*Spoiler4* Gotm17-Carthage - End Game Submitted

[Gen. Maximus]

Originally posted by Moonsinger


Wow!:worshp: That's almost 2000 points more than what I could ever get out of my game. That's it! I'm back to herding cows in my next game.

I :worshp: u instead. Your speed of conquest back in GOTM16 is extremely impressive, u conquered English in the next continent by 1000AD already when at that time I just finish with the German in my home continent. Unbeatable speed of aggression!

 

[RufRydyr]

Originally posted by LKendter
Based the pace that I am gaining cities toward domination I will not be able to finish. The nature of the map just required too much time for the level of detail I play the game at.

I'd like to suggest that you use shift-enter and rush along or change your playing style for a couple of days so you can finish. I'd like to be able to see your game. Also, with the new scoring system it hurts to have a 0 up for a month.

 

[RufRydyr]

Originally posted by No Velcro Shoes


I will admit, when I play solo I tend to reload every now and then. You know the times... like when 10 cavalry die to 2 regular spearmen. Playing along there were quite a few times when I just went in underprepared with troops... and it hurt in the long run.

Never having read any forum posts before playing this game ... I didnt realise just HOW fast people research.

I hope you got around to reading the rules, also. Reloading is a big time no-no for competition play.


When I first started playing I reloaded a lot. When I decided to play some Hall of Fame games, I carefully read all of the rules and learned that reloading isn't allowed for HOF or for GOTM. There's also a list of exploits that are allowed and not allowed. It's just a friendly competition with no cash prizes or anything.

Not reloading was difficult at first, but it really improved my game play. Sometimes there is just a horrible roll of the die and I have to grit my teeth, mutter obsenities at the computer, hit the computer with a hammer and move on.


BTW, 5 or 6 turns for research is pretty good in lots of times. The max is 4.

If I had played with reloads and then discovered that they weren't allowed, I would feel honor bound to withdraw my entry.

 

[Moonsinger]

To be fair with Gen. Maximus, Ribannah, and everyone who has posted their final score, I think I will post mine too. I guess some of us (including me) couldn't wait until the second week of April. Here is mine:

100K Culture by 1880AD with 5315 points

 

[Aeson]

Thanks SirPleb.

As for Histographic victories, no further spoilers from me. Histograph isn't open for an award, so I would expect most if not all games played to 2050AD will go for one of the 6 victory types to give themselves a shot at an award.

 

[RufRydyr]

Originally posted by Moonsinger
To be fair with Gen. Maximus, Ribannah, and everyone who has posted their final score, I think I will post mine too. I guess some of us (including me) couldn't wait until the second week of April. Here is mine:

100K Culture by 1880AD with 5315 points

Is that Firaxis score or adjusted score?

Either way, Jeez. Once again, you go girl!

 

[Bamspeedy]

I finally got around to submitting my game.

I manually built:
Forbidden Palace-470 B.C.
Sun Tzu's - 10 A.D.
Magellan's-420 A.D.
Leo's-650 A.D.
(Yes, you CAN build wonders using an extreme ICS). You just need to pre-build for them. I got Magellan's completed 3 turns after getting navigation.

I had probably about 8 or so caravels ready to explore when I got navigation and they were spread out nicely to explore in all directions, so contacts were made quickly.

Navigation:390 A.D.
410-Met Persia and got contact with England
420-Met Greece and got contact with Rome
430-Met Russia and got contact with Germany, America.
480-Met Babylon and got contact with Zulu, Iroquois
540-Met Aztecs and China (both at the same time, my caravel landed right where their borders met).

Conquest:
270 AD-Egypt dead (swordsmen and a couple numidians)
810-England dead, Persia dead (knights)
1110-Greece dead (cavalry for them and all the rest of the civs)
1120-Aztecs dead
1130-Rome dead
1160-China dead, America dead (by Germany)
1170-Russia dead
1190-Germany dead
1210-Babylon dead
1265-Zulu dead
1275-Iroquios dead.

The turn after I got military tradition, I had 30 cavalry (and 30+ more horsemen waiting to upgrade, but I had to wait for cash to build up) and sent 3 caravels towards Aztecs/China (that is all I need for them, and all but 1 or 2 cavalry survived), the rest I sent at Rome, then I started sending some towards other civs before Rome/Greece was completely taken care of.

I didn't get any leaders until very late (built armies as I had no other use for them, except the last leader I rushed the heroic epic, but the game was over like less than 5 turns later). In fact I even disbanded one leader because I forgot not to raze the last China city, so I couldn't do nothing with the leader except spend 15+ turns shipping it back home! (that's 15 turns of not getting a chance of getting another leader in a more suitable location). I built an army late in the German war and loaded it up with knights, only to realize I can't ship a fully loaded army (3 units, plus the leader) into a caravel

I sold fuedalism to Rome and Greece for all thier money shortly before invading them. The reasoning was 1.) Sun Tzu's was already built and 2.) They would hopefully build the more expensive pikeman instead of their cheap UU. (all had defense of 3, so I would rather they build the pikeman).

 

[Shillen]

I'm just absolutely amazed at Gen. Maximus and Bamspeedy's domination/conquest speed. You guys had dominated or conquered the world by the time I finally started meeting the other civ's! Of course not knowing navigation let me traverse sea squares really killed me, but even if I had gone straight for navigation I wouldn't have finished anywhere near as fast. I still have a lot to learn about warmongering.

Incredible job guys. I particularly love the 72 caravels. I don't think I've ever had 72 ships in a single game, even in the modern age, nevermind in the middle/industrial age.

What's the trick? Build nothing but barracks and units the entire game? With Sun Tzu and FP thrown in? I'm sure I built way too much infrastructure in my game. I built a lot of temples and cathedrals and stuff. My culture when I got conquest was over 50k. I imagine marketplaces are worthwhile, but other than that you probably don't need anything.

Well I'll get to see if I improve in gotm18. I plan to milk it but that starts out with conquest.

 

[Bamspeedy]

At the start, mostly nothing but settlers and warriors (I had warriors in all my cities on the starting island for MP). Then I had my starting island produce nothing but units (most of this after Sun Tzu's was completed). the island immediately to the east produced most of my galleys/caravels, all the rest of the cities built settlers. Utica switched back and forth between horsemen/gallys depending on what I needed the most (It was producing an even 10 shields/turn). Towards the end of the game I did have probably 10-20 too many caravel, but it was nice to have so many, so I wasn't having ships waiting around for a full load of units/settlers or having units waiting for a ship to come. The problem, though with so many ships is I want to fortify them (if they are waiting for units), but then I would forget about them, so that probably costed me a few turns and points. I didn't do any ship-hopping (well, I experimented with it for probably 3-4 turns, then gave up on that). But I would have 1 ship in between each of my islands, so settlers and units would unload from one ship, cross the island, get on another ship, get off on the next island, etc. It may or not have been the fastest way, but it was the easiest way to keep track of all the ships.

I built 1 temple (which I didn't even need) and some harbors (1 for each island, at least), that is all I really built for infrastructure, except for rushing some culture and a barracks in Babylons last city (ellipi?), so I could use that city as a base (to heal units) to launch my attacks on Zulu/Iroquois).

I built the Forbidden palace really close to the capital. It doesn't give you the maximum benefit for reducing distance corruption, but you can build it really fast and it doubles your optimal # of cities, so you still get some benefit from it, even though it is really close to your capital. I wanted to move my palace to Egypt's land, but never got a leader in the Egypt war.

 

[alexman]

Very impressive game, Bamspeedy!

Originally posted by Bamspeedy
I built the Forbidden palace really close to the capital. It doesn't give you the maximum benefit for reducing distance corruption, but you can build it really fast and it doubles your optimal # of cities, so you still get some benefit from it, even though it is really close to your capital.

Actually, building the FP next to your Palace does not double the optimal number of cities. It increases it by only 10% (20% if in Communism). I hate to be the corruption Nazi, but one has to do his self-appointed job, after all!

 

[Bamspeedy]

Originally posted by alexman
Actually, building the FP next to your Palace does not double the optimal number of cities. It increases it by only 10% (20% if in Communism). I hate to be the corruption Nazi, but one has to do his self-appointed job, after all!

Really, 10%? Wow. I did notice only probably about a 10% drop or so in corruption, but it did enable me to get some towns to get one more shield (like 1 city getting 10 shields instead of 9, and another city getting 15 shields instead of 13 or 14, both of which would have been a huge waste if I didn't have the forbidden palace built at least somewhere). My cities were all mostly of a small size, so I figured there would be a bigger difference when I let them get bigger.

What I couldn't believe, though is that the Babylon city was actually producing 2 shields out of 14, maybe 12 (before I irrigated some tiles), despite the extreme far distance from either palace and I had probably 150 cities (all of which would have been closer to either palace). Usually the best you could ever do in that situation would be the usual 1 shield/1 gold unless you got over 20 shields, because of the 95% max corruption rule. Being commercial, WLTK day (it had a marketplace) really helped out that city. I think it may have had a courthouse, I think there was 4 improvements in that city when I captured it.

 

[Renata]

I noticed the same thing, bamspeedy. One of the Zulu/Iroquois/Bab cities (can't remember which) I took over had a courthouse and was actually producing 2 shields per turn. Amazing that actual production was possible that far away.

At any rate, I finally finished. Won't win any awards, though - conquest in 1844 with about 2900 pts. I'm not at all unhappy with it considering the lack of time I had to dedicate to doing it right. Although I probably could have finished 50 turns earlier (even without any better tactics) if I'd just not dawdled so long between navigation and attacking Rome - one civ got infantry *just* as I started to go after them, and no less than three others were the same way with riflemen. But it was entertaining anyway, and I'm looking forward to the Celts!

Renata

 

[ltcoljt]

Bamspeedy makes me feel silly me building nuclear reactors and stuff.

 

[Gen. Maximus]

Originally posted by Shillen
I'm just absolutely amazed at Gen. Maximus and Bamspeedy's domination/conquest speed. ..
What's the trick? Build nothing but barracks and units the entire game? With Sun Tzu and FP thrown in? I'm sure I built way too much infrastructure in my game. I built a lot of temples and cathedrals and stuff. My culture when I got conquest was over 50k. I imagine marketplaces are worthwhile, but other than that you probably don't need anything.

As I'm in Republic, marketplaces and temples/cathedrals are important to prevent city disorder. All my key cities(adjacent to capital) has all these plus libraries+courthouse+harbors+aquedect(whenever applicable). Banks, colleseums and uni's are built in selected cities only. All these creates happy faces that counts to in game final score, but I'm not sure if this matters using the Aeson's score calculation. To churn out calvarys(90+) and musketeers(10+), I built horses+Numedian mercs and then connect saltpeter to upgrade them then disconnect saltpeter to rebuild back obsolute units for yet another round of upgrade repeatedly. I only built necessary wonder, Magellan; as continent effect wonder like SunTze and Pyramids are not powerful in this map. Wonders are normally rushed from about 5 leaders I got or captured. As I'm way ahead in science, I could afford not to research to build cash reserves for upgrade. Hope this enlightens you. I'm sure you can find much more advice other warmongers in this forums can offer you.

 

[Bamspeedy]

Originally posted by Gen. Maximus


As I'm in Republic, marketplaces and temples/cathedrals are important to prevent city disorder. All my key cities(adjacent to capital) has all these plus libraries+courthouse+harbors+aquedect(whenever applicable). Banks, colleseums and uni's are built in selected cities only. All these creates happy faces that counts to in game final score, but I'm not sure if this matters using the Aeson's score calculation. To churn out calvarys(90+) and musketeers(10+), I built horses+Numedian mercs and then connect saltpeter to upgrade them then disconnect saltpeter to rebuild back obsolute units for yet another round of upgrade repeatedly. I only built necessary wonder, Magellan; as continent effect wonder like SunTze and Pyramids are not powerful in this map. Wonders are normally rushed from about 5 leaders I got or captured. As I'm way ahead in science, I could afford not to research to build cash reserves for upgrade. Hope this enlightens you. I'm sure you can find much more advice other warmongers in this forums can offer you.

Wow, we had completely opposite play styles. Here, I am in monarchy with 'no' improvements, and you are in Republic building quite a few improvements. With my denser build, I'm sure I lost out on quite a bit of territory points, but I had lots of population points, to make up for some of that. I went with max science until I got cavalry (middle age techs every 6-7 turns in monarchy), then just went with 1 scientist after that.

Yes, score will help. Aeson's formula tries to balance out score and finishing date, so you don't want to completely ignore adding happy people/territory just to shave a couple turns off the finishing date. The tournament is the place for those looking strictly for finishing date, because they weigh the finishing date so much more heavily.

In this game I didn't need to continually pillage resources to upgrade. My starting island built horsemen the whole game. I would ship the horseman to a city I had in England's former territory. In that city I built a barracks, it had access to horses and iron (and later saltpeter), and I never built a harbor on that continent-so it wasn't connected to my capital and other cities. This was sort of a 'training camp' where the horsemen would be trained to became knights/cavalry. The 1 temple I built was in a city that I built directly on saltpeter on the small eastern island that I didn't want to build a harbor in and get the resource connected to my other cities.

 

[MPF]

Been out of the game for some months (client going live with his new system took up almost al my time). Started this GOTM on march 23 !!!!!!. The new improvements to the game really slows down the early stages (still playing 1.29f and not PTW). Thought I would never finisch but just submitted my 1977 cultural victory.

Seems that I am the only one not to whipe out Egypt as first step. Tried to keep my turns as short as possible so I went for a nice building, no war mongering strategy that enabled me to finish turns fast without doing any major planning. The score (a al time lowest for me with only some 2K) is a big reflection of this playing style

Will start the next game on time so do expect some more challange all you civ-guys and gals


MPF

 

[Ribannah]

Originally posted by Moonsinger


That's a good score. According to the Jason system, I think you beated me by a couple hundred points. But then again, Aeson is still working on his formula and Cracker hasn't yet updated the last revision for the GOTM17 score calculator. So who know what the final outcome will be. Anyway, I'm glad I'm not too far in behide.

The calculator is available now. Even with the Jason formula, your 1880AD 100K victory gets more points than my 1610AD one.

It would be reversed if the 100K cultural victory had a more realistic 'best date'. How can it be only 10 turns behind GOTM18 where the player's civ is religious AND plays pangaea instead of isolated archipel? And even 15 turns ahead of the 'best date' of GOTM15 where one is scientific?

 

[Gen. Maximus]

Bamspeedy,

In this game I didn't need to continually pillage resources to upgrade.

THere a saltpeter on the home island on a desert tile, I have two workers to build the road instantly and a longbowman to pillage it in the same turn after I upgrade horsemen to calvary. Btw, I skip Chilvary so that my horseman goes straight to calvary. This allow me to improve the iron tile on my home city without being forced to build the costly knight that is only 10 shields less than calvary. But I'll certainly keep your sound tactic in mind.

 

[Karasu]

Wow, Bamspeedy, congratulations! I though I had (finally...) achieved a good finish date, but yours... :worshp:

Well, I guess I'll eventually get a fastest finish -one day that most of you are ill and I can bribe those who aren't into going for a different victory type...

 

[LKendter]

Originally posted by RufRydyr
I'd like to suggest that you use shift-enter and rush along or change your playing style for a couple of days so you can finish. I'd like to be able to see your game. Also, with the new scoring system it hurts to have a 0 up for a month.

I have no idea why you want to see an example of my worst played game in a long time?

Due to the extreme distance between islands on this map I some major league mistakes that cost me huge amount of time. For example, I got into a war with Persia and starting shipping all troops to their island. I failed to realize that Persia had infantry. A stack of cavalry vs. infantry is a disaster, so I had to reverse direction to send the troops elsewhere. That alone had a large force of units wasted in transit for 20 plus turns. The game is full of those types of blunders. The distances create a world that I had no clue how to deal with and it showed.