On Prince, the Great Library will not get you slaughtered by the AI. In fact, you'll be in the medieval era well before the AI. And even with only one city, you should easily be able to defend yourself. When I played on Prince, I definitely had fun games where I built the Great Library and did not get squashed by the AI's medieval invasion force.
Rushing the Great Library
- Thread starter Mattson2.0
- Start date
On Prince, the Great Library will not get you slaughtered by the AI. In fact, you'll be in the medieval era well before the AI. And even with only one city, you should easily be able to defend yourself. When I played on Prince, I definitely had fun games where I built the Great Library and did not get squashed by the AI's medieval invasion force.
The subject of this thread is "Rushing the Great Library." It's at the top of every page.
The subject I was replying to was "Why is it a terrible wonder?"
If you don't see how those are 2 different questions, then I don't know what to tell you. You certainly cannot infer context of the second question based upon context of the first. That's putting words in people's mouths.
Well now, hold on a minute.
3bpt, 1gpt, 1cpt and possibly 1 GS I won't dispute.
HOWEVER.
You need to fill those writing slots in order to get the 4 culture/4 tourism. You can't do that until AFTER Drama and Poetry and only AFTER you've generated 2 GW's. AND you need to use them for making great works instead of doing the normal practice of saving them until after you win the WF to finish a social policy tree. Even if you did that, the GL itself still would not net you those extra yields, because your empire would no doubt include amphitheaters which have slots for the great works. Writing great works aren't really limited by the amount of slots you have - they are limited by the amount of writers you have.
So when you look at it like that, the cost benefit goes WAY down, and it's starting to look like a pretty bad wonder.
Chum, I don't think it's worth arguing about who changed the subject or not any more, or who put words into whose mouth. Let's go back to the topic: I think it's a good wonder on Prince, terrible on Deity, and situational in between. It sounds like you think it's a terrible wonder always. That's fine by me.
Im of the opinion that Spain has a pretty decent shot at this on higher difficulties IF you can find a couple of Natural Wonders and get a free 1000 gold to buy 2 settlers.
Delaying cities is always bad. Tradition though at least gives you free aqueducts so a late expo will catch up very quickly.
Liberty though, that free worker policy looks very good for early wonders.
Delaying cities is always bad. Tradition though at least gives you free aqueducts so a late expo will catch up very quickly.
Liberty though, that free worker policy looks very good for early wonders.
MP is played on Quick speed 99.9% of the time and as long as there are no AI's the difficulty doesn't make a difference, provided that everyone is on the same difficulty.
I guess turn 28 isn't THAT ridiculously late, but it is pretty late. I have gotten it on turn 20 before and I think even turn 19. Granted this was back in the day when I used to compete for it (I consider myself a noob back then) and that was quite some time ago.
Wild_Woojsha
Scourge_Of_G0d
I have been looking everywhere and cannot figure out what the difficulty level even does on Multiplayer. It can be set different for every player, does it just give more advantages to whoever sets it lowest?
Turn 19 on Quick speed is crazy
, anyone else have a faster time they have ever rushed this thing? Quick isn't that much quicker...
Wild_Woojsha
Scourge_Of_G0d
I love how I started out saying this thing is critical on Prince and bounced all over the place later on. Where is my consistency?
Anyways, I still favor building everything else before trying to build the Great Library. Every map is different, every game is different, but the build priority is not. We always have to explore, then grow the first city, improve its tiles, build a defense force, and then start hunting wonders.
OP jumped straight into Great library after Scout, monument, Worker and then asked if he should not build a worker. The Great Library is easier to build when you have more hammers. The thing costs 185 hammers, and you get 3 hammers per turn from your palace if you build it in the capital. If you wait, and build other, cheaper, necessary things first, you can start building it at 5-7 population when you have 2-3 mines which give you 6-9 hammers per turn, plus a few plains or pantheons, etc. to get you there further. If you find a way to collect 19 hammers per turn in your city, you can build the glorious great library in 10 turns. If you try to build it with 4 hammers per turn, it will say it takes 36 turns to build, and this is where the trouble begins. The city will obviously grow in this time, and 36 will shrink faster than 1 per turn, but its best to focus on other things first and then try to snipe it when your city is ready for action.
I have been looking everywhere and cannot figure out what the difficulty level even does on Multiplayer. It can be set different for every player, does it just give more advantages to whoever sets it lowest?
Turn 19 on Quick speed is crazy
I think the difficulty might affect city-state behavior. It also affects the AI if/when a human player leaves prematurely.
Let me elaborate on the GL thing really quick. First a turn 20 GL is not normal, even on quick pace. I have done this once, maybe twice. My friend has gotten either turn 18 or turn 16 GL with shoshone and clever ruin picking. Granted this was back in the day when we were both noobs. We had boiled this down to a science.
For example, if I was babylon, I would get my Writing scientist, then research mining immediately afterwards, and wait until i finished mining to place the academy. This way I could place it on forest and get the extra 13 hammers from chopping a forest.
That's just to give you an idea of how we approached the issue. We (mistakenly) thought that the GL gave a player such a huge advantage that we felt it was worth it to compete for it that heavily.
Who's being vague? I agree, 2% is about right. I did say it's almost always the wrong choice. But I named a situation where I built it on Immortal (popped Writing, no room to expand on my Archipelago shared island) and it proved effective and led to a domination victory. 2% is still not "never". This is in contrast with Deity, where never is basically right.
I don't disagree with this. It's probably better to do this than to "rush" the GL in the manner that was described. But at Prince, building the GL at all is basically an insta-win. While it's not the "optimal" strategy, I think you can win at Prince with a GL rush.
yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
This is precisely the reply this entire thread has been missing. The Great Library isn't "a good Wonder on Prince and a bad Wonder on Deity", it's a very mediocre Wonder you shouldn't build unless you're playing Multiplayer.
It doesn't magically become good if you scale down the difficulty. It's worth building if it isn't gone by turn 40, but that's rarely the case, even in Prince games it'll be gone by turn 50.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with build TGL, there is nothing wrong with wonderwhoring, there is nothing wrong with roleplaying.
If that's the way you enjoy playing the game by all means do it. But it doesn't magically make TGL better. Even at Prince you'll most likely finish the game faster by settling as soon as possible. If anything I would get the Temple of Artemis, Pyramids or Petra if I got a desert start, followed by Oracle or Chichen Itza or Macchu Picchu. Those are wonders than can really be gamebreaking.
Yes, you can always create a scenario in which TGL isn't a terrible decision (Small Islands maps, playing as Venice, playing OCC), but even then I'd probably pop mathematics as soon as possible and get me the Hanging Gardens.
Hello,
Me again I asked why is it a terrible wonder? on the first page, and since then the thread really took off!
I am returning to the game after around 5 years of not playing, and I stumbled upon the GL rush myself, totally by chance, when in one game I just happened to somehow get hold of it after around 40 or 50 turns (on Prince), and the benefits were obvious (by which I mean, I won easily and I attributed it to getting a head start on science). I then employed that strategy for the next game, which I also won easily (again, on Prince).
However, after reading this thread I can now understand that whilst it works well on Prince, it is not recommended for higher levels.
So, what should I do instead? Is the recommendation to settle 2 or 3 cities during those 40 or 50 turns? Stick a library in each, and get the NC?
Thanks,
Ackoman
Me again I asked why is it a terrible wonder? on the first page, and since then the thread really took off!
I am returning to the game after around 5 years of not playing, and I stumbled upon the GL rush myself, totally by chance, when in one game I just happened to somehow get hold of it after around 40 or 50 turns (on Prince), and the benefits were obvious (by which I mean, I won easily and I attributed it to getting a head start on science). I then employed that strategy for the next game, which I also won easily (again, on Prince).
However, after reading this thread I can now understand that whilst it works well on Prince, it is not recommended for higher levels.
So, what should I do instead? Is the recommendation to settle 2 or 3 cities during those 40 or 50 turns? Stick a library in each, and get the NC?
Thanks,
Ackoman
yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
That's precisely it. No matter the difficulty for an optimal (science) game you always want to expand as soon as somewhat possible. Your capital shouldn't build more than two or three scouts, a Shrine, a monument (if Liberty) and maybe a military unit, preferably an Archer. Some Tradition builds also include a Worker, which can be good if you are playing on Emperor or below, since Worker steals are much harder to come by-
For everything else really all you have to do is check out the guide section of this website, I recommend Tabarnaks 3 City National College guide, you can find it in the War Academy iirc.
I don't think it's unreasonable to work a granary into the queue before your settler as well, especially if you're skipping the shrine, and certainly if you're working wheat / deer / bananas. That extra bit of early growth is nice, and then the extra food actually become hammers when you're building the settler.
rredding
Chieftain
- Joined
- May 20, 2007
- Messages
- 19
I usually play Emp difficulty. Recently I have been doing GL to leverage a few things to get a jump on early wonders AND make Liberty viable. I have been working on playing wide.
Recently I have been doing this:
Capital on a Hill or next to Sheep for the production bump. Research Pottery into Writing. I build a scout, then monument, then start granary. With extra pop from a hut and a hammer heavy start location you can get all that done right about turn 22ish (standard speed). Then right into GL. I get my worker as the first policy after the unlock on liberty then begin working to the free settler in that tree.
With the worker I chop to the Library. While all this is going on research goes Mining then Bronze Working to unlock Iron Working for the GL to pop.
I then build a unit or 2 or maybe buildings depending on where the game is taking me. Usually at this point I have a 2nd city sometimes a 3rd and I then build Pyramids and then directly to Colossus in the capital if a water start.
This gets me a good start by turn 90ish.
Hope this helps.
Recently I have been doing this:
Capital on a Hill or next to Sheep for the production bump. Research Pottery into Writing. I build a scout, then monument, then start granary. With extra pop from a hut and a hammer heavy start location you can get all that done right about turn 22ish (standard speed). Then right into GL. I get my worker as the first policy after the unlock on liberty then begin working to the free settler in that tree.
With the worker I chop to the Library. While all this is going on research goes Mining then Bronze Working to unlock Iron Working for the GL to pop.
I then build a unit or 2 or maybe buildings depending on where the game is taking me. Usually at this point I have a 2nd city sometimes a 3rd and I then build Pyramids and then directly to Colossus in the capital if a water start.
This gets me a good start by turn 90ish.
Hope this helps.
yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
It's almost never worth it to build a Granary before building your Settlers. The conversion from food to production is not linear.
Someone please correct me if I get this wrong, but iirc this is how it works:
1 excess food will convert into 1 hammer, 2 excess food will convert into 2 hammers, 3 excess food will convert into 2.5 hammers and 4 excess food will convert into 3 hammers. after that investing into food really is not worth it at all: 8 excess food converts into 4 hammers.
so what does this mean? assuming we have a pop 3 city with 2 hills and 1 wheat/deer, a quite realistic scenario:
a settler is 106 hammers. in order to get your 4 city tradition going you will need 3 settlers. in total that makes 318 hammers.
you get 1 hammer from the palace, you get 1 hammer from settling on a hill, you get 4 hammers from working 2 hill tiles and you get 3 hammers (2 food, 1 hammer) from working your wheat for a total of 9 hammers.
this means you will: get the first settler out after 12 turns, the second after 24, the last after 36. assuming you start somewhere around turn 20 to turn 30 that means all your cities will be settled at around turn 65 to turn 70.
now we do the same calculation with the granary: you get 9 hammers baseline, but with the granary you get an additional 3 food (2 for the building, 1 for the wheat/deer). those 3 food will convert into 1.25 hammers.
(once again, please someone correct me if I'm wrong)
so with the granary your city will be at 10.25 hammers, but will need to invest an additional 60 hammers, meaning the first settler will be significantly delayed.
this means you will: get your granary out after 7 turns, your first settler after 17 turns, your second settler after 27 turns and your third settler after 37 turns.
so even if those +3 food accumulate for almost 30 turns (!) your last settler will still come later.
now of course building a granary is not bad if you only need a few more turns to go from pop 3 to pop 4, but most of the time growing from pop 3 to pop 4 takes quite a while since 3 food tiles aren't abundant. even then another calculation has to be made factoring in the fact that you start settler production much later and I will not get into that. I could've taken improving mines with a worker or chopping forests into account but I'm terrible at maths and this was already too much, so please go easy on me.
In any case though I would much, much rather make an Archer or even a Warrior in order to have an additional unit to
a) escort me Settlers or stolen Workers
b) protect my Workers that are improving mines/luxuries
c) protect my tiles from being pillaged
d) do early city state quests
e) clear barbarian camps near my city asap
I almost always start building a Worker or Granary, but as soon as I hit a reasonable population (usually 3, sometimes 4) it's straight to the Settler unless I have massive growth available to me or the Granary is 75%+ complete and could contribute to faster settler. It's worth it when you have lots of high-production tiles because those two food almost always convert to faster production.
But 90% of the time there is zero reason to complete the granary before your first settler.
I almost never build a military unit before my first settler (not counting my two scouts). I rarely will buy an Archer but I really don't need the military at all.
But 90% of the time there is zero reason to complete the granary before your first settler.
I almost never build a military unit before my first settler (not counting my two scouts). I rarely will buy an Archer but I really don't need the military at all.
Similar threads
