Condensed tips for beginners?

[duckstab]

I've noticed that sometimes my religious buildings will produce hammers. What causes that to happen?

When the Apostolic Palace is built, all buildings of the AP religion produce +2. You get that bonus regardless of who built the AP or who controls it. They go away when the AP becomes obsolete (i.e., when the civ controlling the AP city gets Mass Media).

 

[mystyfly]

Remember that cathedrals also get the bonus, not only temple/monastery. You also lose the bonus if you defy a resolution, I think until the next election.

 

[Ataxerxes]

Remember that cathedrals also get the bonus, not only temple/monastery. You also lose the bonus if you defy a resolution, I think until the next election.

In order to get the hammers back, at the next voting of the AP, you have to vote for a resolution and it has to pass.

Be very careful about defying AP resolutions, there are also happiness penalties (-5 IIRC) in cities with the AP religion.

When I first started, I ignored the AP. I have since learned it is the most powerful wonder in the game. Even without the AP religious victory, the extra hammers and diplomacy make it very strong. Remember, you get twice the voting power in the AP if the AP religion is your state religion.

 

[mystyfly]

Happiness penalty from denying is only with UN I thought.

I think the most powerful thing about the AP besides hammers and the victory is the religious dogpile.

 

[cabert]

Happiness penalty from denying is only with UN I thought.

no, you get the happiness penalty in all your cities where the AP religion is present.
It still can be neglected if it's only a bunch of recently captured cities that have the religion.

 

[Emperor Bosco I]

Matching religions with someone is key. If you found a religion, convert everyone nearby. If that fails, or if you don't found a religion, choose the one of your neighbor. And make sure to spread it throughout your own empire.

 

[Ataxerxes]

Matching religions with someone is key. If you found a religion, convert everyone nearby. If that fails, or if you don't found a religion, choose the one of your neighbor. And make sure to spread it throughout your own empire.

Welcome to the forums, Bosco!

Yes, matching religions is key. It's actually easier to choose the one of your neighbor's. I usually don't want to use the hammers to convert my neighbors. If they found another religion later, they'll often switch to that. I usually don't found a religion until Confuscianism, if then. By then, Buddhism and Hinduism are usually the dominant religions and choosing one gets you several allies.

As an aside, if somebody built the AP, that's usually a good religion to get into. Hammer bonuses for religious buildings and twice the votes in the AP elections. War is so much easier if the AP declares a crusade. It also gets you the Mutual Military Struggle diplo points. Your increased votes can also prevent somebody else's diplo victory or help your own diplo victory.

Absolutely, spread it throughout your empire. Most religious civics only work if the state religion is present in the city. Some of the AI's (Isabella being the most obvious) will spread the religion for you, which is very nice. Later on, you can take their shrine if you want.

 

[Lafortezza]

I'm running a specialist economy with Pericles, PHI/CRE, I have the Pyramids and GLib. I used two Great Scientists for academys in my capital and other good science city. The rest of my GS were settled in the Capital which also got Oxford.
Monarch/Large/Fractal/I'm tech leader/overall the game is teching slowly, Lib at 1200AD or so.

Is there a general rule for when you should start bulbing techs with GS instead of settling? I normally begin to bulb instead of settling a few techs after Lib fwiw.

Thanks.

 

[Deckhand]

Is there a general rule for when you should start bulbing techs with GS instead of settling? I normally begin to bulb instead of settling a few techs after Lib fwiw.

I don't know about a general rule, but the most common use of great scientist bulbing (after getting your academy) is to bulb the liberalism path: paper (sometimes), education (always), philosophy (usually)

Spoiler :

If you are winning liberalism without doing this, maybe time to move up a level?

 

[Ghpstage]

I'm running a specialist economy with Pericles, PHI/CRE, I have the Pyramids and GLib. I used two Great Scientists for academys in my capital and other good science city. The rest of my GS were settled in the Capital which also got Oxford.
Monarch/Large/Fractal/I'm tech leader/overall the game is teching slowly, Lib at 1200AD or so.

Is there a general rule for when you should start bulbing techs with GS instead of settling? I normally begin to bulb instead of settling a few techs after Lib fwiw.

Thanks.

Bulbing is at its strongest between Philosophy and Liberalism, at this point bulbs can cover many turns worth of research instantly and gain very valuable trade bait. After Lib there are a couple of things that are sometimes worth bulbing, such as Sci Method and Physics but generally bulbing stops being particularly useful. Instead going for Corps and Golden Ages, so mixing up the GP pool at this point is my preference.
The real value of bulbing comes from trade value of techs you bulb, Monarch may still be a little low for bulbing, especially if you have the Pyramids!

 

[Ignorant Teacher]

Spoiler :

If you are winning liberalism without doing this, maybe time to move up a level?

I sometimes win Liberalism on Deity. Ask me how many Deity games I've won. Liberalism is not a victory condition.

 

[mystyfly]

For me there are two reasons to bulb: Reach a key tech or win lib. If you are not in danger of losing lib, then this is no reason for you. Key techs could be rifling... which is quite common as it's a great military tech and probably the easiest way to defeat the high difficulty levels. Another would be MM for UN... No matter which tech it is, you are bulbing as much as you can.

If you however decide to go to space, settling is more appealing. You are not gunning this much for a specific tech and settling yields more beakers in the long term than bulbing... especially in the academy city.

 

[Derakon]

A settled great scientist generates 6 each turn. Let's say you have a 200% multiplier in your science city, so that becomes 18. Usually bulbing a tech gives you, what, 1400? So settling a great scientist will take 78 turns to pay back speaking just in terms of . That's an awfully long time, IMO, to the point that I'd think it'd be better to chop some turns off of a tech you need to research, or go for a golden age, rather than settle. It's difficult to quantify the value of getting a tech three turns earlier than you otherwise would, but CIV is all about snowball effects -- say, getting Biology early means better farms means more food to run scientist specialists means faster tech, et cetera.

Of course the settled GS also gives you 1. But you'll be settling them in your science city, which at least in my games generally has lots of food to run scientist specialists, not lots of hammers to do production.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

under rep, you get 9 bpt from the scientist, and your science city is very likely getting 225- 250% bonus (academy), so that's 31.5 bpt.

 

[Nick Carpathia]

So that's 45 turns to break even. 45 turns is a very long time. My favourite thing to do with great scientists is to bulb education once I have ~800 beakers planted into it already. I then liberalism astronomy, which in ~15 turns nets me a 150% boost to my bureaucracy supercapital. Awesome, you've increased your GNP by up to a third, and that's not even counting cottage maturation or intercontinental trade routes. Now go churn out cannons and rifles and kill someone still packing maces and trebuchets. Excellent, now you've increased your GNP by up to 100%. That wouldn't be possible if you settled your great scientists and slowboat your way through techs.

 

[Ramesses-Rules]

I always build the Academy and use the rest of them to bulb my way to Liberalism. On the other hand, if you build the Great Library and settle a couple Great Scientists there, then add University and Oxford, you have the best science city on the planet. It is not clear that is always a bad way to use the Scientists rather than immediately bulb stuff with them, especially if your strategy calls for heavy-duty researching to the end of the game (i.e., not playing for Cultural or military strategy). I don't do that, but I am not sure it is always wrong.

 

[Nick Carpathia]

I guess it comes down between wanting a 7 city empire making 1500bpt at the end of the game, or a 25 city empire making 4000 bpt at the end of the game because you got rifles/cannons and went medieval on their medieval asses.

 

[Ramesses-Rules]

I guess it comes down between wanting a 7 city empire making 1500bpt at the end of the game, or a 25 city empire making 4000 bpt at the end of the game because you got rifles/cannons and went medieval on their medieval asses.

Ha! Those are the only two possibilities?

 

[Coppy90]

Can someone tell a newbie like me how Corporations work? I'm confused by all these mechanics.

 

[Sisiutil]

Can someone tell a newbie like me how Corporations work? I'm confused by all these mechanics.

Welcome to CFC!

Hoo boy! Talk about a can of worms. In a nutshell, Corporations are a way to provide your civ with additional benefits by converting extra resources you own into other things such as food, culture, science, hammers (production), commerce/gold, and so on.

Normally, for example, having 6 extra clam resources does you no particular good outside of the cities that can work those tiles directly. You only need one clam resource for the +1 (+2 with a harbour), and clams are so common that it's unusual to be able to trade them for other resources. Use a Great Merchant to found Sid's Sushi, however, and those extra clams (and fish, crabs, and rice) now get converted into extra food and culture in every city where Sid's is spread. Other corporations provide similar benefits, but with different inputs and outputs.

My beginners' guide (link in my sig) contains a slightly longer explanation of corporations.