TJS1 -- Going on the Pill-age

"It takes a pillage, to raze a mile"

Difficulty: Emperor
Map: Standard, 60% Archipelago, Normal humidity, Temperate, 4 bn yr
Our Civ: Scandinavia (SEA + MIL)
Opponents: 7, all Random
Barbarians: Restless
VCs: All default VCs allowed

Participants

I'd like to suggest a play-order going roughly by timezone, with play alternating between more- and less-experienced players. This is what I've come up with so far, but without knowing for sure which timezone Robbus and Nathiri are in, it may still be subject to change...

1. tjs282 (CET, UTC +1 hour)
2. Nathiri (EST, UTC -5 hours)
3. Lanzelot (CET, UTC +1 hour)
4. Robbus (EST, UTC -5 hours)
5. Elephantium (aka 'Tusker') (CST, UTC -6 hours?)
6. Choxorn (WST, UTC -8 hours)
7. Speedbird 95 (WST, UTC -8 hours) -- Retired

Lurking
ToxicMan007
???

Opponents: 7 Civs, All Random

So, what is this all about?

This SG is intended to be a fun wargame, but also a relaxed introduction to Emperor-level inspired by (and started on behalf of) Robbus, and other players like him who might be struggling at this level -- or who haven't yet dared try it on their own (i.e. players like me, a couple of years back).

This game is open to anyone to join, but I would suggest that most/all potential participants should already be playing at Regent- or Monarch-level in their solo-games. This should not be regarded as exclusive, though: Warlords and Emperors are also welcome, and even DemiGods and Deities (provided they're willing to put up with the rest of us faffing about!). (As for my own so-called skills, I'm now relatively comfortable playing at Emperor, but have only made a couple of (unsuccessful) attempts at DG to date...)

Game aim

Obviously, we'll be going for Domination/Conquest, preferably using the mighty Viking Berserks in amphibious assaults on the AI-Civs' coastal towns, before moving inland to finish them off. Participants should not be too fussed about achieving a HoF-worthy early finish date, but we should be aiming to do the majority of our conquering during the early- to mid-Medieval, preferably before too many of the AICivs have had the opportunity to arm themselves with Muskets, Cavs or Rifles (if that happens, we might then impose a further injunction that we must finish our campaign using Marines, just to keep things amphibious).

Ideally I would like to get a single team of 5-6 players together, who will commit to playing all the way through to the (bitter) end (for the AI-Civs, that is!). Slots will be assigned on a first-come-first-served basis, but drop-outs (and drop-ins) will be tolerated, by request. If you're interested in participating, post your name below the line. If you haven't played an SG before, I'd strongly recommend having a look though the articles 'What is an SG?' by Pggar, and 'How to play an SG' by CommandoBob, which are stickied at the top of this forum.

Lurkers are also welcome, as are comments on our progress (or lack thereof!) from more experienced players.

How we'll play it

I'd suggest a standard 20T for the starter (me), then 10T per set, and aiming to follow a 24/48 schedule, i.e. every participant has 1 day to post a 'got it' (with a rough plan for their turnset, if they wish -- or questions to the team about what they should be aiming to do), then 2 days to play -- but this should also not be seen as a rigid timetable, if team discussions are needed. I want to keep things relaxed (so slow movement is OK, so long as we keep moving!)

I've already rolled 4 potential starts, and I'll put screenshots of them in the next post. Since this is also an intro-to-Emperor, then once we've got a team together, it might be a good idea to kick off with a short discussion about which start we all favour (or even whether we should roll another one)...

 

Start 1



Start 2



Start 3



Start 4

 

I'm in. I think I'm fairly comfortable at Emperor right now, but I'm by no means perfect, and I'd be happy to brush up on my skills a bit/help you youngins get more comfortable with higher levels.

I think it would be better to have 20T sets the entire first time around for each of us- there's not really all that much to do in the early game.

 

I'm interested, but I am not experienced in succession games really. I have played a very informal one with someone, but we stopped. I didnt really play well with him either as our playstyles clashed too much. We probably should of discussed things more however. I have played at Emperor lvl AI default game both peaceful and warlike. I havent bothered to work at a higher difficulty as I dont have too much interest in default civ3 anymore, because I find it rather lacking in some areas. So currently I just play more high challenging games whether always war, tough terrain etc in MP with one player.

I think the best starts are obviously start 1 and 3.

 

I'd probably rate the starts, from best to worst, 1>3>4>2.

 

If I had noticed the "conversation" earlier than today, I would have pitched in on map settings etc. Not too interested in a Scandinavia archipelago game (I live in Norway, I've done plenty of them), but I might yet join for the experience. By the way, what graphics mod is that and where can I get it <3 ?

 

Choxorn: Welcome to the game: glad to have you. I pretty much agree with your assessment -- having those Furs right next door is a real bonus. Hope there's some more BGrass under the Forest though... Not sure about the 'everyone gets 20T to start' idea -- remember what happened last time...?

Nathiri: I've only played in one other SG myself (ABLES-SG, with Choxorn, a couple of years ago now), so don't feel that SG-inexperience should be a hindrance to your joining. And I aim to play this as a team game, with our plans discussed and decided ahead of time, and further discussion as needed, rather than everybody just going ahead and doing their own thing without any prior consultation. So you'd be welcome to join if you wanted to.

Toxicman: You got the invite courtesy of your post in Lanzelot's thread. You'd also be more than welcome to join -- I don't think this one will be boring, even if you have already played plenty of Viking games (actually, that might be really helpful, because I've never used them before!). It's a 60% Archi-map, so the farther-flung AI-Civs should have some space to develop themselves before we kill them... But no pressure...

The terrain is Sn00py's (mostly: I use the default city-graphics, and someone else's marsh.pcx, but I can't remember whose). Depending on what installation you've got, you might actually have this terrain already, since (IIRC) it was among the terrain-packs that Firaxis included with Civ3Complete. Have a quick look for the 'snoopy' folders in your '.../Conquests/Scenarios/' folder: I have 4 of them (snoopy45c3c, snoopy45c3c_g [greener land], snoopy45c3c_gw [greener water], snoopy45c3c_gwg [greener land+water]). Each subfolder has a readme.txt to tell you how to install it as your default terrain.

If you don't have it in your installation, you should be able to find it here on CFC, if you're willing to do a bit of digging (the search function has really gone to pot since the change to XenForo... ). It's also included as an optional extra in Civinator's CCM mod, if you have that one?

Robbus: I meant to ask already: Do you already have CivAssist installed? If not, then I'd highly recommend doing so, assuming you can get it to work on your machine (not sure how well it plays with Win10, but I'm using it on WinXP and Win8.1 without any problems). Like C'Bob says in his article, it collects a whole bunch of non-spoiler information into a single place; info which you would otherwise only be able to get by scanning through all your cities every turn, and/or closely scrutinising the Advisor screens. It can also help with planning city-placement to take best advantage of the terrain, and shows you where Forests can still be chopped for shields (which the game doesn't tell you). While I can usually muddle through without it in Regent/Monarch games, I find it really useful at Emp-level, where closer management of cities, happiness and production/overruns really starts paying off.

 

Count me in then

 

Count me in.

 

Awesome, that's 5 -- so let's get it started in here. Seeing as those who've expressed a preference, went for Start 1, that's the one we'll use. Rather than each of us play 20T in turn, how about we all play the first 20T, and then compare progress? I've attached the Start 1 4000 BC save, if you guys want to do that? But don't forgot to log your moves...

(As noted in the conversation thread), I envisage 2-3 phases for this game, which may/will overlap with each other. For Nathiri's benefit:

(Phase 1) Initial exploration and expansion:

Spoiler :

Per any game, builds will mainly be Warriors, Curraghs (M=3 for SEA), Settlers, and Workers, roughly with that priority. This game isn't going to be Always War per se, so I would strongly recommend taking advantage of decent Lux- and tech-trade opportunities throughout the Ancient Age. With this start, we should be able to make the Republic-slingshot, so first tech-target will be Writing (we should be able to get it in ~25-30T, with reasonably fast Settlement and a decent SCI%-rate), then CoL, then Philo (as fast as we can), and grab Republic as our freebie. Not sure yet, if we'll want Republic as our gov, though -- the extra commerce is the prime draw, but I don't yet know how easy it will be to grab the 3-4 Luxes we'll need to keep our folks happy, once the fighting starts.

Chances are good that one of our contacts will go for Mapmaking after learning Writing (from us?), and we can then buy it from them (if we don't do it ourselves after Philo/Republic). So once Writing becomes generally known (with or without our assistance), we should begin prebuilding GLight (our most important Wonder for the second phase). If it will take, say, another 15-20T for Mapmaking to become known (watch out for barb-Galleys!), even if we can only bank 5 SPT into a prebuild, when we get Mapmaking we'll have 75-100s out of 300s, which (barring Wonder-cascades) should be plenty to outweigh the Emp-level AIs' 20% discount.

(Phase 1.5) Consolidating our home territory:

Spoiler :

I have not played ahead on any of the starts, so I have no idea how large our home island(?) is, nor even if it is a proper island in its own right. But we need to own it, and if it's small, we'll need to expand off it before the AI-Civs have developed too far on their islands (in that case, we may need to consider taking Mapmaking rather than Republic as our Philoso-freebie). So once we've hit coastline in all directions, or another civ's borders, we'll need to start military buildup in earnest: Barracks in decent shield-towns, Archer-stacks for later upgrades, and/or if we've no better weapons (fingers crossed for Horses at least!), Harbours and Galleys (M=4 for SEA, M=5 with SEA+GLight) if we've got Mapmaking by that point, and/or Settlers to replace anything that gets auto-razed. We should probably be aiming to make our first AI-kill just before or shortly after we leave the Ancient Age (I can't remember, if I left AI-respawn switched on -- I suspect I did, but I guess we'll find out).

(Phase 2) Amphibious assaults on our neighbours, starting on the nearest, and working outwards:

Spoiler :

Of course, we'll first need to beeline to Invention in the Medieval (might be worth gifting any lagging SCI-Civs up as well: then if they get Engineering or Feudalism as their freebie-tech, try to trade Republic/ Lit/ Monarchy for it), and start a prebuild for Leos (to trigger our GA), once the turns-to-research drops below the turns-to-build. Again, we're mainly looking for a decent headstart on it, though the sooner we get it, the better. Because once we have it, we'll be wanting to upgrade all our Archers to Zerks (and Swords to Maces, and Spears to Pikes, if we have Iron), build (lots) more of them using our GA-shields, load them onto our Gall-... sorry, Longships -- and send them out pillaging!

We won't necessarily be aiming to hold the towns we capture -- small/ underdeveloped towns can be razed (Slaves are also useful), large towns can get their improvements sold, then our Zerks can retreat back out to sea (With the GLight, our Longships can stay out of harm's way on Sea-tiles, until Astro comes in). We won't be worrying about long-term trading reputation, because in the long term, there won't be anyone else to trade with!). This phase will basically end when either we hold all the AI-Civs' coastal towns, or they get Cavs (or worse, Rifles).

(Phase 3) Mop-up:

Spoiler :

Once we control the seas, we will need to expand inland from our coastal-conquests, and take out the remaining AI-cities, using Zerk-Armies and/or Cavs. If the map-generator has been kind to us, we shouldn't have to penetrate more than 1 ring before we reach the AI-Capital(s). If there are major AI coastal cities still standing by the end of the Medieval, we can carry on building Zerks until we get to RepParts (Zerks upgrade to Rambos), but we'll probably be wanting Frigates (or better, Ironclads) for softening up the coastal defenders (which will likely be Muskets or Rifles by that point).

Any comments?

 

Okay pretty sure i understood that. Some of the type of talk with abbreviations and that, still sometimes a struggle for me, but i get what you want. I assume we do build inland, or are we putting that handicap on ourselves? And are we only going for AI coastal cities? not inland, at least not till later.

So I just did my start, should I be posting it here now?

 

Yeah, but there's still some BG's, and the resources clearly push it above start #3. The other two are barely even worth considering, no freshwater and not enough food tiles in the area.

Well, obviously, we just need better communication than the mess we had at the start of last time!

Maybe not 20 for the entire way around, but at least the first few turnsets, because like I said, there really isn't that much to do in the first 100 turns or so.

 

Sorry about the jargon: Once upon a time, in the dim and distant past, there was a list of commonly used Civ3 abbreviations stored somewhere on CFC, linked from the Civ3 FAQ -- but that link was long-dead even before the XenForo makeover, and I got no hits on the list using the search-box... From my post:

Spoiler Definitions :

XX T = XX turns
SCI% = science slider-setting (similarly, LUX% = luxury slider-setting, TAX% = what's left over after subtracting SCI% AND LUX% from 100%)
Luxes = luxury-resources
CoL = Code of Laws
Philo = Philosophy
Lit = Literature
GLight = Great Lighthouse
Leos = Leonardo's Workshop
GA = Golden Age
Zerks = Berserkers
RepParts = Replaceable Parts
Rambos = Guerrillas

So if I/we mention anything you're not sure about, please do ask.

Yes, we definitely aim to fully populate our home island, while also sweeping any AI-Civs off it using Ancient Age weapons -- we'll need all the landlocked shields we can get, for Zerk-production. It's just the overseas Civs we should be assaulting amphibiously, and I would like to control >90% of their coasts before moving inland.

I've just finished playing my 20T as well. I'd suggest holding back on posting your set until everyone's confirmed that they've played their 20T (or that they are just going to go with the group's decision), so that no-one gets Spoiled. Once we've all checked in, you can edit your post (or make a new one) to upload your turnlog and savegame.

As I recall, the problem was not so much that there was a lack of communication, as a glut of it -- and the player in question got confused while (or just couldn't be bothered with) trawling through it all...

That's sure true for the first 20T, but my save is just about to get busier (1st Settler will pop on the IBT), and we should also make sure that we all stay on the same page with respect to town-planning, which is easier with shorter turnsets...

 

I understood 90% of those abbreviations since most of them are often used in MP and I did see that list. Last time I looked at it was just before Xenforo migrated though. I remember having to recheck what BFC meant or maybe it was something else.

 

I'll try to get my 20turns done by tonight. But respawn AI being on? Is that fairly common? I never have that turned on

 

Respawn is one of those settings that I never pay much attention to: since I don't usually aim for Dom/Conq, it never really affects my games one way or the other. But yes, it does default to 'On', and (apart from 'Culturally linked starts', which is bugged if you select Random opponents) I do usually play by the default rules.

So I just re-checked my 3000 BC save in CAII, and yes, looks like I did forget to switch off respawn before I generated these starts -- sorry guys If the team objects, I could roll some new starts -- or we could look at it this way: this game may get more 'interesting' than I'd anticipated...

 

While playing my turns I sadly lost all interest in playing this. Probably because I prefer to have the freedom to just do whatever I like when I play civ, something I struggled with while playing SGs before (and why I stopped). Especially in a higher level game like this one, my recklessness is probably just a liability.
I will be lurking though, and I'll probably have questions if you guys are willing to answer

 

Well that's a shame, but what am I going to do? Twist your arm? Hunt you down? Norway might not be that far away from me astronomically speaking, but it is too far to make that even remotely practical Lurk as you like, and if you have any input, feel free to provide it.

Until then, to anyone else out there: there's now two free slots open...

 

I am in...

Halfway through 20 turns: researching pottery & my build order is warrior - curragh - curragh - granary. Will resume play tomorrow. I would normally go for ceremonial burial next...

 

We could each play 20 turns on this like you suggested, then decide whether or not we want to keep going or re-roll some new starts without Respawn AI?