OCC whipping

[Colonel Mustard]

^ In an ordinary game I would probably agree with you about the libraries, but imo in OCC's you need to run a scientist as soon as possible to get the Academy in place. Please correct me if I'm wrong, it's why I started the thread

If I'm being inundated with barb archers then I've whipped the Great Wall a few times. Of the others I'd only consider the Pyramids and the GLib but have yet to do them.

 

[JustBen]

Whipping the library never lines up with my build order in OCC. The mids-oracle-mids combo devours all my early hammers. By the time I'm ready to build a library, I want the food for growth into +3 happiness. The only reason I build an early library is to bulb into a greedy oracle. But that tech path has no time for BW, so whipping doesn't come up. More generally if I want a fast academy, I prefer to oracle CoL than rush a library.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=324408 is the best OCC guide on the forum. It targets deity space with a pseudo cooked start, but the strats are solid for any OCC game.

 

[Ungeziefer]

[...] But that tech path has no time for BW, so whipping doesn't come up.

So you don't chop the Pyramids?

 

[Ataxerxes]

^ In an ordinary game I would probably agree with you about the libraries, but imo in OCC's you need to run a scientist as soon as possible to get the Academy in place. Please correct me if I'm wrong, it's why I started the thread

If I'm being inundated with barb archers then I've whipped the Great Wall a few times. Of the others I'd only consider the Pyramids and the GLib but have yet to do them.

I seldom whip wonders either. The returns aren't as good as whipping normal buildings. However, whip overflow can help get a wonder started. I often whip libraries to get that academy as you do. Pyramids are good for chopping - it's perhaps the most important OCC wonder in most games.

 

[Um the Muse]

What's so important about the pyramids in an OCC? Sorry, I've only played one or two of them.

 

[JustBen]

So you don't chop the Pyramids?

Not until the oracle is done, but yes BW is high priority at that point. But that's well past the point I would consider building an early library, let alone whipping one. My OCC oracles are limited by tech and not hammers usually, so delaying BW is a natural choice.

Since we're talking about the whip, I should add that I also delay my granary. There's just no time to tech pottery. Even with enough gem mines to tech pottery and BW, I can't find the production to fit a whole granary before the wonders have to start. Once the wonders start the granary isn't helping a lot.

My timings are on normal speed at emperor or immortal. The thread I linked recommends tighter play, but it also expects you reroll for marble or stone.

edit instead of double post:

What's so important about the pyramids in an OCC? Sorry, I've only played one or two of them.

OCC games use a great person economy. All your great people get settled, and you want to run a lot of specialists so you can settle more. You spend a lot of time building Research, which is also a good time to run extra great scientists. Since representation comes too late in the game and along a bad tech path (for OCC), pyramids are a very big deal. (Synergy with caste system and national park is so obvious I should apologize for mentioning it.)

 

[Kid R]

Early library in an OCC isn't actually crucial like a normal game, because after the essential techs for the chosen strategy (masonry, priesthood, whatever), the focus is building stuff for a while, not teching. There's not much to get multiplied anyway till the rep specialists arrive.

Library before pyramids doesn't make much sense to me. 3-pop whipping it straight afterwards is a judgement call based on how food rich the city is by then and whether the worker(s) have managed to get enough tiles ready to grow straight into my +3 without working unimproved tiles.

Re. forest chopping I think if you can have a bit of self control at the start the extra specialists through the renaissance and industrial periods (biology is a crucial beeline OCC tech) are more often than not well worth it. Basically OCC is a tech race except at the start and the end. Having the forest chop hammers in reserve for the end or an emergency is not a major thing but it is a nice little boost.

But then coal is a bigger boost. Coal vs National Park is the OCC thing I always have most trouble with - anybody got any tips for making that decision? Coal seems like it would probably be more useful in military endgames?

 

[Colonel Mustard]

My timings are on normal speed at emperor or immortal.

^Perhaps our approaches are level dependent, I'm on Monarch:

But that's well past the point I would consider building an early library, let alone whipping one. My OCC oracles are limited by tech and not hammers usually, so delaying BW is a natural choice.

What tech do you hope to snag? I like to research Monarchy while building the Oracle so I can pick up Feudalism. My reasoning being I can push out twice promoted units and have Longbows to keep my power level up (due to the frequent lack of metals in the early game, even with balanced resources on.)

This is one of two reasons I play with raging barbs on and throw up the GW- I'm hoping to hamper the other civs long enough to give me the best chance of getting the Oracle. The other is hoping to stop them settling near me until I've had my third border pop.

Once the wonders start the granary isn't helping a lot.

That's given me a different outlook on the granary, although I still like to have it to whip a few post-oracle units if necessary to stop the tribute demands and requests for "help".
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Early library in an OCC isn't actually crucial like a normal game, because after the essential techs for the chosen strategy (masonry, priesthood, whatever), the focus is building stuff for a while, not teching. There's not much to get multiplied anyway till the rep specialists arrive.

I'm still having problems with the early library debate. Having the Academy can shave 2 or 3 turns off of each of the early tech advances.

But then coal is a bigger boost. Coal vs National Park is the OCC thing I always have most trouble with - anybody got any tips for making that decision? Coal seems like it would probably be more useful in military endgames?

National Park every time. Each Forest Preserve with the NP is a powerhouse of a tile - a specialist and hammers, especially with a levee. This should keep you going production-wise until Plastics for the Hydro Plant. I only ever settle riverside.

 

[Kid R]

I'm still having problems with the early library debate. Having the Academy can shave 2 or 3 turns off of each of the early tech advances.

I just don't think it's worth the risk of losing the pyramids by running specialists beforehand. For me tech isn't a bottleneck at the very start, but then I don't consider an oracle slingshot an essential part of an OCC game. I play immortal and take a random start position from the first 3 or 4 the game shows me - usually it doesn't seem possible to get both mids and oracle with any confidence. I do usually try for the oracle but failing doesn't make me a reroll (losing the mids does )

National Park every time. Each Forest Preserve with the NP is a powerhouse of a tile - a specialist and hammers, especially with a levee.

Me too, but only because I'm too lazy to think through the numbers I always think removing the health cap is going to be super-useful but with all the good hammer tile improvements at the end the best configuration seems to be around size 20-25 which doesn't really need super health.

 

[Colonel Mustard]

I play immortal and take a random start position from the first 3 or 4 the game shows me - usually it doesn't seem possible to get both mids and oracle with any confidence. I do usually try for the oracle but failing doesn't make me a reroll (losing the mids does )

I've been known to reroll a lot more than 3 or 4 games , and if the mids go so do I.

 

[Ungeziefer]

[...] and have Longbows to keep my power level up

Keeping your power level up is not that useful in the Middle Ages since diplo and watching for SoDs next to your border are your best defenses.
Having 2-6 outdated units is really fine is you get along well with your neighbors
If the AI attacks the stacks should not be super-big so whipping + building can produce 5-6 spare units and lowering the slider nets you upgrade gold while the stack trudges through your territory
After the Renaissance AI stacks become so big that a DoW is pretty much game over (unless you can manage to get another AI to DoW the AI who is invading you)

This is one of two reasons I play with raging barbs on and throw up the GW

That's why I play with barbs off , I don't have time for fogbusters in the early game and the GSpy from the GW messes up with the GP pool

Having the Academy can shave 2 or 3 turns off of each of the early tech advances.

Avoiding scientist specialists until the GE form the Mids comes along allows you to rush the GLib and shave off 20 turns of production + you get the 2 free Scientists 20 turns earlier too.
That's why I also avoid the Oracle, Kid R feel free to correct me but I believe that its benefit is too low compared to the delay of the Mids and the GProphets. I believe CS slingshots are quite unreliable above Emperor right?

 

[Colonel Mustard]

Keeping your power level up is not that useful in the Middle Ages since diplo and watching for SoDs next to your border are your best defenses.
Having 2-6 outdated units is really fine is you get along well with your neighbors
If the AI attacks the stacks should not be super-big so whipping + building can produce 5-6 spare units and lowering the slider nets you upgrade gold while the stack trudges through your territory
After the Renaissance AI stacks become so big that a DoW is pretty much game over (unless you can manage to get another AI to DoW the AI who is invading you)

One of my strengths is diplo - in 90% of my games I can either go unDoWed or easily fend them off, in the other 10% it's, as you say, game over. I always try to be a military tech or two ahead as well, Rifles vs Maces, Infantry vs grenadiers.

That's why I play with barbs off , I don't have time for fogbusters in the early game and the GSpy from the GW messes up with the GP pool

I play with espionage off so don't have to contend with that pesky GSpy

Avoiding scientist specialists until the GE form the Mids comes along allows you to rush the GLib and shave off 20 turns of production + you get the 2 free Scientists 20 turns earlier too.

That's given me food for thought.

That's why I also avoid the Oracle, Kid R feel free to correct me but I believe that its benefit is too low compared to the delay of the Mids and the GProphets.

And therein lies the crux of my problem. I think I'm trying to cover all my bases instead of concentrating on one of them. For me the secondary reason for going for the Oracle is to get an early GProphet. I also want a GScientist for the Academy and an Engineer for the GLib. And I always get the one I don't want at that moment

 

[Keilah]

hey if you build the NP with 14 forest preserves, do you even need the globe theater? You get +14 happy from preserves, +3 from rep, sometimes 1-2 in your borders, can trade whatever health resources you have for happy, some buildings give +happy, and you have the option to run the culture slider a bit if you like. Seems like national epic or oxford would be waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better.

 

[Celebithil]

I've played a OCC with no Globe Theater as Keilah describes. Just use the culture slider to keep happy up in the beginning. As your science mostly comes from specialists this is no big deal. Unfortunately it does mean you have to still research drama; building a theater is also still useful, as it helps with the unhappy.

The benefits are thus only the ability to build another national wonder. Of course it will be your fifth national wonder and after Iron Works, National Epic, National Park and Oxford the bonuses become less useful (The best ideas are the military national wonders of heroic epic, westpoint or perhaps even red cross, but I often shoot for space ship anyway.)

 

[Ungeziefer]

hey if you build the NP with 14 forest preserves, do you even need the globe theater? You get +14 happy from preserves, +3 from rep, sometimes 1-2 in your borders, can trade whatever health resources you have for happy, some buildings give +happy, and you have the option to run the culture slider a bit if you like. Seems like national epic or oxford would be waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better.

The Globe just makes it easier to manage, even all that surplus happiness sometimes cannot compensate the unhappiness for not switching to Emancipation, defying UN resolutions, etcetc. I agree that the Globe is quite a big hammer investment, but it is safer and more reliable
And anyway, what other NW do you want to build? The Red Cross ?

See the argument between Alexfrog and mirthadir from post #15 on: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=324408

 

[Colonel Mustard]

[...]
The benefits are thus only the ability to build another national wonder. Of course it will be your fifth national wonder and after Iron Works, National Epic, National Park and Oxford the bonuses become less useful (The best ideas are the military national wonders of heroic epic, westpoint or perhaps even red cross, but I often shoot for space ship anyway.)

The four wonders you listed are an "always build" although after Mt Rushmore I consider the Red Cross to be the most useless of the national wonders slots to fill. The Heroic Epic is fairly crap too, production isn't normally the problem - you can push out a unit in 1 turn anyway, especially late game.

If I don't expect to do much out-of-borders warring then I've built Wall Street instead of the Globe in the past. But I do like warring even if going for the space race

I always re-roll a coastal start so the Moai Statues are off the books, reason being there are wasted water tiles that could potentially have had a land-base resource: 'give me uranium or give me death.'

 

[Colonel Mustard]

[...]See the argument between Alexfrog and mirthadir from post #15 on: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=324408

Thanks for the link Ungeziefer, I can see one area where I'm going wrong, I'm definitely not following your Liberalism -> Biology strategy. I'm beelining Rifling in my never-ending quest to keep my power level up

 

[MyOtherName]

Avoiding scientist specialists until the GE form the Mids comes along allows you to rush the GLib and shave off 20 turns of production + you get the 2 free Scientists 20 turns earlier too.

You're paying a rather hefty cost to shave off 20 turns of production -- I'm having difficulty seeing why you think it's a good trade

 

[Celebithil]

@Colonel Mustard: Precisely my point. I'd argue that Wall Street is less useful than Red Cross (one never has money problems in an OCC, and I don't run Universal Suffrage to rush buy (Representation all the way), so what am I going to use the money for?), but neither is very useful. But anyway, none of the choices besides the obvious four are really so good that you don't want to miss their benefits. So you might as well build the globe. Then again, not building it is quite possible, just not a shocking "Now I can do this awesome thing instead"-strategy.

 

[Keilah]

err, national wonders are limited to 4 instead of 2 in OCC?