Russia's UA Abuse

GhostSalsa said:

I don't think this is the majority opinion at all. Libraries and NC in your capital give you less science in the first 80 turns than extra cities and a caravan.

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joncnunn said:

If his one city national college is induced by Great Library [which would result in one city national college before turn 55 and his second and third cities built by turn 80], it's a good one; except that when he moves up a difficulty level he'll have difficulty beating the AI to it.

Without the Great Library it would take a start with terrible gold & hammers for a two city NC to be significantly slower than one city; and I'd notice that in 4000 BC and re-roll.

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In my games, up to Emperor level, it is better to get NC with capital only due to the usual poor starts for Russia. If you happen to get a really good start with some extra luxes around (different than capital area and far enough away from capital influence) then sure, go for multiple cities. Otherwise, it's not worth the penalty. This is actual play, of course, where the AI winds up teching far faster than I do if I have multiple cities before NC (Tradition, not Liberty, which the latter would mean multiple, of course). YMMV, but this is my experience from vanilla through BNW with a couple thousand hours of play using only Russia.

I do not reroll to get a decent start. I may quit a game by Industrial because it gets boring or goes against my preferred playstyle at the time, but I won't simply reroll in Ancient or Classical to get a better start.

And no, I do not try to get GL. No point.

Example: current game, isolated middle of continent on Continents, three city states but only one in caravan reach (for 5 gpt trade route initially, wee). AI techs ahead while I get NC but then I outtech them easily, at least for the next era or two (up to Industrial, sometimes Modern). Lousy luxes throughout continent.

I am vehemently against rerolls. What's wrong with bonus hammers on your second/third cities? It's not like you'd want a NC in the tundra anyway. Spread early, find a better second city that can outgrow your capital. Russia won't have the best capital for growth/science.... Its actually I think THE worst civ for it, besides Sweden.

Power-wise, its fine, you just have a play style that maximizes Russia's disadvantages.

I like Russia. Typically, with an early animal husbandry you'll always be able to find horses, and same thing for iron working and iron. I'm not sure what maps are best, I like pangea, small continents, and continents (not sure if / how small continents is different than large islands though).

For the tundra bias, understand you have two options. Either try to use tundra to your oil advantage or just turn it off (which is what I do). But, I also turn barbarians off because they just ruin the game for me.

Strategics are the best when it comes to trading resources, especially on lower difficulties, because you can sell one or two at a time. If you're not friends with someone, you can at most get 7gpt from a luxury. You can get much more than that from a strategic, and you don't lose any happiness. Doubling your early gpt is INCREDIBLY powerful, hence Russia is awesome regardless of Kreposts and Cossacks or anything else.

Even if it weren't for the way civ rounds up on trade deals, they'd still be awesome. But, getting 24gpt off one 6-iron tile is practically game-breaking.

Russia is actually pretty weak. The UA is the best part of course, but it's not insane or anything, and then the Krepost is pretty bad. Cossacks are nice but not gamechanging.

How are you getting 24 gpt from a 6 iron tile ? Even if you sell 1 iron to 6 civs for 3gpt each, that's 18. And that's very situational.

Horse and Iron resources provide double quantity. A 6-iron tile therefore yields 12 resources. Selling them individually at 2g each gives you 24gpt. (They're worth roughly 1.7g each, and the AI rounds all trade deals to the nearest whole number, so you get 2g for 1, 3g for 2, 5g for 3, etc... technically you could get 10g for 6, but the AI won't buy 6. Anyway, obviously 2g for 1 is the best bet)

You sell 3 or 4 to each AI, completely drain their GPT. Early game snowball engaged.

And it's not so situational. If you beeline Animal Husbandry and Bronzeworking, it's not at all atypical to have 6 resources to sell. Usually it'd be some combination of 4 horse, 2 iron, or whatever. Russia's start bias tends to start you with strategics in my experience.

Again, it's entirely the strategic UA bonuses that makes Russia so powerful. Cossacks? Whatever. Krepost? Meh. Massive early game gold + extra production? Priceless.