Was a prophet born/created? I ask this because we are expending a large amount of early game resources to build the AP ASAP assuming some AI has Theology. But do we know this?
I'm pretty sure there's never been a "standard" Civ IV game (including the HOF, BUFFY, and other xOTM mods) that included the trip-over-a-tile-and-get-something-cool feature and would bet a lot of money that's not what happened in this game. The AI that discovered Divine Right didn't do so until T40, and without the FFH-type trick he must have done it the usual way, which is having any necessary prereqs (both Theology and Monarchy) and either trading with somebody else (which is conceivable but unspeakably evil, even for Neil
) or researching it himself by some combination of brute teching and bulbing.
It's very likely that bulbing was involved (which gives 1000 beakers plus a population-dep term for all GPs other than Great Sci's) because otherwise it means the AI has pretty awesome research capabilities--so good that we'd be doomed. The most likely GP is a Prophet because DR is one of his "earliest" techs. If the AI does not have Mysticism then he can't bulb Meditation (1st in the GP bulbing list) or Polytheism (2nd). If he doesn't have Med or Poly then he can't bulb Priesthood (#3) or Mono (#4). Theology (#5) needs both Writing and Mono. But if he was given Theology and Monarchy to start then he can bulb Divine Right (#6), therefore he must have had Theo, Monarchy (and conceivably Writing or Mono but not both), and now DR.
IF, however, the AI started with Mysticism, then he'd also have to have Med, Poly (otherwise they'd be bulbed before DR). Monotheism would be skipped if he doesn't have Masonry, and without Mono, Theology is skipped. So another possibility is that the AI has Mysticism, Meditation, Polytheism, Theology, Monarchy, and DR--and either Monotheism or neither Mono nor Masonry. None of which probably matters. Uh, what were we talking about??
[BTW, a Great Artist could also bulb DR if the AI already had Mysticism, Polytheism, Monotheism (or no Masonry), Theology, and Monarchy.]
Ah, right. Given the above flawless logic (?) we can be sure that at least one AI (and probably only one) has Theology, and has had it since the beginning of the game. I don't know how the AI chooses what to build, so it's a big question mark on how long we have to build the AP. If it we are
not a big race, that would be great, because as you say, there's a lot of stuff we'd rather build first.
Fortunately, we don't need to commit to the AP yet, and the Toku's will probably trash all our plans anyway. How about if somebody plays to the beginning of T73 following my plan? I think everybody is pretty comfortable with those 5 turns. Let's see what the Toku's do.
Shall we take a vote? I am
green. I don't care who plays but I am available.
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@SH. No vassals means no colonies. So no friendly beneficiaries of magnanimously granted independence. But we can probably get a friendly beneficiary of our tech-gifting.
But I still prefer going for CoL according to my plan until something better comes along.
