Calling All Tourists

My Great Scientist at the campus of London.

 This is the third in a series of blog posts about my search for science fiction elements in the computer game Civilization VI. In the previous post, I had complained about my inability to obtain a Great Scientist, but I did finally obtain Erwin Schrödinger (see the image to the right →). Apparently the word "scientist" was not used until 1833 and that was about the game year when I got my one and only scientist. Early in the game, I was trying to accumulate science points because I expected computer technology to be important for my goal of attracting international tourists to England.

The 50 foot scientist.

Earthly "culture" in 1958

In case you are wondering, the other giant man standing there in the middle of London's commercial district (in the center of the image, above) is a spy, protecting the English Empire's vast gold reserves from foreign spies.

The year before I was born, the film Attack of the 50 Foot Woman came to the big screen. Seeing apparently gigantic (mutant?) human figures walking around in London and the rest of the English Empire adds a science fiction feel to Civilization VI. I wish the game designers had arranged to allow Great People like Erwin and naturalists (see below) to remain on the map after they provide their bonuses. 

Rather than stay on the map and provide some eye-candy during the game, the Great People and naturalists simply evaporate into thin air when their bonus has been given to a civilization. 🙁 

game mod allows naturalists on mountains

Teleportation. While playing Civilization VI, it looks like the human figures beam in to the game, perform their mission and then teleport away. This reminds me of my favorite Star Trek episode, "Assignment: Earth".

Besides waiting thousands of years to obtain a Great Scientist, the two other "big events" that I was rather impatiently anticipating during the long slow development of England from its founding in 4,000 BCE were 1) the arrival of naturalists and 2) the ability to build a British Museum. 

One of my goals was to build as many National Parks as I possibly could in an effort to attract more tourists to England. The image shown to the right illustrates a Civilization VI game modification that allows naturalist units to move onto mountain tiles.

Figure 1: Delhi National Park, east of the city Delhi

My goal of making multiple National Parks was what motivated me to develop my own religion. You need 1,600 "faith points" to buy your first naturalist unit and 1,800 points for your second naturalist. One of the most annoying parts of Civilization VI is the never-ending escalation in prices during the game.

I did not even notice the location of Delhi National Park (see Figure 1 to the left ←) until I got my first naturalist. In fact, my builder unit was just about ready to build a sawmill in the forest and a farm on that wheat resource. One of the rules for National Parks is that there can't be any improvements on the four map tiles of the Park.

Figure 2: future location of a National Park

I was paying particular attention to mountains that could be included in a National Park (see the example shown in the image to the right). I completely over-looked the flat land and river east of Delhi (Figure 1, above). The yellow dotted line along part of the boundary of Delhi National Park is the border of Macedonia. With any luck, this Park will attract plenty of Macedonian tourists! The only tourists who count towards winning a cultural victory in Civilization VI are international tourists. 

What I believed were two potential National Park Locations are shown in Figure 3, below. However, you can't turn four mountain tiles into a park because of the absurd game rule that naturalists can't climb mountains, a fact that I learned the hard way after spending $500 gold to purchase two of the mountain tiles in an effort to prevent them from being absorbed into Macedonia's expanding territory.

Figure 3: Mountains are "appeal" rated as "breathtaking", so many National Parks include mountains.

My second National Park was Pantanal National Park near London (see image below).

A naturalist is standing on the road that passes through the northern most tile of the Pantanal Natural Wonder.

a Park headquarters on hills

Before I understood the silly restriction that prevents naturalist units from moving onto mountain tiles, I wondered if a diamond of four mountain map tiles was not suitable as a National Park because there was no flat land for the park headquarters. Or, I wondered, maybe all my construction projects along the northeast side of these mountains prevented formation of a National Park. Upon building Pantanal National Park, I saw that it did not include any headquarters buildings and apparently not even a sign to inform visitors that they have entered the Park (see the image below).

Pantanal National Park seems to have no park headquarters, just a boundary fence.

The Colossus of Eastport.

In Civilization VI, there are little animations that continually run on some of the map tiles. For example, mining equipment can be seen at work on a tile where you have constructed a mine. 

Don't just stand there! Some of the features on the map are actually statues. For example, I built the Colossus wonder next to the seaport of my city Eastport (see the image to the right). I wish the naturalists who found National Parks could remain on the map and be seen interacting with tourists, otherwise, a park like Delhi National Park can look very empty. I had to send in one of my Apostles just to have something there on the endless grasslands of the park (see the image, below).

A hiker explores the vast, empty prairie of Delhi National Park

She's pissed. I earned a big red -96 for my war with India.

The cities of Delhi and Hyderabad were both originally part of India, but I captured them during a war (see the previous post in this series).

I was worried that by going to war relatively late in the game, after I obtained iron, the other nations of the world would be upset and not allow open border agreements with me, which would reduce tourism. I tried sending gifts to the other leaders, but doing so seemed to have no (or very little) effect on their unhappiness. 

Indian war casualties

Everyone except Alexander the Macedonian persistently denounced me as a warmonger, even hundreds of years after the end of my war against Gandhi. Ultimately, I learned that for tourism, it makes almost no difference if a foreign leader is mad at you and there are no open boarders. The tourists will still visit your attractions.

My war against India was good in the long run because it allowed me to stop continually struggling against the Hindu missionaries who constantly tried to convert my people to Hinduism. No longer having to create apostle units, I could save "faith" points towards obtaining a naturalist. Another benefit of the war against India was that it seemed to turn Alexander of Macedonia into my best buddy. 

Of great importance for my cultural victory strategy, the 150-year-long war against Gandhi produced many archeological sites which later provided most of the ancient artifacts that ended up in my museums where they generated huge amounts of culture points and were a major draw for international tourists.

England is Suzerain of Zanzibar.

By exploring the world with a scout, a caravel and a quadrireme I found all 12 of the City-states. Currently, in 1850, I am Suzerain of Zanzibar which means I get two special resources (cloves and cinnamon). Also, the sugar resource does not seem to be present in Australia.

artifact from the time of the England-India war

 British Museum. When I captured the Indian cities of Agra and Delhi, they both had a theater district that had already been built by Gandhi. I constructed museums in both of those cities, expecting that they would each hold six ancient artifacts. However, as shown below in Figure 4, both of those museums only hold three ancient artifacts.

I did not keep track of when I transitioned between the different eras during the game. I got the industrialization technology shortly before the start of the war in about 1550, so apparently I was in the Industrial Era during the war. One of the first few "ancient" artifacts that ended up in a museum in 1848 is shown to the left: an old newspaper found near Agra.

Figure 4. The collected artifacts at the museum in Delhi were automatically called "themed".

Figure 5. Foreign trade routes boost tourism by 25%.

Theater districts that I build do hold six artifacts (see the 6 ancient artifact "slots" for the museum in OrangePearls, in the image above). However, one part of the British Museum special benefits did apply to the museum in Delhi: the three artifacts were automatically called "themed" which nicely doubles the tourism benefits.

Gambling. Civilization VI is more like gambling than playing a game. Players never know what rules govern the computerized civilizations or determine the types of ancient artifacts that are found in the field. 

artifact from the defeated Indians

In Civilization VI, the players are forced to pretend that museum curators would be too stupid to control which artifacts are placed in their displays. This leads to the annoying task of trying to sort the artifacts by era and nation of origin after the museum displays are full. I'm grateful that the British Museum perks remove the need for that annoying task of artifact sorting.

In the past, I've mostly used trade routes to help provide productivity and food to my smaller, rapidly growing cities. You get a boost in the number of international tourists by sending a trader to each of the other nations in the game (see Figure 5, above). I was able to make a trade route to the capital city of each nation except Brazil, which may have had its capital at a location too far away from my cities. One of the benefits from building the Colossus is getting an additional trade unit.

another Indian artifact

As mentioned in my previous blog post, in 1440 AD there were three international tourists visiting England and 62 domestic tourists. The England-Indian war was from 1550 to 1700 AD. Not much had changed for tourists after three centuries: by 1760 AD, there were 6 international and 146 domestic tourists in England (see below). At that point in time, I was tied for third place

war artifact

in the race to attract international tourists. 

The archeological museum in Delhi opened in 1802, but then I had to train my first archeologist and did not get any ancient artifacts until the 1830s (see image to the right). This closely matches the historical timeline for the real British Museum. The Agra museum opened a few turns after the one in Delhi.

Tourism in 1760 AD. All international tourists in the England Empire were visiting London's palace ( 1 ), Stonehenge wonder ( 2 ) or the Holy Site ( 3 ) for the AllTogetherNow religion.

first dig

  The first archeological dig site (run by my first archeologist, Sigeberht) was right next to Delhi (see the image to the right). At some archeological sites you get a choice between two different artifacts from two civilizations; in this case I could get an Indian artifact or an English artifact. Other times, there is no choice. I was eager to explore this site, because it was blocking a forest resource from being developed with a sawmill, which would have provided additional benefits to Delhi.

Tourism in 1810. A few international tourists were visiting other English cities besides London (upper right). Eight of the eleven international tourists were visiting cultural sites in London. One international tourist was at the Delhi National Park. Due to my high culture, I had a growing lead in number of domestic tourists (171).

I built the Hermitage wonder in London.

When I got the technology for radio in 1802 there was a small surge in tourism. In 1810 I began making trade routes to foreign cities and in 1814 I completed the Hermitage wonder in London. 

The most dramatic and rapid increase in tourism (100% boost) came in 1840 when I got computer technology (maybe a Babbage Engine). My tourism points rate (this rate is different than the number of domestic tourists) increased from 139 in 1840 to 292 in 1844. I'm not sure how computers could realistically have such a quick effect, so let's call this a crazy science fiction element in Civ VI.

From third place in 1775 to first place in 1850 (below).

I was worried that when I changed governments from Monarchy to Democracy there might be a conflict with the governments of the other world civilizations, but I added some new cultural policies and only got one complaint from one other nation about my new form of government. By 1850 I was in first place in the race for international tourists (see below).

Tourism in the eastern English Empire in 1850 was still strongest in London. There was one visitor in Eastport (right) and one at the Pantanal National Park and one at Oxford University.

Tourism in the western part of the English Empire in 1850. Yellow: the City-state of Muscat. There is 1 international tourist at the Colosseum (far left of the image, above). Only one tourist at the archeological museum in Delhi (lower right) and two tourists at a nearby Wonder. By 1850, some city centers like the one in Agra were starting to attract tourists simply because of the existence of their ancient walls.

the first antiquity I obtained

It was a long (5,850 years) slog to finally reach first place in the race for tourists. I obtained my first antiquity in 1834 (an Indian map, see the image to the left) and it started earning "culture points" in the Delhi museum (see the image below, Figure 6). 

I still have not received any Great Writers or Great Artists. To earn more culture from works of art, I'll have to learn how to spend my cash for patronage of the arts. The image below shows the theater district of Delhi (pink buildings) and three archeological dig sites (their map hexes are outlined in white in Figure 6).

Figure 6. My first archeologist in Delhi.

There are still many archeological sites remaining to be visited by my archeologists, so my current focus is on archeology. Now that I've moved into first place, is there anything that can stop me from winning the game?

Cleopatra is getting restless.

 I've seen mention of using military attacks to stop another player from winning a cultural victory. So far, I've kept Alexander of Macedonia on my good side, but I would not be surprised if someone attacked me and tried to disrupt my civilization's progress. I've already caught several spies trying to steal money from me and I have casus belli to start a war with Egypt. However, my preference would be to fight no more wars during this game.

I'll be extending this series of blog posts about computer game science fiction as my current Civ VI game continues and tourism in England expands...

Related Reading: the first post in this series

Next: Universal Game Robots