Need General Civ5 GnK help

Hi, this is my first post here. I've read a few threads here and there to get me started, and I've learned quite a bit from your threads and have learned a few things through testing in game. I'm now playing Emperor level and doing pretty well, but not as consistent as I'd like. I am likely getting lucky about certain details that I do not understand.

So again, I'm playing GnK, I do not have the latest expansion, at least not yet.

My questions:
1) When trying to build up science, what is the keys I need to understand, besides getting the Great Library and Nation College? How critical is population in this endeavor
2) How do you allocate your yields? Should I focus on high population, production, or a balance of the two and at what point should I start using specialists to get science up?
3) I've been finding building up culture helps a lot, as it leads to policies that help, but just how much of that should I work towards? I tend to like to see my culture rate to give me a policy every 15 turns on average.

Now matter how I play, I always find myself in combat a lot, even if I don't finish as a domination victory. I guess I enjoy battling it out.

Now the last question is how to deal with Hiwatha if he is your direct neighbor in a highly forested/jungle area? I decided to try and play as Austria, and my first 5 starts all have been in heavy jungle or forest with hiwatha as my direct neighbor, and his Mohawk army has been insane to deal with. He keeps bringing about 10 mohawks with a number of archers and surrounds me fast. I finally decided to bear down and learn how to deal with him, and it seems the only thing I could come up with that worked, was to just cut down every forest/jungle tile within 2 tiles of my nearest city so he doesn't get an unwieldy advantage. Is there any things else I could/should be doing to deal with him?

I'm not up to Emperor level, but I do play GnK (don't have BNW yet, either).

The Great Library is nice, but not absolutely necessary. The most important lesson I've learned is to choose your first few techs carefully. If your luxuries don't need Calendar to improve them, then don't beeline to that tech. If there's no water close by, you won't need to go for Sailing or the other techs that let you embark.

Knowing when to build your 2nd city, and when to build the 3rd, is a key aspect so that you can avoid crashing your economy, which also hampers science. I have expansionist habits that I acquired playing Civ3 and Civ4, so I am constantly holding myself back from building a settler too soon. Letting your cities grow larger will allow more tiles to be worked, and generate more beakers; larger cities also allow you to assign science specialists to your buildings. I've read that some Emperor players will "plant" their first 2-3 Great Scientists -- that is, make Academies -- near one city to make it a strong science city. Later GS are usually used for hastening research, known as "bulbing". I'm doing that pretty consistently, but I'm playing at a lower difficulty level.

Lately I've been playing as Hiawatha, rather than playing against him, so I'm afraid I can't help you there.

Population would be very critical at that point and also happiness would become critical because more population will become unhappiness.

Getting your National College build as early as possible is one of the overall best practices in this game. Start building it as early as turn 40, or as late as turn 70. Sometimes with only one or two cities founded. This helps sling shot your civ past the classical age and towards education. Once you have universities built and are working those specialists, you never need to look back. If your planning on a science win, then keep building science buildings, and prioritize those techs.

Growth focus is very important as well, especially early in the game. Many science buildings are pop based, and the ability to work more tiles is just obviously a good idea.

We Love The King Day : Get as many of these as possible. Its an incredible boost to growth.

Happiness: must stay positive. Growth stalls when unhappy.

Culture: cant ignore it! sounds like your doing fine in this regard. If you found too many cities, the policy cost will go up too fast. You need to build those culture buildings.

Dont forget about religion:
-can get you population growth
-can get you some culture bonuses
-can get you happiness (I value this the most)

I appreciate the help, though I still feel a bit fuzzy on how to go about taking advantage of those thoughts. I've mostly been doing as you mentioned, though growth may be something I've under used, but that may have been for the best as I've been having my most success with a puppet empire. When I started to be successful with emperor level, it has been by warring early and often, after I learned that puppets do not effect my culture in any negative way. However, I'd like to see about learning the finer points of growing a civilization without the need for a puppet empire.

Without a few puppets, I always fall behind by mid game. I'll find myself in the tech lead until around turn 150-200. I'm guessing it is because I haven't grown enough cities or population, which is another point I'm fuzzy on. How soon do I expand? If I expand fast, my policies come in slow and my wonder production goes down hill. My most successful games seem to be with 3 cities and a few puppets. Should I have more cities? I usually plant my 2nd city around turn 60-70, after my National college is built and I might get a 3rd by turn 90-100. I feel like I may be waiting too long to build those cities.

Then once I do get them up. I've wondered if I shouldn't consider specializing the cities to different tasks. As it stands, my original city tends to be my wonder production and science focused city, with another for land units and a 3rd for naval (I like continents or Earth maps). I've recently thought that I should probably split my science and culture cities up, so my culture city would focus on culture wonders leaving my science city focused on size and specializing citizens.

I guess what it all boils down to, is I'm wanting to be successful without being the warmonger I am. My methods have fail me around mid game if I don't get a puppet empire and I have a big feeling it is related to how I grow and expand my cities.

You can get the technology buildings first before reaching for the next era, too. If you're a peaceful person and are surrounded by peaceful civilizations, you can bee line to technologies that achieve more science. For example, you could choose technologies like writing which gives the library and then you take the university technology which gives the university. You can also put scientist specialists inside the university. The rationalism social policy also can help you since it adds more science.

You can be the tech leader all game long without puppets. Its easier with a few puppets of course (GnK).

if you dont want to be a war monger, then dont declare war. But should someone else DoW you, feel free to take thier cities and puppet them. In GnK this does not give you a war monger penalty (in BnW it does).

also, you can always declare war once without penalty. Make the most of it.

Tech strategy:
Early NC
Early Education and build Universities ASAP
Work university specialists ASAP, and probably forever.
Focus on generating great people, get every garden, and great scientist wonder you can. The leaning tower is important.
Eventually you will want all the other science buildings, the earlier the better.
Observatories are important, so try to build mountain adjacent cities (not always possible).

When a scientist appears, plant them as an academy and work that tile. This is usualy best to do in you best science city (capitol?). I like having 4-6 academy tiles in my capitol. Its best if this city has both the NC, and an observatory. Academy improvements are best placed on these locations: cattle, hills, grassland. These will provide either hammers or food for growth as well as beakers from the academy. This keeps you growing and productive while also generating research.

Thanks for the tips. I have a couple more follow up questions.

At what point is planting scientists counter productive? I've heard you have to plant them fairly early to be worth it.

How many cities do you like when not warring. Btw, when I said I'm a warmonger, I only meant I enjoy the warring aspect of the game. Though most games I do become a warmonger, but usually not until quite late. I've gotten pretty good at finishing out a game once I reach the atomic age.

Update:
I decided I'd just take the plunge and get Brave New World. I've taken a guide to starting with 3 strong cities with Tradition. My first go at it was at Prince difficulty, which proved too easy. My 2nd go at it was on Emperor difficulty, and still proved pretty easy, but I did set myself up for success.

I played an Earth map starting in North America as Korea. This allowed me to focus on build orders and just building an empire, rather than conquering one. I also skipped the great library, as the guide was designed to build quickly and didn't leave time to mess with a great library. The result was I was far behind for at least 120 turns, but all of a sudden, after 160, I noticed I was in the science lead and my score was climbing fast. By the end, I had a 20% tech lead and won with science, but I see I definitely have some refining to do. I was always struggling with production and gold. I'm thinking I bought too many unnecessary building.

Anyways, I did try the follow some of the advice given, even with BNW, and it appears to be useful, though I obviously skipped the GL and with BNW, going with too many cities has consequences with science. I did notice a few other issues I had:
- I created both my writers and musicians guild in my capital and primary science city. I see now that was a big mistake. I should never have had two guilds in one city, as it took too many specialists away from science.
- I forgot to make the gardens in some of my cities until later
- The rest of the world pushed arts and culture down my throat and passed a policy to reduce great scientists by 33%. I'm wondering if I shouldn't have gotten patronage to combat this with CS support. With my gold woes and lack of patronage, I couldn't get the votes to prevent this.
- I also found gold to be an issue, which in the past was always made up for with a huge puppet empire with markets built on almost every tile bringing in loads of gold. This actually appears to be more interesting in BNW, but I'm not sure I can get to the 500-1000 gold a turn output I'm used to near the end of a game.

Anyways, there is a lot to learn with BNW and it definitely seems to have a lot more ways to slow down warmongering, which I don't know if I like or not. I also seem to be overwhelmed with far more choices to make in production of buildings and units. It definitely makes the non combat more interesting.

well, as far as puppets go, remember they increase the cost of all techs by 5% per puppet...that adds up alot! When i am going for a science win, I try not to ever puppet as city....

You need 10 pop before you start to make specialist! So I grow to ten right away...grow grow grow as Madjinn would say...after i get to ten, then specialists..

BNW is a little easier because the ai wont dow you so much early in the game because there economy is based on you, so that helps....

build education buildings asap...try not to ever delay them, every turn you dont have them, is a turn wasted...

hope what little knowledge i have helps...

slo

Has gold been nerfed in BNW or is it just without my large puppet empire that I no longer get tons of free gold?

You are mistaken about needing 10 population to have specialists. I just looked at my last victory, and I had 9 and 7 population cities with several specialists working. I utilized cargo ships to feed them so they could focus on building science buildings. The cities were small because I built them late to satisfy my resources need as North America had no coal or oil. I believe what you needed for specialists is the buildings built that support specialists.

The science penalty for going big is a bummer for me. I also noticed that as I expanded my empire, the cost to make great people also increased. It really hampers the expansion game. I liked to war it out, but it is a bit of a problem if it is holding back my science. Though if the enemy has the same issue, this would slow down run away civs who dominate early.

Anyways, it is kind of fun. I like a lot of the peaceful play options available now, but it does seem to slow down my warring strategies.

Uzael36 said:

Has gold been nerfed in BNW or is it just without my large puppet empire that I no longer get tons of free gold?

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The science penalty for going big is a bummer for me. I also noticed that as I expanded my empire, the cost to make great people also increased. It really hampers the expansion game. I liked to war it out, but it is a bit of a problem if it is holding back my science. Though if the enemy has the same issue, this would slow down run away civs who dominate early.

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Gold is no longer available from rivers, coastal tiles.
In GnK you could rely heavily on these sources of gold. That is gone, and trade routes are the replacement. Getting more out of your routes and trading with AI is the main source of gold unless you have a lot gold tiles to work (lux, camps, trade posts). Consider building at least one caravansary. Gold buildings are just as good as they always were.

Having puppets will yield gold, but those darn puppets just love to build so many useless expensive buildings, it often looses its profitability because they wont stop. I HATE IT when i see them building airports! (5 gpt maintenace!?! in a pop 10 puppet?)

On Science:
you CAN have a few extra cities, so long as you grow them correctly, build the science buildings, they will easily overcome the 5% penalty and be a net gain. This scales up especially well with Order ideology, since it helps produce more science anyway.

You will also need to think about happiness if you have extra cities ( more than 4). Order help here too, but getting the right cities is always a good idea.

Ah, I didn't realize that I lost the gold on my coastal cities. You are right, and probably why I lost a bit of gold. I also have been focusing on using my caravans and cargo ships for growing my cities large and fast. My last game went pretty well, I even got to take a couple capital cities, but I choose not to dominate because I was more interested in seeing how things worked with science and gold output.

So I have a new game going. I'm up to turn 170 on Immortal difficulty. I've finally taken over the tech lead and have a decent army going. I had been at war with England almost the whole start, as I had used them to farm workers. I also managed to level up a couple good crossbow men, until England started popping out longbowmen, so I decided to negotiate. She gave me gold for peace, so it worked out well.

Anyways, I have 3 cities going, and an aggressive neighbor moving in on me so I have little room to grow. Two of which are on mountains, one of the mountains give 10 gold if worked. Is 3 cities enough to win on Immortal, or am I going to need to take a city soon?

You can win with 3. If your going science, then a 4th city *can* make it easier, but its need to grow fast and get the science building asap. Conquering a 4th might be better if the political mood is not to hateful towards you.

again, you can win with 3.

I took a look at the map, and I do have a spot to expand to, though there is no luxury resource. The turn is 157, I am a bit ahead of what I thought, and I just upgraded to a caravel to explore and finishing up observatories. The only thing slowing me down is Shaka Zulu has 10ish units in my boarders waiting to attack, but hasn't because I have a 4 crossbowmen a longswordsman and a knight. I find it odd that it is in my borders getting position, as once he declares war, he'll be put outside the borders and not be able to move that turn.

Oh yeah, I found something I have never seen before, with Immortal (my first time trying), in one turn I had 4 spies steal from me, and another a turn or 2 later. I took my spy and put it in my capital after stealing a tech myself. I've never seen so many spies so early. I guess with the tech lead, I can just leave my spy to defend the only city they ever go after, the capital.

So an update. The crap hit the fan, Shaka's behavior was because he was going to attack England and used me as the way to get there, but after he failed, he turned on me. It took some time, but I fought him off and his 30 man army (those impi's are pretty rough for a pikeman replacement). And now I have a 10 pop city that is at least a city's distance away. Do you think it is wise to start a whole new city at turn 220, between the one I just took and civ? There is a mountain and ivory, which I don't have. I'm thinking I will.

Founding a late city is fine so long as you can bear the immediate cost (happiness). At turn 220, assume it take 50 turns to get a good city out of it...at turn 280 will you have won already? if so, then its barely worth it. If you games tend to go beyond turn 300, then I would do it every time.

as a general rule, there should be a unique lux there (ivory) and you should also be able to grow it and build the science/happiness buildings quickly to make up for the science penalty.

Two food trade routes to the new city will solve the growth problem, and your new city will be a net gain.

Well, I got backstabbed by England and my civ was too stretched out to defend. She was also ahead of me on the military tech and I folded. I did notice this game about a feature I was not aware of before, where I can get information on my friendship with another civ by hovering my mouse over the status. I had a few negative against England, and ultimately that killed me with her and Zulu at the other end of my empire both being aggressive towards me.

Btw, I read an old article about how to tech quickly using RA's. The theory was quite impressive, but I also hear things have changed. Do you know how RA's have changed from the past? I did notice that the porcelain tower has been moved to be later in the tech tree as well.

Yes...
You *can* still get a lot out of research agreements. Remember that these are friendly trades, and if you dont do it, the AI will become friendlier with each other, leaving you as a juicier target. They wont want to break thier RA with you, or with others. They may attack someone who has no trade agreements with them.

Because of this, I like to have a couple of research agreements with AI. Usually border Empires who I dont want to mess with. But I wont make these agreement with border empires I am planning a war with in the near future

Dont back-stab. its a big diplo hit.

There is a widely believed fact that the RA gold is better spent elsewhere. It might be more worthwhile to rush buy universities with this gold, or other important buildings. I cant really disagree with this.

Once you have rationalism's bottom tenet + porcelain tower, RA's are very beneficial. but they also get more expensive and harder to get at that stage in the game.

Uzael36 said:

Well, I got backstabbed by England and my civ was too stretched out to defend. She was also ahead of me on the military tech and I folded.

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I am also on GnK. All the AIs are traitorous, which is kind of annoying. Rather than starting a new game, I like to go back to several many turns before the backstab and see if I can salvage the game. YMMV but usually I can turn a lose into a win.

JeSuisNapoleon said:

There is a widely believed fact that the RA gold is better spent elsewhere. It might be more worthwhile to rush buy universities with this gold, or other important buildings. I cant really disagree with this.

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How can that be? A single university costs more than an RA, and an RA gets you about 15 turns worth of research.