The Cost of Research Explained

[solo]

ST,

If your key civ is destroyed, your research costs are maximized. If restarts are on, you will have to wait until the new key civ appears. The new key civ is apt to have fewer techs than the old one, so you will have to gift all techs again to lower your research costs. If restarts are off, you're in big trouble, since you no longer have a key civ unless your power rating changes.

If a civ other than your key civ is destroyed, your key civ remains the same, as do your tech costs.

I have not tested games starting with less than 7 civs, but would guess that missing colors also mean missing key civs, since in a game with 7 civs, destroying civs other than your key civ does not affect your own key civ relationship.

Samson's formulas apply to medium maps only.

[SlowThinker]

Originally posted by solo
If your key civ is destroyed, your research costs are maximized.

What does this mean? I thought there is no maximum and that every three techs cause +1 penalty beyond any limit.

[Ben Kenobi]

Bravo solo!

Combined with the base beaker numbers one will be able to calculate the total number of beakers required for all situations, provided you know the number of techs controlled by your key civ.

Awesome

[solo]

Exactly obiwan18!

All of this can be figured out down to the last beaker, if one wants to make the effort. After all, it's a computer running things and computers are NOT good at being inaccurate.

ST,

When your key civ is destroyed, the game interprets this to mean they suddenly have zero techs, which gives you a tech lead equal to the number of techs you currently have. You will incur the maximum penalty, which is equal to your tech total divided by 3. (Of course, for every three techs you acquire afterwards, the "maximum" penalty will increase by 1.) Perhaps an example will help:

In my test game, I had 72 techs and currently had a 3 tech lead over my key civ, which gave me a +1 penalty (3/3=1), which when added to the base of 26 resulted in a beaker cost of 1944 (72 x 27).

Then I destroyed my key civ. After this my tech "lead" was 72, so the game assigned me a penalty of 24 (72/3=24), which when added to the base of 26 (26+24=50) resulted in a beaker increase to 3600 (72 x 50).

In this test my tech costs increased even more, because my SSC had three railed routes to key civ cities, and these routes vanished after the key civ was destroted, increasing my tech costs all the way up to 4032 beakers.

Since restarts were on, once I re-established contact with my new key civ and gifted them all of my techs, my research costs went back down quite a bit, but did not recover fully due to the missing SSC trade routes.

One reason why the restart option is on in our comparison games is to make it fairer for players who happen to have their key civ destroyed. When the new one appears they can recover. Without a new key civ, they would be paying the maximum penalty for the rest of the game.

[Bloody Monk]

@ Solo

Thank you for taking the time to explain the penalty consequences so fully. The more details, the better the concept anchors, at least for me. You are a great teacher and we all appreciate your contributions. It took a lot of patience, on a Sunday morning, to compose that lesson for us. Thanks.

I can't wait to read your forthcoming "Doctrine."

Monk

[SlowThinker]

Thank you, solo. But I don't understand the following sentence:

In this test my tech costs increased even more, because my SSC had three railed routes to key civ cities, and these routes vanished after the key civ was destroted, increasing my tech costs all the way up to 4032 beakers.

Does a trade route directly decrease the tech costs?

[solo]

Monk,

Flattery will get you everywhere! The guide goes slowly, as I'd rather be playing.

ST,

Trade routes add many trade arrows from which beakers used for research are based. Losing my trade routes decreased the beaker capacity of my SSC, making techs seem more costly.

[Bloody Monk]

Originally posted by solo
Monk,

Flattery will get you everywhere! The guide goes slowly, as I'd rather be playing.

ST,

Trade routes add many trade arrows from which beakers used for research are based. Losing my trade routes decreased the beaker capacity of my SSC, making techs seem more costly.

It's not so much flattery as appreciation for your willingness to teach.

The trade route problem happened in my game in a slightly different way. After Flight, the Karakorum routes no longer stuck when I delivered to the SSC. This drop from +27 to +9 for that slot was just enough to drop me out of one turn for the next advance. The 611g I received for the delivery of demanded spice was nice, but costly in terms of advances.

Lots of nuances to this game.

Monk

[solo]

ST,

I should have thought this over a bit more. You are right that trade routes should not alter the number of beakers needed for the next tech, since this is a fixed cost.

After a few more tests, it's not clear to me where the additional +6 penalty came from that resulted in the 4032 cost instead of the expected 3600. This could be due to the starting techs given to the new key civ when it is created. If this is so, the penalties are still steep for players when their key civ is eliminated, even after contact is established with the new key civ and all techs are gifted.

[Ben Kenobi]

Anyone have an algorithm for the first 19 techs?

Once you are researching your 20th tech, the beaker counts jump to (32)X where X = the technumber of the tech you are researching.

[Bloody Monk]

Originally posted by obiwan18
Anyone have an algorithm for the first 19 techs?

Once you are researching your 20th tech, the beaker counts jump to (32)X where X = the technumber of the tech you are researching.

obi,

I think you are mistaken. Everything you ask for is given in the first post of this thread. If, after reading it, you wish to delete your post, then, I will delete this one.

As noted elsewhere, the thread is about medium maps. If you are thinking of different map sizes, Solo suggests a 4/5 or 5/4 correction, IIRC.

Monk

[goape]

Thank you for showing how to calculate beaker costs for advances.

There is one question I need to ask which is not directly related to the science cost. I did try to search for the answer but could not find it. So forgive my ignorance but how do you calculate the science bonus created by a caravan trade route?

Thank you for your time.

[Ben Kenobi]

Thanks, BM.

Guess my head was hard. Reading over solo's post, I realised that his list of numbers 1-20 for the base count explains the differences.

I'll rephrase my request:

If Cost = Technumber * (Basefactor + penalty/bonus).

Let Cost = C, Technumber = T Basefactor = X penalty = p and bonus = b

Now C = T *(X- p/b)

X = ? All we have for X is a list of numbers, for techs
0-20.

Can we have a formula to calculate X?
This would make it much easier to remember the most obvious case without beaker penalties.

[La Fayette]

Originally posted by goape
forgive my ignorance but how do you calculate the science bonus created by a caravan trade route?

When you deliver a commodity caravan (freight) somewhere, you are granted a one time bonus in gold + the same amount in beakers.
The ongoing bonus (usually named trade route) is trade arrows.

[solo]

obiwan18,

All techs totals of 20 or above have the same base, which is 26. Base numbers vary for the first 19 techs, so each one was listed. Base numbers are not calculated from any thing else, they are constants. Calculations involve adjustments (penalty or bonus) to the base number, after which the tech cost can be found by multiplying this adjusted base by the current number of techs.

goape,

Besides the delivery beaker bonus (exactly equal to the cash payoff in gold) mentioned by La Fayette, once a new route is established, it adds more trade arrows to the total, from which a city's total of science beakers is derived. You can check a city's beaker total before and after a delivery to see how many beakers you gain this way.