WOTM 09 Final Spoiler

[Erkon]

Erkon, you nailed the rest of us culturally this time. We'll see, we'll see. You beat me by almost 200 years! Not sure what I could have done to shave 200 years off my finishing date, though.

Harbourboy, I think you mentioned the things that delayed you in your spoiler:

• Weak/non-existing artist farm
• Fighting defensive wars
• Lack of cultural plan
• Shutting off research too late

The key for cultural victory is diplomatic relations. You also want a healthy tech lead so that you can trade for tech that is not critical for your cultural development (Liberalism and Nationalism and all the religious techs).

 

[Conquistador 63]

Picking up from my first spoiler:

By the cut-off date for this spoiler, I decided I was too late for a competitive domination or conquest win, even though I had a huge military lead, with macemen, cats and trebuchets on their way. OTOH, I was well equipped for a research-based diplomatic victory.
Current plans include the annexation of China and Zulu, keeping Saladin annoyed but 2nd in pop, and being friends with Washington and Liz. Let's see how it goes in the final spoiler.

I sticked to that plan, reaching Mass Media in 1508AD. In the process, I postponed Liberalism until 1472AD, saving it for Radio (the most expensive tech). I got a lot of GP's along the way - Moscow was a super GP farm, which helped with lightbulbing, trade caravans and a couple GE's for instant UN build in 1514AD.

Oddly enough, the SG vote didn't arise 2 turns after the completion of the UN. Instead, it showed only another couple of turns later. A bug? Nevermind, I got elected SG with a little help from my friends GW & Liz (and Shaka, my vassal, whose last city I was too lazy to conquer).

Then I got overconfident and didn't:
. bother to check diplo standings each turn (Liz was +12, GW +8);
. give away Liberalism to GW and convert us both for Free Speech for civic bonus;

I was punished when the election came and GW abstained - his attitude had dropped to 7! I tried to make amends giving away all my spare resources and techs to him, but the +1 for those gifts did not show up, and I wasn't able to ask him to convert to FS, so I wasted the next round of votes trying to pass FS as universal civic. It was refused!
I then realized why I couldn't see the option to ask him to use in the diplo screen: I wasn't using it myself!
Only after I did it, the civic bonus (and the gift bonus) added up and I was able to get the diplo win in 1568AD, at least 8 turns later than I could have done, if I wasn't such a .

Final comment: I had been waiting for a GOTM on the Terra map, as I think it offers some interesting strategic choices. Too bad those choices didn't come into play, given the low difficulty level (even lower than the regular prince level, as some had pointed out). I suggest using Terra again in an upcoming Monarch+ game.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

This months minor and major gauntlets are both terra maps on monarch, worth a pop. I'm getting battered though, I'm a prince level player at the moment.

 

[da_Vinci]

Nice result C63!

Oddly enough, the SG vote didn't arise 2 turns after the completion of the UN. Instead, it showed only another couple of turns later. A bug?

I think that the elections happen on specified turn numbers, not specified turns after the founding of the UN. At least that seemed to be the case in SGOTM 03, and contributed to the high number of ties: reaching the threshold number of votes within 3 or four turns of each other ends up being victories on the same turn because of this commonality of the election dates.

If you are sufficiently unencumbered by RL, you could see if your votes in this game have the same dates as the votes in our SGOTM 03, and if that is despite founding the UN on dates that would make the cycle different if based on time from UN founding.

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

I tried to milk the game but that did not work. got about 40K points. So, how do you milk this game? I saw points going down all the time after an expansion. Any ideas?

Somewhere there is a thread (or at least a post) that talks about the scoring forumula ... I will see if I can find it later and add it (or PM you with it), unless someone else has its location at their fingertips.

The Firaxis score has a built-in exponential decay function that sets in at some point, so that score eventually declines with time. Late in the game, I rarely find that I can expand as fast as the score declines. Firaxis score weights pop most, then land, then techs, then maybe other stuff such as Wonders and troops (that is all I rememeber off the top of my head). So winning early with a large pop gets the max Firaxis score, more or less (I think).

Now the base score has no exponential decay function, so that grows with time and is usually bigger the later into the game you go (if you are growing). That can be pretty reliably milked (hence "cow" is the award for highest base score). Expand just up to the Domination land limit, grow pop to the max (farms, Biology), research all techs, build all wonders and projects, and either stretch game to 2050 or capture about 6 cities at the very end to add pop and wonders right before a late Domination win. That got me the cow in WOTM 08.

dV

Here is the thread with scoring details: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=156242

 

[Erkon]

You find the base score together with contributors and final score if you hover the mouse over your civ name in the score list. Just continue playing until the final score prediction starts to drop.

 

[Mutineer]

This time there was some ballance in challenge.
Al AI getting worker and player know no tech make AI = to Monarch AI.

On a bright side it did give opportunity to steal the worker.

I settle in place, produce couple warrors when researching fishing.
Fishing-mining-bronse working - well-pttery- massonry- hunting-animas hasbentry.
That my original research order.

In 3370 BC I declare on peter and steal his worker.
No any other workers were avalible. Only chinese capital were near, but he guarded his worker when I start to work on border.
Bronse working reveal bronse conviniently near by.
1780 BC I settle on cooper. a bit late.

I result I never build a single war chariot. Just there was no time to creat settler and settle on more city.

Settle on copper, whiped bunch of axes and went after Peter.

he allready build a bunch of Archers.
I actially build stonehenge910 BC. from overflow/shop with stone connected.

880BC russia no more.
820 BC war with washington, who conviniently build Great wall.
565 BC America no more.
Next I was thinking Arabvia, but scouting reveal to many nasty protective archers and axes were not to hot agains them, so I change targe to Chinise, who were smallest civ.

In a mean time 460 BC I build Oracle and took construction from it.
After that I set research to Feodalism.

Actially I finishing building a lot of wanders, just show that I useally never play for conquest.

205BC declare on Quin.
25 BC made peace, triggered by quin discovering alphavit. extort some easy tech that I miss, like agreeculture.

125 AD resumed war and 170 AD chinise no more.
About that time I was runing deficit on 0 research. Did not like it and I chop Great ligthhouse in Moscow 185AD.

Next I choise Shaka, he was biggest and most advanced.
200 AD He discover CoL. So 245 AD I declare and war continue untill he agree to give me Col for peace.

I keep 2 his biggest cities with idea to vasssal the rest and I needed land and population.

425 BC I chop Garden in Washington, I decided that I have enogth cities to justify it.

455 AD made peace for Col. Resumed war 605 AD and 710 AD Zulu no more.
815 AD declare on Saladin and 950 AD saladin capitulated.

Declare on English 965 AD.

By some reson she was refusing to capitulate until I took capital.
May be because she finally for Feodalism near end? She were still way below in power, land and population. Not sure.

 

[Fronx]

Entry class: Contender
Game status: Cultural Victory for Egypt
Game date: 1856 AD
Base score: 2462
Final score: 11521

I chose to go for the Culture Victory from the start, most likely without even looking at the "the New Land".

Settled 1SOUTH. After settling, tought that I should have settled 1SE because of the water resource, but then luckily noticed that it can be used for the rock/copper city (that I settled on top of the copper).

3rd city for the horses, then war to Peter to get insane GP farm named Moscow. Used only horse-units, I lost one of them.

ST. Peterspurg was to south, ideal grassland for cottages with food and ivory. Took it soon after. Peter had 3rd city somewhere, but I let it be, and made peace.

After that, I didn't war much, just against weak AIs to keep good politics with possibly problematic stronger AIs. Didn't take the game seriously, fast "End of turns" and so on. Didn't have 9 cities until near the end, to get enough cathedrals, so my Culture win was far from optimal.



Ddin't use the north water-resource for any city. Peter was only one whom I warred to "liberate" cities for my own use, got one city from my good friend Chinese with culture. (east from moscow, diamonds).


Lot of wonders, in the end culture bombing so my 3 cities came legenary within 2 turns each.

Never went to 0% research, until at the wery end, just in case. No-one went for the new land.

 

[Munro]

Interesting game...

Hit triple legendary status in 1884, which looks about mid-table for the cultural wins posted so far. (Thanks to orb, Simon c, Harbourboy, Erkon and Fronx for the cultural references... )

Original plan was to play peacefully from the start, but apparently Peter had other ideas...

View attachment 153817

Aarghh!!! I had figured my cultural buffer was healthy enough to give me warning of any possible sneak attack from my comical mustachioed neighbour. Who'd have thought he'd be sneaky enough to launch an amphibious swords attack directly from his galley? Though I must admit I was impressed - I wouldn't have given the AI this much credit.

Anyway, nearly gave up at this point. This was a triple holy city and at 680AD, was already well stocked with cultural buildings and it's first GA specialist. I almost cried... then turned on War Chariot mode instead and decided to gave Peter a good seeing-to just as a point of principle.

After retaking my holy, holy (holy) city without too much of a struggle, I did sue for peace again and focused back on the cultural win, though now many, many turns behind my original plan.

The next thousand years or so were a tense, satisfying struggle (if rather predicatble) as I slowly pushed Peter into his corners with my cultural boundaries, flipped two of his cities (and one of Qin Shi Huang's) and watched with some satisfaction as he got successively pounded by Saladin - the clear score and power leader - and then Washington (who was the tech leader), sometimes both at the same time. =)

View attachment 153818

Looking back, it seems those who did best (Erkon: 1715 , Fronx: 1856) both started early wars against Peter, grabbing some choice city spots and avoiding the need for unplanned (and potentially rather disasterous !) defensive wars later. Unlike the rest of us, it seems. I wonder if this is key? Or whether an extra archer or two for me early on would have nullified Peter's attack, and let me reap the benefit from all that early cultural building in Memphis.

Interestingly, as a natural warmongerer, I found the cultural option to be surprisingly tense and enjoyable. Unlike military wins, which can get boring towards the end (clearing up the cannon fodder after you already know you've won ) the cultural end game was tense and challenging as you switch off science and watch the AIs slowly sail past you on the tech tree, sometimes building up massive stacks of advanced military units to stare at you across the lines and give your riflemen and knights the heebie-jeebies. (It didn't seem worth the to tech military tradition for cavalry, and none of the AIs were willing to trade it - and I avoided chemistry to hold onto the Parthenon's +50% bonus for my GA farm).

This seems to be the real challenge for a fast cultural win - how to hold off an increasingly advanced AI from attacks in later half of the game. What tactics do people use for this? Does it help to build up your standing in the power graph (does the AI pay much significance to this)? , or do you rely on diplomatic relations and gifts to ensure peace?

(I did also like Erkon's tactic of bribing Shaka to hound the other AIs and keep them busy... )

In retrospect, my early tactic of creating hostility between the AIs by spreading different religions to each may have made life more difficult in the long run. While fun, it did make it hard to stay friendly with them all at the same time. Next time perhaps just spread one religion across the world to nurture a friendly, pacifist planet where my cultural plans can flourish... (well, until next time that is... ).

 

[cabert]

Conquest, 1640AD, 68k.
I'm a bit rusty obviously.
Been a while since I played such an easy game, in fact I didn't realize how easy it was until it was too late to really take advantage of it.
Well, still a win .

Peter only had a few archers to defend against my war chariots. Same for China, but I was building wonders so I had not enough units to finish him quickly.
It's the first time that I have the great library before the pyramids .

 

[Fronx]

Looking back, it seems those who did best (Erkon: 1715 , Fronx: 1856) both started early wars against Peter, grabbing some choice city spots and avoiding the need for unplanned (and potentially rather disasterous !) defensive wars later. Unlike the rest of us, it seems. I wonder if this is key?

I'n my opinion, yes, no matter the strategy, wiping or atleast "liberating" as much land as possible from Peter was/is the key, even for builder / diplo / space / culture / whatever strategy; the original own land area was just too small to live in, and islands around weren't as good spots as the spots in the continent (to south, Peters land). And going for another continent just sets you back too much as you cannot settle before astronomy and the time it takes sailing to the new world...


Moscow was insane GP farm, and St. Petersburg was excellent coin/hammer factory. Moscow became one of my Culture cities, btw. It soon outcultured (unintentionally) one of my originally planned cities for that purpose, with pure power of specialists and with some wonders I whipped/chopped there.

 

[Erkon]

...This seems to be the real challenge for a fast cultural win - how to hold off an increasingly advanced AI from attacks in later half of the game. What tactics do people use for this? Does it help to build up your standing in the power graph (does the AI pay much significance to this)? , or do you rely on diplomatic relations and gifts to ensure peace?

(I did also like Erkon's tactic of bribing Shaka to hound the other AIs and keep them busy... )

In retrospect, my early tactic of creating hostility between the AIs by spreading different religions to each may have made life more difficult in the long run. While fun, it did make it hard to stay friendly with them all at the same time. Next time perhaps just spread one religion across the world to nurture a friendly, pacifist planet where my cultural plans can flourish... (well, until next time that is... ).

There are several factors that affects the AI eagerness to declare. Power rating is one of them, and the military presence in border cities is another. Don't forget to check the AI regularly if they are prepared to declare against another AI. If they are "too busy", you know they will declare soon, but you can't be sure against whom. If you think it's against you, try to bribe someone else to attack them.

If you can, try to keep one AI (the weakest) with another religion. You don't want everyone to be friends.

All AI reacts different to your actions. Certain AI is prone to backstabbing and will declare even if they are pleased with you.

 

[BCLG100]

Well i got all excited, conquest victory 500and something AD handed it into Gyathaar&gotm staff, then got told it was a replay i'd downloaded the save at the start of the month played a bit and then got bored and left it, the new one i downloaded to day and played in about an hour. Ahwell apologies once again Gyathaar for wasting your time

Conquest went
russia
washington
saladin
elizabeth
mao-bit of peace afterwards
shaka and mao combined.

i could of finished even earlier but i thought i would need more WC's to take shakas last capital but it turned out i didnt.

I used two axemen against opposing civs the whole game- everything else i killed with WC's and finished with 4 cities and no workers (i deleted them when they had nothing else to do) was losing on average about 30gpt the whole game and went into strike one but luckily captured a city that turn to give me some more gold. Anyways hopefully be able to submit the next one

 

[blastoidstalker]

Have not done one of these in a long long time
Space race victory in 1912.

I did not really play to win by speed or score. I decided That i wanted to win by leveraging the unoccupied continent. In doing so I decided to not have a fighting war with any other civ (I did worker steal from peter early). I colonised some of the nearby islands, built a bunch of wonders for a wonder GP farm in Thebes and went quickly to astronomy. The new content had barbs but they were not as tough as I had expected. I colonised the whole continent before anyone else got there and easily got ahead as the major othjer powers constantly fought each other.

 

[Demon Rob]

haven't entered one of these contests for a long time,
did nothing fancy except kill lots and lots,
and went for a vassalage victory.
All except the zulu who died pre vassalagation.

Just for the fun of it made by last great general into a naval one on a trireme to kill the last english trireme, and then upgraded the general into a caravel so it could travel the high seas and find the new world, except I won the game before then.

Didn't set any specialists, didn't do no tricks, didnt make any religions, just went rampaging, cos I could.

Unfortuantely I lost my save (and the autosaves since I played a different scenario between them) and had to go back to an earlier save game. Played exactly the same, had the same results. I submitted, cos I hadnt for a long time, but probably shouldnt have, and in a different style game I wouldn't have.

 

[MacDude]

Hello everyone,

I'm new to this, and I think I did it wrong! I didn't read any spoilers until after I was done with the game, and I didnt keep any notes on my thoughts while I played like other posters did. In fact, this was a game of many firsts for me; first GOTM, first time being Egypt/Ramesses, first time on prince, first time using these mods, and it was even my first complete game of warloards. It was great fun, even though I was eventually killed by England. Oh well, live and learn I guess.

Since I cant comment on specifics, I'll go general. First off, I have to say the mods are WAY COOL! The foreign advisor was great, and I LOVED the mod that tells when my cities were about to grow, become unhappy, when someone had a new tech, etc. That makes the game SOO much faster & more fun, as you dont need to check all those screens every turn! Great job mod makers!!

As for my gameplay, I'd love some feedback. I was originally trying for a cultural victory, but expanded to the new world too fast and left myself unprotected. Plus those barbarians were BRUTAL! WOW!! I had no idea! I learnt many good lessons on protecting my cities, but was more curious as to how you play for a cultural victory. Is it important to found multiple religions (I was able to found one)? How do you go about catching up technology wise (I seemed to be behind all game!)? Which are the most important techs? I was running at 80%-100% science with NO culture for most of the game, hoping that once I hit machine guns, I could protect myself and go 100% culture. How do you try to run the sliders? I've found many posts on the subject in these forums and have some new ideas, but I look forward to hearing from others who played this same game.

It seems most people here took the war route (which in retrospect looks like the best option). I never played with Egypt and forgot their special unit was an early unit! Opps! Judging from some of your posts, war seemed a great way to build a strong civ FAST! I didn't have any wars at all until I was clobbered by England's redcoats.

Anyway, thanks again for creating this game and letting me take a crack at it. I'm not able to play often, so this idea of "one game a month" is great! I look forward to some stimulating conversation as well! After getting spanked so bad, we will see if I have the courage to try the next GOTM.

Note: my game did crash on me a couple of times. I hope that doesnt mess up anything. Thanks again! Very cool idea!

 

[Jenarie]

Entry class: Adventurer
Game status: Cultural Victory for Egypt
Game date: 1940 AD
Base score: 2098
Final score: 4339.25

I decided cultural pretty much before I even started the game so I didn't even think of going to war against Peter. It would have improved the game immensly. I got a lot of wonders with only 2 great artists.

Since SGOTM requires such intense concentration while playing (it takes me 3-4 hours to play my 10 turns), I wanted to play this one fast and had no real strategy except to build cultural building/wonders. I didn't do a lot of thinking I just made decisions as they popped up and kept it going. Definately not my best game but I had fun playing so goal met.

 

[mushroomshirt]

Entry class: Contender
Game status: Domination Victory for Egypt
Game date: 1724 AD
Base score: 4690
Final score: 71112

I started much too slowly to try for a fast domination like I originally intended. Probably should have gone AH and settled on the horses instead of going for fishing like I usually do when there are so many sea resources around. Seems like others tried this and it worked well for them.

My fist attack on Peter in the early ADs went very badly. I stupidly attacked Moscow with 6 chariots when I should have brought 8 or 10. This delayed me quite a bit. Loved the start though - was able to defend from barbs without the great wall (eventually took it and the pyramids from England).

Just after taking out peter and Washington, I realized that I had over-expanded and was running in serious deficits. Actually had to conquer and raze several cities to keep my cash up until I could trade / extort code of laws and massively build court houses. Definitely set me back.

I left China and Peter alive on the little island NE of the main continent, teched to astro and sent my armies over to the new world. I had furiously been building settlers to try my hand at "milking" while researching astro. So once I reached 63% of land or so I plopped them all down which pushed me up about 5k points & sent me to about 75% land area. Unfortunately Shaka had already built the hanging gardens so I couldn't try that trick.

In retrospect, I should have razed the barb cities to keep away from the domination limit. If I had made it to biology and ended on my own terms I could have really maxed my score (I was busy farming over all my cottages when the game ended).

I usually don't have patience for milking so I probably won't try again soon so I guess I'll never perfect it!

 

[mushroomshirt]

It seems most people here took the war route (which in retrospect looks like the best option). I never played with Egypt and forgot their special unit was an early unit! Opps! Judging from some of your posts, war seemed a great way to build a strong civ FAST!

Not that I am that good, but one of the lessons I learned from civ IV is that military conquest is a great way to develop your civ. If you think about it, by building an army and taking good care of it you can conquer lots of cities complete with buildings and wonders with just that initial investment. Essentially you can leverage your hammers militarily to get a larger and more developed civ faster than you could if you used those hammers to build a bunch of settlers and workers.

 

[Harbourboy]

goal met.

Good stuff, Jenarie. Maybe the next SGOTM will be a cultural one.