A Deity challenge

[The Priest]

This was me at 380 BC - first attempt, without reading others on here. Not bad, all things considered, though its hard to see how I am going to climb the ladder.

[CharonJr]

Had to concede this one since I was not able to keep up with the AIs and the likely victims started to vassalise to the major powers, will try again from the save I posted and have to be more aggressive this time I think.

And I have completely forgotten what I said earlier myself, I have to get the AIs to war among themself...

CharonJr

[CharonJr]

2nd turn of the war and Joao uses the Apo Palace to stop it, but I got Shaka's capital, I just hope the culture-pressure is not too high.





Well, I think the Islamic Chinese might be next, 3 cities for me, 2 for Pacal maybe...

More about his one tomorrow.

CharonJr

[CharonJr]

Originally posted by Unconquered Sun
I was content to block the peninsula in my game. As far as deity games come, this setup is relatively easy, in part because of the block and the high number of AIs guaranteeing our landmass parity to all but the most powerful AIs.

As always USun never fails to impress, Lib 8 turns earlier than me with 1 town less

Will keep in mind that their trading with me will not raise WYFYB...

Should have thought about Joao (Confuz. - but build the Palace under Chrst.) might be using it to save Shaka.

Well, I hope he has not a weak spot for Islamic Chinese

CharonJr

[ben04]

It's my first deity game so I expected to be eaten alive but I'm pretty sure, that I'm going to win this game. Why? Because I managed to team up with Gilgamesh and have Pacal as my vassal. From here on pretty much any victory should be possible.

I settled my cities in the way Unconquered Sun has done it and then I have build mostly archers. Enough to keep me from being at the bottom of the power graph. Isabella did a good job spreading Christianity throughout the world and therefore I had pretty good relations with Gilgamesh and many others. I also didn't open borders with civs of the wrong faith to not get "you traded with our worst enemy" minus points. None declared war on me the whole game over.

To get good with Gilgamesh I also sold my copper and stone to him for nearly nothing. As I wont be building any wonders I don't need the stone and the copper is not needed as I have iron. This however gave me a good "we are thankful for all the years that you have provided us with resources" bonus.

So I concentrate my remaining resources on researching techs the AI doesn't like (and me neither) such as the on that gives you Islam (when that religion was already discovered of course). And then I sell it around for anything I can get. If I only get a 200 gold well I take it anyway. The gold surplus produced this way was actually enough to keep my research at 100% throughout most of the game. I was always a bit behind the AI but never really far behind.

When Gilgamesh and a few other dogpiled Pacal I joined in and declared war. (The first one in the whole game for me.) I never fought a single battle but it gave plus points with Gilgamesh. After Pacal capitulate to Gilgamesh I formed a defensive pact and about 10 turns later a permanent Alliance.

Perhaps I could even win this game without the Alliance. I have a GM ready for Sid's Sushi and I hope to get a GE or GA for Creative Constructions or Civilized Jewelers (or even both). In that case a cultural victory could be possible. The money I get that way could be enough to keep me in the tech race. (That is if a rate of 100% is enough to keep up...)

I have attached a save just before the Alliance is formed. I have not yet played beyond that point.

[Unconquered Sun]

@CharonJr - Also, WFYABTA from trades before meeting an AI won't count for this AI's WFYABTA. That's very useful on continents, but even on a pangea sometimes you make trades before meeting everyone.

[snoopy369]

By the way, folks - site policy requires images to be <= 800 px wide, so that they don't cause the table to go beyond the window for users... if you use the upload facility it will give you a link to a 800px wide version of your picture

Thanks!

[Fleme]

Whoa I'm so happy to see so many participants. I wish I was at my playing comp but atleast I'm vicariously "playing" through your games. Great job everyone, very entertaining and also good learning material to boot.

[CharonJr]

GW and Mide and GL, smart move and nice run there USun

Mids should be fairly easy with stone close and the number of trees around our capital, but I think in order to pull this one of I would have to forget about blocking with the 2nd city to the north.

Trying to pull the Mids of without losing my blocker in the north, but those GPP from the GW are nice, too...

CharonJr

[Crossfire]

Well, I made another go at it last night. In 1780 AD I am just behind Isabelle and firmly in the middle of the pack. I have had pretty constant wars with Shaka but have never managed to get anyone else to help dogpile him so I have never done anything but defend (barely).

Unlike Charon I have gone heavy on cottages. I have almost 800 beakers of production per turn while running at 80%. I just don't understand how to survive the early game with just farms when you don't have Writing yet. My research turns to zero. Even in this game I built no world wonders. How are you managing to keep your research even close in the early game?

I had a heck of a time with Gilgamesh's culture. He even managed to flip New York! In spite of running every culture bonus I know he continues to make inroads even on my Capitol.

I know I have no chance of winning because Pacal already has half the spaceship built but each time I try this game I learn something else. Thanks for starting this Fleme, I never would have even tried a Diety game without your prompting.

[Unconquered Sun]

Originally posted by Crossfire

Unlike Charon I have gone heavy on cottages. I have almost 800 beakers of production per turn while running at 80%. I just don't understand how to survive the early game with just farms when you don't have Writing yet. My research turns to zero. Even in this game I built no world wonders. How are you managing to keep your research even close in the early game?

I had a heck of a time with Gilgamesh's culture. He even managed to flip New York! In spite of running every culture bonus I know he continues to make inroads even on my Capitol.

Early game goes thru several research phases.

Phase one is when your palace is the main contributor.

Phase two is when working resource tiles is the main contributor.

Specialists/cottages come only after that. You have to plan researching either pottery or writing before you run out of steam.

You'll be losing money for cities and military. On deity, there's less slack and they get expensive fast. In fact, early game military depends more on gold for maintenance than hammers for production.

When fighting culture it's vital to reach 100 (150 epic) ASAP. The flip chance is determined by the number of tiles controlled by the rival around your city and the strength of your troops stationed inside. Finally, if flipping is unavoidable, liberate the city to get some diplo bonus at least.

[Unconquered Sun]

Originally posted by CharonJr
GW and Mide and GL, smart move and nice run there USun

Mids should be fairly easy with stone close and the number of trees around our capital, but I think in order to pull this one of I would have to forget about blocking with the 2nd city to the north.

Trying to pull the Mids of without losing my blocker in the north, but those GPP from the GW are nice, too...

CharonJr

Espionage is great on packed maps (distance from palace factor is small).

I don't think getting both GW and second city north is possible. I wanted to make sure my capital is culturally stronger than whatever Gilga puts on the border. I even have a shot at flipping one of his cities.

[Crossfire]

Well, I took one more shot at it. I went heavy on specialists at first but then started bringing cottages online for when I had to switch to Emancipation. I am not going to win but I am usually in 4th place although Huanya has just passed me again in this screenshot. I gave up trying to get the northern city but I might pull a save up and put a city where Gilgamesh put Zimbir a while ago to keep him from creeping into my capitols BFC.

I think to actually win this you would need to take some risky chances and be very aggressive whenever you get the chance so that you gain some additional cities at some point. I can't imagine doing much better than I did in this game and yet Pacal already has his thrusters and another part of his spaceship built while I am just starting to build mine.

It's been quite a revelation all the things one can improve in a game like Civ. My game play is certainly better for this little exercise. I might try this again if someone starts a different game but I have had a lot of time available to play lately and that usually isn't the case.

Anyway, here's my little kingdom in 1822.

[Unconquered Sun]

I was finally able to play a bit more of this.

It's 355 AD and the tech lead is all ours. I took Nationalism from Lib with the intent to use cuirassiers (no AI was willing to trade guilds or engineering at the time), but the AIs were slow to research the banking path and I decided to snatch the Economics GM as well. End result is cuirassiers, rifles, grens, cannons are close on the techtree and I need to decide which one to use. Sending the GM to Portugal will net nearly 3k gold, so mass upgrade is also on the table.

I also need to decide whether to bribe Pacal to attack Gilga. Gilga has too much on his hands. I believe he's not after us, but if I'm wrong it's game over. If I'm right tho it's giving techs to Pacal and taking diplo penalties with Gilga for nothing.

the tech screen

[Fleme]

I personally had no such success but am thrilled to see you doing so amazingly well. Any way for you to post the save of where you are now?

What choices and game made you do so well and were there any wars between you and Gilgamesh or anyone else?

Awesome playing.