Feudalism or Engineering?

So, a recent thread had me thinking of this... Which of these techs do you usually tech first? I am not thinking of extreme situations of offense or defense, but in general?

I personally often grab Engineering first because of the Machinery prereq (a tech i loove), and the early access to trebs, pikes and castles.

i often ignore war in medieval so feudalism is first up for me just for the defense

Engineering...I rarely tech feudalism and usually wind up trading for it. Unless I'm pointedly going for medieval war the same is true for engineering though. Still, if I bother to tech one or the other engineering is more likely.

The best defense is a good offense and trebs give you oodles of that. If you have Engineering you have Machinery and between pikes and crossbows you won't have any problems with medieval-era units. The Notre Dame is also a very nice wonder to grab too.

ENGINEERING

I'm always warring and the extra movement on roads speeds up getting my units to the front and with defensive mobility.

If I want some archery units then I will make do with crossbows rather than longbows or will just use stacks of archers to wear down attackers until mobile defense can finish them off, once I get catapults then these are better to take the war to the invader.

Otherwise I don't usually bother with city garrison promotions until the renaissance when I have Musketmen.

It can be either of them if I self research and decide to fight in the middle ages. Sometimes I do the Feudalism slingshot and run Vasslage for an early war. Other times I'll go through CS and Machinery for maces and crossbows and then it makes sense to research Engineering;even though it's an expensive tech it is decisive in warmongering. But that would be a real middle age war and Feudalism wouldn't add much except the ability to vassalise another civ. With a strong offensive force including trebuchets and pikes, longbows don't add much.

But if I go for a Liberalism beeline I won't bother about either of these middle age techs. I just press on through Education to Liberalism and take Nationalism as the free tech. Then research Constitution or Gunpowder while trading for many middle age techs such as Machinery, Optics, Feudalism, Engineering, Music and Theology. So in that case I wouldn't research either of these techs and might trade for them on the same turn, we need a third option . With jails, Representation, Taj Mahal and Nationhood with Theology for drafting muskets a powerful early Renaissance army can be whipped up. That seems to be one of the best ways to play a Protective civ, despite the power of early longbows under Vasslage (Feudalism Slingshot) or the devastating power of trebuchets and castles from getting Engineering early.

I didn't vote, as my answer is both at times and sometimes neither.

I usually trade for both, engineering is more useful because it opens up chemistry.
I sometimes tech Feudalism myself because i want to have the very useful guilds but don't want to give education for feudalism first.

Dirk1302 said:

I usually trade for both, engineering is more useful because it opens up chemistry.
I sometimes tech Feudalism myself because i want to have the very useful guilds but don't want to give education for feudalism first.

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Agreed. Probably 90% of the time I end up getting both in trade.

Dirk1302 said:

I usually trade for both, engineering is more useful because it opens up chemistry.
I sometimes tech Feudalism myself because i want to have the very useful guilds but don't want to give education for feudalism first.

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Same here. I usually go for civil service-paper-education-liberalism route, completely ignoring feudalism and engineering. I need both of them later, so the one I get first depends on situation and which one I get better trade for.

Where is the Education option?

I rarely tech any of those 2 techs, but if I had to choose , most likely it would be Feudalism. I need it for RP and Rifling

to be honest, i rarely tech it either. i normally trade for it using CS or philo.

I often split. Sometimes I really want Vassalage and serfdom; at other times I'm desperate for Pikemen and 3-move roads. This is a tough one for me.

Engineering for me, and lately with the GLH games I have been playing, I push for it early so I can get a lot of benefit from Castles. Still sort of trying to decide if they are worth building, they go obsolete so quickly, and I dont like postponing Economics to keep em up. Still, even without Castles, I go Engineering for Pikes and Trebs, as well as travel, and trade for Feud later.

You want to tech to Eng first, to get your war machine up and running. After you do THAT you want to get feudalism, so you can vassal people

Genv [FP];6937990 said:

You want to tech to Eng first, to get your war machine up and running. After you do THAT you want to get feudalism, so you can vassal people

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I tend to want my war machine rolling before trebs and pikes. Vassalage is good for my first war with swords/cats/longbows. The extra land means researching machinery/CS/engineering goes quicker and you have more production to build maces and trebs. Besides. It is cheaper to get techs in exchange for peace than by trading your own techs.

Umm, this is skightly off topic, but how would you go about setting up to lightbulb engineering?

I just started a nice game with the HRE. It's only 2000BC and I have 3 cities. I have plenty of time to set something up.

I can't remember the last time I actually teched for either of these techs. I always trade for them and ignore medieval warfare.

Ways of Bulbing engineering:

#1 - GE: with prereqs ( Machinery + Construction ) and IW

#2 - GS: with prereqs, IW, Aesthetics, Calendar and Alphabet, no Fishing ( blocks Sailing, Compass, Optics, astro ), no Drama and no CoL ( to block philo and Paper )

#1 requires the elusive GE .... and you probably want to rush a wonder or settle him. #2 is more academic than anything else.

r_rolo1 said:

Ways of Bulbing engineering:

#1 - GE: with prereqs ( Machinery + Construction ) and IW

#2 - GS: with prereqs, IW, Aesthetics, Calendar and Alphabet, no Fishing ( blocks Sailing, Compass, Optics, astro ), no Drama and no CoL ( to block philo and Paper )

#1 requires the elusive GE .... and you probably want to rush a wonder or settle him. #2 is more academic than anything else.

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I'll try for number 2. You must also need construction. Once you have Alphabet, you could probably trade for calendar, IW, and maybe Aestetics.

Number 1 might be easier if you are philosophical or if you built an early wonder that giver GE points.

Of course, it's: