Golden age strategy?

[AutomatedTeller]

I don't agree. The thing about kicking off your golden age early on is that you'll have far fewer tiles worked. You get the same extra hammer and commerce regardless of what percentage of the tile it accounts for whether you burn your first Great Person in the BCs or the free GE from fusion. If I were to try to chain golden ages, I'd want my first one to be while I was building the Taj.

I agree with all that. I'm just saying that a strategy of holding up GP's to chain GA's may not make sense.

The advantage of early GA's is that you get the advantages earlier - and Civ is a game where, if you get a head start, you can leverage that to better stuff later - an early GA can help you get the free GM for Economics, pick up liberalism, get curaissers early, build a ton of curaissers...

That's all I meant.

 

[Ringo Kid]

I set up a game as Elizabeth to try this out. Cottaged heavily and started the GA when the MOM was built, and kept it going almost until Taj M was built. There was a ten turn gap in the middle but otherwise 48 turns of golden age. I now have a silly tech lead and am conquering my continent with Cavalry and Redcoats vs knights and Longbows. I have most of the multiplier buildings in each of my 12 towns. Anyway, the strategy works well at this level. May even work well at higher levels - at Monarch there was little tech trading I could do because I was too far ahead of the AI. Will have to try it at Immortal and see what happens.

 

[krikav]

I dislike golden ages.
I hate the fact that each one costs more than the previous one, this makes me extremly selective for when I am using them. Usually only when I want to go through several civic swaps. More often than not, I am taking the anarchy rather than using up 2+ great persons.

I am not sure if my opinion is sound, of if I should prioritize golden ages much more,
(to say 4+ Great Persons)

 

[Ringo Kid]

I dislike golden ages.
I hate the fact that each one costs more than the previous one, this makes me extremly selective for when I am using them. Usually only when I want to go through several civic swaps. More often than not, I am taking the anarchy rather than using up 2+ great persons.

I am not sure if my opinion is sound, of if I should prioritize golden ages much more,
(to say 4+ Great Persons)

Anything you do with a Great Person "uses him up" , question is how do you want to use him, rather than if. So this is just one strategy for using them, certainly not the only one.

I think its dependent on the game situation, and even just the mood you are in.

 

[krikav]

Anything you do with a Great Person "uses him up" , question is how do you want to use him, rather than if. So this is just one strategy for using them, certainly not the only one.

I think its dependent on the game situation, and even just the mood you are in.

Do you ever find yourself using 4 great persons to run your fourth golden age?

 

[WelshGandalf]

The advantage of early GA's is that you get the advantages earlier - and Civ is a game where, if you get a head start, you can leverage that to better stuff later - an early GA can help you get the free GM for Economics, pick up liberalism, get curaissers early, build a ton of curaissers...

For most things in Civilization I would agree with you. However the extra hammer/commerce benefits from a GA are worth more the bigger your empire is (a lot more than, say, the extra beakers you get from a later-game bulb compared to an early-game one).

If you're going for a miliary victory, I agree, earlier GA's are better. But if you're going for a space one.... I dunno. In the Peter Noble's Club game I'm going for a space victory. I had a pile of great people but I held off a golden age until most of the cities I wanted to capture were mine & out of revolt. Had I done the GA earlier I probably would've won the war earlier, but my feeling is I gained more from this later GA which affected something like 150+ worked tiles.

 

[Ringo Kid]

Do you ever find yourself using 4 great persons to run your fourth golden age?

This is a new thing for me, first try. I think I would as that would extend the golden age to sixty turns.

 

[Ringo Kid]

I wonder what would happen to your tech lead if you set all your towns production to research over a sixty turn golden age. That might be fun to try.

 

[civvver]

There isn't a hard and fast rule for using gps to settle or bulb over golden ages. The reason is bulbing depends a lot on the tech situation. If you have a comfortable lead on the liberalism race then bulbing education or philosophy is probably not worthwhile. Generally I would never use a merchant to bulb something like banking, but if I can get banking early it can be great trade bait. Same for metal casting with a great engineer over using him to rush a wonder. It's too game specific to say to usually use great people for one task.

As far as golden ages, I love them. I usually wait until philosophy so I can coordinate them with pacifism. If you have a couple food cities and the Parthenon/mausoleum it's very easy to pop multiple gps in a golden age and string together a few golden ages. Generally by the time my golden age chain is done the amount of tech I'm earning per turn is almost as much as a bulb, so at that point I just settle the great people.

 

[kossin]

Do you ever find yourself using 4 great persons to run your fourth golden age?

When you have a BIG empire (I'm talking 40 cities), 4 GS are worth what... 10~12k beakers?
Now take 4 GPs and trigger a GA. You can earn ~700H/t and ~400C/t. Plus usual GA benefits.

1100*12 = 13200

Of course, the only time when this is really useful is for fast space race...

 

[MarigoldRan]

Or running away with a game. GAs are excellent for trying to get a super-high score.

 

[elmurcis]

I usually make 2 GA periods. I count Taj Mahal as bonus if can get it (there are better techs to get from Liberalism and as tech Nationalism for me is too expensive to get it before I have Economics or Astronomy), more worth for me seems MoM, even if its much faster built by AI and have to be fast to get it done by myself... And this is wonder what I might try to get by force early even if there is no war in my plan until Rifles in general.
So in plan 1st GA is when I have built all cities I want on main landmass (as I usually play water maps, than there are 2 periods - before Astro and after Astro+expansion) and want to make all cities in some way profitable (including food and hammers too). 2nd GA I use after I have done afterAstronomy expanding (peaceful) and I have US available or already running for gold hurry. Than I use 1/2 of GA to develop all new cities (80-90% wealth, and 1/2 of GA I maximize research to get as much tech as possible..).
There is 1 small micro management what I try to use - if I see GA starter (great person) comming out in few turns, I will grow my GPP farm to max food reserve on current population (max-1) to be able to starve it all GA (1 extra great person will be more worth than some 20-30 commerce I lost per turn in this 1 city for GA period).
Just my approach to GA.. I can be very very wrong too

 

[Cusanus]

The thing about waiting till later to kick off a GA is that it's hammer/commerce bonuses are less powerful. A grassland caste workshop in a GA has a 50% bump in hammers before Guilds/Chemistry. After guilds/chemistry, it has a 25% bump in hammers. Before rep parts, a windmill has a 100% bump in hammers, after, it has a 50% bump.

An early town has a 25% bump in commerce... after PP, it has a 16% bump.

I wouldn't particularly hold off on Golden Ages just to chain them after getting Taj Mahal. Generally, I try to get good use out of them in other ways.

Never thought about it this way. Very good point.

 

[Keilah]

When you have a BIG empire (I'm talking 40 cities), 4 GS are worth what... 10~12k beakers?
Now take 4 GPs and trigger a GA. You can earn ~700H/t and ~400C/t. Plus usual GA benefits.

1100*12 = 13200

Of course, the only time when this is really useful is for fast space race...

don't forget to run those hammers & commerce through your multipliers before you compute the total value, and of course remember the +100% GPPs and free civic swaps