My Deity Histo Attempt(s)

[killercane]

O.K., so for the first pseudo-game for analysis here, I put out 1 settler, started on the Pyramids in the capital. The second city put out 2 workers, one which helped develop the capital, irrigated the wheat for 002 and then came over and helped develop the capital. I did one worker add-in exactly when the capital hit size 7. I didn't have enough food to go with 3 turn growth, but this implies the possibility of more maps available (and possibly a map with a higher domination limit as suitable also). I've also included a save from the turn I added in my worker, and I have things set up so I can use the resource/luxury trick ASAP:

I tried your test game. Sumerians beat me to Pyramids by a couple of turns in 2000 BC. My score was 288 +4 ppt. This suffers from not having a 3rd food bonus, forests, and having to move T1 but in comparison to your score of 281 at 1790 BC is 10% higher with an exponential growth rate. I will replay but I do not know what you are trying to argue. 3 cities is better for score and you build Pyr at approximately the same time (+-2 turns).

Tried again, again Sumeria built the Pyramids.

 

[Spoonwood]

I tried your test game. Sumerians beat me to Pyramids by a couple of turns in 2000 BC. My score was 288 +4 ppt. This suffers from not having a 3rd food bonus, forests, and having to move T1 but in comparison to your score of 281 at 1790 BC is 10% higher with an exponential growth rate. I will replay but I do not know what you are trying to argue. 3 cities is better for score and you build Pyr at approximately the same time (+-2 turns).

Tried again, again Sumeria built the Pyramids.

What's the size of the capital in your 3 city Pyramid build? I would think it's higher than mine. It may sound strange, but you'll grow more once the capital starts producing settlers and workers if you have it lower, because shields don't hold your growth back, food does, and you can grow faster at a smaller size. If you put out two settlers from size 6 to 6, you have two settlers and the same total population. If you put out two settlers from size 9 to 6, you've put out two settlers, and lost three population point. We really should compare settlers, workers, and maybe even warriors also, not just score and total cities, as it's far too early to compare just score.

Also, I would think there exist 4600+ maps with just one food bonus and maybe some setup like that. After all, Moonsinger did find a 4621 map, but building the Pyramids there basically wasn't an option. I found a 4599 map, but I had no food bonuses nearby, I was on a small island by myself, few, if any rivers, and very bad land.

If you find a very high domination limit with a food bonus and decent landform, I don't know why you would throw it out just because you lost the Pyramids race, or why you would even invest in building the Pyramids, as it comes as too risky and there exist very, very few 4600+ maps. On top of this, a wheat start can do quite well overall, but probably won't succeed at building the Pyramids.

I still don't see how you'll make up the basically forfeited GA.

 

[killercane]

Size 12. The golden age is irrelevant once you have reached military parity in the early ADs. Pyramid power far outweighs golden age.

 

[Spoonwood]

Size 12. The golden age is irrelevant once you have reached military parity in the early ADs. Pyramid power far outweighs golden age.

Do you have anything which proves that you will even reach military parity?

 

[killercane]

Do you have anything which proves that you will even reach military parity?

? Other than building lots of units? What do you think those 2 fpt cities are doing from 1000 BC onwards? Military Tradition doesn't come until then so all you need are lots of horses and gold (and saltpeter). Once you have cavalry in decent numbers you cant be stopped.

I do not understand what you are saying. Are you saying too much growth hampers military production for the main assault? Or are you saying building Pyramids in 1800 BC hampers military production or score or?

I have no desire to go through a milking phase again, but I do enjoy maximizing the early game until you know you are going to win. Pick out a few maps with 3 food bonus on archipelago, build the pyramids in a couple of them, and see how it turns out. Replay the same map and do not build Pyr and compare your numbers. Im not trying to prove anything, I rarely play civ any more, but I would like to point out that this strategy is very very strong. Previous people have discounted building Pyr with Maya due to the GA, and other factors, but it looks to be strong for expanding and scoring on these settings.

 

[killercane]

On a side note, people are STILL complaining about Civ 5 to this day. Funny stuff.

 

[Spoonwood]

What do you think those 2 fpt cities are doing from 1000 BC onwards?

In my games, in basic core cities I've bought or built granaries.

Military Tradition doesn't come until then so all you need are lots of horses and gold (and saltpeter). Once you have cavalry in decent numbers you cant be stopped.

If you're waiting until Military Tradition the first war starts late. If the first war starts later, then you creep more slowly towards the domination limit. Moonsinger's game started with knights... fortunately for her against spears, longbows, and archers.

Are you saying too much growth hampers military production for the main assault? Or are you saying building Pyramids in 1800 BC hampers military production or score or?

I say that the GA induced by the Pyramids might hamper military production, or makes it more expensive to produce quality military units, because 1 turn horse-knights or horse-calvaries in 4-6 won't happen with the Pyramids strategy. You also won't have as much cities easily producing 2 turn horse-knights or horse-calvaries. You also won't get as much gold (though most of it can come from the AIs). Now, maybe you can finish markets and barracks earlier, which offsets this, I don't know. I guess you also don't need shields for any javelin throwers, but the free workers from them winning might offset their cost.

The point comes as that you need a lot more than math here or an early evaluation. Even in the numbers you gave with your higher ppt increase, you had fewer horses (which isn't to say you could have done better on that map), and it seems likely that you would fall even further behind in terms of military production without a GA. Yes, you would win. But, it at least appears that you would grow horizontally (tile increase) slower, so though your ppt increase ended up higher than Moonsinger's, later on hers would come as higher. And since she captured the Pyramids in 310 AD, if she passed you at some point after that, it seems unlikely you would have caught back up to her later on.

Pick out a few maps with 3 food bonus on archipelago, build the pyramids in a couple of them, and see how it turns out. Replay the same map and do not build Pyr and compare your numbers.

That certainly come as interesting, but you'd need to compare things later on once you've started conquering a significant amount of territory.

There also exists the potential that a start with only one food bonus, but a higher domination limit and better landform could do better than multiple food bonus. You really want the Pyramids on a large continent, no matter which strategy you play. Speed in conquering can even outweigh the domination limits, if the difference of conquering speed comes as significant enough. Basically, it's very complex, and you'd need to account for a lot of factors to prove anything mathematically.

I do agree that building the Pyramids early makes for a lot of fun, and perhaps more fun than any other strategy. Good luck in whatever you do these days.

 

[templar_x]

i was following this discussion, and found it very interesting. for lack of time, i surely am not the milking type of player. however, it is the style i used to play when i was much younger, on the early versions of civ. so the idea still appeals to me.

to me, it seems that the "granaries in the core, hope to capture Pyras" approach is much more flexible, when it comes to other factors like that you need to find a decent start position on a map with the right domination limit. the "build the Pyras yourself" approach is quite likely to fail (i know well from my own Sid games how early they are built sometimes!), and there is nothing halfway meaningful you could fall back to, so practically you have to abandon that game.

and would not the approach "start with grans for yourself and HOPE for someone close to build the Pyras for you to capture them" be stronger altogether anyways? i mean, you would probably not get them soooo much later then, maybe 1000 years (which are not a lot of turns at that stage of the game) or a little more. and i cannot see the big difference between the luck of getting them yourselfs, which comes at quite some costs of your own development, and the luck you need that some closeby civ builds them, which only encourages your early build-up and early conquest.

am i overlooking something?

t_x

 

[Spoonwood]

templar_x,

I will say that in my Sid histographic attempts so far, since I've pulled in quite a bit of cash from the AIs, that once I've become a Republic (of course this would work if I became a Monarchy also), I've bought granaries. If you conquer the Pyramids, whoever has the Pyramids will almost surely come as tougher than had you built them instead. It's not entirely clear how much a build Pyramids strategy will differ from a conquer them early game in terms of production.

That said, we do have Moonsinger's games and Kuningas's games for analysis. In Moonsinger's # 1 game she captures the Pyramids in 310 AD, and in Kuningas's game he captures them in 760 AD. Moonsinger's # 1 game starts much slower than Kuningas's game (as well as her # 3 game) in that she settles less territory initially, has fewer cities, and a lower score for a while. It gets difficult to compare the games, but we can say that their scores from 490 AD to 540 AD compare as follows:

Moon Kuni
490 4553 4916
500 4663 5021
510 4780 5131
520 4906 5240
530 5037 5365
540 5181 5496

while on the other hand their tile count in the same period goes as follows:

Moon Kuni
490 1416 1682
500 1483 1734
510 1560 1831
520 1682 1867
530 1784 2024
540 1962 2062

So, Kuningas's has a higher tile count over this period, but Moonsinger's game outpaces him in terms of points per turn (ppt) increase. Then again, ppt increase probably comes easier to come by with a lower score than a higher one... though the difference in terms of score here doesn't seem like all to much, in my opinion. Kuningas also has more cities over this period. How does Moonsinger's game outpace Kuningas in terms of ppt increase then? Well, we don't really know. She almost surely has more happy and content citizens than Kuningas, that I think we can say. But, has this difference in happy citizens happened because of differences in the luxury slider, because of the number of luxuries flowing the empire, because of better terrain to grow than Kuningas, or because for a few turns now Moonsinger has had the Pyramids and thus has larger cities in more places than Kuningas, or because of differences in war weariness, or etc.?