Blackbetsy HOF Attempts

[BlackBetsy]

I hadn't, until right now, considered building settlers to join cities to then speed pop rushing. Anybody ever tried this tactic? Its 2 pop if you join a settler? This way, you can save 10 turns and get a library immediately, or save 10 turns on a cathedral. I have to think this is better than building knights and disbanding, right? A knight is 70 shields and yields 18. A settler is 30 shields + 2 pop and yields 40 shields. (Edit - yes, settlers are slower, but I'm thinking about my cities in slow growth areas around my core needing a pop boost).

It's allowable to add a settler to a city with a food surplus, even if adding them creates a food deficit? It's only disallowed to add someone to a city with a deficit, I believe --- which isn't even possible in C3C. That was a Vanilla/PTW bug, right?

 

[Spoonwood]

Anybody ever tried this tactic?

Workers cost less. Ignas did so in his Chieftain 60k game.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Workers cost less. Ignas did so in his Chieftain 60k game.

Obviously. It's 20 shields for 40 shields on the same food. should have thought of that. I've got an area of flood plain with a few flood plain wheats where the cities have all of their buildings built. I can absolutely pump workers out of those cities.

This makes me want to try again. If I did it again, I'd abandon any game where I didn't hit an SGL on Alphabet. I think my 1000 BC 17 city start was good, but it wasn't good enough. Also, I really think that an Ancient Age despotism Golden Age is a GOOD idea for this sort of game. You want to maximize cities early by all means necessary. I think I would be MUCH better off if I had 22 cities at 1000 BC. A golden age with a production boost can do that kind of thing, especially if you have some flood plains.

I triggered my Golden Age right after I hit Feudalism and cranked out a lot of settlers, but by then I had a lot of 1 shield cities anyway. Turning cities with built culture into worker factories to fuel culture in outer cities makes so much sense.

 

[Spoonwood]

It's 20 shields for 40 shields on the same food.

20 shields for 2 workers and 30 shields for one settler.

Turning cities with built culture into worker factories to fuel culture in outer cities makes so much sense.

Ignas researched to rails to help movement time for worker joining also.

 

[BlackBetsy]

20 shields for 2 workers and 30 shields for one settler.

What I meant is 2 workers cost 20 shields but you get 40 shields in pop-rush. So on the same amount of food (2 population), and 10 fewer shields than settler (20 vs. 30), you get the same amount of shields.

Ignas researched to rails to help movement time for worker joining also.

I am going up the tech tree to Metallurgy, but I would need to flip to Education earlier than I would want. I think by the time I want to flip to Education in 30 turns, I'd have to do 5 more techs and hope Steam Power is my free tech...even then we are close to when culture adds aren't going to make a difference, assuming I luck out and my coal source is already roaded (it might take me 2-3 turns to get it hooked). Even with natural born workers, I still need a dozen turns to do most RR'ing between cities. I just don't see how Steam Power makes a difference.

My tech pace has been very slow even though I've been maxxing tech because there is no negative penalty in Chieftain. Part of that is Feudalism, part of that is I am killing citizens at a very, very rapid pace. I only have one "city" and everything else is a town in my core, often size 2/3/4. I didn't really pop many techs in the Ancient Era - I got quite a bit of barbs and cash, surprisingly. Obviously, no settlers.

 

[BlackBetsy]

It is now 680 AD. It's turn 183, so I'm 21 turns past my last descriptive post. At this point, I've got 171 cities, with 26 settlers moving towards their eventual city location. One more Sumerian city will be mine in the next 5 turns (I have to let it culture expand with the Palace so it won't auto-raze). I won't have 220 cities by turn 192 as I hoped. City creation has been my biggest problem in this game. We have 40,189 culture and are adding 1175 culture per turn.

The good news is that CivAssist now has me finishing in 1335 AD, which would tie for #5 on the Large Chieftain 100k charts. Civ Assist II does project culture doubling, so it's got me ending 2 turns sooner than the simple math does. The even better news is that I haven't done my University cull yet - I am planning on Education for turn 191 and then breaking into the build sequence to change all cities with 6 population to Universities and whip Longbowman / Courthouse / Universities. I've got 15-18 settlers planting in the next 8 turns, and I want to get the ToA for them. Right now 17 cities are ready to go, with another 8-13 heading to pop 6 in the next 9 turns. Adding 100 - 120 cpt in a single turn at turn 192 will shorten my game by 4-5 turns on its own.

Obviously, 1330 AD and 5th place is essentially a done deal at this point. What I am now striving for is turn 249 / 1295 for #4 on the chart. I have 89,611 culture to go in 66 turns. At 1175 culture per turn (currently), I have 77,560 culture already locked up, leaving 12,261 culture to go.

At turn 192, I will (conservatively) add 25 universities @ 4 cpt. From turn 192 to turn 249, these universities will produce 5,700 culture, leaving me with 6,561 culture to go. In the next 8 turns, I will likely produce something like an additional 15 cpt. That will add a total of 7,380 culture through 1295. So I think there is a very good chance we will get the #4 spot, which is better than I originally thought I would do. My guess right now is that we will finish somewhere in the 1270-1280 range. Certainly it's better than my Standard Warlord game where I finished @ 1410.

If I cleaned up my game - only played where I got a SGL on Alphabet - and started building workers to push population in the outer cities sooner, never building Wealth, with a good map without so much jungle near my core, I think I could shave another 25-30 turns, putting me in the 1100 AD range. But the #1 spot is so far ahead of that - another 30 turns - that I'm not quite sure what the circumstances are that lead to it. Certain two early SGLs for Pyramids and Artemis (not sure how he got those with the Celts). Babylon is so superior to the Celts because of the cheaper libraries / universities that I'm not sure how that much success can be had with the Celts vs. Babylon.

If I played Standard for only 100k instead of 130k, I think I would finish around 1140. Cleaning up my game, I think the #4 spot on the Standard Chieftain 100k chart is possible as well. But I definitely will take a break from the 100k games. I'm looking at a 20k culture game since my best is a #7.

I haven't done a Domination game since I've been back, but I have to say, re-reading the old threads, and seeing what happened to my old Domination #1 games is a little daunting. There are numbers on those tables that I have a hard time understanding.

 

[Spoonwood]

Go Betsy go!

 

[CKS]

I'm looking at a 20k culture game since my best is a #7.

The 20k tables are pretty solid except for huge. Huge Sid has only 3 entries, and mine is not speedy, so any 20k win will improve your placing a lot. However, a 1750 win on any upper-level table will improve your placing (3rd on deity, 4th on demigod, 5th on emperor), and that isn't too difficult. You don't need several early SGL to make those dates, you just need to keep from being overrun and research fast enough to have something to build.

Good luck!

 

[BlackBetsy]

I'm glad I googled "what happens to the temples built by the Temple of Artemis" before Education completed! You basically have to build Universities in 1/2 of your cities immediately to break even. Eventually, the math says you can build more culture with Universities because you can re-build the temples, but I'm already getting a good date and it's a lot of work for little benefit in terms of saved turns.

 

[BlackBetsy]

The 20k tables are pretty solid except for huge. Huge Sid has only 3 entries, and mine is not speedy, so any 20k win will improve your placing a lot. However, a 1750 win on any upper-level table will improve your placing (3rd on deity, 4th on demigod, 5th on emperor), and that isn't too difficult. You don't need several early SGL to make those dates, you just need to keep from being overrun and research fast enough to have something to build.

Good luck!

Emperor 1750 isn't TOO much of a problem with a Huge map with an early SGL for GL and a very productive size 12 Wonder city. That's turn 340. I'd probably go Persia to wipe out near civs on a Pangaea right after Republic slingshot and get the Industrious bonus to get the city up to peak performance.

With pre-builds, a 20% discount for AI isn't generally enough for the AI to beat you to a wonder. I think I'd jump ship on any starts that didn't have an SGL before 2000 BC.

 

[BlackBetsy]

The math becomes nigh impossible. Ugh, I am going to wind up a few turns short of the #3 slot. I'm in 850 AD (turn 200), with 64460 in culture (not even halfway!), generating 1677 culture per turn....yes, that's right, I've added 502 culture per turn in the last 17 turns (nearly +30 cpt/turn). Civ Assist II now projects me finishing on turn 239 in 1240 AD. 1250AD of course is when turns become 5 yrs per turn, so every turn I cut now takes off 10 years. My score is only 729, so I don't win the spot on ties, which means its turn 229 (1140 AD) to get the spot.

We have 207 cities with just a few straggling settlers walking around within 5-7 turns of their landing spots. We are generating more than a dozen workers per turn and I am joining them to cities to shave turns off of Colosseums and Cathedrals as best as I can. But all of the cities near most worker production are already LCC (Library Cathedral Colosseum), so they are walking several turns before joining.

I just had a herculean +59 cpt turn with 5 libraries, 5 cathedrals and 13 Colosseums finished, plus a library doubling. Every once in a while I can pull that off, but mostly I've been near the 30 cpt pace. The math says to hit +41 cpt if I want to make turn 229.

One of the problems is that I start *losing* culture the earlier I finish because I lose library doubles. I just lost the Cath double in my capital (250 AD build - drops from the math on a 1240 AD finish).

I don't have any more cities to conquer in the time I have left - everything is a size 1 city far away. I wound up grabbing half a dozen cities from the Agricultural Celts in just about 5 turns, which was a nice boost.

At my +30 cpt pace, I'm going to finish on turn 231, just 2 turns short. I need to get up to +41 cpt every turn, or run REALLY hot the next 5 turns. If I can punch out +50 for the next 5 turns, it helps the math quite a bit. Every +1 cpt this turn is 30 culture over the next 30 turns and the last few turns the added culture is nearly meaningless. Doing a +50 next turn instead of +40 is more valuable than the last 3 turns of +40.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Hmmm. I'm not quite sure how Firaxis score works, but I just got 11 Firaxis points on my last turn. If I finish in 1140, I think I get a 1010 score bonus. With a 740 score now, and 11 points per turn, I might be ahead on Firaxis points with the same 1140 date. I just cranked out +47 culture on my last turn to jump from 1677 to 1725 cpt. But I have a sense the next few turns will be harder to even hit 40. My guess is I will know in the next 3-4 turns if it is at all possible.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Ugh, I just did the math. Its impossible. To do +40 cpt over the next 30 turns, I have to generate +1200 culture. That's actually 120 cities with Temple (2), Library (3), Cathedral (3) and Colosseum (2). Seeing as I have 208 cities, and all of them have temples already, it's actually 150 cities worth of Library / Cathedral / Colosseum. Probably 180 cities already have Libraries and another 125 have cathedrals, and maybe 90 have colosseums. I'd need basically to found 10 cities per turn, which can't happen, I am on a 10+ turn walk to each city location. At some point, my ability to push out new culture will drop to something like 10 cpt per turn.

I just noted in @Spoonwood's thread that I'm not sure the best strategy for 100k isn't just city growth to 300 cities at the fastest pace possible - ignoring libraries and cathedrals and ignoring culture doubling. You get to 300 cities, and within 30 turns they can produce 3000/turn in culture. You only need to do that for 33 turns to hit 100k on a standard map. Working backwards, to get a pre-1000 AD score on a Standard map, you'd have to have the 300 cities by turn 150. Has anyone had 300 cities by turn 150?

 

[Spoonwood]

I just noted in @Spoonwood's thread that I'm not sure the best strategy for 100k isn't just city growth to 300 cities at the fastest pace possible - ignoring libraries and cathedrals and ignoring culture doubling. You get to 300 cities, and within 30 turns they can produce 3000/turn in culture. You only need to do that for 33 turns to hit 100k on a standard map. Working backwards, to get a pre-1000 AD score on a Standard map, you'd have to have the 300 cities by turn 150. Has anyone had 300 cities by turn 150?

I don't know about exact numbers. But, two points to consider.

1. The earlier cities get founded, the earlier they start growing. Since all cities produce at least one shield, each city founded starts getting shields into the box. And you need lots of shields in the box.

2. As soon as cities get founded, they produce food. Food eventually turns into shields. So, the earlier cities have food, the earlier they can produce shields.

It might be that holding back at some point ends up more efficient. But, I think when in doubt, it can work out faster to found cities first instead of producing culture.

That said, it might be more enjoyable to try a limited built city for mass cultural victory. Because hundreds of cities ends up a lot to manage.

 

[BlackBetsy]

1180 AD it is. A #4 score, and just 3 turns away from #3 - I think the 19XX Firaxis score would have been enough to break a tie.

I added 42 cpt - a very high portion of the culture I had left to add - in 930 AD and it didn't budge the calculation of my final turn from year 1200 / turn 235. I really only shaved off 2 turns in my last 18 turns, which seems about right.

All in all, I think I could have done better, with maybe 5-10 saved turns from not ever building wealth on chieftain, building settlers almost exclusively before let's say 400 AD and getting 300 cities (I had 100 cities at 340 AD), and then flipping on culture all at once in a torrent of slaughter where I would go from 600 cpt to 2400 cpt in 20 turns. At 2400 cpt, you are done in roughly 50 turns at that point. What I don't know is how possible 300 cities are by 400 AD.

 

[BlackBetsy]

@superslug the 4000 AD save was attached twice the first time I submitted, so I submitted again without the duplicate.

 

[BlackBetsy]

Huge Emperor 20k Persia.

Am I really doing another Huge map? The goal is to get my capital up to 12 ASAP, and only play where I get an SGL on my first tech (Alphabet) that I intend to save for Great Library to be completed ASAP for the 12 culture per turn (over 200 turns, this is more than 10% of the way to 20k limit). You can't ignore the Emperor AI or take them lightly, so the other cities will be rigged for war. I think I want to try Persia with Science (for SGL and free tech) and Industrious (worker efficiency to get cap built up).

If we want to go for an SGL on Alphabet, we can't have any seafaring or commercial civs. That leaves out a lot. Likely we will want Religious, Militaristic, Agricultural, and Industrious civs as opponents. I'd like to be the only scientific civ so I can trade Bronze Working for CB early. Or I can go for an SGL on CB and just exclude religious civs.

I'm expecting many, many restarts after 30 turns when the SGL doesn't pop on Alphabet (or CB if I go that path).

Our goal is a 1740 AD or sooner finish.

 

[Spoonwood]

The goal is to get my capital up to 12 ASAP, and only play where I get an SGL on my first tech (Alphabet) that I intend to save for Great Library to be completed ASAP for the 12 culture per turn (over 200 turns, this is more than 10% of the way to 20k limit).

I'd think that the Pyramids SGL is likely more effective.

Good luck!

 

[BlackBetsy]

I'd think that the Pyramids SGL is likely more effective.

Good luck!

I'm trying to think about the reasons why this might be the case. Why would you spend and SGL on the Pyramids instead of GL if you only had one AA SGL?

 

[superslug]

@superslug the 4000 AD save was attached twice the first time I submitted, so I submitted again without the duplicate.

The second submission actually had a 1000bc file from a different game, so I accepted the one with two 4000bc files.