Are Culture victories a thing of the past?

vexing said:

so?

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Well I am no litterary genius by any stretch of the imagination, but the meaning of the two sentences make different sugestions about the original quoters state of mind, I am a self confessed "Stupid Old Git" but that is besides the point!

vexing said:

it's mainly due to the globally reduced per city policy cost increase (from +30% of base per extra city in a standard size map to +15%).
the fact that representation is generally going to be an early policy finished (since you want the great person anyway) doesn't hurt.

i could still see situations where one city + puppets come out ahead; arabia could possibly fund an army without a secondary city. generally it's a lot easier to get puppets when you have a few cities to produce units.

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Thanks - This would explain why some of the other guys are saying they have walked into Cultural victory possibilities purely by accident! Those of us that are trying in the old ways are having more of a problem and in no small part due to the bug!

I think another part of it might be that Research Agreements are perhaps still too powerful/cheap in the latter parts of the game, and it's still too easy to blast through the upper parts of the tech tree. So you're getting the tools to go for space/diplo victories a century or two earlier than it was balanced for - hence making culture seem a lot weaker by comparison.

People use research agreements? Why? They are clearly still broken. Why not just play on chieftan?
Moderator Action: Please don't fill this thread with senseless spam.

It's called one city "challenge" for a reason. Surely you can win via culture other ways faster and easier.

Like vexing already explained, a larger empire with more cities are the way to go now when pursuing a cultural victory. I'm very pleased with the changes because frankly, I think the 'don't expand past three cities for the whole game' gameplay was a huge misunderstanding - the game *is* still called Civilization, not Citylization. Getting rid of the gameplay with these three super-cities surrounded by vast expanses of unsettled land couldn't have come too soon. They have, thankfully, re-ICS'ified the game like I posted a thread about a while back.

Beyond the major change (the 30% to 15% per city increase), there are several other things that support this new trend. Broadcast Towers no longer provide exclusively a massive percentage modifer (which benefitted tall empires with fewest possible cities much more than anybody else) and the identical 100% bonus from Freedom was likewise converted into the 33% bonus and is now in Piety. IMO these changes make the cultural victory condition radically more interesting since it's no longer a tiny-empire exclusive.

But since culture and social policies amazingly had a major bug introduced with the patch, I don't think it's reasonable to discuss whether they're too difficult to accomplish yet even if Firaxis mentions it's currently balanced to take account for these bugs. It's still very doable, that's for sure, and you get less 'locked' into certain very limiting styles of play (such as the no-more-than-three-cities rule).

For the attention of Becephalus and others who are opposed to the use of Research Agreements. These screen shots are of a dual player game with no research agreements due to constant war that I played prior to starting the thread. The game I was originally playing when starting this thread and the one attached both had finishing times within 4 turns of each other. It was a very close run game between myself and the Americans they were building their last spaceship part as I sent mine, on the France game they were voting for the UN for a good 30 turns prior to my victory. With this in mind, would it be correct to assume that the late 1800s to early 1900s is going to be the latest time that Deity players need to aim for in order to achieve victory by peaceful means?

By the time I closed up my France game I still needed 5 policies, with producing the Utopia Project also, I estimated another 250 turns of playtime before a cultural victory. Having now had an explanation from GoodSarmation as to why this is occurring, it would seem that a hotfix to this issue would probably bring culture more in line with the science time. As such I now no longer need to dwell on this problem with culture! Time to explore some new strategies other than culture.

With regards to the 'over-powered' nature of RAs, this would be completely true if it weren't for one fact... The opposition use them too, and get the same benefits.

Thankyou Strategist83 - I have thanked vexing for his input also. I was behind the times and need to move on.

I've completed 2 games on epic since patch , one military and one culture . I really enjoyed both , culture victory is without doubt harder than it was but i thought it was fine , took longer than before patch but nothing crazy. Though i was playing on prince/king (cant remember which one) , i could forsee it taking alot longer on a harder difficulty were getting wonders would be more difficult.

edit- i also think RA's are too powerful , especially with the bonus's from wonders/SP . RA's i think need a big nerf still.

As i was talking about RAs in the Porcelain Tower thread before the patch was out they didn't do enough to them obviously, still very easy to get to 100% RA effectiveness then just spam em & win. IF anything RAs are better now than they were as late game techs are further increased in science cost & your the only civ that gets 100% effectiveness.

As to this finisher bug, its seriously annoying me to the point of waiting for a patch to continue playing.

spfun said:

As i was talking about RAs in the Porcelain Tower thread before the patch was out they didn't do enough to them obviously, still very easy to get to 100% RA effectiveness then just spam em & win. IF anything RAs are better now than they were as late game techs are further increased in science cost & your the only civ that gets 100% effectiveness.

As to this finisher bug, its seriously annoying me to the point of waiting for a patch to continue playing.

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I agree with you, playing archipelago RAs are just as easy as ever. Playing pangea is a different story, it seems everone want's to go to war, if you play continents you are at war with all your opponents until you discover another continent, by then it is probably being dominated by one all powerful AI civ, the smaller-about to be conquered civs are not worth doing an RA with.

I keep lists of all my RAs from all games, this France game that I just completed, RAs as follows-
China - 6
Turkey - 5
Germany - 5
Japan - 2 and one failed because they were conquered.
Mongolia - 6
America - 5
Pollynesia - 1
Russia - 5
That is 35 in total, which projected my one City to the brink of Future Tech and without the Rationalism Policy tree. I was turning down RAs in the end because I needed to purchase Nukes as a war deterant (my hammers were needed for spaceship parts).

I am about to purchase Football Manager 2011, I will probably become totally immersed in that for a couple of years. I am sure I will browse this forum from time to time, but like your good self, I don't think I will be playing until this bug is fixed.

ColinTH said:

I keep lists of all my RAs from all games, this France game that I just completed, RAs as follows-
China - 6
Turkey - 5
Germany - 5
Japan - 2 and one failed because they were conquered.
Mongolia - 6
America - 5
Pollynesia - 1
Russia - 5

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How did you earn so much money for so many RAs?
I once played hot seat and if I remember correctly the AI was offering me RAs although neither the AI nor I had enough money.

Is this then a bug???

zyx said:

How did you earn so much money for so many RAs?
I once played hot seat and if I remember correctly the AI was offering me RAs although neither the AI nor I had enough money.

Is this then a bug???

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1 - Deity level the AI have alot more gold.
2 - Keep your happiness to a min and sell all luxuries and excess resources.
3 - Archipelago OCC the Colossus is a big earner.
4 - I had four silver mines (3 within workable distance), so a mint was helpful.
5 - Once you have explored, then sell your open borders.
6 - First eight military for free.
7 - Make sure you have a river, I will reload until I get one.
8 - Choose legendary start (the AI get it as well).

I was doing this pre patch on a regular basis, so it is nothing to do with a bug. Playing versus nine opponents Archipelago pre patch I was getting from 25 - 45 RAs every game.

Just to note, the hotfix released today fixes the finisher bug mentioned.

Help me understand. You think a particluar victory type is obsolete in this patch because another one is easier to accomplish? If that is the case, why did you ever play with any goal other than warmongering in any Civ game previous? Conquering has always and will always be easier in a game like Civ. Why would you ever not take advantage of the pitiful wartime AI of previous versions of Civ 5?

If that is the case, why did you ever play with any goal other than warmongering in any Civ game previous? Conquering has always and will always be easier in a game like Civ

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You're missing the point. You need to actively pursue a military victory, while science and diplo victories can be achieved without doing much else than what you do anyway when you go for a culture win.

What I noticed is that indeed tall empires (3 or 4 cities) are not the way to go. A culture victory is impossible unless you deliberately ignore diplo and science victories and are lucky that the AI is too slow.
On the other hand I played one game as Polynesia (obviously with a bigger empire with many coastal cities) and while I abandoned that game in the early Renaissance I think I was on track for a decent culture victory.

ColinTH said:

1 - Deity level the AI have alot more gold.
2 - Keep your happiness to a min and sell all luxuries and excess resources.
3 - Archipelago OCC the Colossus is a big earner.
4 - I had four silver mines (3 within workable distance), so a mint was helpful.
5 - Once you have explored, then sell your open borders.
6 - First eight military for free.
7 - Make sure you have a river, I will reload until I get one.
8 - Choose legendary start (the AI get it as well).

I was doing this pre patch on a regular basis, so it is nothing to do with a bug. Playing versus nine opponents Archipelago pre patch I was getting from 25 - 45 RAs every game.

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Thanks a lot for your answer!

I play monarch on duell and mini maps (because my laptop is way beyond minimum requirements) and I have lots of gold at the end of the game ( machu picchu! ). Having only three to four workers and most often up to four troups (not even one in each city, I wondered how much gold you must have had in early stages of the game. But maybe on standard maps with much more cities it is way easier. I am still wondering how many players (human and AI) use their military capacities fully. I could build more than 100 troups at the end (having big cities), but I would definitely go bankrupt, which AIs often do at the end, a lot of (medieval) troups and no cash to upgrade. ;-)