TSG 265 After Actions

I only thought about it before the game. I figured if I was doing a lot of fighting I'd nab a less usefull cs with some units. It never factored at all and I did not see much of a benefit to it this game. IMO the UA only has value in maybe Dom games, but otherwise I don't care for it. The Coffee House is fantastic though.
 
By the way, I forgot completely about our UA of marrying city states! Did anyone even consider it?

yes, I annexed a cs Approximately two thirds into the game mainly to examine the consequences. It was a short.-term science setback and moderately positive in the long run. Considering the fact that I spent money on its science buildings that I could have saved to buy spaceship parts, it’s hard to say if it was a good investment. Happiness wise it didn’t matter, and not social policy wise either.

But the cash price for the marriage itself was very moderate, 360 gold. If I were to play again, I would buy it earlier instead of wasting money on city states alliances.
 
Last edited:
I was intrigued by this map, so I wanted to have another go to see if a faster finish time would be possible. Indeed it was, I got a T151, altough it was not a valid attempt: I reloaded for two same-turns on early wonders, which was also the weak point of the play I was attempting, as I will explain shortly.

I actually started the map a couple of times, and tried to get a good start, but raging barbarians made it difficult, even on Prince. The first 30 turns are ok, your scouts can roam free and pick up lots of ancient ruins, but once more camps show up and fill the lands with barbarians, scouting became almost impossible (in my second full attempt I again did not meet all the civs, despite my map knowledge), unless you radar very carefully perhaps, but I would find that too tedious. I even played around with opening honor, to help locate the camps and to get the 33% combat strength help for killing them, but even then, on quick speed, it takes two units to clear out a camp.

In the end, I defaulted to what worked well in the Celts game: Liberty with a splash of tradition for wonder building (and border growth), and then into commerce. I think what went well this game was to go almost straight into settlers, something like scout-buy scout-scout-monument (I wanted actually scout-monument, but out of tradition, no pun intended, I created a second scout)-worker-buy worker-followed by 7 settlers, and only then worry about wonders. This really helped getting out my cities quickly and set me up for a good game, but of course by that time the AI is starting to complete wonders too.

After the settlers I went granary into Temple of Artemis, but I got same-turned (I know, it's not really a same-turn, but it does feel that way if you have one turn left and the AI completes the wonder over the end-of-turn) by a far-away land. So, I reloaded, skipped the granary, and this time got the wonder. After ToA I saw that Great Library was still there, even though France had been building it for some time. I declared war on France and started the wonder, but I got same-turned again. So, another reload to bribe Rome to also declare war on France, and this time I did get the wonder. Perhaps I should not have bothered with either wonder, knowing there was a chance I would get beaten to them. An alternative was to build either of those wonders before settlers, while 'waiting' for Collective rule, but I felt that would have slowed down the game quite a bit. Getting the settlers out first was the greed play, but of course you have to be really lucky to pull that off, or cheat, or both.

Getting my cities out early did mean my one of my coastal expands (one more this time) could build Colossus early. Other early wonders that I was lucky to get were Mausoleum and Machu Picchu. From that point on, the game was quite straightforward: I went Industrialization first again, and engineered Big Ben - I still spawned a single engineer this game, which I could not avoid with Temple of Artemis and Petra in the capital - and delaying universities until after workshops and aqueducts, though I'm not sure going unis first would have 'saved' me. I considered Order, but ended up going Freedom again anyway.

The end game was good, though it still showed there was room for improvement. I missed spawning my final scientist because Porcelain Tower finished a turn early due to city growth, and by the end game I had more science than gold and culture; I had researched two techs too many, but also fell 50 faith short of buying another scientist. In the end, culture was the most problematic. Also, I had not finished Liberty since I wanted to do that during a natural golden age, but I did not get my first one until T120! The challenges of going Liberty I suppose. As it was, I finished Liberty only in the last turns, for an extra scientist, though that was actually a mistake, since now I had to wait two turns for Spaceship Procurements.

To conclude, I think if I were to have the game of my life I (including cooperating AIs that don't build my wonders), then a sub-150 might be possible, though ~T133 would be beyond me. Final note: in all of my attempts I insisted on founding Kitzbuhel, because the lands were so lovely, but actually it was a bit too far away, and the borders took too long to grow to all the wheat tiles. Also, that is the city that did not spawn its scientist.

Austria_second_run.png

Kitzbuhel.png
 
Insipired by @The_Black_Vegetable I also did a second attempt, turn 164 victory. I didn't do any reloads.

I founded capital on the marble this time and I opted for three cities and then NC. Feels like I should have gone more cities before NC, there could be so much more to build before NC.

Wonders missed:
Mausouleum, put one turn into it then missed.
Great library, put one turn into it then missed.
Hanging Gardens, put several turns into it then missed. Note: I built Petra and NC first then hanging gardens, so I was being greedy with this one.
Colossus, but wasn't even going for this one.

National College finished turn 59 or so. After NC I settled four more cities for a total of seven.

Around turns 70-80 I was struggling super hard with happiness. Founded total of 7 cities, in short span founded 4 more, all next to mountains. Had to stop growth in two of the three original cities and still went negative. Stalling growth for a good 10 turns or so. This is first game in a long time that I had to build colosseums, circus maximus, zoos, get ideological policies for happiness.

Due to that stall still on turn 103 my notes were: Feels somehow really slow. The additional cities are so slow to start. Need so many buildings and so many workers to get them online. Haven’t even built library - university - observatory in any of them. Not even library. Granary, monument, aqueduct, stable… Sooo much stuff to build…

At Turn 110 I had a unique moment. I was 0 happiness and six of my seven cities were going to grow that turn! So I let those 6 cities grow and went -5 unhappy for a couple turns (finished Notre Dame soon to fix happiness). For some reason one of them did not grow, but grew the next turn, even though the previous turn it said 1 turn for growth. Seems like during turn end each city grows one by one in the order they were founded.

For Ideology I went order.

I felt like most of the game was waiting around for the new cities to ramp up.

164.jpg

164 Demos.jpg
164 Economic Overview.jpg

164 Science.jpg
 
Last edited:
Seems like during turn end each city grows one by one in the order they were founded.
Indeed, I believe the cities are handled in order, with the cap going first. If the growth of a city causes you to go unhappy, this affects the cities coming after it. So you might not finish a building due to the loss in production, or more likely your city will not grow (actually impressive that 5 out of 6 still managed to grow).

Furthermore, I believe the order is also relevant for great person generation. If you have one city that will reach the counter for a scientist, and another that will reach the counter for an engineer, then you will get either a scientist or an engineer, depending on which city comes first, but not both.
 
Furthermore, I believe the order is also relevant for great person generation. If you have one city that will reach the counter for a scientist, and another that will reach the counter for an engineer, then you will get either a scientist or an engineer, depending on which city comes first, but not both.
I believe in CIv 4 you could even get both if you were lucky. Anyone else remember that? Or was it in Civ5 before some patch?
 
I believe in CIv 4 you could even get both if you were lucky. Anyone else remember that? Or was it in Civ5 before some patch?
In Civ 4, you could definitely pop 2 or even 3 GPs in multiple cities, same turn, if you know what you are doing. (Golden Age + Religion/Pacifism. It's even better if you have a Philosophic Leader and the Parthenon.)
 
In Civ 4, you could definitely pop 2 or even 3 GPs in multiple cities, same turn, if you know what you are doing.
I don't remember any of the details or rules because it is so long ago (stopped playing Civ 4 the moment I got Civ 5), but I remember sometimes getting 2 GP simultaneously by accident :)
 
I don't remember any of the details or rules because it is so long ago (stopped playing Civ 4 the moment I got Civ 5), but I remember sometimes getting 2 GP simultaneously by accident :)
Yeah, Imma Civ 4 player (consider it one of the best games of all time). I'm actually playing it right now..ha. Assuming you played enough to know that certain techs in IV give you a free great person, I assume that was not the case here. It could simply be that you were unaware of certain mechanics at play like a Golden Age and your leader traits. Generally, pumping simultaneous great people takes some understanding of the mechanics behind it, but I could see it happening passively if you had some cities running quite a few specialists. You were probably in a Golden age, and had some Wonders built which also produce gpp.

Funny, as different as V is from IV, great folk work similar in many ways. After V, they really changed how they work. In both games, you produced GPPs (great people points) toward producing a great person, both by running specialists and wonders. Bulbing GS is the most powerful implementation, as well as rushing wonders with GEs. While in IV you don't create tile improvements like academies, you can settle the great person in your city for the bonuses, and a GS can create an Academy building in the city. The major difference though is one has far more control of GPP in IV. Also, Golden Ages boost GPP by 100%. The Pacifism civic also boosts it by 100%, and the Caste System civic allows unlimited specialists, whereas in V we have limited/max slots. However, in V we can buy great folk with faith.
 
Assuming you played enough to know that certain techs in IV give you a free great person
I probably knew it at the time, but forgot by now. I used to be a regular Civ 4 player, and Civ 3 before that. Participated in some GOTMs back then, too :)

Civ 5 is by far my favorite though. Hex grid, one unit per tile, were both great improvements over 4 IMO.

I tried 6 for a bit but didn't like it much. Haven't played 7 yet. I probably will at some point in the future, but for now I'm quite happy to go on playing 5. And I don't really have the time to be playing two versions of Civ at the same time.
 
Well I finished this with a lowly turn 217 victory. Low by comparison standards but I think a PR for me.

Guess I need to figure out how to do the screenshots thing, in addition to furthering my quick science education.

I had 7 cities. Settled in place. I did learn from the woeful Settler effort and ran two city to city trade routes for food.

Never warred. Seems I explored far more than others and even had a few votes completed on WC.

Am I missing something on the saving of GS until near end game? Do they give more bulbs depending on when you use them or how does this work?

Not sure if could have done better with less cities but didn't really want to leave a bunch of open area with raging barbs. So I had my corner of the continent full secured. Settled in place, then put 2nd city to the SW to that great coastal site. Then down closer to La Venta to the E of prior city. Then worked to the NE along riiver, for another coastal city. Meanwhile fighting off Barbs left and right. Next city went NW of there in a good site with some jungle tiles. Then NW of capital for some luxuries...last was due E from Vienna on coast.

I started with Tradition then completed Liberty, then Patronage. Then could focus on Science.

Anyhow, guess still have some learning to do to speed up nearer to all your finishes. Still was happy enough with pre 1900 science win on Prince. That's new ground for me.

One other thing I'll ask about.....do you guys fill every specialist spot like I do? You then get all sorts of great peeps. But way I see it is the added science from each specialist is worth it.

But obviously you guys are doing things I am not.

Moderator Action: Added a screenshot of your game :) . In game, I use F12 to take a screenshot but check your Steam settting as yours may be different. Go to your Steam Profile>Screenshots and click "Upload Screenshots" which will show you your latests ones (you don't actually need to upload). Click on the screenshot you want and then click "Share" at the bottom right and choose "Copy". Paste it right into your post here. Cheers - lymond

Spoiler BB's Marvelous Austrian Empire :
1743285232486.jpeg
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Do they give more bulbs depending on when you use them or how does this work?
Yes, bulbs are directly proportional to your science per turn the last 6 turns or something like that. Which is why it's usually best to pop them near the end, or if you need a tech quick i.e. Plastics and you have enough money to buy a few Labs.

I usually settle my first GS though, not sure if it pays off in the end, I find it quite impossible to do the math. Just a personal preference.
 
Finished on 155. Lost like 30k of overflow from mass bulbing the penultimate part, kind of didn't matter because I bulbed two more GS from Hubble just after, and then Oxford the final tech. Didn't have quite enough gold, so I spent two turns hard building that last part, which was one turn faster than waiting to gold purchase it. Maybe I should start bulbing earlier, idk. I try to alternate my techs and space out the bulbs a bit so I'm not losing too much overflow to those cheap lines along the top and bottom after Plastics, but at a certain point, it's just go time.

Hard built every wonder except Hubble, faith bought a GE for that one since I wasn't going to have enough to purchase a fourth GS anyway. Think I bulbed fourteen GS in total between what I had banked, purchasing the three, and engineering Hubble. Peaked at ~1650 science when I was working max beakers with specialists and research production, swapped it to max hammers in the capital for building the final part, and wealth everywhere else just in case buying it would be faster. I built a few wonders I don't usually touch due to them being one turn in the monster capital, and giving me CS allies. Parthenon, Angkor Wat off the top of my head, might have been more.

Went into Industrialization before Scientific Theory for like the first time ever. Wanted Big Ben early to help purchase the public schools, and try out factorying my way into ideology instead of Oxfording Radio. Had to purchase a coal tile in Kragenfort, I suppose that's better than having no coal at all. I did save six turns on the final tech by using Oxford at the end for once, so that was cool. I also had a nice timing with finishing Statue on the same turn as Radio, and using the free policy to finish Rati and tech immediately into Plastics. Was able to afford five labs, and one turn hard build the sixth in the capital. They went up on 139, so it was sixteen turns from there to the finish.

Ended up with one more policy than I needed, put it in cheaper road maintenance but it was only worth like 12gpt or so.

Didn't bother with Honor, or annexing any of my numerous CS allies. There were two more potentially juicy settle locations with that river/gold/horses/wheat spot a bit to the west, and the river/spices/coast to the northeast, but I was happy with the six city setup.

Spoiler Demos :
mar155a.jpg

Spoiler Policies and Wonders :
mar155b.jpg

Spoiler The Austrian Empire :
mar155c.jpg

Spoiler Climbed a wooded hill NW of India with a double-sight-promoted scout archer, it revealed quite the view :
barbs.jpg
 
Last edited:
Launched at turn 152, pretty happy with this result.
My timing early game sucked a bit, I got too many filler policies before opening rationalism. Already had cheaper buying in commerce and opened patronage.
Later on my timing improved. I bulbed a GS because all cities were ready to hard build public schools. I bulbed a GS because I had the gold to buy 6 labs at once.
Then I focussed on getting all buildings for great people slots and put all cities in full science mode. I had 1 city, graz, that focussed on production, so that it could build apollo while capital built hubble and porcelain tower.
Gold income was very good so i was able to rush buy all parts.
I think I started bulbing on turn 140 but labs were finished on turn 133 so i should have started bulbing on 138.
Spoiler :
1743580347424.png


edit:
I think this map had really good city locations with the rivers and mountains. 3 of my cities had observation tower, which is really good.

edit2: Saw people talking about a GE born before the first GS. I actually had 1 GE born too and planted it in the capital, made a pretty nice endgame tile.
 
Last edited:
Results for GOTM #265
Austria / Science / Prince / Frontier / Large / Quick

...Player.....................Turn
1. fiddlesticks................154 :trophy:
2. The_Black_Vegetable.........156 :trophy2nd:
3. sebtanic....................178 :trophy3rd:
4. lymond......................179
5. Skifff......................179
6. Megalou.....................191
7. Yarin.......................201
8. Xrustyclimbs................206


More details can be found here. Please note: This list is generated automatically and only shows games that have been uploaded to the GOTM website.

Congratulations to the trophy winners and to all who played the game. Thank you for sharing your game and participating in the discussions! :goodjob:
 
Back
Top Bottom