Peter Minuit is the Best Founding Father

[misterslack]

I dont understand why this FF guy is good. Base unit costs increase. So we are not getting 25% more units but only a few more.

I dont understand why the 33% instead of 25%, but regardless, one lategame unit=multiple earlygame units, eating up that bonus for them. Lets follow that example.

33% discount:
6k+9k+12k+15k+18k+21k+24k+27k+30k+33k = 195K for 100units
No discount:
8k+12k+16k+20k+24k+28k+32k+36k+ 5*4000= 196K for 85 units

15 more units, not 33. Difference will only decrease with more purchased units. (to zero)

No no no. The cost of trained specialists *does not* increase throughout the game. An elder statesman costs 1500 no matter how many you buy. The reason I used different costs in my example is because, well, different units have different costs and you need many different units of varied costs to run your settlements.

Also, Peter Minuit gives a 25% discount to unit costs (so they cost 3/4 of normal). This is equivalent to a 33% increase in gold spent purchasing units because 1/(3/4) = 4/3 = 1.33.

 

[obsolete]

I think the reason for a lot of the confusion in this thread, is that I know SOME units do increase in price.

Each time you purchase a cannon for example, I think it increases by at least 100g.

 

[The_Dwarf]

I think Peter Minuit is pretty overrated at the moment. While I agree he is good other FFs are pretty decent also.
The thing is prices for export articles are much less unstable than in Col1, so if you really need money you have pretty decent ways to get money.
Thus a moneysaving FF is not necessarily a top choice in all scenarios.

 

[obsolete]

Yes, I agree he is over-rated, but still an interesting choice. I have much more important favourites, (at least for my playing style). Anyhow... Threads like this remind me of back in Civ IV where every freiken time a new leader would come in, there'd be thread after thread like "Zomg!!! Trait1/Trait2 is just.... OMG sooo overpowering. OMG! We have to fix this!!!"

And like always, after a few months suddenly no one talks about that leader anymore, as they always turn out not to live up to all the hype that surrounded them.

If Firaxis reads these posts, it sort of worries me because with the little work they spare on bug fixes (which is very small to be honest), I'd much rather have them fix something that is truely broken, instead of wasting precious man-hours trying to fix something that ISN'T broken, but just over-rated with a lot of hoopla.

 

[Gliese 581]

So far I've found Peter Minuit to be much better than any other FF. Then again, I've never gotten a FF at 3k or more political points.

 

[obsolete]

Gahhh!! I dont' know how that is possible, are you only building one city? LOL.

I always end up filling all the bars for each category. Don't think I've ever had less than 30 Fathers.

 

[Andvare]

Gahhh!! I dont' know how that is possible, are you only building one city? LOL.

I always end up filling all the bars for each category. Don't think I've ever had less than 30 Fathers.

Didn't you know? Less is more in Civ:Col

 

[tommynt]

Seems to be strong ya - but depends also on your playstyle - I usually try to be kind of indepndent.

with this +1 Food guy u get guys to to food overflow really fast aswell

and overall the +3 Hammer guy seem to be strongest if u r playing a big nation.

But really depends of u play with 3 cities or so there are other strong FF then playing with 30 cities

 

[misterslack]

I think the reason for a lot of the confusion in this thread, is that I know SOME units do increase in price.

Each time you purchase a cannon for example, I think it increases by at least 100g.

Cannons and veteran soldiers are the only units that increase in price. This doesn't diminish Minuit's value since there are so many other specialists that you need to buy.

I think Peter Minuit is pretty overrated at the moment. While I agree he is good other FFs are pretty decent also.
The thing is prices for export articles are much less unstable than in Col1, so if you really need money you have pretty decent ways to get money.
Thus a moneysaving FF is not necessarily a top choice in all scenarios.

The fact that the prices are more stable doesn't matter. To get your cities ready for independence, you have to buy a certain number of specialists from Europe. The number of specialists you'll end up buying, Minuit or not, doesn't change. If you need 3 statesmen in each city, then you need 3. With Minuit you will have to spend 33% less gold to acquire these units, which means you can start spending your money on ore-miner-turned-soldiers that much sooner.

Seems to be strong ya - but depends also on your playstyle - I usually try to be kind of indepndent.

with this +1 Food guy u get guys to to food overflow really fast aswell

and overall the +3 Hammer guy seem to be strongest if u r playing a big nation.

But really depends of u play with 3 cities or so there are other strong FF then playing with 30 cities

These guys are also good (I don't think they're better than Minuit in absolute terms), but they're also expensive, especially McCormick. One of Minuit's key advantages is that you can get him so early. He's the cheapest trade FF, which are the easiest types to get (getting the first exploration guy is faster if you can get a seasoned scout on your first trip to Europe).

 

[lavos]

I never buy more than two statesman from europe. I just teach the rest of them in schools. Its much cheaper and even faster if you have good school system. Couple of farm towns, two towns with fully upgraded schools and good relations with natives and I don't need much from europe.

 

[Gliese 581]

While you only need to ever buy 1 statesman and such with the school system taking care of the rest, the diminishing returns on education means using it for farmers/fishermen (in case natives didn't have both) and lumberjacks, carpenters and ore miners etc is not feasible. If you quickly want a competent workforce for these tasks you need to buy them from europe and Minuit can save you a ton of cash. He also enables you to buy a galleon early if you have lots of treasure to transport which can be helpful since you might need some time to accumulate enough gold without cashing in those treasures. You not only get cheaper units, you get them earlier.

By the way, did anyone ever test teaching a colonist to become a jesuit missionary or seasoned scout?

 

[obsolete]

I have to agree that this schooling system seems to suck. Even though I max it out by putting in the University etc, and even getting fathers that Boost education, it quickly becomes futile to TRAIN units once you do this a few times.

And think of all the time/hammers wasted while building them.

 

[lavos]

Well I never build more than two universities (i think even two is too much) and I never build any schools in other towns. Also I never teach anyone at least until college is up, then it goes fast! Every couple of turns new Statesman. Last game I played epic speed, large map and conquistador diff, in no more than 40 turns I tough 15 statesman and couple of fishermen also.

Imo it is very important to school only the most expensive professions, firebrand preachers, statesman and maybe some factory workers. For field workers use Indian settlements and buy master workers from europe.

Of course a lot depends on map size and game speed. On small maps you don't get all needed indian villages and you don't need as much specialists. And game speed also effects units cost in europe. On epic Statesman cost 6000, while on quick he's 1500.

 

[obsolete]

One thing I haven't had a chance to test yet, if you are almost done educating a unit, then turn him into a dragoon, then later put him back into the education system, does he still REMEMBER his prior education points? Or is there a decay half-life, etc.

Anyhow, back to Peter M. I'd say, just looking at the Military leaders alone, I'd probably take at least half of those guys over Peter. I don't say ALL of them because, there are a couple real duds in there. For example, the first one gives a free stockade (useless) in every city, ughh. Another later one, gives a lousy single frigate, etc. But then... look at some of the good gems in that category.

I'm sure the free-stockade guy will be useful in the next patching though (we hope). And the free-boats guys, need to be made much cheaper to be feasable, and even then I don't see them worth that much.

 

[Andvare]

The looter upgrade I haven't seen affects anything much, but this can be because I don't pay attention .

 

[lavos]

One thing I haven't had a chance to test yet, if you are almost done educating a unit, then turn him into a dragoon, then later put him back into the education system, does he still REMEMBER his prior education points? Or is there a decay half-life, etc.

Yes he does remember his points. I use that all the time!
This is a small, very useful mini exploit.
Lets say you ended training your colonist and got that pop up into what I want him to train. Now if you have enough money its ok, but if your low on money you don't get any option to wait with training for a turn. Only option is that you go into city and put him outside of the colony, then you can wait with him till you get enough money for desired specialization.

I'll try sometime if its possible to pre train colonists and then just put a new specialist into town and train them into that one. I already smell a big exploit with that school system.

 

[Gliese 581]

One thing I haven't had a chance to test yet, if you are almost done educating a unit, then turn him into a dragoon, then later put him back into the education system, does he still REMEMBER his prior education points? Or is there a decay half-life, etc.

Anyhow, back to Peter M. I'd say, just looking at the Military leaders alone, I'd probably take at least half of those guys over Peter. I don't say ALL of them because, there are a couple real duds in there. For example, the first one gives a free stockade (useless) in every city, ughh. Another later one, gives a lousy single frigate, etc. But then... look at some of the good gems in that category.

I'm sure the free-stockade guy will be useful in the next patching though (we hope). And the free-boats guys, need to be made much cheaper to be feasable, and even then I don't see them worth that much.

Yes they remember how much education points they had, at least they still remember after working with something else for one turn.
What I can't understand is why education should give diminishing returns for your entire empire. You don't get that with indian training where it's specific to a village. I think you should at least be allowed to only have education diminish for individual cities. That way mass-education can be a little more viable by spreading infrastructure around your colonies and be an alternative to trade-buying specialists.

 

[Blackmantle]

I strongly agree with Gliese 581 here. Instead of makeing progression slower for education colony-wide, each city should have its individual treashold and the progression even made faster.

Add to that the fact that you can't zip colonists back and forth to insta educate without price (those 'teachers' need to have worked for quite some time in the colony in whatever profession) and it should work out way better than it does now...
That whould actually increase the value of the school-FF alot + whould be quite easy to grasp and make the investment into edacation / higher ecucation / university much more worthwhile. Instead of planting one college somewere, beeing forced to plan from the start of the game the few pops you want to train and then utterly forgetting about it / buy the rest or turn to the natives...

 

[Knaken]

Do we start to see a pattern in multiplayer already?

Turn ~1520
Peter Minuit joins Peter Stuyvesant.
Simon Bolivar: Crap! I was sooo close
Louis de Frontenac: gg
George Washington: OMG win button! cya
George Washington has left the game
Louis de Frontenac has left the game
Simon Bolivar has left the game

 

[obsolete]

Another issue with education, is I think there may be another exploit. It seems that the quirement only goes up once you POP out a graduated student. So, if you educate a bunch of people, and remove them from the que before graduating, you have educated a bunch of people far cheaper than should have been allowed. And can store them later for when you need to convert them into statesmen, etc.

Someone may want to confirm this.