Tech win, 162 turns quick

[Silverfuturist]

So I unistalled Civ a few months ago, it was taking up too much of my time.
I came back to civ, and had the best game ever with the Inca - with the right start I think they are the most powerful civ in the game. Crazy food/hammers/gold with terrace farms and free/almost free roads, plus with start bias you can get lots of mountain cities to make observatories. If you get Petra in an Inca desert hill city... so crazy... I had one tile with 7 food and 2 hammers!!!

It was an Ermak hosted game, so it wasn't just beating up public noobs at first, but most players didn't stay 'till the end. I didn't have a puppet empire (later in the game I took over a few cities.)

I could have done it in under 160 turns, but I didn't play well enough (with turn timer and other players pressuring you, mistakes often made.)

Here is how mind-blowingly strong my empire was, look at the hammers and science per city in second screenshot:
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[Gort]

What's your strategy?

 

[Tabarnak]

I got my best finish date with Incans as well. I agree with you Sir_Spam_a_Lot, this civ is da best!

You have the earliest date so far from i what i heard.

 

[ense7en]

Love the Incans. Such a fun civ, and extremely powerful if you get that start by lots of mountains.

 

[Silverfuturist]

What's your strategy?

Strategy involves using all game concepts I learned

Seriously, I will start off by saying what not to do:

1. Don't play multi-player like it is a single-player game!

In Single player, esp on the higher levels, dealing with the quirky AI is a huge part of the game. Meaning that expansion often means a loss of trading (exploit) partners cuz the AI is mad... then later invades with waves of dumb units that suicide themselves and might even take some of your cities. I think this is the reason why most people on MP don't make enough cities - they are going by their SP experience. But in SP the AI is so dumb, even at higher levels, that you can make limited cities, rush a certain unit (esp special unit) then get a nice puppet empire, but once you have exploited the AI with trading first. Meaning while you only made limited cities, you end up with a sprawling empire. In MP, against skilled opponents, you cannot rely on getting a puppet empire unless you have some nice imbalance going your way. Which means you have to plan on your empire being mostly cities that you build. I had 7 of my own cities, and got them out ASAP so they could start growing.

But in MP something to consider - if you crowd our neighbors with your cities, you can expect backlash, and often several neighbors will band together against you. In my ideal game I had the space to make 7 cities without my neighbors feeling like I was taking the land they wanted, so I had a lot of peace-time. War without being able to create puppets is a giant black hole of resouces in Civ... a few players locked in a stale mate of combat are basically lost. So there is a balance with making a lot of cities in a way that you don't get attacked. If you place cities in easily defendable positions, you also might not get attacked. But if you have a start where you know real estate is scarce, perhaps plan from the start that you will be playing a war game.

 

[Gort]

I kinda meant, "How do you win a science victory in 162 turns?" because that's really really fast.

What social policies did you go for?

What techs should be beelined?

What about the Inca makes them good for a tech win?

 

[smallfish]

What about the Inca makes them good for a tech win?

I think I can answer this. It's due to three reasons:

1) If you start off in a mostly hills continent, that's a natural Great Wall for you off the bat due to Great Andean Road's no movement penalty against hill travel. That translates to easier defense and offense against your neighbors

2) Terrace Farms allows for faster growing of cities in said all hill terrain (+1 food, another +1 food if built next to a mountain), and increased pop means more science generated for your civ

3) The other perk of Inka's unique ability is that roads cost absolutely no maintainance fee on hills. In said all hill terrain, this turns into more gold for rushbuying science buildings or getting out more workers to grow your civ or focusing on any nearby CSes (cultural/maritime) to get you to Unis and Rationalism asap... while others are still struggling with money issues

Hope this helps.

 

[Silverfuturist]

I kinda meant, "How do you win a science victory in 162 turns?" because that's really really fast.

What social policies did you go for?

What techs should be beelined?

What about the Inca makes them good for a tech win?

Thanks, specific questions are easier to answer. This is what I do, maybe there is an improvement.

Social policies:

In a peaceful game:

1. Open tradition
2. Full liberty (getting settler policy ASAP)
3. Wonder/happy policy in tradition if Renaissance isn't open yet
4. Open Rationalism, only go for science boost policies at first
5. Open order, get factory/science policies
6. Finish rationalism. If another policy before game over, pick 1 that looks good.

Peaceful game:
1. Get all basic techs to hook up lux. Don't worry about Iron, or even sailing if inland.
2. Right to Education
3. From education pop renaissance by acoustics. Idea is to open rationalism ASAP.
4. Go to Industrial beeline to Fertilizer. (It is fastest, and hammers/food from Chemistry/Fertilizer nice. The main reason, so that faith won't pop out prophets, you need that faith for great people.)
5. Next get techs for Public Schools, coal, oil, aluminum.
6. Then get tech to build Apollo, then tech for Hubble.
7. Tech to get space parts.

As far as great scientists - save all for popping higher techs. In war game often I have to pop them earlier to get a military tech to survive or kill a civ. In a recent game an opponent had 7 academies and had a tech edge for a while. Until I popped my scientists and he never caught up. PLUS - those 7 academies wrecked his capital, that is 7 tiles not improved (opportunity cost.)

Inca and tech win - the most important thing is production. Russia with a good resource start will beat Babylon in a low production start. Inca have hilly/mountain start bias. Observatories are a big deal, it is like a free science policy esp in capital. The terraces mean that in addition to growing you get 2 hammers per tile. Cities 20+ size with lots of tiles that have 2 hammers per tile have massive production.

When you open a tech for the buildings you need, you need to build those buildings very fast. Or even save gold for buying science buildings. Incas rock there, free roads add a LOT of gold over time. When it comes to key wonders, building national wonders, Apollo, space parts, low production start will drag your speed of building. With Inca, my cities had most of the buildings as I teched along. When you get a low prod empire, your buildings can't keep up and you lose all of the bonuses that go with the buildings.

In conclusion - most of the time with start bias, Inca has big hammers and big food in addition to observatories and tons of gold (free roads) to buy key buildings.

 

[Silverfuturist]

Here is what I mean about start bias. Check out this incredible start, which was on pangea normal settings. I hit my earliest Renaissance ever, turn 78!!! It was El Dorado assisted (bought 2 cities - El Dorado money + meeting CS plus ruins + city income. Bought 1st right away, nex a few turns later.) But you can see what I mean about crazy production and crazy food. Consider this - a water mill costs production and 2 gold per turn upkeep. Each terrace is sort of like a free water mill!

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[Ermak-]

This NEVA happaned! I don't see my name on player list! You just abuse noobs.

 

[Silverfuturist]

This NEVA happaned! I don't see my name on player list! You just abuse noobs.

Ermak, it was one of those games where you declared yourself winner on "points." You disconnected as my demographics were rolling. I kept playing to see just how fast I could do a space win.

 

[Silverfuturist]

I think I can answer this. It's due to three reasons:

1) If you start off in a mostly hills continent, that's a natural Great Wall for you off the bat due to Great Andean Road's no movement penalty against hill travel. That translates to easier defense and offense against your neighbors

2) Terrace Farms allows for faster growing of cities in said all hill terrain (+1 food, another +1 food if built next to a mountain), and increased pop means more science generated for your civ

3) The other perk of Inka's unique ability is that roads cost absolutely no maintainance fee on hills. In said all hill terrain, this turns into more gold for rushbuying science buildings or getting out more workers to grow your civ or focusing on any nearby CSes (cultural/maritime) to get you to Unis and Rationalism asap... while others are still struggling with money issues

Hope this helps.

Exactly. Terrace Farms also give Inca city spots where other civs would have a bad city spot. For example, even though snow hills give no hammers, a 3-5 food spot is not too shabby. Or desert hills/mountains with no river/no resources... Inca can make a killer city with each tile giving 2 hammers and 2-5 food... tile yields of 4-7 where another civ can't even flourish!

 

[Ermak-]

so you won Emperor AIs. I had to go to bed- and by all means i was runaway iTOPS, so it was over if humans continued. We need to play out a real game. I ll post a screen your resignation on here.

 

[Silverfuturist]

so you won Emperor AIs. I had to go to bed- and by all means i was runaway iTOPS, so it was over if humans continued. We need to play out a real game. I ll post a screen your resignation on here.

Ermak - you don't get a spaceship up in 162 turns unless you have an incredible start. The production required to do something like that is off the charts, cuz all key buildings, Apollo and space parts go up very quickly for 162 to happen.

 

[Ermak-]

Ermak - you don't get a spaceship up in 162 turns unless you have an incredible start. The production required to do something like that is off the charts, cuz all key buildings, Apollo and space parts go up very quickly for 162 to happen.

iWINS away before that on regular basis in 8 FFA by out-clickfesting you with my i7-950 Quantum Beast

 

[Gort]

Ermak - you don't get a spaceship up in 162 turns unless you have an incredible start. The production required to do something like that is off the charts, cuz all key buildings, Apollo and space parts go up very quickly for 162 to happen.

Yeah, I tried this strategy and it took me more than 200 turns. I had to fight both Siam and the Huns at the same time, which sucked, though.

 

[Silverfuturist]

Yeah, I tried this strategy and it took me more than 200 turns. I had to fight both Siam and the Huns at the same time, which sucked, though.

Yes, war slows you way down (unless you get some spoils for in investment of the units.) It is more than just wasting hammers on units, often you have to blow great scientists before you have peak science to get military techs to stay alive. As each scientist is = to last 8 turns of teching, using 2 scientists when you have 400 beakers is worse than using 1 scientist at 900 beakers.