OCC advice needed.

Patricko

Warlord
Joined
Jan 16, 2012
Messages
109
Location
Norwich
I've recently moved up from playing at Warlord level and using the advice on these forums I can now win confidently on Monarch.

I've tried a couple of One City Challenges but lost badly both times. I do well through ancient and medieval era but it all goes wrong in the early modern period. In my most recent game I was well ahead on tech through most of the game and was first to Rifling/Nationalism/Steel. But then Tokugawa, who was on the other side of the continent, was out-teching me and he won a domination victory by vassaling most of the other AIs.

My questions are:

1. How much war-mongering do you do in an OCC?
2. How do you keep your tech level up mid/late game?
 
1. I mostly enjoy conquest wins when I play OCC, so I war-monger a lot.
2. Running rep with 100 or so GP settled in the city with all the multipliers usually takes care of the tech level later in the game. (yes a slight exaggeration but you get the idea.)
 
1. No war. Any war is a loss on higher difficulties.

2. Choose your tech path carefully. Don't research what you can trade for.
Take advantage of the National Park small wonder. Free specialist for each forest preserve.

3. Choose your leader and your rivals. Don't allow Tokugawa or others like him to ruin your game.
My prefence is Suleiman. Philosophical gets more Great People, and the Ottoman aqueduct gives +2 happy, allowing for higher population early in the game.
 
I've recently moved up from playing at Warlord level and using the advice on these forums I can now win confidently on Monarch.

I've tried a couple of One City Challenges but lost badly both times. I do well through ancient and medieval era but it all goes wrong in the early modern period. In my most recent game I was well ahead on tech through most of the game and was first to Rifling/Nationalism/Steel. But then Tokugawa, who was on the other side of the continent, was out-teching me and he won a domination victory by vassaling most of the other AIs.

My questions are:

1. How much war-mongering do you do in an OCC?
2. How do you keep your tech level up mid/late game?

Afaik OCC revolves around good diplo and settled great scientist/engineers. Basically you want a tech advantage at all times to bribe AI`s into war or into peace to keep a balanced world. If Toku managed to vassal everyone, it means you didn`t prevent it. ;) Also you want AI`s that you are friendly with to survive, often I just gift them a bunch of military techs.

As for research early on, you want to have GS/GE and the relevant national wonders. So mids, tgl, NE, GT. So a high priority on writing, literature & drama.

After lib, biology is the tech to beeline for national park. Put farms everywhere and grow, grow, grow.. :lol:

Spoiler :

Immortal/pang, 1 turn before space vict.



 
In addition to the above: Build many Wonders.

Wonders = great people points = great people = settled representation science.
Wonders for you =/= wonders in the hands of AIs.

With no need to expand you can put a lot of early hammers into wonders instead of settlers and get a jump start.

Ideally stick mainly to the scientist and engineer wonders, and only National Epic for artist ones - great artists are no help at all. Especially get the PYRAMIDS!!! Go directly to pyramids, do not pass Stonehenge, do not collect Great Wall! But strike a balance - don't let wonder building distract you from fairly narrow beelines to Civil Service and Education since Bureaucracy and Oxford university are the two biggest aces in the OCC's hand. Well them and Biology as BurN said (superfarms). Oh, and Communism (SP)...and Computers (net) :lol:

I agree that on higher levels you just can't afford to war. But IMO OCC is a lot more fun sending task-forces around the map and :ar15: up trouble so I always play it at least a level down from normal.
 
After lib, biology is the tech to beeline for national park. Put farms everywhere and grow, grow, grow.. :lol:

Preserved forests are better than farms. You get the free specialists immediately upon completion of NP, without having to grow, grow, grow. The forests also provide needed health prior to NP.
 
1. I rarely warmonger. I play with vassals and culture victory off most of the time (since I can't get either in OCC, it seems fair too me...).

2. Settled rep GPs (of the GS and GE variety only hopefully).
Running as many specialists as possible, unless building something really important.
Building research instead of pointless buildings or wonders or troops.
Using a PHI or IND leader.
Bee-lining biology, and generally favouring research improving techs over military techs, unless I'm in immediate danger.
Keeping as many forests for preserves as possible. Running environmentalism and windmilling mines is significantly better than free market too.
Perhaps most importantly, picking a good start with plenty of food (I like me a river for commerce and levees too).

On immortal I'm usually #1 in GDP from when I get Oxford to roughly when the top AIs finish getting all the cottage upgrades, and then I hopefully have enough of a head start to get the Internet...
 
In order to get a successful OCC under your belt, I would suggest looking at the War Academy. There are a couple of articles in there about OCC that you can use as a plan for an OCC game. Once you achieve a victory that way, then you will be primed to try it on your own. The articles map things out fairly well but are not so specific that your play and implementation of the plan are not important. How you execute the plan remains critical.
 
Keeping forests is key, OCC is about long-term benefits and National Park with 15+ forests in the BFC is huge. Only chop forest outside the BFC unless it's for the last space part.
The main strategy is to generate lots of Great People and settle all except for an Academy and possibly a Philo bulb. Avoid Artists and artist wonders, they're next to useless and may do more harm than good. Even Parthenon isn't worth the GP pollution, (late) National Epic and Sistine for denial can be worth the risk.

Gain a decent gold source (settled prophets/merchants or resource trades) to pay for a defensive force under Pacifism. It's a secondary concern to science but helps a lot. Just don't overdo it, shrines and Wall Street are pointless.

Civics:Representation/Bureaucracy/Caste System/Environmentalism or Free Market/Pacifism or Free Religion
Must-have Wonders: Pyramids, Great Library, Oxford University, National Park, Internet
Key Techs: Alphabet, Civil Service, Literature, Education, Liberalism, Biology, Medicine, Industrialism (for Aluminium), Computers.

The army should be small and defensive but as up-to-date as possible. Obsolete units should probably be disbanded to keep costs down. A Rifle is no more expensive in upkeep than a Warrior.

Fake wars for Diplo points is often a good idea - preferably non-stop with alternating ally to get "shared military struggle" with everyone while keeping the target alive as long as possible. This also gives the benefit of having the most bonus from that category. Just make sure they can't plausibly reach you with a stack, such wars can set you back a lot.

Decide early which National Wonders you should build as you only can have five of them - make each count and remember that NP removes the Coal from Iron Works.

Internet is the main way for backfill. To avoid "We fear you are becoming too advanced", avoid trading for techs that aren't immediately needed even if offered as part of a deal. I once got Agriculture and Hunting from the Internet...

Best traits:philosophical, Industrial, Spiritual (for diplo)

Only one worker until teching Biology, at which point you should get about 6-8 to preserve forests. This way you can have several preserves up before the National Park is built.
 
Must-have great wonders: NONE

Just to make the point that there are no absolutes. I'm playing on deity, and although I have not yet succeeded, the closest I have come (see here) was in a game in which I did not build the Pyramids or Great Library.

That said, if you have stone, do build Pyramids and GE-rush the Great Library.

Contrary to the previous post, early National Epic is good. You'll net 2-3 GP in the long run, and the chance of getting Artist remains low.

The army should be small and defensive but as up-to-date as possible.
The 'army' should consist of exactly one warrior. Period.
 
@Mathias
Interesting strat not building Pyramids. I'm kind of amazed it's possible.

I've won a couple of deity OCCs with standard settings (and a few more with tech trading and culture turned off), both with Ramesses. I'm pretty convinced he's the best leader (barring my modded IND/PHI leader ofc ;)), although from memory my wins were heavily reliant on luck (no run away AI or culture attempts, and pretty good starts).
 
@Mathias
Army should be small, but isn't a single warrior pretty much suicide? Even simple barb defense requires more than that. As several AIs will declare war at pleased, I just can't see it work even with those buggers off - a start next to Monty or Alex definitely requires more troups than can be produced while they're marching towards The City.
 
@NoSuchName
You can get away with it if the diplo situation is stable enough. Just luck really. I've even deleted my sole warrior several times after Globe Theatre, because an airship animation annoys me (scouting airships are shown attacking my warrior every turn for some reason).
 
I've recently moved up from playing at Warlord level and using the advice on these forums I can now win confidently on Monarch.

I've tried a couple of One City Challenges but lost badly both times. I do well through ancient and medieval era but it all goes wrong in the early modern period. In my most recent game I was well ahead on tech through most of the game and was first to Rifling/Nationalism/Steel. But then Tokugawa, who was on the other side of the continent, was out-teching me and he won a domination victory by vassaling most of the other AIs.

My questions are:

1. How much war-mongering do you do in an OCC?
2. How do you keep your tech level up mid/late game?

NoSuchName's guidelines are good, although I always build the National Epic as soon as possible. Early extra GPs mean more long-term accumulated beakers/hammers/gold.
I'm playing Monarch, and like building the Pyramids, Oracle, Great Library, Shwedagon Paya (for early Free Religion if there's a multitude of religions on the map).

[..]Just to make the point that there are no absolutes. I'm playing on deity[...]I did not build the Pyramids or Great Library.

The OP is looking to win on Monarch so Deity advice ain't exactly helpful :p

1. How much war-mongering do you do in an OCC?
The object is not to be DoWed, diplomacy is key. An early DoW can mean game over, you just don't have enough units to fend off an attack. Personally I like to keep a medium-sized standing army then do a mass upgrade to rifles/cannons and go on the rampage. I like warring.

2. How do you keep your tech level up mid/late game?

IMO the National Park is the key wonder. Firstly it removes the health problem, but most importantly you get the free specialists and are able to work the Preserves to get the extra hammers. Also each Preserve yields one :) so you can hold off building the Globe so as to not pollute the GP pool with Artist points. I like to keep a minimum of 10 forests.

It's been said that playing OCCs is like moving up a couple of levels, so perhaps you could try playing at Prince until you've got the fundamentals in place? A word of warning: I decided to to try a OCC; I now can't play an ordinary game :sad:
 
Many thanks for all the extremely helpful replies. It's given me loads of food for thought and ideas to try. I think I'm getting addicted to OCC!

A couple more questions:

1. I use great scientists mainly to bulb techs to get to Lib. Would I be better to settle them for long term gain?

2. My tech strategy is
i. get a few basic techs in place to work resources in the BFS
ii. beeline for Literacy to get TGL
iii. beeline to Liberalism via CC
Is this a good strategy? Where would you go after Lib?
 
I was addicted to OCC for a while once. Funny thing was (this might have been pre-BTS though) actually found it easier than a standard game and played it a level above. I think BTS made it harder though with a much more expensive SS, and perhaps introducing the restrictions on Nat Wonders.
 
1. I use great scientists mainly to bulb techs to get to Lib. Would I be better to settle them for long term gain?

I might bulb philosophy if no one's got it, and bulb edu if lib race is close, but otherwise I settle. It works for me, although bulbing to the key techs (CS, Edu and Bio) may give you earlier win dates, I'm not sure.


2. My tech strategy is
i. get a few basic techs in place to work resources in the BFS
ii. beeline for Literacy to get TGL
iii. beeline to Liberalism via CC
Is this a good strategy? Where would you go after Lib?

Sounds fine, especially if you're winning the lib race. I like to build Hanging Gardens too, but it's probably not optimal. Some recommend even skipping the GL to get bureaucracy faster.

After lib you should absolutely bee-line Bio, although I often go for economics first if I can get the free GM. After bio: medicine, super conductors, industrial techs to increase production (of research mostly), and computers. Exactly what order to do this in I'm not too sure. You can get rocketry early to start on Apollo, but I usually get it from the 'net.
 
A couple more questions:

1. I use great scientists mainly to bulb techs to get to Lib. Would I be better to settle them for long term gain?
Generally, yes. One exception is to bulb Philosophy while researching Civil Service. At higher difficulty levels, it may be helpful to use them to speed your research through Scientific Method. (Yeah, that's what babar said)

Be careful not to overvalue Liberalism. You should be able to pick up Physics on Monarch. Pick up Scientific Method or Astronomy if you have to hit it earlier. If you can't get one of those, it probably isn't worth researching.
2. My tech strategy is
i. get a few basic techs in place to work resources in the BFS
ii. beeline for Literacy to get TGL
iii. beeline to Liberalism via CC
Is this a good strategy? Where would you go after Lib?

If you have access to stone, research Masonry and build The Pyramids. Otherwise, beeline Alphabet and get the earlier techs in trade.

Literature vs Civil Service also depends on resources. If you build The Pyramids, go for Lit and rush TGL. Otherwise, consider Oracle for Civil Service. It's a bit of a gamble, but I think it can be done on monarch. Oracle for CoL while researching Maths is probably a safe bet, if not a sure thing.

As babar pointed out, Biology is the tech for OCC. Since this requires Scientific Method, which makes TGL obsolete, you end up with minimum value of TGL.

After Medicine and Super Conductors, I'll usually head for Satellites and get the industrial techs in trade. A lot of the late-game choices depends on the AIs' position.
 
Hi babar and mathias , thanks for the excellent detailed replies.

I tried another OCC last night and did much better using your advice. I haven't finished the game yet, but I'm in the late modern era and expecting a win without much trouble.

Settling most great scientists is definitely better than bulbing techs. Also Biology/NationalPark/ForestPreserves works brilliantly. I managed to keep on top of the Diplomacy which is often a weakness of mine.

There was a weird moment when I gifted an army of about 15 Infantry and a pile of cannons to Mansa to stop him being stomped by Shaka. Never thought I'd be happy giving away whole armies, but it worked a dream - saved me from going to war and kept the balance among the AIs.
 
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