How does culture contribute to cultural victory?

[Oaks]

I've seen in the modern age dev diary, the cultural victory involves having a certain number of artifacts displayed in your cities. Sounds cool.

I missed though how culture points actually contribute to this. Some modern age civs go pretty strong into culture, so how does that help?

I know that culture points are for unlocking civics, so you can get the required civic unlocked earlier and get out there and look for artifacts, but past that do we know how they contribute? Archeologists cost culture too perhaps?

I'm just planning some of my playthroughs ahead of time, and wondering the best way to win with cultural powerhouses.

[plaguepenguin]

It is as of yet unclear exactly how this will work, because the Modern livestream only followed America at war, rather than engaged in any search for artifacts, and the previewers either didn't get a build that goes into the Modern, or are embargoed from showing and discussing the Modern.

What I glean from the livestream is that you have to unlock the archaeologists, presumably by moving up the civics tree, which will of course require a high culture point output to get done before the competition. You also need to have museums in which to slot the artifacts once you get them, and the museums I imagine will be unlocked on the civics tree by expending culture. It is possible that you unlock both with the same civic, of course. As an added wrinkle, to find out where the artifacts are so that you can retrieve them, your archaeologist has to go to either a museum or a university (I forget which) to do some research. Then, after you get the number of artifacts all displayed in museums to get to the third milestone, that lets you start a project that wins the culture victory if you complete it before any of your competitors complete any of the victory projects. There was mention of the total legacy points earned in all eras making the project easier

Clearly, a lot of yields beyond your culture output are going to help you do all of this before the competition can win. You get access to archaeologists and museums earlier the more culture you have, which will help, but all sorts of other factors also will help. If the victory projects work as projects do in 6, you will benefit by having a city with a high production output for that final push. Production seems to be a focus in the Modern, so high production is something you want and need anyway. Having gotten more legacy points in all three ages will help you get the projects done more rapidly, so all the pathways in all the ages will matter. If it's universities, or some other science building where the research has to take place, then you will need those early as well, presumably by way of having high science output and moving up the tech tree faster, though, who knows, maybe that building will end up being unlocked on the civics tree. Overall, aside from achieving a victory condition yourself, you also have to keep any opponent from winning before you can, so it's not as if you can ignore your military.

Even more unclear to me is how much you can bring across in the Exploration to Modern age transition to help you win the culture victory. While it is true that your Exploration buildings are going to lose their adjacencies, and have to be overbuilt with Modern buildings, they still all retain their base outputs. Having built more culture buildings in earlier ages is going to put you ahead of the competition in culture yields during the early Modern, before any of you have a chance to overbuild. I don't recall what the Modern culture golden age you can earn in Exploration does, but if it's anything like the science golden age, which lets your Exploration science buildings keep their adjacencies, you will really be at a huge advantage moving up the civics tree in that early Modern period. Other perks that carry over will also of course help with culture, high culture leader attributes most directly, but every advantage can be made to help indirectly in any other area.

This need to bring in all the yields to help specific areas is not new to 7. A big help to total tourism in 6 was to move up the tech tree to get all the new multipliers, as well as to unlock new sources of base tourism. Moving up the civics tree was nice as well, for the same reasons. Having high production helps make theater squares, and even better, lets you snag more of those wonders that house great works. Lots of gold lets you buy the great people who make great works, or the great works themselves from your competitors. Faith lets you get naturalists and rock bands, as well as great people who make great works.

[Oaks]

Very helpful, thanks! I always appreciate the depth of your posts.

Military, science, and production leaning Civs fit well into the different victory paths, I was wondering how to best approach culture. You are right, high culture means faster civic unlocks, the rest will remain to be seen.

[katzenkrimis]

Originally posted by Oaks:

Some modern age civs go pretty strong into culture, so how does that help?

Archeologists cost culture too perhaps?

Age Progression.

In the Modern Age the ultimate victory is to build the World's Fair. You need to get to the end of the Legacy Path using Culture.

They haven't shown us any Indian Jones boys yet, but I doubt that they cost Culture.

Ed Beach called them Explorers in this game, not Archaeologists.

[plaguepenguin]

Originally posted by katzenkrimis:

Originally posted by Oaks:

Some modern age civs go pretty strong into culture, so how does that help?

Archeologists cost culture too perhaps?

Age Progression.

In the Modern Age the ultimate victory is to build the World's Fair. You need to get to the end of the Legacy Path using Culture.

They haven't shown us any Indian Jones boys yet, but I doubt that they cost Culture.

Ed Beach called them Explorers in this game, not Archaeologists.

Wasn't Indiana Jones sort of both?