Deity OCC Science Victory - G&K Strategy and Tips

[The Pilgrim]

The food is ok, but production is non existent. Everything is slow. NC is slow which means science is slow, which means you can't reach Renaissance in reasonable time and will have to waste policies on Patronage. Late Rationalism = late finish. Religion is extremely slow, and you're lucky to get one to begin with. Bottom line: yuck. OCC is all about location. For me it's pretty much instant reroll.

 

[Tesuji]

One other 'tip' I have is with regards to signing for peace. Invariably, one AI is going to DoW you fairly early. And even though it's easy to rebuff, I found it can be pretty persistent in demanding unreasonable sums for peace. Which leaves that AI out of the loop with regards to RA agreements. Sometimes I even have three AIs at war at me. While usually two of them aren't actually sending any troops my way, they keep refusing to sign for peace.

What I noticed is that initially, the AI will ask for pretty much everything you have in return for peace. But after a little while it will settle for all your gold. What you can do then is first spend all your gold (on RAs, units buildings, whatever) and then sign peace for whatever pennies you have left. So far this has always worked. And if more than one AI is at war with you, the second and third will still sign peace for all your gold too, which is zero. Whatever gold I pay for the peace I usually make back instantly through trade. That is the other remarkable thing, whenever you sign peace this way, the AI gets friendly with you instantly. Even when you paid zero gold.

 

[Goblin_Fury]

I've been trying this on Immortal standard pangaea, and I'm having a hard time meeting the deadlines listed in the guide. I never get education before T120 (closest I've gotten is T126). Once I get it, I have enough gold to sign 4-5 RAs and in lucky games I have the DoF's to do it with that many AI. However, often times the AI doesn't have the money to sign the RA. Sometimes I just give them small money they might need or I buy a lux from them to give them the money for RA.

This just delays all the other checkpoints, and I end up not even building the Apollo Program until T320 or so. This is of course way too late, and I've never won OCC science in immortal due to this timing issue. The fastest I have ever won OCC science was around T340 on Emperor. I'm sure the problem is in my not getting to education fast enough, and this just delays everything else to all hell.

Can someone give me some tips on what I may be missing that is causing me to fall behind? I am literally going pottery-writing first and making library asap, except when I try the ToA rush. What kind of bpt is desired at before and after hitting education?

Thanks

 

[Wargizmo]

I've been trying this on Immortal standard pangaea, and I'm having a hard time meeting the deadlines listed in the guide. I never get education before T120 (closest I've gotten is T126). Once I get it, I have enough gold to sign 4-5 RAs and in lucky games I have the DoF's to do it with that many AI. However, often times the AI doesn't have the money to sign the RA. Sometimes I just give them small money they might need or I buy a lux from them to give them the money for RA.

This just delays all the other checkpoints, and I end up not even building the Apollo Program until T320 or so. This is of course way too late, and I've never won OCC science in immortal due to this timing issue. The fastest I have ever won OCC science was around T340 on Emperor. I'm sure the problem is in my not getting to education fast enough, and this just delays everything else to all hell.

Can someone give me some tips on what I may be missing that is causing me to fall behind? I am literally going pottery-writing first and making library asap, except when I try the ToA rush. What kind of bpt is desired at before and after hitting education?

Thanks

My guess is you're not growing your city enough early. Science is based on your population, you get 1 beaker per citizen and then the library adds an additional beaker per 2 citizens, then the NC takes all of that and adds another 50%, but it all comes back to population.

Try spending the first 20-30 turns just growing the city as much as possible, work the tiles with the most food, get an early worker and make farms your no.2 priority (after luxuries). Even consider rush buying the granary and water mill if you have the cash for it, get landed elite as soon as possible. Prioritise maritime city state quests (+2 food just for being friends), and cultural (gets through tradition quicker for that all important aqueduct and growth bonus)

 

[budweiser]

I've been trying this on Immortal standard pangaea, and I'm having a hard time meeting the deadlines listed in the guide. I never get education before T120 (closest I've gotten is T126). Once I get it, I have enough gold to sign 4-5 RAs and in lucky games I have the DoF's to do it with that many AI. However, often times the AI doesn't have the money to sign the RA. Sometimes I just give them small money they might need or I buy a lux from them to give them the money for RA.

This just delays all the other checkpoints, and I end up not even building the Apollo Program until T320 or so. This is of course way too late, and I've never won OCC science in immortal due to this timing issue. The fastest I have ever won OCC science was around T340 on Emperor. I'm sure the problem is in my not getting to education fast enough, and this just delays everything else to all hell.

Can someone give me some tips on what I may be missing that is causing me to fall behind? I am literally going pottery-writing first and making library asap, except when I try the ToA rush. What kind of bpt is desired at before and after hitting education?

Thanks

You are trying a diety guide on immortal. Tech will go faster on diety, try that level. This guide is also pre-patch so, they may have read this guide and adjusted accordingly.

I havent played a whole OOC diety science since the patch.

Also. Make sure you are finding everyone fast.

 

[Browd]

Try spending the first 20-30 turns just growing the city as much as possible, work the tiles with the most food, get an early worker and make farms your no.2 priority (after luxuries). Even consider rush buying the granary and water mill if you have the cash for it, get landed elite as soon as possible. Prioritise maritime city state quests (+2 food just for being friends), and cultural (gets through tradition quicker for that all important aqueduct and growth bonus)

Strongly agree with all this, with the possible exception of improving luxuries first. Given how cash-strapped the AI is these days, and how little happiness problems you're going to have until you found additional cities (not relevant for OCC, of course), I've found that improving a few farms before luxuries can be effective, DEPENDING on the map and the AIs I've met. For example, if I've met Spain or Attilla (both seem to be rolling in gold early game, due to wonder discoveries (Spain) and CS bullying (Attila)), then luxuries first makes a lot of sense (e.g., raise gold to buy that granary or worker). At the other extreme, if I'm on a water map and the only AI I've met is sitting there with 6 gold and 2 gpt, then I farm, farm, farm, and improve a lux only when I get to 1 or 2 happiness (or meet more gold-heavy AI). Another exception is salt, which gives 1 additional food when improved.

 

[liquid_mage]

@Goblin_Fury
I've been trying to get this to work as well. Typically I play on Immortal. I agree with Budweiser make sure you grow your city. Make sure you are placing citizens into the specialist slots as soon as they come up. I have started planting my first 1-2 GS, this speeds up early techs as soon as possible. Instead of giving the AI gold, loan it to them give them 35 and get 1gpt in return. Hope this helps.

 

[The Pilgrim]

My guess is you're not growing your city enough early.

For sure. It's all about growth. That's why ToA rush is so appealing and very obtainable on immortal. On top of everything listed above early growth means buying tiles with 3 asap whenever you can. Especially banana and flood plain wheat, but also cows/jungle citrus.

 

[Goblin_Fury]

Yea the growth definitely seemed to be the problem. Started over with Haile Selassie and got a jungle start with plenty of +3 food tiles, but building ToA was more or less impossible and I didn't bother. This time I was able to hit education in turn 116, but politics were messed up so I couldn't start most of my RAs until 130 or so, and once again I fell behind. I'm going to go for diplo win on this one (for the kicks), and try the build again on diety in next playthrough.

 

[pauklzorz]

I'm trying this for my first Deity game right now, the problem I get is that my neighbours keep DoW'ing me and mass invade my little area. I have 2 citadels set up, so it's no big problem, they just keep dying in the hundreds, but meanwhile I can't work those tiles, and the other AI's start running ahead of me scientifically. They also keep stealing my techs, even though I have max defense buildings and a level 3 spy in my city. So while I'm fighting AI #1 and #2, who don't want peace even though I'm butchering them, AI #3 and #4 have just finished their Apollo program (I'm still researching radar...) Any chance to save this?

 

[The Pilgrim]

Hi, pauklzorz! Welcome to CFC!
How is that you can't make peace? Frankly, I've never had problems with making peace. AI wants all you have, so if you have nothing... it settles on that.
You have GS saved and RA's cooking, right? Then you're not so much behind. I'd say the chances are decent. Although it's hard to be sure without seeing the save.

 

[Wargizmo]

For sure. It's all about growth. That's why ToA rush is so appealing and very obtainable on immortal. On top of everything listed above early growth means buying tiles with 3 asap whenever you can. Especially banana and flood plain wheat, but also cows/jungle citrus.

The trouble with ToA though is % based growth is negligible early. Early on you're never going to have more than +10 food and typically only around +5, which means building it is the equivalent to less than 1 food, which it's just balls when you consider how long it takes to build. Even late game when you have +20 or +30 food that 10% growth is still only worth 2 or 3 food, which is nice but hardly game breaking. I've always thought hanging gardens is a far, far better wonder, which just gives an outright +6 food, and the free garden never hurts.

Yea the growth definitely seemed to be the problem. Started over with Haile Selassie and got a jungle start with plenty of +3 food tiles, but building ToA was more or less impossible and I didn't bother. This time I was able to hit education in turn 116, but politics were messed up so I couldn't start most of my RAs until 130 or so, and once again I fell behind. I'm going to go for diplo win on this one (for the kicks), and try the build again on diety in next playthrough.

Jungle starts are pretty nasty for OCCs, The science and food is great but your production is so awful and chopping all that jungle takes up so much worker time early; not to mention having to research bronze working just to get access to your luxuries.

Strongly agree with all this, with the possible exception of improving luxuries first. Given how cash-strapped the AI is these days, and how little happiness problems you're going to have until you found additional cities (not relevant for OCC, of course), I've found that improving a few farms before luxuries can be effective, DEPENDING on the map and the AIs I've met. For example, if I've met Spain or Attilla (both seem to be rolling in gold early game, due to wonder discoveries (Spain) and CS bullying (Attila)), then luxuries first makes a lot of sense (e.g., raise gold to buy that granary or worker). At the other extreme, if I'm on a water map and the only AI I've met is sitting there with 6 gold and 2 gpt, then I farm, farm, farm, and improve a lux only when I get to 1 or 2 happiness (or meet more gold-heavy AI). Another exception is salt, which gives 1 additional food when improved.

I still think it's worth it to trade for gpt instead of the cash; you can then trade the gpt for cash later when you discover other AIs (or from the same AI a few turns later), you get a bit less overall but it's not that much different. Obviously in your situation where you've got one AI with 6 gold and 2 gpt it's not worth it, but I usually play on pangaea or fractal so it's not normally an issue to find at least one AI with some money.

 

[budweiser]

The trouble with ToA though is % based growth is negligible early. Early on you're never going to have more than +10 food and typically only around +5, which means building it is the equivalent to less than 1 food, which it's just balls when you consider how long it takes to build. Even late game when you have +20 or +30 food that 10% growth is still only worth 2 or 3 food, which is nice but hardly game breaking. I've always thought hanging gardens is a far, far better wonder, which just gives an outright +6 food, and the free garden never hurts.

I like to stack it with the other modifiers from Tradition and Fertility Rites more than I like HG. The more food you have in your starting zone, the better is ToA.

 

[The Pilgrim]

I like to stack it with the other modifiers from Tradition and Fertility Rites more than I like HG. The more food you have in your starting zone, the better is ToA.

Yeah. Stack ToA, HG, Petra, Swords into Plowshare, Tradition, Incas and some maritime CS and you get 24 size city on turn 111. No Fertility Rites though.

It's the middle game where things get harder usually, and ToA bonus is very helpful once your land is fully developed and you're running at maximum food possible.

 

[Darvon]

Is this guide written for an old patch, or some kind of mod? There are things that just aren't possible in the game I'm playing (e.g. Building an monument, taking tradition, then researching drama to unlock amphitheatre in time to get it for free with Legalism).

 

[Browd]

In G&K (unlike vanilla), you do not need to research Drama & Poetry before taking Legalism. Take Legalism when it comes up naturally and then when you later research Drama & Poetry, a free amphitheater will appear in your capital.

 

[BWS]

Tried this again with the Maya on Immortal. Had a very interesting start: Totally forested hills, with five camp sites, on a river, next to a single mountain. I adapted the plan to Mayan strengths and the situation. I was able to found Goddess of the Hunt, chop out the Great Library, and rush to Theology before turn 62 (Long Count 4.0.0.0.0). I was also finally able to distract some of the aggressive civs with side wars, but unfortunately I still ended up next to runaway Rome. Augustus is currently attacking me with rocket artillery, great war infantry, and cavalry. Hopefully, I can hold him off with my hills, citadels, artillery, and machine guns, although I'm concerned that he may have too big a tech lead to win this war or the game.

 

[Hyperion529]

your start sounds interesting, do you mind posting your initial save? i'd like to try occ with the mayans

 

[BWS]

Sure thing! I have attached my initial save. It's been a fun game. I managed to make peace with Augustus, but unfortunately he beat me to Hubble by about 5 turns, so I don't expect to win this one.

Update: Rome beat me with a science victory in turn 290 (and was about to beat me with diplomatic victory too). Game was off to a very strong start, but I couldn't make enough gold, and my science program stalled out in the midgame.

 

[The Pilgrim]

Is this guide written for an old patch, or some kind of mod? There are things that just aren't possible in the game I'm playing (e.g. Building an monument, taking tradition, then researching drama to unlock amphitheatre in time to get it for free with Legalism).

Legalism was fixed in G&K and now you don't need a tech to unlock its building. It'll wait for you and show up the moment the appropriate tech is researched. So you can safely build a monument early on and pick Legalism right after that. Aqueducts, btw, don't even require Engineering. They appear once you finish Tradition even if you haven't got it yet.