Cultural Victory Challenge #3: Huayna Capac

[InvisibleStalke]

You don't need to take Hannibal out immediately - just get a couple of Quechas down there and pillage his copper - and any pastures you see. Kill any warriors and archers. Follow up with 4-5 Quechas and you'll be able to keep him locked in his cities while you expand and tech.

If you get down though and he has hooked up copper with roads to his capital - back off!

 

[ratrangerm]

Round Two: 2225 BC to 1050 BC

Things went along a bit slowly during this round, but the coming round, I expect things to start picking up. Allow me to explain.

I kept a Quecha down near Hannibal's area to keep an eye on him. Part of it was my hope that I could steal one of his Workers if he popped out to get the Copper (which he did found a city near, but wouldn't claim without a border pop) and then just keep a couple Quechas around to harass him after that point. It never got to that point, though.

In the meantime, I founded my second city.



I went with the spot suggested in this thread. I cottaged up the Flood Plains once I got Pottery, and while I started on a Quecha at first, I got Pottery the next turn and then switched to a Terrace. I could still use the Quecha for accompanying a future Settler.

As for why I started cottaging the flood plains, I wanted to take advantage of the riverside territory. There's another site I have in mind for a future GP farm, and this city could still work in that aspect, as it would have more than enough food to work appropriate tiles and run some specialists on top of that.

During this round, somebody else founded Judaism (it wasn't anybody on my continent) so I forgot about Monotheism. Instead, after I got Animal Husbandry, I went for Iron Working so I could claim that jungle territory to the north. I already spotted three ideal city sites and wanted IW so I can clear the jungle away.

Back to AH for a minute, I have no shortage of Horses.





I also took advantage of my Industrial trait for my first Wonder, which I built in Cuzco



And somebody observed that I should have at least one other resource besides Corn by settling in place... and as it turns out, Horses weren't the only resource waiting to be revealed, because after I got IW...



Now we're in business... it's certainly possible now to put together an army to take down Hannibal.

I'm on the path to Writing now and it will be researched in one more turn, but I stopped after Cuzco built another Quecha-Settler combo for another city. Here's a look at the map.



Cuzco is now working on Oracle, with which I hope to get Theology, but I believe I need to get Monotheism first, correct? If so, I'll head down that path after I get Writing. Then I think I need to prioritize Drama, so I can get Theatres alongside my Terraces and start running Artists.

My second city will be purely an Artist city, so I might locate the Parthenon there. But first, that city will concentrate on whipping out a Barracks and units to go knock Hannibal down a few pegs. With the Terrace already in place, I should be able to whip out units at a rapid pace.

Here's the jungle territory to the north.



As far as where to put cities, here's where I have three locations in mind.

* 1N of the Rice and 1SE of the Sugar, and that can serve as a GP farm once I get Calendar.
* 1N of the Cows and 1SW of the Clams, and that will be a good production city with two food sources and Copper to be mined, along with a couple other hills.
* The isthmus that has the two Gems squares and the Rice, which I think can work very nicely as my third culture city. In fact, I may prioritize that as my next city so I can beat Zara to the Gems, provided he hasn't already gotten there first (and I'm hoping he didn't go down the IW path... if he hasn't, it's not likely he'd head that direction, as he does have some viable land nearby.

I have Open Borders with Zara, so I know he already has Writing. Once I get Writing myself, I'll open the borders with Hannibal so I can scout his territory. And then I'll do the same with Ragnar... Hinduism spread to his lands, so I should be able to buddy up with him easily enough. With any luck, Hinduism will also spread to Zara. I'd like to keep him and Ragnar on fairly good terms while I deal with Hannibal.

So maybe a Quecha rush would have been better, but I can still take down Hannibal easily enough now that I have Iron, Horses and a perfect city to whip units out.

Any other suggestions for what else to consider or that I may be overlooking in my game plan for the next round?

Saved game follows.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Your third culture city might be Hannibals capital. You are industrious, so I would go for your third culture city as one that can build lots of wonders too.

Anyway I think you need to take Hannibal out soon. You don't want a long protracted war - you want to get down to some serious wonder building.

I have a suggestion for your rice/sugar city. Don't chop one single jungle. It will suck for quite a while - but will be fine for whipping temples and missionaries. When you get Biology (keep researching with an industrious leader - you want to get to at least radio to build lots of wonders - and biology is on the way to Medicine which will give you Sids Sushi), build the National Park there. When you switch to 100% science you will be able to run around 16 free artists. Add in National Epic (aren't you glad you can build National wonders faster too) and this city will pump out Great Artists like crazy.

 

[Nuageux]

Why dont you settle on the east sugar?
5 resources!!!!!
food and production!!!!
you only need one more good city

 

[oyzar]

Why are you cottaging tiwanku? you need a great artist farm up asap and with multiple floodplains rice and pigs that makes a nice example. Just churn it full of artist wonders(pantheon sistine chapel etc) and you can get away with max 1 prophet if you are fast enough... Meanwhile use your capital to settle the jungle pop confu and tao and you shouldn't have a problem to win this game rather fast... A quecha rush can of course be done instead of or before settling the jungle... You need alot of workers to settle the jungle. But please don't ignore the fact that to win cultural you need great artists to get there as fast as possible. It is of course true that tiwanku also make an excelent cottage city however you don't have many other sites that are good for gp farm nor that will get up that fast. Getting a GP farm up with globe theater + national epic + pantheon + more artist wonders would speed up your victory date tremendously. Get 1 other great cottage site that doesn't share it titles(carthage capital maybe?) and ~6 other sites for building temples and cruise your way to victory. I assume you are going for code of laws off oracle?

Why is the capital only size3 in ~1000 BC? The focus should be on #1 killing hannibal. #2 get the great artist farm set up. You do not want more than one great priest. This was the reason the other game went so slow. Please don't ignore me again... Getting your capital, hanibals capital(you can just rush him with q's. Why the heck are your capital working a grassland hill mine over the horse pasture? Do you not micro manage your cities at all?? That title is strictly better(even though you should focus on growing first!!).. Once you have hannibals land(easilyh acomplished with your UU...) just make sure you henerate a huge number of great artists(easily acomplished in tiwanku). Oh and you can settle as the sugar as the above poster says however that is not where the focus should be now, nor should you probably be building oracle. What you should be building is a massive number of your UU to totaly swarm hannibal so you can use his capital for your own. Of course you should also grow your cities, you don't even have granaries in your cities(your UB which provides culture!!).

I don't like Invisible stalkers idea of a jungle artist farm as this will not generate any artists before the game is over by using my method...

 

[dragomaster]

I did my best and made a dotmap how I whod build my next citys up north.



Site A is for early happynes and late comerc
Site B is for production only
Site C is for late comerc

whell lets se how you settle your citys.

 

[oyzar]

Those sites are probably fine. He doesn't need more than 2 cottages cities due to the nature of cultural though hence it is better to just farm it over and run spare artists there, every great artists can shave off the victory time by quite alot. I would settle the city on top of the northern desert hill before those though for the gold, it can also work 6-7 floodplains and should speed up your research quite a bit. If you take hannibal's 3 cities you don't need more cities after that since any cities after your 9th will be a waste unless they directly speed up your research. Site B should proably be a missionary pump site. If you take out hannibal get the oracle and manage to get your great artist farm up in time for you to not generate a second great priest i will be impressed. After done settlign these sites you should be aim to be first to music and then first to liberalism. Try getting as many great artist wonders as possible in twanku. Oracle should probably be skipped though as you need alot of quechas to declare on Hannibal and you need to build them before he get his copper online(though you do have quite some already i admit. Declrearing war on him before you are ready would mean you would have to waste alot of time since he would build up his defenses(the AI is quite ok at building up defense when they first get into war).

If you cottage up tiwanku you won't have any real GP farm which would be a waste... Also grow to happiness cap before starting on workers and settlers.. You have a ton of good titles to work!!

Once you get to CS you should farm the title SE of Cuzco.

 

[ratrangerm]

OK, let's go over a few things to do...

* Switch Cuzco from the Oracle to a Terrace (the second city already has one). Then follow with a Worker.
* Since I have Iron, I probably don't need too many more Quechas, but I can always take the Quechas defending cities and replace them with other units. The good thing is the Quechas I have are already promoted (two to City Raider I and one to a Medic), so I can add Axemen and Swordsmen now to the stack.
* Replace the Cottages on the second city... I can pull the Worker away from Cuzco since I won't puruse Oracle now. Second city should whip out the Settler and then get started on military builds.
* I definitely want to get that Gems site before Zara gets there, and personally I'd rather found it on the isthmus. Although ship building isn't a priority, it may still be helpful to have. There's no seafood there to necessitate it be moved away from there. Oyzar's Gold city will then be the other city to found. Then I can go back and fill the other spots later.

The jungle artist farm is a nice suggestion, but I'm not certain if I'll get to Biology or not before it's time to rurn up the slider. A lot depends on the tech pace... it will quicken once I claim the Gold and Gems sites, but I've usually found, once I turn the slider up, that I don't get as far as Biology. The biggest reason is that it requires Scientific Method, which obsoletes Parthenon (which I certainly want to build).

And the tech path... should it still be Monotheism next, or just head straight to Aesthetics and Drama?

 

[ratrangerm]

Round Three: 1050 BC to 245 BC

This round was shorter, and much of the time was spent building up a force to take on Hannibal. I stopped before the invasion as I'd like to get some advice on the path of attack... I have one in mind, but wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything before the invasion begins.

First of all, I switched around tiles worked in Cuzco and switched builds to a Terrace.



I never did build a Worker there, as I was able to build them elsewhere without problems. Instead, after the Terrace, I began chopping a Barracks and military units.

I also switched around the tiles in Tiwanaka, and had my Quecha sitting around pillage those cottages.



With those matters out of the way, I then had to decide what to pursue next after Writing. I opted for Code of Laws so I could have the Caste System option available, and wanted to see if I could found Confucianism. The latter didn't happen, though... Zara ended up founding it.

After I got Writing, I opened borders with Hannibal and Ragnar and then snooped around Hannibal's territory.

I also founded the Gold/Flood Plains city as ozyar suggested.



Later, I founded my Gems city on the isthmus.



Both will help with my economy once they get developed. Machu Puccha, of course, is to be cottaged up, while Ollantaytambo probably will be as well.

I got Code of Laws in 365 BC but didn't switch to Caste System right away. I was still needing Slavery to whip units for my military stack. I then pursued Masonry, then went to Monotheism, but I'm now I'm wondering if I should switch. I'll get to that in a moment.

I stopped in 245 BC... I have a stack of Axemen, Swordsmen and Quechas ready to go. Here's a look at Hannibal's territory.



He has four cities founded so far... I'm thinking Utica should be the first to go, as that's a Copper city on a hill. He has another city founded on top of Iron, though, so I'll still be seeing more than Archers... but I've noticed the AI tends to produce Swordsmen instead of Axemen if it has Iron. And yes, Hannibal has IW... I've seen both an Axeman and a Swordsman from him when I peaked into his territory, although he doesn't have a lot of units, and there is a spot in Utica which I can enter immediately after declaring war and he only will have time to whip one unit there.

After Utica, then go to Carthage. I will certainly keep Carthage, and am leaning towards keeping Utica, while razing that Iron city... there's no reason that city shouldn't be on the coast, as it would still claim the Wheat and Sheep. The Horse city he has might be better off somewhere else, too, so that may also be razed. One thing to note: Both Carthage and Utica are on hills.

There's also a Barb city to the south of Machu Picchu... I already know I'm going to raze it once I send units that way, because it's not in the best spot.

I've got a couple more Swordsmen coming out, but now I'm thinking I should get a couple of Chariots out to capture Workers or pillage. Should I switch builds?

Tech path: Part of me says I should switch to Alphabet and see what I can do with trading with Zara and Ragnar. For example, Zara is running Organized Religion, so I know he has Monotheism, but I'm not sure what I have that I could trade it for. There's also the Drama/Music beeline to consider. Should I switch from Monotheism to something else?

Lastly, how soon should I make the switch to Caste System? There's plenty of unhappiness in Tiwanaku as a result of me whipping units out, so I've turned off growth for the time being until that unhappiness goes down, but I'm checking the city each turn to see when I can let it grow again. Obviously, I want it to grow again so it can start running Artists. But I may want to keep Slavery for a while so Cuzco can keep whipping units if necessary. Thoughts?

Any other things I may have missed along the way or changes I need to make?

Saved game follows.

 

[Tecibbar]

I've figured it out. From my experience, a flood plain is a Desert (no hills) tile with access to fresh water through a river (Oases and Lakes don't count).

Some of the desert next to river are just plain desert.

Huayna Capac is the best for culture win. enough said.

 

[ajil]

A little off topic, but I just have a quick question. I tried cultural in civ 4 vanilla. But the predominant way to win via culture involved turning off your science slider and turning up culture. I really did not like that, as it could take you from a powerhouse to a scrub. Are there some other general strategies available now for the culture win?

 

[ratrangerm]

The general rule of thumb is to turn up the slider to 100 percent once you have all the techs you absolutely need to have. The rule of thumb differs depending on the situation.

After you do that, you can still run a respectable tech pace by running Representation.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Are there some other general strategies available now for the culture win?

There have been for a while. Take a look at RB-19

 

[oyzar]

That is quite an attackforce when 20 quechas would be enough to take him out quite some time ago..

 

[DaveMcW]

I downloaded the save and took him out with 4 Quechuas. His single warrior didn't have a chance...

 

[InvisibleStalke]

A little off topic, but I just have a quick question. I tried cultural in civ 4 vanilla. But the predominant way to win via culture involved turning off your science slider and turning up culture. I really did not like that, as it could take you from a powerhouse to a scrub. Are there some other general strategies available now for the culture win?

There are three main approaches for a culture win. All involve getting lots of religions and at least 9 cities so you can build a cathedral for each city. Beyond that:

- Cottage 3 cities, run specialists in the remainder (or whip them for missionaries/temples etc). Shutdown research once you have the techs you need - usually liberalism at least for 100% culture. Great for financial leaders.

- Run three GP farms, cottaging everywhere else. Do not adust the culture slider beyond what is needed for happiness until very late. Run caste system and artists in the 3 GP farms and get your science from your cottages. Settle early artists, culture bomb late ones. Great for Philo leaders.

- Wonderspam in 3 cities. No need to stop research with this approach until very late in the game (radio/mass media). Culture from wonders provides most of the culture output. Great for Industrious leaders.

The last approach is my favourite because the wonders themselves give you other benefits other than culture and you can keep a strong economy and military. Denying the AI wonders brakes their growth a little.

I think this game is not looking like a culture game yet. There is a massive investment in a war with Hannibal that could have been settled with Quecha's early in the game. It can still be recovered if the war goes well. Personally I would go straight for the jugular - in this case the capital. And I would build axes until the war is over. They will do better against the swords and axes he will be building.

 

[ratrangerm]

Cultural Victory Challenge: Huayna Cupac, Take Two

Long story short, my mistakes in the first challenge came back to haunt me. Despite having all those units, I was seriously behind in tech and Hannibal had Construction and Horseback Riding, meaning he had Catapults and Numidian Cavalry coming out, as well as Castles protecting his cities. I knew at that point that I was going to have an uphill battle to face and that a Cultural victory simply wasn't going to happen.

I'll be honest: It was my fault, and it boiled down to this -- I played the game as if it was Noble, when I had moved up to Prince and should have paid more attention to detail.

So I am starting this challenge over with a brand new save. Here's the starting location for the second take.



We've got Rice, riverside territory, an Oasis in an odd spot (I don't often see them that close to Flood Plains) but will give us access to fresh water should I settle in place (not that the lake wouldn't as well). And honestly, I think I should do that. I can work the Oasis to start and take advantage of the commerce on top of the food. But if somebody feels differently, feel free to say so.

As for the builds, I'll do what I should have done before... take Dave's advice and build four Quechas. Once I get the fourth Quecha built, I'll stop there and then we can figure out who is the opponent to rush.

Saved game follows.

 

[oyzar]

Btw the first game was certainly winnable.. You don't need to take so long to build up military and get your cities up and going...
As for the new start: That is what they call the ultimate quecha farm. Plains hill with plains hill forest in first ring pumps out a quecha every 3 turns. On prince you should be able to take out your continent with this one easily(since maintainance on prince is so low it shouldn't be much of a problem). Found both early religions if possible. The other start that is tempting is of course the oasis the irrigated rice etc but i think you can just kill at least 1 or maybe 2 neighbors first.

 

[The Rook]

An alternative plan for the first game would have been to leave Hannibal alone, and pursue a peaceful cultural victory with just 6 cities (9 cities is overkill, some cities need cathedrals more than others). The resources that would have been used for war could have been invested in wonder spam, and pursuing religion (Cuzco had great production potential). Build Stonehenge and Oracle (don't worry about Great Prophet pollution, shrines produce culture, and gold too!), use Oracle to grab COL, and the first prophet to bulb Theology, this would put you in a great position to grab Divine Right later (at least 3 religions). When researching expensive techs, beeline towards Music for the Sis Chapel, the AI is often slow to follow this route so you should have some nice techs to trade as an added bonus . There were a couple of great spots for cottage spam, the cottages would have provided superb base culture for your remaining legendary cities (plus help to surge you ahead in terms of research).

I say try to stay peaceful when pursuing a cultural victory (unless your enemy leaves you nowhere to expand). Grabbing a bunch of remote, unhappy cities would cripple your maintenance anyway. A small, well developed empire can easily out-perform a bloated empire in terms of research prior to the industrial age, and you would be switching off research after Liberalism (or not too much further) anyway.

EDIT: With all its forests, Cuzco would have worked nicely with the National Park + National Epic for a final surge of great artists (if you research as far as Biology).

 

[The Rook]

I would suggest settling in place, and work the oasis straight away to guarantee an early religion (you start with Mysticism). Personally, I'd go for Meditation (for potential Oracle slingshot later). Oasis+financial+Mysticism should equal a formality.

Whether you pursue war or not is up to you, but unless you lack the space for 6 cities (3 good ones), then war shouldn't be necessary. I think the peaceful way is more in the theme of pursuing cultural wins. I'm not suggesting that war isn't effective, but lets face it, once you are the dominant force, it hardly matters which victory path you pursue.

Personally I would forgo building lots of Quechuas until you know who/where your nearest enemy is. Ironically, the Quechua rush is less effective beneath Monarch as the AI doesn't start with Archers. The most conventional start would probably be worker first, and you have farming, so it would be guaranteed something to do, even if you pursued religion first.