I guess I'll write a report after all. Like I said in the main thread, I was disappointed not to finish this. In my eagerness to play, I did so quickly and made a number of micro-mistakes that ultimately sapped my will to continue. I can't remember the details of any of them save the first; they were all little things that, like Clausewitzian friction, added up to unhinge the endeavour. But apparently I took a lot of screenshots of the period I did play (it was a while ago now ...), so I may as well show them to you.
I rolled Isabella of Spain, which was actually the leader/civ I most wanted, since I was in the mood for a good old-fashioned conquer-stomp, and they have a unit for it. (I've never gotten to use the conquistador in single- or multi-player, and I understand it's not as good as some others, but it still seems super-cool. Terrain defence bonus on a mounted unit? Interesting!) The other possibility for this game was Byzantium, but I had just hacked my way through my first Immortal game with it, so I preferred Spain. As it turned out, I was in luck, and what's more, Spain's position probably favoured conquering since it was constrained to that weird peninsula and some islands.
Here was the start for anyone who didn't know:
If I recall correctly, I had decided I was going to move 1E to the forested plains hill unless I saw something that dissuaded me, so unlike Sullla, I moved the scout in a westerly direction, though for the same reason, to see what I might be giving up:
(I did not pop the hut because you cannot receive a tech from one until you have a city.) Apparently I took this screenshot to show I considered moving the settler to the revealed flood plains, but I ended up sticking to founding on the plains hill. I lucked out on an adjacent wheat, but was dismayed to discover I'd inadvertently orphaned a pigs, at least until I settled the islands:
The villagers gave me gold and I started working on a work boat, emphasizing hammers over food. And here's where I made my first and I think most egregious micro-mistake, through a combination of forgetting Normal-speed costs (I always play on Quick even in single-player) and not checking my city every turn:
I should have switched to a 2-1 tile a turn sooner, finishing the work boat the same time but leaving one more food in the box. This minor mistake would actually have significant ramifications down the road, delaying the growth of the city by a turn:
One more food in the box would have let it grow in three.
I believe this influenced me to stagnate on size two for a while, building two workers and a settler (I didn't actually build the warrior pictured above; that's when I started on the settler.) I'm struggling to recall, but I believe the lack of a warrior actually had further effects, either delaying the second city a turn to dodge barbs or forcing my choice of location for the same reason, reinforcing my sense that things had gone off the rails right from the start.
Anyway, my scout was killed by a panther on turn 20, leaving me with this (actually perfectly adequate) map-knowledge:
The northern band would be filled on by a warrior a little while later, but it's all ice anyway. This, and the discovery of Bronze Working and its attendant copper in the south, allowed me to establish a dot-map that I proceeded to follow to the letter:
By turn 50 (the turn I founded Cordoba), this is what my emaciated little empire looked like:
Nothing to be proud of. Four cities, three workers, and two warriors (the latter all I really needed with the natural choke-point). This was the end of my first play-session, and a natural breaking-point, so I took pictures of each of my cities:
Like I said, lots of mismanagement and micro-mistakes went into the development of those cities, explaining their poor estate. Nevertheless, demos show the AI was (of course) still eminently beatable from that point:
I had the important early technologies and was researching Sailing to explore and settle the islands:
I was surprised to learn from a pop-up the next turn that this rendered me actually the second-most advanced civilization (behind Mansa).
I did play a bit farther, leading to this position:
This was essentially where I stopped. I couldn't get over the feeling I had horribly mismanaged everything, and just didn't feel like playing out a game I wasn't proud of, even though I knew I would win handily regardless. Future course of action was of course to settle the islands and the northern tundra-band and go conquer Mansa Musa (and everyone else). I believe I had only claimed one of the special resources, the starting silver, though I had plans to settle for the other visible one, the bananas (more importantly the horses) presently. Anyway, it was a fun little game; I just screwed it up. Thank-you again to T-Hawk for setting it up, and I'll try to do better (or maybe just not give up!) next time!
I rolled Isabella of Spain, which was actually the leader/civ I most wanted, since I was in the mood for a good old-fashioned conquer-stomp, and they have a unit for it. (I've never gotten to use the conquistador in single- or multi-player, and I understand it's not as good as some others, but it still seems super-cool. Terrain defence bonus on a mounted unit? Interesting!) The other possibility for this game was Byzantium, but I had just hacked my way through my first Immortal game with it, so I preferred Spain. As it turned out, I was in luck, and what's more, Spain's position probably favoured conquering since it was constrained to that weird peninsula and some islands.
Here was the start for anyone who didn't know:
If I recall correctly, I had decided I was going to move 1E to the forested plains hill unless I saw something that dissuaded me, so unlike Sullla, I moved the scout in a westerly direction, though for the same reason, to see what I might be giving up:
(I did not pop the hut because you cannot receive a tech from one until you have a city.) Apparently I took this screenshot to show I considered moving the settler to the revealed flood plains, but I ended up sticking to founding on the plains hill. I lucked out on an adjacent wheat, but was dismayed to discover I'd inadvertently orphaned a pigs, at least until I settled the islands:
The villagers gave me gold and I started working on a work boat, emphasizing hammers over food. And here's where I made my first and I think most egregious micro-mistake, through a combination of forgetting Normal-speed costs (I always play on Quick even in single-player) and not checking my city every turn:
I should have switched to a 2-1 tile a turn sooner, finishing the work boat the same time but leaving one more food in the box. This minor mistake would actually have significant ramifications down the road, delaying the growth of the city by a turn:
One more food in the box would have let it grow in three.
I believe this influenced me to stagnate on size two for a while, building two workers and a settler (I didn't actually build the warrior pictured above; that's when I started on the settler.) I'm struggling to recall, but I believe the lack of a warrior actually had further effects, either delaying the second city a turn to dodge barbs or forcing my choice of location for the same reason, reinforcing my sense that things had gone off the rails right from the start.Anyway, my scout was killed by a panther on turn 20, leaving me with this (actually perfectly adequate) map-knowledge:
The northern band would be filled on by a warrior a little while later, but it's all ice anyway. This, and the discovery of Bronze Working and its attendant copper in the south, allowed me to establish a dot-map that I proceeded to follow to the letter:
By turn 50 (the turn I founded Cordoba), this is what my emaciated little empire looked like:
Nothing to be proud of. Four cities, three workers, and two warriors (the latter all I really needed with the natural choke-point). This was the end of my first play-session, and a natural breaking-point, so I took pictures of each of my cities:
Like I said, lots of mismanagement and micro-mistakes went into the development of those cities, explaining their poor estate. Nevertheless, demos show the AI was (of course) still eminently beatable from that point:
I had the important early technologies and was researching Sailing to explore and settle the islands:
I was surprised to learn from a pop-up the next turn that this rendered me actually the second-most advanced civilization (behind Mansa).
I did play a bit farther, leading to this position:
This was essentially where I stopped. I couldn't get over the feeling I had horribly mismanaged everything, and just didn't feel like playing out a game I wasn't proud of, even though I knew I would win handily regardless. Future course of action was of course to settle the islands and the northern tundra-band and go conquer Mansa Musa (and everyone else). I believe I had only claimed one of the special resources, the starting silver, though I had plans to settle for the other visible one, the bananas (more importantly the horses) presently. Anyway, it was a fun little game; I just screwed it up. Thank-you again to T-Hawk for setting it up, and I'll try to do better (or maybe just not give up!) next time!