Fast Science Victory: Civ VII Edition

[Manpanzee]

Fast science victories are always a fun topic, and Civ VII seems to be reaching a relatively stable state for exploring and comparing. I got a very nice game for my first full run in patch 1.2.0, and will share that to kick things off:

--Jose Rizal leading Greece -> Hawaii -> Mexico
--Deity difficulty, all standard settings
--Only used attribute mementos: Scientific + Cultural in Antiquity, Scientific + Expansionist in Exploration, Expansionist + Diplomatic in Modern
--197 turns total: 96 Antiquity, 60 Exploration, 41 Modern

It is possible to finish quite a bit faster if using some of the more OP civs (Bulgaria, Maya, Abbasid), but at this point I’m just trying to get a handle on what’s achievable while playing relatively “fair”. I think the 200-turn benchmark is a reasonable target for a lot of setups, and that a dream game avoiding the more broken civs could get down to around 190 turns, but probably not much less than that.

Golden Ages were Economic in Exploration and Scientific in Modern. Pre-patch, I thought that Scientific was basically always best in Modern, but higher city costs means that Economic may now pull ahead of it in a lot of cases. However, current allocation of Treasure Fleet resources also means that having access to the Econ golden age may not be something you can reliably count on. It wasn't an option for me in this game.

Communism was the ideology choice, and probably always should be for science victory. The raw specialist science is obviously great, specialist food is now pretty relevant, and the +hammers for projects at the end of the tree is fair compensation for skipping out on Fascism’s specialist hammers.

The double-project requirement after you’re done teching means that “chopping” type hammer effects are extremely powerful, and thus I’d rate Bulgaria and Maya significantly above everything else for fast science victory. In this game, I was fortunate to have access to five Militaristic independents, which I was able to keep around and “chop” after finishing the last tech. Saving the IP chops for the right time is now much easier to accomplish with the changes to IP and AI civ behavior in the latest patch.

I ended Antiquity with three cities, Exploration with seven cities, and Modern with seven cities again. That’s far less than half my settlements in all cases. I know there are a lot of people out there claiming that “all cities all the time” is the meta, and that anyone who knows anything knows that towns are worthless, but I didn’t buy that before the latest patch, and I don’t buy it now. Of course, I could be wrong, and that’s why we post these kind of things: to share concrete game reports and have a clear context for discussing claims.

 

[vorlon_mi]

Few questions --

• From the screenshots, it looks like you didn't move your capital. Correct? Thoughts?
• Harvesting IPs (rather than befriending them) is a fascinating idea. Especially since (post patch) the AI players are less likely to disperse them
• Choosing Communism vs. not choosing an ideology: For my first several games, I didn't choose an affinity at all, to avoid a war with an ally. Do you find the benefits outweigh the potential costs?

 

[Manpanzee]

From the screenshots, it looks like you didn't move your capital. Correct? Thoughts?

I didn't, but that was probably a mistake. Even if it's already in the "right" place and you don't really want to move it in Age 2, it's probably worth doing to unlock the free city upgrade moving it back to it's original spot in Age 3. More relevant now that getting the final Econ golden age in a reasonable time is seemingly less reliable.

Choosing Communism vs. not choosing an ideology: For my first several games, I didn't choose an affinity at all, to avoid a war with an ally. Do you find the benefits outweigh the potential costs?

Even on Deity, I don't find the AI unlocks ideologies much earlier than turn 40. Maybe a couple might pick it up around 35? If you're ending the game fast enough, it doesn't really matter.

 

[pmarc]

Besides the resources with different effect in capital vs. other cities, is there any other game mechanic that is affected by choice of capital?

Turn 40 modern is really fast! If you can post the final save, I would be curious to see what the cities look like. One thing I've been wondering in my games is how early to prioritize specialists over more tiles (esp. production tiles) in cities.

 

[Manpanzee]

Besides the resources with different effect in capital vs. other cities, is there any other game mechanic that is affected by choice of capital?

Turn 40 modern is really fast! If you can post the final save, I would be curious to see what the cities look like. One thing I've been wondering in my games is how early to prioritize specialists over more tiles (esp. production tiles) in cities.

For Modern, I want the capital in the highest potential production city, for the extra resource slots to pump up project hammers. For Exploration, I want the capital in the city that's best for taking advantage of city center quarter adjacency. Often these are the same city, which is when I don't really want to switch.

The IP chops in this one cut around 7-8 turns from the game. I unlocked the final tech I needed on turn 38, and was able to finish chopping out both projects only three turns later. It makes a huge difference.

I think I'm usually going to almost all specialists in city growth around halfway or two-thirds into Exploration. Unfortunately, I deleted the save already, and may not be able to recover it. But my cities were stacked with specialists by the end -- with the fishing/farming towns I had, cities were growing in 3-4 turns the entirety of Modern. So I was able to add a ton of specialists in that era alone.

 

[Salamis]

Thanks for sharing this, I really enjoyed it.

In the Antiquity Age, was a lot of the end of the age determined by the Deity AI completing legacy paths?

I don’t have a comparable deity-level playthrough to share (yet!).

I just finished the Exploration age at turn 50 on Sovereign:
--Tecumseh leading Greece -> Ming -> Still to decide!
--Sovereign difficulty, standard settings (largest map size)
--Mementos: Ant: Lydian Lion and Expansionist Attribute; Exp: Golden Seal Stone (Influence per age on Science buildings) and Scientific Attribute.
Scientific Golden Age in Exploration. Finished Antiquity on turn 106 with 5 cities each with a complete Greek unique quarter and Academy (for the Golden Age).

In Exploration the strategy was to suz a Scientific Independent Power first, and take the free technology per suzed IP. Then suz as many IP’s as possible. The end of the age was accelerated by multiple free Future Technologies. The Economic Legacy path was nowhere near complete but the other three were.

Greece is the most important component of the strategy due to their Tradition for reducing the cost of befriending IP’s: suzing IP’s in Antiquity means they start friendly in Exploration so you can suz them more quickly and cheaply.

This strategy might not be viable on deity if the ai destroys IP’s but I will give it a try!

 

[Manpanzee]

In the Antiquity Age, was a lot of the end of the age determined by the Deity AI completing legacy paths?

The AI on the current patch is capable of finishing the scientific legacy path very fast. The fastest I've personally seen is turn 90, and reading reports suggests that mid-90's isn't terribly uncommon. The AI helping out with this path should make achieving sub-100 Antiquity much more frequent than before.

I have never seen the AI complete economic or cultural in a relevant time, but I have seen them finish military fast enough to matter. Sometimes they even manage a civ wipe without your help, which really boosts things. Unfortunately, there's a significant luck factor, and the absolute fastest Antiquities are probably all going to be games where the AI chips in with some kind of assist.

However, it's still possible to do it all yourself in under 100 turns. In the posted game, I did actually manage to complete Antiquity without AI helping age progress at all.

I just finished the Exploration age at turn 50 on Sovereign

50 turns Exploration is extremely impressive! My personal best on Deity is 54 turns, but that was on a previous patch with friendlier treasure spawns. With treasure changes alongside IPs surviving longer, it's definitely plausible that stacking city-states to push Future Tech could be the best Plan A at the moment.

 

[Salamis]

However, it's still possible to do it all yourself in under 100 turns.

That’s good to know. I haven’t got close to a sub 100 antiquity age yet but that will be my next aim

 

[Manpanzee]

Another game I’d like to share. Not as impressive results-wise, but maybe some interesting strategy to discuss, namely: TALL MODERN ERA!

Confucius leading Khmer -> Majapahit -> Siam
207 turns total: 110 Antiquity, 60 Exploration, 37 Modern
Mementos: Science attribute + Culture attribute, Science attribute + Culture attribute, Diplo attribute + Confucius 9 (science on specialists)

Antiquity was completed with all legacy paths plus one future tech. I had a weak hammer start and failed to wipe anyone in a meaningful time. While there’s still room to compress Antiquity quite a bit more than this even without a civ wipe, I think in most cases going for a wipe is pretty much mandatory. It counts for too many turns, and it’s too hard to compress the later ages by a comparable amount.

Exploration had 1/3 economic, all other legacy paths complete, one civ wipe, and two future techs, adding up to exactly enough for 60. Both future techs were “bulbed” with city-state free techs. I’m definitely inclined to push the free techs hard as a default Exploration strategy going forward.

Modern was the most interesting to discuss, as I stayed on only three cities the entire age. This was an idea I wanted to test out, based on a few points:

--There’s nothing meaningful to build at the start of Modern. You can do science/culture projects, but it’s not clear that that’s any better than just pulling in some town gold income to buy science buildings more quickly. Even if I want a settlement to be a city eventually, I’m probably happier to have it as a town for a few turns at the start of the era.

--The attributes giving extra science/culture on specialists to “tall” empires matter. It’s far from negligible, and is another point in favor of keeping towns until you have stuff you actually care about building.

--The Expansionist node giving +% yields to specialized towns is also relevant. That’s ALL yields. It means that keeping a settlement as a specialized town is already more science/culture income than the potential science/culture projects mentioned above.

In this game, I intentionally left two of my most stacked specialist cities on town to start Modern, favoring a “weaker” city upgrade elsewhere. Leaving these as towns really kicked up the yields, as this let them double-dip with the extra “tall” specialist yields alongside the +% specialized town yields.

I did not start the era thinking I’d stay on three cities the whole time. Initially, I thought I’d maybe just stay there long enough to get the two science building techs, then spam out some city upgrades. However, I really underestimated how powerful this approach is. I did some save/reload testing to see just how many more cities I needed to get full science buildings in to justify going above three cities total, and the break-even line was in the 3-4 cities range (and that's only evaluating science -- other yields would have been much lower). With enough gold, it would have made sense eventually, but I had other needs, and I was never particularly close to having the spare change to go for more cities in time for it to matter.

 

[Manpanzee]

New PR to report!

187 turns: 102 Antiquity, 50 Exploration, 35 Modern
Himiko QoW leading Mississippi --> Abbasids --> Siam
Mementos: Scientific + cultural attributes, scientific + expansionist attributes, Analects + Lotus Blossom

This was played on the new Pangaea Plus map, which has to be the strongest map type currently. Finding most of the IPs in Antiquity is great*, and meeting all civs is pretty good too. I do suspect that this map type will tend to be relatively cramped and warry. However, while I doubt that's a net positive, I think it's more double-edged than it is a strict negative.

*Obviously, seeing a ton of IPs in Antiquity is good in itself, but the even bigger benefit is having the full menu to start off Exploration. Currently, I feel that Exploration era is extremely swingy based on whether you're able to start befriending a scientific IP on turn 2. (That's how you get the free tech train rolling and complete Future Tech 4x by turn 50.) On the continent-style maps, it's fairly common to get shut out of scientific IPs to start off Exploration. On Pangaea, that's still possible, but it should be much rarer.

City count at the end of each era was four, six, three. At this point, I'm all-in on the three-city Modern strategy. I really think it's the best approach to the era, and that should remain true for at least three of the four victory types. Towns are good!

 

[MutilationWave]

New PR to report!

187 turns: 102 Antiquity, 50 Exploration, 35 Modern
Himiko QoW leading Mississippi --> Abbasids --> Siam
Mementos: Scientific + cultural attributes, scientific + expansionist attributes, Analects + Lotus Blossom

This was played on the new Pangaea Plus map, which has to be the strongest map type currently. Finding most of the IPs in Antiquity is great*, and meeting all civs is pretty good too. I do suspect that this map type will tend to be relatively cramped and warry. However, while I doubt that's a net positive, I think it's more double-edged than it is a strict negative.

*Obviously, seeing a ton of IPs in Antiquity is good in itself, but the even bigger benefit is having the full menu to start off Exploration. Currently, I feel that Exploration era is extremely swingy based on whether you're able to start befriending a scientific IP on turn 2. (That's how you get the free tech train rolling and complete Future Tech 4x by turn 50.) On the continent-style maps, it's fairly common to get shut out of scientific IPs to start off Exploration. On Pangaea, that's still possible, but it should be much rarer.

City count at the end of each era was four, six, three. At this point, I'm all-in on the three-city Modern strategy. I really think it's the best approach to the era, and that should remain true for at least three of the four victory types. Towns are good!

What difficulty are you playing? I'm always on deity and I'm generally lucky to get one of each future tech and civic. That's me playing with longer ages and doing everything I can not to progress the age.

I'm amazed by 4X future tech by turn 50 in exploration, and I always take scientific IP first and prioritize suzeraining.

 

[Manpanzee]

This is on Deity. IMO Future Tech and Future Civic are completely different animals in Exploration; the first one is way way easier to achieve than the latter.

IIRC I managed to suze nine total city-states, three of which were scientific. That's a ton of bonus beakers in addition to nine free techs. Of the four Future Techs, only one was actually researched, while three were bulbed.

Abbasids are also kinda OP, and Himiko is one of the stronger science leaders. The civ/leader combo is contributing a lot. Although another commenter reported also getting a 50-turn Exploration without using Abbasids, so similar results might be more broadly achievable if you get the right IP spawns.

 

[Salamis]

187 turns: 102 Antiquity, 50 Exploration, 35 Modern

That's terrific! That modern age finish is bananas - when was the final tech completed?

I finished my first attempt on Deity using the strategies from this thread:
204 turns: 102 Antiquity, 52 Exploration, 50 Modern
Jose Rizal leading Rome --> Hawai'i --> America
Mementos: Diplomatic attribute + Lydian Lion (200 gold), Scientific + Influence on Science buildings, Scientific + Influence on Science buildings

End city count by age: 4, 6, 3
Legacy paths by age: Ant - all; Exp - Economy 0/3, all the rest complete
Golden Ages: Both Scientific

Antiquity: No civ wipes by me but Xerxes (who else?) wiped one on the other continent so that was a useful assist. First two IP suz bonuses were free tech then free civic and with the Rome/Rizal culture output, free future civics sped up the end of the age.

Exploration: No civ wipes. First three IP sub bonuses were all scientific to drive up the science rate: free tech, 5% science per IP, science on science buildings. Then Suzed as many other IP's as possible. A few were wiped by the AI before completing but free future techs sped the end.

Modern: Again suzed Scientific IP's as soon as possible but struggled to get the overall science rate high as my base rate was not high enough. Other IP suzes gave the majority of end-tree techs, bulbed the last on turn 38. Unfortunately only two militaristic IP's spawned and one of those got destroyed by the ai within 10 turns so I was only able to 'chop' from one. I made a couple of mistakes to do with upping production in the city producing projects (lost an alliance which cost 6% and forgot to slot the Fascism +3production on specialists for 5 turns) but this probably made no more than 1-2 turns difference.

Overall takeaways for my next play through:
Military: Need to war more, especially in Exploration in order to get some more productive towns for the Expansionist +15/30% for specialised towns. In Modern, IP's were getting wiped much faster than in Exploration so move units to block the ai.
Science: Sounds obvious but a powerful science bonus from a Leader or Civ is needed to get the base science rate high enough in Modern. Having said that, I abandoned a play through with Confucius (Han > Ming) and the first 3 towns each having a tile of the Grand Canyon. The lack of culture and gold in Antiquity and a production-low capital resulted in a slow Exploration age. In other words, Science-only might not be optimal.
Mementos: I've always liked Lydian Lion 200gold for the boost to early expansion but I'm converting to a two attribute points opener used by @Manpanzee!
Civs: Rome was fine but Greece, Mississippians and Maya are likely the top tier for speed.
Since their culture nerf, Hawai'i didn't really contribute anything (I just wanted to play them!) and might be one of the worst for a fast science win. Abbasids for science or Bulgaria for production contributions that continue into modern feel like the top tier. The more gold or culture-focused Exploration civs at least contribute those yields. In Modern, America have nice production bonuses. Not sure which would be top tier though (Japan perhaps?).

 

[Manpanzee]

That's terrific! That modern age finish is bananas - when was the final tech completed?

I believe it was turn 27ish. I only had one militaristic IP to chop, but managed to get a very strong production center in this game.

Fascism

I think Communism is un-skippable for science victory. The raw science buff on specialists is just too good.

I suppose there's possibly an alternative strategy, where instead of beelining ideology, you start with the unique civics tree, then pull into ideology late -- after most of the science stuff is done -- and grab Fascism hammers to buff the last couple projects. But I'm skeptical that there's any Modern civ with enough power in their unique tree to support that currently.

Modern: Again suzed Scientific IP's as soon as possible but struggled to get the overall science rate high as my base rate was not high enough. Other IP suzes gave the majority of end-tree techs, bulbed the last on turn 38.

Something I haven't mentioned that might be unusual or non-obvious: I haven't been using the free tech IP option in Modern. There are just so many masteries to get through, and there isn't the huge bonus for repeat bulbs on Future Tech the way there is in Exploration. I'd rather just grab the direct science buffs ASAP and power through the tech tree without spending any time on masteries.

I also think that getting the project buff from science IPs is pretty much mandatory. So I don't even stop to think about maybe getting free techs unless I see at least four science IPs to start Modern. In addition, if you're staying on three cities, Institutes can become very interesting as an additional way to convert gold into science. Which means you can even make a case that free techs are the very last choice from scientific IPs in Modern.

 

[Salamis]

I think Communism is un-skippable for science victory. The raw science buff on specialists is just too good.

I suppose there's possibly an alternative strategy, where instead of beelining ideology, you start with the unique civics tree, then pull into ideology late -- after most of the science stuff is done -- and grab Fascism hammers to buff the last couple projects. But I'm skeptical that there's any Modern civ with enough power in their unique tree to support that currently.

Agreed - in the playthrough I posted it was clear from the start of modern that my science base was way too low so IP free techs were necessary. Fascism hammers were an attempt to reduce the project turns as much as possible.

The only way Fascism hammers could be a viable alternative was if the base science rate was strong enough without needing Communism’s science. Even then, is the hammer buff going overtake the science buff? Probably not.