Question on Monastaries/Cathedrals/Hit Records

[Rancidlunchmeat]

I know that once you find scientific method (?), monastaries become 'obsolete' and you can no longer build them. But does that mean existing ones lose their cultural and research benefit?

Is it good to rush to build as many as possible before scientific method so you can get the additional building for more research and culture?

How many temples or monastaries do you need to build before you can build a cathedral? And is it like 5 for 1 and 10 for 2, or is it just after you have 5 (temples or monastaries, temples I guess) you can build as many cathedrals as you want?

Finally, whats the purpose of hit records/hit movies, etc? Can you do anything with them other than trade them as excess resources to other players to improve their happiness?

Oh.. I lied! One last question, when trading for resources, how does that work? When you make a trade for +1 Food, is that +1 food in every city? And when you trade for something that gives you +1 food and +1 Health (with pasture), do you get the health benefits even if you don't have the pasture? How do you know the AI does?

Thanks for answering my newbie questions!

[JackRudd]

Re: Question on Monastaries/Cathedrals/Hit Records

Originally posted by Rancidlunchmeat
I know that once you find scientific method (?), monastaries become 'obsolete' and you can no longer build them. But does that mean existing ones lose their cultural and research benefit?

Research, yes. Missionary building, no. Culture, I don't think so.

Is it good to rush to build as many as possible before scientific method so you can get the additional building for more research and culture?

It's not an a priori bad idea; it depends on several things, such as if you can afford to spend the production on doing so.

How many temples or monastaries do you need to build before you can build a cathedral? And is it like 5 for 1 and 10 for 2, or is it just after you have 5 (temples or monastaries, temples I guess) you can build as many cathedrals as you want?

I think this depends on the map size. On the gigantic maps I play on, it's four temples for every cathedral. (So yes, you need eight temples before you can build two cathedrals, and so on.)

Finally, whats the purpose of hit records/hit movies, etc? Can you do anything with them other than trade them as excess resources to other players to improve their happiness?

Nope. All they are is happiness resources.

Oh.. I lied! One last question, when trading for resources, how does that work? When you make a trade for +1 Food, is that +1 food in every city? And when you trade for something that gives you +1 food and +1 Health (with pasture), do you get the health benefits even if you don't have the pasture? How do you know the AI does?

RESOURCES 101:

OK, let's take Cows as an example:

You have a Cow in the radius of one of your cities. By itself, it has a modest effect: it adds 1 food to the production of the square it's on. (This would be an effect that only affects the city that's working it.)

If you put a pasture on top of it, it'll get an extra +1 food and +2 production on top of this, whether or not it's connected. (Again, only affecting the city that's working it.)

If you connect the pasture to one of your cities by road/river/whatever, it'll link up the Cows resource to it, giving you +1 health in every city connected to that Cows resource.

If you trade a Cows resource away to someone, they will get +1 health in... I think it's every city with a trade route to their capital, though I could be wrong. They don't, however, get any food or production bonuses for Cows squares; those can only be obtained by the city working the relevant squares.

[Rancidlunchmeat]

Thanks Jack.

That's odd about the monestaries though, I thought it would be the other way around... like the research bonus would become obsolete but they would continue to generate culture.

Isn't that how wonders work? When they become obsolete every bonus from them is lost except for the culture. Or do I have that wrong as well?

[JackRudd]

No, you have it right about Wonders - and monasteries work the same way; remember that your question was worded in terms of what benefits they lose.