Why end the game early if you want a high score?

[Expatriate]

As far as I recall, the earlier versions of Civ and even Colonization rewarded you with extra points for achieving victory at an earlier point than the time limit. But not Civ 3.

I am currently playing a game on Regent where I have all techs researched and could launch a spaceship in about 10 turns if I started building it now. The other civs are not that far behind, but my military strenght is plenty to sack their capital if they ever try building a spaceship. I have allready eliminated the chinese, the zulus, the persians and Im currently finishing off the germans because they built the first spaceship module. The problem is that I am in the early 1700s, which means there are about 200 turns more left to build population and research future tech if I want.

If I build a spaceship right now, I am basically throwing all those potential points away because I gain no bonus for winning early. But on the other hand, its not really very challenging to play for 200 more turns where I just build up and research while dominating the world.

I WANT MY BONUS! Please?

[Xentropy]

Actually, if you pay attention to your scores at the end of a game, there IS a bonus, and it DOES scale higher the earlier you win; however, the bonus points are generally less than you'd get from playing the extra turns.

Read my long post near the end of this thread:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=37034