Oh that's just great

jarvisc said:

Don't be discouraged Posidonius, you're probably setting some records in your own way.. let us know your high score.

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Not worried, i put the main current game on hold while learning more from the previous game which ended in sludge. Once i figure it out, should finish the current game with a romping tiger's score. No rival cities, a full SShip, guaranteed full Peace bonus, max Tech/Wonder bonuses. Once i know how to dodge pollution, i can rack up the pop for 45 more game-years before Alpha Centauri, or should i say Kepler 452?

Posidonius said:

Did you really get 300 gold pieces for a single trade?

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My information comes from "Rome on 640K a Day".
Caravan revenue is based on the trade in the two cities times the distance separating them.
Caravan trade is cut in half if both cities are on the same continent.
Caravan trade is cut in half if both cities belong to the same civ.
Caravan trade is cut to 2/3 if you have railroad.
Caravan trade is cut to 2/3 (again) if you have flight.
The effects are cumulative.

I have observed that the railroad and flight rules don't apply exactly as stated in the book.
The railroad and flight penalties only kick in when the AI owning the destination city discovers the advances. Your own discoveries don't affect trade.
The reason you are getting relatively low return is you are facing the "same civ" and both technology penalties. Multiplying those effects together, you are getting 2/9 of the value you would be getting from a strong AI city.
300gp * 2/9 works out to about the 67 you are observing.

Now to your earlier question:
You can set the research rate to 0% and still make discoveries from caravan trade. If you are trying to avoid the pollution trigger advance, you have to stop trading when you get to FT 187.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

1) A tech is discovered when the lightbulb bar (F6) is full after a city's output is computed during End Turn.
2) Lightbulbs from an individual city calculation do not overflow into the next tech.

What this means is that caravans can discover a maximum of 1 tech per turn, and you can probably get a huge number of vans through at 1 tech per 2 turns.

Let's say we're researching Future Tech 63 on emperor, which costs exactly 3698 lightbulbs after 1 AD. Science rate 0%. We build a schload of caravans. In one turn, we establish a bunch of routes and net 3666 bulbs. Hit End Turn. No city completes the remaining 32 bulbs. We build an even massiver schload of vans the next turn and their routes pop OVER 9,000 bulbs. But the game stops counting the bulbs during the turn once the bar hits 3698 (no overflow allowed!). The science bar is now full. Hit End Turn. The first city during the End Turn routine, like Rome or whatever, is going to add its zero bulbs, at which point the game will notice the full science bar, and advance FT63.

So you get however many thousands of gold that was, while pacing the march to pollution judgement day in a very controlled manner.

Valen said:

Caravan revenue is based on the trade in the two cities times the distance separating them...

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One has Colossus/Copernicus with a GemSwamp and plenty of fishing squares, and every land square on the planet is railroaded (except the Poles. I can land a diplomat on the South Pole, but not a Settler. Pity.) That city has 65 trade-arrows and lights up 218 bulbs per turn. The second-highest trading city has Gold and a nice river vale, and it's also 65 trade-arrows, on a separate continent. It racks up 89 bulbs per turn (i'm at 20Tax-70Sci-10Lux).

... you are getting 2/9 of the value you would be getting from a strong AI city. 300gp * 2/9 works out to about the 67 you are observing.

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Alas, there will never be an AI city, since the last remaining unit is a Zulu Settler checkmated onto a mountaintop. When that happened, got goosebumps and decided to try and exploit the opportunity, to break the game in unusual ways. Your info gives me another interesting idea:

Routinely do Colossus/Copernicus in the same city, and sometimes i'll put Shakespeare there too, if the scenario makes it worthwhile. And in previous games, i have used the Diplomat Sneak to run a Settler into enemy territory and railroad their grasslands for them, just so i get better trade. What if...

What if i choose an enemy city exactly half the world away from my Col/Cop city, and refuse to kill that one city? I can set them up with massive trade whether they like it or not, avoid the same-civ and same-continent penalties, and if that's the civ's only remaining city, then they'll never get RR or Flight (assuming i stunt their expansion by 1000 BC).

Not just a pure theoretical experiment, if this is possible then it means you can overcome a tax deficit of 1000 gold pieces per turn, just by buying five Camels for less than 98 gp each. Woo, that kind of income can support a perpetual parade with Luxury at 80%. My side-game has a Plains city with access to three Golden Mountains, so if i can find a suitable victim-city 1/2 the map away, might be fun to try out this idea.

You can set the research rate to 0% and still make discoveries from caravan trade. If you are trying to avoid the pollution trigger advance, you have to stop trading when you get to FT 187.

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This is very useful to know, thanks. A correct strategy is taking shape. Getting 3 FutureTechs per turn, so perhaps: restart back a few years to 175 FT's. This should allow me to perfect the trade network without breaking 188 FT's (i need about 30 more Caravans to get all 117 cities paired up with maximum trade-partners). Then drop Science to 0%, bring Tax up to the lowest positive number, and jam the rest of the trade-arrows into Luxuries. Then it's Beethoven's Ninth all the way to 2030, when i start the SS. 2041 it launches full size, and in 2059 it lands.

In 2054 rebalance trade to get up to 190 Future techs by 2057. By now, the pop-effect of parades should have maxxed every city with a wheatstalk to spare, running hi-lux from 2015 to 2054, so i should be able to afford the Science. Finally, in 2057, jump up to 100% Luxury. Full Peace bonus, full SS bonus, full Wonders and +950 in Future Techs.

By 2011, had civscore 3926 (Prince, 7 civs). Wondering if i can still push this game over five grand. Would have made 5,000 easily, if i could have kept up the FT's past 188. Was on a pace for 330 FT's by 2059 (+1650 civscore).

Alas, pollution.

Tristan_C said:

Correct me if I'm wrong.
1) A tech is discovered when the lightbulb bar (F6) is full after a city's output is computed during End Turn.

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Actually at the start of the next turn, not the end of the current one. Indistinguishable in practice, but depending on one's place in the turn order, some foreign civs make their moves and attacks after you in the current turn, and some move before you in the next turn. Sometimes i'm soft in the head, so just because i can't think of a way to exploit this hair-split does not mean that an exploit does not exist.

So you get however many thousands of gold that was, while pacing the march to pollution judgement day in a very controlled manner.

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Highly useful info, thank you. This makes me wonder: is there a balancing point where Luxuries are as effective as they can possibly be, at making Parade Days? If, for example, i have Lux at 70% and 95 out of 117 cities are holding parades, and moving Lux to 80% makes all 117 have a parade... does it make any sense to move to 90% Lux?

Posidonius said:

... does it make any sense to move to 90% Lux?

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If all your cities have trade+marketplace+bank, you don't get much benefit from a higher luxury rate.
The rule is a city can use 2 diamonds per population point. Adding more will not add more happy faces.
For example, if you have a 10-point city with a marketplace and bank pulling in 32 trade points, 30% luxuries will max out your happy faces. Actually, in my experiment, this generated 22 diamonds which is 2 more than the city could use.
If several of your cities are low in their trade numbers (rough terrain, etc.), you will benefit from higher lux.

Just FYI, I've seen a couple books that mention the rails-on-the-ocean trick. This perks up trade remarkably.

Yes, as ocean trade can actually benefit from the rails, unlike land-generated trade (with the exception of special resources). I don't tend to use this trick though, it seems a bit like cheating and a bit of a hassle for me as the ability to do it comes at a point in the game when I'm usually already set on winning.

Otherwise, oceans are the principle source of trade for me. I've had games on Emperor where the combined shield output of my cities was like less than 10, but I still bought my way into space. I'll often settle small grassland peninsulas densely, like build 3 cities on land that could be worked by just 1, and all of them will grow to 15-20 pop, working a total of maybe 40-45 oceans squares of 3 trade each, and roughly 20 land squares x 2 trade. Add markets, banks, caravans, and RR on the ocean if you will. And the beauty is you can run these cities on just a market, bank and a cathedral.

Valen said:

If all your cities have trade+marketplace+bank, you don't get much benefit from a higher luxury rate. The rule is a city can use 2 diamonds per population point. Adding more will not add more happy faces... If several of your cities are low in their trade numbers (rough terrain, etc.), you will benefit from higher lux.

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Re-read the manual i printed out several years ago, and the FAQ pages on this site, but did not pick up that juicy nugget of advice anywhere. Thank you, that makes a bunch of things clearer. You can only push FutureTech so far, and your +2 citz have a limit via this 2-diamond rule. Seems like the only civscore factor left to exploit in my scenario is brute population.

You don't get any credit for how much gold you end the game with, and i need to curtail the Science. Plowing trade-arrows into Lux should quickly pop all cities with an available wheatstalk. This all means that i've been wasting time in my past several games. I don't need to wait until 2041, 18.2 years before Judgement Day, to launch the SS. Force pops with parades, and land on Alpha Centauri just after the last pop.

So what i have to do, is make a set of population projections, looking at various Tax-Sci-Lux rates, and see what year i can Luxparade myself to full terrain-square employment. Figure, a couple turns after that i'd be at maximum population. Then adjust the Sci rate to reach 189 or 190 Future Techs at the same date, and finally instruct 30 cities to start building various SS materials so they're ready to launch a fully tricked SS 19 years before this target date.

Should still have a decent chance of hitting 5,000 civscore. Top score in my installation's HOF is 3,924... and embarassingly, the 2nd-place game is a later scenario at 3,923 civscore. Hoping i can push those games down and eventually off the Top-5. The most valuable thing i've learned here, thanks to everyone who haunts this website, is that the maximum civscore for the long-form game is based on a convergence of 3 things: population, F-techs, and the SS.

Just FYI, I've seen a couple books that mention the rails-on-the-ocean trick. This perks up trade remarkably.

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At this point in my current game, it doesn't make sense to do this. Have enough Trade to grab 3 Future Techs per turn, and have to reorient the Sci into Lux and Tax. More than enough trade-arrows today. But one thing i'm keenly interested to learn is this: the RR increases food production on land, and an Ocean square only makes one food unit so there would be no food increase on a normal sea plot (1 x 1.5 still = 1 in Civ). But does a RR increase the food units of a fish square?

If so, then it's a powerful trick in any game, but moreso in my current game, since population seems to be my only remaining hurdle. I railroaded every land square and irrigated every hill and forest, but if i can get 1 more food out of every fish, that might add up to +400 civscore on Judgement Day. That would be nice.

Knowing this answer would also inform my decision about how far back to restart the current game. At one point i had over 100 Settlers so i set some to useless tasks for perfectionist sake, like railroading mountains i can't even access. If i go back far enough in time, i can RR all the fishies. But if there's no food increase from RR'ing fishies, then there's no point re-playing dozens of turns.

Mize said:

I don't tend to use this trick though, it seems a bit like cheating and a bit of a hassle for me as the ability to do it comes at a point in the game when I'm usually already set on winning. Otherwise, oceans are the principle source of trade for me.

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Yeah me too, i've run games where the only military i needed was to whack Barbies, and just let the Diplomats spend me to victory. But in the past few games, i have adjusted the rates to maximize Science, since Future Techs are +5. Slowly wrapping my head around the concept of a balanced approach, converging max pop with max FTech right before the SS lands.

Valen said:

[Trans1] - [Trans2] - [Port]

If your 2 transports are sitting on railed ocean squares, unload the legion from Trans1. When he steps onto Trans2, both the moving legion and the transport will disappear from the display. Don't panic, just keep moving.

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Aha, now i know what you're saying. I did panic, even though you told me not to, because it's freaky to have 2 units just disappear like that. I found that if you move a third unit onto that invisible boat from land, both the Tranny and the Legion reappear. Even freakier is what RR'ing does to Oceans. Not creating dry land, but the sea becomes a field of mud puddles. Some future game, i'll have to surrounded all the shores with a thick fringe of bizarre tidal pools, just to see what it looks like.

Still can't decide whether this is a cheat or a feature. Discovered the Fast Settler by accident a long time ago, but refuse to use it. There's no way to lose (ever) if development is only limited by Settler movement rates. Discovered that a unit landed by a boat docking into a port city can be awoken and moved, and do that routinely. But never knew that you can do the sentry-awaken trick in EVERY city, and that just seems like a cheat. I couldn't do that in the early game and still feel honest, but if i've RR'ed every square between the poles and one choke-point isthmus city was founded before the RR, i might feel justified in a sentry-awaken maneuver when passing through there. By that point i've earned it, right? Don't answer that, i know it's inherently a moral dilemma, not a gameplay question.

I think you have maxed out every normal means of maximizing your score. With population right at the carrying capacity of the planet and future tech right to the edge of runaway pollution, you have arrived.

Posidonius said:

You can only push FutureTech so far, and your +2 citz have a limit via this 2-diamond rule. Seems like the only civscore factor left to exploit in my scenario is brute population.

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But you still have one more avenue open to you to increase your score: science.
This, of course, leads to the inevitable pollution apocalypse.
You can prepare for this eventuality by building a large team of unsupported settlers and using the fast settler exploit to clear the pollution.
Tedious? Very!
Any other way to increase score? None that I've found.

Is it worth the trouble for a huge score?

There is of course, the possibility of using darkpanda's jCivED to make settlers take off pollution in one turn. Or, you could just modify civ to never add the pollution to the map in the first place... Take a look at this thread:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=521916

kirkham7 said:

...you could just modify civ to never add the pollution to the map in the first place. Take a look at this...

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Those instructions are for CivDOS, but i'm on CivWIN. When i started in '99, i had a choice of installing either one, and i liked the look of the graphics in the CivWIN version better. If i'd known then, that 15 years later there'd be a cool community with a Decompiler Wizard making all these great discoveries and finding remarkable patches and creating a full-blown game editor... i probably would have gone with CivDOS. But by now i've got thousands of saves from dozens of games, and just not willing to trashcan all that playwork, of which i'm quite fond by now.

Anyway, i don't even know where my CivDOS installation disc is now, haven't seen it since last century

Valen said:

Is it worth the trouble for a huge score?

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Hell yeah! That's the only thing that is worth the trouble. And since it's Civ1, it's a labor of love, so not really trouble at all. Fawk, i love this game. For the past 5 years, been only playing long-form games, looking for ways to jack up civscore to new heights.

Any other way to increase score? None that I've found.

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I think i found one this week. Can't believe i never thought of it before. Playtested the idea briefly and it works, without using any cheats, and should certainly work in CivDOS too. Projection is a 20% boost to the final civscore. Still have to do some more googling to make sure that it's truly my own discovery, which would be a shock: finding something new in Civ1 after all these years. Need to playtest some more, to work out the timing.

The more i think about it, the more certain it seems that someone else has thought it up before. The fear is that i'll put up a post saying "Hey Look What I Discovered!" and 20 minutes later someone will toss up a reply saying: "Pffft, that's been known for years, ya greenhorn, here's a link, read it and shut up now." So pardon my reluctance to elucidate immediately; if someone's already discovered the trick, i'm duty-bound to give the credit where it belongs. Must goog harder. And if not, need time to think up a clever name for the technique

Going through all the tedium of playing a long-form game pays off sometimes, in the sense that you see patterns develop in ways that never would appear in a faster game.

The real upshot of everything (re)learned from the manual, and reading this website over the past couple months, is that i think i can shave 100 turns off a long-form game, and still top 6,000 civscore. But i never would have known that, if i hadn't pushed the last several games all the way to 2060. Kind of a paradox, it took so much time to figure out how to save time. But it's a lot of saved time, 100 turns with 100+ cities is more than one or two realtime hours...

...With population right at the carrying capacity of the planet...

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Right, i had also assumed that this was an immutable constant. Turns out, not so.

Posidonius said:

Right, i had also assumed that this was an immutable constant. Turns out, not so.

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OK, I left out one word: With population right at the sustainable carrying capacity of the planet ...

While you are waiting for your ship to land you can get a little crazy with President's Day.

Valen said:

While you are waiting for your ship to land you can get a little crazy with President's Day.

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O it's more than that, but you've got the idea. The key is the Aqueduct. With the AQ, a city will parade itself into whatever it can eat, but without the AQ, they will just stuff the foodbox while still being insanely happy. When the foodbox is ready to burst, but before it does, if a city is at 20 citz, that foodbox will be ten deep and 21 wide. That's a possible 209 wheatstalks. Oooof. Even if that city is later adjusted to be -4 in food, they can starve for 52 turns with no ill effects. An IRR/RR oasis which lies within the "fat cross" area of three cities can create 11 citz, not just support three. And if half of them are happy, that's 16 civscore, instead of 4.

With hilux and a mature civ, you can gorge a dozen widely scattered cities at the temporary expense of their neighbors, stuff the foodboxen for a few turns, then build them an AQ and parade up to a dozen extra citz. When the first wave of cities is done, repeat the process on the two cities nearest to each one of the first wave. It'll only take 40-something turns, even if you have 100+ cities. 40-something is far less than 52, so you have more than enough time to max the other aspects of civscore.

+12 civscore for one oasis... now extrapolate that? One river square can create 6 citz, instead of just supporting 2. Civscore 9 instead of 3. Multiply by the number of river squares your scenario gives you. Setting up a wave of hyperexpansion from multiple loci at once means that you can complete the project before anyone starves, and double the citz-component of your civscore by Judgement Day. Combined with max tech, wonders, and peace? Projection is a 20% bump to final civscore. The key is the Aqueduct. If you have the cash to sell and buy AQ's at will, you can manipulate every city you own into a lengthy period of swollen unsustainability.

And, because it's the long-form game, you choose your Judgement Day. Make your SS land on Alpha Centauri the turn after you finish the hypergrowth program, reach your last Future Tech, and build Manhattan. Think i can hit six grand if i can figure out the Grand Convergence of scoring opportunities.