Cultural Deity before 1000AD is possible

[KMadCandy]

i had an excel spreadsheet i used for vanilla/warlords that you could enter the game date, your culture/turn, and how many GA bombs you expect and get an estimate of the year you'd finish. it calculated the current turn number from the date you entered, and told you the turn number of the final year. but the total number of turns changed in BtS, so i doubt that version works any more. has anybody run across a new one?

 

[FiveAces]

1505 because no marble, not 1st to Lib and reseach not done until 710AD. Only 1F city locations (no wheat/rice) and 2 rel. Will spare everyone the details and just focus on some key points:

Without Oracle, I needed either Academy or skip 1st to Music to be 1st to Lib. Wastin, how do you manage 1st to both Music and Lib w/out Academy? Are you running early sci's in your 2nd/3rd city and don't pop GP from there?

3rd city (cottage) had hammer problems. Had to slave to get anything done. Didn't hurt GP farm too much since timed the 2 slavery periods with NE build and then a quick theater until GP farm ready to run 3 Artists. Wastin may be on to something by saying 3rd (or 2nd) city is hammer city. But question then is without cottage city or GS how do you generate enough sci to be 1st to Lib? Oracle/CS helps of course, but lib in cap is delayed for parth so is it enough?

It seems my problem is generating early sci. Cap had 2 gems, built cottages, 2nd city GP Farm had gold, 3rd city was cottage city and built around 1200BC so not sure where the problem is - maybe not growing fast enough?

 

[jesusin]

@jesusin - I am curious as to your inclusion of Roos since you are going for Oracle and Parthanon. Wouldn't Cyrus be better since he's not industrious? Or is it your experience that he's too aggressive and Roos will always build the Pyramids 1st and allow you enough time to get your wonders?

On bigger maps I use both of them. On smaller maps I prefer Roos, since Cyrus is creative. My worst problem is not losing a WW, but running out of space to settle.

By the way, welcome to the cultural quest. Please, don't (only) try to replicate our games, try out your own ideas and make us bite the dust!

 

[ori]

has anybody run across a new one?

 

[FiveAces]

Latest attempt - reloaded after being beaten to Parthenon by 1 turn. Founded 2nd city (not legendary) on marble as just outside cap's boudaries. Did not work - 4th city (cottage) to slow to develop. Research suffered, but was still 1st to Lib in 440AD because never traded alpha. GP farm only 2F. 13GA (inc music) by 1100 - need 3F GP Farm. Only hindu/conf until late. Needed 3rd rel.

So next time:

If budda spread early, let Mansa get Philo. Trade alpha when sure of music then trade for lit/NE.

If no spread, deny the CoL/medit combo to anyone. Hold alpha, research Philo and hope to pick up music afterwards if nobody has alpha yet, otherwise skip and go straight to Lib. Earlier FS will ease the pain of the lost GA.

 

[KMadCandy]

. add another Golden Age to the 48 or so i owe you already !

 

[Harbourboy]

Holy moly, is this quest still going? Such persistence must be admired!

 

[jesusin]

Holy moly, is this quest still going?

You bet!

 

[FiveAces]

I am thinking for perfect game research path might have to be something like:

Med-Ag/Mining-mason-PH-poly/Writ-CoL(free CS)-Alpha.

It seems counterintuitive to research both med and poly but I am having difficulty getting either Oracle/Parth or confu before the AI and am thinking it is because I am founding hindu instead of bud. If I go hindu, the AI seems to beeline CoL through Med and builds Oracle along the way. If I grab Med, AI seems to not research it (if they haven't started) and skips PH (at first) for mason/mono.

I am also thinking capital build should be worker/warrior-settler-parth if you are not on a PH or better (btw, settling on elephant does not give +1h, even after hunting. learned that one the hard way), and the 2nd city should immediately build oracle - free CS seems worth delaying GP farm setup, esp since it should then be much easier to get music GA and still finish research before 300AD. Or it might be even better if cap can build both oracle and parth (holding the last turn of oracle until CoL is done). Then you get the oracle culture in the cap. Question is, then will AI beat you to parth? Maybe not if you only build 1 settler in cap before starting oracle. hmmm...

For comparison I am going to replay my current game with the above tech path/initial builds and see if it generates a better time than whatever my current one ends up being.

 

[jesusin]

I am thinking for perfect game research path might have to be something like:

I have never tried that. I see two things that I dislike:

- Oracle and Parthenon in the same city would mean that you don't control which type of GP is going to pop.
- Delaying Pottery so much makes early cottages impossible.

Anyway, go for it and please report back, I am very interested in your experiment.

 

[KMadCandy]

(btw, settling on elephant does not give +1h, even after hunting. learned that one the hard way)

plains elephant does, since it gives 2h unimproved. but grassland jumbos don't give a bonus.

 

[FiveAces]

I have never tried that. I see two things that I dislike:

- Oracle and Parthenon in the same city would mean that you don't control which type of GP is going to pop.
- Delaying Pottery so much makes early cottages impossible.

Anyway, go for it and please report back, I am very interested in your experiment.

Yes I considered those drawbacks as well. The first is easier to overcome - don't pop a GP in the capital. Make the GP farm the second city and make sure you pop the first couple GA's there. The drawback is this will slow it's production/growth and prob delay NE depending on when you get lit. Course a bit of luck with GA popping might be what it takes to get 10xx considering nobody's gone 11xx yet.

The second is a bit trickier, and I did consider adding pottery to the above path either before alpha or CoL, but didn't for these reasons: 1) early Oracle in cap will help offset loss of early cottages culture later on 2) early CS will help offset loss of early cottage beakers 3) if 2nd city is GP farm it doesn't need early cottages 4) depending on the map you might not be able to work early cottages in the capital if your focusing on hammers for the wonders - 1F, 2gold, marble, and a mine maxes a size 5, for example.

KMad thanks for the clarification on the elephants.

 

[FiveAces]

Well Cyrus dow'd in 80AD so I got to experiment a day early.

What worked:

med-ag-min-mas-ph-writ-col-cs(free)-poly-alpha-philo-drama-music-paper-edu-lib. Initial builds: worker-warrior-settler-oracle-temple-parth

Oracle/cs 1600BC, parth 10 turns later (forgot yr), both in cap. Founded bud, confu, tao and popped music GA. Philo/pac 510BC. I was able to pop the first gp from my 2nd city gp farm, but not the 3rd which was GP.

By 500AD had 5GA (inc music) and 1GP. Cap had 3 cath, 5 cottages, 2gold plus the oracle/parth culture. I think it would have been ok for 1100.

What didn't work:

Got lib only in 500AD and wasn't first (but only by 4 turns). Only 80bpt in 80AD. Only 2 cottages in 3rd city (supposed to be a "cottage" city!!!) by 500AD. Only 2 workers for what seemed like forever. NE not built until very late due to not being able to build a lib until late.

Why it didn't work:

Wrong build order in 2nd/3rd cities. gp farm had to build settler for 3rd city. 3rd city to slow to grow and build cottages making it completely worthless. gp farm trying to build workers, settlers, gran, lib at same time as running max artists to out gpp capital. Not possible to out gpp capital using only 1 city.

Ways to fix the stuff that didn't work:

Build oracle in 2nd hammer/cottage city (you need ph and 3h tile close). Cap builds 2nd settler before parth. Fixes most problems BUT most maps won't have the necessary site.

Or build oracle in cap but make both 2nd/3rd cities gp farms. Cap worker goes to 2nd city which builds worker (goes to 3rd city), settler, hires artist asap and pops 2GA's. 3rd city builds gran/lib/ne while running artists to pop the 3rd gp before cap. 3rd worker (in cap) comes from cap after parth. Give up philo to reduce research. You need the music GA since you won't have a cottage city.


Other observations:

I quit in 500AD to see if I could incorporate some of the fixes. I couldn't because AI kept beating me to Oracle. Going med first doesn't seem to matter except that it allows you to trade CoL to a couple AI's without jeopardizing philo. But if you give up philo (a possible fix anyway) you still can trade CoL to Mansa, and once he pops it you can trade it to the others. Also going poly first means you don't have to research it later so you can go right from oracle to parth or start as soon as marble ready if you're not building oracle. also keeps some AI away from poly/parth.

1st tech should be poly.

 

[jesusin]

Very interesting stuff. Too short on cottages is the main problem, isn't it? Even 5 in the capital is too few, I usually aim for 10, (but never really got to do it).

Have you thought about using a GS to help your research? Losing a GA is a big loss, but hiring scientists instead of artists for the first or secong GP helps your research and an Academy or bulbing Philo "guarantees" being first to Liberalism.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge

 

[WastinTime]

I think the secret to 1100 AD on small maps is the hammer city (formerly known as the cottage city.) There's not enough time to grow cottages and Saladin isn't financial. An early monastery is 4 culture instead of 2. That's like a village. Build 4 of those, 4 temples, 4 cathedrals, early theatre (for 6 culture), obelisk, castle(?), parthenon, Taj(?)etc. Then once you're done building, it converts nicely to a GP farm. All your miners become artists.

 

[Xin Yu]

I think the secret to 1100 AD on small maps is the hammer city (formerly known as the cottage city.) There's not enough time to grow cottages and Saladin isn't financial. An early monastery is 4 culture instead of 2. That's like a village. Build 4 of those, 4 temples, 4 cathedrals, early theatre (for 6 culture), obelisk, castle(?), parthenon, Taj(?)etc. Then once you're done building, it converts nicely to a GP farm. All your miners become artists.

I think the secret is to use GS to lightbulb techs. Each GS will save about 10 turns. If they become GA then that's only less than 3 turns' saving (he has 1200 culture points per turn, so a GA is less than 3 turns' worth). To further explore this idea, I think it will be interesting to build an academy using a GS, and try to lightbulb more techs that's worth more than 5 turns of research (paper, for example). It needs careful planning, sometimes requiring NOT to get certain techs in order to be eligible to lightbulb the right tech.

The big 'bare' culture points come from two sources: 1) early culture buildings and 2)developed cottages (other sources are not time-dependent, but these two you have to start early). A hammer city will be good for the first but not the second type. It will be fantastic if we can do both.

Leader trait is also a consideration.

Spiritial is good in that it saves at least 3 turns anarchy time, plus a potential benefit in whipping buildings (carefuly planned building sequence may take advantage of the halved temple cost, thus have more left-over shields for the next high-cost building).

Philosophical is good in fast GS production, thus save more turns for research. It also benefits for fast GA production, but not as good as early GS.

 

[WastinTime]

Extra GS lightbulbing was explored and we had turned away from that, but that was on standard size maps. I agree that on small maps, more GS's is a good idea. I even suggested earlier that you could consider dropping the philo trait and use Mansa, since fewer GA bombs are needed, because you will have 2 cathedral cities instead of 1. That's probably not a good idea. Having extra GS's for lightbulbing seems better for research than the financial trait. But fin does boost culture, and I haven't ruled out that trait yet. Since we've decided we will have the Parthenon, that makes Philo even less attractive.

 

[Xin Yu]

I just did my homework for lightbulbing using GS. Assume you always have the techs 'Pottery' and 'alphabet' already, then

1) You MUST obtain mathematics first. Then you can lightbulb 3 techs: paper, philosophy and education, PROVIDED THAT you don't obtain the tech 'machinery'.

2) If, furthermore, you don't obtain fishing (that means you can't pick a civ with fishing as starting tech). Then, provided that you obtain 'Ironworking' and 'Metal casting' first, you can lightbulb the 4th tech, liberalism (after the above 3 in step 1).

GS preference:
Writing (already have)
#Mathematics (must research)
Scientific Method (not possible)
Physics (not possible)
*Education (lightbulb)
Printing Press (requires machinery)
Fiber Optics (not possible)
Computers (not possible)
The Wheel (already have)
*Philosophy (lightbulb)
Chemistry (not possible)
Fission (not possible)
Fusion (not possible)
Optics (requires machinery)
*Paper (lightbulb)
Astronomy (requires Compass and Calendar, both require sailing)
Biology (not possible)
Electricity (not possible)
Flight (not possible)
Genetics (not possible)
Compass (requires sailing)
Satellites (not possible)
Sailing (requires fishing)
Alphabet (already have)
Calendar (requires sailing)
Medicine (not possible)
Ecology (not possible)
#Iron Working (must research)
#Metal Casting (must research)
Engineering (not possible)
Steam Power (not possible)
*Liberalism (lightbulb)

 

[jesusin]

Astronomy (requires Compass and Calendar, both require sailing)

I think Astro requires Optics, not only Compass.

I have lightbulbed up to 4 GS in the past, the last one on Liberalism by trading for sea techs up to compass but avoiding Machinery. I don't remember if that was a Std or small map, though, and I don't understand the influence that the map size has on prefering a GS or a GA.

In my games a GS saves 6 turns, not 10. And a GA saves 2,5 turns. However the GS saves researching turns, which convert into "100% culture turns" at the beginning of the 100% culture phase; while the GA saves turns at the very end of the game. At the beginning of the 100% culture phase you don't have as many cathedrals and your cottages are not as developped as in the end of the game, so a turn saved by a GA is worth more than a turn saved by a GS.

This summer I was talked into the idea that 3GS-saved-tuns equals 1GA-saved-turn. I am not completely sure about this x3 factor.

 

[Xin Yu]

You are right. Thanks for picking up the error. If you don't have fishing, you can lightbulb liberalism easily. Otherwise you need to obtain sailing, calendar and compass then lightbulb liberalism.

I always think one turn is one turn. Suppose at the beginning of the game you pop up a hut and get a tech you are currently researching, and saves you one turn. You would think that you can finish the game one turn early due to that, don't you? This one turn is maybe 10 bulb's worth though. Can we say that this turn is worth 1/100th of a turn in later stage? Certainly not.