Great People used for Golden Ages

[raguas]

Has anyone "computed" the relative value of using great people to start Golden Ages?

At what relative empire size does it become worth it?

Also, do the commerce and production increases pass through the multipliers (library, bank, forge, etc.)?

[gentle]

Also, do the commerce and production increases pass through the multipliers (library, bank, forge, etc.)?

Yes they do. It is a bonus given per tile so they pass through every modifications.

At what relative empire size does it become worth it?

Ok, i cant give you a calculation here ( where is blake ??) but
I imagine two distinct scenarios for golden ages.
Golden Ages improve tile output and this could be used:

1. by individual cities:
This was a thought in the culture thread because it doesnt matter how large your empire is, so even with only 3 cities you would achieve the same as with 15 cities -> boosting the indivudual culture output in the 3 cities.

2. as an empire effect to increase hammers,beakers:
this is the complicated stuff your question aims at, I guess^^
In my opinion, the later the game the less is the use of a GP and the easier is the decision to save some for a golden age.
Anyway, Golden Ages are expensive and I think that a maximum of 3 is realistic to do. 2GPs, 3 GPs and the Wonder one.
Late game I would say using 2 GPs for a Golden Age is a safe move to do. With 3 I am not quite sure....(Blake?! =P)

ok, not exactly what you were looking for I guess but hope my thoughts help a bit.

[raguas]

You're right... it is the complicated stuff that I was looking for. And i echo your question -- Blake?

[gentle]

At least I did the spamming part so we can now lean back and wait for the competent guys

[Yosho]

(shrug) The real question, it seems to me, is how many people do you have working the land?

Doing some quick BOTE (back of the envelope) calculations, so feel free to correct any mistakes I make...

If you have 150 people working the land (10 cities x 15 people per city, with no specilists) that's +150 commerce per turn, for 8 turns (1200 commerce), times whatever multipliers you have. If the commerce multipliers for all the cities for the type of commerce you have it set to throughout your empire average out to 50%, that's 1800 commerce; if they average out to 100%, that's 2400 commerce. So you'll probably be somewhere in that range.

You also get extra hammers, but only from the land that already produces hammers; not from grassland cottages, or water tiles, or flood plains, ect. If half of your tiles produce hammers, that's +75 hammers a turn, which comes to +600 hammers times modifiers. If the average modifier is +50%, (say, half of your people are working in cities that have forges, and half have forges and factories and coal plants), that's +900 hammers total.

1800-2400 commerce and 900 hammers are a lot, but that's still less per great leader then what you would get if you traded both leaders in for technology, or if you spend an engineer building a wonder, or a great merchent on a trade misson, ect. (shrug) Generally speaking, I don't think Golden Ages are worth it, unless you have a HUGE empire and good multipliers; I would say, you want to have at least 200-250 people working the land before it's worth considering, I think.

[platypotamus]

[SIZE=1] Doing some quick BOTE (back of the envelope) calculations, so feel free to correct any mistakes I make...

Looks good to me except...

You also get extra hammers, but only from the land that already produces hammers; not from grassland cottages,

grassland cottages may very well be producing hammers later in the game while running the one civic that makes towns produce a hammer (U. suf?)

So if you've got the appropriate tech, and you are spiritual, it's likely a really good idea to switch to that civic for your GAs if you aren't already running it.

[Yosho]

So if you've got the appropriate tech, and you are spiritual, it's likely a really good idea to switch to that civic for your GAs if you aren't already running it.

Yeah; there's really no sense having representation during a golden age unless you really need the happiness or unless you've got the statue of liberty, you don't want to use specilists during those 8 turns anyway. So yeah, if you're spiritual, it's a good idea.

[rjmatsleepers]

Yosho's calculation looks good - and it agrees with my prejudice that spending GP on GAs is not worthwhile.

However, the AI seems to go for the GA regularly. Is there something going on here that we're missing?

RJM at Sleeper's

[Blake]

I've done the calculations before and they look much the same as Tosho's, same conclusions too.
Despite the fact that I post so much, I managed to track down my calculations. My conclusions were that you want about 100 tiles worked for every GP burnt, at least for a GA to blow the other options out of the water.

I believe the single best use of GP's (other than high-profit shrine/academy) is when you can pop a tech which you can then trade around, especially if you get a religion out of the deal (ie early great prophets).

Golden Ages become profitable when your empire is so large that you've probably already won, what is left is mopping up. I think they ARE good in challenge games when going for high scores and stuff.

And on huge maps with a lot of room to expand, of course. GA's are naturally going to favor the larger empires.

When it comes to settling, I believe it's best to do early in the game when they can pay off for a long time, but this does compete with lightbulbing techs - the main question is what you'll lose by not lightbulbing the tech. If you already have tech parity/lead then lightbulbing isn't necessarily that important, especially if you're already backlogged on stuff to build.
Settling is best when you're planning it carefully, like settling prophets/merchants in the wallstreet city.

Typically the time for settling to pay off will be somewhere between 1/6th and 1/3rd the game length - assuming you can use them optimally for lightbulbing a useful tech.

Also all the different options require various degrees of planning, if you want good techs to lightbulb you need to avoid researching certain techs, for example if you avoid researching masonry you can use prophets to lightbulb Code of Laws, Civil Service and Monarchy. If you avoid researching writing and masonry you can lightbulb Monarchy with a quick prophet.
Golden Ages require different types of GP, if you don't have a good system to generate them what you get is effectively random, you might end up having GP's on ice for a long, long time - all this time they could have been settled and earning income. This must be deducted from the GA's profits. With good planning though you can use like the free GP's from techs and thus not need to leave any GP on ice for a prolonged period.

Another case study is the OCC space-ship building city. Lets assume its working 20 tiles, ALL producing hammer. You have a Prophet (born) and Engineer (from fusion), ALL you care abuot is hammers to finish the SS. A GA would produce 160 hammers (20, while settling both would produce 5 hammers/turn and would take 32 turns to equal the GA. Given the time it takes to build a SS I suspect that in the OCC case its best to settle. Things would be different if burning a useless artist though.

One final thing about Golden Ages - they can give you stuff that the other GP uses can't (or at least not quickly). For example a GA can let you build a project faster, or generate more culture for a cultural win. For this reason they are good to use just before the fat lady sings, settling wont help, you don't need techs, you just need to win. GA's.

[Aeson]

I don't think it's so much about empire size (or comparing pure commerce/production output), but what your goal is. GA's should be used as the hammer to bring victory home.

If you're in a tight Spacerace (or just want to finish sooner), it's the way to speed up production. Seems to be the most commonly accepted use for GA's.

If you've just hit a military tech that gives you a unit advantage, GA's are a great way to increase production of new units, and pay for what they conquer. With most of the larger maps I played on, the condensed timeline ended up reading: Get to military unit(s) X, GA, GA, GA... till Domination.

Spamming Merchants can potentially meet the GA's military effect, but in most cases will hamper overall GP production and/or require avoiding useful Wonders and Specialist use. Also it requires running Caste System at a time when Serfdom is most useful. Combining the Merchants for gold with others for GA's can give the best of both worlds.

I personally think PHI is generally the strongest warmonger trait because of the military impact GAs can have, because generally (outside the Ancient Era) the quickest way to get to the unit techs is by using GP aided beelines, and because Great Merchants are the best way to fund a mass upgrade once you get to a new military tech level. PHI can get to the units quicker, upgrade to more of them, and/or produce them faster.