One City Challenge

[rhaskett]

I've been doing some work in preparation for the Civ3 One City Challenge. The Diplomatic Victory is too easy so I've been trying Cultural.

I've won now on Monarchy (with a pretty nice starting spot I built on a medium map with a full complement of opponents) and am looking to move up. Here is a few things I've noticed.

Militaristic is the best civ-specific. Getting the extra leaders is so important in getting those cultural wonders up quickly. Also, defending yourself is much easier. None of the others are exceptionally usefull, but I choose Scientific for the few extra techs and the cheap buildings. Maybe religion would have been better.

You need to be coastal so the Colosus can be built. The Great Library is also essential. The Science Wonders are all great. Shakespeare's is a great boon. Get non-wonders built as early as possible using forced labor (I'm going to try Religion next so I can switch to a government with forced labor quickly). Also stay fighting constantly against someone for more workers and great leaders (It's wonderful to see Shakespeare's built in one turn).

Otherwise good diplomacy is a must. I had my tech at 100% most of the midgame and was making money off of tech trades. I tried to keep the AI fighting each other constantly so they wouldn't come after me as much and wouldn't build as fast.

The game was still very close though and I would love suggestions, comments and ideas before I try again next weekend.

[Skeeve]

Wow..., I didn't think the one city challenge would be that easy in Civ3! I figured that the need to expand to gain control of strategic resources would be vital, but it sounds like you've managed to gain resources using tech trades.

Utilizing leaders for building wonders is probably the key here.

Thanks for the write-up. I think I'll try the OCC soon.

[rhaskett]

When I added the map, I did give myself some vital resources (Iron, Salt, Rubber), some luxuries, and some bonuses like the Civ2 OCCs. However, I'm hoping to get good enough to do without most of the resources (I can't imagine winning without iron).

[challenge]

How did you give yourself vital resources? Since you can not preset where your civ will start, once you built the map and selected a "full compliment" of opposing civs, the one starting on your pre-arranged site is random. I can't imagine sitting there re-starting the game however many times just to get to my stacked deck starting point.

Besides, stacking the resources is a lot like cheating. If that's the only way a OCC is possible, I don't think it's worth much.

[Haphazard]

Aren't enough units available without resources, at least for defence? You said you won a Diplomatic OCC, was that on a normal random map? I'd be greatly impressed if it was. I'm only impressed at the moment

[kimmygibler]

Well I think the way to beat deity OCC is to go with the build/rebuild of forests. It has been done so it's not impossible.

I'd like to see a spaceship deity OCC win. That would be something...

My tip for early game is once your city is stuck at size 12, start building workers whenever the city is about to grow. These can be used to trade for techs, or to chop forests, or to save until you get hospital. In one of my OCC games I had 5 or 6 workers saved up so as soon as I got hospital I started adding them to the city.

Also, your tech research has to be drastically different from other games. You must go for the techs that give vital wonders, even if they are not necessary techs. In some ways, this makes it harder to streamline the tech tree.

[connorkimbro]

you've won on monarchy (i assume you mean regent, or king level)

I hate to burst your bubble, but technically it's not eve OCC until it's on Diety level. That and you set up your own start positions? Oh gosh. You just don't get it at all, do you? Strategies that you develop from positions where you set yourself up like that are no good at all. . .

i havn't had much time to play recently, but i've been making some progress in my OCC attempts. I've got a few ideas floating around, and I should have time to play this weekend. I'll try and post results after I do.

you mentioned militaristic. . i hadn't thought of it before, i've been mostly playing a very defensive game, not fighting wars at all if i can help it. After all, you don't want to capture enemy cities. but it MIGHT be useful to capture settlers/workers. . . though you really SHOULD be ahead enough scientifically and have a city with a production high enough to not have a problem getting the wonders without the leaders. Though, the leaders WOULD help i suppose.

IMO, having an industrious civ is ESSENTIAL. . the sped up building things time, along with the speed up worker time is VITAL to build things quickly. Scientific may be good, but i prefer commercial, i think the benefits to science are better under a commercial civ than they are under a scientific civ, oddly enough. i havn't tested this fully, but i'd be willing to bet. anyway, keep trying. And maybe, actually try a REAL occ game for once.

[rhaskett]

To all that berated me for not following the full OCC conditions: this was more like a test run to figure out strategies for the real OCC. I won on the forth level from the left; which I thought was called Monarch.

I dismissed the diplomatic victory because all you have to do is build one wonder (one leader) and keep good relations. I haven't done it myself, but a number of people have claimed to have done it on diety.

Industrious is not a bad idea, but the actual bonus is pretty small. After an early war (razing the cities or trading them to other civs immediately) I had more then enough workers. Commercial seems sort of worthless; a few extra commerce isn't bad, but the corruption help is worthless for the OCC (the best IMHO for the normal game). Militaristic with the leader spawning is just too useful. Religious with the cheap buildings and no anarchy time seems as useful as Industrious.

[Out4Blood]

Connorkimbro must have wandered over from the Civ2 board by mistake - the 3rd hardest level is called "Monarch"

[Lightbulb]

Hi together, just like to add my 2cents..

Beating Civ2 with on city was easy and entertaining since the games were much much faster and one could finish a couple of them during a cloudy Sunday.

That in mind I tried to beat Civ3... way harder due to the iron,coal,alu... whatever shortage I expected to run into.

I played the first three levels on tiny or small maps with different land/sea settings using the Babylonians (targeting cultural victory ). I won only one Regent game (cult. 198x) with one patch of ivory being my only resource for the full game. Not using the lumberjack strategy since I regard it as cheating and expect it to vanish/change with the first patch.

Someone said that it is crucial to fight the AI constantly... I tried it.. but with no iron, saltpeter it is quite hard to do that . BTW.. an easy way to declare war without actually doing so is trading coal or iron.. got each for some turns, never both of them 'cause they declared war as soon as I got the other one.

One possible way to the resources are colonies, but I found them impossible to defend against the AI. They surround them with cities and the units left to defend the iron-tile and the road to them had to be removed .... or get kicked out ... any solution to the resource problem... any space ship victories (even on chieftain) WITHOUT cheating (read resource placement )??

got to do some work... will play tonight

[Mercani]

OCC won at Monarch level

Hi everybody,

I managed to win OCC with Babylonians at Monarch level. Cultural victory. I didn't do any cheating(resource placement) but I restarted several times for a good starting location. I started with only 1 luxury and 1 wheat. 5-6 flood plains, rest plains/hills. And rivers running nearly around every city tile.

It was tiny map(I thought if AI has less land to expand it would be easier.) No wars at all. I gave them everything they wanted. I realized in order not to give techs as tribute for just not going to war, sell them and get 15-20 per turn. This way they only demand territory map of my little city-state. It was fun. I built Great Library, Hanging Gardens, Sistine, Bach's, Copernicus, Newton's, Shakespeare, SETI, Evolution.

In the end the city was producing 100+ culture per turn and 300 beakers !

Strategic resources problem can be dealt with by trading.

Babylonians are perfect for culture(temple, library, cathedral, university, all at half price !) I think I should try militaristic and go to war for the leaders at higher difficulty.

You guys have any suggestions?