No beaker overflow in Civ5?

[aimlessgun]

I've noticed that I don't seem to be getting beaker overflow from previous techs like in Civ4? Am I crazy?

Not complaining, actually makes me think more about how exactly I want to place my specs for every tech.

 

[KCMcG]

Actually, that's currently in the list of confirmed bugs. I hope they fix it with one of the early patches because nothing's more annoying than to be 5 beakers short of the next tech and wasting the next 50-200 beakers.

 

[aimlessgun]

Actually, that's currently in the list of confirmed bugs. I hope they fix it with one of the early patches because nothing's more annoying than to be 5 beakers short of the next tech and wasting the next 50-200 beakers.

Ah interesting. And yeah I had the 5 beaker short thing happen to me. Turns out I've spent like half this diety attempt wasting god knows how many beakers ><

 

[Lord Monkey]

Why would scientific progress on, say, a combustion engine "spill over" and let you discover free speech more quickly? If they bring back an overflow system, I think it should only be between very closely related techs (like gunpowder and rifling)

 

[OMG Hexes]

Why would scientific progress on, say, a combustion engine "spill over" and let you discover free speech more quickly? If they bring back an overflow system, I think it should only be between very closely related techs (like gunpowder and rifling)

Because you're not actually spending the entire time period of a given turn still researching something you discovered at the beginning of it. If a turn is 20 years long and you spend the first year finishing navigation (the last 5 beakers), your scientists would not continue for the next 19 years trying to discover the tech you just finished. They would obviously move on to another project.

Because the game is broken up into turns, you have to wait until the next turn to choose what that next project is. But it doesn't make sense to model the game as if all the scientists in your civ would just sit on their hands for 19 years waiting for direction (i.e., the wasted beaker model).

Therefore, you should get to choose the tech that your scientists were working on for the last 19 years of the previous turn.

 

[TiVO]

Good to know. That reminds me that I need to check for production spillover.

Why would scientific progress on, say, a combustion engine "spill over" and let you discover free speech more quickly? If they bring back an overflow system, I think it should only be between very closely related techs (like gunpowder and rifling)

That's an interesting idea. No normal spillover, but maybe a university or labratory-like wonder (Large Hadron Collider anyone? On second thought, that'd be too late in the game to be of much use) or a building that provides a small amount of on related technologies. I kind of like it, makes sense.

Edit:

Because you're not actually spending the entire time period of a given turn still researching something you discovered at the beginning of it. If a turn is 20 years long and you spend the first year finishing navigation (the last 5 beakers), your scientists would not continue for the next 19 years trying to discover the tech you just finished. They would obviously move on to another project.

But that makes sense too.

 

[Ahriman]

That reminds me that I need to check for production spillover.

I think in practice production does spill over, but the UI doesn't show it.

 

[Paeanblack]

I'd like to see any beaker spillover to be divided up and distributed evenly among all of the techs that are available for research. Directing the spill solely into what you research next invites too much micro/gaminess by juggling research options so all the spillover from multiple techs ends up in one specific tech.

 

[Biz_]

spilling over to whatever you research next is the most sensible thing

i don't care if it's realistic, but it will stop me from playing little arithmetic games where i'll delay getting a tech until i grow a city because it has 7 beakers left and i only produce 6 per turn... etc.

 

[Tyrael]

I'd like to see any beaker spillover to be divided up and distributed evenly among all of the techs that are available for research. Directing the spill solely into what you research next invites too much micro/gaminess by juggling research options so all the spillover from multiple techs ends up in one specific tech.

Spillover goes into whichever tech you choose next. There's no micro- you just pick your next tech and that tech gets those beakers, then you research it normally.

 

[nodule]

Realism is an argument for keeping the lack of spillover, but it is a gameplay nightmare. You don't want people to have to micromanage their empire every turn to prevent stupidity like this.

Strangely, I seem to recall once researching two techs in one turn when I was backfilling very early techs. They were queued. I'm not sure though.

 

[PieceOfMind]

You don't want people to have to micromanage their empire every turn to prevent stupidity like this.

That sums it up, for me. Wasting overflow is bad design, and goes completely against the whole point of streamlining the game.

 

[Jabba]

Please, please bring back spillover. It is just micromanagement idiocy otherwise.

Realism??? Since when do all a country's scientists all focus on one technology for fifty years, and then switch to another for fifty years, wasting any excess effort they spent on the previous idea? Since when is the history of scientific progress divided up into discrete turns, during which you have to devote all your effort and resources into one thing or another thing?

 

[UncleJJ]

This is one of the most annoying features of the game. I had to micromanage my research for about 50 turns in the middle game, increasing and decreasing the amount of research by fiddling with scientists and other specialists to get the Rationalism bonus beakers. It makes a huge difference, taking 4 turns to research a tech with a massive overflow that is lost, or 3 turns to get it exactly by adding enough specialists. That made far more difference than getting another GS probably increasing my overall research rate by 20%. Very poor design or a bad oversight by Firaxis.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Very very likely it was oversight IMO. Should be at the top of the list for things to patch!

 

[Zelig]

Very very likely it was oversight IMO. Should be at the top of the list for things to patch!

Although they should probably increase the cost of techs to compensate, since I doubt much of the testers were bothering to micro science to prevent overflow.

And micro'ing science is a huge pain, you have to account for every city that will grow every time you select a tech, and figure out how multipliers and specialists will affect the science rate.

 

[Tyops]

Teching does not need to be sped even more up relative to production.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Although they should probably increase the cost of techs to compensate, since I doubt much of the testers were bothering to micro science to prevent overflow.

And micro'ing science is a huge pain, you have to account for every city that will grow every time you select a tech, and figure out how multipliers and specialists will affect the science rate.

Good point.

Teching does not need to be sped even more up relative to production.

Which is why you do what Zelig just said.

 

[Biz_]

it's actually really important right now to micromanage this

the majority of players will be doing 4-4-4-5-5 = 22 for a price 23 tech
or 7-7-7-7-7 = 35 for a price 36 tech

at least this is how it works on quick speed

and then people rage when you get wonders faster

 

[delra]

It's annoying as hell. Especially when you go back to 2-turns techs after a sling.