OCC games for fun and, well...FUN!

[Dominae]

Hi all,

After sucessfully completing my first OCC game with 1.29f, I figured I'd try to revitalize this great way to play Civ3 in the community. I know there's been some OCC discussion before, bit I've found that the OCC "literature" here on 'Poly to be lacking. I'm going to begin with some OCC basics and such, then give some strategies that helped me win. Feel free to join in!

1. What is OCC?

OCC stands for One City Challenge. It's simply a different way to play Civ3. As the name implies, you can only ever have one city in your glorious empire. The challenge is that you need to beat the AI with this severe handicap, preferably by launching a Spaceship.

2. Why should I play OCC?

First, OCC is great fun. Whether you actually win or not, knowing that you're remaining competitive with just one city is exhilarating. Second, you learn quite a bit about the Civ3 game mechanics. Among other things, you'll perfect your trading techniques and your city management. Ever wonder how the Luxury slider can be your friend? OCC is a great way to figure it out. Third, recognition. Being able to beat an OCC game is certainly a feat, and players (I think) respect that. Fourth, OCC games last about 3-4 hours, which means you can play a whole game in one sitting.

3. Why should I not play OCC?

If you don't like the idea "breaking" the game in any way, this is not the game type for you. I used to dislike OCC in Civ2 because I figured it meant that the normal game wouldn't never again pose any challenge. This was true in Civ2, but I don't think carries over to Civ3; OCC games are very specialized (small maps, great starts, see below), and I doubt anyone will ever routinely beat Civ3 with OCC on any given map. However, just as some people don't like close city-spacing (like me), some people don't like the feel of "weird" Civ3.

Also, if you don't like micromanagement, OCC is not for you. Just some (most) periods of the game, you need to check your city view every turn, and contact every rival civ every turn as well. If this repition gets you angry in the normal game, it sure will in OCC.

Finally, don't play OCC if Civ3 for you is all about warmongering. In the entire game, you'll never build an offensive unit and only handful of defensive units, so don't count on the thrill of conquest or generating GLs, it just won't happen.

4. Setup for OCC.

First, OCC games are best played on tiny or small maps. The larger the map size, the more cities the AI will have, meaning higher beaker output. Since OCC is all about research, this is bad for you. For this reason, the difficulty of any OCC game should primarily be measured (I believe) with respect to the map size. My hat is off to anyone who wins an OCC game on a Huge map (I would love to see your game log!).

Second, you need a great start. Map size being the main factor in OCC difficulty, starting location is certain a close second. Ideally, you're looking for these characteristics in your starting location:

a. Next to freshwater (rivers or lakes). This is simply so that you don't have to build Aqueducts, although the trade bonus of rivers is not to be discounted.

b. Coastal access. Although this one is optional, not being able to build the Colossus is a huge disadvantage.

c. Few "bad terrain" tiles. Any excess of Jungle, Tundra, Desert, etc. is simply bad. Remember, you only have one city, so all your tiles will need to be worked eventually. If you have too many Tundra tiles, you're shooting yourself in the foot.

d. A good mix of food and production tiles. This is obvious from the normal game.

e. Some bonus resources. Not necessary, but having a couple of Cows is certainly a good thing.

f. At least one Luxury resource. Again, not necessary, but early on Luxuries are simply amazing.

If you fire up your OCC game and don't get a starting position that has most of these characteristics, don't be afraid to restart. Multiple restarts are a part of OCC. Since you're stuck with the same city-site throughout the game, a bad start is a virtually guaranteed loss. Might as well give yourself a chance.

Third, I usually either turn off Barbarians or make then sedentary. You simply don't have the time to chase Barbs around the map.

Lastly, I usually turn off all win conditions other than Conquest and Spaceship. Playing with Domination can be exciting but also frustrating because you have very little power in preventing an AI civ from grabbing all the landmass (especially the Germans). Make sure to turn off Culture and Diplomatic, the former because it's actually really easy to win Culturally and the latter because it's just not in the spirit of OCC.

5. Picking the right OCC civ.

Apart from the Greeks, a civ's UU is largely irrelevent in OCC, so picking a civ is a matter of choosing a good combination of traits. I would say that Scientific is essential because of the free tech at every age; techs in a new age are usually very expensive, and you can get some pretty good gpt deals with your free tech. However, I've seen players win without the benefits of Scientific. Commercial is my second pick because Marketplaces work nicely with Luxuries. One could argue that Religious is very good, but I've found that happiness improvements aren't that useful (counter-intuitive, I know), and that Anarchy is never long when your civ consists of only one city. Industrious is also a ok option, although non-industrious Workers seem to keep up with city growth just fine. The other traits are basically useless.

Given this discussion, your best bets civ-wise are: Greeks, Babylonians, Persians. Other civs are definitely viable, but make the game more difficult.

Also not that Wonders and GAs should be taken into account when selecting a civ. For instance, the Greeks will trigger their Golden Age if they build both the Colossus and the Great Library.

6. Wonder choices.

Early on, the Colossus is a great Wonder that will server you well well into the Industrial age (my civ choice preference is the Greeks because they can build the Colossus immediately). However, the early-game should focus around building the Great Library. The GL is so essential to success in OCC that I usually quit if I can't get it. Given this, it is very important that you go out there and discover other civs. Sometimes this is easy and they will come to you, but in other games you might need to research Map Making yourself and go exploring. Once you build the GL, you shouldn't research at all anymore until it becomes obsolete (I'm sure this is conventional Civ-wisdom though). A trick I like to use is to pre-build the GL with the Colossus, and then go back and build the Colossus anyway. The AI often overlooks the Colossus, so don't worry about losing it. Other early wonders that are worth it if you can spare the time are the Hanging Gardens and The Great Lighthouse (if you're all alone).

After the Ancient times, you should focus on the Science Wonders: Copernicus' Observatory, Newton's University, Theory of Evolution and (optionally) The SETI Program. Constructing all of these will actually make you competitive in science, with just one city! The Sistine Chapel sounds great theoretically, but importing Luxuries is good enough to keep all your citizens happy, and grabbing the Sistine Chapel means that you could potentially lose Copernicus'. Shakespeare's Theater is great if you can get it, but the AI seems to prioritize it. The Theory of Evolution is a no-brainer: grab it at all costs. Do not neglect to build the Intelligence Agency, as espionage missions (tech-stealing primarily) are very good in OCC.

Once you reach the Modern age, there is no real Wonder that is worth your attention other than the Apollo Program and the SS components. Researching Computers and going for SETI sounds like a good idea, but you really want to be focusing on the SS components right away.

7. Tech-trading and diplomacy.

Basically your main goal until the Modern age is to keep up in tech at any cost. This means that you will need to sell of any and all techs you do have to every civ for (hopefully) some generous gpt deals. All civs should be Polite with you throughout the game so this shouldn't be a problem. Even if you do get a tech lead (most probably through the Theory of Evolution), sell off those techs. The more money you keep out of the AI civ's pockets, the more chances you have of keeping up.

No matter how good your one city is, the AI would always outresearch you, so you need to be prepared for this. Check every turn which civs have which techs, and act as the broker: you should always be the one selling techs to other civs, even if the price seems low. Sometimes you can't prevent them from sharing some techs during their turns, however. Eventually you should be able to set Science to 100% (or slightly lower if you're using the Luxury slider), and stockpile a bunch of gold for eventualy use in Espionage missions.

At all times you should work to make all the civs love you. This means giving in to outrageous demands, and frequently giving them gifts. At some point in the game, however, it will become necessary for you to set the world into war (in order to slow down the AI economically). Do this using MPPs, but make sure you don't take any reputation hits in the process.

Once you hit the Modern age, your strategy changes quite a bit. You need to focus on SS techs and keep these away from other civs. The AI isn't very good at focusing on a SS victory (they'll research Stealth and other "useless" techs), so all that stand between you and a SS victory is the drawback of having to build the components sequentially.

Unless you're extremely lucky, you'll need to trade for most strategic resources. Iron and Coal you only need to trade for once in order to get your rail network up in under 20 turns. Rubber you may need if you want to upgrade your defensive units. The one you really need to concentrate on is Aluminum; all SS components require it, so you'll need to have access to it throughout the Modern age. Make sure a friendly AI civ is able and willing to "hook you up".

8. Closing comments.

A lot more can be said about OCC, especially specific build queues for the early game. Check out "Quest for OCC victory on Deity" on this forum for some excellent OCC discussion and logs by solo and ToeTruck (sorry I can't provide the hyperlink right now). The thread deals primarily with version 1.17, but a lot of material is still relevant to 1.29. Oh, and I've attached the save for a great start with the Greeks: I manage to win an OCC win by launching in 1968. Try it out!


Dominae

[Theseus]

Wow!

Great overview, Dominae. I still haven't done an OCC... this'll be a great guide.

[jshelr]

I agree. Fun to review. Why do you turn off diplo victory, however. Is it because a one-city civ never gets in the list?

[Dominae]

jshelr, although I'm not 100% sure, I believe winning diplomatically in OCC is just as "easy" as winning culturally. Basically all you would need to do is build the UN, and since all other civs are either Polite or Gracious toward you, you would probably win the election (of course, you have to get to Fission, which means it's not entirely trivial). The original OCC in Civ2 required building the SS, and I prefer the challenge of doing so in Civ3 as well.

Theseus, give OCC a try; it's a refreshing change. Maybe we could have a OCC scenario for AU?


Dominae

[Chemical Ollie]

I have tried a couple of OCCs. I got totally humiliated on higher levels, but managed to win twice in a row on regent, two games won in 3 hours! Both were on tiny archipelago maps with 3 opponents.

The first was an easy win because all 4 civs were on the same tiny continent. I built 4 regular units that conquered the whole world in 2700 BC. My all-time high-score of 14500 (who said the scoring system was fair?)

The second win had no luxuries on the whole map. I built most of the wonders and won by culture in 1870 something with a mediocre score of 500. I would probably had won diplomatic if I wouldn't had the culture, as everone was gracious to me for the later part of the game.

However, these games were perhaps not in the fundamental spirit of OCC, as I went for the easiest ways to win.

But I better like long, epic games on large maps with balanced strategy and strong AI. When I get my 2.56 GHz computer in November, Marla's Earth will be my favorite.

[Arrian]

What do people think of eventually having a AU OCC game? I like the idea that the game can be completed quickly... in some ways that's what I liked about AU102 - no units meant I could simply concentrate on building (and building wonders, which I love to do).

For civ choice, I'm not sure what you mean about commercial when you say "Commercial is my second pick because Marketplaces work nicely with Luxuries." Unless it got changed and I missed it, marketplaces are 100 shields for all civs, even commerical ones. I would think that commercial would be one of the very worst OCC traits, since it's main strength is corruption-fighting. You seem to have investigated this more than I, so please do correct me if I'm wrong.

If I was playing an OCC, I'd go with the Babs. They just save so many shields on buildings (temp/cath/lib/univ). It's true that anarchy isn't all that big a deal in an OCC, as I would imagine all you need is republic. The benifits of demo hardly seem worthwhile.

-Arrian

[vmxa1]

Nice job and your reason to not do OCC fit me to a tee. Do not want to have to trade, Like to war.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Arrian
What do people think of eventually having a AU OCC game? I like the idea that the game can be completed quickly... in some ways that's what I liked about AU102 - no units meant I could simply concentrate on building (and building wonders, which I love to do).

Sounds like a fine idea to me. Not everyone will be pleased, but OCC definitely does improve your Civ3 gameplay, so it at least fits in the AU theme.

Originally posted by Arrian
For civ choice, I'm not sure what you mean about commercial when you say "Commercial is my second pick because Marketplaces work nicely with Luxuries." Unless it got changed and I missed it, marketplaces are 100 shields for all civs, even commerical ones.

You're quite right here, Arrian. It's funny, but I initially just assumed that Commercial civs had cheaper Marketplaces and Banks, and have been carrying this assumption around with me ever since! Although the Commercial trait still gives you some extra trade, it's definitely not as good as I initially mentioned. Industrious and Religious both now seem far superior.

I also made a mistake in saying that the Greeks trigger a GA upon completion of both the Colossus and the Great Library, which is incorrect. It's the Babylonians that trigger their GA under those circumstances. Just for quick reference, here are the relevant Wonders that trigger a GA for the main OCC civs:

Babylonians: Colossus, Great Library
Persians: Great Library, Hanging Gardens
Greeks: Great Library, Great Lighthouse

It's interesting to note that the Great Lighthouse may not be very useful in every game, but building it may be necessary for the Greeks just to trigger a GA. The only other useful Commercial Wonder is Smith's Trading Company, which comes quite late, and is unfortunately very close to Copernicus' and Newton's. Of course, you could always just win a battle with a Hoplite, but that adds a slew of problems to your game.

Originally posted by Arrian
If I was playing an OCC, I'd go with the Babs. They just save so many shields on buildings (temp/cath/lib/univ).

Although it's efficient to build a Temple and a Cathedral in the long run, you usually won't do so until later on in the game (in my experience). Trading for Luxuries and the Luxury slider are more cost-effective ways of keeping the population happy. By the time you build the happiness improvements, their reduced cost is not as impressive as it is in a normal game. However, every shield counts, so I'm not completely discounting the benefits of being Religious.

Originally posted by Arrian
The benifits of demo hardly seem worthwhile.

Because you can usually switch from Republic to Democracy in one turn, the drawback from switching is minimal. The added speed of Workers is quite useful in laying down Railroads and cleaning up pollution (needs to be done in one turn).


Dominae

[seraphin]

nice thread

arrian, you're right: the commercial trait itself is wothless...but...you get alphabet - dont underestimate that

i did all my occ's on 1.21...and all with the persians on deity with all victory conditions activated (only ac is not possible with culture activated, cause you would win with that first)
...and...believe me: i am a warrior no trader and i liked it though.
culture conquest ac

Dominae...would you like to post the exact occ-rules here...i do not know wether my AC-OCC is correct til today (if i remember right, i attacked enemy forces but did not directly conquer or raze enemy cities).

[Dominae]

Although I'm sure I could find the official OCC rules from way back in Civ2, they're simple enough so I'll just post them from memory (someone tell me if I forget some of them):

1. Only 1 city is allowed at any time in the game. Conquered cities must be razed immediately and not at the end of turn (this would allow you to sell improvements). A city that flips due to cultural infuence must be rebuffed, for the same reasons.

2. No reloads of any kind are allowed, for any reason. It is assumed that the "Preserve Random Seed" option is on. This is especially important with regards to Espionage missions, which could be made to always succeed with reloads on subsequent turns.

(I consider this cheating in the normal game anyway, so why should you be allowed to do it in OCC?)

3. The original OCC had to be played on Deity, although Civ3 (usually) just for fun, so pick any difficulty you like. Do know, however, that OCC is quite easy on any level below Regent.

4. The original OCC required the that your Spaceship reach Alpha Centauri first. This was the only allowable victory type. I suggest that this carry over to Civ3. As I've mentioned above, Diplomatic and Cultural victories are quite easy. Furthermore, in my opinion, Conquest games on Pangea-like Tiny maps should not be considered OCC victories. Again, this is just for fun, so if you want to try to conquer the world with just one city, I'm not going to stop you!

5. No known (or unknown!) exploits are allowed. I can't think of any definite exploit in Civ3 as of 1.29f. Something like IFE which was possible in previous patches is not allowable in OCC.


I think that covers it. All other "modifiers" (Barbarian activity, map size, number of civs, etc.) are admissible, and each OCC victory should be evaluated with these in mind. If someone can do an OCC on a huge map, 16 civs and Raging Barbarians, my hat is off to you.

Hope this answers your question, seraphin. By the way, what is 'ac'? I tried your link, but unfortunately my comprehension of German is weak (nonexistent).


Dominae

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Dominae
2. No reloads of any kind are allowed, for any reason. It is assumed that the "Preserve Random Seed" option is on. This is especially important with regards to Espionage missions, which could be made to always succeed with reloads on subsequent turns.

(

What difference does it make about the random seed, if you are not allowed to reload?

[punkbass2000]

In case you 'have to' reload. 'Have to' including power outages, game freezes and the like. You don't wanna throw away a good game for no reason just because of bad luck. You do, however, want to have autosave on, or else preserve random seed is, in fact, pointless. It will only replay one turn, assuming you are honest enough to act in the same way you did before to the best of your knowledge.

[vmxa1]

I understand how it works and in the event of "acts of god", I am not going to be concerned about the seed, if "forced" to reload. So again, I do not see the point.

[Dominae]

vmxa1, being forced to reload with a new random seed could potentially alter a turn to be more beneficial than it was the first time around. This is admittedly a borderline case, so maybe I should simply not have mentioned it. But, I see no reason why you would want to not preserve the random seed unless you were planning to "cheat" in this way.

As a side note, it is very tempting to cheat in OCC by reloading the same turns, even with the same seed. You would do this not by changing your combat plans but by gaining information in diplomacy (I suppose altering combat plans is a form of information gain). For example, you get a tech that none of the AI civs have discovered. In what order should you sell the techs to the civs in order to maximize your return? Sometimes the first civ is willing to pay exhorbitant amounts, but the other civs will only give you their World map and 5 gold. Other times the first civ will pay handsomly for it and so will the second. Reloading to figure this out lets you unfairly ('unfair' defined as outside the rules of the game) maximize your trades.


Dominae

[vmxa1]

I understand how the game, works. My point is either I play fair or I do not. If do, then, it does not matter how I set the RNG as I am not going to reload. Well maybe in the extereme case of the fabled power outage. In that case I am not going to lose sleep over the impact of the RNG for that one turn, it may in fact hurt me. Anyway, it was just a point that stuck me funny. I agree it is cheating, whoops let me retrack that before I get blasted. It is not something I do.

[punkbass2000]

Well, in any case, there's no reason NOT to have the Random Seed on.

[Arrian]

Hmm... maybe I'll try an OCC tonight as the Babs. I'll go Monarch on a Tiny map, I think.

-Arrian

[SanPellegrino]

Originally posted by Dominae
As I've mentioned above, Diplomatic and Cultural victories are quite easy.

AFAIK participants in the UN Vote must control at least 25% population and landmass on the map, so how can an OCC Diplo Victory be possible?

[punkbass2000]

If you build the UN, you're in automatically.

'If you build it, they will come... and vote for you.'

[SanPellegrino]

Originally posted by punkbass2000
If you build the UN, you're in automatically.

'If you build it, they will come... and vote for you.'

I thought that, but in my last OCC I built the UN, but wasn't able to call a vote! I did use UN with 1.29 the first time, is there a new way to call the vote?

[punkbass2000]

Perhaps... I don't have 1.29

[SanPellegrino]

but thx for prompt answering, only one minute!

[punkbass2000]

I do what I can

[Bella Hella]

wow! thank you, thank you, thank you for this thread. i've wanted to try the OCC for the longest time. i finally did it a couple nights ago, but i didn't know any of the rules and ended up winning a cultural victory on warlord AND having another city due to a flip. not much of a challenge. can't wait to try again, this time the right way. i'm gonna try regent level (i still play normal games exclusively on monarch).

[SanPellegrino]

I won on Warlord with Cultural Victory, too, ok, maybe this is vs the rules of OCC, but it was the most thrilling game I've ever had: I was about 5 turns from CV, when the top dog, the romans next to me, which I tried to calm all the game, sneak attacked me. They pulled with about 15 tanks and some infantry in my tiny empire, I had only 4 or 5 infs. They attacked the next turns and brought reinforcements, I hold them off barely, one turn before CV they brought me down to one Inf. This brave little man won his next battle vs the roman tanks, got to elite won his next, generated a leader, (I named them "last man standing" of course ), next "YOU WIN".

Can you imagine my excitement during this last attacks?
And some people say round based games are boring...

[Dominae]

Hey, if you guys want to play OCC with Cultural victory on, and (most importantly) you have fun doing it, then DO SO! As SanPellegrino's game shows, you can still have a heck of a game trying to win Culturally.

In my rules-post I was just trying to carry over as many rules from the original OCC format, and not trying to dictate how people should play their games. This said, I believe trying to win via SS launch is the most challenging victory type in OCC.

As for building the UN, I'm pretty sure punkbass2000 is correct: you get to call a vote periodically and are automatically in the list of candidates. SanPellegrino, do you perhaps have a save from the game where you couldn't use the UN properly?


Dominae

[Arrian]

Dominae,

Did you build the UN in your game? If you don't build it, you can't control the vote, and could end up losing, not because of a strategic mistake, but rather luck 'o the draw.

-Arrian

[Dominae]

Arrian, I originally played my first OCC games with all vicotry conditions enabled. I disliked how essential it was to build the UN in the Modern age (moreso in OCC games than in regular games) and how Diplomatic wins weren't as satisfying as SS wins. So I simply turned off Diplomatic victory.

Like I said above, it definitely isn't easy to get to Fission and build the UN in an OCC game, but if you do, most civs will probably vote for you because you've been such a nice guy the whole game.


Dominae

[SanPellegrino]

Too bad I got no savegame from that, I keep only the savs of my "epic" games. I only recall that in 1.21 or something you were prompted every round to vote, don't know about 1.29.

Would be fun to see if you could be the governor with only one city, because in my last occ game the AI fought a lot of their kind, but all were polite or gracious towards me.

[SanPellegrino]

Sorry dominae, I overread parts of your post, seems you did a diplo win in OCC. Can you trigger the vote yourself after building UN in 1.29?