In my recent game, oracle bulbs Feudalism. I could start a great age and save three turns of anachy(monarchy, vassage, change religion). I think it was very worth it, as future great age would not likely save me three turns. And though I got less :hammer: and :commerce:, they were more valuable in early game.

Golden ages are more powerful as the game goes on. The inverse is true for Great People. Bulbing, settling, and building academies and shrines are all usually better than an early golden age.

It depends on the type of great person you have. If you popped a great artist, and you are not aiming for a cultural victory then burn him for a golden age. Do likewise for a great Spy if you don’t do much espionage. Like Gwynnja said golden ages are FAR more powerfull later in the game, but if you have no other use for your GP then go ahead.

Or you can put him to sleep and use it for multiple late GAs.

I agree with the OP - an early GA that saves three turns of anarchy isn't wasted.

Also, while the GA turns bring fewer extra coins/hammers each, they bring them earlier, giving them more time to "ripple".

The only real shame IME is that the Mausoleum tends not to be built/captured by that point.

better if you have that WW that adds 50% golden age.

build many windmill, watermill, workshop to make most tiles have both hammer&commerce

save some GPs(better if PHI), and... you can be in golden age for quite long.

how'd you get feudalism from the oracle? lol. But yeah, I think an early GA is only worth it if it saves you 2+ turns of anarchy.

People always say golden ages are better late game. How? In the early game, you might have tons of plots giving only 1 or 2 of a resource. So 1 hammer plots turn into 2 hammer, 2 commerce plots turn into 3 commerce, for example. Thus the GA boosts your economy by 30-50%. In the late game the GA might be turning 7 commerce plots into 8 commerce, and 4 hammer tiles into 5 hammer. Thus the GA is only boosting your economy by 15-20%. If I've just expanded a lot and my economy is just making its recoverly, an early GA boosts my economy enourmously.

Late on - you work more tiles overall.

Overall - i don't know. If you crashed your economy due to war/rex into negatives and that Golden Age would get you let say currency. I would go for it.

I actually believe GA should give you an advantage. I usually go through couple while preparing to kill my main rivals.

Golden ages are also a wee bit more powerful on faster speeds, as the anarchy from civic/religion changes are more severe. But saving five turns of anarchy on marathon, from going to org. rel. and hereditary rule and choosing a state religion, is huge.

The real reason early GAs are weaker is that the relative value of other uses of the GP go down as your empire gets more powerful.

Bulbing philo can easily save you 10 turns of direct research time and let you trade for another 20 or so (and that ignores the other very handy advantages of nabbing philo), bulbing electricity likely lops 2 or so turns off your research time and if you are VERY well positioned with respect to normal diplomacy and WFYABTA might be leverageable into another 4 turns off via trade.

Likewise the return on settling is far better the earlier you settle. Settling a late GSp barely makes a dent in your overall espionage (assuming you've built courthouses and jails everywhere, settling one in the early BCs will give you major returns for a over 100 turns.

Even the special uses of GP become less powerful late game. One GE can finish the entire Mids in some podunk town for you, with the SoL you can only use him to play catch up. The amount of gold you get from a trade mission declines relative to your net :gold: potential as the game progresses. Etc.

In terms of raw percent increase in economic performance, early GAs are actually stronger than late (getting 1 extra :commerce: per tile is much bigger when your average :commerce: yielding tile, like seafood, horses, and riverside farms, gives 1.5 :commerce: than 5, from a respectable amount of cottages either overall or in B cap). The difference is that late game you have nothing else to do (aside from found corps). Thus your terminal 2 to 5 GP will likely end up being wasted.

All of that being said, a BC GA is not always a bad idea. The key is to make sure that it is worth it. You are sacrificing the long term value of your future GP, but that is fine if the short term does something like say double your size. Going for a LB rush and saving multiple turns on the civic swap as well as getting the suckers out faster from increased :hammers: is worth nerfing your last few GP (who will sit around unable to start a GA for you) and foregoing the benifits or an early bulb if it will ensure you kill off the competition and dramaticly increase in land size.

I generally agree with the 2+ turn anarchy saving threshold for GA. And if you've expanded to near-strike (REX or early war) rather than idly let yourself remain boxed in, the GA benefits can be a life-saver for rebuilding an economy, quickly.

I agree with both of the previous posters (unless somebody cross-posts me).

The early GA is all about what you can do with it. If it's several civic changes and economic recovery, do it. If you are like me and always feel like you need a few more units to declare war...then a GA can give you the productive edge to nab another city or two. In the late game, it's probably worth the sacrifice of using that great person for bulbing, for instance, to get those cities you wouldn't be able to get otherwise, at least not this early.

Not worth it. Suck up the anarchy or don't make the switch imo. Let's say, hypothetically, that an early golden age affects 30-40 tiles (~6-8 cities at size 5-6). That's nice. However, by mid-to-late game that same golden age affects 200+ tiles (~20 cities at size 10+). The net difference is tremendous. Furthermore, as has been already stated, there are much better ways you can use your great people early on:

GS: Bulbing, academies, settling
GE: Rush-wonder, settling, save for Mining, Inc. or Creative Constructions
GM: Settling, trade mission, bulbing in some cases, save for one of the food corps
GP: Shrine, settling, bulbing (e.g., theology)
GSpy: Infiltrating, settling, scotland yard
GA: Useful for cultural victory; otherwise best used for golden ages or culture bombing an important captured city and thus ending revolt immediately.

GA would be the only GPers I could justify using for an early golden age, but even then I would save it until my empire would benefit more from the golden age.

Not worth it. Suck up the anarchy or don't make the switch imo. Let's say, hypothetically, that an early golden age affects 30-40 tiles (~6-8 cities at size 5-6). That's nice. However, by mid-to-late game that same golden age affects 200+ tiles (~20 cities at size 10+). The net difference is tremendous. Furthermore, as has been already stated, there are much better ways you can use your great people early on:

GS: Bulbing, academies, settling
GE: Rush-wonder, settling, save for Mining, Inc. or Creative Constructions
GM: Settling, trade mission, bulbing in some cases, save for one of the food corps
GP: Shrine, settling, bulbing (e.g., theology)
GSpy: Infiltrating, settling, scotland yard
GA: Useful for cultural victory; otherwise best used for golden ages or culture bombing an important captured city and thus ending revolt immediately.

GA would be the only GPers I could justify using for an early golden age, but even then I would save it until my empire would benefit more from the golden age.


You are right in your results, but wrong in your analysis. The number of tiles affected is irrelevent, we care how how fast the GA increases our economic climb (GNP growth being by and large exponential). It is a fairly good assumption in Civ that :commerce: follows a basic rule of compounding so 20 :commerce: 50 turns sooner is worth far more than 30 later.

For a CE the strongest time to GA is early game, before you have much cottage growth at all. Hypothetically, if we pop a golden age when we only one :commerce: tiles our GA comes pretty close to doubling our GNP (slightly less thanks to things like trade); for a fully mature CE we are looking at only a 14% increase in :commerce:. The first case gives us 8 turns of "free research", the latter only 1.1. With Fin Civs this disparity is even worse (300% increase for the early GA vs 12.5% for the late) literally 24 turns vs 1.

Now, obviously this is a first order analysis. The dynamics change when we include :hammers: as US towns get a huge boost from the GA. But the basic relationship is still the same, GAs give one extra yield to any tile regardless of base yield. Thus a BC riverside mine benefits more from a GA than a railroaded riverside mine with a levee. There is enough play as well with windmills and waterwheels to make GAs a bit more interesting, but the basics are the same, early golden ages trump late ones in their own right.

It is only the extremely high value of everything else early and the extremely low value of the same late that dictates going for late GAs a rule of thumb.

Agree with above. Saying an early GA is not worth it because it effects less tiles is making a huge error in judgement. what's better, getting 1000 beakers in the modern age, or 200 in the classical age? I'd take 200 in the classical age. Or what's better, getting 1 great engineer at the beginning of the game, or getting 10 with future tech? At the point of future tech, 10 GEs won't make a different. 1 GE at the beginning of the game is enough of an advantage to win the game for you.
Yes, in a late game empire, a GA might work on over 100 tiles, maybe even close to 1000. That's irrelevant. What matters is the relative change. In the late game, a GA might reduce your research time from 12 turns to 10, let's say. In the early game, it reduces it from 12 to 6. Which is the better option? Early game, in that case. Anyway, I'm not trying to argue that GAs are better early game, I'm just saying that it's wrong to assume it's better to use them only in the late game. They can be powerful at any point in the game, but as another poster already said, in the early game other options are more powerful, like rushing a wonder, bulbing, or settling. In the late game if you aren't building a corp there is usually nothing to do with GP other than run a golden age, I realize that.

Hi

I dont think its much about WHEN you burn a gp for a GA as much as why you did it and what you do during it. In this case using it for a quick switch to war civics footing and then (I am assuming) spending rest of time massing troops quicker and building a warchest would be worth it if it helps you win war easier and quicker and puts you in better position when its all done. And in long run if it means a successful war then that success would make bigger diff in game than a later GA.

I would say bigger waste would be burning a gp for GA with thinking of "nothing else better to do" then just going on normally doing what you would have done if that gp hadnt popped at that specific time. So it not time of game that GA happens as much as what you do with it while it is happening that counts more. At least that my oipinion.

Kaytie

Yes, in most things civ, early is better than late, I'm not debating that. But, you have to combine both parts of what I said. I can take the bonus from the golden age OR I can bulb my GS for xxxx beakers. Which would I rather do? In most/all cases I would rather take the bulb. Same idea with building an academy that will help in the short term and also pay signficant dividends over the long haul. Would I rather spend a GE on a golden age or rush the pyramids? Would I rather spend a GP on a golden age or build a shrine or settle for :gold: and :hammers: (and :science: with representation)?

getting 1000 beakers in the modern age, or 200 in the classical age? I'd take 200 in the classical age.

I would rather take the x >>> 200 from the bulb...

Also, the percentage payoff does look considerably better for the early golden age, but you also have to consider the sheer gross payoff of the late golden age. That low % can still correspond to a very large volume output that can put a decisive hurt on AIs in terms of your position relative with theirs. This can be especially true if you are able to string golden ages back to back to back, which is, obviously, much easier to do later in the game.

Like I said, a GArtist is probably your best bet for an early golden age, but I would have to question how/why you have generated a GArtist that early in the game, if you are not going for a cultural victory, in which case settling/bombing is probably much better of an option.

I'm w. FutureHermit.

The issue isn't whether an early GA is better than a late one. I actually think it might well be just because it's . . . well. . . . . early.

The issue however is whether an early GA is better than the alternative use of the GP in question. And there, usually it is not.

-abs

It depends. If that golden age would give you an edge to win the current war or a particular wonder race, or so needed boost at the economy (or everything at once), etc., then go for it.

If you need a golden age in order to win a current war or wonder then I question why you are doing those things in the first place.

@futurehermit: it is perfectly possible to plan golden ages, so why not plan to use a GA to gain a critical advantage?

In general, and I've argues this before, I think early golden ages are underestimated. Sure, later on you have more cities, but it's all about relative benefits and exponential growth. Early on, as most tiles will produce 1-3 commerce or hammers, the golden age adds 100-33%. Later on, with civic and tech enabled towns and workshops which produce 4-6 commerce or hammers, the GA only adds 25-16%. Obviously, the MoM adds 50% efficacy, but .16x1.5<.33, and MoM is not exactly a late game wonder. Early great people might be critical for a academy or bulb, but this tends not to hold for priests, artists, merchants, or spies, depending on game play. An early 100-33% boost plus 2-3 turns anarchy with compound interest is certainly comparable with a settled great person, which is better depends on the situation. If not spiritual, I like planning GAs around big civic shifts to save turns as a turn wasted is, well, a turn wasted!:-)

One aspect of Golden Ages that people seem to be forgetting; +100% GPP. During early golden ages, I normally flip into Caste at the beginning and max out specialists in one city. I don't want to whip during a Golden Age, why kill your people when they are working at their peak? Then you flip back into sSavery on the last turn.

With the bonus you can often churn out another GP to replace the one you burnt before the Golden Age even ends. With Philo and the MoM it's often possible to chain Golden Ages back to back to back all the way to the Taj Mahal.

Golden Ages are also very handy for preparation right before a war - you use the hammers to build units faster, and switch into Theo and/or Vass then switch back out on the last turn.

Saving yourself 3 turns of anarchy? Most definitely worth it.

bar unlucky ga pop from ne or some wonder, not worth it; any other gp can produce much more then a ga at that time. Acad/infiltrate/trade mission/bulb... all trump a ga. A ge for a later wonder or mining(since it's so hard to safely get one) and a gp is such a nice addition to any bureau capitol it's a pity to burn even without shrines.

Yes, in most things civ, early is better than late, I'm not debating that. But, you have to combine both parts of what I said. I can take the bonus from the golden age OR I can bulb my GS for xxxx beakers. Which would I rather do? In most/all cases I would rather take the bulb. Same idea with building an academy that will help in the short term and also pay signficant dividends over the long haul. Would I rather spend a GE on a golden age or rush the pyramids? Would I rather spend a GP on a golden age or build a shrine or settle for :gold: and :hammers: (and :science: with representation)?



I would rather take the x >>> 200 from the bulb...

Also, the percentage payoff does look considerably better for the early golden age, but you also have to consider the sheer gross payoff of the late golden age. That low % can still correspond to a very large volume output that can put a decisive hurt on AIs in terms of your position relative with theirs. This can be especially true if you are able to string golden ages back to back to back, which is, obviously, much easier to do later in the game.

Like I said, a GArtist is probably your best bet for an early golden age, but I would have to question how/why you have generated a GArtist that early in the game, if you are not going for a cultural victory, in which case settling/bombing is probably much better of an option.


The point about bulbing (or settling or whatever else) is valid in most circumstances. The point about gross yield is pretty much utter garbage aside from culture wins. By the math, getting to a half dozen key techs a few turns early thanks to the magic of compounding will net you a lead over the AI that UTTERLY dwarfs whatever small advantage you can take off the AI. Go back to the numbers call it a 50% modifier vs a 25% one (and this is being very generous to the late GA) we effectively save four turns or we effectively save two.

A properly leveraged early GA should give you more growth (i.e. 3 more turns of a tech advantage with a LB rush can mean getting a shiny second cap or going down in flames when the AI gets LBs.


If you need a golden age in order to win a current war or wonder then I question why you are doing those things in the first place.

Because:
1. You've exhausted other options. Being hard blocked by Toko comes to mind, you have got to knee cap him and you cannot afford a strike.
2. Target of opportunity. You crashed your economy REXing, but Monty has called Pacal's SOD away leaving you a quick shot at his cap (with say the Mids and ToA). You could let Toko overrun Pacal and then deal with an oversized, overwondered war monger who is notoriously hard to manage via diplomacy; or you could burn a GPr and have the cash to whip in a quick strike force of 8 HAs and take down the cap while it only has two archers on garrison duty.
3. Crappy luck, you send out masses of jumbos against a metal deprived AI and halfway through the war a random event gives him Fe. Now your pult requirements double so the war lasts longer but being able to afford it via a golden age is better than tossing away the potential gains by leaving the AI cap intact.


Now I agree that early GAs are not worth sacrificing the other uses of GP; but there are times where the tactical situation says pop the GA and leverage it to the hilt. It, however has nothing to do with total :commerce: output, rather how many turns you save or even more precisely how it changes your rate of growth.

I would like to see in-game examples of the benefits of an early golden age. I am open to it, but remain skeptical. In all the many, many games I've read through on these forums, especially those by high-level players, I have NEVER seen anyone use an early golden age.

Let me ask this question,

1 turn in classical age = (how many ?) turns in industrial age

I would say 1.5~2. A little advantage in the begining accumulate to huge late game advantage.

The bonus in commerce/hammer can be converted to free turns too.
My early gold age give me 5 free turns. I think that's the best gold age I ever had.

Like I said, I would love to see a game posted in these forums that demonstrates the potential power of early golden ages. Let's see it in practice.

If you need a golden age in order to win a current war or wonder then I question why you are doing those things in the first place.

Because things do not always work as desired. I believe you can manipulate AI's not to attack you or attack at the right time every single game, but I cannot. Sometimes AI declare when I see that probability but I just hope they woun't ant try to build libraries instead of troops to get an economic advantage. Sometimes AIs bribe other AIs to help when I attack them. Or sometimes I attack hoping for a short war (e.g. to take that only Shrine city or resource) but AI refuses to make peace and my situation suddenly becomes very bad. But then again, if they did not happen I would consider moving one difficulty level up.

I don't remember what the exact quote is from Sun Tzu, but the gist of it is, only fight when you know you are going to win (that doesn't necessarily mean that you have to move a skill level up...).

If you're bogged down in a war, chances are you are going to be building up WW, which can mean that your cities are working even less tiles, making a golden age even less appealing imo.

I agree that during a war is probably the worst time to Golden Age. Immediately before or after are ideal, however. Before for reasons already mentioned; after to quickly build infrastructure in the newly captured cities, and because you are suddenly working significantly more tiles after a successful war.

Great artists are devastating against non-culture AIs though, and 3 gpt isn't half-bad early on. I've occasionally settled citysites I wouldn't otherwise have because of GAs. Settling 2 squares away from an AI city and overwhelming it with culture gains you a citysite as surely as taking the AIs city. But, early GAs? They scale directly with population, so I tend to bulb and use my last 3 GPs for two GAs.

Yes, in most things civ, early is better than late, I'm not debating that. But, you have to combine both parts of what I said. I can take the bonus from the golden age OR I can bulb my GS for xxxx beakers. Which would I rather do? In most/all cases I would rather take the bulb. Same idea with building an academy that will help in the short term and also pay signficant dividends over the long haul. Would I rather spend a GE on a golden age or rush the pyramids? Would I rather spend a GP on a golden age or build a shrine or settle for :gold: and :hammers: (and :science: with representation)?



I would rather take the x >>> 200 from the bulb...

Also, the percentage payoff does look considerably better for the early golden age, but you also have to consider the sheer gross payoff of the late golden age. That low % can still correspond to a very large volume output that can put a decisive hurt on AIs in terms of your position relative with theirs. This can be especially true if you are able to string golden ages back to back to back, which is, obviously, much easier to do later in the game.

Like I said, a GArtist is probably your best bet for an early golden age, but I would have to question how/why you have generated a GArtist that early in the game, if you are not going for a cultural victory, in which case settling/bombing is probably much better of an option.

No...you totally missed the point. I wasn't talking about 1000 beakers in the game exactly. You immediately thought "OH BUT I CAN GET MORE THAN 1000 BEAKERS!!!! FROM A BULB !!!! YEAHH!!!!"

No, no, no, totally missed the point, completely. I was comparing two hypothetical numbers. I said what's better, 1000 beakers in the modern age or 200 in the classical age? Fine...since you can't handle hypothetical concepts, change the numbers. 5000 beakers in the modern age or 1000 in the classical age? I'd take 1000 in the classical age, thank you very much.

Are you going to get 1000 beakers from an early game golden age?

Define early game

Yes, defining what we all mean by "early golden age" would probably be a good idea. I'm thinking of early game as pre-currency/pre-col, which means pre-200AD normal speed for me on Monarch. I define "mid-game golden age" as around liberalism/nationalism and the taj mahal, which means around 1000-1200 AD. I guess a case could be made for an "early-ish golden age" somewhere between 200-1000AD, but at least in my games I experience a lot of variance with respect to what happens during this period (e.g., if I am rexing, wonderspamming, warmongering, etc.), so I would have to see a specific game to see what a golden age here would look like.

I usually find that GAs help the most during critical stages in the game where I'm falling behind the curve so to speak. Usually this happens around the renaissance-industrial era when I've not been able to get enough land, which is a not uncommon problem on immortal/deity, the problem is compounded by the mounting era bonuses the AI receives, which means you need an ever greater ratio of land in order to compete at the same time as bulbing is losing efficiency. There will usually be a snag where you need to put out a critical amount of hammers for getting universities/oxfords up or for building an army as this kind of production usually will have had to be sacrificed earlier in the game in order to keep up, first in expanding, and secondly in research.
I would liken it to using the turbo in a racing game at the right moment or perhaps to use a military analogy, to withhold firing your volley until the enemy is very close on an 18th century battlefield.

I'm speaking here of game where you are struggling to maintain the grip, I can see an equally good argument for pushing the advantage in games where you are in a position of being very close to outdistance your opponents and just need a little extra push.
In any case it's a matter of timing. I don't think you can automatically assume that early GAs are bad, but in my experience the right timing will typically be after the medieval period at least for reasons others have mentioned in the thread. I will often use even early artists for bulbing, drama and music are good techs to trade around as they are not popular early choices, it can be worth it even if there is one other civ that beat you to music.

What about a medieval golden age? I play on standard speed, and I often find it difficult to produce macemen fast enough for an effective war with them. I'll try timing a golden age for this period next game.

Like I said, I would love to see a game posted in these forums that demonstrates the potential power of early golden ages. Let's see it in practice.

ECI [emperor cookbook I - Ghandi] round two.

It can be argued that first place winner was not far away from other saves but it is one of best ezamples of early GA i have read.

The write up on it is not very detailed. He said he basically used a GP from the stonehenge on a GA to push through monarchy. He also said:

Early game golden ages are relatively inefficient

I would like to see some more games played out showcasing this to see how beneficial it can be, especially compared to other possibilities. What else might've been done with that GP? Would it have been a better idea? Maybe not. GPs I can get on board with using in a GA, but I need to see more than this to be convinced.

I once conquered a vast swath of land with Shaka and my economy was tanking so hardcore that I was only managing to pay the bills with pillage money. I was teching currency to save my rear when my economy finally bottomed out. I made about 2 gpt at 0% science, and currency was about 80 turns away, though I was the largest civ by far. I spawned a great person and their bulb was not going to help, so I burned them for a golden age and bam, I got currency before the end of the GA, I think in about 7 turns (on epic speed). So if I'd been able to bulb currency, maybe I would have, but in that case the golden age really helped. Once I had currency I could bump the slider up to 10% because of the trade routes, and after a few turns I had many markets built and got the slider up to 30%. The GA really helped me. If I'd had to plod along for more than 30 turns trying to get currency I would've fallen too far behind.

The write up on it is not very detailed. He said he basically used a GP from the stonehenge on a GA to push through monarchy. He also said:



I would like to see some more games played out showcasing this to see how beneficial it can be, especially compared to other possibilities. What else might've been done with that GP? Would it have been a better idea? Maybe not. GPs I can get on board with using in a GA, but I need to see more than this to be convinced.

It is a highly situational thing, normally not encountered if everything goes according to The Plan. In terms of net long term benefit, yes eary golden ages suck, it is exceedingly hard to get more raw outputs via the golden age than you get from a bulb; however there are times where the short term leverage trumps long term considerations.

For instance, you go on a phantapult war and one AI bribes another to declare on you (i.e. Cathy) which blindsides you, but more importantly takes down two happiness resources (say a gold and fur) on the border to pillage. You've lost happy cap, you need to whip in new defenders to turn back AI 2's SoD and overall you will just have more units required. If this pushes you into strike (quite likely if you made a hard beeline to jumbos) and now you have GSp pop you face rather limited choices. You could settle him for a pittance of science but you still are at war with two AIs, no major econ techs aside from writing, and your army is about to strike. You could SY, which would be great for late game espionage. But you'd still have nothing for turns. Infilitrate would be handy, if you have alphabet (which is not a given with a hard beeline for jumbos) and if the AI has economy techs to swipe .. of course you still need to divert production to the spies themselves.

Such situations are rare, but not unheard of. Perhaps better play could let you get around using the GA to stay solvent, but sometimes things beyond your control change the plan (e.g. the AP finishes while you are at war and a religious crusade is called).

Most often my early GA games come down to some moment of decision where winning a war has a high possibility of more than doubling my total late game economic output. If it takes a GA to win that war then it is still worth it.