Help me win my 1st Scientific Victory.

[Fahim]

Just won my 1st Cultural Victory as Greece which took me about 7 hours. I focused on merely on Theater Squares, Great Artists, Writers and Musicians, Trade Routes which got me lots of culture, wonders that give me culture, went for a Diplomatic Government and focused on Cards that awarded culture unless i'm lacking in any other resource. Basicly CULTURE CULTURE CULTURE! =) At the same time had to make sure all my cities were happy with growth housing and amneties. I did not focus on any military at all except for couple of archers warriors and horsemen to fend of barbarians early game but was always keeping an eye out for civs that might be a threat and declare a surprise war.

Now I am looking to go for a Scientific Victory in which I have zero experience. Need some tips on what to focus on to while going for a scientific victory.

1. What districts do I need to focus in my Capital and my other following cities?
2. What government should I aim for and any specific cards that could be of great use to me?
3.Will trade routes have a big impact going for a scientific victory?
4. Should I focus on any military apart from fending of barbarians?
5. Should I play more offensive style (attack other civs or city states) or defensive ( try to make peace with everyone)?
6. Anything else you might think of.

Might have asked some stupid noob questions but im still beginner all tips, ideas and suggestions are much appreciated =)

 

[Ornen]

Build a space ship

 

[MyOtherName]

Ultimately, you need a good amount of research, and 1-3 cities with a lot of cogs to do the actual building. Having enough great person points and faith/gold to snag the relevant great engineers and great scientists can help a lot.

The rest of your civilization can be basically anything. You could even go on a world conquering spree if you like -- that might even help by giving you extra population to gain science and more campuses, although in my two victories (on Deity) I built very minimal units.

The possibly nonobvious things are:

• The enlightenment civic has a card that doubles the science output of campus buildings, so that gives you a target for the civic tree
• Internal trade routes sent to cities with the right districts will give a lot of cogs
• Your production city will gain production from factories built in nearby cities (if the industrial zone is close enough). The same goes for power plants, but you may or may not have the time for that to become relevant.

 

[eewallace]

Science victories seem to take longer than culture, so be prepared to play defensively to hold back the AI from a culture victory while you research and build your spaceship. You should probably get your campuses up as soon as possible and make sure you are earning great scientist points. Production is a big priority for a couple of cities as well, as you will probably want more than one spaceport. Also, it is a good idea to station multiple spies in the spaceports to catch enemy spies. Word of warning--you can get an accidental cultural victory on the way to space, that happened to me in my first game, and I've seen several other people report that, as well.

 

[TheGrumpyBuddha]

I don't know that early campuses are the way to go. The standard strategy of Commercial Hubs then Industry seems to be very strong. I've won a few lazy turn 350 science victories, and that was building wonders, goofing with culture, and so on and rarely doing Campus Projects. If you build Campuses first, then you're waiting until your cities get to size 9 before you can build 3 districts, not sure that's a good idea.

 

[aimlessgun]

I'd try to get 1 or maybe 2 early campuses if you've got good spots for them since a single library and a +2 adjacency is a lot of science early game, but yeah there's no rush to get a lot of them. As MyOtherName said, the Enlightenment civic + universities is when they really start being great.

Government...guess that's Communism's 10% production vs Democracy great people buying (and better slots). Great people buying is crazy expensive even with the Democracy discount, but lategame great people are insane for space victory. There is at least one great scientist that gives +100% spaceship production, and a great engineer which gives 1500 production (IIRC), combined I was able to build a Mars spaceship part instantly.

Trade routes are always good. Domestic trade routes are usually too strong for them to be a good source of science though (science only comes from international routes). Depends on the AI, if they get some good cities going you can get some nice routes which give 2 science. The civic for +1 science +1 culture on an international route isn't bad either if you have a lot of routes (near coast and have lots of harbors).

 

[Fahim]

Thank you guys for the great tips and suggestions

 

[KmDubya]

I would not worry about early campuses, I find commercial and industrial play a bigger part early. An early one in a great spot is fine, later on you can add in multiple campuses with universities very quickly after you've got power plants up and affecting multiple cities. Remember that teching really fast gets you to later eras where districts cost more as do new troops. Better to build a solid base of an empire that can build and pay for everything it needs rather than be way out of balance with high tech but unaffordable troops.

For the actual building of the parts you need just one massive production behemoth. Surround this city with as many small borg cities that have industrial zones within six tiles of the behemoth city for the extra factory effect. Ruhr valley is a great wonder to build in the behemoth city. Also remember that the space port is a district so make sure you can fit it into the city both hex wise as well as population.

The two super space race great people are random but make a huge difference. The +100% production one hade me building projects in like nine turns and the instant build one got me the last part immediately. I find teching the top Mars part first and then dropping down to get the next two lets me build the parts before I've teched the next one.

 

[ZHONN]

Basically what KmDubya said. Spam cities and let one of the grow to be your main production center, it getting the Ruhr and as many adjacent factories as possible. Try to get the great engineer and scientist to help the space race. When it's time to build the thing, get all of your trade routes to originate from the building city.

 

[KmDubya]

Another tip is to put a counterspy in your space port as well as in your industrial zone. Running both Police State and Cryptography will drop enemy spies by four levels and can also make a big difference in keeping your stuff not sabotaged.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Science victories seem to take longer than culture, so be prepared to play defensively to hold back the AI from a culture victory while you research and build your spaceship. You should probably get your campuses up as soon as possible and make sure you are earning great scientist points. Production is a big priority for a couple of cities as well, as you will probably want more than one spaceport. Also, it is a good idea to station multiple spies in the spaceports to catch enemy spies. Word of warning--you can get an accidental cultural victory on the way to space, that happened to me in my first game, and I've seen several other people report that, as well.

This seems utterly impossible to me unless you're playing on extremely low difficulty.

Anyway, I think somewhat contrary to a lot of people ITT so let's get it out of the way.

1. Science is highly decentralized in Civ VI. The more cities the more science you get. I never aim for less than ten and usually up to 20 cities.
2. You don't have to build the Campus first. Commerce district and Harbor first is often a good decision.
3. Focus on policies that improve internal trade routes, Merchant Republic into Democracry is almost always the way to go.
4. Great Scientists are often complete garbage. Also Science is hardly ever what's stopping you from achieving a fast SV.
5. Great Engineers on the other hand are 100% essential. You will have to get to the last GE if you want a decent time, seeing as how the last two give you +1500 Hammers for a space project and +100% production towards space projects respectively.
6. Try to focus production in three cities, send all the trade routes there, get workers on position to chop, steal other cities tiles and so on. How you play your endgame makes a crucial difference.

This way I got a T250SV on Deity. I think this can be much improved, but I originally wanted to do domination and played as Sumeria, so not ideal for science at all anyway.

 

[georgjorge]

I don't know that early campuses are the way to go. The standard strategy of Commercial Hubs then Industry seems to be very strong. I've won a few lazy turn 350 science victories, and that was building wonders, goofing with culture, and so on and rarely doing Campus Projects. If you build Campuses first, then you're waiting until your cities get to size 9 before you can build 3 districts, not sure that's a good idea.

Just so I understand the basics of it - Commercial Hubs for more internal trade routes in order to maximize production (which always seems to be the bottleneck from early on until the end of the game), right? Or are you generating a lot of gold to rush-buy buildings with?

I'm currently trying to get that victory on Immortal, but I'm not sure 5-6 cities are enough for a decent date. I rarely get to settle more (maybe can work more on overlap), and I refuse to conquer AIs which are currently far too stupid to defend themselves properly. Do you think it can be done?

 

[lamaros]

Different views to others:

Only three things matter for a science victory.

1. Great Engineer points, or enough Gold/Faith to buy the ones you want.
2. Science Output
3. Great Scientist points (for science rush + Sagan).

The only hard bottleneck to finishing a science victory is getting the tech required to do the projects - actually building the projects is a flow on, and can be significantly rushed.

Your industry output is important, but not hugely so. You only really need one city with a Spaceport and good industry if you have the other factors.

#2&3 above go hand in hand for the most part, so the only think to otherwise do it get a plan for getting the Great Engineers you need. I think the most efficient/fastest method would be to recruit one and buy the other straight after, so getting good commercial income/faith is important.

How you do this of course depends on the civ you have. If you have Germany then you'll probably just go hard on industry instead, and actually build more than one city. If you're Arabia you'll probably go hard with science and faith and buy a great engineer with faith.

 

[KmDubya]

Just so I understand the basics of it - Commercial Hubs for more internal trade routes in order to maximize production (which always seems to be the bottleneck from early on until the end of the game), right? Or are you generating a lot of gold to rush-buy buildings with?

I'm currently trying to get that victory on Immortal, but I'm not sure 5-6 cities are enough for a decent date. I rarely get to settle more (maybe can work more on overlap), and I refuse to conquer AIs which are currently far too stupid to defend themselves properly. Do you think it can be done?

The commercial are for the trade routes, especially the food and cogs that can be sent to the main production center. Having a nice gold income is very useful as well.

Five to six cities is really really small unless they are in a ring five hexes away from your powerhouse and feed it with factories. I'd want to have two to three times that many cities

 

[Fahim]

Most of you are saying have a minimum of 10 cities, is this for bigger maps because I usually play on small maps and never have more than 5-6 cities. I don't usually conquer other cities unless its necessary or going for a domination victory.

 

[redeemed371240]

Hi Fahim! If you want an early finish date, then you might want to conquer some AI and city states early when there is little to no warmongering penalty. There's less land on smaller maps and you need as many cities as possible to generate science since science is still tied to population like in Civ V. It's 0.7 science per one citizen according to some other threads.

For your reference, I played a science-focused Saladin with six cities each with developed campuses and an expansive Montezuma with 20 cities and only three undeveloped campuses. At 200 AD, Saladin generated 89 science per turn and Montezuma generated 157.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Most of you are saying have a minimum of 10 cities, is this for bigger maps because I usually play on small maps and never have more than 5-6 cities. I don't usually conquer other cities unless its necessary or going for a domination victory.

Even on small maps I never end up with less than 10 cities. You might not like conquering but right now it is without a doubt the best option for a fast science victory. If you want to play completely peaceful it will hinder you.

 

[TheJokker]

Start as Germany. Build lots of slingers/archers and warriors/spearman and take out all the civilizations and city states on your continent. Don't worry about settlers (until you conquer your continent) as you will have plenty of cities from conquest. Build some builders here and there to develop your resources. While you are conquering your continent, as soon as your army is built up enough, start building commercial districts and traders for gold and roads. Next, start building Hansa's for production and then entertainment districts for amenities to keep your cities growing. Lastly build your Campuses.

If you control your continent you will control all the resources. You will have a sizable army you can upgrade with all the gold your commerce districts creates and you will have great production with no competition. On King or below you should be leading in Science even before you start building your campuses.

 

[georgjorge]

I see what you are saying about needing to conquer many cities to get enough science. I just hardly get around to that since when I already have an army, why not keep conquering until I have won? Strange that we shouldn't be able to achieve such a victory (with a decent date) peacefully.

 

[redeemed371240]

You can achieve a decent date peacefully; however, in my experience, you just finish about 75 turns faster with a continent all to yourself. Obviously, balancing a militant strategy becomes challenging on island and pangea maps for different reasons.