Civ 3 Conquests COTM 17 (Celts, Emperor level)

Game started: 1 Oct 2005, finished: 1 Nov 2005

This game has finished. Click here to see the results.

You can no longer submit a competition entry, but you can download any starting save below (click on an icon) to play for fun.

Open: (The standard save)	Starting save for
Conquest: (The easier save)	Starting save for
Predator: (The extra-hard save)	Starting save for

version 0.0.0 last updated on September 30, 2005

This is a C3C Game Of The Month. It MUST be played in Conquests Patch version 1.22f.

Conquest 17: Celts

The Celts were a group of peoples that occupied lands stretching from the British Isles to Galatia. The first historical recorded encounter of a people displaying the cultural traits associated with the Celts comes from northern Italy around 400 BC, when a previously unkown group of barbarians came down from the Alps and displaced the Etruscans from the fertile Po valley, a displacment that helped to push the Etruscans from history's limelight.

The next encounter with the Celts came with the still young Roman Empire, directly to the south of the Po. Roman historians in fact tell us much of the Celts. Diodorus writes that:

"Their aspect is terrifying... They are very tall in stature, with ripling muscles under clear white skin. Their hair is blond, but not naturally so: they bleach it, to this day, artificially, washing it in lime and combing it back from their foreheaads. They look like wood-demons, their hair thick and shaggy like a horse's mane.
"The way they dress is astonishing: they wear brightly coloured and embroidered shirts, with trousers called bracae and cloaks fastened at the shoulder with a brooch, heavy in winter, light in summer. These cloaks are striped or checkered in design, with the seperate checks close together and in various colours.
"They wear bronze helmets with figures picked out on them, even horns, which made them look even taller than they already are... while others cover themselves with breast-armour made out of chains. But most content themselves with the weapons nature gave them: they go naked into battle... Weird, discordant horns were sounded, they shouted in chorus with their deep and harsh voices, they beat their swords rythmically against their shields.
"In exactly the same way as hunters do with their skulls of the animals they have slain...they preserved the heads of their most high-ranking victims in cedar oil, keeping them carefully in wooden boxes."

The Romans were soon to experience the Celts' prowess in battle, even though their first encounter was a peaceful one. In fact, they had sent three envoys to the beseiged Etruscans to study the new force that had arrived onto their lands; Livy tells us about this first encounter:

"The Celts told the Roman envoys that this was indeed the first time they had heard of them, but they assumed the Romans must be a courageous people because it was to them that the Etruscans had turned to in their hour of need. And since the Romans had tried to help with an embassy and not with arms, they themselves would not reject the offer of peace, provided the Etruscans ceded part of their seperfluous agricultural land; that was what they, the Celts, wanted. If it were not given, they would launch an attack before the Romans' eyes, so that the Romans could report back how superior the Gauls were in battle to all others.
"The Romans then asked whether it was right to demand land from its owners on pain of war, indeed what were the Celts going in Etruria in the first place? The latter defiantly retorted that their right lay in their arms: to the brave belong all things."

The Roman envoys then proceeded to break their good faith and helped the Etruscans in their fight; in fact, one of the envoys, Quintus Fabius, killed one of the Celtic tribal leaders. Diplomacy this time failed to maintain peace between these two peoples, and a Celt host marched south, towards Rome.

The Celts tore through the countryside and several battalions of Roman soilders to lay seige to the Capitol of the Roman Empire. Seven months of seige led to negotiations whereby the Celts promised to leave their seige for a tribute of one thousand pounds of gold, which the historian Pliny tells was very difficult for the entire city to muster. When the gold was being weighed, the Romans claimed the Celts were cheating with faulty weights. It was then that the Celts' leader, Brennus, threw his sword into the balance and and uttered the words "vae victis", woe to the defeated.

The Celts in CivIII Conquests are Agricultural and Religious, and the Gallic Swordsman is their unique unit. Take up arms or ploughshares, and lead them to a glorious victory.

Scope of the Game:

Conquest 17 starting position - Click for a wider view of the start position

Civilization: Celts
Difficulty: Emperor
World size: Standard
Landmass: Continents, 70% water
Geology: 5 billion years old
Environment: normal climate, temperate
Barbarians: Roaming
Rivals: 7 Preset
Respawn: OFF
Scientific Great Leaders: OFF
Mobilisation: ON
Goody Huts: Provide WORKERS (not settlers)
Submissions due by November 1st, 2005. PLEASE NOTE THE DATE.

Goody Huts: Goody huts have caused some game balance issues previously, where some players have got settlers or cities from goody huts, and some have missed-out. The game rules have been modified so that a hut that would have given a settler will instead give a worker (as discovered by Roland Ehnstr�m and TimBentley ).

A 'fix' for the Barbarians!: As many of you know, the barbarians in C3C are 'broken'. This can be fixed by going to your \Conquest\ folder, and opening your Conquests.ini file, and adding a line noaipatrol=0 to the file. As well as fixing the barbarian misbehaviour, it appears this change also affects the AI's battle tactics. We cannot force people to do this, but without it your game is not fully comparable. If you are not comfortable editing your .ini file, you can download a utility here to do it automatically.

ALL SPOILERS PROHIBITED: Do not post any messages or questions about this game in any forum until after about October 5, 2005. Please do not discuss any aspect of this game prior to that date.

As always, have fun playing the COTM and we hope you join us in the postgame discussions!

You will have your choice of Playing COTM 17 in one of three skill levels that most closely matches your current abilities - Conquest Class, Open Class, or Predator Class.

Conquest-Class Game Details for Conquest 17

Players who choose to play in the Conquest class game will receive a set of bonuses designed to help them focus on key early strategic decisions that may help them to get more enjoyment out of the specific conditions of this game. The bonuses ARE NOT designed to guarantee you a win without requiring some good early decisions to be made and without asking you to manage your Civilization properly.

Players who might be interested in playing the conquest class game could be those players who might only feel comfortable playing at Warlord or Regent difficulty.

For the purposes of global ranking and comparison to all other GOTM scores, the Conquest class games scores in the QSC and GOTM results will be weighted downward with an 85% multilpier to factor out the value of the additional starting bonuses.

Conquest Class Starting Bonuses:
Conquest class players will begin the game with following unit and game feature bonuses:

Starting Cash in Treasury: 150 units of gold
Extra Units: One extra warrior.
Technology: You know the Alphabet as well as Pottery and Ceremonial Burial.
Unique Unit:: A Gallic Swordsman costs only 30 gp.

Click on the image below to download the Conquest-class start save file.

Open Class Game Details for Conquest 17

Players who choose to play in the Open Class game receive no bonuses compared to a game that would be normally be played on this level.

For the purposes of global ranking and comparison to all other GOTM scores, Open class game scores will be ranked according to the Jason score which balances speed and scoring skills for a combined "Best Overall game" rating.

Open Class Starting Bonuses:

None

Click on the image below to download the Open-Class start save file.

Predator Class Game Details for Conquest 17

Players who choose to play in the Predator class game must overcome an extra set of obstacles built into their game to provide an extra level of challenge. The intent of these changes is to raise the difficulty without altering strategic play progress from that which you would see for comparison in the conquest class and open class games.

Players who might be interested in playing the Predator class game could be those players who have participated in the Elite or Leader divisions of the Medal Play Series or players who just want an extra level of excitement or challenge.

For the purposes of global ranking and comparison to all other GOTM scores, the Predator class game scores in the QSC and GOTM results do not receive any compensating scoring bonus for the added elements of challenge.

Predator Class Equalizing Obstacles:
The game features for Predator Class Games have been raised to provide the following obstacles:

Technology: Your people have forgotten Pottery.
AI trade factor: Demigod level.
AI cost factor: Demigod level.

Click on the image below to download the Predator-Class start save file.