Alpha Centauri 2

Other Games => CivII => Topic started by: Sardaukar on August 23, 2022, 09:55:44 PM

Title: Seeds of Greatness: Thread III
Post by: Sardaukar on August 23, 2022, 09:55:44 PM

Starting a new thread because the images in the previous one are too large and they seem to have scrambled the text formatting.

Mighty Babylon! My favorite civ yet. Was just starting out with Egypt. Greeks and Minoans can get a little finicky inasmuch as they're in the corner of the map and rely on sea travel.

(https://i.postimg.cc/PqfBgBk6/babylon.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)

But Babylon is great. There are the usual barbarian waves, competing civilizations and treacherous events but this is an enormously fertile area with excellent growth potential. In this game, I managed to hoard most all the wonders other than the first few. With that kind of happiness bonus, Babylon ran on monarchy the entire game. Usually, it's advantageous to switch to empire (vanilla communism) for the double police powers of garrison units but the corruption can bite. Republic boasts its own benefits but the difficulty of military action conflicts with the goal of the scenario: conquering all seven founding cities!

I particularly enjoyed this game because I took a new strategy, foregoing the usual research of Chariot IVs to instead rush sewers. Medium game warfare consisted of appalling trash units (spear-chucks and the like) supporting sluggardly but lethal armored siege towers. Those took out Persia and Assyria, my immediate neighbors.

(https://i.postimg.cc/76CThDRs/central-asia-230.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)

Even once all the objectives are fulfilled, the game doesn't end until every enemy faction is conquered, time runs out or you press the retire button. I took the opportunity to put together a world-shaking fleet and invade central Asia, north of the Caspian. This is where the barbarians keep the Ishtar Gate (Great Wall). Absurdly well defended. Can't imagine any way to take it except for siege ships, which are quite advanced and you need a lot of them. If anyone could conquer the city before meeting the victory conditions, it would be Persia, but even that is doubtful.

Title: Re: Seeds of Greatness: Thread III
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 23, 2022, 10:20:47 PM

Try adding " width=800" inside the img tag...  (The second pic was already borked before my edit.)

Title: Re: Seeds of Greatness: Thread III
Post by: Sardaukar on August 24, 2022, 02:07:19 AM

The scenario presents a challenge inasmuch as bridge building (roads across rivers) can't be constructed until late in the game. On top of that, the Tigris, the Euphrates and the Nile consist of ocean squares, though there are plenty of crossing points where the narrow two corners of tiles touch. This design choice allows ships to sail up and down these major rivers, which adds a lot to the naval engagement of the game.

When it comes to roads spanning the rivers, have to plan ahead. Without bridges, the only way is to build cities directly on the rivers or to take advantage of the barbarian "towns" (airbases) which count as roads. You can see some of them in the first pic, pre-placed on rivers (north of Babylon, northwest of Lagash). Main problem with these is that sometimes barbarians will pillage them.

Title: Re: Seeds of Greatness: Thread III
Post by: Sardaukar on August 27, 2022, 09:44:00 PM

Slight change of topic. I've been playing Kull's original Bronze Age Collapse scenario (starting 1200BC) with a couple of friends. We gave the guy with no civ experience the powerful marauding Sea Peoples, while I took the Minor Powers (Canaan, Elam, a couple other cities) and the third fellow took Greece.

We played for about 300 years. The Greeks tinkered around, grabbed the Slave Labour System (Hoover Dam) and focused on infrastructure. The Sea Peoples conquered Egypt, the Hittites and Assyria. They also nabbed half of Babylon. My Minor Powers consolidated our position in Canaan and built a few useful wonders of our own.

At 915BC, I decided to crack the game open with the scenario editor. With three bronze age civs out of the game, it would be enjoyable to add in three iron age replacements: Lydia, Urartu and Elam. The Minor Power were renamed to Israelites and, having lost their Elamite cities, they were restricted to Canaan. Their position was roughly comparable to the historical King Solomon, though he never held Cypress. Historically, he wasn't surrounded by hostile kingdoms descended from Sea Peoples.

(https://i.postimg.cc/vZSCrCB4/israel.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)

Had some fun jiggering the graphics. Have not succeeded in using a paint document or gimp because these modern applications screw the old 16 bit interface or something like that. Only workable method was to find other scenarios with the desired graphics and copy-paste through the in-game scenario editor. Lot of good resources in the King David scenario.

Title: Re: Seeds of Greatness: Thread III
Post by: Blake00 on February 27, 2023, 04:05:55 AM

I enjoyed reading these. Also nice name, speaking of Sardaukar and Civ2 I'm actually working on a Civ2 Dune 2 scenario atm although I gotta release all my other stuff first haha. Too many projects lol..

(Note: Hills and forts still to be replaced)

(https://forums.civfanatics.com/attachments/teaser-png.650058/)