The UNREAL Walkthrough

[Roxlimn]

I think you're mistaking the whole wonder building bit with the settling specialists bit. He's building wonder after wonder because he's Industrious. Obviously, he won't be nearly so drawn to wonder building if he plays Genghis Khan, but he can still settle specialists to advantage.

 

[Phrederick]

I'm not sure why his starting position is such a big deal on this.

This isn't an insane starting position. It's not crap, but he didn't have three plains/hills/gold tiles or grassland/hills/river/gems to boost his research. I've gotten both.

As futurehermit said, it's the combination of a couple high-food tiles and a couple high-hammer tiles. The reason I was pointing out that not a single tile had less than 3 food + hammers was that it seemed very improbable, not that that aspect was unusually good, although it was too.

My interest is his claim that it can be replicated without the Industrious trait. He claims to play safely and take his time, but the whole strat seems like a much bigger gamble.

That, plus the tone of disdain he gives off when discussing the use of cottages and lightbulbing. This strategy obviously works, obviously. However, he's saying it's a viable alternative to lightbulbing or cottages in general, while only providing examples with above-average high production starts, playing an industrious leader. I'd have nothing but praise for him if he could play an example game without those crutches.

 

[CivCorpse]

It's a good starting position, I have had much better ones though. And to be honest I usually reroll until I have a good starting position. Ex: if I start with fishing I will not play an inland start. Ok, I'm a wussy but I like my way. And his strategy worked for this game. I give him credit that he showed that in some circumstances lightbulbing is not needed. However, in both of his examples he relies heavily on the pyramids to give him early representation. Yes having lots of wonders helps with GPP but the Mids make those settled great peeps WAY more effective. Playing on a standard map vs a huge map is definately an advantage to his strat as it is easier to pay for maintenance costs with specialists. Before State Property you will have a LOT of cities that are a good distance from your capital. Even with courthouses it will require atleast one merchant or priest specialist to pay for each city, maybe one for every two cities with building multipliers. That is a lot of hammers spent on marketplaces. And every one of them takes the place of a scientist for research.
If you want this strat to be taken seriously, do it without building the Pyramids on a huge map with locked assets so noone can claim you used the World Builder. Reroll until you have a good starting position and then play. Either that or rename the strat to "Pyramid-economy strat for use on standard or smaller maps."

 

[mice]

EDit:
This strat just got buffed by BTS. Caste system now gives 1H to workshops and State prop gives 10% production bonus.

So the mega city now runs; Rep + Caste + State property + Workshops + Ankor + Priests.

 

[aelf]

Playing and posting a game is quite time consuming, having done it myself on occasion.

Well, I assume that having done so myself at a regular basis, I can perhaps comment without being stopped by the charitable card

You'll see a very underdeveloped and non micromanaged game. His second city is working 3 unimproved grassland tiles and forests in 1505AD He has two workers both automated He had only played for 1 hour 16 mins at that stage. I have never seen such a neglected game on Emperor. He must have just been pressing end of turn

The serious point here is; this could have been done so much better and I expect with an improved result.

Yes, but what is the basis of this strategy? IMO, it's the strong starting position and Pyramids. I highly doubt that without the Pyramids and a strong starting location for building lots of wonders he can manage so well with only settling specialists and no cottaging. It may work in certain situations (eg. ideal neighbours or precious metals/stones near starting position), but likely he will either fall behind or get crushed in mid-game. These are the factors that allow the strategy to work despite less than ideal micro (which I am often guilty of too in my offline games).

And isn't it ironic that the game claims to have good micro and when it turns out that it didn't, people are using that to tout the strategy used? I get the point, but it just seems like the weirdest irony And I guess some of the premises establised in the OP have to be modified, in that case.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

The thing that makes the starting location so great is NOT the floodplains. I repeat NOT the floodplains.

What makes the starting location so great is the PRODUCTION. Copper, cows, elephants, city on plains hill, another plains hill, and a grassland hill. That's a lot of production for this strat.

Try this strategy on a coastal capital. Try this strategy where you get mostly floodplains/grassland/plains. Even covered with a number of forests, your production is going to be significantly less. Even with an industrious leader, if you have a low-production capital, you can kiss this strategy goodbye.

Erm see my example screenshot on pg 6 of the thread..

 

[frob2900]

Slightly off-topic, but then again maybe not.

It will now be interesting to see if the AI plays with obsoletes specialist settling strategy, because:

• Super specialists (Great People settled in a city) now remain in the city if it is captured.

(As described here)

Methinks this just made AI capitals even more valuable.

 

[InFlux5]

If he does mean to say this strategy is all-around expert, then it's a laughable statement at best.

The reason for the disclaimer, is because at least one person pointed out this is not something to recommend to general players ‘in not so many words’ because the skill level required is much higher.

I'm the one who originally made that statement, and I stand by it. You couldn't simply say to a Noble or Prince player: "Just found 2 cities, spam wonders in the capital, and run an SE. Beeline to Cav and win Space Race."

What I said was simply that this strategy requires one to hold in mind information about many game mechanics: civics, great people, wonders and their specific abilities, technologies and their benefits throughout the entire tech tree. I'm sorry, but it's hard enough for most novice players to keep their economy afloat, period.

While on the surface it may appear to be nothing more than spamming wonders, Obsolete's play revolves around micromanagement (in the early game anyway) and in-depth knowledge of how to run an SE.

(When I say "It just looks like wonder-spamming" I'm using shorthand to say something else. It's clearly more than just wonder-spamming, but my point was that I'd like to see the same style of play with a contrasting leader.)

 

[frob2900]

While on the surface it may appear to be nothing more than spamming wonders, Obsolete's play revolves around micromanagement (in the early game anyway) and in-depth knowledge of how to run an SE.

(When I say "It just looks like wonder-spamming" I'm using shorthand to say something else. It's clearly more than just wonder-spamming, but my point was that I'd like to see the same style of play with a contrasting leader.)

This is what I've been trying to point out too!

 

[SoxSexSax]

Wow, I don't log in to the forums for three days and a brilliant thread like this pops up!

Obsolete,

Excellent game, sir! You do come across as a bit arrogant at times but I generally don't mind that in a person...a lot of people confuse confidence with arrogance after all.

HOWEVER, while this strategy does indeed work (as you have elegantly demonstrated) I do not feel it is the most efficient strategy. That is to say, I feel I could have won that game significantly faster if I had limited myself in no way.

It works because the AI is not very clever. I would like to see you play a 1v1 vs a competent human on a mirror map and win without building a cottage. I am strongly against using SP tactics that won't work in MP, because it feels like you're just taking advantage of poor AI to win. So beat a good human player without building a cottage and then you may indeed have come up with a killer strat. At the moment, I see it as a very interesting strat that works against the AI, but one that would come unstuck fast against a top opponent.

Beating emperor is trivial compared to beating a strong human player.

 

[UncleJJ]

Yes, but what is the basis of this strategy? IMO, it's the strong starting position and Pyramids. I highly doubt that without the Pyramids and a strong starting location for building lots of wonders he can manage so well with only settling specialists and no cottaging. It may work in certain situations (eg. ideal neighbours or precious metals/stones near starting position), but likely he will either fall behind or get crushed in mid-game. These are the factors that allow the strategy to work despite less than ideal micro (which I am often guilty of too in my offline games).

I think another important factor to consider is the Rameses UB. The ability to run two priests to suppliment the GPPs from Stonehenge (2560BC) and Oracle (1560BC) can accelerate the production of the GProphets. There is great synergy there once The Pyramids (925 BC) are built. Two food giving a hammer, a gold, 3 beakers and 3 GPPs (both hurrying and increasing the chance of a GProphet) is a good deal and adds considerably to the snowball effect. In 100 AD he already had 3 settled prophets.

Looking at his game there is an important decision that I would have taken that is drastically different and would have changed the direction of the game completely. That is the tech taken from The Oracle. In that circumstance I would never have been able to resist taking Code of Laws, thereby founding Confusionism in his second city, whereas obstacle took Alphabet to trade with Cyrus. I know religions can be dangerous at emperor level but thay can also be very good and a Spiritual leader can play with religions like no other. Without a religion (or even several) a Spiritual leader is much weaker, many of the best civics to play with are the religious ones. Pacificism and OR would at times have been very beneficial in this game, and Theocracy could have helped with the cavalry rush.

So I would found Confusionism and then send the missionary to Cyrus and link up the trade network. In a few turns the religion would spread to obsolete's own capital, as they always do in the early game and then it could become the state religion for as long as it causes no diplomatic problems. Cyrus would in all probability adopt Confusionism and be securely locked into a freindly relationship (which allows unlimited tech trading among other benefits). Even Toku might have adopted Confucionism. I love the way you can make war on a neighbour that shares your religion and they still like you afterwards as "brothers and sisters of the faith"

Of course the potential downside of taking Code of Laws from the Oracle and then researching Alphabet the hard way is that we could delay and even lose the Great Library. That is a key wonder, providing 8 GPPs and 12 beakers, only Pyramids is more central to this strategy. I appreciate my comments on how the game could have been played is with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight and that is always perfect

And isn't it ironic that the game claims to have good micro and when it turns out that it didn't, people are using that to tout the strategy used? I get the point, but it just seems like the weirdest irony And I guess some of the premises establised in the OP have to be modified, in that case.

It is amazing that some people accused him of micromanagement when they can never have even opened any of his many savegames Nothing could be further from the truth. I admire obsolete's achievements in this and his other walkthrough even more from his quick and easygoing playstyle, something I can never bring myself to do. My own games are horribly micromanaged and take many hours to play. That more than anything convinces me there is something special in this "snowball effect" that obsolete is employing, other than just a "rigged starting position" which some people unfairly accuse him of. There is clearly a strong synergy that many self appointed "experts" have missed until now. I wonder how much of the synergy is due to the industrious trait and how much to the technique. It strikes me that a philosophical leader could use a similar strategy, maybe buiding less wonders, but getting more GPPs from them and his priests / engineers.

 

[RandomLeader]

My interest is his claim that it can be replicated without the Industrious trait. He claims to play safely and take his time, but the whole strat seems like a much bigger gamble.

Bold claims, and ones many people would like to see truly tested.

For what its worth. I played one game with Mehmed and played with these instructions. I play in prince level but I'm not so good player so it's quite possible that somebody who knows what he is doing could get it work with higher levels also. With n00b skills and prince level (normal speed, large continents) it worked out just fine. I do believe that you can't make it work every time but isn't that the case almost conserning about everything?

EDIT: for some reason I thought I opened last page of the thread and quoted... I was wrong so this message is futile.

What is not futile is that I have learned about game mechanics and micromanagement more than with past year with these quidelines. Which tells something about me

 

[madscientist]

I must admit I am trying this approach with my current game. It's a technique I have never tried so I can see myself using a modified approach to it. This method involves a few things I have figured out 1) all GP get settles in the capital, 2) build farms and production, forget commerce from tiles unless it's there (spices/sugar/gold/gems etc...), 3) expand slowly, 4) wait to go to war if you can. At least that is what I get out of it.

I am playing on monarch, random huge map (I do not play only a continant map), marathon speed. My guess is this technique may not be so good for marathon speed or huge maps but we'll see. On the other hand starting 2 cities for a long time on huge will keep your enemies away longer and still leave area to expand.

My rules to use this, no cottages in first two cities, after that I am free to build them prudently (I will not spam on grasslands though). I will settle all great people in my gapital with the following exceptions A) Great artists are reserved for I usually do with them since I think I utilize them well and they offer NO production bonus, B) I will use one Great Scientists (if I get one) to lightbulb Philosophy if I can get Taoism first (this is a big advantage I think and would always do this). If I do not get a GS in time, so be it. I will not bulb paper or education though, no bulbibg theology (GP), metal working (GM), or Machinery (GE). Here we go.

So I have tried this approach with a random leader, got Hatsheput. Capital had limited production, built warrior settler (got nice horse city as sister city) went for GW first, chopped alot, got 3/2 of the way before rouge archers came and took Thebes. Game over. To be fair this is only my second monarch game and I noted that barbs come a little earlier so my timing was off, this game was my misplay.

Second game, randomly got Tokugawa on a southern iceberg, on coast, miles from grasslands. Well not the setting I want to learnt his with, I quit this game.

Third, selected Ramses II. Now I know the examples games were won with this leader but he is my second favorite (after Washington), plus industrious will help in getting a big production capital. Start on coast, little production, not what I looking for. I quit this game. Now I do want a fair chance to test this system out, so I want a city with at least some production.

Try Ramses again. Started on an obvious archeopolego map, no neighbors. Got a great starting location, 5 hills, forrests, corn, a seafood, only 4 coast tiles (including seafood so only 3 2 food tiles). Second city pretty good, all hills (settled on one), one seafood, pigs on a hill, but quite a few 2 food sea tiles. I have built stonehenge/great wall currently building pyramids (my they do go fast with so much prodcution). I plan to run 2 priests per city once pyramids are built, then beeline for the oracle with which ever city will get it first (for this wonder I do not care if the GP points are spread out) I really want early metal working, early forges, early colossus (if I had to start this game on a coast tile I want to get to financial status fast).

I will keep all posted how I do. Now I am not the best player here (my god, look at the clash of the war-monger epic, I lost that game very early), so if I can get this strat to work maybe it can be a useful strategy.

Quoting myself but this is easier. Bascially I ended up on a snaky mini continent but did meet Mehmed and Elizabeth on others. Got GW/pyramids/Stonehenge maybe some others (NOT oracle). Settled 4 GP and GE. Started with 2 cities then went to 4 to acess iron and just plain bored. The amount of cash coming in was idiotic and figured I should do something. I ended up buying archery from elizabeth for $500. Was tech defiicient but probably could have gotten better, was another smaller mini-continent next to me that I could have settled. I quit the game.

Overall, I found this type of game very boring, and stagnant. I had no horses for a cavalry rush (not eager doing that by sea anyway) but could have done Grenader/trebs but for what purpose. My feeling is I should have used the GP smarter, should have bulbed theology and found it, built the church of the nativity with another, settle the rest would have been fine. My GE I should have just popped a wonder with, but at a good time. Not cottage building just seamed plain dumb to me, especially cities 3 and 4.

Now this was only my second Monarch level game, so I am sure i did not play it the best I could. But I think I could have utilized Ramses traits better being a little freer, and bulbing theology would have helped. Also he was ser up to expand unopposed quickly instead of focusing on the capital powerhouse.

I tried this a second time with Ramses, had 2 marble in fat cross (yeah) but side tracked to techs for building early and got trashed by barbs before I could defend myself.

Tried a third game with Ramses as I normally would play and did better (I saved this game but I did make some early bad decisions and the game sort of stinks). I bulbed theology, did some smart trades, got copper late but chariots early. I waited too long to attack southern ice-bound Monty and got some fringe poor cities while leaving his capital standing. An overall poor game because I was trying to limit early expansion.

So bottomline, this strat is not for me although I am more open to settling GP if appropriate (they were helping). I can either try this strat again on Prince where I am quite proficient at or Monarch using my usual thinking (adapt as the situation arises. I think I will go with the Monarch route tonight.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

@MadScientist:- Aren't you a huge map/marathon player?

I was only asking, because you said you got trashed by barbs. Barbs are not really a consideration for normal map / normal speed players. Barbs come at 400% of normal on marathon, AND there are almost 3x the turns for them to arrive in AND a whole lot more room to spawn from. Barbs HAVE to be prepared for straight away on marathon, unless that is you can build the Great Wall, but if you miss it by a turn, and don't yet have at very least archers, you will get trashed every single time on Monarch and above.

But then marathon is so much easier than normal

 

[madscientist]

Drew, I have been at marathon/huge so long I never realized this. No wonder I always thought everyone nuts for ignoring archery so long (although I was actually doing this on my later prince games). An dI guess that is why I did well in the Ragnar.Monarchy game because I teched archery out of the gate (sorry, this refers to a different thread). I guess for myself and ramses I should be going AH of the gate and build the second hrose city faster at the least, or mining to BW with nothing in between. Teching hunting/archery is too long for ramses. Also all my ramses Monarch games I got off to a decent start I nailed the GW fairly early (neither time with sotne0.

OK, lesson learned on Marathon, protect myself from barbs. Thanks Drew

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Drew, I have been at marathon/huge so long I never realized this. No wonder I always thought everyone nuts for ignoring archery so long (although I was actually doing this on my later prince games). An dI guess that is why I did well in the Ragnar.Monarchy game because I teched archery out of the gate (sorry, this refers to a different thread). I guess for myself and ramses I should be going AH of the gate and build the second hrose city faster at the least, or mining to BW with nothing in between. Teching hunting/archery is too long for ramses. Also all my ramses Monarch games I got off to a decent start I nailed the GW fairly early (neither time with sotne0.

OK, lesson learned on Marathon, protect myself from barbs. Thanks Drew

Yeah the GW is such a gamble. When I was trying out this strat with Roose (who is Ind) I had Stone right by Washington. Because I first had to tech mining, then masonry, even though I build it right out of the gate(well from the turn I discovered Masonry), and even though I had Stone connected up, I didn't get it. Stalin on same continent as me, must have done the same (but he starts with Mining, and I know he popped BW from a hut). He completed it in 2400BC when I still had about 11 turns to go.

And then the barbs arrived, when all I had was Warriors to defend with. And soon after Im afraid I gave up. I don't mind admitting when Im beaten. It's part of the luck of the draw. Great Wall reliance on marathon/huge is a fickle strategy. If it works, you can stick your middle finger up to the endless barbs who you'll see parading around your Wall on their way to pillage and harrass one of your neighbours. If it fails, you're very rich, but soon to be dead and as they say, you can't take it with you

 

[frob2900]

Great Wall reliance on marathon/huge is a fickle strategy. If it works, you can stick your middle finger up to the endless barbs who you'll see parading around your Wall on their way to pillage and harrass one of your neighbours. If it fails, you're very rich, but soon to be dead and as they say, you can't take it with you

At one point I decided to see what really problematic barbarians will do on marathon. I XML upped their spawning rate by about ten-twenty times and made the Great Wall cost 5000 hammers.

Result (Look who just discovered Liberalism.. )

(The conquest victory with still living AI civs is due to the fact that the Monarch level AIs all got slaughtered by barbarians, so I had to worldbuilder them back with about twenty longbows for support Yes, it was a silly game)

 

[lilnev]

I tried this last night: Emperor standard normal continents, Ramses. Got a good start location with Marble. Built GW-Stonehenge-Oracle, taking MC. Not sure if that was correct -- I ended up getting Construction and Currency for it, but after self-researching Alphabet (hoping to trade for Math, but it didn't happen right away), I was too slow for the Hanging Gardens (400 BC). Taking Alphabet off the Oracle and self-researching Math might have been better.

Meanwhile 2nd city built Parthenon, then put out settlers and workers for two more cities. After the Oracle, I went for the Temple of Artemis, got it, then got beat to the Pyramids (800 BC). I think I still would've been too slow w/o the ToA. Great Library, NE, Chicken Pizza while researching CoL (trade it for Monarchy to solve happiness limits) and Philosophy (founding Taoism, adopting it, Pacifism), then Angkor Wat while researching CS.

Neighbors were HC and Saladin. They stayed peaceful despite religious differences, though trade willingness became erratic.

At that point I felt I'd be too slow for Liberalism, so I went straight for Nationalism, Music, MilTrad. Built the Taj despite the GA pollution. Was that correct? Hit MilTrad around 1000 AD with a bunch of elephants and a pile of cash. Quit there, as the AI clearly wasn't going to withstand it -- my continent was pretty backwards, a result of minimal trading.

So it worked on Emperor without the Pyramids, though it clearly would have been stronger with. Personally, I'm not bothered if this strategy is only useful in certain situations. If there are situations where it's very strong, then I want it as a weapon in my arsenal. Ultimately, I want to know if it'll work on immortal, and if so under what conditions (I played this one on emperor because I'm new to this strat).

I'm also not concerned that cavalry are the current weapon of choice, and they're about to be nerfed. The real key is creating a production powerhouse -- if I'm cranking out a treb/turn, devoting cities 2-4 to maces (one of which can be the HE city), that would've worked, too.

I don't share obsolete's aversion to chopping. In this game, my secondary cities were all production-oriented (and spent some time building Wealth or Research), but I could easily see building some cottage-based commerce cities instead. And certainly after capturing a bunch of land, I would transition most of the empire into a CE. Likewise I think the 'no lightbulbs' restriction might make an exception for Philosophy. But those are secondary characteristics -- the core engine is the Wonders<->settled GPs and GEs feedback loop, which is at least worthy of some significant testing.

peace,
lilnev

 

[Snaaty]

funny, I tried the same last night on emperor with a random leader... ...and ended up with cyrus:

built two workers and second city super early, chopped stonehenge & Oracle, second city was settler spamming, found stone, got beaten GW, build Pyramids, ToA, beaten to Panth, managed GL, beaten to chicken... ...but I focused not only on wonders, but on running piests, so I founded 3 religions and around midgame, I was running slavery and 8 priests under pacifism... ...which ment basically one new GP every 6-12 turns (gets slower with time, but not really much)

The two GE´s I got I burned on wonders to keep up (ToA and GL)

Ended game around 1200 AD, with 6 cities build myself, no war and I think 6 settled GP´s, 2 GS... ...game was basically won at that stage.

...

I think the real key aren´t that much the wonders, but generating a huge ammount of priest points for settled GP´s. And this can be done best by a wonder-prist specialist combo, so early religions are way to go with this strat. Would be interresting to see, if it also is reliable on immortal

 

[Thomas G.]

I also tried a game with this strat. (Using Ramesses, and was given 1st time a quite good production capital). Built StoneH, Oracle, ToA, GW, Pyra and GliB in capital. Setteled every great person in cap, ran rep. when I got it, and pacifism when able for a long time

Above poster showed that it wasn't the pyramids that did it. My game showed that it wasn't cavalry either. (Found that out after I declared the guy who was supplying me with horses, and was suddenly unable to upgrade more any more horse archers---WHaT?!? I mean, they ALREADY had horses, I just wanted to give them cowboy hats and repeater rifles...)

Anyway I had to continue a pretty long, protracted war without the benefit from the mighty cavalry except the 3-4 I had ready, and I was even a way off getting grenadiers (my usual weapon, combined with trebuchets). But macemen, catapults did the job, as I was really producing a lot of troops from my high-production capital.

My continental neighbour bit it, and was vassalized with 2 island cities left. I then hunkered down and set out to win by space race.

The other continent gave birth and rise to fame of Shaka, and he eventually vassalized his entire continent, had a totally overpowering military, twice my score, 15 times my power and was ahead technologically.

The thing that made me win was certainly a high-production capital. Stayed in bueareuacreaucy [sic], it had 10 hammer-giving super-GP (scientists, engineers and luckily mostly priests), it had ironworks and forge. It built internet in record time (after which I could squeeze in a factory and a nuclear plant), then proceeded to build most of my SS part except casings and one set of thrusters which were chopped in my ex-rivals former cities. Shaka must have been certain of a win, so when he finally noticed that I was about to win he attacked me from overseas. Too late, and too stupidly (I fought him guerilla-style for fun, game was won at this point).

Also I noticed in my game, after one settled priest my research was 100&#37; for a long long time, and it never went down much. +5 gold is very nice in the early game, and the +2 hammers will serve a wonder-building capital well.

About Great Artists, they might be handy to bulb mucis (for the free GA if it is available), used tactically in a warzone, or settled in what will later house a wall street.

So this "obsolete" strategy certainly has its uses.

Oh yes, I build no cottages nor bulbed anything.