How to use specialists efficiently?

For example, i know that i have to assign the specialists into universities, public schools and such to increase my science output and my GS spawn rate, but if i wanna pursue a Diplomatic victory for example while maintaining an high science rate and also increase the amount of money and the GM spawn rate what are my options?

grow mega tall so you have enough people to work all tiles while you work the specialists also

Erfe555 said:

For example, i know that i have to assign the specialists into universities, public schools and such to increase my science output and my GS spawn rate, but if i wanna pursue a Diplomatic victory for example while maintaining an high science rate and also increase the amount of money and the GM spawn rate what are my options?

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I would personally recommend playing as Sweden. Get Honor and free GG first, gift it to a culture city state, use that culture to rapid-fill Tradition, work every single specialist spot along with making sure that you choose Secularism ASAP. It is the most OP social policy in the game. As Sweden, keep fighting wars, similar to how people say to play as Aztecs spawning those GGs, and then use those GGs you get basically as your GMs. Internal Caravans after National College are a must as well, including a fast Civil Service and Granaries.

Sweden is actually really fun to play and you can play them anyway that you want.

1. Always fill every science slot. (If food actually a problem, add food route)

2. Given that the whole point of guilds is running them, then you'll want to fill all the slots of the ones you've built as well, but consider delaying constructing some of them.

3. If there are a lot of tiles that max out at 2 0 0 0 0 0 or worse then it may be worth filling engineer slots in mid game.

4. Don't run merchant slots unless playing Venice unless there's no risk of actually spawning a Great Merchant. (Usually requires you to have taken Tradition and have a level 1 Freedom tenet to be worth while.)

You don't need GM for Diplo. Use Spies, rig elections, coup if confident. A single level 3 spy that you used after a couple tech steal can wreak havoc to the AI CS alliances.

If you decide to run those merchants anyway, Specialist-heavy also means Freedom. Doing so outside Freedom is shooting yourself in the foot imo. And Freedom has the most powerful CS allying policies in the game. My personal preference is playing Freedom as Germans, but I still try to not generate any GMerchants.

Regardless, internal trades are a must, if you can have at least two sea ones then you're golden. Also, try not to staff those specialists until after you reach at least pop 10 or 12.

Settle in locations that have sources of . Bananas, deer, and wheat all get +1 from the Granary. Watery farms get +1 from Civil Service. Watery hills are usually made into farms. If settling on the coast make sure there is at least 2 fish as that is 5 and 1 hammer with the lighthouse per tile. My favorite tile is cattle which has a potential of 3 and 2(stable) (3 if you're the Huns). Desert Sheep with Petra is a nice tile at 3 and 4 (with stable).

Erfe555 said:

For example, i know that i have to assign the specialists into universities, public schools and such to increase my science output and my GS spawn rate, but if i wanna pursue a Diplomatic victory for example while maintaining an high science rate and also increase the amount of money and the GM spawn rate what are my options?

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Maybe you know this but since nobody pointed it yet : Great Scientists, Great Engineers and Great Merchants all use the same great person counter. All cultural GP have separate counters and as you know it Prophets and Generals/Admirals use totally different mechanisms.
This means that each time you get one of those 3 GP you'll need more points for the next. So let's say you have a city producing 6 Great Scientist points (2 specialists) and 3 Great Merchants (1 specialist). You are at 60/100 for a Great Scientist and 45/100 for a Merchant (you got that market early). You should have a great scientist in 7 (40/6) turns and a great merchant in 19 (55/3) turns.
But as soon as you get the scientist, the counter increases and you now need 200 points for the next great person. So your merchant progress is now 45+3*7=66/200 and you need another 45 turns for your great merchant. During those 45 turns you will produce 45*6 = 270 Great Scientist points and get another GS. You now need even more points.
That means it's very hard to mix those 3 GP. The "best" way to do it is get one as your first, maybe with points from a wonder to help out, and then start producing scientist because with 2 slots from universities, you'll get more scientists than anything else unless you purposefully avoid working those slots. You might be able to micro your specialists to get 2 different GP at the same turn, but then the counter will increase twice and you'll get the next one much later.

All of this being said, as other people already posted since CiV is all about science, non scientist GP are usually a waste You can buy a few ones with faith in industrial with the right social policies

Bob Morane said:

All of this being said, as other people already posted since CiV is all about science, non scientist GP are usually a waste You can buy a few ones with faith in industrial with the right social policies

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There's one kind of significant exception to this, if you aim for a SV using Order. In the DCL6 I just finished, I was sitting on 4 late game GEs (missed Pisa so I could have made it 5) and that was practically the same as buying parts with gold.

There is a reason i said

non scientist GP are usually a waste

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Of course there are exceptions. A peaceful Venice willing to get several Great Merchants to buy CS would be another one but most of the time it sucks to get a merchant cause it's one less scientist. Engineers are not as bad but even a Pisa or Liberty finisher GE will delay scientists (unlike buying them with faith in Industrial).

I don't like the "one yield to rule them all" design of CiV much but the way the game works, more science will give you more of everything (including science) and if you care about "efficient" games with fast finish times, you must prioritize science no matter what victory you want.

If you want to work lots of specialist slots while still growing your cap to its maximum I would suggest settling a good food rich city on a river and putting your guilds in it. Make a garden as well as national epic in that city and work all the specialists you want without sacrificing growth for your cap.

Bob Morane said:

There is a reason i said
Of course there are exceptions. A peaceful Venice willing to get several Great Merchants to buy CS would be another one but most of the time it sucks to get a merchant cause it's one less scientist. Engineers are not as bad but even a Pisa or Liberty finisher GE will delay scientists (unlike buying them with faith in Industrial).

I don't like the "one yield to rule them all" design of CiV much but the way the game works, more science will give you more of everything (including science) and if you care about "efficient" games with fast finish times, you must prioritize science no matter what victory you want.

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At least in civ the person who's top in science does not necessarily have a military advantage since they may not have went down the military tech path.

Try Beyond Earth where science -> affinity -> stronger units and everything. This is much worse in BE.