Can somone explain the slingshot

[Mordraken]

...bunch of stuff...!

Hmm... my strategy for Oracle is this:

• research BW at the same time as building 2 workers
• Research Pottery for Granaries & towns while building a settler
• Research (one of) Agriculture/Animal Husbandry/Hunting as necessary for special resources while building another settler
• Research Mystisism, Polyth.. and Priesthood while building developing my two new cities

After this, I generally rush to build the Oracle. I find if I wait much longer than this, the oracle will be built by the AI (and this is at Noble level).

Can you really wait to research writing, build a library, wait for a great scientist, AND research code of laws before any AI finishes the Oracle? Seems like that might take another 20 turns... Now, I usually DO build the Oracle, but I have no idea how far along other AI are when I do....

 

[katank]

The biggest slingshot early on is probably the Oracle. If you time it right with chopping, you can get it. The AI gets it in the 950-850BC interval on Prince-Monarch at the earliest. It's quite tight as you need Bronze etc. and you may get beaten by an industrious AI.

The question as to whether to pick Code of Laws or Metal Casting is usually dependent on warmongering right now and are you industrious? If warmongering, CoL is a no brainer. Courthouses lets you expand that much more and allows your skydiving science rate to recover. If you need a religion, also go for CoL. Metal Casting is superior for industrious civs as 1/2 price forges are awesome. If a warmongering industrious civ, then it's a toss up.

The civil service slingshot is pretty impossible on higher difficulty levels but you might pull it off on Noble. Even then, it requires extreme sacrifices.

I almost always get nationhood with liberalism as earlier West Point and cavalry can be great. Also, Taj Mahal's Golden Age is what I need to put my fairly large empire ahead most of the time.

 

[Mordraken]

If warmongering, CoL is a no brainer. Courthouses lets you expand that much more and allows your skydiving science rate to recover. If you need a religion, also go for CoL. Metal Casting is superior for industrious civs as 1/2 price forges are awesome.

I am such a noob... That reasoning is excellent, and a good reason to go after CoL instead of Metal Casting despite the higher cost of metal casting. I guess it could go either way, but CoL+courhouses = higher research rate, which might mean you could get Metal casting just as fast...

 

[rddc05]

IMO spiral is the best wonder in the game

Hmm, I don't get it. Spiral is maximum 2.3 gold per city in your civ and you can't use Free Religion. Doesn't seem that great to me. Am I missing something? Is that 1 gold for all of the State Religion buildings in all Civs?

 

[jaythewise]

Hmm, I don't get it. Spiral is maximum 2.3 gold per city in your civ and you can't use Free Religion. Doesn't seem that great to me. Am I missing something? Is that 1 gold for all of the State Religion buildings in all Civs?

its a gold per city that has your state religion

 

[Wodan]

One problem with Spiral is you can't switch to Free Religion without losing it all. So, you're stuck with OP or Theocracy for probably longer than you really wanted it.

Wodan

 

[gettingfat]

IMO, Unless you have several cities and big country that involves very high maintanence, free religion doesn't really help that much. 10% research bonus doesn't really speed up the research by 10%.

 

[snepp]

its a gold per city that has your state religion

He's talking about the Spiral Minaret, not the shrine constructed by a prophet.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

IMO, Unless you have several cities and big country that involves very high maintanence, free religion doesn't really help that much. 10% research bonus doesn't really speed up the research by 10%.

It helps if you're trying to ease diplomatic relations with several civs of differing state religions - or if you're particularly trying to improve relations with one particular civ and can't swap to his state religion.

Agreed that the 10% won't be anything like 10% by the time you have universities/observatories/libraries in all your cities plus academies in some of them. But if you're specifically beelining for liberalism, you'll probably have researched it immediately after education, which means the only other science boosters most cities will have will be libraries. So you'll still get a 7-8% science boost (135%/125%) which can be significant over time. Plus the lower costs and extra happiness from all your religions can be significant. True, the benefits aren't overwhelming - but is there any civic that does have overwhelming benefits? (If there was we'd probably all be crying that that civic was overpowered)

As to high maintenance: If you're playing well on a higher level, won't you almost always have high maintenance by the time you get liberalism?

 

[denogginizer]

Thanks for the explanation on this, I was curious myself. I used it for the first time in a Prince game last night, and have maintained a 4-6 tech lead over everybody except Mansa Musa (it used to be 4-6, but now it's a 1-2 tech lead and I'm running 90% science). I'm still trailing in points to Mansa and Peter (barely), but am about to war with a weaker civ...

 

[Skippa]

Virtual M,

Thanks for the the CS and PCS slingshot explanations. I've done the CS slingshot many times but I'd never done the great phophet (aka PCS) slingshot so I thought that I would give it a try.

I started a noble game as Elizabeth (I'm a Prince level player but figured that I would make it easy for myself during this test game).
I did everything explained: Beelined to COL, left masonry alone etc. I got Stonehenge in London around 1500bc and was building Oracle at my second city by that time. I built a Hindu temple in London and added a priest to get the prophet churned out (no problem with Lizzy's philosophical trait).
I got my great prophet with about 5-10 turns left on Oracle and fully researched Civil Service with him. Just a few more turns and I'd have Nationalism right? I was all going to plan.

But wait a minute Oracle gets built and no Nationalism option.
It seems that Nationalism requires Civil Service AND (Philosophy OR Divine Right)!
I had to settle for philosophy and a third religion. The only way for me to pull of the Nationalism slingshot (that I can see) would be to get another great prophet to research Divine Right before getting Oracle (this may be possible on low levels).
At the time of building the Oracle Nationalism was a hefty 99 turns of research out of my grasp (Philosophy and Divine Right were 30-40).

So either I'm missing something here or the PCS isn't quite what it was stated to be.