Optional Advances

[Aeson]

Waiting until Ecology (Mass Transit) to get Sanitation (Hospitals) can really cut down on pollution problems. I usually don't space my cities too far apart anyways, so in order to not have to deal with pollution I just wait and let my cities stay at size 12. I still end up using just about every tile anyways.

The only exception would be in scoring games, where building hospitals as early as possible really can make a difference.

[DeepO]

Aeson, but isn't that also related to your borg-city spacing? I go for sanitation relatively early (after the ToE is built, which gives me Hoover, and after replaceable parts is researched) because I like fewer, high-production cities. Pollution is one of the aspects of CivIII I find over talked about, and under done (): you don't need mass transport to battle your own pollution, and you will have global warming anyhow because the AIs are terrible pollution cleaners.

You are other points are, as always, very valid: optional techs are imperative on higher levels because you can trade them to the AIs for more usefull things. Other then that, only wonder techs and rep/monarchy are worth it, there rarely is a need for stuff like communism or nationalism.

DeepO

[jshelr]

Anybody noticed that the AI is now virtually always skipping both military tradition and democracy, at least on emperor and above?

[Aeson]

Yes, tight city spacing is the main reason why I feel justified waiting for Hospitals in most games.

The reason pollution bothers me so much is I never automate my Workers until all terrain improvements are done the way I want them done, which usually hasn't happened by Sanitation. So having a lot of pollution just adds to an already overwhelming number of Worker jobs to be assigned each turn.

jshelr -

Yes. Advanced Flight is another they wait until late in the Modern Era to research often.

[Harovan]

jshelr:

In the AU-101 game (Emperor) the AIs were lazy on Democracy indeed, but researched Military Tradition very early.

[The Pioneer]

I never had much interest in Free Artistry and Espionage, so I'll always skip them and either trade or forget about them.