Cultural Victory Challenge #4: Pericles

Cultural Victory Challenge #4: Pericles

This is the fourth of the Cultural Victory Challenges, in which the goal is to achieve a cultural victory, in part by utilizing the traits and unique building of the leader in question. In this installment, I will be playing as Pericles.

Here are the settings for the challenge.



And here is the starting location.



Not a bad spot for the first city. I'm thinking there should be one other food resource to the east, should I settle in place. And although it would be tempting to move 1W and get more riverside territory, I think settling in place is the best option. There's a good chance that the hills to the west will be in a spot for a production city and I don't think there's going to be additional food found if I move the Settler 1W.

The Cows obviously mean that Animal Husbandry is a priority tech, and Bronze Working is obvious as well. There was talk in the pre-game thread about pursuing an early religion, so shall I consider heading to Monotheism after gettting any needed Worker techs?

Also, what I usually do with a civ that starts with a Scout is build an additional Scout to explore and find the neighbors. Then I start my first Worker when the city grows to size two. Sound good?

The saved game is attached for those who want to play along.

Wow that is a really bad start... Basically you want to get as many great artist farms up as soon as possible and bomb away to victory... This site is obvious for cottages and with bureaucracy that should probably carry the majority of your research.. Get maybe 1 more cottage site and just run artists in the rest of the cities. Hopefully we won't be "alone" with Shaka this time . Two possibilities for food resource. If neither is food this is a seriously low food site.. 1W won't really gt more riverside though...

1W won't really gt more riverside though...

Click to expand...

...but it does get him some production... /sigh...

At least the plains cow gives 3f/3h.

Keep mapping, please!

Not the best of sites, I say settle in place and use all those forests if you find a close neighbor you can chop an army and grab his capital.

Production will do nothing without food... This site have literally no food...

Round One: 4000 BC to 3725 BC

Yes, this round was brief... I've got a neighbor who is almost in my backyard. You'll soon find out who.

I opted to settle in place.



There is a Spices square on Grassland, so once I get Calendar, that will help a little bit with food. It would be nice to get that Truffles random event at some point, but I won't count on it. Obviously, Pottery is taking higher priority for both the Granary and to get Cottages early.

I did appreciate the fact that, when the borders popped, the city governor assigned the citizen to the tile I wanted to work.



Two food, a hammer and a commerce isn't bad, even if it could be better.

My first Scout popped a pair of huts for gold and then I met up with my first neighbor.



Well, it's not Shaka... not that this guy is much better. And on top of that, like I said, he's nearly in my backyard.



So I stopped here because I wanted to post the question of whether or not I should seriously consider a Warrior rush. I've done it before on Noble and Epic with neighbors who weren't far away and it works fine if you have three to four Warriors together and the neighbor is fairly close to you. I have never tried it on Prince, though.

Toku isn't that close, mind you, but he's definitely going to be a problem quickly, particularly since it looks like I have Jungle to the south of Athens. I haven't explored much to the west, but my second Scout is finished and will be heading in that direction.

But I did want to check with everyone to see if I should attempt a Warrior rush or not. I haven't experienced Toku since I got BTS, so I don't know if he'll prioritize Archery... if he does, a Warrior rush is likely out of the question, and even a Phalanx rush could be problematic, given that Toku is Protective.

So I will defer to those following the thread... do I risk a Warrior rush or just hope for the best in the coming turns?

I think a warrior rush is a good idea, better have six warriors to be on the safe side. The only thing that can kill a warrior rush is if Toku is settled on a hill.
Can you get your scout close enough before he pops his border to see if he's on a hill?

Hmmm, nasty starting position. The lack of food resources in your capital is a concern. I don't know how you like to go about a cultural victory, but I personally like to have my 3 cities high on food resources (for specialists) and hills (production/wonders). This is the sort of city I'd cottage to get the economy going, but not really what I'd want as one of my 3 culture cities.

At least there's plenty of trees for chopping!

I've never tried a Warrior rush before, because I don't really rate Warriors as city raiders. However, if AH pops Horses in your cultural borders (there is a blank grassland square in the east which could be something, hopefully), you could go for a Chariot rush. You've got the wood for chopping plenty of units. This is quite a big 'if', however.

And yeah, it'd be interesting to see what's in the northwest, where the gold is. Looks like there could be a few floodplains.

I've never done warrior rush, but it could be worth it in this situation.
I'm not convinced he's "in your backyard" though.
building 6 warriors, + sending them over would be pretty long = long enough to see protective archers starting to spawn.

I would go worker stealing for a while, then phalanx rush him instead.
edit: chariot rush is great too.

Why ever would you build a scout first? Seriously? Warrior rush might be doable on prince.. Just showing how easy it is to exploit the AI not starting with archers... Better to be fast than safe as even one archer will totally ruin any plans of a warrior rush. 4-5 should be more than enough...

Cottages + 100% cultural slider is also good for cultural.

The problem is that I don't think Toku is quite close enough for a Warrior rush. By the time enough Warriors have been built and sent over to Tokyo, I'd put good money on Toku having researched Archery.

Some pretty horsehockey land so far. Capital is mediocre at best even if copper/iron/horses pop up. Food is very limited. Even calendar will not change that since spices and dyes only give 2 food so you are going to need a couple of grassland farms. Thank god they are riverside so not completely wasted.

I don't disagree with the scout build first, but a second might be pushing it (at least it looks like you are building a second one). Sure you need to scout some good city sites first but with the initial warrior and a scout that should be more then enough. I would let Toku build a bit. The land surrounding him is not that great. Maybe his capital is, then consider the warrior rush but otherwise let him be. Toku is not that much of a threat if you ask me.

He starts with a scout... Building more scouts also makes warrior rushes way harder...

Killroyan said:

Even calendar will not change that since spices and dyes only give 2 food so you are going to need a couple of grassland farms.

Click to expand...

Spices give plus one food, (the resours after calender will be 3 0 4 ) good realy. you will need too farm some squares though.

I usually build a second Scout when I start with Hunting so I can uncover the map faster. But that second Scout just finished on the turn I stopped play, so I can switch the build easily enough.

As far as building Warriors go, I can easily switch over to the Plains hill and pump them out faster.

I am at work right now, so I can't look at my saved game. When I am able to, I'll have to load up the save to do some calculations regarding how long it would take to get four Warriors out, provided I work just the plains hill. It would mean keeping the capital at size one for a while, though, as if I let it go to size two, I fear it would be too late to Warrior rush Toku.

@ cabert: You may be right that Worker stealing might be a better option. Then I just have to hope for Horses or Copper nearby.

OK, I loaded up the saved game.

A Warrior would take six turns to build if I worked that forested plains hill. That means four Warriors would be produced in about 24 turns.

On the one hand, Toku doesn't start with Hunting, but on the other hand, he would certainly have plenty of time to tech to Archery.

So I'm leaning more toward doing what cabert suggested and just use a Warrior to steal Workers, then come at Toku later with better units.

In the meantime, I'll switch to a Warrior in the build queue, then get a Worker going at size two. And when I grow to size two, I'm tempted to work one of the Dye tiles to get some additional commerce and thus cut down the time it takes to get to BW.

Toku has to go sooner than later... but actually, not THAT soon.

You're like, two tiles or something too far away to run a warrior rush. Mining > BW, chop in settler, hook up copper, then Phalanx rush him.

I can't advise for or against the worker steal.

Toku is utterly useless in a cultural game. However, consider Kyoto your new GP farm.

OK, I played the next round last night. Update should be coming tonight.

Round Two: 3725 BC to 2825 BC

After debating on it, I decided to forgo the Warrior rush attempt at Toku and stick to exploring and gathering more info as to what Toku's lands were like, as well as who else might be out there.

First thing I did was switch the build in Athens to a Warrior, then followed with a Worker. I had the Warrior initially go out and uncover some territory to the south, while I had a Scout head in Toku's direction to check things out.

I was able to uncover his city without having to intrude into his territory and this is what I found.



He's kind of in the same situation I am... not the best city site with barely enough food to grow. True, he's got two food resources, but Cow on plains and Sheep on a plains hill amounts to the same I will get for Cow on plains and an improve Spices tile... he just gets his faster growth sooner.

My second Scout popped a hut for Agriculture and I got my first research tech a couple of turns later.



No Horses near me at all, but Toku didn't have any either.

I then headed down the path to Bronze Working, and as this was happening, I met up with two more neighbors.





Well, that's better... I've got two neighbors who are generally pretty easy to get along with. And when it comes time to start trading techs, there will be two who will be open to it. On top of that, both of them could found religions (Hatty might pursue Judaism, while I've seen Zara pursue Code of Laws quickly and get Confucianism) so I may not have to do that myself.

I had hoped to time getting Bronze Working at the same time I finished my second Warrior, but that didn't happen. I ended up building a third Warrior because I still hadn't found the best site for a city... I had no idea where Copper was and nothing looked particularly appealing at that point.

Once I got BW, I learned this not-so-good map was going to annoy me even more.



Yep... Toku has Copper right by his capital. On top of that, he still hasn't built an Archer, and he still hasn't got BW himself. So yes, I probably could have done a successful Warrior rush.

Then again, knowing how the AI works, if I went that route, Toku probably would have grabbed Archery sooner and ended that hope. Who knows... I sometimes can't figure the AI out.

But there is some Copper that can be taken by me, as the northern part of the map shows.



The Copper is in a spot where I can found a city that wouldn't be great, but would be at least decent... in that floodplains area that includes Spices and Gold. It would most likely have to be a cottage city, but could concentrate on whipping units to start. The Gold would also help raise happiness caps.

Of course, it would really have been nice if there were more good city sites that I could claim in Toku's direction, and get them before he does. I see at least one GP farm candidate, but the Copper site, I think, takes priority.

Here's the map of the land to the west and south of Athens.



A lot of jungle territory, which is why I selected Iron Working for the time being. Since I just finished BW and then revolted, I can easily make a tech switch and I think I should get Wheel so I can connect my future second city, which I think should go on that floodplains site. True, it doesn't have food, but it's the closest source of Copper and would also help to box Toku in (although it was there more food around those peaks, I could grab a third city to further contain Toku).

The good thing about the map away from Toku is there are some better city sites to be had once I move down the tech path. Calendar is obviously a priority with all the Bananas there.

And while Toku does have Copper himself, a Phalanx rush would still be possible, given that Kyoto isn't on a hill. I would have to target Kyoto first and make sure that I get on those hills and forest to the east of it, and then keep tabs as to where Toku founds future cities (and I suspect he'll try to found at least one on a plains hill, even if the hills near him are not the best city sites).

Athens, of course, is growing slowly thanks to the lack of food. I'm thinking I should just get a Settler out once that Warrior is finished... I'd then have one to defend Athens, one to accompany a future Settler to the second city site, and the third will likely spend time keeping tabs on Toku.

And then there's IW... there's no doubt in my mind I'll have to get it myself. The northern part of the map doesn't really have that many appealing city sites, but to the west and south, there is some land that will work nicely, but requires clearing jungle, which requires IW.

So does it sound good to switch to Wheel, get the Settler started ASAP and let the Worker chop forest, then send him off with a unit to my suggested second city site, and begin preparations for a Phalanx rush at Toku?

Any other suggestions?