Joshua368
Warmongering builder
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2008
- Messages
- 3,072
Hello everybody. I wanted to play around with Civilization, and found this slingshot. With it, anyone should be able to slingshot education ~1000 BC, without militarily dominating every other civ into submission early. Let me just first say that this is not a legitimate strategy, there is a huge amount of a risk and a fair amount of luck involved in doing it. However pulling it off is fun and should put you into a very interesting position! 
As a disclaimer I will say that I am most certainly not the first person to do this, someone must have done it before me. But I didn't rip this off a DaveMcW deity game or anything.
I was reading an old thread somewhere and someone celebrated pulling off a Civil Service slingshot (back in vanilla) and another person said to tell them when they oracled to Paper. Then another person pointed out that that would require bulbing Theology, and then got me thinking... what if we bulbed paper after that? Clear route to Education!
So how do you pull it off? Well it actually isn't too hard as long as you aren't unlucky. Turns out its very possible, even on Emperor. (the level that I'm comfortable on) It just requires a careful beeline, some fortunate tech trading, and no AI finishing it early! On lower levels its probably less risky, and I'm not even sure if it's possible on Immortal. Leave that for someone else...
For this test game, I'm playing Pericles of Arabia. (unrestricted leaders) The difficulty as I said is Emperor, the speed is Epic, and the map is standard-sized Pangaea. (early contact with many other civs is important)
You don't need a very specific combination though, all that's vital is the Philosophical trait. The other trait isn't nearly as important, pick any philo guy you want. Pericles is nice though because Creative gives him cheap libraries, which are a nice bonus for this.
Starting techs are probably the second most important thing, you want good ones to do this as fast as possible. Mining and Mysticism are the most important techs, followed by whatever food resource you got (preferably Agriculture). The UU/UB probably won't be too vital, though the Madrassa's priests can certainly help.
If you want to do this with a regular leader, I would advise Ghandi of Inda. Philosophical, begins with Mysticism/Mining, and the fast worker doesn't hurt! I did this again with him later, he's pretty good.
Here is the start I chose, reloaded a few times before settling on it. Nothing flashy, no gems or anything. It has a great food resource though and plenty of hills/forests for production, forests are pretty important! Also the city starts on a plains hill, good for getting the first worker out faster. The marble looks nice, but we won't actually be using it all because early Masonry (and the Wheel) won't help us with our beeline!
I chose worker first and teched Agriculture, then Mining and Bronze Working. Even in this crazy game we can't forget the basics! We need food and we certainly need the hammer boost from chopping.
After the worker is complete I begin production on Stonehenge, though focus mostly on city growth for the time being. You have a pretty good shot at getting it, once the corn is farmed start I chopping forests and mining hills!
Bronze Working finishes and I begin the oracle beeline.
For the record, in the end we're going to need both Meditation and Polytheism. (otherwise the prophet can't bulb theology) In this game I take Med because it's cheaper, but I suppose Poly might be better because you're more likely not to get it in a trade later thanks to the Temple of Artemis.
Also during this time we start meeting our neighbors. They're unrestricted but I didn't specifically pick out any, I think finger picking specific leaders could make this a more secure strategy. We meet the likes of Catherine of Germany, Sitting Bull of the Netherlands, Suleiman of the Vikings... what fun.
2775 BC and a few chops later and Stonehenge is complete. Don't really need the monuments, we need it for the Great Prophet points! Notice the GP will take 37 turns to come with our philosophical leader.
Not too long later we finish a fairly important tech in our staregy!
Though it's not for the Oracle... we don't need to get started on that quite yet! You can't build it faster than you can research, hence why marble is not important. The main reason we needed Priesthood right now is to continue teching to Writing, for libraries! No Wheel --> Pottery route needed this game.
Between finishing Stonehenge and teching Writing, there is a bit of "downtime" where you can build whatever you want. This is a good time to spit out garrisans, explorers, workers and maybe a settler. As you can see here, I chopped out a settler to grab some nearby gold! Even without gold, a decent second city should help speed up research, even in short term. (a second library)
Yes, I settled Medina one space off the coast, but I don't really plan on playing this game into the ADs, very short-term spot. Won't have fishing or sailing anyway. Mostly I wanted the gold and being able to steal Mecca's corn tile for quick growth, I want Medina to grow quickly to be useful.
Also yes there's a road there... but that's because my civilization started with The Wheel. If yours doesn't, don't bother researching it, it'll just slow you down.
After researching Writing, the next tech to reseach was Alphabet. This is a pretty vital tech and the end of the beeline required for this strategy.... Mysticism --> Med/Poly --> Priesthood --> Writing --> Alphabet. The main reason is that you can't bulb Paper with it out there, and it opens up tech trading. Building research isn't bad either to speed this along, every turn counts as you cross your fingers in the ending stretch.
Also notice that I was able to chop out the Medrassa/Library within the first two turns. Even if you aren't Creative, simple pre-chopping can get it out asap! Three chops should be enough for normal leaders.
As you can see, I didn't really need its priests for the Great Prophet... it was coming up in three turns anyway. If I had finished Stonehenge slower or got Writing quicker it would have been difference, as it was they shaved off one turn from the GP. Could've done that with a scientist anyway without much risk... ah well, no harm done.
Also if you haven't started chopping out the Oracle yet, now would be a good time to do so.
Great Prophet comes out right on cue! Right now he'll just bulb Polytheism... so I'll save him for later. I quickly change specialists in the city to two scientists. I should get my next great person in 30 turns!
With 6 great scientist points and 2 great prophet points, the odds for the vital great scientist are about 75%... if that isn't good enough for you, make sure you have your second city at size three before writing and pre-chop its library to run two scientists there asap instead, you should still get the Great Scientist before you need him.
At any rate, get those scientist specialists working right away to get Alphabet as soon as possible.
And there we go, the beeline is over! The oracle is being stored with 1 turn left (it won't decay, don't worry) and I can tech trade. You got to get somewhat lucky here as well, not only do you not want someone to complete the Oracle at this point (I'd advise not trading priesthood around
) but to speed this along you got to hope the AI will be willing and able to trade you certain techs.
Outside of the beeline, to bulb Theology we need Polytheism/Meditation, Masonry, and Monotheism. After Alphabet to bulb Paper we need Mathematics and The Wheel. Our job at this point is to get those techs as soon as possible!
Lucked out here, usually the AI won't part with Masonry when the Pyramids are still around! Very nice trade. As you can see, I'm researching Polytheism now as no one will give it to me.
Also my civilization began with The Wheel, but if it didn't it would have been very easy to trade for it, that's not an issue.
Also around this point in the game you'll probably want to backfill for techs like Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Iron Working, etc... I didn't in this playthrough, but its a good idea.
At 75% odds, I get the Great Scientist... whoo, that's a relief! In retrospect I'll definitely want to use the second city for the scientist. Hello there, Alhazen. He'll bulb Mathematics, so he sleeps for now.
My second city doesn't have a madrassa, it's just building research... I have to admit at this point I'm playing kind of sloppy, but I'm in the home stretch.
Polytheism comes in and I'm able to make this trade, horray. At this point I'm close enough to not really worry about trading away Priesthood, if someone builds it in won't be him. Sitting Bull doesn't build wonders anyway. I can now use the Great Prophet to bulb Theology, and I do so, snagging...
Yay, a nice little bonus for doing this whole mess.
No one even had mathematics yet, and even if they did odds are they wouldn't trade it due to the Hanging Gardens. Though if you can luck out and trade alphabet for math... that'll probably seal this whole thing for you.
But not for me. Twelve or so nail-biting turns later, Mathetics completes, allowing my great scientist to do this!
And the very next turn The Oracle was complete! I got it!!!
4212 free beakers, think I got enough bang for my buck?
My civilization gets to enjoy a Renaissance in 975 BC! How can it be reborn... was there ever a dark age? I was in the medieval era for all of twelve or thirteen turns.
The grand achievement, early access to universities! And thanks to the Philosophical trait, they are very reasonably priced for an early empire, same as an aqueduct. Plus I'm sure early Oxford will be very handy! On top of all that, we have founded Christianity, have early shots at the Apostolic Palace, Hagia Sophia and University of Sankore, and can trade maps.
So where would you take a game at this point? Well unfortunately for me I've lost this save file, but if I pull it off again, I'd imagine there are quite a few good options. I'd probably want to try quickly expanding with settlers and using my +25% bonus to rocket ahead in tech... probably start laying down cottages. Plus I've got a bit of a headstart in the liberalism race.
Although on the other hand... Gunpowder is now available for research. And after teching/trading Aesthetics and Iron Working, another great scientist can bulb through most of it. I could surprise my opponent's archers and axemen with BC muskets!
In fact, imagine doing this with Suleiman. Extremely early Janissaries! +25% vs. Archers, Melee, Mounted! Now that is something I'll have to try out sometime.
Hope you've all enjoyed this walkthrough, maybe some others can try it and use early education (or gunpowder) to win the game. Once again though, signifigant risk involved, be prepared to have to regenerate your game if you get unlucky with an AI finishing the Oracle. I got it in my first try though. Certainly fun to pull off on a decently high level, I surprised myself!
As a disclaimer I will say that I am most certainly not the first person to do this, someone must have done it before me. But I didn't rip this off a DaveMcW deity game or anything.
I was reading an old thread somewhere and someone celebrated pulling off a Civil Service slingshot (back in vanilla) and another person said to tell them when they oracled to Paper. Then another person pointed out that that would require bulbing Theology, and then got me thinking... what if we bulbed paper after that? Clear route to Education!So how do you pull it off? Well it actually isn't too hard as long as you aren't unlucky. Turns out its very possible, even on Emperor. (the level that I'm comfortable on) It just requires a careful beeline, some fortunate tech trading, and no AI finishing it early! On lower levels its probably less risky, and I'm not even sure if it's possible on Immortal. Leave that for someone else...
For this test game, I'm playing Pericles of Arabia. (unrestricted leaders) The difficulty as I said is Emperor, the speed is Epic, and the map is standard-sized Pangaea. (early contact with many other civs is important)
You don't need a very specific combination though, all that's vital is the Philosophical trait. The other trait isn't nearly as important, pick any philo guy you want. Pericles is nice though because Creative gives him cheap libraries, which are a nice bonus for this.
Starting techs are probably the second most important thing, you want good ones to do this as fast as possible. Mining and Mysticism are the most important techs, followed by whatever food resource you got (preferably Agriculture). The UU/UB probably won't be too vital, though the Madrassa's priests can certainly help.
If you want to do this with a regular leader, I would advise Ghandi of Inda. Philosophical, begins with Mysticism/Mining, and the fast worker doesn't hurt! I did this again with him later, he's pretty good.
Here is the start I chose, reloaded a few times before settling on it. Nothing flashy, no gems or anything. It has a great food resource though and plenty of hills/forests for production, forests are pretty important! Also the city starts on a plains hill, good for getting the first worker out faster. The marble looks nice, but we won't actually be using it all because early Masonry (and the Wheel) won't help us with our beeline!
I chose worker first and teched Agriculture, then Mining and Bronze Working. Even in this crazy game we can't forget the basics! We need food and we certainly need the hammer boost from chopping.
After the worker is complete I begin production on Stonehenge, though focus mostly on city growth for the time being. You have a pretty good shot at getting it, once the corn is farmed start I chopping forests and mining hills!
Bronze Working finishes and I begin the oracle beeline.
For the record, in the end we're going to need both Meditation and Polytheism. (otherwise the prophet can't bulb theology) In this game I take Med because it's cheaper, but I suppose Poly might be better because you're more likely not to get it in a trade later thanks to the Temple of Artemis.
Also during this time we start meeting our neighbors. They're unrestricted but I didn't specifically pick out any, I think finger picking specific leaders could make this a more secure strategy. We meet the likes of Catherine of Germany, Sitting Bull of the Netherlands, Suleiman of the Vikings... what fun.
2775 BC and a few chops later and Stonehenge is complete. Don't really need the monuments, we need it for the Great Prophet points! Notice the GP will take 37 turns to come with our philosophical leader.
Not too long later we finish a fairly important tech in our staregy!
Though it's not for the Oracle... we don't need to get started on that quite yet! You can't build it faster than you can research, hence why marble is not important. The main reason we needed Priesthood right now is to continue teching to Writing, for libraries! No Wheel --> Pottery route needed this game.
Between finishing Stonehenge and teching Writing, there is a bit of "downtime" where you can build whatever you want. This is a good time to spit out garrisans, explorers, workers and maybe a settler. As you can see here, I chopped out a settler to grab some nearby gold! Even without gold, a decent second city should help speed up research, even in short term. (a second library)
Yes, I settled Medina one space off the coast, but I don't really plan on playing this game into the ADs, very short-term spot. Won't have fishing or sailing anyway. Mostly I wanted the gold and being able to steal Mecca's corn tile for quick growth, I want Medina to grow quickly to be useful.
Also yes there's a road there... but that's because my civilization started with The Wheel. If yours doesn't, don't bother researching it, it'll just slow you down.
After researching Writing, the next tech to reseach was Alphabet. This is a pretty vital tech and the end of the beeline required for this strategy.... Mysticism --> Med/Poly --> Priesthood --> Writing --> Alphabet. The main reason is that you can't bulb Paper with it out there, and it opens up tech trading. Building research isn't bad either to speed this along, every turn counts as you cross your fingers in the ending stretch.
Also notice that I was able to chop out the Medrassa/Library within the first two turns. Even if you aren't Creative, simple pre-chopping can get it out asap! Three chops should be enough for normal leaders.
As you can see, I didn't really need its priests for the Great Prophet... it was coming up in three turns anyway. If I had finished Stonehenge slower or got Writing quicker it would have been difference, as it was they shaved off one turn from the GP. Could've done that with a scientist anyway without much risk... ah well, no harm done.
Also if you haven't started chopping out the Oracle yet, now would be a good time to do so.
Great Prophet comes out right on cue! Right now he'll just bulb Polytheism... so I'll save him for later. I quickly change specialists in the city to two scientists. I should get my next great person in 30 turns!
With 6 great scientist points and 2 great prophet points, the odds for the vital great scientist are about 75%... if that isn't good enough for you, make sure you have your second city at size three before writing and pre-chop its library to run two scientists there asap instead, you should still get the Great Scientist before you need him.
At any rate, get those scientist specialists working right away to get Alphabet as soon as possible.
And there we go, the beeline is over! The oracle is being stored with 1 turn left (it won't decay, don't worry) and I can tech trade. You got to get somewhat lucky here as well, not only do you not want someone to complete the Oracle at this point (I'd advise not trading priesthood around
) but to speed this along you got to hope the AI will be willing and able to trade you certain techs.Outside of the beeline, to bulb Theology we need Polytheism/Meditation, Masonry, and Monotheism. After Alphabet to bulb Paper we need Mathematics and The Wheel. Our job at this point is to get those techs as soon as possible!
Lucked out here, usually the AI won't part with Masonry when the Pyramids are still around! Very nice trade. As you can see, I'm researching Polytheism now as no one will give it to me.
Also my civilization began with The Wheel, but if it didn't it would have been very easy to trade for it, that's not an issue.
Also around this point in the game you'll probably want to backfill for techs like Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Iron Working, etc... I didn't in this playthrough, but its a good idea.
At 75% odds, I get the Great Scientist... whoo, that's a relief! In retrospect I'll definitely want to use the second city for the scientist. Hello there, Alhazen. He'll bulb Mathematics, so he sleeps for now.
My second city doesn't have a madrassa, it's just building research... I have to admit at this point I'm playing kind of sloppy, but I'm in the home stretch.
Polytheism comes in and I'm able to make this trade, horray. At this point I'm close enough to not really worry about trading away Priesthood, if someone builds it in won't be him. Sitting Bull doesn't build wonders anyway. I can now use the Great Prophet to bulb Theology, and I do so, snagging...
Yay, a nice little bonus for doing this whole mess.
No one even had mathematics yet, and even if they did odds are they wouldn't trade it due to the Hanging Gardens. Though if you can luck out and trade alphabet for math... that'll probably seal this whole thing for you.
But not for me. Twelve or so nail-biting turns later, Mathetics completes, allowing my great scientist to do this!
And the very next turn The Oracle was complete! I got it!!!
4212 free beakers, think I got enough bang for my buck?
My civilization gets to enjoy a Renaissance in 975 BC! How can it be reborn... was there ever a dark age? I was in the medieval era for all of twelve or thirteen turns.
The grand achievement, early access to universities! And thanks to the Philosophical trait, they are very reasonably priced for an early empire, same as an aqueduct. Plus I'm sure early Oxford will be very handy! On top of all that, we have founded Christianity, have early shots at the Apostolic Palace, Hagia Sophia and University of Sankore, and can trade maps.
So where would you take a game at this point? Well unfortunately for me I've lost this save file, but if I pull it off again, I'd imagine there are quite a few good options. I'd probably want to try quickly expanding with settlers and using my +25% bonus to rocket ahead in tech... probably start laying down cottages. Plus I've got a bit of a headstart in the liberalism race.
Although on the other hand... Gunpowder is now available for research. And after teching/trading Aesthetics and Iron Working, another great scientist can bulb through most of it. I could surprise my opponent's archers and axemen with BC muskets!
In fact, imagine doing this with Suleiman. Extremely early Janissaries! +25% vs. Archers, Melee, Mounted! Now that is something I'll have to try out sometime.
Hope you've all enjoyed this walkthrough, maybe some others can try it and use early education (or gunpowder) to win the game. Once again though, signifigant risk involved, be prepared to have to regenerate your game if you get unlucky with an AI finishing the Oracle. I got it in my first try though. Certainly fun to pull off on a decently high level, I surprised myself!
, so I had to research them all manually. With a coastal start and 2 seafood, 6 
really helps the research rate. I was able to get the last tech needed in 775BC and pulled it off. Lots of sacrifices here though: very little room means Saladin rexed the whole island while I was doing this, so it's down to a 2 city challenge. I already have gunpowder, mach, CS and Sal has only feudalism as his top military tech (swords/axes/longbows). It'll be interesting to see where this goes. If I hadn't read about this slingshot, I would have played very differently (copper in the starting BFC 
).
Financial is overpowered. 
