4th Apolyton CtP2 SP Tournament: 3 September - 3 November 2002

[Dread_Doomfist]

Locutus: have you tried to finish my save-game?? i can't...the game crashed every time..if i try this...

[ETB]

I was able to achieve a science victory in my game! I guess that I’ll have to email it to Locutus because it is too big to post! Unfortunately, CtP2 crashes on my machine after viewing the science victory movie - how disappointing after nearly 900 turns! I hope that Locutus has better luck than I did in getting past the victory movie.

I also ran into 2 fatal problems during gameplay. The first occurred when I negotiated peace with the Carths. The game would crash shortly after I accepted their cease-fire. If I didn’t accept the cease-fire, then the game wouldn’t crash. (I began to wonder if Cradle was designed for really aggressive play!) I only had stealth units in Carth territory, but I was moving them out because I had GlobeSat and I didn’t need the stealth units for surveillance anymore. I found that I could disband the units near Carth cities and the game would no longer crash after I accepted the cease-fire. I could not see if the Carths were attempting to expel my units or attack them after accepting the cease-fire, but I am confident that the crash I was experiencing is related to the Carths attempting to do something on a stealth unit near one of their cities. I had only spies and corporate branches in Carth territory, so I disbanded or moved them away from Carth units and cities to continue my game.

The second problem occurred late in the game when I completed the tech tree. No matter what I did, CtP2 would lock up (or freeze) rather than let me research Hextapul. Life Extension was the last advance that I researched. The game would not allow me to switch to Hextapul before I completed researching Life Extension and it would always freeze at the beginning of my turn after I completed my research of Life Extension. I didn’t need Life Extension, so I increased its science cost so I would not complete it before I completed the GAIA project. I am wondering if this somehow causes my game to crash after viewing the science victory movie…

[ETB]

Originally posted by Dread_Doomfist
Locutus: have you tried to finish my save-game?? i can't...the game crashed every time..if i try this...

I tried your game and it behaves exactly like mine – it crashes after the victory movie plays! Fortunately, we can calculate our scores by using the score before the movie and add the victory bonus amount (and the amount for your final city). This is certainly strange though. My CtP2 had not crashed before I played this game, although I haven’t played as many games as most folks here. I really enjoyed playing this game though.

Originally posted by mnbryan37
I may not finish either. It is a very long game. I have more than enough playing time in to have finished any other game, but am only at 500AD. A win is possible, but the tactics are weird. Instead of normal or historical tactics, one must take advantage of the existing AI weaknesses, as it is impossible to beat them by raw force. I have eliminated 2 AI's and have a third on the ropes. To accomplish this I had to lure troops out of their cities, rush in and destroy the city and then run like hell. This, to me , is not the way the game should be played. I am fighting with Legions, Catapults, and even still some Archers.

I didn’t think to try that tactic. I was able to take most of the Persian and Greek cities early on in my game because many of their cities were poorly defended, although I had to build four separate invasion forces to do it. That must have given me the empire base required to catch up in science in time to take on the Etruscans. The Etruscans, Carthaginians, Celts, and Nubians all had well-defended cities, so it was slow going when compared to the Greeks and Persians! I built lots of forts so I could refresh my troops, attack an AI stack or city, retreat to a nearby fort with few or no losses and rotate in a fresh stack. I spent over 100 turns in this type of combat with the Etruscans and I would wear down each stack until I could eliminate it. I didn’t take many cities during these turns because they were too well defended. The tide changed when I was able to build an air force and attack with air and ground troops.

Originally posted by mnbryan37
The next two AI's I need to take on have Infantry and Knights (which is crazy, gunpowder didn't exist in 500 AD), but the final AI (Pink) has Bombers, Fighters, Machine Gunners, and Artillery already!!. Pink has a stack of these approaching one of my main cities. I have no choice but to give up the city, as it would take at least 50 troops to try to defend it.

I noticed the readme for Cradle states that the timeline doesn’t match history. I built the Solaris wonder in 1850, which definitely doesn’t match history! Many times I was able to take AI cities and then watch in amazement as they retreated even though I was severely outnumbered. It turned out to work often enough that I continued some campaigns with a lot more aggression than normal. Of course, I got really mad when the AI would counter-attack me! I had plenty of turns where I intently watched the AI move troops near weak stacks, empty or weak cities, or stealth units and I wondered what they would do. Fortunately for me, they didn’t exploit my vulnerabilities. I think Shadow is playing such a high-risk type of game. It works well as long as you can keep your opponents off-guard!

I also saw the AI keep its word in many agreements. The Persians kept their promise not to trespass for almost 700 turns! The Egyptians were the only AI to attack me after negotiating a cease-fire during the entire game, which I thought was odd in CtP2. I certainly expect the AI to break their word more often. The anti-piracy agreements were broken quite often though. I guess that it’s hard for the AI not to pirate! I found that the AI doesn’t like to be embargoed and the AI will honor it’s anti-piracy agreement the longest when it is tied to lifting an embargo against them. But it takes along time to negotiate such an agreement!

[mnbryan37]

I concur that thw AI's still don't use their military advantage very well. I survived a number of close calls while the AI "danced" around prior to attacking. In my game, I was able to take a number of poorly defended cities early, as most of you did, but I found out early that it could take up to 3 stacks of my forces to take a well defended city, so I adopted the "lure, attack, destroy, and run" technique for those. My empire had pretty much caught up with all the other AI's except for Red and Pink. If I started the game over I would go after them earlier in the game, as their "personality" make-up (Populist Zealot and Evil Genius) make the best military leaders. By 500 AD Pink was so far ahead of everyone else, including me, that I am sure a military victory against them is not possible. They have Planes, Artilary, and Tanks, vs my Legions and Catapults, not much of a match. They brought in a stack of Tanks at about 550AD, and proceeded to wipe out a third of my forces in less than 10 turns.

If anyone scores a military victory in this game I'll buy them diner!!!

[centrifuge]

Originally posted by mnbryan37

If anyone scores a military victory in this game I'll buy them diner!!!

Sounds like a fun challenge, not that I want the dinner, but post the game I'd like to give it shot. Espescially, since I feel like I got jipped since I got the such an early peaceful end to my game.

[Maquiladora]

Incidently centrifuge, what exactly did you do to get all the AI's so happy so soon?

[centrifuge]

Nothing out of the ordinary, I swear!!! I just made a beeline for diplomats, and took advantage of the main weakness that the game has... the diplomacy. If you take a diplomat to another civ, it is possible to get an alliance with them on the very first meeting. The things to remeber is that a tougher civ likes you to act meek... Until they reject your propasal, then they cave in if you threaten to declare war. It was always the same... either had to be meek or friendly/equal... and then give them a threat. After an alliance is made, no matter how it was made, the AI alway holds you in high regard.

[Maquiladora]

I suppose that is very possible. I think i wouldve expected one of the AI's to ask you to attack the other because of the alliance, i always get that crap.

Anyway im on for a military victory now, although i have no idea how far ahead pink is in tech, havent bothered to ferry a diplomat across yet.

I noticed the AI defends it's cities well with wonders in though, or maybe its just a coincidence in my game. I keep using the old crossed swords over the city trick though, its my only way to take any cities.

[centrifuge]

Originally posted by Maquiladora
I suppose that is very possible. I think i wouldve expected one of the AI's to ask you to attack the other because of the alliance, i always get that crap.

Ohh, they did, absolutely... They would ask me to attack another civ, I'd counter and say well, okay I'll attack if you give me your best city (something that I knew they would refuse ) this would break the alliance, but all that I had to do was turn around, and remake the alliance as soon as it was my turn(suckers ) . This kept happening, until I got alliances with everyone, at which point the game was over.

[Dread_Doomfist]

Originally posted by mnbryan37
If anyone scores a military victory in this game I'll buy them diner!!!

uuuhm...look at my save-game..it's the military-victory..ok..military win in the last year..but i had wait..for a higher score....

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by mnbryan37
The next two AI's I need to take on have Infantry and Knights (which is crazy, gunpowder didn't exist in 500 AD)...

Actually, this doesn't seem too out-of-the-ordinary, given how the tech tree is structured. Gunpowder is available in the Medieval Age, and Infantrymen are only the second gunpowder unit...

Originally posted by mnbryan37
...but the final AI (Pink) has Bombers, Fighters, Machine Gunners, and Artillary already!!. Pink has a stack of these approaching one of my main cities. I have no choice but to give up the city, as it would take at least 50 troops to try to defend it.

This, however is incredible...Seems the AI doesn't have a problem in the area of research - and it is out-performing what I expected it to be able to do. And up to this point in time (version 1.3-1.31), players had been reporting that the Human was able to catch up, tech-wise, to the AI during the Medieval Ages. I did not change anything that would give the AI a greater advantage from 1.31 to 1.32 either.

Question: were you keeping close to the city caps???

[ETB]

Originally posted by Dread_Doomfist
uuuhm...look at my save-game..it's the military-victory..ok..military win in the last year..but i had wait..for a higher score....

Well then it’s settled – we’ll all meet in Germany for dinner!

I was wondering why you left that one Egyptian city until the end of time, now it makes sense

I would not want to replay this game though. I consider myself extremely lucky after having read some of the posts here. Hopefully we’ll see more end game files soon.

[mnbryan37]

Hexagonian,

By "City Caps" I assume you mean the max cities allowed for each govt. I used. Yes, in fact I was always 2-4 cities over each time I moved up to an improved govt. I also maxed out my research slider and also maxed out selected cites, that I was starving out, with scientist's. As a result, I was close to all the other AI's in technology by 400AD, except for Pink.

I have tried 2 other Cradel games, at about the same settings, and did not have this problem, at least up to 500AD or so.

DD

I am impressed!!! You must be very good and very lucky. I've played a lot of Conquest games in CTP2 and CIV2, and never lost before. I haven't looked at your game yet. Were you able to get close to Pink in Technology before you went to war with them?

Next time you're in Minnesota, dinner is on me!

Magailadoia

I have not found the same trend as you as to which cities are most heavily defended. It seems pretty random to me. In fact I usually send Tonto into town (an American joke) ahead of my main attack force to determine how many troops are there. It's a suicide mission, but is a good use for my obsolete troops.

What is the "crossed swords over the city" trick?

[centrifuge]

Originally posted by mnbryan37

What is the "crossed swords over the city" trick?

This is a small bug in CTP2, that allows you to know whether a city is defended or not. If you run your unit selected cursor over a city that is defended, crossed swords will show up, if its undefended they won't.

[Jesper Portus]

Originally posted by ETB
Well then it’s settled – we’ll all meet in Germany for dinner!

I hope I can win by bloodlust too!
Maybe a big fiesta in ol´ Germany?


Status: 500 AD
Citys: 39 (one lost this round to the egyptians )
Research: Banking
Research race: Far behind pink, purple and blue, even with orange (Maya, former egyptian slaves and ) and my only friend violett.
War: All but the violett.
Progress: Fast reasearch to hunt the AI, maybe I can catch them in 750 AD?

So long
JP