Design an ideal OCC game

[Ali Ardavan]

You get to design the map. You pick your and your rivals' starting positions. You choose the game parameters (barbarian activity). The goal is the quickest OCC finish by space ship at Emperor level. How would you do it?

What map size? What would you have in your starting location besides access to 4 specials? What specials would you pick, and why? Where would you put your rivals? How many rivals? Any particular civs you would like to include/exclue? Would the world be pangea, continents, archipelago, something else? What level of barbarian activity will you choose, and why?

 

[Ali Ardavan]

I will choose to start on a small island all of whose land is within my city radius. This way I will start with free techs and possibly an extra settler. I will choose 2 whales, wine, and silk for my specials. I will make the starting tile a grassland. I will have the rest of my city radius consist of 8 shielded grasslands and 8 oceans.

I will pick the largest map size possible (10K tiles) and put my island next to a large uninhabited continent. I will put my 6 rivals each on their own island big enough to host 3-5 cities.

I am not sure about the level of barbarian activity. On the one hand, getting a leader at 50/100/150 is a joy. On the other hand, more often than not they are just a pest pillaging your land and killing your units. They also introduce another element of randomness into the result. I am tending towards setting barbarian activity at the lowest possible level. I would like to hear what others have to say on this.

 

[ElephantU]

Small map, round and archipelago; Purple civ; start on a medium-sized continent with two other "Rational, Perfectionist, Civilized" civs; city radius (not starting location) with 1xWhale, 1xSilk, 2xWine, rest rivered grassland; Barbs at Raging Hordes; 7 civs total, restarts on.

Do you get to choose starting techs and number of settlers too?

 

[ElephantU]

And the "why":

Small map: Shorter distances to contact other players, higher delivery bonuses over shorter distances;

Round: Two routes to get to everyone;

Archipelago: AI civs don't start on same continent, wasting time warring with each other; lots of ocean for ship chains and exploring for huts later on;

Purple civ: Not my own KeyCiv (rarely hit Supreme), the largest AI civ Keys off me, and no Mongols;

start on a medium-sized continent with two other "Rational, Perfectionist, Civilized" civs: The best trade routes are to an AI city on your own continent; two civs gives more options for picking trade route destination cities, and higher chance of starting techs and 2nd settler; and RPC are the "calmest", most interested in being good neighbors and developing large trade cities;

city radius (not starting location): want worse terrain at starting location to get 2nd settler or few starting techs; also pick up a couple huts moving to OCC location;

1xWhale, 1xSilk, 2xWine, rest rivered grassland: Whale for 1st worker (only 1 cause cannot road Whales later on), Silk for 2nd, Wine for mining and roading later, rivered grass for more food and trade (after BridgeBuilding);

Barbs at Raging Hordes: Higher payout for BarbLeader and greater frequency, more opportunities for bribing cheap NONE units;

7 civs total, restarts on: More potential allies for gold-begging, research slaves for off-path techs, no holes in KeyCiv slots due to wars.

 

[Ali Ardavan]

Small map: Shorter distances to contact other players, higher delivery bonuses over shorter distances;.

I know the amount of trade per turn generated by a route increases with distance. Are you sure the delivery bonus is higher over shorter distances?

Purple civ: Not my own KeyCiv (rarely hit Supreme), the largest AI civ Keys off me, and no Mongols;

Wonderul points. I did not even think of this one making a difference, but it certainly does.

start on a medium-sized continent with two other "Rational, Perfectionist, Civilized" civs: The best trade routes are to an AI city on your own continent;

Could you please define best?

city radius (not starting location): want worse terrain at starting location to get 2nd settler or few starting techs; also pick up a couple huts moving to OCC location;

Great points again, which I missed.

rest rivered grassland

Good point about rivered. I forgot to mention that.
Do you really prefer an unshielded grassland to ocean? With a Harbor Ocean gives you one more arrow and one fewer food vs. roaded irrigated unshielded grassland. I will take the arrow without hesitation as the extra food is not very useful when most of your growth comes through celebrations. Late in the game the ocean will get an extra shield (offhshore platform) vs. the grassland which gets an extra food (supermarket & farmland) and an extra arrow (superhighways). Still I rather have the shield as it helps me get to a base shiled production over 32 which with factory, powerplant, and manufactruing plant puts me above 80 shields per turn which is ideal for qucik construction of a space ship. Of course, all that extra food at the end results in a larger city population. But on the other hand, the ocean does not require the services of a settler/engineer. I doubt if a single settler can keep up with the celebration growth if you have 16 grasslands to deal with.

 

[ElephantU]

I know the amount of trade per turn generated by a route increases with distance. Are you sure the delivery bonus is higher over shorter distances?

Ongoing trade route is NOT affected by distance to destination city. Only the delivery bonus.

start on a medium-sized continent with two other "Rational, Perfectionist, Civilized" civs: The best trade routes are to an AI city on your own continent

Could you please define best?

"Best" here means highest potential for amount of ongoing trade routes. A "critical path" RR connection and SuperHighways gives you a 150% multiplier; just the "critical path" road gives you 50%. Doing OCC, two things matter: getting and milking as many alliances as possible, and maximizing the trade of your city. Trade routes are one way to achieve the latter; repeated deliveries of unblocked commodities is another.

Do you really prefer an unshielded grassland to ocean? With a Harbor Ocean gives you one more arrow and one fewer food vs. roaded irrigated unshielded grassland. I will take the arrow without hesitation as the extra food is not very useful when most of your growth comes through celebrations. Late in the game the ocean will get an extra shield (offhshore platform) vs. the grassland which gets an extra food (supermarket & farmland) and an extra arrow (superhighways).

I want Ocean access, but not all Ocean tiles. Sometimes there's no choice (GOTM43 is a good example), but given the choice I'll take the Grass, preferably rivered. Rivered Grass gives you the same trade as Ocean after you discover BridgeBuilding, and before you don't have to build roads. Irrigation is cheap and gets you 50% more food than Ocean, which means your city will have Specialists once you get over size 20. Plus, the Superhighways bonus will kick in extra on all those roads. That's why I only wanted one Whale as a special - you cannot road Whales, but they are great to get you started in Despotism.

Still I rather have the shield as it helps me get to a base shiled production over 32 which with factory, powerplant, and manufactruing plant puts me above 80 shields per turn which is ideal for qucik construction of a space ship.

Making 80 shields is over-rated in my book. I usually aim for 30 in the mid-game, sometimes 50 in the end-game. I shoot for stockpiling freights and gold to rushbuy the spaceship parts. I also buy two AI Engineers to deal with pollution and last minute terrain transforms, and a bunch of cheap Barb&AI ships and defenders to disband if I don't have a large pile of freights.

Of course, all that extra food at the end results in a larger city population. But on the other hand, the ocean does not require the services of a settler/engineer. I doubt if a single settler can keep up with the celebration growth if you have 16 grasslands to deal with.

Use your second settler to road and irrigate around the city until it hits size 2, then Join him into the city to make it size 3 and start celebrating. A celebrating city in Despotism gets the full benefit of terrain specials like in Monarchy, particularly the irrigated grass and the 3rd or 4th trade from Whales, Silk, Spice and Wine. A celebrating Monarchy gets the extra trade arrow of Republic. Shoot for the latter before you deliver your first caravans to the AI. Once you get into Republic, celebrate up to size 7-8 and pop out two Settlers to work on irrigation. If you have some done already you can usually celebrate back up to 8 again. A ship and a Dip out exploring usually turns up a Nomad at some point; bring him home and disband one of the supported ones. After Explosives, immediately gift it to all the AIs (especially the one with Leos and the one you have your trade routes with), then start exchanging maps until you find a couple Engineers far from their capitals to bribe. Grab two (should be 200-400g each, sometimes I pay more), bring them back home and disband any remaining supported ones.

The other issue with Harbors is the need for Pottery. If I don't get it as a freebie tech I try to avoid getting it until mid/late game when I want to force commodity supply changes. Pottery greatly increases the amount of poorly demanded Salt. If the AI develops Seafaring early I'll do an immediate trade, otherwise I'll wait.

 

[TimTheEnchanter]

Not understanding all the rules, but somehow the city should be placed such that it produces hides

 

[DSN]

Well this is my fist attempt at an OCC.

The city ended up being quite big (28), with over 400 science and 90 production. I was helped by the fact that I played King level I think with only 2 AI, so I managed to build loads of wonders. I realised that in OCC the important wonders are the ones that I usually don't bother with and vice versa. I.e. Shakes, Newton etc. are very useful, whereas Mike, Bach, Pyramids etc. aren't.

The place I started was good; some forest hills, ocean and mostly plains (but no river), so I was lucky. I suppose I could have grown a bit more by turning the forests into irrigated plains, but somehow I didn't bother.

I got to 1999AD, but although I had all the tech for spaceships, I somehow wasn't allowed to build it. I don't know why.

Saved files:

 

[Ali Ardavan]

I want Ocean access, but not all Ocean tiles. Sometimes there's no choice (GOTM43 is a good example), but given the choice I'll take the Grass, preferably rivered. Rivered Grass gives you the same trade as Ocean after you discover BridgeBuilding, and before you don't have to build roads. Irrigation is cheap and gets you 50% more food than Ocean, which means your city will have Specialists once you get over size 20. Plus, the Superhighways bonus will kick in extra on all those roads. That's why I only wanted one Whale as a special - you cannot road Whales, but they are great to get you started in Despotism.

OK. I suppose rivered unshielded grassland is superior in this case to ocean since by the time you
get to use it (above size 12, for the first 12 you would use the 4 specials and the 8 rivered shielded grassland) you have likely discovered bridge building. One can also compensate for the extra shield through offshore platform by converting the grassland to forest temporarily before space ship construction and convert it back afterwards.

Making 80 shields is over-rated in my book... I shoot for stockpiling freights and gold to rushbuy the spaceship parts. I also buy ... a bunch of cheap Barb&AI ships and defenders to disband if I don't have a large pile of freights.

I disagree. Under 80 shields, you cannot build anything outright in one turn. With 15 structurals, 2x3 components, and 1x3 Modules space ship construction takes a minimum 24 turns. Unless you deliberately delay construction of Apollo I find it highly unlikely that you have enough freight/units/gold to help you get done in 24 turns. With 80 shields per turn, you only need help getting done 6 components and 3 Modules done in 9 turns which is still considerable. Also, typically Apollo itself uses quite a few of your stockpiled freights.

After Explosives, immediately gift it to all the AIs (especially the one with Leos and the one you have your trade routes with), then start exchanging maps until you find a couple Engineers far from their capitals to bribe. Grab two (should be 200-400g each, sometimes I pay more), bring them back home and disband any remaining supported ones.

Great idea. Never thought of it before. Thanks.

 

[Ali Ardavan]

... somehow the city should be placed such that it produces hides

What is the big deal about hides?

 

[Ali Ardavan]

I got to 1999AD, but although I had all the tech for spaceships, I somehow wasn't allowed to build it. I don't know why.

Since Apollo is built, the only explanation I can think of is that when you started the game you chose bloodlust as part of custom rules.

 

[TimTheEnchanter]

What is the big deal about hides?

Most of the time, when you deliver goods to a city that item in the supply list becomes blocked and goes from Beads to (Beads) in the list. For the most part, these blockages remain in place until the supply list changes due to city size, acquired techs, improvements, terrain transformation, etc. and some subsequent trigger forces the list to be recalculated. These changes do not happen with great frequency so one of the limitations of OCC is that your 3 trade supplies get blocked and often stay that way for a long time, forcing you to build food vans, and limiting your ability to take advantage of one of the most powerful tools in the game: delivery bonuses for cash and research.

For some reason, Hides supply and demand are never "blocked" when a caravan or freight is delivered. A city supplying hides will always have the option of producing hides when a caravan or freight is built. Knowing that the city will produce Hides for the majority of its existence would allow the creation of a ship chain to a moderate distance, fairly large AI city - preferably one that repeatedly demands hides. Once the chain is established, you could use the delivery bonus gold to rush a caravan every turn and still pocket some extra cash. The delivery bonus beakers would be extra on top of the city beakers and would accelerate research. The extra beakers could facilitate a number of 1 turn techs - something that is often hard to achieve from one city's research alone.

 

[DSN]

In the OCC I did notice that some supplies got periodically unblocked. I never knew this could happen, so I was rather surprised. I thought it might have something to do with the AI capturing cities

 

[ElephantU]

I disagree. Under 80 shields, you cannot build anything outright in one turn. With 15 structurals, 2x3 components, and 1x3 Modules space ship construction takes a minimum 24 turns. Unless you deliberately delay construction of Apollo I find it highly unlikely that you have enough freight/units/gold to help you get done in 24 turns. With 80 shields per turn, you only need help getting done 6 components and 3 Modules done in 9 turns which is still considerable. Also, typically Apollo itself uses quite a few of your stockpiled freights.

I felt the same way when I started OCCing, but I've discovered it is not as crucial as PaulVDB asserted. It is also very hard to do in some situations, notably GOTM43. 21-4 ocean tiles bring in 1 shield each; 4 land tiles with Forests make 3 shields each with RR, for a total of 29. Transforming the land to Hills would solve the problem, but that takes significantly longer, losing both the trade from roaded Grass/Plains and the extra food for specialists (and ultimately, 3/4 of the workers on the Hills as well, if you don't have much surplus food in the box).

The solution I have evolved is to focus on maximum trade, micromanaged to produce excess gold as well as necessary beakers, coupled with unblocking commodities, alliance begging, purchase/exploration for NONE units, and early focus on stockpiling of caravans and freights well before Apollo. After Apollo I crank research down to the minimum to get Fusion in 24 turns, shifting the rest to Taxes. If I do not have a caravan or freight to start a spaceship part, I disband a NONE unit or RushBuy a Barracks (160g), then RushBuy a large enough city improvement so that I will be able to produce the extra shields to finish the part. I try to be producing around 25 or 50 shields in the mid-game after Factories (an early KingRich can make this happen even earlier...) to punch out caravans every turn or two. With a city producing 30 shields, I can RushBuy the shields I need for around 12,000 gold (secondary use for SAM: RushBuy 100 shields for <200 gold, switch to structural and let city production finish). Drop that to around 5,000 gold if I have 24 caravans or freights stockpiled after Apollo. If I can go into Apollo with 63 I've got it made without gold. If my city is producing 50 shields, I only need around 10,000 gold for RushBuying shields or 4,800 if I've got 24 caravans or freights stockpiled. And some of that needed gold can be earned or begged during the 24 turns of building, since your research is turned down.

Take a look at some of the recent GOTMs where I've done OCC (red highlights) and look through my attached logs. I haven't finished #43 yet, but #40 was a decent one, as well as a couple in the mid to late 30's.

 

[ElephantU]

In the OCC I did notice that some supplies got periodically unblocked. I never knew this could happen, so I was rather surprised. I thought it might have something to do with the AI capturing cities

The major influences on what is supplied are documented in Samson's thread "How Supply and Demand Lists Change" in the Apolyton Great Library. Basically, as your city grows and as you gather more techs the beginning supply commodities decrease in priority while others increase. When you get a new commodity it is automatically unblocked; if you deliver it to the right city (one whose own trade arrows are less than one of the cities you already have trade routes with) you will not set up a new trade route and thus block that commodity supply. Using this trick and "WonderBread" (starting a wonder, contributing a food caravan to release the supplies, then switching to caravan production) you can reset the supply commodities to repeat more often than the regular 16 turn "Solo Cycle". The key is to keep an eye on your Supply list and your trade routes for any changes after you lock in the first three routes.

 

[ElephantU]

Knowing that the city will produce Hides for the majority of its existence would allow the creation of a ship chain to a moderate distance, fairly large AI city - preferably one that repeatedly demands hides.

The problem with this theory is that Hides is an early-game, small-city commodity. In certain city locations it can be a "wildcard" until the civ reaches 32 techs, but otherwise it is usually available when the terrain around the city is rough (Forest/Tundra/Glacier/Jungle) and the city is below size 8. When the civ's techs reach 49 it's likelyhood is halved again.

That said, if you do happen to get Hides, especially in the middle slot, MILK IT till it disappears. Try to produce a caravan every other turn if possible. Stockpile the Hides for future deliveries - they make great "unblocking trade routes" later on too! Keep the city small (also helps to keep your Power Rating down, which encourages more gifts from allies) and refuse off-path tech trades.