CE vs SE war

[TheMeInTeam]

nice post US. The only thing I disagree about (or rather point out since you don't deny them?) are the value of cottages in a bureaucracy capital, as the +50% bonus pays dividends there. Assuming you can meet your GP and production needs in other cities, cottaging your capital a bit more aggressively than other cities generally pays off.

Unless it's one of those non-river plainsfests or the seafood special.

 

[peppe1]

Not sure what Unconquered Sun will say.

I imagine Bureaucracy on Deity is a difficult choice or has a window of useful. It is high upkeep, so the +50% benefit may not be greater than the benefit nationalism would provide when it is available to a 6+ city empire.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Not sure what Unconquered Sun will say.

I imagine Bureaucracy on Deity is a difficult choice or has a window of useful. It is high upkeep, so the +50% benefit may not be greater than the benefit nationalism would provide when it is available to a 6+ city empire.

In his example, he said bur was one of your assumed civics at the time.

Mileage varies. I've seen people run bur commerce caps on deity ---> including Rusten/USun/ABCF. None of them will always do it.

I can't say I've seen a lot of 2nd or 3rd cities changed to the capitol to get the bonus though. I guess cottages just HAVE to come very very soon if you aren't FIN so that their ROI comes out ahead before the game is functionally decided. Higher difficulties push the tech pace more and more for the AI, so the window of time you have to act before they get out of control is smaller. If it takes 100+ turns for a cottage to break even with some of its alternatives, you damn well better have it in place before they "break even" at turn 250 or something when the AI is already rolling with infantry, possibly tanks.

But if the capitol favors them they can be worthwhile there, yes.

 

[shyuhe]

Not sure what Unconquered Sun will say.

I imagine Bureaucracy on Deity is a difficult choice or has a window of useful. It is high upkeep, so the +50% benefit may not be greater than the benefit nationalism would provide when it is available to a 6+ city empire.

Unless you have a bizarre empire set up, the only situation I can think of where you'd skip bureaucracy entirely is if you're warring from the medieval era and need vassalage promos (and unit discounts).

Bureau as a long-term solution is much more game dependent, as it's a function of your empire's overall research and production capabilities - i.e., can you whip/slow build or do you need the draft to take out a neighbor.

 

[r_rolo1]

The issue with beauro ( as usual ) is that the gain of going there might not outweight the costs compared with simply staying it the top row of the civics in this regard when those are the only two options. Besides the costs of the civic itself ( that can be quite a drag ), there is the oportunity cost of changing civics if you aren't Spiritual and the obvious fact that the spot where you have the palace may not be suited to give a lot of raw output that can can be multiplied by the civic ( say, like here ).

 

[Unconquered Sun]

I wrote a very long post, perhaps it was unclear on non-financial cottages in the capital. The +50% commerce bonus makes them worth it, and more often than not I cottage my capital (or another city and move palace).

Non-financial cottages are also a decent choice for citizens in the free happiness range of any city, as long as you're out of hills, and as long as the +1 food from irrigation is unavailable or not needed (situations when whip will get you less than some extra research edge). In BtS, those cottages may be replaced when workshops and watermills improve depending on overall goals, civics, slider, Kremlin, corporations, etc.

 

[Burning Stone]

Very interesting, Unconquered Sun. A lot for this Monarch player to think about. But it fits with a recent experience I had. I forget my leader but he wasn't financial. I started with little AI's pressure and a lot of grassland, so I spammed cottages. The resulting tech rate was ok, but I wasn't able to build a solid tech lead. I was puzzled why, with so many cottages, I wasn't able to tech as well as I expected.

What you outline has implications for the initial Rex, of course. I should be focusing more on cities with production potential and less on places that can support cottages.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Non-financial cottages are also a decent choice for citizens in the free happiness range of any city, as long as you're out of hills, and as long as the +1 food from irrigation is unavailable or not needed (situations when whip will get you less than some extra research edge)

The problem here is that you can 1) generally run specialists in such a city or 2) if you can't, it's probably low food, and you have to consider the value of settling it in the first place.

 

[DampRain]

Thank you Unconquered Sun for your post on previous page. It was hugely enlightening. An interesting corollary (I'm sure you know it for sure,but for others who were glancing), then the power of any river tile immediately becomes substantially larger. When in the situation of HR. Damn, that post needs to be kept somewhere special, because it is an absolute gem.

The reality (which I didn't realize until vicawoo pointed it out to me) is that after the 2nd city, each one forces a move from other tile improvements to commerce to keep a viable rate, so you're really trading some of your current improvements for special tiles and weighting that against land conceded to the AI.

TMIT, could you pelase elaborate? From other tile improvements, is it from say mines, etc. to cottages to fund the additional maintenance?

 

[yanner39]

Great Post Unconquered Sun. A very good read.

 

[georgjorge]

In terms of research, the order of usefulness is:

scientists that will produce a GP >>> mines building wealth/research > scientists > cottages > irrigations (zero research value)

In terms of production, the order of usefulness is:

mines or irrigations (depending on city size and presence of granary) >> cottages >> scientists (zero production value).

Put simply, mines outshine non-financial cottages in the free happiness range.

However, if you're building Research/Wealth, the production value of the mine becomes zero (can't build anything else), while if you would get your wealth from a plains riverside cottage (as you assumed surplus food), it would net you less wealth than a mine but more production, so it's not like the mine is a strictly better choice.

 

[kossin]

Cottages don't give gold, they give commerce.
It will be true if you're at 100% gold but usually you build wealth at 100% research to complete a tech sooner. It allows to focus your cities on science multipliers and to delay gold multipliers for later.

 

[Unconquered Sun]

However, if you're building Research/Wealth, the production value of the mine becomes zero (can't build anything else), while if you would get your wealth from a plains riverside cottage (as you assumed surplus food), it would net you less wealth than a mine but more production, so it's not like the mine is a strictly better choice.

A mine can be riverside too.

As DampRain observed, using Hereditary Rule to work extra riverside improvements has a considerably better payoff. However, let's look into riverside tiles above the 1 commerce tile bonus:


financial cottages benefit 10 commerce

non-financial cottages don't get a special benefit

mines seemingly don't get a special benefit

irrigations seemingly don't get a special benefit

non-financial windmills don't get a special benefit

financial windmills benefit 1 commerce/turn until Electricity or adopting Environmentalism

workshops seemingly don't get a special benefit

watermills don't get a special benefit (unless pre-Electricity, when they seemingly don't get a special benefit)

I.E. a non-financial plains riverside cottage is 1food 1hammer 2commerce; a plains riverside mine is 4hammer 1commerce; comparison is 1 food, 1 commerce, 1 turn of cottage growth vs 3 hammers and a very minor chance to pop a special resource.

Interestingly, mines/irrigations/workshops/pre-Electricity watermills do get something extra from riverside commerce: eligibility for +1 commerce during Golden Ages. Suppose you have just researched Replaceable Parts and you want to switch from 2hammer mines to 1food 1hammer 1commerce windmills. You're also about to start a Golden Age. Should your workers start to improve from the riverside mines or the non-riverside mines? The correct answer is to improve non-riverside mines first as riverside mines get the GA commerce bonus anyway.


A similar Golden Age factor is to be considered for Levee hammer bonus. Taking both into account could improve your Golden Age output noticeably.

The problem here is that you can 1) generally run specialists in such a city or 2) if you can't, it's probably low food, and you have to consider the value of settling it in the first place.

Not all cities will produce a great person though. A non-financial cottage will lag in research compared to such a scientist, but the basic tile yield might become a decent substitute as early as the hamlet stage. The key here is to be able to tell which city will produce a Great Person as far down the road as possible.

 

[budweiser]

"Every city beyond the first causes you to shift work to commerce tiles in order to keep up research. AND cottages take forever to pay off."

That kinda makes my head hurt.

/pretty soon we will all be starting over. I might actually read the manual this time.

 

[DampRain]

"Every city beyond the first causes you to shift work to commerce tiles in order to keep up research. AND cottages take forever to pay off."

It means if you want to keep up a decent research rate (so it doesn't take 2000 years to research aesthetics), then instead of working hammer tiles to produce settlers/workers, you'll be working tiles that produce commerce. The issue is that cottages take a long time to pay off.

 

[budweiser]

It means if you want to keep up a decent research rate (so it doesn't take 2000 years to research aesthetics), then instead of working hammer tiles to produce settlers/workers, you'll be working tiles that produce commerce. The issue is that cottages take a long time to pay off.

Yes, yes. I know.

But the common thme on the boards is to rex out to 6 and cottage up. That would seem to be suboptimal. The income should come from another source since (non-fin) cottages are so weak.

 

[yanner39]

Yes, yes. I know.

But the common thme on the boards is to rex out to 6 and cottage up. That would seem to be suboptimal. The income should come from another source since (non-fin) cottages are so weak.

This is what I was thinking as well. Even, REX until you slider reaches 0% because land is power.

I am interested in reading more. In the absence of REXing, the human player would lose land to the AI and this is especially true when the AI is say Justinian. It's funny, I've never been a REXer until recently and now I do it pretty: claiming land, researching to Alphabet and currency and then fully recovering my economy at CoL.

More info!

 

[georgjorge]

Cottages don't give gold, they give commerce.
It will be true if you're at 100% gold but usually you build wealth at 100% research to complete a tech sooner. It allows to focus your cities on science multipliers and to delay gold multipliers for later.

Yea, Gold/Commerce/Wealth - I confuse the words sometimes.

I'm not sure what era we're talking about. I assumed that Unconquered Sun was talking about early eras, as he was talking about cities where surplus food isn't an issue. At those stages, I'm never close to a 100% science slider.

Anyway, what I was trying to say is that in terms of commerce, a plains cottage seems actually better than a grassland hill - if you produce Wealth, both give exactly the same commerce, but the cottage will grow.

 

[vicawoo]

"Every city beyond the first causes you to shift work to commerce tiles in order to keep up research. AND cottages take forever to pay off."

That kinda makes my head hurt.

/pretty soon we will all be starting over. I might actually read the manual this time.

I didn't figure this out until I spent a long time trying to answer, how many food/hammers is 1 commerce worth early game?

To use a simple example, say your 3rd city increases your total maintenance costs (which is more than it's own maintenance cost) 4 gold per turn. If you want to maintain your prior beakers per turn, you will have to come up with 4 commerce. In most cases, this means taking two population off of mines (4 food+hammers) in favor of riverside cottage (2 food + 2 commerce). 4 food + hammers - 2 food = 2 food+hammers.
Therefore, settling that new city actually cost you 2 x 2 food+hammers = 4 food + hammers per turn, making that unirrigated rice you gained a lot less impressive.

Why not just keep the mines and ignore the gold loss? If you've ever stalled your economy before you hit pottery/writing, you'll realize it can cost you the game techwise. A seemingly meaningless decision now depends on the AIs tech rate and how close you are to matching it.

About the expand to 0% then cottage: through experience shadowing games at various levels, I've come to realize that this advice implicitly relies on lower level maintenance discounts/tech discounts. Specifically, if you hit 0% before you hit pottery/writing, you lose, but on say noble/prince/monarch tech discounts will allow you to reach those before you can expand fast enough to kill your economy.
Second, each difficulty level below deity gains about a 5% maintenance discount, so on noble, you get about a 25% maintenance discount. Which means you'll have to switch off 25% fewer tiles to commerce, which means new cities are 25% x maintenance cost more productive than in deity. And more commerce x lower research cost means you hit those economic techs a lot faster.

Finally let me point out that due to optimization in difficulty adjustments, the best strategies for deity are somewhat suboptimal for say monarch, and I'm not just talking warrior rushes. Higher levels require a lot of suboptimal sacrifices, but in say monarch you can adhere to land is power without falling behind the AIs tech rate.

 

[kossin]

About the expand to 0% then cottage: through experience shadowing games at various levels, I've come to realize that this advice implicitly relies on lower level maintenance discounts/tech discounts. Specifically, if you hit 0% before you hit pottery/writing, you lose, but on say noble/prince/monarch tech discounts will allow you to reach those before you can expand fast enough to kill your economy.
Second, each difficulty level below deity gains about a 5% maintenance discount, so on noble, you get about a 25% maintenance discount. Which means you'll have to switch off 25% fewer tiles to commerce, which means new cities are 25% x maintenance cost more productive than in deity. And more commerce x lower research cost means you hit those economic techs a lot faster.

Quoted for truth.
If you expand until 0% on Deity, you'll fall hopelessly behind.