OCC (One City Challenge) at Monarch and above

[Blake]

Here's a Greatplains "Cows" start.

On a plains river, with 4 cows and 1 wheat. Very short of hills, but 100% of tiles are good (no desert).

Peter (exp/philo), Monarch difficulty.

I won this one, launch at 1992. The AI's were very stroppy and busy fighting for most of the game. China invaded me with a swarm of 30-40 units but luckily I had a dozen mechinf, that had been promoted off of Saladins knights. THe AI's were so busy skirmishing that I had free reign of the tech tree during early-industrial, I built the Statue of Liberty and Eiffel Tower (not usual OCC wonders, but I wanted the Merchant GPP's).

You'll appreciate the Exp trait. I had only about 14 health when my city was size 23.

[solo]

Thanks for the start.

Another routine OCC win for you, I guess!

It will be useful to build up a location of interesting starts for people to try!

[Diadem]

I died the game I was playing. I can't believe it.

I'm not used to building large armies in OCC games. Usually I try to keep out of wars. But this game, they kept attacking me. I might still have been able to defend if I had focucced more on military, but I thought I would easily managed, so I was building spaceship parts in the middle of a war

And then just when I had thrown most of my forces on Monty's major cities Alexander declared and came charging in with 30 or so cavalries. Wow!

I restarted, again. I prioritized horseback riding and iron working this time, giving me a big army pretty soon. Of course they still wouldn't leave me alone. But I can easily defend now. I just torched Athens (150BC) so I don't think I'll see much from Alexander this game

I'll try to attach the start. Hope this works, haven't done that before on this forum

[solo]

That seemed to download okay, Diadem.

I like what I have seen so far by going the early religion route and then maximizing production of Great Prophets and later Great Engineers. I got so many of both I lost track and most were hidden on the city screen. I also generated a few Scientists, 1 free merchant and 2 Artists. I think staying away from wonders that make Artists kept their production very low.

I played another Emperor game, this time using Saladin (Phi,Rel) of Arabia. I wanted a good shot at Hinduism and was able to get it after researching Polytheism first.

I started the game building StoneHenge, but after I got Hindusim, I learned Fishing to make a boat and then The Wheel & Farming a bit later when I made a worker, before switching back to my Civil Service beeline.

My plan was to start building The Oracle so that it would be finished just after I learned Code of Laws, and for once things went right according to plan.

This gave me Civil Service as the free Oracle tech. Meanwhile, I was picking up Great Prophets, since they were still at 100%.

Next was the Pyramids, which got me Representation just in time to continue growing, and it also started building up Great Engineer percentages. One was ready to rush the Great Library when I got that tech later.

It wasn't until I was size 12 and had run out of ways to keep my city happy that I added a theater and then Globe's Theater right after. I think delaying these two for as long as possible gave me more of the preferred GP's.

I kept adding wonders afterwards that gave me more GP production or added to GP production for the good kinds (non-Artists).

One wonder I missed was the Great Lighthouse, but there was more than enough compensation for not getting it.

At the end I built the Internet followed by paying mostly cash for the Space Elevator, and having both of these led to my best finish so far, at about 2014 A.D. I was two parts ahead very near the finish, when I last checked.

Within my city's culture boundaries, I had Coal and just barely Copper, but missed out on Aluminum, since there wasn't any I could trade for. I also had to pay for Iron.

I had one long war with the Aztecs, who made peace the turn before I finished SS parts. He sank all of my fleet in a late attack, but did no real damage.

I must say that, in conclusion, I had a much easier time of it playing this way than by what I was doing before. Being able to add so many good GP's to my city meant I always had more gold than needed and could build most wonders in under 12 turns, even without using an Industrious leader.

I think it might be time to give this a try at Immortal.

Below is a zip with my start and finish. The starting position was a good one, but there was nothing really special or remarkable about it.

[solo]

I just managed a spaceship win on Immortal, using Bismarck(Ind, Exp) of Germany.

My major piece of luck this game was finding Stone next to the starting settlers. They hopped aboard and I was able to crank out Pyramids, Stonehenge, and used the Oracle to get Mathematics so I could also build the Hanging Gardens, to boost production of Great Engineers, which I think are the best to try for in OCC, since each one added to my city gave me 3 hammers and 6 science.

Except for 1 Great Scientist used for the Academy, all GP's produced were joined to my city, so that in its prime it was producing 57 base hammers at the end and over 600 beakers in science, during the middle part of the game, when I was maxing out science.

I never built the Globe Theater. Instead, I kept my population at about 15 to 16 citizens, since that was the number I could keep happy and healthy. I ran most of the game using 1 engineer and 2 scientists as specialists.

This is my first Immortal game where I got a tech lead, which I hung onto long enough to beat the AI in the SS part race, finishing in 2009 AD.

I think the key was joining all Great Engineers produced instead of using them for speeding wonders. Wonders could be built quickly enough with Industrious and the specialist's hammer bonuses.

Besides Stone, my start featured clams, fish and spice within the city radius. Outside of it I was able to connect to a cow and some silk, and later to some Iron and Oil. Coal was tantalizingly out of reach, 1 tile outside of my culture boundary. Towards the end I was able to trade for it, though. Aluminum was never available, and I only was able to trade for Copper a few turns before the game ended.

I had some additional luck in this one because most of the AI were Aggressive and only two of them were good researchers. In previous games, the AI led all the way through the tech tree usually finishing a spaceship in the 1960's, beating me by four or more SS parts. In this one I got to Physics first, and was able to stretch out my tech lead a bit afterwards.

I built the Internet to accumulate techs I had bypassed on the way to Space Flight. Below is a zip file with the starting and finishing positions.

[Diadem]

Immortal. Wow! I'm impressed.

I will try for emperor in the near future I guess.

But my next OCC project will be an attempt at a conquest victory. Not sure what other conditions I'll set for this challenge. On a dual sized map it'll be trivial of course. On a huge map probably impossible. What map size would give a decent challenge? Should I play normal or epic speed? Probably a balanced map script, conquest will be impossible if you lack, say, oil.

Any suggestions here on what would make an interesting challenge...

[ToeTruck]

Well done!

Excellent job Solo - I'm very impressed.

I've been experimenting with OCC at the middle levels (Monarch and Emperor) and felt right away that Space Race wins at the higher level were possible. Civ4 is much better suited for OCC wins than Civ3 was (though Deity wins were still possible in Civ3).

Even though I've been building Globe Theater in all my games so far, I've suspected that there are enough happiness buildings available (or luxuries are easily enough traded for) that the real issue is health. Lately, I've been playing Bismark and falling short just a couple of SS components. Environmentalism is also important, but I'm still trying to figure out the best research order in the late game.

With my last game, I started sinking my Great People into super-citizens and my city really blossoms. One Great Scientist for an academy and maybe an Engineer for a key wonder, but otherwise I think they should be plowed back into the city.

Also, I think you've struck onto something with the a size 15 or 16 city. Moving forward, I think most high level OCC games will be won with less than full population.

Again, good game! I'm going to download your start and see where it takes me...work boats - yum!

- TT

[Diadem]

They key to winning OCC is definitely having a high GP production, and adding them to your city as specialists. In fact I don't usually build the Great Prophet special buildings anymore. Unless my state religion is spread far and wide. This game is really suitable for OCC games. There are good civics for it and having unlimited national theaters is a nice bonus.

There's only one flaw really. If you select a 'balanced' maps some resources still aren't generated inside your city radius. Sometimes they appear just outside it. That's annoying

How much more difficult is OCC than normal gameplay by the way? Do you guys have any idea?

[solo]

Thanks Diadem and a big hello to Toe Truck! I remember when both of us were experimenting with OCC when Civ III first came out and that you stuck with it much longer into that series. IIRC, you had the first Civ III win in OCC at Deity.

It was nice to finally find a way in Immortal in Civ IV, but I must be quick to add that the Archipelago maps that I have been using allow the OCC player to economize quite a bit on defense. I'm finding that a strong fleet is a good deterrant for most of the game, allowing me to skimp a lot on land based defenders.

When I was attacked by the Japanese late in the game, their fleet had more destroyers and they took out most of mine. But I had artillery and mech infantry to meet the grenadiers, riflemen and cannon that they attacked with. On the land it was no contest and their invasion force was gone after 2 turns.

I would expect both of you and others to be able to produce Immortal wins using the start supplied.

Some newer strategy ideas:

1) I now think that going for the Globe Theater is not a good idea. This lulls you into building your city to full size, virtually wasting the extra food that is spent on maintaining health. This extra food is better used to run more specialists in order to boost research, hammers and of course, GP production rates. Avoiding the Globe Theater also helps avoid Geat Artists.

With fewer citizens, I can swap them around as needed, putting most on the commerce tiles when I want to boost research and shifting them to hammer tiles when in a rush to complete a wonder. These benefits are in addition to those accrued by having more of them work as specialists.

2) While Great Prophets are welcome, I think Great Engineers and Scientists are more useful in OCC. Engineers are especially good, since they add an extra hammer and add twice as many beakers as Prophets. Extra gold is nice, but extra hammers and beakers are more useful.

3) One main reason that joining specialists to a city is so effective is because the hammers that are contributed are added to the base supply before the multipliers take effect, whereas extra gold is just added to income and beakers are just added onto the total.

4) Another reason I have for favoring Archipelago starts is that sea-based food resources are easier to convert early in the game. Work boats can be built early on without causing a slowdown in city growth. The extra trade for sea resources also speeds up early research. If possible, I'll wait to make a worker until the city is at its happiness and health limit.

5) With 4) above in mind, this causes me to want to place my settlers directly on top of an early land resource that would otherwise need worker improvements to function. By settling on Stone this game, all I had to do was research Masonry to get its benefits. I did not need a worker to build a quarry and connect it to my city with a road. This allowed a delay in picking up The Wheel.

6) The best path I have found so far, is the Civil Service beeline, so besides Fishing and Masonry (and perhaps Sailing), the only techs I research are along the most direct route towards this tech. This means no more going to Alphabet and Drama, but waiting later to pick these up from trades. After Civil Sevice the following beelines were to Liberalism, then Computers, then Rocketry and finally Fiber Optics for the Internet, which fills in all bypassed techs. Along the way, I'll trade for any techs I have missed that provide direct help, but will avoid any that don't.

7) I think Bismarck is most suited for OCC at higher levels. The AI are so quick with wonders, that Industrious is imperative in order to build my own quick enough. After that, I think Expansive is best so that the health boosters can keep up with the happiness ones. For starting techs, Mining is needed to get a jump on making the Pyramids, so Bismarck best fits the bill.

I think that by running more specialists in a smaller sized city makes up for not having Philosopical. Fortunately, there are any other ways to provide excellent boosts to GP production.

I do not think founding religions is important, so Religious is not needed to get a jump on this. I would rather just put any Prophets received into my city.

Financial might be an alternative to Expansive, but would need a start with more food resources or with a lot of forests and perhaps a source of fresh water.

Finally, in my game above, I only started with two food resources available within the city limits, so can imagine that more specialists could be added with this system using starts having 3 or 4 food resources within reach.

I have not played any Deity games yet, so do not know how big a boost it is from Immortal, but perhaps we will find a way to win at that level, too. It will be fun to find out.

After that, it might be fun to explore an OCC conquest game, which I think would be the ultimate challenge in OCC at higher levels. I would start out small and see what can be done and then gradually increase map size and # of opponents to see how far this can be developed. For now, my personal prefrence is to stick with SS games long enough to see if a Deity win is possible.

I have played mostly OCC games so far, Diadem, so am not the person to ask for a comparison. The first tournament game was about my only mult-city game!

[amicus curiae]

That's funny I have been doing the same thing in not going for drama right away. I have been playing deity lately and I am going for pyramids as soon as possible to get some engineers. I like to save one to build great library. I also agree that avoiding artists at all costs is a good plan. Once you get representation with pyramids it is good to crank out anything but merchants and artists and add them to the city.

I also like having sea resources early. I think the best city would be two sea resources, some cows, and a mine resource like gold, stone, etc. This also sets up a good basis for pop rushing things early on. You can quickly build up a few extra citizens that won't work due to unhappiness and then pop rush them when needed.

[Diadem]

1) The way I see it, every citizen your city has costs you three food. Health bonusses provide free food to your city.

Thus, it is worth it to let a city grow as long as you still have tiles that produce 3 food and something else (more food, or commerce, or hammers). Though you should take in mind here the fact that growing takes time. If your city has 3 surplus, you can run a specialist, or you can wait for 10 turns for your city to grow so it can use that final grassland tile near a river that gives 3/0/1. But having a specialist less for 10 turns is just not worth the 1 extra commerce you'll get afterwards.

If you managed to pick up a few religions you usually do not need Globe Theater until far into the game I guess. Though the one artist point it generates is not that much of a problem if you have enough specialists.

2) But Great Prophets are much easier to generate. There are more prophet wonders, and priest specialists are (with wat) just better than engineers. Though imho all GPs but artists are good. So I just build all wonders that generate those, and see which ones I get. I'm happy with them all. Even in an OCC game you need gold. Though only up to a point, I guess.

3) You are mistaken here. Gold and science are also added to the raw totals. Wall Street works over the gold Great Prophets or Great Merchants give. And your library etc works over the beakers specialists give. Check the breakdown you get when you mouseover the cities science total.

5) If you do that, though, you'll miss the bonusses these resources give to food, production, commerce, etc. And those bonusses can really be worth it!

6) You beeline to those without doing any of the other techs? You'll miss out on a lot of important ones then, won't you? Most of the military techs, railroad, combustion, etc. That works? And why beeline for computers, what's so important about them?

7) Ghandi is industrious and also starts with mining. As good at getting the pyramids. But I think having no anachy is better than that 2 health. And India's UU is the best of the game.

[solo]

Originally posted by Diadem
3) You are mistaken here. Gold and science are also added to the raw totals. Wall Street works over the gold Great Prophets or Great Merchants give. And your library etc works over the beakers specialists give. Check the breakdown you get when you mouseover the cities science total.

5) If you do that, though, you'll miss the bonusses these resources give to food, production, commerce, etc. And those bonusses can really be worth it!

6) You beeline to those without doing any of the other techs? You'll miss out on a lot of important ones then, won't you? Most of the military techs, railroad, combustion, etc. That works? And why beeline for computers, what's so important about them?

7) Ghandi is industrious and also starts with mining. As good at getting the pyramids. But I think having no anachy is better than that 2 health. And India's UU is the best of the game.

3) Okay, I am often wrong, and will recheck this. I think you need to run less than 100% science to get the increased benefit from the gold Prophets generate. It's not like they are adding extra raw commerce that can be converted to beakers or other uses.

5) True, I missed a few hammers maybe by sitting on top of stone, but got the early wonders so much sooner, it was well worth sacrificing those. For most other resources, I would agree, especially sea-based ones!

6) I think I mentioned I would trade for these other important techs along the way. I confined my own research to techs along the direct paths. Computers gave me another research boost with the lab and the lab helps with SS parts, but I consider a beeline direct to Rocketry just as good, if not better. Also, I am willing to trade Radio and even Computers a bit later for some vital techs, but am less willing to let go of Artillery and Rocketry when I get them first, since I want a jump on SS construction. Computers first was not that much of a detour.

7) Gandhi is good, too! I tried him in a few games, but was not switching civics often enough to convince me Religious is better than Expansive. A Gandhi start with extra health, such as a pond, might end up being better than going with Bismark. I think Gandhi also gives you a better shot at the Civil Service slingshot.

[solo]

I decided to try another Immortal game, this time playing as Gandhi and was again presented with Stone next to my starting settlers. There must be something about my computer that attracts Stone starts!

With two Clams and one Pig Sty within view, things were looking up. The extra food resource would help make up for the lack of health bonuses, although I also had enough forests (5) in my radius to give me 2 health.

I hopped on the Stone again, since this adds an extra food to the tile and only loses 2 hammers for lack of a quarry. A city center with 2 food and 2 hammers is fine, and earlier wonders mean an earlier start on GP production. I had those two hammers back in no time and with interest.

I played this one pretty much the same as the Bismarck game, only making a few minor refinements to what had worked well before.

I think if there is enough food around and a few extra sources of health from trees or fresh water, using Gandhi is slightly better than Bismarck, since you get no anarchy as Diadem pointed out, and also because you have a chance of founding religions, allowing you to build temples and monastaries for more happiness and early research.

I was surprised to found Buddhism first, since I had researched Fishing before Meditation, but later I was not too surprised getting to Code of Laws first for Confucianism using the Oracle.

I did not even bother trying to delay the Oracle long enough to get Civil Service, since this would have not happened until after 1000 BC. By that time on Emperor, I have observed in other games that the AI are most likely to finish the Oracle first.

So I played it safe. A mini-slingshot to CoL is better than no slingshot at all. Meanwhile, I had researched Mathematics for an aqueduct and the Hanging Gardens.

Even with temples this game, I did not have many happiness boosters, so when I had reached size 12, I decided to trade for Drama to add the Globe Theater. Most of the game my city was about size 12, and only grew to the final size of 15 quite late, when many more health boosters became available.

This game I increased the number of science specialists to increase the GP production rate and also to increase beakers. This worked even better than in the previous game, since this time I was able to get to Liberalism first for its free tech, a huge bonus for me and also a huge one withheld from a leading AI researcher.

I was first again to Physics in this game too, and went the same route afterwards, beelining to Computers before heading to Rocketry. At the point of making this decision I did save the game, so I could go back later and try the Rocketry first approach later. I wanted to compare how both beelines worked starting under the same conditions.

The result of this experiment was that Rocketry first left me out of the running, as I lacked techs to trade for key ones I missed, and I also lacked research speed and the SS part boost by not having a lab. Computers first worked successfully for me again, and I was just able to beat Hatty by 1 SS part, completing my ship in 1999, 10 years better than in the previous game.

My conclusion is that a smaller city with many science specialists is the way to go in an OCC space race. Don't exceed the health or happiness limits to maximize the number of specialists. Below is a zip containing the starting and finishing positions. I think others here will crack the Immortal barrier using this start.

Now I must try to find a way in another Immortal game in which I do not start with Stone nearby. I think its presence is what made the difference between a win and just another close call.

[Ixthod]

Originally posted by solo


3) Okay, I am often wrong, and will recheck this. I think you need to run less than 100% science to get the increased benefit from the gold Prophets generate. It's not like they are adding extra raw commerce that can be converted to beakers or other uses.

Only posting because I did quite a bit of testing on this playing around with the Great Profits strategy. The gold added by specialists (normal or super) is directly added to the gold produced by the commerce rate you have set and THEN multipliers from city improvements like Bank, Grocer, Market and Wall Street are applied. Having a commerce rate of 0% doesn't effect the 5gp created by a super prophet specialist or the fact that it becomes 10gp if you have Wall Street.

The confusion for me was the fact that commerce and gold use the same icon, when they are really two different entities.

In OCC games, I always find a use for gold - from upgrading units to purchasing techs and resources to buying an ally. Even with a GP strategy I find I can always use more gold.

[Diadem]

I'm playing an OCC on monarch now, trying to get a conquest victory. I'm playing on epic to give my armies a lot of time to move. This caused a bug to end the game in a victory for Alexander at 1810. Damn. But I clicked 'one more turn'

Small map, with Montezuma, Alexander, Kublai Khan and Saladin as AIs. Iron, coal and horses within my cultural influence. No oil or uranium though. Probably no aluminium either, they are usually only generated in the western mountinious (sp?) part of a Great Plains map.

I've become very good friends with Alexander. Together we've eliminated Monty, and Saladin and Kublai Khan are currently dying.

Taking out Alex will be a problem though. I hope I can trade oil with him, and then build up a huge army to smash him. Not sure if it will work