Adv 39 - zeka

[zeka]

Before playing my first deity single player game, I made sure to read some reports from epic 4 and epic 10 mostly to know how to deal with the barbs and the AIs, though there was not raging barbarians this time as it was in epic 4. So after reading useful information and playing a test game with the same map conditions but random civs to avail the turntime of wonders, religions and other stuff, I started to figure out how could I win this game.

The main results of the test game were:

- T08 Buddhism falls.
- T16 Appear the first barb.
- T38 Stonehenge is completed.
- T40 Barbs invade.
- T44 The Great Wall is built.
- T56 Oracle is built.
- T65 The first AI to research Alphabet.
- T80 All AIs land are filled.
- T84 Pyramids is built.
- T88 Second civ with Alphabet.

I wrote the turns of civs getting alphabet cause I was considering an alphabet brokering as the majority leaders/civilizations prefer to research other techs, we are on a Pangaea map and T88 for the 2nd civ with it was somewhat late, so I could get it around T80 after researching the vital techs Bronze working and Animal Husbandry. So the first short goal of plan #1 was to get alphabet soon, while expanding. With early writing, chop a library in the 2nd city and run 2 scientists (helping the research of alphabet) while the capital builds settlers and workers. Eventually, the 1st or 2nd scientist would bulb philosophy and another brokering era would begin. Talking about victory conditions it would probably be culture, though diplomacy was an option and the leader choice encouraged space. Domination would be a viable option as sooooo demonstrated in epic 10 but one of my major rules when playing civ is to not play a long game and to pursue the fastest victory.
Plan #2 was way more aggressive in terms of risk and delay of the growth curve. It was based on an Apostolic Palace victory, after bulbing theology from the Great Prophet from Oracle (getting Code of Laws). T56 for Oracle could be achieved with some efforts, although it would delay the 2nd city and some important techs. Grabbing one of the 2 earliest religions was encouraged too.

After all the planning, I started the game to discover we don’t start with mysticism neither mining as usual for Pacal, but agriculture and the wheel (and a combat I warrior also). What was that?! Probably a “don’t try to get an early religion you fool!” or a “let’s build up granaries and cottage the land asap”. About the civ/leader choice it was a great choice as exp/fin were nice for a builder civ, trying to pursue a space or culture victory, besides of the resourceless Holkan to defend against barbs (it turned out later that it was a total waste UU as the AIs rapidly covered the fog) but I think a phiolosphical civ would be better for a increased chance of victory (maybe Elizabeth or Peter). Well, it was more challenging though.
So without mysticism, plan #2 ’s poor chance of success was totally discarded and I chose plan #1, with the beeline for alphabet after researching AH, BW, hunting, pottery and mysticism. OK, this is not a direct beeline in fact…
Moved the warrior to the hill NE of the settler in order to explore the river tiles. The settler founded Mutal in place, getting corn, cattle, dyes and lots of grasslands and grass hills, a fantastic all-around (food, hammer and commerce) city. Looking now after the game I should have put the city 1 east to get the bananas.





I chose AH first instead of hunting to get the cows sooner than the corn in order to have more production to build warriors for fog busting. In this way I could grow up the capital to size 5 while building 4 warriors after the worker and then build the 1st settler.
The C1 warrior explores NE then clockwise, despite of the revelation of a hut SW of Mutal’s border. He found Mehmed, a lion (which attacked the warrior on a hill and dead) and Mansa Musa. Esiponage points were all directed to Mehmed as it would be useful to see his research, but not Mansa’s overpowered research. He found also a nice location for a 2nd city with ivories, cows, shared corn and more grasslands to cottage. Even more, the city placement was in a hill, important do defend against barb attacks.





The 2nd city, Lakamha, was settled SW of the sign though, abdicating its coastal but getting much more grass tiles. Worker pastured the cows and went to the corn roading a hill between it and the capital. Our 2nd warrior got 5xp from the hut SW, promoting to woodsman II, so he could explore and defend more efficiently through these forests. The forest hill would be a nice fog bust point. One warrior stopped at Mutal to permit size 5 while the other warriors went to hill places to bust the fog. The Great Wall was built in T44 exactly as predicted, but Mansa Musa got Alphabet 17 turns earlier than the prediction, enabling a nice change of pottery for hunting and part of mysticism. I would need hunting after researching mysticism to get the ivory in Lakamha.

Labor civic was changed to slavery while the settler walked to the city spot. After the 1st settler, capital built a 2nd worker and then another settler for the city spot near bananas and horses. I could farm the bananas short term and cottage all these grass tiles after chopping a big number of forests to complete some wonder.





At this time Asoka and Augustus Caesar had alphabet too, when I was researching writing. So instead of getting alphabet I changed the plan to get another forgotten tech for most of the AIs: Aesthetics. With this, my game would totally lean towards a cultural victory, as after aesthetics it would be interesting to get literature and music, landing both Great Library and Sistine Chapel.
With the cultural aim, we would need at least 6 cities in order to build 2 cathedrals for each religion, so after the settler for the 3rd city, Mutal immediately begun another settler a city SW, getting horses and grasslands but no seafood. As Mansa was expanding rapidly to his west and I would need another city in the southern (getting fish and 2 ivories, I whipped the 3rd settler down to 3 pop, built a 1 turn scout while 1 turn growing to size 4 and then another settler for the fish city. I beat Mansa for 1 turn to settling this city (luckily he wanted to found it on the hills and wasted 1 turn). The hills spot was the blue circle location, but 1 tile S would be a better city with Moai.








I had some possibility to take that barb defend by 4 warriors with my shock warrior and Mansa’s axes but he managed to get it in a 1 turn attack. With 5 cities it was time to develop the economy of the short empire so workers and libraries were built in all cities. Lakamha, the 2nd city, hired 2 scientists to get an academy or maybe philosophy if I’d managed to get Code of Laws and meditation with the brokering era of aesthetics. T82 it’s research was completed and we traded it for polytheism, maths, priesthood, fishing, iron working, masonry (went free from a Mansa offer), archery and alphabet. It was a nice 8:1 rate. Mansa had Code of Laws already but he was not willing to trade it neither we had any tech to trade for, so the 1st scientist built an academy in Mutal.








Literature was set to next research, due in 9 turns (T90), Chichen Itza chopped out Statue of Zeus, completed in T91, and Lakamha failed to get Parthenon on its half (built by AC). Mutal succeeded in landing TGL by turn 100 (although Mansa was in the race also) boosting the research of music, though Mansa got it 4 turns earlier.





When I started to build Sistine in Mutal, Mansa had already finished it in T104. Shwedagon Paya was built in Lakamha though, with help from AC’s gold. These wonders were built basically for its culture points, though earlier pacifism and +3 Great Artist point didn’t hurt. Some AIs wars already begun, basically involving Romans and Vikings, but it was too far from my empire to bother me. All my nearest neighbours but Mansa were Buddhist as was I. Drama was the next research due in only 4 turns. Although Mehmed and Asoka (few turns later) were already “WFYABTA”, the Literature/Music/Drama tech brokering era had begun, with the score of 9:3 getting Monotheism, Sailing, Monarchy, Code of Laws, Calendar, HBR, Construction, Currency and Metal Casting.





F4 screen was like this at the end:





The last (6th) city was settled on the northwestern, getting copper, sea and some grassland to farm, while I failed to found Taoism for few turns. Although, Philosophy was traded for part of Civil Service, Compass, Feudalism and Machinery, opening the path to Liberalism. No one had paper already and the plan was to research it, bulb great part of Education and research Liberalism then, getting whatever free tech. It would be a big victory to be the 1st to Lib in deity, so any free tech would be profit.
In 14 turns the plan went perfect and 1 turn earlier Asoka was willing to trade Optics (and Engineering for Education) for me opening Astronomy as the free tech!!





Well, but why Astronomy in a Pangae map? The answer is a small island shore discovered by someone with optics to my west. With trade of world maps I was able to see this and the island seemed to have room for a colony, and better, there were visible seafood. But, again, what’s the matter with this? Colony, cool, but for what? I don’t know if I was wright at this time, but with the loss of Sistine, it would be much difficult to have culture in the 3 cities and I chose to research until Medicine to get Sid’s Sushi Corporation, instead of stopping research after Democracy, pushing the culture slider to 100%. As it was path to biology, it was an ok plan and should be worth trying. So we would need seafood in the long term.
Not much happened between the discover of Astronomy and the colony settlement, besides some trades for guilds and printing press, and some AI wars involving Mansa, Mehmed, Asoka and Ragnar. At this time even Mansa was WFYABTA with me.
After building 2 galleons, 4 settlers, 3 maces and some workers, all the island was filled (after razing a barb city), getting 1 fish, 2 clams, 2 whales, marble and iron. Not bad. After chopping granaries and harbors for all cities and hooking the resources, it was time to grant independence to the colony under the government of Washington.





Some nice trades were done during this time, getting gunpowder and chemistry both from Mehmed (who would be the civ with less time under WFYABTA, though he was not very friendly and advanced. If someone could explain me this WFYABTA mechanism I would be greatfull). A Great Merchant (for Sid’s Sushi) was born in Mutal after a Golden Age provided by a Great Scientist. Democracy was researched to improve all the cottages, to make Chichen Itza (the banana city with weak production) a good hammer city also and to buy important buildings such as temples and monasteries in weak production cities. Medicine was the next aim for obvious reasons and it came around T200. Before it we got a nice random event I’ve never seen.





There was no strong reason to found Sid’s Sushi in Chichen Itza, but it was the largest city in population and needed a grocer anyway (the 1st city with it actually) so it would be nice to get the multiplier. Chichen Itza looked like this after founding the corporation:





Useless techs were traded just for fun, such as divine right, military tradition, rifling and steel. (although one of these techs would turn up later to be vital for the victory). Mansa Musa completed the Apollo Program at T219 to scare me a bit, but he would need to tech and build the spaceship in about 50t or sooner to beat my 3 legendary cities. Great artist were born and giving +4000 culture, cathedrals were built and with all culture building done in the 3 cities, they were set to “culture” and the other 3 set to “wealth”. Culture victory was approaching, lasting only 10 turns, while Mali had 3 cities with +30k culture and was reaching the start of the spaceship building. Everything was fine and good when suddenly the horned guy came out to my screen on T251: “So be it.”





Oh God, at this time all cities had a garrison warrior, Chichen Itza had 3 maces returned from the colony and Ankara and Gaziantep (flipped ottoman cities) had 2 riflemen each. To get worst, Ragnar had a sizeable army of cavalries and trebuchets at my borders, near Ankara.





Well, this has brought some excitement to the somewhat boring later game. The plan was to defend the 3 (almost) legendary cities logically, and there was only one solution to create an army from nothing. Yes, you are wright, drafting! On the 1 turn of anarchy, the Viking took Gaziantep, which was light defended by 2 riflemen. But now we could draft 3 riflemen per turn: 1 from Chichen Itza (already a legendary city), 1 from Ankara itself and another one from the coastal horse city. Mutal and Lakamha were 10 turns from achieving legendary. Thanks to AI’s silliness to bombard a light defended city down instead of attacking immediately, and thanks to the stack of ~ 40 riflemen created in 12 turns (some were built and other upgraded maces), we could hold all cities and even get back Gaziantep from the Vikings to achieve a cultural victory on T263!








You can notice in the 1st picture the size and starvation of Lakamha and Ankara after all the drafting.
Wow, great victory, my first and maybe one of the few (or only) I’ll get at this difficult. Much thanks to Sullla for this enjoyable game.
I would like to invite everyone to read his writeup from Apolyton game, present in other thread. Masterful game and writeup!

[kalin]

Hi Zeka,

Congratulations on a great victory! I have enjoyed reading your report a lot, amazing job It was very entertaining.

Regarding the "we fear you are becoming to advanced" limit, I think I saw T-Hawk in the other thread mentioning something about it not applying if you are in the bottom half of the score but I am not sure about this...

Having never tried a deity game myself, I have been wondering how you managed to not get attacked with such light defenses. Also, kudos on your trades, very impressive.

Kalin

[zeka]

Hi Zeka,

Congratulations on a great victory! I have enjoyed reading your report a lot, amazing job It was very entertaining.

Kalin

Hey, thx i'm glad you enjoyed it.

Having never tried a deity game myself, I have been wondering how you managed to not get attacked with such light defenses.

Kalin

I had the luck of all civs but Mali and Romans being buddhist. The Romans were too far from me to attack and i had some relationship points with him from resource trades, shared technology and "our trade relations have been fair and forthright". The only threat was hindu Mali, but he is pacifist and i had these same points with him.
Also, the AIs were busy most time with wars between them, like Ragnar vs. AC, Mansa vs. HC etc

[timmy827]

Great job.

Even with Sushi, I'm sort of shocked that you managed to flip two cities - never tried on Deity, but assumed that the AI's huge unit spam would kill revolt chances.

Why create a colony? IIRC the maintenace with 4 cities starts to become significant, but I still think you would come out ahead keeping the land yourself.

[T-hawk]

I'll third the kudos. Yours was the game I wanted to play. Settling the island for Sushi resources and culture was a great idea. I do agree with Timmy on why liberate them, though? The Forbidden Palace could go there, and since colonial maintenance is capped with relation to distance maintenance, costs would be low. But that's a minor detail in a splendid game.

Where and when did you get a Great Artist farm set up? I wasn't happy with mine - at Mutal for only 5 artist specialists - but there was no other location with enough food. Did you use the National Park?

If both you and your trading partner are in the bottom half of the scoreboard, there will be no WFYABTA trading refusal from that partner. In case of an odd number of civs, the middle slot (#4 out of 7 here) counts as the bottom half. An equivalent way to say that is if you are not in the top 3 civs out of 7, only the top 3 civs will ever say WFYABTA.

[Olodune]

Nicely done. Getting Astronomy with Liberalism on a Deity Pangaea map?? And having it pay off!

Did your Mansa avoid heading towards a cultural victory, or was he just too slow?

[zeka]

I'll third the kudos. Yours was the game I wanted to play. Settling the island for Sushi resources and culture was a great idea. I do agree with Timmy on why liberate them, though? The Forbidden Palace could go there, and since colonial maintenance is capped with relation to distance maintenance, costs would be low. But that's a minor detail in a splendid game.

Where and when did you get a Great Artist farm set up? I wasn't happy with mine - at Mutal for only 5 artist specialists - but there was no other location with enough food. Did you use the National Park?

If both you and your trading partner are in the bottom half of the scoreboard, there will be no WFYABTA trading refusal from that partner. In case of an odd number of civs, the middle slot (#4 out of 7 here) counts as the bottom half. An equivalent way to say that is if you are not in the top 3 civs out of 7, only the top 3 civs will ever say WFYABTA.

IMO the only reasons to keep the colony were to have more than 9 cities (10) to build 3rd cathedrals and 100% guarantee the seafood resources. The first would cost too much time to build the temples and then the cathedrals and i don't know it would pay off the cost and the second was easy to trade some resources for all of Washington's.
I didn't know about "colonial maintenance is capped with relation to distance maintenance". Knowing that, the Forbidden Palace could be built on the iron city after chopping some forests.

Actually there wasn't a Great Artist farm, as food was lacking, but Mutal had the National Epic and could hire about 5 artists. Chichen Itza could hire +- 7 artists, so it was a mix.
The National Park was not built as i chopped out every forest mostly to complete the three wonders: Statue of Zeus, Shwedagon Paya and Great Library.

Thanks for the info about WFYABTA.

[zeka]

Nicely done. Getting Astronomy with Liberalism on a Deity Pangaea map?? And having it pay off!

Did your Mansa avoid heading towards a cultural victory, or was he just too slow?

Mansa was reaching 40k culture on the 3 cities at the end of the game, but he was involved with too many wars and had a numerous stack. I wonder he could won the game if he had friendlier relations with the others.

[Dr. Nomadic]

I have a hard time believing that this was deity level.

I mean, building wonders that I can't even get on Noble?
Being able to get a decent chunk of land, including an offshore island?
Getting to liberalism first?
Having a huge tech lead on an opponent?
Warding off AI aggression with cardboard defenses?

Ye gods, you did well!