow.

How come you are at war with Mansa?

Gave in to demand from Khmer. Thought it might benefit me long term to farm some diplo. Mansa will pretty much always trade anyway unless worst enemy. But yes, not sure about that decision. Bribed Kublai on him aswell to maybe get Friendly earlier. MM had Longbows already so thought he'd be fine.

I would not have settled Nanjing, fish + horsies instead like marked.
(7th city costs you *much* gold, try to always stay at 6 on such maps).

Never paid much attention to city count like that (simple thinking, more cities = better), but seems very significant. Definitely going to take more care there. Totally agree with the settling order. Was rather lazy play on my part. And some bad scouting, only revealing northern fishes quite late.

Also good discussion about libraries. Probably shouldn't just carelessly build them in fringe cities and just grow faster. Probably need every trade route modifier I can get with a start like this?

 

[georgjorge]

Continuing to play on from your 375BC save...

After getting to Cuirassiers and whipping some of them out (plus about 10 War Elephants I upgraded) I had a bright idea...

Spoiler :

...as Kublai had broken off from beating on Mansa (Sury had vassaled to Kublai, dragging him into the war). Gunpowder was a monopoly tech but it doesn't matter if the target is soon dead or vassaled anyway.

I waited until Bismarck's stack showed up in Kublai territory and attacked:

Spoiler :

The outcome after a few turns?

Spoiler :

So Bismarck is effectively dead (though he might make a good vassal) and I have the Buddhist shrine and the Mausoleum (I think you didn't start a Golden Age yet and it will help me get to Rifling). Kublai is not close to Rifling though Sury has Chemistry and could tech Military Science. If Kublai's stack is in a good position for me I might be able to declare on him in 5-6 turns and destroy it, but even if not once I get Rifling I can trade it for Chemistry + Steel, and Rifles + Cannons have a long window of opportunity.

Conclusion: you didn't do so poorly at all with your start, as it's very possible to get into a winning position from there!

Save attached...

 

[Lain]

I actually re-started this one and am going to provide some write-up of it later or tomorrow. Just tried to improve on my play and I think the comparison is extremely valuable. Currently at 1 AD, think the results are quite astonishing. I even started to think the land is actually amazing .

Looking forward to read/analyse your game after that, @georgjorge ... Want to reach Cuirs first aswell and then compare, should be interesting. But you seem to be doing very well, even with my somewhat botched opener. Very impressive .

@BornInCantaloup

Yes, I think you are making a lot of sense. I will upload my "new" Turn 100 Save later, think I have a much better base. Bigger cities and better infrastructure. Also tweaked the settling order and that helped A LOT. Careless (and needlessly rapid) expansion really hurt me, as you pointed out. The snowballing effects are insane.

However again no single cottage and I did the same thing with pottery, avoiding it together with Fishing and Mysticism . I totally understand the controversy, though I felt like my cities didn't do any growing in that period (building Settlers/Workers with the few imroved tiles, Capital running 2 Scientists asap. Got a really early GS.

Would be very interested in your opinion on that one. Will do a rather detailed write-up later and provide Save.

We need to play a cookbook game or whatever it is called soon . Have to learn more. Just lacking the diversity that you often need on Deity. For instance, if I had room for 12 cities, I'd probably screw it up, because no idea how to pace expansion properly. When to avoid settling something and leave it to the AI maybe. This is just standard Pangeae (though rolled from a Fractal script) and I managed to miss so many details with just 5% land or something. Total eye-opener, comparing new save with the one I posted yesterday.

Will check out your try aswell . Thanks for playing.

 

[shakabrade]

I took the save and settled on Silk to get +2 commerce and get +1 food on lake. Also not to kill potential seaside spots and to get some potential food (ofcourse I knew about seafood as I have seen screenies but I would definitely settle like this). A lot of food and GPP but not much commerce made for easy bulbs but not so easy Nationalism and Gunpowder. Anyways:

Spoiler :

Five Cuirs 500AD, attack on Bismarck 4 turns later.

By 1000AD he is no more:

Spoiler :

I have built Shwedagon Paya for earlier Pacifism. Probably only thing worth mentioning in this typical 6 city cuir breakout.

 

[Fippy]

Shaka and Cuirs, is hell freezing over?

 

[Lain]

Very nice @shakabrade. No Great Merchant for major upgrade, just some Knights and then whip Cuirs? What did you bulb? Philo/Paper/Edu/even Lib maybe? Self-tech Nationalism and Gunpowder?

So, my new attempt so far:

Spoiler :

I also settled on the Silk this time. Tech Agriculture/BW/Wheel/AH/Writing ... I think. Skipped Mysticism, Pottery and Fishing. This time I fogbusted the location for 2nd City and got something much better than last time. Growing Capital to Pop 6 for Settler whip and max overflow into Library, finish with chops. 3rd city will go to marked location and work Corn at Pop 1 for another Settler or Worker. Capital will work Copper + Cows and run 2 scientists at Pop 4 for first GS.

Why city there? To not waste great tile while I want GS as early as possible. Also a bit afraid of Bismarck settling Bananas (no border pop in Shanghai without Mysticism for a while yet.







Hoping to time backfill trades so Nanjing can hook up Fish after border pop in time.



Can you spot the problem with that approach? Come on, I thought this was Deity .



Finally someone got it and I went for Literature. Can't believe I had to tech Fishing and Myst myself though.

Then Mansa insults us. Only one proper reaction to such insult of mighty Chinese empire.





(No, but seriously: I declared same turn and bribed someone. Some things never change, exactly same thing happened in first game too. Don't see any harm really, it will slow him down, I farm some diplo and he will trade anyway. Not like he will die either.)

Built Great Lib 450 BC and started to collect a lot of Failgold (1000+) from the other stuff. Hammer Economy, hm? Can research at 100% until we crash economy at Cuirs.

Settled Cities 5+6 at south coast (Fish/Clam and Crab). Bit late, but maybe build Globe in Xian. Capital will grow all of the GS, maybe I can farm a GM in other city in time for upgrade with smart rotation? Like hell will I get the timing right . Go full caveman with Cuirs I guess and see what happens.

Cities and Tech situation at 1 AD:

Capital



Shanghai (City 2)



Guangzhou (City 3, inbetween)



Nanjing (City 4, north coast)



Xian (City 5, maybe Globe? Farm GM with Pacifism? Can I get 500 GPP here before we unleash Cuirs though? Don't tell me I have to calculate this. On Immortal I would remember 4 turns before Lib "Hey, some upgrades would be nice." And then start on it. And attack 10 turns late because who cares.



Chengdu or Cra(p)b City (City 6) ... making up the numbers, I guess?



Empire



Techs



Diplo (lots of closed borders... I keep them closed to the villains too so they don't get trade routes.

Appreciate any comments and discussion of course. I don't have any illusions: Lots of stuff I could improve on probably.

I really want to stop uploading stuff to those sites though. They will probably be deleted in 6 months or something? Can anyone point me to some guide on how I host screenshots here? Or I will get some webspace myself, can't be that hard I hope.

 

[georgjorge]

How to upload images here: when you post, click on the "manage attachments" button. You can upload images there, when they are uploaded you can link them like you would link images from other sites.

Your game seems really solid. But I'm not sold on sacrificing early expansion to get an early Great Scientist for an Academy in what is not such a great commerce city. I would have used the capital for faster expansion and gotten the Scientist later, done without an Academy and gone for a lot of bulbs (Philo - 2x Edu - Liberalism) and then Great Merchants.

Also don't keep borders closed just to deny them trade routes, in most cases (like here) the "villains" get enough trade routes already from open borders with AIs and you lose out on +1/+2 diplo. Only reason to keep borders closed is to not annoy their worse enemies.

 

[Lain]

Yes, not sure about Academy either. But I feel like quicker settling would have slowed me down too much (poor cities) and there is enough time to settle. Still debatable of course.

There seem to be more severe problems in my play though. I continued to Cuirs and just did terrible apparently.

Spoiler :

Lib only at 680 AD. Then still had to tech Gunpowder ... upgraded 15 Phants, but when I was ready to attack at 850 AD or something Bismarck (and most AIs) were too close to Rifling already.

Where did I lose all that time? Really don't get it. Maybe... do you just beeline Nationalism and Gunpowder no matter what? Example: Someone has Metal Casting and I want to trade for it, but only have CoL at that time. So I put beakers into MC for 2 turns and trade for it. And I do stuff like this couple of times throughout the game. Is that actually bad? Just ignore it and beeline my key techs no matter what? Because I can trade for MC later anyway?

Surely I could get slightly better attack date that way? But I really don't understand what caused all the delay. I'm sure if I give you that 1 AD Save you will just crush them with Cuirs easily. Really think Opener was reasonably good (albeit not perfect).

Really a bit disappointed right now. Some screenshots of my failure:

I uploaded the screenshots, but still not sure how to display them like before. Guess you can still see them?

Going to buy ice cream to comfort my sorrow. Then replay from 1 AD and try to avoid the thing I mentioned in spoiler. But really feel like I miss something more major.

 

[georgjorge]

It would help the most if you uploaded some saves from before Lib (between 1AD and Lib), just the same as uploading the pictures.

Some things you might have missed which are essential to getting to Lib early:
- lots of bulbing (Philo, 2xEdu, Lib)
- trading away techs for gold, especially to AI you will only attack later, to maintain 100% research
- minimal infrastructure (Granary/Barracks) and then building Research/Wealth
- as you said, you don't care much for techs like Theology or Metal Casting which are not essential to your beeline. Pick them up if you can for outdated techs, if not pick them up later

But without saves it's hard to say. You will get there eventually!