Setting up a Good Base-Strategy for Babylon

[Emperor Giulio]

I enjoy playing as Babylon on King, because I like to have a comfortable lead in technology. Let me explain how I am playing, and some of you could probably help me perfect a solid strategy. My hopes are to get better with using this Civ, so I may play with them adequately on Emperor.

I immediately make a b-line for Writing, so I could obtain the free GS, which I settle as a an academy. During this process, I like to construct a shrine in an effort to start to obtain “Monument to the Gods”. The social policies I choose are from tradition. With Aristocracy, and Monument to the Gods, I set myself up to build the Great Library. The free Tech I unlock with the Great Library is Philosophy, so I may construct the National College. I try my best to at least build 2 archer Units, to add to the warrior I already have. During this time, I have a scout exploring as well. If it is possible, I try to steal a worker from neighboring CSs. Building a granary after the great library would be my next step. At this point I usually consider expanding, so I try to find at least 3 other cities. However, the process of rapid expanding slows me down a bit, but it translates well in terms of overall score. Perhaps I should consider finding these cities at a slower pace. With a technological edge, 6 composites/crossbowmen are more than enough to repel any would-be invaders. I find that gardens, and the National Epic along with Babylon’s 50% GS bonus, have you at least an era head of your greatest rivals. By the time you reach the industrial era, you can have the option of pursuing a domination victory, because medieval and renaissance Units are no match for infantry, and bombers.

 

[Bnel]

Monument to the gods is a bit of a trap. God of craftsmen is better in most/all cases.

And I honestly only take god of craftsmen if my starting location doesn't support a better choice (that is still available).

 

[Catan_Settler]

Well yeah, that's pretty much how everyone plays them except maybe the monument to the gods part. They're not exactly a civ that screams flexibility at you, they scream-- get the great lib and sit back on your ass while you win easily.

 

[JeSuisNapoleon]

There have been a couple of threads recently about trying to get Science Vic in 250 turns, using Babylon or Korea.

the general concensus seemed to be that building the GL is a bad idea since at high level you may never get it. At king you can get it almost always, but emperor? pushing it maybe. Just build a regular library (its faster) then research your way from writing to philo, then nat.Col. Really the GL isnt that great anyway, and if done quickly you should get to the nat.Col realy fast this way.

also, this should be pretty easy to do as a single city, then rush settlers after nat.col. sometimes having one extra city before nat.col is ok, but that might take longer. It also depends on what you want for your religion. as Babylon, sometimes I end up with leftovers for faith :/

I dont know about religion, I have used the growth ones to boost population and had good results. As a peaceful civ, sword to plough is nice because if you spread it to war mongers, they don benefit as much as you do. I have also enjoyed messenger of the gods for that early - mid game beaker boost.

the general strategy is sometimes to spawn as many scientists as possible. Desert folklore is a must if you have a desert to work, or some other faith factory that will let you hoard the faith for late game scientists. This assume you take ratioanlism. if the game goes on long enough and you take Order, buying GE's can be nice to for rushing Hubble.

 

[joshua43214]

Fertility rights is the best pantheon imo for tradition SV build 3 or 4 very tall cities.

you can only reliably do religion on Emperor and below. The best thing in my experience is to take tithe, +1% production/follower, itinerant preachers/religious texts and +2 faith for each foreign city. Spam missionaries like mad, until industrial, convert the two civs that did not et religion and all the CS's. Once it start going it will take over everything. You will be earning enough faith to easily buy plenty of GS's once you finish rationalism. Take Freedom after that, you will have to learn to protect yourself culturally from other civs when you take an unpopular ideology.

Get an early wonder that gives GE points such as Stonehenge, you will pop a GE before you get a GS. Save this GE and use it on the Hubble. Alternately you can build Pisa and get the GE from that. Do not bother with the porcelain tower on King or below unless you have nothing else to make, if you are playing well you will never be able to afford RA's because the AI will be 2 era's behind you. Save Oxford and use it to bulb satellites, then use the saved GE to rush Hubble. Don't be in a big rush for the Apollo project, just let it build in a random secondary city. As long as it is done before you get the last techs you are fine.

Lastly, do not build the GL, it teaches you bad habits and you could be building something that you city needs instead. Watermills and granaries >> GL.

 

[Deau]

He is probably too humble to quote/link to his own thread but Martin Alvito has written a good thread about Babylon. It is aimed at deity play so it doesn't even remotely considers the great library but it may give you some additional insight.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=503647


I agree with others that monuments to the god really isn't a good choice. It lacks scalability with tall empires which Babylon favors in the early game. A faith-generating pantheon (for a religion) or an early game pantheon that will provide a good culture boost or early game hammer/growth will almost always outweight monuments to the gods. Even more so if you are delaying expansion until after NC because by the time you put MTG "online", the net gain to your science is really marginal.

 

[DarthSheldonPhD]

You got the obvious; initial tech is pottery as its the prereq for your second tech, writing. Always. Even if you're surrounded by 3 cattle and 2 sheep. And plant the GS as an academy. This usually triples the BPT early, making 9-12 turns/tech into 3-4 turns. And pottery as the initial tech (which I usually do with all civs) and switching production to a shrine the turn you get it (and maximizing production until it is finished) means that you'll get one of the first few choices at pantheon.
The early GS-based wonders are nice if you can get 'em (GL and Oracle), but not necessary and risky above emporer.
The other tactic I usually do with Babylon is to save up a few hundred gold before finishing the research of Education so I can buy a uni on the same turn and switch two citizens to scientists.
I usually use the pantheon selection for faith, whichever of folklore/circles/aurora gives the most faith, or festivals with monastaries later. The objective is to create enough faith to get pagodas in all your cities by mid renaissance and buy lots of GSs from industrial on which, when combined with frequent naturally-spawning GS's, slingshots you through the rest of the tech tree.

 

[MarshalN]

Also, you may want to consider building a second scout before any of your archers. I don't think on King you need 2 archers + warrior. You should also be sending your warrior out for exploration - the early gold bonus from meeting CS helps, especially if you're the first to get there. If you end up with 2 faith CS you've got your pantheon right there. When I mostly played on emperor I usually just build two scouts + my warrior, and I would leave my capital undefended until I get a worker. Your time spent building archers can also be put towards a granary. Also, 6 composites sounds like a lot. I can usually manage with 3-4. On King I don't think you have any worries. You should also have a healthy tech lead by medieval so your units would be more advanced than the AI's, negating the need for more.

As others have mentioned, monument to the gods is not that great. I'd also agree that the Great Library is far from essential. Also, settle your city next to a mountain if you can manage it. That +50% bonus from observatory is huge.

Since population = science, your focus should really be on getting your few cities as big as possible. This means aggressively getting luxuries via city states and trade, and doing whatever you can to boost that growth.

 

[Crudgington]

I am also new(3 months) to Civ and have just progressed to Emperor level. I won both my first two attempts at this level. I was popping a new GS every 5 or 6 turns by the time I got SV( turn 370 and then turn 390). In fact on the second game I went on a wonder hogging spree and ended up with GL,HG,Parthenon and Hagia Sophia. I fully expected to get 'out-scienced' but the AI went for a cultural victory after having been miles ahead in tech going into industrial.
Looking ahead it seems the great library(which I have been getting on turn 44) is out of the question for the next level. I am curious as to how some folks are generating over 1000 science at turn 200. I know that the science gain is exponential after you get into rationalism and research labs, but my question is, how do you get these THAT EARLY?

 

[Tich]

Tradition (the policy tree) 4 city opener into National College. NC should be done by turn 100. Go Granary - Library or just Library - Granary in your 3 satellite cities based on their production. You can always rush buy the 4th Library if needed since it often finishes very late otherwise. Mass farms in all of your cities and try and get to 10 pop in each of them by turn ~120. Beeline Education as soon as you've grabbed whatever you need from the early portion of the tree (Sailing for the trade route, Construction for Colosseums, Iron Working for Iron) and get Universities in your 4 cities asap. Work those science slots as soon as it becomes feasible. That usually comes at 10ish pop which is why you need a lot of early growth. If you have 2+ cities or your Cap next to a mountain you want to get Astronomy next to crank out Observatories. If you only have 1 satellite city proximal to one then you can wait until Scientific Theory is finished to grab it. Next you want to rush Scientific Theory for Public Schools. Plant Great Scientists (GSes) that you produce up until then as Academies. Stop planting Academies once Scientific Theory finished. You'll be bulbing all future GSes 8 turns after you complete your Research Labs + work most of your specialist slots. Speaking of which, build your Guilds quickly and work their slots. Secularism from that Rationalism tree enables them to generate science and you'll want the artists for various things. Musicians you can just create great works with but the other two you can use for great works or for their bonuses as needed. Using a Writer to rush Secularism is great for example. Artists can be used for Golden Ages or for great works. I like to pop an Artist when I win the World Fair to create a ton of culture. Pop your Writers 8 turns in to your "super duper Golden Age" for tons of culture. Moving on, you should have Public Schools building by turn 160 at the latest. Buy one in your lowest production city if you have to but try and build them if possible. Work their specialist slots asap. Next you'll want to open Industrialization to look for Coal for Factories. Getting Fertilizer after is fine for more growth. Beyond that click on Plastics. When Replaceable Parts is finishing have your Cap produce Oxford. Make sure they end at the same time so you can use the free tech on Plastics. Start building/buying Research Labs. Fills their slots when you can. Once you've had your Research Labs built and all specialist slots working for 8 turns start bulbing your GSes. Get Satellites so that you can build Hubble while you research Apollo in a satellite city. I'm bad with the tech names but I usually get the tech that lets you build boosters first, then the "final" tech on the bottom that lets you build the cockpit (I think) and then I end with Particle Physics (the one at the top). Since the only thing that matters at this point is science I use my faith my buy Great Scientists to bulb. 2500 gets you 2 and 5000 gets you 3. If you have 3500 buy 2 and buy a Great Engineer to rush Hubble. If you only have 2500 then buy 2 GSes and just build Hubble. Your tech lead is too big and even though rushing it saves ~22 turns they're not 22 turns that matter. You'll still be sitting there waiting for Particle Physics so it's kind of pointless.

When you get Workshops work their specialist slots (again, Secularism generates science out of it) and if you can pop 1 GE that's usually fine. Get Porcelain Tower or Pisa with it. Both rock. Don't go crazy popping out GEs though. 1 tops usually.

For social policies max Tradition then open Rationalism + Secularism as soon as possible. You'll want to get Free Thought after. Finish the tree eventually but it's not required early on, especially if you're not making many friends. Open Order next and grab 2 happiness perks (+2 happiness from monuments, +1 happiness from Workshops/Factories/etc) and then get Worker's Facilities. Build Factories in all 4 of your cities. These are the key science policies. Nothing else in Order really matters (the Level 3 is marginal at best) so if you have good culture gain pick up Consulates early on and use that instead. You don't need to finish Order by any means and you don't have to finish Rationalism right away. You can leave the last 2 policies in it until your final RAs are completing. For Order Hero of the People and Skyscrapers are both really good but I mean happiness gets SCARY when other civs start adopting Ideologies. If you don't have a big happiness buffer (which you shouldn't) then I usually just get my +16 happiness. It goes FAST unless everyone around you adopts Order for whatever reason. So yes, get the +25% great person generation and -33% building cost policies first *if possible* but like if you think that +8 happiness is going to cut it when everyone around you adopts Freedom and Autocracy then you're going to be sitting at -10 over the course of 2 turns. Sit on your happiness buffer and thank me when you realize how it was just barely good enough to keep you afloat.

The only tricky part of policies is when to get Consulates (if ever). Whenever I can get Oracle (~25% of the time) I ALWAYS go Consulates after Tradition and then go Rationalism Opener + Secularism. If I don't get Oracle then I only go Consulates if I'm getting extra culture from a Pantheon, some city state allies that I made early on, some civ bonus, etc. If I'm just getting Culture from my Monuments and maybe an Amphitheater or two then I usually don't both getting Consulates since going Pat Opener -> Consulates -> Rationalism -> Secularism takes too long in my opinion but I mean maybe that's wrong and maybe I should always get it. Not sure really.

Mass farms. All farms all day. Don't bother with trading posts or lumber camps in most circumstances. I only build Trading Posts on jungles that aren't touching fresh water basically. I don't think that I've ever built a Lumber Camp. Mines you'll need obviously but like just spam farms on everything that you can (especially fresh water) and work those tiles asap. You'll need to work a mine or two for production obviously but like you want to emphasize growth.

Religion is tricky if you don't have a a bunch of natural help. Get a Shrine early on so that you can get the 10% growth Pantheon if nothing else. If you don't get a religion that's fine. If you do then get Tithe and Swords to Plowshares/Pagodas usually. I really like Tithe + StP though but Pagodas do help with Culture and Happiness. Still, the 10% growth pantheon is easily worth getting an early Shrine and the AIs NEVER take it. Obviously get better Pantheons if you can (faith from quarries, faith from natural wonders, faith from desert tiles, etc.) but if nothing else get 10% growth. I personally don't bother with religion unless I get a good faith generating Pantheon but I mean do whatever you want. You still need faith buildings to buy GSes later on but I mean you don't need to prioritize them in most instances.

Sub 250 wins do require good starting spots usually though. Still, it's definitely possible. I got 224 the other day on Deity.

 

[Crudgington]

Tradition (the policy tree) 4 city opener into National College. NC should be done by turn 100. Go Granary - Library or just Library - Granary in your 3 satellite cities based on their production. You can always rush buy the 4th Library if needed since it often finishes very late otherwise. Mass farms in all of your cities and try and get to 10 pop in each of them by turn ~120. Beeline Education as soon as you've grabbed whatever you need from the early portion of the tree and get them in your 4 cities asap. Work those science slots as soon as it becomes feasible. That usually comes at 10ish pop which is why you need a lot of early growth. If you have 2+ cities or your Cap next to a mountain you want to get Astronomy next to crank out Observatories. If you only have 1 satellite city proximal to one then you can wait until Scientific Theory is finished to grab it. Next you want to rush Scientific Theory for Public Schools. Plant Great Scientists (GSes) that you produce up until then as Academies. Build your Guilds and work their slots. Secularism from that Rationalism tree enables them to generate science and you'll want the artists for various things. Musicians you can just create great works with but the other two you can use for great works or for their bonuses as needed. Using a Writer to rush Secularism is great for example. You should have Public Schools building by turn 160 at the latest. Buy one in your lowest production city if you have to but try and build them if possible. Work their specialist slots asap. Next you'll want to open Industrialization to look for Coal for Factories. Getting Fertilizer after is fine for more growth. Beyond that click on Plastics. When Replaceable Parts is finishing have your Cap produce Oxford. Make sure they end at the same time so you can use the free tech on Plastics. Start building/buying Research Labs. Fills their slots when you can. Once you've had your Research Labs built and all specialist slots working for 8 turns start bulbing your GSes. Get Satellites so that you can build Hubble while you research Apollo in a satellite city. I'm bad with the tech names but I usually get the tech that lets you build boosters first, then the "final" tech on the bottom that lets you build the cockpit (I think) and then I end with Particle Physics (the one at the top). Since the only thing that matters at this point is science I use my faith my buy Great Scientists to bulb. 2500 gets you 2 and 5000 gets you 3. If you have 3500 buy 2 and buy a Great Engineer to rush Hubble. If you only have 2500 then buy 2 GSes and just build Hubble. Your tech lead is too big and even though rushing it saves ~22 turns they're not 22 turns that matter. You'll still be sitting there waiting for Particle Physics so it's kind of pointless.

When you get Workshops work their specialist slots (again, Secularism generates science out of it) and if you can pop 1 GE that's usually fine. Get Porcelain Tower or Pisa with it. Both rock. Don't go crazy popping out GEs though. 1 tops usually.

For social policies max Tradition then open Rationalism + Secularism as soon as possible. You'll want to get Free Thought after. Finish the tree eventually but it's not required early on, especially if you're not making many friends. Open Order next and grab 2 happiness perks (+2 happiness from monuments, +1 happiness from Workshops/Factories/etc) and then get Worker's Facilities. Build Factories in all 4 of your cities. These are the key science policies. Nothing else in Order really matters (the Level 3 is marginal at best) so if you have good culture gain pick up Consulates early on and use that instead. You don't need to finish Order by any means and you don't have to finish Rationalism right away. You can leave the last 2 policies in it until your final RAs are completing. For Order Hero of the People and Skyscrapers are both really good but I mean happiness gets SCARY when other civs start adopting Ideologies. If you don't have a big happiness buffer (which you shouldn't) then I usually just get my +16 happiness. It goes FAST unless everyone around you adopts Order for whatever reason. So yes, get the +25% great person generation and -33% building cost policies first *if possible* but like if you think that +8 happiness is going to cut it when everyone around you adopts Freedom and Autocracy then you're going to be sitting at -10 over the course of 2 turns. Sit on your happiness buffer and thank me when you realize how it was just barely good enough to keep you afloat.

The only tricky part of policies is when to get Consulates (if ever). Whenever I can get Oracle (~25% of the time) I ALWAYS go Consulates after Tradition and then go Rationalism Opener + Secularism. If I don't get Oracle then I only go Consulates if I'm getting extra culture from a Pantheon, some city state allies that I made early on, some civ bonus, etc. If I'm just getting Culture from my Monuments and maybe an Amphitheater or two then I usually don't both getting Consulates since going Pat Opener -> Consulates -> Rationalism -> Secularism takes too long in my opinion but I mean maybe that's wrong and maybe I should always get it. Not sure really.

Mass farms. All farms all day. Don't bother with trading posts or lumber camps in most circumstances. I only build Trading Posts on jungles that aren't touching fresh water basically. I don't think that I've ever built a Lumber Camp. Mines you'll need obviously but like just spam farms on everything that you can (especially fresh water) and work those tiles asap. You'll need to work a mine or two for production obviously but like you want to emphasize growth.

Religion is tricky if you don't have a a bunch of natural help. Get a Shrine early on so that you can get the 10% growth Pantheon if nothing else. If you don't get a religion that's fine. If you do then get Tithe and Swords to Plowshares/Pagodas usually. I really like Tithe + StP though but Pagodas do help with Culture and Happiness. Still, the 10% growth pantheon is easily worth getting an early Shrine and the AIs NEVER take it. Obviously get better Pantheons if you can (faith from quarries, faith from natural wonders, faith from desert tiles, etc.) but if nothing else get 10% growth. I personally don't bother with religion unless I get a good faith generating Pantheon but I mean do whatever you want. You still need faith buildings to buy GSes later on but I mean you don't need to prioritize them in most instances.

Sub 250 wins do require good starting spots usually though. Still, it's definitely possible. I got 224 the other day on Deity.

Many thanks.

 

[Tich]

Many thanks.

Np. Oh, and for what it's worth GL is impossible to build on Deity so it's not even a consideration. My opener is usually Scout - Scout - Scout (not required but I really like meeting all the CSes, finding NWs, getting ruins, etc) - Shrine - Worker - Settlers - Granary - Caravan - Library - NC. Use Legalism from Tradition to get your Monument. You don't need to build a Worker; you can just steal one from a nearby CS using one of your scouts. You can even stay "at war" with that CS and come back to steal another worker like 9-12 turns later if you want. Doesn't work on military CSes (usually) but it works on most of the "peaceful" varieties who don't churn out units early on. It's obviously a bit tricky, it's not always possible, but I mean it's certainly do-able some % of the time. You just need to get a "feel" for how the AI works and what terrain you need to pull it off.

If you want to farm a CS for 2 workers, whenever possible look for a CS that has a hill 2 tiles away away from their border that has lots of flat terrain around it. Use that to scout for a Worker and to snag it when you can. If you can't get vision (due to jungles or whatever) then don't even bother. It all comes down to vision and terrain so eventually you'll learn when you can and can't get multiple workers out of the deal based on the setup alone.

 

[joshua43214]

Tich's write up is excellent. The only thing I do substantially different is I use Oxford to bulb satellites rather than plastics, and burn a GE that I acquired earlier on Hubble. Order is definitely a safer route to go, I usually go freedom but I usually have to prepare many many turns in advance to deal with the discontent.

 

[jahsoldier]

I recently breezed to a diplomatic win as Babylon on Immortal (Epic speed). I more or less focused on nothing but Great Scientists - I beelined every tech that improves their generation (Porcelain Tower, Leaning Tower, etc as well as Freedom, Gardens, all that stuff). I had something like 14 academies across 5 cities by the end, and an extremely small army.

I also ignored religion completely. Only had one war: Songhai invaded me fairly early and kept up an annoyingly persistent attack on my capital which I just managed to fend off, til he finally cut it out around the Renaissance era. After that, everybody was nice as pie all game. Interestingly had Korea in there too, who seemed to be the only civ on a par with me in techs.

I was, of course, pursuing a science victory but I decided to pop Globalisation early just to see what would happen (all my spies were diplomats). Lo and behold, diplo win at the first opportunity - can't remember what turn but it was around the 1860s.

In short: science is better for diplo wins than it is for science wins, I guess

 

[JeSuisNapoleon]

and all this talk of science victories, I find Babylon is just fine as a war monger so long as you keep a decent tech lead.

for this to work, you would focus a bit more on the military tech, and less on getting to hubble early. In this case it is just fine to get 2 of the 4 public schools up a bit late, same with research labs. You will want some constabularies / maybe a police station in the cap. You wont want Monty.Z having the same artilery as you! You might consider getting biology and flight asap, because thats a clear cut winner when the opposition is 2-4 techs away.

You will still want fast growth so I would keep tradition and rationalism policies, and a growth-enabling religion. Just consider autocracy in the place of order.

You should be able to get most of the important wonders you want if you maintain the tech lead.

If you decide to war monger, I find its best to puppet or burn most captures. the puppets tend to add up to some nice beakers and gold.

**This might not be such a great Idea in BNW, since captured cities leads to diplomatic penanlties.

I have used sudden military expansion to prevent Ghandi from winning an early culture vic so many times, it just needs to be considered as part of the strategy

 

[Tich]

I don't think anyone here is suggesting that Baby/Maya/Korea/etc. aren't ridiculously OP warmongers as well. Just hit fast Xbows and raze 2-3 nearby civs. From there you can tech to Dynamite for Artillery to finish another couple off. You can finish the last player off with Bombers if needed but I mean realistically Artillery can get the job done. Just bulb Dynamite with Oxford and have a bunch of Canons pre-built and ready to upgrade. You should have some nice logistics Xbows by now and if you can get them to Gatling Guns then all the better. Just churn out a few Rifles/Lancers to tank/capture cities and you're good to go.

Either that or just ignore everything and rush Bombers and beat everyone with those. Modern Armor are amazing too. Any high mobility, high damage end game unit should be good enough to win when massed.

 

[Lunco]

Tich: were you feeding all those 4 cities in your screenshot with Caravans? Do you keep the highest food tiles locked down all game? I'm having issues hitting such high numbers consistently.

 

[joshua43214]

Tich: were you feeding all those 4 cities in your screenshot with Caravans? Do you keep the highest food tiles locked down all game? I'm having issues hitting such high numbers consistently.

I can't speak for Tich, but I lock down food tile and work nothing but food tiles until I run out of food tiles. I will swap over to full production to crank out a science building depending both on the building and the turns to completion. For example, don't try to hammer down on a library if you only have 3 pop. You are better off letting it take 12-15 turns to complete while growing because it give science based on population. Public schools on the other hand are worth hammer focusing on if they take too long because they increase base science.

You just have to find a good balance for the map. Sometimes I settle a city that has very poor food in the 1 ring, and just work a hill and stagnate until the granary is up and the borders expand to a good food tile, then do nothing but food focus.

 

[Tich]

Tich: were you feeding all those 4 cities in your screenshot with Caravans? Do you keep the highest food tiles locked down all game? I'm having issues hitting such high numbers consistently.

I'll only ever have like 1 food caravan going usually. You need a lot of gold to roll RAs all game long. You should be able to make 4+ friends by turn ~130 and you should be able to roll RAs every 30 turns until the game ends when things go right. It's tough to get the gold for that if you're sending food every which way. Unless you get Tithe, then by all means! You basically need to roll 3 sets of RAs (4 or more) starting around turn 120 if you want sub 240 wins. Otherwise you're looking at like 250-260.

Yes, you want to lock down high food tiles but you can't just mindlessly avoid production either. I try to work every 3-4 food tile that I possible can but I mean if you're working like 2 Bananas and some farms you have to lock down a mine or two so that your cities can actually build things at a reasonable pace. Growing tall is nice but it's not very helpful if your cities are bare. I will always lock down a mine or two if needed to ensure that my cities are doing "things."

The only way to hit high pop numbers is to have a lot of fresh water. There's no secret. If you don't have a lot of it then you just plain can't grow very big usually. It's not hard to win quickly even if you don't have a ton of fresh water but I mean your wins will be slower.

One thing that I'll say is that I value Workers higher than most. I get like 7-8 in most of games. I don't know how people live with 4. Roads, mass farms, luxuries, etc. you need to build so much in so little time. I like can't even fathom how people tolerate having 4 all game. I obviously deleted them all once my 3 rings are fully improved but like I strongly recommend getting a TON of Workers (~2 per city) to spam farms for growth.

Here's my latest win. Deity obviously. My fastest time yet! As you can see my cities weren't even very big. It's mostly about working a ton of specialist slots and abusing Secularism. Nothing special again. Just worked fresh water tiles, spammed farms, worked my specialist slots and won very easily. I didn't have a religion and I was only able to buy one GE at the very end to rush my last spaceship part. Could have been a GS, might have shaved a turn off my time (maybe, I didn't really care). All I did was roll RAs all game, worked my specialist slots and bulbed some GSes. It's pretty mindless really.

 

[Martin Alvito]

If you can get 217 with Shoshone and no religion, then sub-200 has to be doable.

Guess I know what this week's project is...