[BNW] Any Civ 5 Fans Interested In My Little Competition?

[KingVercingetorix]

I recently found an absolute gem of a map while watching Civ videos on YouTube. A map so strong you'll start to snowball right after settling. The game in question features Spain. Pangea map type, standard size, standard speed and deity difficulty. After winning a simple science victory on it I thought I'd try a cultural victory. However, because the map is rather strong I handicapped myself.

The handicaps I put in place were:

• I can't touch any Rationalism Policies.
• No Research Agreements allowed.
• I have to choose Autocracy as my Ideology.

The competition in question requires players to follow my rules above and win the fastest culture game they can. I don't mind if anyone learns the map before submitting their own results. I had prior knowledge of the map as well. If anyone wants to give the game a shot and post their results that would be great.

Here are my results.

Turn 0 settler location.

Within the next few turns you'll have collected 1500 gold thanks to Spain's UA. Ridiculously strong!

500 gold from Sri Pada. That is where I settled Barcelona. 1000 gold from discovering The Great Barrier Reef. The gold is nice but can we just take a moment to realise how crazy it is to settle next to TGBR on turn 3/4 as Spain.

Turn 28 Great Library on Deity! I was a little slow on getting Chichen Itza however(turn 83). It also required me to declare war on the AI as I saw it getting built in their capital. Forbidden Palace plays an important role in my strategy and it can't be neglected. Catholicism must be the world religion!

Yet more wonders in Madrid. Turn 41 Pyramids, Turn 58 Parthenon and turn 103 Notre Dame.

And no I didn't neglect ToA and The Oracle. ToA was built on turn 39 and Oracle 72/73. Being able to buy a settler as soon as Madrid reaches pop 2 gives massive advantages.

Even my 4th expo cranked out Globe Theatre.

I couldn't fit all AI here but at the bottom is Venice. I was influential of Venice before turn 100. I'm dominant at this point!

Most of the AI followed in my footsteps. Turn 151 Radio and turn 152 Ideology pick.

I opened Tradition for early culture. It ends up paying for itself, faster border expansion is nice also. Up next was Liberty opener, into Republic and then Collective Rule. I then ignore Liberty for the time being and it is a race to reach our Reformation belief in the Piety tree. Pagodas and Mosques provide killer early game culture. I was also able to befriend Prague for some extra culture too. Thanks to the Oracle I ended up getting Sacred Sites on turn 74 or so. 5 cites with both Pagodas and Mosques equates to +20 Tourism. The Parthenon comes with a free work of art for an extra +2. At this point in the game the AI had a combined tourism output of zero!

Sacred Site tourism abuse doesn't really work on higher difficulties. That's why I didn't decide to spam cites. It does however provide a foundation of tourism that we need later on.

Futurism can yield some very nice results if taken early enough. Cult of Personality is situational. Siam was my last victim, I asked Austria to declare war on him. 27 GPT later she did. I then declare war on her, get my money back and in return get a +50% tourism boost over him. It also stacks. Who else dislikes Siam and is willing to fight him? My beloved Theodora who I've had consistent friendship with from like turn 50. I felt bad backstabbing her but it made the win within a few turns.

A little word on The World Congress. I didn't get a screenshot on my resolutions but they were, World Religion, Cultural Heritage Sites and International Games. Timing Radio with a proposal will result in a very early International Games and therefore a fast win. I didn't get the benefits of IG until around turn 200.

Turn 221 is the benchmark. I had a pretty lazy game. I played it in one entire sitting and got a little restless towards the end. Made silly mistakes like I always do when victory is on the horizon. Looking forward for some pre 200 victories from some of you. Or if Acken decides to play pre 150!


I'll upload the initial turn 0 save and my turn 221 victory save as a reply to the OP (I have 10 files uploaded already). You can check my save and see the deal history. No RAs were signed. If anyone wants to post their results could you provide the end save too!

I believe all DLC is required to play this map. Also there may be a bug with one of the National Wonders. When I discover The Grand Mesa I receive 500 gold despite the fact one of the AI has settled next to it and therefore discovered it before me. Let me know if the same happens for you.

 

[KingVercingetorix]

Saves:

 

[docbud]

I am not a deityb
player by any means (I play Emperor).

But that start looks great and I will play bit. I can't do what you did so far as restrictions.

GL on turn 28? I can't get that lucky on emperor.

As an aside before I try it--how agressive were the barbs and AI?

 

[KingVercingetorix]

I am not a deityb
player by any means (I play Emperor).

But that start looks great and I will play bit. I can't do what you did so far as restrictions.

GL on turn 28? I can't get that lucky on emperor.

As an aside before I try it--how agressive were the barbs and AI?

A strong map like this is a nice place to start if Deity is new to you. It will give you rough approximations on AI tech pace and wonder construction. Don't worry about the restrictions I put in place, play the map however you want and post your results.

Regarding the GL:
You have two options when it comes to settling. Settle on the hill or settle on the wheat tile. In a game where I focus on science I would settle on the wheat. An observatory gives such a boost to BPT. Losing the wheat isn't much of a problem because the capital is such a high food area. 28 pop without completing tradition at turn 221 is pretty good. I also didn't send as many food trade routes as I usually do to the capital and I never had the time to send a work boat to the fish tiles.

Settling where I settled isn't worth it in 9/10 games. I only did it for the early game where hammers are at their most valuable. Losing the forest was annoying however. I will give you a rundown of my early game.

• Settled on turn 4
• Purchased both Great Barrier Reef tiles, went production focused and locked my first citizen on the GBR tile.
• Bought 1 worker and a monument. My build order started with a scout(4 turns).
  
• On the next turn my worker started to improve the wheat tile while I researched Mining. (Mining first to improve the salt, build mines and chop my one forest tile).
• When my first scout finished I had just reached pop 2, I then rush bought a settler and started to build another scout(3 turns). My new citizen automatically worked the second GBR tile but I locked it in place.
• When Mining finished I stopped improving the wheat and started improving the salt. My next research was Pottery into Writing.
  
• While all this was happening my warrior was on the way to Morocco's land in search of a worker to steal.
  
• My first scout went north because there are 3 ruins I want before Morocco grabs them.
• My settler is on its way to where I settled Barcelona. Around turn 13/14 is when I settle my second city. There was a barb camp east of my location so my second scout caught up to my settler and escorted it.
  
• Once Barcelona is settled I switch it to production focused and lock Sri Pada. Two turns later I chose the 'One With Nature' pantheon.
• Barcelona had to build ToA so I rush bought a monument there. At this point I hadn't yet researched Archery so I put a couple of turns into a granary.
  
• I need workers to chop forests around Barcelona ASAP. My capital had started to build a worker after my second scout. I had also stolen one from Morocco.
  
• When the worker in Madrid had finished it was time to start GL. My salt has been improved so I make sure my citizen is working that tile. My turn 4 worker then gets to chopping that forest while the built one heads to Barcelona.
  
• At pop 4 my citizen works the 1 food 2 hammer sheep. Animal Husbandry is being/has been researched so my worker will improve the sheep after chopping the forest.
  
• Barcelona by now would be building ToA. The two additional workers would be chopping all surrounding forests.
• Republic in the Liberty tree would be chosen for an extra boost in production during GL and ToA.

There is a lot of randomness involved with the early game. Ruins would have changed my tech path for example. The early game for you is dependent on your victory conditions and the ruins you get.

By turn 2/3 your settler would have come across some ruins. There is a chance it could be +20 culture. If that is the case and you're going full Tradition there is no need to rush buy a monument as soon as you settle (like I did). Buying the worker however is a good use of all the early game gold. In a science reliant game on this map I wouldn't bother building both GL and ToA. I think ToA provides benefits that last all game long whereas GL provides more of a sudden boost. It was however very important in my strategy. My free tech was Drama and Poetry(Parthenon).

If you're planning a science victory or science reliant victory (full Tradition and Rationalism) go for ToA. With the help of a worker you should be able to build it buy turn 30 in Madrid. The AI usually build it (Deity) on turn 35-40. The GL however can go between turn 25 at the earliest and turn 35. I have once seen it delayed until turn 40.

I had 4 barb camps spawn pretty close to my cities. There were also some further away with city state quests later on. The AI were great in this game. I had consistent friendship with everyone but Morocco and Austria. Morocco did declare war on me around turn 200 or so. That is why I have Great War Bombers (rush bought) in my cities. He asked for peace very quickly after a failed war attempt.

If possible search the user 'Kokizi' on YouTube. He is how I came across this map. He did a video series where he achieved a turn 197 science victory on this map. You can learn a lot from his play.

Definitely try this map out even if you're new to Deity. Be sure to steal workers from AI and chop forests early. Which victory condition would you go for? Also what are your fastest Emperor victories?

 

[docbud]

Thanks for the tips, King. Much appreciated

 

[beetle]

I recently found an absolute gem of a map while watching Civ videos on YouTube.

Very fun map, thanks for sharing! Please post a link to the YouTube channel where you found the game.

I still cannot get an Autocracy CV from this map, tried a couple times. I kept missing key wonders (Hanging Gardens, Sistine, Uffizi) by few turns. I also SIP because wandering the starting settler to GBR felt like cheating. In order to claim space, I put Sri Prada between two cities. That caused my religion to be late, and I cannot get faith buildings. Still, being able to rush buy 3 (!) settlers makes the game very different!

 

[KingVercingetorix]

Very fun map, thanks for sharing! Please post a link to the YouTube channel where you found the game.

I still cannot get an Autocracy CV from this map, tried a couple times. I kept missing key wonders (Hanging Gardens, Sistine, Uffizi) by few turns. I also SIP because wandering the starting settler to GBR felt like cheating. In order to claim space, I put Sri Prada between two cities. That caused my religion to be late, and I cannot get faith buildings. Still, being able to rush buy 3 (!) settlers makes the game very different!

I know settling Madrid next to GBR is disgustingly overpowered but it allows those nice early wonders and a super fast early tech pace. It basically gives the player Deity level advantages. SIP is still pretty strong. I would says it's an above average location. Hill, River, Cost and Mountain. Nice Salt tiles also. I wouldn't follow my restrictive rule set however. I'd need the Rationalism policies to hit Internet for the CV.

 

[beetle]

Thanks @KingVercingetorix, then I don’t quite so bad for needing the Rationalism policies! As you point out, a start on a coastal river hill mountain spot with salt as your lux is pretty OP!

For those that want it, here is the link without the embed. Someone with a YouTube account should comment on that page back to Kokizi that we are enjoying his map!

 

[beetle]

@KingVercingetorix, I only just figured out that you were talking about amazing Spain starts for warmongering here. Both maps apparent give 1500 gold in the early game. Which map did you like better? Which is better for DOM VC?

 

[KingVercingetorix]

@KingVercingetorix, I only just figured out that you were talking about amazing Spain starts for warmongering here. Both maps apparent give 1500 gold in the early game. Which map did you like better? Which is better for DOM VC?

They're similar in some ways, GBR nearby and Morocco as the closest neighbour. Austria and The Netherlands as AI. I just loaded up my 292 save to refresh my memory on the map. Settling Madrid next to GBR wouldn't be anywhere near as strong. In a 3 city NC CB rush it also wouldn't be worth it IMO.

The Kokizi map is definitely superior and I'd rather play it. Due to the Topography of the map a CB/XB rush may be difficult though. There are some snaky parts near Theodora and Siam that could prove challenging. Taking out Marrakech, Amsterdam and Venice with CB/XB would be simple though. There is a lot iron nearby so a frigate rush could work. I've only played science and culture on this map so I'm speculating. Due to the super tech rate I imagine this would also be the better domination map. Pre turn 200 victory definitely. A master (Acken for example) could win pre turn 180.

The other map had some nasty jungle parts but other than that it is a pretty clean sweep. I took a sub-optimal route and my science game back then was awful.

 

[vadalaz]

Tried this challenge and got it on turn 165, culture leader was India with 8500 or so total culture. 4-city Tradition -> Scholasticism -> Aesthetics and Futurism, opened Exploration for Louvre and got a bit of Liberty and Commerce in the end due to culture overflow from World's Fair. Actually built the Pyramids around turn 160...

Hotels, archeologists and wonderspam with heritage sites did the trick, never made it to the second WC vote or the Internet. Played pretty fast so there's a lot of tiny improvements that could be made here, ~t150 should be doable. Fun map, thanks for posting it here.

 

[KingVercingetorix]

Tried this challenge and got it on turn 165, culture leader was India with 8500 or so total culture. 4-city Tradition -> Scholasticism -> Aesthetics and Futurism, opened Exploration for Louvre and got a bit of Liberty and Commerce in the end due to culture overflow from World's Fair. Actually built the Pyramids around turn 160...

Hotels, archeologists and wonderspam with heritage sites did the trick, never made it to the second WC vote or the Internet. Played pretty fast so there's a lot of tiny improvements that could be made here, ~t150 should be doable. Fun map, thanks for posting it here.

Well played, turn 165 is super fast and you did it without moving your initial settler. I didn't think such a fast victory would be possible when settling in place. Could you do better if you settled Madrid next to GBR or isn't it worth it? What was the most important part of your strategy that allowed such a quick victory?

You were able to thrash my attempt. Could you criticise my game and provide me with some pointers please. Would you say my strategy was weak or do you think there are concepts of the game I don't understand. My BPT look pretty bad when comparing mine with yours. In my end game I had 5 cities with Research Labs setup, in your end game you had 3 cities with just Public Schools maybe? Do you reckon my cities were too small?

One last thought. If you went full out science with Rationalism, used RAs and used Freedom how quickly could you win this map?

 

[vadalaz]

Well played, turn 165 is super fast and you did it without moving your initial settler. I didn't think such a fast victory would be possible when settling in place. Could you do better if you settled Madrid next to GBR or isn't it worth it? What was the most important part of your strategy that allowed such a quick victory?

You were able to thrash my attempt. Could you criticise my game and provide me with some pointers please. Would you say my strategy was weak or do you think there are concepts of the game I don't understand. My BPT look pretty bad when comparing mine with yours. In my end game I had 5 cities with Research Labs setup, in your end game you had 3 cities with just Public Schools maybe? Do you reckon my cities were too small?

One last thought. If you went full out science with Rationalism, used RAs and used Freedom how quickly could you win this map?

I think settling Madrid next to GBR wouldn't make that much difference in the long run. I skipped Great Library and ToA and focused on workers and granaries instead in the early game. Going for early GBR + GL is a strong play too though and I think both approaches lead to a similar Education timing.

A few of suggestions regarding your game:
- If you finished Aesthetics you would've been able to spend all that faith on Great Musicians and have them perform concert tours to greatly speed up the endgame. You can see on my screenshot I gifted a city to India who was the culture leader in my game, so that my GMs wouldn't have to travel too much. This saves quite a few turns as well
- Full Liberty + a splash of Tradition is strong but if you're going that route I'd suggest getting Aristocracy instead of Oligarchy and Legalism for the wonder bonus and the happiness
- That said, in a 4-5 city game you want your cities to grow as much and as quickly as possible, so full Tradition to me seems like the better pick, especially since you can buy all your settlers on this map and don't really need Collective rule anyway. Plus Tradition gives access to faith-buying Great Engineers (I bought 2 in my game for Eiffel and Broadway)
- Sacred Sites isn't worth the investment of 4 policies and Piety is kinda weak in general. If you really want to go Piety here, I suppose you could take the reformation belief that allows faith-buying any Great Person (e.g. Great Scientists despite not having full Rationalism, or Engineers without Tradition)

Your bpt looks fine actually, all my cities already had labs there I think. About Rationalism+RAs+Freedom, do you mean a science victory? Turn 175-180 should be doable here, or faster if you really take the time to optimize things.

 

[KingVercingetorix]

I think settling Madrid next to GBR wouldn't make that much difference in the long run. I skipped Great Library and ToA and focused on workers and granaries instead in the early game. Going for early GBR + GL is a strong play too though and I think both approaches lead to a similar Education timing.

A few of suggestions regarding your game:
- If you finished Aesthetics you would've been able to spend all that faith on Great Musicians and have them perform concert tours to greatly speed up the endgame. You can see on my screenshot I gifted a city to India who was the culture leader in my game, so that my GMs wouldn't have to travel too much. This saves quite a few turns as well
- Full Liberty + a splash of Tradition is strong but if you're going that route I'd suggest getting Aristocracy instead of Oligarchy and Legalism for the wonder bonus and the happiness
- That said, in a 4-5 city game you want your cities to grow as much and as quickly as possible, so full Tradition to me seems like the better pick, especially since you can buy all your settlers on this map and don't really need Collective rule anyway. Plus Tradition gives access to faith-buying Great Engineers (I bought 2 in my game for Eiffel and Broadway)
- Sacred Sites isn't worth the investment of 4 policies and Piety is kinda weak in general. If you really want to go Piety here, I suppose you could take the reformation belief that allows faith-buying any Great Person (e.g. Great Scientists despite not having full Rationalism, or Engineers without Tradition)

Your bpt looks fine actually, all my cities already had labs there I think. About Rationalism+RAs+Freedom, do you mean a science victory? Turn 175-180 should be doable here, or faster if you really take the time to optimize things.

I didn't start putting policies into Aesthetics until a lot later into the game, those GMs would have come in handy. I believe I performed two Concert Tours in my game. I walked my GMs up to Gandhi's city north of Cordoba. Gifting cities is a trick I've never got round to using. It is very clear that Piety and Sacred Sites just doesn't cut the mustard. I was reading some guides about CVs using that strategy but they were on lower difficulties. My plan with Legalism was to time it with Broadcast Towers so my cities got that quick boost in culture. Unfortunately I forgot I needed Museums in order to build BTs.

You had your Research Labs up and running really early compared with me. That is why I thought you just had Public Schools. My Labs weren't up until about turn 200. Either my tech path is really stupid or my science leading up to Labs is too low.

My question about Rationalism, RAs and Freedom was regarding a CV. How quickly could you win when playing an optimal science game. Is reaching Internet even necessary? If you can do a turn 165 with these "handicaps" (they slowed me but not you) how quickly could you win playing however you want?

 

[vadalaz]

I didn't start putting policies into Aesthetics until a lot later into the game, those GMs would have come in handy. I believe I performed two Concert Tours in my game. I walked my GMs up to Gandhi's city north of Cordoba. Gifting cities is a trick I've never got round to using. It is very clear that Piety and Sacred Sites just doesn't cut the mustard. I was reading some guides about CVs using that strategy but they were on lower difficulties. My plan with Legalism was to time it with Broadcast Towers so my cities got that quick boost in culture. Unfortunately I forgot I needed Museums in order to build BTs.

You had your Research Labs up and running really early compared with me. That is why I thought you just had Public Schools. My Labs weren't up until about turn 200. Either my tech path is really stupid or my science leading up to Labs is too low.

My question about Rationalism, RAs and Freedom was regarding a CV. How quickly could you win when playing an optimal science game. Is reaching Internet even necessary? If you can do a turn 165 with these "handicaps" (they slowed me but not you) how quickly could you win playing however you want?

Without Secularism the science rate is all about population, so I guess my cities must've been bigger thanks to Tradition bonuses, I think Madrid was at 22 pop on turn 100. I also took Scholasticism which was roughly a 10-15% bpt boost. My tech path was Education > Sci Theory > Radio > Refrigeration > Plastics with a few detours here and there to grab the key wonders.

Hard to say how Rationalism would affect the finish time, maybe speed things up by 5 turns? I never built Oxford either, wanted to save it for the Internet, so there's probably a couple of turns lost there too. I'm not a fan of RAs and only had 2 DoFs anyway, and Freedom is likely weaker than Futurism here. Pretty sure I spawned 5 Musicians, 2 or 3 Writers, and 2 or 3 Artists post-ideology, so that's 2250-2750 tourism from Futurism out of the 8500 required.

 

[KingVercingetorix]

Without Secularism the science rate is all about population, so I guess my cities must've been bigger thanks to Tradition bonuses, I think Madrid was at 22 pop on turn 100. I also took Scholasticism which was roughly a 10-15% bpt boost. My tech path was Education > Sci Theory > Radio > Refrigeration > Plastics with a few detours here and there to grab the key wonders.

Hard to say how Rationalism would affect the finish time, maybe speed things up by 5 turns? I never built Oxford either, wanted to save it for the Internet, so there's probably a couple of turns lost there too. I'm not a fan of RAs and only had 2 DoFs anyway, and Freedom is likely weaker than Futurism here. Pretty sure I spawned 5 Musicians, 2 or 3 Writers, and 2 or 3 Artists post-ideology, so that's 2250-2750 tourism from Futurism out of the 8500 required.

Were you feeding Madrid by boat and land? 22 pop by turn 100 is absolutely ridiculous. Growing my capital is something I definitely need to work on. In my game two fish tiles in Madrid were never even improved by work boats. After 221 turns in a game where I was never poor and had decent production is unacceptable isn't it!

I love Scholasticism and I can see how it would have helped me in this game. It makes me pay more attention to CS quests and I'm less lazy when using spies for elections rigs/coups. Losing Hanoi/Budapest for example when I don't have Scholasticism isn't too much of a big deal. I lose luxury happiness and I don't get unit gifts as frequently. When I have Scholasticism however I'd try much harder to keep them as allies. Is it possible to go for both Rationalism and some Patronage in this game or would you ignore Scholasticism.

I know playing the same map can get a bit boring but I would love to see what is possible. When possible could you try again and see how close to turn 150 you can get. @beetle asked about domination on this map and I think that could be a fun prospect too. I started a dom game a couple of days ago but haven't been on Civ to finish it.

Maneuvering troops and being aggressive enough is my downfall in domination. I'd be very happy with a sub 200 victory. Also have you got any ideas why Ahmad is such a jerk on this map. In my two complete play throughs(SV and CV) he was top in military demographics at some point and was aggressive towards me. Usually he is a really nice guy who offers friendship and plays peacefully. Worker steals and settling cities too quickly pushes him past breaking point I guess.

 

[vadalaz]

AIs really hate when their neighbour has more than 1.5 * [average number of cities], it's one of the strongest diplo debuffs in the game. So in the beginning when AIs all have 2 cities and you settle 4 or 5 quickly, your neighbours will hate your guts. In this game it's only Ahmad though, and eventually all AIs expand so the diplo hit goes away. Ahmad had top military for a time in my game as well, I gifted him a Salt to make sure he's not too hostile and kept track of his troop movements.

Madrid had HG and I was sending a food cargo ship and later a production caravan there, also allied the nearby maritime CSs fairly quickly. I tried to get as many We Love The King Days as I could and had a ton of workers early. Another thing you could try is getting food bonuses from religion, though I'm personally not a fan of that. My religion was Tithe, +15% production, +2 faith per world wonder, 50 faith for every Great Person used.

Scholasticism + Rationalism works, though the faster you end the game the less time you have for excess policies. In a CV you could go for just Scholasticism + Secularism since other stuff in Rationalism isn't as impactful, in an SV I'd skip Patronage most of the time to make sure I can get Mercantilism.

 

[fimbul]

nice one vadalaz! Only managed 176, think i messed after 4 city nc, eventually losing uffizi and a GE rushed louvre i always thought WR was the best resolution for futurism games, but hard to argue with your results.

btw the map seemed a bit bugged, i got free gold for a wonder next to india, and there was a funny grassland jungle barb camp tile.

 

[KingVercingetorix]

nice one vadalaz! Only managed 176, think i messed after 4 city nc, eventually losing uffizi and a GE rushed louvre i always thought WR was the best resolution for futurism games, but hard to argue with your results.

btw the map seemed a bit bugged, i got free gold for a wonder next to india, and there was a funny grassland jungle barb camp tile.

Very good result there. Will you give it another go and see how many turns you can knock off? Losing a GE rushed wonder must be infuriating! I had the same bug with Grand Mesa too.

 

[fimbul]

Replayed the part from nc onwards; got it down to 162. I might have been able to get it down to sub 160 if I built globe in my expo instead of half building the forbidden palace... but i think im done.

btw im pretty sure this map was slightly edited; just occured to me while playing that sri pada is not allowed to spawn on mainland of Pangaea maps. I think grand mesa was originally there and jungle grassland tile housed mount kili?