Technology beelining

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Artuero
The GP techs (Music, Economics, Physics and Fusion),

For me, this is very situational. Music is nearly always very nice: it will most likely give the first GA of the game (you can get there using caste system, but I haven't done so. Avoiding Music and doing that can be an option, though).

Economics, OTOH, is less important in my games. I nearly always run merchants when I'm short in cash. An extra GM is nice, but not that important. Of course, it's better to take the advantage instead of giving it to someone else

Physics similar. GS are easy to come by.

Fusion can be good but there is not that much use of a GE that late. Can be very helpful if you specifically play for it, though.

DeepO

[gentle]

I for myself use some sort of "research modules", that is some sort of short-term beelining imho.
This depends on personal style/strategy a bit,imho.
What I mean by that is that -depending on strategy- the occurances of "downtimes" occur during different periods.
As an example:
My current early game research modules etc:

1.
Mining
Bronze
Masonry
->Aiming at: Enable chopping + get Pyramids

Depending on diff. it may happen that my 2nd city placement is entirely dedicated to Pyramid chopping (lots of forest, no matter how bad city site is otherwise) and one Settler beforehand. Also I start with Worker/Settler/Worker

2.
Mysticism
Polytheism
Priesthood
->Aim: get Oracle and Prereq for Writing

3.
Writing
->get Diplomacy bonus (OB), get Libraries, important prereq.
As you might have noticed I didnt research any Worker Techs til now, that is cause all my Workers are chopping stuff (only 2 workers there anywhere).

Downtime now. Cities have to grow in order to be big enough to set up scientist if needed.Libraries have to be built to be able to set up scientiest, workers (have to) finish on chopping pyramids.
Depending on what Cities are up to atm, I delay it and research stuff from from nr4.

4. Worker Techs - Downtime
Agriculure
Wheel
Pottery
Animal Husbandry
-> get Worker Techs,Sailing e.g. depends on whatever one wants.

From now on key techs for me are:
-Alphabet to trade techs
-Literature for Great Library to get extra scientists and dampen the anti-growth effect specialists have
-Mathematics for Hanging Gardens
-Astronomy (I play on terra maps or earth),meaning compass+optics.Maybe this is the only thing you might call beeline?

Short Comment on Difficulties:
I play either Noble or Deity. The one described above is sort of ideal noble research though even on deity the only thing I have to change is that I have to put in Archery (and hunting of course) very early.
Main point here is to sharpen my senses on what is going on and what I need. Sort of getting flexible but not losing focus...Having those modules, leading to personal key techs, just speeds things up (not losing focus ^^) and when arriving in modern era I find myself missing lots of earlier techs (the ones that seem to be more/less irrelevant for my style - can be argued against though it shows that I had a plan considering tech tree, which imho is a good thing overall).

Comment on downtimes/different strategies:
Warmongers might laugh at even considering Pyramdis or Literature as key-techs and religious players might wonder where the heck is my Stonehenge or which religion did I found?
Culture guys might find it dramatically barbarious to not include drama for theatres, etc.
These approaches lead to different key techs,imho, and therefore to different modules (keytech+prereqs) and different timing when to do stuff (like missionaries,etc)

[DeepO]

gentle, I think you're on to something. "research modules" is good term to describe how research in CIV works: you nearly never just go for one tech, because it's available and it seems cool to have. You always have some purpose you are aiming for. Sometimes that goal is far off and you can call it a beeline (e.g. the CS-beeline), sometimes it's much closer.

Both things are needed in any game, although the real beelines are a bit more advanced: they give more, but require more effort as well.

My research modules would be those leading to Priesthood, harbors, writing, pottery, gunpowder, alphabet, CS (obviously!), and some others. You can probably divide them into military ones (AH, BW, IW, MC are the early ones), economic ones (writing, alphabet, lit, CS, Optics, Biology), growth ones (worker techs, pottery, CS, Optics, etc), civics, and so on. In many situation's you'll find that the general 'my empire needs something military' can give you a couple of military research modules to go for. Depending on your style, you pick on of them.

DeepO

[gentle]

Yes, I think most modules consist of 2 things:

1st: to reach certain points in development
-this needs a little bit of thinking beforehand. what style of game do I want to play? What are the interesting techs for me (according to impact on the game for example)?
Obviously this needs some experience on how games develop, which techs can trigger off new style. For example I try to avoid war until the gunpowder area, then suddenly my pacifistic, defensive style changes to aggressive redcoat diplomacy =P

2nd: How do I get there ?
-just checking which prerequisite techs one wants to research because there are several ways to a tech one might want, soo which suits my style best.

[cal_01]

gentle: that's a very nice formalization to something that may be prevalent around here, but without any real substance yet. Bravo!

[lastchance]

I think there are few very important key "modules" or just plain techs in the early game.

Military-wise, I think Animal Husbandry + Wheel/H-Back Riding w/ Archery (to Bronze Working later for production boost, or something else I haven't seen) and Bronze Working by itself (revolving around Axeman, and a few spears) are absolutely deadly, if you get the resources.

Archers just seem way too easy to stop, they lose a lot of effectiveness once your opponent gets Archers, IMHO, a much stronger defensive tech than an offensive one, though you will need it for Horse Archers, so it will be something that warmongers need to research.

Tech-wise, Metal Casting leads to lots of production (but you're going to have make that work) all-around for tech (Great Lighthouse, Hanging Gardens, more workers, spread religion, etc). Can't really turn that into a game-winning advantage without some happiness or some real strong military units, which means either you need to hybrid this line, or you can go for Machinery.

Priesthood is a very strong tech because it A) leads to Writing and CS, and B) has Oracle, and C) by grabbing this tech early, you can likely found a religion.

Every Tech beeline needs to get Writing, because of Alphabet, free Great Artist (Music), excellent Civics (representation, Bureaucreacy, Caste System), Catapults, and the main advantage of Writing itself, Library. Hell, every decent early game tech requires Writing. Writing+Oracle is strong, but so is Cottages + Writing, though less strong in a beeline, and actually delayable, the non-priesthood way of getting CoL might work, considering your edge from Libraries, Alphabet, and

# of Techs that likely (techs that you need to research 3 techs before you can get them) take more time than Writing that can be researched without Writing:
Machinery
Metal Casting
Monarchy
Compass
Optics

The Conclusion: You need Writing to advance as a Civilization.

CoL and CS is also incredibly important in this beeline, I think, which is another reason why Priesthood is strong (a key question is if you can get priesthood by going to alphabet).

So, I do believe the early game tech tree breaks down like this:
Military Rush (AH/Bronze Working)
Metal Casting line (also requiring Bronze Working, Masonry is probably needed)
Writing (+ Priesthood, generally)

Other notes: Religion can be a very nice side effect, though without Priesthood, I doubt it'd be as good as it is now (Monotheism doesn't seem that strong to me, at least early on).
Fishing/Sailing are very strong on the water maps, but completely bite anywhere else.
You need Bronze Working/Archery if you want to survive the early game.

[cal_01]

My small-bees are usually:

Mining/Bronze-Working/Masonary

Hunting/Animal Husbandry/Writing/Alphabet

Afterwards, I trade up for the ones that I missed. Once I got all that settled out, I usually play it by ear; if I missed a religion early on (ie. on Monarch), I usually try and go for CoL, or save up a few Prophets for Divine Right or Theology.

Of course, once I hit Bronze, I might actually smush a few nearby civs to consolidate my gains. Actually, taking over another civ's religious capital might be better than researching your own religion.

[dacole]

Originally posted by DeepO



There is none I'm aware off. And I don't know how it works exactly either, only that it's true. When picking up techs everybody already has, you will spend less beakers on it... pay attention when testing the CS strat to the extreme, and you will notice this effect.

It's not the same as in Civ3, but it has the same effect: backward civs will be given some bonusses to get back into the game.

DeepO

I know I'm bumping an old thread here but thought it was a great one...wish I had found it earlier (by waiting for the pc gamer review and several ones here to come out before I bought the game I missed a LOT of the learning evidently). Question directly related to this is does anyone know if this is related to the mechanic in AC? There the more techs you researched the more it cost you to get the latter one, was what made beelineing important. As well civs that were last or close to last in tech got a boost to ALL there research. Was wondering if something like that existed in Civ IV (the manual doesn't even tell you if the numbers on the tree are general beaker costs or not....)

[Cort Haus]

Yeah, good bump, dacole.

Tech devalues as more civs research it, so manually backfilling becomes cheaper, and new techs have more trade value over old techs.

I'll have to reread this thread to see if anything was said about Optics beelining on isolated starts. I'm wondering whether too direct a beeline pays a price for missing out economically useful things - like the great library for science, calendar/drama/monarchy for vertical growth.

[DeepO]

Yes, the costs don't go up as you research farther into the tree... at least not like you're proposing. Techs have a fixed price which doesn't change over the coure of a game.

What does change, however, is the modifier between the amount of beakers you 'build' each turn, and how many beakers get forwarded to the tech. If nobody has the tech you're researching, that modifier will be 1. So, all your beakers generated count for beakers poured into research at an equal rate. If everybody has the tech, the modifier goes up to let's say 2: every beaker you generate counts as two beakers towards the tech.

---------

Optics beelining, and comparably navigation beelining is a strange thing... I've had to do it a couple of times, but foregoing all unnecessary techs can be too hard on your economy. Isolated starts on higher levels mean you have to try for a religion yourself, as otherwise you'll wait for ages before one of your cities gets a religion. Also, without external trade, you need to focus on economic development more as well: more libs, more markets, more CHs, currency faster, GLib if possible, etc.

In my games, I found it easier to not go straight for optics and navigation (optics you can still do, navigation is too hard IMHO), but to research some other techs first. Going for Drama is a bit much, though, I prefer Monarchy or an early religion. Drama is most useful when fighting wars early on, and you won't be in a position to start conquering anyway. Her. rule is the more peaceful pacifier for me.

DeepO

[Arrian]

To clarify - DeepO means Astronomy when he says Navigation (CivIII is still in your head, D!)

-Arrian

[DeepO]

/me whistles again...

this is the second time in a week you've got to correct me. First the discovery that Copernicus isn't in anymore, now this...

oh well, at least you've learned to understand my ramblings, it seems

thx!

DeepO

[Arrian]

I've just been nitpicky lately, I guess. I knew exactly what you meant, being a vet of CivIII, but newbies might get confused.

You're welcome, of course.

-Arrian

[dacole]

Originally posted by UnOrthOdOx


A victim of your own success there. You've certainly mastered the language to where you come off quite fluent on most occasions.

I see your post as not being offensive either, but it's one of those where since the internet cannot convey tone of voice, it COULD be interpretted as being rude or being simply informative. A good thing for folks in general to do is that if a post can be taken 2 ways, take it the better of the two.

Agreed one thing you might want to know is that even in english directness can be seen as not rude. I have no idea what part of the country the offended poster is from but espically in the south directness can be very offensive. As an example I was in Maine (the most norhtern state in the continentail us) and I asked a welcome center worker for help finding a cheap decent hotel in a tourist area. He laughed and told me I don't think you could find one. (and then proceeded to help me do so) I thought he was being rude which the norhterner I was with found amazing until I explained I often found her directness rude. In the above example I would have went "hmm that will be difficult but lets see what we can do" with a wrinkle of my brow rather than a laugh.

I agree you are a victum of your own success I was surprised to find out english was your third language! (I don't even know anyone in person who knows three languages, not even my foreign language teachers...)

[Arrian]

As a Northerner (Connecticut), I am also amazed you thought that guy in Maine was rude. Silly Southerners.

Kidding! Kidding!

-Arrian