Teching past the mid game

2metre, you are not getting the concept of balance production in regards to building wealth. As I said previouslly by the time I need to build wealth exclusively, my empire can wipe any AI out. So no need to build new units.

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LOL, I do know when and what for building wealth is worth and thats why I am trying to tell you (and all who read this) that this is strictly situational and of limited use. Not like what here was attempted to be made some kind of general strategy and kind of economics. Building wealth is just one tactic, which you can use or use not along with other general concepts in some games and not a strategy to be aimed for at all.

At standard speed and map size both market and Grocer cost 150 hammers and bank cost 200 H. Lets say you you build all three in a city and ran 4 merchants. So that is 24 commerce per turn. The cost is 500H. It will take 21 turns of running 4 merchant specialist to recover the hammer cost. So if you have more than 21 turns left in the game AnD can run 4 merchants (depends on food surplus) than it is worth building those improvements. If you can only run say 2 specialist the it will take 42 turns to recover the cost of building those improvements. There are no set rules with these kind of buildings. Sometimes it is worth building it, but some times they are not.

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Yeah, of course I know lot about the rate of returning for investments - I have economical college degree, despite working something completely different - but this your example have again nothing to do with the opening post - Teching past the mid game. This is again just a specific narrow case.

2metraninja said:

Whats PvE?

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Player vs Engine in contrast to Player vs Player.

I'm not the best player in the world, but sure got my share of winning. Had the fourth best % of wins at The League and was third for best streak of wins - 18 wins in a row or something at one time.

If you are so seasoned MP player, I will be even more tempted to try playing against you. I like challenges and learning the things trough hard experience. Sadly not much players are like this...

Anyway, the challenge stays, take your time.

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The 1st 10 times you'd own me, I'm sure of that, simply because I got 0 Civ PvP experience. You'd probably rush me at a time where I'd try to Oracle.

If you you were 3rd of the league, ask Number 2 and 1 if they have teams, and if not, if they want to make up a team with you and me. I always say I play what is needed, but if I have free choice, I'd play something like a Tech-Whore. You'd have to protect me then.

I'm 0% interessted in single player PvP, fought over 10000 duels in Warhammer, that time is over. A really good group could interesst me though and I'd really be willing to dedicate a lot my time.

Htadus said:

Nice shot seraiel. Isn't high level games with max opponants are a hoot to play? Nice job beeline and tech selling for everybodies failed/accumilated gold.

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What is a hoot? O_o

Let me guess about the economy. International traderoutes in all cities

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Correct.

low maintanance cost due to the size of the map.

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Correct.

Small empire for the map size but large for number of AI.

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Wrong. Viccy, and Pericles and Washington are larger than me by a good share, they all have like 12 cities, I have only 8, and think I'm #4 in land owned or so.

You likely founded 1 or two cities after the capital and claimed the rest via early wars.

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Again wrong. All 8 cities were settled peacefully, I haven't fought a single war up to this point, my Military are 8 units for MP :> .

AI are small and has even lower maintanance which means they have alot of GPT to buy your resources. On this set up claiming just few resources and selling it to AI for large amount of GPT is awesome. I have sold corn for some obsene 15 or 25 gpt once.

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Also wrong. I mentioned the ones being larger than me, most have my size, there are some small AIs. Best GPT I get for a Ressources is 8 from Washington, I get about 40 GPT from Ressource Trade overall.

Also if you bulbed or Oracled Theo, you may have the shrine gold too. But that income is limited to the spread. So no big surprise.

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Having founded Christianity must have confused you, but I mentioned that I play with choose Religions. I founded Christianity with Meditation (I have no leaders starting with Mysticism in that game) and teched Sailing before Monotheism was discovered. Auto-Spread on Huge / Marathon is very very sick, about 6-8 Civs converted to my Religion, especially my neighbours. The Shrine alone generates 44 GPT atm. I have built exactly 1 Missionary during the whole game, because one of my cities got Islam.

So when you get to about 20 cities, please post a screen shot at 100% science.

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I'll try I hope Conqs are as good as the people say.

As for techs: You likely bulbed theology? Then teched or bulbed paper. Traded theo for most what you need. You are likely going to bulb most of Liberalism with the next GS. WHich would mean you have the option to trade Philo or already bulbed philo. So how far off am I?

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Totally wrong . I oracled MC because it was easy and the most expensive I could get, I didn't bulb anything as my 1st GP was a Prophet at 1200 BC and the 2nd is / was a GS at 900 BC with which I'll build an Academy suiting my Buro Capital. No bulb at all till now, I plan on bulbing PP, Chemistry, SM and Bio all once and try a huge Liberalism -> Medicine Slingshot again, but I don't think it's possible with Isa, at least not for me. Bulbing btw is highly inefficient on Huge / Marathon.
Trading with 17 Civs if one understands Diplomacy is quite amazing though. Another trick I used was taking all the Gold-Builders into my game, Civs like Viccy, Lizzy, Mansa, Willem, etc.

Seraiel, hoot is sort of fun or funny as in makes you laugh. In this case due to the opportunities available for trades and warring small empires. Thanks for the clarifications.

Regarding your city claiming, is it because the settlers are cheap in marathon?

BTW, can you really prevent AI from teching Lib untill you open Medicine in Deity? I stop at Immortal level but find it difficult to hold AI back in the Lib race even if I hog Philo. What is it that you do to enable liberating Medicine? Why is bulbing inefficient on Marathon?

Don't know about the "hootiness-factor" , i. e. Diplomacy with 17 AIs is horrible, especially if you play for Sushi and have to keep everyone on cautious to get their ressources. The possibility of trades is awesome, aswell as horrible again, because the AIs trade everything between themselves, they also tech everything because 17 AIs just make very many random choices. It's incredibly hard to maintain a monopoly on whatever, anyhow, if one made it to get one, one can get like 7 techs for 1 sometimes.

Settlers aren't cheap on Marathon, they cost 300 . 8 cities is also more than usual, normally I only get as many with IMP and with slaving my cities down so much, that the Capital cannot even work the Gold. This map otoh was extraordinary, so was also the tactic used in rexing. I stole workers from QSH which allowed some tremedous production by chopping, Isa has cheap workers in addition, and on top of that, I bribed all Civs against QSH, allowing me to basically settle the space which was though for him.

Key to keep the AIs from getting Lib is to tech Educatioin before someone has reached Paper and can choose it as a tech, and, enabling the AI to tech different things, like Astronomy, Nationalism, etc.
One has to be very fast to Paper, then don't trade Paper and tech Education before one AI has completed it. Then the Tech is tagged as "known by somebody" and has lower priority, this is what I call "the Education Block" , which can sometimes hold for over 800 years.
The last step is to start a GA at the right time and create an enormous amount of GPs during it and heavily bulb towards Biology, this of course means, that one had to let ones empire grow as much as possible up to that point.

Bulbing on Huge / Marathon is simply inefficient, because one gets only very few Beakers in return for a GS, i. e. 5000 Beakers while Education costs 10k+ . GAs are very strong on Huge / Marathon therefor.

Leevees are very strong. I usually go Replaceable parts for leevees after Cuirassiers.

2metraninja said:

Yeah, sure, but where your STRONG defensive army will come from if your production cities are building wealth instead of units I do wonder.

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I don't really need a strong defensive army! I need an adequate defensive army. I do lower my research-rate (temporarily!) to quickly build up a strong ATTACKING army, though.

Yeah, sure, but lowering the slider with no money-multiplying buildings wont do you much good, this is my point.

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But it will do some good... and many small rivers...

Yes, yes, selling resources is OK, but it is some kind of nice additional side income, you cant rely on it to keep your slider at 100%.

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Exactly, a nice additional side income. Right on the button, there...

Once I tried this approach and it turned out that I cant get positive gold income on 100% before factories, railroads and such. Am I missing something?

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Maybe you missed the title of the thread: "Teching past the mid game". In the early game you will manage 100% Research on the slider with some quality tech-selling, losing 5-20 Gold per turn.

Again, having no single marketplace/grocery/bank and running 0% science slider looks like pure waste of commerce to me... But hopefully at some point someone will take the gauntlet and teach me how much I am wrong

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Running prolonged times with 100% Gold without Gold-multipliers IS a waste of commerce. You only run 100% Gold during short military campaigns...


Yours Sincerely

Kjotleik of Norway

Running 100% gold slider without gold multipliers does waste a little commerce, but it wastes fewer hammers, which are usually more coveted. Running 100% gold with or without gold multipliers still lets you go a little bit farther with your science multipliers.

The binary research system isn't really about this negligible, round-off waste anyway. It's about being able to research (and then trade) monopoly techs. On higher difficulties, you can count on the AI to research much faster than you'll ever match single-handedly. Knowing that, you have to use the AI's strength against them as much as possible. There are two ways of doing so: espionage and tech trading.

Espionage allows you to catch up in technologies very quickly (especially on slower speeds, which I often play) but gives you less flexibility in what techs you're going to get. The diplo penalty of getting caught is permanent, I think, but it's usually not a big deal. It also gets stronger the more you work it.

Tech trading usually gives you more, gives you better diplo (if you do it right or don't have to worry about worst enemies), and is far more flexible in terms of what technologies you can get. It does have the problem of being hard to judge how good of a deal that you're getting, it's harder to get the timing right, and it means sucking up more to your buddies.

100% gold lets you use either method to leverage the AI strengths and, if you choose to trade a tech, allows you a clearer picture of what technologies to research. Not bad for a system that only costs you patience.

2metraninja said:

LOL, I do know when and what for building wealth is worth and thats why I am trying to tell you (and all who read this) that this is strictly situational and of limited use. Not like what here was attempted to be made some kind of general strategy and kind of economics. Building wealth is just one tactic, which you can use or use not along with other general concepts in some games and not a strategy to be aimed for at all.... but this your example have again nothing to do with the opening post - Teching past the mid game. This is again just a specific narrow case.

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Ah, but building wealth does have to do with researching past the mid-game. It does for me anyway.

You're right that building wealth is a limited use strategy. For me, though, the strategy is to get to a specific technology that will require a lot of hammers once I get there. In other words, it's when I'm in a situation where I want science now and production later, but it takes time to switch between the two even when you have a lot of workers.

I've had one or two games that I knew that I was going to get either chemistry or guilds fairly early. Either tech makes workshops on grassland tiles very effective for this strategy. Getting both is even better, of course, but not at all necessary.

So, once you know that you are going to do this, you are faced with a bit of a conundrum: how do you get the research that you need while still retooling your empire for workshops? You build wealth!

Once you get the techs that you need, you don't need to research more, so you quickly switch to production instead. If you find yourself to far behind A) You're not warring, just kind of defeats the purpose of this approach and B) You can always switch your cities back to boosting your research/espionage.

Maybe you missed the title of the thread: "Teching past the mid game". In the early game you will manage 100% Research on the slider with some quality tech-selling, losing 5-20 Gold per turn.

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For me, the mid-game is rifles. Past them there is a lot of time before you have factories and powerplants.

I don't really need a strong defensive army! I need an adequate defensive army. I do lower my research-rate (temporarily!) to quickly build up a strong ATTACKING army, though.

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Adequate defensive army is still a lot of troops building.

Anyway, the challenge stays - gather yourself, play a game or two with me and prove me how I am wrong - Play by E-mail, Pitboss, online without turn limit - anything works for me.

Cheers.

2metraninja said:

Anyway, the challenge stays - gather yourself, play a game or two with me and prove me how I am wrong - Play by E-mail, Pitboss, online without turn limit - anything works for me.

Cheers.

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Well, attach a starting-save to a post, and I'll look into it. I cannot promise to post save-games more often than once a week, though (Sundays), as I mostly play on weekends...

This will be a single-player game. My gaming-computer is not the same as my internet-computer. It hasn't been for a while now... So I'm not able to play a 2-player game...

Just choose a level/mapsize/maptype/speed/civilization/leader and post the save-game as an attachment. Standard BTS 3.19 (18 Civs, no native villages & no events) is my preference.


Yours Sincerely

Kjotleik of Norway

I was referring to a multi-player game, either duel 1 vs 1 or with AIs. Not really interested in a single- player game where you are out of my reach

If you are not eager to meet me in duel, as a compromise - about single- player challenge, I do play from time to time in the BOTMs - this months BOTM53 I think I might give a shot. What VC we set to pursue? And what will be the benchmark - earlier finish date or points at the time finished?

2metra, I have already started but be very happy to join in a friendly BOTM game challenge as long as it is not Domination or Space Colony. What will it be?

that's the noble one? I would have doubts about anything regarding "teching past midgame" since that game should be over at cuirs latest.

LOL I dont think I've ever done anything else than Domination.

Actually I have one Diplo win and it turned out to be the fastest diplo for this particular BOTM back then.

What about Conquest now?

vranasm said:

that's the noble one? I would have doubts about anything regarding "teching past midgame" since that game should be over at cuirs latest.

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If you get to Astro fast enough, maces and cats should do the job.

2metraninja said:

LOL I dont think I've ever done anything else than Domination.

Actually I have one Diplo win and it turned out to be the fastest diplo for this particular BOTM back then.

What about Conquest now?

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Conquest it is. BTW it is much easier than Domi.

@ Opies :

@ Tech path :
Play a handful games that force you into the modern era and you should become more familiar with endgame techs. There are lots of bottleneck techs (Sci Meth, Combustion, Electricity, they're everywhere) and techs worth of beelining.
The reasonning for getting a tech is no different in the modern era than in the ancient, though. Techpath depends on one's relative position to the AI and one's own objectives. They may be to increase the bpt, production, to get a unit, or just a trade, etc.


@ Tech rate :
Organized Religion.
There was a lot of discussion about building wealth/research. OR got little attention. It is a prime way to increase one's GDP : it allows to get the multipliers going and to raise the city caps.
Getting OR in the BCs or in the ADs makes a real difference on one's tech rate. Cities get more productive and faster. That is still the early-mid game, right. But having infrastructure puts one in good position to tech in the late game.
It also is a fine late game civic. At least till factories are built. Given commerce and Universal Suffrage, one can also rushbuy infrastructure at a discount (starting with Banks).
Running Organized Religion may actually put one in the position where cities have built everything they could. Then they can switch to build wealth by lack of other things to do.

A committed use of other civics is also to be considered. One has to gauge these civics' lifespan.

Opies said:

Would it be recommended by people to play space victory to better familiarize yourself with late game tech paths and the value of various techs?

It also seems like late game, tech trading nosedives and becomes near useless with techs being so expensive and not having cheap techs to make the difference.

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To your first comment. Yes definitely. Like you mentioned, having played through the late game tech tree a few times, tried different civic combinations, different wonders, different units etc. you get a much better feel for it.

If you're teching at 20% something is going badly wrong imho. It certainly happens when warring but it shouldn't be the normal state of affairs. In any case, if you haven't already, look into binary research! When warring, putting the slider to 0% is a good idea in fact because you might not be sure what you want to research next and more importantly you want to avoid striking.

I've learnt recently that a strong bureau capital (basically one with plenty of river tiles, all of which are cottaged, at least three decent hammer tiles [to get science and gold multiplier buildings up quickly] and at least one decent food resource) is really important. It can fuel a massive empire. As you start to war generally the AI will have cottaged their capital for you and they will be nice and mature so that should help keep your economy going. When you've got plenty of coastal spots, the Great Lighthouse can be incredibly strong as well.

Anyway that's enough mumbling for now.

2metraninja said:

If there are times, when you cant put your hammers in anything useful (no war expected, no space to settle, needed infra in place) then you must be doing something wrong. Having built all the buildings you may want means you are small. If you are small, you must prepare to become big - thus prepare for war. Staying in one place is not good.

As one guy once have told me about one game - If you are not fighting or preparing to fight, you are doing something wrong

Joking aside, I have read already at few places about using a lot of production building wealth to keep your slider at 100% all the time as main strategy. Why would you do that and what advantage you get? Is it about saving yourself building money multiplying buildings? Can someone show some screenshots or post some guidelines how good this fares compared to a normal binary research?

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Personally I build wealth if there is nothing else worth building, especially if I want to beeline something. And in desperation when I'm about to go into strike. Situationally useful but I certainly wouldn't devote productions cities to it the whole game...

@Seraiel - Just out of interest, why have you chosen Isabella? I find her to be one of the weakest leaders in all honesty (that might generate a lot of hate ). Her starting techs are particularly weak. I guess its ok if you want to found a religion but that's a strategy I never employ (much better to capture the shrine after they've spread the religion for you). Having never tried it I couldn't say but I'd always thought that on deity an AI will pretty well always get to medi or poly before you...

Opies said:

I find myself time and time again in games where, the first say, 200 turns are easy, and make sense to me, but once I've hit Cuirs, or maybe all the way to cavs, the tech tree becomes a big jumbled mess I can't make any sense of.

I understand the typical early beelines and tech path options, but have no damn idea too far past liberalism. Do I beeling to cavs once I have cuirs? Beeline to medicine for sushi? Go for economics for the merchant? This is an excellent path as it gives you 2 great civic options and a GM to do a Trade for goldI'm sure there are other tech paths but those are kind of the only 3 I focus on. Should I go straight to tanks if warring, or would it be better to build up my economy since I've conquered so much land.Can your economy help you get there? From what is said below, I would say you need to practice the recovery part of the game. This require you having the crucial techs; CoL, Alpha and Currency; You should have these via pointy stick tech method if you have Cuirs.

I guess it's really dependent on your game state, more blurry than the early game plan, but can anyone offer some advice and kind of the "right paths" to go on in the "common" situations.It is no more blurry than your early game since your focus would have been for a type of VC you are heading. Unless you changed your end game or trying to save a game gone bad, your goal should be the same. However, if ever in doubt and you have AI to trade with heading the Physics - line will give you techs that can be traded with AI. Again if you are in the hunt for more land mode , Rifling and Assembly line is prefered for obvious reasons and production gains.

Also, I find my research drops badly to 10-20% or even 0% (without much of an SE) after capturing significant land in wars, so much that civs with only 4-8 cities start to blast past me in tech rate. Any advice on how to mitigate that if possible. Whip/Build CH and build the FP asap. Prefferably about 12-14 tiles from the capital and in another AI's former core. If running slavary , build a few libraries/markets in different cities to run specialists. I understand it would kind of be either continue warring, or peace-build for a while and rebuild your economy, but is there more to it than that? Selecting which city to keep is crucial in war games. So if you have units (which cost the most), you might as well take on the next AI. This time be even more selective about razing cities.Also is there anything useful to do with peacevassals?While teching an expensive tech you want, ask your vassel (peace or not) to tech another lower cost tech you want to learn. Peace vassals are almost always Friendly and will trade with you if it is a fair trade. That is the reason for you to learn the more costly tech. If both techs cost the same, then spend a turn or 2 learning that tech. After each turn ask for the trade. You will get it. besides hope that once in a while they will give you a second rate tech for free?

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Why wait for them to give you tech? He is your vassal and nearly never leave. Get them to the tech level needed to tech a useful tech for you. Then trade with him. If needed ask him to not trade to any potential opponants.