My first go at the RON Challenge game has been posted. I clicked Enlightenment Age at 14:09 13:28. The game is posted at Carch's Site o' Fun, although you might need to wait until he approves it. I used the SCI2 -> CLASSICAL build. There's certainly room for improvement as I did nothing to optimize my build purely for achieving early Enlightenment (e.g., I over-researched SCI and that cost a lot of knowledge, losing at least a couple of minutes) and I made early granaries and lumber mills (not sure when is the optimal time to make these).

For those who want to try it, download the save game here. You have to play it, then post your game and time and what build you used. RON Challenge Game

UPDATE: Posted a 13:28 version. The obvious thing is to get the universities up and full of scholars as quickly as possible. Also, the univeristy upgrades at medieval (200 timber) and gunpowder (400 timber) are very important. Getting additional commerce and production bonus upgrades aren't worth it because the payback period goes beyond the game length (in this case). The not-so-obvious thing is that the extra knowledge of cost of COM2 is offset by the knowledge gathered during the earlier classical. As Apollyon so eloquently put it, in a real game it will come down to the rares you get.

posted by Tim at 4:43 PM