what do you use the Oracle for?

[rah]

Yeah having a few golds and the excess food to work them is great for tech whoring early but I'd still want more than 3 cities at that point in the game.

[Blaupanzer]

He will soon have more new cities. Lots more! Samurai in BC means he'll own the whole continent if he wants it.

Haupt, getting MC, Mach, and CS pre-AD is quite an accomplishment. Have you ignored the whole math and aesth chains? Also, as the picture is hard to see, where is your copper/iron?

[sorinache]

what difficulty level are you playing ? In my games Oracle tends to be built between 1200 and 900 BC ... sometimes it's me, sometimes it's them. But not even the AI got as far in the tech tree as you describe here by that time ...

[QUOTE=frunobulax;5668673]I always build The Oracle as part of my CoL/CS strategy to get the Bureaucracy Civic ASAP (+50% hammers and +50% commerce in capital) as I like the hammer/tech boost it usually gives me, enough to get ahead early on (being more a Builder than a Warmonger). I usually play as someone Protective + Financial / Philosophical / whatever (e.g. Sitting Bull).

I've tried various tactics and must say that I have seen nothing so powerful as the religions. Therefore I try to use Oracle to get Theocracy. This puts me in the pole position to be the first to Divine Right which is extremely juicy : I pay 2016 beakers (on normal speed) and while Versailles (which the AI loves to build) is still available everybody will trade with me for Divine Right. That way I can get things such as Banking, Guilds, Optics and other interesting techs for the price of Divine Right

[Blaupanzer]

sorinache, good thinking on the tech trading front. I seldom bother with either Theology or Divine Right unless on a religious ploy shooting for the AP and the Spiral Minaret [weird for them both to be one religion in the real world but a great combo in the game]. I usually let the enemies of my enemies trade me those techs for combat techs just to get them into their hands. I know I can gift the techs, but I usually can make use of their spare $ in such a trade and take either of these two techs in return to balance the trade. Makes the trades more "reasonable" somehow.

As to what the Firaxis programmers mean by "reasonable," try giving a 'pleased' or 'friendly' AI a pair of your cities on the other side of your nation from his position. The AI will refuse, saying this is not "reasonable."

In general, the AI's seem more refined in asking for things in BTS. I'm not getting 25million-billion requests for the same tech from the same AI. In Warlords, if I beat Isabella to Theology, she would ask for that tech almost every turn until either she developed it or I gave in. Not so much in BTS.

[rah]

Turn tech trading off, then they never ask

[Blaupanzer]

I turn off brokering, so my "friends" can't retrade my hard-earned techs. However, I do like the tech trading process itself. And, as I said so long-windedly earlier, the BTS AIs don't constantly ask for techs like they used to in earlier versions.

[rah]

When the AI offers up even trades most of the time, then I'll turn it on. Otherwise I can avoid the aggravation of offering them deals slightly in their favor and sometime more so just to have them turned down.

Of course my favorite is when the romans demand one of your iron. (oh does that mean you don't have one) , I don't think so.

[Ming]

Hauptman... Nice capital location. I NEVER see 7 specials in my big fat cross. I would need to use world builder to come up with iron, horses, two sea resources, two golds and pigs. With a start like that, anything is possible.

[rah]

Yeah, another no fresh water start. People say it shouldn't happen but it does often enough for me to in MP games.

[Theben]

I've been tinkering with the 'build research' option for cities, and in my last game used the Oracle for Alphabet. I also targeted Pyramids and the combo of Rep scientists + build research helped my research... a lot. Anyone else use Oracle for Alphabet?

[Ming]

Alpha is only a 300 beaker science. COL is 350 and Metal Casting is 450. It seems like such a waste to use Oracle for only 300 beakers.

[Theben]

True, but you get to unlock more science if you use the "build science" option. With that I was able to research CoL quickly.

The cost you mention is one reason why I used to pick Metal Casting over CoL.

[Hauptman]

Is it the Huge maps that do it? I get starts like that thrown at me nearly everygame. 5+ resorces seems normal in my games for a capital... goes for the ai's too. Ive seen Mansa end up with 3 or 4 gold in his bfc and go crazy.


As far as the location, Iron was (8) from the capital. (8 = 1 square due north to those who didnt get it) and i had traded for the copper later to build the colasus in a jiffy. Oracle got built first. And i cant remeber if i traded for or researched on my own for sailing to get the lighthouse, but i do believe i had planned on that from the start. Lighthouse was chopped, those hills had some forests on them at start, and that city was just plain great production. Then with a forge build, pretty sure collasus took 6 or so turns to build. The world was goin nutz by then doubt anyone was brave enough to devote resources to wonders at that point.

Monty declared war on me just about the time my second Sammy finished, all he did was provide xp. I had a stack build and set to jump off at 40ad. wich actually included catapults. Normaly in my jap games the sammies run out all on their own. But this was Emperor and i didnt wanna take any chances.


back on topic. Code of laws gives you a religion, quick free culture to newly conqured cities, courthouses, and a science rate limited only by your food availability. Lets call that Religion (5) culture (1) courthouse (2) SE economy (2) for an arbitrary score of 10!

Theoligy gives you religion (5) AP (-2... ok lets call it a 1) and ummm... what else. oh yeh nothing. score 3 - 6 (depending on if u can use the ap)

Metal casting, 25% bonus to production that requires a building. 3 point to all civs that are not industrious. 6 points to ghandi.

Comparativly speaking. doing anything other than CoL is a waste of a fine wonder.

[Ming]

I wouldn't consider an additional free 100 beakers (metal casting) a waste of a wonder
And you forget... a possible chance to get collasus earlier...

[Theben]

Bah, my completely unbiased scoring gives CoL a religion (4, later religions aren't as great), Caste System (2, due to limited use early game), courthouses (2), an okay wonder (1), and a decent trading tech (2). Throw in 1 more for opening the tech tree and you get 12 points.

Theology gives you religion (4), wonders (1-2 points depending if you have diplo victory on... and I gave HS 1 point in value b/c it generates Engineers), Theocracy (1), and an excellent trading tech (4) for 10-11 points.

Metal casting 25% bonus to production to everything and doubles the happiness of gold/silver/gems (4), a wonder (1, 2 if you're FIN and/or have completed the ToA/GL/Col trifecta), and also a good trading tech (3) that leads to Machinery and therefore Civil Service (1) for 9-10 points.

So okay, CoL still wins. But not by as much, and it will depend on your game play style what works best for you. For me, it's Oracle--> Metalcasting, trade for CoL (and maybe some small tech extra), and use G Priest to lightbulb Theology.