Is This A Useful Great Person City Tactic?

I'm still learning this game, so this is probably old news, but I want to see if I'm getting a better idea on ways to get the most out of city specialization. What I've been doing is using a spot with lots of floodplains and/or at least a couple of food resources and grasslands to make a mostly farmed and lightly cottaged city for high population that can work tiles, grow, and still afford to have specialists.

The new (at least to me) technique was that at around size 12-15 I would go into Caste System and every few turns I would remove as many workers from the tiles as I could without starving off a pop point, and setting them all to a specific great person for a round. I'd get a big influx of GPP and lose food, which in the ensuing 2 or 3 turns when I set everything back to normal I would get back anyway. Is this useful to do or would I end up just getting the same results over time by leaving things alone as I set up in the first paragraph? It seemed like I was getting GPs faster with the binge and purge method, but that could just be my newness to city specialization.

As a side note, it would seem that this tactic, if viable, would be interesting with Saladin since his Philosophical and Spiritual nature would allow you to switch in and out of Caste System roughly on pace with the binging and purging and you would benefit from the +100% GPP rate.

But is this all just useless activity that would results in the same thing as just leaving the city alone at stagnant level with all excess workers as the specific specialists? Can it be useful to hurry up the acquisition of a specific GP?

Just looking for input from those more knowledgeable than me.

I think it could be an interesting strategy for spiritual civs. Nice for those who don't mind the micromanagement.

As long as you're spiritual and you have more farms than you need in your GP farm, this could work. I'm not sure however that the right conditions are often in place. But when they are, sure, go ahead!

Without spiritual and switching civics, this is of course completely useless and has the same result as just leaving everything stagnant.

I think as you describe it comes down to straight math. How much food, how bad is the purge, is your city still growing at all etc. My estimation is that it would be very close to the same effect as just limiting food in the long term. You might be able to micromanage a little extra out but I would be suprised if it was significant.

I think the real benefit of this strategy is not in the long term trade off between doing this and just limiting growth a little. It is in the "rush" of the GP you create. You could feasibly get that GA or GP out just a few turns earlier. Being able to control the birth date of a GP is a very important option to have.

Your second point about a spi/phi leader is interesting. If you time your binge/purge cycle you very well could get more out of it. You couldn't do it every few turns though because of the waiting turns between switching civics meaning your other cities might suffer a little as they are stuck on Caste System for (I think 5 turns?) before you can switch again. Then you have to wait 5 turns and switch back etc.

In conclusion I think your idea has merit and will add it to my tool chest of Civ tactics, thanks.

I believe Caste System would only allow speeding up the acquisition of Great Scientists, Artists and Merchants which is too bad because I needed to hurry up a Prophet for a shrine in the last game and failed.

One thing that occurs to me now, if you can more accurately attain a specific GP at a specific time, especially with Scientists but it would work with other GPs if you know their Technology potentials in advance, is to time gaining a normal tech through research and then gain the GP as close to that turn as possible in order to gain the next most advanced tech in the tree as quickly as possible.

The hurry up option could also allow you to get a Great Artist if you really need a Culture Bomb. And I guess a fast Merchant could allow for a relatively quick influx of cash for upgrades or long term deficit spending during an unexpected cash crisis.

Oh, and even though you'd be locked into Caste System for 5 rounds with the free Spiritual civ swap, I'm now thinking this trick would be mainly useful for emergency or occasional situations when you need a specific GP and you need them fast. So the few rounds semi-wasted in Caste System isn't that big of a deal.

I was thinking more of other civics besides caste system. For example, you could add the civic that gives +100% GPP, and the one that gives +3 beakers per GP. Switch to all of these at the same time, and get rid of them when you're going back to farms.

if you're switching to max out great person production, may as well have more then one (or even more then a couple) cities doing great people, and then switch to caste system and pacificism for an even greater boost.

Great idea
Seems like a great way to get use out of that no anarchy bonus. Time your binge/purge on a 10 turn cycle, cycling pacifism/caste system with a different religion/labor combo and you should be able to get most of the gp production as well as half of another civics bonus as well.

Simple example: a 1 tile island city with no resources only open ocean to work. This city has 2 extra food available, if lighthoused, which could normally support 1 specialist. Operating on pacifism/caste system over 10 turns you would be able to earn 10*3*2=60Gp points.

Cycling civics you could get the exact same results. On the purge cycle(5 turns) you could specialize 2 citizens to consume 10 food. 5turns*6gpp*2pacifism=60GP points. The other five turns you would have to earn 10 excess food to be at equilibrium. You could switch to organized religion for 25% building bonus or theocracy for experience bonus during those 5 turns. You could cycle slavery for a pop rush in a different city or serfdom for faster workers.

As long as your cycle is not starving off a citizen it theoretically sounds pretty good.

I would have to get home to check how much but you could have a very lopsided cycle if the city food allowance allows. 5 turns of specialists and 10 turns of normal operation maybe. Sounds like a lot of micromanaging but any gain is worthwhile to some people.

Best GP city I've had was an all-farm set-up, hereditary rule to keep a large population happy, with Philo leader, Pacificism, Caste System, National Epic, some great merchants turned into super specialists for extra food, and a few wonders. I don't remember my exact GPP/turn, I think it was mid 100s. I don't know if I would have the patience to do a cycle with large complex cities. Eventually your GPs only give you 20% of what it would take to discover a tech in the late game, there's not enough time left to make it worth a super specialist, etc. In the late game I've found the most helpful GPs are merchants for trade routes (1,000 gold is always handy) and artists for culture bombs. Usually by that point you have a academies in the cities where it would make a difference, and you can't rush space ship parts or non-building wonders with engineers.

Doctor Love said:

Best GP city I've had was an all-farm set-up, hereditary rule to keep a large population happy, with Philo leader, Pacificism, Caste System, National Epic, some great merchants turned into super specialists for extra food, and a few wonders. I don't remember my exact GPP/turn, I think it was mid 100s. I don't know if I would have the patience to do a cycle with large complex cities. Eventually your GPs only give you 20% of what it would take to discover a tech in the late game, there's not enough time left to make it worth a super specialist, etc. In the late game I've found the most helpful GPs are merchants for trade routes (1,000 gold is always handy) and artists for culture bombs. Usually by that point you have a academies in the cities where it would make a difference, and you can't rush space ship parts or non-building wonders with engineers.

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Yeah, it would have to be a more early tactic when cities are limited by happiness and those great scientists/artists/merchants would make a nice difference. Right when you discover caste system you could cycle slavery and caste system in all your happiness inhibited cities so you would retain the option of pop-rushing or serfdom for faster worker improvements. Under specific circumstances there appears to be no downside to cycling like this which sounds like a perfect way to swap civics often to your advantage.

Zombie69 said:

I was thinking more of other civics besides caste system. For example, you could add the civic that gives +100% GPP, and the one that gives +3 beakers per GP. Switch to all of these at the same time, and get rid of them when you're going back to farms.

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In CIV3 there was an abuse involving dogpiling tens of workers per turn into 1 city to artificailly boost its population to milk a late game score. The exploit worked because you only lost 1 population per turn no matter how much of a food deficit you ran So if you added 10 workers per turn it didn't matter if you starved at 1 pop per turn.

So, I think that CIV4 is the same. I don't think you can add workers or settlers to existing cities, but you can abuse that maths of a population drop.

Say you have 3 GP factory cities (lets give then 16 population each - and hey - lets say they have heath issues so dumping some population wouldn't really hurt anyway).
You use your spiritual leader to drop into : Caste system, Representation, pacifism, mercantilism (for the extra free specialsit) all at once. lets say you're Philosophical as well.

So you get 1 production, 3 + 3 beakers, 9 GPP from your unlimited great scientists.

During the 4 turn "No anarchy" lockout you set the GP factory cities to have 100% scientists (for example) so that they will starve.

Turn 1 you make 16 hammers, 96 beakers (+ city infrastructure bonuses) , 144 GPP points. Loose 1 pop point

turn 2 15 hammers 90 beakers (= city improvement bonuses again), 135 GP points. Starve to 14 pop.

Total's over 5 turns = 70 hammers, 630 GP points, 420 beakers per participating city.
Etc until turn 5. You've probably popped multiple GP's per city in this time frame. 5 population lost. You've dropped below the unhelathy level of population, and can regrow peple faster from a smaller population base using your best food tiles (no rubbishy farmed grasslands, just pure floodpalins and hooked up food resources... and you had granaries right?). Now you flip back to whatever civis you're running for the rest of your gameplan. Wait out the 4 turn lockout, then rinse and repeat.

Hey lets make it more abusive... lets make great merchants instead, and put them as food producing super merchants who make..... FOOD Yes thats right.. they add 1 food as well as 6 commerce for no population work.

So picture 3-4 iterations down the track when you've added, say 20 Great Merchants to your National Epic GP factory city.

Even on "full starvation" the city makes 22 food, paying for the first 11 citizens. When in "repopulate" mode from 11 population averaging 4.5 food per tile you make 71 excess food.

It's just a pity you can't do this with Ankor Wat powered priests

One other abuse I've yet to test:
Same idea across ALL your cities, but you also have the hanging gardens
(+1 pop), Mercantilism (+1 free specialaist), Statue of Liberty (+1 free specialist).

So a newly founded city could have 4 specialists, and what happens when it starves?.... can the city with "real" pop of 1 starve down a pop? or does your city just stay parked at 4 specialaists? Without the need to worry about food life could get a bit surreal

Get the Parthanon and Philosophical and Pacifism, and get 12 beakers and 42 GP points + 4 *the effect of the actual specalist for every tiny unimproved city you have! No need for workers to improve the land, as no one's working it.

I think I'll have to try this

Thats interesting stuff Robinm. Not being too familiar with the mechanics of GPP, it makes my head hurt a bit, but I'll definitely have to explore these ideas. Besides Phillosophical, do you think there is another trait that has synergy with this tactic, or could you really pair this with any trait for similar results? Maybe Spiritual to micromanage your civics more freely?

I'd say Spiritual and Philosphical would be the best to maximise use of this trick - which would dictate Saladin as your leader. Camels for victory

300+ GPP is sweet on immortal. I was damn lucky though!

robinm said:

During the 4 turn "No anarchy" lockout you set the GP factory cities to have 100% scientists (for example) so that they will starve.

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I haven't experimented too much with starvation, but, I believe, when you starve from 16 pop to 12 pop in 4 turns, you create a "food deficit" of 44+23+24+25 = 116 food; i.e., this is how much excess food you'll have to generate to grow back to size 16. If you had just used that 116 food to feed your city (plus 2/turn from the city center = 8), that's 31 food/turn, which is enough to feed 15.5 people.

So I don't think you're getting a big gain this way. You can get about the same average number of specialists, or maybe even a bit more, just by feeding everyone at the steady state. You get some advantage from running Representation/Caste System/Pacifism only on some turns, instead of all the turns. But that assumes that there's something else you would rather be doing on the remaining turns.

If you have great merchants in the city as super specialists, that's not necessarily better, because any food they generate on the "starvation turns" is just wasted.

robinm said:

Same idea across ALL your cities, but you also have the hanging gardens (+1 pop), Mercantilism (+1 free specialaist), Statue of Liberty (+1 free specialist).

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I don't think the Hanging Gardens is relevant. It just gives you a one-time boost in your population, when it's built. I don't think it prevents your cities from starving back down to size 1.

You can certainly build lots of size-1 cities, and run Mercantilism and Statue of Liberty, and you should be able to come out ahead in each city. Whether this is profitable enough to make it better than other strategies, I don't know. Since you can only build one city per 9 tiles, at most, usually you are limited in the cities you have room for, at least in the midgame, and it's more important to get as much as you can out of each one.

robinm said:

Say you have 3 GP factory cities (lets give then 16 population each - and hey - lets say they have heath issues so dumping some population wouldn't really hurt anyway).
You use your spiritual leader to drop into : Caste system, Representation, pacifism, mercantilism (for the extra free specialsit) all at once. lets say you're Philosophical as well.

So you get 1 production, 3 + 3 beakers, 9 GPP from your unlimited great scientists.

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Where is the 1 production coming from? Scientists only provide +3 research and I don't remember anything that gives a specialist 1 additional hammer.... Are you thinking of GREAT scientists (who do provide the 1 production bonus)?

DaviddesJ said:

I haven't experimented too much with starvation, but, I believe, when you starve from 16 pop to 12 pop in 4 turns, you create a "food deficit" of 44+23+24+25 = 116 food; i.e., this is how much excess food you'll have to generate to grow back to size 16. If you had just used that 116 food to feed your city (plus 2/turn from the city center = 8), that's 31 food/turn, which is enough to feed 15.5 people.

So I don't think you're getting a big gain this way. You can get about the same average number of specialists, or maybe even a bit more, just by feeding everyone at the steady state. You get some advantage from running Representation/Caste System/Pacifism only on some turns, instead of all the turns. But that assumes that there's something else you would rather be doing on the remaining turns.

If you have great merchants in the city as super specialists, that's not necessarily better, because any food they generate on the "starvation turns" is just wasted.

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Let's say that you have 2 food sources (5 food) and 4 flood plains and unlimited grasslands around the city.

Assuming all the flood plains and grasslands are farmed, to support the city with no starvation, you need 8 citizens (5*2+4*4+3*2 = 32 food) working the land which leaves you with 9 specialists.

The total would then be 0 hammers, 6*9*5 = 270 beakers, 9*9*5 = 405 GPPs.

If you had 2 unhealth, then, the specialists would drop to 8 so the totals would be, 0 hammers, 240 beakers, and 360 GPPs.

This is versus 0 hammers, 6*(17+16+15+14+13) = 450 beakers, 9*(15*5) = 675 GPPs

You would be producing 44 = (5*2+4*4+3*6) food at 12 pop, 47 food at 13, etc. So, you would grow back in 6 turns [(44-24)*3 + (47-26)*1 + (50-28)*1+(53-30)*1 = 126 food]. Assuming that you could have the same specialists, during "non-GPP producing" times, you would garner 0 hammers, 3*8*6 = 144 beakers, 6*8*6 = 290 GPPs (assuming you switch out of representation, mercantilism and pacifism).

Add that with 270 beakers and 405 GPPs and your total would be 414 beakers and 695 GPPs vs. 450 beakers and 675 GPPs.

Assuming 2 unhealth, you get 240+126 = 366 beakers and 360+254 = 614 GPPs. So, it might be worthwhile to starve your citizens while in "GPP producing mode" if you're unhealthy, but not otherwise (unless you would rather have beakers than GPPs and then with the trade loss, you'd probably do not even want to do the switch to mercantilism).

Now, losing FOOD SAVED might be worthwhile when in "GPP producing mode" as 2 more scientists at -6 food saved would improve research and GPP without the major cost of replenishing the food (only ~ 1 turn's worth at max food, 60 beakers & 90 GPPs vs. 24 beaker & 48 GPPs, even better for unhealthy).

However, with a NON-philosophical leader, this changes. The beakers stay the same, but GPPs for the starvation method drop to 450 GPPs, but for the stay constant method it goes to 415 GPPs giving you marginal returns if you're not unhealthy and good return if you are unhealthy. The reason is that the GPP bonus you gain from pacifism is offset by getting the bonus of being philosophical ALWAYS. Since the modifiers are ADDITIVE, this strategy works better with players which DON'T get a bonus to start with (same thing with National Epic).

Req

Would avoiding population loss affect this strategy? I've been just looking at taking advantage of the Granary surplus with this tactic in the game I'm playing, and not actually losing population. Although I had to at a certain point when I lost several happiness resources when an unexpected war broke out and I could afford to lose some unhappy dissenters.