More Wonders for our Nation?

We voted to build Newton's University in Priapos, but there are more Wonders coming up that we should plan for if we want them (thanks to the prompt from DaveShack on this one):

Smith's Trading Company(600,3): needs Economics, pays upkeeps for Harbours, Marketplaces, Banks and Airports.
Theory of Evolution (600,3): needs Scientific Method (600,3), gives 2 free techs.
Shakespeare's Theatre (400,8): needs Free Artistry, makes 8 citizens in it's city content. Being built by Japan.
Magellan's Voyage (400,3): needs Navigation, gives +1 ship movement, being built by Japan and Persia.
JS Bach's Cathedral (600,6): needs Music Theory, gives 2 content citizens in every city.
Hoover Dam (800,2): needs Electronics, gives a Hydro Plant in every city
Univeral Sufferage (800,4): needs Industrialisation, reduces war weariness.
(numbers in brackets indicate build cost and cultural value)

The big one we need to plan for is Theory of Evolution for those 2 free techs. Do we want it and if so where do we want to build it? Governor Daveshack has offered Styx for the task which will take just under 30 turns to build it, less with the railing of the mines around the city. We could start a prebuild soon allowing us to research Sanitation, Electricity then Scientific Method, athough our palace prebuild will only last 13 turns turns at present so we will need to consider what we will use for a prebuild.

Hoover Dam, although it does not come until later, could be reached in the same timescale if we take Atomic Theory and Electronics as our free techs from the Theory of Evolution. We'll need a city on a river for that.

Shekespears theatre does a lot, but for only one city. All our cities will be large perhaps JS Bach which benefits every city would be better? That's if we want either of them!

We only have a few cities, we need to be selective about the Wonders we build. What ones do we need and where should we build them?

I think we should go for ToE and Hoover. Those are 2 of the most powerful wonders in the game!

There is also Smith's, which gives us gpt equal to the maintenance costs of commerce producing buildings. We previously assigned it a low priority, just mentioning it for completeness sake.

Japan will give GPT and either economics or free artistry, in exchange for Theory of Gravity and peace. This might not be a good deal, but it would allow us to convert a prebuild directly to Smith's or Shakespeare's. This is a fairly big risk because if Persia then gets ToG we might be facing rifles faster than we wanted to due to their free tech.

Obviously we should focus on ToE first.

Hoover and TOE
Ill offer aguean stables to eaither one.

Theory of evolution, Hoover Dam, and Smith's Trading Company. Smith's will aid us greatly because of the gold saved.

Smiths is already being constructed by Persia in Persepolis and Japan in Babylon. We will be playing catch up. Until we get Airports, the maximum saving will be 3 gpt in Styx and Priapos and 2 gpt in the other cities. We will save a further 1 gpt in every city with an Airport. With only 8 cities the current maximum we could save is 18gpt.

We must remember that we only have 8 cities with Rome a long way to go before it is productive. If we want to build ToE and Hoover (we'll need to start soon for both of them) , can we afford to have a 3 of our 8 cities building Wonders?

Another option with Smiths may be to let Persia build it for us in Persepolis.

That's true, Furiey. Let's hope we can steal it from Persia.

At our current poor rate of research (40% is the highest we can go without going negative) it will take us 4 turns to complete Sanitation, another 19 turns to complete Electricity and about another 12 for Scientific Method. Total 35 turns. I do hpe we can speed this up, but until we know we can we'll run out of prebuild if we start earlier.

We can build either Smiths or ToE in approx 24 turns in Olympus, Styx or Priapios. Hoover Dam will take longer at approx 30 turns. Styx and Civantonia are not on a river so will not be able to build Hoover.

We can currently build ToE faster than we can research it and our longest availible prebuilt (Military Academy) will only last 14 turns, so the earliest we can start ToE is 14 turns before we research Scientific Method in 21 turns time! This means that we probably could make a grab at Smiths in the meantime, and if we could change Styx's prebuild would probably get it. How to get Economics is the problem though. If we follow DaveShack suggestion we will get Economics, yes, but we will also give Japan a tech to trade to cash rich Persia, plus with all that gold would Persia then ally Japan against us again. Could we do the deal and tie in a Military Alliance against Persia? (or if they'll still give gpt a separate MA deal or we lose the gpt if Japan makes peace early)

I've put up a poll regarding Smith's Trading Company here

We now have the option of building Smith's, Bach's or Shakespeare's. We decided we wanted to got for ToE and then Hoover, but we are still 4 turns from Industrialisation, with a further 10 turns for Electricity then we would have to research scientific Method.

But what if we got a Scientific Great Leader?

At the moment it's even too early to start our prebuild for ToE, would we want to hold that long?

We could grab one of the currently available Wonders in the meantime and still be able to prebuild in time for ToE.

Smith's would save us money on maintenance, Bach's money on happiness (which will become more important as our cities get bigger), Shakespeares would only benefit one city.

So do we grab one if we get a SGL? If so which one?

Furiey said:

We now have the option of building Smith's, Bach's or Shakespeare's. We decided we wanted to got for ToE and then Hoover, but we are still 4 turns from Industrialisation, with a further 10 turns for Electricity then we would have to research scientific Method.

But what if we got a Scientific Great Leader?

At the moment it's even too early to start our prebuild for ToE, would we want to hold that long?

We could grab one of the currently available Wonders in the meantime and still be able to prebuild in time for ToE.

Smith's would save us money on maintenance, Bach's money on happiness (which will become more important as our cities get bigger), Shakespeares would only benefit one city.

So do we grab one if we get a SGL? If so which one?

Click to expand...

If we get an SGL use it to build Shakespeares in The Augean Stables. I would love to see my homecity to be the first of our jewels to go past size 12.

Why Shakespeares in particular? It only benefits one city and most of our core cities have hospitals and are already past size 12. The Augean Stables grows to 13 next turn.

Furiey said:

Why Shakespeares in particular? It only benefits one city and most of our core cities have hospitals and are already past size 12. The Augean Stables grows to 13 next turn.

Click to expand...

whoops, i haven't looked at the current save yet. i didn't know that AS has a hospital already, or that other cities have past size 12.

so, in light of this new info, i would suggest going for Bach's. the happiness bonus is quite nice.

I must admit that playing more Vanilla (succession games with Mac players) I tend to forget that Shakespeare's allows a city to grow past 12 without a hospital.

There has been very little discussion in this thread, but considering that we are very capable of building ToE and Hoovers with prebuilds until these Wonder become available I intend to instruct that should we get a scientific leader we should grab another Wonder in order of priority Smith's, Bach's or Shakespeare's. Smith's or Bach's should be built in a city that can be quickly switched with no shields in the box and preferrably one of the outlying cities that need culture. Shakespeare's should be built in a very high food city that will get larger than the others.

Once we are close to being able to build ToE we will be able to consider whether we switch our prebuild to something else and rush ToE or finish ToE with the prebuild and rush another Wonder.

We can also build Battlefield Medecine: when do we want to build it and where?

Civantonia is on its way to building Hoover Dam in 15 turns (it could build Theory of Evolution, but why?). Olympus, Priapos, Styx, Augean Stables (once optimized for shields), and Berlin all could build Theory of Evolution within 15 turns. (I haven't looked at optimizing these cities for shields, or the effect of worker merges.)

With the military academy and battlefield medicine (I'd prefer to leave it as a prebuild) as possible prebuilds, we may want to build Heroic Epic.

Civantonia has a prebuild going that with MM could build ToE in 9 turns.

The time to get Scientific Method is 2 turns to complete Electricity + 6 turns for Scientific Method = 8 turns total, which matches in ideally with building ToE in Civantonia. We would then have just one turn of zero research before taking our 2 free techs and being able to increase research again.

But then we need to find somewhere to build Hoover. With mm for production we get:
The Augean Stables = 17 turns
Styx does not have a river
Priapos = 17 turns (but has to take a tile off Olympus causing it to use specialists
Besancon and Rome do not have a Factory yet
Berlin = 18 turns
Olympus = 15 turns (using some of Priapos's current tiles, but Priapos can use coast)

This would give:
Method A
Complete Scientific Method = 8 turns
zero research and complete ToE = + 1 turn (9 turns)
Complete Hoover in Olympus +6 turns (15 turns)

Alternatively we use the Civantonia prebuild for Hoover (13 turns with MM)
again using Olympus as the fastest builder we get ToE in 12 turns. We would then have 4 turns of zero research (Corporation would require 6 turns, Replaceable parts 9) The timeline would then be:

Method B
Complete Scientific Method = 8 turns
zero research and complete ToE in Olympus = + 4 turn (12 turns)
Complete Hoover in Civantonia = +1 turns (13 turns)



Method A (ToE in Civantonia, Hoover in Olympus) takes 2 more turns to complete Hoover than method B but gives 3 more turns of research.
Method B (Hoover in Civantonia, ToE in Olympus) complete Hoover 2 turns sooner but delays our research for 3 more turns than method A.



What are your views? Have you got a better option?

I personally prefer A. If we can't research something in the time between getting Scientific Method and ToE I would prefer to keep the zero research time as short as possible. We would then be 3 more turns closer to Replaceable Parts and getting those faster Workers and hopefully some Rubber.

edit: I've thought of another option myself.

Method C:
Join Native and German Workers to Olympus to take it to size 20, this will allow it to build ToE in 10 turns
Complete Scientific Method = 8 turns
zero research and complete ToE in Olympus = + 2 turns (10 turns)
Complete Hoover in Civantonia = +3 turns (13 turns)



Method C: delays our research only 1 turn more than method A and 2 turns less than Method B, Completes Hoover the same time as method B and 2 turns earlier than method A.



I'm now torn between A and C

Either option, the pre-build won't run out before it can be switched to Hoover Dam?

I really like option C. It's fairly quick, gets us the wonders we want, the techs we want and still gives us a bit of cash in the process!

I think we're also in a fairly good spot to consider grabbing one of the other wonders in Augean, Styx or Priapos. Good production, solid military and minimal threats on our continent, plus we would deny them from the AI.

-- Ravensfire

We're safe on the prebuild, we have Universal Sufferage which costs the same as Hoover to prebuild with.

Thinking about it today, I think I prefer option C.