Having explored the dark side, I think the next set of games for people like me, kbk and blizzrd who've done conquests and dominations to try the other side: earliest possible cultural victories. (Cultural victories used to be easy, but with the 50000 limit set, the challenge is not IF, but WHEN you get it). Some civs are probably still impossible to get cultural victories (like the Mali who can't even survive beyond 1800--I'm always amazed that the AI is able to do so), and part of the challenge for civs like Egypt and Babylon is to survive beyond their allotted time.

So people please post screenshots of their earliest cultural victories using the most recent patch. (Obviously in monarch, otherwise it'll be too easy or too hard). Listing in spawn order:

Babylon: 1793 (youtien)
Egypt: 1480 (usi)
China (3000BC): 1555 (usi)
China (600 AD): 1982 (AP)
India: 1898 (blizzrd)
Greece: 1570 (Verily)
Persia: 1490 (usi)
Rome: 1390 (usi)
Carthage: 1745 (War Bear)
Japan (3000BC): 1685 (usi)
Japan (600 AD): 1856 (blizzrd)
Ethiopia: 1940 (War Bear):goodjob:
Maya: 1959 (blizzrd) :goodjob:
Vikings: 1936 (AP)
Arabia: 1736 (blizzrd)
Khmer: 1835 (usi)
Spain: 1808 (usi)
France: 1817 (blizzrd)
England: 1870 (blizzrd)
Germany: 1886 (AP)
Russia: 1888 (blizzrd)
Netherlands: 1918 (AP)
Mali: 1934 (TDK) :goodjob:
Portugal: 1961 (AP)
Mongolia: 1962 (AP-3000BC unlocked)
Inca: 1886 (blizzrd)
Aztecs: 1966 (AP)
Turkey: 1832 (blizzrd)
America: 1973 (CreCon)

nice challenge :)
Will update when I have a screenshot.

Might try with the Greeks, if I am able to to pump out enough artists it should be possible!

You can cross Babylon off the list. I got 50000 culture in Jerusalm, Babli and Shush.

The trick is to wipe out as many wonders as possible and kill Turkey ASAP.

But this was with 1.181 so im not sure if you can get it in the current patch...

We need screenshots!

Again, the challenge is not whether it can be done, it's how early you can manage to do it.

I dont have any screeshots, but i got it around 1800ish.

i was going for a diplo victory so i say i could get it earier if i tried...

http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/1863/greece01nv3.th.jpg (http://img56.imageshack.us/my.php?image=greece01nv3.jpg)

Greece, cultural victory in 1874 with latest patch (1.183). My culture cities were Epidamnos, Babylon and Dispolis Megale (Niwt-Rst). Can be done much faster, didn't really focus on a quick finish (didn't use culture slider or convert production).

How did you keep greece alive for so long? Have you launched a spaceship? There is a discussion about it in the "Help me understand stability" thread. moreso, about how to keep your stability up around the 1200-1600 phase.

Stability was really no issue. I had only few cities: Atina, Byzantinos, Alexandreia, Hattusas, Roma and the three mentioned above. Built courthouses and jails asap and cottages in egypt and mesopotamia for economy.
I didn't launch the spaceship yet, but i could have done it soon. Wasn't really sure which victory to go :) In fact i could have been much faster if i had focused on culture (skip research etc.)

Too bad I only had Christianity for the longest time, then I had an Islamic Cambridge in South America, so I went to OR and built Islamic Temples all over so I can build 3 Mosques. Stayed in Representation, Mercantilism, Pacifism for a long time. The only mistake I made was not to get Music early to build the Sistine Chapel. Had Mali, Netherlands, Khmer, Inca and Aztec as vassals.

I had numerous cities flip to me, most of which I disbanded. Witness the tiny American empire (Philadelphia flipped to me).:lol:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197483&stc=1&d=1229502780

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197487&d=1229514550
Babylon, cultural victory in 1997. Again not for speed, but for fun. I only owned 3 cities in the non-flippable core area in Mesopotamia. Also notice the perfect timing :p

How are you able to be stable with just 3 cities? What's your economy like?

i was shaky. economy was like -50, but it was compensated by city and foreign rating.
i also could not research much, so i relied mostly on trading and espionage.

Before this thread was posted, I had a cultural victory on the new patch as Greece in 1784. Cultural cities were Athenai, Byzantion and Babylon. Wasn't really organized, though; Babylon reached Legendary culture long before the other two.

Greece 1763 AD (turn 342) 1.183

Very casual play. Turn 300 should be straightforward if you work at it. Maybe turn 250 or earlier in a lucky game.

screenshothttp://i234.photobucket.com/albums/ee216/athenai777/CFC/rfc-greece-culture-200812.jpg
game2/3 UHV. Machinery from Oracle.
200 Liberalism to PP, shut off science slider
250 noticed that everyone was Islamic and adopted Islam/Caste/Pacifism
320 the only plague of the game
339 Apulon declared independence

I haven't finished it yet, but it dawned on me that as China, we need:
1. Elephants against the Mongolians and to get another shrine in Patna (i.e. elephant 2S of Hanoi)
2. a good vassal for happiness if you don't want to support lots of troops (i.e. Khmer)
3. Japan often gets Buddhism
4. Most of your southern cities are already Buddhist (as in real life from Wikipedia):

Buddhism was popular during the Six Dynasties period that preceded the Sui dynasty, spreading from India through Kushan Afghanistan into China during the Late Han period. Buddhism gained prominence during the period, when central political control was limited. Buddhism created a unifying cultural force that uplifted the people out of war and into the Sui Dynasty. In many ways, Buddhism was responsible for the rebirth of culture in China under the Sui Dynasty.

The Emperor Wen and his empress had converted to Buddhism to legitimate imperial authority over China and the conquest of Chen. Wendi presented himself as a Cakravartin king, a Buddhist monarch that would use military force to defend the Buddhist faith, much like the notion of Jihad in Islam.[7] In the year 601 AD, Emperor Wen had relics of the Buddha distributed to temples throughout China, with edicts that expressed his goals, "all the people within the four seas may, without exception, develop enlightenment and together cultivate fortunate karma, bringing it to pass that present existences will lead to happy future lives, that the sustained creation of good causation will carry us one and all up to wondrous enlightenment".[8] Ultimately, this act was an imitation of the ancient Mauryan Emperor Ashoka of India.[9]

So I converted to Buddhism, built Leaning Tower, Sistine Chapel (China starts with Music), Notre Dame and Univ of Sankore. Got several tributes from Khmer and finally they vassalized. I had built Hanoi (yes, it is possible to get there before the Khmer and it will not flip) and slaved a pavilion for early culture. Japan was Confused at first but became Buddhist, and yet still declared war on me, I killed all their triremes and they made peace. Even Mongolia (who I did not kill) turned Buddhist. I'm gunning for Patna and getting conquerors next, although the English may have beaten me to it.

Sorry I just finished Chinese one (3000BC though). . .
Beijing, Sanshan and Tokyo (Tianjin) achieved legendary culture.

Some tips are:
1) Build the Great Lighthouse, and build coastal cities.
2) Kill Japanese when they appear.
Tokyo is damn good and you'll also get gold and silver (8 chariots will be usually enough).
3) The warrior you start with will go India to kidnap workers (woodsman II) and the first warrior you built will go Europe (trade).
Barbarian chariots and immprtals will appear after a while, so move the warriors carefully.
4) Gift a cheap tech to Babylon and OB with them after you got monarchy from Persia. It will connect your trade routes with Euro civs.

I have just discovered the hard way that all the artists, wonders, temples and cathedrals in the world won't help you win an early cultural victory. I'm in 1950 and still just 15 turns to victory despite having all the wonders and religions in Beijing, Xian and Qufu. I have 5 vassals too which doesn't help. :blush:

It's the cultural slider (i.e. no vassals and turn off science slider after switching to free speech)!

I tried India but failed miserably. I'm at 10 turns to the end and my cities are still around 30.000 culture. I didn't really set up any good strategy though, but like AP says I learnt that I should have sticked to 4 cities max, should have forgotten about Mass Media and beelined Liberalism. The hard part with India was that I couldn't build many wonders... too few production. It was an interesting game nonetheless, India is probably the most stable of the 3000 BC civs (and even of the classical civs); I even went through 4 very bad plagues but I was never Shaky, and was Stable most of the game !

This is actually a good guide:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=298093

The only thing missing is corporations. I think my English game went much quicker because I had all the corporations founded, having run Mercantilism and Pacifism throughout for great people. + 15 :culture: just with Sushi is like having 1.5 Forbidden Palace's culture, not to mention the other culture-related corporations.

Actually, you DO want a large empire, because you need to be able to support a 100% cultural slider with no deficits. 4 cities is just not enough, and India suffers due to lack of endowment in the New World (where cottages can be plenty and hammers at Denver can be all converted to gold (500 gold per turn!). But not large enough to drive your science down.

The most important paragraph is:

Ok, so you want to get a lot of raw culture and a lot of multipliers in three cities in a high difficulty game (Emperor, Immortal or Deity). Where will the raw culture come from?

Buildings? No. How many WW do you think you are going to build, being realistic. 1 early and 2 medieval, maybe? And smaller buildings add simply too little culture. There is a long way to 50000. It would take too long. (Note: BTS has many more interesting buildings and Sistine's add a great benefit to building temples and monasteries).

Specialists? No. Only 4 culture per artist. 6 if you build the Sistine's. Too slow.

GA? No. You are not going to get more than 20 GL in any game. At least if it doesn't go so late that Deity AI launches their Spaceship. 20*4000=80000, not bad, but you need another 70000 out of somewhere.

Cultural slider? Yes. Here is where culture lies. A city that has built his cottages around 1000BC and worked them will enjoy towns around 1000AD. Since the obvious civic to run is FS, every town is worth at least 7 commerce per turn, which will convert into 7 raw culture if the cultural slider is at 100%. A city can easily get 10 cottages, so we are talking about 70cpt in all three cities. That's superior to any other source.

Ok, so the most important contributor will be the commerce transformed into culture, the second more important contributor will be GAs generated by artists and buildings will add another bit. (In BTS there are many new WW and Sistine's has changed a lot, so the balance has changed a bit).

England done in 1870AD.
Legendary cities were Southampton, Inverness and Chicago.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197715&d=1229707721

Washington was in terrible trouble from Chicago's culture, but it still wouldn't flip to me even at the end.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197716&d=1229707721

Just managed Greece in 1570. Really not very exciting or particularly difficult. The Great Wall (in Europe) is paramount, of course, as is conquering Babylon early on and slingshotting to Theology using the Oracle. Also be sure to raze Jerusalem and Sur so they don't flip to Arabia.

Had mixed feelings about beelining to Free Speech because it meant losing the Great People bonus early, but ended up doing it anyway. Three cities were Athenai, Babylon and Salona. Salona seems better than Diospolis Megale or Byzantion for a cultural victory: more production. Byzantion focused on commerce to power my research. Never bothered to conquer Egypt, although I did take over Italy after the barbarians wiped out the Romans, and I founded Sinope after the Turks spawned to hem them in (they eventually vassalized).

Towards the end I had fun with vassals; Ethiopia grew massive as my vassal, taking over Egypt after they collapsed and then invading Arabia on my behalf. Of course, Ethiopia collapsed the turn before I won, so my score was much lower than it would have been had they survived a turn.

Blizzrd your screen looks almost like mine with the 3 (or is it 4 now with Duluth being also a powerhouse) key American cities. :lol:

I think I made the mistake of getting too many vassals and too many techs, and not making one of my American cities legendary. Production is key (500 hammers turned into culture per move plus cultural slider, beats anything that all the palaces and statues of liberty can do in 50 moves). For my French/German games, I'm going to beeline commerce and culture techs, get to the New World, and as soon as I have rifling and kill the French (Germans), I'm going to stop science.

The most important paragraph is:


Yeah but that guide doesn't take into account 4 nasty RFC plagues (since they level towns). I will try Egypt, should be easier with culture but harder with stability.

Dan Quayle would be proud. :blush:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197746&stc=1&d=1229731914

Blizzrd your screen looks almost like mine with the 3 (or is it 4 now with Duluth being also a powerhouse) key American cities. :lol:

I think I made the mistake of getting too many vassals and too many techs, and not making one of my American cities legendary. Production is key (500 hammers turned into culture per move plus cultural slider, beats anything that all the palaces and statues of liberty can do in 50 moves). For my French/German games, I'm going to beeline commerce and culture techs, get to the New World, and as soon as I have rifling and kill the French (Germans), I'm going to stop science.

Duluth was actually just my 12th city so that I could build enough temples to get 3x Cathedrals in each legendary city.

A key step was conquering Patliputra and spreading Hinduism and Buddhism to the rest of my empire.

My 12 cities were:

Southhampton (capital), Inverness, Newcastle, Dublin, Durban, Patliputra, New Delhi, Mexico City, Chicago, New Orleans, Denver, Duluth.

Having done England in 1870AD, I now know how I could have also done it faster though...

Rome 1817

Legendary cities: Athenae, Antium, Mediolanum.
First time I ever use pacifism as a civic, these GA came up handy.
I was very surprised that although I set the science slider to 0% during most of the game, I was still tech leader :eek:
Also I eventually had to switch to Viceroyalty and get 2 vassals to boost stability. So it certainly could be done much faster.

Legendary cities were Paris, Constance, Bordeaux. Multiple great artists born, stayed in pacifism, US, free market (NO GREAT DEPRESSIONS!), viceroyalty and emancipation for the rest of the game after democracy was learned.

The importance of Constance is now really apparent, since we can't squat in Breme anymore, and peace with Germany is important. In fact, when the Russians declared war on Germany and captured a city, they were willing to vassalize to me, which help me with tech (nearly all my techs after rifling were stolen from the Germans). Of course, I had to research fascism, biology, medicine and electricity myself, and I'm a sucker for 5 vassals (Khmer, Mali, Aztecs, Inca and Germany), so potentially this could have been done much sooner.

Chartres in South America was founded to get all the food in range, and knocks off Spain's territory significantly, and I was able to flip Santiago near the end. On the mainland, I especially love the fact I could finally get that Spanish iron with my culture.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197873&stc=1&d=1229809685
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197874&stc=1&d=1229809685
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197875&stc=1&d=1229809685

Persia won in 1490AD.
It was actually easier than I thought.
Sirajis, Babylon and Delhi were the legendary cities.

Yeah, Persia has got the best chance of being the earliest cultural win, simply because they have access to 5 religions reliably and have no stability problems, and all the production necessary for wonders. Plus that free great artist from getting Music first doesn't hurt. :goodjob:

Tried Egypt and built almost all wonders up until Renaissance. Then I collapsed :D

India done in 1898AD.
Legendary cities were Takshashila, Dilli and Chennai.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197936&stc=1&d=1229863953

Only went for two religions, 2/3 of UHV and 8 cities. Was lucky that Lasa had Confucianism which allowed 2x more Confucian Academies in my slowest cultural cities.

Built the Internet, which was probably completely useless for my purposes, since I was so peaceful that I had to declare war on the Germans to see if they would collapse because they launched their spaceship in 1976. Well, they only built 4 thrusters, so I just made it in time. (if they would have just built one more thruster I would have lost). Having 5 religions in my empire (only 4 of them, excluding Christianity and its hammers) was also key.

Legendary cities were Chicago, Denver and Montevideo (their equivalent in Quechua). The key realization was the even though Nazca (my capital) had more culture to start with, it could not catch up while the high production cities and high population cities can churn out hammers and artists that turn into culture.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197995&stc=1&d=1229905401
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=197996&stc=1&d=1229905401

Great job!
I didn't think Incan cultural victory would be possible.

Just finished Spain in 1808.
Madrid, Lisboa, and Burdeos were the legendary cities.

Conquoring Alexandria and Jerusarem gave me both economic boost and stability issues.
Egypt and Marsella later became independent.

Some tips:
1) War elephants are extremely cost-effective.
I used one of my starting settlers to found Casablanca (on Ivory).
2) It's not good to kill Portuguese right away.
When they spawn, kill all of their military units except one. Let them found Lisbon, wait one turn (so that it won't flip), and then take it.
This way, you will have free buildings.

Very tight game, had only one religion. No spaceships launched yet.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198028&stc=1&d=1229945080

Well done that man! I look forward to seeing an American success now :-)

Cheers, Luke

Tried Egypt and built almost all wonders up until Renaissance. Then I collapsed :D

I retried and spent 5 GP to have 2 golden ages, plus Taj Mahal built, but collapsed right after the end of the last GA by Taj Mahal >_<
I had 3 cities plus Aksum which I lost and reconquered due to instability like 3-4 times.

India done in 1898AD.
Legendary cities were Takshashila, Dilli and Chennai.

Only went for two religions, 2/3 of UHV and 8 cities. Was lucky that Lasa had Confucianism which allowed 2x more Confucian Academies in my slowest cultural cities.


Wow congrats, what strategy did you adopt ? Did you stop research at Liberalism ? What was the city build order ? Dehli, Taxila, Chennai and then the rest ?

Wow congrats, what strategy did you adopt ? Did you stop research at Liberalism ? What was the city build order ? Dehli, Taxila, Chennai and then the rest ?
I built Takshashila first, then Dilli (but one SE of the Indian start location to get the Iron) and then Chennai. I built up to 7 cities and then flipped Lasa for the 8th city.

Built Oracle in Takshasila straight up after a Worker for the Marble (who then had not so much to do for quite a while). Took Monarchy from the Oracle.

I researched for Liberalism and was going to stop there, but then actually kept researching to Nationalism for another Golden Age and the +100% National Wonder.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that easily the most important aspect was getting the +2 health special event about 20 turns into the game. Certainly couldn't have done so well without this -- too much jungle.

Turkish Cultural Victory in 1832AD.

Legendary cities were Istanbul, Atina and Bagdat. Built/flipped/captured 10 cities to secure the 1700AD UHV condition and then captured Mecca for the Spinal Minaret and Samarkand for the 12th city to support Cathedrals in all cultural cities and also for Buddhism.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198048&stc=1&d=1229960806

Khmer done in 1835.
Legendary cities were Jayakarta, Hangzhou and Delhi.

One important tip I forgot to mention - micromanagement.
It is often good to hire artists and not work on food tiles when there is enough food in a city or when you are about to win.
Nevertheless, it seems to harm stability.
The turn before I won, my stability was -13, and then it dropped to -21.

I played very defensively, stopping research only after industrialism, since I know that Germany will probably declare war on me at some time...it never happened. (probably because my culture enveloped the oil near Graz) Also voted mistakenly for emancipation and can't switch to caste system.

Nearly all of Scandinavia was conquered without a fight (culturally flipped), including Goteborg which had the Forbidden Palace while the Vikings were still alive.

Legendary cities were Tallinn, Moscow and Kiev (the latter is not a very good choice since it's got too many plains, can't grow too big without farms and we want towns or mines all around, not farms!).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198184&stc=1&d=1230069759

Legendary cities were 's-Gravenhage, Amsterdam and Middelburg (on the corn 1W of Montevideo). Could have been done much sooner but I wanted to see how much my culture can go.

Took a hint from blizzrd and sent my crossbows conquering South Africa and Patna, which provided all the Hindu and Buddhist missionaries.

My whole German and Scandinavian empire was acquired purely by flipping. This was one of those lucky games where Frankfurt was razed and I could found a 2nd city with marble and iron. Even then, it took an extremely lucky world conference where Germany was partitioned before they collapsed. Almost got to domination limit (I had 24%, limit was 25%) just by pacifist means.

Paris is reduced to a size 2 village on the outskirts of Amsterdam.:lol:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198331&stc=1&d=1230266796

So I've come to some conclusions regarding cultural victories:

1. Cultural slider is key, i.e. for your legendary cities, you want to have plenty of towns around it (because the slider turns that particular city's money into culture), and US will be very useful in providing hammers that turn into culture. Conversely for your "supporting" cities, you want plenty of production so that hammers can be turned into gold.
2. Cultural victory is easier for civs that do not have a lot of European contacts (e.g. Khmer, Persia, China) because nobody can successfully attack you and you can concentrate on culture rather than catching up on tech. If you have a large enough empire you can steal all the late techs easily.
3. Cultural victory is now actually easier since the diffusion of tech is slower, i.e. once you have rifling you can probably stop.
4. Radio and Mass Media wonders are OK but may actually delay your victory. Best to stick with caste system and all artists and plenty of religious buildings.
5. Absolutely need all the money you can get, i.e. need banking, economics (and do free trade if possible), corporation, printing press, democracy (emancipation for quick town growth). Liberalism is a must for free speech but not free religion. Unless you are Khmer or a 3000BC civ able to build Shwedagon Paya, you need philosophy.
6. An early opera house is worth much more than a late Eiffel Tower.

I managed to win a cultural victory with Carthage in 1745 AD, with the cities of Roma, Athenai, and Qart-Hadasht. I actually sent my settler in the galley to found Roma as my capital, and refrained from building Quart-Hadasht until the Romans had captured Mediolanum. Went straight for Theology, and bulbed out Divine Right. China, India, Egypt, Greece, and Babylonia were all wiped out before they could many wonders, so I had little competition for wonders for a while.

I managed to win a cultural victory with Carthage in 1745 AD, with the cities of Roma, Athenai, and Qart-Hadasht. I actually sent my settler in the galley to found Roma as my capital, and refrained from building Quart-Hadasht until the Romans had captured Mediolanum. Went straight for Theology, and bulbed out Divine Right. China, India, Egypt, Greece, and Babylonia were all wiped out before they could many wonders, so I had little competition for wonders for a while.

Squatting Rome? Did you use 1.181 or 1.183?

As I've noted before in the squatting thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=7487955&postcount=94), with 1.183 it's possible to still have your capital not flip if it's your one and only city. I suppose that's what War Bear did. I think for cultural victory I would have founded Carthage on the spot after Mediolanum flips, since it's more productive with 2 more usable tiles.

As I've noted before in the squatting thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=7487955&postcount=94), with 1.183 it's possible to still have your capital not flip if it's your one and only city. I suppose that's what War Bear did.
Yeah, that's what I did.

I can't remember why I founded Qart-Hadasht on the sheep, actually. It must have been to get the grain in it's fat cross or something. :crazyeye:

Done in 1900. The key was getting the Spiral Minaret and University of Sankore.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198621&stc=1&d=1230593224

I'm well on my for Arabian as well with my three cities growing happily! I'm currently GA bombing my cities, so I'll see, but from my judge I was in turn 172 and doing 250/150/100 culture sitting at 7000/8000/11000 so should be good ;)

...are not meant to survive because
1. They have crappy and small amounts of land
2. Their UP and UB are not used very effectively by the AI
3. They rarely trade useful techs

In the human player's hand, however, you can easily be top scorer and win any type of victory you want. I had England, America (who helped me get superconductors, genetics and industrialism), Khmer, Inca and a respawned Turkey as my vassals. Germany was friendly/pleased with me while Russia was pissed.

I was shaky for most of the late game despite having lots of towns, running US/free speech/emancipation/free market/viceroyalty and pacifism.

I chose Goteborg and Helsingfors because they have the most amount of flat land, and don't overlap much. Note that I didn't do Lulea as my third legendary city. That is because it doesn't have enough food and workable land to grow towns. That is why, just like Inca, I took Montevideo (or 1 W of it on the corn) as my 3rd city. Spain was so pissed that I took Montevideo/Buenos Aires that it declared war on me 3 times, the last time when I won.:lol:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198684&stc=1&d=1230687116
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198685&stc=1&d=1230687116

Again, could have been done much sooner, but I went for the uber-German tech, Industrialism. Legendary cities were Reval, Frankfurt and Danzig, in that order. France, Inca, Aztecs, China and India were my vassals.
Favorable events:
1. France became my vassal after losing Bordeaux to Spain. They researched many of my techs like railroad, combustion, and flight (too bad my spy got caught the move before I won, because I would have stolen Refrigeration from them).
2. Again, thanks to blizzrd, went for Patna early on with 2 galleons of troops, and helped spread Hinduism and Buddhism. Judaism also spread to New Orleans, and I waited till all the monasteries were built (bought them with money while in US) before getting SC.
3. Taking out Istanbul and Athens early boosted my great people rate and workers productivity. Eventually Turkey collapsed.
4. Russia never dared to declare on me (well, I was nice to everybody and even have open borders with Russia).
5. Best corporations to found are Creative Constructions and Sid's Sushi--boosted Reval and Danzig's commerce rate greatly, besides getting 20-30 culture points per city with the corporations.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198826&stc=1&d=1230832228
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198827&stc=1&d=1230832228
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198828&stc=1&d=1230832228
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198829&stc=1&d=1230832251

Has anybody tried America yet? Is it even possible with the later spawn? The good news is that with democracy to start with, one can just change civics once (US, pacifism, free market, emancipation, free speech, occupation). But even with around 1000 cultural points per move after corporations and maybe 2 religions, you still need 50 moves, and by the late 1900's Germany will have built a spaceship. And can't really build religion since early SC is one of the most important techs to get to UHV.

I'm going to try tonight.

Just finished my America game! 1973, legendary cities Washington, New York and Chicago. This was the first time I've ever played America so I made some mistakes early on, also should have started producing gold and moving the culture slider up to 100% much sooner so there's room for improvement. The key is to do it the American way, with corporations.

-Went Representation/Bureaucracy/Emancipation/Mercantalism/Organized Religion/Occupation in the beginning to get me a quicker start, switched to Free Speech and Free Market before settling west coast. Was planning to switch from Rep and OrgRel late on but my economic stability was over +100 which kept me nice and stable overall.
-Went for 2/3rds of the UHV for the extra golden age. This probably wasn't worth it, as capturing/razing a couple of Spanish island cities cost me a lot of hammers early on when I should have been getting my science up.
-The world was quite backwards, and so was I rather soon due to overexpanding, not getting bonuses for known techs, saving great people for corps, and wasting hammers to the UHV, trading tech was like pulling teeth. I only got Assembly line that I beelined for around 1900 which seemed really, really late.
-I had a little Vietnam war when I captured independent Angkor for Buddhism and Confucianism. Islam spread to York Factory, I left the fringe cities free of religion hoping this would happen.
-After this the game was about grabbing corporation resources by trading and colonizing, I also took a couple of cities off collapsed Portugal in Brazil. Culture slider didn't start going up until well in to 1900s, after I had secured the corps.
-Germany was the only decently advanced civ ahead of me and everyone else, and nicked Wembley, Graceland and Cristo Redentor which was annoying and set me back quite a bit. Even they weren't a space race threat though.

Chicago was getting a whopping 1769 culture per turn at the end.

Edit: this was the 600AD start.

Isabella is so annoying nowadays. I found Lisboa and she's -3 annoyed at me because of proximity. Well, it happened a plague was ravaging the world, and being immune, I decided to capture Santiago (defended by 2 horse archers) and then made peace. From then it's a matter of getting conquerors and being first in tech. Spain was so pissed at me she declared war at me 3 times, the last time I became master of America (while they were at war with England who just became Spain's master). I had signed a defensive pact with Germany who got my back (in fact captured Madrid at one point). Spain eventually collapsed, respawned (with just Madrid) and got eliminated by me again.

I go around the world to India, and unfortunately Patna was razed. So I had to deal with just 1 religion and by the time I got Islam and Confucianism, I decided not to go for OR (which would have massively destablized me) but went for corporations (except for Standard Ethanol I founded all of them).

I had free market for a long time, and was in a great depression the last 10 years, was shaky but became stable when I built some cottages over workshops. Are the hammers from towns counted in your production excess??

Legendary cities were Lisboa, Rosario (on the wheat in South America) and Lagos (Chicago).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199000&stc=1&d=1230959659
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199001&stc=1&d=1230959659
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199002&stc=1&d=1230959659

Being completely flustered by the Mayan instability, I thought I would take a break and do Rome again. Neapolis was a gift from the Greeks. Got beat to the Colosseum, but got everything else. Founded Islam, too bad the Christian and Jewish shrine was razed. Got rid of Spain, France, Germany and capitulated Turkey and Aztecs. Netherlands, Khmer and England were voluntary vassals.

Built up America in less than 50 years--took a hit to my stability but maintained my economy around 25. Spain respawned twice (thankfully not Athens) and got killed twice.

Legendary cities were Neapolis, Mediolanum and Athens.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199131&stc=1&d=1231063715

Hahaha, I love how you always play insanely aggressive to reach your goal. I almost never attack anyone going for it...

Egypt is also impossible right now. The built in agricultural bias is impossible to overcome, just like Maya and Mali. There's just no room to expand.

Maybe lessening the penalty to 6/5 instead of 4/3 would help?

if (iPlayer == con.iEgypt or iPlayer == con.iMaya or iPlayer == con.iMali or iPlayer == con.iKhmer): #counterbalance the high growth threshold
iPopulation *= 4
iPopulation /= 3

Egypt is also impossible right now. The built in agricultural bias is impossible to overcome, just like Maya and Mali. There's just no room to expand.

Maybe lessening the penalty to 6/5 instead of 4/3 would help?

That would probably help. I think I'll try it soon.

Another problem I've been having whenever I go for the Cultural Victory with Egypt is that there's a shortage of good, productive city spots that won't kill your stability, cramp your other cities, or flip to another civilization. :crazyeye:

Same problem with Babylon. Try to build up your army while building wonders is a bit of a challange.

What are the best town choices for Egypt, logically you can have direct start location and 2 East of Wheat, and Jerusalem. Though it means having to fight the Arabians when they turn up.

Or my main choice with be the location for doing the UHV, followd by Jerusalem and Babylon. Those should aid you in achieve success.

That's so cool that Germany builds New Ulm and Bismarck in Minnesota/North Dakota.

They have a great Oktoberfest in New Ulm.

I was trying to play pacifist but had to declare on Japan and its vassal Khmer twice to get the razing city UHV criteria. Then Spain declared on me so I eliminated them. I didn't use Khanbaliq as one of the 3 cities because China built on such idiotic locations, and I was afraid of a respawn. Had no vassals for a very long time, then capitulated Japan (who collapsed), Khmer, got Egypt/India/Rome/Inca as voluntary ones.

Could have been done 100 years earlier if I didn't war so much and build the Internet. Hey, I did learn how to use the Mongolian UP though--my mistake was not to take into the account that when you capture a city, its population goes down by one. So basically you want to starve the surrounding cities with destroyers (a little off the coast if needed) and wait just for the right moment to raze the city you're attacking. For example, I just razed 2 cities in South America and got all the others, and only 2 cities in Japan got me all of them.:lol:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199329&stc=1&d=1231222464
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199330&stc=1&d=1231222464

3000 BC Japan, technically finished in turn 388, but I hit enter again and turned the science back up to 90%. :blush:

Cultural cities were Kyouto, Makao, and Chunchon. I had a very strange game. China went and founded Macao as it's second city, Bejing was raised within a few turns, Makao became the capital, and both Confucianism and Taoism were founded in it. :confused:

So I thought I would experiment and found 1 city on Honshu that would enclose most of the food, namely, Kanazawa on the iron. It has copper, 2 seafood, 2 rice, and a pig. Early game it's a good choice since it grows really quickly, and since bureaucracy is free, I was score leader even before 1100 (which is usually done by Arabia). It turned out not so good for production since it misses the hills up north and rice isn't as good a food as I thought it would. China vassalized to me very early on even though they were winning against the Mongolians, and so did the Khmer (who later collapsed). Then it was all of the Americas which was probably not necessary, but since I stayed in mercantilism, they were good for overseas trade. I'm probably going to go back to 1780 or so (when I had assembly line) and do the other path, namely, conquest.

Legendary cities were Kanazawa, Guangzhou and Seoul.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199674&stc=1&d=1231473452

So I thought I would experiment and found 1 city on Honshu that would enclose most of the food, namely, Kanazawa on the iron. It has copper, 2 seafood, 2 rice, and a pig.
It has a Silk also.

It turned out not so good for production since it misses the hills up north and rice isn't as good a food as I thought it would.
Yeah, the problem with the Japanese rice tiles is that they aren't connected to any rivers and so improving them with a Farm leaves then without irrigation, unless you also farm the grassland tile where Edo/Tokyo would be. The rice W of Kyoto requires two further farms on grassland, on grassland tiles that would be better as cottages.

EDIT: The rice in Korea has the same irrigation connection problem. Food in Keijo is never a problem so I often ignore this Rice and cottage or workshop the tile instead.

1970AD seems late, I might be tempted to improve on your cultural victory date this weekend. :mischief:

Yeah, I was not really going for a quick cultural victory here (in fact since China and Khmer vassalized to me and Mongolia was dead, I could have just stopped research and gone for all religion, capture Patna to get Hinduism). But this game was a detour en route to Japanese conquest... (which you said you were about to do but didn't yet):mischief:

Did I really say I was considering a Japanese Conquest victory?

Anyway, I did try Japan from 600AD for Cultural victory. Got it in 1856AD. Legendary cities were Kyouto, Toukyou and Chunchon. I razed Keijo and built Chunchon (with the 3rd starting settler) instead on the Deer one tile N so that it has the Iron in its fat cross.

I think I could have done this faster if I had beelined for 12 cities earlier. I spent most of the game with just 4 cities (3 Legendary cities plus Kuishuu) but when China collapsed in the 1600s I decided to expand to 12 cities and build extra the cathedrals.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199807&stc=1&d=1231562417

:aargh::aargh::aargh::aargh: :suicide: :aargh::aargh::aargh::aargh:

AN HOUR AND A HALF HITTING ENTER OVER AND OVER FOR AN ETHELRED THE UNREADY SCORE AND I'VE BEEN COMPLETELY OUTCLASSED!!!

China in 1864; should have read the first post before going for it. :blush:

If you're playing the 600 AD, you beat me, so go ahead and post your screenie. There should be different scores for the 3000 BC and 600 AD scores.

It was the 3000BC start.

I reckon usi could probably beat most of our records actually. Any thoughts on strategies that usi used would be great to read...

He said he conquered Japan and picked Tokyo for his third city, presumably started converting all his hammers and commerce to culture much earlier than I did and got more Great Artists. All very good ideas; I'd try them if it didn't mean having to get another Cultural Victory.

I am currently in Japan (usually in the US), and the PC in front of me is so old that I can't even start RFC...
I tried to remember what I did, anyway.

1)
Early civics: heredity rule, slavery (temples), and organized religion (wonders and missionaries)
Later civics: heredity rule, free speech, caste system (GAs), and pacifism (GAs)

Free market is helpful, but not necessary.
After you switched to caste + pacifism, cities which will not be legendary should try to generate GAs. Those cities should hire as many artists as possible. This, however, makes your empire very unstable, so don't go too extreme (e.g., not working town tiles).

2)
Techs we must research: sailing (establishing trade routes), aesthetics, literature (only if wonders are not built), drama (artists), currency, music, compass (like currency, we'll get more than we spent), liberalism, printing press (to get nationalism from liberalism), and banking (extra money from shrines).

Drama is actually important, since you'll keep getting useless GPs from wonders and specialists. Be sure to micromanage large cities to hire artists rather than scientists or engineers.

I do not think we need to research gunpowder, replaceable parts, consitution and beyond. Those are too expensive.

3)
Invade other civs ASAP. If you have the Great Lighthouse, conquering coastal cities can give you greater benefit than building a library in your capital city.

4)
It is extremely important that you send galleys to establish trade routes with other civs and trade techs with them. You can get alphabet from Rome(or Greece), monarchy from Persia, horseback riding from Ethiopia, and so on. Have your galleys move around their boarders.

5)
Sell maps and techs to anyone willing to pay, say, 30 or more gold.

6)
For China, it is extremely important that you do NOT build southern cities (Luoyang or ones near copper) too early. Doing so will kill your economy. Usually, my second city is Sanshan. Then I build Shanghai and Fuzhou. How to get copper before barbs arrive? Kill Japanese and build Tokyo. That way, you can get copper, and your economy won't suck (if you have the GL).

7)
For Spain, war elephants and catapults were the key. Never build nonsensely expensive macemen or musketmen. Also, be sure to hire strong mercnaries before you invade other civs (so that they won't hire those mercs).

Maybe I'll write a step by step guide (like the ones in the wiki) for a civ. But that will be after I got a new computer...

France done in 1817AD. Legendary cities were Paris, Francfort and Rome.

My strategy was:

Kill Germany (razing Frankfurt before they spawn).
Kill Dutch.
Take Rome.
Get conquerors (after Gunpowder).
Bulid Galleons and send conqueror units to capture Patliputra (Hinduism and Buddhism) and Qufu (Taoism and Confucianism).
Found American cities to bring total cities to 12
Spread 5 religions through all cities and build 5 cathedrals in each of Paris, Rome and Francfort.

Usi are you playing the most recent patch? Constitution and nationalism's positions have been changed long ago. (Also you need military tradition and thus gunpowder to get nationalism)

Hm. I like Sanshan as a second city, too. I also did the trading thing, as you said, with all the same wonders (plus a lot more.) What you said confirms my belief that you started with culture a lot earlier than I did and were more focused on getting Great Artists. I'm not sure what you mean about Spain, though, do you mean capturing a city from them so you can build a Christian Missionary?

As far as getting Copper to resist barbs, I have a different strategy - build Stonehenge, revolt to Castes, run Great Scientists in Beijing, bulb Math to found Confucianism, then build the Oracle for Construction for a very early Great Wall.

Constitution and nationalism's positions have been changed long ago.

Yeah, now I remember that it was not nationalism. I cannot run RFC with my PC, so I'm not sure, but I guess it was constitution. That tech should be the one which lets me build Taj Mahal.

I'm not sure what you mean about Spain, though, do you mean capturing a city from them so you can build a Christian Missionary?

IMO, for most civs there is no need to build American cities. Cities which will not be legendary only need to build temples and hire artists. Thus, as long as there is enough food (to whip temples and hire artists), any city is good enough. So, if you use Spain, you only need to capture some European cities, and the faster you capture them, the faster you can build temples, and the faster you can switch your civics to caste + pacifism.
Did I answer your question?

build Stonehenge, revolt to Castes, run Great Scientists in Beijing, bulb Math to found Confucianism, then build the Oracle for Construction for a very early Great Wall.

I guess that's a good idea too. But if we should later switch to slavery, we need to be careful of stability.

Legendary cities were Delhi, Constantinople and Baghdad.

Took a hint from pkuwest and went straight for Constantinople with my 4 camel archers. Then all their cities became indy which are kinda dangerous since they still have the 2 cataphracts. So I had to delay the capture of Shiraz and India until I hooked up the copper in Egypt. Then razed Alexandretta and Trabzon. Killed the Turks after they had fewer troops to start with (I had founded a city on the horse to prevent them from expanding east).

Built all the available wonders except for Mt. Rushmore (which Germany beat me to). Had defensive pacts with Germany and Spain which essentially guaranteed phony wars which I don't have to fight.

At one point Lasa actually flipped to me with Confucianism (without a monastery though), but by then I was close to winning so I let it go.

France, Aztecs and Incans were voluntary vassals. France was essential to getting Radio and Railroad for me (I bought all the wonders). Stopped research after democracy (except for a brief stint to get medicine).

Sold a lot of techs cheaply towards the end to scrounge up the money for the Pentagon (too bad I won before it was actually built :cry:).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=200015&stc=1&d=1231740791

1829 as Rome.

It was my first ever culture win in Civ 4 :) It was a lot different for me.

I made the mistake of letting my economy sit basically stagnant for about 75 turns when I turned up the culture slider. I ended the game at a -52 economy rating.

So wr4th's 2009 win for the Aztecs seems a little late to me. Doing the Incans has shown me that if you don't spread any religion at all, you'll get plenty of them in no time (both eastern and western religions), as long as you're nice to people and open borders with them, and get Astronomy soon. It's 1840, no Euros have cities in the UHV area, and I've just done Communism; America and Inca are my vassals, Spain is pleased and in a defensive pact with me, and I have all of North America with 15 cities plus Tucume except for NE Canada and a little Bluefields central America. I have 5 religions (Christianity, Judaism, Confucianism, Buddhism and Hinduism), in fact, at the turn I learned SC, Islam went to my Vancouver, but I think I have will enough cathedrals.

And, BTW, even though you waste 1 tree, Tultan is so much better as a capital (2N of start which you can get to in 1 turn)--it's got 3 cereals, a deer, silver and spices, less wasted sea tiles and more hills, AND it's on a river to boot! I built Oaxaca as an afterthought to get my bridge across (which I haven't really used). If I didn't get the 2/3 UHV it would have been a good setup for conquest since the whole world is still very backwards (I was almost the first to Communism by 3 moves and nobody has Assembly Line yet).

The only question now is should I go for Electricity/Radio or just aim for Steam Power/ Assembly Line. I think for a quicker win getting a corporation would be essential, since so far I've only had 6 great people (never used Pacifism this game), 2 GP, 1 GE, 2 GSpy and a GScientist.

Pacifist; What do you think about founding on the coast one East of the Aztec starting position and founding the second city on the Silver?

I did that before, but there's still too much desert in Arizona/New Mexico for useful cities. Better do Tultan (1 good city at par with Denver, and better growth and production than Guiyang, Aksum because it's got food AND hills) and New Orleans.

Edit: I find that founding cities on food is usually not a good idea (unless you have a lot more like Germany and England). I debated about founding Tultan and Oaxaca (which will need very little garrisoning since Tultan will take all the barbs/natives and Oaxaca can hook up the stone quicker), but in the end decided that founding Oaxaca after learning sailing is better (get free harbor which will take too long to build, while New Orleans you actually want to chop the trees where cotton will appear in the future).

Tultan is also much more defensible: often the barbs like to pillage unless they think they can win. With Tultan, just don't chop the forest north of it, and garrison jaguars (5 strength plus 20% advantage on forests but cut that in half due to dog soldier advantage) and archers (3 strength plus 25% on hills), both with baseline 25% fortify and 75% hilled forest advantage): i.e. jaguars vs. dog soldiers = 5 vs 4 and archers vs dog soldiers = 6 vs 4, all defending of course.
The silver hill and the hill north of the deer are good choke points with archers and if you get catapults there, you can easily barrage onto a plain. I find that dog soldiers coming from the NE tend to like New Orleans better so you'll have your corn and spice (2N and 1NE of Tultan). unmolested.

Did I mention Tultan can build a jaguar, an archer or a catapult in 1 move, a longbow in 2 moves, and a settler in 4 moves? Just settle your great generals there and you'll get your early Pentagon and theocracy/vassalage without the Pentagon. :)

Legendary cities are New Orleans, Chicago and Denver (in that order). America, Inca, Rome and Turkey were voluntary vassals. Only war was the American vassalage (when I declared on Arabia, England and Vikings).

Could have been even quicker since I had to race towards Scientific method to get the 2/3 UHV, so Denver and New Orleans each lack a Confucian and Buddhist cathedral because it wasn't worth it for my only city with the monasteries to build missionaries instead of culture. Same thing for Islam (which Vancouver had). As I said before, just be friendly and get your caravels in range, and because American cities are so profitable, inevitably you'll get religion from trade routes.

Somebody please remind me never to give my vassals medicine until I found Sid's Sushi. :mad:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=200185&stc=1&d=1231896447

Ethiopia done in 1940, with Aksum, Buhen, and Gondokoro. Stability was a problem towards the end. It probably could have been done much faster, due to the amount of wars that I got into (first with the Egyptians, then the Arabs (who almost took Niwt-Rst), and finally the English for the second UHV condition).

Very nice war bear. I guess you just have to stay inside Ethiopian lands to avoid collapsing into civil war (like me who went all the way to Mexico and New Orleans, plus the whole of Africa).

Yeah, Ethiopia appears to have to stay in eastern africa to avoid collapsing. Even just settling in South Africa seems to be a poor choice for stability.

hi all, finished Maya, stability was not a dreadful as expected. The key here is to get lucky early and stay nonaggression. Cities were tikal, los angeles(got the settler from the goody hut near denver), and vancouver. could of been faster, but i failed at planning. i got dragged into several wars due to all the defensive pacts i had, but i didnt actually fight a single one of them.

Stability was not lower than shaky the whole game. since your economy is gonna be -50 you make up for it with the other four and commonwealth.

You must have been really lucky to get the wonders you got (Moai in Vancouver?!--must have taken ages just to get there; Wat Preah Pisnulok and Great Library is just unbelievably lucky).

hi all, finished Maya, stability was not a dreadful as expected. The key here is to get lucky early and stay nonaggression. Cities were tikal, los angeles(got the settler from the goody hut near denver), and vancouver. could of been faster, but i failed at planning. i got dragged into several wars due to all the defensive pacts i had, but i didnt actually fight a single one of them.

Stability was not lower than shaky the whole game. since your economy is gonna be -50 you make up for it with the other four and commonwealth.

You are not playing Monarch then. Getting a settler from a goody hut is only possible on Viceroy. Even then its only a 1/20 chance.
You can check it in CIV4HandicapInfo.xml

AP, it could be time to edit the OP to say that the challenge is for Monarch difficulty.

If I recall correctly, it already said monarch only in the origional post. Might want to put it in bigger font.

Also, it is possible to build the Wat Preah Pisnlok as the Maya, but you have to be EXTREMELY lucky. I managed to get it once, due to a collapsed Greece and Persia.

ill give it another go in monarch when i have enough time and patience to get 'lucky' again

Egypt is also impossible right now. The built in agricultural bias is impossible to overcome, just like Maya and Mali. There's just no room to expand.

Maybe lessening the penalty to 6/5 instead of 4/3 would help?

Just by goofing around with the Egyptians this afternoon, I noticed that you can create a quite solid economy rating by whipping your cities down to a population of 2 or 3. I was solid on monarch until the Arabian spawn, which seems to drive Egypt's foreign rating way down.

Of course, the problem with this is that you quickly fall behind in techs and production capability.

Anybody want to see how well this would work in terms of actually winning something?

Just finished Egypt in 1480, and I'll descrbe how I won.
(Forgive me that my writing sucks.)

Plan
The very first thing we should do is to plan. If we start playing the game right away, the likelihood is that we will make some nonsense decisions. Here is the plan I made for this time:
1) Cities: Niwt-Rst (capital; 1N of the starting tile), Per-Wadjet (1W of Wheat), and Yebu (2W of Gold) will be built. 2 Greek (Athenai and Byzantion), 1 Babylonian (Babili) and 1 Indian cities will be conquored by a chariot-rush. 1 more city will be captured or built so that there will be eight cities.
2) Legendary cities: Niwt-Rst, Babili, and Athenai. There is no need to worry about respawn, since it is presumably possible to win the game before anyone gets Nationalism.
3) Civics: Early civics - Monarchy, Slavery, and OR. Later civics - Monarchy, FS, Caste, and Pacifism.

Early game
I built Niwt-Rst (1N of the starting tile) and sent the warrior to get goody huts (4 total). I got small amount of cash, tech (pottery), map, and a warrior. Niwt-Rst built worker, worrior, worker, granery, settler, and war charriot. I kept checking mercenaries after I got cash from a hut, and I was lucky to get a war charriot for the hire cost of 21 and maintainance cost of 2. The two war charriots invaded Babylon and captured Babilu (turn 60) and razed Ninua (turn 61). The hired war chariot was then fired. I built the Pyramids (turn 69) and started preparing for invading Greece. I surprise-attacked Greece from the sea (Per-Wadjet whipped a galley) and captured Athenai (turn 81; landed turn 80) by two war chariots. Loaded the war chariots on the galley (turn 81), gave them a turn to heal, and attacked Byzantion from the sea (amphibious attack) and captured it (turn 83). One thing to note: before invading a civ, check mercenaries. If you do not hire them, your enemy might hire them. Oracle gave me theology (Christian holy city!), and I got Mining, Hunting, BW (I had to research it a bit), Alphabet, and Monarchy through trades with Carthage, Rome and Persia. From here, everything is self-explanatory: make important buildings (e.g., granaries and libraries), trade techs whenever possible, build some units and prepare for barbarian hordes, build wonders in cities which will be legendary, and so on. Persia and Rome decleared war on me, and Ethiopia became my vassal. Nothing special. But one thing to note is that you should constantly ask for a small amount of cash if a civ is pleased or friendly with you. It helps your research and might avoid a war.

Mid game
I partially researched paper and philosophy and kept a GS. I don't remember exactly when, but techs become chaper a little bit before Arabs spawn. After Arabs spawned, I finished researching those techs and used the GS to partially research Education. I have been unlucky that until the 10th C, I got only one GA, which came from Music. I finished researching all the techs I need in 960AD (see the pic below; Constitution came from Liberalism) and switched the civics to the four I have planned. Unfortunately, I have underestimated the terrible instability of Egypt, and I lost Babilu due to instability during revolution. I reloaded back to few turns ago (it did not give me anything special but a chance to switch civics differently and to whip few more buildings, but if it constitutes cheating, please don't add my score on the record). This time, I switched to FM and Pacifism before finishing researching Liberalism (when I was not so unstable), and then I switched to FS and Caste after I whipped some temples and courthouses. My stability was about -19 most of the time, and I really regretted that I razed Ninua. Later I adopted Viceloyality, since I got an extra vassal, Mali. With 0% research rate I also started researching Optics. Neither Aztec, Inca, nor Maya (alive!) became my vassal.

Late game
Golden ages (from the Taj Mahal and GPs) really improved my stability for a while. Nevertheless, the stability went into unstable in 1350 AD. And there came an unlucky event - plague. Well, I guess Rhye will fix it, since it's certainly an exploit, but there is a way to avoid a plague. That is, when plague hits one of your cities, gift the city to another civ. It is usually more costly than plague, but in this specific case, it's helpful. In order not to lose any essential city, I did that. Niwt-Rst became legendary in 1450AD. Babilu became legendary in 1460AD. My golden ages ended in 1455AD, and the stability became collapsing in 1465. There were three more turns until Athenai would become legendary. I prepared a galley with units and removed all the units from every city except the capital, so that I can recapture them quickly. Fortunately, my empire did not collapse and I won in 1480AD.

Summary and other stuffs
So, there were some lessons I learned. First, never raze a city. -4 stability point is extremely large when your empire is shaky. Second, it's not good to quickly build the Pantheon and the Leaning Tower if the Greeks are already dead. I got way too many useless GPs. Third, I totally forgot trading with East Asian civs. They usually do not OB with me, but Japan usually declears war on China about twice in a game, so, in such occasions I could have decleared war on one side and OB with the other side (depending on who's the master of Khmer). I must have been able to obtain Silk and Banana too.
I have made two decisions which can be seen as cheating (reloading) or exploit (avoiding plague) as noted above, and I must have not been able to win without them. I was also planning to play Egypt with four cities, since it seemed to be better in terms of stability. However, it turned out that the greatest amount of instability in the current game came from Economy (-49 at the end), and Expansion (-24) was no so problematic given that there was a great positive from Cities (+32). The last thing to note is that a golden age might actually harm our stability in a long run, since there will be a huge drop in commerce when it's over. It might be a good idea to win the game before the golden ages are over.

Does it really matter for your economy when you switch to commonwealth? From what I remember it doesn't do anything for agricultural penalties. I would have done that instead of viceroyalty.

Vassals are a double-edged sword. I found that out playing Ethiopia. They do a little good for your city happiness but take a severe toll on your economy. And the +4 stability from viceroyalty often doesn't outweigh the economic damage.

Egypt has the worst trade routes ever, so without optics/astronomy, it's impossible to improve economy.

Good job anyway (I've always suspected Egypt can't win anything staying inside Egypt alone).:goodjob:

Cultural victory in 1888AD. Legendary cities were Moskva, Tallin and Lublin.
Strategy was to eliminate Germany so that Lublin could be founded, stick with 4 key cities (legendary ones plus Kiev) for the early-middle game and then found cities 5-12 to the east after Turkey has spawned. Cities 5-12 do not get a religion until one spreads. I actually got all 7 religions speading to me, but quite late (well after Sci Meth).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=201319&stc=1&d=1232792478

Japan (3000BC) won in 1685.
Toukyou, Pekin, and Dairen (Sanshan) were the legendary cities.
I razed a city (1N of Marble) but my empire was solid or very solid most of the time.
I was lucky that I got Christianity, but Rome got some Literature or Aesthetics wonders.
It could have been done earlier if some wonders including the Mausolus of Mausoleum were not taken by others.

Some tips are:
1) Do not quickly connect Copper by roads. You should build some warriors to make your people happy.
2) Send one of the workborts you started with to the West. Alphabet, IW, Monotheism, and Horseback Riding can be obtained through trades (though you might have to research Alphabet a little bit).
3) Conquor China ASAP. Swordsmen, Axemen, and Catapults are strong enough, and Samurais are just too late and expensive.

Screenshots please usi?

Cities:
Only 4 cities within spawn area.

Religion:
Christianity and Islam, 2 Cathedrals.

Tech:
-Went straight for Music but lost out on the free Artist(to the Chinese, I think).
-On to Liberalism for Free Speech but missed the free tech by 3 turns.
-Tech shut down.

Great Persons:
-Assigned an Engineer and used it immediately for Sistine Chapel.
-After that almost only Artists but one more Engineer that couldn't be used for much.

Wonders:
-Sistine Chapel(by Engineer)
-I probably could have gotten the Leaning Tower and the Statue of Zeus(I decided to trade for Calender instead of waiting for the fourth Monument:rolleyes:)

Stability wasn't a big problem in this game(I even moved my Capital due to bad planning:crazyeye:). I ran Commonwealth and Mercantilism most of the game and dodged all but one light plague. After going 100% Culture with Theaters, I exported all happiness resources and got all health. I attempted to get to +10 health but that apparently didn't immunize me completely from the plague.

http://img264.imageshack.us/img264/7776/mansasg2.jpg

Good job, although I don't think you could have won if you started from the 600 AD (simply because the Euros don't have Rome/Greece to deal with).

This is a sad state of affairs: to win cultural victory one has to stay in the African homeland (at least for Mali and Ethiopia). So much for having a decent score AND winning. :lol:

What was your economy score at the end?

It is the 600AD!

My score in economy was -33 at the end, but I don't know how much of that actually counts in Commonwealth. Is -33 a lot?

I attached the game.

It is the 600AD!

My score in economy was -33 at the end, but I don't know how much of that actually counts in Commonwealth. Is -33 a lot?

I attached the game.

Ah. The Chinese start with Music in the 600 AD start, so you can't get a free Great Artist from it.

My score in economy was -33 at the end, but I don't know how much of that actually counts in Commonwealth. Is -33 a lot?

AFAIK, all of it counts whether you are in Commonwealth or not. If you were not in Commonwealth, your economy score would likely have been even lower.

The benefit of Commonwealth is to remove penalties for low amounts of traded resources (i.e. trade routes) but it doesn't do anything to prevent penalties for a stagnant economy (i.e. no growth of overall civ commerce).

I have been also playing as Mali (600 AD), and actually stability does not seem to be a serious issue as long as we do not build any Carthagian city.
I successfully built four American cities, and my stability was still 17 after two recent revolutions (had five revolutions so far). The stability has almost always been solid before the two revolutions.

I have not won the game, but I'll probably give up this Malinese game (my PC is not good enough to have an enjoyable 20th C game), so I attach screenshots.

Once again, I have not won the game, the screenshots below are there to show that we can expand the Malinese empire outside of Africa.

I think that having land (specifically, grassland) in general is better for Mali since you can cottage them. North Africa is mostly sea which cannot expand in terms of economy. Also, the rest of Africa is white on the settler map and happens to be contain the core area of Carthage, so I wouldn't be surprised that's the reason I collapsed when I occupied both North Africa and America. I think that after America appears, usi's expansion stability will take a dive.

Usi how did you get to America so early (before the Euros)? I see you have the usual 2 vassals in America and built New Orleans first.

Actually I did not intend to get the two vassals, since I saw an Arabian caravel before I got Calender. It was probably 1200s, but I don't know the exact year.
I only intended to build four cities in North America in 1500s.

I got both Feudalism and Machinery from trades with Euro civs (DR + about 500 golds total).
I researched CS, Philosophy, and Paper before Guilds, since those are the techs Euros often do not have.
I got Guilds, Optics (pleased Vikings) and some other stuffs from trades.
Those techs and maps were also attractive enough to have them fight with one another. This must have slowed down their colonization too.
I was lucky to get conquerors (aka. great colonial city defenders) in Aztec (!), but not in Inca.

After I obtained Optics, I researched Astronomy, and it was done in 1550.
Bureaucracy + cottaged Wagadudu gave me about 150 beakers per turn, just by this city.
Actually I mistakenly assigned the two towns on flood plains to Daloa and Zaria too long, so it could have been researched earlier.
I quickly upgraded the galleys I have already built and sent them to NA with settlers, workers, and elephants.

AFAIK, all of it counts whether you are in Commonwealth or not. If you were not in Commonwealth, your economy score would likely have been even lower.

The benefit of Commonwealth is to remove penalties for low amounts of traded resources (i.e. trade routes) but it doesn't do anything to prevent penalties for a stagnant economy (i.e. no growth of overall civ commerce).Commonwealth does state that "No negative stability points for poor economy", what does that mean?
Do we know the threshold for "No negative stability points for low amount of traded resources" and is it counted against pop? I mean Mali should be able to trade away 9 resources from their spawn area and that seams like a lot for ~30 pop.

Ah. The Chinese start with Music in the 600 AD start, so you can't get a free Great Artist from it.Oh, so one should probably go directly for Liberalism and try to trade for one of the prereqs for Music.

Yeah, the problem is that the AI will likely not trade for the tech that still doesn't have a wonder built with it, unless you're willing to go all the way to China for it.
I'm actually surprised the Vikings were willing to trade Optics with you (every time I see them they are pleased but their techs are always red, just like the Russians). You must have wiped the beer-saturated saliva off their smelly boots with your face. :crazyeye:

Yeah, the problem is that the AI will likely not trade for the tech that still doesn't have a wonder built with it, unless you're willing to go all the way to China for it.
I'm actually surprised the Vikings were willing to trade Optics with you (every time I see them they are pleased but their techs are always red, just like the Russians). You must have wiped the beer-saturated saliva off their smelly boots with your face. Yes, I find it's sometimes necessary to gift them a tech before they will actually trade something back. I also always vote for those two if possible for the +2 dip modifier.
You are right that Music is hard to trade for, but I think it's possible to trade for one of the prereqs and that should give you a shot at Lib.
If you get to Lib first I think the fastest way with Mali is Biology and National Park with 10 Forest Preserves:eek:. Possibly also Medicine for Sid's Sushi if you can trade for enough Seafood. Could be a fun game.

TDK

Two failed attempts in the last two days.

The first game I tried a slowly, slowly approach. Chose not to found Tikal but founded my capital one S of the Silver and Oaxaca one E of the Stone as my second city. Oaxaca built Temple of Kulkallan and I chose to miss the Calendar UHV requirement. Founded my third city on the New Orleans tile around 1100AD. Founded my fourth city on the Chicago tile and my fifth city on the Denver tile just before the Euros made contact with the new world.

The problem wasn't my stability, it was that it was going to take me another 500 turns for my 3 cultural cities to reach 50,000 cultural points. I was Stable (+1) in 1906AD with my five cities but only got my first religion in a city well after Sci Meth (and after Biology). Back to the drawing board.

The second game I founded Tikal on the spot and my second city on the New Orleans tile. New Orleans quickly built a new settler once it reached size 3 and this settler founded on the Chicago tile. Hooking up Iron early meant no problems from dog soldiers. Tikal built Temple of Kulkullan on the same turn that Japan was about to build it (had to reload about 10 turns to shave a turn off the build).

After 1500AD I spread out and founded all the way to 8 cities, enough to support 2 cathedrals for each religion. Cities 4-8 were on Denver, Duluth, Edmonton, Fort Albany and Havanna. Got Buddhism spread to Denver, Hinduism in Havanna and Confucianism in Fort Albany by 1700AD.

The problem was that once America spawned, my stability plummeted big time. I went from Stable (+3) to Unstable (-32) to a collapse of everything except my capital of Tikal in less than three turns in the late 1700s. All when I was just about to finish spreading my three religions between all of my cities too. Back to the drawing board again....

I got Babylon Culture Victory in 1940. The cities were Rutpa (SW of Babili), Ninua and Shushan(SE of original Shush).

Found Rutpa - 1 SW of Babili, made Sur quickly revolted in 2520 BC, Yerushalanym flipped in 1950 BC. I kept Sur, disbanded Yeru.

Later Egypt founded Judaism, I should be able to get it first next time.

India collapsed in turn 8x, then I built Oracle and chose Theology. Unfortunately Christinity was founded in Sur, which would flip to both Arabia and Turkey. Christinity became my only religion until I conquered Arabs.

Shushan flipped just before Persia spawn. Disbanded. Persian then found Shush on SE of the former Shushan.

I get "Greed" quest targetting the iron NW of Parsa. Completed it by conquering Persia around AD 555. Got me 11 swordsmen. Not bad. Got Parsa and Pura(Useless city, but I didn't want to raze it. Next time should keep it until it flips.)

In game one I used the swords to capture Dilli for Hinduism and Buddhism, but my stability soon became collapsing.

Arab spawn, flipping Sur, Rutba and Shush, this is too much. I refused, kept my army of elephants and spearsmen on NNE of Rutpa, kept the flipping area empty unless enemy approaching. Aftet 10 turns I made peace to Arabia.

Tech for Liberalism. Get Military Tradition as free tech, granting Curissair. Conquered Makkah and Sa'naa, got Islam.

The civics were HR - Bureaucracy - Slavery - OR - Commonwealth.

In 1280 Turkey spawned, flipping Sur, refused, war, retreat, killed 5 Cannons + trebuchets by Cuir. Made peace.

8 cities till the end: Rutpa, Sur, Ninua, Shush, Parsa, Pura, Makkah, Sa'naa. Forbidden Palace in Shush, Summer Palace in Ninua.

Economy was -49 to -55, why?? Later I adopted Representation - free market - Emanicipation(Stonehenge) and got 2 golden ages from Taj and Olympic. Revolt again to US - Free speech - later I got great depression, luckily I had 3 vassals that time, revolted to Mercantlism - Viceroyalty. Economy became horrible -90.

Got free spy from Communism (should be able to get Physics first as well but I didn't). The last tech I researched was Radio (for Eiffel).

You're lucky you didn't collapse without Commonwealth. Give us a screenpic. :lol:

Screenshots here. Actually it is 1941.
I was trying again this morning, founded Judaism and Christinity in Sur. But didn't get Horseback Riding and Construction before 600 AD (should use Theocracy to trade with Rome, Greece, Persia and Carts), I think I'll lose to Arabs. Should restart.

Anyone else tried Rutpa start? You can build nearly all early wonders -- Great Lighthouse, Moai and Oracle in Sur, Stonehenge, Pyramids, Parthenon(or Artemis), Great Library in Rutpa. Also you could be very advanced with contacts to every other early civs.

Space race victory might be possible as well.

Very nice. Lucky that you didn't lose a legendary city to independence due to your instability.

Looks like you killed the Persians anyway despite donating food to them.:lol:

Actually I did in the first game - Collapsed to civil war. Quickly I tried to recapture them. Ninua was 20000+ culture, when I recapture it, there was 9000+ left ; Shush was 20000+ as well, but when I recapture it, only 900+ left. I don't quite understand how it counts. Also I don't understand why Babylon's economy always become poor after midage. I adopted Commonwealth, but ecomony still went down and down, I don't know why. Too many towns? Imports / exports (were about 140/120, rank 1)?

In this second game I never went collapsing (below -40), luckily I had 5 vassals, good for viceroyalty.

Maybe the trade route and economic system are the imperfect parts of CIV4 and this great mod.

Land-locked civs like Ethiopia and Babylon, and to some extent, Egypt, have the worst trade routes. Also, the fact that you probably have towns early on means you can't expand your economy, even if your economy is no.1 on earth. (just like the USA nowadays--Rhye does have a point I guess:p)

Land locked, yes. But who locks whom? It was Turkey that blocked between Europe and Asia, made Europeans desperate to sail around Africa and through Atlantics. Well... Rhye does have a point.

About this growing problem, can we use slavery to help this problem? Stalin: death solves all problems. No men, no problem.

Mayan cultural victory achieved in 1959AD. :D Cultural cities were Tikal, Uxmal and Mayapan.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=202193&stc=1&d=1233471617

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=202194&stc=1&d=1233471617

Went for key world wonders this time as opposed to a race to Liberalism. Founded Tikal and Uxmal (New Orleans) with the starting settlers, then Mayapan (Chicago) in 660AD, Calakmul (Duluth) in 1080AD and finally Oxhuitza (Denver) in 1680AD once all the late game resources had spawned. This steady growth pattern was great for my stability keeping around or just below Stable/Shaky for most of the game. Finished the game in 1959 on Shaky (-13).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=202195&stc=1&d=1233471617

Researched Sailing first to share resources via trade routes between Tikal and the rest of my empire. Then researched Code of Laws for the Temple of Kulkallan. Didn't try for the 1st UHV requirement of Calendar but got the Temple of Kulkallan in Tikal in 810AD for the 2nd. The 3rd requirement for a golden age and Triumphal Arch was straightforward in 1745AD.

After Code of Laws, tech research was Bronze Working, Iron Working, Mathematics, Calendar, Monarchy, Construction, Aesthetics, Archery, Alphabet, Literature, Drama, Philosophy (bulbed via Great Scientist) and Music.

Mayapan (Chicago) built Leaning Tower in 6 turns after Literature was learnt (with much chopping of forests) and the built Sistine Chapel after Music was learnt (more chopping of every remaining forest nearby). Uxmal (New Orleans) built Wat Wreah Pisnulok immediately after Philosophy was bulbed. All of these early wonders were crucial.

After Music, I researched towards Liberalism and traded the techs required for Optics from the Euros. The Euros didn't push for circumnavigation, which I managed to steal after buying Optics from the Dutch and racing some Caravels across the Pacific.

Missed Liberalism by about 10 turns to England. Once tech reached Liberalism, I learnt Constitution and Democracy and turned off research. Stole techs using espionage during the remainder of the game. Built the Statue of Liberty in 16 turns in Oxhuitza (Denver).

I finally got my first religion (Buddhism) in 1727. Quickly this was followed by Confucianism in 1730 and Taoism (Apostolic Palace) in 1772. Spread each of these religions to all my cities and built one cathedral in each of the cultural cities.

Vassalized Aztecs (voluntary) in mid 1400s but refused all other requests for vassals after that. Demanded and on-traded all Aztec resources to help with economy throughout the game.

Right at the end, New York flipped to me (which I disbanded). Washington was also in terrible trouble, completely surrounded by my cultural borders.

Very nice blizzrd. I don't know how the Chinese did it, but somehow they got Emperor UHV which is amazing to me. Maya is so bad in terms of trade and because they spawn so early, their economy has time to stagnate unlike the Aztecs and Incans.

Maya is so bad in terms of trade and because they spawn so early, their economy has time to stagnate unlike the Aztecs and Incans.

Around Tikal, sure the economy stagnates unless you eventually get Biology to clear some jungle. But by building new cities over a long period and developing the surrounding tiles slowly (I only ever had 4 workers at the one time) I managed to keep my economy at least 2 stars well into the 20th century.

Getting Astronomy for trade routes around the world is also important, as is building embassies to maintain contacts with the Afro-Eurasian civs.

Rome won in 1390AD.
The legendary cities were Arretium (1N of Roma), Athenae, and Constantinopolis.

I probably could have won earlier if I had not forgotten conquoring Hierusalem up until some time around 900 AD.
By the time I built my first Jewish missionary in there (I had to build a Jewish monastery first), it was apparent that I wouldn't need it.

It's always kind of funny to see "Augustus did as good as Augustus" or "Hammurabi did as good as Hammurabi."

Nice one, Usi.

By the way, that's the longest I have ever seen the AI Egypt live. Did they respawn or something? Long lived Carthage, too.

Nice to see I'm not the only one who likes Caralis.

But can you beat the size of my Roman :borg:empire?

Nice to see I'm not the only one who likes Caralis.

But can you beat the size of my Roman :borg:empire?

New challange: bigger empire than AP's
:P

By the way, that's the longest I have ever seen the AI Egypt live. Did they respawn or something? Long lived Carthage, too.

Nobody had Nationalism, so no civ had respawned. IMO, civs are more likely to live longer if they have more techs. I saw some of their cities being razed by barbs, but I sold a lot of techs to them, and I gifted many techs to Egypt after it became my vassal. Those techs might have made them live longer.

Nice to see I'm not the only one who likes Caralis.

I guess we both like Singidunum too.

But can you beat the size of my Roman :borg:empire?

After fighting some wars, I start to get lazy fighting anymore. Hm, I'm actually more of a pacifist than you.:lol:

Just a question guys (after congrats for all these quick victories): Why do you keep Sparta? Doesn't it ''eat'' some tiles for Athens?

Attached are the pics of my Athens and Sparta.

Sparta eats one tile of Athens (the very tile Sparta is on), but in a long run, it does not really harm Athens, since the tile is not very useful when Athens needs to produce culture. Of course, it does slow down the speed by which Athens build wonders though.

As you can see from the pic, Sparta is a respectably good city. In fact, I built Sparta by myself. Nevertheless, I actually prefer Corinth (on Marble) to Athens + Sparta, and initially I thought about razing Athens so that I can build Corinth. But I was afraid that some civs might build some wonders before I do (since Rome and Constantinopolis are not very productive in an early game), so I kept it.

Won again, Babylon in 1793. I wonder how could you guys win before 1600?

This time, got animal husbandary from a hut.

Jerusalem flipped by Rutba AFTER it founded Judaism and spreaded to Rutba, so, I disbanded it. No Jews holy city for the game. Oracled theology, found Christianity at Ninua. Exchanged tech with all other civs. India didn't collapse so Persia got Hinduism and Buddhism, conquered them. About Arabs, captured Makkah, made peace, vassalized it and got guilds and divine right.

Built wonders and regilious buildings evenly in 3 cities: Rutba, Sur, Ninua. Statue of Moai is important for Sur.

Liberalism after gunpowder, get Military tradition for cuirssair, thus killed Turkey cannons and other units smoothly. Turkey only used 2 cannons + 3 trubechets to invade Sur, not very wise for them.

Conquered Byzantion, Athens(Colussus + Artemis, useful) as well. Sparta(Temple of Kukulcan, useless) flipped later. That's 13 cities. Luckily Byzantion had MoM (+50% Golden age length). So theoratically I would have 48 turns of GA - Taj, Olympic, and 2+3 GP. Unfortunatedly a later congress assigned Byzantion to my ally Germans. I didn't refuse.

12 turns before I win, stablity was collapsing -44, time to start a golden age?
Did. And one times Turkey respawned and took Ninua(!), another time my empire collapsed on the very last turn. Last time I revolted to HR + occupation. Finally I won.

Anyone earlier? Not so hard. An early flip of Sur made you quite advanced to other ancient civs. Arabs and Turkey aren't really hard either. The most challening part is economy. Ahhhh, painful.

Won again, Babylon in 1793. I wonder how could you guys win before 1600?
While I haven't done a Babylon cultural victory, I think getting it earlier that you did involves turning off science and turning up the cultural slider pretty soon after you research Drama. Maybe still research Music for Cathedrals but probably don't even research Liberalism for Free Speech. Guessing, but that would be my hunch.

A living Carthage in 1793? Did you gift them Iron working, also? :P

Youtien, where is Arabia on your map?

Youtien, where is Arabia on your map?

Masqut, one lonely city. (Al-Maqilla flipped to me and I disbanded it)

I managed to improve on my Mali date by going National Park and Sid's Sushi. It wasn't nearly as quick as I would have thought though.

I ended up with most of Africa and managed about 25 seafood+rice for Sid's, and 9 Forest Preserves for the National Park.
http://img74.imageshack.us/img74/4112/malicultural.jpg

From now on records can be tracked here:

http://rhye.civfanatics.net/wiki/index.php?title=Rhye%27s_and_Fall_of_Civilization_ challenges#Earliest_cultural_victory

Legendary cities were Constantinople, Baghdad and Delhi.

Voluntarily vassalised Russia, Khmer, Dutch, Portugal.
Capitulated Turkey, which was a waste of a vassal slot.

Turned off science after Nationalism was learnt, but still learnt about 4 techs over the last phase with Culture at 100% due to many specialists.

A key step is not to learn Sci Meth which would obsolete Monasteries and devastate the economy/science situation.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=240871&stc=1&d=1264262745

Was this won with RFCC or not? (If so you may have had an advantage with the Islam-based wonders and the Pyramids don't expire with Calendar)

Nope, regular RFC v1.186.

Does RFCC have a 600AD start? I was only aware of the 3000BC one. Either way, great job!

Yes it does.

Baghdad is an independent city to start with in 600AD RFCC for instance and the Stone is moved one tile to the left (to the Babylon spawn tile), whereas Baghdad is not present and you have to found it yourself in regular RFC 600AD.

Madrassas replace Universities in RFCC whereas they replace Libraries in regular RFC.

Legendary cities were Chicago, Denver and Montevideo. Aztecs were Capitulated very early and I liberated Chichen Itza to them also. Peace event with the Natives was lucky and essentially made life in North America habitable instead of crazy hard otherwise.

Had to manage continual economic growth carefully so as to balance my expansion civic (-132 at the end) with a booming economy (+102 at the end).

Waited for a long time for a 6th religion to spread to my cities but it never happened, even though I had many cities with no religion. Is there a point after which religions stop spreading?

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=241068&stc=1&d=1264511324