*Spoiler3* - Gotm23-Arabs - End Game Submitted

[Kaiser_Berger]

1.27f Open

Well, due to my constrained time, I didn't keep much for notes, but I'll recap what I remember.

Ancient Age- I took waaaaay too long to get my settlers out. I didn't get one out until around 2000 BC, I think. The barbs slowed my progress some, but they were never much more than a nuisance. I think I ended up the QSC with six cities. I also revolted to a Republic. As a side note, Spain was destroyed.

Medieval Age- I had built up a decent amount of horses, so when Chivalry came up, I upgraded and wiped out the Ottomans in a few turns. I then decided to let my GA do its work with infrastructure, but Rome stabbed me in the back causing me to have to fight during it. I ended up revolting to Monarchy afterwards and reassesing my options. I decided to go North and attack Persia. This worked well. Once I got MT, I decided to go on the offensive against India, who also performed a sneak attack. Cavalry sliced through their spears easily. Now I had all of the east excpet for Rome.

Idustrial Age- I immediatly took my cavs to the Egytian border and attacked. This proved to be a slow war with many losses against Egyptian rifles. This war did, however, provide me with leaders I desired. I sent one to Delhi and built my long awaited FP. Others were used for armies. Once Egypt was finished, I headed straight into the weak Zulus. They were still in the MA, so I had no problems. After this, however, my nation was gassed, suffering from a severe lack of infrastructure. Therefore, I decided to change the objective of my game and instead of go for domination like the last two monthes, I decided to build the SS. France and Carthage were both fairly strong, and I didn't fancy fighting them. So I revolted to a Democracy and built...and researched. Within a little while I had recovered into a great modern age civ.

Modern Age- This was fairly straigtforward. I built the stuff I needed to, and launched in the painfully late year of 1832. The French gave me quite a scare though. Despite being Communist, they managed to beat me to the UN. Well, the world hated them just about as much as me, so I think it would have balanced out

My Score was Firaxis-5377 Jason- 5834

 

[Merle Corey]

Well, I didn't keep very good notes of my game, so bear w/ me.

Diplo victory in 1752, Firaxis score 2717. Open game, ptw 1.27.

I got into an early furball w/ Carthage which lasted well into Medieval times, which delayed my city building program. Instead I ended up capturing most of my cities - around 30 - while founding less than ten myself during the course of the game. That war did produce a leader that I later used to build the Sistine Chapel in 470 ad. I starting my golden age by combat in 660 ad in a war with Rome.

In 1190 ad, the Romans & the Zulu destroyed the Spanish. That same year I eliminate Carthage. At this point, Rome is the top dog, and I think France is #2.

In 1250 ad I discover Steam Power. At this point, I've caught up to the tech leader - which is France - and started down the path to the ToE & Hoover Dam. France goes for - and gets, I had to trade for it w/ them - Industrialization.

In 1255 ad Rome goes to war with the rest of the world. Not all at once, but eventually they are at war with just about every one else but me. France was initially attacked by Rome, and they had a mpp with Persia and the Ottomans. Egypt joined in after 5 turns or so, and toward the end the Zulu piled on. The Zulu took the last four Roman cities, including Rome. Veii was the last to fall in 1430 ad. This war marked the ascent of France to # 1. It also resulted in the crippling of the Ottomans as they suffered the most from the original Roman onslaught and were later unable to take back those cities of theirs that the Romans hadn't razed. Instead, their allies claimed them.

In 1455 ad I complete the ToE and head for Hoover Dam. At this point I'm second only to France.

In 1500 ad Egypt goes to war with Zulu, France and the remaining powers. I stay out since I have trade deals with all concerned. When Egypt only has the city of Thebes remaining, I fortified an infantry on each of their city squares to protect them - and my lucrative trade deals with them. This blockage began around 1650 ad and was still partially in place when the game ended in 1752 ad.

In 1550 ad I completed Hoover Dam.

In 1605 ad I go to war and capture three cities with my Cav in the first turn. This first turn also generates my 2nd great leader, which I use to create my first army. I fill the army with infantry. After a couple more turns of offensive operations with Cav against the Zulu I revert to a defensive posture to wait for the development of tanks.

In 1650 ad I complete researching tanks and began further offensive operations against the Zulu, this time with armored spearheads. In 1660 ad the Zulu capital of Zimbabwe fell. In 1685 ad I make peace with the Zulu. I captured all of the Zulu cities to the west of my empire leaving them only the four cities that they had captured earlier from the Romans. The new Zulu capitol is in Rome.

In 1735 ad, with the technology to build the UN a few turns away and a palace pre-build in place I form two mpps to set up for a Diplo win. One with France, the other with India. France will be my competitor in the UN election.

In 1752 ad I completed the UN and won the vote with myself, Egypt, India and the Ottomans voting for me. France voted for themselves, and Persia and Zulu abstained.

~fin

 

[Herse]

1.27 Open

Link to Ancient Age
Link to Middle Ages

Industrial Ages

Our assault on Rome has begun and our cavalry and cannons have given us military superiority.

1150 AD Arab forces cross the mountains into native Roman lands.

1170 AD The capital city of Rome falls and we capture Sun Tzu’s.
1200 AD Arabs complete Newton’s University. Generate a Great Leader.
1210 AD Leader rushes Forbidden Palace in Rome.
1230 AD The war with Rome ends, with Arabia conquering all of Rome’s continental lands. Rome’s single remaining city is on the island to the north. The original plan was to sue for peace with the last city on the continent and take Caesaraugusta (the city on the island) in the peace deal. Then when the peace treaty expired we could destroy the final city. I didn’t want to build ships. However, while basking in the throngs of victory I failed to notice that Caesaraugusta was larger than the final two cities on the continent and it became the Roman capital (non-negotiable). Oh well. Meanwhile the Persians to the north are suddenly restless, encroaching on our lands. Here are some shots:

Hey what are you guys doing up there?

1255 AD The Persians sneak attack us, and are repelled with minimal Arab losses, as we were expecting their treachery. Persia enters its Golden Age (but not for long).
1280 AD The Persians have been soundly defeated and have only two cities remaining, both on the northern island. In the peace deal they surrender their second city, Hamadan, to us. This is our foothold on the island and in 20 turns we will rush some units and destroy both Rome and Persia.

The Indian Massacre

1310 AD The Indians are particularly weak. We invade mercilessly using slave labor to rail our way to a quick invasion.

Preparing for attack, while the Spanish and French colonists grow jittery.

1315 AD Our third Great Leader is generated. He returns to Makkah.
1320 AD We had spotted a vessel leaving an Indian port headed north, presumably to attack our recently acquired city on the northern island, which still had no unit protecting it. However, India’s fall was imminent.
1325 AD A small force of Indian soldiers including a War Elephant land next to Hamadan on the island. At the end of the turn India’s last city remains with a single defender reduced to one hit point, however, our cavalry with remaining movement can only reach 1 square from the city. We cannot take it this turn. Hamadan was still undefended. I did not think that if I rushed the defensive unit being built in Hamadan that it would be produced before India’s attack (not positive though). Instead of allowing India to take the city and remain alive, not to mention taking a share of our gold, I gift the city to Spain, the only other civ with a city on that island.
1330 AD India is destroyed.
1335 Our forces move back into our native lands. Our generals’ eyes are fixed on Egypt to the south. Because Egypt is spread out in a strip along our southern border, they should fall quickly to our mobile forces. In the meantime, however, we have rather lucrative trade agreements with Egypt including providing them iron (they still lack saltpeter) and wanting to maintain our honor we will wait until the deals expire.
1375 AD The treacherous Zulu sneak attack our cities to the west, taking two of them with cavalry. We counter attack retaking the cities and more. Unfortunately the Zulu have managed to acquire Nationalism and there are some Riflemen among their defenses. We enlist the aid of our long time allies, the French, against them. But our cavalry suffer casualties against the riflemen.
1380 AD Complete Theory of Evolution. Atomic Theory and Industrialization. Rush Universal Suffrage with Great Leader.
1385 AD Complete Universal Suffrage. Egypt sneak attacks from the south, but can do no damage against our infantry. Fighting with Egypt produces another Great Leader. Rome has a MPP with Egypt and declares war on us. We turn our forces on Egypt and slow our advance on the Zulu. Egypt too has Nationalism and riflemen. We build a galleon in the north to rid us of Rome once and for all.
1410 AD Egypt is destroyed.

1420 AD The Zulu have only one city remaining, with our troops advanced to its perimeter. We have landed a force of cavalry next to the final Roman city.
1425 AD Completion of Hoover Dam. Domination victory.

1425 AD Domination Victory
Firaxis Score: 4705
Jason Score: 7370 (I think: I used the New>=19 entry on the calculator; I can only assume this refers to the GOTM #??)

My first GOTM and first victory . . .

Here is a view of the Histograph:

However, there is much to learn . . .

An Attempt at Self-Criticism.

(1) Early Expansion. Apart from not taking adequate notes particularly for analysis of the early game, the primary mistake I believe I made was in the development of settlers and early expansion. I had moved my settler to the SE to get access to the floodplains and had a city spot capable of being a “settler factory.” If Makkah had generated settlers early on, we could have secured much more land, increased production and revenue, and limited our neighbors. Building the Pyramids stifled our early development. It would have been much more efficient to have a larger core city base.
(2) Build Density. I should have built cities closer together and shared developed tiles. I am good at micromanaging to optimizing production. Though we did reach Sanitation in this game, it never should have gone as far as hospitals, and each city did not need all its workable land.
(3) Early Wars. This follows from the first two. With increased expansion, production, and commerce from having a larger city core we should have been able to go to war much early and perhaps destroyed a civilization or two before conflict with Carthage. The advantage of early war can really be seen by the amazing early AD Domination and Conquest victories of others. Great job, by the way.
(4) Tech Pace. We frequently pushed the tech pace through research and trading. This was not a good idea. In fact, I think that we should have slowed the tech pace as much as possible, especially in the post-Chivalry era. We did not exploit our UU advantage very well at all. We could have accomplished a lot of what we did with cavalry, much early with our Ansar Warriors. Letting (helping) civs get to Nationalism was a terrible mistake as well. Cavalry versus riflemen is not the way one wants to conduct a war of conquest.
(5) Wonders. As mentioned in (1) building the Pyramids was a mistake. We should have foregone building it and perhaps one of our neighbors would have produced it so that we could take it through war. We should rather have timed our efforts to give us Sun Tzu. Leonardo’s was helpful, though we could have done without it and the game should have been over before we did half our upgrading. Later on when it became much easier to build wonders, I did so. Why?
(6) Gold. What was I doing with all that gold? Earning it pushed the tech pace and what good is a treasury full of gold for an early Domination win? Not much unless you spend it on military victory.
(7) Military Alliances. I should have looked for ways to bring other civs to war against each other. This would have slowed their production and technological development and made them easier for domination.

Since the conclusion of this game I have come to fully understand the application and power of the “settler factory.” BAMSPEEDY I THANK YOU for your article! My play has improved significantly through this one concept alone and I think it could have really helped my in this GOTM.

If you have had the patience to read through my saga of GOTM23 I thank you. Any and all comments are welcome and I hope to see you all in France 5-6.

Best wishes,

Herse

 

[n8mac]

This was my first official GOTM (others played but never submitted). I lost to France diplo in 1794!

In the beginning I aimed for a culture win (anybody get one?), but France pushed out wonders like a factory. I had many early temples and libraries.

I went to war with Egypt and took them out first. Later just before getting railroad Rome and Ottomans allied against me. At first I thought I was doomed when the baulkan dragoons came over, until I realized they didn't have very many so I got a few cities from that war.

I got involved in other small wars but problably my biggest mistake was making peace too soon and not gainging much territory although I still had the most land and biggest score.

Some how in the industrial ages I got behind in tech from 3 or 4 other nations by 2-3 techs. I tried trading but no one would, being 'insulted' when I offered anything per turn even though it was a very good deal for them! Answers?

So I went on building cultural and taking out neoCarthage. Then I lost theory of evolution to France (had prebuild but they built it a few turns before I got the tech, remember, no trade). So I went on gradually gaining ground on France's tech.

Enter the modern age as I have a prebuild for UN. Its in my second highest production city (second to capitol) doing well @39 net shields and only two turns till UN. All of the sudden BAM! France gets UN and I lose diplo.

France had it so easy. No one ever went to war with them, every body trade tech with them, and everybody but me loved them!

I have a question for an experienced player...
Could I have won 100k culture under these conditions: @1794 I have 50k culture with 1/3 the land mass and a temple, library, and cathedral in most of my cities.

I tried; Makkah had Great Library, Universal Sufferage, Js Bach, and Shakespears.

Next time Cracker turn diplo off

ps - very nice game Cracker

 

[Mark Cutt]

First Post

I discovered Monotheism in 630BC, then I stopped my research until I could trade for Feudalism (530BC), I restart researching Chivalry (discovered in 330BC) and stopped again. I got Engineering for peace from Ottomans.
In the meanwhile I had conquered Sogut and the Hanging Gardens that gave happiness to all my cities.
In 310BC my Cataphrats entered the game and my GA stated. Ottomans were terminated in 190BC.
In 150BC I bought Invention from Rome for a lot of gpt and immediately declared war on them. Rome was terminated in 50BC.
In 50AD I attacked both India and Persia.
In 130AD I got my first GL who expedited Leonardo in the city I had just conquered. In the same turn I conquered Persepolis and Pyramids.
In 150AD Persia was terminated.
In 170AD Carthage refused to leave my territory and declare war on me. I allied with Zulu against them. In 190AD I got my 2nd GL.
In 190AD I reached my maximum military power (around 120 units), I stopped military units construction and switched all my productive cities to wealth.
I also started building settler and temple in the conquered cities and to make it faster I gradually disbanded 70% of my military forces.
At 190 AD I still missed 1025 tiles for domination. My target was to complete as many temple as possible in 300AD to achieve the domination in 350AD.
In the meanwhile I terminated India (250AD) and attacked Zulu and Egypt and France.
Unfortunately I missed my target; in 350AD I still missed 68 tiles.
Domination arrived in 370AD.

 

[Naboo]

Originally posted by n8mac

Some how in the industrial ages I got behind in tech from 3 or 4 other nations by 2-3 techs. I tried trading but no one would, being 'insulted' when I offered anything per turn even though it was a very good deal for them! Answers?

Most likely you'd broken a deal with someone, either purposely or accidentally. For example, you may have been trading something on a per-turn basis with another Civ, and the trade route was disconnected due to pillaging or loss of their harbor. Even if this was not your fault you still get the bad reputation. This is one of the more frustrating aspects of the game. You can find out what the problem is by actually "offering" the deal to the AI, despite your advisor's warning. They'll usually tell you what's bugging them -- "France has told us of your perfidy"... or some such. I'm not sure if there are any repercussions from "insulting" them with the offer, though.

It can be tempting to take advantage of a Civ's declining fortunes. For example, they lose a key resource such as Iron because they're getting their butts kicked. You may get a juicy tech deal by trading them the resource. But, if they get wiped out or the trade route disappears because of the war, you may not be able to trade for any per-turn items afterwards with other Civs. You need to weigh the benefit of the trade with your estimation of their survivability and how important your reputation is at the stage in the game.

 

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by n8mac

Enter the modern age as I have a prebuild for UN. Its in my second highest production city (second to capitol) doing well @39 net shields and only two turns till UN. All of the sudden BAM! France gets UN and I lose diplo.

n8mac, if you find yourself in this situation again, spend the money and spy on the rival city (check F7) building the wonder you're after. If you find you're a few turns behind then try micromanaging tiles or adding workers. This approach has saved me many times. All you need to do is match the rival civ's production because the human player all ways wins a tie.

 

[ssharlow]

Open - PTW 1.27

This was really fun, I lost to France's UN vote in 1735 but it was still a great map. 4th GOTM - first loss - not too shabby, I think.

Interesting thing was France didn't win by much - 2717 to my 2547. Is it possible to lose the game and still win in points?

I just never recovered in Tech - I was so far behind in the industrial age - I was sure I was going to see a French spaceship - the UN never occured to me.

I'm too tired to link to my earlier post but just before I was going to wipe out the last few ottoman towns - the zulu declared war and me and Egypt, and later india took them out - then I wiped out the ottomans.

France had mech infrantry and tanks so even a hundred cavalry couldn't have stopped them. I was planning on taking out India on the thought that might give me domination before a space launch. (so much for that plan).

Probably two big mistakes
1. got two techs from spain before they were wiped out - those two techs ruined my rep and I never could buy a tech again.
2. didnt' research nationalism until the very end - after I got atomic. I kept hoping I could buy it eventually. In retrospect - I'm assuming the AI will rarely part with a tech that gives a new unit - no matter what the price or your rep.

Here is a nice map - I still think that India may have given me enough tiles but otherwise France would have been in space.




Still fun game, even a loss - this was just a fun map. keep it up Cracker.

ssharlow

 

[MadScot]

Originally posted by ssharlow
Interesting thing was France didn't win by much - 2717 to my 2547. Is it possible to lose the game and still win in points?

Yes. While you get a winning bonus (based on number of turns left and difficulty) you could easily lose one of the "non territorial" games (i.e. UN or Spaceship) and be the biggest, baddest civ on the planet, hence have a huge score in population which the win bonus cannot overcome.

It's the flip side of winning an OCC, where your points score may be rather low (since you have few citizens and tiles) and so the Ai may outscore you.

 

[Ricardo]

Well at about 1500 AD it became apparent that there was no way I was going to win by a culutral victory like I had hoped. I just didnt have enough cities for the 100k win and although I had a great leader just waiting in my capitol I couldn't get anyone to trade me the later techs to build any of the late industrial age or modern age wonders. I did manage to build a few wonders in the capitol early on in the game and really I was at tech parity or even ahead in tech until about half way through the modern age. then France just started to take over and refused to trade any techs with me.

So the only solution seemed to change strategies and really try to capture as much of the world as possible. I started the campaign upon gaining the ability to build tanks... which was slightly before the rest of the civs giving me a nice edge to the ensuing warfare. Here is a screenshot of how things went over the next 100 years.

unfortunately it wasnt enough and I suffered another GOTM loss. My mistakes were too numerous to mention. Next round I definitely need to concentrate harder on early expansion. I totally missed how to make the 4 turn settler factory that someone else outlined in a previous thread. And I failed to really take advantage of the superiority gained upon being able to build the cataphract.

here is a screenshot of my capitol just before the loss. If only I could have gotten a few more wonders maybe I could have made the 20K victory.

Thanks a lot GOTM staff for a really fun game.

 

[ltccone]

Originally posted by Ricardo
here is a screenshot of my capitol just before the loss. If only I could have gotten a few more wonders maybe I could have made the 20K victory.

It looks like your game was going well. How did you lose? Diplomatic?

 

[Yurian]

Txurce, Offa.

Thanks, that you have become interested in my game. Excuse, that at once has not answered - finished game 5-6. Now I am free and I shall try to describe my GOTM23.

 

[Naboo]

Originally posted by Ricardo
Here is a screenshot of how things went over the next 100 years.
---
unfortunately it wasnt enough and I suffered another GOTM loss.

Ricardo -

Looks like you were progressing well on your Domination attempt - that's a heap of progress in 100 years . It would be interesting to know how you lost. I'm wondering if France got a cultural win. That was a worry in my game. Also wondering if the elimination of either Egypt or Spain might have been a deciding factor. If one of them had more than 1/2 the culture of France it could have delayed or prevented a 100K culture win for France and you might have prevailed by eliminating France first even if though it would have been more difficult militarily.

 

[Ricardo]

I am pretty sure I lost to the French by spaceship but I am not entirely certain. Everything indicated I was the cultural leader so I don't think I lost that way.

My game was basically a matter of too little too late. If I had been as aggressive in the beginning as I was at the end things probably would have gone differently.

Looking forward to next month's GOTM to try try again.

 

[Naboo]

Originally posted by Ricardo
I am pretty sure I lost to the French by spaceship but I am not entirely certain. Everything indicated I was the cultural leader so I don't think I lost that way.

My game was basically a matter of too little too late. If I had been as aggressive in the beginning as I was at the end things probably would have gone differently.

Looking forward to next month's GOTM to try try again.

Oh yeah, you did say you'd been playing for cultural win. Disregard my babblings. I'm still not used to folks talking about spaceship launches in 1600's so I just ASSumed...

 

[n8mac]

Thanks Naboo and Dojoboy for your advice. I think I had an alliance vs. someone who offered me peace and maybe a resource trade that I was getting that I later acquired in war.

Good idea dojoboy, I usually just spy on those I am at war with or during a spaceship race. But alas, my city was size 12 no hospital with all tiles improved and no food income. I guess I didn't prebuild soon enough. I did think about taking over France UN city but I just had tanks vs. their modern armor/mechanized infantry units. Would have to take it 3 or 4 turns I belive.

My game seemed close to ssharlow's game but I had a slightly bigger lead in point over France

Two shortcomings I learn of Civ III:
1. You can't look at other advisors while trading.
2. The game doesn't tell what method you lose at. This is a basic requirement.

btw - My high scores page crashes everytime I try to access it since this game. Letterhead?

 

[a space oddity]

Originally posted by n8mac

btw - My high scores page crashes everytime I try to access it since this game. Letterhead?

No, that's probably because the HOF file has now an entry with an invalid civ code number, let me see if I can find a link for you.

edit: Found it, you can read about it here.

 

[jack merchant]

Predator class, PTW 1.21

I actually kept putting off this game, being too busy with PBEMs and other solo games and thought I would have plenty of time - well, I guess not Submission three hours before the deadline !

Sadly, there was little in the way of glorious Arab culturebuilding for me - I decided to see if I could take the whole world over with Ansars. In the end, a few cavalry were required too though.

This is my territory before the GA (~50AD or thereabouts)

And this is my territory after:

The unhook-rehook trick was used twice to upgrade about 50 Ansars in all (25 each time). Carthage fell in 4 turns, after which that wing swung south to Egypt in a simultaneous attack all along the coast. The Northern wing made short work of the ironless Persians, and then went on into Spain which was knocked over rather easily. Together they went after the Zulu and then the French. A small batch of Ansars went to the peninsula south to mop up the remaining Carthaginian, Ottoman and Egyptian cities there, after which the new production was sent to India.

No research was done after the ancient age; all tech after that was either extorted or bought heavily discounted after wars, or bought with resources and luxuries. End result: Domination victory in 680 AD. From the GA onwards, none of my core cities produced anything else than Ansars (though a few built markets and cathedrals first) and my income, which was never more than 200gpt due to a late and ill-placed FP in former Carthaginian lands, was used up every turn to rush temples.

 

[Zwingli]

Ancient Era Post

I havn't had much time to finish the GOTM, and even running a 5CC I had to rush a bit to the deadline. At the beginning of the Industrial Age, I had traded for Democracy and revolted, speeding up the workers in anticipation of Steam Power and rails (I was somewhat surprised to have coal in my territory, and had an iron supply reappear shortly after depleating). My small empire managed to research both Medicine and Sanitation first, supplying enough gold to run 100% research from that point onward. Of course, with only 5 cities I could not compete directly with any of the large neigboring civs in research, so I had to guess which techs they would avoid. During the Industrial age, I researched Electricity, Scientific Method, and Radio first (as well as Atomic Theory and Electronics from TOE) with each tech bringing in thousands of gold. By the beginning of the Modern Age (1470 AD) I had over 40,000g in the treasury and was making over 1000gpt at 0% research.

However, I had not been able to reseach any of the last 3 techs of the Industrial Era first and the extra income from the other civs soon dried up. Still, I was able to make a 14 turn effort at getting Computers first, but came 1 turn short when an AI civ discovered it and traded it around to all the leaders (the AI civs were remarkably even in power). Similarly, a 15 turn attempt at researching Miniaturization first failed by 1 turn (I did get a little trading value out of this tech from backwards civs). The other civs were just progressing too fast because there had been world peace since the early Industrial era when Egypt had evaporated under a massive dogpile. Despite the peace, the world was highly unstable with many MPPs signed in every direction, and when neoCarthage completed the UN, I decided to throw a match onto the powderkeg.

A failed spy insertion was all that was needed to provoke neigboring Carthage to war, and I spent a few thousand gold to ally the richest civs against them. Soon alliances sprouted all over the globe and Cathage was fighting the world with only the weak Zulu for aid. As had been hoped, Carthage largely avoided the strongly defended Arabian cities (except for a few bombing attacks) in favor of weaker targets elsewere. Carthaginian Mechanized Infantry fortified in Metropoli held off the huge accumulated armies of the world, and the research rate plummeted. With the rest of the globe tottering on the edge of Anarchy, Arabia scored Nuclear Power first and traded into tech parity. After Nuclear Plants were completed in all 5 cities, the rest of the Spaceship parts were quickly finished and Arabia won by Spacerace in 1740 AD.

 

[Ricardo]

Originally posted by ssharlow
Is it possible to lose the game and still win in points?

I think I proved that this can be true in my GOTM this time. My final world ranking was the highest in my game by about 400 points yet I still lost. Guess that is just the way the game goes sometimes.