AU207: Big Planet - Strategy, Spoilers and Comments

[Jaybe]

(Increase the AI aggression levels for a huge map (?))

[Arrian]

I agree with Nathan re: the cultural victory should be adjusted for map size.

Come to think of it, there is no way I'll make it to the SS. I'll win culturally well before that.

-Arrian

[Konquest02]

You want a piece of me ?!?

This is it!

The Mongols stole the GL by 4 turns from me in the early game. They conquered the Americans, probably using their Keshiks. They've been aggressive throughout the whole game, even blackmailing me at on e point.

Now, they come and backstab me, as I tried to be friendly with them!

I'VE HAD ENOUGH!!

I've enlisted every civ on my continent, every powerful civ on the other continent and signed an embargo with all of the others. It gives a pretty messy F4 screen, but it's really worth it.

My palace is 25 turns from completion in Berlin and I am 2.5 techs from tanks. I do not fear for my Civ, I'm just utterly angry!

I'll play maybe this evening, as I'm kind of busy with something called real life right now...

More on this later...

--Kon--

[BigDork]

Give'em hell Kon. Take no prisoners. I've always had problems with the Mongols whenever I've played with them in a game. Having them and Germany on the same continent sure made for an aggressive game. Japan doesn't help either.

BigD

[Catt]

Originally posted by Catt
Additional game notes and thoughts later.

I'm a bit hesitant to draw many conclusions on huge maps after only one game -- the last time I played a huge map game was under vanilla civ v1.07 or v1.16, I think. Nonetheless, several things struck me, and struck me to such a degree that I'm skeptical that my results in this game could be wholly fluky -- in other words, some things were so striking as to present themselves to me, until I see otherwise, as true game differences between huge and standard maps.

Some of these striking observations:

* The OCN seems a bit screwy. My REX was slowed by (i) setting aside city #2 and (ii) a somewhat late granary in Paris, but it wasn't completely incompetent. I was roughly the size of many of my AI neighbors after the REX phase. Nonetheless, I couldn’t build the FP until I built one throwaway city just to trigger the FP build! It seems to me that it would be quite easy to be denied an FP build without some early warfare if one's start isn't great.

* Related to above -- the screwy OCN means corruption was never an issue. I was building universities (200 shields) in 8 - 15 turns (max) in even my farthest flung cities before the FP was built. Compact empires can be very, very productive.

* Tech research / leadership positions are surprisingly easy to secure. I secured a tech leadership position in the early middle ages -- well before I even had the FP built. My AI competitors often had solid start positions and even greater REXing results, but in a game I played entirely peacefully -- without even taking out the Babylonians who played with a large target painted across their flag -- I secured enough land to be a "world power." I cannot even imagine securing a tech lead on a standard map with less than the number of cities required for an FP build -- simply unthinkable.

* Peaceful "building" works better on larger maps. Related to all of the above -- with much less pressure to aggressively take land from rivals in order to assume a leadership position, war becomes even more of an option as opposed to a near requirement. I believe war on a huge map must offer as many, or nearly as many, rewards as war on a standard map, but peaceful playing doesn't demand as many concessions regarding one's leadership position as a smaller map does.

* Again related to the above – a later game peaceful approach seems to be easier than on smaller maps. IMHO, during the age of rifleman and infantry, you can usually count on at least several wars among the AIs, including the AI leaders. Since the AI is so very bad at Industrial Age warfare, these wars essentially offer the player who opts for peace to skate along at the lead while the closest challengers attrite themselves into backwardness. With 12 – 14 AI civs, instead of 5 – 7 AI civs, you can pretty much be sure that much of the world will descend into fruitless warfare – you can join in and take spoils (unlike the AIs) or you can remain neutral and research at 4 – 7 turns while the AIs’ research engines stall.

* Trading skills (resources) are better tested on huge maps. Securing the land necessary to obtain local and exportable sources of 4+ luxuries (let alone 8) is a bigger enterprise. One’s ability to trade luxuries (and to a lesser extent, I think) strategic resources, will be more important than on smaller maps – smaller maps seem to me to offer opportunities for quick and more efficient seizures of desired resources.

* Diplomacy (in the sense of relations / attitude, etc. leading to a UN vote) is more challenging, if only because you’ve got to keep your eye on XX civs instead of X civs.

* Because of the increased importance of trade / diplomacy / “peaceful warfare,” micromanagement is a greatly increased burden. At or near a tech lead, trying to strike the most advantageous series of tech trades to the AI civs is time-consuming process – so much so that I frequently didn’t bother to do it “the right way” – I would just sell a tech to the 2, 3, or 4 closest competitors one after the other and then make the rounds of more distant competitors and sell them some outdated techs.

* Turn length is still very problematic. I recently bought a new laptop – 1.8 Ghz Intel Celeron, 256 MB RAM – not state-of-the-art by any stretch of the imagination, but a big leap ahead of my prior laptop (PII 350 Mz, 128 MB RAM). Even so, by the late middle ages / early industrial ages, I experienced delays of approximately 1 minute each twice during each turn – first after completing all of my city management decisions (builds, etc.) and then again after I had completed all of my unit moves (no background programs other than Irfanview running). Since I was playing peacefully (no excitement and resulting lengthy turns of engaging warfare), the bulk of many, many turns was waiting as AI civs went through their decision-making processes. It would have been painful to play 10 more hours to get to an AU-Mod SS victory or even several more hours to get to a standard-rules SS victory.

And now, abandoning the “bullet point” approach, an attempted over-arching view that surprised me the most – I think the huge map game is actually easier than a standard map game! This goes against all my prior experience under previous versions. Under vanilla civ v1.16, v1.17, or perhaps even v1.21, my impression was that huge map games were decidedly more difficult. Of course I recognize that my skills have improved since way back when, but I am still dazzled by one of my earlier observations – I cannot imagine securing a significant tech lead on a standard map with less than the number of cities needed to build an FP. I’m inclined to believe that the reduction in “tech whoring” over several versions, combined with the restructuring of tech costs under 1.29f (and perhaps adding in the slightly more aggressive AI posture under PTW which allows the “AI shoot itself in the foot” syndrome) means that the “scaling up” of difficulty with map size is no longer necessarily accurate.

I’ve no doubt glossed over other observations that don’t come to mind at the moment, but I’ll add more later if and when it comes to me.

EDIT: And I completely agree that the 100K culture should scale with map size.

Catt

[Arrian]

GROG LIVES!

In 1425 AD, in the middle of a massive Cavalry vs. Cav/Sam/Musket war:

[Arrian]

Grog provides me with Universal Suffrage. He will FINALLY get that Tank I promised him.

The Japanese are going down hard. A few more turns & they're toast. I'm taking about 1 city per turn (more like 2-3 every 2 turns, since I stop to heal my units).

Konquest,

Give 'em hell!

Catt,

I think you might be right in your observations. Considering the start position (ok, not great), attaining UP (yeah, I think I've got it) has been easier than I thought it would be.

-Arrian

[nbarclay]

Arrian, how big is your military right now?

[minke19104]

I won 1776 by Diplomatic Victory..

Once I gobbled Germany Zulus Babs and Vikings, the remaining civs got much too powerful for my likings.. I decided to trade with them instead. No major wars just trading techs and resources. 100 gold bribes also work wonder every time AI's attitude dropped below Polite.

In the end a total of 7 civ voted for me and America voted for itself for UN general. I realized when u get big enough more cities and lands dont necessarily mean better empire. I decided to play differently than my previous huge games, which were basically conquest games.

It was good fun playing this map, definitely took a long time. Cant wait to read more posts..

[Arrian]

Nathan,

I can check when I get home, but I figure I've got roughly 50-60 Cavalry + 5 knights (3 of which are in an army) + 10 cannon + 8 galleons (saving up for overseas actions)... the problem is I have almost no concept of how many pikemen/musketmen I have. Call it (very) roughly 135 units.

EDIT: I checked - I had 170 units.

Less than I'm allowed under Monarchy. My military costs me nothing. Still, as soon as I take down Japan, we're goin' Demo.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Slowly, steadily, winning the race...

Another update from the front:

Japan - dead.
Scandanavia - no more.
England - ceased to be (I didn't do it, I swear!)

Screenie

[nbarclay]

Why so many muskets?

[BigDork]

I agree with nbarclay. you worried about an invasion?

[vulture]

Peace In Our Time

At the start of this episode of the glorious French empire, we discover printing press, and as previously advertised, trade it for invention (plus a bit of gold) from the Americans. Invention and printing press are then traded to the Mongols (whom all the leading civs are at war with) in return for chivalry, 2 workers and 27 gold. Japan is willing to give up 28 gpt and 110 gold for printing press. Since both theology and invention have been floating around with the AI for some time, I assume that both education and gunpowder will be researched soon, so we start stockpiling cash (after noting that we could research education in 12 turns, so we won't beat the AI to it).

Next turn the Americans confirm my plan by getting gunpowder, but we're certainly not going to buy it off them just yet (520 AD)

In 560 AD, the French empire climbs to 2nd in the 'Land Area' rankings, and Japan and the Mongols also get Gunpowder (although not buy trading it with America). All of the leading civs chose gunpowder over education, possibly influenced by being at war. By 610 AD we have stockpiled enough cash to buy gunpowder, which we eventually get from the Mongols for 1531 gold and 6 gpt. The Americans were offering it for a slightly cheaper price (being a commercial civ), but the Americans, Japanese and Germans are now gaining ground in the war against the Mongols. We want to even things up, and stop America running away from everyone else in the research race, so we decide to give the money to the Mongols. The good news we get is that we have two sources of saltpetre, one of which is already on the road nework.

Ten turns after we could have started researching education as 12 turn pace, we finally start researching it ourselves, since no-one else seems to have got it yet. The very backwards Zulu declare war on the Japanese for no apparent reason, probably triggering golden ages for both of them. The Mongols presumably have had a keshik-trigger GA by now. The Americans already have chemistry...

630 AD, the Mongols build Sun-Tzu's. We have three wonder builds going on, getting near completion on the Sistine Chapel. One city is working on Leonardo's, the other on a palace prebuild. We finish the Sistine a few turns later, and our first suicide galley in the south catches sight of a purple border in the ocean before sinking. Another galley is quickly prepared, and in 720 AD succesfully complete the crossing to Scandanavia, who are horrifically backwards. Selling contacts gives 274 gold and 14 gold per turn, for contact with an entirely irrelevant civ.

[vulture]

Return of the Blitzkrieg

By 730 AD the Mongols have used their gunpowder windfall to buy off the Japanese and Americans for peace, and evidently upgraded a whole pile of horsemen to keshiks, and start to make progress against the Germans, who are a few techs off the pace. When I notice that they have reversed their previous losses and taken a few German cities, I decide it is time to implement my plan to take control of German spices, and take advantage of the fact that the German offensive force must have been entirely destroyed by now. The initial war aim is at the least to take the three southern cities (in the picture) which gives us spices and a defensible area protected by lakes. A strike force of 8 knights and 4 medieval infantry is assembled, not very much, but all I can spare from guarding the Zulu border and the southern rapid defense group.

As the war starts, we are the first to discover education, despite a 10 turn delay in starting the research. The AI are ignoring it as though it were George Bush in a French restaurant. We trade to America for chemistry, 44 gold and 17 gpt, and then to Japan as well, since the Japanese have the Great Library and will get it anyway. We get 23 gold per turn that the Japanese really didn't need to spend.

Stuttgart falls quickly to the French assault, and the second group pushes past quickly into the hills between the next two towns. Next turn, America has metallurgy. They are at peace at the moment, and have a choice of researching music theory, banking, astronomy or military tradition. It later transpires that they went for military tradition, the first time I've ever seen an AI civ beeline for that tech upon entering the middle ages. Japan annoys me by completing Leonardo's while I have 8 turns left, and I waste 280 shield convertin to a university. On the bright side, we still have the palace prebuild for Bach's, and the wonder cascade is now broken.

On the war front, we lose a knight to a longbow counterattack, nut eventually take Nuremburg after some hard fighting and heavy losses, and a stack of medieval infantry capture Brandenburg. War aims complete, Hurrah!