The All Leaders Challenge Game Bullpen

[slaze]

Any chance an Advanced Start ALC is coming any time soon?

 

[kazapp]

Try a HUGE map a see how fast you can get a domination win at marathon speed.

That would be a masochistic win to me...

 

[DrJambo]

Hey Sisiutil, (post moved to Bullpen )

Have you ever considered using permanent alliances in your games? They can really spice up the late game by upping the anté.

Take my last Emperor game as an example. Playing as Goldfinger himself (Sury), I had a troubled start but mananged to recover and work my way into 2nd place on the score by medieval times. Into the renaissance I noticed Mansa Musa would accept a PA and that really opened up my game to slice through the two most powerful civs on my continent - Catherine and Mehmed - who'd been taking turns to pick on myself and Mansa Musa repeatedly. Great I thought. Only then the two most powerful civs on the other continent - Pacal and Tokugawa - also signed a PA with each other, instantly making them the most technologically advanced! They jumped in on dogpiling Mehmed after vassalising their entire continent. Two veritable superpowers! The opportunity to vassalise Mehmed and Catherine arose, and I thought that by vassalising them my problems would dissipate. However, immediately upon doing so, the other superpower instantly declared and proceeded to drop around 10 nukes on my continent!

What ensued was a long drawn out and bloody intercontinental war which finally turned my way by virtue of a fortunate diplomatic victory. Thumbs up to permanent alliances which first brought me into the picture (I was considering quitting when Mehmed and Catherine declared), and then raised a beheamoth from the other continent to make the late game a thrill!

 

[CivCorpse]

I have played marathon speed since CIV IV came out and I get plenty of space/diplo/cultural wins. Try a HUGE map a see how fast you can get a domination win at marathon speed.

Then again, I really don't know any better, as I do not play epic or standard unless I try to poorly shadow an ALC game.

Sis on a huge map at Marathon speed? My grandchildren will certainly enjoy reading the finish. . Seriously though Marathon is really meant for Huge maps. And for those that say it is a warmongers speed. Maybe so. but it can be lethal to them as well. The tech lead can definately give you an overwhelming advantage. But it can be the dagger in your back. Shaka is your neighbor and you don't have copper? you're toast. IW takes a looooooong time to research. If your enemy gets a tech lead you can be in serious trouble. There is no "quick" adjustment to your tech path to grab a military tech. You find yourself on the short end of the macemen vs. swordsmen fight. And you stay there for a while.

 

[Daedal]

It would be fun to see PA used once or twice. Upcoming Lincoln is a good candidate for this since he shines late in the game and we need a late leader otherwise Sisiutil will have conquered the world before he can find somebody to ally himself with.

 

[Sisiutil]

What exactly does a Permanent Alliance entail?

EDIT: CivCorpse, we could always play a marathon/huge map ALC with Advanced Start. Imagine the fun! The starts currently generate 10 pages or so of discussion--imagine how long they'll take when we can see 3-4 times the tiles and have techs, units, and buildings to buy!

 

[r_rolo1]

If you get a PA , you kind of merge with a AI: you share research, diplo and finances....This can be good if you can persuade a much larger civ to PA with you, but it can also backfire in multiple Directions: your PA partner may decide to make SoL in a fishing artic village ( making impossible for you to do it... ), 2 strong AI can PA making a mamoth....

There is also another issue that you need to see if you go that way: some AI will never accept a PA, no matter how friendly they are with you ( I've seen some PA games going down because of a vain attemt to PA with those civs ). Check ori files on civ leaderson doubt...

 

[ori]

you should also note in a PA:
- you are jointly teching - but in most cases the AI partner gets the the tech first and will start any wonders / space ship parts in their remotest villages before your turn starts; unless you ask them to switch to a different tech the turn before it is completed.
- you can get all resources (including ones they'd never ever trade or only have one instance of) and all their money (both treasury and surplus/turn) from them just ask for it - they'll decrease their tech slider though
- you usually need to be friendly with them and have been on the same side in a war and/or had a defensive pact for at least 40 or so turns before it becomes available. The war counter does not reset - so two 20 turn wars do in the span of 4 millenia do as well
- diplomacy gets whacky since your standing towards all other AIs will be the mean (rounded down) of both of you. Sometimes this means the numerical values and sometimes it is attitude levels...

Can't think of more right now

Edit: except:
there are no leaders that refuse a PA everytime anymore - the refuse threshold was lowered for those in BtS. There are 4 which will consider a PA at Pleased: DeGaulle, Peter, Qin and Ramesses - all others will only consider it at Friendly

 

[Shoot the Moon]

You also need 40 turns of either shared war or defensive pact for them to accept PA (in addition to the required relationship). for more information, WastinTime wrote a guide on permanent alliances.

 

[Bandobras Took]

I would recommend such a thing for a leader you're extremely comfortable with, since the you know what to expect from a standard game with that leader.

 

[Sisiutil]

Can you dissolve a permanent alliance? Or are they, indeed, "permanent"?

 

[r_rolo1]

They are, indeed, permanent ( unless you go to WB ) This means that you need to choose your PA partner very carefully......

 

[Shoot the Moon]

The fun thing about Permanent Alliances is that they allow you to win cultural and domination victories in OCC. Although cultural victories with that can be infuriating, as you see all the stupidity of the AIs.

 

[DrJambo]

Re Permanent alliances:

All existing tech is immediately shared and the price of new tech is raised 50% for the two civs in a PA. So if you pick a poor partner, research rate can actually do down. It definitely comes with some risks but two AI civs together can become quite formiddable.

In my game it was Toku and Pacal - Pacal brought Toku into the modern age with his tech, and Toku brought the military. Turned out to be quite a scary combo.

Re general ALC game settings:

There's something to be said for playing with the low sea level setting on a standard map size with 2 extra civs! This is what I do, and the end games are always far more interesting.
- a playstyle that Blake, the AI designer, use to advocate as the best setup.

 

[JTMacc99]

Re general ALC game settings:

There's something to be said for playing with the low sea level setting on a standard map size with 2 extra civs! This is what I do, and the end games are always far more interesting.
- a playstyle that Blake, the AI designer, use to advocate as the best setup.

I'm okay with that! Frankly, for the Lincoln game up next, I am in favor of any change in the setup that would make it more likely to advance to the era of the American UU and UB, and have those two things make a difference.

Having said that, I am opposed to moving up the difficulty level for the next game for the same reason. If I am reading these forums correctly, victories on Immortal are achieved 90% of the time by crippling the AI way before it gets to the industrial era. If that isn't true, then please just ingnore me.

 

[Sisiutil]

Re Permanent alliances:

All existing tech is immediately shared and the price of new tech is raised 50% for the two civs in a PA. So if you pick a poor partner, research rate can actually do down. It definitely comes with some risks but two AI civs together can become quite formiddable.

In my game it was Toku and Pacal - Pacal brought Toku into the modern age with his tech, and Toku brought the military. Turned out to be quite a scary combo.

Re general ALC game settings:

There's something to be said for playing with the low sea level setting on a standard map size with 2 extra civs! This is what I do, and the end games are always far more interesting.
- a playstyle that Blake, the AI designer, use to advocate as the best setup.

I'll have to think some more about PAs--maybe play a couple of off-line games with them.

However, I like your idea for the map and will probably incorporate that into the next game.

 

[Borealis]

Bump for Hammurabi - going to take him on in Immortal? He has a nice early UU (at least, my lowly Monarch player likes it vs axe spammers) and the Garden, which adds health to the Colosseum, always a good thing in the endgame. Construction, already a priority, is enhanced and Archery provides a cheap, powerful unit. Hammy has excellent traits for expansionistic warring, with Aggressive providing cheap barracks/good initial promotions and Organized allowing cheap courthouses and factories to help defray the cost of a large empire and increase its production. I don't know what map type to suggest for him, except that avoiding isolation would be a good thing in order to use his Aggressive trait at all.

 

[Julian Delphiki]

Hammy has strange personality disorder for an AGG ai - he's one of the easiest leaders to befriend, imho. Waiting for the next game with interest, what will be the map settings?

 

[r_rolo1]

Bump for Hammurabi - going to take him on in Immortal? He has a nice early UU (at least, my lowly Monarch player likes it vs axe spammers) and the Garden, which adds health to the Colosseum, always a good thing in the endgame. Construction, already a priority, is enhanced and Archery provides a cheap, powerful unit. Hammy has excellent traits for expansionistic warring, with Aggressive providing cheap barracks/good initial promotions and Organized allowing cheap courthouses and factories to help defray the cost of a large empire and increase its production. I don't know what map type to suggest for him, except that avoiding isolation would be a good thing in order to use his Aggressive trait at all.

( underlined is mine )

I do agree that Agg is somehow minimized by isolation, but remember that the halved cost building of Agg ( Barracks, drydocks ) never go obsolete and that Agg also boosts gunpowder units ( from muskets to Mech Infantry ). And if you ask me, the free combat I is more valuable in gunpowder age than in the earlier days ( except if you're planning a axe rush )

I would say that S man should not trim isolation possibility from Hammurabi.... in fact he already won a isolated start with a Agg leader ( remember Ragnar ). This is All leaders Chalenge after all , not all leaders showcase

 

[Bast]

Hi, are you going to play Victoria again?