Dear fans of Vox Populi and its challenge (hopefully)!
This challenge's submission date has passed, don't miss the next one (and scroll down to see the results in the second post)!
How could it be different? The eighth challenge will give you the opportunity to play the civilization everyone is talking about these days - will you be able to lead Rome to glory and a stable empire? No matter whether you already know the concept or not, keep on reading.
This time, you have the opportunity to erect a truly great empire. But frankly, that's no easy task! Your advisors think that glory will only await you if you manage to both expand and protect Roman lands while keeping the people happy to guarantee inner stability of the empire.
Before you continue reading, make sure that you have Vox Populi version 10-10 with the newest hotfixes (currently 10-10-2) installed.
Before we go into details, please make sure you know the rules. Especially, don't share ingame information unspoilered, not even the number of points you achieved (or the turn where you finished the challenge). I don't want anyone to be discouraged by your score, or knowing what numbers he should aim for. In spoilers, you are very welcome to describe your game, of course
SpoilerGame Rules :
1)The Golden Rule: Don't replay, don't reload, send in your first try! It is recommended to set your auto-save frequency to 1 turn for this game. If you have a crash that forces you to replay, write it in the mail afterwards and try replaying as closest as possible to what you did before the crash.
2)Don't exploit any bugs you may find. At the moment, I'm not aware of any exploitable bugs, but just in case, don't overuse obviously bugged mechanics (like the infinite tribute-bug a few patches ago).
3) Don't share ingame-information unspoilered! If you want to share strategies or ingame information in this thread, use spoilers and write "Do not open unless you already sent in your game." on top of it. A separate thread for spoilers would be good, but I don't want to spam the main forum for this pilot.
4)Don't look at spoilers if you didn't finish your game!
5) Don't use cheat tools (Ingame Editor, Info Addict...) and don't open the map in some editor or else.
6) Don't use any additional mods besides full Vox Populi (1 to 6, either EUI or non-EUI) as I'm not sure whether I will be able to open your savegame files if you do.
This time, the goal for the challenge is to perform best in three categories, measured by points as followed. The goal:
Until turn 200, build an empire worth the most points in the following categories:
(1) Expand and Integrate: You get 7 points for capturing Carthage and the first copy of every non-Roman non-Carthaginian unique building.
(2) Build the Limes: You get 4 points for every tile in your longest connected line of forts, citadels and cities.
(3) Stabilize the empire: You get 1 point for every happy citizen in a non-puppet city and minus 1 points for every unhappy citizen in a non-puppet city.
Tie-breaking is base production per turn in your capital.
I know that the assignment is quite complicated, but don't get discouraged, it's actually easier than you think. The short version is: "Capture as many different unique buildings from other civs as you can, capture Carthage, build a long line of Forts, Citadels and Cities and grow a lot of happy citizens".
Submission deadline is Sunday, the 28th of October, 6pm Eastern Time (midnight in Central European Time). You can submit by personal message to me, posting your save in this thread, or sending it to vox-populi-challenge@gmx.net. Don't forget to write the name under which you want to appear in the ranking if sending by e-mail!
SpoilerGame Settings :
Map: Donut with Ocean in the middle, Small
6 players and 12 city states in game
Carthage is in the game
Research Agreements, No Tech Trading
No Ancient Ruins
No Events
If something is not clear, read the following spoiler, then ask a question if still unclear:
SpoilerChallenge Specifications :
General Remarks:
Don't be afraid of the length of the specifications, it really is only needed to fix a simple goal.
You explicitly are allowed to send in saves earlier than turn 200! This can make sense if you have a golden age for instance (which makes your population happier).
Comments on (1) Expand and Integrate:
Every unique building you capture counts only once (so no matter how many Ostrogs you control, you get 7 points if you control at least one).
Carthage is an exception: When capturing their capital, it doesn't matter whether the Great Cothon is built or not. The reason for this is that I don't want to rely on the AI building a unique national wonder, but want to give points for "destroying" Carthage. You can't play a Rome challenge without Carthage.
I am aware that you need to do a bit of guessing whether the UB is already built or not. With some buildings, you may be able to see it (by looking at city strength etc.), with others not. However, I hope that the safety margin is long enough for everyone to have a shot at capturing every unique building present in the game in principle (with the exception of the Great Cothon which you don't need). In my Prince test game all AI had built their unique building at least once by turn 150, so that should work out.
Comments on (2) Build the Limes:
The length of the longest line in your empire can be counted as follows:
1. Place yourself on a citadel, fort or city.
2. Ask: How far can I go without touching a tile twice and passing only over tiles that have either a fort or a citadel or a city on them?
3. Answer this question for all of your citadels, forts and cities.
4. Take the highest of all these numbers and multiply it by 4. That are your points.
Reminder: Forts cannot be adjacent to Forts, Citadels cannot be adjacent to Citadels, Cities need to have a minimum distance of 3 empty tiles to the next city. Forts cannot be placed on resources.
Pillaged improvements do count.
Comments on (3) Stabilize the empire:
Keep in mind that the number on top of your screen (next to happiness, if you play with EUI at least) counts also citizens in puppets, and doesn't count unhappy citizens in puppets. Short story: The left number (the one with an unhappy face next to it) is the number of unhappy citizens used for the points, the number with the happy face next to it is not the number of total citizens used for the points as it does include puppet population.
On later thought, it might be instructive to add a full example of how points are calculated:
A player controls the following unique buildings:
- 3 x Hanse
- 2 x Ikanda
- 6 x Jelling Stones
This gives 21 points.
He does also control Carthage, without the Great Cothon (this actually doesn't matter).
This gives 7 points.
This is his Limes:
(Ignore the fact that this is not Rome). The green line has length 10.
This gives 40 points.
The player has a total non-puppet population of 52, and in these cities 14 unhappy citizens.
This gives 38 points.
The player gets a total of 21+7+40+38 = 106 points.
I hope everything is clear now, if not, please ask.
This challenge is the eighth of a season of 12 challenges. After the submission deadline, I will rank all participants (divided by difficulty level) and you will get 15/13/11/10/9/8/7/6/5/4/3/2/1/1/1/... points for the 1st/2nd/3rd... rank. At the end of the season, your best 10 results will count for the final ranking.
The winners of the season (one for Prince, one for Immortal) will be granted the opportunity to become a part of the game as a Great Person of their choice (Prophets excluded). Thanks to Gazebo for this contribution to the challenge!
Now... download the save for your difficulty, make sure you have Vox Populi version 10-10 and you're ready to go!
And... be gentle with me if the points for this challenge aren't well balanced, they are estimates after all. I can only hope everything works out well Have fun!
The participation went down quite a bit (sad), but we got a few submissions nontheless. It turned out that the rules were not that unamigously defined as I initially thought (or rather: as I intended them), but luckily, that wouldn't have resulted in different standings. Anyway, congratulations to Bonniebpilly for his second prince victory (even in a row) and to Dejagore for taking the Rome trophy amongst the Immortal players.
Dejagore still leads comfortably in the Prince season, while the field is closer together in the Immortal one: Thomas8 now in close pursuit with only one point less than CrabHelmet. I'm curious how that'll look after the last third of the season, coming up now!
Very much enjoyed that, first 200 turns or so of the game are always my favourite so perfect length challenge for me. Here's my prince attempt, definitely up for trying immortal too:
Spoiler:
Smashed Ethiopia apart early and then claimed Carthage pretty quickly, then stagnated into a fairly long war with Mongolia and made little impact on Spain. At one point four of the other civs (all but Egypt) DoWed me at once but held things together fairly well. Not having much iron available at the key time held me back a lot.
I also went Tradition rather than Authority in the interests of making a fast start. Still not sure if that was a good idea or not.
I think my score (please check!) is:
Length of limes: 56pts for 14 tiles (from Addis Ababa in the west to one tile north of Rome)
Conquering: 21pts for Carthage plus owning a Ger (Hsia) and Stele (Harar or Addis Ababa)
Population: 48pts for 23 unhappy citizens against 71 non-puppet citizens total
Okay, I had a go at Immortal too. Hopefully there'll be a lot more entries to come
Spoiler:
Unsurprisingly, that was a lot harder. Took a big chunk out of China early on so off to a very decent start, but then trapped between a Zulu rock and a Carthiginian hard place and always seemed to be at war with both at the same time so never made much impact on either and in fact would probably have struggled to make it another 50 or so turns without losing anything. Went more traditional Authority this time.
Points wise:
7 points for one Paper Maker in Shanghai
60 points for 15 in my limes - south of Rome around, through Antium and into Nanjing
36 points for 50 citizens with 14 unhappy
So total of 103 unless I'm counting incorrectly.
Thanks for the challenge, will definitely play Rome again under more normal conditions
Glad to see that you're back, Nemoens. I'll probably aim to a length of about 200 turns on average for the future challenges (or better, for a distribution centered around 210), so I'm happy to get your feedback.
There is one other competitor at the moment, I can just agree to you that I hope more will come til Sunday
I finished at turn 192 - there is probably no point in playing further. I went with Authority / Progress.
I went first by grabbing good spots - but still Ethiopia took one from me. Then I fought Carthage and slowly pushed them back to capital and gained it. I have planned to wage war against Ethiopia around Turn 150 - but he had defensive pact with Egypt and I chickened out. Spain DOWed me, I gained extra Great General and pushed her back (probably overextended in attempt to gain extra city before turn 200).
Points:
14 tiles for limes * 4 = 56 points (Rome - Cumae - Limes + weird extra line near Valetta)
7 points for Carthage
60 people - 6 = 54 points (I specially bought Inquisitors to squash down religion unrest in last turn)
Just finished Immortal challenge. Was much harder than I initially thought.
SpoilerDetails :
Eventually I've finished with no special buildings from any Civ apart for Carthage which is bad. At least building Limes went pretty well. As I was almost all the time in war with neighbours I've got quite a few Great General points
As for Prince challenge - I've sent the save file over a week ago to Grabbl directly but might as well post it here. Both were 'fun'.
@Grabbl - thought that nothing from my post is actually a spoiler but due to Your comment I've put a spoiler on few sentences.
Again went with Authority/Progress. I finished exactly on turn 200
I had bad early wars. China DoWed me early - and went for my undefended city - it was captured, after that - Carthage also DoWed me at the same time. Luckly desert slowed Cathage down. I was able to grab religion with bonus to healing (Goddes of protection) and retake lost city and peace out with China (Zulu attack her on other side of the map). I have easily pushed Carthage back to her first city, but I have made tactical errors and lost 3 units and had to peace out. I thought that game is lost at the point but I have rebuild in peace and when China again DoWed me I was prepared. After long trench warfare I took 2 cities from her and made her my Vasal (I have annexed those cities right away - this actually might be best use of new Rome ability - since new cities wont drag you down). Then Carthage DoWed me again (I built to many Citadels for limes near her) - but I only got last Great General from her. It was pretty swingy gameplay from me.
In retrospect - I could have also annexed captured cities in Prince save - after 20 turns they start to become stable and bring bonus happines.
Weird limes line - start south from Guangzhou (I didnt finish 1 last fort there - so I am not counting it) - Cumea (4 fields south of horses) - Antium - Ravenna - +extra steps: 19 tiles
Immortal score:
Poplution: (76 total - 16 unhappy) +61 points (no puppets - all cities annexed)
7 point from Chinese paper maker: +7 points
19 * 4 = +76 points
I'm not really a conquering style of player but gave it a go anyway.
Spoiler:
I kinda messed up on the city placements and generals. And I didn't account for the non puppet city population and just didn't annex any until it was too late. Also lost about 20 points on the last turn because I miscalculated the speed I could make all the forts and couldn't connect it to my last city. pretty bad run imo.
T - 2 min !
I did not really have time to finish, but with the golden age ending I probably would not have got better.
The scoring seems weighted towards the population. I should have spent more time optimizing happy citizens (I am missing a few city connections) instead of chasing the missing unique building that did not get built...
Thanks for the scenario!
The results are finally there, scroll up for them!
I apologize that they come this late, I had a busy week I learned from this challenge that weighting points is not an easy task - your limes got all longer than I expected, but you captured less unique buildings than I thought (partially also because even Vox Populi AI seems to ignore their UBs from time to time - I saw Addis Abeba without a Stele). Anyways, I hope you had fun and are looking forward to the next challenge, as do I. On top of that, the challenge rules were already complicated enough, but not as precise as I initially thought. I did my best to follow exactly what I wrote in the initial post - don't be angry!
Thanks to all the participants, and congratulations to the winners Bonniebpilly and Dejagore - latter one profited by half a point of the rules - "non-puppet" cities include occupied cities still in resistance, with only half of their population being unhappy.
You are right that there are no actual spoilers, I want just to be cautious on that as some people prefer to play the challenge without knowing how others did (there was one complaint about that, and that's also how it's intended to be played). Thanks for spoilering!
Annexed (without Courthouse) or puppeted at least make no difference in points - only if you'd conquered them that recently that they were still in resistance. If I'd thought of that, I'd probably prevented it in the rules, but well...
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Have fun!
