Vanilla - GPP/SE need help

[Renzland]

Hello,

i play on monarch a great plains map (small size) with 5 Leaders. I'm Germany Frederic (Philo / creative). At the beginning the creative helps me a lot to gain land. Now all borders are closed.

It is the first time i run a SE. My question:

I mostly have science specialists in my towns, because of the beakers to disvcover techs faster.

Is this ok? Or do you think it is better to get some priests, merchants, artists...

PLease give some tipps how do you run your own SE.

What techs a very important?

I discover first Literature. Should i build great library? I think yes.

Do you often kill population to finish buildings or do you switch your population on a mining field to get more hammers?

[ParadigmShifter]

Fred is a good leader for SE. I play warlords, looks like his traits have changed (he's not creative, he is organised in warlords).

I mainly run scientists, capital always builds a library as soon as I get writing. If I can get stone or have lots of forests I build the pyramids, after getting 4 cities up and running. I whip settlers out of the capital and other cities at size 4 until I have 4 or 5 cities total before starting to build them (otherwise you are just asking to get attacked).

I always try and get the great library, if I have any forests left and other civs know literature I chop them.

I use slavery alot early on, to get granaries/libraries/settlers.

Beeline for code of laws to go into caste system so you don't need to build libraries everywhere, once you have whipped your basic infrastructure in your core cities.

First great scentist goes on an academy unless he can lightbulb philosophy. Philosophy aint that important for Fred since he is philosophical anyway.

You can either turtle a bit until you win the liberalism race (best choice, take military tradition for cavalry, 2nd best get nationalism and tech mil trad next), and stomp everyone with cavalry.

Otherwise you can go on an early conquering spree but you need to raze alot of cities to keep your economy going, and trade techs with people you don't attack for tech.

Last Fred game I played I didn't build any cottages at all, farms everywhere.

Make sure you build the national epic in your GP farm (often the capital for me because it has the most food normally). EDIT: AI capitals are pretty good GP farms normally as well.

Get 6 cities and build Oxford, again it is in the capital normally for me.

Important techs for me: alphabet, literature, code of laws, philosophy, paper, education, liberalism. EDIT: And currency obviously, then banking for the mercantilism civic.

If you can get cavalry when everyone has longbows you can take out most of your opponents on the same landmass and go for domination.

If you can't win by domination with cavalry, a good tactic is to go for democracy, get emancipation, and cottage everywhere (double cottage growth speed with emancipation), and then win via space with the land you conquered with your cavalry.

Once riflemen start appearing you need to have chemistry for grenadiers and then get steel for cannons.

[Renzland]

I see you like to win in military way. Ok this can be a good solution.

I have 6 cities. I want to make at least 4 of them with specialists / GP, because they are near rivers and have much food. How many specialists do you get per city? How much are possible in all cities? Only in 1-2 cities?

If i don't want to win military i think the best way is culture victory.

What is about late game with SE running? Is SE weak at late game?

[ParadigmShifter]

SE is even better after biology, you can run a ton of specialists then. Don't be too afraid to obsolete the great library to get biology (I normally get physics first for the free great scientist, and use him to lightbulb most of biology).

If the AI has a tech lead and you have a lot of cities, but not enough for domination, I recommend the emancipation/cottage everywhwere strat for space wins. Another alternative is the cheesy diplo win, increase your population massively after biology and vote yourself the winner. It helps to have a great engineer or 2 saved to build the UN in a timely fashion.

Culture wins are fine though, just run a ton of artists instead and culture bomb where needed. I only won cultural once though, the last time I tried was a HOF gauntlet, quick speed, small map, deity level, painful (needless to say, I didn't succeed).

[A_Hamster]

Originally Posted by Renzland

I see you like to win in military way. Ok this can be a good solution.

I have 6 cities. I want to make at least 4 of them with specialists / GP, because they are near rivers and have much food. How many specialists do you get per city? How much are possible in all cities? Only in 1-2 cities?

If i don't want to win military i think the best way is culture victory.

What is about late game with SE running? Is SE weak at late game?

There's some good primers on SE and Hybrid economies in the Civ Academy. In particular, the article on the Hybrid economy talks about specializing your specialist cities, so you'll have a few Science cities, and then a few Merchant cities to pay for them. This way you've more control of what GP you get. Also, since you're trying for a Culture win, you'll want a GA city. The article also points out that you can run lots of artists in the three cities you want to make legendary, adn so you can start this later than if you were doing it with Wonders and Culture bombs. So yes, the SE or a Hybrid will be good for Culture victory.

[DaveMcW]

If you're trying for a culture win, any great person that's not an artist hurts you.