CIV Illustrated #4: "Hybrid Economy" !

A Middle-Finger Diplomacy Guide

Pangaea said:

A Middle-Finger Diplomacy Guide

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That would be a guide for Zx Zero Zx ^^

Too bad he isn't active in these forums anymore.

To make your guide more complete, I would add some quasi-economics types and some exotic types

#1. Scouting.
You can get quite good amount of gold (and some random techs) via huts. This could be valuable not only in the beginning, but also if you have barbarian continets, like America.

#2. Pillaging.
Goog resource of gold. And source of "-science" for your opponents (quasi-research)

#3. Conquesting economy.
Attack. Get money, regular payment and tech. Then do it again and again.

#4. Vassal economy.
Your vassals could not only be useful for economics types you wrote (for example, for GLH), but they could be independent source of science, gold and resources (you can trade ofr money). You could get vassal creating it yourself (free colony) or via conquest, that is good corresponded with #3.

#5. Diplomacy economy
You can transform good relations into some gold or some techs (mostly cheap)

I would also make an accent on two GP - Great Merchant and Great Spy. First can give you a lot of money via Trade Mission, and GSpy could give you a lot of techs, and maybe money. Also, you could easily convert some ESP to good diplomatic relations (change religions, civics), so look #5.

I think, only #3 and #4 could action alone, but if we talk about Hybride, where all types are mixed, then all other types should be also considered.

Iwo Jima said:

To make your guide more complete, I would add some quasi-economics types and some exotic types

#1. Scouting.
You can get quite good amount of gold (and some random techs) via huts. This could be valuable not only in the beginning, but also if you have barbarian continets, like America.

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Most players here play without huts, also, one cannot rely on huts, therefor I left them out. Even when getting huts, it's not sure one will get anything good out of them, often enough it's just a map or a barbarian horde.

#2. Pillaging.
Goog resource of gold. And source of "-science" for your opponents (quasi-research)

#3. Conquesting economy.
Attack. Get money, regular payment and tech. Then do it again and again.

Click to expand...

Pillaging improvements is mostly bad, because one wants to use the land after one has conquered it. Pillaging also slows down the conquest heavily, so it's faster to not do it.

#4. Vassal economy.
Your vassals could not only be useful for economics types you wrote (for example, for GLH), but they could be independent source of science, gold and resources (you can trade ofr money). You could get vassal creating it yourself (free colony) or via conquest, that is good corresponded with #3.

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I don't get how you think Vassals would be a source of economy, Vassals cost you money. Sure, you can direct their research, that's why they sometimes make sense on Deity, they also give +1 which is nice, but you still need to trade them techs for their techs, and that's no economy. If you're only selling techs, it's already mentioned in the guide.

#5. Diplomacy economy
You can transform good relations into some gold or some techs (mostly cheap)

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Tech-selling is mentioned as a form of economy, read again.

I would also make an accent on two GP - Great Merchant and Great Spy. First can give you a lot of money via Trade Mission, and GSpy could give you a lot of techs, and maybe money. Also, you could easily convert some ESP to good diplomatic relations (change religions, civics), so look #5.

I think, only #3 and #4 could action alone, but if we talk about Hybride, where all types are mixed, then all other types should be also considered.

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Great Persons are mentioned as an economic feature, because I wrote something about Specialists, and when running Specialists make sense, so please read more carefully before you post.
Also, all Great Persons are economical help in some way, as they all can bulb, be settled and most have a good unique feature, so it's not only Great Spies or Great Scientists.

I think you should include pillaging in your guide. It is an opportunity to discuss pillaging and its drawbacks. You neglect to acknowledge that pillaging can be effective because not every city will be kept. There are also tiles that will be swallowed up by culture from a neighboring that can be pillaged.

A mention should also be made about capture gold as suggested by Iwo Jima. This can be done peacefully with barb cities.

I also be believe any guide on economy should have an explanation for beginners to clarify the concept of commerce vs gold.

The difference of and already is explained in the CIV manual, isn't it?

Also, I don't want the readers of this guide to depend on uncontrollable resources, of that some even have a drawback unless executed with exactly knowing what one is doing. The point at which a player makes his economy rely on pillage- or conquest-gold, is the point at where a normal player fails, because it's not garantueed to capture a city and pillaging anything but Villages / Towns only gives a marginal sum of , that is even influenced by random factors, sometimes pillaging a Farm gives 2 , sometimes 8. Pillaging Towns would be very stupid in most cases, because even a size 1 city with only having 1 Town already contributes to the economy, so shouldn't be razed.

Seraiel said:

The difference of and already is explained in the CIV manual, isn't it?

Also, I don't want the readers of this guide to depend on uncontrollable resources, of that some even have a drawback unless executed with exactly knowing what one is doing. The point at which a player makes his economy rely on pillage- or conquest-gold, is the point at where a normal player fails, because it's not garantueed to capture a city and pillaging anything but Villages / Towns only gives a marginal sum of , that is even influenced by random factors, sometimes pillaging a Farm gives 2 , sometimes 8. Pillaging Towns would be very stupid in most cases, because even a size 1 city with only having 1 Town already contributes to the economy, so shouldn't be razed.

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A beginner may not realize there is a difference between commerce and gold, so may not go looking for an explanation.

I am not suggesting a "pillage economy" or a "conquest gold economy".

It's your guide put in it what you want.

shulec said:

A beginner may not realize there is a difference between commerce and gold, so may not go looking for an explanation.

I am not suggesting a "pillage economy" or a "conquest gold economy".

It's your guide put in it what you want.

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Elitetroops wanted to write a "CIV Illustrated: #0" which should include all the basics of the game, I'm sure he reads this thread, and will make himself a notice to explain this, otherwise I'll remind him when he writes that guide.

If you don't suggest a pillage-economy or a conquest-gold-economy, what are you suggesting then?

Sera

Seraiel said:

Most players here play without huts, also, one cannot rely on huts, therefor I left them out. Even when getting huts, it's not sure one will get anything good out of them, often enough it's just a map or a barbarian horde.

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It seems that you always disagree with all that I write. Bad-bad-bad boy

Moderator Action: This is not necessary and personal.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

Let's talk about the game at whole instead of habbits of several people you know.
I wrote about exotic and quasi- variants. Huts is a type of quasi-economic, but their influence for the current of the game could be very high despite its randomness. Via huts you could easily get about 300 gold in the start of the game, a long before your first GM gives you 900 gold. So, your science slider could stay at 100% very long.

Also huts could could pay for colonization of America, when your upkeep will rise quickly and high.

So, its not negligible source of money. Once again, I doubt, that your guide is only for experts, who play on deity. Experts do not need such guides. And common players play mostly on Prince and Monarch, and huts are more pleased in these levels.

Pillaging improvements is mostly bad, because one wants to use the land after one has conquered it. Pillaging also slows down the conquest heavily, so it's faster to not do it.

Click to expand...

You don't like pillaging, somebody likes it. It's a question of playing style.
This economics was typical for real vikings, for example. And could be modelled in CivIV very well.

And you absolutely ignored #3 Conquest economics.
And this is the most strong type of economics among those I wrote. And some players use it, especially when warmongering.

I don't get how you think Vassals would be a source of economy, Vassals cost you money. Sure, you can direct their research, that's why they sometimes make sense on Deity, they also give +1 which is nice, but you still need to trade them techs for their techs, and that's no economy. If you're only selling techs, it's already mentioned in the guide.

Click to expand...

Vassals could give tech that nobody researched, money (one time or constantly) and resources. I also forget to add a trick, when you gift all your army to vassals, so you have a lot of money saved, while conducting war by others hands.

Tech-selling is mentioned as a form of economy, read again.

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You reject ideas even not understanding them.

Moderator Action: Tou have a responsibility to help him understand. This is personal, please leave it out in future.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

I said not about selling. I said that you can get FREE tech, or FREE gold, when you ask smbd who likes you enough to spare. While you said only about selling, and this is two different approaches - to be trader or to be beggar

CivIV is a great game where you almost always can convert one resource into another. Even unmaterial resource like good relations you could convert into solid money. (The opposite is also true, of course)

Great Persons are mentioned as an economic feature, because I wrote something about Specialists, and when running Specialists make sense, so please read more carefully before you post.
Also, all Great Persons are economical help in some way, as they all can bulb, be settled and most have a good unique feature, so it's not only Great Spies or Great Scientists.

Click to expand...

Once again. I suggested you to make accent. Highlight this aspect. You described mostly specialist, and less GPs. And I think, that text about GM trade mission and GSpy infiltration is very important, especially in early economics. Their influence so huge, and 900(or 1100, etc.) golds or even 4000(iirc) esp could outweight for a long time the influence, for example of GLH or wealth production or failed gold.


I don't know why you also do not included EE here, even if wrote a guide for EE by yourself. Guides like to be complete.

Iwo Jima said:

Let's talk about the game at whole instead of habbits of several people you know.
I wrote about exotic and quasi- variants. Huts is a type of quasi-economic, but their influence for the current of the game could be very high despite its randomness. Via huts you could easily get about 300 gold in the start of the game, a long before your first GM gives you 900 gold. So, your science slider could stay at 100% very long.

Also huts could could pay for colonization of America, when your upkeep will rise quickly and high.

So, its not negligible source of money. Once again, I doubt, that your guide is only for experts, who play on deity. Experts do not need such guides. And common players play mostly on Prince and Monarch, and huts are more pleased in these levels.

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I find it funny, that you don't want to talk about "habits of players I know" , but then argue, that "common players play mostly Prince or Monarch" . FYI, my guides are for all players, from Noble to Deity. When I started winning on Deity, I didn't know all the tricks that are listed in this guide, so even very good players may find this guide useful and get some inspiration out of it.

To the argument itself: On Deity, the AIs start with 2 scouts, so if you don't accidentally spawn a Scout from the first hut, it's very likely that you'll get 1-2 huts, more is unlikely. If you start with a Scout yourself, because your civ has Hunting, you'll get between 2 and 5 huts usually. 5 huts can be some , but that is no form of economy. Economy are the Cottages you build and the Scientists you run to get to Alpha or Currency, you can't rely on huts in your economy, or you'll fail if they yield something different than money.

You don't like pillaging, somebody likes it. It's a question of playing style.
This economics was typical for real vikings, for example. And could be modelled in CivIV very well.

Click to expand...

What does your historical argument have to do with CIV? What I can definitely say, is, that it's no matter of "play-style" , pillaging certain improvements is plain bad. I also pillage, but those are rare cases that maybe make up 0.01% of my total game's economy. Sometimes they may also make 0.1%, doesn't matter, pillaging is no source of economy, when you rely on pillaging to stay out of strike, you're doing it wrong.

And you absolutely ignored #3 Conquest economics.
And this is the most strong type of economics among those I wrote. And some players use it, especially when warmongering.

Click to expand...

Conquest-economy is either un-safe, or requires planning to a point that's competition level. I doubt any non-competition-player will build up his economy on the he gets from capturing cities. Competition-players however know the code that tells how much a city of size x will give, they get that info from the SGOTM-threads, therefore the topic is not only very special but also already covered.
I count myself as a competition-player, and even I don't calculate with conquest-gold, because it's not reliable enough. If I get 150 from a city I'm happy, but I'd only need to lose 2 fights, then I'd get it 1T later and it would only be 130 because the AI would have whipped, hmm, what do I do on the turn at which I calculated to get the and what do I do afterwards to get the missing 20 ?

Vassals could give tech that nobody researched, money (one time or constantly) and resources. I also forget to add a trick, when you gift all your army to vassals, so you have a lot of money saved, while conducting war by others hands.

Click to expand...

Vassal-mechanics are not the topic of this thread. Also, explain plz how vassals give one-time money that's not covered by the § about tech-selling or even give constantly that is not covered by the § about selling resources?

I said not about selling. I said that you can get FREE tech, or FREE gold, when you ask smbd who likes you enough to spare. While you said only about selling, and this is two different approaches - to be trader or to be beggar

Click to expand...

I already mentioned in this thread, that I will update it with a § on beggar-mechanics. Please at least read the discussion before you come up with an idea that somebody else already had.

Once again. I suggested you to make accent. Highlight this aspect. You described mostly specialist, and less GPs. And I think, that text about GM trade mission and GSpy infiltration is very important, especially in early economics. Their influence so huge, and 900(or 1100, etc.) golds or even 4000(iirc) esp could outweight for a long time the influence, for example of GLH or wealth production or failed gold.

Click to expand...

All Great Persons are very important in the early game. Great Scientists can build an Academy and by that give 30-40% more research, they can also bulb techs like Philsophy, which cost about 4000 iirc., Great Artists i. e. can bulb Theology when having Drama and Music, I think I remember that they could even bulb Philosophy when having Theo already, Great Prophets can also bulb Theo or create a Shrine if having a holy city, Great Engineers can bulb Metalcasting or Machinery and rush wonders... I don't get your point. I wrote explicitely, that it's worth working Specialists if the city can create a Great Person.

I don't know why you also do not included EE here, even if wrote a guide for EE by yourself. Guides like to be complete.

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Espionage-economy is such a huge topic, that it needs its own guide. Why don't you write one, if you already know what guides like?

Seraiel said:

Elitetroops wanted to write a "CIV Illustrated: #0" which should include all the basics of the game, I'm sure he reads this thread, and will make himself a notice to explain this, otherwise I'll remind him when he writes that guide.

If you don't suggest a pillage-economy or a conquest-gold-economy, what are you suggesting then?

Click to expand...

Like Shulec, one of my first thoughts when reading this was also that some basic explanation of commerce vs gold/science would be nice. But then I thought it probably fits better in the upcoming #0 edition, which is supposed to go through the basics and bring the noob up to the level where he can understand and apply the rest of the guides. So yes, it's on the list.

Regarding conquest and pillaging, I think such a thing as conquest economy can exist. Mainly in BC domination games where conquest gold is major source that prevents your army from striking. Of course, then the conquest gold follows automatically as you rapidly conquer the world, so it's not like you have to decide between "conquest economy" or something else. You just get the conquest gold on top of any other income sources you have available. Pillaging can add a bit on top, if you have spare turns with your army.

With the right set-up, stealing gold from the AI can be profitable.
The AI has much more gold not visible in the tech trade screen.
That number is probably ~20% of the total amount of gold the AI really has.
The gold trade for EPs in the screenshots was far from optimal.

180 BC


975 AD

Seraiel said:

I find it funny, that you don't want to talk about "habits of players I know" , but then argue, that "common players play mostly Prince or Monarch" . FYI, my guides are for all players, from Noble to Deity. When I started winning on Deity, I didn't know all the tricks that are listed in this guide, so even very good players may find this guide useful and get some inspiration out of it.

To the argument itself: On Deity, the AIs start with 2 scouts, so if you don't accidentally spawn a Scout from the first hut, it's very likely that you'll get 1-2 huts, more is unlikely. If you start with a Scout yourself, because your civ has Hunting, you'll get between 2 and 5 huts usually. 5 huts can be some , but that is no form of economy. Economy are the Cottages you build and the Scientists you run to get to Alpha or Currency, you can't rely on huts in your economy, or you'll fail if they yield something different than money.



What does your historical argument have to do with CIV? What I can definitely say, is, that it's no matter of "play-style" , pillaging certain improvements is plain bad. I also pillage, but those are rare cases that maybe make up 0.01% of my total game's economy. Sometimes they may also make 0.1%, doesn't matter, pillaging is no source of economy, when you rely on pillaging to stay out of strike, you're doing it wrong.



Conquest-economy is either un-safe, or requires planning to a point that's competition level. I doubt any non-competition-player will build up his economy on the he gets from capturing cities. Competition-players however know the code that tells how much a city of size x will give, they get that info from the SGOTM-threads, therefore the topic is not only very special but also already covered.
I count myself as a competition-player, and even I don't calculate with conquest-gold, because it's not reliable enough. If I get 150 from a city I'm happy, but I'd only need to lose 2 fights, then I'd get it 1T later and it would only be 130 because the AI would have whipped, hmm, what do I do on the turn at which I calculated to get the and what do I do afterwards to get the missing 20 ?



Vassal-mechanics are not the topic of this thread. Also, explain plz how vassals give one-time money that's not covered by the § about tech-selling or even give constantly that is not covered by the § about selling resources?



I already mentioned in this thread, that I will update it with a § on beggar-mechanics. Please at least read the discussion before you come up with an idea that somebody else already had.



All Great Persons are very important in the early game. Great Scientists can build an Academy and by that give 30-40% more research, they can also bulb techs like Philsophy, which cost about 4000 iirc., Great Artists i. e. can bulb Theology when having Drama and Music, I think I remember that they could even bulb Philosophy when having Theo already, Great Prophets can also bulb Theo or create a Shrine if having a holy city, Great Engineers can bulb Metalcasting or Machinery and rush wonders... I don't get your point. I wrote explicitely, that it's worth working Specialists if the city can create a Great Person.


Espionage-economy is such a huge topic, that it needs its own guide. Why don't you write one, if you already know what guides like?

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OK. Do what you want with my addition. If you don't like smth, rational arguments are useless. Finally, its your guide.

I see it's useless to debate further. You have a very high class of playing, so you can answer for all question yourself, if you change your point of veiw.

Tatran said:

With the right set-up, stealing gold from the AI can be profitable.
The AI has much more gold not visible in the tech trade screen.
That number is probably ~20% of the total amount of gold the AI really has.
The gold trade for EPs in the screenshots was far from optimal.

Click to expand...

We're already discussing in the HoF forums how to exploit this tactic best . The formula is something like "population of the city / total population" , so if one beats a CIV down to 1 city, it's possible to steal 100% of its ;D . Pangaea has probably discovered the latest way to gain lots of !

Really enjoyed the guide. Lots of great info here. Thank you.

Along with selling techs, you can often get cash for your world map. If you mentioned that I did not see it.

Sometimes you can blockade an AI's resource with a privateer - like sea food, then sell him yours.

And speaking of gold, if you cleaned up the spelling and edited a bit you could get some real world gold , perhaps, by publishing your guide as a kindle book. It's that good. Thanks again.

Ringo Kid said:

Really enjoyed the guide. Lots of great info here. Thank you.

Along with selling techs, you can often get cash for your world map. If you mentioned that I did not see it.

Sometimes you can blockade an AI's resource with a privateer - like sea food, then sell him yours.

And speaking of gold, if you cleaned up the spelling and edited a bit you could get some real world gold , perhaps, by publishing your guide as a kindle book. It's that good. Thanks again.

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Thx for that compliment .

Yes, I mentioned map-selling in one sentence and I feel honored that you think that I could sell my articles. I believe CIV4 is too old for that though, also I'm happy with providing free knowledge . Maybe if CIV7 becomes greater than CIV4 .

I never realized you could get gold from hammer overflow before reading those pages.
Thanks for that info. I'm not sure how efficient it is (1 for 1 conversion) but it's a thing to keep in mind.


I used to think the excess hammer overflow was lost,
After some patching of the PROtective Walls exploit (in a time I wasn't playing, yet),
Now I understand said exploit was due to hammer multipliers applying to the overflow item (so completing PRO Walls at 100H/50 would yield 50 overflow hammers, instead of 25 now),
And all the patch did was prevent production bonuses to translate from the previous build into the next one.

produced by regular means can be transformed into directly. I believe that OF exploit is about converting into through whipping. Although this is the only way of such conversion, it can be compared with, let say, working extra cottage instead of whip.

Anysense said:

produced by regular means can be transformed into directly. I believe that OF exploit is about converting into through whipping. Although this is the only way of such conversion, it can be compared with, let say, working extra cottage instead of whip.

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There are several ways to transform into . Missionary-Failgold, Warrior-OF and 4-pop-Hermitage-Failgold-whips just to mention three.

What BiC ment was the too much OF method, where you can chop as many Forests into the whipped Warrior as you want, to not only generate a small OF that gives money, but to really produce large sums of far before Currency is available.

There's an update for this guide in progress, featuring Gold thefts, Conquest economy and professional beggar tactics like proposed. I'm also thinking about writing a § about "the Mids economy" , though I'm not sure that Mids without PHI are an economy of their own.

Discuss.