Immortal Peaceful Authority Potential Assessing

[Cokolwiek]

Yo,

I'm gonna keep this sweet and short. Rules are simple full authority, but no wars in the first few eras. I am certain authority is going to rock this, and will outperform progress. It is a test if authority is too powerful when at peace due to its great production, gold, culture (yes), and settling potential. I found its obvious but some people were unconvinced so here we are. China, immortal, epic, pangea, 8, 16. Some of the screenshots you can judge yourself, they are to show strength of my cities and yields and science and culture, and are self-explanatory, so I didn't comment on them. I tried to take them every forty turns or so.

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There has been a lot of discussion how authority and progress should be adjusted. I was a voice that authority is brutally overpowered both when it comes to peaceful development and warmongering.
Another reason to post this is to check if balance changes we were discussing in the deity thread are relevant at other difficulties. I also wanted to see if indeed tough happiness, city locking and food being worthless is mostly deity thing. Lastly I done this to check if I don't play well enough to deity and if immortal is challenging for me. Long story short, immortal is a yawn and I feel like I already won this game even if I am five techs behind the current score leader. Immortal is a cakewalk. Deity many times also is, but I'm sure I wouldn't be able to get as many wonders, cities, yields on it. I will repeat this challenge on deity, of course. This is April version, though I increased war approach of AI towards player and other AIs nearly twofold (it's not enough by the way).
I don't intend to finish this playthrough, but probably will.
I have a problem with taking screenshots, I was using Lightshot app, so some are missing.

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This is the bug when taking screenshots I was talking about. More than half ended up this way.

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Very standard for me, wheel first, monument, stonehenge (springtime of course), trapping, pottery, first settler founded Xian (monument first, then herbalist), archer bought to go barb hunting, as worker wouldn't be able to do anything useful yet, invested shrine, second settler up north to forward settle Russia, those cities were built without imperium by the way, free settler founded Chengdu to block off Washington. I hard built one worker in the capital at some point (there was no useful buildings to build, only walls and market which weren't needed, I decided against hanging gardens (rightfully, I was twelve turns off), and settler spamming was already delegated to other cities), bought the rest of workers.

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My cities on turn 136, look how powerful they are, I've been investing in herbalists, then monuments, then shrines and wells, some invested (then councils, paper makers (invested), barracks, arenas(usually invested)). I am swimming in gold. This is the power of authority, you settle a city, it immediately finishes first building and gain a tile, then you invest in monument so it can repeat that tile into production and gold mechanism. I founded third religion, very comfortable, completely different than at deity, of course I went apostolic and churches as I want culture, strong capital (I am considering artistry or fealty) and WLTKD synergies with my ability, maybe fealty, for sure with synagogues and industry. I was also able to grab terracotta and angkor wat without any substantial racing, AIs are sleeping compared to deity. It's not that different from deity, they are strong, but like -20% slower in wonder policies, settling, which translates to huge difficulty gap. And it's kinda boring.

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I was going to settle another city just north from Frankfurt but Germany beat me.

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I decided I need to enhance first to get synagogues (plus 10% science in all cities during WLTKD will give me more than scholarship, apart from the building other bonuses) and mendicancy (which give will give me enough faith to use my all faith sinks (synagogues, then missionary spam and reformation which will be another faith building, maybe monasteries, then churches) and much needed plus two culture on every city.

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I am the first to enhance and just about to begin my real power spike with yields from authority finisher, apostolic tradition, and religion buildings. Don't think any wonders are necessary or crucial until renaissance. I bought most of the bowmen. I will aim for the globe maybe (I am upper tree-focused, don't even have bronze working and iron yet) and definitely sistine and summer palace, maybe taj mahal even. Don't know if I will try pisa, it's a detour. Right now I am 5 policies and one policy behind the two top AIs, but I will make up very quickly now, I don't see any powerful contender. Monasteries would be amazing and nobility would be amazing but I will pass probably and focus on artistry. Statecraft in my position is the worst option, I have five city-states around me, but mostly mercantile, no cultural, only one militaristic. Spies wouldn't be useful because I am going to catch up very quickly now, trade routes to city-states are meh, I prefer internal. There's much more happiness, production, great people, golden ages, culture and also slightly more science in both fealty and artistry. I think the most powerful would be fealty, but I will probably try artistry.

I would like to hear what do you think of authority peaceful power (it's amazing and evident) and also what enhancers and policies would you take now. I'm pretty sure mendicancy and synagogues are the best in my position though, am I missing something?

 

[CrazyG]

As of your final picture, how many social policies do you have? How many techs?

 

[DeAnno]

April version was before the big ABC buff on Epic, Epic Immortal then was probably much easier than Epic Immortal now. I still suspect Epic is easier in current patches but probably not by so much (maybe half a difficulty easier instead of a full diffficulty.) Standard Immortal on current patch is a similar rigamarole to Deity of trying to found usually these days.

 

[CppMaster]

Yeah, if you want to use a playthrough as a balance evidence, it's better if it's Standard speed and the newest patch. Otherwise it's not as valuable.

 

[Cokolwiek]

As of your final picture, how many social policies do you have? How many techs?

Don't remember exactly, will provide in the next episode, I was on par with culture with the most, two policies behind Ethiopia. At one point it was my 17 to every other AIs 22, I was usually last in science (still didn't have bronze working while doing theology and education). After medieval powerspike I am on par with science with everyone and three techs behind Ethiopia, one policy behind Ethiopia.

April version was before the big ABC buff on Epic, Epic Immortal then was probably much easier than Epic Immortal now. I still suspect Epic is easier in current patches but probably not by so much (maybe half a difficulty easier instead of a full diffficulty.) Standard Immortal on current patch is a similar rigamarole to Deity of trying to found usually these days.

You are right, I just play it because I get CTD on turn five or six every time I start June one. I was amazed to learn that immortal per se have only slightly decreased (really 5%) AI bonuses and it feels in this game. Everything feels very like deity, but those small differences amount to wonders being some several turns later, which influences easy feel. However AI performance got better later. One of the points of this photojournals is to demonstrate how different immortal feels (at least when you come from deity).

Yeah, if you want to use a playthrough as a balance evidence, it's better if it's Standard speed and the newest patch. Otherwise it's not as valuable.

I wasn't starting it with an intention to a photojournal and I don't pretend its anything definitive and settles the case. Many deity/otherwise players are epic players so it is still somewhat relevant. But anyway I play first for the fun, so I accept it may not be as helpful.

I would like to point your attention at the fact that I can still grab a lot of wonders (mostly the same that are possible on deity, ofc I couldn't get great lighthouse), my cities are brutally ahead of where the progress cities would be (I build every building as soon as it is unlocked because I have nothing else to do) and my cultural output is consistently nearly half more than my science even though I am authority without any wars. No point in getting those techs apart from ruining you happiness, you won't have production to build buildings (and many times it won't be good idea to build then anyway, like workshops apart from capital, one tile island, or 5 forests tiles city) or culture to build wonders. That's how I usually play, science and food while the most important in vanilla, are not nearly as important as now. Authority and other stuff provides so much gold from late classical on I can invest in pretty every building and buy emissaries. I also haven't built a single church yet. Circuses are still to come.

 

[CrazyG]

Are there plans to finish this game or the German one? I'm really curious to see how you handle the midgame with this strategy. I tried playing authority peacefully this patch more than once and I just keep getting wrecked. My science and culture are just too low to keep up with the AI, maybe you can show me what I'm missing?

 

[Cokolwiek]

Are there plans to finish this game or the German one? I'm really curious to see how you handle the midgame with this strategy. I tried playing authority peacefully this patch more than once and I just keep getting wrecked. My science and culture are just too low to keep up with the AI, maybe you can show me what I'm missing?

I recently reinstalled the whole Civ5 to see if I can play new version without CTD with new patch from ilteroi and photojournal on this. And yes, I was stupid, I hoped that I will run 6-19, ended up with removing everything, screenshots included to remove any trace of Civ5 VP and secure clean install. Now I retreated to March version. So no.
As I don't play much I remember the outcomes of both, with Germany I annexed France, hadn't had a religion (neither had France) or faith buildings so went fealty for monasteries, development and happiness. Beelined rifling and warred Washington with a plan to attack on Morocco later (Marrakesh was just two cities to the south). Lost interest afterwards. Could I won that one? As Morocco was the only snowballer with ALL the wonders, and he was my friend with most of his army on the other side on pangea (everyone else hated and declared on him) I think yes, as long as I would be able to stay at the same military tech level and take his capital.
China one I played exactly to the moment I get Neuschwanstein, entered industrial first, was first in score, and polices, lost interest after. I had strong religion with churches, mosques, and reformed with ability to buy any great person. I remember I generated 300 science but 600 culture a turn with full artistry.
I conquered Washington, annexed three or four cities of him, left the tundra ones as a puppets, and started attacking Germany, strong AI who hated me already, his Berlin would be the final addition to my empire. I wasn't going to take any of the coastal cities, even though I initially want to settle when Germany did with Frankfurt. It would just leave vulnerable spots for Japan to attack me and not add much because I was going to have thirteen strong cities overall: nine my own cities, four from Washington, one from Bismarck so three capitals. Askia was successful in the North, grabbed some wonders, swallowed up Russia, but was very friendly and I had enough of a chokepoint to stop him in peninsula around Guangzhou if need be. I also got Sistine in Nanjing, Pisa and Summer Palace in Beijing. I don't recollect medieval wonders after Angkor Wat I suggest I got none. Basically every other medieval and renaissance wonder went to Morocco, Great Wall, and Himeji to Askia.

But I think I wouldn't be playing this anymore had I possessed the saves still, epic is too much of a slog now when I transitioned to standard. And this game was influenced by being epic, having enough space to nine (!) good cities without wars, very strong faction, and AI bonuses not scaling to epic properly.
So I would rather start a new one than continue this.