ICS, Civ V style

The problem is rather that the SoL comes very late in the game, even if it's one of the first techs you research in the industrial era, building it takes so long that you're almost in the modern era unless you have a GE
 
Yeah I've never gotten much use out of the SoL. In comes late and it's really expensive, so the game is pretty much over before you can finish it. It would be powerful though- adding extra free hammers to all your cities is always very powerful.
 
Yeah I've never gotten much use out of the SoL. In comes late and it's really expensive, so the game is pretty much over before you can finish it. It would be powerful though- adding extra free hammers to all your cities is always very powerful.

Yes it is. Once they fix engineers to give 2 hammers, one Factory engineer will be able to generate 6 hammers (3 from engineer, 3 from factory+railroad). Add to that the base 10 you get from Communism and you have 16 hammers in a 1-pop city (that costs 0,5 happy to sustain with Forbidden Palace). All you need to do is rushbuy the Factory. If you're chinese and your first build is a paper maker, your city is generating a gold surplus once it reaches pop 3 (papermaker will pay for itself + factory, while the two citizens will pay for the railroad connection).
 
Yes it is. Once they fix engineers to give 2 hammers, one Factory engineer will be able to generate 6 hammers (3 from engineer, 3 from factory+railroad). Add to that the base 10 you get from Communism and you have 16 hammers in a 1-pop city (that costs 0,5 happy to sustain with Forbidden Palace). All you need to do is rushbuy the Factory. If you're chinese and your first build is a paper maker, your city is generating a gold surplus once it reaches pop 3 (papermaker will pay for itself + factory, while the two citizens will pay for the railroad connection).

Yeah but you can just run a mine or lumbermill instead, and get the same production value. If there's no hills or forest near the city, then you can run scientists or work trading posts instead of making it a production city. Scientists are so much better than engineers.
 
Running a mine won't generate Great Engineer Points, which generates Great Engineer hammers after a it pops, so running the tiles instead of a Engineers doesn't exactly generate the same results.

Moreover, under certain policies, the Engineer will consume half food, so he's functionally also giving one food. He'll also generate half the unhappiness. The change to the Engineers will make them very, very strong. Scientists are better for teching, of course, so they look better if you're a tech-junkie.
 
Running a mine won't generate Great Engineer Points, which generates Great Engineer hammers after a it pops, so running the tiles instead of a Engineers doesn't exactly generate the same results.

Moreover, under certain policies, the Engineer will consume half food, so he's functionally also giving one food. He'll also generate half the unhappiness. The change to the Engineers will make them very, very strong. Scientists are better for teching, of course, so they look better if you're a tech-junkie.

I don't want great engineer points, I want scientists! Every great engineer basically costs me a scientist! If i did get a great engineer, ironically the only wonder worth getting him for would be the statue of liberty.
 
pi-r8:

I may be wrong here, but I do believe that in Civ V, Great People points are no longer pooled. This means that you can generate Great Engineers in your production centers and their generation won't affect the rate at which you otherwise acquire Great Scientists in you Science cities.

I've actually had a Great Artist and a Great Engineer pop out together on the same turn.
 
I may be wrong here, but I do believe that in Civ V, Great People points are no longer pooled. This means that you can generate Great Engineers in your production centers and their generation won't affect the rate at which you otherwise acquire Great Scientists in you Science cities.

This is true, they have their own pools that fill up at the same time, and all specialists create points that go in one specific pool. But of course you still need to feed all those specialists, so if that engineer means you have to take one specialist out of your university, it's still bad.
 
dannythefool:

That's kind of a valuation judgement at that point. If you value tech over hammers, then taking out Scientists for Engineers would indeed be a bad idea. Just don't be surprised later on when you can't build anything that you have the tech to make.
 
they have separate gpp pool - true

they have common gpp limit... so when you generate engineer you move limit for scientist effectively delaying it
 
they have separate gpp pool - true

they have common gpp limit... so when you generate engineer you move limit for scientist effectively delaying it
Exactly.
Also I have only a limited amount of food and citizens, so I don't really have enough to run max scientists and max engineers at the same time.
 
pi-r8:

Not sure I get your point. Why would you run Scientists in your Production Cities?
 
pi-r8:

Not sure I get your point. Why would you run Scientists in your Production Cities?

I don't. I work mines or lumbermills in my production cities, and run scientists in almost all my other cities. I don't run engineers anywhere, because a great engineer would make a great scientist more expensive and there's no wonders I really want except for forbidden palace and maybe statue of liberty.
 
If you're prioritizing Science that much, don't you get problems with teching too quickly and not having enough production?
 
If you're prioritizing Science that much, don't you get problems with teching too quickly and not having enough production?
:lol: no matter what I do, I always have that problem. That's originally why I made this strategy, to get +8 hammers in each city, and that's why I never bother with rationalism. I also build factories and windmills everywhere, and no science buildings except libraries. Scientists are really really powerful in this game.
 
pi-r8:

Perhaps you haven't done quite nearly enough. :)

Scientists are powerful for racing up the tech tree, but they don't help you with much of anything else. If you prioritize them above all else, you end up with lots of tech and no way to build what you know how to build.

How's your base hammer rate for each city? 20's a nice, round benchmark for Medieval and Renaissance. It's possible to get base hammers up that high, if you focus for it. If you think about it, it's just the center tile plus 6 Mines ('bout a pop 8 city, I reckon). With a Forge, such a city would build Musketmen in 6-ish turns, and a Cannon in 10-11.

It'd probably be possible to have three such cities up by that time, if you REX hard enough.
 
pi-r8:

Perhaps you haven't done quite nearly enough. :)

Scientists are powerful for racing up the tech tree, but they don't help you with much of anything else. If you prioritize them above all else, you end up with lots of tech and no way to build what you know how to build.

How's your base hammer rate for each city? 20's a nice, round benchmark for Medieval and Renaissance. It's possible to get base hammers up that high, if you focus for it. If you think about it, it's just the center tile plus 6 Mines ('bout a pop 8 city, I reckon). With a Forge, such a city would build Musketmen in 6-ish turns, and a Cannon in 10-11.

It'd probably be possible to have three such cities up by that time, if you REX hard enough.

Yeah I guess most of my production cities have about 20 base hammers. It's hard to get higher than that because the only way to get production is with mines and lumbermills, so once you run out of those tiles, you can't add any more hammers. 10 turns for a cannon is OK, but 20 turns for an artillery and 30 turns for a mech infantry or tank is really annoying. Especially for the tank, because it means I've already researched modern armor before the first tank finishes.
 
You are probably better off buying or upgrading units than building them. Focusing on money over hammers just seems to work better given the current game setup. It also means you can get other polices over communism and the other needed techs.

It seems like the real power only kicks in after you have already won. A fast tech to UN or mech infantry will win you the game, while being able to build stuff in your cities is just nice.
 
pi-r8:

Not so! 20 hammers is okay for small cities, but not okay for large cities! In fact, if all a 20-size city ever did was work Plains Farms, it would have 22 base production already!

By the time you get to Industrial, the benchmark should be 25-30 base, and 30+ once you get to Modern, with 40 base hammers being quite good.

I've outlined the basics of my normative Military Cities. They are capable of producing Tanks in 7 turns, without the benefit of Golden Age. By the time you roll into modern, you should have cities capable of producing Artillery in 6 turns flat.

In addition to Mines and Lumbermills, you get hammers from Plains, and each bonus strategic resource generally grants you +1 more hammer. Engineers after SoL also give +2 hammers per hired Specialist. Longhouses give you +1 hammer per Forest worked. Sea Ports give you +2 base hammers per Sea Resource worked.

So... Modern Age, slightly lucky, slightly optimized size 24 city.

+2 hammers center tile
+4 hammers - 2 Fish Resources
+1 hammer - 1 Iron Resource
+3 hammer - 1 Plains Horse Resource
+18 hammers - 6 Lumber Mills
+9 hammers - 3 Hills
+ 6 hammers - 6 various Plains tiles (Wines, Farms, whatever)

43 base hammers.

Wow. That was better than I expected. Should be able to do lots of stuff with that. Better with Ironworks!
 
Thanks, good to know CP is not wasted on border pops.

Yes, I suppose one could forego SPs (I assume after the first 3 essential liberty SPs, which if not France will still require some monument building, which further can enable the nat'l epic at some point), the tradeoff being saved maintenance going towards buying stuff instead. However spending for culture maintenance will open optional paths within the ICS based strategy, giving it some flexibility. Further, this makes the Order branch absolutely essential to boost production to compensate for the money lost to maintenance. Synergy.

Gold is only useful spent one way or another. However, denying the benes specific to a whole game structure (SP) would seem to be a suboptimal ICS, unless the intent is a warmongering ICS where one wants to buy/upgrade/maintain lots of units. It would be similar to never building Wonders (also synergized by Order). But for me the whole advantage is that I can rely on a massed grid of cities for defense with a minimal military. ICS turtle, in essence (though amoeba is a better metaphor for this).

No it doesn't cost culture points as such, each culture point goes towards border expansion and towards policies. What I meant to say is that tile claiming normally takes a long time. Each city gives you six tiles "for free" that would have otherwise needed a lot of turns to unlock.

If you're willing to forego getting social policies completely, you never need to build any culture buildings with ICS, and this is most likely not a bad strategy.
 
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