Merchants or Scientists?

[Rockinfrog]

Which do you find gives you the greater advantage, running merchants to keep your reaserch slider high, or running scientists to get the beaker count up?

Also I have noticed in a few games the AI will put some cities on Reaserch instead of building anything. Would running Wealth give the same results? Thanks guys, This is the most helpful forum I have yet to see for a game!

 

[Groogaroo]

Personally I find running scientists is the best startagy, atleast it works with my style of play. Apart from the beaker output from the specialist, the great scientists you will get will offer you, acadamies (for +50% science), great early game bulbs (philosophy, paper, education, optics) and settling also gives nice rewards.

If I'm running a strict no cottage style Specialist Economy I will run the odd merchant to keep me out of the red but generally don't go out of my way to generate them as a GP unless I need them for a corp.

Of course you can base an economy on running merchants in your GP farm to settle for food and gold allowing you to run more merchants to get you more food and gold, but I havn't played with that yet!

 

[AnitaGaribaldi]

I usually run Scientists. I think merchants are great in a city that already produces a lot of gold (shrine, wall street). The merchants helps to finance war and expansion. It really depends what you want to do with the Great Person. Do I need a Great Scientist for Education? Do I need a Great Merchant for upgrade my military?

 

[vanatteveldt]

In a thread called Hybrid Economy, someone advocated running merchants (plus shrines, corp HQ etc.) in the wall street city to allow a very high global slider. This allows more specialization than normally possible in CE, ie all gold in one city with gold buildings and national wonder, and all other commerce cities produce only science so need all the science buildings and not the banks etc.

Haven't tried this myself, but I can see it working out well in a CE if you run four scientists initially in the Gr Lib city or a bunch under caste system until grocers or banks come online, then start the specialization. This way you get the scientists initially to set up academies and bulb towards lib, and then move into greater specialization.

 

[Rameau's Nephew]

Depends on your multipliers. Add up the % bonuses you get in the city for beakers (from Libraries, Monasteries, Universities, et al.) and compare that with the % bonuses you get for Gold (from Markets, Grocers, Banks, et al.). If one is higher than the other, that's the type of specialist you should run in that city.

Also, as Anita mentions, if this is your main GPP producer, you should be thinking about what kind of Great Person would be most useful.

 

[Ibian]

Merchants and more merchants. And then settle the GM you get. Wall street the place and found the corps there. Thats one city will keep you at a surplus at 100% science.

 

[Artichoker]

I'd say it depends on how late it is in the current game.

Both scientists and great scientists tend to be more useful during Medieval and Renaissance eras, when you're still in contention for staying ahead in the tech race. Every additional tech counts here, as it can spell the difference between getting Riflemen or Cannons before or after your rivals.

Once you've reached Industrial and Modern Eras, it's possible that you have sufficient technology for a domination victory. In this case, gold would be more important than beakers, especially for upgrading military units. A similar situation arises when you're going for a cultural victory, in which case the extra beakers are of little help. In these later eras, merchants and great merchants--and also engineers, great engineers, priests, and great prophets--will tend to be more useful than scientists and great scientists.

Roughly speaking, engineers and great engineers get the best of both worlds...they have useful science output for the tech race, and high hammer output for producing important builds.

 

[Groogaroo]

Depends on your multipliers. Add up the % bonuses you get in the city for beakers (from Libraries, Monasteries, Universities, et al.) and compare that with the % bonuses you get for Gold (from Markets, Grocers, Banks, et al.). If one is higher than the other, that's the type of specialist you should run in that city.

Also, as Anita mentions, if this is your main GPP producer, you should be thinking about what kind of Great Person would be most useful.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm under the impression that the GPT generated by merchants isn't mulitiplied by anything other than Wallstreet. Markets, grocers and banks multiply commerce not Gold as far as I know.

 

[Rameau's Nephew]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm under the impression that the GPT generated by merchants isn't mulitiplied by anything other than Wallstreet. Markets, grocers and banks multiply commerce not Gold as far as I know.

You are wrong. Raw Commerce (from worked tiles and trade routes) is split into Gold and Beakers (and, if applicable, Culture and Espionage) based on the empire-wide sliders, then additional sources of and (like specialists and shrines) are added in, and then the city's multiplier buildings are applied to either portion. (IIRC, the only multiplier that is applied directly to raw Commerce is the 50% Capitol bonus in Bureaucracy.)

Here is one strategy article that touches on these mechanics. It's not precisely on-point, but most of this is in there.

 

[DaveMcW]

If your science rate is high run merchants.

If your science rate is low run scientists.

 

[AnitaGaribaldi]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm under the impression that the GPT generated by merchants isn't mulitiplied by anything other than Wallstreet. Markets, grocers and banks multiply commerce not Gold as far as I know.

I usually settle Great Prophets.... And their gold get multiplied by markets, grocers and banks; their production by bureaucracy, forge, etc...

 

[Jerrymander]

Merchants are very useful. I think Industrial starts give you a free Market in your cities, and with Mercantilism, that's an instant gold boost in each city you found. :>

 

[Groogaroo]

You are wrong. Raw Commerce (from worked tiles and trade routes) is split into Gold and Beakers (and, if applicable, Culture and Espionage) based on the empire-wide sliders, then additional sources of and (like specialists and shrines) are added in, and then the city's multiplier buildings are applied to either portion. (IIRC, the only multiplier that is applied directly to raw Commerce is the 50% Capitol bonus in Bureaucracy.)

Oh my gosh! Your right! I've learnt something new today! Thanks .

 

[DigitalBoy]

Scientists and merchants are both great, but I find that it's easier to use scientists for a couple of reasons:

1) It's easier to get scientist slots earlier in the games. Libraries are cheaper than markets. Writing comes earlier than Currency.
2) If you're running Caste System, a city with a lot of assigned scientists can get a huge boost from an Academy.

 

[DMOC]

Completely depends on the situation. If you have a higher percentage of gold multipliers, merchants are better, if you have higher science, scientists are better.

 

[QuixotesGhost]

Ultrashort answer: Little Empires want Science, Big Empires want Gold.

Semi-Short answer: Look at the science slider, the lower you are running it the more you want to prioritize gold over science. Personally, around 40-60% I value gold over science and science over gold if I'm running it higher than that. This is in a CE-style economy with the odd specialist. In straight specialist economy the slider matters much less, so more or less only run enough specialists to keep you out of the red especially since you won't be running US so can't dump excess cash into hurrying stuff. I'd run merchants in your Wall Street city and Scientists everywhere else.

LONG Answer:

You also have to keep in mind the split in technology paths concerning Gold and Research around the middle ages.

There's

Guilds + Banking (which gets you +75% to gold, knights, health cap increase, and gets you started towards rifles)

Education (which gets you +25% to science, Oxford, and positions you for Liberalism)

Astronomy (which gets you +25% to science and opens up overseas trade routes)

Paper + Divine Right (for University of Sankore and Spiral Mineret)

which one you want to prioritize depends on your current situation.

I'd say that Paper+Divine Right is the best from a pure economic standpoint for huge expansive empires, but requires wonder-building and does little for you militarily except get you close to nationalism. The more cities you have the more opportunities you have for +2 sci and +2 gold. Plus Monastaries and Temples are much less taxing on the hammers of small new cities you get through expansion than stuff like Universities or Banks.


Guilds to Banking is a lot better for the military side of things and almost as good for paying the big maintenance cost that big empires require. That +75% bonus to gold is gotten for a lot more cheaply tech-wise and hammer-wise than an equivalent bonus to science. However such a bonus does little for you if are already running the science slider fairly high (small civilizations).


Astronomy is great if you have a coastal empire with a continent overseas. The overseas trade can be HUGE, plus can give you luxury and health resources. A lot of times with an island start, astronomy will slingshot you back to parity and beyond. Just make sure other civs aren't running mercantilism because this will kill it. Likewise you can encourage mercantilism in your neighbors if you want to make sure an island opponent can't take advantage of overseas trade. I did this last game on Emperor to keep the Incas backwards and impoverished


Lastly Education is great if you have a good commerce capital running Bureaucracy with some settled scientists, plus gets you a free tech if you think you can beat people to Liberalism.


Basically, whether you want to run scientists or merchants specialists depends a lot on what economic tech path you're going (which depends on your civ). I'd say if you go Education first, you definitely want Great Scientists. The later you go education compared to banking the less attractive Great Scientists become compared to Great Merchants.

However, considering the academy and Oxford (the fact that it comes significantly earlier than Wall Street) it seems to me that it's much easier to concentrate +% sci in a single city. You can get +200% to sci in a single city as soon as you hit Education (plus more with monasteries), but it's just that ONE city. Everywhere else is going to be sitting at +50-70%. However, +100% to gold can be spammed all over the place as soon as you hit banking, but you gotta wait till corporation to hit +200% in one city. Your single city gold modifier will never be good as the +225% sci modifier with the academy (climbing to +250% with labs).

To sum up the previous paragraph: It's easier to concentrate really high +%sci in a single city than it is to concentrate really high +%gold in a single city. However, it's easier to get a respectable +gold% (100%) throughout your whole civilization than it is to get a respectable +sci% through your whole civilization.

Since Science specializes better, I'd say that it's better to settle scientists in a science city than settling merchants in a gold city. However great merchants give you +food so that is something to keep...

Oh god, this could go on forever. I'll just shut up now.

Something else I forgot. If you are running a SE you want Philosophy. Since that goes well with Education for Liberalism, I'd say that makes Education and thus Great Scientists the better choice, all things being equal.

 

[JBossch]

Digitalboy's comments and a few others are right on when it comes to the early game. At this stage you just need enough gold to get by; most will be spent on deficit research anyway. Scientists are absolutely the way to go because of earlier and cheaper libraries and the possibility of a much higher % modifier earlier on (lib + academy), not to mention the greater usefulness of GSs. If, in the early game, one has multiple cities with a better gold modifier than science this is a problem. Stop wasting hammers on markets and grocers that are doing nothing (25% of 3 gold is a small number)

Later on, it should not be a question of strictly scientists or merchants but of specializing cities to run one or the other (assuming a fairly strong focus on SE). We have to differentiate our economic cities (hate calling them commerce cities in an SE) between science and gold. Almost always, the emphasis should favor science (i tend toward a ratio of at least 3 to 1 by mid game, though it is totally situational). At times, one strong gold city (shrine + eventual market, grocer, wall street, + as many merchants as possible) may be enough to support the whole empire's gold needs. As you expand, you may need more gold cities.

P.S. - In an SE I tend to favor cities that will have high commerce regardless of the lack of cottages (gems, gold or other commerce bonus tiles) for gold production. I figure the slider will be real low most of the game (meaning the reciprocal, gold, is high) thus I can leverage that fact with gold modifiers (markets, grocers, etc)

 

[Ibian]

Completely depends on the situation. If you have a higher percentage of gold multipliers, merchants are better, if you have higher science, scientists are better.

Not quite. If you have a higher gold multiplier, merchants are better. If you have a higher science multiplier you wanna keep the science slider maxed, so merchants are still better.

 

[Rockinfrog]

Thank you ALL for the quick responce!

The basic theme I get here is that there is no one best choise, but that it is situational, which is what I had surmised but I wanted to see if there was something I was missing. I have of late been running a hybred economy, which is flexable to what ever the situation demands and puts me in a most favorable position in the mid to late game to dominate, ( my favoite Victory condition ). I have been able to get and maintain a good tech lead keeping the slider between 80 and 90%. The other 10 to 20% goes to espianoge.

I read these threads just about every day and am constantly learning. Having never played any of the Civ games before 12/07 and starting out at settler I now play on Noble and enjoy every minute of it. I like the fact that there is no "formula" that you can learn to win every time. Each player can win in his own style by effectively combining the different elements of the game to achieve the best advantage he can.