Sid 20k aka "My kingdom for an SGL"

The road to 20k on Sid is proving very ugly. I have had a couple of promising games fall in a hole due to sharing an island with the world power, or not going to war early enough to rein in a runaway civ. Most attempts were with the Byzantines, and after moving 2 tiles I discovered this start:



Map gods being what they are, I was sharing a small island with Japan, and while I managed to withstand the first massive archer rush and get peace, I couldn't withstand the second.

Next lot of attempts was the greeks, I found this decent start and decided to see what happened.



AA: Research path went writing at min, philo at max, literature for the freebie, code of laws at max, then Republic at min. Built the Colossus first, then went exploring, found the Egyptians and got CB, immediately built a temple. Prebuilt Library to finish with Philo, then started on Mausoleum. Got that, triggered my GA, started on Great Library, traded for Map Making in 430BC, and switched to Great Lighthouse as I was still confident of GL after that. Egypt were sharing an island with Japan, and Japan went on the warpath and killed them off around this time. My island looked like this:



Finished Great Lighthouse, and started on Great Library again. Nearly finished it when I discovered I could now trade with Japan, and they had ivory for sale. Got the ivory, traded for Maths, and switched to Statue of Zeus wasting approx 120 shields. Started on Great Library for the third time, finished researching Republic at minimum a few turns in, and revolted. Finished the Great Library, immediately got all AA techs except Currency, which I started researching. Rushed a Colosseum, bought currency off Japan a few turns later and entered the MA.


MA: Got theology for my free tech, and rushed a cathedral. Researched Theology then Printing Press at max, and got both first. Feudalism and Engineering appeared via the GL, Japan built Knight's Templar and triggered their GA, discovered theology and built Sistine Chapel from scratch in 7 turns, costing me 300+ shields. I wasn't waiting to build my uni, so I researched Education, shutting off the GL, cash rushed a uni. Then researched Music Theory, started on JS Bachs, and set research for Free Artistry. Japan discovered Astronomy, I immediately traded for it and switched my JS build to Copernicus', due in just 2 turns, and the Japanese finished it the very next turn, via an SGL of their own. I switched back to JS, and completed it. Banking finally produced an SGL, which was used to build Shakespeare's in 1 turn instead of 20ish, which saved a grand total of 2 turns on the finish date. Started on Magellan's but didn't get there, the Arabs beat me to it and I wasted another 300 shields. I traded my way along the bottom path of the tech tree, researched Physics & Theory of Gravity and built Newton's Uni. Late in the MA the Arabs landed on my island, I signed the Chinese in against them. The gracious chinese invaded about 10 turns into the alliance, killing the last unit on my home island produced an MGL, which was turned into a knight/ancient cav army that went and invaded china, letting me build Heroic Epic

IA: Game was all mine, I just had to avoid war with Japan and try and improve my time. Nationalism was my free tech, I researched first for Industrialisation, then for Scientific Method. Built Universal Suffrage, Military Academy & Theory of Evolution, took Corporation & Espionage for my free techs, letting me build Intelligence Agency, rush stock exchanges & build Wall St. Every IA tech I researched I was first to, but no SGL's to be seen, even though they would have made almost no difference. Japan offered an MPP for 3gpt about 50 turns from the end, that made finishing it off very simple. Finally hit 20k in 1914, I was at 95cpt, with a clear tech lead.

Culture Builds:
3950BC: Palace
2390BC: Colossus
1650BC: Temple
1225BC: Library (prebuild)
800BC: Mausoleum
430BC: Great Lighthouse
30BC: Statue of Zeus
370AD: Great Library
380AD: Colosseum (cash rush)
440: Cathedral (cash rush)
990: University (prebuild/cash rush)
1285: JS Bach's
1420: Shakespeare's Theatre (SGL)
1585: Newton's Uni
1660: Heroic Epic
1778: Universal Suffrage
1796: Military Academy
1828: Theory of Evolution
1840: Intelligence Agency
1850: Wall St.

I was first to 20 techs before I switched off research in favour of cash & happiness. 1 sgl is average for 20 techs, but 1 early one or a couple of them would have made a massive amount of difference.

Monopoly techs:

AA: Writing, Philosophy, Literature

MA: Theology, Printing Press, Education, Music Theory, Banking (SGL), Democracy, Free Artistry, Physics, Theory of Gravity

IA: Steam Power, Industrialisation, Electricity, Medicine, Scientific Method, Espionage, Corporation, Replaceable Parts.

Map size, opponents?

You probably saved more like 5 or 5 turns, since you got 21 cpt in builds 20 turns earlier

Spoonwood said:

Map size, opponents?

Click to expand...

Odds of me actually remembering that?

http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ3/game_info.php?entryID=676 says it was small. Thread mentions Egypt, Japan, China and the Arabs. So they were probably the opponents.

You probably saved more like 5 or 5 turns, since you got 21 cpt in builds 20 turns earlier

Click to expand...

Nope. Thread says I built Shakespeare's in 1 turn, not 20. Which is 152 culture extra, assuming my memory's correct that Shakespeare's is 8 cpt.

My Newton's build was from scratch, as the Arabs built Magellans, and nothing to switch to meant I wasted 300 shields. So the SGL didn't affect anything but the Shakespeare's build, giving me 152 extra, and I was at 95 cpt by the end.

Ahh. So you're saying that building shakespeare's 19 turns earlier didn't affect how long it took to build the other stuff, because you lost Magellan's to a cascade. Bummer that.

Yep. Not even a cascade, that was the only thing available to build. Looking at the build dates, there was also a big gap between finishing heroic epic and starting universal suffrage too. Plus the gap described in the OP between cathedral and then uni/bach's.

This thread indicates why you might want to have the Palace to pre-build on Sid level.

I have been experimenting with Sid 20k for 3 years now and found out that the small pangaia is the way to do this. I play with Persia and shoot for CB Scientific Leader. With small pangaia, it is possible to take control of the world with Immortals so quickly that you lose only 1-2 wonders to the AI. The trick is to make them fight early and all time with each others, and then strike. Main problem is with the tech pace, I have not been able to research Free Artistry "fast" enough even with the help of other Scientific Sid AIs. But 1450 CE win is definitely possible on many maps.

Bonus side with this setup is that Sid pangaia is the most interesting to play in Civ3 so the games are fun.

Will believe a sub-1500 Sid 20k game when he sees it. Same goes for sub-1700 Sid 20k game for that matter also.

Spoonwood said:

Will believe a sub-1500 Sid 20k game when he sees it. Same goes for sub-1700 Sid 20k game for that matter also.

Click to expand...

Admittedly it is a long, long time since I've played any civ3, but reading the thread, I had 4 shots at an AA SGL. There's about a 3% chance of 2 of the 4 actually yielding SGLs, which could have meant Pyramids and Oracle on top of what I built. Getting both those would have put me in to the mid 1700s I think. Looking at the HOF, my 2 best Sid 20k were 1764 and 1792. At Sid, I was much more concentrating on actually winning than stressing too much about going for a really good date. Play a Chieftain 20k, and you'll abandon it and start again without an SGL in the first few techs. But on Sid I'd play out anything that looked winnable. If I paid more attention to really good dates only at Sid, it would mean a lot more attempts to end with a submittable game, but breaking 1700 is very feasible. I suspect breaking 1500 would require insane levels of luck however, like an SGL for all 4 AA techs.

Well we've only got about 10 days until the next update. It promises to be quite interesting.

I can see breaking 1700 on Sid also. But, it's definitely a challenge.

Ah, I didn't make myself clear. (That's one of my problems-I'm not very good at being subtle!) The 1700AD barrier has been broken for Sid 20K. As for the actual date that Drazek has reached I'll leave until the update. It will be an interesting update IMO.

I know that Killercane used a similar approach with the aztecs in a Deity 20K gauntlet a while back. That game is still the #1 20K game at that level, although Spoonwood has a couple of games with the same date, but with lower scores.