Hidden antiquities sites

[tetley]

How many people have actually explored these hidden antiquities sites (from completing Exploration tree)? I just explored one (just to get the achievement) and discovered that these sites are actually better than regular archaeological digs. I was curious if people actually know just how much better.

The one I dug up, it was like I dug up a Great Writer. I was given a choice whether to create a great WRITING or to take 11000 culture. I took the latter. Unfortunately, I won the very next turn (courtesy of a musician that pumped 19000 tourism into Persia), so I never got the chance to dig up more. I plan to go back to a save game and find out what's in the rest.

What other digs have you seen? I'm starting to doubt my long-held belief that completing Exploration is underpowered. At least, not on sea maps.

 

[joncnunn]

Moderator Action: Moved to General Discussions

 

[jac7_98]

Have never got that far down the tree to grab these. I was always worried that the sites would be in enemy civl areas, and that if I had any penalties I couldn't get there. No culture wins in a while though, so maybe worth a try

 

[beetle]

Certainly the exploration tree is interesting enough to do for one game. The hidden antiquity sites are just like regular digs except about a third can be Great Writers. Agreed, the GW hits are awesome, but still I don't see how that tree is competitive with your other choices, even when trying for a CV.

Mind you, I am struggling with CV, but my first real try at it I figured Exploration would be more important than Rationalism. It did not work out! I would love to read about a scenario where finishing out Exploration would be pivotal, if you can think of one...

When I am playing games that are sufficiently challenging, I can't seem to be successful if I deviate much from (Tradition or Liberty) + Rationalism + Ideology. My games take 400+ turns, so I usually end up filling out one other tree. Piety or Patronage or Aesthetics are all strong, and can be started before Rationalism. Commerce and Exploration just seem weak in comparison to those three. But I am interested in trying different things. For example, MoV makes finishing Commerce a priority for Venice.

 

[Redaxe]

Certainly the exploration tree is interesting enough to do for one game. The hidden antiquity sites are just like regular digs except about a third can be Great Writers. Agreed, the GW hits are awesome, but still I don't see how that tree is competitive with your other choices, even when trying for a CV.

Mind you, I am struggling with CV, but my first real try at it I figured Exploration would be more important than Rationalism. It did not work out! I would love to read about a scenario where finishing out Exploration would be pivotal, if you can think of one...

When I am playing games that are sufficiently challenging, I can't seem to be successful if I deviate much from (Tradition or Liberty) + Rationalism + Ideology. My games take 400+ turns, so I usually end up filling out one other tree. Piety or Patronage or Aesthetics are all strong, and can be started before Rationalism. Commerce and Exploration just seem weak in comparison to those three. But I am interested in trying different things. For example, MoV makes finishing Commerce a priority for Venice.

What's your difficulty rating?

I sorta agree on exploration. I've used the finisher once or twice - mainly out of curiosity. The hidden great works are pretty cool, think of it as getting a refund for much of that culture you invested in Exploration.
The problem though is that the tree doesn't really pull you toward any particular victory which is an issue considering it has to compete with rationalism which is good for every victory strat.
But I would say if you're playing ICS over the ocean then it's a fantastic tree. It feels like a good extension to Liberty and it will generate bucketloads of extra happiness, gold and productivity so it's pretty good at doing what it does - which is helping the maritime oriented Civs particularly Carthage (exploration screams at this one). The nice thing is settling on a coastal hill tile with Liberty & Maritime Infrastructure you get a base of 6 hammers/turn which really makes new cities expand quickly.
Oh and the opener is actually really good for a large sized map.
Try England, with Great Lighthouse and Exploration!
If you want to to Exploration my suggestion is play a large sized water based map with a water civ and win the World Fair. Oracle is another good Wonder to snag in preparation for this.

 

[beetle]

What's your difficulty rating?

Immortal, map was prolly continents plus since that's my favorite. Agreed that it is interesting to do once or twice, and I also really like the opener. If the hidden sites were an SP half-way through they would be so much more tempting. Finisher ability to buy Great Admirals is also weak. As you observe, it is just not sufficiently competitive to rationalism. I like your observation about the synergy with Liberty, since I tend to be stuck on the Liberty synergy to Piety, I might give that a go.

Really I would like a road map sketch for making the finisher a linchpin to a solid (maybe not the fastest) CV. From my amateurish tries, extra GW and museum theming bonus are just not competitive with the alternatives. I can't work it out in the abstract either. It feels like it should work better than it does.

I like your idea of focusing on Exploration with a naval civ, and just treat the finisher as an added late game perk to keep busy.

 

[tetley]

I was thinking Sweden. Exploration can give you a lot of Admirals. I pick the first 3 SP all the time (the happiness one being the third--that one is awesome). When I went on and finished, the GA policy was not so bad: my GA's couldn't keep up with my Frigates, let alone my destroyers. And when you've got 8 of them, it actually turns out to be pretty useful to burn one when you're out privateering--you wind up with whole clusters of wounded ships, captured and hard-built alike. The one that gives 1 gold per harbor, seaport, etc. was not so bad, either. It's not as good as the happiness, but that gets multiplied by banks & markets, and I combined it with skyscrapers, which I promptly used to rush-buy airports--which gets you your CV. I think that added like 70gpt when I first got it. The last SP added a little more gold and was kind of blah, but it came with the finisher.

And then, by that point in the game, great writers were giving a full SP apiece. When you're going for a CV, those great works+theming bonuses are giving culture as well as tourism. So if you dig up 3 writings through the hidden sites, you make up your 3 SP's back. I would probably use those to finish aesthetics--I can't bear to pick up the "half of happiness gets converted to culture" any earlier in a wide game. Then with aesthetics done, you faith purchase musicians and win the game. I don't know what it is about musicians and the Internet (Youtube? ITunes?), but musicians after you research the Internet are game winners.

 

[Redaxe]

Immortal, map was prolly continents plus since that's my favorite. Agreed that it is interesting to do once or twice, and I also really like the opener. If the hidden sites were an SP half-way through they would be so much more tempting. Finisher ability to buy Great Merchants is also weak. As you observe, it is just not sufficiently competitive to rationalism. I like your observation about the synergy with Liberty, since I tend to be stuck on the Liberty synergy to Piety, I might give that a go.

Really I would like a road map sketch for making the finisher a linchpin to a solid (maybe not the fastest) CV. From my amateurish tries, extra GW and museum theming bonus are just not competitive with the alternatives. I can't work it out in the abstract either. It feels like it should work better than it does.

I like your idea of focusing on Exploration with a naval civ, and just treat the finisher as an added late game perk to keep busy.

Continents Plus is ok but it puts all the CityStates on Islands doesn't it and I think that will be a problem if you want to avoid inland spots. If you fork out the $$ for the Scrambled Continents Pack there is a map called "Small Continents Plus" - this actually generates some very interesting maps and more importantly CSs are not not all on the islands, some start on the continents, imo its possibly the best map type for exploration.
Can't help you much with a CV strategy. For an Exploration CV you ideally need Tradition or Liberty/Piety-To The Glory of God for late game engineers so you can buy the Eiffel Tower etc....
Then you want at least 1 policy in Aesthetics (Writer/artist/Music bonus) and full Exploration then back to Aesthetics. The only way I can think of to do it all is maybe Poland & Oracle & World Fair. But Poland isn't that suited to water maps.

But I'm actually tempted to start a Carthage game on Small Continents Plus with a focus on exploration. To think free harbor with exploration in each city means each new city gets extra happiness & gold immediately & more with Liberty.

 

[kaspergm]

Hidden Antquity Sites are somewhat poorly imbalanced in the sense that lower half of Exploration is quite bad, but if the opportunity is for you to dig a lot of them, they can quite easily give you back more culture than you invested in filling out Exploration thus making it kind of worth it anyway. Particular fun can be had if you manage to delay the World Congress resolution called World Games (or whatever it's called) which gives you double culture for 20 turns and times it match with the hidden sites.

Do notice, however, that it's only about 1/3 hidden sites that give you the "cultural revolution", the other ones will just work as normal archeology sites - personally, I think it would have been a better solution to have all of them gives special yields, but have it be less extreme.

 

[Redaxe]

I was thinking Sweden. Exploration can give you a lot of Admirals. I pick the first 3 SP all the time (the happiness one being the third--that one is awesome). When I went on and finished, the GA policy was not so bad: my GA's couldn't keep up with my Frigates, let alone my destroyers. And when you've got 8 of them, it actually turns out to be pretty useful to burn one when you're out privateering--you wind up with whole clusters of wounded ships, captured and hard-built alike. The one that gives 1 gold per harbor, seaport, etc. was not so bad, either. It's not as good as the happiness, but that gets multiplied by banks & markets, and I combined it with skyscrapers, which I promptly used to rush-buy airports--which gets you your CV. I think that added like 70gpt when I first got it. The last SP added a little more gold and was kind of blah, but it came with the finisher.

And then, by that point in the game, great writers were giving a full SP apiece. When you're going for a CV, those great works+theming bonuses are giving culture as well as tourism. So if you dig up 3 writings through the hidden sites, you make up your 3 SP's back. I would probably use those to finish aesthetics--I can't bear to pick up the "half of happiness gets converted to culture" any earlier in a wide game. Then with aesthetics done, you faith purchase musicians and win the game. I don't know what it is about musicians and the Internet (Youtube? ITunes?), but musicians after you research the Internet are game winners.

Never thought of Sweden, but I haven't tried that Civ, the UA seemed wierd and clunky to me but maybe I should give it a go.
People have actually used the Admiral bonus (I think it used to be in Commerce) for early exploring as they cross oceans. If you doing a medieval era start or playing some of the bigger scenarios it can be quite useful.
The happiness to culture policy bugs the hell out of me. I'd love to be able to do Aesthetics and full Commerce for Protectionism but it's basically mutually exclusive with Liberty until you get Order or Autocracy.
Agree on Aesthetics though, it's really a waste to finish that tree early seeing as most of the benefits really don't flow on until later. The bonus to culture buildings is possibly the most useful though as it helps you get the Hermitage much more easily. If you have a culture heavy capital and win the world fair you really want this one.

Oh & the other advantage in the Hidden Sites is that all that extra culture will kill any other Civs dreams of gaining tourism dominance over you. If you're under ideological pressure the hidden sites will really make a difference.

 

[Redaxe]

Do notice, however, that it's only about 1/3 hidden sites that give you the "cultural revolution", the other ones will just work as normal archeology sites - personally, I think it would have been a better solution to have all of them gives special yields, but have it be less extreme.

Actually they are special in the sense that the Works you get from them are Great Works of Writing which means that they don't compete with Museums & Art slots and its a good way of using those empty amphitheatres. If you have a culture heavy capital with national Epic/Heroic Epic then once you get National Visitor Centre etc those extra works of writing become quite useful.

 

[beetle]

I appreciate all the interesting discussion and opinion!

Actually they are special in the sense that the Works you get from them are Great Works of Writing...

Only 30%, the other 70% are the usual landmarks/artifacts.

If you have a culture heavy capital with national Epic/Heroic Epic then once you get National Visitor Centre etc those extra works of writing become quite useful.

I disagree with this, because it's late game, you should bulbing the Great Writers. Before even opening Exploration, your first two GW should be in amphitheaters or the NW you mention. Then they get traded and moved to Oxford as soon as you have that for theming bonus. Unless you have other wonders for theming bonuses, I think it is a pretty easy case to make for bulbing GW after the first two.

 

[tetley]

I don't see myself ever picking the Great writing work over the cultural renaissance, but I will grant that I can run out of museum slots sometimes. It's harder to theme the writing slots. Theming Oxford is easy, but then you have to have the Great Library to get any more.

Post-patch, I actually like using Legalism (on a Liberty start) to vault myself to Hermitage, but aesthetics could be done, too. The problem there is that it falls at the same time you are working on Exploration. My last game, Legalism gave me 4 broadcast towers. 2000 free hammers ( only to later get CN tower, though).

 

[Barbbb]

still, exploration is one of the things that are fun to try once or twice, but even on water based maps, depending on what VC you want, ideology/rationalism/aesthetics give much more benefits. The real benefit from the tree is still the sites, and they're not that great, at least not exactly worth all the policies you took to get there

 

[Coastergenius]

If you're doing a culture victory, I feel that it's almost required to get the louvre (because it's hard enough to get the other early Wonders) so that requires at least unlocking Exploration. I think that Exploration goes well with Cultural Victories in general.

 

[joncnunn]

I don't see myself ever picking the Great writing work over the cultural renaissance, but I will grant that I can run out of museum slots sometimes. It's harder to theme the writing slots. Theming Oxford is easy, but then you have to have the Great Library to get any more.

You forgot about the Globe, which is much easier to get than Great Library.

 

[kaspergm]

If you're doing a culture victory, I feel that it's almost required to get the louvre (because it's hard enough to get the other early Wonders) so that requires at least unlocking Exploration. I think that Exploration goes well with Cultural Victories in general.

I tend to agree, but that just goes to show what a miscreation Exploration is (in my optics at least). The fact that Exploration (and not Aesthetics) has the most powerful cultural wonder is strange in the first place, the fact that Uffizi is much more difficult to get theming bonus from than Louvre only adds to this (Uffizi's 3 works from same civ and same era can be a real pain imo.). The fact that Exploration generally does not cater to cultural victory - apart from the finisher - makes it even more strange, although I guess you could say there's a general synergy between expansion and CV in BnW.

 

[beetle]

If you're doing a culture victory, I feel that it's almost required to get the louvre (because it's hard enough to get the other early Wonders) so that requires at least unlocking Exploration.

Agree.

I think that Exploration goes well with Cultural Victories in general.

Disagree. It is not until the finisher that you get anything else for CV. As others note, it takes too long to get there, and there are too many better choices.

 

[Barbbb]

You forgot about the Globe, which is much easier to get than Great Library.

it's possible if you head to PP early, but in all fairness I still don't think it's necessary to use GW that you digged from sited, since Globe gives a free writer

 

[Sarin]

Am I the only one thinking Exploration is more meant for a naval warmonger civs? It buffs naval units quite significantly (especially by buffing GAs, allowing them to keep up with fleets), while improving production, happiness and gold, and giving them access to an interesting culture source. Basically the things that warmongers lack most.