[BNW] Confused about how-to use Great Scientists

[GunnarStahl]

I never know what to do with them when they pop out.

Generally, I zZzZz them in the back of my city, so I can use them to get beakers by the end of the game so I can get my techs faster. Is this a good way to use them?

Should I get academies too? How do you guys use them?

Please note I am actually playing on KING and planning to play on Emperor pretty soon. (maybe one or two lasts games on KING since I can win often on KING).

 

[consentient]

Acken (one of the best players on these forums) demonstrated mathematically that there is no point making academies, and you're better off saving them. I think one of the good things about his mod is that there were more reasons to do other stuff with Great People.

 

[IronfighterXXX]

Acken (one of the best players on these forums) demonstrated mathematically that there is no point making academies, and you're better off saving them.

We have at least these exceptions: Babylon, Mayans, liberty finisher (all early academies) or playing OCC.

 

[CrsBenjamin]

That's pretty similar to how I use them. Sometimes if I'm working towards something mid-game that I'd like to achieve sooner, I'll wait for key point when my science output is boosted (e.g. building some universities if I've got Jungle tiles) and then wait 8 turns and pop one or two.

 

[Blatc]

Acken (one of the best players on these forums) demonstrated mathematically that there is no point making academies, and you're better off saving them. I think one of the good things about his mod is that there were more reasons to do other stuff with Great People.

Do you have a link? I don't think I ever read this, but have seen it referenced.

We have at least these exceptions: Babylon, Mayans, liberty finisher (all early academies) or playing OCC.

I think Korea may slip in there as an exception as well, but again haven't seen the original post by Acken.

 

[noonex]

For me (mostly Immortal) - they usually appear when key technologies are around - Industrialization, Scientific Theory, Dynamite, Plastics, Satelites - so I in that case I don't hesitate to pop them to unlock Science Buildings, Specific Wonders or my Civ/Ideology -specific bonuses (Minuteman, B17, Statue if Liberty, Kremlin).

 

[adcarrymaokai]

Acken (one of the best players on these forums) demonstrated mathematically that there is no point making academies

Link? I remember Acken talking about it, but I think it was along the lines of "I think that..." I don't remember a mathematical demonstration.

 

[vadalaz]

Here's a quick spreadsheet for a fast T200 game, assuming T110 academy, T115 observatory, T135 Sci Theory, T150 Free Thought, T165 Plastics, T175 Atomic Theory and New Deal, 14 total scientists (8 natural + 2 faith + 4 LToP/PT/Hubble): https://www.dropbox.com/s/dg8f6gzoaibjygs/academy.xls?dl=0

It's pretty bad. By Plastics the academy gives you 1200-1300 science, so it speeds up labs by 2 turns at best, you'd be better off bulbing. An endgame bulb is stronger as well.

 

[Blatc]

vadalaz, at nearly 8000 by T200 that's more than I was expecting and I could see your spreadsheet being used as evidence that you should build 1 academy. As there is value beyond simply the total science output - because reaching techs sooner along the way brings value - the key question is how big a difference between Bulbing (B) and Academy yield (A) is the breaking point.

 

[vadalaz]

The thing is, you don't reach the key techs that much faster. The academy gets you ~500 beakers by Sci Theory and ~1500 by Plastics. So you get schools 1 turn earlier and labs 2 turns earlier than a no-academy game. But a game with a T160 bulb for 6000 beakers will reach Plastics 4-5 turns faster than the academy game. Add the 4-5 turns worth of lab science to the 6000 bulb value and you'll most likely get a bit more than the 8000 beakers the academy would give you, 30 turns quicker. More GS points and less risk of overshooting the tech tree that way, plus you don't need to take New Deal.

 

[phryxolydian]

Link? I remember Acken talking about it, but I think it was along the lines of "I think that..." I don't remember a mathematical demonstration.

Yeah. From his Freedom's Science Victory guide:

The maths are still up to debate so just acknowledge that for the first GS it's approximately the same value to plant vs not planting and then it's worse and worse for every successive great scientist.

 

[psparky]

While much of the advice/analysis above is good, it is in the context of a fast (t200-220) science victory. This may not be applicable to OP as he is at the king/emperor boundary, or may be playing other victory conditions. Academies will fair somewhat better in a game that takes, say, 300 turns.

My advice would be make academies with any early to early-mid game GS (such as one from liberty finisher) and to bulb late game ones. In between, you are probably not making a huge mistake either way. If you feel you are moving towards the late game, save for bulb. If it feels there is a long way to go, maybe more than 100 turns, consider academies especially if you have good locations or a city with observatory and NC.

 

[Blatc]

The thing is, you don't reach the key techs that much faster. The academy gets you ~500 beakers by Sci Theory and ~1500 by Plastics. So you get schools 1 turn earlier and labs 2 turns earlier than a no-academy game. But a game with a T160 bulb for 6000 beakers will reach Plastics 4-5 turns faster than the academy game. Add the 4-5 turns worth of lab science to the 6000 bulb value and you'll most likely get a bit more than the 8000 beakers the academy would give you, 30 turns quicker. More GS points and less risk of overshooting the tech tree that way, plus you don't need to take New Deal.

How big a difference between planting an academy (A) and bulbing (B) do you think is necessary to make bulbing the clearly correct choice?
If we agree to always plant as Babylon after 2nd tech, then at what point (turn number relative to final turn number) do we no longer plant 1 academy with most other civs?

I've played both ways. The numbers your posting would be pretty rare for me and flat-out impossible on most maps. Other concerns, such as getting to Printing Press and starting on LToP sooner, bring additional value to planting an academy for those of us that don't always get LToP (or Big Ben, etc.).

 

[phryxolydian]

Are you getting those results on Pangea maps, vadalaz? I've never played them but those numbers seem more feasible on Great Plains type maps (from what I've seen mountain+river cities are in abundance on those maps), no?

 

[vadalaz]

Are you getting those results on Pangea maps, vadalaz? I've never played them but those numbers seem more feasible on Great Plains type maps (from what I've seen mountain+river cities are in abundance on those maps), no?

Yeah, the numbers I give are very optimistic. I'm not sure what a realistic scenario on an average Pangaea would be, since I haven't played a Pangaea SV (or any first-roll map for that matter) in a really long time.

How big a difference between planting an academy (A) and bulbing (B) do you think is necessary to make bulbing the clearly correct choice?

I think it's hard to say and depends on your late-game beakers and total number of GSs you can get. Let me try to compare them a bit more carefully:

Bulb for Plastics (B)

Let's assume you're averaging x bpt for 8 turns pre-Plastics. Your bulb at this point is worth (8 / 1.1)*x = 7.27x, as Rationalism opener bonus doesn't count towards bulbs. Let's also assume that you can buy all labs at once and they increase your bpt by about 35%. Labs give +50%, but since the bonus is additive, it's actually a 19-31% increase depending on the city, and then there's the raw science you get from the specialist slot and the lab itself, so I think 35% is fair. You get labs 7 turns earlier than a no-bulb-no-academy game, so in total this GS gets you

7.27x + 7*0.35x = 9.72x beakers
and
7 turns of working an extra scientist slot = 42 GPP with garden, LToP, ideology and Humanism

Academy (A)

Let's say the academy gives you m beakers pre-Plastics. You also get some beakers from reaching schools 2 turns faster, I think 150 a turn is a good estimation for an average empire, so 300 total. As for GPP, you reach Printing Press one turn quicker (1 GPP), schools 2 turns quicker (9 GPP), ideology 2 turns quicker (2 GPP). You reach Plastics (m+300)/x turns faster than no-bulb-no-academy, and each endgame bulb is increased by 48*8=384 beakers in the best case scenario. So, assuming 13 bulbs and n beakers from the academy post-Plastics, academy gets you in total:

m + 300 + (m+300)/x * 0.35x + 13*384 + n = 1.35m + n + 5397 beakers (in the 200-turn spreadsheet m = 1250 and n=1500, so total would be 8548.5, slightly better than the spreadsheet prediction)
and
12 GPP described above plus (m+300)/x specialist-turns from getting labs quicker... would be 2 turns in most cases, so that's another 12 GPP, for a total of 24 GPP from the academy.

No bulb, no academy (NBA)

I think [endgame bpt] = [1.8 * pre-plastics bpt] is a reasonable estimation (750 -> 1350, 1000 -> 1800... sounds about right). So if you save the GS for an endgame bulb, you'd probably get around 13x beakers from it.

B will always get you the most GPPs, it gets the last natural GS one turn faster than A and 2 turns faster than NBA. Also consider that the earlier you get labs, the earlier you can start bulbing for Rocketry and build Apollo, so for the very best finish times I think this is the correct play.

To summarize:
By turn #t, B's would get its final scientist and in total B's GSs would have made roughly 9.72x (Plastics bulb) + 3*10x (Rocketry bulbs) + 10*13x (endgame bulbs) = 169.72x beakers
By turn #t+1, A would get its final scientist and in total A's GSs would've made (1.35m + n + 5397) + 160x beakers
By turn #t+2, NBA would get its final scientist and in total NBA's GSs would've made 30x + 11*13x = 173x beakers

Bulbing is strictly better than the academy if your x (pre-Plastics bpt) is high enough and the game doesn't last too long for the academy science (m and n) to catch up. In the t200 spreadsheet example, you'd need x > 879.4 bpt for that. Bulbing could still be better with a lower x if you didn't actually need the academy beakers and just wanted your last GS asap though.

With enough cities, a double-bulb into Plastics would get the 14 scientists by turn #t-2 and an extra GS by turn #t+2, which I believe makes it strictly better than NBA. But only if you have an extra city capable of getting that GS out.

 

[phryxolydian]

Excellent post, vadalaz. I haven't played a Science game in a while but, when I do, I'll come back to this post and see for myself. I have never done any sub-200 victory so it's unlikely I'll get this right before a few tries but, on Culture games, I have been getting good results with no academies and then bulbing Replaceable Parts (for SoL) and, after labs, bulbing either all the way to Internet or up to Tele and getting Internet with Rationalism finisher, depending on the WF. My technique still needs polishing but anyway, thanks for your analysis!

 

[Blatc]

Thanks vadalaz, if you're willing I'd love to see a breakdown of how to get 14 Great Scientists; I'm thinking there must be a minimum # of cities >4 for this to be possible by T200.

 

[vadalaz]

14 scientists by T200 could be 8 natural ones, 4 from LToP/PT/Hubble and 2 from faith, which is actually doable with just 4 cities with a good civ+map combo. Here's a spreadsheet for a 200-turn game which gets 9 natural GSs (assumes T100 Universities, T130 LToP and Humanism, T140 Schools, T145 Ideology, T170 Labs; pretty optimistic but possible): https://www.dropbox.com/s/zl32p6gp5hrurm8/GS generation.xls?dl=0

(On a side note, after including Sweden's DoF bonus in the spreadsheet, I realized that Sweden could potentially get +110% to GPP generation on a Huge map, if you stack the opponent list with friendlies - so that's something to try maybe?)

 

[Blatc]

Thanks for sharing. I downloaded and tweaked the numbers a bit to be more conservative, but am not sure where to realistically add Porcelain Tower.

 

[claudiupb]

There is also this thread. I remember Acken posted a spreadsheet in there somewhere. From what I recall fiddling with it, you need a pre-T100 academy to worth it. But those calculations were done only in the context of a fast SV at diety. For games that last more than 300 turns I think the first academy is worth it. Of course for any other victory type thing are harder to formulate: for example it's pretty difficult to factor in advance the benefit of having machinery/chivalry/etc. 8 turns faster.

On any difficulty lower than immortal I'd say planting the first scientist is a safe bet.