TSG56 After Action thread

[Arilian]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 56
Date submitted: 2013-03-08
Reference number: 28468
Your name: Arilian
Game status: Science Wrong VC
Game date: 1740AD
Turns played: 258
Base score: 948
Final score: 1858
Time played: 2:27:00
Submitted save: Haile Selassie_0258 AD-1740.Civ5Save
Renamed file: Arilian_C505601.Civ5Save

Settlead near the mountain.
As most people, I have started a 3city trad game peacefully with god of the sea.
Pottery-Sailing-Optics-Writing
Unfortunately the starting hut gave me 60g instead of pop or culture...
Later I have found a small island in the middle of the ocean, and expanded to 4 city (It had 4 fish, 3 atoll and a horse for good food and prod)

It went well, I did not get DOW from Russia, in fact we were friends almost all game.
At the end she finally dowed me, I have captured two of her city with battleships then settled for peace, and give them back to her for the peace.

I have completely miscalculated my GSs, I have discovered everything, even stealth this cost me 10-20 turn.
I also lost a few turns because she GP bombed my capitol, costing me 4 and 15% prod for nothing. (she had the most stupid religion with +30% city ranged, +2happy for garden, and somthing even useless)

I liked this, as I like builder games, but did not go as well as planned.

Also I still have the auto annex bug - I had to load the autosave at the russian city captures....
I have a legal, fully updated CIV with all dlc from steam. It is rare but still happening.

 

[TimeWeaver]

Yannarosh, what a lovely summary of your game, and what game it was! Thanks!

You're really know your stuff. The only thing I've seem to have done like you is the religion choices, but when you wrote that you got to having a tech lead, I realize I'm doing stuff wrong. I was second to last in science (OCC, but still). Should I have used science agreements? I didn't do that, I relied on good spies stealing the techs from the AI, but that was tardy in the game. I learn from this kind of write-ups, so good on you for posting it.

 

[Yannarosh]

I'm glad you enjoyed it !

In my opinion the one advantage OCC has is getting to have good relations with every AI so it only makes sense to sign as many research agreements as you can. Spys are useful indeed for stealing techs but they will piss off your friends eventually and won't really get you in the tech lead. After I figured I was in the tech lead I only used spies on CS.

What I would do if I played this game OCC would be to go full out science. In this map I don't think you have to sidetrack at all for muskets/rifles. Frigates should keep you safe after astronomy and gatlings from industrialisation and those are techs that are in your optimal tech path. Frigates with privateers should be able to get you a huge fleet if you want and eliminate any threat from your immediate neighbours. After you complete the left part of rationalism and porcelain tower you ll see that research agreements give you a big boost and you ll be in the tech lead if you manage to sign a lot. Putting a lot of specialists in your cities after you open the policy in rationalism with +2 science from specialists is a great boost too.

If you see someone building Apollo or if you just want more cities you can upgrade to battleships and 1 ironclad and go take any coastal city you wish in like 2 turns.


With an aggressive approach the AIs dont really tech up. They just focus on military. And every time you make a peace treaty they usually tech up and upgrade their units to the next tier.

If you want some practice on OCC try the Deity OCC science strategy posted in the forums. Its also doable on immortal but its actually easier on Deity.

 

[TimeWeaver]

Interesting, so research agreements to get the relationships going. However, in this game Catherine was cranky, and I only got to meet William, who soon got eaten up by Catherine. My first spy had to flee out of his capital when she steamrolled over him. It was exciting! And that landmass to the east with America and Siam, well, let's say I discovered that to late. I hade nice culture figures, but science was abysmal.

 

[dthompson32]

I tried another playthru focusing on taking out Cathy (and William) early. I had an army of CBs ready to sail from the capital by turn 72 and Cathy was eliminated by turn 95. William then sends all of his troops and surprise attacks, and gets wiped out. The problem is trying to follow up and take Amsterdam. That is a tough city to take down. It seems that regardless of the tech you use, the defense of that city lets it take out one of your ranged units every turn, and it takes a long time to whittle it down. One mistake was I was using open terrain promotions to deal with Cathy's cities, I should have used rough terrain. Cover promotions would have helped too.

Anyway, I had to take peace 4 times before finally eliminating him around turn 200. I had gotten to Astro around turn 140, so had met everyone, but they all hated me as a war monger. I finally quit at turn 250. I could easily get a win around turn 300, I just finished Plastics, but Japan settled a bunch of cities on my continent and DOWed me. I'm bored with the fighting.

Having tried both methods now, I think small and focused works best for this map. The only thing to worry about is a late rush attack by Cathy or William (who will have tons of troops) and their constant sending prophets and missionaries at you. I think making religious choices that don't depend of spreading your religion are good.

Part of my problem, is that when I'm in a war, I'm focused on the war and not on my cities. I only got to build one additional city, and unlike in other playthrus it was terrible, barely grew at all.

 

[dthompson32]

One last play through today, got a 240 turn diplomatic victory. This can be shaved off a little but not by much, I ended up with more research than I needed, but I'm not sure what I could have done differently instead of research to save time. In the end I was still able to get a win on the first vote.

Tech order - Pottery, Sailing, Optics, Writing, Calendar, (AH from ruin), Philo, Trapping, Drama, Theology, (Archery from ruin), Mining, beeline to Education, Compass, Guilds (to build Machu), Astro, beeline to printing press, beeline to architecture, beeline to scientific theory, navigation (for seaport), industrialization (for factory), beeline to fertilizer, beeline to Plastics, beeline to refrigeration for subs, beeline to Globalization

Policy order - Tradition opener, legalism, landed elite, monarchy, aristrocracy, oligarchy, Patronage open (oracle), aesthetics, rationalism open, secularism, free thought, scientific revolution, humanism (humanism was a mistake, philanthropy would have been a better choice for bribing CSs)

City 1 order - Stele, Granary, Scout, Workboat, Lighthouse, Library, Workboat, Trireme, NC, settler, circus, HS, Oracle, National epic, Machu, harbor, market, buy workshop, LTOP, PT, buy seaport, Frigates x 3, Ironworks, factory (coal from Geneva), buy research lab, barracks/armory (for sub promotions), Frigate, Hospital, submarine
City 2 order - Granary, workboat, lighthouse, library, circus, university, workshop, harbor, market, public school, coliseum, theater, cannon, factory, research lab (didn't need)
City 3 order - Granary, workboat, lighthouse, library, university, observatory, workshop, workboat, harbor, public school, market, coliseum, theater, factory, research lab (didn't need)

Religion - God of the Sea, Ceremonial Burial, Sword to Plowshares, Pagodas, Religious texts (going for happiness benefits, growth, and pressure to keep other religions out of my cities)

T0 - This will be about my 6th play though on this map. I have a huge advantage of knowing where the other civs are, where the best locations are and all the ruins. The strategy for this play through is a small 3 city empire focused on allying the CSs early for their happiness benefit and science.
T2 - Settled city 1 on east side of mountain to get access to the ivory on the north island. The one ruin gives 20 culture.
T16 - Pantheon - God of the Sea
T34 - Optics and sending my scout south toward Warsaw then swinging clockwise. Sending warrior north for the ruins and to steal a worker
T40 - Stole worker from Milan
T42 - Ruin gives AH
T52 - Ruin gives 90 gold
T61 - Philo opens and I can start building the NC. Buy settler and move it into place for city 2 on west edge of land area
T63 - Policy, take aristocracy. Need to be careful here, I will finish Tradition in 28 turns if I don't plant more cities. I need to have Theology done so I can open Patronage, and have my other 2 cities planted.
T64 - Population ruin
T70 - NC finished, starting settler. 31 bpt right now. Found city 2 and bought a workboat there. Cleared a camp for Milan and Rio, kept the worker.
T76 - Faith ruin
T80 - Found city 3 next to whale to south
T83 - Prophet pops 3 turns after first chance
T88 - Tradition finished
T94 - Golden age
T97 - HS completes
T107 - Trade routes set up
T111 - Education completes, buy a university in capital, GA spawns start another golden age. 81 bpt
T114 - Aesthetics, pledge to protect all the CSs I know of for friend bonus
T119 - RA with William
T125 - First spy, sent to Columbo (several jewelry quests are active)
T127 - Astro, upgrade the trireme and send it east, send scout west
T137 - GS spawns, planted, bought Observ in capital, 136 bpt
T138 - Machu finishes
T140 - Open rationalism
T149 - Starting to build LTOP, RA with William finishes
T153 - Signed RA with Washington
T156 - Signed RA with Greece
T157 - Signed RA with William
T162 - LTOP finishes, take GE, start PT
T169 - Sci Theory finishes, buy a public school in capital, 332 bpt
T170 - Sign RA with Cathy of all people
T177 - Policy, took free thought, 379 bpt
T179 - PT finishes, planting GS 414 bpt, 2nd GS also spawned, saving it for Plastics, starting to build navy before Cathy gets any ideas
T184 - RA finishes
T187 - RA finishes
T188 - RA finishes, sign new RA with William
T191 - RA with Washington
T194 - Sell silk to Japan for 240, buy copper from Cathy for 240, completes Geneva quest, get 3 coal
T195 - Scientific revolution
T197 - RA with Greece, bought GS with faith
T201 - Golden age starts, RA with Cathy finishes putting me halfway to Plastics, bulbing the rest
T203 - Buy research lab, 618 bpt
T212 - RA with Cathy
T214 - Going science focus for a few turns then bulbing my GSs when next one spawns in capital
T215 - Policy, took Humanism, 25 turns to rationalism finisher
T219 - RA with William ends, signing no more, with last RAs, bulbing, rationalism finish, and Oxford I have research done.
T221 - Bulbing results in 2 turns from finishing Telecom won't need rationalism finish, starting Oxford
T225 - Globalization done, rushed UN completes in 6 turns, selling buildings for cash, Greece has bought a lot of allies
T239 - I have about 5 votes lined up, Greece has the rest, so this will go to a second round. Selling every building and unit I can to generate lots of gpt (163), sold the gpt to Washington for 2500 gold and bought up 5 more allies. DOWed everyone.
T240 - Won the UN vote with exactly 10.

 

[Tventano]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 56
Date submitted: 2013-03-09
Reference number: 28471
Your name: Tventano
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1842AD
Turns played: 291
Base score: 827
Final score: 1425
Time played: 6:12:00

Settled Next to the mountain. Exploring with my warrior I concluded that I was on an island, thus started OCC and early Sailing and Optics. Stole in total two workers from nearby city states. Because I thought it was an islands map I built the Great Lighthouse.

Build order: Stele, Granary, Worker, (bought Trireme), Workboat, Workboat, ..
Science: Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Sailing, Optics, Archery, ..
Religion: Gods of the Sea, Tithe, Pagoda's, Defender of the Faith, Divine Inspiration
Social: Tradition, opener Commerce, Rationalism, opener Patronage.

Settled one city west of my island and two on the North island, one on the Ivory and one next to the Marble. Settled three scientists and kept the next two. Bought one merchant to improve relations and get more gold.

Did befriend and did multiple research agreements with Washington and Alexander and later on als William. Was denounced and denounced Catherine multiple times, happily she never attacked me. Stole two technologies from Catherine and after that fully concentrated on city states.

Catherine became really large, also because William did not expand and she was strongly going for a science victory. William went for a Cultural victory but juist came to five completed trees.

The stele makes it easy to get an early pantheon and Gods of the Sea helped a lot with production.

So all in all a nice game, but the out of control Catherine made me continuously afraid she would turn on me, and that I could not stop her if she really wanted. Fortunately she had other priorities.

 

[Browd]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 56
Date submitted: 2013-03-10
Reference number: 28477
Your name: Browd
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1775AD
Turns played: 265
Base score: 769
Final score: 1450
Time played: 3:37:00

Pretty hum-drum game. 3-city Tradition--settled capital on the silk, Harar by the mountain to the SE (whales and sheep) and Adwa by the mountain to the East (cows and Ivory on the northern island).

After finishing Tradition, took Patronage (opener + Aesthetics for perma-friend), Rationalism (left side plus Humanism - never took finisher, since I waited too long to bulb GSs and wanted to open Order to get a GE), then Order opener (GE rushed UN down to 3 turns), and finally took Philanthropy a couple of turns before UN finished.

Early in the game, I thought naval battles would be in my future, so I wasted hammers building the Great Lighthouse, barracks in my capital and a bunch of galleasses that I upgraded to frigates, and later a couple of privateers, but never did anything with them. All that probably deterred Cathy from being aggressive, so the result was no wars, no denunciations, no nasty looks. A few turns before the end, Cathy had a bunch of battleships in our bay, together with a carrier with 3 planes (first time I've seen AI carriers with planes in a while), but she hated William much more than she disliked me.

Besides the worthless Great Lighthouse, other wonders in my capital were Hagia Sophia, Oracle (finished Tradition), Pisa (took GS and planted academy), and Eiffel Tower (helped with late golden age, but otherwise not needed). Harar also built Sistine Chapel, Macchu Picchu (would have been much more useful with a bunch of puppets) and Statue of Liberty (helped finish UN more quickly, but that's about it).

Five RAs in total (2 with William, 2 with Oda and 1 with George), but the first didn't come until about turn 180, so they helped, but mostly late game. Would have been nice to have a couple of earlier rounds, but only William was interested in friendship (despite playing the usual tricks to get others to like me), and William kept spending his gold (including spending it on my whales ).

Religion was unremarkable: God of the Sea pantheon, Tithe, Mosques (Pagodas were gone), Religious Community (for the extra hammers), and Itinerant Preachers. Used missionary to spread while building Hagia Sophia, enhanced with Great Prophet from HS, and used 500-faith natural GP to spread. Bought Inquisitor before entering Renaissance, which deterred Cathy and William from conversion attempts. Built temples and Grand Temple, with perma-friends with religious CSs providing a somewhat reliable stream of faith -- The AI kept eating cultural and religious CSs, so that did put a crimp in things. Ended up buying 1 GE, 2 GSs and 1 Great Prophet at the end (to satisfy a CS quest).

When UN was built, I sold off my science buildings, sold my gpt to Oda and George and allied up every CS that wasn't already allied. Didn't do the DOW trick, so there were some coups towards the end. Ended up with 13 votes - 8 CS votes (last minute coups took away 3 CSs), plus my auto vote (for building the UN) and votes from all 4 surviving AI civs (William, Oda, George and even Cathy).

Better bulb timing and taking the Rationalism finisher would have saved some number of turns, but at the likely cost of the Order GE, so that might have been a wash. Expanding to a 4th city might have been helpful, but the island to the north was worthless and the AI settled every other decent city site (except near Sri Pada -- I thought about settling there, but William and Cathy would have been irritated and it was too far away to defend).

Only other option would have been early aggression. A bunch of Russian puppets would have been nice, but frankly didn't feel like it.

 

[Andra Bullar]

My first GOTM - very, very fun game and although I mostly play on emperor and have only beaten immortal once before, I had no real troubles with this one. Thanks to the isolated start I didn't have to prioritize an army early on, instead I built the Great Lighthouse and planted another city to my west. After building NC around T90 I settled two more cities on the mini-continent to the north.

Later on I DOWed William to stop his plans for world domination as he was wonderspamming like crazy and running away in the scoreboard. Got a couple of his cities and was then backstabbed by Catherine. I captured some of her cities as well, burned others and after a short peace she DOWed me again and wouldn't sign peace for the rest of the game unless I gave in to her ridiculous demands, which I of course didn't. So instead I kept burning her coastal cities with my frigate/later battleship armada (All with Range + Supply). It's silly, really, how powerful a strong navy is.

My religion got my economy going early on (Tithe+Itinerant preachers) and I managed to stay in the tech lead from the renaissance and ahead. After I got plastics I beelined for globalization, which I bulbed with Oxford and built the UN with the GE I got from the Leaning Tower (I was planning on building an earlier wonder with him and then buying a new GE with faith but I didn't really need any other wonder after Pisa so I kept him around and saved all faith for great scientists)

By the end of the game, with a few turns left before the UN election I was allied with 13 CS and managed to keep 10 of them after all the coup attempts from the AI, also Catherine wiped out Florence two turns before the election.

There is probably a lot of room for improvement in my game but overall I'm very happy with how everything turned out. I never go for Diplomatic Victory (most often Science or Culture) so it was great to see it work out, especially on immortal, even though this starting location was pretty forgiving

Spoiler :

 

[leif erikson]

My first GOTM - very, very fun game and although I mostly play on emperor and have only beaten immortal once before, I had no real troubles with this one. Thanks to the isolated start I didn't have to prioritize an army early on, instead I built the Great Lighthouse and planted another city to my west. After building NC around T90 I settled two more cities on the mini-continent to the north.

Welcome to GOTM.

Glad you enjoyed it and congratulations on your first one being a win.

 

[Arilian]

Ahh damn, I see now, that I should won by Diplo.
I was checking why everyone win via diplo instead of Science

Thats really annoying, because I would might have had top3 result if I go diplo, as I shoud have

 

[Yngve]

Hei. My first try on these challenges.

I felt really alone on my half island so I decided to go Turtle, rushing the hanging gardens and building quite high. Was planning to risk not that much military and not triggering war to early. Turned ok, the most peacefull immortal game I have done, noone made war on me, got one denouncement from greece and the dutch was a little unhappy a little periode, but for some reason they didnt bother my 2 city kingdom. Rescued one of Russias settlers from barbarians and traded her my strategic resources, might have been why she didnt go to war. Russia was leading tech the whole game, but I got on equal footing in tech in the endgame with a bunch of RA, tech from city states and the huge amount of tech I was getting from my capital. Since everybody was peacefull towards got to build alot of building and wonders midgame and my 2 cities produced a ton of everything. Netherlands was messing up my religion plan so didnt get much money from tithe so I used alot of religion in the end to buy great people to rush tech and buildings including UN. Won safely in turn 295, 1850AD.

This is how it looked in the end:

Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1850AD
Turns played: 295
Base score: 739
Final score: 1252
Time played: 3:27:00

Spoiler :

Was pretty fun, would have been more fun with someone challenging me, but I can blame myself because I didnt go look for a fight.

 

[leif erikson]

Hei. My first try on these challenges.

Welcome to CivFanatics and GOTM.

Congrats on your win and best of luck in future.

 

[Maxym]

Diplomacy Victory
Game date:1660AD
Turns played:242
Base score:1184
Final score:2466

ouch, finally over, it was a bit of a nailbiter, this one

Will post screens and details later, but to make it short 1 city NC, then 3 city tradition,
4th late on island with dyes and lots of sea resources in the middle of the ocean towards Japan.

Spoiler :

I took GOtS, tithe, production, swords into plowshares and cheaper missionaries since itinerant preachers and all religious buildings were gone, and planned to be peaceful. Cathy was friendly and when she asked me to Dow Will midgame, I agreed in 10 turns, I was getting ready for some galleases and figured I will have astro and can stop anything he sends and can grab a coastal city from him.

It didn't go as planned he took her city and she sued for peace And despite all green modifiers DoWed me. She was leading in tech, not by much, sometimes when I was closing gaps after beelines, I was ahead by a tech, and she did a number on me early when I was beelining public schools, she stole four!!! techs in quick succession and I abandoned my attempts to steal military techs and stuck my spy in my cap. She stole two more techs over the game and someone else stole few and my inept spy did not catch anyone all game long.

I just spent half an hour describing how it all went down and it al disappeared just before i saved

I dont think i have it in me to do it again...

the most importnant decision was going for biology to find oil and then for flight before labs, as i felt i needed cathy weakened and an airforce for when she finally recovered. Otherwise i would have had earlier, much earlier labs and potentially 20 turns less or thereabouts. I just wasnt willing to risk it. In retrosepect i prolly should have, she had just a few GWB when it ended, and didnt attack even when i was involved with finishing William, it might have helped that i denounced her when she turned friendly from guarded. If i didnt have early flight, i would have just had one source of oil and prolly no peace from her, so that would have slowed her teching as i could slaughter everything she threw at me thatnks to the way she settled Yakutsk. I might look to see if i have earlier save....

Besides Wars with WIll and Cathy, I had late ones with everyone but Oda and George to protect my CSs, even then ALex couped prague while at war with me despite my spy there, and cathy grabbed 2 more on last turn, got 13 votes, including one from Oda.

end stats:

Spoiler :

geopolitical situation at the end:

Spoiler :

It was a great game, thanks team, without this competition i dont think many would play out a terrible start like that

 

[Half Nelson]

Diplomatic Victory 1830AD
Turns played: 286
Base score: 1435
Final score: 2517

Not had time to report on last couple of TSG but still struggling to get a good start in G&K games:- I need to practice my early game to pull up to a good finish time. I teched towards sailing and settled 3 cities early (one south of the mountain barrier). Russia DoW in response but held them off easily. Both Russia and Netherlands had excellent land to spread into and I looked forward to contesting it with them on the battlefield. I continued with the naval techs (Compass-Astro-Navigation) and used frigates to gain control of coastal territory on our continent. Russia were annoying but Netherlands a greater threat due to their religious and scientific progress (they beat me to several key wonders and my favoured religious beliefs). After discovering the other continent (equally divided by Japan, Greece and USA, with Siam and China already departed), I made allies of USA and Greece (getting 2 RA from each of them) and focussed on science and cash. I settled a fourth city on the N island:- it wasn’t a great spot but I felt that I needed an extra building slot and higher pop. After Flight I DoW Netherlands, captured Amsterdam (a wonderful capital) and razed their other cities as revenge for the frustration they caused me in the early game. I bought up as many CS as possible when UN was completing:- this involved several coups as Greece was hogging most of the CS at that time, alongside selling many buildings to maximise my cash. I then DoW with everyone except USA (in the mistaken belief that they would vote for me) and, despite some CS recouping by Greece and completion of Patronage tree by Japan, I managed to seal a narrow UN victory at first vote. I didn’t realize until this game that DoW did NOT prevent your enemy from staging a coup against you. I had a large faith excess at the endgame which I used for GS and a GE but didn’t think of using my last policy to open Commerce and purchase a GM for influence and cash.

I am not a great fan of Ethiopia, although I would like to try them in a CV game. The UA was useful in early wars but the UU offers little as an attacking force. The UB is pretty good, although I still missed out on first religion to Netherlands, who built SH very early and took Papal Primacy to my great annoyance. A very interesting map with some unusual challenges:- I can’t remember any previous TSG in which I had no river cities.

 

[WarIsPeace]

Game:	Civ5 GOTM 56
Date submitted:	2013-03-14
Reference number:	28501
Your name:	WarIsPeace
Game status:	Diplomacy Victory
Game date:	1915AD
Turns played:	335
Base score:	1107
Final score:	1652

Interesting game, thanks! I think this is the first immortal game I've played post-patch, so it's a sweet victory. (I'm on a Mac, so I haven't had the patch as long as many of you have.) I think I got lucky because I didn't start well, but the other civs left me alone long enough to eke out a victory.

- How many cities did you build and how many did you decide to acquire?

Three, and as many as I could (about six).

Capital went next to the mountain two tiles NE of the starting settler location. Second city went on the western end of the starting land mass. Third city (Adwa) came sometime later (T116) and was near the marble on the island to the north.

I conquered most of Russia's cities, but I took most of the game to do it.

- How did you use religion or spying to your advantage?

Like everyone else, I picked God of the Sea for my pantheon. I also picked Mosques, the belief that gives +1 food to shrines and temples, Itinerant Preachers, and Papal Primacy (+15 base influence to city states following my religion). That last choice did very little for me and I passed up tithe to get it. I always pick tithe, so I thought I should try something different. The moral of the story: change is bad. =)

I used espionage almost exclusively to increase CS influence, although I think I stole a key tech (compass?) earlyish.

- How did diplomacy go with your neighbors?

William took a while to warm up to me, but otherwise I was BFF with him and Washington. Got along fine w/Russia after conquering most of her cities.

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?

It would be generous to call my choices "decisions". More like "informed guesses".


- Were your UA and UU helpful?

Yes, during my war w/Russia which lasted for a substantial chunk of the game, it was great to have +20% combat bonus. Only built a couple of Mehel Safaris and they didn't see much action. My serious combat was naval.


I'm a slow starter and this game was no exception. Completed GLighthouse @ T79, NC @ T95. Finished Tradition @ T101. I was last in all demographics categories for most of the game. Cathy DOWed me @T142. I saw it coming a mile away so I was ready. She had founded a useless city near my lone northern island city Adwa. Her forces were concentrated there. I wish I had a screenshot (can't figure out how to take 'em); she had every possible tile covered with military units. But thanks to readiness, terrain and help from allied CS, I took her city rather than the other way around.

At some point I built Machu Picchu which was a very good wonder to get.

After that it was just building galleasses (and later frigates) to pound on Russian cities across the bay. William mostly just sat around stewing; I think he was going for a cultural vic.

On the other continent, China was gone before I ever met them, and Japan and Greece disappeared about 5-10 turns after I met them. This was fine with me as Rammy and Washington were fairly even and kept one another busy.

At one point William & Washington asked me to DOW Siam, so I went along with them. Naturally the instigators quickly had enough and bailed out after about 15-20 turns, leaving me holding the bag. With my highly promoted frigates I liberated Satsuma from Siam to give me an extra UN vote. Oda didn't survive long enough to vote, though. Then there was no more fighting w/Siam, just Rammy popping up every few turns asking me for all my gold and half my cities in exchange for peace. I didn't care except that he was allied to over half the CS when we went to war, so I couldn't ally them despite having lots of cash.

Some highlights --

T19 - pantheon
T79 - completed GLighthouse
T87 - founded Pastafarianism
T95 - Completed NC
T101 - Finished tradition, entered medieval
T116 - Founded Adwa (should have done that sooner)
T122 - Cathy first to renaissance
T133 - Enhanced Pastafarianism
T142 - DOW from Russia (with love)
T171 - Cathy first to industrial.
T187 - Captured Yakutsk
T199 - Captured Vladivostok (razed)
T210 - Industrial era for me.
T216 - Siam first to modern era
T217 - Captured Smolensk
T220 - Cathy enters modern
T224 - Wash. enters modern
T239 - Liberated Satsuma
T240 - Finished patronage (2nd tree). Later started in on Commerce.
...Somewhere in here I captured and annexed St. Petersburg (flood plains, manufactory, oil, needed a harbor to link my other Russian puppets to capital for trade route) and another Russian city or two...
T280ish - Out of the blue, Rammy offers ~1900g and some gpt in exchange for peace. Huh?!? Excellent outcome for me.
T293 - I cannot conquer Moscow with its juicy wonders because it's one tile out of range of my battleships, my GW bombers die attacking it, and I haven't even researched cannons yet. Cathy doesn't know that, though, and so I finally give her peace in exchange for her remaining cities. This put me at -42 so I sold one city to William and one to Washington for what I could get for them. (Your offer is generous, because I'm broke and you can't afford to wait for this city to burn.)
T326 - Rammy completes the UN just as I complete Globalization. All other civs are building spaceship parts.
T335 - I win w/12 votes on the first UN vote.

I was very glad to win this vote because Siam had a fleet headed for my capital that consisted of an armed nuclear sub, three aircraft carriers w/bombers, two missile cruisers, and miscellaneous other units. To defend I had battleships w/logistics, one sub and an aircraft carrier w/two triplanes. I might play the game for a few turns more to see if I can sink his fleet despite the tech disparity.

 

[glory7]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 56
Date submitted: 2013-03-15
Reference number: 28505
Your name: glory7
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1655AD
Turns played: 241
Base score: 1382
Final score: 2879
Time played: 6:44:00
Submitted save: glory7_gotm56_241diplo.Civ5Save
Renamed file: glory7_C505601.Civ5Save

I thought it was islands map, but realized later that it wasn't. I settled 2nd city south of cap (left hill of ivory) and 3rd city at the left sheep hill of starting 'island'. Started with 1 city NC. Wanted to do 4 city tradition but could not find any more good space. Sri pada was too far and Dutch already took several tiles near there.

I knew that the war with russia was inevitable, so I decided to take an initiative. when I saw unguarded settler, I got it. I hard built one worker at the beginning and all other workers were 'imported' ones. I think I got 2 settlers and 2 workers from russia before peace treaty.

With this bad starting location, I thought I need to kill william and russia to make sure that I can win. Since I spent some turns on teching CB and made like 5,6 archers, I got edu pretty late - t125. t132 astro.

Unlucky thing was that Dutch got several wonders I needed .. sometimeswith 1-2 turn differences. Terracotta, oracle, etc.

I did not have enough culture and lost oracle - so my rat opening, secularism, and free thoughts came too late. I got secularism at t171.. enough said. I was planning to use aesthestics approach this time, but I could get it very late as after opening patro I had to work on rati left tree. Took moscow t166, Dutch cap t186.

religion: god of the sea - tithe - religious community - guruship - itinerant preachers.
sp: full tradition, patro open, rati left 2, aesthetics, philantrophy.

Rest of the game was just thinking about why my science is so slow even with annexed 2 caps. I felt that missing 4th city was critical and if I decided to conquer I should have finished it earlier. I lost several units at the first war and had to peace and re attack later.

Would love to see how tommynt approaches this map.

 

[Old Peter]

Heard this challenge is hard even for diety players? Worth playing?

Also, I see that everybody did a diplomatic victory with the computer being far ahead in score etc, is that really a pleasent way to win? No critic, just wondering.

 

[Arilian]

it was quite easy.

 

[Maxym]

I was curious how much of a difference getting flight and oil b4 labs did and replayed from t 187. I think i already had some beakers towards biology there but it didnt matter i thought. I did not build or buy a single plane, investing money i got of Will into bttleships and using them to get three cities from cathy instead of two i got with flight. Also i fought her much longer and it delayed her GWB just like i thought it would.

Spoiler :

On the other continnets things went a bit different and USA got Beijing not Alex as in previous try, and this got him rolling, taking a CS from Japan and leading in score. This time i did not DoW those guys and spent some cash to improve relations, in the end i got 18 votes, and only Will couped Warsaw on last turn. I think the coups get spent and have to be replenished by rigging another elections, so i aliied the CS earlier and at least 6-8 got couped, but i bought them back and it preserved them till the end. Also not warmongering a much got me three votes from the other AI vs only 1 last time.

Mistakes i made in both playthoughrs:

not getting more culture, i only had trad filled, two on rationalism left, two commerce left and order opener. this is a first game for diplo where i did not have anything in partonage. Slow culture really hurt, and made my science beelines less effective.

Not getting Taj when i could earlier, i wanted more food, cash and production in cap, and was building buildings, big mistake. I got beat to Taj in 2nd try by 1 turn by Will, and i was building it in my 3rd city. Building it asap in cap would have been better, the golden age gold then spent on buildings, i dont know what i was thinkning

Not getting more labs in 2nd try. I had Plastics on t200, late, but much earlier then first try, and i only got 1 lab in cap. I could have scraped and saved for few more and gotten to globalization earlier then t226. Seems dumb now, to make the effort and not leverage it.

I was surprised that getting plastics earlier only shaved off four turns , i expected much more, but i misplayed it. I felt poor, always borrowing gold from AI, and in the end i was swiming in it, i buit a t 226 louvre, one GA was fully used the other party wasted.

I had the stealth annex bug, i had an option of puppeting, and my happiness hits seemed normal (but i did not pay attention, maybe i was gtting hit for more then it should) but every city conquered was rasing my NW costs. annoying but not game breaking.

I think a well played finish could shave the time to late 220s but no more.

@Peter, its not really your style of game, the only difficulty is that you cant get rolling realy fast, but with your science generation, you will coast and either have to keep conquering everyone or be bored waiting for the end. try it and see how it feels...

@glory: how did you go about the warring? usual CB rush? how late and in what order? Cathy first then will i assume?