Alamo Testing Thread

[phunny_pharmer]

New idea- connect the inland sea to the larger ocean through San Francisco. That allows for more options when (if) that sea is cleared- it also allows another choke point if half the empire is overrun...

Make the squares in red into coast squares. If you get pushed back to here, then you can try and hold SF, a grassland, and a forest (from either side of the line) against the invaders. Could really make for some late game fireworks and some crazy launches...

Oh, yeah- if SF falls to marines on a transport, your empire is just...

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How about this, just for a plot idea- give the US a wounded force on the island with New Kyoto. A half dozen marines, a tank or three, a MI to cover it, and a few ships with 3 HP- enough to show that there are beat-up survivors.

This would look as if the US made an attack before the scenario began. Then, you can give the US player a choice about these units:

• Do you risk your fleet to save your expeditionary force?
• Do you let them die without reinforcements?
• Do you try to sneak them out undefended?
• Do you try to be audacious and capture the city?
• Do you reinforce them?

After all, there is uranium to be won...
And it would get China and Japan into the early game, too...

(Forgive me for posting these comments- I have yet to move a unit. It's time to die, now!)

[DeepO]

Vel, forget about those scared Germans, use the term smart Germans instead. They retreated because one of the transports on the inland sea had moved towards Leipzig, and was fully loaded with MAs (and one longbowman. You can't have everything, I suppose). These went around my 2 tier defense, and dropped their load behind them! When I reloaded to move my F15s where they were supposed to be (see bug 8), I couldn't help myself, and put a conscript MI on the hill, so I should have an easier time killing them... it didn't work out exactly as planned, though. Instead they were lured by another unprotected hill, and moved their transport through the sea towards it. But, as they couldn't reach it in one turn, I'll probably be able to kill their traninny, together with the 2 others that are in the middle of the sea.

The transports in the inland sea sure are a lot of fun, but it is a shame that the AIs will use these only in the first turns, and don't build new ones... is it possible to set AI city build preferences in the editor, like we can set governor build preferences in our own city? Otherwise I would definately put these on 'build naval units often' for the cities bordering the inland sea.
DeepO

[DeepO]

Phunny Pharmer, an interesting idea, but I'd do it a little different: make only the most southern of your red squares coast. That would still create a possible chokepoint if things went wrong, but will not give immediate access to the ocean. As it is now, there is a spot on the map that lets you build Panama, so you can get out of the sea if you want to. I wouldn't make that available from the start...

DeepO

[DeepO]

Oh, and about those battered up marines: let them die . I would probably disband them after they did some pillaging, or go for a crazy attempt to capture the city. they cost money, and my navy is just too dear to me to try to rescue some forces.

DeepO

[Aeson]

I just played through the first 8 turns and things seem to be going very smoothly.

I pillaged the frontline forts in on the Russian side, and fell back to second line of forts. The leader made an army, and I filled it with reg and vet MI's, it was stationed in one of them. I also pillaged the frontline forts on the German front and fell back. I was able to hold onto all 6 manned forts, but with heavy losses in the Russian (non-army) fort.

First turn builds were all Workers, 2 Settlers, and a Battleship in the inland sea (4 turns). The Workers really helped keep the terrain improvements in place, one Settler built Panama, the other a Coastal city on the SE fort, German side. I figured it would make a good port city to help combat the German fleet that had built up there last time through.

Both my Southern fleets were sent west, which was probably a bit of overkill. No one got close to landing on the western shores so far, sunk about 20 transports, and at least 50 other ships. The eastern shore has been a lot more interesting, 1 Chinese transport making it through and landing some Marines (which were slaughtered by MA's). There were several other close calls.

I ended up building Magellan's, which helps, but wasn't necessary. On the fourth turn I had really bad luck, and the Russians broke through 1 fort (8 MI's taken out by 10 MA's). But I quickly took it back. When the Armies showed up I nuked once on both the Russian and German fronts, killing 5 Armies and a huge fleet of Destroyers. Another Army was taken out by loose MA's.

So far I've been able to save most of the named ships, but one of my Talon's got shot down! I had sent some MA's (8 of them) to pillage the mountain roads on the German side, and saw their armies approaching. My MA's all got wiped out and I needed to make sure the German Armies wouldn't get to attack without sitting outside my city for a turn. So I used my entire Hawk and Talon wings to bomb the roads, all but one of my Hawks getting shot down.

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It seems this version is the easiest so far, probably just because I know what's coming. The first time through I spent way too much time building Granaries, Courthouses, and Police Stations. Focusing on building up a navy (8 Battleships in the first 6 turns!) and having so many more ships to start has made for a bit of overkill on the seas. Or maybe it's just not having any Stealth Fighters...

[Velociryx]

Back at the editor and ready to make some changes in light of incoming stories about the latest version.

Aeson, in your recommendation, should we trim the number of ships the US has at game start?

As it is, I'll definately reduce the total number of hp's available on America's side of the front lines, and will reduce the size of the land bridge south of San Fran, and possibly even fortify it in advance.

Other notions?

-=Vel=-

[DeepO]

Beta 4 test

First of all, I kind of feel bad I'm currently playing Civ instead of enjoying the beatyful sun outside, we don't get that much good summer days in Belgium, but this certainly is one of them. Oh well, the sun will shine again, the Alamo is happening now!

Notes while setting up the game: indeed, those two workers underneath your RAs would probably be too much, just move one of them somewhere else, and you'll ensure that before turn 2 there can't be much road bombing on the fronts...

I'm glad you have put policestations everywhere, this will make it a lot easier on battling WW. Probably this alone is the reason why it is not as bad as in the previous tests. With just 20% lux, nearly all my cities are in WLTKD (this will change once the first fighting breaks out), a big improvement over last time. And the intial build orders are also well balanced, people will adjust where needed. For the test, I won't be building ship parts, of course.

The naming is a very nive touch, I had quite a few chuckles out of them. However, one typo (I think): shouldn't it be USS Apocalypse, instead of Apocolypse? I'm sorry the 'not your average scud' has gone, personally I found that the best one. After all, we are playing the Americans

I tried to steal plans, but I haven't got enough cash for any of them... should be fixed the next turn. Of course this is bit of a disadvantage that I can't rush things, but we'll get over it

Damn... I forgot about my leader. I changed the place of the Magellan to the least producing city, but forgot to wake my leader! Vel, maybe it is best if you just leave him as is, not putting him to sleep. Maybe others are more careful then I am, but I was lucky that I keep to saves per turn around.

In turn two, everything went about as planned, except for the buggy F15s on carriers. I will try to find some workaround in the next few turns...

The inland sea has become a litte harder, not because of more units (At least I expect them to be the same), but because the AIs do not attck the two attack subs that were there initially. As a result, their ships are not exposed so much, and more of my ships take hits. I concentrate on the transport for now, I'll clean up after they're gone.

The other ships seemed to be positioned right, except perhaps one of the tactical subs, I would put both of these at the south pole, so they're bot out of position, instead of one being good, and the other one having to go for 5 turns before reaching the other coast. But this is nothing major, just a little bit of nit-picking.

In turn 3 I finally had money enough to steal maps, even if the Russians were still killing my spies. The Chinese seem to be doing well, although I'm not sure about the German transports. They still have plenty of them, and I'll have to keep an eye to see whether they are moving their troops towards the transports or not. The Japanese, however, seem unwillingly to use their transports, and are coming by land. They have a MPP with them (first time I see that, maybe that has something to do with it. Some of their transports are loaded, and are coming towards me.

I'm doing turn 4 right now, but I'm going to stop it. Still a few comments to make, but as a mate just arrived to go drink something, there's no time to fully explain everything. Vel, I agree with Aeson, it is getting way to easy. But I have some ideas how to solve this, one of them is giving the AIs more armies (far away, so they won't rush you with it in the intitial turns.)

More this evening,

DeepO

[DeepO]

Vel, don't reduce our navy by much, but perhaps make it less experienced... Don't forget that we are doing this a few times already now, and focus on the test, more then the building of the ship...

DeepO

[Velociryx]

A very good point! Will do, then...I'll go through and tweak some of our ships to give us fewer hp's overall.

Was also thinking about *possibly* reducing the USA's ships by a handful but increasing the a.d.m values of nuclear subs marginally (perhaps giving them +2/+2 on their attack and defense values. How would that sit, from your view?

I've also been toying with the notion of giving DD's a slight power boost. Thoughts there?

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

Mystery solved as to why I cannot get the AI to declare war on us.

Seems that the option to demand troop removal or declare war doesn't appear until the after the AI takes its first turn. That's no good for us, cos invariably, the AI moves his attack force off....and screws up the whole timing thing....*sigh* So...it looks like we're gonna have to remain the badguys in the war.

That means higher war weariness, and an eventually toppled US Democracy, but the alternative is to totally screw the attack tempo.

So....I'll remove the archers I had placed in US territory, leaving nothing but four workers, and do it the way I was doing it before.

And btw, our elite spies SUCK lately for some reason. I have done prolly a dozen tests since last night, and every time, I fail to plant a spy somewhere...UGH....

-=Vel=-

[Aeson]

Between building Panama (uniting the inland fleet with the western), and building all those Battleships early on, it really unbalanced things. Without that it probably would have been a lot closer battle on the seas. I admit that just playing through twice so far, I've probably learned more about proper sea warfare than in all my previous Civ3 experience altogether. The mortality rate on the sea this last game has been about 20:1 in my favor.

It's pretty fun the way it is now, I wouldn't change too much. The 'easy' factor has more to do with the way the AI uses it's navy (exposing their ships at the end of turns, following cultural borders instead of staying out to sea, ect.), rather than numbers.

[Brinoch]

Vel, Aeson's point is well made. We're doing better in our tests because we know what to expect. The first turn I played in one of the earlier scenarios I had my head handed to me -- because I had no expectations. Now I know to keep an eye on the Germans, raze my tier one forts and hunker down.

Another thought: I think the 'skittishness' of the Germans comes from not wanting to expose their units to a counterattack. When I pull back my lines, they tend to funnel in and attack the southern-most hilltop. This leaves any successful attackers -- like MA armies unfortified in plains. Which are gleefully wiped out. I like the plains there though -- it really makes you think.

With regard to the naval situation: I wouldn't really change anything. I haven't done as well as Aeson and DeepO on stopping their navies. Of course, I'm also not as good as they are. I *think* I can hold, even with my reduced forces, but it'll be a suck-it-in-and-pray ordeal.

Well, I'm gonna get back to playing here and see if those bad boys pull any surprises.

[Velociryx]

Alamo 1.0 Final?

'k guys....here's the compilation of all the latest. Not too many changes, though I did hopefully restore Germany's initial aggression on turn one, and gave both the Germans and Russians a small stash of "surprise" units that may or may not wind up being used correctly by the AI....(besides, gotta throw in a few curveballs for those of you who have played it a time or three already!)

I *think* this is the one tho....unless you guys find any major flaws in it, I believe this'll be the save we post on the other thread. Let me know if I screwed up anyplace!

-=Vel=-

PS: Still can't get Gramphos' save game editor to cooperate with me, so if anybody can figure a way to coax the starting year to 1950, that'd be a great help!

[Brinoch]

All right, I just downloaded the latest (final?) version. I'll give it a whirl tonight or tomorrow morning. I must go see Goldmember tonight and get some actual work done.

I played the old game for about two hours today, and the AI just kept coming and coming.

The Chinese were very aggressive, but not too intelligently so. I used one nuke on a transport/Aegis stack and picked off the rest. They are down to 27 marines and less than 10 transports.

The Germans were Germans. I vaporized two MA armies and one MI army in one blow, along with assorted marines, MI, and MA. They are now under one hundred MA. They have been reduced to using marines to assault my lines.

Interestingly enough, the Russians have been the most creative and dangerous. They landed two transports full of MI, MA and Marines along the inner sea shore behind my lines. This is really interesting -- once I consolidated control of the inner sea, I used DD's to look around the coasts. The Russians were sending their MA armies through German territory to avoid my 19 and 20 point MI defenders on the Russian front. I turned them back by plinking at them with naval bombardment. I want to save my ICBM's for when I really need 'em. The AI should accept the plinks as acceptible losses. Those MA armies will crack a fortress and sunder the front if they just accept the losses and get there.

I have a 17 and an 18 point MI army on the German front, and a fortess with a dozen MI and MA's, backed by 6 RA. I have a leader, but I'm saving him for later...

The Japanese, I surmise, are moving their troops over land to hit me. They finally arrived on the naval front. I'm really killing a lot of ships. It's gotten so that I just use bombers and stealths to wound and turn back the Japanese DD's, while I hunt and kill the Chinese. Once the Chinese transports are gone, I think I can handle the remaining navies. Both nation's transports are going for Chicago, which is undefended. They sail through a nasty air/sea gauntlet to get there.

Everyone has ROP's and MPP's with each other. In previous versions the Japanese land assault was here by now. They might be going through Germany to avoid those powerful armies.

It's too bad the Japanese and Chinese didn't coordinate their naval manuevers. Ah well, it's challenging enough...

[Brinoch]

Well, I've played the first turn, and it seems okay.

The Russians and Germans came on full force, as expected. Against Russia, I pulled back to the tier two forts, except for the tier one with an RA that stood down. I razed the forts and let the Bear come on at me.

On the German front, the same strategy. Save your RA and raze your other forts. In T2, raze the other tier one forts and consolidate your second tier.

Both the Russians and Germans took one fort, and I *needed* the mountain RA to take back my eastern front fort. So, that's good. It means their road structure is still basically in place and should offer them another strong attack this coming turn.

I used my scouts as blockers in Germany and Russia -- they both died (well, Russia captured it), but they took and extra attack away from the AI.

I used my leader to build Magellan. I like the extra move and I figure I'll get a leader in a reasonable amount of time. I haven't yet, but I know I will.



***Spoilers****













I have to tell you, the cruise missiles were fun. They both have 5 or 6 left after the first turn. They focused on Boston and Miami and really beat up the units there -- no reinforcement help from there. They also weakened my front line units enough to lose an extra MI on each front. In fact, I held one fort against Germany by the skin of my teeth. The cooks and mechanics were doing the fighting, cause that MI took a pounding.

More to come.