Adv 48-Gold Ergo Sum

[Gold Ergo Sum]

I didn't spend a ton of time thinking about this unfortunately, so I have no idea if this will be a solid game or not. I didn't realize how the scoring worked until I had already traded away techs no one else had in the late game. I also wasted a decent number of worker turns just futzing about.

The typical goal for an OCC for me seems to be:

1. Build 3-4 workers
2. Bronze Working --> Pottery --> Quarry --> Writing --> Literature
3. 'Mids/Representation
4. Great Library
5. Globe Theater
6. National Epic
7. Caste System
8. Philosophy/Pacifism
9. Oxford
10. Trade in Liberalism for the best tech possible (I think I did RRs or Assembly Line)
11. National Park
12. Superconductors
13. Space Victory

I go for tech as soon as possible, because I find that tech is the limiting factor, more than production.

Normally my goal would be to chop as few forests as practical, get to Biology with 8-12 forests in place, and then use the mass of free scientists to tech away. But I quickly realized that any tile I could have four food on would net the same extra specialist (since I wouldn't be limited in happiness or healthiness due to the NWs), and any food over that would be .5 extra specialists. I would lose the forest production, but given the rivers on every tile, the levee would take care of that.

But I also realized since I was designing tiles, I could get some unnatural combos that would allow me to make up for that forest hammer. By putting a hill on every tile, I would get the hill hammer, plus the railroad bonus hammer, plus the levee bonus hammer (plus forge, factory, power plant, Ironworks), while also putting a fresh water corn on the hill. This would create a 5f1h1c tile after a farm, up to a 6f3h1c tile after levee/RRs/Bio.

So I would go max food, with a hill on all 21 BFC tiles. I put at least once of every agriculture and animal tile, plus sugar and bananas, at least once in the immediate tiles around the city to get extra healthiness prior to the National Park. Everything else was forested river corn hill. I made four exceptions to the max food tiles. I put a gems and gold tile to get extra happiness in the early game prior to Globe and to speed up early tech which can be slow prior to the flood of settled GScientists. I also put a stone and marble tile to speed up 'Mids, Great Library, National Epic, and Oxford. Then I added a choppable forest to 16 of the 21 tiles, because I figured I could get farms up on 5 tiles prior to finishing Bronze Working.



I opened with four straight workers if I remember correctly, maybe a couple Dogsoldiers thrown in. Not much barb trouble.

Diplomatically, I got one ridiculous stroke of luck. The three civilizations that I met (the only ones I met for 200+ turns), Isabella, Sury, and Shaka all went Buddhist and stayed that way until the game was already decided. As soon as I saw this bloc developed, I gladly switched when the demand came, and I was in good for the remainder of the game.

Turn 100:



Less than 10 turns later, the tech rate doubles:



Somewhere around turn 150, Shaka declared war on me like a doof. He couldn't help himself, despite being +9 Pleased diplomatically. I already had Gunpowder and was near Rifling (with Protective on an all hill BFC) when he brought a bunch of out-dated crap my way. I slaughtered his entire stack with the loss of only two muskets I think and then I bribed Sury to go after Shaka. I made peace with Shaka eventually, although it wasn't really imperative, because he couldn't get to me without going through Sury.

Turn 170:



Built Taj Mahal (despite the crappy GArtists points, even though I avoided the Mausoleum for the same reason) just because I could:



Turn 200 changeover. Constantly had to get rid of Prophets hired by the stupid governor:



I'm leading in GNP on Immortal with one city 200 turns in. Absurd:



This is about the most tech I ever hit in a turn. I think I might've made 1799 at one point:



At some point I signed some defensive pacts with Isabella and Sury. Hannibal attacked Isabella before I had even met Hannibal which meant I auto-declared on a civ I didn't know existed. Hello! Nice to meet you! Die! I wasn't too worried because I had Protective infantry on hills. This canceled my DP with Sury. Sury ended up back at war with Shaka and I kept refusing to rejoin, which didn't matter because I was about +18 in diplo at that point. I eventually made peace with Hannibal pretty easily.

This amount of production is just dumb:



I eventually managed to top out at size 45. I guess if I hadn't put hills everywhere, I could've grown up to size 55 .

I launched T285:



I cleaned up some techs and grabbed Internet on the last turn which got me Flight, right as the game ended on T297, in 1854 AD:



Oh shit, it's Alpha Centauri:



Demos:



Hall of Fame:



No one else close to victory:



My tech tree:



Production:



5400 GPerson points needed for next GPerson:



Science breakdown, including 354 base science from specialists:



I did my best to settle all but 2 GPeople by my count (Academy, 1 GAge), although I might've used two more for another GAge, and I got the free Music, Econ, Physics and Fusion GPeople. I think in the end I had about 17 settled GScientists, 6 settled GEnginers, 1 settled GArtist, and 1 settled GMerchant.

Tech Breakdown:




Unfortunately, I traded too much with the A.l., which probably cost me in scoring. Also, damn Hannibal finished Adv. Flight on the last turn, costing me a point.

By my tally:

Exclusive Techs: Mass Media, Laser, Composites, Computers, Fiber Optics, Fusion, Ecology, Genetics, Robotics

+9

Techs Behind: Adv. Flight

-1

SCORE: 8

[T-hawk]

Farmed hills is an interesting approach, though I'm not so sure it was optimal. Each hill trades 1 food to get 1 hammer. But there are ways to trade 1 food for more than that. Obviously the whip, but also employing engineer specialists (or priests with Angkor Wat), which make the same 2 food to 2 hammer conversion, plus the specialist productivity in Representation beakers and GPP.

By putting a hill on every tile, I would get the hill hammer, plus the railroad bonus hammer

Is that true? I thought the railroad bonus hammer applied only to mines and quarries, not simply to any hill.

Somewhere around turn 150, Shaka declared war on me like a doof. He couldn't help himself, despite being +9 Pleased diplomatically. I already had Gunpowder and was near Rifling (with Protective on an all hill BFC) when he brought a bunch of out-dated crap my way. I slaughtered his entire stack with the loss of only two muskets

Well done! I was hoping that sort of thing would happen, and this is indeed why you had the Protective trait. The map actually spawned the Zulu randomly there; I didn't pick Shaka but went with it.

The score isn't the highest we've seen, but still a good showing. Thanks for the report and glad you had fun with it.

[Krill]

The idea behind the hills is you can mine them in the early game for the wonder production, which you can't whip. It worked for me...

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Farmed hills is an interesting approach, though I'm not so sure it was optimal.

Yeah, definitely true about the Engineer specialists, although you are pretty limited in terms of assigning Engineer specialists until the very late game right?

Clearly doing mass gold BFC would be superior based on results, but that type of commerce-based strategy typically is a loser in an OCC, so I really wanted to see how many GPersons I could settle with the more typical OCC strategy.

Is that true? I thought the railroad bonus hammer applied only to mines and quarries, not simply to any hill.

Nope, it's not true. One of the many nuances of the game that I am slowly learning. Did you see in my PBEM11 thread where I thought starting techs came from the leader, and not the civ?

Well done! I was hoping that sort of thing would happen, and this is indeed why you had the Protective trait. The map actually spawned the Zulu randomly there; I didn't pick Shaka but went with it.

Yeah, I actually diverted a ton of hammers into military production over time. I probably built ~10 muskets, ~10 rifles, a few siege, and probably 10 infantry, because I was at war with Shaka twice I think, and also Hannibal at one point. I don't think it cost me more than 10 turns overall though. With my whole BFC being hills, and the Protective trait, I slaughtered any incoming stacks.

The score isn't the highest we've seen, but still a good showing. Thanks for the report and glad you had fun with it.

Thanks, and thanks for the interesting game idea.

[luddite]

Farmed hills is an interesting approach, though I'm not so sure it was optimal. Each hill trades 1 food to get 1 hammer. But there are ways to trade 1 food for more than that. Obviously the whip, but also employing engineer specialists (or priests with Angkor Wat), which make the same 2 food to 2 hammer conversion, plus the specialist productivity in Representation beakers and GPP.

But this assumes unlimited population. To do that, you'll have to grow an extra pop point, which takes time and probably costs 3 food (since you'll be constantly over the health limit until you can get the national park).