Is Oxford that good?

[Lily_Lancer]

Why Oxford Lily?

Because it's good.

 

[Victoria]

@Lily_Lancer The thread is asking, the forum is about sharing. You have asked questions here and had them answered. Why not join in?

 

[Lily_Lancer]

@Lily_Lancer The thread is asking, the forum is about sharing. You have asked questions here and had them answered. Why not join in?

In fact I never got any useful strategic information from this forum...(On the other hand, I do got experimental information, and appreciate for that) If I provide a reason there'll be endless debates concerning meaningless topics such as "not every map can be finished that early", or "commercial hubs are extremely useful in my games", etc. Which is sure to lead to results that I have to block someone and/or he blocks me.

 

[HyJinkx]

I’m not a huge fan of Oxford in most games because I doing ok on science by then and have other things I’m churning out. Given a free city with the production to get it I will throw it in but it’s not in my normal to do list.

You second question about research labs is another iffy one for me. I normally plan on them with good intentions but I don’t find I get them everywhere I would like to before things have snowballed so far that they don’t really make a big enough impact. Being a bit of a weekend war monger means I normally have plenty of cities to make up for things(if I’m gonna be hated anyways it just as well be for a reason). The collosiuem and Big Ben, if I can remember, it is what I like aim for. I still play by the law of “If they build it, I will concour” so I still end up with wonders anyways. Oh and once in awhile there’s a spot that just screams for Petra but it’s so iffy on higher levels.

 

[Kyro]

In fact I never got any useful strategic information from this forum...(On the other hand, I do got experimental information, and appreciate for that) If I provide a reason there'll be endless debates concerning meaningless topics such as "not every map can be finished that early", or "commercial hubs are extremely useful in my games", etc. Which is sure to lead to results that I have to block someone and/or he blocks me.

Forgive me for sounding so direct, but for the rest who find this post uncomfortable, I will tell you why it feels uncomfortable and why this sort of post is not healthy for discussion.

The person first makes an emphatic, albeit controversial assertion contrary to evidence, then intentionally does not provide evidence to back up said assertion, making it appear that his assertion is a self-evident fact immune to crticism when the opposite is true; thereby claiming the higher position by ignoring and denying the right of others to claim he is wrong.

The incoherence of such a post is this: If you don't provide evidence for your claim or attempt to debunk evidence of contrary claims provided by others, then your claim cannot be crticised because you have provided nothing for it to be considered by. In others words, Argumentum ad ignorantiam; you are right because no one can prove you wrong, albeit because you did not subject your claim to scrutiny.

The person then makes reference to past negative experiences while still claiming the higher position that it is "pointless" to discuss the claim of the post. Indeed it is rather pointless to discuss anything when one is simply not open to constructive criticism and quite honestly it sounds condescending.

The usual trend of people who make posts like this is that they have past achievements they are proud of that gives them a false sense of superiority to dismiss any critque of whatever claims he or she makes. IE "I have results so you can't question me."

I hope this provides insight on how to respond to posts like this; you don't try to reason with said person, you first scrutinize whether his/her achievements and strategies can be successfully replicated against the measuring tape of true human intelligence.

Moderator Action: Please do not take it upon yourself to lecture another poster in a public thread about how to post. -- Browd

 

[Archon_Wing]

I actually finished a t361 >.> King game today where the beginning was utterly stupid; entire capital was surrounded by Barbarians and Horse Archers by turn 20. Only luck was finding Yerevan, and I had to take God of the Forge just to stay alive. To make matters worse, I couldn't rush anyone because there was a mountain range in between me and the nearest civs, meaning I had to play peacefully too. and the land being pretty bad; capital has no hills until the final ring. Things were so bad that I used the Great Prophet from Arabia to scout. Well, except that time I declared war on Japan because I mistakened Spain's Missionary for theirs. And there were pretty crazy too; Big Ben was gone and I had nothing better to do, so I built Oxford and behold it gives me both techs needed to get Rocketry lol. (Now I was already ahead in tech at this time, but I don't think i would have won til 2000 or something at the rate things were going!) I also built Ruhr but that didn't really help since you want Sagan and Kwolek to do most of the stuff anyways. Of course Albert Einstein never even showed up...

Spoiler :

And of course, the silly diplomacy....

Spoiler :

 

[Lily_Lancer]

For those who want to make "constructive criticism". I don't want to be that direct, but you keep on forcing me to do so.

I don't expect you to be better than the state of art to make "constructive criticism", but you have to at least show that you can understand the basic concepts of the games. Please at least experience some real games (such as sub-180 SV in your chosen setting, which I think is achieveable for me in most random settings), otherwise your "criticism" will never be "constructive" and only a waste of time.

There really exist someone saying Adam Smith being better than Crassus, or commerical hubs shall be prior to campuses, these are really funny ideas that a rookie may made. Also, people with such ideas never make "constructive criticisms". What I'm saying is that you shall first try to play as experts and get rid of silly ideas if you want your "criticisms" to be at least possibly "constructive"



Victoria is gooding a good job improving himself, I appreciate his attitude. Although from Gotm results he still lack of some understanding, but it's clear that he's improving and knows better comcept than he was previously.

 

[Rosty K]

Ruhr is a bit like IZ, it takes too long to get back the production taken.

Well, guess I'm a production maniac. If it gives production - I need to have it. Just... can't... resist...

Though I often don't bother with Ruhr because of its position requirements. Competes with Big Ben

 

[Victoria]

Although from Gotm results he still lack of some understanding

I'm happy enough just playing, being fastest would tire me out.

 

[antimony]

If only one of the two free techs is something useful, that effect probably compares with an average mid-game great scientist. As for the rest... the 1240 production going into Oxford would generate approx. 248 great scientist points and 186 science if it were put into campus projects. Therefore, it probably results in a net loss of great scientist points (which may be well compensated by the free techs), and you can calculate how many turns it takes for the science output to pay off. Of course, this is the assumption that there is no other major build that Oxford is competing with in that particular city.

EDIT: Corrected the numbers.

 

[Ivan Hunger]

With me, the way it typically works is that I start building one of the "good" wonders, but to make sure I don't get sniped, I equip the faster wonder production policy card.

Now that I have the card equipped, I start to feel anxious about only building a wonder in one city. After all, shouldn't I try to get as much benefit as possible out of that card while I have it active?

Next thing I know, I'm building wonders all over my empire, including ones that have long since lost their usefulness (this is how the Great Library gets built in many of my games).

Of course, having an empire with a bunch of random wonders isn't so bad, even if it's sub-optimal. They provide tourism, appeal for all surrounding tiles, and adjacency bonuses for theatre squares. I remember one game in particular where I was needed to build a neighborhood, and the only +6 location was right next to Ruhr Valley. Man, those people were super jazzed about getting to live next to a noisy, dirty processing plant.

 

[Esperr]

I can say that there still isnt a wonder in the game i will go out of my way to build, i have only ever built oxford in my flavor games or when there just isnt anything else to do. Even the good ones like FP and Ruhr before the nerf still arent worth giving up regular developement for. BE was the same way, even in 5 some like chichen itza were the nuts and really changed the game when they dropped

 

[Lily_Lancer]

the 1450 production going into Oxford .

I wonder how long since you last played a civ game that you seems to be talking about an ancient version.

 

[antimony]

That's right, I just opened a Wiki rather than looking up the Civilopedia in game. I'll correct the numbers above.

 

[Olleus]

If I provide a reason there'll be endless debates concerning meaningless topics such as "not every map can be finished that early", or "commercial hubs are extremely useful in my games", etc. Which is sure to lead to results that I have to block someone and/or he blocks me.

Then why bother writing in this forum? This is literally a place for discussion, if you don't want to discuss, don't say anything. You are allowed to just read without replying. What do you, or anyone else, gain by you making a statement that you refuse to argue for or against? No one is going to be convinced to change the way the play or learn anything. The only possible reason I can fathom (do correct me if it's wrong) is that you expect everyone else to be grateful for words of wisdom from you, and you get a kick out of that.

In fact I never got any useful strategic information from this forum...

Then why bother even reading these forums? If you want experimental information, then a wiki is probably more suitable. Or at least the strategy section of these forums.

I'm genuinely curious as to why you bother reading or replying on threads like these. You evidently show no interest in taking what other people are saying onboard, and you obviously are not interested in a discussion for the state of it. I'm not saying you should stop coming here or anything like, I just don't understand what motivates you to do so.

 

[Cerilis]

Clearly, we are not meant to bother the likes of Lily, as they are so much above us! Lowly cretin like us should rather be most grateful to be allowed to dwell in their shadow while they honour this forum with their presence!

 

[Arent11]

Most of the time I was thinking one of the few percentage based ones would be good, but how much science can an individual city really generate? Assuming Enlightenment boosted campus and grabbing all the needed great people, we're talking a +20 uni, a +8 library, and +10 (expensive) research lab. And let's assume +4 from adjacency and a 30 pop city (unlikely) for +21. That means a city with 63 science. 20% of that isn't very impressive. Even if we had some more insane bonuses popping it to 100, it'd be the equivalent of an extra university. Of course, there's the additional issue of Einstein not being there until the modern era.

So basically, we're building the thing for 2 free techs then? Problem is that sometimes beelines are done so it might pick up some pretty bad ones. For example, I never pick up military tactics, or if I'm playing a Pangaea-like map, naval techs would be irrelevant. (Then again, I never play that in this game)

Finally, it also comes at a time where you have things like Big Ben and Ruhr, if you're not trying to win the game already.

I actually think this wonder seems stronger if you're not going for a science victory. If say, you are going culture or warring, you are more likely to not have that strong of a science and getting lucky with the techs can allow you to catch up especially if you are losing the GPs. The 2 extra slots of writing also helps with the culture game.

On a related note, what about Research Labs? Any pleb city can build or buy a university, but those things are so expensive and don't give much more than a university. With great people boosting unis, it feels even worse. They often come so late that some don't even finish before I've researched everything and then they just cost me maintenance (somewhat muted with the Totalitarian card)

Most wonders are not really worth building. There are so many other things to build, even another ship or unit can help you more than a wonder. Which is somehow sad, because it weakens "builder" approaches even more than they are already.

Same with research labs - is it just me or are they actually worse than universities? Just compare their production & maintenance price & their output with a university & I get the impression that universities are much more cost effective. I'm not even talking about reaching the end of the tech tree. Additionally, you could invest all that production in other stuff, hell, you could even start science/other projects if you have nothing else to do & get great people.

I'm basically still searching for some kind of "slingshot" strategy to win the game with few cities, that might make use of wonders or high end infrastructure, but I haven't really found anything.

 

[Victoria]

I'm basically still searching for some kind of "slingshot" strategy to win the game with few cities,

Well... there is a thread on OCC where someone has won a cultural victory on deity with one city, not some freak early luck victory but a hard won one. Sadly it still included violence.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

Then why bother writing in this forum? This is literally a place for discussion, if you don't want to discuss, don't say anything. .

This is just a way to distinguish capable person and incapable person. In my previous experiences in the forum, I found capable person(there really exist a few) knows the idea of value immediately that when I say the names of these wonders, they can get enough information and figure out the reason themselves and can give constructive information, while incapable people insist on forcing me to give them "reasons" and still understand nothing even if I provide full-detailed reasons and usually leads to silly debates. So there's no need to provide reasons, which is the lesson this forum taught me in the previous discussions.

I'm always willing to discuss with the 1st type of people, who experienced some real games such as the guy who finished T138 SV in a pervious Gotm.

What if a person who doesn't even know the cost of Oxford talk about his many ideas about this wonder?So I try hard not to make these silly debates.

 

[Arent11]

Well... there is a thread on OCC where someone has won a cultural victory on deity with one city, not some freak early luck victory but a hard won one. Sadly it still included violence.

Oh, I read that. I liked the religious approach/pilgrimage, because that is to a certain extent a "slingshot" that might outperform strong expansion in some cases. But going expansion is still the best bet.