Play With Me 2: Iroquois Zero-Culture ICS

alpaca

King of Ungulates
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Play With Me 2: Iroquois Zero-Culture ICS

Welcome to my second public game, where I'll try to show just how broken ICS is by almost completely ignoring an integral part of the game: Culture. I've seen a lot of posts where people claim that you want to wait and grab Communism for an ICS approach.

Well, I'll let you in on a little secret: I've played plenty of ICS games and so far I took Communism exactly once, to test it out. By the time you can get Communism I'm usually done settling my whole landmass.

The policy I will try to get for ICS is Meritocracy, which means 3 social policies. If I can get a fourth one that is an unexpected bonus and would probably be the base Freedom policy.

I chose Hiawatha because I never played with him so far. Let's hope we have some nice forests!

As the last one, this game will be played on Immortal difficulty on an all-standard Pangaea game. I will try to update the game in a more timely fashion than the last time where I ran notes for long stretches of time which I then compiled later. You can click the images to get a full-sized (1920*1080 pixels) version.


Table of Contents

Part 1 (this post)
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10


Turn 0 - The Start of It All



Now that's a sucky starting position if ever I saw one. A single luxury, lots of grass, not even much forest. The only saving grace is its starting yield which isn't bad. No matter, I'll make the best of it. Settle on the spot because I can't find anything better available in the next two turns.

I'm not sure where to go now. I could try the Mohawk Warrior out but decide that the furs drag me into the horseman direction. Animal Husbandry it is!

I need to find some good settlement space soon so Onondaga starts with a scout. After that I'll directly go for a settler.


Turn 3 - More furry creatures

I find more furs and some marble to the south. Still not overly excited so I'll keep exploring the area around my capital. No sign of an AI civ yet which is good :)




Turn 5 - Baby Boom

Onondaga grows to size 2. And... I pop my first ruins which contains survivors, putting me instantly at 3. Nice.




Turn 7

Some forest at last, with shiny gems at the end. I will settle this one closely to save on road maintenance. Since this is partly a teaching exercise, I marked the positions I would like to settle with numbers telling you the likely order.



Still no sign of AI by the way - not that the term "intelligence" could be applied to it at the best of times, anyways.

----------------------------------------------------

As I said I'll keep the updates smaller this time so you can comment on my progress and make suggestions. On to Part 2
 
Thanks for the good wishes but it wasn't to be: I didn't get any :mad:

By the way, do you still wonder why you have such a large variance in your games? The whole start is totally based on luck ;)


Play With Me 2: Iroquois Zero-Culture ICS, Part 2

Turn 8 - River Warlord

You guessed it, I meet Askia. I also find the first city state, Vienna. Good job Askia didn't find them before me. I like cultural city states, they're almost as overpowered as maritime ones and Vienna's refined culture will most likely be what will drive me to Meritocracy. Unfortunately, Vienna makes spot 3 above impossible to settle so I will change the order a bit to accomodate. What bugs me more is that I will have to get the gems from them instead of getting them myself. Ah well.



Oh, there's also a second ruin for me to grab and Animal Husbandry is finished. There are horses north of Onondaga. You know what that means: the city settlement plan has to be thoroughly rewritten ;)




Turn 9 - Elephant Dung

Gah! Rammydammy or whatever he's called steals my ruins! Wait till I can lay hands on you, pal!


Turn 10 - No manners at all

Askia insults my army. Looks like he'd like his head bashed in by horsemen. I also meet an archer-scout of Bismarck's and Siam guarantees Vienna.


Turn 12



Curious, an empty barbarian encampment and a German warrior ran away from it last turn. I wonder why... maybe it's haunted? No matter, 25 gold for me.


Turn 13

I find Askia's border. He's so close I can smell the stench of his burning beard. The ruins will contain 60 gold I'll pick up the next turn.




Turn 17

A barbarian brute is making ready to harass Onondaga. Luckily my scout is at large and lures him into attacking so I can send my newly finished settler out unmolested to settle right on the horsies. Onondaga will build a worker while I wait for Liberty.




Turn 18

The wheel is finished, on to Horseback Riding.


Turn 19

I shortly contemplate waiting for Liberty for six turns but decide I want the additional production ASAP and settle Osininka on the horses. It will start with a worker, too. Ram asks for open borders but I refuse. I could sell mine to him for some gold but I don't like that, I only sell luxuries because I think that buying strategic resources or open borders is practically always a bad idea so I won't sell them to the AI, either.


Turn 21 - Barbarians galore

I find a barbarian encampment to the south that will be used to train my warrior a bit. Ram offers a pact of cooperation, which I accept. North of me is Tundra which means I will be more or less safe from attack from that direction.


Turn 22

My warrior finds the encampment deserted. That brute will be surprised to find it gone when he returns :lol:



Seeing all the barbarians abroad, I decide to slowly move my warrior home to defend.


Turn 23

Bismarck offers a pact of cooperation, which I also accept. I'm big on cooperation but for some reason the AI always cancels them sooner or later :(


Turn 26

Onondaga finishes the worker and starts on a second settler while I wait for horseback riding. The worker will move to improve the only road I need to hook up Osininka, thanks to the Great Warpath.




------------------------------------

That's all the PWM2 action for today. Have a fine evening, folks! Read on in Part 3
 
Thx for sharing, it's very time consuming

Nice starting location...3 food cow to boost get to pop 3 earlier + science bonus
forests for not needing to build road for Iroquois.
this is too easy :crazyeye:

side note...technically it's not "Zero Culture" as you put it....
you still need to buy CS to get to 3 social policies...
with all that extra income from your trade route so early (not needing to build road)
sell lux ($300)get Vienna ally,
buying culture from Vienna when you only have 2cities, you will hit Meritocracy early <T100
time it right settle your 3, 4, 5 cities on the turn that unlocks meritocracy...more cities can come online much sooner.
(monuments as first cap build).
not even need to hook up horses early cos no AI cap <10 tiles
and you got city ruins on? lol...you're pretty good, you don't need all these kind of bonuses...
 
I'm curious why you would want to settle cities in that order, especially switching 4 and 5. Isn't 5 (on the revised order) better to settle first than 4 since it will already be automatically connected to 3? Or are you afraid an AI will settle too close to the marble?

Also, is it possible to adjust 3 on the turn 9 picture to the northwest so you can settle to the west of the gem spot?
 
I'm curious why you would want to settle cities in that order, especially switching 4 and 5. Isn't 5 (on the revised order) better to settle first than 4 since it will already be automatically connected to 3? Or are you afraid an AI will settle too close to the marble?

Also, is it possible to adjust 3 on the turn 9 picture to the northwest so you can settle to the west of the gem spot?

you'll get the gem from allying Vienna, unless you grab it with 2nd city
(pros sell for quick cash to get Vienna ally sooner),
but it's dangerous move, can't be sure to grab it before Vienna...
gem site fits well with marble (mining+masonry), prob earliest 2 lux sell possible
construction 1 tech away, +happy and CS bonus upgrade = ICS game over
alternative is hook up the marble site (1w, 1s of current Osnnka on the desert tile) sooner, then $600 cash...buy for +75 relation
 
By the way, do you still wonder why you have such a large variance in your games? The whole start is totally based on luck ;)

It's amazing how much of a difference small things make. Ramesses let me have both of his Workers on turn 4 in my most recent game. The resulting production was about as insane as you'd expect, especially since there were two Cows and a Sheep in Beijing.
 
Thx for sharing, it's very time consuming

Nice starting location...3 food cow to boost get to pop 3 earlier + science bonus
forests for not needing to build road for Iroquois.
this is too easy :crazyeye:

side note...technically it's not "Zero Culture" as you put it....
you still need to buy CS to get to 3 social policies...
with all that extra income from your trade route so early (not needing to build road)
sell lux ($300)get Vienna ally,
buying culture from Vienna when you only have 2cities, you will hit Meritocracy early <T100
time it right settle your 3, 4, 5 cities at the same time...more cities can come online much sooner.
(monuments as first cap build).
not even need to hook up horses early cos no AI cap <10 tiles
and you got city ruins on? lol...you're pretty good, you don't need all these kind of bonuses...

Actually the goody huts are bonuses for the AI more than for me. I could switch them off but I don't usually bother. Switching them off makes early scouts extra pointless, anyways.

You're right, though, it might be more instructive if I don't ally a cultural CS, either.

I'm curious why you would want to settle cities in that order, especially switching 4 and 5. Isn't 5 (on the revised order) better to settle first than 4 since it will already be automatically connected to 3? Or are you afraid an AI will settle too close to the marble?

Also, is it possible to adjust 3 on the turn 9 picture to the northwest so you can settle to the west of the gem spot?

Since I'm not sure what Askia is up to and he's already hostile, I want to go for a set-up that's as defensible as possible. 4 before 5 completes a triangle. This means, if 4 should fall, both Onondaga and 3 can shoot on his units.

I don't like disturbing my lattice too much and I guess Vienna will have gobbled up the gems by the time I get around to settling the area. If they are still available when I found 3, I might settle a city three tiles east of it.
 
you'll get the gem from allying Vienna, unless you grab it with 2nd city
(pros sell for quick cash to get Vienna ally sooner),
but it's dangerous move, can't be sure to grab it before Vienna...
alternative is hook up the marble site (1w, 1s of current Osnnka on the desert tile) sooner, then $600 cash...buy for +75 relation


So he's banking on Vienna getting that gem tile before he makes city 3 and making a mine there roughly when he builds a quarry on city 4's marble?

Since I'm not sure what Askia is up to and he's already hostile, I want to go for a set-up that's as defensible as possible. 4 before 5 completes a triangle. This means, if 4 should fall, both Onondaga and 3 can shoot on his units.

I don't like disturbing my lattice too much and I guess Vienna will have gobbled up the gems by the time I get around to settling the area. If they are still available when I found 3, I might settle a city three tiles east of it.


Ah. I didn't see where Askia was. That makes sense.
 
So he's banking on Vienna getting that gem tile before he makes city 3 and making a mine there roughly when he builds a quarry on city 4's marble?

sorry, I wasn't sure what you intended to use the Gem for
if you want it for yourself to sell early, grab it with 2nd city
if let Vienna get it, it'll allow you to expand horizontally sooner because vienna will have that hooked up by the time we build settler 5 and finish quarry.

I've been experimenting with getting earlier Meritocracy with 2 cities' 1st built monuments, and settle 3, 4, 5 on the same turn after policy grab...it's not that much slower in terms of horizontal expansion pre T100...with HBR, Construction, this allow you to expand faster than you can build settlers post T100.

I would've look for more lux with my 2nd city, thus will able to hook up marble with his 2nd city (there's 2 marbles on this map), so if settle on the desert or the wheat tile, there will be enough time. Desert is good coz next to the mountain. Take loan to buy marble tile if money is tight.
 
ICS is getting some love lately. But I am still playing like mongols and steamroll everyone in sight with horsemen. Nobody happy at home but I got SCIENCE!
 
Random recommendation: don't put the road where your red circle is. Put it directly West of Osinka so that it both hooks up your city and connects to the forest patches to the northwest, in case you settle up there in the future.
 
Just saying Iroq gains massive production, communism provides production

other civs get communism because they dont have the massive production Iroq can get


but yea ICS is horribly OP
 
When you say zero-culture, do you mean you literally won't produce any culture except the +1 from your palace? If so, how are you going to get meritocracy? I guess you can still expand without meritocracy if you want, it'll just limit your city size a bit more.
 
When you say zero-culture, do you mean you literally won't produce any culture except the +1 from your palace? If so, how are you going to get meritocracy? I guess you can still expand without meritocracy if you want, it'll just limit your city size a bit more.

Pretty sure he's funding it with cultural city states early on, until Meritocracy pops. It's been a day or so since I read this so I can't remember exactly where that's stated without going through it all again but I think it was mentioned a couple times.
 
Looking forward to see how you'll fare without theocracy :)

Small note: The Great Warpath is wonderful. However be aware that they only count as roads. If you want railroad connection later in the game, the trees just don't cut it anymore (pun intended). That is to say they don't count as railroads.

While I'm pretty certain you'll be biased towards Chivalry (Knights) into Banking (FP), I'd recommend Metal Casting for the amazing Longhouses.


Also, do you reckon the Longhouse production bonus will outperform Rome's UA? Or do you just want to play in the forests? :)
 
Hi alpaca,

Thanks for sharing. Will be interesting to see how you handle the happiness situation here. I also have some questions :)

Why only 1 scout? Even on small maps I build 2 scouts, as my thinking is that more ruins, more city state encounters and more Civilisation meetings ultimately means those 4-5 turns spent making another scout gives you a bigger advantage than settling 4-5 turns earlier.

What's your "policy" on stealing workers from city states? on immortal, they bring the worker out around +/- turn 30, which is basically a free worker for no risk and will easily justify the cost of a scout. Of course, you don't want to steal it from a city state you want an immediate relationship with... which again is why i feel you need more scouts to discover more city states :)
 
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