Is the Cultural VC the hardest to achieve?

MadDjinn said:

You just need to hit Electricity for that, which is much easier to get now. Likely easy to get in under 170 turns with a number of RAs post-Universities (though, without the Academies, you'll need a few more RAs).

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Electricity for what exactly? Broadcast towers need Radio...

I have not been able to get sub T300 CV's since G&K. So far I have only tried twice, but once was in the 400's, and second was around 350 or so.

I think part of my issue was lack of focus. In the T350 game I couldn't decide if I wanted to be production or GPT heavy. I had great production cities but could not afford RA's or competing with Alex against CS's (there were only 2 cultural CS's, and only 1 by mid game..), and the gold I did have I think I spent on silly stuff.

My T400+ game I was the tech lead by a long shot, but didn't really know what vic condition I wanted until it was too late to get a decent finish time.

My T350 game I did not bline/slingshot science until way too late, and I did have a lot of time where there was no cultural building to construct.

I think my next game, I'll only set up capital as production city (for wonders) and spam TP's everywhere else. I became too enchanted with the bonus where you get culture in every city which has built a wonder (forget what gives you that), so I think I went overboard with it. Big Ben/Commerce would be a bit more important in that case as well, and I wonder if I'd have enough money to keep up a decent amount of CS friendships?

ifinnem said:

Electricity for what exactly? Broadcast towers need Radio...

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I assume he means you need to get to Electricity and then bulb Radio with Oxford University.

ifinnem said:

Electricity for what exactly? Broadcast towers need Radio...

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Calouste said:

I assume he means you need to get to Electricity and then bulb Radio with Oxford University.

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yeah.... erm. That's exactly what I meant

forgot to write that in there when I posted, but I was definitely 'thinking' Oxford for Radio.

Calouste said:

I assume he means you need to get to Electricity and then bulb Radio with Oxford University.

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I think that's EXACTLY what he means as I did exactly just that in my Ethiopian game.

P.S. Never Mind, I used the free tech on plastics, not radio. Silly me.

Yeah I'd say teching to Radio isn't too hard and getting plastics for the CR might be worth it but could see the argument either way

Tabarnak said:

Hmm so you think we can't play culturally and tech like mad at the same time? Isn't best cultural games are those where you can reach cultural key techs fastest possible? In vanilla the goal was to reach Archeology and later broadcast towers as fast as possible. SOH under 200 turns isn't appropriated?

I need to test it out.

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Unless you get a lot of research agreements you're gonna run into trouble there. The main problem for me is that you can't have both Great Artists and Scientists. Every scientist you get makes your artists more expensive and you can't really faith-buy them, either, because that requires rationalism. You might get to Ecology fast but only if you heavily focus on science at the cost of culture, which means you will unlock your policies more slowly.

alpaca said:

Unless you get a lot of research agreements you're gonna run into trouble there. The main problem for me is that you can't have both Great Artists and Scientists. Every scientist you get makes your artists more expensive and you can't really faith-buy them, either, because that requires rationalism. You might get to Ecology fast but only if you heavily focus on science at the cost of culture, which means you will unlock your policies more slowly.

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Doesn't getting a particular great person increase the GP cost for just that person or does it increase the GP cost for ALL great people, like it did in Civ 4?

GreedysMaximus said:

I think a cultural route is the most diverse and complex to achive, since you need to manage a lot of different aspects(science, units, culture, gold) at the same time,

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I'm actually trying a game using the 4 cities Tradition approach. My goal is to get the NC(turn 76) as fast as possible then concentrate on culture and growth while maintaining a sufficient army to defend against hostile civs.

I personnally made the best set-up using this strategy so far. This is immortal, pangea map. Rivers everywhere for each cities, only 3 unique luxs but with Ethiopia it's possible to leverage the religion factor fast enough to counter unhappiness.

I went for Drama before Metal Casting. I rush bought 2 amphitheaters and built 2 others. i also rushed a workshop into capital who is now working on Terracota army and a bit later will start HS and Oracle. En route for Education. I only have 1 ally so far(religious) and early DoWs made me scout the land less than usual. I've just started to scout more and i will eventually find more cs.

I got a triple DoW(4th civ some turns later Harald) but managed to repeal all of them and made favorable peace deals including extra happiness

I completed Tradition. Now, what is the best route for the fastest cultural victory?



Little tip here : Slow or stop growth some turns before finishing Tradition. You will gain some food from aqueducts.

I'd go this way:

1. Liberty's Representation
2. Full Piety (+33%; -10% = sweet bonuses)
3. Full Freedom (Only finisher is really worth it, and max use will be late game anyway, when you settle 6+ Artists)
4. Finish Liberty (pick GA for golden age or whatever)
5. Patronage

If possible - Chichen Itza + Louvre for a long golden age

The most important wonder in a cultural game is Chichen Itza, the 50% golden age boost is HUGE for a cultural game, if you lose that then forget about a game under 300 turns, unless you're really good. Combine CI with freedom finisher and GA's and you will be in a permanent GA for the last 50+ turns, not to mention the more brief golden ages you will generate b4 finishing freedom, i always beeline towards civil service after i've hooked up the luxuries and teched archery.

So far my times haven't been that amazing though, i still need some practice. 3 cultural games so far - 2 were little over 300 and one a few turns under 300, CI made a huge impact in these games. I have a weakness for the bottom side of the tech tree early on(i blame Tabarnak for that ). So far i've always taken physics for ND, but i think that might be a mistake, since it's slowing me down in tech and i cant reach chivalry for Alhambra in time - the AI seems to love that wonder.

I've been almost totally neglecting religion so far(i pretty much don't bother with shrines early on). That might be another mistake which is costing me in the long run, but even if i'd be able to found a religion with the proper beliefs, i still have to consider conversions - this has actually happened already in my games and is quite annoying. Another fact which is very characteristic of my cultural games so far - i don't build over 3 cities.

Four reasons for that:
1)It will slow down the NC which is crucial for reaching civil service in time(usually finish it somewhere in the early/mid 80's if i won't rush the libraries).
2)It pisses off neighbours if you have 4 cities by turn 50, denounciations guaranteed.
3)You also need extra security/workers/luxuries for that last city which means more hammers/gold elsewhere.
4)The more cities you have the slower the policy acquisition.

So far i haven't had a map where i could utilise 4 cities - the luxuries just aren't there and neighbours are usually too close by to tolerate expansionism.

EDaddy said:

Doesn't getting a particular great person increase the GP cost for just that person or does it increase the GP cost for ALL great people, like it did in Civ 4?

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No, each GP you get increases the cost for everything. In Civ4 the system works quite differently as you get a random great person whenever you pop one. For faith-bought great persons, buying one GP doesn't increase the faith cost for others.

So, whenever you get a scientist, you make your next artist 100 points more expensive. This is also the reason why Great Engineers are very hard to come by until you get factories up and running.

Agree CI is a huge wonder. Also broadly agree with @Moriate's SP path. Might get 1 or 2 patronage policies earlier and would not bother completing Piety after you get the -10% (or maybe even stop it till later once you get the +33% assuming you can go into Freedom instead)

I question the hammer investment of Terracota but I guess if you can fit it in.

You need to assess midgame whether you are going to try and get to Ecology or just settle for CR @ plastics. With all the wars you appear to be in I think RAs are not going to be in abundance

The point of burning Artists for GAs rather than settling comes sooner than you think so be sure to run the numbers.

ifinnem said:

Agree CI is a huge wonder. Also broadly agree with @Moriate's SP path. Might get 1 or 2 patronage policies earlier and would not bother completing Piety after you get the -10% (or maybe even stop it till later once you get the +33% assuming you can go into Freedom instead)

I question the hammer investment of Terracota but I guess if you can fit it in.

You need to assess midgame whether you are going to try and get to Ecology or just settle for CR @ plastics. With all the wars you appear to be in I think RAs are not going to be in abundance

The point of burning Artists for GAs rather than settling comes sooner than you think so be sure to run the numbers.

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Don't forget about Great Mosque of Djenne (GMOD) though. It is great for a cultural victory as well! Basically you have to choose between CI and GMOD for a cultural game since you probably won't get both. As Ethiopia, its a no brainer -- GMOD beats CI anyday. Since you're going to have an early religion anyways, you might as well get it to help your religion spread further. With either Tithe or World Church founder beliefs and either Religious Texts or Itinerant Preachers Enhancer, the GMOD is very powerful as Ethiopia. As Celts, GMOD > CI for the same exact reason.

The only time I've ever managed to win an Immortal-difficulty Cultural Victory was when I spawned in the desert, got an early Petra (straight beeline, turn 110-ish), covered the desert with Trading Posts and went Patronage with unstoppable Gold income. I actually felt like a Deity AI with a stockpile of tens of thousands of gold, any time an AI took away one of my allies I just purchased it back.

It was silly because I could easily have won a diplomatic victory before 300 by beelining UN, but for the sake of actually winning an Immortal difficulty Cultural Victory I spammed radio towers and got CV around turn 350.

It's a little bit silly how much slower a CV is compared to science victory.

EDaddy said:

Don't forget about Great Mosque of Djenne (GMOD) though. It is great for a cultural victory as well! Basically you have to choose between CI and GMOD for a cultural game since you probably won't get both. As Ethiopia, its a no brainer -- GMOD beats CI anyday. Since you're going to have an early religion anyways, you might as well get it to help your religion spread further. With either Tithe or World Church founder beliefs and either Religious Texts or Itinerant Preachers Enhancer, the GMOD is very powerful as Ethiopia. As Celts, GMOD > CI for the same exact reason.

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Is it really better to spread your religion rather than save the points for great prophets and great artists that provide culture? We also have to consider that the AI tends to use a lot of their great prophets for spreading their religions, so you need to allocate a lot of resources for this. Probably not worth the hassle in my opinion.

Inspired by this thread i started my second G&K cultural game last night with Napoleon (Immortal).

My previous attempt was on Prince and went pretty fast, where i built Utopia on turn 280. Had 15 wonders there, 14 City States were under my reign by end game, however didn't manage to go as far a CR, since Prince AIs were broke and i managed to sign two RAs only. Had 63 cities under World Religion, and that gave me below 100 Cpt (actually).

This time i settled four cities Tabarnak style, NC - turn 86. Beelined Drama, rushed two Amphitheaters, built 4 universities, straight after - 4 operas, signed 10 RAs along the way, and still, CR came too late to be really important. (About turn 240). Rushed Broadcast towers in the capital and in another satellite city, hard built two more - all before turn 195. However, a war with Nobunaga broke out, which left one Cultural CS out of my scope up until turn 240. Having only two cultural CS's allied through entire game was a biggest setback when i look back at it, since money was more than abundant.

Also, i was puzzled with the whole great artist issue. In the end i settled only five of them, the rest were burned for golden ages. (About 50 turns of golden ages altogether) Thinking again, i might have settled them all instead (9), not sure if i did right.

As to social policies i went through the route i mentioned in previous post, however (completely agree ifinnem, i was under impression nothing changed since vanilla) delayed last policy of Piety in favor of Freedom.

Another war broke out with Sejong late game, however that had zero negative effect, and i actually enjoyed razing two of his cities.

Utopia was built @ turn 303, and i am scratching my head as to why it was so late .. Guess still a lot to learn from cultural games.

Wonders: Oracle, Petra, Sistine Chapel (GE), Notre Dame, Taj Mahal, Brandenburg Gate, Cristo (Liberty GE), Statue of Liberty.

I would say PT is also important for quicker times since you aren't getting the rationalism boost.
Also CI would have made a big difference as you can get more GA time or same GA time with more settled GAs...

BTW what turn did you finish Freedom and what was your cpt at the point vs end game?

ifinnem said:

I would say PT is also important for quicker times since you aren't getting the rationalism boost.

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PT is a must, the research bonus+the GS is too important to pass up. I use the GS for bulbing archeology and then use the GE from Pisa to rush Louvre. What do you guys do with the GS(PT) and GP from Pisa?

You guys are right about PT. I tried it, but missed by few turns. Would have bulbed Cristo 10+ turns earlier with that. CI would be hard to get on immortal, since there are fundamental things to do when it's unlocked - workshops, amphitheaters, markets, then straight into universities, into operas.

Infinnem, attached screenshot. End game Cpt was 710.

Thinking of playing as Ramkhamhaeng today. Give myself a little edge.