Does it pay to use the 2nd and 3rd Great Scientist to found multiple academies?

[Blake]

Indeed the culture is not to be entirely neglected.

Building an Academy in a critically placed jungle city can be worthwhile, in the short term jungle cities have abysmal commerce, in the longer run they will have godly commerce thanks to plantation resources and cottage spam. Meanwhile the jungle city has poor production, making it difficult to get in culture buildings. +4 Culture is basically enough to culturally overpower or break even with anything in the early game - even creative + cheap library is only +4 culture. This means the Academy will tend to culturally secure it's city (especially if built early enough to later double to +8).

The vast majority of the time it's probably NOT worthwhile building an academy for the culture but it's fun finding cases where it is.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by nbarclay
Trying to compare the value of settling a great scientist in a city with the value of a second academy is more complex than it appears at first glance. The multiplier for settling a great scientist in a city grows over time as a city builds additional improvements that boost its science multiplier. But the value of an academy grows as a city works more income-producing tiles, cottage-based tile improvements grow, trade routes become more numerous and valuable, Printing Press makes villages and towns more valuable, and Free Speech (if adopted) boosts the value of towns. Also note that the obsolescence of certain buildings and wonders, or changes to civics that produce less wealth, can have a negative impact on the value of settling a scientist or the value of an academy. So any comparison between the value of settling a great scientist and the value of building an academy needs to consider both the current situation and how the situation will change over time. My general view is that unless the next-best science city is pretty lousy, an academy is worth more than settling a scientist.

Leaving aside the cultural value of an academy, comparison of the beaker impact does not need to take as long a term view as you suggest. You only need to consider the relative value from the point you are making the decision until you get your next great scientist. If you will get more short term research by settling your scientist rather than founding another academy then you can settle the scientist and repeat the analysis when the next GS pops out.

RJM

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

I note that the AI seems to build a lot of Academies (in vanilla Civ4, anyway). I've gone on conquering binges and captured 3 or 4 cities with intact Academies from the same Civ.

I wonder what the logic is that the AI uses. Or is this just another case of "stupid AI"? A smart AI would lightbulb every GS (or perhaps every one after the first), on the basis that it might not exist for long enough to get the longterm benefits of Academies/settling.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by rjmatsleepers


Leaving aside the cultural value of an academy, comparison of the beaker impact does not need to take as long a term view as you suggest. You only need to consider the relative value from the point you are making the decision until you get your next great scientist. If you will get more short term research by settling your scientist rather than founding another academy then you can settle the scientist and repeat the analysis when the next GS pops out.

RJM

There are several things that can go wrong with your reasoning here.

What if the player isn't focusing enough on generating great scientists to know when to expect the next one?

What about the possibility of using the second great scientist for a second academy and the third for a third academy, and maybe even the fourth for a fourth academy?

Might the next great scientist be needed to light bulb a tech, or to help trigger a golden age?

I'll grant that there are situations where the attitude, "I'll just worry about which choice will be better during the time until I get my next great scientist," makes sense. But it's useful to look ahead enough to make sure the situation you face really is one of those situations.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Six Thousand Year Old Man
A smart AI would lightbulb every GS (or perhaps every one after the first), on the basis that it might not exist for long enough to get the longterm benefits of Academies/settling.

I don't agree. AIs need to do their planning based on a hope that they will be able to survive for the entire game. The critical question is essentially the same for AIs as it is for humans: will light bulbing a tech produce enough short-term advantage - and perhaps opportunity to leverage a short-term advantage into a longer-term one - to offset the loss of the long-term value of an academy? If the answer to that question is usually no, and the programmers haven't figured out how to get the AIs to make reliably good choices of when it's better to light bulb a tech, it may make sense for the programmers simply to have AIs always use great scientists to build academies (except perhaps if they'll be needed to trigger a golden age).

If the ability for humans to capture numerous academies is viewed as a balance problem, the logical solution would be to change the rules so academies can't survive when a city is captured. It certainly wouldn't be any less logical to have academies be destroyed when cities are conquered than to have libraries and universities be destroyed when cities are conquered.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by couerdelion
That's just a comparison with settling. The more I play this game, the more likely I am to use the scientist for lightbulbing or triggering a golden age.

p.s. You forgot the production

So just evaluate the output of the scientist over the expected life of the game. The academy is a little more difficult, but not terribly so. Take the average of the output now and the expected maximum output over the course of the game (this model assumes linear growth of the city's commerce output, which is a decent first-order approximation).

[rah]

Warlords, latest patch. I end up conquering many cities that have a GP in it, just twiddling. I don't know if they're just waiting for another to Trigger the GA, or some strategic reason I can't fanthom.
All types of GPs.

[joncnunn]

Re: Does it pay to use the 2nd and 3rd Great Scientist to found multiple academies?

It depends.

If your second best commerce city is almost as good as the first then your probably better off with another Academy. But if there's a big drop off in commerence between your worst commerce city with an Academy and the best one without one, your probably better off settling the GS in the science city.

Now if you want to do more math, the per turn benifit of an academy is half the commerence the city is currently taking in.

While the per turn benifit of settling a GS is base beakers (in game will include Representive Civic bonus if this applies) + science modifier % of the city being proposed to boost it.

Originally posted by damarcus
I realized in my last game that you can found more than one academy by using the Great Scientist. Prior to this game, I always settled the GS in my science city, but now, I'm thinking it probably is better to found the 2nd academy at the 2nd best science city.

Does anyone else do this?

[joncnunn]

Originally posted by rah
Warlords, latest patch. I end up conquering many cities that have a GP in it, just twiddling. I don't know if they're just waiting for another to Trigger the GA, or some strategic reason I can't fanthom.
All types of GPs.

I think Blake's mod fixes that.

[rjmatsleepers]

Re: Re: Does it pay to use the 2nd and 3rd Great Scientist to found multiple academies?

Originally posted by joncnunn
It depends.

If your second best commerce city is almost as good as the first then your probably better off with another Academy. But if there's a big drop off in commerence between your worst commerce city with an Academy and the best one without one, your probably better off settling the GS in the science city.

Now if you want to do more math, the per turn benifit of an academy is half the commerence the city is currently taking in.

While the per turn benifit of settling a GS is base beakers (in game will include Representive Civic bonus if this applies) + science modifier % of the city being proposed to boost it.

As you say, the benefit of settling a GS depends on the science modifiers. In the mid game, your science city could have Oxford + university + library. (Perhaps some monasteries, but we'll ignore those.) With representation, the base 9 beakers from settling the GS becomes 22 beakers. To get 22 beakers from a second academy (even at 100% science) needs 44 base commerce. Without representation, a second academy only needs a base commerce of 30. If you don't have Oxford in the city where you built your first academy, and no representation, only 18 base commerce. Of course if you are running less than 100% science, all the figures will be bigger.

The way I play, it's a no brainer to settle a GS, but other styles lead to other solutions.

RJM

[joncnunn]

Re: Re: Re: Does it pay to use the 2nd and 3rd Great Scientist to found multiple academies?

In actual practice, I find it boils down to how many coastal cities you have. I've found coastal cities almost always generate sufficent commerence to generate more beakers than settling the Great Scientist in the Oxford and all other science improving buildings.

Also, I find in real games I'm normally running 80 or 90% science since I need more income for maintenance costs than I can bring in with Religious Shrines alone.

Originally posted by rjmatsleepers

As you say, the benefit of settling a GS depends on the science modifiers. In the mid game, your science city could have Oxford + university + library. (Perhaps some monasteries, but we'll ignore those.) With representation, the base 9 beakers from settling the GS becomes 22 beakers. To get 22 beakers from a second academy (even at 100% science) needs 44 base commerce. Without representation, a second academy only needs a base commerce of 30. If you don't have Oxford in the city where you built your first academy, and no representation, only 18 base commerce. Of course if you are running less than 100% science, all the figures will be bigger.

The way I play, it's a no brainer to settle a GS, but other styles lead to other solutions.

RJM

[rjmatsleepers]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Does it pay to use the 2nd and 3rd Great Scientist to found multiple academies?

Originally posted by joncnunn
In actual practice, I find it boils down to how many coastal cities you have. I've found coastal cities almost always generate sufficent commerence to generate more beakers than settling the Great Scientist in the Oxford and all other science improving buildings.

I had a look at one of my game saves from the later stages. I had a couple of coastal cities with base commerce of 52 and another at 46. I was running 90% science. In my best city, I had 3 (non science specialists) worth 9 beakers and another 2 beakers from Sankore. So an academy would have brought me 28 extra beakers.

My science city had 225% multipliers - library, university, observatory, academy and Oxford. So a settled GS was worth 29 beakers. Not quite a no brainer, but still marginaly in favour of settling the GS. If my 3 specialists had been scientists, the academy would have given me 4 more beakers, but I would have lost gold and hammers.

In that particular game, my GP farm was not a coastal city. If it had been, the balance might have tipped in favour of the an academy.

But ...

in the late stages of the game, it may well be worth using your GS to light bulb (part of) a technology.

RJM