TSG60 After Action thread

[CatGarfield]

I played horribly, started conquering way too late (went to education before machinery). After taking out Isabella I attacked a hostile Elizabeth. I allied one of the CSs between us, took the other without losses and laid siege to Nottingham on the south coast east of London. I managed to take Nottingham and lost one XB doing it. Went for London and it all went south. Lizzy's Longbowmen thinned my crappy troops so fast I lost half my army trying to get to London and failed miserably. I made a somewhat profitable peace treaty and decided to wait for artillery. The wait was long and fruitless, I only had one RA partner in Askia and all the others pretty much hated me. Lizzy and Rammy Dowed me just as I was getting to Industrial age, but they presented no real problems. Just XP for my troops.

Once I got artillery, I had the Heroic Epic, Brandenburg Gate, barracks, armory and military academy in my Cap and some money saved to get some highly promoted arties to start clearing up the continent. And then I bought the first Artillery IN A WRONG CITY.

I quit and decided not to waste more time trying to play a style I'm not comfortable with (Liberty & early conquest).

 

[Maxym]

First of all, thank you. It seems that we were pretty on the same route (t82 London - same turn, t105 XB - very similar). Slightly late XB might mean that you bought lib at cap later than I did.

I think the main difference after that is Paris. I luckly got an open border from France and bribed him to fight against like 3 other AIs, so I surrounded Paris with CBs/UUs and took it in like 2-3 turns, and upgraded to XBs right after. French army was far from Paris so I did not worry about recapture.

And I bribed AIs a lot so for the rest of AIs I only need to kill basically 5-6 units till I got there caps.

I think that was it too. If it all worked out, and I held on to it, then everything would snowball in the right direction instead of wrong. These Dom games really magnify small differences. I think I built the library, but if you are fve turns late at one point, it put you ten turns later at another and twenty or more at the end.

On the other hand you got to gamble to get very fast times, if I held back waiting for XB I would have been late that way too. I think bringing a settler would have helped here. Land east of Paris had only Askia city, and I think I could have squeezed a disposable city there just to upgarade and then take Paris in three turns and keep going. Sully given time is a pain, I try to have him out before renaissance in every game he is in, as he beelines his UU effectively and so it was this time. I had to sacrifice a GG to get his cap as he was pumping a Janissary per turn and my XB were just short of killing one per turn. Also more time meant more unit spam, 10-20 per civ before getting to caps. It all adds up, but then we new that already

 

[Arilian]

For me the biggest issue was that Nappy, the stongest civ anyway, built the GW...
I could get open bordest, but he also had a lot of culture, so I could not direcly attack his capital, had to take several of his cities. Actuall I think, I might win this by score had so many cities.

 

[Pizzaspy]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 60
Date submitted: 2013-05-20
Your name: Pizzaspy
Game status: Domination Victory
Game date: 1828AD
Turns played: 284
Base score: 2691
Final score: 4805

Didn't get lucky and have any AI take out another AI capital...had to do it all myself.

Blitzed to take London early, ground my way slowly into position in the center to take out Askia ( this took the longest ) attacked Siam from the ocean in the north and Napolean by land in the south. Forces met up to swing up through Ottoman territory to the Mongolian capital.

 

[Cromwell]

Only my 2nd Immortal victory (the other was that Hun domination GotM a while back)

Game date: 1822AD
Turns played: 281
Base score: 1717

I tried to do a CB rush but the spanish capital was awkwardly placed and I generally botched it. 2nd army got rolling nicely, though. Ended up leaving the Thai's for last, which was certainly suboptimal, but the Ottoman's were ahead of me in tech and I wanted to make sure I got to them before they got artillery. Fortunately, they were more concerned about besieging Jerusalem than defending their heartland.

Very forgiving map: apart from Spain's initial DoW, no one bothered me all game.

 

[bc1]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 60
Date submitted: 2013-05-24
Reference number: 29040
Your name: bc1
Game status: Domination Victory
Game date: 25BC
Turns played: 114
Base score: 724
Final score: 3290
Time played: 5:31:00

Build order: scout/scout/archers... Built & bought mostly archers/composites/crossbowmen (had 25 towards the end) and a few warriors (built no settlers, captured needed workers from AI)
Religion: goddess of protection (so the AI can't have it, it makes a key difference with unit survival rate)
Tech: beeline to machinery, except for writing & calendar
Social policies: out of habbit, I went tradition, not necessarily a good choice...
I ransomed city states time and again, which brought loads of cash. I stayed at peace with AIs until it was time for them to fall.

IMHO the insta heal is abusive because of the promotion saving option (too strong for domination game), so I chose not to use insta heal (but forgot to upgrade units though...)

What really mattered was start rushing the closest neighbor with 9-unit strong army
T39: archers take Madrid

Spoiler :

T66: composites take London

Spoiler :

The French were at war with the Mongols, they were central location from which to launch attacks on other civs, so I thought they were fair game. But they turned out to have loads of armies home and it took me almost a dozen turns to grind them down
T80: composites & ballista (Hanoi gift) take eastern french city

Spoiler :

T85: Paris falls

Spoiler :

I annexed the first french city to buy units and help marshall 4 armies with 6 to 8 units each, targeting each of the remaining caps (out of luck, had to take out all AI capitals myself)
T100: Gao falls

Spoiler :

T102: Machinery
T111: crossbows poised to take Istanbul (great walled), Karakorum, and Sukhothai

Spoiler :

That Thai pikeman cost me turns , but Sukhothai falls at last on T114

 

[Maxym]

Well executed bc1, GG That eastern French city was my bane as well in first game took me long tie to grind it down. Looks like you had a harder setup then glory and still finished faster. I like the cap build order, Nothing superfluous like settlers or grannies just archers. And pantheon denial, brilliant

You Gao army was from cap ?

 

[bc1]

You Gao army was from cap ?

1/3 from cap, 1/3 bought in france, 1/3 CS gifts Edit: mostly from cap, not 1/3. Likewise the eastern Sukhothai troops were from Gao (ability to jump over mountains was very helpful on this map)
I did eventually build stuff like bookstore & granny at some point though, unit support costs were getting awfull... and mostly cap was too far away from the action

 

[glory7]

Game: Civ5 GOTM 60
Date submitted: 2013-05-24
Reference number: 29040
Your name: bc1
Game status: Domination Victory
Game date: 25BC
Turns played: 114
Base score: 724
Final score: 3290
Time played: 5:31:00

Build order: scout/scout/archers... Built & bought mostly archers/composites/crossbowmen (had 25 towards the end) and a few warriors (built no settlers, captured needed workers from AI)
Religion: goddess of protection (so the AI can't have it, it makes a key difference with unit survival rate)

Nice game. going 2 scout - archers is really aggresive play. And pantheon choice was very impressive - get that one to deny AIs to get it.. hm.

London before t70 and Paris around t85.. really fast.

Did you guess that this would be a pangea map? I would not skip granary unless I know that I don't need to cross the ocean (like in continents).

 

[bc1]

I did not know it was pangea, but saw that it was big - so time enough to go after other AIs before thinking about having to detour tech seagoing. And I did not push back granary that much, it was built after the initial army (2 warriors + 7 archers, if I remember correctly). It just seemed that puppeting AI cities was just as good for science than growing my own cities ! (the link between ocean and granary is tech, right ?)

 

[gkreitz]

Game:	Civ5 GOTM 60
Date submitted:	2013-05-26
Your name:	gkreitz
Game status:	Domination Victory
Game date:	980AD
Turns played:	[B]159[/B]
Base score:	1178
Final score:	3800

Felt a bit rusty and was a bit slow into the first war with Spain (settled a second coastal city sw on the opposite side of the river). Went full tradition, honor (1 right), rationalism (didn't matter much, maybe it got me cannons a turn or two earlier) and got decent growth in the capital (ending with 20) which was probably not very optimal. At least I remembered to bully city states into giving me money, something I usually forget. Also, gotta love the games when you don't have to care much about diplo - I think I lied about the troops on the border with most of the poor AIs. They're merely passing by...

By being a bit late getting through Spain and then England, I had a close call with Askia. He had settled 2 more cities and had spammed a lot of units so I didn't dare throw my cb:s directly onto his capital. Instead took a city he'd settled southwest and upgraded the army to crossbows there, after which it was mostly smooth sailing. Playing it out a bit cautiously, I didn't split the army after that (probably should have) and progressed through France, Ottomans, and last Siam. The Ottomans had just gotten a few janissaries when I reached them, but with my army size they were easily overrun.

Very early on in the game someone took Genghis' capital. I'd spotted an orange square while scouting with a boat but hadn't met him so I spent most of the game thinking William was in there and being bullied.

 

[glory7]

I did not know it was pangea, but saw that it was big - so time enough to go after other AIs before thinking about having to detour tech seagoing. And I did not push back granary that much, it was built after the initial army (2 warriors + 7 archers, if I remember correctly). It just seemed that puppeting AI cities was just as good for science than growing my own cities ! (the link between ocean and granary is tech, right ?)

yes - teching to astronomy in case. It makes sense to clear own continent (in case it turned out to be continents map) with extreme early rush - I should try that next time.

 

[DrZ]

Jesus, those times of finish!

I was a bit rusty myself, but enjoyed this map very much, don't remember when i did went over mountains this often. Also tried to build a road on a mountain (you have the option it seems) and it died horribly.

Thanks leif for an awesome map!

I don't understand how is it possible to kill the Immortal AI so fast...

My finish time:

Your name: DrZ
Game status: Domination Victory
Game date: 1750AD
Turns played: 260

Pretty crappy seeing you can do this in less than half that time, but still, i enjoy the fighting game at all tech levels.

 

[leif erikson]

Glad you enjoyed it.

I will have to learn a bit more of how these guys do it once Brave New World comes out. This game keeps changing too fast for my old brain.

 

[Arnold_T]

I went super aggressive at the start. went with double scout, Archery, No Writing, build archers, archers, archers, look for 1st conquest. Crashed and burned though. Almost took Madrid at turn 34 (so close!) but had to withdraw. Came back again, and took it with the archers at T50 while beelining Construciton. Ok, maybe not so bad yet. Upgraded to CB and took London at T70. My tech was really hurting though. Got to X-bows a little late (T108), and spent some time on Orleans before take Paris at T111. The French had Goddess of Protection. Only thing worse would be Great Wall - which is what the Ottomans had!
took me quite a while to slog it out and take down, in order, Isanbul(T128), Karakoum(t141), Gao(t151), and Sokathai(t154).

Congrats to glory7 and bc1! great times - I need to do a better job handling multiple targets at the end like you guys.

Sokothai was very tough to take out, with all the rough terrain around. I was really glad for all the x-bows I had upgraded to logistics and range.

Religion wasn't really a factor - went god of the sea.

Social Policies - maybe the best part of this game - very happy with Tradition to start (opener, plus three more - Legalism, Landed Elite, and Monarchy), followed by full Honor. Military Tradion helped a lot to get to Logistics ASAP, and professional Army helped with happy at the end too.

Fun map, thanks Leif!