micromanaging the science/tax rate

[SCG]

As many of you probably know, when a discovery is made, any science left over from the current city is wasted. This is especially noticable in OCC or when your capitol is an SSC. In OCC, with a little extra micromanagement, it is pretty straightforward to figure out exactly how to split the tax rate so that you squeeze the maximum amount of tax from the city and still get the discovery that turn. For multiple-city civs, that is a lot more difficult, if nothing else, simply because you don't always know which city produced the final beaker that pushed you to the next tech. I have had some civs where the F6 key made it look like i still had several hundred beakers to go and then the very first city, producing 1 beaker, pushed me over the limit. If the tech is a government tech and you want to revolt to form that government, you could wind up wasting an entire extra turn of tax and science if that happened - revolting before the end of the turn is 1 less turn of anarchy that needs to be endured. I've managed to discover republic with my last city, revolt, and then become a republic that same turn on occasion by turning the science rate to 0 and making 1 tax man in my capitol - works flawlessly if you have the SOL and make a govt discovery with your last city. My question is this: Has anyone figured out a way to coordinate their discoveries reliably without wasting massive amounts of science or tax in a SSC (or a civ for govt techs)?

PS: I figure that many of you OCCer's might be able to shave several turns off your landing dates with the extra tax that could be generated, assuming you aren't already doing so (well, other than in the fundy OCC)

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April Cantor: Sire, in order to expand further we must first gain favor of the King

SCG: darn, I've never really got the hang of that tribute thing, guess it will be a long time until i make prince

*goes off and starts gifting gold and techs*

[jpk]

According to other posters the number of beakers needed for an advance depends upon the state of the AI civilizations. I think this will make it difficult to fine tune discoveries.

On the Macintosh version at least it seems like a filled beaker box means the first city reliably discovers a new advance on the next turn. If you think you will discover an advance on your next turn try to deliver sufficient caravans to fill the beaker box. Unfortunately this may mean you have to deliver commodities to cities that do not need the given commodity.

This probably isn't much help but it is the best I can do.

[SCG]

the problem i have on my IBM machine is that once the number of beakers already researched is large enough to no longer allow you to distinquish between beakers or groups of beakers, a full beaker box means my caravans pushed me well over the limit. Somewhere around 90-95% full on the display often is actually 100% full... As for actual number of beakers needed depending on the AI techs, in general, if the AI makes a discovery, the needed amount will drop slightly (unless all 6 of them all have the same techs), so you generally have a small margin of error in favor of making the discovery. This is why it seems straightforward to do this in OCC. You always know exactly how many beakers you have discovered and how many are needed for a discovery going into the next round (that number is slightly fluid, but generally will only get smaller if you do not trade techs) Not that the AI takes advantage of that, but it always know exactly how many beakers it has left until its next discovery. I think it would have been neat to have that number displayed on F6 or the status window just like your current gold coffers are displayed (you always know exactly how much gold you have). Not much like real life but its doable in OCC

[MacUser]

Bummer. I was actually going to ask this morning if the actual number of beakers is displayed somewhere. Guess not. Looks like a request for Civ 3 or a job for a creative hacker!! The Mac versions are a bit better. I can guess about how many beakers are need based on the remaining space in the window, but that is a VERY loose approximation. I seem to be able to do this in OCC (last night for instance) plus or minus a turn. I have been turning the Science down to around 10% when the discovery is near to avoid wasting beakers. However, when I guess wrong, that can delay the discovery by as much as two turns! (double bummer!)

BTW - in the Mac version the beakers are Erlenmyer flasks (triangle shaped) most often used for titrations and frustrating computer gamers. Leave it to a chemist to be picky about that!

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"And now for something completely different..."
- John Cleese

[Tom DeMille]

You can get the exact # of beakers required by setting your science rate to 0% (and switch any scientists to taxmen). The number of turns listed until your next discovery is the # of beakers required.

edit: This only tells you the total you need between discoveries. It won't help you at all in setting your science that last turn to just get enough (whether 10% or 20% will do it). May I suggest a ruler.
[This message has been edited by Tom DeMille (edited August 10, 2000).]

[Scouse Gits]

There is a kuhl on-screen ruler available from here. I use it all the time.


[Edit for typo in ubb code]
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Scouse Git[1]

"CARTAGO DELENDA EST" - Cato the Censor
[This message has been edited by Scouse Gits (edited August 10, 2000).]

[Tom DeMille]

Thanks, SG1, I'll check that out. It might be easier than using my thumb.

[BuilderR]

This ruler is COOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!
tnx ALOT!

[tonic]

I think it's the same ruler that I downloaded sometime ago as a general screen utility. I hadn't thought it would work on top of the Civ F6 screen. What I had done as a working tool was to physically measure the amount of beakers left in cm with my wooden ruler and check that with a spreadsheet of the number of turns vs the length (cm) required for each turn.

There's certainly a lot of micromanagement involved with squeezing the optimum from the T and S ratios as well as the Einsteins and Accountants in the City screen.

[Spider]

Now, if only they could make an on-screen slide rule.

[Scouse Gits]

Spider, It's called the calculator available from all good accessories buttons.


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Scouse Git[1]

"CARTAGO DELENDA EST" - Cato the Censor

[MacUser]

Any "old folks" out there ever had the joy of explaining to a young 'un what a slide rule IS or how it works? This came up as a result of the Tom Hanks movie "Apollo 13". My neighbor's teenager asked me "what's that?" sigh. I think I should go ask someone even older than me if they still have their abacus laying around.

Now I'm off to download that ruler...

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"And now for something completely different..."
- John Cleese

[MacUser]

Uh oh. the ruler looks to be PC only...bummer.

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"And now for something completely different..."
- John Cleese

[Smash]

There is a thingy called "Super Ruler" for MAC.Its kinda old and not very glamorous but it works well.

http://info.apnpc.com.au/swlib/Fonts...s/MC13557.html

I'm sure you can find it at your fav search engine by searching "super ruler"