The K-Club 1 : Rameses of Egypt

[Noble Zarkon]

Welcome to the first installment of the K Club based on the famous Nobles Club - the intention is for people using the brilliant K-Mod to play the same map and compare thoughts, progress etc.

The intention is we will play all leaders over the next few months.

The saves are set up so you can use any version of K-Mod, any speed etc.

Our first leader is Ramesses of Egypt.

The Egyptians start with Agriculture and The Wheel.

Traits: Ramesses is Spiritual and Industrious. Spiritual means no anarchy in civics changes and half price temples whilst Industrious means half price Wonders (both Great and National).

The UB: The Obelisk, a monument that allows two Priest specialists.

The UU: The War Chariot, a Chariot with 1 additional strength and immunity to First Strikes.

And the start:

Spoiler map details :

Not too big or small, standard size.

Spoiler edits :

Moved a few resources about.

Our standard doctrine:-

There are no hard and fast rules here: fun and learning are our primary goals, but we do suggest that you update your progress at various points in the game, using the Spoiler feature of the boards. You can post as often as you like; here's one suggestion:
4000 BC (starting thoughts, no spoiler required for that discussion)
1000 BC or so (how you decided to progress up the early tech/build paths, which AIs you have met, where you're thinking of putting cities, etc)
500 AD or so (after establishing some cities and a possible plan of action)
1200 AD or so (mid-game, Lib race, wars or peace, or whichever happened or didn't, met other
continent if applicable, etc)
1600 AD (or when you have decided on a course of action and a specific victory condition)
End of game (Victory!!! or defeat, no shame in losing, especially if you tried a higher level. Learning is what we focus on, not fastest win or biggest empire)
This is just a guideline. If you're trying to improve your game, then posting more frequent updates, in as much detail as you can manage, is the best way to get suggestions from other players. If you come to what seems like a major decision and you want some advice, post an update, regardless of what game-year it is.

We also welcome players to ask for specific game advice, hopefully we will have a number or stronger players who lurk and help out with solid tips, and of course, we help each other. Replies to specific questions should also be in spoilers, with a simple "@" in front of the person the answer is directed towards.

Special thanks go to everyone at the Nobles Club for the inspiration for this club.

The WB-saves are attached (zipped; they are bigger than standard saves). To play, simply download and unzip it into your BTS/Saves/WorldBuilder folder. Start the game, select "Play Scenario", and look for "KClub 1 - Ramesses Noble" (or Monarch, etc., for higher levels). You can play with your favorite MOD at the Level and Speed of your choice. From Quick-Warlord to Marathon-Deity, all are welcome!

Spoiler what's up with specific difficulties :

In each scenario file you can select your level of difficulty, but that doesn't give the AI the right bonus techs by itself. Use the Noble save for all levels at and below Noble. The Monarch save gives all the AI Archery. Emperor adds Hunting; Immortal adds Agriculture; Deity adds The Wheel.

For players on Monarch or above, you should add archery as a tech for the barbarians (if you don't, the AI will capture their cities very early). This cannot be done in the WB save file and must be done in Worldbuilder as follows:

1. Zoom in all the way so you can't see the rest of the map.
2. Use the CTRL-W key (or the menu) to enter the worldbuilder. Avoid looking at the mini-map in the lower right corner.
3. By default you're in "player" mode (look in the box in the upper right; the icon that looks like a person should be selected). You'll get a drop down menu labeled with your leader's name. Barbarians are at the bottom, so cover the rest of the list with your hand if you don't want to see who else is on the map. Select "Barbarians".
4. Select the "Technologies" tab in the box on the left.
5. Find Archery (the arrow head icon; 8th row, 3rd column from the right) and click it.
6. Exit the worldbuilder.
7. Zoom out again after the map fades, and start playing.

Spoiler huts and events :

Note: The standard saves have no huts and have events turned off. If you want tribal villages and random events, choose the saves with "Huts" in their names. If you want huts but no events, select the Huts saves and use Custom Scenario to turn on the option that suppresses events (or open the save in a Word Processor and and add the line Option=GAMEOPTION_NO_EVENTS underneath the line beginning Calendar=.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Spoiler winners :

None yet.

 

[Lenneth]

A great initiative! Although I don't have much free time, I subscribe to this and hope that many others join in.
I will try it on Emperor. By looking at the picture, I would move W with the warrior and there being then enough food in sight I would settle in place, otherwise I could consider a settler move.

 

[karadoc]

I'd probably just settle in place right away and let the warrior start exploring further afield - probably moving the warrior south-east after settling. Since we can't see any food resources, I think it's unlikely that we're going to identify a good spot to move the settler within couple of turns. So I'd just trust that the starting position is good. (Starting positions usually are good.)

 

[plastiqe]

To the north and east are a lot of forests. More floodplains to the west. I would move my warrior 1W onto the forest/grass hill to check if there is a good reason to settle 1W1S on the river forest grassland. You'd lose 6 forests and a possible resource if you moved.

Otherwise SiP for a sweet bureau capital and chop out the Pyramids. I'm deep into a K-Mod game of my own at the moment but maybe I'll give this one a spin next.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

To the north and east are a lot of forests. More floodplains to the west. I would move my warrior 1W onto the forest/grass hill to check if there is a good reason to settle 1W1S on the river forest grassland. You'd lose 6 forests and a possible resource if you moved.

Otherwise SiP for a sweet bureau capital and chop out the Pyramids. I'm deep into a K-Mod game of my own at the moment but maybe I'll give this one a spin next.

Thanks for participating.

 

[Choix003]

This is probably the first one of these I'll participate in. I love playing K-Mod because it feels like a more complete game to me, even if that causes it to be harder. I'll try this on Prince tonight or tomorrow night, whenever I can get some free time.

 

[plastiqe]

Thanks for participating - please put details of the map in spoilers - thanks!

Oh I haven't played it, those are just the details I gleaned from the screenshot. : P

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Oh I haven't played it, those are just the details I gleaned from the screenshot. : P

lol OK - I'm impressed

 

[Choix003]

4000 BC:

Spoiler :

Settled in place, nice to have both stone and marble with Rameses. Plan to research Mining, Masonry, and Bronze Working to cut down those trees for either a wonder or two or some settlers.

 

[Choix003]

1080 BC:

Spoiler :

I built 3 other cities to the south, found Justinian to the southwest and Tokugawa to the southeast. I am planning on blocking off land to the north from these 2. Because I won't settle it quick enough to prevent barbarians, and because I hooked stone up so early, I chopped a couple forests for the Great Wall.

I researched Mining, Masonry, Bronze Working, Animal Husbandry, Pottery, and Writing; I am about to finish Math and chop the rest of my trees.

View attachment Choix003 BC-1080.CivBeyondSwordSave

 

[Lenowill]

Gonna start one of this.

Monarch no huts.

4000 B.C.:

In an attempt to do something different from everyone else that might still work, I settled 1N on the plains-hill stone. Discovered that I have Cattle and MARBLE in my BFC as well. Very cool. Early wonder shenanigans are likely. I start researching AH and enjoy my 10 turn worker with the 3 hammer city tile.

 

[Lenowill]

Monarch no huts,
1000 B.C. checkpoint

Spoiler :

I have 4 cities so far with a 5th on the way shortly. Got the great wall in 2280 BC. Took a screenshot, may edit in a picture in a bit. Justinian on my continent, my plan is to expand/tech in peace since I don't know where he lives and the contact was late (probably far away).

The great wall is enabling me to expand hilariously without fear of barbs.

 

[Lenowill]

Monarch no huts,
500 AD (well, 620 ADish) checkpoint

Spoiler :

I have wonder spammed incredibly, picking up the mids, parthenon, chapel, mausoleum, and various others. I got two great engies, two great artists, and two great scientists. Rushed the Zeus in a good culture pushing spot with an engy, culture bombed twice in the same city to double pressure Tokugawa and Justinian, and flipped Antioch already with Kagoshima hopefully on the way. Currently making Longbowmen and catapults before someone notices I have very inadequate defenses.

Edit: lol, it flipped on the next turn. Seeing possible war options for the future I adopt Vassalage while training my units.

 

[Lenowill]

It was fun for a while, but I've decided to quit.

Spoiler :

It turned into a huge war game that wasn't fun anymore, and my real life isn't in a place when I can afford the strain of drudging my way through it.

I'm locked in a cycle of Perma dogpile war with Justinian and Toku, who are only making units while Willem behind them steals techs and won't become involved in the war. It's still possible I could win it (I got Lib race and grabbed Gunpowder with it) but at this point I don't care enough to try.

I quit after Toku captured a fully Castled and unbombarded city that was garrisoned with multiple CG2 longbowmen, using an offensive stack that I've never been able to take a similar city with except in cases of extreme luck.

I accidentally moved stacks of units in the wrong direction three times over the course of the wars, twice because of accidentally bumping the numpad. One of these incidents cost me the chance to take one of Toku's cities. The lack of a do-over for movement mistakes made the game less fun, just like it always does.

As ever in Civ4, the pace of the game becomes too boringly slow during war, and I still hate the way the game's combat system works, almost in its entirety.

I'm going to go back to not playing Civ4 until I get up the urge to actually do my military mod, because my patience for the regular game's counterintuitive combat system is too far gone.

K-Mod is still the best mod of the regular game ever, though.

Spoiler :

It was a fun start though. Difficulty -1 for all the happy.

I'd have played Prince instead of Monarch if it were an option. (Why wasn't it one?)

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I'd have played Prince instead of Monarch if it were an option. (Why wasn't it one?)

Prince has the same handicaps as Noble so you just use the Noble save and select Prince during the startup. I'll clarify the instructions to make that clear.

 

[karadoc]

Speaking of those handicap adjustments, I've noticed a minor mistake. When the AI civs get free starting techs the barbarians should get them as well. I played on Emperor and I was surprised to see a barbarian city guarded by warriors.

(I recorded 30mins or so of myself playing this map in a "lets play" style video - in which I basically just play the game and mindlessly ramble about the decisions I'm making while I play... but due to my inexperience in recording stuff I ended up with 100 gigabytes of super hi-def video (1920x1080) which I'm not really sure what to do with. -- Actually, I've already compressed it down to 3.4gb and deleted the original because my hard drive was full; but that's still too big. I'm not sure if I should just scrap the video and forget about it, or if I should break it up into a bunch of smaller parts to upload, or if I should compress it again to a lower resolution which would make it far less watchable but far more manageable. -- Next time, I think I'll reduce the in-game resolution to 1280x720 for recording.)

 

[Lenowill]

I'd be interested to hear footage of you talking about the game. I will be happy to hear if you get something like that working sometime.

I'm pretty bad at video myself or I'd try to offer advice.

 

[plastiqe]

Spoiler :

Played the Emperor/no huts*. I went Mining, Bronze, AH, Myst, Masonry, Med, Priest, Writing, CoL (Oracle), Alphabet (tradetradetrade), Math, Construction, HBR. I think I built 3 workers before my first settler. You need a lot of workers for this start.

Heliopolis (my third city where I made sure I founded Confucianism) will eventually be the new bureaucratic capital with support cities to grow the cottages. Thebes will be the Wonder/GP farm.

Spoiler :

War with Justinian is super easy (*more on that below). I have War Chariots/HA + Catapults vs Archers/Chariots since my first move was to take his Iron city. Once I get fur online I should be able to finally trade for Dutch Ivory and get my War Elephant rampage on.

Spoiler :

Early Pyramids was key for Rep happiness and I built the other wonders several times for the failgold. I had Thebes pumping out 2 turn War Chariots during my pre Byzantine-face-smashing buildup.

Spoiler :

I made two dumb mistakes.
A) Set espionage vs Justinian that will just go to waste now.
B) Settled my first Great Scientist in Thebes. Should have put him in Heliopolis since that was eventually gonna be the capital.

*However

All of this is moot because I'm not quite sure how but I ended up playing regular civ and not K-Mod. I just double clicked on the Emperor no-huts save file and started playing and didn't realize I was in easymode till later. When I load K-mod I can't load my autosaves or find the worldbuilder saves (I know where they are, they just don't show up). Dunno what happened but chalk it up to my newbiness when it comes to playing saves from the forums.

I didn't like the map much with that artificial line of mountains as an unnatural natural barrier. I'm not gonna finish it so I peeked at the worldbuilder and it was basically a win your island and GG type map with three more isolated AI, which isn't quite what I like to play. I might try the next one tho. : )

 

[rkade8583]

I'll give it a try and edit my results. Noble Normal Huts and events.

Spoiler :

4k Archery, Masonry, Writing. Warrior exploring.
3k Writing, Monarchy, Sailing 2c (5w2n) 3c (7n)
2k OB Neth, Byz until established. Byz has Bud. Kill?
1k Founded Conf. built GW/Ora. Building ChIt. Defense. Feudal
0 IW, Cal, Con. Longbows, catapults, iron offense? Shanghai?
1000 Gunpowder. War with Byz. Cats and LB

Byzantine killed me. They killed me bad. Divided and nabbed my 2 cities and then swept north and east. Damn