OCC (One City Challenge) at Monarch and above

[Diadem]

Believe it or not, but that map is the very first start I had. I've only tried OCC-deity once before but that was from a scenario.

So that start for my very first ever OCC deity random start.

Am I lucky or am I lucky?

[solo]

Well I blew that one! I was late to Gunpowder, and we all know what that means, when defending with archers and such stuff!!!

I've noticed that techs are a bit cheaper for the human on small maps than they are on standard ones.

Back on standard sized Archipelago maps I had two short games:

1) I found a start with Stone, hopped on with Gandhi, researched Masonry first, then started the Pyramids. The wonder was built by an AI just before I was about to finish it myself! This means you also need some luck to finish them first on deity, so I tried another game without even going for that wonder.

2) In game #2 without Stone, I started with 4 clams and 1 fish, plus some good terrain for hammers. I was able to build the Oracle and used it to get Monarchy. With Hereditary Rule all I had to do was add defenders to keep my city happy. The extra food took care of health and still left me with a 4 specialists at size 15. My research was pretty fast, but I was too late again to Gunpowder, and my city defenders were blown away!

Seven AI opponents on standard sized maps may be just too many to deal with at deity level, especially if they decide to attack early with superior forces!

[korn469]

Hey is there a limit on super specialist in one city on OCC? It seems like you can only have 6 super specialists. I just wanted to check with and see to make sure that civ4 isn't allowing cities to have more specialists, but then isn't displaying them.

[solo]

No limit in OCC, which is why they work so well for us.

I believe there is a display bug in the game that prevents players from seeing all of their super specialists.

[Buskerdu]

Diadem, thanks for the great feedback. I agree with basically all of your advice including the comments on my overall religious strategy and use of Great Prophets. Stonehenge was certainly meant to produce nothing but GP which in turn help with hammers (except that I used 3 of them for Shrines lol).

I have tried a few island/pangea maps with similar results. While the AI trading did help I really struggled with health in those games since I did not have many resources within my borders. At least on my posted save I was able to expand cultural borders significantly and utilize additional resources (to no avail in the long run). I will definitely try another island map using the other tactics you highlighted, building Pyramids and Great Library for sure if I can.

Thanks again.

[Merzbow]

Deity this, deity that, bah. Back down in the Special Olympics division I've finally won on Prince, first at 2050 a year before time ran out. Next game I vastly improved my performance for a win in the 1980s. This OCC exercise is teaching me far more about terrain management than I ever knew before. The key is build your terrain for mass commerce almost exclusuvely up until the point you can build any spaceship parts, then reconfigure half/half until you've researched everything (Internet helps of course), then go all production. Farms and cottages to watermills and so on is key.

[Brinoch]

Originally posted by solo
No limit in OCC, which is why they work so well for us.

I believe there is a display bug in the game that prevents players from seeing all of their super specialists.

Yes, I had that same concern in a game with Elizabeth when I added my specialist from the Econmics free GM... but the extra food and gold was definitely there. Each additional GL added as a super specialist clearly increased the relevant f/g/h/b.

[Risa]

I've finally done an OCC on Immortal, with Elizabeth.

I started with stone nearby, and it turned out to be extremely powerful. I had built 13 great wonders in the city, including Pyramids, two GL, Hanging Garden, Colossus, Ankor Wat, and some later ones. It hardly feels like an Immortal game, at least not until modern age. Early great engineers ROCK! I had a fairly large tech lead in renaissance, and a small lead in industrial.

However, Mansa Musa's research power simply just took off after that. Soon he grew to several techs advanced than me, even though I hadn't trade a single tech to them since renaissance! Were not my spies keeping hard working, I would lose by some 20-ish turns. And that nearly bankrupted me. I stopped research when I am only short of genetics, and sold my techs and resources at any chance of gaining gold. Yet still, if I would need one more sabotage, I could not afford it.

So, at least to me, my previous claim holds true: it is quite unlikely to score victories on Immortal level on regular basis.

Here is the save.

[Risa]

BTW, CS slingshot isn't impossible on Immortal as I previously thought. I had done it twice, one at some 1600 BC, another at around 900 BC. It is just about avoid off-line research and production as many as possible, and luck. Usually AI will get it built by around 1100 BC, which is faster than on Emperor level.

[solo]

Risa,

I will download and take a look at your game. Stone is great to have for those early wonders! I'm impressed that you managed the CS slingshot, but if you were able to research CoL before 1000 BC on Immortal, I agree it's worth taking the chance and delaying the Oracle a bit. I'm guessing the Financial trait made the difference in research speed.

[Risa]

1000 BC is too late in my experience. To me, 1200 BC is the safe line, and any where later than 1100 BC is more or less counting on luck. Something weird may happen, though. In one game I was aiming the slingshot at some 1300 BC, yet at 1560 BC I was told that the Oracle had been built in far away land! And that was not a small island map!

[solo]

Yes, I agree, but much depends on which AI you are facing and what they "decide" to do.

I looked over your game and noticed you did not build the Oracle in that Immortal win, but sure managed to build a lot of other early wonders!

Can I assume that one or two of these were rushed with the help of Engineers?

Besides having the Phi boost for GP's, Elizabeth's starting techs are quite good. With Fishing you can start off with a work boat and get the most out of that early food bonus. The four food resources in your fat x probably made all the difference, too!

Without Stone, I doubt you would have been first to the Pyramids, so it's great to have it when you are not an Ind civ.

Great game!

[Merzbow]

Even if you can pull off the Oracle CS slingshot is it really worth it delaying acquiring so many early techs (like, say Pottery) until 1000 BC. Somehow I doubt it.

[Diadem]

I think The Pyramids is more important than Oracle.

Representation just comes too late in the game, otherwise.

[Merzbow]

Pyramids is a game winner for sure, it's an easily doubling of your early-game tech rate for like 50 turns.