early game advice for culture victory please

[grumble]

According to the Overall World Rankings I am culturally massively ahead of my nearest rival.
I am generating 1908 tourism and 1223 culture per turn.
My nearest rival is generating 156 tourism and 358 culture per turn.

And yet the culture screen estimates I will only get a culture victory in 277 turns. (I will either have a science or diplomatic victory in about 35 turns but I get most satisfaction from a culture victory)

In the culture screen I can see that my rival has 358 visiting tourists to my 328. So even though I am now producing massively more tourism per turn I am currently second in the race.

The only way I can make sense of this is that somehow earlier in the game my rival built up a culture lead that it is going to take me ages to catch up with.

In the early game I believe it is essential to prioritise science despite hoping for a cultural victory because if you do not you get invaded by greatly superior quality forces.

So are there any tips and tricks for gaining more tourism in the early game that does not involve building culture buildings before science buildings? (Note: I always build monuments as soon as I can)

[grognardgary]

Remember it doesn't count rock bands. The only thing I can think of early game, would be to pick a religion and make picks from there that carry cultural benefits.

[jmerry82]

The time estimate on the cultural victory screen is extremely unreliable. Basically, if you earned any visiting tourists last turn, it divides how many more you need to win (if your opponents don't add any more defense) by how many you gained. Since you typically earn a fraction of one visiting tourist per rival per turn, this is a very erratic measure. Some turns you'll gain several tourists, some you'll gain none.

But yeah. Rock bands are how you rush a culture victory. Which means you need faith production, which comes from developed holy sites. And the most important factor on religion is to have one in your cities so you can build worship buildings. Nothing about that religion's beliefs makes much of a difference.

[plaguepenguin]

The early game effects of both domestic tourists drawn by culture, and of foreign tourists drawn by tourism, are cumulative, but they're swamped by late game additions to your tourism base and, more importantly, your tourism multipliers.

The most effective strategy is to climb the tech and civics trees ahead of your rivals so that you reach the late game enhancements to tourism base and its multipliers before your competitors have a chance to pump up their domestic tourists by pumping out a lot of culture in the late game.

Buy their great works starting in about the mid-game, which lowers their culture and thus their defense, while increasing your tourism. You have to start in the mid-game because they are going to stop selling later on as you become a clear threat of winning. For this strategy to work, you need to have enough great work slots to warehouse your purchases, so this is when you have to start building theater squares. Their culture helps you climb up the civics tree so they're nice even earlier for that, but you may have other ways of getting culture, like unique tile improvements, that are more cost-efficient at getting culture early. You mention monuments, which are of course the basic culture side hustle that takes some of the pressure off building theater squares early.

Getting ahead in science is important, so it's not wrong to continue to prioritize science in the early and mid-game, but you also want to build one of the two money districts in most cities, because you need money to buy great works and great people, and you want to send trade routes to every civ, because that's one of the two early game multipliers. Holy sites give faith points, which are nice for buying great people, and in the late game get you national parks and rock bands. The parks are your best late-game additions to your tourism base, because besides their significant tourism, they give amenities and era score. IZs are a mid-game priority as well, because wonders not only add to your tourism base (the earlier built the more they earn), but some of them are also great works warehouses, and some (Eiffel Tower, the Redentor, the Biosphere) enhance your tourism base significantly. Walls are something the human player rarely has much use for in war against AIs (okay, below Deity, anyway), but they also grant tourism, and this is about the only reason I have ever chosen Monarchy.

District priorities aside, exploration and naval techs become more important, because of the two multipliers you get from almost the start of the game, open borders and trade routes. Get both with as many civs as you can as early as you can, to start accumulating tourism.

If the ultimate goal is culture victory, about the only area that has its priority lowered in the early and mid-game is conquest. Just lowered, not abolished, because doubling your land is always nice. It's just that it comes with extra downsides specific to winning a culture victory. If you indulge conquest too much, many and then all the surviving civs will not grant open borders, thus denying you one of the game's two early multipliers. Complete conquest of a competitor also removes a source of the foreign tourists you need to attract.

Tourism is cumulative, right from the start of the game, but doesn't really start accumulating significantly until later. It certainly isn't wrong to build theater squares early. That helps with your base tourism, but you have other priorities that help you get more quickly to the late game's huge enhancements of your base and multipliers. It's probably more important to get both of your early game multipliers in play, than it is to get a bigger base early.

[gdshore]

Museums, both types and alliances (particularly late game) and economics. You will need to make trades, favorable to your allies, this will strengthen the alliance and somtimes in late game allow trade on/in great works. You have to build wonders especially those that give culture, you also need a strong production function, that means industry. (do what you can to acquire those engineers that help build wonders [gold helps here]) Finally "Rock Bands" they can give culture points from a couple hundred to multiple thousand and for that to work you need holy sites and followers.

[stuff]

I can't add anything other than make sure you pick a civ with good bonuses to culture, which you're probably already doing.

[colostmy4]

What I like doing is choosing cathedrals for my religious structure, and if you have Gathering Storm, pick Voidsingers for secret society. The religious artifacts from the Voidsingers that the cultist make gives you a large amount of tourism, more than normal religious artifacts. The cathedrals will give you extra room for religious works of art. You can trade for religious works with other civs or steal them with spies. I have noticed that there seems to be a limit on the number of religious artifacts you can make with cultist though, so you might also want to build that wonder that allows all of your Apostles to create a religious relic if they die in religious combats including with whatever ability the Apostle already has.