GS's Post Liberalism?

[bardolph]

I think the trading argument is irrelevant. There is nothing special about trading a tech that has been lightbulbed over a tech that has been obtained by any other means such as normal research, or from earlier trading or even from extortion. Any trade you can make with lightbulbing can usually be made by normal research a few turns later.

This is partially true. Other civs will also be doing research during those "few extra turns," and if a civ discovers the tech in question and trades it to someone else before you discover it, then you have just cost yourself a lot of commerce. Also, if other civs are "in progress" researching the tech in question, that will reduce the value of the tech when you do trade it, which will also cost you.

If the lightbulbed tech is one that has little or no trade value, or if you are fully "two techs ahead" down a particular path, then settling may be better, but you also have to weigh the immediate benefits of getting that particular tech sooner. I'd say the circumstances are pretty rare when settling is the better long-term solution.

Academies, however, can grant a much higher per-turn yield, so must be evaluated differently.

 

[pigswill]

Or if a city is producing 65+ base beakers its better to build an academy (given that half a dozen cities will have lib and uni so you can build oxford in the first place you should have some choice).

 

[futurehermit]

This is partially true. Other civs will also be doing research during those "few extra turns," and if a civ discovers the tech in question and trades it to someone else before you discover it, then you have just cost yourself a lot of commerce. Also, if other civs are "in progress" researching the tech in question, that will reduce the value of the tech when you do trade it, which will also cost you.

If the lightbulbed tech is one that has little or no trade value, or if you are fully "two techs ahead" down a particular path, then settling may be better, but you also have to weigh the immediate benefits of getting that particular tech sooner. I'd say the circumstances are pretty rare when settling is the better long-term solution.

Academies, however, can grant a much higher per-turn yield, so must be evaluated differently.

I would say settling is the better long-term solution if they are settled early and you are planning on a space race victory (i.e., going through the whole tech tree). However, I believe that leveraging things in the short term (e.g., getting liberalism faster, or lightbulbing a key military tech to allow you to conquer more land) is the better move.

I really don't understand why people don't understand that trading lightbulbed techs brings in additional beakers, but to each his own I guess.

 

[Galileo44]

I think that Academies are underrated by most people. I normally have around 5 cities producing 80 base commerce per turn by the 1600s. Then, it is obvious that academy is better than settling as long as the science slider remains around 70% and higher.

80*.5 = 40 beakers per turn, twice that of the optimal settled scientist under representation with (almost) all buildings (monestaries were not counted earlier)

So, having cities that produce 80 beakers and making them 120 is a big difference, making up the 2000 beakers lost to lighbulbing in only 50 turns.

 

[futurehermit]

I would prefer academies to settling, especially if running a CE. However, the question is, in 50 turns, how much can you leverage your lightbulbed (and subsequently traded-for) beakers? I would say a lot.

 

[cabert]

I would prefer academies to settling, especially if running a CE. However, the question is, in 50 turns, how much can you leverage your lightbulbed (and subsequently traded-for) beakers? I would say a lot.

this is often true, but not always
and even acidsatyr (whom you mentionned earlier rightfully as one of the biggest partisans of lightbulbing) mentionned an academy for some very early scientist (= keeping him for some hundreds of years asleep would be a waste).

I'm a big fan of a variant :
- run for scientists until you hit education or liberalism (for the avoid machinery trick)
- run for merchants after that

A big gun scientist will lightbulb something like 1800 beakers. 2000 in the very late game.
A moderately well used merchant will give you 2400+ gold, feeding your economy for a while. And a single settled merchant can convert a soso production city to a good production city, just from the 1 food.

 

[Galileo44]

I'm a big fan of a variant :
- run for scientists until you hit education or liberalism (for the avoid machinery trick)
- run for merchants after that

A big gun scientist will lightbulb something like 1800 beakers. 2000 in the very late game.
A moderately well used merchant will give you 2400+ gold, feeding your economy for a while.

Yes, this is a very good strategy. Not only will the merchant get 2400+ gold, more raw commerce than a scientist, but also, you will likely have a larger average multiplier for science than gold, so gold and beakers are not a 1:1 exchange rate, more like 1 gold : 1.2 or 1.3 science.

 

[UncleJJ]

Yes, this is a very good strategy. Not only will the merchant get 2400+ gold, more raw commerce than a scientist, but also, you will likely have a larger average multiplier for science than gold, so gold and beakers are not a 1:1 exchange rate, more like 1 gold : 1.2 or 1.3 science.

This is true, and it is the way I run my SEs and HEs . I tend to have built a library in all my cities and a university and monastry in many others for the science multipliers and the cultural output. Only a few of my cities will have the complete set of MGB (Market, Grocer and Bank) and in these cities it makes good sense to run merchants (from food, Mercantilism or SoL) instead of scientists as they get the 100% multiplier. That extra gold lets me run the science multiplier at 100% for long periods (if not always) and the commerce spread through my empire gets converted to beakers at better conversion rates than if simply used to make gold. So this is a more efficient way to run a SE or HE making the most of how the various multipliers are distributed. Holy shrines income, sending GMs on trade missions and selling techs for gold all help stretch the income from merchants further.