Make me a better player, please.

[padillah]

Originally posted by Rancidlunchmeat


Ignore Iron Working or Alphabet?

huh? Why would you do that?

edit: Are you saying why grab CS with the free tech instead of others?

I don't think so, I'm asking why a "slingshot" to CS? What makes ivil Service itself worth slingshotting to while ignoring the other tech during the slingshot?

And what makes it a better slingshot goal than any other tech you have access to? So much so that you specifically set out to get it "ahead of time".

Does that question make sense?

Tom P.

[Arrian]

Because bureacracy is hugely powerful, and its power is proportional to how small the empires in the game are, and thus the earlier in the game you get it, the stronger it is.

Bur gives you a 50% bonus to production and commerce in your capital. In the early going, your cap is often far and away your best city. Plus, if you follow the slingshot step-by-step (I don't*) it gets you an early great scientist for an Academy in your cap. So now you've got +50 commerce, +50% research, +50 production in your best city, at a time when most empires in the game have 2-3 cities.

On Prince, one can do the slingshot w/o totally beelining. I often research 1-2 techs that are outside the slingshot beeline. Stuff like pottery, archery, bronze working... you get a feel for what you can get away with, in part depending on the power of your starting position.

If you want to know exactly how to execute the SS, there are threads on it, or I could give you a quick version here...

-Arrian

* - I often forgo the early GS for the Academy in favor of better growth/production in the early going. I typically get out to a nice tech lead anyway, and thus would rather boost the other areas. A tech lead is nice, but you need cities and hammers to do something with it.

[Palpster]

Originally posted by padillah


I don't think so, I'm asking why a "slingshot" to CS? What makes ivil Service itself worth slingshotting to while ignoring the other tech during the slingshot?

And what makes it a better slingshot goal than any other tech you have access to? So much so that you specifically set out to get it "ahead of time".

Does that question make sense?

Tom P.

Two things: a) because it's often quite useful to get to bureaucracy and b) because when you finish the Oracle CS will quite likely be the most expensive tech you could get for free...the other techs are all faster to get, even more so when the switch to bureaucracy is made since this switch will increase your science output substantially.

[Azuarc]

because when you finish the Oracle CS will quite likely be the most expensive tech you could get for free...the other techs are all faster to get, even more so when the switch to bureaucracy is made since this switch will increase your science output substantially.

Not if you don't spend numerous turns researching Code of Laws.

The advantage in CS lies squarely in the hands of Bureaucracy. I will often run that the entire game, especially when not playing spiritual.


And as much as I generally try to play without "teh sling", it really is that good.

[Rancidlunchmeat]

Originally posted by padillah


I don't think so, I'm asking why a "slingshot" to CS? What makes ivil Service itself worth slingshotting to while ignoring the other tech during the slingshot?

I don't think I've advocated any sort of 'bee-line' in order to complete the CS slingshot. You aren't ignoring other techs during the slingshot.

Here's the tech path from Devel's Workshop I - Completing the CS slingshot:

Mining, Bronze working, Mysticism, Wheel, Meditation, Priesthood, Writing, Pottery, Code of Laws , Alphabet, Civil Service via Oracle, Iron Working, Mathematics, Trades IW for Polytheism, Sailing, archery and Masonry, Currency, Monotheism, Literature, Music, Compass, Metal Casting, Machinery, Optics...

It goes on.

Anyway, you aren't really bypassing any techs that I see are critical. IW is a rather expensive tech if you try to do it before you have a library, academy, and run Bur in your Capitol.

[Dominae]

Bureaucracy is not as powerful on Huge maps, which the OP likes to play...

[Rancidlunchmeat]

Originally posted by Dominae
Bureaucracy is not as powerful on Huge maps, which the OP likes to play...

Please explain. I always play on Huge maps, and I always take a huge benefit from Bureaucracy.

Are you just making that supposition because on Huge maps you'll have more room for expansion, so you'll have more cities and therefore the production of your Capitol isn't as important?

That might be the case but the OP doesn't expand, either.

[Solver]

I wonder if I'm wrong in using Bureaucracy a lot, even when I have a larger empire. I just find that with Bureaucracy, my capital can produce military units in 1 or 2 turns, on Epic speed. It seems very powerful to me - even when I have a lot of other cities. I do, though, sometimes switch to Free Speech, but only if playing a cottage-heavy game. Vassalage I use very rarely...

[Rancidlunchmeat]

I don't see what civic could possibly be better.

Vassalage and Nationhood are really only good if you're aggressive and almost constantly at war. At which time, the happiness bonus from Nationhood is pretty much minimalized, and you need Nationalism to get to it which is rather far down the tech path.

I suppose you could get Vassalage earlier, but I normally ignore monarchy and feudalism until later (because I also ignore horseback riding and archery so I don't use Knights or Longbows)

Free Speech requires liberalism, and is great. The commerce and research from Free Speech Civ-Wide could easily surpass the benefits of Bur. But we're talking about Liberalism, and we're talking about added benefits only from Towns! Even if you get Liberalism early, you probably won't have enough towns to make it more productive than Bur for quite some time. About the same time you'd like to switch to US, I'd imagine, which is rather late.

I'd say for the most part, under most conditions, Bur is the way to go through the mid-late part of the game. Which is why it's so popular.

[padillah]

OK, I know it's late but here's the deal: in defference to my earlier thread ("What's the BEST leader", much earlier) I'm going with Catherine. Everything else will be out-of-the-box standard. Continents, Standard size, Temperate, Medium, Ancient, Normal. 7 AI's and me.

My personal preferences are for "Complete Kills" and "City Flipping after conquest".

I have a preference for no time or space race victories but I will save the WB file so I can turn them on if I get enough kick-back.

I figure the first couple of moves will be warrior build, chase the CS slingshot, worker second, and see what I come up with next.

I'll post the saves in the first post so they are easier to find.

Here we go, thanks in advance.

Tom P.

[Rancidlunchmeat]

I'd go huge and epic and add three more AI.

But that's just me.

[SebP]

I'd advise you to play for spaceship victories if you don't want to conquer the world. It's not that cultural victories are hard, but they are, well, somewhat unintuitive. Diplomatic victories are good. Trying to get those will teach you about important aspects of the game (as will the spaceship victory). From my limited experience though, there seems quite a bit of luck involved with the former (diplo). Therefore, spaceship first. Errr.... perhaps someone can back me up there?

[One_more_turn]

Conquest gives you the coolest end movie.

Cultural victories are so underwhelming.

[Swiss Pauli]

Originally posted by padillah
I have a preference for no time or space race victories but I will save the WB file so I can turn them on if I get enough kick-back.

Backing up SebP, how do you want to win? Not only that, the AI wants to win too and its default path to victory is the spaceship. Turn it off and the AI might look to win by conquest/domination...

I figure the first couple of moves will be warrior build, chase the CS slingshot, worker second, and see what I come up with next.

I loaded the game and the build order is fine, but what are you researching first and why? I picked Animal Husbandry to improve the pigs. Don't get too hung up on the CS Sling...it's a good move but it's not always the best. Look first for a good 2nd city site.

[padillah]

@RancidLunchMeat: That's easy enough to change. I still have the WB script so I can edit that for a second try.

@SebP & Swiss Pauli: I guess the thing I don't like about Space Race is how short it used to be. Time too. I don't want to stop playing just because it's time to stop playing.

@Swiss Pauli: I was going to go for Mysticism first, then BW and on but you have a point about the pigs. But won't they hold till after the slingshot? I've got plenty of food from the grassland and my health won't be a problem for a while.

Tom P.