Thoughts on OCC

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So, I just completed my first OCC victory (cultural) as India on exactly turn 500 (Prince only though, Pangaea, standard everything, I'm also a civ newbie). So here are some of the things I noticed:

I got a rather good start. Two luxury resources, 2 hills (fur and cotton, with silver around the third ring) and a lot of rivers. Settled on the spot and got my warrior to roam for a bit (maybe find goodie huts and other civs). Made a scout to reveal the map. Most CS's are far off or you must pass through rough terrain to get to them. I managed to do only a few quests because of my limited army.

Since this is only Prince-level, I managed to rush to Calendar for the Stonehenge and Writing for the Great Library (it should be noted that the wonders that require 1 of a type of building on each city is quite easier to build here). Once writing is done, I made a Library (those two specialists add quite a lot towards getting Great Scientists, more on that later) immediately, while making mines on the surrounding hills for hammers. I also managed to get Oxford University and The Oracle, so that helped quite a bit.

I took Tradition for the first SP until I got Landed Elite (that's the name, methinks... it increases growth of the Capital by 33%), then Piety until I got Free Religion. I saved those policies up for the time I got to the Renaissance for Freedom. I didn't complete Piety and Tradition until much later in the game. In the Freedom tree, I didn't get the middle policy until I got Communism from the Order tree. The last SP I got was Honor, but that was mostly just to complete the objectives, rather than for getting an army going.

I didn't run into happiness issues, and my problem for this particular game is getting enough coinage to keep my empire running. Because of this, I only built most of the Happiness buildings as I was nearing the end-game. I focused for a bit on getting Science buildings, assigning specialists. I built Culture buildings only after that. All throughout the game, I think I popped 9 or so Great Scientists to keep my tech up to date (a lot of players were ahead of me when getting to the Classical Era, and I was only delayed one turn before someone else reached Modern Era). Because all those specialists, I managed to discover 5 techs in one turn in order to get the techs for Cristo Redentor and Broadcast tower. At that point, I should have reassigned my specialists so I can go full-on culture to shave off a few turns from achieving the win. More than half of my workable tiles are adjacent to a river, unfortunately, I had no Aluminum, which is a shame, because that should have made my one city a very big production powerhouse.

I never got much use from the City-States, because of the aforementioned lack of coinage (whatever gold I had, I used to rushbuy some buildings, as opposed to plunking them down on CS's and Research agreements). Also, two Civs eliminated most of them. Because of this, I only managed to get to 19 citizens (even after getting a Hospital and that building from Penicillin). The specialists really limited my food production, even with the half-food SP.

I spent the late game sandwiched between two runaway AI's (Bismarck and Wu Zetian), praying that I don't piss either one off. It was an unsettling era of peace. Both of them are looking at me to help kill the other. As I have an all-powerful army of one Pikeman (barb police, which I disbanded anyway), every time I declined their demands to declare war on each other, I felt nervous.

On the homestretch, I switched to production mode, and I still require 5 turns more than the limit. Luckily I have a Great General from the SP, which I used to get a Golden Age which shaved off those 5 turns. I completed Utopia just in time.

All in all, I think I played this one and adhered to the game's description of India: a nation having both great wealth and grinding poverty. Though it was mostly grinding poverty, since I only noticed how much money and hammers my city was making when I dropped the Specialists.

I think I'll try again next time (whenever that may be) and try for a better time (or going for a dominationvictory, depending on how suicidal I'm feeling).

 

[CultureManiac]

I've been able to rush Stonehenge on Immortal for an OC cultural there as well, though there's no chance after that of the GL, at that level.

With such a high happy cap, India is a really good pick for OCC. Got one game on the go now, about 20 turns from Cristo with a GE standing by ...

 

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Being my first OCC, this was more like a learning experience. I'll prolly try again as Germany, and go for an early domination victory (kill every encampment you see while rushing for their UU).

 

[surb]

Good insights... I tend to go for the Commerce tree near the end of my OCCs to fill out the fifth spot rather than Honor. It has some nice goodies like +3 hammers if you're on the coast, 25% off gold rushing and +1 happiness from each luxury (which feeds into culture because you already have Mandate of Heaven!)

Pre-patch I used to go Patronage because I could sell luxuries to the AI to fund some City-State Alliances. Haven't tried the same strat since they nerfed luxury selling so don't know how it compares. Gold seems to be the weakest part of my OCC economy.

 

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Good insights... I tend to go for the Commerce tree near the end of my OCCs to fill out the fifth spot rather than Honor. It has some nice goodies like +3 hammers if you're on the coast, 25% off gold rushing and +1 happiness from each luxury (which feeds into culture because you already have Mandate of Heaven!)

Pre-patch I used to go Patronage because I could sell luxuries to the AI to fund some City-State Alliances. Haven't tried the same strat since they nerfed luxury selling so don't know how it compares. Gold seems to be the weakest part of my OCC economy.

Yeah, having only one city means you're only strong in Culture and suck at everything else, so having the perfect balance of beakers, food and gold is even more important. If you can avoid going to war in the early goings (keep a few units within your territory, just in case), you can probably avoid all-out war near the late game. By the mid game you can easily tell who'll be the runaway/s and kiss arse to avoid future conflicts.

One thing I noticed in my game is that the two warmongers had 200+ gpt at some points (probably Golden Age triggered), then a few turns later, they're wallowing in poverty (less than 100 gold and -56 GPT, probably from unit maintenance). They still had the army to send me to the afterlife, fetch me from there, then send me to the after-afterlife while having tea in their capitals, though.

 

[budweiser]

I completed a 1CC as Elizabeth on level 2, standard archepelago map. Tradtition, Piety, Patronage, Commerce, Freedom. I sat on my island and build almost all the wonders. It is better to spend turns building wonders in most cases than it is to put up a building that requires maintenance. Money is limited, but its worth it to but a CS or 3 within your sphere, if you are doing the Patronage tree.

The most interesting thing about my game was that I sent a Caravel and a scout out exploring the ocean and picking up ruins. The scout found the following weapons: archer>Long Bow>Rifle>Infantry. Along wth my initial warrior, these two units were the only ones I had all game.

I finished before 1900, was researching electricity.

I suggest concentrating on th ewonders that give GE points, then later on going for the high culture (4pt) wonders. If possible, purchase your culture buildings to get them in 1 turn. Most Social Policies were coming in 8 to 10 turns all game.