AU 105: The Power of Gold: Spoilers

[nbarclay]

My key to taking out Rome was to hit them with archers before they got a chance to build legions. Without its legions, Rome is no big deal.

I didn't have prebuilds for enough knights to take Greece out, but I did make a dent with them (coupled with longbowmen upgraded from my archers from the Roman wars). Then a while later, cavalry swept in and Greece didn't have a chance.

Nathan

[Catt]

Been away for several days - great games all. It's nice to see so many people playing the AU games - especially all different difficulty levels.

Originally posted by Jawa Jocky
I've never tried OCC, I don't think I have the patience for it. Is there an OCC strategy thread?

I don't know - I've only played 3 or 4 times -- the first time to see what it was like, the next couple of times to get a Civ III fix in a few hours (my previous experience with OCCs) -- AU 105 took six - eight hours of play time, probably due to more frequent warfare involving me and note-taking for the spoiler thread. I had wanted to play the game with the AU Mod and stadard rules to compare, thinking each game would be a 2 - 3 hour commitment, but the 8-hour game precluded me from playing a second time under standard rules.

I gave the totally broke American's a bunch of tech's so they would have knowledge of their saltpeter. My best friends were more than happy to trade that resource to me. (I thought it would be nice since the Greeks keep attacking me). I've never done this to get a resource before, does any have an even better story regarding this strategy?

Great creativity in securing a vital resource! I've done it once or twice, but usually only when the AI civ is a tech or two behind - no better story than yours.

Originally posted by Theseus
Superb GA... gutsy move delaying Hoover.

Wasn't too gutsy - I checked just about every turn to see if others had discovered Electronics. Since I had the IW in my capitol city (almost no waste), a city with a fair number of hills and (of course) iron and coal, I figured Thebes was the most prodcutive city on the map by a wide margin. Even starting a few turns late I should have been able to snatch Hoover from someone else (barring use of an AI leader, in which case I would have been screwed).

Originally posted by Keeper of Hell
I lost. [. . . .] I realized there was no way I was going to get anywhere without oil and quit. *Very* frustrating.

The great thing about AU games is there is no competition - so, as the old saying goes, it doesn't matter if you win or lose, it's truly how you play the game.

Don't give up though! Oil is a fickle mistress and will disappear and reappear with some frequency. Struggling through the hard spots is sometimes where you learn something new that you've never considered before. Lack of important strategic resources (and the military means to take them) can teach an awful lot about effective trading and diplomacy.

Originally posted by CorpusScorpius
I decided to play AU 105 OCC (regent) to see if I could come close to Catt's accomplishment . Cleo did win a cultural victory, However my score is an Exceptional display of the need to practice a heck of alot more . I dont recall hitting a golden age & I was unable to build IW due to my iron source petering out before Feudalism . I decided to play the game out to see if I could salvage a victory . Oh yeah , in the late 1960's early 70's, cultural victory was achieved ......drum roll please...... my final score was in the 400's.

Score will always be absolutely pitiful in an OCC game (since territory is so critical to score) - you should totally disregard it in evaluating how you did. My score finished in the low or mid 400's, IIRC.

Very rough break with the iron depletion - mine actually stayed put the entire game.

How many played the standard rules versus the AU Mod? Any sense of whether the mod creates a more formidable AI opponent?

Catt

[Theseus]

Originally posted by Catt
Oil is a fickle mistress...

No kidding... man, did I get lucky.

Couldn't agree more about the 'philosophy' of AU... don't ever get discouraged, as each of these games is suposed to be a mutual learning experience. People are going to try various strategies, and we all get to learn from the many successes and failures.

For instance, I typically play with early aggression; while that was probably the right thing to do here (with sufficient / overwhelming force), I am reminded of the second mini-tourney game (precursor to AU), when doing the same thing as Germany, which *should* have worked, resulted in a These-ass kicking like no other.

Re the AI civs, I did not see anything hugely impressive in my game, although I was impressed by Greece in yours, Catt.

I'm putting my "killer AI civ" thinking hat back on...

[Jawa Jocky]

Originally posted by BillChin
> I'd be interested to hear how people dealt with Greece
> and Rome (two civs with incredibly good Anicent Times
> defenders for very few shields) being on the same
> continent.


- Bill

On emperor.

I attacked the Romans early with 2 swordmen and sued for peace, really just to make room for myself and get some free techs, workers, and gold. I did this every 20 turns until they were just 2 cities between me and Greece (I also extorted a lot of jungle cities from them). I spent my only leader on a FP in Northern end of the Jungle. I had two cores up and running pretty early except my 2nd core was half in the jungle and not very productive.

My Greece policy was a complete failure. I had to travel to far to attack them at 1st. Once I had a road network everytime I built up an attack army it became outdated, and I was unable to upgrade due to the resource constraits. I had to give America several techs just so they could hook-up their saltpeter and trade it with me. Because Greece was my size and always declaring war on me I never got a chance to take Persia. I used all of my military just to defend myself.

[Keeper of Hell]

Update, in case anyone is eagerly following the epic of the AU loser: After finding out that the Civilopedia was misleading me about the amphib. assualt thing, I set off for the northern island. Three turns after the first boatload of marines arrived, the island was captured and a new city was founded. Unfortunately, the oil dried up about 20 turns later, but by that time it didn't matter, as I captured the Roman one-tile-island city of Lugdunum and secured another source of oil. This was about the time that the world at large entered the Modern Era, down two civs (Aztecs, who got murdered by a coalition of three or four civs and Rome, who I took out by capturing Lugdunum). Immediately, the tech leaders jumped on Fission and Rocketry, but I managed to buy one and trade for another. I built the UN, courtesy of Ramses, then held elections. Inconclusive- Rome abstaining for some reason (thankfully- if they'd come in on the side of the Greeks it would have been game over). In preparation for the next election I destroyed Rome, as I've already detailed, and struck luxury deals with several other civs. Greece and Persia were stubbornly against me, and I didn't consider it worth my resources to try and get Persia on my side (I really doubt Alexander would have voted against himself even if we were really good friends). The next election was another inconclusive, with the Indians (who were Gracious toward me) casting the vote that kept the game from ending in victory for me. In the meantime, I'm building up my army for an assault that ought to either cripple or destroy the Persians. The only issue is that the Greeks have an MPP with them, and it could be inconveinent to try and defend myself against both. I think I'll hold off on my invasion until the next election, and if there's no decision again then I'll strike.

[Keeper of Hell]

Final update: called a UN meeting in 1954, got elected. End score: 942. Not very impressive, I'll admit, but at least I got it done.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by Keeper of Hell
On another note, I'd be interested to hear how people dealt with Greece and Rome (two civs with incredibly good Anicent Times defenders for very few shields) being on the same continent.

I took the city of Rome early with a bunch (5 or 6) of veteran swordsmen. This left the Romans without iron and horses and hence without teeth. I finished them off 20 turns later.

I never fought a war with Greece. We were peaceful neighbors for the entire game.

[Ribannah]

I stayed friends with them my entire OCC game on deity.
Victory came in 1525 AD when we built the United Nations and got all the votes except from Persia (America had been destroyed). I could have played on for a cultural or a space race victory, too!

[Harovan]

Respect. I never won an OCC on deity, only on medium levels. In all my deity tries I got killed by sneak attacks in the industrial age, almost everytime by Jerxes.

But the space race, in only one city? Did you have such a big tech lead? How this?

[Theseus]

Interesting that Rome survived, as opposed to Catt's OCC, where Greece (and I guess Catt) showed Caesar a good ol' time.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Ribannah
I stayed friends with them my entire OCC game on deity.

Yowza! I've only ever tried an OCC as high as Monarch - won that one via culture but fell behind in the tech race in the industrial age -- since I had no shot at the UN, I had to hope that the AI that built it wouldn't call a vote. Staying in the tech race long enough to win via spaceship (at deity!) is truly amazing!

Originally posted by Theseus
Interesting that Rome survived, as opposed to Catt's OCC, where Greece (and I guess Catt) showed Caesar a good ol' time.

I used Caesar as my shield - never once attacked the poor guy, but bribed him into war every time Alexander got uppity. My Caesar was perhaps unfairly hampered however - his iron supply depleted really early on, so he couldn't make a swarm of Legionaries and, unless he traded for it with Alexander or Xerxes, probably had very few knights and pikemen.

Catt

[Killerdaffy]

Originally posted by Ribannah
I stayed friends with them my entire OCC game on deity.
Victory came in 1525 AD when we built the United Nations and got all the votes except from Persia (America had been destroyed). I could have played on for a cultural or a space race victory, too!

Congrats!!

How did you keep everybody happy, especially your direct neighbours? And I assume you got the GL?? (Or how else did you keep up the tech race??)

[Ribannah]

Culture and many deals (plus the rare tribute).
And no pacts, of course!
We built the Colossus first, and then the Lighthouse.
GL was done in 590 BC but we didn't get any techs from it as we were ahead and wanted to get to the next wonders asap.

[Harovan]

Wait a moment... You outresearched the AIs with one city on deity in the ancient age, where they use to trade like mad? That's bold, are we talking about the same game here?

[Killerdaffy]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
Wait a moment... You outresearched the AIs with one city on deity in the ancient age, where they use to trade like mad? That's bold, are we talking about the same game here?

Quite an achievement!

I have never tried it but, on the other hand, building zero settlers and having zero corruption will make a HUGE difference in the ancient age. And trade you can as well (depending on who got the lighthouse there was probably no contact between the continents until at least Astronomy in this game). Only later becomes the rest of the empire really important in science / money terms.