Civilization Thread!

[Sousa]

Today on "Troubling Implications of Playing Civ V":

* Play as England on Earth map

* Wind up in the Indus Valley

* Stone's throw away from Africa

* Where Shaka lives

* Denounce Shaka

* Conquer Shaka

* Take EVERY ZULU CITY

* Other world leaders in Eurasia (exclusively white/western leaders) are all "nah it's okay cool bess have at it"

* All African people in the game are now ruled by England and nobody seems to be mad

[Lint]

[Mick]

Gandhi is dumb. He is going wide and conquering city states

[Benji]

No matter how hard I focus on science, my scientific achievement is still behind the "real world", and it's preventing me from getting earlier victories. Anyone got any advice? I want to do more research agreements, but I don't trust the people around me not to backstab me and waste my money by going to war with me.

[Plubby]

I don't track all of history, but I tend to get ahead of RL early, and then it pegs me back >_<

[Benji]

I think I thought up a fun scenario last night. Stick the game on a Large, Terra Map, but with only 8 Civs (standard size map amount of Civs) and more city states than average, exact amount up to you). That way you have plenty of space to expand on the "old world", but the race to the New World is equally important, as you meet new city states for new benefits, potentially conquer the new continent, and just generally have a lot of fun. I imagine Spain would be brilliant for this because of their Natural Wonder boost combined with the Conquistador's unique ability of being a scout who can settle on a continent that's not home to the capital.

[Benji]

Wrote this in a PM, but I thought it might be fun to post in here what game I'm currently playing and what my goals are. They're based off Steam achievements:

William (Dutch) - Continents Map

- Goal 1: Win the game (natch)

- Goal 2: Go for Autocracy ideology with a Diplomacy win (win combo not done yet)
- Goal 3: Capture a Spanish coastal city with a Sea Beggar (Civ's specific achievement - selected Spain as one of opponents to get it)
- Goal 4: Fully Explore Exploration (only social policy not done in full)
- Goal 5: Win a Diplomatic Victory without ever being the host of the World Congress (this will be tough, but I selected continents map so I don't meet all opponents first and accidentally found it. So long as I'm swimming in money it should be easy though... except Alexander and Venice have come over to me from the other continent, and are notorious city-state hogs, who I'll have to eliminate/cripple. On the plus side, Alexander already took Venice's original cap, so he may do it for me)
- Goal 6: Propose to repeal an active Resolution which you had originally proposed to enact (easy enough, so long as I have the most city states and don't vote myself into being host - will probably use this to cripple Venice/Greece economy)

[Mick]

No matter how hard I focus on science, my scientific achievement is still behind the "real world", and it's preventing me from getting earlier victories. Anyone got any advice? I want to do more research agreements, but I don't trust the people around me not to backstab me and waste my money by going to war with me.

Policy wise, to maximize science (unless you're China), I'd aim for Full Tradition/3 Patronage/3 Rationalism/Order.

Tradition will help boost population, and keep your costs for building certain national wonders (National College, Oxford University) down. In addition, I suggest you take the following when you're building up your religion: Fertility Rites (+10% Growth), Swords into Plowshares (+15% Growth when not at war, which for me is typically always). With this religion, it is imperative that you keep an inquisitor in your cities at all times, because it will keep assholes at bay. Don't use the inquisitor, a small empire should generate enough pressure to get by. By playing tall, it will cost less culture for your policies, which means getting into the other branches faster. Patronage is a direct path to the first middle choice, which gives, if I'm not mistaken, +25% of an allied city-state's research. Collectively, this is a nice boost. For every four CS's you're an ally with, you effectively get another city's worth of science. This isn't too difficult to achieve, to be honest. Finally, with Rationalism, the policies on the left will give you a boost to Great Scientist production, science from your trading posts, and +17% science to University's and/or Wats.

Order has two fantastic policies for boosting your science as well. The first being Hero of the People, giving you +25% to Great Person production, and, I forget the name of it, but it gives you +25% science for each factory. How this plays out is because you're going tall, your Public Schools are going to be providing some decent science, and because you're allied with so many city-states, it allows you to effectively run the board once city-state alliances are counted among delegates.

To achieve this, I just truck along normally, making my priorities, technologically speaking, Pottery --> Whatever techs will help my early terrain improvements --> Civil Service (You really want the Chicken Pizza) --> Education --> Acoustics. Why the hell do you want Acoustics? The Sistine Chapel. It boosts the hell out of culture. Focusing on boosting culture is imperative, since it obviously means you'll have faster access to policies. Alhambra is nice as well, though not as necessary. If you're planning to win any way outside of a culture victory, Writers should be used for their political treatise, Artists for the instant Golden Age; in fact, with the Artists, if you're close to a Golden Age, just wait to hit it, then use them. Great Works are not essential to this plan.

With your Great Scientists, before you have research labs, your best bet is to always use them to build academies. Once the research labs are up, just use them for the science boost. At this point you should be plowing through science, and it's an overall better use. Great Engineers, always use to rush Wonders. Merchants, trade missions. Prophets....uh, yes. I almost never build the Holy Site, and by the time I get a third Great Prophet, my cities have already converted. So...yeah.

Overall the thoughts on Research Agreements are mixed. They're nice, but overall they're not really needed. If you're worried about a declaration of war, updated ranged units and an updated siege unit will act as an effective deterrent. Frigates in your coastal cities are bonuses, since it's effectively an extra siege unit and attack. If you're following this strategy, declaration of war should not happen, because nobody wants to piss of the city-states. I'd say in terms of military strength, you should aim to be at least 3rd on the chart. I think I've only had wars break out a handful of times. The first time was courtesy of Hiawatha, which was more of a "Yeah, I'm settling this whole continent, and you're kinda in the way, so....yeah", the second was Montezuma being Montezuma.

Speaking of war, here comes diplomacy. The AI will almost always accept 7 gold per turn for a luxury resource, and can at times pay you to establish an embassy. This little bonus early on is quite helpful. Don't be an outright dick to them, since getting drawn into a war will kill your science production as you go after certain techs.

Now, your production and economy. Get the best trade routes going that you can. This should go without saying. Disregard any bonuses to science with other civs, since, as you establish your CS alliances, money is more important than a couple of beakers. Sea trade routes should be preferred, but you take what you can get. I usually only send my trade routes out from the capital. Build only what is necessary. Generally, each city aside from the capital that I build is always Shrine-->Worker-->Library-->Military unit. If money is a problem early on, there's no harm in building up Walls, since they have no maintenance cost. I build Universities and Public Schools as they become available. Remember, once you reach Guilds, you really have no excuse to build anything you don't need, since you can focus on Wealth, and later on down the line, Research. If your cities are a decent size, you can always focus on Production to squeeze that extra bit of coin or research out. The one time you should completely shift production is when there's a global project going on. You want the free policies.

And finally, wonder production. I've found that the capital is typically the most badass city you have, and I try to focus exclusively on building wonders there, the exception being if I have a nice site set up for something like Petra or other terrain-dependent wonders. Some national wonders you can safely ignore; these tend to be things like the guilds or the heroic epic. The once you really want are National College, East India Trading Company, the Hermitage and National Epic. The World Wonders, well, hell, I want 'em all , but I can live without Uffuzi, Statue of Zeus, Temple of Artemis, and even the Great Library. Sure, it's a free library and tech, but consider the advantage you get to building Stonehenge, which virtually guarantees the establishment of the first or second religion. Borobudur and Hagia Sophia...meh. Generally, the Wonders before the Industrial Age I want to have are Stonehenge, Porcelain Tower, Chicken Pizza, The Oracle (it's a free policy and like, nobody builds this, so why not?), and the Sistine Chapel. Leaning Tower of Pisa is very nice as well, for the boost to Great People as well as the free Great Person (I almost always make this an engineer to rush the Globe Theater, since by this time everyone has a spy, and they're all jacking my shit, and if I don't grab it, someone else will).

Hopefully this will help you out, feel free to ask questions.

[Sousa]

A great way to maximize science is to beeline

1. Philosophy

2. Education

3. Scientific Theory

pretty much in that order. I often get the worker techs I need (except The Wheel) and Writing, then head straight to Philosophy just because an early National College is so powerful. If you hard-build it before any settlers (which isn't always possible), you can have it by turn 70 or so, which is an incredible boost to science.

I'd advise skipping The Great Library--yes, you can do a catapult straight to Philosophy, but it slows down your first Library if you don't build it first.

The goal of getting fast Education (go through Civil Service, then straight through Theology into Ed) is to get a quick University in your capital and start running scientists. Great Scientists--to be settled for Academies, then bulbed post-Scientific Theory--are a key to fast science. In this respect, The Oracle is a great wonder for a science victory; the AI is often loathe to build it for some reason, and it gives Great Scientist points.

While all this is happening, pump food into your capital or National College city. Farm everything. Farmed riverside hills are wonderful after Civil Service. Run a food trade route or two into the city. Build a Granary and (if you can) a Water Wheel. Settle your other cities next to mountains if it's at all plausible to do so and still grow. Jungles are very nice for science, but don't overlook production. Remember that any of the Natural Wonders that are mountains (Fuji, Kilimanjaro, Kailash, Cerro, etc.) count as mountains for the purposes of building an Observatory.

Head straight to the Renaissance after Education (Astronomy and Printing Press are both good entries--take the former if you've got cities next to mountains) and start grabbing Rationalism policies. Open Secularism, then add Humanism after that. You should have a University in every city at this point or should be getting there, but your next tech stop is Scientific Theory.

Why Scientific Theory? Three reasons:

1. Buying Public Schools

2. Rushing to Radio

3. Boosting Academies

Pay attention to #1. If you have a choice between Research Agreements and buying Public Schools, buy Public Schools 100% of the time. One thing that really slows down science is trying to hard-build the last science buildings. Save your pennies and buy them instead, and use the Scientist slot pretty much immediately.

The reason why you're rushing Radio is because it's the easiest pathway to the Modern Era and therefore Ideologies. You can roll the dice with Industrialism and hope you get coal, but then you're stuck trying to build Factories, which can be a pain. Rushing to Radio gives you access to Aluminum and Hydro Plants while paving the way for another science tech in Plastics.

The best Ideology for science is, as Mick said, Order. Workers' Facilities is the policy that gives the science boost to Factories and is worth beelining. This is also why I suggest the Radio entrance to Ideologies: Workers' Facilities also makes Factories cheaper, so they're not such a bear to build. Skyscrapers is very nice as well since, again, you want to buy science buildings whenever possible. Skyscrapers can be a savings of 300 gold or more on Public Schools and Research Labs, so that's a fantastic deal.

Mick didn't mention it, but Freedom can do well for science, too; the key is to combine Secularism (science boost on all specialists) with Avant Garde, Civil Society, and Universal Suffrage. Then you just run an absolutely laughable amount of specialists and watch your tech rate shoot up to the moon. I did this in a recent Egypt culture game, and it's a fantastic boost since you'll be running Writers, Musicians, and Artists most of the game.

After Workers' Facilities, I either head toward the Order policy I want to finish with (Dictatorship of the Proletariat for Culture, Iron Curtain for Domination, Spaceflight Pioneers for Science) or finish up Rationalism. Finishing up Rationalism lets you buy Great Scientists with faith, and while you might only get one or two, you can buy them whenever you want (i.e., after Research Labs are online). The free tech for finishing Rationalism is nice, but I find it a little hard to time. I often get a tech like Railroad, Flight, or Atomic Theory--all useful techs, but not exactly high science value. Atomic Theory is secretly a great science tech because of the boost to Academies.

So there you go. Do all that and you'll lap everyone else in science.

[Plubby]

I think I play it too safe when warring >_< My opp had a sizable navy, so I waited until I could ring his continent with submarines, had three artilleries + 4 infantry to take his one city on my continent, then built three more artilleries just for funsies to sandwich his continent. I think I lost two total units. One was preventable.

[Mick]

Yeah, Great Library is nice, but I'd honestly rather go after Stonehenge. Comparatively speaking, your religion is much more important than the Great Library, when you consider, yes, it does offer a free tech, and yes, it does give +3 science and a maintenance free Library, there is one tenant that gives you +2 science per city connection (awesome if you go wide with Carthage and only settle on coasts), or any of the other ones. I'd rather have a shot at taking my pick than picking for marginal leftovers, not to mention the early denial part of it. If you get slow in Faith, your nice little religion is going to be overrun by some asshole's missionaries.

Also, don't forget that you got to play the diplomacy game. If someone's getting ahead of you, stop selling them luxuries. I just had Bismarck complain that the 7 gold I offered for my....gold, was an unfair deal (he offered four). Yes, yes it is unfair, Bismarck. 7 Gold. "NEIN!" Sorry, we're closed. Suddenly he gets hit with unhappiness and he's not nearly as productive as he once was. You should also focus on trading with city-states versus other civs, merely because it helps them out. This is not quite avoidable early on, but once you get Harbors, holy cow.

[Plubby]

I did my first ever game on Earth map. I got given Gandhi (ugh. I always do terribly a Gandhi) and I think I might be mostly alone in the US. I am fairly sure I have created DELA (Delhi, Louisiana)

[Benji]

Jesus, I just hoped for a tip or two, not full guides. Cheers guys

I briefly started going after Great Library, but realised it really wasn't worth it in the long run. I'm trying to curb my abuse of wonders too, because I tend to build them unnecesarily when I should really use that time to pop a unit/building or two for balance.

[METALMAN]

I'd advise skipping The Great Library--yes, you can do a catapult straight to Philosophy, but it slows down your first Library if you don't build it first.

Doesn't Great Library give you a free library anyway?

[Benji]

I'd advise skipping The Great Library--yes, you can do a catapult straight to Philosophy, but it slows down your first Library if you don't build it first.

Doesn't Great Library give you a free library anyway?

It does, but it takes much longer to build, meaning you fall behind on research and waste time that could be spent on other buildings that have more benefit.

[METALMAN]

Usually for me the difference in turns between building a Great Library and a shitty community library is less than the amount of turns it would take to research music & drama (the free technology I would take), so it is worthwhile.

[Pizza]

If you hit Calendar before the Great Library finishes, you can do Philosophy for the Nat College too. The extra 3 points of Science and free tech easily make up for the lost time, plus you'll get Scientist points which is one of my favorite GPs. I usually have Landed Elite by this time so the Granary isn't immediately necessary, and Religion isn't a priority for me usually.

[Sousa]

Here by the way is what you can do if you follow the beelines above. I'm capable of winning this game (going for the Poland Can Into Space achievement) since I have the cash to buy the last spaceship part and just got the required tech for the last ship piece. (I actually stopped to finish International Space Station for the Herculean Effort achievement--I always finish space before I can actually ever build the ISS)

Note that this is actually a pretty lousy start--Warsaw was settled on turn three or four and the settler started a little west of where Warclaw is . Only three of those cities are actually any good (#4 is the tundra nonsense in the south, #5 is off on an island), but I've got lots of Academies, plenty of food in the capital (but very little production), and did a ton of bulbs late in the game.

The ideology, by the way, isn't Order; it's Freedom. Warsaw is running max specialists and every other city is running four scientists at least.

[Benji]

Since when is a coastal, river start with a mountain nearby, copper for happiness, iron for early units, plus fish and wheat for growth "a pretty lousy start"? >_>

EDIT : Never mind, just realised you said you moved your settler a few turns in.

[Sousa]

Wroclaw is the only city on a river. The river could support two cities, but then you miss the fishies. I saw mountains to the north and chased them. If I hadn't settled Warsaw where I did, I almost certainly would've lost the iron to Malacca. If I'd settled where the Settler had started, I'm pretty sure I'd have only had room for three cities, tops.

Fish is not great early food--it takes forever to get going. You need a Lighthouse at least for fish to make decent food, and I don't often go for Optics until after Civil Service. It's almost certainly not worth losing a river over aside from the mountain being there.

The (one) wheat is good, but it isn't riverside. Most of the tiles in the capital are flat brown land or unusable coast. There might be a better capital inland (maybe Wroclaw), but this is one of the only arrangements that really takes advantage of the land. And I wanted that mountain for an Observatory since I was planning to go science. Did I mention mountain?

I rarely build iron units anyway except Frigates, so "iron for early units" isn't a selling point to me. I'd rather have horses, but I can get by with just Archers/Compybows. Range is where the power lies in Civ V, so really, the only thing the iron gave me was production in a capital that lacked it.

Copper for happiness is pretty much all the happiness there is, too. There's some marble scattered among the tundra, but anything else requires trade or buddying up to city-states--and since the land is so tight, there actually were very few barbarian spawns for city-state quests.

I figured I'd win anyway since I'm still playing below my difficulty, but this is definitely not an ideal start, especially not for science.