I'm afraid I may be asking a question that has already been asked. But I've searched and searched and can't seem to find the thread.

What are the advantages/disadvantages to playing on Epic or Marathon vs. Normal or quick...other than the obvious production requirements. For someone that thinks playing on normal or quick speed is just too quick, which would you recommend: Epic or Marathon, and why? And for an added bonus, which map size is best to play when choosing one of these two?

Thanks in advance for any and all advice!

(I'm playing BTS with the official 3.13 patch only and on Noble difficulty if that helps)

There are no "real advantages or disadvantages." Except for Time. There was a bug with 3.03, can't remember if it was fixed in 3.13 t hough, that caused a scaling problem for espionage missions like oison water, invoke revolt and Cause unhappiness that basically made the length (in turns) they lasted not to scale properly.

Basically though the longer the game (ie marathon) the more beaker/hammers things cost. You consequencely have more turns in the game. THe opposite is also true as well for quick games.

Movement however does not change - a Mounted unit at Marathon still has 2 Moves/Turn - so playing slow speed makes moving units around 'cheaper' thus making big maps a little bit easier.

Slower speed multiplies movement. In 5 turns, a unit moves 5 tiles (for example) and a city produces 25 hammers (5 per turn) (normal/quickspeed). Or: in 5 turns, a city produces 25 hammers and things cost x5, so the net is 5 hammers - and the unit moves 5 tiles (epic speed).

The only thing not scaled to speed is movement.

It benefits the attacker, generally, to have slower speed because less can be produced on the approach. On marathon speed, you should be able to run the AI over with a decent unit or 2.

If you want to marathon a culture or space victory, then you may be some kind of a masochist (because of time it would take, irl, and the advantage you give to agressors).

So if I'm understanding this correctly, the need for land grab, whipping/chopping workers-settlers-military, and war rushing earlier in the game would be of top priority vs. just one to four well balanced cities with the emphasis of cottage spamming for beakers and techs.

Would it make more sense to play on an Island map with Marathon or Epic to try to gain the tech edge before raging war then? Or would the slower speeds just be too excruciating long to travel over seas for war?

So if I'm understanding this correctly, the need for land grab, whipping/chopping workers-settlers-military, and war rushing earlier in the game would be of top priority vs. just one to four well balanced cities with the emphasis of cottage spamming for beakers and techs.

No more so than at any of the other speeds. Everything has been scaled appropriately, aside from movement cost. On Marathon, the game is 3X longer than Normal but it takes 3X as long to produce anything as well, or to research a tech.

Or would the slower speeds just be too excruciating long to travel over seas for war?

No, that's one of the advantages of playing on Marathon. On the quicker speeds, by the time you reached your destination your units might be obsolete. At Marathon, when the convoy gets there your units are still useful because it takes 3X as long to research the tech that renders them obsolete. So units overall have a longer shelf-life on Marathon, so to speak. That's the main advantage of playing at that speed.

So units overall have a longer shelf-life on Marathon, so to speak. That's the main advantage of playing at that speed.

Thank you for clarifying that. Makes much more sense now!

Note though that while teching and buildings scale to speed, training units does not to the same extent. Building units is cheaper on epic and marathon, relatively. This means that stack sizes are bigger on the slower speeds.

Building units is cheaper on epic and marathon, relatively.

Only in Marathon. Everything takes x3 time, except unit creation which takes x2 time, and unit movement as it has been said. On epic, everything except unit movement is x1,5.

Can anyone confirm what IronCrown said about units being relatively cheaper on slower speeds? I started a multiplayer epic game once with a friend and it seemed to take forever to get a worker and settler going so we quit. Does it maybe not affect settlers and workers but standard units? Not that I don't trust you Iron, it's just that I don't want to start a new MP game and quitting it after half an hour because it takes so long :) But if units are build relatively faster than I might consider an epic game.

It's definitely like I said on marathon, but Jujulautre my be right that it's not so on epic. You can test it: Launch a game on normal and check how many hammers a worker costs. Then start a game on epic (same map size/difficulty as before!) and check again.

But I think Juju was right... I remember that building my first worker usually took 15 turns on normal and it takes 23 turns on epic. That's a factor of 1.5.

I find that units 'last' longer. Having built them , you get more use from them at epic speeds since it will take the AI longer to respond and you longer to replace them. It makes getting to key units first all the more important.

Can anyone confirm what IronCrown said about units being relatively cheaper on slower speeds?

All you have to do is look in the GameSpeedInfo.xml file. And according to that, in Marathon the training cost is only 200% higher than Normal, as opposed to 300% for everything else.

I think it's best to match the speed with the map size. I use normal speed on map sizes of small or below, and epic on standard and large. If I am going to play a huge map then I go to marathon. My favorite is probably epic on standard.

I like to use epic when playing OCC even on small maps since once your city gets fully going you are building one unit a turn, so on epic you can build 1.5 times as many.

I almost only play on Marathon (and Prince). Every once and a while I try to go back to normal, just to see if I can do it, and everything happens too fast. My units are obsolete before I can attack with them. I just can't concentrate hard enough to play normal - every turn, every move has to be really thought out, because you only get so many. On marathon you can march your little men all over the place to your heart's content.
The first time I tried Marathon I was aghast at how long it took, for example, to make my first worker. Now I can't go back.