Science Issues

[Twelve Motion]

Ok, I have been playin this game for a long time, well not LONG but pretty regularly for a month or so. I have never had a single leader and I am getting pretty pissed about it. What am I missing? How do you get a leader?

[vmxa1]

MGL come from elites winning a battle vs another unit other than barbs. It is fairly common for an elite that has won 3 or 4 battles as an elite to generate a leader. Not a sure thing, but I start to feel cheated if one has won more than 4 times and not made a leader.

An SGL comes from being the first to research a given tech. This is something like a 5% chance for non scientific and 6% for them. So it is not hard to not get one in a game. This is even more the case if you are playing at Demi or better, since you will not be first to a lot of techs for the first two ages.

So if you are playing at say emperor and are not doing too well in research, you do not have many chances for an SGL.

If you are not having wars and even if you are and you do not take care with elites, you don't get many MGL's.

[Terra Nullius]

and did i mention ...

Originally posted by vmxa1
55 leaders in a CivIII game.

that's impressive

[punkbass2000]

Your odds for a MGL are 1 in 16 for an offensive elite win, 1 in 32 for a defensive elite win. If you build the Heroic Epic, an offensive elite win gives a 1 in 12 chance, 1 in 24 for an elite defensive win.

Your odds for a SGL are 3% every time you research a tech on your own before anyone else in the game. Techs from huts don't count. Scientific civs have a 5% chance.

[Commy]

Wow, not that I don't believe you, but where did you find that out? Looking at those numbers, it's hard to believe that in the same game I got 3 scientific leaders in the ancient ages, while at the same time the aztecs had two military leaders. What are the odds...

[Kuciwalker]

He could be counting armies he built with the Academy. That's still impressive, though.

There was one game where I got fourteen (!!!) SGL's in one game. I think it was balanced out, though, by the fact that in the next game (RoR conquest) that I played, I lost three armies to a lone defender.

[punkbass2000]

Originally posted by Commy
Wow, not that I don't believe you, but where did you find that out? Looking at those numbers, it's hard to believe that in the same game I got 3 scientific leaders in the ancient ages, while at the same time the aztecs had two military leaders. What are the odds...

Not sure where I got the numbers, but it's fairly common knowledge. I'm surprised I was the first to post it. If you ask over at CFC you'll probably get the answer with 15 minutes.

BTW, I've had 8 SGLs in a single game, though that was while I was doing fastest 20k experiments with LulThyme and bedhead for the HoF at CFC.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by lebensraum
and did i mention ...

that's impressive

Truth is that is was due to poor playing on my part. These were all from leaders, iirc.

I did not really know what I was doing and I got into war with all the civs. I had large numbers of units spread out in fairly small stacks. Forted on hills and mountains in most case.

So many small groups keep coming for me that it was a long time before I could break out. Very poorly played.

Some of the stuff I used to see in the early games, I miss now. I remember making a choke point city and having civs toss many units against this point. One group of 88 jag warriors still sticks out.

I have had games this year with the AI losing 5 to 7 thousand units and not getting any where near that many leaders. 20 to 30 leaders being about par for a conquest on huge map. Most armies coming from MA.

Of course one reason is that many of the kills come from defensive battle with armies doing most of the killing. The AI will send stacks of 100 or more at my city with many forted armies.

[Terra Nullius]

hey twelve motion
thanks for letting me ride your thread for so long ...

i do enjoy the smell of apple in the morning

i've never really played civ2, so i'm not qualified to comment there, but i had roughly the same experience, got myself independently through to regent, no probs. but i just couldn't get it happening on monarch

over the last coupl'a months i punched through monarch and romped ahead to be pretty comfortable firing up a random deity game. not that i win all (or even most) of the time but i can get far enough to have plenty of laughs
hmm ... this happens to be a time that roughly corresponds to my thoughts first being poisoned with some of the spurious trash to be found on this site ...

while it's been great fun disagreeing with people so far, i should point out that the sort of aggressive research i am recommending will make it quite easy to get ahead at < deity levels
to get anywhere at >= deity level, you certainly need a few more tricks up your sleeve

don't get me wrong - leader farming is always an important skill to have. but in retrospect i guess leaders are kind of overpowered and sooner or later civ4 will make it to the shelves. then we'll both have to stop and learn the basic skills of building a proper empire without the assistance of exploiting suicidal ai feild tactics.

hmmm... how else can i put this ...
#@$&%!% dominae was ##@$ right ... (again)

things that i found made a big difference
- tech extortion
- leader farming
- more workers
- more priority on food (always)
- close city spacing
- focus ... and i can't believe i got this one in before ... the d mentioned it. build only what you need in any given city. set your goals for research - don't try to study everything

on a purely personal note, and i'm sure others will disagree (yay!) i'd say don't set the tech slider so high.
having the tech lead is by no means a necessity. like relying on leader generation, it can be a trap. better to learn how to get by when you are struggling with obsolete troops and snooty neighbours

and ... why worry about the higher levels anyway
beyond emperor things can get very dry and clinical ... better to be a blood-thirsty monarch ...

The humble people of grog do homage ...
...
... ... ... GROG
...

[trev]

Trading is the most important part of any game where there is any intention of gaining and keeping a tech lead. Good early trading will bring you to tech parity before you have learnt 10 techs in the 2nd age. If this is not the case, spend more time contacting civs and trading techs to achieve this. From this point if you choose techs the AI does not choose first and research them at 100%, selling them for gold per turn and luxury resources, you will maintain this lead to the end of the game at Emperor level and below, Deity is different though and not enjoyable to play anyway, so just avoid that level. It is essential you you sell techs to the AI tech leader at all times so that its gold comes to you and is not funding its own research. You stay ahead by slowing the tech leaders research down by making them pay you hundreds of gold per turn in tech trades

[Commy]

I like that strategy. It's when you're at war under a democracy with 4 civs at the same time who are all more powerful than you that that becomes a challenge, as in my current game in Greece. I worked until I had to start drafting, then war weariness hit, was forced to used the slider, still didn't have fascism or communism, and it went down hill from their. Anyway, truly, it is the only way to stay in the tech lead, unless you are practically the only civ left...

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by punkbass2000
Your odds for a MGL are 1 in 16 for an offensive elite win, 1 in 32 for a defensive elite win. If you build the Heroic Epic, an offensive elite win gives a 1 in 12 chance, 1 in 24 for an elite defensive win.

Your odds for a SGL are 3% every time you research a tech on your own before anyone else in the game. Techs from huts don't count. Scientific civs have a 5% chance.

I never knew what the odds were, especially for defensive GLs. Do these odds also apply to vanilla civ?

Also, how does playing a military civ change the equation, or does it simply improve the chances of being promoted?

Twelve Motion - building barracks is key to start with veteran units, so that only one promotion is required to enable the probablity process for MGL creation.

I never knew there existed such a thing as SGL. Does this apply to vanilla civ also?

[punkbass2000]

Originally posted by Shaka II

I never knew what the odds were, especially for defensive GLs. Do these odds also apply to vanilla civ?

AFAIK.

Also, how does playing a military civ change the equation, or does it simply improve the chances of being promoted?

It doesn't outside of increasing chances of getting promoted.

Twelve Motion - building barracks is key to start with veteran units, so that only one promotion is required to enable the probablity process for MGL creation.

Quite true, though I would say that the "key" is farming barbs properly to get Elites and then using those Elites properly to kill enemy units.

I never knew there existed such a thing as SGL. Does this apply to vanilla civ also?

No, it doesn't. They are a C3C addition.

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by punkbass2000
Quite true, though I would say that the "key" is farming barbs properly to get Elites and then using those Elites properly to kill enemy units.

Yes, I have learned these tactics pretty well, but am still a bit reluctant to use raging barbarian level, though I know it will give me the best "barbarian training".

"Using elites properly" seems like a deep subject. I have read strats here on that, but maybe a brief rehash would be good, especially for Twelve Motion.

My own technique is to save the elites for high probability wins, using veterans to do the heavy lifting, thereby maximizing the chance of success. Is that about right?

Of course, sometimes using veterans results in giving elite status to the enemy, sort of "barbarian training". So, I play it the way I feel is appropriate at the time, sometimes relying on my elites to do the heavy lifting, when I really need to.

[punkbass2000]

"My own technique is to save the elites for high probability wins, using veterans to do the heavy lifting, thereby maximizing the chance of success. Is that about right? "

Yes, that's about the bulk of it. Assuming you're not in a sticky situation, Elites are for easy wins only.