Playoff game 1 prediction :
I usually try to picture the most likely ways the game will unfold, and go from there.
Here, that seems impossible : I believe that religions will dictate events, and religion spread is basically impossible to predict here.
We could have two, three, four, maybe even five (?!) major religions, with situations ranging from one big unified block of nations with a single religious pariah quickly put down, to each civilization following its own tenets, with anything in between.
We have two religious leaders (Charlemagne, Saladin) who start with Mysticism but may not open with a religious tech because they may acknowledge their dire need of worker techs (plus, fishing start in Charlie's case).
Pacal also starts with Mysticism, and while not a true zealot, religion is culture, and he's prone to go for that.
Louis, while going after wonder-enabling techs, also often founds his own religion.
Washington (and Pacal again), as a good techer, may also found a religion.
And last, there's pure random chance : Alex could open with Mysticism, and if the religious leaders opened with worker techs, he might find himself in the race !
Another reason I think this could happen is that there doesn't seem to be river connections between the AI capitals, so religious spread should be slow and limited initially to backwater cities, making the AIs more likely to swap to their own self-founded religion, even pretty late.
So, with no idea of which alliances may form and which dogpiles ensue, let's see if we can try and guess at the final outcome anyway.
A few random observations first, though :
- Some viewers wondered whether this was a cold climate map : it is indeed a bit unusual, compared to the previous maps this season. There's a lot more viable land available (except in the western part). Instead of 4-6 cities, and then expand through war or into the ice, here there seems to be room for 8-9 cities.
So conflicts could start later than usual, and we could also have barb cities spawn in the middle of the map in key locations.
- Louis has no ivory for elephants.
- Pacal has no oil (probably irrelevant, but it means he can't rely on late game tech advantage alone : he'll need to conquer far and wide).
- With no sugar anywhere on the map as far as I can see, this is going to be a bitter contest !
Alexander
a.k.a. Deadman Walking.
He has no copper, and his only iron should get snipped out of the bat by Pacal's initial settler.
His situation is so dire that his best shot at getting metal is if it pops out of a mine
!
So a repeat of his previous performance is definitely not in the book, and he seems doomed to be first to die.
... or not ?
See, lack of early metal is only a death sentence if there's an executioner.
And here, the only one available seems to be Charlie. The other weakling in this setup.
Archers on hills and chariots can get you a long way when the only thing you build is units and your opponent is weak.
So if Charlie does indeed conquer Alex, I expect a long slog rather than a blitzkrieg. Which may still be enough for a first to die spot, depending on whether dogpiles happen elsewhere.
Now if someone else (like Pacal for instance) were to come knocking, it would be over quickly indeed.
So barring an extraordinary strike of luck, I don't see him doing well in this game, and he's a prime candidate for first to die (but not a slam-dunk as his metal-less status could lead to believe).
Charlemagne
OK, there were two short straws in this draw, and he drew the second one.
I'm exagerating a bit, but basically the land available to the other civs is equivalent to Alex and Charlie's territories combined.
So Charlie needs to conquer Alex... and instead of getting him a decisive advantage, it would merely put him back on an equal footing with the other civs.
His one chance is that his other neighbour (Washington) is dogpile bait. So he should be relatively safe, with opportunities for expansion. But he's starting from such a deep hole that it's hard to see him climbing all the way to the top.
Might be enough for a second-place finish ?
Note that there's a spot to his west which was an initial starting spot I bet (plains deer is a telltale sign). It should go to Washington (1st ring for him, 2nd ring for Charlie)... but Washington is spoilt for good city spots, while Charlie's starved. So if he somehow manages to settle there, he'll be in better shape, especially since that's the only way he'll get copper.
Washington
He's the opposite of Alexander : rich land, access to metal guaranteed. He'll be a strong early leader, with a good teching pace to boot.
And yet, he's the other prime candidate for first to die.
He's the highest peace weight AI, sitting right in the center of the map.
In time, shared religion (plus Saladin cannot plot at pleased), mutual military struggle, civics (Pacal's is Hereditary Rule) should overcome the peace weight penalty.
But time is what Washington may not have.
Early conflict with Pacal and Saladin seems very likely, and that just might be enough to trigger a feeding frenzy from his other neighbours (Louis, Alex, and even Charlie if they're on opposite sides of the religious divide).
Is a strong Washington actually more likely to be first to die than a weak, metal-deprived Alex ?
Let's put it this way : Alex is far more likely to die to an early conflict, but Washington is far more likely to be involved in early conflicts that could degenerate into a dogpile.
Now, if he somehow makes it through...
He's going to be strong leader, with a good economy, and Washington surviving probably means a weaker Pacal.
So, suddenly his prospects would be looking good.
Not enough to make him a favourite for anything but first to die, but what I'm saying is that Washington finishing second, or even winning outright wouldn't be actually shocking.
Saladin
I like his position, next to Washington (expansion prospect), at a diagonal from Pacal (opportunities for shared military struggle, less chance of conflict). The floodplains spot to his north-west is gorgeous, with copper access to boot, and should be his Holy City site, boosting the chance for a religious spread. The ice to his south has some good ressources (although watch as he keeps this year's tradition going by carefully settling away from the food).
The rest of his land is not so great, so he'd need to settle aggressively along the rivers (towards Washington) or to the north (towards Louis).
So that means early conflict with Louis and Washington is extremely likely. And if it turns into a two-front war, then it means trouble.
His other big issue is that he can't plot at pleased. And in the mid-game, when conflicts lead the AIs to run Theocracy, he might be unable to seize expansion opportunities.
Unless they share an early religion, I see his game shaped by conflict with Louis. He should get the upper hand more often than not (less time wasted building wonders in the midst of a hot war, Louis missing a critical unit at a critical time - elephants), but that's not a given.
There's a possibility that what happened in last year's "First to Die Fiesta" happens here too : the third religion gets dominant because it gets spread hard through missionaries, while the early religion founders (and Saladin's extremely likely to be one of those) are left as religious pariahs.
In spite of all those pittraps, I think Saladin's prospects look good, though : he's a decent leader (meaning he keeps his eco going without neglecting his military), with decent land, and expansion opportunities.
Louis
At first glance, his position looks great : lots of space, silver at his capital to boost his early eco, stone to help him not waste too much time on early wonders, coastal capital for a shot at the Great Lighthouse.
But.
He lacks rivers and the lush land to his south is covered in jungles, but that should be somewhat alleviated by the early boosts mentioned (silver, GLH).
Another thing I've already mentioned : no ivory. So no "ele" in the age of elepults.
His main issue, though, is his neighbours : Pacal and Saladin, who should be the strongest leaders in the field.
If he ends up at war with both... he'll die.
I can see him doing well, providing he befriends one (religion), and gets allies vs the other one.
Overall, distant prospect at winning the game, decent chance of finishing second.
Pacal
He's got to be the favourite, right ?
Only financial civ, great land, borders the two first to die candidates, no peace weight induced target on his back.
If he were to conquer Alexander early, he'd probably seal the game right there.
But he's most likely to squander early armies before American walls.
He could be in early trouble if Louis ends up with a different religion : fighting both Louis and Washington could send his game spiralling down.
The land to his south is absolutely great... but he needs to be the one settling it. If he spends his early turns going after wonders instead of settlers, he could miss out on a lot of that territory.
But yeah, I think he's the most likely to win this game, even though he's not very likely to win (if that makes sense).
In a perfectly balanced 6-player game, each has a 17% chance to win.
So let's say that here Alexander stands at 5% (super rare case where he gets metal and somehow manages to get a snowball started).
Let's put Washington at 10% (higher than that if he survives the early game, but there's a good chance he does not).
Charlemagne (bad but sheltered land) and Louis (good land but breakout iffy) should be similar, at slightly lower odds than average : 15% each.
We're left with 55% for Pacal and Saladin.
Saladin has IMO better than average odds : 20-25%.
So that leaves Pacal at 30-35%.
Let's call it one chance in three.
That means he's twice as likely to lose as he is to win.
So yeah, most likely to win, but not very likely to win.
All in all,
Winner : Pacal > Saladin
Runner-up : Saladin > Louis/Charlemagne
First to die : Washington / Alexander
But with a pretty low confidence level this time.
Here, that seems impossible : I believe that religions will dictate events, and religion spread is basically impossible to predict here.
We could have two, three, four, maybe even five (?!) major religions, with situations ranging from one big unified block of nations with a single religious pariah quickly put down, to each civilization following its own tenets, with anything in between.
We have two religious leaders (Charlemagne, Saladin) who start with Mysticism but may not open with a religious tech because they may acknowledge their dire need of worker techs (plus, fishing start in Charlie's case).
Pacal also starts with Mysticism, and while not a true zealot, religion is culture, and he's prone to go for that.
Louis, while going after wonder-enabling techs, also often founds his own religion.
Washington (and Pacal again), as a good techer, may also found a religion.
And last, there's pure random chance : Alex could open with Mysticism, and if the religious leaders opened with worker techs, he might find himself in the race !
Another reason I think this could happen is that there doesn't seem to be river connections between the AI capitals, so religious spread should be slow and limited initially to backwater cities, making the AIs more likely to swap to their own self-founded religion, even pretty late.
So, with no idea of which alliances may form and which dogpiles ensue, let's see if we can try and guess at the final outcome anyway.
A few random observations first, though :
- Some viewers wondered whether this was a cold climate map : it is indeed a bit unusual, compared to the previous maps this season. There's a lot more viable land available (except in the western part). Instead of 4-6 cities, and then expand through war or into the ice, here there seems to be room for 8-9 cities.
So conflicts could start later than usual, and we could also have barb cities spawn in the middle of the map in key locations.
- Louis has no ivory for elephants.
- Pacal has no oil (probably irrelevant, but it means he can't rely on late game tech advantage alone : he'll need to conquer far and wide).
- With no sugar anywhere on the map as far as I can see, this is going to be a bitter contest !
Alexander
a.k.a. Deadman Walking.
He has no copper, and his only iron should get snipped out of the bat by Pacal's initial settler.
His situation is so dire that his best shot at getting metal is if it pops out of a mine
!So a repeat of his previous performance is definitely not in the book, and he seems doomed to be first to die.
... or not ?
See, lack of early metal is only a death sentence if there's an executioner.
And here, the only one available seems to be Charlie. The other weakling in this setup.
Archers on hills and chariots can get you a long way when the only thing you build is units and your opponent is weak.
So if Charlie does indeed conquer Alex, I expect a long slog rather than a blitzkrieg. Which may still be enough for a first to die spot, depending on whether dogpiles happen elsewhere.
Now if someone else (like Pacal for instance) were to come knocking, it would be over quickly indeed.
So barring an extraordinary strike of luck, I don't see him doing well in this game, and he's a prime candidate for first to die (but not a slam-dunk as his metal-less status could lead to believe).
Charlemagne
OK, there were two short straws in this draw, and he drew the second one.
I'm exagerating a bit, but basically the land available to the other civs is equivalent to Alex and Charlie's territories combined.
So Charlie needs to conquer Alex... and instead of getting him a decisive advantage, it would merely put him back on an equal footing with the other civs.
His one chance is that his other neighbour (Washington) is dogpile bait. So he should be relatively safe, with opportunities for expansion. But he's starting from such a deep hole that it's hard to see him climbing all the way to the top.
Might be enough for a second-place finish ?
Note that there's a spot to his west which was an initial starting spot I bet (plains deer is a telltale sign). It should go to Washington (1st ring for him, 2nd ring for Charlie)... but Washington is spoilt for good city spots, while Charlie's starved. So if he somehow manages to settle there, he'll be in better shape, especially since that's the only way he'll get copper.
Washington
He's the opposite of Alexander : rich land, access to metal guaranteed. He'll be a strong early leader, with a good teching pace to boot.
And yet, he's the other prime candidate for first to die.
He's the highest peace weight AI, sitting right in the center of the map.
In time, shared religion (plus Saladin cannot plot at pleased), mutual military struggle, civics (Pacal's is Hereditary Rule) should overcome the peace weight penalty.
But time is what Washington may not have.
Early conflict with Pacal and Saladin seems very likely, and that just might be enough to trigger a feeding frenzy from his other neighbours (Louis, Alex, and even Charlie if they're on opposite sides of the religious divide).
Is a strong Washington actually more likely to be first to die than a weak, metal-deprived Alex ?
Let's put it this way : Alex is far more likely to die to an early conflict, but Washington is far more likely to be involved in early conflicts that could degenerate into a dogpile.
Now, if he somehow makes it through...
He's going to be strong leader, with a good economy, and Washington surviving probably means a weaker Pacal.
So, suddenly his prospects would be looking good.
Not enough to make him a favourite for anything but first to die, but what I'm saying is that Washington finishing second, or even winning outright wouldn't be actually shocking.
Saladin
I like his position, next to Washington (expansion prospect), at a diagonal from Pacal (opportunities for shared military struggle, less chance of conflict). The floodplains spot to his north-west is gorgeous, with copper access to boot, and should be his Holy City site, boosting the chance for a religious spread. The ice to his south has some good ressources (although watch as he keeps this year's tradition going by carefully settling away from the food).
The rest of his land is not so great, so he'd need to settle aggressively along the rivers (towards Washington) or to the north (towards Louis).
So that means early conflict with Louis and Washington is extremely likely. And if it turns into a two-front war, then it means trouble.
His other big issue is that he can't plot at pleased. And in the mid-game, when conflicts lead the AIs to run Theocracy, he might be unable to seize expansion opportunities.
Unless they share an early religion, I see his game shaped by conflict with Louis. He should get the upper hand more often than not (less time wasted building wonders in the midst of a hot war, Louis missing a critical unit at a critical time - elephants), but that's not a given.
There's a possibility that what happened in last year's "First to Die Fiesta" happens here too : the third religion gets dominant because it gets spread hard through missionaries, while the early religion founders (and Saladin's extremely likely to be one of those) are left as religious pariahs.
In spite of all those pittraps, I think Saladin's prospects look good, though : he's a decent leader (meaning he keeps his eco going without neglecting his military), with decent land, and expansion opportunities.
Louis
At first glance, his position looks great : lots of space, silver at his capital to boost his early eco, stone to help him not waste too much time on early wonders, coastal capital for a shot at the Great Lighthouse.
But.
He lacks rivers and the lush land to his south is covered in jungles, but that should be somewhat alleviated by the early boosts mentioned (silver, GLH).
Another thing I've already mentioned : no ivory. So no "ele" in the age of elepults.
His main issue, though, is his neighbours : Pacal and Saladin, who should be the strongest leaders in the field.
If he ends up at war with both... he'll die.
I can see him doing well, providing he befriends one (religion), and gets allies vs the other one.
Overall, distant prospect at winning the game, decent chance of finishing second.
Pacal
He's got to be the favourite, right ?
Only financial civ, great land, borders the two first to die candidates, no peace weight induced target on his back.
If he were to conquer Alexander early, he'd probably seal the game right there.
But he's most likely to squander early armies before American walls.
He could be in early trouble if Louis ends up with a different religion : fighting both Louis and Washington could send his game spiralling down.
The land to his south is absolutely great... but he needs to be the one settling it. If he spends his early turns going after wonders instead of settlers, he could miss out on a lot of that territory.
But yeah, I think he's the most likely to win this game, even though he's not very likely to win (if that makes sense
).In a perfectly balanced 6-player game, each has a 17% chance to win.
So let's say that here Alexander stands at 5% (super rare case where he gets metal and somehow manages to get a snowball started).
Let's put Washington at 10% (higher than that if he survives the early game, but there's a good chance he does not).
Charlemagne (bad but sheltered land) and Louis (good land but breakout iffy) should be similar, at slightly lower odds than average : 15% each.
We're left with 55% for Pacal and Saladin.
Saladin has IMO better than average odds : 20-25%.
So that leaves Pacal at 30-35%.
Let's call it one chance in three.
That means he's twice as likely to lose as he is to win.
So yeah, most likely to win, but not very likely to win.
All in all,
Winner : Pacal > Saladin
Runner-up : Saladin > Louis/Charlemagne
First to die : Washington / Alexander
But with a pretty low confidence level this time.
![[Image: survivor5-10-8.jpg]](http://www.sullla.com/Civ4/Survivor/S5/survivor5-10-8.jpg)
![[Image: survivor5-10-9.jpg]](http://www.sullla.com/Civ4/Survivor/S5/survivor5-10-9.jpg)
![[Image: survivor5-10-10.jpg]](http://www.sullla.com/Civ4/Survivor/S5/survivor5-10-10.jpg)
![[Image: survivor5-10-11.jpg]](http://www.sullla.com/Civ4/Survivor/S5/survivor5-10-11.jpg)
), wisely.
![[Image: d8uigwg-2fb4bfdf-e315-42b1-be17-a0753914...mE0k01MaYA]](https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/857287e7-d073-4c62-812e-aae249f67326/d8uigwg-2fb4bfdf-e315-42b1-be17-a07539149e2b.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOiIsImlzcyI6InVybjphcHA6Iiwib2JqIjpbW3sicGF0aCI6IlwvZlwvODU3Mjg3ZTctZDA3My00YzYyLTgxMmUtYWFlMjQ5ZjY3MzI2XC9kOHVpZ3dnLTJmYjRiZmRmLWUzMTUtNDJiMS1iZTE3LWEwNzUzOTE0OWUyYi5qcGcifV1dLCJhdWQiOlsidXJuOnNlcnZpY2U6ZmlsZS5kb3dubG9hZCJdfQ.gJmNBcnNe5xru5QR0urec5fniyhFIcgDxmE0k01MaYA)
Scoring was pretty high overall with an average score of 10.19 points thanks to some of the community favorites hitting in the leader scoring categories. The opening of this game was weird and then it kept getting weirder as it went along. We are continuing with our normal Friday date for next week's game. Next week we continue with the second playoff game as our returning winners come back for another round of action. Who do you have this week?