Science problems

[ltopp80]

I am finding that it is taking me until 1990 AD to get through the Middle Ages. How can I make research quicker without buying the techs?
This is a problem that is really affecting my game enjoyment. Also I have never played Civ before I got Civ III, so I have no knowledge of previous games.

Thanks for you help


Leanne xo

[ixnay]

You're going to have to trade for techs if you want to make any sort of progress...the way I see it there are 2 good ways you can go - set your science to really low so that you earn a ton of income and then buy techs, or set science high and sell your extra techs for income.

[Ethelred]

What level are playing on?

Ixnay mentioned trade which is good unless you are playing on Chieftan. On Chieftan the AI is so badly crippled you will have to take the lead on research yourself.

Most likely you aren't doing what you need to make money. Build enough workers. One per city or even more. If you are an Industrious civ a little less than one can be enough if you don't have to deal with a lot of jungle. Any non-industrious civ must have AT LEAST one worker per city and it takes two captured workers to equal one native.

Build roads. Connect all the cities. Try to use the rivers as the adjacent tiles produce an extra gold in each one. Roaded tiles produce an extra gold which is why you need the roads for money.

Build marketplaces.
Build libraries.
Build whatever helps money or research.

Don't waste time improving every tile in a city early as the only ones that are in use or are connecting cities or resources are needed.

Even on Warlord this a good idea. Only on Regent and above can you depend on buying tech as the AI is handicapped on the lowest two levels. On higher levels you MUST trade for or buy tech to keep with the AI at least in the early game.

Get out of despotism as quick as you can. If you are playing a religious civ go for Monarchy till you are ready for Republic. You get more cash with a Republic but you have to spend more as well and you no longer have military police so you must have luxuries and marketplaces or cathedrals to get your population up except maybe on Chieftan.

[Lucilla]

Research in general is faster on higher levels. The AI gets a lower cost factor on higher levels (see editor > scenario > custom rules and then rules > edit rules > difficulty levels > cost factor). That means that his research will be faster. A tech that is already researched by one or more civs, becomes cheaper for you as well. This way, faster research by the AI also lets you accelerate your own research.

[Nicollo Rising]

So to sum up:

Commerce (the little gold coins on tiles) produces income.
A percentage of commerce (set in the domestic advisor screen) is given to science.
Increasing commerce increase science.
Build roads/railways
Build marketplaces, banks (increase commerce).
Build libraries, universities (increase science derived from commmerce)
Build wonders that assist science and commerce
Exploit luxuries tiles.

Ol' Nic

[yamaraion]

Having read the responses to the origional question, I still have questions about science.
I am well into the 21st century and don't have space flight at the Chieftain level. I do all of the things suggested and still have this problem. Having still played CIV I and CIV II where I was always ahead of the historical science curve, I find myself years behind now and don't know why. Have they really made science that much more time consuming or am I doing something wrong. I would be glad to trade for science advances but I am so far ahead of everyone else in science advances that it does me so good. I have started a Prince level game, and find myself with the same problem except that I am behind everyone and nobody wants to make a fair trade or any trade close to fair and they will not give much if any off of origional demands.

both of us are having this and are very experienced CIV players with over 80 years of gaming between us.



yama and friend

[Ethelred]

80 years of gaming. Well that kind of depends on when you start counting. Candyland? I played my first Avalon Hill game 40 years ago. Aproximatly. Gettysburg.

IF you are doing ALL THOSE THINGS then you aren't building enough cities and you may not be getting their population up. Population plus improvements = money.

On a standard map you should go for eight cities and then you can build your Forbidden Palace. You must do so as soon as you can if you want more cities that are usefull.

Your optimum number of cities on a standard map is sixteen. That really isn't optimum but thats what its called for some reason. After 16 your corruption due to the number of cities goes up but you can make use of more cities effectively which means that optimum isn't really optimum. More like the lowest you want to have for rapid research. Corruption is also caused by distance from the Palace or the Forbidden Palace whichever is closer.

Corruption can be mitigated by building Courthouses and later Police Stations.

Republic lowers corruption. Democracy lowers it a tiny bit more.

I played a Chieftan game with the 1.16f patch just to see if it was as hard as Newbies were saying. I was nearly ready to launch when I accidently won by domination in 1748 just a few turns before launch. Standard map playing France. I traded tech to other civs for luxuries only. They had no tech I needed. I was at least a full age ahead on tech and that was only because I traded them tech that they were that close. I got little money from trades as the AI had no money in comparison to me. With the later patches the AI should do a bit better since they trade tech aggresivly but they still shouldn't be able to match you on that low a level.

On Chieftan you must do it all yourself to launch early. Go for Republic and stick with it. Get your eight cities. Build the Forbidden Palace as far away as you can manage in thirty to fourty turns or do it with a Great Leader should you get one. Just before that or just after you should be able to switch to Republic, before is better as it will help in building the FP if you don't have GL. Go for your sixteen cities.

On chieftan you have twice the production of the AI. You should have three or four cities before the AI has its second and maybe more. If you don't you are dawdling and most likely not building those roads you say you are. If a neighbor is in your way wipe it out. You need those sixteen or more cities. You don't need your neighbor. Not on Chieftan.

Don't play a lot of games on Chieftan before moving up. Its too bloody easy and you will develop bad habits.

[yamaraion]

Well, thanks.
First, let me say that we started playing Gettysburg respectively in 1958 and 1960, before that I played TACTICS II. I wasn't counting things I played before I was 12 yrs old, like Chess. I can't speak to CANDYLAND because I didn't play that until I did it to entertain my much younger brothers. I can't remember anything before Chess, sorry.

But, despite your thoughtful and detailed response, our question has not been answered. The question was not "how do we win". In fact we have both won handily at Chieftan and been way ahead of the AI in science, but way behind our CIV I and II and the CIV clones science levels. That, not winning, is the question we address. What is happening with science in CIV III. We don't mind a hard game, but we want to know what is happening. We had a joint game with dozens of large cities spewing out pollution and armies of workers stacked just to "put out the fires", but that didn't tell us "why science seems so much slower, and why the % of taxes in science doesn't change the # of turns to complete a tech advance", for example.

Since none of us can count on good "aftermarket" books like the ones that came out after CIV I and, together, answered most questions, even giving algorithms for the game,,,,how do we find out what rules the game plays by and what "cheats" like the Lief Erikson model galley it uses. For purposes of this discussion we will settle for science algorithms. The ins and outs of tuning production are fine, but many players are still not getting insight into how the "new" science works.

Perhaps the only answer is to kidnap a certain game designer and apply significant quantities of sodium pentathol to his anatomy. Or maybe buy him a chocolate malt and beg for information.

Any other ideas out there?

Yama, et.al.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by yamaraion
But, despite your thoughtful and detailed response, our question has not been answered. The question was not "how do we win". In fact we have both won handily at Chieftan and been way ahead of the AI in science, but way behind our CIV I and II and the CIV clones science levels.

Well considering that I have no idea what your levels WERE its hard to answer. I was dealing with what you said about not haveing space tech in the 21st century.

We had a joint game with dozens of large cities spewing out pollution and armies of workers stacked just to "put out the fires", but that didn't tell us "why science seems so much slower,

So much slower than what? Just how radical were you doing in the other games anyway. The idea here is to make it close to the real world. So there is four turn minimum.

and why the % of taxes in science doesn't change the # of turns to complete a tech advance", for example.

Well thats wrong. They do change. You have to change it enough to change the time it takes. If you are making 100 per turn and the the cost is 400 a ten percent change isn't going to do much most of the time.

how do we find out what rules the game plays by and what "cheats" like the Lief Erikson model galley it uses.

There is only one galley and its not Leifs or the thing would be seaworthy. There is no cheating of that sort. The only confirmed cheat is that the AI knows about resources that are on their maps before they get the tech. So they will build cities in places that later turn out to have oil for instance. Thats it. All other claims of cheating apear to be purest paranoia.

They may also know what you have in your cities without spending money to investigate.

There are no imortal galleys untill the civ has the tech that allows galleys to go out on the oceans safely. You too can do that.

For purposes of this discussion we will settle for science algorithms. The ins and outs of tuning production are fine, but many players are still not getting insight into how the "new" science works.

Just move the slider around and you will see. There is a 4 turn mininumum and a 40 turn maximum as long as you spend something. This is documented but don't ask me where. The 40 turn is in the readme for the first patch. I am not sure on the other and I don't feel like checking. Open up the editor and you can see a lot of the details.

Perhaps the only answer is to kidnap a certain game designer and apply significant quantities of sodium pentathol to his anatomy. Or maybe buy him a chocolate malt and beg for information.

Any other ideas out there?

Yama, et.al.

Perhaps beer would be more effective. The Guides are written while the game is still being desinged. Almost all of them are worthless and many have incorrect details since there are often changes after the book goes to the publisher.

Just read here. Lots more here than in any book. The internet is why the strategy are such crap these days. They only sell to those that don't use the net.

Do a search for Velocyrix's strategy threads. Those are good to start but most of them are old. Do a search on people that you like the posts of. Just click on their profile and then the upper right of the profile has a search link for the person. You might want to limit the search to the Civ III threads. Otherwise you will find out all the evil discussions not related to games in the Off Topic areas.

Me, I tracked down the posts by the guys from Firaxis.

[Dobian02]

One way to fix it is to just make all the techs cheaper and quicker to make in the Civ 3 Editor. After I did that, I had my first space race the next game. Now my question: is there a rule of thumb for converting citizens to scientists (number per city)? Same goes for other professions, like tax collector.

[Ethelred]

Yes there is a rule of thumb.

Don't do it

The only thing that specialists are good for is padding your score. Well they are usefull in hoplessly corrupt cities. There it would depend on wether you want money or science. Most of the specialists I ever have I set to entertainers. Thats can get you into WLTKD and thats worth a lot in cities with middling corruption.

Generally I have very few specialist. I try to stop growth in my cities at one worker per tile. Excess irrigation just means specialists that produce one coin, flask or happy face each. The happy faces may be worth it but usually its better to mine it and get more shields.

There is one VERY GOOD use for a science specialist. They produce science even when you are in anarchy and that can keep your research going at the minimum rate and it only takes one specialist to do that.

[Dobian02]

Thanks. One last question. My problem with economy in general comes late in the game, when my infrastructure becomes too expensive and eats into my profits. I end up having to cut my research way down, or I'm in the red. Maybe it's just that I'm losing trade opportunities, but is there a limit to how much infrastructure you should build in a city?

[Ethelred]

Well you shouldn't build improvements you don't need. Late in the game you should have a lot of money unless you doing badly.

Are you selling to the AI? Are you only buying from the AI? Have you roaded all the tiles you are working? Did you build marketplaces and banks? Do you enough population in each city to support the improvements?

Don't pay to build stuff you don't need in hopelessly corrupt cities. Get a temple and library and thats it unless you think a courthouse and police station can make the city viable. Don't rush build with no shields in the production box as that doubles the cost. You must have a hospital if your are trying to build all the other stuff as you need a lot of worked tiles to support them all.

You could post a save of a game that you are having this problem with. That way you might get more specific help.

[Dobian02]

Yes, my tiles are all developed and roaded, and yes, I sell to the AI much more than I buy from it. Your comment about not having enough population to support the improvements is probably the mistake I'm making. How do I determine this (before I build that next improvement)?

[Ethelred]

I don't know. I just build stuff when I get the tech or have the other stuff built. As soon as I get hospitals I let the cities pop climb at a moderate rate if I have the luxuries to keep them happy. I often am low on income as I am coming up on hospitals.

When I have a choice in building I do tend to build marketplaces and banks before I go the other stuff. Ignoring other buildings that I may or not build depending on the cities needs I often go for this order.

Marketplace
Library
Bank
University

That way I have the money to cover the other buildings. If I am low on cash I may build the bank even before the library if I have the tech for both.

Maybe you have a lot of money and are just greedy.