explain a scientist farm
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creamcheese
Spreading since 1990
How many did you have? Remember, they only give 3 beakers per scientist, so it takes quite a few to make it go a turn faster, especially for the later game techs that cost many beakers. You could try changing them to taxmen if you don't want science.
Also, this would be a lot easier to determine the cause if you post a save for us to look at.
You do not normally want to turn citizen into scientist in a productive town. Those citizen are probably making income enough to be worth more than the 3 beakers. This is the case in cities that has a bank, libs and uni.
The concept is that you make farms out of totally or highly corrupt places. This give you 3 beakers and you need not buld structures like libs. You often do not have to have markets for happiness as you have many specialist in that town.
I was playing an easy DG no peace on a large map and was able to have so many scientist that I could learn some techs with zero research on the slider.
The concept is that you make farms out of totally or highly corrupt places. This give you 3 beakers and you need not buld structures like libs. You often do not have to have markets for happiness as you have many specialist in that town.
I was playing an easy DG no peace on a large map and was able to have so many scientist that I could learn some techs with zero research on the slider.
creamcheese
Spreading since 1990
Yes, if your core cities have too many citizens you should have more mines and less irrigation. Only the outer cities that are too corrupt to do much get scientists, as they cannot make anything else useful.
EDIT: I have attached a save from Raliuven SG2 (see my signature for the full game), we were going for Space Race and we had a lot of science farms. Check out the cities near the capital, and then check out the ones far away from the capital. Notice how outside the core there are basically just science farms, no productive cities.
EDIT: I have attached a save from Raliuven SG2 (see my signature for the full game), we were going for Space Race and we had a lot of science farms. Check out the cities near the capital, and then check out the ones far away from the capital. Notice how outside the core there are basically just science farms, no productive cities.
Check out Bede's article in the War Academy, "The Role of the Specialist Citizen," for some good information. The long and the short of it is this: Specialist output (whether gold, beakers, or shields) is unaffected by corruption or by multiplier buildings. A scientist in a 90% corrupt boondocks makes 3 beakers that go directly into research. A scientist in your capitol does the exact same thing, regardless of what infrastructure you have there.
what everyone else has said
it's towns (size 6 or less) that will only give 1 productive shield, maybe 2 if you're lucky, as opposed to the usual 6-12
it's a waste building a barracks, library, courthouse or marketplace in these places because they have almost no effect. if you have a bonus ocean/sea tile, then you can rush a harbour for even more food.
basically you skim off scientists whilst making enough food for the city not to starve. reason being that specialists aren't affected by how good or crap the city is.
usually you'll get at least 1 scientist out of each size 6 city, quite often two. if the tiles are good, 3 or 4 is possible. if you do this with 10+ cities, particuarly conquered cities far from your main cities, it builds up.
then you slowly let it make artillery cos that's all it's good for.
it's towns (size 6 or less) that will only give 1 productive shield, maybe 2 if you're lucky, as opposed to the usual 6-12
it's a waste building a barracks, library, courthouse or marketplace in these places because they have almost no effect. if you have a bonus ocean/sea tile, then you can rush a harbour for even more food.
basically you skim off scientists whilst making enough food for the city not to starve. reason being that specialists aren't affected by how good or crap the city is.
usually you'll get at least 1 scientist out of each size 6 city, quite often two. if the tiles are good, 3 or 4 is possible. if you do this with 10+ cities, particuarly conquered cities far from your main cities, it builds up.
then you slowly let it make artillery cos that's all it's good for.
Fiddlin Nero
Prince
It is hard to notice the benefit of Science Farms and how many you need before you even look for any benefit. I can say I notice it with the number of times I can turn my Science Slider down with minimal cost in turns to the next tech. I've never counted when it became noticeable but I would put the number at over 20, most being 3 Scientists out of 6 population, a few with rivers have 6 of 12.
OblivionsCall
Chieftain
Yeh i've sure noticed that it takes many many many scientists to even make a dent in your scientific research. So usually if i make a specialist at all it's most likely an entertainer. But having been told this recently, newly captured enemy cities do indeed make excellent scientist farms.
creamcheese
Spreading since 1990
Don't you still play PTW though? The specialists are much better in conquests I seem to remember. Or is that Vanilla that they only give 1 each?
You should try to use the luxury slider in place of entertainers, it is a better option. Also, note that specialists don't count as unhappy citizens so they can help make a corrupt city content and still give you things.
I second Cream Cheese's question. If you're still playing vanilla CivIII, the scientist farms do just about nothing. I didn't play PTW but went straight to Complete. In Complete the Scientist farms do make a difference.
As others mentioned, only do this in very corrupt cities. Core cities should not have scientists, just change a couple of tiles to get more mines and less irrigation. As you move up in level, you'll find yourself with fewer "core" cities and more cities where scientist farms are the best option.
As others mentioned, only do this in very corrupt cities. Core cities should not have scientists, just change a couple of tiles to get more mines and less irrigation. As you move up in level, you'll find yourself with fewer "core" cities and more cities where scientist farms are the best option.
i'd like to add that your core cities CAN have scientists if you've got a couple of irrigated food tiles, especially if it's on the coast
even with hills, mountains and forest you will have food overspill
so if you've a city or two that's hit size 12 and has 25 or more food, that's still a couple more scientists
this is assuming the early medieval age, when hospitals are miles away
even with hills, mountains and forest you will have food overspill
so if you've a city or two that's hit size 12 and has 25 or more food, that's still a couple more scientists
this is assuming the early medieval age, when hospitals are miles away
If the city lies on the coast and has a library for each coast square you get 4.5 beakers (3 base commerce+1.5 from the library) in Republic (Conquests) before corruption. A sea square gives you 3 beakers before corruption. So, you almost surely will get more science from coast squares with just a library than scientists. If you don't have libraries, then scientists basically will yield you more beakers everywhere except for river/coast squares in your capital in Republic. This all ignores growth, which basically means that only in the rarest of situations, or during Anarchy, will you want to use scientists in your core areas before hospitals. If you have hospitals later on (not advisable on lower level space/diplomatic games since Sanitation comes as an optional), you can irrigate your entire core and have the benefits from libraries, universities, eventually research labs, AND multiple scientists.
Ataxerxes said:
Just to make our terms clear "Complete" doesn't refer to any version of the game. "Complete" refers to the packaging of the games. If you load up the civ III Complete package as how the disks come set-up without doing anything you'll play Conquests, which comes as what you mean. You do have PTW. If you look in your civ III folder, you should find one sub-folder for Conquests and another for PTW. Conquests originally got released as a sort of expansion pack, and then they packaged it as the lead game of the civ III Complete edition, so to speak.
creamcheese
Spreading since 1990
If you have irrigation and extra food, you need to mine those squares. Production you can use for a library, university, etc. These will give you more benefit in your core than any specialist.
scratchthepitch
King
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I don't use specialists much unless I have to in a particular circumstance. Cops and engineers in high corruption towns, entertainers in unusually unhappy ones. I don't start regularly using specialists till once I've filled up a city with enough people to have every tile worked, then it's usually a toss-up between scientists and tax guys, depending whether I'd rather speed up research or need more money.
I've never tried science farms since I had modified the game in the editor before I heard about them and the modifications I made such a game exploit redundant. You can adjust a few things there that reduce the absurdity of the game's corruption set-up so that it's playable without resorting to console game like exploits like science farms. It's easy to do, just changing a couple settings that does it. For me, this is the way to go, rather than using cheesy console game like exploits that take the strategy fun out of the game. You can adjust enough things in the editor so that even on high play levels you wont need to use those kinds of exploits to win the game, I've found.
I've never tried science farms since I had modified the game in the editor before I heard about them and the modifications I made such a game exploit redundant. You can adjust a few things there that reduce the absurdity of the game's corruption set-up so that it's playable without resorting to console game like exploits like science farms. It's easy to do, just changing a couple settings that does it. For me, this is the way to go, rather than using cheesy console game like exploits that take the strategy fun out of the game. You can adjust enough things in the editor so that even on high play levels you wont need to use those kinds of exploits to win the game, I've found.
creamcheese
Spreading since 1990
So science farms are an exploit, but using the editor to minimize corruption is not?
scratchthepitch
King
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So science farms are an exploit, but using the editor to minimize corruption is not?
It depends on how you use the editor and what you change. What you suggest would be very easy to do with the editor, but shooting fish in a barrel is only fun for the simple minded. The changes I make are to make the game more historically accurate (the historical accuracy in all the Civ games is garbage), improve the strategy and improve the AI, or remove the items the AI isn't able to use (such as removing armies and working on getting the AI to use land artillery units).
The game was designed to be a strategy game, initially, not a console game. Things like science farms were not intended by the designers and are not in keeping with the spirit of the game, the way the game was designed to be played.
If you have some time, give the mod and creation forum a read. The people there are mostly modifying the game to make it better, more playable in the way it was originally designed to be. Not to make it more easy to win by exploits.
