AU207: Big Planet - Strategy, Spoilers and Comments

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Arrian
Nathan, great AAR! And 42 leaders! Wow. Then again...

8 vs. the Vikings
3 vs. Japan
7 vs. the Mongols in my final war with them
17 in various wars on the second continent.

35 of them were generated with blitz attackers. Impressive, nonetheless.

Not quite. At least one or two of the leaders against the Vikings were from older elite units brought over in the first wave of the invasion. Still, the vast majority were from blitz attackers, and the fact that I had so many tanks become elite against the horribly outclassed Vikings was a considerable help.

What I found to be more impressive was the attack you launched on Zululand & Germany AT THE SAME TIME. That's ballsy.

Actually, I attacked the Germans at the same time as the Zulus to keep my WC force from getting bored. When I started the war, I had a big enough swordsman force (upgraded from warriors) to put a big dent in one rival and a big enough fast-mover force to put a big dent in one rival. (I hadn't used my swords much against Babylon because I figured Zululand was where they would do the most good.) I also was in the midst of a golden age, with a large and productive core churning out reinforcements at a rapid pace. My WCs couldn't even get to the main Zulu core until an additional piece of road was finished. So since I had a big enough military for a two-front war, and neither front was wide enough to really profit from concentrating on one war at a time, I decided to fight a two-front war.

Even one against two, the odds were so stacked in my favor that the AIs never stood half a chance. I ended the war with somewhere approaching twice as big a military force as I started it with. It was a classic application of my "overwhelming force" doctrine, as applied to a situation where I had so much power that I could overwhelm two opponents at once.

[Catt]

Great AARs, all

Catt

[Nor Me]

In 1375AD, I won:

[Nor Me]

A brief AAR

All the interesting stuff has already been said by other people so why should I bother?

At the last post, I was 2 turns away from the FP. Well, that was built in Uruk in 740AD roughly in the middle of the jungle beyond the east chokepoint. From there, I built.

Very soon after the FP was built, I entered the Industrial age. From the 1.21f Scientific lottery, the Germans and I got Medcine and the Koreans got Steam Power. I gave away these and the remaining Medieval techs to all civs for free in the hope that they might research something useful like Industrialisation. It was not to be. So I researched Sanitation, Electricity, Replaceable parts, Scientific Method and Radio then Industrialisation. Meanwhile the AI researched Free Artistry, Military Tradition and Nationalism. In 1110AD, I built Theory of Evolution, triggering my GA. The only Industrial age tech I researched for more than 4 turns was Radio, which took 6 turns while I was waiting for the AI to research Industrialisation. Victory delayed by 2 turns because of AI lack of competence in science.

In a last ditch effort for an interesting game, the Mongols attacked me in 1220AD. Next turn, the Russians lead a coalition of the willing including 12 AI civs against them. They couldn't have picked a better time. Half way through my GA with factories in evry city and nothing left to build except infantry and artillery. Thanks to superior tactics, I was the only civ to start capturing the Mongols southern cities.

Not taking more money than necessary from the AI began to pay off when the Americans discovered Communism! I was still 10 turns from the modern age and needed Police Stations to keep up the 4 turn pace with a war on too fronts (haven't I mentioned the Vikings?). The war was going well. But it was all a distraction as I was not going to research any more techs at more than 4 per turn. So in 1335AD, when 30% luxuries and 70% science would give me a 5 turn Flight, I decided that since to finish off half the Mongol empire with my first tanks would mean delaying victory by at least one turn, I would be peaceful.

Entering the modern age, the Germans and I got Computers and the Koreans got Rocketry. So I have to research Fission? Disbanding all my artillery to make as many cities as possible build research labs in one turn, I managed to reduce Fission from 6 turns to 5. In 1370 AD, Peter the Great founded the UN. In a rare show of integrity, the Russians did not sign any alliances or MPPs just to give the AI a chance. They didn't take it.

[Nor Me]

Lessons not learned

Prejudice confirmed 1: The Russians are a premier league archer rushing civ

I used not to believe Sir Ralph's Ultra-early Archer Rush thread classification of them as good because it was too slow and emphasised spearmen too much. But now my expansionist non-militaristic archer rush is better than my militaristic non-expansionist version.

By starting on ceremonial burial at 0%, the Russian's cheapest tech is Warrior Code so they are quite likely to pick that up from a hut early. Then they're effectively in the German position of having both early.

Especially on a huge map, scouts can reveal the strategic position early which takes some of the uncertainty out of an early archer rush. The possibility of picking up settlers and cities from huts is a good reason not to build them.

Obviously not all games will have my settler on turn 2 and warrior code on turn 5, but I've found them to be generally good. That basically decided this game.

Platitude 2: The AI is your friend

I've read several times that the secret of sucess at higher levels is to exploit the AI's weaknesses. While this is useful, it's also useful to exploit the AI's strenghs. If you can keep control of the game, techs the AI researches are your techs by trading, cities the AI founds are potentially your cities by warfare.

Now I can keep up on Emperor, I find the lower levels harder to play well although still easier to win.

On a huge map, diplomacy is especially important. A civ with a bad reputation is likely to be ganged up upon. Provided you try to be honorable in war, that always means your enemy. I tend to find that Huge maps aren't conducive to Killer AI's simply because when a civ dies, everyone takes a slice of the cake. It seems to be too easy to get ahead by trading tech. But then again I found that as an OCC on a small map in AU302 so I'd better stop rambling.

More pointless rambling 3: I'm right and you're all wrong (obviously).

As far as I can tell, early warfare followed by later building was the right thing to do in this game if not on all maps with this setting. With the time the late game starts taking on a huge map, I'd try to aim for an early victory. Once you've got enough territory, there is nothing to stop you researching at 4 turns a tech for the rest of the game so hurting the AI's is counterproductive: you could use their tech and gold.

That's why the Russians are obviously superior to all those 'industrious' civs on offer. Only the aztecs could rival their potential for early warfare and they enabled me to have a relatively tech focused game.

Although 1375AD is hardly impressive, no-one else seems to have done earlier in this non-competitive game. But I didn't do enough early war to get my FP up fast enough...

Mistake 0: Why did I build horsemen instead of warriors?

Perhaps it was something to do with those irritating barbarians early on but I should have been able to deal with those with archers and warriors. I had 1300 gold when leaving the ancient era and so I had to research Chivalry for a Knight upgrade.

If I'd built warriors instead, I'd have been able to start my 2nd war ealier, had a choice of Babylonians or Zulu and beelined for Navigation. 1300 gold's worth of swordsmen would have taken care of the Zulu easily and given me a good FP spot early. Knights can't deal with Impis and since I was still with 1.14f at this stage, would have given the AI's 2 whole techs to research on their own.

I've obviously still got a lot to learn.

[Dominae]

Good comments, Nor Me. Although AARs are cool, I always appreciate those who think on their game critically and put their thoughts on paper for everyone else to see.


Dominae

[Theseus]

I finally went back to do a short AAR:

Damn, that was fun... and long.

1894AD, SS win, 6592 points, Emperor, Carthage.

BTW, over 126,000 culture, but the damn Koreans were so strong it held off the culture win (which made me very happy ).

For me, this was warmongering heaven. I used the western jungle as my military playground... civs from around the world kept trying to build cities there (incidentally clearing the jungle ), only to fall to Carthage's wrath.

I finally claimed entire ownership of the continent (Tanks and MAs, oh my), with 139 cities. My military was just massive at 485 units (no workers), although I only had 12 Armies out of a possible 34!! I have a new mixed-unit combo that I like: NumMerc, MedInf, Rifle, Infantry.

And I topped it off with, you guessed it, 45 ICBMs!!! First, I razed the 3 remaining AI cities on the islands to the west. Then...

BANG BANG BANG... declared war on the world, and nuked everybody back into the stone age. Their largest cities left are at 12 pop, and the vast majority are under 10 pop.

Of course, there was massive retaliation... but thanks to the SMD, only 9 of 41 enemy ICBMs got through (BTW, the SMD zap effect is pretty cool).

Had a GL saved up to finish the SS shortly thereafter.

KAIs were Korea and Ottomans... commercial obviously rocks on these huge maps. The Mongols did incredibly well too, even though I punished them several times in order to slow them down. And, get this, my bestest buddies until I took'em down with MAs were... the ZULU. They even built up a real empire, with GWs and everything!! (including the Library!!) Saved Shaka for last 'cause of the tough terrain.

Much as others did, a lot of my geo-political strategy revolved around oscillating wars, even if no shots fired by me in the case of far-away AI civs, and enlisting military alliances with everybody else... LOTS and LOTS of those pretty red lines!! It does seem I took the warmongering the furthest!! (well, Nathan did too... but I got to play Global Thermonuclear War!!)

[Theseus]

I'm uploading the save for anyone who wants to try their hand at a nuclear demolition derby!!

It's also a pretty good example of building a huge and very productive empire... lots of Palace moves.

http://apolyton.net/upload/files/Theseus/TheseusoftheCarthaginians1892AD.SAV

[nbarclay]

My own view of Global Thermonuclear War is, "The only winning move is not to play." Even if you're so far ahead in tech that the other civs can't retaliate in kind at all, blasting them back into the stone age seriously undermines their value as customers for techs, luxuries, and so forth.

[BigDork]

Originally posted by Theseus
KAIs were Korea and Ottomans... commercial obviously rocks on these huge maps. The Mongols did incredibly well too, even though I punished them several times in order to slow them down. And, get this, my bestest buddies until I took'em down with MAs were... the ZULU. They even built up a real empire, with GWs and everything!! (including the Library!!) Saved Shaka for last 'cause of the tough terrain.

Hi all...

The Zulu had their butts kicked in my game. Almost from the start they had pressure being applied by Tokugawa. They eventually ended up only having one city on my side of the choke point that I let them keep for a while because I'm such a nice person and all. Well that and I was busy fighting the dang Japanese myself.

I've never fought in a nuclear war. Just didn't seem like a good idea. That's not to say that I wasn't ready for one if the AI was stupid enough to start one. Usually a whole bunch of ICBMs and some subs with tactical nukes off the coast makes a good deterant.

But it sounds like you had fun.

BigD

[Arrian]

So you nuked the rest of the world, and then got the hell outta dodge on a SpaceShip? You sir are a bad man.

Still, they did get 9 hits in on you. 41 AI launches is pretty impressive.

When was your GA, and under what system of government?

-Arrian

[Theseus]

Sorry I never responded, Arrian.

Ummm, the GA was *not* in despotism. I remember being surprise, as I had NMs all over the place, but they never got attacked.

It was pretty late I think... triggered by Smith's maybe?? And probably in republic. In other words, it rocked.