Cultural Victory: Discussing the basics

[Rancidlunchmeat]

I agree with Dave, that's why I'll even delay Scientific method for a couple of turns to make sure I've got monastaries in my three culture cities.

I usually go for two religions, and not starting with mysticism hasn't really been that much of a problem. I stll usually end up with confucionism first, and then I never have a problem getting taoism (which I want anyway, because I want pacifism in order to get the GPP in order to churn out great artists to add as SS or culture spike any of the three that are lagging behind)

Does anybody go for a cultural victory without being FIN? I've been able to get cultural victories with a lot of different combinations, but I always use FIN. I find I need the cash in order to rush the wonders I need to get really build those cultural meccas.

[Rancidlunchmeat]

Duh. Saladin is PHI/SPI. Sorry for the last question.

Here's another... how difficult is it to do without the extra cash to rush those wonders? Don't you need a bunch more cottages/towns then? Or do you not rush buy wonders and use the PHI to spawn more GP engineers?

[gentle]

Originally posted by Rancidlunchmeat
Duh. Saladin is PHI/SPI. Sorry for the last question.

Here's another... how difficult is it to do without the extra cash to rush those wonders? Don't you need a bunch more cottages/towns then? Or do you not rush buy wonders and use the PHI to spawn more GP engineers?

yep, thats what PHI is for.
finished my first deity 1ad to test/attune this strat and this is how i got the wonders:
stonehenge: chopped
pyramids: chopped
great lib: engineer
national epic: engineer
elizabeth stole oracle as only other wonder on my "wanted list" but so early that contesting it would have made no sense. hadnt even writing. guess it was sort of 2700BC.could have made it instead of stonehenge but decided for earlier GP production instead of grabbing writing.
i am not quite sure if u rushbuy stuff that early but late in the game money should be no prob for any civ.

concerning money, i was quite irritated that i started with -2 gold on deity (did a patch change that?)
money probs made my first gp a greatproph-specialist and later i build the shrine and as usual resource/gold trades.
atm i am running 100% science and making profit.
(my first! founded city made me go down to 50% research oO due to civic upkeep cost WTF! basic ones! thats a point for ORG [x] =P)


to be honest I am quite sure that non mysticism starters wont even found 1 religion. Hinduism was the only one i got and i started to research poly on 1st turn.
everything running fine though tech advancement of course is little bit slower than on noble so it is still 2 techs til liberalism though this is my first try and its a good "reference game" for my restarts.

[gentle]

OldBuilding: DoubleCulture

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Originally posted by gentle


If u dont mind I would like to see the savegame to have a look at the tech tree ?

sry, for doublepost

OK I might be able to send it tonight (I am at work right now... but send me a pm - for e-mail)

[OneFootInTheGrave]

wow a culture win in 1935 on that level is very impressive, with the wars et all...

I now think that going all gung ho for science if you are alone including great scientists etc, or the "war" game if you are with someone who is aggressive next to you during early game should be OK for culture win still. Overall I think that #1 priority is to get as many religions as possible and #2 get to Liberalism as quick as possible for early culture finish. Once you those techs, and you have built the shrines in all three cities. Actually it seems that the wonder city can do well with wonders alone. Crank up the culture for 500+ culture per turn and you are there. Last game I had one city producting 700 culture per turn towards the end of the game, but I had hermitage + 5 shrines in it. I started relatively late in the game as it was Thebes (and I was Arabian) only after I destroyed Egyptians, still I managed to finish in 1949 with it. btw... I am playing all my games on Noble so far.

[CerberusIV]

I may have missed this somewhere but...

The manual ( ) says a cultural victory requires 3 cities with 50,000 culture points on normal speed.

Does anyone know how many points it takes on other game speeds? I ask because I have 3 cities with the required culture on Epic and am not getting told I have won the game.

[uberfish]

Early game I would think it's actually better to have great scientists than artists. Academies get you to the all important liberalism faster, and provide +4 culture.

[gentle]

While playing on deity and trying to focus on culture and the pre-posted tech approach I realized some stuff that might aply to diffculties Noble+.
Only important if one wants to play on that high diffs but anyway here is some stuff I noticed / am thinking about.

One thing that struck me was that I start with -2 gold (80% science) as soon as I found my capital. 2nd city drops it to 60% (-4 gold) due to civic upkeeps.Two of the inital civics require upkeep -> decent point to get slavery btw, because slavery needs no upkeep (why should it =P ).
This combined with the effect that tech costs are more expensive than on noble is pretty nasty.
Only way I came up so far to cope with that and not have to halt "expansion" (we are actually talking about the first city oO) is a Great Prophet Specialist as soon as possible.
This guy does a really good job at collecting the tenth and gives me a +5 gold share of it.Thats enough to get into the game and makes me appreciate Stonehenge even more for its early GP pts (+PHI leader, that I am).
Maybe someone has a different approach to that ?
I guess ORG could be very useful in this scenario too.

Second thing has to do with tech costs and wonders.
Ok, I exspected that Oracle slingshot to Philosophy is not possible due to my prior experiences on deity as the early wonders are also built early =P by the AI oO.
Claiming possession of Stonehenge and Pyramids worked all the time though (very good news for me) but Oracle is no way. I guess it is 2/3 of these 3 wonders - your choice.
To still get Philosophy early for Pacifism civic I will have to cope with the "donate tech" tabel of GPs again so that I can grab that tech via GP.
Actually, writing and alphabet are the 2 techs that really consume time. Writing more than Alphabet because after Writing I have a library and squeeze out a scientist.
Everything is slower though and this drops my available GPs from 8 (noble) to 6 (deity) with the 1st one being a super spec and 1 (2) others should be engineers for Great Library (National Epic).Another Great Prophet for a shrine. This leaves me with 2 GPs (maybe 3 - depending how fast I get to Philosophy) who I can use for Techs.
Atm, my 1AD games on deity are pretty much the same concerning techs. Always stuck at researching paper (so it is 2 techs away from liberalism). But as said I have to redesign my donation plan a bit.

Third thing. Found 1 religion. 1 is enough but do found it under all circumstances. The money a shrine generates (about 7-10 at 1AD) is very important to get an acceptable income.I am not quite sure why , but I am lacking money all the time. Do upkeep costs also change by a factor x on higher diffs ?

This leads me to the fourth thing. I liked currency a lot for its possibility to trade resources for gold per turn.
Now I really love it !
On deity the AI has gold to give and I am not reluctant to give them my only luxury resource for sth like 7 gold per turn !
Keep in mind that you dont have to research currency on your own (you wont be there as the first one anyway) but keep an eye on the AI when they discover it.

Ok, so these are just general thoughts on how to cope with appearing problems on the higher diffs and very builder oriented (of course I pump out more military than I would like to but I try to avoid conflict - I even pay my neighbours good amounts of money so they convert to my religion and I can run a state religion for pacifism without living in fear).I just dont want to be an "easy pick".

Comments and different approaches (other than "build praetorians and gogogo" plz =P ) are very welcome.

One question...Wonders/Buildings only obsolete when I myself have researched the tech !?

[gentle]

Originally posted by CerberusIV
I may have missed this somewhere but...

The manual ( ) says a cultural victory requires 3 cities with 50,000 culture points on normal speed.

Does anyone know how many points it takes on other game speeds? I ask because I have 3 cities with the required culture on Epic and am not getting told I have won the game.

sry for doublepost, but here is the answer

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=154116

6th point:
quote:
Normal speed requires 3 citys with 50K culture, epic 75K, marathon 150K and quick speed requires 3 with 25K.
/quote

*edited initial post*

also interesting stuff from the link above:

Normal speed:
Total turns: 460
One turn is
40 Years, untill 1000 BC (75 turns)
25 Years, untill 500 AD (60 turns)
20 Years, untill 1000 AD (25 turns)
any culture buildings after this point will not generate extra culture/turn, before a realistic deadline
10 Years, untill 1500 AD (50 turns)
5 Years, untill 1800 AD (60 turns)
2 Years, untill 1920 AD (60 turns)
1 Years, untill 2050 AD (130 turns) -> time victory condition

copy/paste from "spiceant" , thx.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Yes this turn's breakdown is something I was really interested in, overall an early wonder or two producing great prophets is great IMO as well.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

to add the right balance has to be

early game - expansion, early religion rush, good city placement + 2-3 wonders.

My favourite are 1. Pyramids 2. Parthenon 3. Stonehenge, perhaps one can manage Oracle too but very hard to do.

It is kind of easy to do this in games against AI, where you can restart, but even with Salading on Noble I cannot be sure that I can get all early religions, actually it seems that I can be sure that I won't be able to get it most of the time.

I guess that leaving one out is the safest strategy and go for Polytheism/Monotheism. Almost every time I can get to Monotheism first if I go there, but Buddhism/Hinduism are tricky. Buddhism mostly so, as if you do not have extra gold near your first city it is most often captured by another civ the exact turn when you discover the science. Sometimes it happens on both Buddhism and Hinduism if I go buddism first (as in I lose them both exactly the same turn I am meant to discover them) and that is at the expense of early worker, growing the city the fastest I can to get the science speedup.

So I guess two out of three is the best one can hope for (under normal circumstances, without restarts ), and than going for Confucianism, Christianity and Taoism... perhaps Islam. Not sure how useful it is as you need some other "normal" tech in between for proper development and 200% - 250% from shrines is perhaps enough. Another 50% plus from another religion is increasing your culture output for just 1/5 more than before so it is not that beneficial as getting to pottery (and cottages) or bronze working/archery if you need to go to war.

Actually that is an early science dillema - how many sciences can you squeeze between discovering Monotheism and going for Caste System, but that you can still be reasonably sure you will get to Caste System first. and than the rest - Philosophy and Christianity(all while getting sure to build the Pyramids first)... Pyramids are great too for great engineers that give you Sistine Chapel in any city you designate, even though it might have poor production abilities.

Will have to try again and see how it all goes. But early religion rush 2/3 and 4/7 in total should be the "norm" for quick culture finish style game.

[gentle]

Hmm, I dont pay that much attention on the numbers of religions I found. I am fine with just 1 which is usually Hinduism. This religion I spread to get most out of a shrine I will build later and for diplomatic/convert reasons, it is also enough to get 50% cathedrals in the 3 cities.

My favourite are 1. Pyramids 2. Parthenon 3. Stonehenge, perhaps one can manage Oracle too but very hard to do.

Atm I am thinking if Parthenon is worth the effort.
It conusmes 450 hammers or 1 Great Engineer. Thats pretty much for only 50% (it is 300% vs 350%). It has become at least lower priority for me.Though definetely a decision influenced by the fact that I am running low on GPs on deity. On noble it is sort of no-brainer imho..Only wonders I go for atm are Stonehenge,Pyramids and Great Library.

Actually that is an early science dillema - how many sciences can you squeeze between discovering Monotheism and going for Caste System, but that you can still be reasonably sure you will get to Caste System first. and than the rest - Philosophy and Christianity

Indeed thats a dilemma, because Code of Laws is somewhat off-track. Philosophy and Christianity are good tech donations though and pretty easy to have if one wants.
Code of Laws also leads to "wrong techs". I usually go for Theology - Paper and circumnavigate that pre-civil service block. So Confucianism is certainly a religion I wont found.

Will have to try again and see how it all goes. But early religion rush 2/3 and 4/7 in total should be the "norm" for quick culture finish style game.

At least there are good chances that one will do 4/7 because Hindu,Judaism,Taoism and Christianity are on the tech path.
On deity though I only manage Hindu oO, but 1 is enough for me ^^.
---
Btw, lets say we have Liberalism, how do we wanna get to Scientific Method ? Astronomy+pre stuff or Gundpowder+Chemistry ?
I think this is not necessarily decided by the sole fact if one plays on terra or not, but by the prereqs one needs (and in most cases lacks) and it is also easier to use Liberalism to grab Gunpowder (no prereqs needed) than to delay Liberalism *shudder* and go for Astronomy !?
---
Hey OzzyKP, whats up with Gandhi ? ^^

[Arrian]

I build the parthenon only if I have marble. If I'm industrious but lack marble... maybe. Only after other things are taken care of. If I'm industrious with marble, well, hell, why not!

-Arrian

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Well that is true, even though the plus side is that if I build it early in the second city the benefit is the free artist generation for early land grab if needed plus if built early enough it doubles the culture production rate later so that is a nice boost with multipliers for that city... No Parthenon no early Great Artists and if you go for Oracle - well it's cheaper + free science but no free great artists early, and extra great prophets that you get anyway (assuming a temple built if nothing else)

I am far from making an optimal culture game but I have a feeling it will be either science rush to get the religions and to get to Liberalism/Nationalism, or great artists rush that could work on all levels anyhow. The great artist rush should still involve Pyramids and a few engineers for free wonders. I guess that in both cases 9-12 cities seem to be optimal. However if you have only 9 cities, it is hard to spread all the religions in every city and seems much less costly to create settlers + build cities if you have space for the cost of failed missionaries you get otherwise.