Getting lower scores in cultural victories
- Thread starter mrt144
- Start date
Ray Patterson
the dude is not in
And you're likely to turn off science at some point, so you get relatively few techs.
I think the decision not to award different points to different victories was bold and ultimately correct. It would be impossible to completely balance them, it's better to not even try and just have seperate competitions for different victories.
I think the decision not to award different points to different victories was bold and ultimately correct. It would be impossible to completely balance them, it's better to not even try and just have seperate competitions for different victories.
good points. I can just imagine getting screwed on score by getting a diplo victory for less points than a domi victory a few turns later, or some such scenerio.
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
yeah the ingame is the same formula no matter how you win (or lose). i posted a link to it not long ago, i'll find it again later today if you're that curious, right now i'm about to go to bed *giggle*. the main factors are your population, # techs, amount of turns left in the game, to some extent wonders that you built. cultural you tend to not be high pop and not be high tech compared to the same year of another type, so your score is really low.
but feel free to be proud of your win, no matter what score the game gives you, is my theory
but feel free to be proud of your win, no matter what score the game gives you, is my theory
I guess it is just a case of choosing that victory early (you pretty much have to, like todays game I played where I killed of Augustus in the first 50 turns of the game and then proceeded to sit in isolation, beelining for liberalism until someone decided to show up and say "hi". stupid island with its stupid lack of health resources and stupid astronomy for not starting earlier.) So pretty much to ensure a cultural victory you have to go against 2.5 of the 3 things that give you a big score: Time and Science and Pop through conquest (though Im sure that can be done)
I was just curious if the type of victory conditions it sets up actually causes you to play differently to achieve it thus diminishing your score.
I was just curious if the type of victory conditions it sets up actually causes you to play differently to achieve it thus diminishing your score.
Lord Sandwich
Chieftain
- Joined
- Mar 13, 2007
- Messages
- 16
Unfortunately, the score is biased heavily in favor of early victories and cultural victories come late.
AnitaGaribaldi
Warlord
Early cultural victories (1350-1500 AD) are possible, just look at the HoF tables. I think you must: handpick your opponents (no Mounty please), turn off the barbs, regen a crap start. Early victories are hard even on Settler. My best time so far is 1540 AD (small/settler/normal). You don't have time to build military, one or two units/city. You have to gamble. Diplomacy is the key. How do you think the Deity players survives? 
Quick and Marathon speed gives better times than normal. The earlierst Deity finish is 1355 AD (thin/quick).
Quick and Marathon speed gives better times than normal. The earlierst Deity finish is 1355 AD (thin/quick).Population and early finish are the dominant factors in scoring. If you look at the highest scores in the GOTMs they are all fast conquests/domination where all the worlds population is captured and usually blown up with post-Biology farms.
Technology and wonders do contribute to score but capturing a 10-12 sized city will increase score more than multiple techs/wonders. Another benefit to the aggressive approach is that you tend to accumulate all the worlds wonders. When you capture a city with a wonder your score gets credit for it. So essentially with the fast aggressive approach you get all the population, which is the main factor, all the land, all the wonders and most of the techs depending on how far through the tech ladder you decide to go.
Going culture could be a high score strategy if you're playing a really tough game where taking over the world is out of the question and if you can't compete with the AI technology-wise for the space race. Then your options dwindle to diplmo or culture and those can be really powerful options in really hard games. Otherwise I think you play culture for the fun of it or because it's a little less time consuming than marching armies all over the world, but not for score.
Technology and wonders do contribute to score but capturing a 10-12 sized city will increase score more than multiple techs/wonders. Another benefit to the aggressive approach is that you tend to accumulate all the worlds wonders. When you capture a city with a wonder your score gets credit for it. So essentially with the fast aggressive approach you get all the population, which is the main factor, all the land, all the wonders and most of the techs depending on how far through the tech ladder you decide to go.
Going culture could be a high score strategy if you're playing a really tough game where taking over the world is out of the question and if you can't compete with the AI technology-wise for the space race. Then your options dwindle to diplmo or culture and those can be really powerful options in really hard games. Otherwise I think you play culture for the fun of it or because it's a little less time consuming than marching armies all over the world, but not for score.
Lots of good answers already.
Slowrider has it right on the reasons,
AnitaGaribaldi has it right on the option to make the score a little better (winning earlier, on quick setting)
Mrt144 is right in being sure that you can conquer some pop and land while going for cultural (I tried, I got a better score but a later finish).
And, most importantly, KMad is right that a victory is sweet regardless of score.
When I start (should be past here, but maybe one day i'll try an immortal cultural win) a new level, I start by going for a cultural win with a civ starting with mysticism. And when I win, the victory is certainly sweet for being the first at this level
.
Slowrider has it right on the reasons,
AnitaGaribaldi has it right on the option to make the score a little better (winning earlier, on quick setting)
Mrt144 is right in being sure that you can conquer some pop and land while going for cultural (I tried, I got a better score but a later finish).
And, most importantly, KMad is right that a victory is sweet regardless of score.
When I start (should be past here, but maybe one day i'll try an immortal cultural win) a new level, I start by going for a cultural win with a civ starting with mysticism. And when I win, the victory is certainly sweet for being the first at this level
.selfexiled
Chieftain
How's your economy structured? I hate to criticize the articles written about cultural victories but they tend to go Cottage economy for the most part. Have you tried setting up an early GP farm and aiming for those great artists? You could probably cut down the victory time by a few turns by either settling them as residents or saving them towards the end for that last quick culture boost. And large expansion I would consider a necessary evil. It hurts with the upkeep but if you focus with those three cities on culture I believe you can maintain a decent army and if you're pulling enough gold (I usually cottage spam, w/ exception to the GP farm, like hell anyways) you can still stay in the game with a 10% research rate. Of course if you pull it off just right you probably wouldn't need the army nor the research at that point.
I can't say I've been playing the cultural angle much these days (I did when I first started out, they were my first victs; I was getting there around 1850+ Noble/Normal). But taking down an opposing civ early did help as mentioned before. I think the best determinate would be starting position, a first city next to two gold mines certainly will give you a great lead in researching some early religions and pyramids (if you go that route)
Of course I find the cultural harder since I lost my Vanilla Catherine's Financial trait to Warlords (although Imperialistic isn't that bad). Maybe I should go back to vanilla to see what I can pull off now...
Anyways I'm done rambling, feel free to pick apart the incoherent thoughts and point out what you think was useful or not.
I can't say I've been playing the cultural angle much these days (I did when I first started out, they were my first victs; I was getting there around 1850+ Noble/Normal). But taking down an opposing civ early did help as mentioned before. I think the best determinate would be starting position, a first city next to two gold mines certainly will give you a great lead in researching some early religions and pyramids (if you go that route)
Of course I find the cultural harder since I lost my Vanilla Catherine's Financial trait to Warlords (although Imperialistic isn't that bad). Maybe I should go back to vanilla to see what I can pull off now...
Anyways I'm done rambling, feel free to pick apart the incoherent thoughts and point out what you think was useful or not.
I don't know to whom this was aimed. So I won't answer everything.
Are you aware of the number of great people you need to get a city to legendary ?(on quick it's a lot less, that's why this setting is better)
Let's pick normal speed (my usual setting) :
50.000 culture needed, in 3 cities
Each GP brings 4000 culture.
That's 13 GA needed.
Let's hope you have a few culture building, even without using the slider.
If you do this very carefully you could be down to 10 artists needed per city.
1 or 2 less for the capital.
28 artists is a lot.
How do you plan to get that many artists in time?
When you're very dedicated, you manage to have 6 to 10 artists waiting to do there job. Quite far away...
Sure, you can use research and expand longer, and thus gain a few more.
But they are getting costly with the numbers, you know.
expansion is good.
Achieving cultural victory with 15 cities is easier than with 6.
Not faster though.
In warlords, Huyna Capac or Mansa Musa are great for cultural.
My favourite in vanilla or warlords is still Isabella.
Are you aware of the number of great people you need to get a city to legendary ?(on quick it's a lot less, that's why this setting is better)
Let's pick normal speed (my usual setting) :
50.000 culture needed, in 3 cities
Each GP brings 4000 culture.
That's 13 GA needed.
Let's hope you have a few culture building, even without using the slider.
If you do this very carefully you could be down to 10 artists needed per city.
1 or 2 less for the capital.
28 artists is a lot.
How do you plan to get that many artists in time?
When you're very dedicated, you manage to have 6 to 10 artists waiting to do there job. Quite far away...
Sure, you can use research and expand longer, and thus gain a few more.
But they are getting costly with the numbers, you know.
what's your point?
expansion is good.
Achieving cultural victory with 15 cities is easier than with 6.
Not faster though.
For every victory condition, a multi gold city is good.
try another leader!
In warlords, Huyna Capac or Mansa Musa are great for cultural.
My favourite in vanilla or warlords is still Isabella.
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
best quote evah!!!!!!!
When I start (should be past here, but maybe one day i'll try an immortal cultural win) a new level, I start by going for a cultural win with a civ starting with mysticism. And when I win, the victory is certainly sweet for being the first at this level
go for it, good plan! but one thing i do like is that at the higher levels, the AIs do spread their religions. so i <3 Liz as my cult leader. do i always win? well, no 
*giggle*
OscarWildebeest
Prince
Tell us why, Monsieur Cabert. I can see the advantage of the Spi trait, but wouldn't you want the Phi trait to get extra GPs? (Which leads one towards Saladin in Vanilla, although I've got Cultural with Elizabeth - Phi/Fin in Vanilla.)
well i think it really depends on the most effective ways to generate culture which from me perception of game mechanics is through the culture slider using high commerce squares.
If you can pump out 12k (sorry, marathon player here) in culture using commerce in the same amount of time it takes to generate 3 great artists, then its a wash, but I get the feeling that all things being equal, it takes much longer to generate 3 GAs than otherwise. I think the general strategy I used, was to use GAs to supplement a lagging city culturally.
The only difference I suppose is that going with commerce is an opportunity cost for the most part where as GP farm has little opportunity cost. you generate those points mostly independent of economic balance.
If you can pump out 12k (sorry, marathon player here) in culture using commerce in the same amount of time it takes to generate 3 great artists, then its a wash, but I get the feeling that all things being equal, it takes much longer to generate 3 GAs than otherwise. I think the general strategy I used, was to use GAs to supplement a lagging city culturally.
The only difference I suppose is that going with commerce is an opportunity cost for the most part where as GP farm has little opportunity cost. you generate those points mostly independent of economic balance.
because :
1) she starts with fishing, giving possible early high commerce tiles + starting with myst = early religions
2) spiritual is great of course (cheap temples!)
3) expansive is cool too for the cheap granaries, cheap workers, and free health (no conquest wars in those games = lacking health resources. happiness isn't a problem when you run 100% culture
)
OscarWildebeest
Prince
because :
1) she starts with fishing, giving possible early high commerce tiles + starting with myst = early religions
2) spiritual is great of course (cheap temples!)
3) expansive is cool too for the cheap granaries, cheap workers, and free health (no conquest wars in those games = lacking health resources. happiness isn't a problem when you run 100% culture
OK, I'm sold. I'll try it next time I go for Cultural.
