GOTW: May 31st return of the Russians

[Pedal2Metal]

Originally Posted by WOOD

I would be surprised at a pre 1000 AD victory at this point. I was attacking Washington at about 1050 with 2 infiltration/fundamentalist knights and the both bounced off the pikeman like a bug. Five turns later the same unit (now upgraded) swallowed two infiltration tank armies. Every battle was in my favor but that didn't matter.
This last playthrough I almost got an ok time but Bejing ate my tank army so I had to sail artie up from Kyoto adding 9 more turns. The BS factor this week on deity is a little much.
That best score posted on 360 is 1400 AD but that is last weeks game. I am probably going to leave my 1525 so I don't break my controller.

So maybe my 15 elite tank armies wasn't such a bad idea heh?
I didn't lose any but it wouldn't have mattered when you have 5-10 elite armies attacking each city. I sailed 10 to Japan, USA, China. I kept 5 for Egypt. 12 armies were infiltration/blitz/march. 3 armies were infiltration/medic/whatever. So it was more like 30 armies due to blitz. The AI didn't stand a chance.

Still, I wouldn't rule out a pre-1000 AD victory just yet. Usually it's just a matter of finding the right "seed" but you have to play it like 10+ times to optimize them all perfectly but it can really make a difference when you do.
I used to do that so I could try for the #1 spot but it just became so "unfun", I've changed to a 1 playthrough approach which I really enjoy more.

best regards,
Pedal2Metal

[elthrasher]

Originally Posted by WOOD

I would be surprised at a pre 1000 AD victory at this point. I was attacking Washington at about 1050 with 2 infiltration/fundamentalist knights and the both bounced off the pikeman like a bug. Five turns later the same unit (now upgraded) swallowed two infiltration tank armies. Every battle was in my favor but that didn't matter.
This last playthrough I almost got an ok time but Bejing ate my tank army so I had to sail artie up from Kyoto adding 9 more turns. The BS factor this week on deity is a little much.
That best score posted on 360 is 1400 AD but that is last weeks game. I am probably going to leave my 1525 so I don't break my controller.

You are just hitting bad seeds by chance. It isn't like it's programmed so pikemen beat tanks.

[MadDjinn]

I doubt it's a seed thing.

a seed win is any BC dom win. after that you're needing skill.

here's a random thought:

if you have problems with the AI having super powered defenses.. why not take their GLs? spies are even 1/2 price later on. upgraded archers will still die to upgraded knights or cat's.

[Pedal2Metal]

Originally Posted by MadDjinn

I doubt it's a seed thing.

a seed win is any BC dom win. after that you're needing skill.

here's a random thought:

if you have problems with the AI having super powered defenses.. why not take their GLs? spies are even 1/2 price later on. upgraded archers will still die to upgraded knights or cat's.

I agree.

I took 2 GLs in my game long before I took the capitals. I used 1 GL to churn out 45 elite legion units which I then turned into tanks. However, if you take too long, it will take a veteran spy ring as the AI will build spies to protect their GL. My guess is a pre-1000 AD win using the same technique I did is possible. Steal Egypt's GL early. Build granary & get construction so you get 11-12 production early in city next to Egypt, start cranking out elite legion units. I had this city w/60 production quite early & so I was doing 2 legion armies + 1 legion every turn. Once you have however many armies you like, build Leonardo's. All this assumes you've been building cities & teching like a mad dog everywhere else. I also build EIC in another production city w/11+ prod (next to city I settled by Egypt). I actually had Colossus, GS, Trading Post, Library in another city w/3 desert tiles + wine. I never went into democracy & this one city was doing 66 science in no time. It hit 100+ at some point. Needless to say I had 24 techs before anyone else had even hit Industrial age.

The same approach could be used w/knights as MadDjinn suggests & probably bring the time down to pre-1000 AD or darn close.

best regards,
Pedal2Metal

[MadDjinn]

cat's are faster to get and if you're galley dropping, easier to use for that (the knights extra movement isn't required). plus ca'ts don't get hurt and knights do.

I gave this a run through (mostly actual play but I recognized the map on turn 2) and I know a pre-1000 AD win is going to happen (PS3 has a 950 AD dom win), but pre-500 AD is more likely to be the best score.

spies are really important here.. in my run through, there were at least 2 GB's on the map and a few GS's... so nice. I didn't get any free spies and there are few good production spots on the map.

but...

super city spam will help with that. I got 4 cities out before COL (stole one unattended egyptian settler) then found the 7cities after I hit COL. if I had waited to take the arc until after I got the mass city spam done, it would have been more interesting.

[MadDjinn]

oh, and I moved my settler to the 2 forest/3 desert/2grass/wine location.

throw a courthouse in there later and poof insta mega city (it's not hard to hit COL first).

[Pedal2Metal]

Originally Posted by MadDjinn

oh, and I moved my settler to the 2 forest/3 desert/2grass/wine location.

throw a courthouse in there later and poof insta mega city (it's not hard to hit COL first).

Yep, that's the one.

best regards,
Pedal2Metal

[Pedal2Metal]

Originally Posted by MadDjinn

cat's are faster to get and if you're galley dropping, easier to use for that (the knights extra movement isn't required). plus ca'ts don't get hurt and knights do.

Agreed but it's a requirement you'll have to build 2 galleys minimum as China is so far north from everyone else. Knights allow you to take a simpler approach. Build 5 armies, drop them off at Japan & move north through the capitals. You'll take each city in 1 turn w/5 knight armies, although healing will take time. 5 knight armies = 5 x 3 x 25 = 375 hammers. 375/20 = 18 or 6 catapult armies for 360 hammers. Add in 2 x 30 (-15 overflow) for 2 galleys vs. 1 galley for knights you have a cost of 405 hammers vs. 405 hammers. So the hope is that you can send 3 armies north to China, 3 to Japan & win both cities w/minimal army losses (1 army will probably be lost unless you spy spammed both cities earlier) with a quicker final result (it may take more than 3 turns to take each city however) than 5 knight armies taking Japan & moving west & north through American/China capitals. I've ignored Egypt but just assume you can build what you need take Egypt while the boats are sailing to other caps. Shouldn't be too hard given you took the GL here first. Now move both sets towards America or maybe put a settler on boat to China to build dummy city/road down to America to speed things up a bit.

Personally I think both approaches will yield similar results & I agree a pre-500 AD time seems plausible.

best regards,
Pedal2Metal

[MadDjinn]

it's possible. I use 2 galleys anyways. you need one to grab the 7cities and the other to get the SoC.

my current thought (haven't done it yet) is that you can tech to writing, pop the 7cities build 2 spies and steal the GL's from the Americans and Japanese.

get BW and spend the last 80 g on a barracks in the best prod city then drop a GL there.

could be nice to put another barracks in a city for the other GL, but maybe you can save the extra GL for another city that you take from the AI which has better prod.

if you've got 3-4 cities at the beginning then grabbing the Arc to get that first GP early will help. if you can get that GP first then grab the SoC you'll be doing fine and have a better shot at getting at least 1 GS. (a GE to use in medieval will help with the cat rush), GB for the Oracle would be cool too. and while you're over at the SoC, grab the templars (medieval era for the cannon as backup to the cat's)

it'd be best if you brought a settler along to be able to use whatever GP's you get from the SoC faster.

[Pedal2Metal]

Originally Posted by MadDjinn

it's possible. I use 2 galleys anyways. you need one to grab the 7cities and the other to get the SoC.

my current thought (haven't done it yet) is that you can tech to writing, pop the 7cities build 2 spies and steal the GL's from the Americans and Japanese.

get BW and spend the last 80 g on a barracks in the best prod city then drop a GL there.

could be nice to put another barracks in a city for the other GL, but maybe you can save the extra GL for another city that you take from the AI which has better prod.

if you've got 3-4 cities at the beginning then grabbing the Arc to get that first GP early will help. if you can get that GP first then grab the SoC you'll be doing fine and have a better shot at getting at least 1 GS. (a GE to use in medieval will help with the cat rush), GB for the Oracle would be cool too. and while you're over at the SoC, grab the templars (medieval era for the cannon as backup to the cat's)

it'd be best if you brought a settler along to be able to use whatever GP's you get from the SoC faster.

Sounds good to me. I teched up so fast I had a galleon before I needed to build a 2nd galley.

I had 5 cities when I popped Ark which was quite nice. 200 free hammers!
I tried to build another oak production city by Japan but they beat me to it. So I just took it. Of course the americans took it from me not too long after (they got a lucky win of like 18 cats vs. 22.5 archers) but I sat on all the trees until I had my tank armies so needless to say it became mine again soon enough. That one hiccup in my playthrough probably cost me a lot of time as I was going to steal the GL & do the legion trick there as well. I could have probably dropped 500 years easy with that city early on. Oh well, I only allow myself 1 playthrough per victory type so that's all she wrote.

best regards,
Pedal2Metal