AIs are fine with Ice FPs.
I'm playing through a dtay start myself.
I'm playing through a dtay start myself.
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[LURKERS] PB27 Map & Lurking: Walking in a :weed: wonderland
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to join in the ranking fun, I made my own combo tier list.
 Tier 1: (ACCEPT ACCEPT ACCEPT ACCEPT ACCEPT) 1. Wang Kon of England [Serdoa] 2. Augustus of Sumeria [Dtay] 3. Zara of Dutch [VonTao] Tier 2: (very happy to have rolled) 4. Hammurabi of India [Adrien] - (very close to putting this Tier 1 b/c the FW is so much better now but I loathe Hammurabi) 5. Sury of Ottomans [Comm] 6. Charlie of Mongolia [AT] 7. Hannibal of Vikings [Borsche] Tier 3: (definite accepts) 8. Julius of Russia [REM] 10. Pericles of Germany [Plako] 11. Washington of Inca [CH+Fenn] 12. Nappy of Greece [Ichabod+retep] 13. Roosevelt of Mali [Gavagai+Bacchus] 14. Shaka of America [Elkad] 15. Toku of Aztecs [Barteq] Tier 4: (ehhh... well, um...) 15. Pacal of Persia [Tasunke?] 16. Alexander of Maya [HAK] 17. Justinian of Khmer [Yuris] 18. Joao of Eygpt [Wannabe] 19. Boudica of Japan [Grimace] Tier 5: (rerolls) 20. Monty of China [Krill] 21. Stalin of Zulu [Donovan] 22. Willem of Celts [Molach] 23. Ragnar of Babylon [Nyles] In consideration of their starts, REM and Borsche move up, and Gavagai (maybe?) moves down. Serdoa I think moves down just a little bit, his starting area geography might be difficult but who knows with the actual neighbors he has. I have a much higher opinion of Ind, Imp, and Cha. I don't any of them are traits you can consider strong by themselves though (like the latest version of Cre), they're either support traits (Ind/Cha) that need a workhorse or early workhorse traits that need mid-late support (Imp). I generally like having one of each category, and that's one reason I like Ind/Imp a lot, especially with a sweet civ like Sumeria. I like Ind and Imp because they give you a lot of flexibility. Ind can be sure to grab at least one big, centerpiece wonder (think about how late many wonders went in PB18 and how many non-Ind civs got big wonders - hell, dazed got the MoM without marble) and get other infrastructure up faster by plowing through those bottleneck forges, while Imp has tons of spare early hammers due to settlers being so cheap. I think the new Cha is pretty good now, although I think it'll do best when paired with something to give it extra early oomph, like Imp, Cre, or especially Pro. I would have loved to see Cyrus or Churchill in this game. Someone like Boudica is just too slow; Hannibal of Vikings is slow too but that combo is special. The new Cha colosseum is a spectacular building IMHO, as it's essentially a 40 hammer forge with +2 Exp on the same tech as a pair of important military units. Cha can beeline Construction as their first real classical tech (no need for Monarchy or Calendar, Currency is less important with a taller capital working more cottages, MC would be strictly inferior, IW as always is situatioal) and then whip themselves into the ground to little-to-no ill effect. A Cha city with just a granary, barracks, and colloseum (160 total hammers) can easily whip out a CR2/Barrage2 Sword/Catapult every other turn, or a C2 WE every third turn. (no stables required!) That is a lot of power, especially if you can hit some overexpanded target still limping towards Currency! The timing is one of the most important aspects of it; a late cheap colloseum isn't that special because it isn't an expensive building to begin with. However, Cha is one of the better early research civs, along with Cre, and so it's very possible that you may be the first of your neighbors to enter the classical age. On top of that, the building is so cheap that it'll be a single whip/chop per city within a turn or two of having Construction, and you can continue whipping with your high happy cap, perhaps 2-3 more units per city (and possibly even some finished Axes/Swords sitting in the queue before that) within a span of 5-6 more turns. Multiply that by 8-9 maturish cities, and you can have an army heavy enough to wipe out a neighbor before they fully understand what is happening! (August 26th, 2015, 14:47)GermanJoey Wrote: How does it handle the ice floodplains? Does it recognize them as a good tile, or does it think of them as just ice and turn their nose away in disgust? AI is treating the ice FP like regular FP; most are farmed or have towns, a handful have watermills. For reference, I'm using the Krill start and am in whatever era features rifles, grenadiers and cannon. I have no idea what the base script is- I thought everything was hand-drawn (although now that I think about it, you probably said otherwise earlier)! Everything is crazy lush, the tech pace is ridiculous and both the AI and I are running around with giant stacks since like 80% of all the cities can 2 or 3-turn the most advanced units. The AI sadly doesn't appear to recognize the 1-tile islands as legitimate city spots- perhaps it will after all of the ocean continents are filled. Speaking of which, Molach AI was able to reach the island off the coast of what used to be HAK AI's land with a galley. Not sure how it managed that, might have gotten bumped there via a hostile border expansion. It's a great map for SP, most fun I've had with non-FFH Civ IV in a long time. Also, I may be biased since it's what I started with, but I'll be surprised if Krill doesn't win this game, assuming he doesn't drop. (August 26th, 2015, 23:59)Bobchillingworth Wrote: AI is treating the ice FP like regular FP; most are farmed or have towns, a handful have watermills. For reference, I'm using the Krill start and am in whatever era features rifles, grenadiers and cannon. I'm glad you enjoyed it!! Galleys getting bumped by wardecs and crazy jazz like that isn't something we thought about, but if someone actually gets this to happen in the live game, well, more power to them IMHO. Krill's land was something we debated a bit... its one of the most land-starved spots on the map, but it also has one of the best strategic positions, able to easily wall off the north and then just focus fully on the south. In the hands of a weak player, that spot would just get boxed in I think, but with Krill.... at any rate, we decided not to change any spot on account of any particular player.
August 28th, 2015, 05:42
(This post was last modified: August 28th, 2015, 05:46 by GermanJoey.)
 (August 27th, 2015, 00:15)Miguelito Wrote: Why do you guys think Stalin of Zulu is awful? Sure, there'll be traits with better synergy than ind, but I can't see how agg Zulu can ever be bottom tier imho in a big game like this you need something to leverage to get yourself ahead somehow, either in tech or hammers, and agg/ind doesn't get either of those things easily. I still think Zulu is a good civ but not so good where I'd be willing to eat a bad leader to get them. a.) stalin is slow (no early hammer booster, Agg and Ind are both hungry-hungry-hammers in the classical era) b.) you expand slow, so no extra hammers to pump into wonders because you'll already be struggling to keep up with your neighbors c.) zulu got nerfed (starting techs don't matter so much anymore, meaning Agri/Hunt isn't so special, and the impi was straight-up nerfed too) d.) agg ikhanda are nice buildings, but both have more and more of an effect the more cities you have, and they only really make a difference when you have "lots" of cities (which is why genghis of zulu is so great). however... agg/ind is slow. so you won't have lots of cities. Quote:I have a much higher opinion of Ind, Imp, and Cha Well I wouldn't disagree with Imp being good, apart from Augustus all the Imp combos are in my top two tiers. It's a big part of why I like Justinian, I think Spi works well with Imp or Pro to give it a good start and you can use it from a position of strength. I just can't get behind Ind in a 22 player game though. You say it guarantees at least 1 big wonder. But in a 5 player PBEM it guarantees a lot more and it's rarely the top choice there. In fact if 3 players picked Ind a 5 player game they'd be cursing each other but the situation is even worse here. IMO it's clearly the worst trait in these massive games. Regarding Cha, well, Krill ninja-nerfed the Colosseum again. It doesn't give 25% military production just xp. It's main bonus is always going to be that happy cap though and when everyone has easy access to 3 early happies that loses some value. The players can't really complain much IMO because they did see the Ivory at the capital. Additionally, I wouldn't like to rely on any trait which needs to war in the ancient - classical era. That's too risky a strategy even if you know somehow you have weak players for neighbours. Quote:Why do you guys think Stalin of Zulu is awful? Sure, there'll be traits with better synergy than ind, but I can't see how agg Zulu can ever be bottom tier Pretty much agree with GJ, with an extra helping of Ind sucks. Also, I was catching up on Krill's thread and saw his response to the 2h plant capitals being annoying for mapmakers: Quote:Yeah I'd rather see RtR never be played than revert that change. I am totally banned from making maps for 3.0. I would not be able to resist alternating people between 3h plants, 3f plants and extra resources just to mess with Krill. 
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