OCC Tips Please

For my next game, I want to try a regent OCC Culture or SS, so can anybody give me tips on terrain for the City, what to research first, wonders, coastal or non coastal, preferrable civs. The Works.

Screenshots would REALLY be appreciated.

Preferable civs: to me, Seafaring is the best, and Scientific, Religious, and Commercial are pretty good.

Colossus is a great wonder, get it early. Research should be directed towards the Writing branch. A beeline to Philosophy is great and you'll get the MoM. SoZ is great too. Coastal is a must. The Great Library is good for culture games, but will give you too much culture for a space game.

Get yourself a river, for sure, for the commerce. Some bonus grasses and/or hills for shields is almost necessary: a dozen plains tiles won't get you very far. A lux is nice to have but not required, same with a food bonus.

If you can arrange things to get into a better government before completing the wonder(s) that will trigger your golden age, that always helps.

Renata

So would the Byzantines or Greeks be good? They are my top choices.

Try Korea, you can build all the religious great wonders without triggering your GA. Then, you can use your UU to start a GA or build Copernicus and Newton's to start it off.

budweiser said:

Try Korea, you can build all the religious great wonders without triggering your GA. Then, you can use your UU to start a GA or build Copernicus and Newton's to start it off.

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Well, isnt it practically the same with Greeks?

Except for the early GA liability, yes.

I'd say that Byzantines are the best - coastal is almost required and Seafaring gives you that.

For OCC, the Byzantines are easily the best choice in Conquests. You need a coastal city in order to build the Colossus, and I can't stress to you enough how important the Colossus is to get. Simply put, you cannot win a OCC without it. Scientific is an excellent trait for the free techs, and the free tech at the beginning of the Industrial age is a lifesaver. Starting with Bronze Working allows for you to build the Colossus right away. Starting with Alphabet as well puts you 2 techs away from Philosophy. Far and away the best starting position you can hope for. The Greeks are comparable in this respect, but lose out to the Byzantines because Commercial is all but useless in a OCC, and the likelihood of starting coastal is dramatically lower.

I've recently experimented with non-scientific civs for a OCC, and I'd say that a non-scientific civ makes more than a difficulty level of difference in how hard the game will be - meaning that I can win OCC on Deity probably 40% of the time if I get the Colossus, but find even an Emperor OCC with the Dutch to be very hard to win. So go with the Byzantines.

For researching, go for Writing in 50 turns, and then max science for Philosophy. Send out those Curraghs as much as you can, building 2 or 3 before starting your Colossus build to trade as many early techs as possible. Now, the ideal situation is to get either The Republic or Monarchy from being the first to research Philosophy, and you will have to have traded techs and gotten lucky on what the AI has researched.

This early, you can't afford to buy Code of Laws or Polytheism, but once you research Philosophy first, you can click to the science advisor and then switch over to the foreign advisor before picking the next check. If anyone has researched Code of Laws or Polytheism, trade Philosophy and whatever else you have to to get the tech, then go back and set your research to Monarchy or The Republic, and you will get that tech free! I doubt the AI will research well enough to have this happen on Regent, but on higher levels it happens frequently.

In the meantime, you should have been prebuilding while researching Philosophy, in order to switch over to the Mausoleum as soon as you finish that research. If you managed to get a gov't tech, revolt immediatley; with one city, you should only have 2 or 3 turns of anarchy. This is important because the Mausoleum will trigger your GA, and you don't want to waste it in Despotism. You should start as much research as you can afford on Literature; don't be alarmed if it's 25 turns or more. Prebuild for the Great Library if you can, but either way, you must get the GL as well if you want to win.

That pretty much covers the opening sequence; the rest of the game you MUST build these wonders, or you will be toast:

Copernicus' Observatory
Newton's University
Theory of Evolution
SETI Program

It differs greatly from game to game regarding how you will accomplish this, but if you manage to get Copernicus' and Newton's, it should be smooth sailing for the rest of the game. Just be careful to always plan as best you can for building the required wonders, as they are your main concern.

If you manage your game carefully, and trade right in the Industrial Age, you will become filthy rich. Like this:

Or this.

That was the game-ending post from an OCC space-race succession game I was in recently. We were leading out research all the way in that one, too.

Renata

I've just gone searching for my last OCC game and I guess it must be longer ago than I first thought. The save is on my old computer which I packed away a year ago. It was a dream start with a cow and several furs-great for production and trading lux when you are so small is fantastic. (You can get sooo much from large civs for just one resource.) It was coastal but only had a few water tiles. I played the Babylonians for 20K but I think that it might have been PtW.

The Byzantines with Dromons and the seafaring trait would be very tempting now. I certainly would not recommend com civs as a major bonus for this trait is reduced corruption. This is not going to be an issue in a OCC game! BTW have you considered Diplo as a VC?

metalhead said:

I can't stress to you enough how important the Colossus is to get. Simply put, you cannot win a OCC without it.

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Wanna bet? Not building the Colossus will make space race difficult at or above monarch, but not impossible. As for 20K culture, I have had plenty of non-coastal victories.

metalhead said:

Scientific is an excellent trait for the free techs, and the free tech at the beginning of the Industrial age is a lifesaver. Starting with Bronze Working allows for you to build the Colossus right away.

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In my opinion, scientific is overrated for OCC. You can always trade for BW very early, so starting with BW isn't much of a plus. The free tech isn't going to be game-breaking, either. You will either be leading in tech, or trailing in tech. One free tech isn't going to change much at the begining of the IA, especially if it's Nationalism. I will concede that this does carry more weight on higher difficulties, as techs are more expensive for you.

metalhead said:

Starting with Alphabet as well puts you 2 techs away from Philosophy. Far and away the best starting position you can hope for.

.... but find even an Emperor OCC with the Dutch to be very hard to win. So go with the Byzantines.

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I absolutely agree on starting with alphabet is most helpful, and that seafaring is superior to commercial. This doesn't mean that starting with alphabet is always necessary, just that the game will be more difficult otherwise.

My earliest OCC launch on Monarch was with the Dutch, and that date was matched (it should have been beaten) in my SG with the English.

metalhead said:

For researching, go for Writing in 50 turns, and then max science for Philosophy.

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This may be the only real option at or above Emperor, but is plainly wrong at or below Monarch. Max research for Writing, followed by Code of Laws before Philosophy, getting Republic for free, is the fastest way to get out of despotism.

metalhead said:

you must get the GL as well if you want to win.

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If you are going for space race, the Great Library gives you too much culture and puts you at a disadvantage if you try to use if for free techs. You want to be the first to Education and Astronomy, not the third.

metalhead said:

you MUST build these wonders, or you will be toast:

Copernicus' Observatory
Newton's University
Theory of Evolution
SETI Program

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Can't argue with that, as this is what makes OCC space race possible.


metalhead does make some very good points, but I think most of his post was more in line with an Emperor/Deity level approach. If you're going to play at Regent, I suggest going for 20K culture first to get a feel for the OCC variant. Any seafaring civ is a good choice. Start your research toward Republic as I described above. Use curraghs to find other civs. Once you meet two or three, you should easily be able to trade for whatever they have. Get your city to size 12 asap, but do build enough workers (2 or 3 in addition to the one you start with) to get all of the terrain improved just as quickly. You shouldn't have trouble getting Colossus, Oracle, Mausoleum. You should also get the Great Library, as it has 6 culture per turn, but don't try to use it for free tech. Instead, head straight for Music Theory so you can build Sistine and Bach's sooner. You should be ahead of the AI in techs, and should not have trouble getting Cop's, Shake's, and Newton's, so long as your city has an adequate production of 20 or more shields per turn.

If you want to go for space race, then read my SG, the one that Renata linked to.

budweiser said:

Try Korea, you can build all the religious great wonders without triggering your GA. Then, you can use your UU to start a GA or build Copernicus and Newton's to start it off.

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Cop's is expansionist only, and will not trigger GA for Korea. Korea's GA will be triggered by Colossus (commercial) plus Mausoleum (scientific), both of which you want in any OCC, provided that the Colossus is available to build.

Edit: Diplo as VC
Pretty lame if you ask me. Build the UN and you win, hands down.

Yea, no duh about the Diplo Victory, so shut that off.

I have a recent game in regent where its 80% water Archipelago, My city is coastal , built on a river and has 2 wheat, other detalis include mostly grassland, and I think 2 or 3 wheat tiles. I would show you the pic, but its on the other comp, I am Theo of the Byzantines and since this game was from this morning when I didnt think of making an OCC , I have the 3450 B.C save right after I made a warrior for exploring.

I'll try to get the pic ASAP.

Mathias said:

Edit: Diplo as VC
Pretty lame if you ask me. Build the UN and you win, hands down.

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Agreed to a certain degree but it can still be tough if you play the OCC game at the level that you normally play a standard game. UN at the highest levels is usually about prebuilds (what can you use for this?) or getting an SGL. (but if you're playing at your top level what's research going to be like with only one city?)

Of course if you are playing OCC at a level far below the one you normally play at, why are you bothering?

Tone said:

Of course if you are playing OCC at a level far below the one you normally play at, why are you bothering?

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Agree, what would be the point?

On the other hand,

So,, if I make a beeline for Phil, I research what? And what kind of map?

Archipelago? Continents?

And what Water Percentage?

The difficulty level greatly affects your victory condition.

Chieftain - You could win by conquest if you try.
Warlord & Regent - You will get 20k culture before the modern age.
Monarch & Emperor - Spaceship is very possible if you don't want diplo.
Deity - If you manage to build the UN, you deserve to win.

Regent's my ticket.

I'll go with Theodora(SCIENTIFIC,SEAFARING, AND HOT )

Paint isnt wrking with me so I posted the save.

Ansar, are you patched to C3C 1.22? I'm getting an error trying to load that save.