Ultimate Power: a more pragmatic approach - Page 6

Mountain Sage · June 4, 2003, 05:01

Arrian,

Irrigation: since Atlanta was the last city I buit, I carried over irrigation from Roxane to Erin, then to Philadelphia.
I know that plain grassland should be mined, but unfortunately I can't stand the sight of 'just' mines. Ah well (pun -almost- unintended), it's cracker's again for me...
Barbs: I went back and checked: empty hut!

I'll post the end of this game tomorrow, then it's AU208

I'll play Apprentice Chieftain.

Arrian · June 4, 2003, 10:10

You know, you *could* just decide you don't want to play AU208, if the thought of nonstop war doesn't interest you.

Hell, even I am playing in bursts - it gets tiring after a while, fighting off nonstop attacks.

-Arrian

vmxa1 · June 4, 2003, 14:35

Don't forget the depression of not doing well for sooooo long. I have only been able to take a few hours at a sitting.
I don't mind being behind, but I can usually see the point where I will start to move to the front, not in AU208.

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:27

Quote:

Originally posted by Arrian
You know, you *could* just decide you don't want to play AU208, if the thought of nonstop war doesn't interest you.

-Arrian

And miss all the fun of getting slaughtered? No way.
I'll play Carthage, start on Deity and go down a level every time I'm annihilated.

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:28

1485 AD: The Babylonians declared war, and promptly lost the only ‘red’ city in my ‘blue lagoon’.

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:31

1665 AD: PUP at its best. Long live the Americans!

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:32

1848 AD: mathematics for beginners: 1+1 = 1+1
1 stupid civ (the Babs) + 1 stupid civ (the Vikings) = …

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:33

1900 AD: … = 1 continent for 1 civ only.

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:34

1900 AD: my last wonder with my 8th GL. Useless, but pretty.

Mountain Sage · June 5, 2003, 06:35

1902 AD: Arrian’s Temptation: why not destroy the whole Zulu army (they were ‘helping’me against the Babs), just to be on the safe side?

I’ll never know the answer, since on the same turn I won by domination (after 23 hours of play!!!!!).

Mountain Sage · August 22, 2003, 11:11

Hi everybody,

Anybody interesting in comparing game strategies and achievements, waiting for the next AU?
My latest game: Greece, emperor (easy, even for Arrian!), standard, 8 civs
Screenshots and comments for BC: 2500, 1500 150; AD 10, 1100, 1350, 1500, 1700, 1800 and the last turn.

Your starting point:

Mountain Sage · August 22, 2003, 11:13

And the save (PTW):

vmxa1 · August 22, 2003, 20:30

MS I have two games going now to try to debug a problem with Firaxis. Why not start a new thread for this so we will not have to load all the old pcs or thread jack. It will be easier to follow. Just a thought. That way people can come back to at a later date.

Arrian · August 23, 2003, 12:11

Emperor, MS, is not easy for me. It's a challenge, and it tends to feel more like "work" than "play." That's why I only occasionally venture up there. Most of the time, I play on Monarch. It's more fun for me.

I actually haven't been playing much civ lately, so I'll pass on this one for now.

-Arrian

Mountain Sage · September 2, 2003, 04:22

Please put your comments about my last posted game under the 'Emperor Games: how to improve your skills' thread.

Arrian,
You and YS have at least one thing in common (besides being just a bit on the dark side): you both should go up a level. Hey! A whole new world opening in front of you at Emperor, with UP, perfect P/FP placement, civs to kill, corruption to check, luxuries to grasp....

fanes7 · September 2, 2003, 06:27

There are so many pictures, I like this topic very much, but a monarch game... I wouldn't play it.

This is my first GL, he is soooo cooool !

And the second !

any suggestion is welcome !

Vlado · September 2, 2003, 09:15

Hmmm, these last couple of pics do not look like they're from either PtW or CivIII. Maybe a little breach of security around Conquest?

Yahweh Sabaoth · September 2, 2003, 10:18

Yeah, those units look pretty rad. Where're they from?

Arrian · September 2, 2003, 12:23

Looks like some type of mod (note the popup from the GL creation... it should be unit-naming... something's a bit off there).

-Arrian

fanes7 · September 3, 2003, 00:15

I named these two units, but the pictures didn't show them.

If you want to see them, I will upload their pictures.

It's PtW1.14f, scenario DYP1.00X, I will upload the scenario's technology-tree.

Vlado · September 3, 2003, 02:44

Where's all the chinese signs from. As far as I can tell they don't change btw either countries (compare what's written behind rome, england) nor do they change in the right corner by the number (comåare the two pics).

I must say that It looks quite nice though. I escpecially like the wheats.

Mountain Sage · September 3, 2003, 02:56

fanes7,
This is not a Monarch game, but an Emperor one. Why don't you give it a try, even if it's a bit low for you, and post your screenshots with us?

Arrian · September 3, 2003, 09:45

Quote:

Originally posted by Mountain Sage

Arrian,
You and YS have at least one thing in common (besides being just a bit on the dark side): you both should go up a level. Hey! A whole new world opening in front of you at Emperor, with UP, perfect P/FP placement, civs to kill, corruption to check, luxuries to grasp....

Actually, last night I finally went back to finish an Emperor game I'd put on hold.

I will admit I got very lucky in this particular game with leaders. Extremely lucky, actually. The result is a game in which my empire looks almost like it would at Monarch*, but the difference is that the AI has been (almost) able to keep up with me in tech, and they have bigger armies & better culture.

I loaded up my saved game, and found myself in 1030AD, still a Monarchy, researching Steam Power (I'm China, btw). I immediately revolted and switched to Democracy.

I have smashed 3 out of 4 of my neighbors. Korea & India still exist, but are pretty much meaningless. Japan is dead. Mongolia, on the other hand... yeesh. #2 in power, #1 in culture. They have the Pyramids, Copernicus, Magellan and Newton's. I hate them. I covet their possessions. And I will have them. But not yet.

Sometime in the 1200s, the Mongols attacked me. Due to damn good luck on their part, they actually took a border city in the initial attack. This irritated me, not only because I lost the city, but because I always preach that you should avoid putting yourself in a position where 1 or 2 bad RNG rolls can screw you. I had 3 out of 4 of my border cities heavily fortified. I just wasn't paying attention to the 4th. So, when the 1st Mongol Cavalry unit killed my infantry, I was in trouble. My backup defender (guerilla) knocked out 2 more Cavs and redlined the last one before falling.

I was not amused. I was in full builder mode, having completed ToE, and nearly Hoover & Uni Suff. My railnet was almost done. I was building stock exchanges. Arg!

I took back my border city and then spent the next ~6 turns killing incoming Mongol units. They had a LOT of them, and seem to be able to replace them pretty quickly (I have to remind myself that they only need to muster 32 shields/turn for 2-turn Cavs). I also continued to get a bunch of really unlucky results, but thankfully had just enough firepower to avoid serious harm. I generated 3 leaders (2 armies, one of which - the 2x elite* Cav - got itself killed, and Wall Street), and then managed to take my first Mongol city (thank goodness they don't have Rep Parts yet), capturing Magellan's. War weariness is starting to really kick in, though. Considering they attacked me, I was surprised at how soon it started hurting me. Part of it may have been the alliances/MPPs they got with Korea and India, so that I was at war with 2-3 civs at any given time. I did make peace with India, and will with Korea shortly. Maybe that will help a bit.

Speaking of alliances, I made one of my own. Aside from Mongolia, there are 3 AIs that matter: Egypt, Rome, Carthage. They share a continent, and at the time of the Mongol attack, Egypt was at war with Carthage. I decided that those two were unlikely to pick any more fights for the time being, and therefore Rome was the worry. So I enlisted them as my ally vs. the Mongols. Unfortunately for me, that alliance lasts 12 more turns. I did just manage to wrangle the 8th luxury via trade, so that should take the edge off of WW for a little bit, and luxury spending isn't yet a problem (10% right now).

The current plan is to capture 2-3 more Mongol cities (probably raze 'n rebuild) in the next 12 turns, and then make peace. I'm really hoping I can get nationalism out of the Mongols in the peace treaty, but as of now they laugh at me when I suggest that. That annoys me, because I really want communism for the police stations, but if I detour, my tech lead in the industrial corridor will take a hit. I need those PSs, though!

I still haven't learned humility, have I?

-Arrian

* - Directly or indirectly due to my leader luck, I have: a decently-placed FP, the Great Library, SunTzu, Sistine, Leos, Bach. I forget who has Smith's... me? ToE, Hoover, U.S. Anyway, I'm doing great on the wonder front.

Master Zen · September 3, 2003, 11:10

Arrian,
With your knowledge of the game, I honestly doubt you'll have much trouble on emperor. I made the jump around january-february and have only gone back to Monarch one or two times, only to find it ridiculously easy.

And trust me, I am not the kind of guy who loves to micro-manage. In fact I hate it. I usually play fast and by instinct. One of the last games I played I was winning despite having built no wonders and having a crappy desert start. So it can be done...

On the other hand, I don't think it is possible to rush through Deity unless you have a godly start.... and play with Persia! (the only civ I've managed to beat deity with)

.

Arrian · September 3, 2003, 11:30

I know I'm capable of playing on Emperor, MZ. It just requires an adjustment in my expectations. That's the hard part.

I don't like the hole Emperor puts you in. I can climb out of it, but I don't really enjoy doing it. I have more fun on Monarch. The game I mentioned above is different, because the early leader luck gave me quite a boost.

-Arrian

vmxa1 · September 3, 2003, 12:17

Quote:

Originally posted by Master Zen
On the other hand, I don't think it is possible to rush through Deity unless you have a godly start.... and play with Persia! (the only civ I've managed to beat deity with)

.

Does this count as as a godly start? I fired up a deity on a small map. I am not sure if I ever played a game on a small map, so I am not sure if this is normal start or not. Anyway I had 4 cities and three luxs, with the next city owned my another civ very close having a fourth lux.
I plan to grab it next, so with 4 luxs this game is a cake walk. I got Colosus and Pyramid and have GL building.
America went to war on me while I was building the last two and triggger my GA. They only sent 3 units and followed with two more. I had a wall and Num Mercs, it was very funny. Thanks for the elites. I put up walls as I could see three civs and figured the action would come soon and I would stay below size 6 for a bit. The luxs means, I will not stay below 6 for long.
So what I was wondering is this common for a small map to have all those luxs nearby. I can also see ivory not too far away. Being able to have extra citizens and have them work is so strong at this level. I am behind in tech, but that is about the only thing that looks normal to me. I would have expected a lot more units to come my way by now.

Arrian · September 3, 2003, 12:53

Well, small maps are designed for 6 civs, but still have 8 luxury types. So, instead of the 1:1 ratio on standard maps, you have a 1.33 : 1 ratio. You're more likely to grab more luxes. That being said, getting 3 right off the bat on Deity, with a 4th in reach is probably abnormal.

But I don't often play small maps. In fact, I think I've only done it once.

-Arrian

vmxa1 · September 3, 2003, 15:35

That is about what I thought. Like I said, I do not remember playing on small or tiny. I think I tried one of each the first month the game came out and never again until now. I was trying to get a game done in one afternoon for trouble shooting. Each time I report in my findings they want me to reinstall. So I am starting new games all the time, not wanting to risk any corruption in the new test. I must have 10 games partial done now.
I save them in case they ever figure out what the problem/solution .....

fanes7 · September 4, 2003, 00:37

Quote:

Originally posted by Mountain Sage
fanes7,
This is not a Monarch game, but an Emperor one. Why don't you give it a try, even if it's a bit low for you, and post your screenshots with us?

Well, I am very busy resently, I almost can't play one hour at night because of overtime-working, I downloaded your em4000bc.save, and I will play it at weekend.

Thanks very much!

I am very eager to communicate my experience with you, but my reading is so bad, even I will headache when look at a big mountain passage or article, ;-).

I thinks the most important thing is the game is easy, and we must enjoy with playing it, we shouldn't abuse ourselves by the game. Do your best, and you will enjoy your achievement in the game, by this, you will forget some unhappy thing in the realworld and become more self-confident.

Mountain Sage · September 4, 2003, 06:40

Quote:

Originally posted by Arrian

I still haven't learned humility, have I?

-Arrian

Well, no. But you are not the only one

At least you know the game well enough to give your 'bragging' a very solid foundation.
Other players, on the other hand...

I believe that Master Zen is right. You'll have the same fun on Emperor, once your brains realize that you can't be number 1 from the very first turn.
As for getting out of the 'Emperor hole', this is also mostly psychological. I went thru the same mental process.
Try the Greece game on my 'Emperor games' thread. it's an easy one, exactly your style. You won't be disappointed.