Tokugawa Civil Service Challenge

[Simple Machine]

I present here a challenge to test your early empire optimization abilities. The start looks like this, with you playing as Tokugawa of Japan:

Your task is simple: reach Civil Service by turn 100 (375 BC).

To make your life simpler, there are no barbarians and no AIs. In other words, it's just you, Japan, all by yourself.

You must abide by the following two restrictions:

1. You may not convert to any religion. However, you can build religious buildings (e.g., monastery, temple), missionaries, and found religions as you see fit. Of course you will need to found some religion(s) to reach civil service.
2. You may not build any wonders. No Oracle! No nothing. Just your own wits and teching power.

In case you have doubts, this is very possible to achieve - even with a fairly weak leader where your traits will do nothing to help you out (although your starting techs are pretty good). I was able to get Civil Service on Turn 96 (although it did take me several tries). I'm sure it's possible to get there even earlier with better play.

I'll share in a later post what my approach was. Now back to my shadow game......

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Not sure I have time to play but cool concept.

 

[soundjata]

I'm going to move the settler until I find 2x gold

 

[soundjata]

Well I got a T97 CS on a quick run

Spoiler :

SIP, skip AH and bronze. 2 cities. Slowbuild stuff. No great person used.
T96 Kyoto

Osaka:

(cowtage!)

My issue with the map is that the result is mostly dependent on the settling position I guess.
Would be fair with a pre-settled city.

Still interested by other approaches

 

[ariosto]

I got T95 CS. Could have been T94 if I had realized I could put hammers into useful monasteries instead of useless worker/settler/temples/oracle earlier.

Spoiler :

The biggest issue with this challenge is where to put hammers, especially if no wonders are allowed. You need only 3 warriors, granaries and libraries - and that's it. So I made much more cottages and less mines than I usually do. I also didn't expand at all - if there were AIs that would be unacceptable. That means, no AI no barbs changed my approach significantly.
I had grown one GS to bulb math. Unfortunately, I researched Caste System 2 turns too fast, so I had to put extra beakers into something (Polytheism in my case). I should have prioritized chopping library in capital sooner, that would cut 1 or 2 turns.
Second city settled T35, third T50

 

[ariosto]

@soundjata

Spoiler :

Interesting idea with skipping both AH and Bronze. I didn't think of it, even though there is limited usage of those techs.
Actually, I had another idea on this challenge - go Alphabet-Currency, grow Great Merchant and bulb Civil Service. Unfortunately, Metal Casting blocks this bulb, but if you skip BW problem solved. Still need to self research Sailing, though.

 

[sampsa]

I would be shocked if the optimal solution didn't involve a golden age, or some other use of a GP.

 

[Gumbolt]

Maybe a golden age. Use of Great Priests need 2 of them to bulb CS and or you need theology. Maybe great Merchant could work if you went case after COL and spammed merchants. It adds alphabet and sailing to the requirted list.

Whatever you do it will need a specialist or 2 instead of a worked cottage. How quickly could you get a merchant? 3x4=12 9 turns if you switch to caste?

That or a city builds 2 temples and runs 2x priest most of the game? That is 35+ turns of 2 priests. 3 if you built a third temple.

 

[Simple Machine]

Spoiler soundjata :

SIP, skip AH and bronze. 2 cities. Slowbuild stuff. No great person used.

Wow - I would have thought that with only 2 cities and no great people for bulbing or academy, you wouldn't get the beaker rate necessary to hit civil service in time, but I guess you can do it that way!

Spoiler ariosto :

I got T95 CS. Could have been T94 if I had realized I could put hammers into useful monasteries instead of useless worker/settler/temples/oracle earlier.

Looks like your approach was similar to mine.

Spoiler My approach :

I settled to get the silver in the capital. Overall plan was to expand to 4 cities relatively quickly, tech Ag-Mining-BW-Pottery-Hunting-AH-Writing and get libraries up, then go Mysticism-Meditation-Priesthood-CoL while getting a scientist out to bulb math.

I settled city 2 on T35, city 3 on T46 and city 4 on T57. If you do go to 4 cities you need to get the 4th out early so it has enough time to pay back. Didn't build a single mine, except for the silver.

Also, I had experimented with an Academy instead of bulbing Math, but you need to get it really early and/or have a very strong capital for the academy to pay back in time. Also, Monarchy doesn't give a quick enough return to be worth it either I think. Maybe if we didn't have the silver or fur that would be different.

I even tried a different crazy approach - get two GS. One to bulb math, and the other for an academy. It is possible to get two GS out before T90, but you have to sacrifice too much development so I wasn't able to get it to work.

@sampsa and @Gumbolt:
For a merchant to bulb civil service, you also need to clear out Currency, in addition to Alpha and Sailing, right? Not to mention Monarchy, if you go through Priesthood to get CoL. Maybe you can self-tech Alpha-Currency-CoL, then use a scientist for a golden age to switch into caste and rush out a merchant while teching Math. Then use the merchant to bulb civil service. Unclear if you can rush through Alpha-Currency-CoL in time though.

 

[sampsa]

I'd be a bit surprised if some strange bulb worked well and of course the value from a golden age is not massive. Math bulb sounds best actually, not sure if you can get a GA in time for the math bulber to be your 2nd GS. I'm guessing not.

 

[ariosto]

For a merchant to bulb civil service, you also need to clear out Currency, in addition to Alpha and Sailing, right?

You need Currency (676 ), but you skip religious techs (320) and get +1 TR in every city, so it's about same. You also need Alpha + Sailing, thats about 600 beakers. But you don't research BW (about equal to Sailing) and you can build research. You also get 1000 beakers from CS bulb instead of 400 beakers from Math bulb. So this plan should be ok commerce wise.
The main bottleneck is to build market in time (GM is market turn + 17). Or you can convert to caste - I didn't consider that option - that may work out even better.

tech Ag-Mining-BW-Pottery-Hunting-AH-Writing

My tech path was completely different. Ag-AH-Mining-Pottery-BW-Writing. Hunting after Priesthood if I remember correctly

 

[soundjata]

T96

Spoiler :

2 cities, no agriculture no specialist

 

[drewisfat]

Less is more approach

Spoiler t89 :

Kyoto: Library, 2 monasteries. Osaka: Library Kept it pretty simple: pottery > mining > CS Shaving off the last turn took some work, but shocking sampsa is worth it.

 

[sampsa]

Hmm, is it that a library comes too late (for ) if you skip the -techs you want to skip?

 

[Gumbolt]

Are you allowed to put hammers into wonders? T89 looks good unless you can micro to get GS before CS starts. Or play odds with Great priest points. A lucky roll might get a GS.

 

[notslin]

What's the difficulty of the save? Even with no AIs and barbs, difficulty level changes tech cost, etc.

 

[Gumbolt]

What's the difficulty of the save? Even with no AIs and barbs, difficulty level changes tech cost, etc.

Deity

 

[drewisfat]

@sampsa Yeah, only building cottages and can't chop out library without BW. Capital maybe could just barely finish in time, but it obviously wants to work the silver mine constantly. I was just chasing the specialist yield, but I essentially tried to rush a GS out of Osaka as fast as I could.
I considered that BW could pay itself off between the faster libraries and warrior gold. The problem with that is health.

 

[soundjata]

Worry not @sampsa I've got your back

T87

Spoiler :

Agri>Mining>Pottery>Writing>COL
4 villages.
Time growth (size 5) with library in both cities.
Then go full scientists (3 > 2)
Academy T69 (+13)
Click next turn.

 

[Izuul]

T86

Spoiler :

Same approach as soundjata, but i must've done something slightly different along the way. I think i got the Academy 2T earlier.