[LP] Yongle Apocalypse Exploit

[blackbutterfly]

Not a game breaking exploit but Yongle is exploitable in Apocalypse mode taking advantage of Hyper-yields. (See GPT in grab).

Steps:
1. Play an arboreal map. E.g. Europe (standard not modded).
2. Don't chop forest.
3. Use Soothsayer to start forest fire.
4. Convert hyper-yielding tiles' production into gold or faith. (Not food b'cos fires kill pop...but they bounce back rapidly).
5. Use Liang's Reinforced Materials promotion to prevent fire damage to cap (eventually).

 

[pokiehl]

You could stop at step 3 and this would be an exploit for literally everyone.

 

[blackbutterfly]

You could stop at step 3 and this would be an exploit for literally everyone.

Yeah, Apocalypse mode exploits arboreal maps. See guide -> How To Survive Apocalypse Mode.

But civs other than Yongle have to build a holy site or encampment/harbour/commercial hub in order to convert the hyper yields to faith or gold.
Yongle doesn't need to.

As Yongle throw Barb Clans mode into the mix for even more exploit.

 

[Disgustipated]

People actually play these modes?

 

[MangoCheeseCakey]

Not a game breaking exploit but Yongle is exploitable in Apocalypse mode taking advantage of Hyper-yields. (See GPT in grab).

Steps:
1. Play an arboreal map. E.g. Europe (standard not modded).
2. Don't chop forest.
3. Use Soothsayer to start forest fire.
4. Convert hyper-yielding tiles' production into gold or faith. (Not food b'cos fires kill pop...but they bounce back rapidly).
5. Use Liang's Reinforced Materials promotion to prevent fire damage to cap (eventually).

I'm seeing that the cities all lack sufficient amenities, which can make endless population growth counterproductive even for Yongle. My suggestion would be to chop some of the woods and replace them with Great Walls (the yield will remain after the chop) since they also provide gold but more importantly culture. Consider replacing some woods with districts and lock the population into specialist slots to prevent excessive growth. The image is satisfying to look at, but it's not powerful enough to be called an "exploit" IMO.
An interesting approach to Yongle that I read about earlier is playing him with an Atomic Era start. Your capital immediately gets 10 pop to trigger the bonus, and all cities after start straight up at 6 pop. At a start this late, Civs that rely heavily on early bonuses like Russia and Wonder Qin will be forever crippled and you can dominate over the AI easily.

 

[blackbutterfly]

I'm seeing that the cities all lack sufficient amenities, which can make endless population growth counterproductive even for Yongle. My suggestion would be to chop some of the woods and replace them with Great Walls (the yield will remain after the chop) since they also provide gold but more importantly culture. Consider replacing some woods with districts and lock the population into specialist slots to prevent excessive growth. The image is satisfying to look at, but it's not powerful enough to be called an "exploit" IMO.

That game was a play test of my map/mod the UN Earth Maps (which are map scripts - they were developed before World Builder).

I did a guide on this Apocalypse exploit -> How To Survive Apocalypse Mode
And I do suggest chopping anytime after you get Asterix(*) yields, though increasingly I do not do this anymore. I've become greedy for greater and greater hyper yields.

But look at that cap.
400 production -> 400 gold.

In this build I was going for domination, so gold for units is what I needed.
Clans provide more advanced units that Yongle could build.

 

[iammaxhailme]

People actually play these modes?

I actually tried Apocalypse for the second time (first was at its initial inception) with Neo Cleo and did some great bath river faith yield shenanigans. It was fun but I stopped at like the medieval era because I was so far ahead due to being able to afford a zillion monumentality settlers, the game had become a boring steamroll.