Science Fiction Victory

agiasi · June 23, 2001, 12:03

Fellow Gamers,

I recently achieved the science fiction victory in CTPII, and would like to share some lessons learned.

1. A key element for achieving this victory is to place your obelisks in such a way as to cover 60% of the earth. In order to do this, you have to have a combined conquerer/empire builder strategy, that seizes enough terrain to help cover most of the land, while not accumulating too many cities to overburden your form of government. Obelisks should be built in a star pattern, with one being placed by the city, and the other four at the far corners of the area of influence of the city. If you don't control enough of the landmass of the planet to achieve 60% coverage, or the map is mostly ocean, sea cities will have to be built. These are particularly good at achieving coverage, as you can place them where you need them, and their area of influence is greater than that for land cities.

2. You can increase the radius of coverage of each obelisk (initially 5%), by increasing the number of satellites launched, over and above the 10 minimum required.

I hope this helps!

Immortal Wombat · June 23, 2001, 12:40

Quote:

Obelisks should be built in a star pattern, with one being placed by the city, and the other four at the far corners of the area of influence of the city.

If your city influence is quite small, or you have build loads of satellites, then the one by the city might be unneccessary, as that area will get overlapped by the ones at the points.

Thanks for the summary agiasi !

Skeeve · June 29, 2001, 16:12

Hey guys, I was wondering...
Is it possible for you to destroy another player's obelisks using the PILLAGE command?

I've simply never had the occasion to try because the AI never got that far.

I kind of think that would be fun if the AI was way ahead for some reason.

agiasi · June 30, 2001, 10:15

It is possible, and it happened to me. One AI player, that also was my historical enemy, pillaged one of the obelisks that I had built at sea. This precipitated the last war of the game, in which I stripped the AI of any ability to threaten me again, prior to completing the science fiction victory.

agiasi · July 1, 2001, 16:30

Good point, Immortal Wombat, regarding the placement of the obelisks. In the case of small cities, you could get away with four.

This brings to mind another consideration regarding the science fiction victory - it takes time! The "critical path" is the construction of the obelisks. They cost 3,000 a piece, and they take four or five turns to complete (I don't remember which). I allowed 100 years from the time I completed the Solaris project to complete construction of the Gaia Controller. It actually took me about 50 years.

Ruffinshot · July 6, 2001, 18:58

The key to the Sci-Fi victory is ALLIES. I've been beating my head against a wall for an hour trying to figure out how to cover enough territory to win. I'm already dangerously over the city limit and playing on a huge map. Then I discovered that I could build obelisks in my allies territory (nice of them, don't you think?). Problem solved.

Rob_Outram · July 10, 2001, 17:25

Sorry if this is asking the obvious, but for the SF victory does every one of your cities need its own Gaia controller core or can you get by with the minimum number? And can you churn out satellites from a couple of big cities, or does each city have to launch its own satellite?

Also, what radius should you be aiming for?

I have got to 61% coverage and completed the Solaris project, but my Gaia controller dialog box just gets to "0 years to Gaia controller online" and just stops there.

The other possibility is that some of my beacons are with allies who have a habit of breaking off their alliance at the crucial moment (b*****ds!)

Advice gratefully received!

Ruffinshot · July 10, 2001, 17:45

I seemed to still have control of the obelisks I built in allies' territory even when they broke the alliances. If you've got to 0 years it should bring up the end of the game. No idea what's gone wrong.... I pushed up to 75% coverage though, so maybe losing one or two allies didn't effect the total for me.

Pilfur · July 11, 2001, 15:42

This is hillarious. I've spent zillions of hours playing this game and yet I have absolutely no clue what you guys are talking about!

I've never had a game run into the modern, nevermind the future era. I either conquer everybody by then or get bored with the game and start over.

Ruffinshot · July 11, 2001, 15:48

Try playing on a huge map. Even doubling the city limit for governments you'll never be able to conquer more than a third of it. Then you have to figure out other ways to win.

I usually quit before I got past the modern era, too, til I figured out how to win with the sci-fi victory.... doesn't take nearly so long to finish that way.

Frog_Gamer · July 12, 2001, 03:16

I have actually won once by way of science. That was the second time I played on EASY

Otherwise it is practically impossible either due to size considerations or the lack of time in the tech tree!!

Ruffinshot · July 12, 2001, 12:37

Time is the real constraint. I've won Sci-Fi style twice now on Hard, but the only way to do it is to set your science goal for the Solaris Project fairly early on.

Build the Ramaya then use the extra happy pop to lower your tax threshold (or whatever the right bar in the empire settings is called). That'll about double the speed of your tech growth and give you a chance of getting to Solaris in time without having to make half your people scientists (though that helps too).

Once the computer players get fascism they'll all convert to it and stop their own tech growth dead. That's when you can set your goal for Solaris is really go for it.

agiasi · July 17, 2001, 21:30

Gaia Controller Cores

Rob_Outram, you only need 10 cores to win, and it apparently doesn't matter where they are located. You need at least 10 satellites (maximum of 20 allowed). You do have to hold your obelisks and cores for at the 10 turn start up sequence. Since some of your obelisks are with allies, their breaking off the alliance might cause you to lose control of them, and probably break the countdown sequence.

I noticed that when the Gaia counter got to zero, nothing happened until the following turn. Then, the game played a movie depicting satellites beaming energy down to Earth. After that, you should see the victory message.

I hope that this help. Good luck!