Strange or crazy challenges?

[ariosto]

Great game!
I expected that you would find such a starting position that some AI would be forced to put second city in your third ring. Then you start with Stonehenge - ToA and flip that city, so you can build units outside of your capital. No idea how would you defend that city though.

 

[valergrad]

Great game!
I expected that you would find such a starting position that some AI would be forced to put second city in your third ring. Then you start with Stonehenge - ToA and flip that city, so you can build units outside of your capital. No idea how would you defend that city though.

I like your idea. I mean, with "my way" you can only win on duel map, may be tiny map, having huge doubts about small map, and it is absolutely impossible to win like this on huge map. I've tried - deity AI just too fast on a huge map for a single-tile city
But if your idea will work - then even huge map deity win would be possible. May be I'll do an attempt some day)

 

[danjuno]

That was spectacular! Would be interesting to see if ariosto's idea can help on larger map sizes.

 

[valergrad]

That was spectacular! Would be interesting to see if ariosto's idea can help on larger map sizes.

Yes... One potential problem that I see is that AI probably would avoid to settle close to huge groups of peaks. So, it would be hard to get an AI city in 3rd ring. And culturally conquering city even from 4rd ring ( especially if it is the capital ) could take so much time, that this city after flipping will be totally surrounded by other cities of that particular AI. Not a good starting point for a winning against deity)
But I am sure that if this will try guys like @Kaitzilla or @Henrik75 they will find a way to win)


UPD. Nope. Forget what I've said. Tried and from the first attempt Roosevelt founded New York right in my 3rd ring. Let's see how swiftly I'll be able to flip it.

 

[BornInCantaloup]

I'm not sure how this is harder than OCC (which was obviously too easy) but this was a very interesting play on map options,
Well played, sir ! I wasn't expecting this to look as much of a "regular game".

 

[danjuno]

UPD. Nope. Forget what I've said. Tried and from the first attempt Roosevelt founded New York right in my 3rd ring. Let's see how swiftly I'll be able to flip it.

Facepalm. Why is my favorite leader's AI such a potato? (Seriously, look at his track record in AI Survivor). Did I do something to piss off Sid?

 

[Fins]

How about posting there some CIV4 challenges that you've tried no matter how daffy they look?
...

I have a good one for you: the Leeroy Jenkins challenge!

It's simple:

- BtS, 1st standard map, standard size, standard everything, no mods or tweaks;
- Victory: conquest only;
- the one and only rule: you can't have more than one land combat unit outside of your cities' tile every time you press "end turn" button. This unit - is Leeroy Jenkins.

And of course, Gunships count as "land combat unit". Would be too easy otherwise. This challenge may seem impossible to win, but it very much is.

Implications

Spoiler are quite fun :

- early-game, you better build your cities exactly 3 tiles away from each other and connect 'em with roads ASAP, so that your city-defending 1-move units can move from one city to another;

- despite having a mighty "offensive" force of 1 land unit, 2-move land units are still needed: only they can kill any enemies who come to pillage your city and then go back to it before you have to press "end turn";

- Navy and Air Force are both still unlimited (as those are not land units), and become way more important than usual. Sadly, they can't capture cities, nor kill large packs of enemies, though;

- Nukes become amazingly useful and desired, unlike in normal game where you don't anyhow "need" em;

- Diplomacy and Spying also become far more important: fighting on two fronts when you have only one unit able to anyhow advance your territory via conquest - is not doable. Forcing AIs (via espionage) to adopt your civics and state religion mid-game helps a ton;

- Leeroy Jenkins', when played right, becomes a monster unit by late-game. Totally scary unit, yep!

Some deets about the latter: early-on, Leeroy must be a Melee unit and take all City Raider upgrades before he upgrades to a Gunpowder unit. Obviously, attach your 1st GG to him, that's +20 extra XP. And then late-game, upgrade him to Mechanized Infantry (which normally does not have City Raider promotions), and see him roll around with 3 moves per turn (from GG promotion for it), Commando to use enemy roads (so up to 9 moves per turn even on regular enemy roads!), March to heal-on-the-go whenever they scatch some paint off him, Woodsman 3 for +2 guaranteed 1st stikes, Drill 4 for +3 more 1st strikes and more 1st strike chances, and Combat 6 for a juicy 56 base strength - which makes sure that even when some super-lucky enemy manages to survive all the 1st strikes, then it's indeed only some paint being scratched, i.e. not any much damage. Which 56 strength then gets further increased by other promotions, of course: huge further boost from City Raider 3 for attacking cities, +25% from vs-unit-type promotions, wood and hill bonuses where applicable, etc. "Man, it's impossible to get THAT many XP" you say? Not a problem: when Leeroy is the one and only guy who wipes out several AI civilizations, and with GG's 2x XP gains - it's all promotions you want and then some. By the way, Cover and Charge promotions are obtainable for Leeroy when he's still a Melee unit, but become not available once he upgrades to Mechanized Infantry, so might wanna grab those before he stops being a Melee unit, too. While March promotion - is given for free when upgrading to Mechanized Infantry, yet it may well be a good idea to take it far earlier anyway - helps much.

Difficulty per your preference; I doubt this is anyhow doable on Deity, that is... %) Good luck!

 

[valergrad]

I have a good one for you: the Leeroy Jenkins challenge!

It's simple:

- BtS, 1st standard map, standard size, standard everything, no mods or tweaks;
- Victory: conquest only;
- the one and only rule: you can't have more than one land combat unit outside of your cities' tile every time you press "end turn" button. This unit - is Leeroy Jenkins.

And of course, Gunships count as "land combat unit". Would be too easy otherwise. This challenge may seem impossible to win, but it very much is.

Implications

Spoiler are quite fun :

- early-game, you better build your cities exactly 3 tiles away from each other and connect 'em with roads ASAP, so that your city-defending 1-move units can move from one city to another;

- despite having a mighty "offensive" force of 1 land unit, 2-move land units are still needed: only they can kill any enemies who come to pillage your city and then go back to it before you have to press "end turn";

- Navy and Air Force are both still unlimited (as those are not land units), and become way more important than usual. Sadly, they can't capture cities, nor kill large packs of enemies, though;

- Nukes become amazingly useful and desired, unlike in normal game where you don't anyhow "need" em;

- Diplomacy and Spying also become far more important: fighting on two fronts when you have only one unit able to anyhow advance your territory via conquest - is not doable. Forcing AIs (via espionage) to adopt your civics and state religion mid-game helps a ton;

- Leeroy Jenkins', when played right, becomes a monster unit by late-game. Totally scary unit, yep!

Some deets about the latter: early-on, Leeroy must be a Melee unit and take all City Raider upgrades before he upgrades to a Gunpowder unit. Obviously, attach your 1st GG to him, that's +20 extra XP. And then late-game, upgrade him to Mechanized Infantry (which normally does not have City Raider promotions), and see him roll around with 3 moves per turn (from GG promotion for it), Commando to use enemy roads (so up to 9 moves per turn even on regular enemy roads!), March to heal-on-the-go whenever they scatch some paint off him, Woodsman 3 for +2 guaranteed 1st stikes, Drill 4 for +3 more 1st strikes and more 1st strike chances, and Combat 6 for a juicy 51.2 base strength which makes sure that even when some super-lucky enemy manages to survive all the 1st strikes - it's indeed only some paint being scratched, i.e. not any much damage. Which 51.2 then gets further multiplied by other promotions, of course: huge further boost from City Raider 3 for attacking cities, +25% from vs-unit-type promotions, wood and hill bonuses where applicable, etc. "Man, it's impossible to get THAT many XP" you say? Not a problem: when Leeroy is the one and only guy who wipes out several AI civilizations, and with GG's 2x XP gains - it's all promotions you want and then some. By the way, Cover and Charge promotions are obtainable for Leeroy when he's still a Melee unit, but become not available once he upgrades to Mechanized Infantry, so might wanna grab those before he stops being a Melee unit, too. While March promotion - is given for free when upgrading to Mechanized Infantry, yet it may well be a good idea to take it far earlier anyway - helps much.

Difficulty per your preference; I doubt this is anyhow doable on Deity, that is... %) Good luck!

What about units inside your boats/galleons/etc.? Can they end the turn outside of your borders?

 

[Fins]

What about units inside your boats/galleons/etc.? Can they end the turn outside of your borders?

Depends on what unit. Like i said - simple: is it land combat unit? Then only 1 can be outside my cities at any given end-turn moment. Does not matter if it's 2+ land combat units in boats or not: if those boats outside cities - nope, can't do! But if it's non-combat units in a boat - Settlers, Workers, etc, - then sure, they can be anywhere in any number you like.

It's a simple rule, but it has tons of peculiar consequences, yep - way more than ones i mentioned under the spoiler above. Like, Airports become hella nice; can still move "slow" land combat units between cities more than 3 tiles away from each other via regular roads one-by-one if to "park" Leeroy in some city for a few turns; Railroads become a life-saver; some pillaged road / railroad because you just forgot to put a 2-move unit in a nearby city - at times spell a local disaster if enemies are still present; etc.

Oh, there's also "soft Leeroy" version of this challenge: the only difference is that on top of cities being "the only place for other-than-Leeroy land combat units to end their turns in" - Forts are also included. Soft Leeroy is nothing too crazy to win, though.

 

[valergrad]

Depends on what unit. Like i said - simple: is it land combat unit? Then only 1 can be outside my cities at any given end-turn moment. Does not matter if it's 2+ land combat units in boats or not: if those boats outside cities - nope, can't do! But if it's non-combat units in a boat - Settlers, Workers, etc, - then sure, they can be anywhere in any number you like.

It's a simple rule, but it has tons of peculiar consequences, yep - way more than ones i mentioned under the spoiler above. Like, Airports become hella nice; can still move "slow" land combat units between cities more than 3 tiles away from each other via regular roads one-by-one if to "park" Leeroy in some city for a few turns; Railroads become a life-saver; some pillaged road / railroad because you just forgot to put a 2-move unit in a nearby city - at times spell a local disaster if enemies are still present; etc.

Oh, there's also "soft Leeroy" version of this challenge: the only difference is that on top of cities being "the only place for other-than-Leeroy land combat units to end their turns in" - Forts are also included. Soft Leeroy is nothing too crazy to win, though.

I like this challenge, interesting idea!
Except for, if we are speaking about deity/immortal - than having Leeroy or not having it doesn't matter, one unit can't take a city no matter how much exp it have.
But if 'conquest' is the only enabled win condition, then you probably can build Sushi and Creative Constructions at your cities and just wait until your culture move borders close enough to enemy's cities.

 

[Fins]

I like this challenge, interesting idea!
Except for, if we are speaking about deity/immortal - than having Leeroy or not having it doesn't matter, one unit can't take a city no matter how much exp it have.
But if 'conquest' is the only enabled win condition, then you probably can build Sushi and Creative Constructions at your cities and just wait until your culture move borders close enough to enemy's cities.

One unit can not do it on Deity indeed, but we ain't talking about "one unit" here - it's "one _land_ unit". Ships, fighters, bombers and nukes are all not restricted in any way. Also, what i said above about Leeroy best being a Melee > Mech Infantry unit - for Deity specifically, this is most likely suboptimal; if i'd ever try this on Deity, i'd try with Mounted > Gunship, instead. 5 moves per turn (with a GG) = up to 5 attacks with Blitz per turn in an offensive. 1st damaging the garrison up with bombers and, where possible, ships. Gunship would end up without City Raider upgrades, of course - but higher mobility and number of attacks per turn would probably be better.

As for defending your own cities - that's not such a problem: if you'd doing Deity, you know where and why you may be attacked, at any point, and you either prevent that entirely (there are some tricks), or, if preferable - set up sufficient defense force, by moving your defending units in such a way that they all end up in one of your cities by the end of each turn. Usual methods of softing attacking AI stacks all work; even 1-move artillery units can and will help, once main enemy stack arrives to any tile touching the city tile which AIs tries to attack: as long as artilleries don't kill last unit in the attacking stack, they remain on your city's tile after hitting the AI's stack, hence not violating "only 1 unit outside cities by the end of each turn" rule.

And then - Nukes, of course. Obviously, getting those in any good number requires reaching late game, which on Deity with its piling up -5% cost of everything per era for all AIs on top of -40% cost of everything right from the start (iirc) - is a challenge in itself. But Deity is named so for a reason, right? So, yeah. Like i said above: personally, i don't think Leeroy challenge is doable on Deity, myself, but then, some amazing folks do all kinds of amazing stuff, you know.

 

[valergrad]

Okay, single-tile deity huge map challenge also is possible ( using strategy from @ariosto ). Though this time it should be called 'single-tile start', as later we had more, of course.
This time it was huge pangea, 17 opponents, quick and Huayna Capac.
To get Hinduism ( for +5 additional culture) I've chosen 17 opponents that are not cultural and doesn't have mysticism.

I've placed my single-tile peaks near chinese tribes.
But despite of Mao placed Bejing in my 3rd ring, apparently it seems impossible to early flip the capital. Capital pushing borders, and that's why it get +20 culture for every level, so early flipping for it just not possible.
Hinduism + Stonehenge + ToA + Oracle ( for Alphabet ) didn't help.
But luckily Alexander founded Sparta in my 4st ring, and when Sparta had just 1% own culture he gifted it to me.
This happened quite swiftly - T49.

After that this game became pretty similar to a 'normal' deity game except that you have even slower and rougher start than usual ( Only one actual city at T49 on quick... )
By the moment I was ready to settle, there was not much space for a new cities left, so I had to stay with just 4 cities.

I am not a professional deity player, so I thought it is a lose.
Especially after I've lost race to The Great Library.
And then I've lost race to the Music.
But after managing to build Sistine Chapel in Sparta I've got some hope for a cultural victory.
Of course, you can't win cultural victory with 4 cities and two religions. So, I had to find a window to conquer some neighbors - Mao and Alexander were the obvious targets, as because of my cultural pressure they become weaker than other AIs.
In the meantime I've lost race to Liberalism to Mansa... Charles De Gaulle had 5 vassals at T120, so the whole game didn't look good to me.
But after upgrading all riflemen to infantry and eliminating first Mao ( +4 cities ) then Alexander ( +3 cities ) I've got 11 cities and 4 religions. This happened around T165.

Now I could concentrate on Cathedrals and cultural victory.
It was a tough race - Sparta and Tiwanaku became legendary exactly at the same turn that Hammurabi launched his spaceship. This means I've won just by 6 turns advantage. But I've made a lot of mistakes, obviously better player would win faster.

 

[ariosto]

Great! Actually, I didn't think it is possible, given that you have to abandon OCC this time. How did you avoid possible AI's attacks?

But despite of Mao placed Bejing in my 3rd ring, apparently it seems impossible to early flip the capital. Capital pushing borders, and that's why it get +20 culture for every level, so early flipping for it just not possible.

I think, flipping capitals is just impossible regardless how many culture you have, but I'm not sure on that.

 

[valergrad]

Great! Actually, I didn't think it is possible, given that you have to abandon OCC this time. How did you avoid possible AI's attacks?

I was quite lucky. As I have got early Hinduism - then all my neighbors were converted to Hinduism too. It is quite easy to keep peace if you share religion.
Of course I've used some usual methods like fulfilling all their demands, profitable (for them) tech trade and resource trade.

I think, flipping capitals is just impossible regardless how many culture you have, but I'm not sure on that.

No, there is no such a rule. I flipped capitals many times, but yes, this requires really enormous amount of culture, it can't be done early. After AI's capital pushed borders three times - you need culture advantage as +60 per turn just to reach parity. And to flip you probably will need as much as +100-200 culture per turn.