The Power of Expansionists!

[Bamspeedy]

I have ALL of the ancient era techs including Literature, Republic, and Monarchy. Notice the date. Regent level.

This was with science at 0%. I only bumped it up to 10% now to start on Fuedalism. This actually is almost a curse, because I wanted to have a bunch of chariots built before getting chivalry. But I should still get a bunch of horseman built that I can upgrade to knights. Babylon is my neighbor, I'm almost tempted to give them all the ancient era techs, so I can buy Monotheism off of them and get chivalry alot sooner. And since Babylon doesn't have contact with anyone else yet, I can kill off their 1 or 2 cities (respawning is turned off), and thus no one else will get those techs.

 

[Knightblade pDM]

How on Earth did you manage that? Rapid Expansion? If so, I should try that, and it seems like your economy didn't falter one bit..darn good

 

[Bamspeedy]

Well, I got a settler at 3950 B.C. .

But the main thing was pumping out scouts like crazy. I have only built scouts (15 or so) and settlers (7-8 cities right now). I started out on rivers, so that helped the commerce, and I could bump luxury up to 10% to keep the 3rd citizen happy. Place cities ICS style (each city 2-3 tiles apart). Mine everything (started on all grassland).

 

[BCLG100]

but why do you want to build loads of knights if it is only you and babylon?

 

[Bamspeedy]

It's a pangea map, Babylon isn't my only neighbor. I also have India and Greece nearby in other directions. Since it's a huge map, it will take awhile for Babylon to actually meet those other two. I'll wait and see if they have made contact with them by the time I'm done with fuedalism, or when I have a large enough army to take them out. There are other civs around somewhere, so I want the knights to take over EVERYONE. I would probably kill off Babylon with horsemen just to hurry up and get rid of them, before they trade the techs away.

 

[Gastric ReFlux]

Now try to do the same on an Archipelago map. That'll impress me.

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Bamspeedy
It's a pangea map, Babylon isn't my only neighbor.

Good job! On Pangaea, expansionist civs can be a real asset. I almost always build 2-3 scouts before any other unit in such situations.

 

[wohmongarinf00l]

wow! 2230BC and all ancient era techs discovered.
with 8 cities u can demand cities from everyone every 20 turns...
that should be interesting

 

[Bamspeedy]

Yes, it should be quite interesting. I just knocked off Babylon (in the upper left) after they completed the Pyramids for me and I gave them all the techs so that I could get Monotheism from them. Went and studyed Engineering while I was waiting for Babylon to finish the Pyramids to really help my mobility because of all the rivers. The only civs that have contact with anyone (but me) is France and Russia. I have 45-50 horsemen to upgrade to knights (I will make a couple hundred gold when I knock science back to 0 or 10%). I have 71 cities. And on the next turn I will get the last (8th) luxury!

Then everyone will be toast

 

[Sullla]

Bamspeedy, I'm impressed to see just how far you've managed to take the ICS strategy and use of early scouts in this game. It is a HOF game, right? I can hardly imagine that you would be playing on Regent otherwise.

While I have no doubt as to your considerable skill at the game, I find myself questioning the purpose here. You have squeezed 71 cities into a space that would normally hold 20 at the most, have demanded cities from the other civs (your power has to be off the charts), and clearly have had all the ancient techs since the earlier stages of the game. This start is PERFECT, so perfect that I don't think it could possibily have been done better. But... haven't you lost the sense of playing a game somewhere in here? Your civ is playing by a formula, one designed to reap the maximum possibile score. What is the point to playing this game? To get your name on the HOF? I know you to be a great player, so why would you feel the need to spend umpteen hours carefully managing this game to squeeze more points out of it in the eyes of Civ3's broken scoring formula?

Look, I am not criticizing you here. If you really want to go through the unbelieveable tedium of this kind of game, by all means go ahead. But is it "fun" to play this kind of game, where the other civs are meaningless and the goal is an accountant's one of managing territory for score? I am curious as to the motivation for you in this kind of game. What keeps you going back when each turn begins to take over an hour - and you have 300 more to play? I honestly don't understand it; how (why) do you do it?

 

[Bamspeedy]

This start is PERFECT, so perfect that I don't think it could possibily have been done better.

Yes, it could have been done better. I'm sure Aeson, who is more experienced in the 'settler flood' would have done better. I'm also using the governors in all cities, except the capital (currently building a wonder), so I have little micromanaging to do. Believe it or not, I have made several mistakes in this game.

But... haven't you lost the sense of playing a game somewhere in here? Your civ is playing by a formula, one designed to reap the maximum possibile score. What is the point to playing this game? To get your name on the HOF?

Yes, to get on the HoF. It does not matter to me really whether I get on there or not. Moonsinger beat my score quite a while ago, and I finally got around to beating it again. If I really cared about it I would have been doing this long ago, and not screwed up my last attempt by doing the exploit that I knew would be dissallowed anyways.

But is it "fun" to play this kind of game, where the other civs are meaningless and the goal is an accountant's one of managing territory for score?

Funny you should say it like that. I have a degree in accounting . But that is not my profession. I get plenty of excercise with my job (very physical work). Some people get a kick on just how many points you can get, or how powerful you can dominate the AI. If it wasn't for Civfanatics I probably would still be playing Chieftain, trying to build every single wonder, and get every single improvement in every city.

What keeps you going back when each turn begins to take over an hour - and you have 300 more to play? I honestly don't understand it; how (why) do you do it?

My turns take about 10 minutes, maybe less. I do not 'study' the screen like you did, when you were milking GOTM 6, where you spent 1/2-1 hour on some moves because you were mapping out your territory, so you would know where to put all your cities for maximum scoring potential. I just glance at the screen and say to myself "that spot looks good" and build a city.

This is actually a change of pace. It gets boring after a while to continually pound the Zulus , and have old Bismark and Catherine up to their back-stabbing routine every game.

I play a few 'normal' games in the GOTM and the tournament, then play a milking game. It adds variety. I certainly understand it's not your preferred style, but 'to each his own'.

Some people like different objectives, and do stuff differently than the usual, boring spaceship victory, or UN at the usual date every game.

I'll now sit down from the podium and await Sulla's 'Realms Beyond Epics' sales pitch.

 

[Soviet beast]

OEn word! HaXoring!!

 

[Sullla]

Hey, I'm not trying to criticize you here (although it probably looks that way). I really am curious why you would enjoy playing such a game. It makes more sense to me when you explain it as stemming from a perfectionist playing style. I suppose I am not as much of a perfectionist when it comes to things - or, in other ways more so, since I can't bear to automate workers or use city governors. You seem to be saying that these games are a change of pace for you, which I think I can understand. I tried the same thing as well in the past to see what it was like, but only once and I doubt it will happen again. I can see that you and I have different ideas of what is fun to do in Civ3, and what constitutes an enjoyable game. There is nothing wrong with this. In the end, we will both do what we enjoy most, and that's what is most important.

(No soapboxing here, just truly was curious as to what motivated you in these games. )

 

[Richard III]

Look, this is an inspiration: I'm one of those "I'm playing for the history geeks" who likes to play the UK but is tired of getting my ass kicked at Monarch level. By compromising slightly from this strategy - to, say, build slightly fewer cities slightly farther apart

It honestly never occurred to me to build scouts in any quantity. At most, I have had two in a game. But obviously, they count for (A) striking power in the AI's warped calculations, and (b) picking up goodies in larger quantities than I beleived possible.

R.III

 

[candidgamera]

Bamspeedy:

Agreed on expansionist, don't know what people are thinking that say its not powerful, better than scientific in early game for getting tech, assuming big continents. If you get lucky and get mapreading early even playing on island worlds wouldn't matter much. You play kind of like a permenant state of "know I'm going to get theory of evolution" then.

Its so powerful for the early game on big world, big continents I quit playing with it - too easy.

Curious: how big a world is this campaign on?

Am persuaded from playing and experimenting that the scout itself gives almost always positive only results for goodie huts (don't play raging but do play restless). This when even giving the scout to nonexpansionist civs. Also the "all terrain as roads" seems to do the same: cut out scouts and gave the warrior this and several games in a row (regent, restless) got all positive results: tech, settlers, workers, money. Same conditions giving warrior 2 MP got all negative results - barbs everytime. Undocumented feature of explorer maybe?

Final balance solution for interesting games is no scouts, warriors 1 MP all terrain as roads, 240x200, with middle option on continents: provides some firebreak to the tech rush per Gastric ReFlux, restless barbs - no bad huts but uprisings.

like to do mine with "civs on stereoids":
Example: Americans are Scientific, Industrial, Commercial and a "horse culture" - they get mounted warriors, riders, cossacks.
(sucks when they end up trading for horses though).

"legion culture" is for England, Germany: they get the legions that build roads, forts.

 

[Bamspeedy]

I suppose I am not as much of a perfectionist when it comes to things - or, in other ways more so, since I can't bear to automate workers or use city governors.

I'm in a similar situation. I know using the governors is not efficient, but yet I want to maximize score. The governors IMO is too time consuming for 200-500 cities, but I will manually control the workers, so I don't have so many mines to switch back to irrigation later on. When I get 300-500 workers or so, I may automate them too, just to keep my sanity.

It honestly never occurred to me to build scouts in any quantity. At most, I have had two in a game. But obviously, they count for (A) striking power in the AI's warped calculations, and (b) picking up goodies in larger quantities than I beleived possible.

A. Scouts don't add as much to your power ranking as previous versions/patches do. But by getting a huge tech lead, contact with everyone (with embassies), maps and having alot more cities than the AI helps your power ranking tremendously.

The number of cities is where the ICS style comes in. The quicker you can build a city, the sooner you can get another city built. Roads help tremendously on this. Some of the first few cities will only be two tiles away, so if you have a road directly there you can build a city on the same turn the settler was built. There are some techniques to the ICS than just putting every single city 2 tiles apart in every direction - it is more in-depth than that.

I'm playing on a huge pangea map with minimal water (maximum land area to claim for maximum scoring potential), so I want as many scouts as possible. On a smaller map, that many scouts would be unnecessary.

Also, scouts can sit on the AI's Iron resources so that they can not connect the iron. This is why when you get knights you can dominate the world because everyone only has spearman, archers and horsemen. Note: Scout 'resource denial' is not allowed in GOTM or the tournament.

Am persuaded from playing and experimenting that the scout itself gives almost always positive only results for goodie huts (don't play raging but do play restless). This when even giving the scout to nonexpansionist civs. Also the "all terrain as roads" seems to do the same: cut out scouts and gave the warrior this and several games in a row (regent, restless) got all positive results: tech, settlers, workers, money. Same conditions giving warrior 2 MP got all negative results - barbs everytime. Undocumented feature of explorer maybe?

Hmmm..You may be right on this. The 'all terrain as roads' might be a guarantee of postive goody huts. If you give all civs the scout or all civs the possibitlity of only positive results from huts, then expansionists is back to being worthless. Scouts always get good results because they have 0 defense, so some people would not want to open a hut, for fear of losing their scout. Perhaps you could give scouts a defense of 1?

I play with barbarians set on 'sedentary'. So my scouts can't be killed by a wandering barbarian. The only time they do is when another civ opens a hut and pops out barbarians and my scout is nearby.

 

[candidgamera]

Bamspeedy:

I give scouts and explorers a defense of 1 already and -2 hp adjust on scouts, -0 hp adjust on explorers - had these stats for the results mentioned above. I can imagine the havoc tech rush you must have with a pangea map. Going big continents main thing becomes contact with other civs - the "Christopher Columbus" point - as a result: don't ever build Great Library anymore. Kind of like the mixed continents because of this - more likely to make some contacts with galleys, but still more paced.

ICS?

 

[Bamspeedy]

ICS = Infinite City Sprawl - Placing cities everywhere, not worrying about overlapping of tiles. Most of the time this means cities are 2-3 tiles apart, usually 3 otherwise you will hit the maximum # of cities (512) before hitting the domination limit on a huge map.

Funny thing about contact is that in my game, no civs attempt to make contact. I traded my maps every turn at the beginning. I guess if a civ already has an area mapped out they don't attempt to send troops there, even if it means they could establish contact. For example: Persia and China are neighbors. They have had each other's map (from me) for centuries, yet they still don't have contact with each other. And now they have cities 5 tiles apart and still don't know each other!

 

[candidgamera]

Bamspeedy:

Thanks. Am doing that myself now more, but using 4 apart.

Contact: noticed some delay, but not much. Seems to be a great bargaining chip - they'll sell their souls for contact.

Several games now have noticed though - neglected expansionist opportunities - whole continents left alone or largely untouched. Playing one right now where I sailed half around the world to and the Russians are just marching hordes back and forth over but not moving settlers to. AI seems to only like being contiguous unless boxed in - then its Holy Roman Empire time.