Science Victory Strategy (and boasting!) Compendium ツ

what Civ are we playing as?

  • SUMERIA

    Votes: 2 8.0%
  • SCYTHIA

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • MACEDON

    Votes: 3 12.0%
  • AZTEC

    Votes: 4 16.0%
  • GERMANY

    Votes: 6 24.0%
  • ROME

    Votes: 4 16.0%
  • OTHER (please specify itt)

    Votes: 6 24.0%

  • Total voters
    25

yung.carl.jung

Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
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Mimicking this absolute gem of a thread: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/fastest-science-victory.563022/ I wanted to have a space where everyone can come together and exchange strategies, tips, share savegames, share victory times and just have fun colonizing mars.


The goal is, of course, to play optimally and acquire the lowest finishing times possible. However I do not expect all players to abide HOF rule. If you have to reload twenty times to get perfect finishing times, go ahead. Speaking for me personally reloading has definitely helped me become a better player. I want to give a huge shoutout to this following thread: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/the-return-to-nibiru-diety-turn-100-science-challenge.603285/


Our current post-patch Champion is whacker, sporting the first sub t200 win since the update, t165 as Rome!


Even after the patch there are still minor and major exploits in the game. Whether you use them or not is up to you really, this thread works on an honor basis meaning everyone is given the benefit of the doubt.


That being said, I want to provide you guys with some very obvious and some less obvious things that helped me achieve a sub T200 science victory without any "exploits". I will later on be posting my t1 savegame and the t198 finish save. Certainly, going back to that game, I could have finished t175 or t180 easily. I did not even get the most relevant Great Engineer because the game ended before that!

A little write-up would be appropriate I guess so here we go. I was playing Rome on what I believe was a large map, could have been standard as well. Standard speed of course and the difficulty was emperor. My capital was good, but not great. Expansion space seemed plenty, but I met my first neighbor at around t5 or t6, which is never good. Did not get a settler from him either because it was mostly jungle. Built double scout, lots of slingers because barbs were particularly bad this game. Stole a settler from England, then decimated her with upgraded warriors and slingers. I had to settle far away for iron, there was none nearby. After England I took to Congo. Got his first city rather fast with legions and crossbows. I had 13 cities up at around ~t70, took two more of Congos cities and kicked him out of the game. At this point everyone hates me, unsurprisingly. First I get declared on by Monty, southern nieghbor. Then I get declared on by Germany, eastern neighbor, but only need few legions to hold them off. Get declared on by Teddy, northern neighbor to Congo. I first take Frederick's capital, then use all my troops to fight off America, take three of his cities and peace out, leaving him at two. I peace out with Germany after taking and selling his second strongest city. At this point we are at almost 20 cities and culture is going insane from all the free monuments, same for science. Though most of my cities are lacking in hammers and I took too long to get trade routes up. I also have barely any wonders built or conquered. After peacing out with everybody I focus on developing tiles, build districts everywhere and prepare for spaceport. I got research labs very early, around t120 I believe. Too early in fact, they were too hammer intensive to build in most cities. Get declared on by Sumeria to the east and decimate them with a few crossbow, later field cannon corps. Take back all the cities I sold him for gpt and refresh the deals, this time also taking all his luxuries. After that it is safely cruising to victory. I got to spaceports super early, but it took me forever to build them. Cities were not developed enough. Made a lot of tiny mistakes late game and a few big ones. Focussed too much on science when I should have focused on engineers. In this game most of the great scientists were not even needed. Still, I am fairly happy with t198 science victory. It is my personal record so far.

Screenshot 1 turn before winning~
Spoiler :




Resources


The Basics


Civics
Spoiler :

- Agoge (production to builders)

- Foreign Trade (trader unit)

- Mysticism (great scientist points)

- Early Empire (production to settlers)

- Political Philosophy (government)

- Recorded History (campus district adjacency bonus doubled)

- Guilds (district adjacency boni)

- Feudalism (charges for builders)

- Rationalism (double science yield from buildings)

- Free Market (double gold yield from buildings)

- Civil Engineers (charges and production to builders)

- Globalization (science from suzerain status, generally comes too late)

- Space Race (production towards space projects)

Techs
Spoiler :

- Writing (placing campus districts as soon as possible)

- Irrigation (clearing marshes, hanging gardens is a mediocre to strong wonder)

- Currency (trade routes allows for higher growth and production)

- Apprenticeship (industrial district for production, factories and city project, boost to all mines)

- Education (universities)

- Printing (Forbidden Palace is a very strong wonder)

- Industrialization (factories, additional production to mines, Ruhr Valley is a gamechanging wonder)

- Scientific Theory (additional food from plantations, research agreements, Oxford University is a gamechanging wonder)

- Economics (Big Ben is a very strong wonder)

- Electricity (power plants)

- Chemistry (research lab)

- Rocketry (spaceport district, earth satellite)

- Robotics (mars habitation)

- Nanotechnology (mars plantation)

Misc
Spoiler :

City States

Geneva (gamechanging)

Toronto (incredibly strong)

Hong Kong (incredibly strong)

Stockholm (mediocre)

Seoul (rather weak)

Pantheons (all terrain dependent of course)

God of the Open Sky (incredibly strong)

Fertility Rights (strong)

Goddess of Festivals (strong)

Lady of the Reeds and marshes (strong)

Oral Tradition (mediocre)

General Strategy
Spoiler :

- In the early game prioritize meeting city states, getting villages and producing units over everything.
- Try to settle as many cities as possible.
- Discard buildings, focus on builders, districts and military units.

- Head straight for the important techs and civics while keeping eurekas in mind.
- Even research labs only need very little prior techs, one could probably reach them ~t100 with a sound start.
- As soon as key tiles are improved, focus on the campus, commerce hub and industrial zone districts.
- You should not stop settling until roughly ~t100.

- Science falls off after some time. Investing in science buildings late game will yield little results, same for production. Therefore I always try to get libraries and universities, then workshops and factories out as soon as possible. After that markets, research labs, followed by power plants. Only then do I usually build banks and or stock exchanges, if ever.
- Working the respective district projects early is usually better than building any food or production in far away or underdeveloped cities. The later in the game the less important those yields get.
- Set up your three cities (or two) for the spaceport district, improve all the tiles, switch tiles over from other cities.
- Centralize all the trade routes in your highest production city, make sure you have the encampment in that district.


Advanced or indirect advantages


Civics
Spoiler :

- Games and Recreation (Colosseum is a very strong wonder)

- Civil Service (culture from specialty districs)

- Medieval Faires (housing from specialty districs)

- Mercantilism (gold from trade routes)

- Class Struggle (merging of district adjacency cards)

- Collectivizations (food from trade routes, generally comes too late)

- Gunboat Diplomacy (more envoys per turn, generally comes too late)

Techs
Spoiler :

- Celestial Navigation (harbors for trade routes, harvesting of fish)

- Masonry (harvesting of stone, Pyramids is a strong wonder)

- Bronze Working (reveals Iron for production boost and trades, chopping of rainforests)

- Wheel (relevant for cities high in rice or wheat)

- Engineering (aqueducts to get around the housing cap)

- Astronomy (Potala Palace is a strong wonder)

- Sanitation (sewers to get around the housing cap, inspiration for democracy government)

- Replacable Parts (bonus food for farms)

- Steel (bonus production to lumber mills)

- Advanced Flight (aluminium for production bonuses, also gives needed Eureka for building an alu mine)

General Strategy
Spoiler :

- Harvest early on, especially harvesting food when at the housing cap is a strong strategy.
- Make sure to think of district adjacency and area of effect boni when settling.
- Take more advanced things into account: Farm triangles, eurekas for certain ressources, strategics for timed unit pushes.
- Never finish technologies unless you need them to advance, same for civics. Keep a lot of technologies around 1 turn or around 1 turn before half if the eureka is missing. This helps a ton with district cost.
- Strategically evaluate which cities need which districts. Place them instantly as soon as you hit the population cap, then switch production.

- Build an army early on and conquer at least one or two neighbors.
- Alternative position scouts to steal settlers and or builders, kill some of their units and take a big peace deal, then turn to another neighbor. Rinse and repeat to improve economy drastically.
- After conquering cities make sure to sell artifacts. Often times it can also be worth it to sell conquered cities, especially if you have around fifteen to twenty cities yourself anyway. Only accept deals around 100gpt.

- Be sure to take advantage of the feudalism wave strategy. There is a separate thread on this forum.
- Strategically pick out one or two cities that will be used mainly for trade routes and build all the highest yield districts, meaning theater square, holy site and entertainment districts for all the food in addition to your regular districts. Send all the trade routes to these cities with priority to maximize yields.

- The Conservation civic can be used to plant trees and build lumber mills on tiles that would otherwise be farms, increasing lategame production in spaceport cities.
- Remove improvements from luxury tiles on forests or rainforests to chop them.
- Take proper advantage of science overflow. In the later stages of the game, research a 1 turn technology, then a longer one, then a one turn technology and so forth.
- Save Oxford until very late and build it after all the 1 turn technologies are gone.




Hoping for some contributions from the players that actually helped myself get good at this game, such as Acken and IronFighter :)



I'm gonna make challenges in purpose to establish optimal strategies for fastest finish times (after some time from release), but only if there won't be any obvious one dimensional 'strategies'- like spamming trade routes in BE.
 
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That is an incredible writeup man.
That being said, I tend to get bored just juggling tech tree, and usually just go and take a bunch of capitals with my tank armies to wrap the game =)
 
Thanks my man! This game I was so tempted to just sweep up the entire place, especially after getting three capitals without much effort. Had to really restrain myself because I wanted to focus on science victory only, essentially using conquest to get better land, more cities and gold from peace deals.
 
- Never finish technologies unless you need them to advance, same for civics. Keep a lot of technologies around 1 turn or around 1 turn before half if the eureka is missing. This helps a ton with district cost.
This one is so counter-intuitive. If you want to win a science victory fast, you have to avoid researching technologies! :wallbash:
There is really something wrong with the way district cost scale and this advice is a proof. Good advice to exploit a bad game mechanism.
- Alternative position scouts to steal settlers and or builders, kill some of their units and take a big peace deal, then turn to another neighbor. Rinse and repeat to improve economy drastically.
- After conquering cities make sure to sell artifacts. Often times it can also be worth it to sell conquered cities, especially if you have around fifteen to twenty cities yourself anyway. Only accept deals around 100gpt.
- Strategically pick out one or two cities that will be used mainly for trade routes and build all the highest yield districts, meaning theater square, holy site and entertainment districts for all the food in addition to your regular districts. Send all the trade routes to these cities with priority to maximize yields.
Are those advice pre-patch or post-patch? The fall patch fixed the doubling of district effects so now theater square and holy sites correctly give +1 food like a campus. Same goes for production, an Industrial Zone or Harbor is only +1 like a Commercial Hub. You no longer have uber trade routes as early.
Similarly, the patch tried to address the unescorted settlers bug and even thought you'll still find unescorted settlers now, it's not guaranteed. Some bugs with trade have also (supposedly) been fixed so maybe you won't have as good deals as before.

And yes, Horse Economy is a now defunct exploit.

That science victory looks a lot like a disguised domination victory to me, sort of an inverted version of the Science Domination from Civ5 (Stealth Bomber + XCom Squads).
Great job winning before t200 without obvious abuses thought :thumbsup:
 
Yup, fast science victory would start in the same way as a fast conquest victory. The difference is the tech path you take after the very early game and what districts you build. I haven't played for conquest yet, but when I do, I know I will focus teching and districts very differently.

My fastest SV to date was for 6otm01, which is still running, so can't make a write-up here yet. For that one I also actively avoided using exploits. I'll try to play a SV with the fall patch to see if it has any effect on my perception of how fast a good SV should be.

My tech order is usually slightly different than yours. Mainly because I don't care at all for the +policy slot wonders. They are too expensive and come too late to make a difference. After Industrialization I usually head straight to Electricity. Getting power plants up and running is really massive. I'm now starting to have doubts about Chemistry as well... It depends on the map, I think. If there are enough mountains for good adjacency and 3 scientific city states around (+12 science/campus) you might not even need Research Labs. It's all about finding the correct time to stop improving infra and start spamming district projects. I think in a really fast game the correct time could be before you have time to build Research Labs.

I'm also loosing faith in Oxford as a worthwhile investment. With a hard beeline to Rocketry, then backfill, the situation is often that half of the available techs that can be chosen at random are dead end techs that you don't need. If Oxford is built, it has to be timed to complete at a time when there are as many useful picks as possible available. I have to study the tech tree to see how to set up the optimal situation.
 
Take proper advantage of science overflow. In the later stages of the game, research a 1 turn technology, then a longer one, then a one turn technology and so forth.

AFAIK, science overflow gone when you get boosts. Be careful.
 
How many cities and science districts would you suggest? I'm guessing around 7 cities, 5 with science?
 
I will post my version of science victory guide.
This is a translation of my science vic guide(that I wrote after gotm1 and Hof T62). Gotm1 is still running, however, this is a compile of related information and general advice so I think it's okay to post now.


All the numbers are based on standard speed.

1. Science victory requirement

Atomic era Rocketry tech > Spaceport district(2000 production) > Earth Satelite project(1500 production)
Information era Satelites tech > Launch Moon Landing project (2500 production)
(should build spaceport > Earth satelite > moon landing in order but following three modules can be done independent of order)

Information era Robotics > Mars Habitation module (3000 production)
Information era Nuclear fusion > Mars reactor module (3000 production)
Information era Nanotechnology > Mars Hydroponics modue (3000 production)

Regarding victory requirement, one needs balancing science and production for science victory.



2. Related great people
(Sorted by era progress)

Science victory - space project related

Great engineer
Robert Goddad - Modern era / Triggers the Eureka moment for Rocktry. +20% Production towards Space Race projects.
Sergei Korolev - Atomic era / Gain 1500 Production towards Space Race projects.
Wernher Von Braun - Information era / Space Race Production +100%

Great Scientist
Stephanie Kwolek - Information era / +100% production towards Space Race projects
Carl Sagan - Information era / Provides 3000 production towards the Space Race construction project.

There exist great engineer/scientist helping science victory condition - at least 15000 production.

- '+20%, +100% production towards space project' effects above works the same as military unit production +% policy cards. For example, if you use +100% great people in city of 150 production per turn, 300 production will be added to project per turn.
- How to use them the most effectively : Activate Robert Goddad, Wernher Von Braun, and Stephanie Kwolek in one spaceport city to give 220% boost, then activate Serget Korolev and Carl Sagan there. 4500 production*3.2 = 14400 production will finish Earth satelite to all three mars modules, which cost 13,000 production.

Edit) These '+ % production towards space project' are global, so don't need to activate in one city. Thanks to @elitetroops


Science output related

Instant science

Galileo Galilei - Renaissance era / Gain 250 science for each adjacent Mountain tile
Charles Darwin - Industrial era / Gain 500 science for each adjacent Natural Wonder
Mary Leakey - Atomic era / Gain 350 science for every Artifact in this city. Artifacts in all your cities generate 300% of their normal Tourism.
Janaki Ammal - Atomic era / Gain 400 science for each rainforest tile here or adjacent.

Upon activating above great scientists, gained science will unlock queue'd techs.
[However, techs unlocked sometimes doesn't correspond to the science calculation (pre fall patch)]

Science per turn

Hypatia - Classical era / Libraries provide +1 science instantly builds a Library in this district
Isaac Newton - Renaissance era / Instantly builds a Library and a University in this district. Universities provide +2 science.
Albert Einstein - Modern era / Triggers a random Modern Eureka moment and provides +4 science to Universities.

+science to campus building effect applied civ-wide. For example, if activated Hypatia, all libraries in my civ are upgraded from science +2 to science +3.


3. Related policy cards and others(CS, wonder, science outputs)

3.1. Policy card

Classical era / Recorded history / Natural philosophy(economic) - +100% Campus district adjacency bonus
Renaissance era / The enlightment / Rationalism(economic) - +100% science from Campus district buildings
Modern era / Class struggle / Five-Year plan(economic) - +100% campus and industrial zone district adjacency bonus
Information Era / globalization / International Space Agency - +10% science per city-state you are the suzerain of


3.2. City-states, wonder

Scientific CS will provice 2 science to campus district if having 3 envoys or 4 science if 6 envoys. If choose papal primacy belief, this bonus increases to +3 science or +6 science.

Geneva provides +15% science to all city if not at war with any other civ.

Wonder related to science victory is
Oxford University - Industrial era / Scientific Theory / +20% Science in city, and awards 2 randomly chosen free technologies when completed.

This is not mandatory in my opinion. Helpful only if you aim for fastest turn victory.


3.3. Science output

1 population produce 0.7 science.

Campus district adjacency bonus - +1 science from each adjacent mountain, +1 science from every 2 rainforest or district tiles.
(Natural philosophy, five-year plan can be applied)

If having enough envoys on scientific CS, +2, +4 or +3 +6 science added to campus district.

Campus district buildings : Library +2 science, university +4, research lab +5 science.
(can be upgraded by great people, also rationalism policy card can be applied. For example, if activated Hypatia, library provides +3 science, which can be +6 upon rationalism policy card.)

Campus project increases science putput which is 15% of production used for the project.

All science output above are additive then multiplied by available multipliers(Geneva's 15%, Oxford's 20%, Amenity 5% or 10%).


4. General strategy for Science victory

If you played previous civ(5 or ealier interation), the above information would be enough to lead to science victory. This is general strategy without any exploit such as diplomacy gpt bug, production overflow, reselling units (all patched after 2016 fall).

4.1. When to decide science victory
Playstyle for science victory is very similar to those for domination victory. It takes longer time(or turn) so domination is prefered than science in many cases. Generally, science victory can be option if you already reached natural border such as continents, mountains, or rainforest belts. If playing in small map, you can go conquer with waves of units after developing your cities. If playing in larger map, or there exist strong, fast teching AI in opposite end of map, science victory can be solid choice.

Regarding space race projects, massive production is required. I wrote in great people section that great people can be helpful but you still need productions for related districts, buildings, projects, and golds for patronage. This means that science victory will take forever if you don't have strong base of production and gold.

Therefore, spamming commercial hubs and industrial zones, to run many internal trade routes and to place factories and power plants is important as other victory. After decided science victory, spamming campus districts and projects will lead faster science victory.


4.2. general advice

In short,
early expansion(or conquest) to have many cities,
grab rationalism policy for higher science output,
increase production by industrialization(factory) and electricity(power plant),
finish space project with production and great people.
 
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- How to use them the most effectively : Activate Robert Goddad, Wernher Von Braun, and Stephanie Kwolek in one spaceport city to give 220% boost, then activate Serget Korolev and Carl Sagan there.
I haven't tested with Von Braun or Kwolek, but I know Goddard at least is global. It does not matter where you activate him, you get the bonus in all spaceports. I would assume the same is true for the other two. Though if you get them all, you never need more than one spaceport.
 
if you get them all, you never need more than one spaceport.
I think this is a big "if"
On lower difficulties, you can win before they even show up, either they are assigned semi-randomly or AIs simply don't help you enough to grab the useless ones and you simply can't take all Engineers and Scientists yourself.
On higher difficulties, it's the opposite. They might appear and be gone before you have time to accumulate points. Maybe if you check the GP screen every turn it would be possible but even on Immortal i've had a game where i skipped a GP i didn't want in hope of getting a better one later. When you skip part of your accumulated points are removed so when a few turns later the useless GP was gone, i didn't have enough to instantly get the next one. I didn't worry because i was far ahead of every AI but the next turn when i checked, the new one was gone. Obviously AIs can patronage very aggressively sometimes, and other times simply don't seem to care at all.
Of course with the now defunct Horse Economy, you could easily have enough money to buy them all once you reached the correct era.
 
This one is so counter-intuitive. If you want to win a science victory fast, you have to avoid researching technologies! :wallbash:
There is really something wrong with the way district cost scale and this advice is a proof. Good advice to exploit a bad game mechanism.

I agree to some extent, but there is actually also some really nice strategic aspect to the way districts scale. Let me elaborate if I may.

So, the ideal way to cut costs is to place districts instantly, correct?

But there are tons of wonders that need city center adjacency and some districts like the Aqueduct do, too. So there you have your first decision.

Then you also have to sacrifice tiles. Sacrificing tiles in the early game is a bummer. Is it worth more than the small production cost cut for the district? You have to decide.

Also you have the aspect of ideal district placement. Often times you can buy a tile and get more adjacency that way, or more aoe bonus from factories and such. When do you buy, sacrificing early gold, when do you just place the district asap and put off buying tiles for ideal lategame situations?

It makes for interesting mindgames, that much is sure. Personally I quite like it, but it is definitely counter-intuitive and you are right in your complaint.


Are those advice pre-patch or post-patch? The fall patch fixed the doubling of district effects so now theater square and holy sites correctly give +1 food like a campus. Same goes for production, an Industrial Zone or Harbor is only +1 like a Commercial Hub. You no longer have uber trade routes as early.
Similarly, the patch tried to address the unescorted settlers bug and even thought you'll still find unescorted settlers now, it's not guaranteed. Some bugs with trade have also (supposedly) been fixed so maybe you won't have as good deals as before.

And yes, Horse Economy is a now defunct exploit.

That science victory looks a lot like a disguised domination victory to me, sort of an inverted version of the Science Domination from Civ5 (Stealth Bomber + XCom Squads).
Great job winning before t200 without obvious abuses thought :thumbsup:

It is pre-patch, but most of it also applies post-patch. It can still be worth it to have one city focussed on theatre/holy horsehockye/entertainment just for the food trade route and the amenities.

Clearly this specific science victory was a disguised domination victory. I would have finished much faster had I played dom. But that is pretty boring to me, as the AI never puts up a fight. So I try to challenge myself by steadily improving my own victory time. It is the only way I can have fun with the game right now, because the AI literally will not win before t300 :(

Will reply to the other posts soon of course! :)
 
Yup, fast science victory would start in the same way as a fast conquest victory. The difference is the tech path you take after the very early game and what districts you build. I haven't played for conquest yet, but when I do, I know I will focus teching and districts very differently.

My fastest SV to date was for 6otm01, which is still running, so can't make a write-up here yet. For that one I also actively avoided using exploits. I'll try to play a SV with the fall patch to see if it has any effect on my perception of how fast a good SV should be.

My tech order is usually slightly different than yours. Mainly because I don't care at all for the +policy slot wonders. They are too expensive and come too late to make a difference. After Industrialization I usually head straight to Electricity. Getting power plants up and running is really massive. I'm now starting to have doubts about Chemistry as well... It depends on the map, I think. If there are enough mountains for good adjacency and 3 scientific city states around (+12 science/campus) you might not even need Research Labs. It's all about finding the correct time to stop improving infra and start spamming district projects. I think in a really fast game the correct time could be before you have time to build Research Labs.

I'm also loosing faith in Oxford as a worthwhile investment. With a hard beeline to Rocketry, then backfill, the situation is often that half of the available techs that can be chosen at random are dead end techs that you don't need. If Oxford is built, it has to be timed to complete at a time when there are as many useful picks as possible available. I have to study the tech tree to see how to set up the optimal situation.

Actually this is not my tech-order at all, I just wanted to name all the techs that were relevant to SV, the bolded ones having higher importance obviously. My tech order is mostly straight to research labs, which is only like 12 or 13 techs anyway. I almost never get Big Ben unless I get the City State for wonder production or captured some production heavy capital along the way. Usually just running campus research grants is better I think. The only wonder I get in every single game is Ruhr Valley, probably Oxford should be up there, too.

Definitely agree on the research labs though. If your empire is 20+ cities just forget about them and build Indu and Commerce hub buildings. Good point on Oxford - I could just not research those dead-end techs at all and not finish the wonder. More and more I get the impression that science isn't actually the most important aspect for a fast SV but rather centralized hammers in 2 cities.

AFAIK, science overflow gone when you get boosts. Be careful.

Thanks very much for the heads up!

I will post my version of science victory guide.
This is a translation of my science vic guide(that I wrote after gotm1 and Hof T62). Gotm1 is still running, however, this is a compile of related information and general advice so I think it's okay to post now.

<snip>

That's some great information there. You want me to copy paste it into the OP (mentioning your name of course) or just keep it on the front page? Thanks for the detailed write-up. Most of the time I just get all the Great People anyway though because waiting for the AI just takes way too long :D

How many cities and science districts would you suggest? I'm guessing around 7 cities, 5 with science?

If you want optimal finishing times you need at the very least between 15 and 20 cities, probably more would be good. After 20 it gets iffy because of amenities. If you look at the screenshot of my room game I had like 23 (? don't remember) and that is with me selling four cities..

All cities are science focussed, only the latest ones do not build the Campus. You need Campus and Indu anyway for campus research grants and industrial hub project. As Elitetroops pointed out, after some point it just is not worth investing into science anymore, you need to find that breakeven point.

My border cities and my less developed cities usually just build commerce hubs and harbors, which still makes them very useful.

I think this is a big "if"
On lower difficulties, you can win before they even show up, either they are assigned semi-randomly or AIs simply don't help you enough to grab the useless ones and you simply can't take all Engineers and Scientists yourself.
On higher difficulties, it's the opposite. They might appear and be gone before you have time to accumulate points. Maybe if you check the GP screen every turn it would be possible but even on Immortal i've had a game where i skipped a GP i didn't want in hope of getting a better one later. When you skip part of your accumulated points are removed so when a few turns later the useless GP was gone, i didn't have enough to instantly get the next one. I didn't worry because i was far ahead of every AI but the next turn when i checked, the new one was gone. Obviously AIs can patronage very aggressively sometimes, and other times simply don't seem to care at all.
Of course with the now defunct Horse Economy, you could easily have enough money to buy them all once you reached the correct era.

I have made the opposite experience, even at deity I never have problems getting all the GS and GE that are relevant. When you are making 1500+ Gold per turn (like in the screenshot) before t200 and are running campus research grants/industrial hub project in every single city you can get a great person every four to five turns easily. Honestly, because of this it might even be worth it to start the projects on t150 or something ridiculous if you expect to finish sub t200..

It works a lot like in Civ V where you stop growing your cities after getting research labs and work every single specialist, work nothing but trading posts, make trade routes external and produce research for higher GS bulbs. Just that Civ V was so, so much more intricate :(
 
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On the pantheon pick, I am thinking divine spark is a good choice for science victory. It helps you to pick up key GS before spamming projects. Because the end-game policy is rationalism in enlightment, no need to invest in culture significantly.
 
I have not had a chance to test that yet, though to me it seems rather weak. Pantheons are all about giving early game bonuses, the earlier they apply the better. Divine Spark will not contribute significantly until you got a campus up in most of your cities, so around t80 or t90 for me (yes, I build lots of units. sometimes commerce or indu come before campus). In those ~60 turns I could have had +10% growth or like +5 culture per turn from open sky, which is really significant early on. Again though I really won't make a final judgement on it before I have tested it myself. Often times I never get GS until very late in the game, like t100. Getting one earlier, especially if it is one of the better ones that gives +science to library or uni, can be a gamechanger!
 
I've been taking Divine Spark in a lot of my games and I pretty much always get the first great scientist if I make an early Campus a priority.
 
Thanks for you advice on number of cities. I assuming you need to kill 1 - 2 neighbors to have enough room. Do you intend to grow them, or lock at pop 5 to support a Campus and Industrial Zone?

Sorry if this is a stupid question but I assume this is for Deity difficulty?
 
Thanks for you advice on number of cities. I assuming you need to kill 1 - 2 neighbors to have enough room. Do you intend to grow them, or lock at pop 5 to support a Campus and Industrial Zone?

Sorry if this is a stupid question but I assume this is for Deity difficulty?

I've managed self-founding more than 10 cities, but killing your neighbors really does help of course. I never really "lock" my cities, but often times will not bother with any housing beyond the Granary for my border cities and underdeveloped cities, so I just work max production in them.

Not a stupid question at all! There are several advantages to playing on Deity or Immortal/Emperor (as I did in my game). On Deity you could (dk if this still holds true) easily get two settlers from the AI early game. I actually have a game where I stole a settler t8 or something, it was beyond ridiculous. I ended up with 4 settlers stolen on t40. Also on Deity you get much, much better deals and peace deals. The AI also founds way more cities, meaning you have to invest less hammers into settlers.

On the other hand on Immortal/Emperor conquering cities is a little easier, though aside from the early game this is pretty insignificant. Once you get logistics crossbows the Deity AI doesn't do anything to you anymore. Once you get corps you can completely steamroll them. Another advantage on E/I is that you can self-settle more cities, meaning they have better placement than stolen AI cities would. You might also find a few more CS first or get one or two more ruins. It really is just a matter of preference, both grant similiar winning times I'd assume.
 
yeah that kind of sounds about right, the more cities you have, the more science you get. The biggest bottleneck for me at least was producing the spaceport. The projects then don't take as much as you get the needed great people for it, though with the infinite gold bug turned off, it's no longer a guarantee you'll get all the GP you need.

Another thing to look out for is gold management, when your economy becomes silly, rush buying Labs/PPlants becomes a lot easier than hard building them. Meaning Trade hubs are a must in most cities, and set your trade routes outside to get you as much gold as possible, while also keeping some in your capital for production boosts which comes into play for when you cannot rush buy something.

I also realized Lumber mills are (still?) a mistake to make, as your cities will benefit more from earlier campuses. Which kinda makes Romans a bad choice, when compared to, maybe Germany.

I have also experimented with Aztecs, since their builders can rush districts, but that was quite underwhelming and you need a lot of them to actually make a difference, whereas chops give you raw production yield which is much higher.
 
Lumber Mills are only worth it on River tiles. Also building them lategame when you get the opportunity to plant woods. Even on river tiles I chop them every now and then, especially if my city has lots of hills.
 
I think it's too early to tell for sure, but right now I believe deity might allow faster victories than lower difficulties. Of course not always, since you cannot steal early settlers every game, but when you can it is a massive boost. So in a HoF type setting, where you have unlimited attempts to find the best start, deity has potential to outperform the lower difficulties. Even if you don't manage to capture any of the free settlers, it is also an advantage to have more cities available for capture early. The Fall patch, which removed the God of the Forge bug, has significantly reduced the amount of units the AI builds. I haven't played enough with it yet to tell if the AI becomes tougher in the mid game.

It is also possible that some tech boost stealing strategy could help on deity. I haven't experimented with that yet.

I'm still undecided about best Pantheon. Usually I've picked Divine Spark, but I'm not sure about this pick anymore after doing some math. It depends on how fast you can get the Campuses up. Let's say you have 20 campuses and the average build date is turn 120, which I think is an optimistic estimate. Your target victory date is turn 180. In this case Divine Spark yields you a total of 1200 Great Scientist points over the course of the game. Is it worth it? God of the Open Sky gets you through the civics tree a lot faster, unlocking all the key civics earlier. You can also reach Democracy very early without investing at all into Theater Squares, which makes up for a lot of the lost GS points. On the other hand, picking up the earlier era Great Scientists faster is also really good. It's a tough choice.
 
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