Babylon Strategy

kamex

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I haven't seen this discussed much, maybe because its DLC and not everyone has it.

I've already started a thread about bowmen, but I was was wondering what the best way to milk the UA is.

Also, what the best use for the free writing scientist? Use write away or save for a steel / rifle rush? :lol:
 
The UA is for crazy tech. Between the lines, they re discussed very much. Consider some of the insane early victories that are done using Babs :)

This is gathered from other threads, I have no first-hand experience with Babs.

Build libraries and universities as soon as you can, work them and create as many great scientists as possible. Bulb through half the tech tree. Be in the renaissance age to be able to chose the relevant SPs way before anybody else.

In line with that, use the great scientist to help you on the way to get universities, IIRC theology was suggested.
 
Let's see:

- The UA is best exploited by running enough cities maxed out on Scientists to have each city produce a GS before the game ends. For Space, you need about 15 cities and Universities to achieve peak UA efficiency. For a Diplomatic win, you can lean more heavily on early Research Agreements, run fewer cities, build fast Libraries and worry less about Unis.

- The UA also lets you produce Great Scientists for early bulbs. Using two Libraries and the free GS, you can have three Great Scientists by the time other civs can have one. There are plenty of fun things you can do with this:

- One option with Rifle rush is to use the free GS and produce two more. That lets you bulb Steel, Physics and Gunpowder to open Renaissance very, very early. If you buy a Cultural ally soon enough, you can deploy Rifles starting around turn 90.

- Another option is to aggressively get to Renaissance bulbing Theology, Education and Acoustics. A more useful approach on Continents is to bulb Compass, Education and Astronomy.

- A third approach is to beeline Writing from the start and build an Academy. This will get you fewer Science points than bulbing deep, but will permit you to open the early techs much faster (since it essentially doubles your tech production in the very early phases of the game). Depending on your start, this can provide a stronger result than a series of deep bulbs. It is particularly helpful if you want to Iron rush but also need a lot of techs to hook up luxuries.
 
No doubt Babylons one of the most fun civs to play as then! Will defo be trying these out.

Bit skeptical about relying on scientific method for rifle rushing though, as apparently the next patch will mean you can't store polices.
 
Don't be skeptical. turn 90 biology on standard game pace happens once in awhile. By making only 2 or 3 cities early you can use the oxford university (all cities must have a university) porcelain tower great library and the freebie from writing plus the 2/3 GS you get from UA to unlock industrial era before most of the AI is in medieval... Completely insane, ALSO note that you still have not used rationalism slingshot doing it thaT way, so you can have SPs fpr unlocking order, planned economy and communism... and still go for a cultural win if you'd like... or explode with a mid-game ics explosion with whatever good units you feel like researching. Not sure if multi player you wouldn t be dead before all that happens, but in single player mode it is really a killer. Even faster if you use rationalism :)
 
Rushing certain techs and buildings is the way to play babylon, or at least that's how I managed.
You'll want to get writing as soon as possible and rush those libraries out, do whatever necesary to get them filled with scientists whilst having a semi decent production in that city. A maritime citystate can be useful to feed the specialists.
Once you get those filled up you're ready to crank out great scientists. The one you get for researching writing is best used to rush civil cervicie or iron working (so you have more efecient hexes, more room for specialists). After that you'll want to focus on getting the hagia sophia wonder for the specialist increase, as well as buildings gardens wherever you have set specialists.
When done with those two I usually build monuments in every city so I can build the national epic in the capital, for even faster scientist creation.
From there on I would suggest trying to rush fertilizer, I'm not sure about the original game but in my modded game it gives you another food for each farm. You'll want that to feed even more specialists. Rush university and perhaps even public school.

As for civics freedom is an obvious choice. Less unhapiness from specialists means you need to spend less money on hapiness buildings, as well as less need for production. Faster specialist creation, you should be all over this at this point. So rush renaisance. The rationalism for the hapiness per university is also a great idea.
 
I just learned about these Babylons today.... if they can create GS at twice the rate they just the current strats even stronger. As far as I know the most consistent strat to winning games if the rifle rush, and quick teching is generally what all the other strats want.

For OCC, this also good because getting Rifles ASAP is need for domination victory path or the Cultral victory path wants you to get Acoustics -> Archeology -> Radio. And its going to be even more important to do this quickly since you are going to be required to take policies as you get them.
 
If you have a starting cows/wheat you can go:
Tech 1. Pottery
Tech 2. Writing
Then put an academy on the cows/wheat which won't cost you much because you'll get the science bonus and the only improvement you give up on is a farm (+1 or +2 food) or a pasture (+1 production). Neither of these is a big deal.

This saves you 1 gold for each of the turns you actually would have kept the GS around, and also gets your enough lightbulbs to make up for bulbing a tech by the lategame. This assumes you have the beaker overflow mod installed and active, otherwise the math is much more complicated.

But yeah I think the consensus is that getting lots of GS's for bulbing is the way to play Babylon.
 
I downloaded this guy. He seems like cheating. Seriously, that why they made him $5, cause people who want to have the best will pay for it.
 
I downloaded this guy. He seems like cheating. Seriously, that why they made him $5, cause people who want to have the best will pay for it.

Oddly enough AI Nebuchadnezzar always does extremely poorly in my games. He usually either just sits around with 2-3 cities doing not much at all or gets steamrolled by another AI (or me) early on. I guess the AI doesn't know what to do with great scientists.
 
Maybe something has changed in the last year (ie. an update), but I find myself underwhelmed by the Babylonians. I downloaded in the other day, and have been playing them since. Not really seeing how great they are. Been following some of the tips on this thread....am I missing something? Did they get nerfed? Sad, really. I enjoy doing Tech victory, and thought that the Babs would really give me that extra boost. But I really don't see how they are any better than the Korea. Correct me if I am wrong - please! :)
 
I would say they are on par with Korea, I don't think anyone said otherwise. How many GS did you end up getting altogether?
 
Babylon is one of the Civilizations I do best with. I've used them through many generations of the game. I don't win scientifically. I don't know if I don't use the most optimal strategy, but I find it easier to win diplomatically than via the space race. It is definitely easier to win diplomatically than culturally.

I've taken a break of late and tried the Doomsday Book scenario in my last game, but basically regardless of civ I tend to research Archery first. This strategy works just fine with Babylon then I go to the on tech past Writing that allows research agreements. I underestimated how useful it is to open this up early.

From there the lay of the land has a big effect on me. I use the archers for defense and to take down barbarians and have several buildings I can build to improve my city. I then look at other sites or whether I have neighbors to trade with or whether I'm on a big continent or a small island. This is kinda my generic opening start now.

I'm trying more Civs I like less and thus am trying to beeline to a Civs unique unit, I prefer Civs with early unique units and an unique building. I think they offer a lot more options so Bablylon with there super archers and the easy to build super city walls fits in well with my defensive builder play style.
 
In addition to the obvious science focus talked about in the thread, Babylon is a great civ for an early rush. There are several threads which talk about the dreaded Bowman UU rush. In addition to rushing with Bowmen, Babylon can easily be the quickest to Swordsmen.

1. Beeline Writing (free GS).
2. Save GS for a rainy day and start building the Great Library.
3. Beeline Iron Working timing the Great Library to finish one turn later.
4. With the Great Library, take Metal Casting.
5. Use Free GS from Writing to bulb Steel.
6. Enjoy steamrolling with your Longswordsmen!
 
I haven't seen this mentioned, but Beeline the techs to get you:
The National Epic (+25% GP)
Hagia Sophia (+25% GP) (Use the Liberty GE to rush Hagia)
Garden (+25% GP)

Shoot for the Freedom SP opener (+25% GP) as soon as it is available.

You already achieve GSs at double the rate with Babylon. Add these builds to your capital, and get Freedom ASAP. I recently tried this strategy with Korea. I spammed Academies and before long, I had a huge tech lead. Once I completed the Freedom tree, I was getting tremendous science output from my academies. I don't run numbers, so I don't know how this compares to other strategies, but it worked well for me under the circumstances presented in the game.
 
I would say they are on par with Korea, I don't think anyone said otherwise. How many GS did you end up getting altogether?

I had more GS that have ever been in my kitchen. Seriously, I have no idea how many I had, but it was a ton. Certianly more than I had with Korea.

I think my problem is that I stockpile most of my GS and use them to breeze through the Industrial Era to get the Apollo Program. Maybe the GS would be better used as Academy?
 
It's most certainly not the most efficient strategy, but it's certainly fun. I go writing first and settle the GS, then get a National College asap before expanding. After that I focus on getting university up and gaining more GS.

I try to settle around 4 academies near my capital, with the modifiers the tech you get is crazy (although bulbing is considered better after your first GS, I really prefer it this way). The GS I don't use for academies are used to bulb to rennaisance as soon as possible. Try to hit astronomy if you have a mountain near your capital. Hold off on culture untill this moment, once you reach it buy and build as much culture buildings as you can (4 free opera houses are pretty good if you get a policy just before reaching the rennaisance) and fill up freedom.

By now every academy is producing a huge amount of science due to all the multipliers. You should be unstoppable.

In short:
Settle many academies near one city
Go for the science multiplying buildings in that city (rush NC)
Hold off on culture

Then

Bulb to rennaisance, astronomy if a mountain is nearby (observatory!)
Time producing and buying culture buildings to rush through the freedom branch once you hit rennaisance
Megascience output from your science city=win
 
How are you all getting GS so early to help bulb to the Renissance?? I am about 150 turns in, and I haven't gotten a single GS except the one I got from Writing. Just curious...I am using a lot of the advice given here on this thread, but I'm not cranking them out that fast at all.
 
Essentially you have to prioritize education ASAP, and staff that university in your cap. This also means growing it rapidly so you have the population to spare, but since babs get 100% more GS growth, with a fully staffed uni your first one comes out 9 turns after you finish it! That's simply crazy fast. National epic doesn't hurt either, if you have the time for it. ;)

Education is a pretty expensive tech, but getting it before even seemingly critical war/development techs tends to pay off, since it dramatically increases beaker output for any civ, and has especially great synergy with Babylon.
 
With Babylon you have time to produce 12-13 GS before turn 200. The only one that can be valuable to settle is the first one from writing. Others are more valuable at bulbing techs.

Check the no RA challenge #1 for more details.
 
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