last updated by cracker – May 19, 2003

This is our second game in a continuing series of “Spotlight Games” that are selected from among the competitive submissions to the Civ3 GOTM and QSC games.

Games that stand out as superior games of Civ3, that distinguish themselves above their peers when surrounded by 20 or 30 excellent and well played games, should be regarded as special examples that we can refer to as setting the standards of game play while making it possible for all players to reach new heights of personal enjoyment from their games.

This spotlight game is one of those games that should probably appear on any player’s list of the best ten games of Civilization III that may ever be played by a single player. In playing this game, SirPleb participated in the Pre-game Strategy Discussion of GOTM19 and told us all the exact strategy and formula that he would try to apply to play the most perfect game he could imagine to take full advantage of the special attributes of the Celts on a Large Map Pangaea game.

Then he almost flawlessly followed this strategy to provide us with a documented timeline of his first 80 moves that:

Positioned his game for a strategic early swordsman rush to conquer virtually his entire world.
Deliberately SLOWED DOWN technology development to extend the time period where the advantages of his Gallic Swordsman UU could be used to decimate his enemies.
Optimized city positions and road improvements in the ancient age to provide a direct path into the heart of his opponents.
And then shifted into total command of the game to allow him to control virtually every variable and engage every possible victory condition simultaneously at the end of the game.

We want to acknowledge this game as the standard of play and virtual recipe for success for playing an aggressive early game strategy on a Pangaea. The surrounding rivals for SirPleb’s Celtic Civilization included all three of the strongest defensive civilizations in the Ancient Age: Greece, Carthage, and Rome.

The Icing on The Cake
On top of a nearly perfect opening play sequence, then Sirpleb goes on to achieve an almost perfect combination of simultaneously enabling every possible victory condition while treading only 1 to 5 squares away from triggering a domination victory for nearly 2000 years to maximize the possible Civ3 game score achieved from the game.

The ability to perfectly time Space Race, Cultural 100k, and Cultural 20k victories to coincide with Diplomatic, Conquest, and Domination victories that would normally create conflicting results is just another reflection of the skill demonstrated in this spotlight game from Celtic GOTM events for April 2003.

Download a SirPleb's Game in PTW format to take close look at this game

You may also download Sirpleb's timeline and 1000bc save file from the Qsc18 results page


You may also download the original Gotm18-Celts starting game position and play along with SirPleb as he gives us all a master's recipe for playing an aggressive opening strategy that will virtually guarantee you success on Monarch or Emperor difficulty games on large Pangaea maps.

Game Summary
excerpts from original comments by SirPleb

Pre-game:

Before starting I planned to:

1) Go for a multi victory milked game with a diplomatic win included. To do this I'd have to avoid taking many permanent AI attitude hits. (These are now fairly well understood thanks to Bamspeedy's excellent article in the Strategy section.) I planned to:
a) Break no deals.
b) Raze no cities, not when asked and not by auto-razing.
c) Declare war a minimal number of times.
d) Pick one Civ who would be my "friend" and get that Civ down to one city without fighting them.

2) Use Gallic Swordsmen to the max. So I'd:
a) Slow research as much as possible.
b) Use warrior upgrades heavily as well as building GS's.

Early development:

For a long time my second and third town (sharing the NW fish) produced settlers and workers. Entremont also produced a few settlers. Other towns produced barracks and warriors.

I left a few early towns unconnected. These constantly built warriors until late in my conquest phase, an ongoing source of units to be upgraded to GS.

My exploring warriors met a number of Civs quickly. I traded for Alphabet early on. Then when Writing became available (1710BC) I traded to get Writing, contact with all Civs, all tech to that date, and everyone's gold.

In 1175BC some of my rivals learned Map Making. I traded maps to get all tech known to that date plus all maps and gold. At this point I had everything I needed for the coming wars except a decent military. I started working on that. I also began fomenting distant wars, trading to get alliances against China and Egypt.

Status at 1000BC:
12 towns
6 barracks, 3 granaries, 1 temple
16 warriors
3 native workers + 7 foreign workers
629g in the treasury

Read the complete details of Sir Pleb's prototype game for a guaranteed win on Pangea style maps.

Quote from SirPleb summing up the end of his game:

"At the end, France was gracious toward me. I stayed at peace for the Diplomatic win. A war alliance to further improve relations would be overkill. There was no way Joanofarctix would vote for the evil Hannibal who'd taken so many of her towns.

I played it out as a zero pollution game. Many cities, not one metropolis. No pollution causing improvements. France and Carthage were only about 2/3 of the way through the Middle Ages at the end so they were incapable of causing pollution.

I never learned Chivalry or Military Tradition. I'm so very fond of the Horseman / Knight / Cavalry path that it seemed amusing to finish a game without learning those techs.