Proposal: a "no AI help" AC challenge

[DaveV]

Well, since we're comparing...

Romans at AD1:
15 cities, 1 size 1, 2 size 2, 8 size 3, 3 size 4, 1 size 12 .
17 techs, Alphabet, Banking, Code of Laws, Construction, Engineering, Monarchy, and Trade are white. Invention is one beaker short of being discovered.
Hanging Gardens (-700) and Colossus (-500) in Ravenna.
Monarchy in -2450. Researching horseback riding as my 5th tech meant the Mongols slaughtered four of my warriors, but I'm holding them off now with a fortified vet phalanx on a river.
18 trade routes established with Ravenna so far, max payoff was 132 gold.

This is an awfully slow moving game; the infinite caravan sleaze takes an lot of micromanagement, even without chatting up the AIs every turn.

[EOL]

Its probably better to play as you have and leave the Mongols in. The purple civ became the Sioux and restarted on the other side of the world so I'm having all kinds of trouble helping them out with any techs.

EOL

[Scouse Gits]

I can think of few fates worse than sharing a small continent with technologically equivalent Mongols - I stick by my decision - the Indians have since appeared on the same continent as the Germans and Japanese - I now 460AD - have a beachhead on this continent and have accidently acquired Washington on the other major continent - both will soon hope to become sleaze centres - I have the Lighthouse, Cope's and have just (460) built Mike's about 41 cities and am now four times ahead of the second civ on the powergraph (Greek/German/Japanese virtually tying) - The Empire continues ...

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Scouse Git[1] -- git1@scousers.net

"Staring at your screen in horror and disbelief when you open a saved game is one of the fun things of a succession game " - Hueij
"The Great Library has been built!"
"A short cut has to be challenging,
were it not so it would be 'the way'." - Paul Craven

[Smash]

Would be fair to build the Great Library?

[EOL]

Do you mean to build it and then allow the purple's to capture the city?

EOL

[Smash]

No build and most likely "fill in" techs....like I did.Got 4 techs so far when it occured this is supposed to be no ai help.So is the Graet Library considered help?

[Scouse Gits]

We think it's legit, Smash - SG2 has rejected it - I guess he will post a log over the w/e - I'm (SG1) stalled at 460 (game at work) and haven't decided whether or not to blow 6 carries on it ...
______________
The SGs in South African Red (is that PC these days? )

[Scouse Gits]

1000 AD update --

Lost my way a little, slept through not one but two oedo years, went Republic in 700AD

Supreme - now 5 times better than Indians/Greeks/Germans all tied in second
Population 5.04 m; 49 cities, 1@12, 2@7, 8@5, 16@4, 10@3, 9@2 & 3@1

No 1 in Science: 26 techs, 9 white, Invention next turn; 4 turns/tech

7 WoWs: HG, C, L, GL!, MC, CO & ME on course for Super Ironclads

This is certainly not going to be a record, but I shall arrive.

The Empire continues ...

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Scouse Git[1] -- git1@scousers.net

"Staring at your screen in horror and disbelief when you open a saved game is one of the fun things of a succession game " - Hueij
"The Great Library has been built!"
"A short cut has to be challenging,
were it not so it would be 'the way'." - Paul Craven
[This message has been edited by Scouse Gits (edited May 08, 2001).]

[EOL]

Hmmm! I found that I haven't been getting enough cities down in the early AD. A mistake i often make, lots of other stuff to worry about .

Anyway - 1000AD.

Supreme 3-4 times the others (all about the same).
27 cities. 3 size 8, 1 size 7, 8 size 6, 2 size 5, 2 size 4, 10 size 3, 1 size 2. Republic government.

No. 1 in science - 25 techs, 12 white. T of Gravity next (4 turns/tech)

HG, MC, C, CO.

Probably a mid 1800's landing at this rate .

The Foreign Minister is still as keen as ever to find other nations. Killed
some offensive looking Greeks who had the cheek to land on my main island .

EOL

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"One day your life is going to flash before your eyes, make sure it is worth watching."

[VetLegion]

Well, today I had free time, I wanted to do some online catching up, but my ISP was broke. So I accidentaly found I have downloaded this scenario earlier and I played it.

W A R N I N G! Perhaps a spoiler ahead. If you havent finished it yet, you should not read on because I reveal some in game information about your enemy civ locations.

I really, really dont like landing on AC so I did a conquest game. I thought it would be nice to try the limitations (noAIspeak) and see if they affected my strategy. And also, this can give you folks something to compare with if someone else tries the conquest.

here is a little report (I havent kept exact log)

year: 1500 AD
victory type: victory by conquest
tech path: horseback - monarchy - philosophy - monotheism. Detracted for mapmaking. After monoteism, maxed the gold.
losses: approx 60 units of which 50 are crusaders. Loss to kill ratio 1:3
(havent produced veteran units or Sun tzu)

play time: ? hours in two sessions
avg time per turn: ?

wonders of significance: lighthouse and michalangelo. Later stole or built some with excess production, but without relevance to game outcome.

home cities on continent: 12 I think
captured cities: around 40 (mongols 4, americans 2, japanese 4, sioux 1, germans 8, greeks 5, carthagians 1)
(founded some later on out of a habit, but no use for them) connected some cities with roads and repopulated some areas. I am a perfectionist in soul

how it went: assessed the limitations. previously depended on stupid AI to sign peace all the time, so decided to double minimal invasion forces now from 2-4 to 4-8 crusaders because of possible counter-attacks. (havent really sticked to it, relied on lots of triremes and gold for swift reinforcements)

With horseback I discovered early that I was alone on the island which made me find mapmaking very early. Used settlers to calm down cities and build the wonders (2 of them). By 1 AD discovered all opponents and most of the map. Waited for monotheism and built michalangelos very soon with settlers diplomats and horses, whichever fitted best. Switched to crusaders. Went west (Mongols) first, when they were soon to be finished went simultaneously north to Germans (which previously killed Aztecs and two more civs). in parralell with Germans destructed big part of Americans (far east) except walled capitol and some Greeks (east). Around 1200 had everyone down to 1 city but found out restart is on so decided to wait 1500 AD (to avoid having to search icecaps or similar areas). Somwhere in between got bored and kicked ass anyway. Spent next turns to find Carthagians only city (large island north of Mongol mainland) and eliminate it at 1500 when restart stops officially. Finished with loads of cash and sentried units

resume: everything went as planned, tactical performance lacked sometimes, but good all around. if not for indecisevness near the end could perhaps have done it hundred or so years earlier.

bad moves: overestimated the AI agressiveness and discovered bronze working and feudalism for defense, which proved unneeded.
overproduced diplomats to destroy city walls which proved unneeded as AI didnt even have vet defender phalanxes (mostly regular phalanxes, some archers and warriors), let alone pikemen.

key to victory: finding them emmediatelly and attacking previous to their dicovery of pikemen. What could have caused trouble? AI building Great Wall in a city not easy to reach from the coast.

No AC but fun anyway

[Scouse Gits]

Hi VetLegion - good game, but our Mongols started on the same island as us (EOL & I)

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Scouse Git[1] -- git1@scousers.net

"Staring at your screen in horror and disbelief when you open a saved game is one of the fun things of a succession game " - Hueij
"The Great Library has been built!"
"A short cut has to be challenging,
were it not so it would be 'the way'." - Paul Craven

[Scouse Gits]

Yes - me too! The destruction of the Mongols on my patch was the first objective.

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SG(2)

[Smash]

That must be a different game cuz this is a scenario and there are(were ) Mongols on that isle

[VetLegion]

perhaps a different file then. I downloaded from DaveVs site, so I dont know. But I definately started alone on the island/continent? (puzzled smiley)

[DaveV]

Vet Legion - I botched the events.txt of my first attempt and tried again. But I'm sure I only uploaded one file to the website. Strange...

Status as of AD1000:
32 techs, 17 white. 4 turns/tech. I established an embassy with the Mongols and discovered they have a grand(?) total of 8 techs .

Wonders:
Hanging Gardens (700 BC)
Colossus (550 BC)
Statue of Liberty (AD100)
Leonardo's Workshop (AD280)

27 cities: 1 size 20, 1 size 4, 7 size 3, 14 size 2, 4 size 1.

Still commie after all these years...