increasing science cost

[ollethegreat]

do you like the idea of science cost going up when founding new cities?
i hate it it!!!
why do the game need to punish you for creating big empires.
i mean i am ok with increasing culture cost and unhappiness but science no way!
what do you think?

 

[DemonMaster]

It is an incentive to develop your cities. I think it is good, it opens up for some tactics Tall vs. Wide. I have used both tactics with success. You can't mindlessly spam cities here and there anymore perhaps (and that's good) but you can still go wide and benefit from it.

 

[householder]

Does the science penalty vary according to the size of the map, or perhaps the difficulty level? I have seen many people say that the science penalty is 5% per city, but in my games the penalty has been 2% per city.

I can see where a 5% penalty would feel onerous. It wouldn't take long to get a -25% or more. But with 2% I find I can puppet or annex cities without too much concern.

 

[ollethegreat]

It is an incentive to develop your cities. I think it is good, it opens up for some tactics Tall vs. Wide. I have used both tactics with success. You can't mindlessly spam cities here and there anymore perhaps (and that's good) but you can still go wide and benefit from it.

ok your right but i still think there to many punishments for wide empires.

 

[DemonMaster]

ok your right but i still think there to many punishments for wide empires.

The % can perhaps be adjusted.

 

[Shimmler]

do you like the idea of science cost going up when founding new cities?
i hate it it!!!
why do the game need to punish you for creating big empires.
i mean i am ok with increasing culture cost and unhappiness but science no way!
what do you think?

Well if you develop those cities (libraries, universities etc.), then they overcome the penalty and actually add to your science production. So it's pretty balanced imo

 

[killmeplease]

iirc 2% is for huge maps, 2.5 for large and 5% for other sizes
btw per-city unhappiness is scaled too, theres only 1.8 per city on huge maps
i dont like this, feels like two different games.

even 5% penalty is not very big as a new city will contribute to science output too, not just increase penalty.
heres a typical (correct me if i'm wrong) distribution of science in a wide empire at some stage:

as you can see only just-built cities decrease your teching rate while as they grow they start to increase it.

 

[ollethegreat]

if you have 2% sciency penalty it will be great for chartage if you get messanger of god
and only build coastal cities

 

[kaspergm]

iirc 2% is for huge maps, 2.5 for large and 5% for other sizes
btw per-city unhappiness is scaled too, theres only 1.8 per city on huge maps
i dont like this, feels like two different games.

even 5% penalty is not very big as a new city will contribute to science output too, not just increase penalty.
heres a typical (correct me if i'm wrong) distribution of science in a wide empire at some stage:

as you can see only just-built cities decrease your teching rate while as they grow they start to increase it.

I don't understand that table at all!?

 

[killmeplease]

I don't understand that table at all!?

well rows are cities, first is a capital and so on
first column shows how much science particular city produces (hypotetically)
second column shows tech cost (some tech X) for N cities
e.g. if you had only the first 2 cities (one of which produces 100 science and second 50) the tech would cost 1100, and it'd take 7 turns to research it

ps attached spreadsheet

 

[kaspergm]

Oh I get it now, thanx.

 

[killmeplease]

if you have 2% sciency penalty it will be great for chartage if you get messanger of god
and only build coastal cities

i think your tech rate effectively wont suffer in this case

 

[Mudrac]

if you have 2% sciency penalty it will be great for chartage if you get messanger of god
and only build coastal cities

You get 2 % penalty on Huge maps. When you found new cities use one trade route to bring food to it, in about 30 turns it lasts the city will grow from 1 to about 13 - 15 pop. Whenever you have enough gold prioritize Science buildings, and buy them instantly both in new and old cities. I have been using this tactic with relative success. Although it still happens to me that I research techs slower than I should, particularly from Industrial Era and onwards.

 

[Wojciech Rodzik]

I don't get why developers were trying SOO hard to limit players expansion....

You can't be Empire if you have like 4 cities..... And I don't care how big they are.

It should be more about land grab, you have fever cities = fever people = fever taxes, science, production.....

 

[Mudrac]

I don't get why developers were trying SOO hard to limit players expansion....

You can't be Empire if you have like 4 cities..... And I don't care how big they are.

It should be more about land grab, you have fever cities = fever people = fever taxes, science, production.....

You can be a pretty big Empire, you must play on bigger maps, even before science penalty the smaller the map was the lesser cities you have, because there wasn't enough space on those maps. Here is the tactic I use when building new cities. When I play on Duel, Tiny, Small, and Standard, where science penalty is 5%. I build a second city and then send a Caravan to it. It grows, and by the time the Caravan is finished I mostly have already researched Philosophy, and then build NC ASAP. After it I found a 3rd city, by then I already build workshop in capital. I send Caravan for food, once it's finished, I send it for production, so 30+30 is 60 turns. So pretty much that's a new city every 60 turns. If you play on Standard speed by the end of the round you can easily have about 7 -8 cities, which is great on these map sizes. When I play Large or Huge where the penalty is 3% and 2% respectively. Early on for 2nd city I use the same tactic, but later on when I get workshop I send 2 Caravans to new city one with food and one with production. So that's one new city every 30 turns. So basically by turn 350 you can easily have 9 - 10 cities, and by turn 500, up to 13 or even 15 cities. So if an Empire with 13 cities is small for you then I don't know what to say.

 

[Alziel]

I don't mind it at all.

As others have said, it adds a new layer of strategy for players who want to go wide - it now means that instead of just plonking cities down willy-nilly, putting in basic buildings and then forgetting about them (the infamous 'ICS') you will now have to think carefully before placing a new city and take time to develop each one.

Playing a wide empire is still feasible and perfectly doable. I play wide nearly all the time on Emperor level and never experience any major issues.

 

[Pembroke]

I don't get why developers were trying SOO hard to limit players expansion....

In this, the realism aspect must bow to playability. The reason is that in the implementation they decided that a) the population produces science, and b) city improvements (including the science generating ones) are "per city". The consequence of these decisions is that you must scale tech cost upwards depending on the number of cities. Otherwise, you could just spam cities to get massive science production. It's to prevent this.

If science was generated some other way then the solution could be something else, too, but as it's now you need to make tech advancement harder for wide empires or it would create a hugely unbalanced situation gamewise.

 

[DemonMaster]

Regarding realism:
During the Ancient Era you have the means to have an empire the size of ancient Egypt or Babylon. Not much today perhaps, but back then they where huge empires. In Civ that would be to that you could take on your neighbour and take part/all if his land, two neighbours is hard but could perhaps be done.
During the Classic Era you can hold/take more, pretty much the size of ancient China or Rome, still not so much if we compare it with today, but back then they where extremely huge empires. Again in civ this means that you can have more than you could in the Ancient Era. This goes on through each era.
It would be to much stress on your civ if you tried to do what the Arabs did, Charlemagne or any other very large nation during the Ancient Era, but during the Medieval Era you have the resources and technology to do it. If you want to occupy a continent equal in size of Europe, then you probably can start during the Classic Era, but finish during the Renaissance Era or Industrial Era even, due to the fact that it would drain your nation to much if you do it to early.

When I have played Liberty I don't spam settlers high and low. I do build settlers more often and much earlier than what I do in my Tradition games. But I do not keep crap cities and I do not expand to much to fast. But if I play Liberty, I will be, one way or the other, the big boss of my continent by the time I reach Modern Era (or even the Industrial Era).

 

[Mudrac]

Besides it was also added to address the problems that players had on King difficulty and above. The AI spawns cities there too fast, happiness was not enough to stop the AI. Also another reason is because trade routes have been added now. And since AI mostly uses internal trade routes. Image how quickly it would grow its cities, and without the science penalty it would run you over scientifically like a Japanese Train. The number of players who would be able to defeat AI on these difficulties would greatly diminish.

 

[Luckystrike77]

do you like the idea of science cost going up when founding new cities?
i hate it it!!!
why do the game need to punish you for creating big empires.
i mean i am ok with increasing culture cost and unhappiness but science no way!
what do you think?

You want the game to be one-sided instead, with just one OP strategy that is viable?

No danger the developers would agree.

I don't get why developers were trying SOO hard to limit players expansion....

You can't be Empire if you have like 4 cities..... And I don't care how big they are.

It should be more about land grab, you have fever cities = fever people = fever taxes, science, production.....

These are limitations that add to gameplay, and you can work arround them by some priorities on happiness, and developing your cities so their value becomes greater then the penalty also in research.

The cities just need to grow larger and contain some more buildings then in the terrible ICS style of exploits. You will also need to do harder priorities now when choosing what kind of CS to ally, policies to pick etc. It all comes together making it a better strategy game with these limitations.

This is what good strategy is all about.