What is Civ3 ultimate challenge?

[Brundlefly]

I am looking for the most difficult configuration to play and win. Some parts of the game configuration are obvious: Deity level, raging barbarians, Max number of civs (but should they be random or selected?). I need some suggestions for world map size, age, continents. Also suggestions needed for game preference settings and any suggested editor tweaks. And, of course, which civ should I play? Maybe there is a mod out there already which has what I am looking for?

[badams52]

You want the most difficult configuration? Well I don't know about the exact setting that would be the hardest, but when you mentioned an editor tweak, Soren's Suggestion has got to be the best way to make the game more difficult. If you take up his challenge, I'd love to see the game.

[Gufnork]

If you want a challenge, make a map where you start in the middle of a huge desert. I highly doubt you would win.

[asleepathewheel]

you could try disabling just the civ you were using's uu and abilities.

[alexman]

May I fearfully suggest AU 208?

[Theseus]

badams, what was the 'single post' thing you did?

Feephi, I've actually never dared to try what you are suggesting. A couple of games come to mind though:

* I throw out references to "The Egyptian Mess" every once in while, a game I played in early 2002. Unfortunately, I don;t have any saves, but I can tell you that it was when I was first experimenting with using map settings to generate KAIs. IT WORKED. I know much more know then I did then, so that's obviously a factor, but it was still one of the most insanely difficult situations I've ever gotten into (I gave up a fully developed game, without even going back to replay it as I learned more, which has happened, uh, once!). Just knowing my thinking from back then, it would have been emperor, large, 1 or 2 AI civs less than the max, 3B, warm, wet, continents at 60-70%, with opponents such as Germany, France, and Russia.

* AU 208. Jesuchristo, I'm still working on a replay of this one. How many people actually played it out to a win? Two or three?

* AU 402. Friggin' great game. I have zipped the saves for when I have a Cray.

And then...

Drum roll please...

Aeson's "So Very Cold..."

Set up that kinda game, on tundra or desert, and you'll have your hands full.

Good luck.

/me snickers.

[Gufnork]

Ok, I've heard too many references for it. Where can I find AU 208?

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Gufnork
Ok, I've heard too many references for it. Where can I find AU 208?

Ok Dean you have work to do. So sad that we are not able to make this more visible.

Gufnork. go to the strat forum and find the top thread for AU. It has all the game thread in it.
Last I knew only three won AU208.

[vmxa1]

Here it is:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=83557

[badams52]

Theseus, it's a side effect from being able to ignore people. If you add "action=showpost" inside a link to a specific post, it will only show that post and not the entire thread, i.e. when you click on a link for "show post" for an ignored person, it adds that command to it.

so:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=1094039#post1094039

becomes

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?action=showpost&postid=1094039#post1094039

and make sure you have the "&" in there as well. Learned that trick in the community forum from geeslaka.

Oh, and back to ontopic, AU 208 is very difficult, but might not be so difficult if you aren't playing it as "declare war on civs you meet for the first time and never declare peace."

[Mountain Sage]

What about Deity, huge map, max civs, raging Barbarians, and of course ... OCC ?

I won OCC on Emperor, 8 civs, standard map, but got trashed every time on Deity (standard). Imagine with the above settings.

Badams52:
If you play AU208 without "declare war on civs you meet for the first time and never declare peace.", it just becomes a 'normal' civ game. Everybody will be able to win it at the level he currently plays.

[Brundlefly]

Originally posted by Gufnork
If you want a challenge, make a map where you start in the middle of a huge desert. I highly doubt you would win.

You're right - on Deity, such a start would be a death sentence. I'm not looking for an unwinnable game. I'm looking to be challenged right to the end of time all through the Modern Age. It seems like, in my experience, a game is usually decided one way or the other before Modern Age - sometimes even before Industrial. I want to actually worry about another civ getting a diplomatic victory or winning the space race or overwhelming me with military.

I guess what I want is a game perfectly balanced to my skill level as a player - and I should probably realize that such a thing is not possible. It's just frustrating sometime to lose interest before the end in a particular game I've spent a lot of time with because either me or the AI will clearly win.

I wish there was the threat of a random event or something (like a meteor crash - wasn't that in Civ1?) that could turn the tables on someone (human or AI) who is clearly winning... Then there would be a reason to continue in such a game when you appear to have won.

[Gufnork]

Play builder. Maybe you're that much better than me, but I have at best been able to keep even with the best other civs without warring in ancient/middle ages.

Another possibility would be to somehow tweak nukes so that the AI use them and make them more destructive...

[badams52]

Originally posted by Feephi
I guess what I want is a game perfectly balanced to my skill level as a player - and I should probably realize that such a thing is not possible. It's just frustrating sometime to lose interest before the end in a particular game I've spent a lot of time with because either me or the AI will clearly win.

AH, then maybe you should have called this thread "What is the best way for Civ 3 to go down to the wire?"

I myself have only 1 time been even with a civ heading into the modern age, and then that civ didn't know how to "win" the game. I researched straight into the space race techs (UN was moot since there were just the 2 of us left) whereas the civ in question dilly dallied into other techs not essential to building spaceship components and didn't make any effort to attack me to try to win that way. So what could have been a great race to see who could build the spaceship first, ended up being a runaway victory for me.

The AI will also never get the domination victory cause he always stops short when building/taking over cities. It's programmed not to exceed the optimum city number.

So I think the main problem is that the AI is not programmed to go for a win when he has the chance. It's programmed to provide a challenge which ends up just being an obstical to my eventual victory.

[Vince278]

My biggest challenge has been to keep a huge, 16 civ game running on my computer without long waits or crashing.