Cultural Victory in 1816 AD
Entry class: Contender
Base score: 2434
Final score: 21343
Our starting location seemed just as good as any, so I settled where we started.
My initial Research path was towards Meditation for Buddhism, followed by bee-lining towards Monotheism for Judaism. I figured that Isabella is the one who always seems to found Buddhism when I play against her, so when I was actually playing as her, I felt that I was guaranteed of getting it. Perhaps I was a bit over-confident, but it seems that my confidence paid off.
Along the way to Judaism, I also founded Hinduism. This bonus was unexpected but appreciated.
A quick war with Peter netted me a Worker, which I was more than happy to escort back to my capital. The worker would quickly run out of things to do, however, so I snuck in a couple of quick Worker techs in my Monotheism bee-line.
My true goal in researching religions had been to expand my cultural borders quickly, so that I wouldn't have to worry about a lot of barbarian activity. However, after getting the first three religions, I felt that I owed it to the world to try for my first Cultural Victory.
Meditation -> Polytheism -> Hunting -> Mining -> The Wheel -> Masonry -> Monotheism -> Bronze Working -> Archery -> Priesthood
I started off by building a Work Boat. Ahhh, the joys of starting with the Fishing tech. No wonder it seems that Isabella always has her sea resources hooked up so early!
I then built a Warrior, followed by a Settler.
In 1960 BC, I finally founded Barcelona. A little late, I know, but in retrospect, I feel that the move was worth it.
First of all, I was able to found Monotheism in Barcelona in 1690 BC, meaning that the city's borders could quickly expand. Second, I built the city with the Stone resource up by Peter in its extended radius. There was a cultural war for the Stone, but my city eventually won out.
After building the Settler, I built another Warrior in Madrid (our capital), followed by Stonehenge. Stonehenge was complete in 1360 BC.
The next turn, Judaism spread to Moscow. I don't think that Peter took very long to decide to convert.
Barcelona started by building a Warrior, followed by a Worker.
I was disappointed to not see Copper, other than next to Peter, so I quickly began researching Archery. It was a good decision, as on the turn after researching it, I lost one of my Warriors to a Barbarian Archer.
After Stonehenge, I built a Settler and then an Archer in Madrid. I wasn't going to build a Settler, only to lose the newly built city due to wimpy Warriors not being able to handle the flight of Barbarian arrows.
Immediately prior to building the Archer, I'd researched Priesthood. So you'd figure that I'd start on The Oracle, perhaps grabbing Alphabet or Code of Laws. However, it was already 910 BC and I didn't want to chance it. Instead, I decided to risk even more hammers on the line and thus I started on The Parthenon in Madrid. Meanwhile, I'd been building an Archer in Barcelona.
A few turns later, with Stone already hooked up and a home-built Archer for defense, Barcelona began building The Pyramids.
In 685 BC, I finished The Parthenon. My thanks to all of the forests that were chopped for good purposes: for the river-boats that brought Marble quickly to the capital, for the houses that housed my otherwise migrant workers, and for the 24 hour home-fires that kept the meals hot and the workers working around the clock. In order to compensate Nature, I let some jungle grow back in place of the forest.
After building The Parthenon, I built another Settler, followed by a Lighthouse. Afterwards, I had delusions of building a much bigger and more powerful lighthouse, one that could light up the skies and make our empire the trading capital of the world. However, that project was scrapped when some other civilization stole our idea, copied the plans, and then had the nerve to build it quicker and more efficiently than us.
A turn after the "minor" and "somewhat less significant" Lighthouse was built in Madrid, in 490 BC, The Pyramids were completed in Barcelona. On this turn, our first Great Person also appeared. I was hoping for a Great Prophet, considering that I'd founded 3 religions. However, it was not to be, and I received a Great Artist. It was then and there that I realised I had been pretty lucky and that a Cultural Victory attempt was now a must-do project.
In 460 BC, our 4th city, Cordoba, was founded over by that huge pile of resources to the West of our capital.
I spent the next few hundred years focusing on building cultural buildings, throwing in the odd missionary when I was runing out of buildings to make in a city. I also had to keep pumping out Archers, to help stem the tide of the Barbarians.
By now, the Barbarians had at least 2 cities. Both of those cities were closer to me than to Peter, so I was receiving the brunt of their attacks.
In 145 BC, I managed to found Code of Laws, and thus, Confucianism was founded. I'd missed building The Oracle to some enterprising fool that hadn't bothered to take the religion, so I was happy to make up for his or her mistake.
At this point, I was really hoping to get a Great Prophet as my second Great Person, so that I could try to found Christianity and thus keep a lock on the religious world.
However, in 155 AD, my second Great Person was born, again in Madrid, and it, too, was a Great Artist. If you're a Cultural-Victory-chaser, now I'm sure that you're sitting up straight in your chair, wondering how I managed to get two Great Artists so early. Okay, for me it's early, perhaps not for some of you.
Well, there wasn't really a big secret--it was the luck of the draw. Sorry to disappoint you.
Anyway, since I wasn't researching towards Christianity, I missed founding it. It was founded in 275 AD. I could handle the situation, but it was still a bit of a blow--having not had any luck finding other AI players by this point, I figured that the rest must be on an almost-pangaea-island. Christianity would spread like wildfire. It was a disappointment, but I could handle it.
I was pretty sure that I'd use the capital for one of my 3 Legendary Culture cities. I also chose to use the city up by Peter that had built The Pyramids as another such city, by founding some early Great Artists in it.
The trouble was that I couldn't decide on which city to use for my 3rd one. I had some nice resources to the West of the capital for one city, with 2 Gold and a Gem, plus a lot of river. However, that city was too busy building military defense and missionaries to accumulate a lot of culture.
I had a nice chunk of flood plains in the city to the South West of the capital, but it, too, just didn't seem like a good fit for the job.
Eventually, I chose a city that I founded in 605 AD. It was over by a second Copper that I'd discovered, somewhat to the South West of where Moscow was located.
In 395 AD, I had completed The Great Library. In all, the city in which I built it produced two Great Scientists. I had been hoping to lightbulb Philosophy with the first Great Scientist, but Peter beat me to it. Actually, I wasn't very disappointed at this news. I had a good chance of the religion spreading to me.
So, I used my first Great Scientist in my 3rd Legendary City, in order to build an Academy--that city could use all of the cultural help that it could get. Had I picked its location sooner and had I founded the city earlier, things may have been different, but they weren't, so I did what I could.
The second Great Scientist was used a bit later in a Golden Age.
In 875 AD, I lost a key defender (an Archer) to a Barbarian Archer. Peter, who'd been a panther waiting patiently in the grass, chose this moment to strike. He launched his invasion with Catapults and Swordsmen closing in on my Pyramids city (Barcelona), just south of Moscow.
With only Archers to defend, I was forced to whip an Axemen without any pre-production, i.e. at double its population cost. The war began with me trying to build troops from behind.
It was dicey, but that one Axeman defended from first a Catapult and then a Swordsman in the same turn. I was impressed at how the AI softened up the defender first with a Catapult.
My 3rd Legendary City, a little while after it was founded, began work on The Sistine Chapel. I was afraid that I'd be beaten to it, as I'd been beaten to Theology by quite a big time margin. However, I managed to build that Wonder as well, completing it in 905 AD.
In 1085 AD, The Pyramids finally paid off, at least in terms of Great People, and netted me a Great Engineer. However, I didn't have any Wonders to build that I really wanted. Chichen Itza was still available, but I didn't see how it would help me very much. I ended up settling the Great Engineer in my 3rd Legendary City, to help it produce some cultural buildings a bit faster.
In 1196 AD, I researched Optics and began the production of a Caravel. I ended up being the first to circumnavigate the world. Surprisingly, Montezuma took his sweet time in doing so--he showed up with a Caravel and met both Peter and I before I'd found any of the other AI. Unfortunately, he wasn't willing to join the war front against Peter, but at least Peter wasn't able to convince Montezuma to join in, either.
More Swordsmen and Catapults were thrown at me by Peter, along with a good mixture of Horse Archers and Spearsmen, but that initial battle for Barcelona had done the trick.
A slow supply of Spanish Axemen and War Elephants began to populate the battle field. Every battle was on home turf, as all I could do was play defensively for a couple of hundred years. Fortunately, I was able to win the majority of the battles; failure to win so many battles would have required me to give up on my hopes for a Cultural Victory.
Peter had Longbowmen defenders, so I couldn't easily counter by taking his cities. Instead, I had to wait a couple of squares away from my borders on several fronts, ready to send in troops wherever he attacked.
Since, by this time, Peter had cities to the East and South East of The Pyramids city (Barcelona), I was getting attacked all along my supply lines to that city.
I was able to pillage one Iron source (the one to the North of Madrid, our capital), but Peter had two Iron sources. He also had a Longbowman guarding his Horses.
I mustered a stack of units and sent them in--Horse Archers kept suiciding themselves on my War Elephants, but I had to retreat the stack a couple of times just to go back to my territory in order to regroup and heal. Finally, I was able to pillage his Horses. Unfortunately, Peter decided he'd instead build War Elephants. Only my heavily-promoted War Elephants could touch his, and even then, only with a 75% chance of winning. Further, I kept having to let Peter pillage a few squares in between battles with his War Elephants, as my few War Elephants would need time to heal.
In 1370 AD, I began implementing an operation code named "Convert some allies to my cause" or at least "Keep the bad guys off of my back". I began with Montezuma, getting him to adopt Judaism. The other AI on his continent would be converted as soon as I could get Missionaries to them. None of them wanted a piece of Peter, who I believe was also Jewish at the time, but at least I wasn't as obvious a target for them.
In 1400 AD, I was finally able to bring Macemen to the battle field. I spent a lot of time building troops and a lot of money upgrading Axemen to Macemen, just to stay alive.
In 1430 AD, I had learned Education, which is a pre-req for the Liberalism tech. I wanted to research Liberalism before the other AI, so that I'd get a free technology out of it. I had tried to keep a monopoly on Paper, the pre-req for Education--I even refused a demand from Julius to hand it over. Unfortunately, one of the AI researched it within a turn or two of my refusal. Further, by this time, the AI on the other two continents were trading heavily amongst themselves. So, it became a race to Liberalism.
The problem was that some of the AI had Philosophy, which is a pre-req tech for Liberalism, but I didn't have it. I had been trying for quite a number of years to get it as part of a peace deal with Peter, but he would have none of it. After researching Education, I finally decided that I'd give Peter peace and then would trade with him afterwards. He was lacking several techs and was the most technologically backwards Civ, so I figured I had a good shot.
In the Peace deal, at least I got a city out of him. However, that city was already 100% Spanish due to culture--it just had yet to flip to me--so it was pretty much a write-off for Peter and he was more than happy to oblige. I didn't even ask for extra Gold out of him in my haste to see if he'd accept.
Unfortunately, after declaring Peace, Peter wouldn't trade Philosophy. He received a nice tech for his remaining gold, but still, he wasn't happy enough.
Unable to trade with the Civs that had Philosophy, as they were all Christian and I was sticking with Judaism, I decided to research it the hard way.
As a further setback, the AI managed to research and trade Education during this time as well.
The race was on--every city switched from production to commerce, where possible, gaining me 1 turn of research. Since I was no longer at war, I could afford the temporary trade-off.
Well, the trade-off worked. I researched Liberalism in 1502 AD. Further, I research it first. I'm not sure if that date is a good or a bad one for this map, but I was quite happy by it.
However, I had barely squeaked Liberalism in--I tried to see what other Civs had for trade, but Egypt already had it. I must have researched it at the end of my turn before the begining of Egypt's turn, just in time for the free tech.
I picked up Nationalism (not really a big surprise) and shortly thereafter began building the Hermitage.
Interestingly, the city which was ready to build it was already my Legendary-City-to-be with the highest culture-per-turn value, my capital of Madrid. In the end, this approach worked out without me needing to settle or bomb any Great Artists in Madrid.
Food for thought for your Cultural-Victory-chasers: I built the Hermitage in the city which had the most building-based cultural points, as opposed to one which would rely on commerce-based culture at the end of the game. In this way, I may have maximized the benefits of this building, as I would accumulate a lot of extra culture even while I was in the building-stage and with my cultural rate at 0%.
In 1538 AD, I completed work on The Taj Mahal. Woohoo, a free Golden Age! I built it from the ground up, mostly using lumber to speed its construction. Also, in that year, I'd researched Printing Press, so I really started raking in the commerce.
In 1556 AD, Madrid completed work on the Hermitage. At this time, I was heavy into building the cathedral-equivalent buildings in each of my Legendary Culture cities, so after building the Hermitage, Madrid moved on to building a Buddhist Stupa (cathedral).
In 1577 AD, I received my second Great Engineer. By this time, I wasn't really sure what to do with him. I'd already built The Taj Mahal without the help of a Great Engineer. I still didn't have Divine Right, while I believe that both of the two Wonders you can build with that tech were already gone or soon to be gone anyway, so I kept him around.
In 1598 AD, Yakutsk, a Russian city, flipped to Spanish control. In the bargain, I obtained Taoism.
In 1607 AD, I built my first Taoist Missionary. He would start spreading religion #5 in each of my cities, in case you were counting.
In 1637 AD, my second Great Scientist was born. I also wasn't sure what I should do with him--an Academy could help, but would not help very much, as I'd all but shut down research at this point.
So in 1646 AD, as I mentioned previously, the Great Scientist was used on a Golden Age. I used my Great Engineer in the bargain. In a non-Cultural-Victory-game, I'd have waited for a Great Artist to partner-up for the Golden Age and would have kept my Great Engineer, but really, I think that I made the right choice. It was really tough to do, though, as it's not often that I get a Great Engineer in my games.
I was planning for a victory year around the 1780s AD. Unfortunately, my troubles were not over yet.
Around 1754 AD, Montezuma declared war on me. We were brothers of the faith! Arguably, I had not upgraded my Warrior defender in my capital, nor my Archer defenders in other cities, but come on, give me a break here!
Montezuma dropped several loads of escorted Riflemen, Knights, and Catapults on my Western shores. He did a great job of escorting his Galleons with Frigates. My Caravels couldn't touch his Frigates, so the only job they had was to lure the Frigates away and run from them. That circumnavigation bonus comes in handy when you are a tech behind in naval technology, as his Frigates had a tough time catching my Caravels. Still, it left me in a position where I was forced to playing defender to countless waves (actually, 3 waves, I believe) of landed troops.
I realized that it wouldn't be a viable strategy to lose my Legendary-to-be cities, so I blew my cultural budget on the military. Units were upgraded and new ones were built, emptying my coffers. Civics were switched in order to give me a better advantage. I knew that this war would hurt my chances at a reasonably fast win, but since I didn't want to completely lose, either, I took my chances.
I fought him hard, using Riflemen, War Elephants, and Macemen. I lacked a Horse resource and I hadn't researched Chemistry, so I was not able to produce either Conquistadors or Grenadiers.
In the end, Montezuma hadn't sent enough upgraded troops. He kept pillaging key resources, such as my health-related resources, but he was unable to breach the walls of any of my cities. Go cultural city-defensive bonus, go!
In 1766 AD, a Great Merchant was born. I was able to sneak out past Montezuma's boats of war and send him in a Caravel to Mali. Montezuma's Frigate chased my Caravel the whole way and sunk my boat on its return trip, but not before I obtained about 2400 in Gold.
Still, it was scary when Montezuma was the first to research Military Tradition. I could still see some of his cities, thanks to our shared religion, so I could see him upgrading his knights. Soon, it would be over.
So I poured my commerce into science. My research allowed me to finally bribe a war ally--Julius--into the fray. The results were astounding. I watched Julius make several almost successful simultaneous attacks on Montezuma's cities, only to be beaten back and slowly suffer the pillaging that Montezuma had been laying on me.
With Montezuma occupied, I tried to delay any further landings on my shores. I had to suicide a few Caravels and Galleons against Montezuma's Frigates, but I was eventually able to delay long enough for him to agree to Peace.
Immediately, I switched my Civics and Commerce budget back to a cultural focus, while the war between Montezuma and Julius raged on.
Thinking that I was home free, I was scared to find out that Peter had finally started getting some more technologies and was able to upgrade his mounted units to Knights. Fearing the worst, I accepted his demand to switch to Taoism, a religion which he's founded and had spread to all of his cities. This choice was worthwhile and kept him off of my back so that I could win the game two turns later.
In total, I culturally flipped 6 cities, culminating with the flip of Moscow in 1792 AD. It was satisfying to flip my opponent's capital; did you know that it was possible to do so? As a point of interest, I hadn't captured a single city all game via a militaristic attack--even the two Barb cities near me were culturally subsumed. Maybe it wasn't completely a peaceful game, but cultural subversion instead of conquest sure makes for a rewarding change of pace.
In the end, I managed to obtain Legendary Cultural status in a city two turns from the end of the game, while the last two cities reached Legendary status at the same time, ending the game. I ended up realising a few turns from the end of the game that my last Great Artist wouldn't be able to shave off any turns from the end of the game, so I culture bombed him in Moscow, just for the fun of it.
In all, I managed to build 10 Great Artists, 2 Great Scientists, 2 Great Engineers, and 1 Great Merchant.
Thanks go out to godotnut, VirusMonster, armstrong, actionmedia, walkerjks, uberfish, jesusin, Kelvenor, Dorkus, Woobi, Conquistador 63, HardCoder, and others for your questions, comments, and information in godotnut's Diety Cultural thread.
Thanks, ainwood, for such a fun map. It's still hard for me to believe that our starting location, with a pretty low amount of resources (for a GOTM map), would turn out to be one of the Legendary Cultural sites of the world!
Brilliant! 
).
. Having been there before, I sympathize.
.
