Ridiculous Early Settler Victories

[vexing]

i tried out the diplomatic win, however i tried to keep it a bit too tight, starting RAs before turn 90. i managed the timing of research perfectly, but i forgot to account for opening rationalism until it was too late. sub 300 win is absolutely doable.

 

[bostich]

Yeah the window to get rationalism is usually pretty tight (5 turns or less in most of my games).

I just got a 400 BC Diplomatic Victory (Turn 310) with a completely different strategy.

I was going for a scientific victory with a tall strategy and a tradition opener. I got a 4 city NC and delayed my RAs a bit to hardbuild the porcelain tower (last RA on 116). Because the RAs were so late they were very powerfull. i got scientific theory + 2 techs from my first round and decided to go for a diplomatic victory. I stayed on 4 cities the whole game and went quite culture heavy to get the GE from liberty. In hindsight it is obviously the best strategy to sign the RAs as late as possible. I think the 11th RA should be signed 192 turns before the desired win date (91+91+9+1). I'm not sure yet if its better to sign multiple RAs in 1 turn.

Back to the scientific victory: I noticed that in theory the scientific victory requires the same number of techs as the diplomatic. The cost of the last techs is irrelevant because they wont be hard-researched. Is it maybe possible to get a science win in the BCs? Getting all necessary techs by 500 BC (turn 300) should be possible. Are 50 turns enough to build all the parts for an 1 AD (turn 350) win?

Edit: Fixed an error: I got scientific theory + 2 techs with my first round of RAs. Not Scientific revolution.

 

[vexing]

it is obviously the best strategy to sign the RAs as late as possible. I think the 11th RA should be signed 192 turns before the desired win date (91+91+9+1). I'm not sure yet if its better to sign multiple RAs in 1 turn.

obviously it's easier to hard tech earlier techs, but optimally you want to sign starting as soon as you can and still get all the techs in two rounds + great scientists + oxford + scientific revolution.

here's the optimal ra path for the first half, which should get you started (though i'd also encourage trying to figure it out on your own =)

Spoiler :

open: techs gotten
navigation, chivalry, construction: chivalry
navigation, acoustics, banking, construction: construction, metal casting, steel
navigation, acoustics, banking, engineering: engineering, physics
navigation, acoustics, banking, gunpowder, machinery: gunpowder
navigation, chemistry, metallurgy, acoustics, banking, machinery: acoustics, banking (partial)
navigation, chemistry, metallurgy, banking, machinery: chemistry
fertilizer, navigation, metallurgy, banking, machinery: navigation
archaelogy, fertilizer, metallurgy, banking, machinery: metallurgy
archaelogy, fertilizer, rifling, banking, machinery: machinery, printing press
..., banking: banking, economics
..., scientific theory, military science: scientific theory

there should be enough overflow for a good chunk of military science too.

this position should be enough to clear all the techs required for bulbing globalization with sufficient scientists.

 

[vexing]

i thought of a less straightforward path that requires just a few more beakers to start but results in two full late renaissance techs completed.

 

[Martin Alvito]

It's always preferable to run up the bottom of the tree to the Chemistry/Metallurgy point before running up through Chivalry, but you have the ticking time bomb of the pending RAs to contend with. I find that going up through Chivalry and blocking on Construction is usually all you have time to do.

Taking Acoustics early in an RA chain is almost always a bad idea, unless you're playing for Cultural.

 

[vexing]

normally that's the case, but the way i posted followed by an appropriate second wave is probably the least number of raw beakers needed pre start that is enough to get all the way to globalization with 8 bulbs (which is maybe the most you can expect)

the early acoustics or banking is necessary to cut down the 6 slots to 5

the alternative way that i referred to in my subsequent post (requiring more beakers but finishing an extra half a late renaissance) is going through bottom of tree, signing one RA that fires pre renaissance to get 3/4ths of physics and bulbing gunpowder. you don't take sailing / compass / currency, but have to tech metal casting, engineering, steel and 1/4th of physics, which basically equates to slightly less than one late medieval tech extra to hard tech. this results in machinery as your first median, astronomy 2nd, navigation 3rd - very efficient.

 

[Martin Alvito]

You always want to take Banking and not Acoustics. That sets up Economics later. Acoustics is generally the tech you take on the RA before you take Scientific Theory. It's also not a bad interim hard tech when you have a more typical number of RA partners.

I've been fighting like crazy to avoid bulbing into the Renaissance lately. This is easier on some difficulties, game speeds and civ choices than others.

 

[vexing]

You always want to take Banking and not Acoustics. That sets up Economics later. Acoustics is generally the tech you take on the RA before you take Scientific Theory.

... unless you happen to be signing 11 RAs in succession that'll be completing both banking and acoustics and it makes no difference.

 

[Martin Alvito]

Weak dominance means that "always preferable" still applies.

 

[vexing]

284 diplomacy. you can probably shave at least 10 turns off that too - i had 3 unneeded RAs at the end.

 

[bostich]

very nice. if you don't need the full 11 RAs that opens up other possibilities. For example take 9 early, then 2 in the middle, then the other 9.

 

[vexing]

you do need to get to scientific theory to speed up the 90 turns of research, so you'll want to do the starting full 11.

 

[bostich]

I got a turn 414 cultural victory, beating vexing's entry by 4 turns . Lets hope they fix the server soon.

I think sub-400 turns should be definitely possible here. I went very low tech; signing just 9 RAs to get to Archeaology (6-7 would have been enough though) and got steampower just a couple turns before starting the utopia project.

After turn 250-300 money became rather useless (after allying every maritime and cultural CS and rushbuying every culture building) so maybe signing enough RAs to get to Mass Media for the Sydney Opera House would be an improvement. Or maybe buying 4 settlers and buying all cultural building in the new cities.

I learned this game that opening honor early is very powerful when playing Askia. Seeing a barb hut spawn almost every turn is quite useful.
Does anybody know what the formula for that is? It seemed to me that the spawning rate is about 0.9 per turn. Does it depend on the area with fog of war and/or how fast you kill them?

 

[vexing]

bastard =p can't believe you're going to make me redo that =)

 

[bostich]

hehe. have you tried a science victory yet?

 

[oopsy poopsy]

Here are some snapshots of my game:

Turn 50 i have:
5 cities, 1 settler, 5 worker, 2 scouts, 1 archer, 1 warrior, 9 population, 12 science beakers per turn (hardbuilt so far are 1 scout, 1 worker; the rest is from huts, social policies or rushbought)

I am not in this calibre of player at all, but for the life of me I can't figure out how you can pull this off. This is Askia on huge, marathon right? I'll assume a worker and a settler from Liberty, but this has to be from at least a couple culture ruins. Even with that (which includes no honor opener so you're finding the camps yourself) you need to buy 4 settlers, 3 workers, 1 warrior, and 2 scouts (I'm assuming Archer is one upgraded scout from ruins) right? That's 7860 in gold with 2 minimum culture ruins (I didn't run the math, but it's probably more like 3, but I guess it would depend on how late the other cities went up). That's gotta be a bare minimum of 17 barb camps in the first 50 turns without honor to find them and only 4 units to kill them.

How could you possible find and kill that many camps in 50 turns? I tried this a couple times and didn't come anywhere near that many with raging barbs turned on. I've obviously missed something important here and I'm wondering what it is.

I'm pretty astonished at the high level of science you're cranking out by 150, but I'm assuming it's related to the sheer number of camps per turn you can get to compared to me that would allow rushbuying libraries and granaries and buying maritimes while working max food.

Is there something I'm missing here? I'm not trying to say this stuff isn't possible, since there are some very high level players who haven't criticized at all, but there must be a piece of this I'm not getting otherwise you must play so many starts until you luck out on the perfect storm of camp killing and ruin popping. Help me obostonekenobich, you're my only hope.

 

[sanabas]

On settler, goody huts can give you both settlers & workers.

 

[bostich]

One important thing is to find a barb camp as soon as possible. With this money and a little bit from meeting CS you can buy 2 scouts. So by the time a "normal" start would get its first scout in addition to the warrior, you will have 3.

I don't have the exact number but i would guess it is quite normal to find 10-20 ruins and 5-10 barb camps by turn 50.

As sanabas pointed out ruins can give you settlers and workers. Getting a scout upgraded to an archer is very nice.

That start was pretty good, but getting 2-3 settlers and 2-3 workers from ruins is quite normal and each barb camp will give you 450 gold to rushbuy the things you don't get from ruins.

I dont play with raging barbs because i think (vexing told me) that that will only increase the number of barb units not of barb camps.

Of course it requires a bit of rerolling but every 3rd or 4th start should give you something similar to that.

Another thing: the number of ruins you will get depends quite a lot on the map and where you spawn. In that game i spawned in the center of great plains with almost only CS near me who wont steal my ruins.

 

[oopsy poopsy]

One important thing is to find a barb camp as soon as possible. With this money and a little bit from meeting CS you can buy 2 scouts. So by the time a "normal" start would get its first scout in addition to the warrior, you will have 3.

I don't have the exact number but i would guess it is quite normal to find 10-20 ruins and 5-10 barb camps by turn 50.

As sanabas pointed out ruins can give you settlers and workers. Getting a scout upgraded to an archer is very nice.

That start was pretty good, but getting 2-3 settlers and 2-3 workers from ruins is quite normal and each barb camp will give you 450 gold to rushbuy the things you don't get from ruins.

I dont play with raging barbs because i think (vexing told me) that that will only increase the number of barb units not of barb camps.

Of course it requires a bit of rerolling but every 3rd or 4th start should give you something similar to that.

Another thing: the number of ruins you will get depends quite a lot on the map and where you spawn. In that game i spawned in the center of great plains with almost only CS near me who wont steal my ruins.

Alright, I'll give it another shot. I'd tried it twice and was absolutely nowhere near your totals (your 10-20 ruins freaks me out even more than finding all those camps, 'cause even when I got two camps very early and sent 4 scouts out ASAP on the 2nd attempt, I didn't come close to 10 ruins or 10 camps).

I will admit 2 attempts isn't enough know anything and this is far far far away from my maps, speed, and difficulty norms. I would like to get a start like this to see if I can come close to leveraging it nearly as well as you did. My guess is I'll fall short, but when I was at turn 35 and knew I was less than half as productive already I was a little disconcerted, especially when I tried it again and the same thing happened.

Also, good tip about the raging barbs thing. Thanks.

 

[bostich]

i loaded the save on turn 50 and went through the log:

ruins found on turn: 2, 4, 9, 12, 15, 16, 16, 19, 21, 22, 26, 36, 38, 43, 44, 45, 46
camps found on turn: 4, 23, 24, 25, 27, 34, 42, 43, 45, 45, 45, 46, 47

i think i got to the ruins usually 1-2 turns later for 17 ruins total.

Of course i cant kill all the barb camps as soon as i see them. I see 8 camps alive at turn 50 so i have killed 5 so far for 2250 and will kill another 8 soon for another 3600.


I think that was one of my best starts overall but i submitted 5 games so far with starts close to that. Don't be intimidated by the research output. In my other starts i often have only half the output at the specified turns, get Educations 2-3 turn later, buy 2 universities and suddenly am up to the same research output.