Great Person cost scaling

[Trackmaster]

From doing some reading, I mostly have a grasp on how Great Persons work, but there is something that I can't quite get definitive answers on. I've established that the costs to acquire them exponentially escalate and are separated into separate pools, with Merchant/Engineer/Scientist combined. However, I'm still curious about the "free" Great Persons factor into the calculation. I put quotation marks around free because I'm wondering if some or all of the situations trigger cost increases. From my understanding the free GP's come from:

Social Policy finishers
Mayan Calendar resets (I think I've heard that this one definitely does push the cost up for future GP's)
Wonders
Gifts from City/States with Piety finisher
Anything else provided by Civ's Unique Ability
*Anything that I'm missing*

Feel free to answer what you can if you don't know the answer for everything.

 

[tetley]

The costs don't go up exponentially; they go up linearly. Except for Prophets and faith purchasing: those costs are more like a Fibonacci function.

 

[Browd]

Take a look at this post: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=13020127&postcount=19

 

[Trackmaster]

That list provided was pretty helpful. It's also good to know that the scale is linear and not exponential. That makes me much more at ease about taking GP's which trigger the scale.

 

[Browd]

What do you mean by "pool doubles"? Each GE/GM/GS costs 100 GPP more than the prior GE/GM/GS. So when you spawn a GS at 100 GS points, the next GS/GM/GE costs 200 GPP. A "free" GE from the Liberty finisher obtained when the next GE/GM/GS will cost 200 GPP counts as your "200 GPP" great person and the threshold for the next GE/GM/GS jumps to 300 GPP.

GGs and GAdms operate similarly, but on their own counters. First GG is 100 points, second is 200 points, third is 300 points, etc.

 

[Trackmaster]

What do you mean by "pool doubles"? Each GE/GM/GS costs 100 GPP more than the prior GE/GM/GS. So when you spawn a GS at 100 GS points, the next GS/GM/GE costs 200 GPP. A "free" GE from the Liberty finisher obtained when the next GE/GM/GS will cost 200 GPP counts as your "200 GPP" great person and the threshold for the next GE/GM/GS jumps to 300 GPP.

GGs and GAdms operate similarly, but on their own counters. First GG is 100 points, second is 200 points, third is 300 points, etc.

No, I understand now. I thought that the cost doubled for the GE/GM/GS pool for each one obtained, but I wasn't sure. Thanks for clearing it up. The analysis that you provided in the linked thread was the most clear and helpful one that I've found.