Is cultural victory possible?
- Thread starter MarcoPolo
- Start date
Tauro
Warlord
- Joined
- Nov 20, 2005
- Messages
- 251
You can manage to obtain a cultural victory even without many great artists if you are strong enough in wonders, buildings and commerce. The only time that I tried it I had only one artist and worked well (on prince 
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Thanks for the helpful advice everyone. I'm close to a domination victory in my current game playing Bismark on Warlord. Just now getting to build Panzers and most of the AI is still just building Riflemen. I will try for a cultural victory in my next game.
petey
Prince
With Great Artists, I find it's best to settle them as super-specialists in your three cities early in the game. The +12/turn, when multiplied by all the bonuses that you're going to put in those cities, works out to more than the culture bomb will give you. Remember to try beelining to Music for the free one, since you will then get it early enough to settle. Try to build all the Wonders that give Artist points in your main city and build the National Epic and Globe Theatre there and set as many specialists as you can to Artists and then build the other Wonders in your other two cities. That city will then crank out GAs like nobody's business.
After the mid-game, keep the Great Artists in reserve. If the AI sees that you're getting too close to a victory, they will attack you, so by keeping the cultural numbers down until the last turn, they won't know that you're about to beat them and will have one less reason to attack you. Then use them all in one turn to boost your cities over the limit - ie if you have one city at 50,000, a second at 42,000 and a third at 26,000 and you have 8 Artists in reserve, culture bomb 2 in city 2 and 6 in city 3 and you'll get the win without any of the AI realizing that you're about to beat them.
After the mid-game, keep the Great Artists in reserve. If the AI sees that you're getting too close to a victory, they will attack you, so by keeping the cultural numbers down until the last turn, they won't know that you're about to beat them and will have one less reason to attack you. Then use them all in one turn to boost your cities over the limit - ie if you have one city at 50,000, a second at 42,000 and a third at 26,000 and you have 8 Artists in reserve, culture bomb 2 in city 2 and 6 in city 3 and you'll get the win without any of the AI realizing that you're about to beat them.
Wodan
Deity
I wouldn't worry so much about the AIs doing a last second attack. Nevertheless, keeping your GAs for a last culture push is definitely good advice, but for a different reason. One of your 3 cities is almost certainly going to lag a bit behind your others. So, having 2 or 3 GAs to pop in there for 4000 culture each will even them out. This can let you win the game a good 12-15 turns earlier than you would otherwise.
Wodan
Wodan
I play on Noble (no advantage to either side) with Elizabeth on large pangea maps.
If I just want to win the game easily, I chop rush cities to sane places, try to expand at the correct rate, found religions, make friends, try not to get rolled militarily, and either do space race or kill everyone with tanks.
Cultural victory is harder. The times I've done it, I've planned for it. I've made three or four cities that are heavily cottaged and probably inland. I've religion-hogged. I try to get 9 cities and 3-4 religions.
It's tricky to get temples everywhere, and cathedrals in the right places, but if you can do this while avoid getting militarily crushed, and have democracy and rifling ready to go by about 1600, you can turn culture to full blast, rush-build any remaining religious buildings, put military units on your borders, and win pretty easily sometime around 1900. Your score probably won't be very high.
The last time I did this, I wasn't paying attention and ended up with four or five too many great artists. I also don't micro-manage specialists that much.
This is trickier than playing a "normal" game, but it is certainly not impossible.
It is not necessary to go crazy with wonders, although on this difficulty you'll get a lot. With a nice cottaged city and a bunch of cathedrals you can get maybe 600-900 culture per turn in a good city.
bruce
If I just want to win the game easily, I chop rush cities to sane places, try to expand at the correct rate, found religions, make friends, try not to get rolled militarily, and either do space race or kill everyone with tanks.
Cultural victory is harder. The times I've done it, I've planned for it. I've made three or four cities that are heavily cottaged and probably inland. I've religion-hogged. I try to get 9 cities and 3-4 religions.
It's tricky to get temples everywhere, and cathedrals in the right places, but if you can do this while avoid getting militarily crushed, and have democracy and rifling ready to go by about 1600, you can turn culture to full blast, rush-build any remaining religious buildings, put military units on your borders, and win pretty easily sometime around 1900. Your score probably won't be very high.
The last time I did this, I wasn't paying attention and ended up with four or five too many great artists. I also don't micro-manage specialists that much.
This is trickier than playing a "normal" game, but it is certainly not impossible.
It is not necessary to go crazy with wonders, although on this difficulty you'll get a lot. With a nice cottaged city and a bunch of cathedrals you can get maybe 600-900 culture per turn in a good city.
bruce
MaskedFrog
Chieftain
I have won culture victories on both Noble and Prince. My first one on Noble was in the 1930s. My second one on Prince was in the 1880s (I made a number of mistakes and could have done alot better).
You need to plan this victory from the start. I go for Bronze Working first then any techs needed to develop your land then straight to Oracle. I do not bother with Stonehenge as you can always chop rush an obelisk if you need it. For me the imporant wonders are the Oracle (Free Tech and Great Prophet generation), Hanging Gardens, Norte Dame, Sistine Chapel, and Taj Mahal. The Parthenon is nice if you have early access to marble but is not critical. The National wonders and Cathedrals are more important. I try for the one the increase culture by 100% and the one the increases GP generation by 100%. Globe Theatre is also useful for GP city.
I have found the key is to get to Music quickly for the free GA and access to theatres. I usually use the Oracle to get Code of Laws for Courthouses and founding a religion. I also try to be the first to get Taoism and Islam. Liberalism is also nice for the Free Tech I usually use to get Nationhood.
I try to keep turns of Anarchy to a minimum. I usually only have a revolution 2 or 3 times. Bureaucracy is nice and Universal Suffrage, Free Speech, and Free Religion are all important.
For city development you need Theatres immediately then Graneries to help the population increase faster. Libraries, Temples, and Monasteries are also important.
Try to identify the 3 cities early on. Usually your Capital is going to be one city then choose 2 others. In the Prince Game it was my 4 or 5th city that I founded that was my third city. It was actually in the middle of a Jungle. Once I dedicated 3 workers to improving it with cottages, it caught up and passed my first two cities. It actually reached legendary status about 20 turns before the other two and I added two GAs each to the other two cities.
Try to tune your GP production to mostly GAs. A few GPs and GSs do not hurt especially if you can found a couple of religions.
Use your early GAs as super specialists as you will get more culture out of them. As you get close to the end save the GAs for culture bombs in the cities that need it.
It is very important to be on good relations with the AI. I suggest not adopting a religion at all and going for Free Religion. It is also recommended to build a fairly sizable defensive army. Make sure to include some units capable of taking towns in case the AI declares war on you. It is far easier to get a peace treaty if you capture or destroy one of his towns.
As soon as you can adjust the culture slider try to keep it at least 10% while maintaining a decent tech growth. Once you get Deomcracy and maybe Rifling depending on your relations with the AI. Completely shut of research and switch over to as much culture as you can. If you need to convert to all gold for a few turns, to buy any buildings or defenses you need. Now you just have to cruise to victory. Do not expect a big score as you will be sacrificing land area and population to achieve a victory.
You need to plan this victory from the start. I go for Bronze Working first then any techs needed to develop your land then straight to Oracle. I do not bother with Stonehenge as you can always chop rush an obelisk if you need it. For me the imporant wonders are the Oracle (Free Tech and Great Prophet generation), Hanging Gardens, Norte Dame, Sistine Chapel, and Taj Mahal. The Parthenon is nice if you have early access to marble but is not critical. The National wonders and Cathedrals are more important. I try for the one the increase culture by 100% and the one the increases GP generation by 100%. Globe Theatre is also useful for GP city.
I have found the key is to get to Music quickly for the free GA and access to theatres. I usually use the Oracle to get Code of Laws for Courthouses and founding a religion. I also try to be the first to get Taoism and Islam. Liberalism is also nice for the Free Tech I usually use to get Nationhood.
I try to keep turns of Anarchy to a minimum. I usually only have a revolution 2 or 3 times. Bureaucracy is nice and Universal Suffrage, Free Speech, and Free Religion are all important.
For city development you need Theatres immediately then Graneries to help the population increase faster. Libraries, Temples, and Monasteries are also important.
Try to identify the 3 cities early on. Usually your Capital is going to be one city then choose 2 others. In the Prince Game it was my 4 or 5th city that I founded that was my third city. It was actually in the middle of a Jungle. Once I dedicated 3 workers to improving it with cottages, it caught up and passed my first two cities. It actually reached legendary status about 20 turns before the other two and I added two GAs each to the other two cities.
Try to tune your GP production to mostly GAs. A few GPs and GSs do not hurt especially if you can found a couple of religions.
Use your early GAs as super specialists as you will get more culture out of them. As you get close to the end save the GAs for culture bombs in the cities that need it.
It is very important to be on good relations with the AI. I suggest not adopting a religion at all and going for Free Religion. It is also recommended to build a fairly sizable defensive army. Make sure to include some units capable of taking towns in case the AI declares war on you. It is far easier to get a peace treaty if you capture or destroy one of his towns.
As soon as you can adjust the culture slider try to keep it at least 10% while maintaining a decent tech growth. Once you get Deomcracy and maybe Rifling depending on your relations with the AI. Completely shut of research and switch over to as much culture as you can. If you need to convert to all gold for a few turns, to buy any buildings or defenses you need. Now you just have to cruise to victory. Do not expect a big score as you will be sacrificing land area and population to achieve a victory.
There is a very good write-up about this by Kylearan (very good player), he did a 3CC on this. if you got to http://www.compoundeye.net/civ it's on the "private games" list. Good read, and very helpful, will give you an idea of what to shoot for and what some goals should be.
