Dom or Hist?

[Lord Emsworth]

I have game going at the moment. It is a huge D/DG pangaea map with 60% water, I playing as the Chinese, and the game is actually going very, very well. The date is 590AD and my score is already at 7305 points. This is an increase of 187 points from last turn (7118) which means that the internal per turn score is at 39656.

Sniffing through old HoF threads I found a thread where Dianthus posted graphs of the then best scoring games:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=3422354&postcount=8
Incidentally the games graphed there are what I would be 'competing' with were I to continue with a milk run. I am way ahead of them all in both actual and internal per turn score.

The is one tiny problem with my game however. The domination limit is egregiously low. The map yields a measly 3580 tiles which I could get to score. And I just fear that something similar happens to me, as did to SirPleb's (?) game on the graphs. He too was quite strong towards the beginning amd easily ahead of Moonsinger's and Mazarin's games, but in the end probably simply fell prey to lower scoring potential of his map. Of course I am ahead even yet more than that, but likely have an even yet lower dom limit.

I don't really know what the dom limit of these games is as the only tool that I use, jmapstat, does not seem to work on these PTW saves. I have tried with one of Mazarin's saves, but jmapstat does not seem to recognize them.

Originally I intended this game actually a domination game. However, when I could capture the Pyramids from my very close by neighbors, the Iroquois, in 1400-1500 BC I switched goals (not that it made a big difference at that point).

So, what should I do? Continue with a histographic game at the risk of simply getting caught by higher dom limits? Or just go for domination and be done with it? Atm I am still about 500 tiles below the dom limit, but with a ton of workers (and several dozens of settlers) and the recent discovery of Steam Power I can probably finish the game within very few turns at will. Or just wait and see a little? The domination date to beat is still far off in the distance at 1285AD or so.

 

[Elear]

I always recommend Histographic.

 

[DWetzel]

I'd say that if you can get a big-time #1 domination victory, I'd do that. A small domination limit = great for domination/not so great for histo, no?

 

[ignas]

I always recommend Domination.

 

[Spoonwood]

I recommend Domination, because it's Vanilla. Call me biased, but I don't see a Vanilla tribe outdoing on an agricultural map given all other factors as equal. Even in Vanilla, does China make a good choice there, since the militaristic trait does nothing for you in the milking phase? Of course, it's a good trait for a fast domination game.

Concerning SirPleb's game vs. the other ones, do we know that he had similar city spacing/numbers of content/happy citizens as early as the other ones? Did his cities grow differenlty than the other ones?

I don't the domination limit on my histographic game (I have a save in my thread, if anyone knows how to check it), but I managed 21,800+ on a *standard* 60% pangea demi-god map, where I SGL built the Pyramids in like 2800 BC. The second place standard deity map played on an archipelago map and scored less than 200 points higher than me, and the first place game on Deity played on a pangea map, so the domination limit itself doesn't matter as much as one might think. The more relevant calculation comes as food per domination tile. That's harder to calculate. You also never know when an archipelago map will have a lot of coastal tiles on it.

 

[Chamnix]

Just curious - why 60% water if you were going for domination?

 

[Lord Emsworth]

I recommend Domination, because it's Vanilla. Call me biased, but I don't see a Vanilla tribe outdoing on an agricultural map given all other factors as equal. Even in Vanilla, does China make a good choice there, since the militaristic trait does nothing for you in the milking phase? Of course, it's a good trait for a fast domination game.

I don't have to outdo agricultual civs (if that was what you meant). I would implicitly be competing with the PTW Ottomans. And from what I can see, China definitely makes for a better choice than the Ottomans here in this scenario. Although both have an outstanding UU well suited for conquering large chunks of territory, I think the fact that the Chinese Rider comes earlier gives it the edge over the Sipahi.

When it comes to traits I don't think that any of those that are in Vanilla or PTW give a civ a big, inherent advantage when it comes to scoring as does the agricultural trait in C3C. With the exception of industrious maybe, but both the Ottomans and the Chinese have this trait. I think Industrious is almost a mandatory trait to have on mid to high level games.

Wrt to the second trait, military does not actually come out so much worse, if worse at all, than the remaining traits. With mil I get rax, walls, harbours, airports and SAMs cheaper. Cheap rax help a lot towards the beginning of the game, esp. if you use warrior->sword upgrades for the first warring (20 shields less for a rax means 2 swords more per town that builds military!). Walls, airports, and SAMs are almost irrelevant, but the cheap harbours (40 instead of 80) are very nifty and have a fairly lasting effect throughout the build-up stage of a milk-run. Cheaper harbour may not be entirely as useful as a cheaper cultural building, but the saved 40 shields per coastal town come fairly close to the saved 20-40 shields per cultural building (20-40, because sometimes you would only need a 60 shield temple, whereas sci gets by with a 40 shield lib and rel with a 30 shield temple). If the type of building on which you have a discount is still not enough, then there is still the higher chance of battlefield promotions that comes with mil. Very useful on a huge, high-level map as it means that you'll simply have a higher quality military and will get more leaders overall. In this game here at hand, I've gotten 22 leaders until now and since this is Vanilla I could easily spare three of them on SunTzu's, Leo's and JS Bach's. I also could spare some of them on Palaces and FPs, and still manage to get a couple armies up (armies in Vanilla and PTW are nowhere near as strong as they are in C3C, but they are still very helpful).

The tech freeby of sci civs wouldn't have mattered at all in my game, because early on (AA and very early MA) I was simply relying on AI tech research, and later on ... well, in Vanilla there is a 90%+ chance that you get Nationalism, which is next to useless.

So, yeah, China makes for the best choice I think (even more so, since I don't even have the Ottomans) in a game where you spend a lot of the time slugging it out with the AI.

Concerning SirPleb's game vs. the other ones, do we know that he had similar city spacing/numbers of content/happy citizens as early as the other ones? Did his cities grow differenlty than the other ones?

Just look at Dianthus' internal per turn score graph. What you'll see is that the green line simply caps at about 78K, whereas the other ones only cap at about 89K (OK, Mazarin's line does a curious zig zag). What effect this had on the actual score you'll see on the other graph posted; the green line, although ahead earlier, is eventually overtaken. What exactly determined the shortcoming here matters little. It might have been a bad city placement, but it might as well have been a lower score potential, i.e. dom limit. (I very much suspect the latter.)

I don't the domination limit on my histographic game (I have a save in my thread, if anyone knows how to check it), but I managed 21,800+ on a *standard* 60% pangea demi-god map, where I SGL built the Pyramids in like 2800 BC. The second place standard deity map played on an archipelago map and scored less than 200 points higher than me, and the first place game on Deity played on a pangea map, so the domination limit itself doesn't matter as much as one might think. The more relevant calculation comes as food per domination tile. That's harder to calculate. You also never know when an archipelago map will have a lot of coastal tiles on it.

Wrt to food per domination tile I would simply assume that the games won't dramatically differ in that respect as long you don't compare cold and dry with warm/temp and wet/medium humidity. (I have temperate and that medium humidity (I forgot what it is called) and the map looks quite fertile). At least not so much as it is possible with the dom limit. A low dom limit on a huge map is 3500-3600. A high dom limit is 4300-4400. That's a difference of 20ish percent.

 

[Spoonwood]

I forgot about cheap harbours. That definitely sounds useful. I don't see a point to cheap cultural buildings. You only need culture to prevent flips and maybe if you really want a border expansion. For instance, in my game, I did build some temples at the borders... but I built like a library or two if that, and didn't even dream of universities. I basically let the AIs research a little, bashed them, and then did scientist research (O.K., that won't work as well in Vanilla... but still, beyond Sanitation and Replacable Parts, what do you really gives you much benefit tech-wise? Maybe Cure for Cancer, but only if the luxury slider then changed a content citizen to a happy one, instead of an unhappy one to a content one). Considering cheap harbours, quicker promotions, and cheaper barracks militaristic might actually then work as the best Vanilla trait. Especially when you consider that coastal cities have poorer tile selection, and thus fewer shields on average.

If they have equivalent numbers for food per domination tile, then pangea would seem better for the faster conquest.

If you only care about competing with the PTW Ottos, I'll change my mind and go histographic. But, take plenty of deep breaths, take your time, and manage your workers well to maximize growth. Then rename yourself "Lord Emsworth: The Pollution Cleaner."

 

[Lord Emsworth]

Just curious - why 60% water if you were going for domination?

That is a good question. But I chose 60% because I want to actually play and play on a pangaea. With 70%/80% I made the experience that all too often the pangaea just turns out to be a de facto archipelago, and there is no way I am gonna play one of these - I just don't like them. Sure, there might be that one 80% pangaea, but I also don't want to play and ditch game after game just to find out. So, I willingly trade a later finish date for more playing pleasure.
(My last submission, D/DG conquest on a large map was on a 60% map as well.)

In addition to that, the current #1 on a huge D/DG map has a finish date of 1280AD (not 1285 as I said earlier), and I figured I could beat that easily even on 60%. Looking at my game, I think it turns out to be true.

And, for a final reason, there is always the option of maybe taking the game for the full 540 turns instead, if it shows to be good enough. And that is what I am pondering now.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

I forgot about cheap harbours. That definitely sounds useful. I don't see a point to cheap cultural buildings. You only need culture to prevent flips and maybe if you really want a border expansion.

I think you'll need quite a few cultural expansions Optimally I think you should try to work as many tiles as possible within your cultural boundaries with as few cities as possible. The city centers themselves just don't score so well. They only yield two (three with agri) food and deny a tile to a happy laborer. So, eventually I think it would be best to approximate the ideal of OCPed metroes as closely as possible. Which of course means that amongst the necessary builds there is very often "some token culture." You won't need it always, but you'll need it more often than harbours I think.

For instance, in my game, I did build some temples at the borders... but I built like a library or two if that, and didn't even dream of universities. I basically let the AIs research a little, bashed them, and then did scientist research (O.K., that won't work as well in Vanilla... but still, beyond Sanitation and Replacable Parts, what do you really gives you much benefit tech-wise? Maybe Cure for Cancer, but only if the luxury slider then changed a content citizen to a happy one, instead of an unhappy one to a content one). Considering cheap harbours, quicker promotions, and cheaper barracks militaristic might actually then work as the best Vanilla trait. Especially when you consider that coastal cities have poorer tile selection, and thus fewer shields on average.

If they have equivalent numbers for food per domination tile, then pangea would seem better for the faster conquest.

If you only care about competing with the PTW Ottos, I'll change my mind and go histographic.

I am more competing with 55.3K points.

But, take plenty of deep breaths, take your time, and manage your workers well to maximize growth. Then rename yourself "Lord Emsworth: The Pollution Cleaner."

Don't worry about the workers. I have ≈500 nationals and ≈300 slaves (numbers increasing dramatically) and they all want work. So, for now it is "Lord Emsworth: Employment bureau."

 

[Spoonwood]

I think you should try to work as many tiles as possible within your cultural boundaries with as few cities as possible.

I understand that's so called "conventional wisdom" and it does yield more citizens. But, it causes more pollution, and pollution takes a happy citizen off the tiles. Maybe that gets offset by having more tiles available to work though. Metros also have slower growth than more smaller cities. Moonsinger's 88k game doesn't have such spacing... though perhaps that's a weakness. Additionally, tiles count towards score, so before have your cultural built you either have unused tiles (hence a domination limit problem) or you have a temporary camp... which means more settlers, so less population earlier on. With cultural expansions you also risk triggering the domination limit, and maybe you don't mind losing a fast space game due to late game bad luck, but I wouldn't feel the same way about a histographic game. Having said all that, I still think conventional wisdom correct in that larger cities with more tiles work out better... but even that's tricky as gaps even within your cultural borders seem like a waste... and a CxxxxC spacing leaves gaps.

*laughs* employment bureau. I more meant matching worker jobs to pick up growth. Like with New New Beijing at size 7 and it reads 7 turns... well you can knock that down to 5 or 4 turns slapping down some railroads and irrigation quickly before the turn ends (hence I don't get people who like the Iroquois in conquests so much for this). Surely that's redundant for you at this point, but it's kind of a new experience for me... and I gave it up on it in my histographic game towards the end even as I didn't take enough "deep breaths."

 

[Lord Emsworth]

[/QUOTE]

I understand that's so called "conventional wisdom" and it does yield more citizens. But, it causes more pollution, and pollution takes a happy citizen off the tiles. Maybe that gets offset by having more tiles available to work though. Metros also have slower growth than more smaller cities. Moonsinger's 88k game doesn't have such spacing... though perhaps that's a weakness. Additionally, tiles count towards score, so before have your cultural built you either have unused tiles (hence a domination limit problem) or you have a temporary camp... which means more settlers, so less population earlier on. With cultural expansions you also risk triggering the domination limit, and maybe you don't mind losing a fast space game due to late game bad luck, but I wouldn't feel the same way about a histographic game. Having said all that, I still think conventional wisdom correct in that larger cities with more tiles work out better... but even that's tricky as gaps even within your cultural borders seem like a waste... and a CxxxxC spacing leaves gaps.

OCP is a little tighter than CxxxxC. It would use CxxxxC on only one axis, and CxxxC on the other axis, and then offset the CxxxxC axes by two tiles:

CXXXXCXXXXCXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXCXXXXCXXXXC

There are no unusable tiles between the cities, and each city will have 20 tiles at its disposal.

And the matter of camps is not such a big issue either. Whether you use OCP with camps, or use 12CC the original amount of settlers needed is about the same. If you used something looser than 12CC, say, CxxxC then you would have unworked tiles inbetween your cities until Sanitation, or found camps.

I think the real trick is to morph the earlier tight placement into a loose OCPish placement without incurring too much population loss. Which means you need to start to think about the final city placement quite early.

*laughs* employment bureau. I more meant matching worker jobs to pick up growth. Like with New New Beijing at size 7 and it reads 7 turns... well you can knock that down to 5 or 4 turns slapping down some railroads and irrigation quickly before the turn ends (hence I don't get people who like the Iroquois in conquests so much for this). Surely that's redundant for you at this point, but it's kind of a new experience for me... and I gave it up on it in my histographic game towards the end even as I didn't take enough "deep breaths."

Worker management is just murderous at the moment. I am very relieved to have railroads now, so I don't have to factor in movement anymore.

 

[Donny Brook]

1. If it's SirPleb's score calculator you're using, be aware of the disclaimer that it approximates your score once the game is fairly static. You still have tiles to occupy and population growth ahead.

2. If you're gonna milk it, come and feel my pain. I've got 200+ turns of cleaning pollution and micro management before submitting my emperor game.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

1. If it's SirPleb's score calculator you're using, be aware of the disclaimer that it approximates your score once the game is fairly static. You still have tiles to occupy and population growth ahead.

I think that the score prediction if all stays same gave me about 29K. The internal per turn score is somewhat higher, 39.5K. If I am not entirely misunderstood that is pretty much what you'd get if you had what you have now for the entire 540 turns.

 

[Calis]

2. If you're gonna milk it, come and feel my pain. I've got 200+ turns of cleaning pollution and micro management before submitting my emperor game.

What size is your map, Donny?

 

[Donny Brook]

What size is your map, Donny?

Huge (ouch). 20+ spots of pollution some turns (pre-mass transit). Plus it's an archipeligo map, so sometimes I have to transport troops around (pre-airports).

 

[Spoonwood]

Maybe America makes a good choice in Vanilla at Deity, *if* you pop the free settler. Of course, the expansionist trait also helps put you in a tech bartering position. Thing is, you'll need to either hand build The Hanging Gardens or Pyramids or Hoover's Dam and Cope's or MGL rush them for a GA, right?

 

[Lord Emsworth]

Maybe America makes a good choice in Vanilla at Deity, *if* you pop the free settler. Of course, the expansionist trait also helps put you in a tech bartering position. Thing is, you'll need to either hand build The Hanging Gardens or Pyramids or Hoover's Dam and Cope's or MGL rush them for a GA, right?

The de facto lack of any kind UU, and the almost total uselessness of the expansionist trait later on all rule strongly against America.

I have been toying with the idea of using Egypt, though. The War Chariot has an interesting side 'ability.' As long as you haven't had a GA and horses are present, you can build them no matter what. And building those 20 shield units en masse in order to upgrade them either to Knights (+100/50 gold) or even Cavs (+120/60 gold) certainly sounds very interesting. No need for the disconnecting hassle, plus just more shields bought at extremely low prices.

 

[Spoonwood]

The de facto lack of any kind UU, and the almost total uselessness of the expansionist trait later on all rule strongly against America.

The Maya (at higher levels) basically have the same UU problem in Conquests... it's a golden age trigger and not much else. The expansionist trait, somewhat like the agricultural trait in one respect, doesn't end up useless later *if you pop the early settler*, because the early settler puts you in a stronger position earlier, making the later game easier. Can't scouts pillage also?

 

[Lord Emsworth]

The Maya (at higher levels) basically have the same UU problem in Conquests... it's a golden age trigger and not much else. The expansionist trait, somewhat like the agricultural trait in one respect, doesn't end up useless later *if you pop the early settler*, because the early settler puts you in a stronger position earlier, making the later game easier. Can't scouts pillage also?

I think the chance for an early settler here is almost negligible (As an aside, I have popped settlers with non-epx on deity as well). The biggest expansion comes when you annex your first AI empire.