Cutting it very close

[Arrian]

alva,

A little American slang phrase. Translation: You are poor. (24g, -18/turn).

-Arrian

[Spaced Cowboy]

Usually punctuated.

You is po'

[Theseus]

I can't afford the apostrophe!!!

[Arrian]

Let alone the "or."

-Arrian

[Catt]

Originally posted by Arrian
It would appear I was wrong. Not the first time, not the last, that's for sure. I've always timed it so that I get a tech, then have 1 turn at 100% tax while ToE finishes. But if I'm already rich, I've been wasting a turn. *Arrian's knowledge grows* Excellent, Smithers

-Arrian

p.s. Theseus, my friend, you is po!

Me too! I usually start a pre-build for ToE and can't always time it "just right," but have grown accustomed to having at least 1 and sometimes 4 (!) turns of zero science in order to boost my treasury (often in the expectation of upgrading riflemen / pikemen to infantry and/or cash-buying factories. When faced with "research in four turns and complete ToE in four turns" I'll now go ahead with the research - in the past I would set research to zero and hoard gold or delay ToE by a turn.

Catt

[steven8r]

Theseus, I often find myself in a similar predicament. I always find myself trying to get Atomic Theory 1 turn before I finish ToE. I've even gone so far as to have my Cavalry piliage my improvements to slow-down ToE. However, if what Catt and Alexman say about nbarclay's observations, then you should be able to finish ToE the same turn as Atomic Theory. I've never wanted to chance it. I shall try it at the next opportunity.

Safe Approach: try and get as much gold as possible for the next 2 turns and slow Beijing by 1 turn. As soon as you finish ToE (and get Electronics), change Beijing to Hoover.

Risky? Approach: Speed up Shanghi by 1 turn, get 3 techs the next turn and switch Beijing to Hoover.

Regardless of which choice, GET SOME GOLD MAN!!!!

Also, I don't know how far ahead you are in techs, but generally I find that the AI(s) tend to research the 'middle branch' (Refining, Steel, Mass Prod., Combustion, etc.). Try to get (buy, steal, bully) as many AI techs as you can the turn before ToE. That way you won't have to research as many. I usually wind up w/ Electronics and either Mass Prod., or Mot. Transp. from the ToE. Then I stop trading for awhile.

It's about this time in my games that I start whooping-up on the AI w/ Tanks!

Edit: Spelling Correction.

[Theseus]

You nailed... that's why I was broke: I had spent every dime I had to reach tech parity up to Atomic Theory.

It worked great... within a couple of turns I was raking in around 1000 gpt.

[DeepO]

Theseus, It's too bad you don't have the switched situation: Beijing (capital, first city founded) will be the first to finish its production, followed by Shanghai. If it would be the other way around (i.e. Beijing building the ToE, Shanghai prebuilding the pentagon), you could accelerate both cities...
First you research atomic theory, then you build the ToE in Shanghai, go into city view, use your arrows to get to Shanghai, change the build order there to Hoover, exit the city view, and the game continues without building the Pentagon. I do this quite a lot when it gets too close. Similarly, you can do this from the F1 screen (so you don't have to scroll through your cities) when you discover a new tech.

It's similarly too bad that both wonders do not take the same amount of shields, or you could switch them using a palace in Shanghai.

And lastly, if you are starving just to time it, it is too bad you didn't ask this question a few turns earlier, as you could have switched then, prebuilding a palace in Shanghai (if your palace costs more then 400 shields, of course), timing to get the ToE in Beijing (which looks like the less productive city of the two), and switch your palace to Hoover... this might have netted you a few turns on Hoover. And the Pentagon could have been build by one of your lesser cities

If only there was a way of switching the order in which cities' production is finished, instead of going from oldest to youngest...

DeepO

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Arrian
It would appear I was wrong. Not the first time, not the last, that's for sure. I've always timed it so that I get a tech, then have 1 turn at 100% tax while ToE finishes. But if I'm already rich, I've been wasting a turn.

Why bother writing my own post, when Arrian's fits perfectly for me, too...
Some fine pieces of knowledge in this thread. I especially like DeepO's trick to cut it VERY close...