Specialist Economy? - What am I doing wrong?

Recently got back into Civ4 after playing on and off for several years...

Thought I would try my hand at following some "SE guides" but I find myself lost.

As I understand it, the basic premise (at least in SE cities) is to farm the best tiles and build libraries (etc) allowing the city to run specialists and thereby "Farm GPs". Using the GPs to lightbulb techs, and supposedly running the tech-slider at near-zero.

The first problem I seem to hit, is that after the first few, GPs are increasingly slow to farm. I generally find it pointless to have more than a few cities generating GPs, and it doesn't take long before farming GPs for light-bulbing is utterly futile.
I wonder if my problem there is that I need to beeline CoL for Caste System, run heaps of scientists and stagnate the cities at a moderate size? I prefer to run Slavery or Serfdom until Emancipation comes along so perhaps thats where I'm going wrong?

Next, I don't understand the rationale behind settling GPs, and I am constantly amazed when I capture an AI city and see all the settled GPs.
A GS adds 6 science per turn, an Academy adds 50% so you only need 12 science before the Academy is a better option. It would be a pretty poor science city that wasn't producing at least 12 science (especially if running CS to farm GSs). Furthermore, you would need to settle a GS every early in the game for its cumulative effect to surpass light-bulbing, and the problem there is that Light-bulbing is most effective early in the game.
Similar calcs apply to most of the other GPs. A shrine is much better than settling a GP (assuming you have a Holy City), Culture Bombing is more effective than the 12 culture a turn from a settling a GA, Trade Missions generally generate more gold in a single hit than the 6 per turn from a GM, and building a wonder generally equates to more production than the 3+3 from a GE.
Maybe this is because I play on Marathon? But I thought everything was scaled?

Whilst I can understand the benefit of running specialists, especially in certain cities, I can't see how it would allow running the tech-slider at "near zero"?
Furthermore, until you get to US, apart from a few periods of massive military upgrades, what is the purpose of generating a massive gold surplus?

Frankly, the "SE" is a really outdated strategy and it would help players more if those guides were removed.

Specialists are very powerful, but they should be integrated into a broader economy rather than the lone focal point. The easiest and most common way to get a strong economy in Civ 4 is to have a powerful Bureaucracy capitol. This is accomplished by working cottages in the capitol, running the Bureaucracy civic once it is unlocked with Civic Service, and focusing research multipliers such as library, academy, university, etc in this city. A good Bureau capitol typically just needs a decent amount of food so that it can grow large, and some nice river tiles to boost the cottages built around it. Typically with a good Bureau cap you want to generate a great scientist early in the game and build an academy in the capitol. As a general rule of thumb, do not build more academies in non-capitol cities, bulbing techs is usually more powerful.

Specialists can still comprise a large part of your research power if you build the Pyramids and run Rep early, but this isn't something that should be attempted in every single game, especially on higher difficulties where you can lose the wonder quite easily. More commonly though, specialists are run primarily to produce great people such as scientists and merchants and these are used to bulb techs, run trade missions for large amounts of gold, or trigger golden ages. Settling has it's place, but it's not something that should be done the majority of the time.

Crazy Dazz said:

Recently got back into Civ4 after playing on and off for several years...

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Welcome back to Civ IV


First, as long as you understand this:

Izuul said:

...but they should be integrated into a broader economy rather than the lone focal point.

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...and realize that a "Specialist Economy" is not "the only/best way" to play this game, you should get a lot of fun out of experimenting with doing a SE game from time to time. Just don't expect it to be the optimal gameplay, most of the time.


Now, if you DO want to play a pure SE game to have some fun...
(apologies if you know all of this already. Too little info in your post for me to know how good you are at this game)

Just off the top of my head:

- Your tech-slider should not be near-zero in the beginning of the game. In fact, I'd recommend that if you don't have a need for Gold (money)/Culture/Espionage from your commerce, you should actually play with the slider set to research.

- Once you have gotten Libraries (and other buildings that makes specialists available), you will most probably go into each and every city to micro-manage quite often. Make sure to work the high-food tiles in your city-radius, and set the other citizens to work as specialists. If you need production, you should look towards Slavery, rather than working Mines. Your cities will probably stay small enough for that to be the most efficient way of getting Production, because of the specialists each eating two food/turn.

- In my opinion a good SE game needs The Pyramids for running early Representation together with Caste System. Without Caste System you will have to "waste" a lot of Production (and time!) building the needed infrastructure before setting citizens to Specialists.

- Using Great Scientists to bulb technologies very early is both a benefit (getting a tech early is good) and a drawback (100% bulbing with one GP usually means losing research as the early technologies are cheaper than the research-points given by the Great Scientist. And the "overflow" is lost).

- If you manage to get a lot of early Great Persons, bulbing is good short-term. But settling some of them may be beneficial. A Settled Great Prophet gives +2 Production as well as +5 Gold (money). If you later on run Representation he will also get a +3 Research on top. A Stonehenge-generated settled Great Prophet will enable longer periods of 100% Research-slider in the beginning of the game (when it matters the most).

- Once you empire gets up to a decent size (5-8 cities) you could also trigger Golden Ages with your Great People. It only takes one for the first GA, two (different ones) for the second, three (all different ones) for the third etc.

- In some of my own games I have experimented with going for Culture Victories. That usually means setting the Slider to 100% Culture (sooner rather than later) and having three early cottage-spammed cities (or two, with the third as a dedicated GP-farm with some Artist-point World Wonders). In that case, I run Caste System/Representation/Pacifism (you need a State Religion for Pacifism to work, though). You still get a decent research-rate with this approach, as all Specialists are getting the +3 Research from Representation. Settled GP's benefit from Representation as well.

Oh, and feel free to disagree if you have examples that can shed a light that points in a different direction...


Yours Sincerely
Kjotleik of Norway

As has been mentioned an economy based purely on specialists isnt optimum play,the arguments for CE or SE have been discussed ad nauseum over the years,and the general consensus has been a hybrid of the two pretty much.Nevertheless,it is something fun to do,but there are a few things you need to do to get it working to its max.

Pick a PHI leader,as you mentioned Gpeople become more expensive the more you get,this negates it somewhat,and also brings me onto my next point-run pacifism for the +100%GPP.With a PHI leader you will be able to bulb it early because of your +100%GPP,so if you didnt pick up a religion from your neighbours,youve got one now.Obyiously caste is a must,but as Kjotek says you will need slavery for whipping in Infrastructure-this makes Ghandi the ideal choice for his PHI/SPI traits to change from caste to slavery as you need to.

The wonders you want are the Mids/parthenon/great library/MoM/taj mahal/SoL is good if you have copper and an engineer to finish it quick.

When using bulbs I try to set myself a goal,such as get nuc;ear weopens in 1750AD,or get democracy in the medieval era so I can build the statue of liberty in 1400AD or whatever.

Scientific method obsoletes the partenon and GL so get the max out of them before teching it.Theres a page on the forums somewhere with bulbing orders,there are some pretty unusual paths you can take if you study it,Bulbing CS with prophets or Nationalism with a great artist etc.
Many of these more unusual paths require you to not research certain techs as the bulb order changes.

Have fun.

Izuul said:

Frankly, the "SE" is a really outdated strategy and it would help players more if those guides were removed.

Specialists are very powerful, but they should be integrated into a broader economy rather than the lone focal point. The easiest and most common way to get a strong economy in Civ 4 is to have a powerful Bureaucracy capitol. This is accomplished by working cottages in the capitol, running the Bureaucracy civic once it is unlocked with Civic Service, and focusing research multipliers such as library, academy, university, etc in this city. A good Bureau capitol typically just needs a decent amount of food so that it can grow large, and some nice river tiles to boost the cottages built around it. Typically with a good Bureau cap you want to generate a great scientist early in the game and build an academy in the capitol. As a general rule of thumb, do not build more academies in non-capitol cities, bulbing techs is usually more powerful.

Specialists can still comprise a large part of your research power if you build the Pyramids and run Rep early, but this isn't something that should be attempted in every single game, especially on higher difficulties where you can lose the wonder quite easily. More commonly though, specialists are run primarily to produce great people such as scientists and merchants and these are used to bulb techs, run trade missions for large amounts of gold, or trigger golden ages. Settling has it's place, but it's not something that should be done the majority of the time.

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How does a strategy become obsolete when the game has not been patched/changed? What is popular in the forums certainly changes as the active players change.

Optimal has always been play the map to make the most of every tile, but whether you slice up your land for farms or cottages can depend on the player/preference.

I think there are more ways for a player to go wrong in SE or their initial concept of SE compared to cottaging. A good SE will actually settle a lot of scientists in the bureaucratic capitol (also a good SE will have a cottaged bureaucratic capitol). The benefits of bureaucracy is just too large to ignore it. Some techs are worth setting up your tree to bulb, but especially with a philosophical leader settled GPs can be significant contributors.

Pyramids makes the SE a slam dunk early to mid game, but even without it you can still setup for a power spike on specialists earlier than cottages. What you do with that power decides the game.

Without either pyramids and/or a phil leader specialists are not all that great. If I am not mistaken a non-representation scientist only gives as much science as a 3-trade-tile and consumes 2 food. So with grassland farms it is very poor, one needs a food-rich map to make it work well.
The other difficulty is that without a spiritual leader it takes quite a bit of skill to first build up infrastructure or in any case change between caste and slavery without losing too many turns. And it is not always possible to smoothly beeline the essential techs like CoL and Philosophy. Sure there are still maps (seafood heavy) where specialists are a good strategy even without a Phil leader.

What does one do with seafood heavy capitals? (probably one in 5-7 games, I'd say) Move the Capital to better cottageable land or just build the cottages that are feasible?

(For me the most stunning early/mid game economy is the Great Lighthouse traderoute economy. Of course it only works on some maps to full advantage (and the tendency of some AI to go for Mercantilism can wreck it in midgame). But 6 or so trade per city "for free" almost immediately and later on 20+ with currency and a harbor is just amazing.)

Note that when "SE" is quoted as such it is referring specifically to the strategy written about in those guides. The "SE" that is detailed there entails much more than just building the Mids and running Rep specialists which, in itself, can be a boon to any economy.

I'm doubtful it was ever an optimal strategy even in the best of circumstances, but what really hurts the "SE" is that more often than not it is like trying to force a square peg into a round hole.

Kallikrates said:

Without either pyramids and/or a phil leader specialists are not all that great. If I am not mistaken a non-representation scientist only gives as much science as a 3-trade-tile and consumes 2 food. So with grassland farms it is very poor, one needs a food-rich map to make it work well.
The other difficulty is that without a spiritual leader it takes quite a bit of skill to first build up infrastructure or in any case change between caste and slavery without losing too many turns. And it is not always possible to smoothly beeline the essential techs like CoL and Philosophy. Sure there are still maps (seafood heavy) where specialists are a good strategy even without a Phil leader.

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They are still extremely powerful, you just have to use them more situationally. It's still pretty easy to get 2 great scientists early just from 1-2 cities with libraries working 2 scientist. That's enough to build an Academy and bulb Philo right there. Beyond that the easiest and often most powerful way to use specialists without sacrificing production (IE Slavery) is to trigger a golden age, switch into Pacifism + Caste System, and then run a ton of specialists to generate multiple great people in a very short period of time. Cities are often even starved down a bit to squeeze the most GPPs possible out of this window. These great people are then used to bulb techs on the way to Liberalism or run trade mission for large amounts of gold for research or unit upgrades.

Remember I read those guides early on too, and couldn't make heads nor tails out of it. Early on you don't have the slots to run many specialists, and you need a PILE if they're supposed to be able to research for you. It simply doesn't make much sense. A hybrid economy is quite simply better, as you can sort of take the best from both and get a results better than the sum of the parts.

Admittedly with Rep, specialists are pretty good on their own, but the main thing about specialists is to get great people. Then use them for bulbing (early) techs and launch golden ages. You don't need to run specialists in all cities for that - in fact, it's not good because GPP are based on a per city basis, so if you for example run two scientists in all cities, many cities will never pop a great person, making those great people points basically a waste.

peppe1 said:

A good SE will actually settle a lot of scientists in the bureaucratic capitol.

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Settling GPs is usually the weakest of all options, and prolongues the time needed to win. There are exceptions, but those are few and only for a maximum of a handful early GPs.

SE can be beneficial when you have cities like this

If there is a lot of riverside grasslands then they certainly must be cottaged.

Izuul said:

They are still extremely powerful, you just have to use them more situationally. It's still pretty easy to get 2 great scientists early just from 1-2 cities with libraries working 2 scientist. That's enough to build an Academy and bulb Philo right there.

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True. This is something one can do in most circumstances. Of course, without a Phil leader it will take a while and one might get a non-scientist from a wonder (Oracle or Lighthouse)...
It should also be noted that a *representation Scientist* is better than a cottage/village/town (if there is enough food) for quite a while). But without Pyramids and/or a Phil leader Specialists are mostly for those early bulbs.

Beyond that the easiest and often most powerful way to use specialists without sacrificing production (IE Slavery) is to trigger a golden age, switch into Pacifism + Caste System, and then run a ton of specialists to generate multiple great people in a very short period of time.

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I never really managed to use this really efficiently for some reason. Either the GAs come to late (Music is a detour not always worthwhile and a comparably early engineer might have a better use for a wonder or one city does produce (because wonders, Great library or NE) so much more GPP points that even in a GA at best one more city can "keep up".

Also the bulbing gets a lot less interesting after Lib because important military techs can not be bulbed well and e.g. physics is so expensive that a bulb only saves 2-3 turns. Although technically bulbing seems still much more efficient than settling I often have the impression that my direction of research follows the bulbable techs not some better plan. If I have the Great library I also tend to postpone SciMeth. Ideally I'd want an Engineer around Lib for the Taj Mahal but there is this annoying tendency not to get the GPs one wants (e.g. Merchants too early before overseas contact, Priests too late when they are completely useless etc.)

Bulbing after Education and Liberalism isn't something I like either. Maybe into Printing Press, but that's probably not worth it. The value of bulbing after these techs is starkly reduced, as you mention, and the real value of Great People at this point is Golden Ages. For that reason, I welcome just about any GP I can get, and a late GProphet can be great if you need 4-5 different GPs to launch a golden age. Scientists, Merchants and Artists is easy to generate during Caste, but Engineers, Spies and Prophets is more tricky as there are limited slots and Caste won't help with those types of GPs.

Launching a late Golden Age is incredibly much more powerful that partially bulbing into Physics or whatever, especially if you have MoM.

(There really should have been a wonder called DaD).

As Pangaea said, post-Lib specialists are usually strongest for golden ages, preferably 12T golden ages if you can build/capture the MoM. Bulbs can still be decent at that point, but it depends on what kind of game you are playing. You will see it more in SGOTM's and stuff.

Anysense said:

SE can be beneficial when you have cities like this

Spoiler :

If there is a lot of riverside grasslands then they certainly must be cottaged.

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That's not an "SE" though, it's just one city using CS to run 6 Rep scientists. That kind of play can be used in any economy.

peppe1 said:

A good SE will actually settle a lot of scientists in the bureaucratic capitol (also a good SE will have a cottaged bureaucratic capitol). The benefits of bureaucracy is just too large to ignore it.

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For what it's worth, (Great) Scientists don't really benefit from Bureaucracy. The civic boosts and , whereas Scientists produce .

A settled Great Scientist adds 1H, but that's not the most convincing reason to settle.

The problem is that when I trimmed my cities to produce scientists it often happens that I do not get enough different GP to get three different ones. Once or twice I went for communism to get the spy so I would have a chance at a three person Golden Age.

I think one simple reason why SE is more tricky is that there is nothing exactly like the bureaucracy boost for GP. Of course there is pacifism, the pyramids, the NE and the Parthenon but they are more "distributed" not boosting one city immensely.

Settled scientists would of course benefit from >100% science multiplier buidings in the Bureau Cap. But even about 20 beakers/turn (9 under Rep times 1.25 or so from Academy, library, university, observatory) would need almost 100 turns to recoup the 1700-2000 beakers bulbing gives around lib

Crazy Dazz said:

Next, I don't understand the rationale behind settling GPs, and I am constantly amazed when I capture an AI city and see all the settled GPs.

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If you see the AI doing something, it probably means you shouldn't be doing it. The only GPs that are consistently worth settling are GGs. It's very situational if it's going to be worth settling any other GP.

The only good situation I ever used it for was OCC.

I once had a GM pop as my first GPerson from the GLH. I figured that I couldn't get him to another civ for a trade mission without him getting killed by barbs (it was on a maze script), so I decided that the best use was settling. I was playing Warlords, so you still needed two GPersons to have a GA and I felt it too early for a good GA anyways. So that's another rare situation.

I probably still would have figured out how to escort the GM. Even really early trade missions are worth 900g which would take a settled GM 150 turns to produce. I guess the 1F is worth something too, but not enough to pass up on all of that juicy trade mission gold.

ok let me try to sort this out for everyone. please correct me if i'm wrong. The reason a lot of us are saying 'specialist-only economy sucks' is because this is simply not the economy one would hope to have in an extremely high-scoring game (that economy being a strong cottage bureau capital supported by an academy, a few scientist bulbs and one or two trade missions or golden ages).
BUT
The reason specialist economy is so important, EVEN specialist-ONLY economy, is because sometimes you MUST run it successfully in order to win. If you roll a start that has zip CE potential and your surrounding land is the same, you better damn well run some specialists to get your economy going.
This highlights an underlying difference in some players' advice on the forum. Some people want a high score and some people are just trying to win as likely as possible. It makes a big difference in decision-making. In this case the OP tries for specialist economy not seeing it's something that is possible and sometimes necessary, but don't go for it unless necessary. disregard it completely if you are just trying for a high score game.
for the record, I can understand the obvious reason why people want to get a high score. But it's another discussion completely how can you most likely win on deity. I want to discuss this more