39 turns Exploration
90 turns Antiquity
129 turns so far
Mementos were Corona Civica + Groma (expansionist attribute).
All legacy paths complete + three! civ wipes.
Played on 1.3.0 using the legacy option.
Well I am so happy with this Exploration. 39 turns is a personal best in Exploration and I never get PBs on a GoTM. It is true that thanks to especially
@Manpanzee, but also
@Salamis and
@pmarc I have been getting better at Exploration and in my last 2 private games I was able to finish all paths before t40, but I had not managed to wipe a second civ in Deity before t40. Of course, here in Sovereign level, and with Lafayette and Spain military advantages, wiping that second civ is relatively easy. I am going to extend myself a little longer than usual in this write up as I learned a ton.
The plan:
I spent a ton of time on t1. First was to calculate all 4 legacy paths to see which one was going ot be the limiting factor, taking into account that thanks to Spain my Gold production was going to be very healthy.
Before doing anythng I calculated the 5 over 40 districts. My IP spawn was pretty terrible, I had one friendly science and one friendly food IPs and that was it. I had fortunately one hostile gold IP, but that meant that 4 Guildhall+Bazaar in Rome, Neapolis, Chang'an and Pataliputra could be built. Pataliputra also had a potential tile with 4 adjacencies for a science quarter if I built a wonder, easy as I was intending to build 2 of the ones that have three relic slots, and one of them was definetely going to be El Escorial, Spains wonder, for the additional settlement limit. I calculated the money I was going to get and realized I could buy/build all these over 40 quarters easily before t35, and even before.
Second, the Tosharkana. I was intending to get the "2 relics per city state" religion by prioritizing Mysticism and I had pretty good base influence that I could improve on. I calculated travel times to the IPs and saw I could get to 12 relics by t35 or even earlier if I focused. Also you get a couple of relics from other sources, one from a narratve event and one from one of the settlement limit masteries (Society) that I intended to get. So that was not going to be a limiting factor.
Third, military. This has been the least of our problems since
@Manpanzee taught us the settler spam at the begining of exploration ages ago. Basically, prep build a couple of settlers in Antiquity, then build/buy another extra 4 settlers. 6 settlers planted in distant lands with your religion means you finish the military path without needing to go to war. If you also choose the enhanced belief of "getting your religion on the settlemets you found" and pair it with the Spains rewards for settling own religion DL towns, you not only finish the military path by t15 but you also have really fast growing settlements, which allow you to work all the treasure resources much earlier.
And fourth, and this is the difficult bit, the economic path. This is completely situational based on what resouces you find in DLs that are not too far away. In the last few games, I have been pretty lucky with this. In this game, there is no way to know whether the West sea has DLs rich in trasure resources. But I had a good feeling about it (I could see DL coast, a one tile crossing, and the shape of our coast indicated a significant Island). They have included a new wonder (La Havana) in the shipbulding mastery that can help in a pinch.
So the only thing left to do is wipe 2 AIs in exploration. That is not a great deal, this is sovereign, I have a well promoted Army Commander, a 7 units army, and during Antiquity I had already tanked relationships with Confucious by declaring war and showing up with an army at his borders. So what is left to decide is what other civilization to wipe. I chose Friedrich. Yes, he had 4 settlements, but all his settlements are on coast, and I could attack them simultaneously with a fleet. Also, my Army likely could get on time there after wiping Confucius.
All this thinking in turn one. The execution was easier.
The Execution:
In terms of legacies, I converted Neopolis and Chang'an, changed capitals to Pataliputra (my highest adjacencies settlement), so 4 cities in t1. Legacies, 2 economic to get to 15% discount, 2 diplo to get to the cheap befriend attribute. By the way, I never understood why I did not get my frist diplo point in Antiquity, yes I lost Emile Bell, but I should have had one by becoming the first to befriend a city state. Anyway I had to sacrifice a cultural point to get the 2 diplos. The big innovation was to NOT get Fealty. I had chosen Corona Civica, so I really thought I would not need Fealty with the happiness rewards from Lafayette and the early settlement limits rewards from Spain. And I really wanted to get to 15% yields in towns in the Expansionist tree. So chose 2 expansionist points to add to the expansionist memento and also one militaristic. For the rest, I got 2 Science attributes and 1 cultural.
I then specialized my towns to mining or food as appropiate, mostly mining, I was swimming in gold. I had OK influence so did not do any hub towns.
I opened with Piety, rush bought the temple and then researched the first religion civic to ensure I had the religion combo before my first DL settlement was planted (on t10).
I sent the two cogs West to explore, and the 2 cogs in the south started heading towards Friedrich, chose Cartography and Piety. But by t6, it was clear that there was a true El Dorado about 5 tiles West of our coast. An island with 11 treasure resources! 5 tiles away from our cities! 40 turns explo becomes possible! And 5 turns later, another island with another 5 resources. I planted my settlers. I got excited about this, as I felt wiping the 2 civs would be easy. But when I found the second treasure island and realized that Pachacuti was in one settlement although all the way on the other side of the world, I started to think about THREE AI wipes and getting a sub40 Exploration, something I had never done before. It took me a couple of turns to commit to this plan, so wasted a little bit of time (a mistake, for these speedrunds it is extremely important in civ 7 is to commit to a plan as early as possible and go for it with everything).
I bought the fleet in Chang'an, I already had 2 cogs from antiquity and a bought a fleet commander and three cogs in Chang'an. That fleet was a monster. Attacked Friedrich even before my army got there after wiping Confucious. I also managed to wipe Pachacuti's 2 settlements just in time to finish on t39.
Anyway, it worked, by the skin of my teeth, the end game was very abrupt, by t38 I was under 40% age after wiping Confucius and finishing the military path, but in 2 turns I wiped Friedrich, I wiped Pachacuti, I finished the science path, I finished the culture path and I finished the economic path, On t39 the age ended.
Regrets:
Not so much regrets but a few mistakes I made. I could have finished this game by t38, one turn before. I went to Education and then Shipbulding. it should have been the other way around, first Shipbulding then Education. I lost some time deciding whether to try for the third wipe or not, I could have done that third wipe one or 2 turns earlier. On my treasure towns, I should have bought my 5th settler Immediately on the westernmost settlement in the treasure island and sailed it to the 2nd treasure island to save 3 turns instead of hardbuilding it on the mainland and sailing it. That would have saved 1 turn on the economic path. I should have bought/built one catapult for my Army from the very begining to make war easier. I could have done t38. I think t37 would have been impossible. But really pleased with the result.
For Modern, my science and culture are a bit low. But I have 22 settlements, 4 universities, my empire spans the entire world, and not unlike 16th century Spain's empire, the sun never sets on its lands. I have massive superior military power but I likely will not use it unless I discover that one of the other cities is a production powerhouse better than my own. Now lets hope for a good IP spawn with military and science IPs and if that happens I could do something really special here, pity about the low science. I will not be able to play until I get back, my laptop does not really have the power. I have no feel about how badly off I am science wise, as I conquered a lot of settlements in the last few turns. It looks like maybe 600 spt after I do all upgrades? That's too low for a 30s finish in Modern. Anyway, on the screenshots below I am showing the whole empire, you can judge for yourself.
