TSG 59 After Actions Thread

[Halcyan2]

Reasonably speedy game, though I made my fair share of mistakes.

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CITIES

Although the start location wasn't so hot, the surrounding area was actually quite nice. Early on I planned out for 5 cities but it took too long to set things up and the difficulty level was too low to generate cash quick enough. My city locations were:

1. Capital (spent 2 turns to settle on the hill next to the cow)
2. Gibraltar
3. On the plains hill to the east (next to river/mountain)
4. Krakatoa
5. Grand Mesa

The Gibraltar location was actually pretty good, but I had to spend a fair amount of gold to purchase the horse and two cow tiles before Sweden took them through border expansion.

If you're familiar with the map, these cities basically encircle Sweden (who I was Friends with). In order to "stake out my territory," I had to buy a few extra units (extra Scout, 1 or 2 extra Archers) to ward off a Swedish and Ethiopian settler until I could settle the places myself. I spent about 20 turns dancing 3 of my units around the Swedish settler (which cost me gold, and time that could be sent clearing barbarian camps). The cities were actually pretty good, but I feel in this game I should have stuck to just 4 cities.

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RELIGION

Religion-wise, I was second to found and enhance, went with Fertility Rites + Tithe + Cathedrals + Swords to Plowshares + Religious Texts. Ethiopia took Pagodas first, but I still got two Pagodas (let his religion spread before replacing it with my own) and I'm actually glad I ended up with Cathedrals instead. Swords to Plowshares was decent, but in hindsight I would have preferred Divine Inspiration.

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DIPLOMACY

Friends with Sweden the whole game. Gustavus was highly tolerant even though I Was settling and buying tiles all around him! Initially Ethiopia gave me normal price (was Neutral) but England was giving a slightly less Guarded price. By mid-game, the situation switched. I became Friends with England, while Ethiopia got pissed at me (probably cause I beat him to most of the wonders) and DoW'ed me twice. Both times he sent an army, I killed a bunch of units, and then he sued for peace (paying half his gold) 5-10 turns later. Had DoF's with Darius, Maria, and Isabella. Theodora was wiped out by Isabella early on before I met her. (Apparently she got stunted when a barbarian took her settler, leaving her with just her capital which she lost to Spain). Signed two rounds of RA's with England/Sweden, and one round of RA's with Austria/Persia/Spain. The DoF's would have paid off more for a Science victory, because I could probably have netted another 3-5 more before the game ended.

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PRODUCTION

Was always strapped for cash. After rush buying my settlers, I spent everything else pretty much on science buildings but even then, it took me awhile to get Universities (bought 1 immediately but took time to buy more), Observatories (couldn't buy any immediately), Public Schools (couldn't buy any immediately and hard built 3 actually), and Research Labs (bought 1 immediately and 2 later on). Having the gold to buy all the buildings immediately would have helped tremendously.

With Wonders, my capital went with:

1. GL
2. NC
3. SH
4. Pyramids
5. HG
6. Chichen Itza
7. Terracotta Army
8. Oracle
9. Great Mosque
10. Alhambra
11. Hagia Sophia
12. Porcelain Tower
13. Leaning Tower
14. Himeji (Pre-build)
15. Workshop (Pre-build)
16. Stables (Pre-build)
17. U.N. (Rushed with 2 GE's)
18. Forbidden Palace (in 3 turns)

Gibraltar city had:

1. Great Lighthouse
2. Colossus

Desert city had:

1. Petra
2. Machu Picchu
3. Notre Dame

I let Haile have the Great Wall (but I beat him to Pyramids, HG, Alhambra, and Leaning Tower). This time around I wisely ignored Angkor Wat, which went to Darius.

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TECH

-> Writing
-> Philosophy (detour for Mining)
-> Education (detours for Masonry, Sailing, and Optics)
-> Astronomy (detour for Construction, Bronze Working, Iron Working)
-> Scientific Theory
-> Plastics
-> Globalization

Things could have been slightly faster if I hadn't made the detours for Pyramids (Masonry), Great Lighthouse (Sailing/Optics), Terracotta (Construction), and Colossus (Bronze/Iron Working) but it's hard for me to pass up wonders!

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SOCIAL POLICIES

Full Tradition
Patronage opener (not in Renaissance yet)
Oracle to open Rationalism.
Leftside of Rationalism
Order opener
Rest of Rationalism

 

[Halcyan2]

One question I have for some of the top players:

For Science/Diplomacy games, is it better to enter the Renaissance with Acoustics or Astronomy?


Acoustics Pros:

1. Can be done straight after Education (Astronomy also requires Sailing -> Optics -> Compass)
2. Depending on cultural production, you might not need to "waste" an SP
3. You could start getting a science boost via Rationalism sooner
4. On higher difficulty levels you might still be able to build Oracle in time (Astronomy will probably be too late)
5. Along the path to Architecture


Astronomy Pros:

1. Gives access to Observatories
2. Allows contact with other civs which are separated by Ocean (lets you meet them sooner, which lets you DoF and RA sooner too)



In other games, I often go with Acoustics first, but I feel like other people get superior results with Astronomy (for observatories). This game I actually went with Astronomy first (but it took awhile to get the observatories) and it feels like people did better going with Acoustics. I figured that with several mountain cities, and a continents map, that Astronomy would be better this time around (plus I already had gotten Optics for the Great Lighthouse).

So I'm curious how people decide whether they want to do Acoustics or Astronomy first?

 

[Novalia]

Personally I don't plan so well my policy timing.. Sometimes I'll pick up a cultural CS or two randomly that puts a kink into any plans.. Usually if I can't get into renaissance within the next policy I'll delay it entirely and pick up some other techs to get myself another cheap pagoda/missionary. One of the many reasons i would never qualify as a top player =)
Otherwise if I had the choice between those techs (and a mountain city) I would pick up astronomy every time.

 

[stickyfingers]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 59
Date submitted: 2013-04-21
Reference number: 28789
Your name: stickyfingers
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1828AD
Turns played: 284
Base score: 1510
Final score: 2696
Time played: 6:35:00
Submitted save: William_0284 AD-1828.Civ5Save
Renamed file: stickyfingers_C505901.Civ5Save


was a fun game though i have no idea how some people get these sub 200 times. i built 3 cities then swededon DOW'ed me. i took his capital which was his only city. Then I went on to Ethiopia and took like 5 of his cities. it was slow going because of the terrain. his capital was surrounded by jungle/forest so there was no chance to set up 3 tiles out and move and shoot, which is my normal strategy. there was no way i could see to take his cap without taking big losses - which i didn't want to do bc i was building important buildings in my cities instead of units. took a long time to get his cap but eventually did it with x-bows. Then england DOW'ed me, but I had a similar stalemate with them because of the terrain. They had a city up north on that small land-bridge and I couldn't break through till I got artillery. Then I took London and some crap cities they had. Everyone hated me for being a warmonger (no consideration that 2 of the 3 civs i was killing DOW'ed me in the first place) and Spain and Austria DOWed me, but never actually attacked from across the sea. I sunk a few of their ships off their own coasts with a nuke sub.

 

[Kigur]

i'm not pr0.

even if patronage is not an absolute must have for diplomatic vc, 1 or 2 sp in patronage is not a waste if you follow a diplo win path.

imho for diplo vc, if you have a good timing for renaissance era/rationalism and your next sp or you don't need observatory/caravel/ocean crossing go acoustics. else go astronomy.

 

[Cromwell]

One of these days I'm going to have to go read up on the exploits strategies that let people pile up tech so quickly. Any suggestions where to start? It must be the early game somehow.

I was being much more aggressive on tech than normal: selling luxuries, buying tech buildings with cash, lending people money to get research agreements. I even timed the two bonus techs from culture correctly to get me to globalization.

I shaved 27 turns off my record doing that sort of stuff. There must be something big I'm missing early on.

 

[Tabarnak]

Stayed peaceful for the rest of the game. I even DoF Sweeden in the middle of the game for a nice 10% gpp boost.

Got Edu turn 101 and acoustics turn 110. Got Public schools around 148 and RLs around 177. I used 3 or 4 gs to get RLs faster then a couple more for globalization. 2 more gs would have popped some turns after the completion of the UN if i didn't switch for gold focus...

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

The Education slingshot is very important as i can see. The faith production should be over 80 per turn when entering the ind. era to maintain a sub 200 win which i failed(few turns late). If i only i had started the gp production sooner(like 10 turns faster), these 2 extra gs would have been very useful.

But i have a question for best timers :

How much cities do you generally plant(cap included) for a fast NC? 2 or 3?

 

[Tabarnak]

So I'm curious how people decide whether they want to do Acoustics or Astronomy first?

If i had settled my desert city close to a mountain i would have teched Astro first. But a stupid barb camp spawned the turn i was going there with my settler...

Definitively Astro if continent AND at least 1 early big city that can get an observatory(i almost got these 2 conditions for this gotm) or very few contacts made/hostile AIs.

 

[Maxym]

I decide on case by case, in this case I had a mountain second city, but I could have had two quick ones in ratio (oracle) if going acoustics so I went for acoustics. I teched to astro right after that iirc. I never touched patronage tree. If I had to burn a policy before ratio then I think I would have gone astro as I would have had time for it.

Can you PM me the same info like last time Halcyan, I am curious how much help those RAs were...

@Tabarnak, I went with 2 city NC, I usually do that unless swimming in gold for some reason and then 3 city is an option. If I am dirt poor then even 1 city but that had not happened much, except the Siam immortal challenge just now

 

[chicagofan98]

Well that got out of hand... ended up getting a domination victory, oops.

Game: Civ5 GOTM 59
Date submitted: 2013-04-27
Reference number: 28822
Your name: chicagofan98
Game status: Domination Wrong VC
Game date: 1912AD
Turns played: 332
Base score: 3124
Final score: 4733
Time played: 5:26:00

After taking over Sweden and being so close to Ethiopia, they were not too happy with me and eventually denounced. They were also spreading their pagan religion all over my cities, so eventually push came to shove and I had to declare on them too since I could not manage to provoke them to declare on me. That pretty much made the whole world hate me, but I was pretty advanced militarily and began my quest for world domination with the help of the amazing sea beggars.

- How many cities did you build and how many did you decide to acquire?
Not sure on the exact number, but I probably built around 7 cities of my own and conquered quite a few, including a couple city states which I learned makes you a warmonger pretty much automatically.

- How did you use religion or spying to your advantage?
Tithes gave me lots of cash, and taking people's capitals allowed me to send in inquisitors to make sure my religion was the dominant one.

- How did diplomacy go with your neighbors?
Terrible. After taking Ethiopia I was labeled a warmonger.

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
Since it was Prince I was able to have a good tech lead and an advanced military.

- Were your UA and UU helpful?
The Sea Beggars are amazing! I annexed Stockholm and made it my navy producer. Sea Beggars were able to come out of the gate with two attacks per turn, allowing me to attack cities and retreat before they could hit back.

- Was your UI helpful?
To an extent. It allowed a couple cities to get some really high populations, but that also led to some happiness problems later.

 

[Gooble]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 59
Date submitted: 2013-04-30
Reference number: 28843
Your name: Gooble
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1800AD
Turns played: 270
Base score: 2018
Final score: 3737
Time played: 7:50:00
Submitted save: TSG59_Gooble.Civ5Save
Renamed file: Gooble_C505901.Civ5Save

My fastest victory to date!

- How many cities did you build and how many did you decide to acquire?
I wanted to build myself a reasonably sized empire. I built my capital+5 cities, the main one being Rotterdam next to the mountain east of my capital (built capital on silver). See the screenshots for the other placement.

I took Stockholm (destroying Sweden) very soon and annexed it after it stopped revolting.
I took Addis Ababa around turn 220 (I think). Towards the end I conquered Ethopia and England (both completely) - left these as puppets except for one annexation by mistake.

- How did you use religion or spying to your advantage?
I wanted a good faith income for the faith quests of CSs, I took +2 faith/quarry as that worked out best for faster start, otherwise I took Tithe for the gold income (had +50 gc/turn by end) and mosque for extra faith - worked well. I had +127 faith at the end, overall it gave me a fair amount of great persons.
Spying was pretty much useless and terrible for me this game. Had only rank 1 spies, lost out on rigging elections, had a few technologies stolen (the AIs tried to steal from Amsterdam, but Rotterdam had much bgreater potential (my science city with ca 6 academies).

- How did diplomacy go with your neighbors?
Considering the difficulty level it was no problem. Sweden DOWed me around turn 70, which was great, because I wanted to conquer them but didn't want to DOW. Later I DOWed Ethiopia several times, finally DOWed England (they DOWed me harmlessly before) - conquered all three.

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
Low difficulty meant I wasn't too worried about having a big or high-tech army, took it easy overall.

- Were your UA and UU helpful?
The UA is very nice. I only recently learned to trade even my last resource away, but without the UA I wouldn't have been able to do that to such an extent - like this I managed to stay in +happiness almost the whole game, while continually selling as much as I could.

Didn't use the Sea Beggar at all. Maybe I was just lazy, but it didn't fit into my game plan and it's quite a late unit. I must say I don't know how to make good use of privateers.

- Was your UI helpful?
The Polder is nice, but there weren't many places for it to make such a huge impact. But it helped Rotterdam grow into a big and mighty city. Plus they look very nice

 

[gkreitz]

Game:	Civ5 GOTM 59
Date submitted:	2013-05-01
Reference number:	28859
Your name:	gkreitz
Game status:	Diplomacy Victory
Game date:	1600AD
Turns played:	230
Base score:	1418
Final score:	3082

Settled on the silver.

Made a few early mistakes in this one. Played overly sloppy early and managed to lose 2 scouts, delaying scouting quite a bit. Settled 4th a bit late, which delayed NC and then proceeded to clumsily finish oracle before medieval so I couldn't use it for patronage. Got beat out for HG by a couple of turns.

Once I had crossbows I steamrolled and eliminated Sweden and Ethiopia, annexing Stockholm for the polder-opportunities.

 

[Merenptah]

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Spoiler :

Game: Civ5 GOTM 59
Date submitted: 2013-05-01
Reference number: 28861
Your name: Merenptah
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1360AD
Turns played: 196
Base score: 1314
Final score: 3369
Time played: 9:15:00
Submitted save: TSG59MerenptahDV_0196 AD-1360.Civ5Save
Renamed file: Merenptah_C505901.Civ5Save

Synopsis and Overall Comment
This is my second GOTM and my fastest victory ever (first one under 200 Turns). I usually don’t aim for speed and have other goals but being Prince I thought I might as well try to be quick. Surprised myself by the fast finish in particular given some major screw-ups mid-game (popped a Great Artist on Turn 136 and a Great Prophet with just over 500 Faith on Turn 143, i.e. the same turn I got Scientific Theory as I was saving Faith for a Great Scientist). Also, I should have been more aggressive with Sweden early on, i.e. taking his capital and not just his worker and two settlers, not to mention Ethiopia. Having more puppets early would have helped tremendously and acquiring them fairly easy.

I bulbed two GSs on my way to Plastics and three GSs on my way to Ecology. To be frank, I don’t think GS bulbing is very well balanced (just as RAs for the same reason). In my opinion, there should at least be some diminishing marginal returns when bulbing several GSs within a short period of time, but that's a different discussion.

Milestones

• Turn 70: 4 Cities NC
  Great Library in Capital; Library built in 2nd City and bought in 3rd City; settled 4th City with NC completion and built Library there much later after Granary and Water Mill.
  
• Turn 85: Tradition complete
  Declared war on KL same turn to avoid filler SP before entering Renaissance.
  
• Turn 94: Education
  
• Turn 110: Rationalism open + Secularism (Oracle)
  
• Turn 127: Free Thought
  Used Culture specialists to speed this up but then popped an unintended great Artist a few turns later (thanks to Hanging Garden and Hagia Sophia in 2nd City and me not paying attention).
  
• Turn 143: Scientific Theory
  Got this with Oxford but it didn’t help with avoiding and unintended Great Prophet (was already above 500 but I took my chances for another screw-up).
  
• Turn 153: Planned Economy
  
• Turn 170: Plastics
  Took big loan (like 800 Gold) from Maria to buy 4th Research Lab (she must have been saving to marry a CS and then forgotten about it). Completed Big Ben on Turn 169 to be able to afford all those Research Labs.
  
• Turn 186: Ecology + Rationalism complete
  
  
• Turn 187: UN complete
  
• Turn 196: Diplomacy Victory

1. How did the terrain affect your early decisions? What were your initial priorities?
Not a great starting location so OCC was not an option. Decided to settle on Silver and explore fast (started with two Scouts instead of one) to locate good places to settle next. My second city (next to Mountain and Marble) became the de facto capital: build NC there as well as The Hanging Gardens and Petra, and with three Polders it quickly became the largest city.
2. What tech path did you follow and why?
Followed a standard Science Victory tech path with a few exceptions. Researched Mining before Writing so I could sell the Silver Lux ASAP to buy a settler, and got Masonry right after Calendar for Quarries.
Pottery (on Turn 3 thanks to an ancient ruin) -> Mining -> Writing -> Calendar -> Philosophy (w/ GL; NC) -> Masonry -> Theology (Great Mosque and Hagia Sophia) -> Education (Universities) -> Astronomy (Observatory) -> Guilds (Polders) -> Metal Casting (Workshops) -> Acoustics (Opera Houses for earlier Free Thought and CPT throttling) -> Printing Press (Religion spreading enhance) -> Economics (Polder enhance) -> Scientific Theory (w/ Oxford; Public Schools) -> Industrialization (Coal + Factories) -> Plastics (Research Labs)-> Chemistry (Mine + Quarry enhance) -> Ecology
3. Were there any wars and who started them?
Early Wars (Turns 28, 45 and 67): Sweden worker and settler enslavement
Gustav was being friendly but then he sent a settler my way and just where I was planning to settle my 4th city. I kindly asked him to refrain settling near me … he got offended and told me I was in no position to make such demands … really? Well, I declared war on him and enslaved his settler. I did this three times until I finally settled my 4th city on turn 70. Gustav founded his 2nd city Sigtuna SE of his capital on Turn 98 … so late, but that was really his fault as he could have gone there much earlier when I asked him not to settle near me. I did not take any of his cities as I had not built any units yet except for a single Archer.
Turns 121-154: Attacked by Ethiopia and England
On turn 121 Ethiopia declares war on me and shows up with a small army of CB and spearman. England joins and declares war on me Turn 122. I only had a laughable defense force at that point consisting only of an archer and a spearman, but within 5 turns I had the largest and most advanced army on the planet (see graph in attached pic): quickly upgraded Archer to CB, Spearman to Pikeman, and started producing CBs in my two major cities (two each). 5th CB came out with Machinery, I upgraded CBs to XBows, and proceeded in building a Knight and a Trebuchet (which I did not actually use and just kept near Rotterdam in case Gustav was going to attack as well).

With my little army I went on the offensive and took three Ethiopian cities (including capital) in a fairly slow going campaign. Conquered Adwa on Turn 132, Addis Ababa on Turn 146 and Harar on Turn 154; then singed peace for Gold (100g lump sum) and left him with a single city. During the whole campaign all I saw of Liz was a single Warrior … which I captured and castrated before killing him (not really, but Liz is just so obnoxious; she’s been hostile and offensive towards me in every single game I have encountered her so far and nothing ever worked in trying to be friends) … was offered a peace deal on Turn 145: Liz offered one of her cities but I didn’t want it and asked for all her GPT instead which she accepted … 25 GPT for 30 Turns … nice!
Turns 162-169: Stockholm capture
With Electricity I got to see Aluminum near Addis but it was out of reach and border growth not fast enough to get there within a reasonable time. So I really needed another Great General since I had used my first one to get the Citrus near my southern city. I did not feel like going after England, and decided to bring my army back home instead and take Stockholm which was quite a nice city with Terracotta Army as well as three tiles for Polders. Was a really quick and painless siege, and with hindsight I should have gotten Stockholm first before going after Ethiopian cities as I could have handled it with ease even with two wars going already.
4. What Social Policies did you choose and why?
Standard Science Victory SP progression. Heavy use of CPT throttling with specialists and even declared war on a Cultural City-State upon completing Tradition to make sure I can complete Astronomy before my next SP. Opened Order with Scientific Theory and completed Rationalism the same turn as Ecology. Build Pisa very late (Turn 181) since I wasn’t sure if I needed another GS (to get Ecology earlier) or another GE for faster UN completion. Turns out I didn’t need the GS because my CPT wasn’t high enough, but to compensate I used two GEs for single turn UN completion.
i) Full Tradition ii) Rationalism -> Free Thought iii) Order -> Planned Economy iv) complete Rationalism
5. How many cities did you build and how many did you decide to acquire?
Build four cities and wasn’t really keen on getting more. It did cross my mind to engage in Naval warfare with Sea Beggars but then production was just too low in my port city so I didn’t bother getting Navigation earlier. I only acquired more puppets once Ethiopia declared war on me (too late to make a difference), and I ended up with four puppet cities (including Ethiopia and Sweden capitals) in addition to my original four cities.
6. How did you use religion or spying to your advantage?
Religion: Fertility Rites, Ceremonial Burial, Divine Inspiration, Religious Community, Religious Texts. Built a single Shrine in Capital and gotten the rest of Faith for my first Prophet from religious City-States. Completed Great Mosque and started producing Missionaries before enhancing Religion with Prophet from Hagia Sophia. Ceremonial Burial together with the UA meant I never had to worry about Happiness and could trade every single Lux I had access to throughout the game. Divine Inspiration was my main source of Faith and is very powerful at levels Emperor or below when you get to build many World Wonders. Religions Community was a huge help since I had pretty low productivity in all of my cities.
Faith usage: Prophet, 8x Missionaries (3 to convert City-States on my own continent and used another 5 to explore and find the other City-States on the new continent), Great Prophet (not intended and he just popped the turn I finished Oxford + Architecture; it was a waste of 500 Faith since I had everyone converted already; FPT throttling is not something I had thought about, but declaring war on Lhasa would have gotten me another GS and thus Plastics at least 5 turns earlier; not to mention I had already popped an unintentional Great Artist to screw things up even more), 2x GS, 1x GE
Spying: Nothing special here. Kept two in main cities (Amsterdam and Rotterdam) in the beginning and then placed them in Cultural City-States later, but they did not help in preventing coups by Austria and Sweden. Interesting is also that they did not get promoted quickly and I did not get a single special agent. At higher levels these guys get much more experience and I usually have a special agent before getting the next recruit.
7. How did diplomacy go?
On my continent diplomacy did not go very well. My fault to some extent since I bullied some City-States + gone to war repeatedly with Sweden over his settling ambitions. But England was hostile from the turn after we met, and only Ethiopia was paying full price for Lux … but not for very long as I was soon labeled a warmonger by all of them.
However, as soon as my missionaries met new Civilizations on the new continent things changed for the better and I found excellent trading partners for the rest of the game. Austria and Persia would pay full price throughout the game, and Byzantium was only one level below that (paying 209g / Lux) after I refused a DoF. I never got to meet Spain as they were conquered by Persia before I had reached the new continent.
I never exchanged embassies and refused all requests for friendship. Since they were at war with each other I did not want to alienate any and rather keep good trading partners. Still, both Maria and Darius voted for me at the UN, while relations with Civs on my own continent never improved.
8. How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
I didn’t bother building any units during the early game except for a single archer to help clearing barb camps near my territory. Build the Great Library as well as the Pyramids (which I usually never build).
9. Were your UA helpful?
The UA combined with Ceremonial Burial meant that Happiness was never a concern and so I was just selling everything I could.
10. Were your UU helpful?
Didn’t build any Sea Beggars even though they were one of the main motivations for me to try this game (having never played the Dutch before). It seems very powerful: with two military buildings this should be perfect for Naval Masochistic Domination … doesn’t even require any strategic resources to build.
11. Was your UI helpful?
Amazing improvement; just wish I had more than just three flood plains within range of my cities.

 

[glory7]

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Great writeup and great time. Well done!

 

[Maxym]

GG Merenptah, I was pretty sure I had 2nd spot locked up

Do you have city stats from the time you were bulbing? I am very curious, I was thinking of doing NC in Petra city, but thought that cap growth might compensate, I think I was wrong. How much science was there?

 

[Merenptah]

Have not kept track of BPT per city breakdowns ... but overall BPT was close to 500 after getting Public Schools and close to 600 after getting Factories.

The reason I built NC in 2nd city is that I was planning to plant two Academies (turned out to be only one because of the unwanted Great Artist), and I wanted those Academies to benefit from both the Observatory and the NC.

What also helped is that I got Fertility Rites as my Pantheon (+10% growth in all cities). And it turned out that growth in my 2nd city was better than in the capital thanks to Water Mill, Hanging Gardens (started on Turn 70 right after NC, completed on Turn 83) and 3 Polders, which more than compensated for the Landed Elite bonus received by the capital. With a few Maritime CS friends this would have been different, but I wasn't very lucky in that respect.

 

[TyfoonTurk]

t236

had 2 extra GS and a lot of unhappiness during the game.

40 turns behind number one, right like my handicap.

 

[Arnold_T]

thanks =)

... rotterdam was founded t24 ... next to the mountain on the plains hill for river access

Hey pkf, Congrats on the amazingly quick game!
I kinda did the same as you as far as city placements. but was way behind, right from your Edu time on. how did you get to t90 for Edu? did you go Liberty? burn free GS from liberty finisher for Edu? I guess CS quests were lining up nicely for you too probably?

Arnold_T

 

[pkf]

Thanks! I went Tradition (LE -> Aristocracy), I think Liberty is far worse here. I don't remember having particular good luck with the CS, managed to do all barb camp quests quickly though and had strong religion early, so lots of happiness to grow like crazy. There were mostly religious CS IIRC and Lisbon, which I allied very early with barb camp and barb kills near their borders.

I had no luck in wonder and lux quests, same for WLTK (never got it).

 

[Arnold_T]

went Tradition (LE -> Aristocracy)

thanks, that helps to explains it. I went Monarchy before Aristocracy, as usual (without thinking). my culture start was slow too. didn't get an early culture ruin, and didn't build monument