Let's Play: Deity BC Space: Strategies from a 10 year veteran

[Kaitzilla]

Maybe I can just get Rocketry sooner and take my time on Apollo.

Actually, I may have broken Civilization 4 testing my overflow difficulties.
I got some weird numbers in 1 city that shouldn't have been possible.

Spoiler :

Notice how the base overflow went UP against all logic.

So I loaded older saves and changed things one at a time until I pinned down what I did.
It appeared to involve Mining Inc.
Then I noticed I had tried to build a Mining Inc. Executive in a city that no longer had Mining Inc. corporation. (I had reasons...)

It seems Civ 4 ignores overflow caps if you try to build a unit that is no longer possible and adds the raw production to the running production overflow total.

Since building Mining inc. Execs in cities without Mining Inc. isn't possible outside of world builder, I decided to test it with Religious Missionaries.

Spoiler :

AND IT WORKED!

All it requires is Cristo Wonder.
1) Change civics to Org. Religion.
2) The following turn, start building a Missionary in a city that doesn't have a Monastery for that type of religion.
3) Revolt out of Org. Religion and continue to build the missionary. (don't touch it!)
4) The following turn you will be told that the missionary couldn't be built, but the overflow WENT UP ANYWAY. ^_^
5) Revolt civics to Org. Religion and press next turn.

By alternating in and out of Org. Religion and carefully building any missionary before the civic switch, a city can build Wealth to store overflow hammers and increase [Overflow Hammers Counter] by [city's raw production] every 2 turns!

1 turn Apollo!
1 turn Space Parts!
Finally the Cristo Wonder and Religious civics are useful endgame!
Just need early Cristo and then build overflows up to 1000 or 2000 as needed.

A 100 city would take 20 turns to reach 1000 overflow hmm.
If you were attempting this in 15 cities at the same time, obviously you'd need 5 different religions due to the 3 Missionary unit cap.


I tested this idea in BUFFY and it works there too.
No chops or whips necessary.

Spoiler :

**Edit**
As of August 2017, this technique has been banned by both HoF and GOTM.

 

[WastinTime]

I figured it was going to be that issue with cities that have large base hammers. I rarely run into that, so I haven't got it straight in my head yet how I might exploit it (or at least not get burned by it)...even after your explanation. I knew i'd have to get it sorted out by the time I got to late game.

I'm not sure yet why it made your problems worse. Seems like it would help.

 

[Kaitzilla]

I figured it was going to be that issue with cities that have large base hammers. I rarely run into that, so I haven't got it straight in my head yet how I might exploit it (or at least not get burned by it)...even after your explanation. I knew i'd have to get it sorted out by the time I got to late game.

I'm not sure yet why it made your problems worse. Seems like it would help.

I was wasting effort in 140 production cities with Executives and Guided Missiles.
I could have just built 2 Spies and ended up with 140 base overflow.
Or cold whipped 1 Spy and got 140 base overflow.

I thought Execs could give me 200 base overflow ultimately, but the reality was always 140 whether I whipped or didn't whip. (base production was greater than 200/2=100)
I thought Labs could give me up to 750 base overflow, but the reality was always 375 max (+100% production city) and 300 max (+150% production city).

 

[WastinTime]

I thought Labs could give me up to 750 base overflow, but the reality was 375 max in +100% production cities and 300 max in +150% production cities.

yea, so it was the production modifiers that burned you, not the issue with large base hammers.

Nice work figuring out the 1t space parts and apollo. Now you have to play the whole thing again!

 

[Pangaea]

Oh joy, more ways to break the game

Pretty sure Seraiel told me about the hammer cap btw, or I figured it out myself (probably the former). The game takes the highest of base hammers or the value of the previous build (dividing by multipliers, as shown above). Therefore, a good way to get a pile of OF in the late game is a spy or two in a high-production city.

 

[dutchfire]

Are missionaries best, or can you also do it using some units and disconnecting a resource (e.g. horses before you unlock gunships)

 

[Kaitzilla]

Are missionaries best, or can you also do it using some units and disconnecting a resource (e.g. horses before you unlock gunships)

You are a genius!
Yes, building horse units, pillaging the tile, and rebuilding the pasture next turn should work too.

It means you can stack production every turn instead of every 2 turns!
And it doesn't need Cristo.
And it can be done mid game and not just late game.

Might get into trouble with traded horses when pillaging.
It might cancel the trade first and build the horse unit.
Same with getting horses in between turns from a captured city popping borders.

It would cost a lot of Workers to build the same pasture every turn.

Maybe do it with oil based units when gunships obsolete horses too.

 

[Kaitzilla]

Mmm, trading any horses at all might be too dangerous considering how often AI cancel trade deals.
Maybe just 1 source of Horse for the empire total.
Ideal would be isolated Horse in the 2nd ring of a fron tier city.
Make sure there is only 1 road leading to the Horse and just pillage and build the road every turn.
Ai roads or being on a river would ruin it from being severed from the trade network.

It could work with Elephants too, but war elephants and 1 happiness is too steep a price to give up most games.

 

[WastinTime]

just pillage and build the road every turn

remember, you can't pillage your own road.

 

[Kaitzilla]

remember, you can't pillage your own road.

Heh, I keep forgetting that.

 

[rah]

But you could connect to it using a road that leaves your territory an pillage it there.

 

[dutchfire]

remember, you can't pillage your own road.

But you can build a farm over your pasture.

 

[rah]

Or just pillage the pasture

 

[Kaitzilla]

But you could connect to it using a road that leaves your territory an pillage it there.

This might be the cheapest way to do it, but it is still like giving away half a forest chop every turn.
I can see a road through neutral land connecting to a river or AI trade network working.

Fine for 1 turn space parts or a 1 turn UN, but it is hard to justify the cost for lesser Wonders.

Maybe if the lone horse city could be gifted to a 1 city civ like DeGaulle. Maybe even 2 cities.
Then DOW and take them both back with 2 move units.
Combine 20 war success with threateni g his last city leveraging the Aggressive AI setting, and he might be willing to ceasefire every turn.
Even if this worked, there would be diplo costs, 2 cities not growing, and a buildup of war weariness.

Or if it works on Iron and Bronze units, gather up 10 sources of Iron, Copper, Elephant, and Horse.
Gift 1 away each turn, then after 10 turns cancel, build unit, gift away again.
I don't think AI can cancel before the 10 turns is up.
This method has no cost, but it takes 10 turns to set up, needs a lot of resources and land, and gives all the AI strategic resources they didn't have.

The trick is probably only useful for mid or late game empires.
I can imagine WT stacking hammers and chops (does the chop add or vanish?) simultaneously in 20 production cities and putting them into Hermitage 1 city at a time. Then whipping them all complete on the 20th turn (more than 900 fail gold?) and completing Hermitage for 20,000

 

[WastinTime]

I'll keep it in the back of my mind. Seems like it's hard to use it until late game when you have workshops and huge base hammers.

To do it early game, won't you have to 0h whip stuff? Otherwise, you're just stacking 5h, 10h or something small like that.

 

[Kaitzilla]

I'll keep it in the back of my mind. Seems like it's hard to use it until late game when you have workshops and huge base hammers.

To do it early game, won't you have to 0h whip stuff? Otherwise, you're just stacking 5h, 10h or something small like that.

Early game, starting with max overflow whips would be required ya.
Raw production is just too low.
Maybe some 6 cow cities on Great Plains map would be a different story.

I still don't know if chops added while using this method carry through or vanish.
I know never to whip or chop a Wonder the AI already completed!
Needs testing.

The method requires a huge amount of care. No unit selected before losing the resource and you lose 1 turn of stacking.
Forget to get rid of the resource one time and the huge overflow vanishes utterly to create unwanted units.

I'm not even sure if the 1 in 10000 chance of popping of Bronze or Iron on a hilltop mine in between turns would be a disaster or not if someone used Axemen to stack production.

 

[Kaitzilla]

I'll keep it in the back of my mind. Seems like it's hard to use it until late game when you have workshops and huge base hammers.

To do it early game, won't you have to 0h whip stuff? Otherwise, you're just stacking 5h, 10h or something small like that.

I'm not sure what happens if you cold whip the unit that doesn't get completed.

 

[WastinTime]

I didn't realize you played on Huge.
I wonder if you'd find it easier on Large. Tech is 7.5% cheaper IIRC. That makes a big difference early and mid game. Plus the AI are closer together, etc.

 

[diegobueno]

Spoiler :

 

[Kaitzilla]

Are missionaries best, or can you also do it using some units and disconnecting a resource (e.g. horses before you unlock gunships)

This idea helped me win the one city space challenge in HOF Challenge 18 #10
Thanks Dutchfire.

I was able to build the space parts before getting the techs researched.
Here is 2 SS Engines being built in 2 turns right after teching Fusion:



Pillaging Horses while building Calvary helped store hammers for most of the endgame.
Then once I got Advanced Flight through the Internet and obsoleted Calvary, I started pillaging and rebuilding Uranium while building advanced ships since my city was coastal.

So, the crazy production storage method helped win a real competitive game.