Firstly, the fact is that the Campus District is generally superior to the Theater Square. This means that it is easier for any civilization to produce science than culture. Thus, producing culture is generally more challenging. Secondly, Great Scientists are vastly more useful than Great Artists, given that all Great Artists do is produce slightly more culture and facilitate tourism, while Great Scientists actually help you advance.
This means that much of the function of Theater Squares is useless for anyone pursuing a Scientific Victory, while Campuses are still very useful for everyone.
But both the Tech and Civics tree are extremely important for any victory condition, including Science. What this ends up meaning is that for anyone pursuing a Science Victory, the biggest challenge is typically producing enough Culture to advance through the Civics tree, not Science. Advancing through the Tech tree is relatively easy.
Thus, when pursuing a Science victory, you end up being better off with a civ that aids in the production of Culture as opposed to Science, ironically making civs like Greece (Pericles) and Khmer better at Science Victories than science focused civs like Scotland and Korea.
Khmer is able to essentially ignore Theater Squares altogether, instead going for Holy Sites and Campuses that provide far more utility. For Greece, the Theater Squares are cheaper and actually provide decent adjacency bonuses, and you can at least sell off the Great Works for Gold to buy stuff, but the 5% added Culture from City-States is the real boon.
Even the Maori can rock a Science Victory, with their insane ability to generate culture and faith without the need of Holy Sites.
So in general, civs that provide intrinsic ways to generate more Culture (especially if paired with Faith) can do more to propel a Science victory than Science oriented cultures like Scotland and Korea, although Korea does have some bonus to Culture as well. This is especially true of Khmer, which also gets a production bonus via Work Ethic.
This means that much of the function of Theater Squares is useless for anyone pursuing a Scientific Victory, while Campuses are still very useful for everyone.
But both the Tech and Civics tree are extremely important for any victory condition, including Science. What this ends up meaning is that for anyone pursuing a Science Victory, the biggest challenge is typically producing enough Culture to advance through the Civics tree, not Science. Advancing through the Tech tree is relatively easy.
Thus, when pursuing a Science victory, you end up being better off with a civ that aids in the production of Culture as opposed to Science, ironically making civs like Greece (Pericles) and Khmer better at Science Victories than science focused civs like Scotland and Korea.
Khmer is able to essentially ignore Theater Squares altogether, instead going for Holy Sites and Campuses that provide far more utility. For Greece, the Theater Squares are cheaper and actually provide decent adjacency bonuses, and you can at least sell off the Great Works for Gold to buy stuff, but the 5% added Culture from City-States is the real boon.
Even the Maori can rock a Science Victory, with their insane ability to generate culture and faith without the need of Holy Sites.
So in general, civs that provide intrinsic ways to generate more Culture (especially if paired with Faith) can do more to propel a Science victory than Science oriented cultures like Scotland and Korea, although Korea does have some bonus to Culture as well. This is especially true of Khmer, which also gets a production bonus via Work Ethic.