Emperor Science

[McSaucy4418]

So I finally jumped up from Prince and King to Emperor because I was tired of just running away with the science game and by extension steamrolling everyone in wars, wonder production etc. So far I am liking the game play of Emperor much more. However I find that I just cannot be competitive in the science game. I play almost exclusively on huge marathon maps and I am frequently among the last two or three civs to enter an era sometimes nearly an entire era behind the leaders. To make matters worse the tech deficit makes grabbing wonders nearly impossible and war is a no go unless I want to suffer heavy losses and tank my economy. I am really enjoying the new challenge but I am wondering how to keep my beaker production competitive because as we all know science is everything in civ.

 

[cajypart]

I don't play marathon but i think it's easier than standard if you take the good decision and much harder if you take the wrong...
Steal workers to the other civs (or to one CS) is a great gain of time.
Liberty tree could be better than Tradition to expand quickly (collective rule) and improve tiles (citizenship) but the tradition opener can be unavoidable for the border expansion.
You can use GE (liberty finisher) to rush NC or delay to Pisa tower and take consulates/Rationalism before.
Ally CS as soon as possible... I think maritime and cultural CS bonus are OP in marathon.
Build granary, watermill, library, university ASAP too...

 

[justanotherturn]

about epic / marathon speed :
the construction time, beaker cost ect are longer, but the bonus are the same. +2 food/science/faith is still +2.

I personally feel like it's easier to catch up to the IA in epic or marathon than in standard speed.
just build library / uni ASAP and use specialist.

I play a epic immortal game right now, and i was first to enter Renaissance just by growing my city and building science building.

 

[cajypart]

The amount of faith to get a pantheon must be terribly big...
Stonehenge become a incredible wonder in slower speed, so if you have forest to chop...

 

[justanotherturn]

The amount of faith to get a pantheon must be terribly big...

no ? it's the same faith you need speed doesnt change that.

stonehenge is a great wonder. but like you say you need some "condition" to get it on high diff. (i never try it in deity, as i prefere oracle)

 

[cajypart]

no ? it's the same faith you need speed doesnt change that.

stonehenge is a great wonder. but like you say you need some "condition" to get it on high diff. (i never try it in deity, as i prefere oracle)

I have just verified this: 30 faith needed for the first pantheon in marathon (10 in normal speed), so the scales must be 30, 45, 60...

Otherwise, Maddjinn build Stonehenge in his India deity LP, so it's possible! (I never try to buid it, i generally skip religion if i don't have gems or desert, and with a good faith pantheon, no need Stonehenge.)
He managed to get world religion too...

 

[justanotherturn]

you right, I dunno why i was thinking that.

the difference in epic speed is less (15 for first pantheon) closer to the number you get from normal speed.
I rarely play on marathon (not play once since vanillia i think).

 

[McSaucy4418]

After prioritizing libraries and the national college more than I am used to I am doing much better. Having some civs ahead of me still takes some getting used to but it is definitely more challenging. As far as faith goes I can confirm that it is 30 for the first pantheon increasing by 15 and 600 for the first great prophet (if you're lucky it took me four turns over 600 faith to pop one on my current game).

 

[cajypart]

You can use GE (liberty finisher) to rush NC or delay to Pisa tower and take consulates/Rationalism before.

Finally, i think planting GS is better in marathon.

 

[Tich]

Finally, i think planting GS is always better

Fixed that for you .

 

[cajypart]

Fixed that for you .

Not sure about this.
If you go wide (+6 cities), NC can be very expensive.
If you want to spread your religion, Great Mosquee of Djenne can be cool. (with the 50% missionaries cheaper from mandate of heaven and holy order)
On a water map, Great admiral could be a must have to meet other civs/CS...

 

[Gus_Smedstad]

I recently had the same experience. I run away with the game at King, and on my first Emperor game with BNW, several civs had entered Renaissance before I hit Medieval. I wanted a slight increase in difficulty, not going from first to dead last.

 

[qutsemnie]

I don't know if this is true on Marathon, but with a 4 city start on Emperor standard continents I find that if a civ has a larger empire than me they will out tech me and if they don't they won't. So what I do is cram up one of my neighbors in my first city expansion guaranteeing that at least one of my neighbors if vulnerable to conquest in the long run. The trick for me to catching up to the rest of the AIs is converting that crammed empire into puppets. With the extra puppets I catch up.

It wasn't until after I did this a few times that I realized that I was basically prepping a neighbor for harvesting with my second city by denying them their natural expansion. If I let everyone around me get all the space they wanted by being timid then what I would find is they all out teched me and I had no targets to get this puppets I need to catch up to that dude that is inevitably steam rolling the rest of the world.

As you can imagine though this guarantees at some point you will have to survive a declare war, but that is basically par for the course in Emporer I think.

 

[Gus_Smedstad]

I feel like I'm getting dumber.

I dialed the difficulty back to King, and I still out-teched in my most recent game. I played very conventionally, Liberty and Patronage to Consulates, and then Rationality. Granted, I was on the same continent with Korea, but it was England that ended up in the lead for most of the game, so I can't blame Korea's crazy science boosts.

The usual Composite Bow rush completely failed for me because I only had about 200 gold when I got Construction, and I was running negative. At least no one attacked, but I was just not in a position to hurt any of my expanding neighbors, and I got boxed into a corner with just 3 cities.

Further, I was playing as Byzantium, where religion is important, and Korea founded a religion before I did. I'd take Stone Circles as my pantheon, and despite getting +6 faith / turn from that fairly quickly he still out-faithed me. Granted, Desert Folklore will generate more, but he was God of the Open Sky. By the time I accumulated 300 Faith for my second Prophet, only my Holy City remained my religion, due to religious pressure from Korea and Persia.

It's not like I had a jungle start, yet I felt completely crippled the entire game. I gave up when England hit the Industrial era well ahead of me.

 

[SirPepsi]

In some ways, King is actually /harder/ than Emperor. By this, I mean once you have played Emperor for long enough, it's difficult to revert to King - stealing workers isn't as beneficial or as easy (AIs get them much later), the AI has no gold per turn to trade for, RAs are impossible b/c the AI is broke, and micromanaging for growth isn't as important as production because your science lead will be tremendous anyways.

If, however, you need help on King, do the following:

Select Genghis Khan.
Select Ramesses as one of your opponents.
Select Large Islands, Standard Speed, Standard Size, etc., etc.)
Try and found 1 to 2 more cities on your landmass.
Attack some CSs and expand.
Build up a force and take Thebes.
This will break the habit of Wonderspamming, get you used to the need for skillful combat on higher levels, and allow you to see how to go about pursuing a victory as a particular civ.

 

[Syntax Error]

If you're actively pursuing science, then prepare to be outpaced up until Medieval. There is no reason that you won't be permanent World Congress host in Emperor and below. Make sure to get your NC before turn 100, then grab Education for Unis (115-130ish, Standard pace).