National Wonder Strategy

[cv431410]

National Wonder Strategy

National Wonder Planning obviously depends on your playing styles.

Background:

Science city should have:

Library +25%
Observatory +50%
University +50%
Academy +50%
Oxford University +100% (Nation Wonder)

Commerce city should have:

Bank +50%
Grocery +25%
Market +25%
Capital and civil service 50%.
Wall Street National Wonder 100%
Lighthouse

Military City:
Rest of buildings

Hybrid city should have all three groups.

My style is generally early expansion and then war (cat + cross/maze). I generally avoid axe war for several reasons:

(1) If you can grab land free, why fight;
(2) I need time to build up the cities;
(3) Without cat, axe suffers heavy lost.

Let us assume I will generate 7 cities on a standard map.

City 1. Capital ---- hybrid city (Production + Commerce)

City 2, 3, 4 --- the order can change here

Great Person Farm City (GPF)
Military City
Commerce Cities

The order really depends on the map:

(1) My highest priority will generally go to the spot with 4+ flood plains and set up a commerce city there. Each flood plain has the potential of 3F+ 9C.

(2) A location with enough food + iron/copper/stone/horse … will be the next priority, the Military City.

(3) A location with plenty of food will be good for GPF.

For seek of discussion, this is the order:
2. Military City
3. Great Person Farm City (GPF)
4. Commerce City

To a large degree, the Military City (city 2) and the Commerce City (city 4) are also hybrid cities (Production + Commerce).

The second wave of cities will be:
5. Capital 2 --- hybrid city (Production + Commerce)
6. Commerce City;
7. Science city.

I often switch the order of city 4 and city 5:

4. Capital 2
5. Commerce city


Now, the National Wonder strategy places the following wonders into the 7 cities:

Forbidden Palace: (Merchant) Reduces maintenance in nearby cities

Globe Theatre: (Artist) No unhappiness from this city. Can turn 3 citizens into artist

Hermitage: (Artist) +100% culture in this city

Heroic Epic: (Artist) +100% military unit production in this city

Ironworks: (Engineer) +50% hammer with Coal. +50% hammer with Iron. Can turn 3 citizens into Engineer

Mt. Rushmore: (Artist) -25% War unhappiness from all cities

National Epic: (Artist) +100% Great People birth rate in this city

Oxford University: (Scientist) +100% research in this city. Can turn 3 citizens into Scientist

Red Cross: (Scientist) Free Medic I promotion for units built in this city

Scotland Yard: (Scientist) Required to train Spy

Wall Street: (Merchant) +100% gold in this city

West Point: (Engineer) New units receive +4 experience points

Here is my strategy:

1. Capital ---- hybrid city (Production + Commerce)
Wall Street: (Merchant) +100% gold in this city
Globe Theatre: (Artist) No unhappiness from this city. Can turn 3 citizens into artist

City Number 2 always get this one:
Oxford University: (Scientist) +100% research in this city. Can turn 3 citizens into Scientist


2. Military City
Oxford University: (Scientist) +100% research in this city. Can turn 3 citizens into Scientist
Ironworks: (Engineer) +50% hammer with Coal. +50% hammer with Iron. Can turn 3 citizens into Engineer


3. Great Person Farm City (GPF)
National Epic: (Artist) +100% Great People birth rate in this city
Hermitage: (Artist) +100% culture in this city


4. Capital 2 --- hybrid city (Production + Commerce)
Heroic Epic: (Artist) +100% military unit production in this city
Forbidden Palace: (Merchant) Reduces maintenance in nearby cities


The strongest city of the following get the rest wonders:

5. Commerce City;
6. Commerce City;
7. Science city.

What is your strategy?

 

[MrCynical]

You're mixing up gold and commerce, which aren't the same thing. Commerce is turned into gold and science depending on the sliders.

Your science city is OK as a set up (throw in the laboratory for another 25% late game).

The "commerce city" is a strange fudge together of commerce and gold cities. I don't know why you're specifically including the lightouse either, as this is a must for all coastal cities regardless of specialization.

A gold city should have:

Bank
Marketplace
Grocer
A religious shrine (if possible)
Wall Street

A commerce city needs both the science boosters (library, university, etc, but not Oxford), and the gold boosters (bank, market etc, but not wall street). Given the science rate is usually above 50% the scince buildings should be built first. The capital will also benefit from the Bureaucracy boost if it's a commerce city.

I don't really agree with your national wonder arrangements either. They're generally poorly paired up:

Wall Street: should go in any city with a religious shrine, not specifically the capital. If no shrines, find your best commerce city.

Oxford: goes in your highest science city (may well be the capital).

National Epic: goes in your GP farm obviously. Hermitage however should definitely not be paired with it except possibly if you're going for a cultural victory. The globe theatre is a possibility, as the GP farm will tend to have the highest population. Oxford or wall street are also possiblities depending on the type of specialists you're running.

Heroic Epic: There are a number of national wonders that work well with this, but the forbidden palace isn't one of them. This city is specialised for military production, so you want something to support that. West Point is one option, so the military units that you're building faster will be more highly promoted. he ironworks is another possibility to further boost unit production rates, but personally I prefer to save this for a wonder/project specialised production city. The Red Cross isn't a bad pair for the heroic epic, giving all the new units medic promotions. The globe theatre could also go here instead of the Gp farm if you're using slavery to build your units.

Ironworks: If not paired with the heroic epic should go in your highest production city. Could pair up with the national epic if you're relying on wonders not specialists for GP production (usually inadvisable).

Forbidden Palace: Place to minimise the distanc ebetween your cities and it and your capital. No real reason to pair this with any other national wonder.

Hermitage: Use to shore up a dodgy cultural border, or to support the weakest of your three culture cities in a cultural victory. Again no obvious reason to pair with anything.

Scotland Yard: Doesn't matter where you build this, just place it so it doesn't interfere with building any other national wonders.

Mount Rushmore: Similar to Scotland Yard, doesn't matter where it goes.

 

[pigswill]

I'm tending towards trying to achieve a science capital (academy, bureaucracy, Oxford, science buildings and monasteries; good place for cottages) and a money city (at least one shrine, money buildings and wall street; could be cottages but works fine as production coz the gold comes from the shrine not commerce). Military city gets HE and westpoint.

 

[cv431410]

You're mixing up gold and commerce, which aren't the same thing. Commerce is turned into gold and science depending on the sliders.

Your science city is OK as a set up (throw in the laboratory for another 25% late game).

The "commerce city" is a strange fudge together of commerce and gold cities. I don't know why you're specifically including the lightouse either, as this is a must for all coastal cities regardless of specialization.

A gold city should have:

Bank
Marketplace
Grocer
A religious shrine (if possible)
Wall Street

A commerce city needs both the science boosters (library, university, etc, but not Oxford), and the gold boosters (bank, market etc, but not wall street). Given the science rate is usually above 50% the scince buildings should be built first. The capital will also benefit from the Bureaucracy boost if it's a commerce city.

I don't really agree with your national wonder arrangements either. They're generally poorly paired up:

Wall Street: should go in any city with a religious shrine, not specifically the capital. If no shrines, find your best commerce city.

Oxford: goes in your highest science city (may well be the capital).

National Epic: goes in your GP farm obviously. Hermitage however should definitely not be paired with it except possibly if you're going for a cultural victory. The globe theatre is a possibility, as the GP farm will tend to have the highest population. Oxford or wall street are also possiblities depending on the type of specialists you're running.

Heroic Epic: There are a number of national wonders that work well with this, but the forbidden palace isn't one of them. This city is specialised for military production, so you want something to support that. West Point is one option, so the military units that you're building faster will be more highly promoted. he ironworks is another possibility to further boost unit production rates, but personally I prefer to save this for a wonder/project specialised production city. The Red Cross isn't a bad pair for the heroic epic, giving all the new units medic promotions. The globe theatre could also go here instead of the Gp farm if you're using slavery to build your units.

Ironworks: If not paired with the heroic epic should go in your highest production city. Could pair up with the national epic if you're relying on wonders not specialists for GP production (usually inadvisable).

Forbidden Palace: Place to minimise the distanc ebetween your cities and it and your capital. No real reason to pair this with any other national wonder.

Hermitage: Use to shore up a dodgy cultural border, or to support the weakest of your three culture cities in a cultural victory. Again no obvious reason to pair with anything.

Scotland Yard: Doesn't matter where you build this, just place it so it doesn't interfere with building any other national wonders.

Mount Rushmore: Similar to Scotland Yard, doesn't matter where it goes.

I suppose I need explain the reason for my strategy:

For me, with 0% exception, the best Commerce City and the best science city is the capital. My style (early bureaucracy and early academy in capital) might contribute to this. Between Wall Street and Oxford, I select Wall Street for capital. I suppose Oxford can also be justified.

Oxford (Wall Street) goes the next highest science (commerce) city, which is usually city #2.

Even a city with Heroic Epic, the capital is still more productive in military units. Therefore, Globe Theatre goes to the capital so the military production is maintained during war.

My 4th or 5th city is generally my second “capital”, which is the center the second group of cities. It is generally far way and is a Hybrid city.

Hope this will clarify my strategy.

 

[MrCynical]

You're still mixing up commerce and gold. Wall Street boosts gold, not commerce.

 

[cv431410]

You're still mixing up commerce and gold. Wall Street boosts gold, not commerce.

commerce - science = gold.

There is a strategy, though I must admit I rarely use, is to reduce science to 0% for 1 turn and run it at 100% rest of time.

However, 20% - 30% of time in every game, I do use capital to produce gold to increase research rate. Currency is alway one of the most important research for me. In that case, I believe it does matter to have the following multipliers:

Bank +50%
Grocery +25%
Market +25%
Wall Street National Wonder 100%

 

[playshogi]

If you're trying to win by spacerace, you might want to build the ironworks in a city near the equator, so you can build the space elevator later. This city may not be the absolutely best hammer city you have.

 

[UncleJJ]

I assume this is for a cottage based economy...

Commerce is split into beakers, gold and culture by the sliders, not just beakers and gold.

Early on all the science cities can make good use of monastries

Wall Street should only be built in a Holy City with a shrine and whose religion has been well spread.

Oxford built in your capital will give a much better boost to your economy than Wall Street ... unless you found and spread your own religion.

 

[cv431410]

I assume this is for a cottage based economy...

Commerce is split into beakers, gold and culture by the sliders, not just beakers and gold.

Early on all the science cities can make good use of monastries

Wall Street should only be built in a Holy City with a shrine and whose religion has been well spread.

Oxford built in your capital will give a much better boost to your economy than Wall Street ... unless you found and spread your own religion.

Yes, it is cottage based economy. Lol, I am gradually forced into details in my playing style.

In 50% of my games I have no religion at all.

I play Victoria (Expansive/financial). Depending my start position, I switch between the following two paths:

I. CS Slingshot (<50% of time)

Condition: capital has at least 4 flood plains + 2 hills and some other goodies.

The strategy is:

(1) Build Oracle, research Code of law, get free tech, Civil Service;
(2) Enable bureaucracy, capital + 50%;
(3) Research feudalism, workers +50%;
(4) Education ;
(5) Liberalism, another free tech;
(6) Get constitution, go for democracy
(7) Emancipation, penalty for other
(8) Calvary
(9) Attack

I usually get confusion in this approach.

II Early Expansion. (>50% of time)

(1) City 1: warrior, worker, chop settler, chop settler. City 2: worker. ....
(2) research civil, Enable bureaucracy, capital + 50%;
(3) Research feudalism, workers +50%;
(4) Education ;
(5) Liberalism, another free tech;
(6) Get constitution, go for democracy
(7) Emancipation, penalty for other
(8) Calvary
(9) Attack

I do not get any religion in this path. I found even my research rate is down to 40% by 6 cities in this very early stage, I can recover quickly in research. This will not be true if the research rate is 40% in any other time period.

 

[cv431410]

Ok, I will accept recommendations from UncleJJ, pigswill and MrCynical:

1. Capital ---- hybrid city (Production + Commerce)
Oxford University: (Scientist) +100% research in this city. Can turn 3 citizens into Scientist
Globe Theatre: (Artist) No unhappiness from this city. Can turn 3 citizens into artist

City Number 2 always get this one:
Wall Street: (Merchant) +100% gold in this city

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

What is your strategy?

Well, I usually try for a bit more synergy with my wonder distribution.

In my games, the primary wonders are National Epic, Heroic Epic, Oxford, Ironworks, Wall Street (though truth be told I'm usually slow getting this one put together). I usually like to have some plan for how I'm going to distribute these going in.

But fundamentally there are no surprises. Oxford goes to the city with the most base research, Wall Street to the city with the most base gold, Ironworks to the city with the most base hammers (unless I had to drop heroic epic there, since I rarely pair these). Heroic Epic goes in whatever city has the best production in the classical era (of late, that usually means food - but I've decided to abandon that strategy until Globe Theater gets properly nerfed). National Epic goes to the GP farm.

Hermitage goes wherever I need the culture boost, but I don't play for culture very often, so never mind. Forbidden palace goes wherever convenient, provided it doesn't get in the way. Similarly for the Yard.

I've been pairing West Point with the Red Cross (because HE has been slotted out since the classical era), but I'll probably return to the obvious pairing of West Point and Heroic Epic, and start dumping Red Cross into a sea port.

Normally Oxford usually ends up in my capital, or in my GP farm, depending on how I'm running the slider that game, and everything else is basically situational. I often manage to double up shrines, which makes Wall Street a no brainer - in the right conditions I'll pair it with Ironworks and try to attach priests.

If I'm not going to be abusing the GT, I probably want it in the city with the largest surplus food (ie, the one I'm trying to push out to 30+ population) rather than the one with the most commerce BUT I haven't ever particularly tried Globe Theater plus bureaucracy. It's got some obvious upside.

 

[svv]

Oxford goes to the city with the most base research, Wall Street to the city with the most base gold...

Wouldn't that be the same city? I've never really understood seperating the "commerce" city from the "science" city - I generally just make the city that generates the most commerce the science city. Thus I build Oxford and Wall Street in the same city (usually the capital). I put the Academy there too, though fortunately this doesn't count against your limit of two national wonders.

If I switch the slider to science, this city generates more science; if I switch the slider to gold, it generates more gold. In either case, why put either one in a different city? Obviously I'm missing something here, but I'm not sure what. For a while I thought you guys were setting the sliders differently for the science and commerce cities, but I don't see a way to do that.

As for the hammer-heavy cities, I usually end up putting Heroic Epic wherever I've put Ironworks. It's usually pretty late in the day before I've qualified for West Point, so why not go ahead and have your HE production also increased by Ironworks?

 

[pigswill]

Putting HE where you put ironworks sounds a bit back to front as HE is available much earlier unless you play an extreme pacifist/builder strategy and don't get a Level 4 unit until the 18th century.

 

[Pantastic]

Wouldn't that be the same city? I've never really understood seperating the "commerce" city from the "science" city - I generally just make the city that generates the most commerce the science city. Thus I build Oxford and Wall Street in the same city (usually the capital).

If you have a shrine, then you have a city that produces a lot of gold but not a lot of commerce, so it makes sense to split it out. Often I'll have a capital that builds a lot of wonders, so builds national epic and becomes GPP farm, then later builds Oxford. Then a shrine (usually captured) is the best fit for Wall street. I don't get the OPs idea of seperating 'commerce' and 'science' cities aside from placing national wonders though.

It's usually pretty late in the day before I've qualified for West Point, so why not go ahead and have your HE production also increased by Ironworks?

Wow, you must play a really pacifistic game. In vanilla I'd always qualify for WP by medieval times, in warlords I use my first GG to qualify for it. I don't see the point of combining the two even if I didn't have WP, you burn a lot of turns when you could be cranking out units building ironworks, and they're not as effective paired up. Usually HE goes in a good early production city, then builds WP when I get to it. I'll generally have a better production city late in the game for ironworks, especially since I can rely on CS, biology, and/or state property for the IW city while the HE city won't have it. That city then ends up mostly building wonders for me.

 

[Welnic]

Wouldn't that be the same city? I've never really understood seperating the "commerce" city from the "science" city - I generally just make the city that generates the most commerce the science city. Thus I build Oxford and Wall Street in the same city (usually the capital). I put the Academy there too, though fortunately this doesn't count against your limit of two national wonders.

As it was stated above, if you have a profitable shrine that is where Wall Street should go. That will always be generating some gold, and there will just be more if the gold slider is increased. Also if you can run some merchant specialists in there and get the full multiplication of the market, grocer, bank, and Wall Street. If you aren't making anything important it is usually better to run merchants instead of working land for hammers. You can also have a Great Merchant join the city for a specific boost in gold.

You can make as many Academies as you have Great Scientists to burn. I sometimes make two Academies, sometimes on purpose and sometimes when I go, "wow, that city is generating a lot more beakers than I thought it would".

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Wouldn't that be the same city? I've never really understood seperating the "commerce" city from the "science" city

Not necessarily - research can also come from specialists. Oxford, for example, comes with three extra Scientist slots. To fully exploit that piece, you'd want it to be in the GP farm. So imagine a game where you are running a lot of specialists (and attached Great Scientists) in a single city, and running the science slider very low. In that case, the city with the most base research will not be the city with all the commerce.

As for the hammer-heavy cities, I usually end up putting Heroic Epic wherever I've put Ironworks. It's usually pretty late in the day before I've qualified for West Point, so why not go ahead and have your HE production also increased by Ironworks?

A couple reasons. (1) Ironworks doesn't boost your HE production, or vice versa (these are additive bonuses). (2) Ironworks is suitable for building late wonders, but any time you aren't building military you are wasting the HE. (3) At most speeds, combining these two wonders is overkill - a good production city is going to have 65+ base hammers during that period, and you can build just about anything unit in one turn with that level of production without adding in the Ironworks.