TSG25 Game in Progress

[Onan]

A 2 iron tile close to me? Ok...but elsewhere? Where, dammit? AHHH i see some...far far away close to Berlin. YES!

Alright so i throwed a settler and a worker immediately. I couldn't settle on it because Essen was close.

Hmn, I thought you needed 3 tiles between, EXCEPT when cities have no land between them / have water between them. No? Would the iron have been a possible site to settle, or is this another case where the game mechanics perform differently from the manual?

Looks like another nice game, Tab. My game I will not likely return to.... an unfortunate barb camp delayed my first two settlers getting where they needed to...lost 3 scouts to barbs after optics, with little reward (one worker)...managed to starve London the turn after a settler was built (seems a bit of an exploit to be building a settler with -4 food per turn...so I guess I deserved it). I don't have the patience for epic with a start like that.

 

[Tabarnak]

Hmn, I thought you needed 3 tiles between, EXCEPT when cities have no land between them / have water between them. No? Would the iron have been a possible site to settle, or is this another case where the game mechanics perform differently from the manual?

Hmm no i think you are right. I just didn't remember about this fact. If i had knew it...o well almost every aspects where sub-optimal in anyway

 

[nthexwn]

Played around 100 turns so far, but had approximately 20 crashes due to a weird glitch with my new GTX570 video card. Finally got the game stable again, but I think I'll skip out on this one, due to the huge number of replayed turns. Regardless, this is a great scenario, and plays quite uniquely compared to the previous TSGs! Never had so much fun with naval battles before.

 

[Monthar]

I'm up to turn 407 now and not much closer to winning this one than I was 100 turns ago. I've already looked in the after action thread to see how fast some folks have beat it. After seeing that some folks have beat it well under 200 turns, I think I'm gonna just give up now.

 

[Zikkurat]

I'm up to turn 407 now and not much closer to winning this one than I was 100 turns ago. I've already looked in the after action thread to see how fast some folks have beat it. After seeing that some folks have beat it well under 200 turns, I think I'm gonna just give up now.

Same here, but just for the 'giving up' part I'm close to turn 400 and just captured Beijing with my fleet of 7 SotLs and 2 caravels. 8 caps still to go, including all of the big ones like Rome, Paris and Bangkok. Technologically I'm way behind the leaders, still some 40 turns away from the SotL upgrade and already saw a massive fleet of destroyers and carriers from Siam.

So, in short, if I continue playing I will just add a couple of hours of playtime to see my utter failure

But its OK, it was my first game on Immortal and I learned a lot. I'll go back to some earlier saves or even start over and see if I can improve my research to get to SotL quicker and rule the oceans, but for this TSG I'm out.

 

[QuizMan]

Turn 350 and I am not sure how much further I can bothered to take this.

I am still a long way off winning and it is getting harder as each AI accelerates through the tech tree. Only Napoleon loves me and all the rest have declared war. 5 capitals captured so far with Caesar & Darius well under way. I have 14 SoTL's out there mostly with logistics and range (and I need that with artillery now being seen), but frankly, it is now getting boring especially the wait between turns even with quick combat enabled and regular switching to strategic view before clicking next turn.

 

[trueblue]

You guys are making me glad i stuck at it

 

[Monthar]

At the point where I gave up I still has SotLs, some rifles and some infantry. Yet Darius has mech-infantry, cruisers, arty and lot of each. Most of the AIs had infantry, arty and I think a couple also had cruisers. My biggest problem is I tend to get into building buildings instead of units, so I didn't have enough to take folks out before they became a problem.

I've been trying to get better at warmongering while playing the Romans to complete the achievement of capturing the city that built the statue of Zeus. in my current game of that at emperor I'm in the top slot and based on the 4 city swords rush. I took out Japan, but got bottle-necked trying to take China and Persia. So even this practice game isn't doing as well as I need to do. However, I did severely limit the number of buildings I build and that's made a lot of difference in my income. I can actually afford to buy buildings, units or CS alliances a lot easier than I normally do. All while maintaining the #1 slot in military. including upgrading several Legions to LS as soon as I got the tech. So hopefully I'll be better prepared for the next Emperor-Deity level game and the next Domination game.

 

[QuizMan]

trueblue, you have my admiration for seeing it through to the end. How did you alleviate the end of turn boredom? I lost count of the times I ended the turn and went to make a cup of tea. Caffeine levels shot up, but at least I stayed awake.

 

[ElWanderer]

The brave Siamese and Arabs have risen up and thrown off the yoke of their oppressor! Unfortunately that oppressor was me.

I'm in the middle of conquering Egypt (easily - they're quite poor), but four civs have declared war on me: Siam, Arabia, China and the Ottomans. The latter shouldn't be able to recapture their capital, but it's an annoying sideshow. Siam recaptured their capital after an epic fight - I thought I'd done enough to hold it, but an insta-healed knight carried the day. I should be able to recapture it if I can keep bombarding it and get a land unit over. Meanwhile, Mecca was a total loss; German intransigence meant I couldn't get any ships into range of the place to bombard the attackers. It will be a pain to recapture, and I may have to fight Germany again.

Because of the no-razing rule, the ridiculous happiness mechanism, a desire to go as quickly as possible and a personal feeling that selling the captured capitals to other civs was a bit cheap, I've not been able to secure what I've captured.

I should still win this, but it's going to be a long, long slog, and I'm not sure if I have the time, what with going away for Christmas.

 

[Half Nelson]

Made a start on this game, but might not get any further before the due date because of seasonal distractions. Settled in place, built monument-granary-GL-scout-trireme. Took the Liberty track (worker before settler), settled second city South for ivory. Beelined for Optics, sending 2 scouts / 2 triremes to seek out new lands. Made early trades (gold, gems) with Ottomans and built settler for third city on the lovely 3-gold / river-hills spot to North. Spotting an Ottoman settler / warrior heading in the same direction, I made a snap DoW to secure the spot. The war has continued unabated since then. I popped BW from a hut, speeding up discovery of IW before a push to Education and on to Navigation. My solution to the iron problem seems to differ from most posts, as you can see from the screenshot. The battle of Hastings has brought me lots of XP and 2 GG so far. My army consists of 1 pike, 3 archers (including a scout upgrade) and 6 triremes (with 2 more soon on the stocks in barracks cities). Built HS in London and used 2xGE for PT (London) and ND (Nottingham). Compass is due in 8 turns and I will have 2xGS ready for Navigation. Have met all AI. So far so good, but warmongering is not my forte:- who to attack first; how many armies etc???? Plan A is to take Istanbul, then send the SotL strikeforce to take down standing armies whilst I build up a second invasion force to capture capitals. Greece and Rome look to be early targets. I am friendly with Germany, China and Persia and have a couple of RA in place. My research focus will be Currency then up to Machinery, before a long beeline towards Combustion. Having completed Liberty, I am toying with a run through the full Honour tree, although a dip into Tradition (for Oligarchy) is tempting if I leave a LB in each capital for defence. Money and Happiness are OK for now, but culture is weak.

 

[da_Vinci]

Please use this thread to discuss your goals for the game and your opening moves through about the first 80 to 100 turns.

That will be easy, as I have started keeping notes as I play. Here are the first 100:

Spoiler :

TSG 25 Notes

Settled in Place, monument first, then worker.

Got a pop from a ruin.

Took Tradition policy first.

Found Suleiman.

T 27 (3325 BC): First Liberty policy.

T 35 (3125 BC): Farm built. Calendar done. Mining.

T 39 (3025 BC): Granary done. Stonehenge.

T 40 (3000 BC): Aristocracy policy.

T 46 (2850 BC): Mining done, AH.

T 57 (2575 BC): AH done, Wheel.

T 62 (2450 BC): Collective Rule policy.

T 63 (2425 BC): London is size 4.

T 66 (2350 BC): Stonehenge in London. Scout.

T 69 (2275 BC): Settled York SSE for Ivory.

T 71 (2225 BC): Wheel done, Writing. Scout in London, Watermill.

T 75 (2125 BC): London is size 5.

T 82 (1950 BC): Writing done. Sailing. Scout done in London, Great Library. Buy granary in York.

T 83 (1925 BC): Hanging Gardens far away (Great Lighthouse went earlier).

T 84 (1900 BC): Colossus far away. Citizenship policy.

T 85 (1875 BC): York is size 2.

T 92 (1700 BC): Sailing done, now trapping.

T 96 (1600 BC): Great Library in London. Take philosophy. Oracle next.
T 99 (1525 BC): York is size 3.

T 100 (1500 BC): Trapping done. Now Optics.

This was the first serious SP game I have played since back when tech blocking was an issue. In fact, I decided to take a Civ V break until that got sorted out, then RL made the break longer than initially intended.

- What were your initial priorities?

Found 3 to 4 cities, ideally timed to reduce policy cost damage and to get Nat Col early. Get 'Henge and if possible, some other early wonders.

- What Social Policies did you choose and why?

Tradition and Liberty look really attractive early now, so went for those. Tradition first, then LIberty T27, Aristocracy T40, Collective Rule T62, Citizenship T84, Representation T 110.

- What tech path did you follow?

Took a monument first strategy to fuel policy acquisition. Worker second as wonder building needs hammers. The wet map meant barbs would not be an early problem, so troops could wait. So the direct line to henge (pottery, calendar). Then mining for some hammers. Then AH, Wheel, Writing, Sailing, Trapping, Optics.

- Did you prioritize any Wonders? Managed to get Henge T66, Great Lib T 96, and later Oracle T 113, all in London.

- In this game, more City-States were added, how did this affect your strategy? Not any different at the start, still need a solid tech and production base regardless. It may affect the winability, though, see after action report.

- How does the larger map size and Epic game speed affect your strategy Again, not at the start. But may affect winability ... see after action report.

The other newsworthy early event was settling York SSE for the ivory.

I liked my start, but as usual on this kind of map, who might be getting unstoppable in some hidden, far away part of the map?

dV