Introduction and preliminary thoughts

So, the Potluck Epic has arrived. While I never participated in any of the Civ3 Epics, I did read them and the ones that stand out the most in my mind is the original potluck, the potluck following (two maps, had to get two different kinds of victories depending on your traits) and the huge Epic 36.

I'd only managed to play in two RBC events so far. A combination of vacation and basically being burned out on Civ meant that I didn't have the motivation for neither normal play or RBC events. Instead I had fun with Diablo 2 again. Now, all this has changed and there are two reasons for it. The first is that this is a Potluck Epic. I expect this to be highly enjoyable and to learn a lot from studying how the other players, mainly those playing the same nation did. The second reason is that Warlords has just come out here and has managed to revitalize my interest in the game.

Now, this is vanilla Civ4 which plays slightly different. The biggest loss for me will be the lack of Trebuchets and the fact that I can't counter axes with chariots anymore. Even so, I will adapt and, hopefully, survive.

This game is on Monarch which is slightly frightening. I've only attempted the level twice before, first losing horribly in Epic 2 and later losing horribly again in a private game. Epic 2 can be read here on the site. The other game saw me starting extremely close to Caesar and Louis and after being boxed in I made the mistake of trying to fight my way out. It went reasonably well until Louis decided to join the party.

I've learned a few things from them though. Build early military to stave off their desires of early attacks, stay on their good side and, as the most difficult thing, don't make mistakes. Something I'm very good at. Throughout the report I have tried to point out the options I considered when I felt it being important. I will try to explain what my thoughts were when I made a specific decision. I'd very much appreciate some feedback on my choices so I can see if I did right or, if not, why I did the wrong thing.

Right, let's open the save and see what we got.

P.S. While proofreading my report I start changing the text to the past tense as I seemed wrong. I was writing while playing so everything would be fresh in my mind. It then struck me that whether it was written in the present tense or in the past tense should really matter much. That is why page 6 and some of page 7 might be a bit confusing. I hope you'll all bear with me.