Sign up for the second succession game!

Oerdin · November 4, 2009, 17:47

With the resounding success of our most recent succession game (a quick domination victory) I thought we might start a new succession game. The purpose of this thread is for people to discuss which settings we want and to set the play order. For the order we'll make a list of players on a first come first served basis. I'll play at the end of the list since I played first during the last succession game.

Some suggestions based on our experience from the last succession game. Marathon speed might be a bit to slow for some players so we should consider bumping it up a notch to epic. Also 100 turns might be a bit long so we could cut it down to 75 or 50 or something.

Thoth · November 5, 2009, 01:35

Count me in!

As far as settings go, I would favour Epic speed, normal size map. I don't have any strong preferences as far as map script goes, but I've been having some fun lately playing on Tectonics Randomized Actual Earth. The continents are similar to Earth, but with enough variation that the map is still interesting to discover. They also seem to produce more land per civ, and feel like a map size larger.

As to turn length, I would be in favour of shortish turnsets with some discussion between sets as to where we want to go, best moves ect.

As far as other settings go, I usually play with Aggressive AI on, tech brokering and Vassal states off, but I'm open to other settings.

I'm thinking that Monarch would be an appropriate difficulty, we spanked the AI pretty hard last game on Prince.

I actually went ahead and generated a start this morning, but didn't have time to post it before I had to go to work. The settings are Monarch, Tectonics Randomized Actual Earth, Monarch, No Vassals, No brokering, Aggressive AI. The leader is ~~Mehmed~~ Polytubby of the Ottomans.

4000 BC save attached.

I'll volunteer to go first.

self biased · November 5, 2009, 02:23

i'm in favor of cutting the number of turns down as well. a hundred was nice, but there was a lot of pressure to perform as well.

Thoth · November 5, 2009, 03:06

It's also *way* too much to write up in detail. Just getting the bare bones of 100 turns written up took a considerable amount of time. I'd have liked to go into more detail about some of what I had done (and more importantly *why*) but I ran out of both time and patience.

40-50 turns each until 1 ADish and then 20-30 each would allow for a lot more detail in reports as well as more discussion in between sets. We'll want to be disciplined in terms of time per set (hanging onto the save for a week before playing would be poor form), but I think we'll have a better game overall, and we'll all have a better chance to learn something new.

self biased · November 5, 2009, 03:45

the shorter amount of time spent playing turns would also result in more of a roleplaying aspect as well, which adds to the fun.

fed1943 · November 5, 2009, 05:32

I am in.
Any settings are good to me.
Do I need to post screens? That can be a problem...
because I'm not sure if i can do it.

Oerdin · November 5, 2009, 10:16

OK, we'll use Thoth's settings and we'll give the first guy 100 turns to found the civ with each subsequent player getting 50 turns which should be pretty reasonable on epic speed. The only reason the first guy gets double turns is because he starts out with a warrior/scout and a settler so it isn't very interesting sitting there watching one unit move around.

The order of play so far is:

1. Thoth
2. Self Biased
3. Fed1943
4. Rah
5. Theben
6. Me (unless someone else wants to join in and then they can go before me)

rah · November 5, 2009, 10:58

Depending on the timing, (I am leaving town for a few days upcoming) I wouldn't mind participating again. Later in the game when combat is more of an option lends itself better to my aptitude.

Theben · November 7, 2009, 00:21

throw me in there somewhere.

Oerdin · November 8, 2009, 16:43

OK, we have six players so if Thoth will start we can add more people on the list as we go along if more people want to join.

Oerdin · November 11, 2009, 21:12

Thoth?

Theben · November 11, 2009, 21:45

I went and started one... rather interesting results. Played til turn 87 but could cut back. Any interest?

self biased · November 11, 2009, 22:51

keep going, and i'll take over. toth can play whenever he comes out of torpor.

Thoth · November 12, 2009, 03:15

Sorry guys. Got the set done on Monday but got bogged down with RL, and haven't had time to finish off the report yet. Go ahead from Theben's save when he gets it done.

@ Theben: what game settings are you running?

Theben · November 12, 2009, 07:10

I downloaded your game and ran with it.

Theben · November 12, 2009, 21:59

Annnd it's a go.

Thoth · November 13, 2009, 01:21

Originally Posted by Theben

I downloaded your game and ran with it.

Cool. I took a very different approach, and had some different results with the events RNG.

If there is any interest, I can post up a shadow with commentary (after the next round, there are spoilers in my 1500 bc save compared to yours....and vice versa

I didn't get to iron by 1500 bc), if there's no interest say so....it would save me a lot of work.

Theben · November 13, 2009, 09:11

Quote:

Looks decent Theben. I'm curious as to why you didn't open with a worker? There is a 3 hammer tile available with the forested plains hill to give us 4 for the expansive bonus. Istanbul can build a worker on turn 18 to start improving the corn and sheep.

From the other thread... I didn't want to fill it with commentary.
I really didn't even think about settling on the plains hill for some reason- I often do, especially with 1st cities. IIRC I was thinking of having all those forests available to chop. I built the warrior 1st to help with the goody hut search, which is still an option in Monarch. Plus with all the forests all a worker could do would be to irrigate the corn and build roads until I got BW (or stumbled on AH which I wasn't expecting) which didn't seem too important atm.

Thoth · November 13, 2009, 13:53

(cut and pasted from my partial writeup)

Quote:

Initial thoughts: 2 plains sheep. Meh. It's a 4/1/1 tile when improved with a pasture. Good, but I'd really prefer a +5 or +6 food resource.
We have a forested plains hill right beside us. This means that if we settle in place we can generate 4 hammers immediately and so gain +1 from expansive when building our initial worker. If we settle on the plains hill, we'll gain the extra hammer on the city tile at the cost of a turn. We could then work a plains forest while building the worker. If we settle in place, the worker will take 18 turns to complete (vs 23 for a non Expansive civ). Settling the hill would get the worker out in 15 turns (+1 turn for moving). There look to be rivered, forested grass tiles to our north vs plains tiles to our south. It looks like settling in place will produce the stronger long term city.

I moved the warrior 1 SE to get a better idea of what tiles are to be gained to the south (by scrolling the map in, I could see the edges of the tiles to the north, but our view to the south is more limited.)

That revealed WET CORN! The best early game food resource, and we start with Agriculture.

The tiles to the south are looking pretty crap other than that, it's all plains down there which is pretty crappy terrain until Biology.

I decide to settle in place, and begin building a worker (18 turns).

The capital looks very nice. 17 river tiles to boost commerce (and hammers with a levee), wet corn, 2 plains sheep, a crab (we're not coastal so it's not a great tile, but it's still a 4/2 tile once it's netted), 10 riverside grass, 1 grass and two plains hills and 3 plains tiles. Lots of forest to boost early production, but we don't have any early strategic resources in our fat cross (the only non forested tiles already have a resource).

Looks like a solid cottaged bureaucracy capital.

Techwise, we start with the wheel and agriculture which are the two most expensive 1st tier techs and are both good worker techs. They also open up Pottery and Animal Husbandry as tech options. Both are on our priority list of early techs, with Animal Husbandry having a much higher priority. However, I chose to tech Hunting before Animal Husbandry. This was for two reasons, 1) it gives us an additional 20% boost to research when we do tech AH, and secondly it's a prerequisite for Archery. If we don't have copper close by we'll want archers for barb defence even if we do find horses. Defending against barb spears with nothing but warriors and chariots bites.

It will currently take 19 turns to research AH. Getting hunting first will drop this to about 17 or so (even less once the worker is built on turn 18 and we start working the rivered corn instead of the plains hill). It will take 9 turns to research Hunting, so I expect AH on turn 25/26. The farm on the corn will complete on turn 27 (8 turns to farm +1 turn to move to the tile) so we'll be able to start pasturing the sheep as soon as the farm is complete.

Bronze is a key tech, but I'd rather be working the pastured sheep early. It was my next priority after AH (got bronze on turn 55, 5 turns after I'd settled my second city 1 tile west of the grass horses).

Researching the tech(s) you need to improve the specials around your capital and building a worker is almost always a stronger play than building a warrior/scout first. Initial scouting won't be as good and you will likely miss out on a hut or two, but the capital will be more productive faster which will speed up everything else it builds.

I did get lucky with early huts and popped a scout from the hut to the east on turn 12 and a second scout from the hut to the west on turn 16. If I hadn't popped the scouts I would likely have built another warrior before the first settler (maybe....with a decent, close, resource grabbing second city I'd be very tempted just to get the settler out ASAP and then scout with chariots).

self biased · November 14, 2009, 03:56

i will take my turns some time on sunday. fifty, right?

Oerdin · November 14, 2009, 05:10

Yeah.

self biased · November 16, 2009, 01:59

game is done, i will post it tomorrow.

fed1943 · November 16, 2009, 07:58

I can play next 50 turns tomorrow, if the save is here and no one wants to jump in.

self biased · November 17, 2009, 02:39

poasted.

Oerdin · November 17, 2009, 02:41

Originally Posted by fed1943

I can play next 50 turns tomorrow, if the save is here and no one wants to jump in.

Go for it.

Thoth · November 17, 2009, 02:49

Slot me in at the end of the roster.....I went and yielded to temptation and played my shadow out to past Sci Meth and chemistry. The games are very different, but I've got way too much in the way of resource spoilers to play before the main game reaches that point.

fed1943 · November 18, 2009, 06:25

I'm playing "my" 50 turns slowly.
I have a summary of concerns, goals and tools and some saves to try a poor replacement
to screenshots (the last time I tried I crashed the game) and beautiful story (not enough
English).

self biased · November 18, 2009, 12:28

no worries. you can send me the saves and i'l dump them into my photobucket account.