Best options for point games?

Phoenix_Reaper

Chieftain
Joined
Mar 28, 2011
Messages
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I want to go for a lucrative point amount, like 20k. Don't know if it's possible but I intend to find out. Anyone have suggestions on what to do to manage this?

So far I'm thinking Huge Great Plains played at a Marathon pace. The Civ I am still undecided on.

Tips anyone?
 
My domination games always have a higher score than my science, culture, or diplomacy games. I think it's the population + city points. If you don't go for a super early domination win, you usually finish all the techs, so that probably isn't too much of a factor.

Maybe you could play near-domination, puppet the world, and do everything you can to increase your population before you hit a time victory.
 
I attempted it and got dam close to 20k! I was going for a time Victory, 16 turns away. I did not know that if you get 8 Branches of Social Policies done you win with a Culture Victory. SO CLOSE!

20085 Points. 578,408 Gold, 15,478 Research. XD
 
I did not know that if you get 8 Branches of Social Policies done you win with a Culture Victory.

20085 Points. 578,408 Gold, 15,478 Research. XD

Cultural victory for 8 branches? Not just 5 + project.... definitely news to me, cool. Nice that there's still things to learn after 1000 hours playing this game - a figure I only know thanks to Steam, tracking how much time I waste.

Grats on hitting 20k - that's a beastly score. Try it next time with India (higher populations) - and disable all victory conditions but conquest/time so you don't get any accidental wins too early.

I'm currently working on a game just like that (except I also have Time Victory disabled).. My focus was to get ALL happiness bonuses from all wonders / policies possible to see just how ridiculous pop can get. Playing on emperor so it's engaging without being hard.

I only wish I could try it on a huge map without turn times becoming unbearable in the late game to *really* test this out.

Once I'm finished the game (another 20-30 hours of playtime I assume), I'll post back in this thread to see what I can get. It will be lower than is possible, due to the smaller map-size and lack of abundant resources, but should still be pretty decent. I'll see if I can approach your 20k on a smaller map (large continents vs. huge great plains) thanks to India's natural advantage when going for high scores.

If I can make 10k+ I'll consider it good for these map settings, then I'll go try on your map-type afterward to really try to push it if I can bear the long turns. I started the game aiming for happiness rather than score, but the two objectives share a great deal of similarity.
 
Cultural victory for 8 branches? Not just 5 + project.... definitely news to me, cool. Nice that there's still things to learn after 1000 hours playing this game - a figure I only know thanks to Steam, tracking how much time I waste.

Grats on hitting 20k - that's a beastly score. Try it next time with India (higher populations) - and disable all victory conditions but conquest/time so you don't get any accidental wins too early.

I'm currently working on a game just like that (except I also have Time Victory disabled).. My focus was to get ALL happiness bonuses from all wonders / policies possible to see just how ridiculous pop can get. Playing on emperor so it's engaging without being hard.

I only wish I could try it on a huge map without turn times becoming unbearable in the late game to *really* test this out.

Once I'm finished the game (another 20-30 hours of playtime I assume), I'll post back in this thread to see what I can get. It will be lower than is possible, due to the smaller map-size and lack of abundant resources, but should still be pretty decent. I'll see if I can approach your 20k on a smaller map (large continents vs. huge great plains) thanks to India's natural advantage when going for high scores.

If I can make 10k+ I'll consider it good for these map settings, then I'll go try on your map-type afterward to really try to push it if I can bear the long turns. I started the game aiming for happiness rather than score, but the two objectives share a great deal of similarity.

India is a VERY BAD IDEA! I played on a Huge map and I let them grow out quite well. When you puppet it increases unhappiness greatly. You may not think annexing is a good idea but when you get so much Culture you don't want to put them into the last trees nothing you can do.

I kept all options viable because I like my things to go to HoF. =)

In the late game yeah it gets very long on a Huge map but it pays in the end.

I might try to cap population on one city tomorrow. One MAJOR problem I did was killing all the Marintine CS's. I wanted their land without thinking their growth gave me more points.
 
I got a 26k score in a game once, though a bit cheezy. Duel map, Diety, modern era start, lucky the other civ started nearby, domination victory in turn 15 or something...
 
My best score is 10,077, domination win on turn 384 at Emperor level, standard continents map, standard speed. At the end my science output was something like 5,000 beakers per turn (a Future Tech every other turn), my culture was 5-6 turns between policies, my gold was about 2,500 gpt. I think I had a military size of about 120, mostly used as garrison troops.

I think that the most important score factors are, in order:

1. Population
2. Land area
3. Wonders
4. Technology (esp. "Future Techs.")
5. Military size
6. Turn No.

Will be standing by for denouncements/ridicule/corrections.:p

-- Cliff in Virginia
 
India is a VERY BAD IDEA! I played on a Huge map and I let them grow out quite well. When you puppet it increases unhappiness greatly. You may not think annexing is a good idea but when you get so much Culture you don't want to put them into the last trees nothing you can do.

I kept all options viable because I like my things to go to HoF. =)

In the late game yeah it gets very long on a Huge map but it pays in the end.

I might try to cap population on one city tomorrow. One MAJOR problem I did was killing all the Marintine CS's. I wanted their land without thinking their growth gave me more points.

India is by no means a bad idea! Break-even point for city size (India vs. other) is 4 - in any city larger than 4, India wins the hapiness / city size contest. Basically, India means "bigger cities". Indian puppets also cause less unhappiness as they grow - their UA works on puppets as well as settled cities. India is my favourite for mass puppet empires.

Ignoring policies (which just make India's cities even bigger), let's look at the maximum size a civ can grow a city while minimizing unhappiness:

Non-India: You can never (without policies/wonders/luxuries) have a city that causes no net unhapiness. The best you can do is -2 until you account for policies - and policies push it further in Ghandi's favour.

e.g.
Coliseum: Size 3, -2 net happiness
+ Theatre: Size 7, -2 net happiness
+Stadium: Size 12, -2 net happiness
(+ Circus: Size +2)

India:

4 Unhappiness from City, 0.5 unhappiness from population

Coliseum: Size 3, -2.5 net happiness
+Theatre: Size 7, -0.5 net happiness
+Stadium: Size 12, +2 net happiness
(+ Circus: Size +4)

Same 'net' for comparison's sake: Size 16, -2 net


Now let's add in policies & wonders

Summary of modifiers:
Theocracy: -25% from pop
Planned economy: -50% per city
Meritocracy : +0.5 per city
Forbidden Palace: -25% from cities per city
Military caste: +1 per garrison
Freedom: -0.5 per Specialist

Let's look at our old size 12 City with all unhappiness buildings now.

Non-India / India
Base net hapiness : -2 / +2
+ Theocracy: +2 / +4
+ Planned Economy: +3 / +6
+ Meritocracy: +3.5 / +6.5
+ Forbidden Palace: +4 / +7.5
+ Military Caste: +5 / +8.5
+ Freedom: Varies with # of specialists (I'll ignore it for now)

So, what's the largest city each can have when you account for *all* of this, and still have no net unhappiness?

Non-India: 12 + (5/0.75) = 18 2/3 (20 2/3 with Circus)
India: 12 + (8.5/0.375) = 34 2/3 (38 2/3 with Circus)

16-18 extra population PER city! Now, if going for a points game, there is no way that's a bad idea, unless I'm missing something big.

In city-spam India games that you let run till the end, you can run happiness surpluses into the hundreds per turn - population growth can't nearly keep up with the rate you acquire happiness buildings at end game, and it's worth having as many cities as you can for points (you get higher total population with more cities - per city + food modifiers and more specialists only consuming 1 food each instead of 2 => spam is best).

I can understand in a 'real' game that other civs are better, but for an abuse-the-mechanics, score as much as possible type of game, I don't think anyone holds a candle to India.
 
My best result was 44k with Askia on a huge lakes map (settler/marathon). Pop settles/workers. Clear Barb Camps for huge amount of money. Buy more Warriors => kill more Camps. Buy Settlers and fill out the Map. Steal rare happy resources from City States before they pop into it. After turn 200 you should have about 50 Cities and all of the happy resources (may be you have to kill a City State for the last one). Buy mud temples in all cities => no problem with SP's. Then buy all of the maritime/cultural City States and conquer the rest. After that it's all about maximising the pop in your cities (never TP!).
 
My best result was 44k with Askia on a huge lakes map (settler/marathon). Pop settles/workers. Clear Barb Camps for huge amount of money. Buy more Warriors => kill more Camps. Buy Settlers and fill out the Map. Steal rare happy resources from City States before they pop into it. After turn 200 you should have about 50 Cities and all of the happy resources (may be you have to kill a City State for the last one). Buy mud temples in all cities => no problem with SP's. Then buy all of the maritime/cultural City States and conquer the rest. After that it's all about maximising the pop in your cities (never TP!).


Damn, very nice. Songhai is a good choice - the extra gold from camps really helps get things going initially. I didn't even know it was possible to get as high as 44k. Well, 20k seemed doable, I don't know that I'll be able to get anywhere near 40k though.

I decided to scrap my previous game and go right into the huge map as Ghandi. Huge/Highlands/Wet/Seas/Scattered/Thin, seemed to give a nice looking map for spamming cities.

I disabled all victory conditions but conquest, so I'm not even worried about playing well. I'll just spam spam spam cities, and see what happens. Went on king difficulty so that I don't need to worry about AI - yet Pachacuti stole my pyramids.

He's likely going to be an early target, Inca can be ridiculously OP on a highlands map. So many tiles with 2 production and 2-5 food (though they work better with mountains set to ranges instead of scattered). On the other hand, Isabella is my nearest neighbour, and the longer the Incas are doing their thing, the more sexy terrace farms they'll leave behind. But I want those pyramids - with SO much land to develop, they will be handy.

Too bad early rushing doesn't work on huge - everyone is just too spaced out - it would have been nice to have taken out a neighbour in the normal window where War Elephants are dominant. So city spam it is.

Was your 44k before the latest patch (i.e. before the new city spacing rules) or after?
 
I am now going to retry my game because it seems I made a mistake. (I like to submit my games in HoF.)

Gandhi will be my new pet to try. I think I'll go with lakes this time in order to maximize land and hopefully food gain. I'll prob play turtle for a very long time and let others cities grow out more and more than puppet them all.

Thanks Kevin J for the insight on Gandhi. Also think I'll drop down to Chieftain so I can make it easier for points. XD
 
44k was after the Patch. I had only 2 AIs and max City States in the game, giving me tons of ruins to pop (foreign scouts get killed on first contact). You should definitely not fail to get the pyramids, if you plan to city spam on a huge map. I used the free GP from liberty for it around turn 50.
 
55k with Japan, future era, settler, duel, pangaea, marathon 15 turns domination win.
Just grab your starting mobile infantry and rush them down, though I did go the honor tree with the 3 starting sp and grab the GG and waited for him, and had to trek through a vast mountain range. Might be faster if it's on great plains or something flatter.

edit: Actually just got a 101800 score with similar setups but on great plains, 7 turns. Looks like turn number makes a huge difference. So a marathon domination win will probably give you the highest possible point.
 
How are you getting scores like these? My highest ever score is 6XXX and that was on a total domination King victory as Egypt where I had a dozen Giant Death Robots and another dozen Stealth Bombers at the end. Nukes, a massive navy, like 10 iterations of Future Tech, every world wonder (some built, some taken), allianced with every CS, over 1K GPT surpluses. My capital was making so many hammers by the end that I could crank out a nuclear missile every 2nd-3rd turn. Only 6XXX, which was only about 1000 pts higher than my first ever CiV game on Chieftain, when I didn't even know the rules.

What's the secret? Ratcheting up difficulty seems to have little or no effect.
 
Winning under 10 turns seemed to do the trick :lol:

Everything else pales in comparison when it comes to your score.

Well, aside from the map size (which obviously affects the time it takes to kill everyone)...
 
Yes these 22k 44k scores are insane! I only topped 20k and that's starting from ancient era. I feel inferior.
 
55k with Japan, future era, settler, duel, pangaea, marathon 15 turns domination win.
Just grab your starting mobile infantry and rush them down, though I did go the honor tree with the 3 starting sp and grab the GG and waited for him, and had to trek through a vast mountain range. Might be faster if it's on great plains or something flatter.

edit: Actually just got a 101800 score with similar setups but on great plains, 7 turns. Looks like turn number makes a huge difference. So a marathon domination win will probably give you the highest possible point.

Words can't describe how ludicrous this is! :confused::eek::cry::crazyeye::(

I just blew away my best score many fold by using this cheap trick of getting a 50k+ finish in 5 minutes! I spent all those long hours playing this game, when there was a 5 minute solution all along! :thumbsup:

Oh wait, there was an ounce of strategy. I had to surround the capital and place my Mech Infantry on rough terrain before the DoW. :sad: Oh yea, and I had to pick Honor with my free policies. :nuke:

I knew that the scoring mechanism wasn't meaningful, but this really hit it home!
 
How are you getting scores like these? My highest ever score is 6XXX and that was on a total domination King victory as Egypt where I had a dozen Giant Death Robots and another dozen Stealth Bombers at the end. Nukes, a massive navy, like 10 iterations of Future Tech, every world wonder (some built, some taken), allianced with every CS, over 1K GPT surpluses. My capital was making so many hammers by the end that I could crank out a nuclear missile every 2nd-3rd turn. Only 6XXX, which was only about 1000 pts higher than my first ever CiV game on Chieftain, when I didn't even know the rules.

What's the secret? Ratcheting up difficulty seems to have little or no effect.

As I posted a couple of days ago in this thread, I think that the most important score factors are, in order:

1. Population
2. Land area
3. Wonders
4. Technology (esp. "Future Techs.")
5. Military size
6. Turn No.

Of course, these factors only come into play in a real game -- not in a 5-minute future-start blowaway!:p
 
I want to go for a lucrative point amount, like 20k. Don't know if it's possible but I intend to find out. Anyone have suggestions on what to do to manage this?

So far I'm thinking Huge Great Plains played at a Marathon pace. The Civ I am still undecided on.

Tips anyone?

settler level, extreme REX and annex the whole world on a huge map without reaching a win before move 500.

i'm playing such a game at the moment and it seems to work out good, but it's very, very boring. so i don't know if i will ever finish this, or try to play on king the first time to get some challenge.
 
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