New attemp at Quick/Small/culture, 1425AD

Cultural, Deity, 1425AD, 59324points(2074basic), 12 hours, 5 sessions

Pangea is a better map. Beeline to Alph through AH, gold mine made a whole lot of a difference, Alph in 1960BC. Liberalism in 200AD. Now, religions (4) came late, so at 200AD I had only 2 religions and 1 temple. No good GP farm either, only had popped 1 GP at 200AD. So I kept on researching to Democracy, for both US and Emancip. It was huge! New built cottages became towns in no time. From 650AD I used 100% culture, but for 6 money-making turns. The rushbuying phase was far from optimum. I had started with the temples corresponding to the cheapest cathedrals (resource had) in order to put them to use sooner. But then I had to rushbuy those first, paying double price a hammer. At 995AD I paused for a moment and decided to go for the 6th city (I settled 4, one city had flipped). It allowed me to get to my 10th Cathedral. I should have gone for the 6 cities from the start, Pangea maps are really bigger than GreatPlains maps. Only 7 GP, 1 of them scientist. I got music and Liberalism first (ignored Literature for a long time, so as to get to Music first). At the end, another city (9 pop) flipped, but I razed it because of maintenance concerns. By the end, there were 8 towns per city and they were each doing 600-750cpt.

I have to say that I have learned a lot. I had never had more than 200g in the treasure, I thought it was a waste. Rushbuying has changed my views. I would have never gone to Democracy but for godotnut and Xin Yu advice. Now I understand their strategies a lot better. godotnut recommends Pyramids, so you don't have to tech to Democracy to enjoy rushbuying. I like his idea a lot more now, but I'm still worried about delaying my settlers and disturbing my 100% artist GP production. Xin Yu recommends using a GP to get to Democracy faster. With Emancipation you will plant more cottages than you normally would and they will become towns before the game ends. You sacrifice a GreatWork in 1 city, but you get more towns in all three cities. I'm sorry I didn't realize how good his idea was at first. It's a pity I didn't have a GP around this game when I decided to tech to Democracy. I would have liked to reload the game and to try sacrificing a GP, then comparing the results to see if it pays off. Thank you both! I'm sure you both can beat my date.

jesusin said:

Thank you both! I'm sure you both can beat my date.

Click to expand...

A Deity level HOF winner with humility. You are a class act.

Congratulations! (And please count me out for beating your date -- I'm still learning the basics now.)

More suggestions: Is it possible to beat the AIs for stonehedge and have 17 turns before it expires by Calendar? This is a very cheap wonder but great for three reasons:

1) Early GP (prophet) points, it should be very helpful to get you theology or civil service for free. 17 turns gets you a Prophet (if not made obselete). If you missed Theology, don't trade with AI for Monarchy, otherwise after theology the Prophet will research divine right, which is not immediately needed.) Check out the following preference for Great Prophet:
Meditation
Polytheism
Priesthood
Monotheism
Theology
Divine Right
Mysticism
Code of Laws
Civil Service
Monarchy
Literature
Music
Writing
Philosophy
Printing Press
Drama
(Basically you cannot get anything after Monarchy since with that you'll be forced to get divine rights. Therefore if you missed Theology, go for civil service. Code of Laws is not worth it since it is a cheap tech.)

2) Early culture points in all cities. You have problems with cities flipping to AIs. These early culture points may get them stand a little longer.

3) The wonder itself will become a good culture generator after 1000 years.

Have you tried a Quecha rush on a slightly crowded map to start the game?

Maybe the quick speed would make this option less attractive, but all three of the top games in the Major Gauntlet One involved Quecha rushes to start. It makes the land grab on Deity sooo much easier.

However we were all operating under the assumption that slower speed is better for game finishes, an assumption that your recent games call into question.

When I finish up my current games, I'll give quick speed a shot, using a version of the strategy I outline in my guide (with Pyramids and all that). I'll do a short write up in this thread when I'm finished, so that we can compare and learn.

Cheers.

After checking the research preferences of great people (see the strategy article section http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=140952), I concluded that it is not directly doable for Democracy. You have to research that tech by yourself. Some prerequisites can be lightbulbed by GPs though. These prerequisites include printing press (great scientist) and constitution (great merchant). If you don't mind wasting a great prophet on divine rights, after that is researched you have more options.

Dump a great artist for music and get a free GA back is a good deal. Both literature and drama are cheap techs and not worth a GA. In order to get the GA to research music you need have already got literature and drama. Ideally you can research drama, trade for literature then get music afterwards using a GA.

So the ideal tech path:
step 1: AH->writing->alpha then trade. Hopefully you can get priesthood. If not available, research drama and wait for that.

step 2: anytime you get priesthood, research code of laws-> finish drama -> philosophy. Hopefully you can trade for theology. Do not trade for monarchy.

step 3: use a great prophet for civil service. Use a great artist for music after trading for literature. Then you have two choices: Nationalism -> constitution -> paper -> (trade machinary) printing press -> democracy -> education -> liberalism; or paper->education-> liberalism -> (free tech) nationalism -> constitution -> (trade machinary) printing press -> democracy. The second is probably faster, however if AI civs research liberalism for you, the first approach may actually save you time.

@Xin Yu:

You don't need both literature and drama to get music, you only need one or the other (plus mathematics). I also noticed that you recommended using a prophet on Civil Service. If you are recommending that on the assumption that you need it for paper, you'll want to know that you only need theology or civil service.

When there are two lines leading to a tech on the tech tree, they represent alternate paths. If there is more than one prerequisite, the second prerequisite is represented by an icon in the upper right corner of the tech you want to acquire.

Attached to this post is a PDF file of the Civ4 tech tree that may offer a clearer picture. It's a more cluttered outlook, but it clearly labels which tech prerequisites are required and which are alternate.

Well, actually I was not referring to what you would research by yourself, but to what the G-man would research for you (i.e., sacrefice a G-man for a tech. See the link in my previous post). A great artist would research literature, then drama, then music. So if you have both literature and drama (with mathematics) the GA will research music for you. Otherwise you can't use the GA.

Same for a great prophet. The GP will not research paper for you. Likely the sequence will be Theology, then code of laws, then civil service (provided that you don't have monarchy, otherwise it goes to divine rights).

My bad. Sorry about that.

I do wonder, though, if it's a good idea to research those techs so that you can use the great people for music and civil service. Given that you can trade for drama and civil service in most cases, the relative value of the great person goes down. I guess my personal inclination would be to not use the artist for music, but rather to beeline for music naturally. On a small map with fewer opponents, you would have a very good chance of getting to music first without the great person, especially if you have gold near your capital as jesusin describes.

I would consider using the priest the way you describe if I received one that I didn't want, but I don't know if I would "farm" one for that and lose the artist.

I'm not sure if my game is optimal or not, but in the past I've only used a great artist for a tech when I didn't have enough religions spread late in the game, so I used an artist to help research divine right.

As a side, note, I struggle with the question of how late it's a good idea to add an artist as a superspecialist versus saving them all for culture bombs. With all the multipliers involved, the math gets a little thick. I guess on average, I stop adding them as artist after around 500AD. What about you all?

Oh my! A new GOTM and a whole lot of brilliant ideas in this thread waiting to be tested. This is going to be a busy month!

Quechuas: they are my favorite unit in the game since I first survived till 1000AD in a random deity map. They are almost an exploit IMO, since the stupid AI keeps on sending archers against them. I have to either have Quechuas or choose my opponents to stand a chance at Deity. I am most interested in a totally peaceful cultural game. No war and Deity means the land-grabbing phase is really difficult. As a consequence I don’t feel like building wonders (no godotnut’s Pyramids, no Xin Yu’s SH, no jesusin’s Parthenon). Since Quechuas are cheaper than settlers, probably the best result will be reached with Quechuas and wonders.

Quick speed (1): I don’t have time for long games. In addition, I am a veeery slow player, I have to micromanage every city every turn. That’s why I will keep on trying with Lizzy, instead of using Quechuas. If you are planning to move units in your game, you are better off playing Marathon, no doubt.

Quick speed (2): I wish unit movement were the only difference between game speeds. I have heard that dates are not evenly distributed among turns in all speeds. So in the 1400AD range there must be an advantageous game speed. I don’t want to know about it, I hope it get fixed in the future (maybe HOF shouldn’t be based on dates but on number of turns relative to the total number of turns?). Also, the 66.6666 factor that should be applied to Quick speed is not perfect. Sometimes 0.66 and rounding should be used. Sometimes 0.67 and rounding should be used. The main phenomena I have found are:
- You play for culture, you should need 33333.33c to get to Legendary. You need 25000c.
- You have Maths and forge, you chop a tree, you should get 25 hammers, you get 24.
- You have Maths and bureaucracy, you chop a tree in your capital, you should get 30 hammers, you get 29.
- There may be other effects I haven’t noticed.
I wish all these things were fixed.

SH: I don’t have my notes with me at the moment so I don’t know if it is true that obsolete wonders keep on producing GPP. If that is the case, you would get an early prophet, but you would also risk a very late prophet you don’t want.

3steps ideal Xin Yu techpath: Sounds fine. I would rather trade for CoL than research it myself. I have always done your second option, beeline to Liberalism.

Superspecialists: I think I am quite good at planning. That’s why I can actually calculate with a small margin which way will give me more culture. I used to scorn the gold, since I had plenty of it when I didn’t rushbuyed. At Quick, you will hardly ever join a GP to a city. With 4x multiplier at the end of the game it would take 56 turns x 12 x 4 to get over 2680. You are not going to be so long at 100% culture and you wont have your cathedrals for so long. I’ll look for my exact dates at other speeds and report back.

New ideas I would like to test:
- Prioritize CS to enjoy a longer bureaucracy period
- Skip CS completely, never trade or research it.
- Stonehenge + prophet lightbulb.
- Purposely farming a scientist (maximum beaker return) for lightbulbing a tech (maybe Education). Maybe even mix artists and scientists when not in Caste System for increasing GPP and being flexible about the GP produced.


@godotnut: When I finish up my current games, I'll give quick speed a shot, using a version of the strategy I outline in my guide (with Pyramids and all that). I'll do a short write up in this thread when I'm finished, so that we can compare and learn.

Thank you!

Just played a deity small pangea quick game. Starting city has a stone. I play Saladin. This strategy is interesting: stonehedge + a priest for early GP.

First tech poly (better than medi since it leads to mono). Got this first so I found the religiion. Second tech masonry for hooking up the stone.

First 5 turns built stonehedge, when city up to size 2 switched to worker for 8 turns (a flood plain), afterwards switch back to stonehedge. After hooking up the stone only needed 6 turns. Built the wonder in BC2620 -- the AIs would build it anytime so I did not waste a single turn. Then a settler, then a temple. After the temple hired one priest and running 10 GPP per turn for a long time.

After masonry, tech was priesthood, writing, alpha. Then mono (nobody would trade mono at first, but after I researched it a bit suddenly AIs wanted to trade -- a lesson learned). A GP went to theology immediately, I got another religion! While researching drama, I got the 2nd GP went for code of laws, a third for civil service but this one didn't work -- only 687 out of 860 something for this tech. However it was still a good deal since the AIs would trade CS with me when I almost got the tech.

With an early theology I was able to start the sistin chapel. However I didn't have marble so it took a while and I stopped before finishing it. I had 4 cities and 4 religions quite early, so I consider myself in a good shape.

After being made obselete, the stonehedge still produced GPP, so yes you have to find another city for GA farm after the first 3 Great Prophets, otherwise it's diluted.

Also I tested trading techs for monarchy, and my GP went for divine rights after that. Similar to CS, one GP was not enough for the tech.

Replayed the game from start this morning a bit (before going to work). This time even better. Because I traded for mono as early as the AI was willing to (after two turns of researching into it), I was able to put two GPs for Theology and COL immediately -- both first to tech so I had 2 more religions. That greatly helped my new cities (as the founding cities). Then I switched the specialist to artist, running a 60/40 chance of GA vs. GP for the 3rd great person. My plan was to use the GA to music, or GP to build a shrine in the city closest to the AI. Then I'd stop producing GP from the capital (will run a GS in another town for lightbulbing paper, then all GAs).

The AI would go for music quickly, so after drama I'd like to go with philosophy, paper, education and liberalism. Would trade with AI for mathematics and literature (if the AIs won't trade, can use the trick of researching it a couple of turns then trade), then use the (hopefully) GA to get music.

The drawback for this approach is that you can only build road before alphabet.

Some more thoughts: the stonehedge strategy requires a stone resource and severely delayed early development. Unless you have already blocked AI's access to your future city sites, this risk yourself being bottled by the AIs.

A more generous strategy is: start with Philosophy leader and have mining as a starting tech. Make a worker, and first tech is bronze so that your worker can chop trees for your first settler. This should get your second city down by around turn 25. (If you plan to go for slavery, don't revolution till your settler is built.) At this time you should be close to writing if your another tech is either fishing, the wheel, agriculture or hunting (just not mysticism). As soon as writing is discovered, build a library (chop more trees or sacrefice a pop) while waiting the city to grow to size 4.

Hire 2 scientists after the library is done. This has two effects: first you can get better research rate. second you can have 12 GS points each turn. That should get you 4GS in the next 56 turns.

The GS's can get you the following instant techs: paper, education (need 2), philosophy. Therefore after alphabet you go for drama (maybe music as well), and after building the theaters, adjust culture to 100% so that you won't have any happiness problems (this should happen at around turn #70). You only rely on the scientists for research. Research and/or trade for theology and COL, then your GS's will get you 3 techs which puts you ahead in tech race. Now full gear to liberalism.

Please, Xin Yu, I need clarification of the last paragraph.

The first 3 paragraphs I can understand. It is just what I do, Lizzy as leader, gold, silver or gems at the starting position for my worker to mine. Whip and/or chop the first settler. 2 scientist in library for a single GreatScientist for an Academy in the capital.

When I have my Academy, I keep on researching at 100% while I fire the 2 scientists, only want artist GPP from that point onwards. I think you are suggesting not getting an Academy, getting more than 1 scientist and using them all for techbulbing. What I don't understand is why you should want to use 100% culture before liberalism. In that situation I would keep on using 100% science anyway (90% if I need some money or some happiness).


The good thing I see about using GPs for techbulbing is flexibility. You can hire both artist and scientist as specialists, not minding about the probability. When the GP is born, if it is a scientist, you get a free tech. If it is an artist, you make a GreatWork. You are happy either way, and probably you can keep on doing the same thing for the next GP. This boosts your GP points while not being in Caste System (slavery is sooooo sweet).

Not exactly 100% culture but a relatively high culture rate so that you don't run into happiness problems. This way your cities can grow to 10+. Then when you research liberalism it'll be faster. Also with a large city you'll have a good GA farm later in the game. I think at this stage growth is more important than tech advance, so I'd put culture rate a bit higher and not go all the way to science.

Anything after the 4th GS (or 5th if you use one for academy) is not going to get you a useful tech, but certainly you can produce less GS and just research the techs. I suggest at least use one GS for philosophy, which gives you a shot at a religion as well as a chance for a religious civic with +100% GP rate (check your neighbors and if they all have the same religion, you can convert to it and grab the benefit temprarily.)

Whether to use a GS for the academy depends on whether you want to research further into democracy. If stop at liberalism then probably not worth it.

Gave Liz a try today. Financial is just an amazing trait. I had a river with a bunch of floodlands, so I created a worker and cottaged them. Just one worker was enough to keep the pace. (A cottage is only useful when worked on, so building it too early has no use at all). Quickly put down 3 cities this way. Consider this: each floodland cottage has 3 commerce and grows gradually to 6!. That means each such square equals to 6 other squares. In the first stage beaker is all that counts so this is really powerful.

Tech path goes this way: wheel, pottery, bronze (for chopping a couple of settlers. My sequence seemed not so good. Maybe should go like settler-worker-settler-worker-setter so that each city would have one worker to help), writing, alpha. After alpha I found that all early techs were only worth 1-2 turns, so I traded writing for a couple and researched the rest by myself. By holding alpha the AIs were kept behind me. Then went for drama and music. At this stage ran into financial problem and had to lower the science rate to 80%. AIs still couln't pay money for my techs yet.

On GS produced in capital for Academy.　

Diplomacy was not so good for this game. The Japanese obviously didn't want to trade anything. Other civs wouldn't trade either. Especially Mao, who suddenly changed iron working to won't trade after I traded with Alex. Need to fine tone this one a bit.

(Edit: changed strange fonts).

Ok, understood.

Quote: Ｂｙ　ｈｏｌｄｉｎｇ　ａｌｐｈａ　ｔｈｅ　ＡＩｓ 　ｗｅｒｅ　ｋｅｐｔ　ｂｅｈｉｎｄ　ｍｅ

That's a very useful thing to do when you want to be sure of your victory (specially militar). It is not so often that you are so far ahead of Deity AI.

However, when playing HOF you don't want to just win, but to finish asap. That's why, in your case, I would have kept on trading (or even gifting Alphabet to the AI). I don't want to be ahead of them, I want to be at the same level, and then I want each of the civs to research something different so that all can trade and advance. Basically, you want to accelerate the global tech pace.

I honestly feel that an early finish is easier at Deity that at other levels, AIs research faster so you can trade with them. And they are reach, so you get tons of money by trading. Trade is the key to Deity, really.

Now that I read what I have written, maybe Inmortal is easier. 1 less starting settler makes landgrabbing a lot easier, while the teching capabilities of the AI are not so much worse.

godotnut said:

As a side, note, I struggle with the question of how late it's a good idea to add an artist as a superspecialist versus saving them all for culture bombs. With all the multipliers involved, the math gets a little thick. I guess on average, I stop adding them as artist after around 500AD. What about you all?

Click to expand...

I checked my notes:

GOTM7, last added 1100AD, first bombed 1244AD, finish date 1673

GOTM8, last added 1270AD (because it was a x4 multiplier city, 1060AD in x3 cities), first bombed 1410AD, finish date 1808AD.

In my 14xxAD finish date games, I am playing Quick speed, so not even the first one is added. Also I think I am playing more focused games now that when I played those GOTM games.

I'd like to mimic Godotnut's writeup and separate the whole strategy into 3 periods. Can only write the strategy for the first period now since I haven't played a lot past drama.

First period is 'tech+land period' where you need to put down some cities (at least 3, prefer 4-6) and get drama. Before you get the drama tech and build theaters, your city population is limited to a happiness cap, which is 4 for the capital and 3 for others, unless you have gold/silver/gem to boost it up a bit (which is very useful!).

Also, if you have an early religion with the priesthood tech so that you can build a temple, you get more happiness -- however this comes late, usually when you almost get drama. So we don't consider it.

There are not many things which need hammers in this stage. Wonders? You are likely to lose to the AIs anyways. Buildings? Other than a library, you don't have anything useful to build (granary is good for later growth so not so useful now). Settlers and workers? Food can replace hammer in building them. Soldiers? They become obselete soon.

You want to pass this stage fast in order to remove the happiness cap and grow the cities, so science beaker is the most important thing. Production can keep up by whipping and chopping.

The best combination is financial trait + cottages on flood land on river. That's as good as you can get. Flood lands come in bunches, but you only want 2 riverside flood lands (that's just enough for 4 populations) for the capital, and 1 for other cities. More than that you run into happiness cap and maybe even health cap at this stage. So build the cities tightly packed.

However if you have a gold mine, then you can use 2 riverside floodlands AND a riverside grassland for the capital, and 2 floodlands for other cities, which makes a huge difference.

Let's say you have 3 cities sized 4, 3, 3 with 2 workers on riverside (cottage went up to town), library in every city and 2, 1, 1 scientists. How many beakers are we talking about? (Answer: 74). If you have a gold resource, then you can have the cities sized 5, 4, 4 with 3, 2, 2 workers and 2 scientists each. How many beakers now? (Answer: 89). Compare to 6 cities, sized 4, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3 and no river, not cottaged, not financial leader? (Answer:16, or you spend 5 times longer to get a tech).

Now the research path: pottery for cottages, bronze for chopping and whipping, writing, alphabet (trade techs), drama.

So the best starting combination is: financial leader, starting tech mining + one of the prerequisites for pottery (fishing, the wheel or agriculture), a gold mine, a long river with several flood lands on the riverside. Also some forests to chop as well (chopping forests on the riverside will get you back a grass or plain with 1 commerce, so it's better to chop them first.)

If you start in food abundant region, you may want to wait till level 4 and whip a settler. Here's what I did (Victoria with fin/exp for dealing with health problems in flood lands):

Turn 1: London established. Build warrior.
Turn 6: Size 2
Turn 10: Bronze discovered. Size 3 -- make sure everyone works on flood lands.
Turn 11: warrior built. Continue warrior.
Turn 14: Size 4. Switch to settler. Revolution. I have only 3 flood lands, so this one works on forest.
Turn 15: Changed to Slavery.
Turn 19: Whip a SETTLER. Down to size 2.

Compare to building a settler directly at level 1, only lost 2 turns (including one turn revolution), but got a lot more commerce and city grew to size 2.

2nd city also built on food abundant area to take the advantage. Now almost researched pottery so the 2nd city started with granary (the first switched to granary immediately when available). Another whip immediately as soon as city grows. The exp leader trait worked here so only 1 pop is needed.

After that, the first city continue to build settlers and the 2nd city start popping up workers. This is indeed a very powerful start.

Compare to other strategies including building a worker first: Not a good move to start a worker earlysince there is no tech for improving the land! Can only chop trees, however in this opening there are not many trees close by. Even when you can chop trees to speed up the settler, it's still going to be a lot slower than the size 4 whipping opening.

The exp leader trait gives a very strong start. Land grabbing is a lot easier with this trait, when you start with flood lands.

Well, I have been trying since I finished GOTM. 2 attempts at deity/tiny/quick/culture, 1 attempt at deity/standard/quick/culture. All failed to get to the HOF tables by five turns.

I have learnt some things though. I would like to share them here:

- When you have four cities and 2 religions in only 2 cities (no state religion), all religion founders AIs will try to attract you to their side by sending you missionaries.

- When you have 4 cities and 1 religion in all four cities (no state religion), nobody will send you missionaries, they will think you are a lost case.

- In that situation, you should declare a state religion. When you have 4 cities and 1 religion in all four cities and you declare a state religion, other leaders will send you missionaries, trying to change your mind.

- I have always thought that 100% artist for the whole game was the way to go with GPs. Now I have changed my mind (Xin Yu's influence). My current view is that you should get 2 GPscientist and then as many GPartists as possible. One scientist gives you Academy in the capital. Other scientist should be used for Education (1 GP saves more turns of your game that way than as a culture bomb). I might consider using a GPartist for Music or using another GPscientist for Print or using another GPscientist for Philo to found taoism; all of that depending on the particular game needs, I won't do any of those on a regular basis.

- As a consequence, at the late beggining (0AD) of food-rich-games you can have 4 specialists per city, 2 artist, 2 scientist, instead of being restricted to 2. Say you do that in 3 cities and you already have an Academy. Chances are that you'll get 1 or 2 GPscientist, used for Education or Education and Print.

- It may sound fairly obvious, but 4 cities in a standard map is not enough. It is surprising though that it can give you a 1525AD deity win nonetheless.