R & T T4 D5 - Post Golden Age Research

[RegentMan]

Now that our golden age has gone the way of the evening newspaper and polio, we need to reassess our research rate and goals. Here is a very pretty chart that I constructed:

This brings up two questions:

What research rate do you want?

What do you want to research now?

The current list being followed:
*Replaceable Parts
*Industrialization
*Medicine
*Scientific Method

Well... have at it!

 

[greekguy]

i guess you should just stick with that list for now. going by that chart i'd say 60% science rate. that would get stuff researched fairly quickly and net us quite a bit of gold.

 

[RegentMan]

Of course, I spot a RegentMan-typo in my chart...

Spoiler RegentMan's error :

100&?

Get chatting Fanatannia!

 

[Stuck_as_a_Mac]

I also like 60%. Gives us 100+ gpt and a reasonable research rate. Best of both worlds.

SaaM

 

[DaveShack]

I would put Industrialization last so it can be free if ToE is almost ready. Then take the tech leading to Hoover (why can't I remember that) as the other free one, and turn off research almost completely.

 

[RegentMan]

That's one move for putting industrialization last. Any other opinions? ANYTHING will be helpful!

 

[Furiey]

Have we put any beakers into Replaceable Parts yet? (meant to be on the way to work by now, so no time to open the save)

We are carrying on research to get our cities as productive as possible, we don't really need it for conquest now and yes the faster workers will help, but we have so many we'll quickly complete our railnet and have very little for them to do. so I'm in no hurry to research Replaceable parts. If we have have put beakers in already then we continue.

Assuming we haven't:

Medecine > Scientific Method > (if enough time before the ToE build completes: Industrialisation > ) Free Tech 1: Atomic Theory > Free Tech 2: Electronics (for Hoover Dam) > (if we didn't get it earlier or can't trade for it: Industrialisation > ) Replaceable Parts.

This means we need 2 prebuilds going, one for ToE and 1 for Hoover to time with the research rate we pick.

50% gives us enough for a Temple rush every turn, 40% gives us a Library, but is starting to slow research to the point we might as well not bother. I would not go higher than 50% (unless eg: with 2 turns to go upping the slider allowed it to be complete in one).

 

[zyxy]

Question for the proponents of "moderate" research (which seems to be 80% atm, or 60% as some people here propose): what are you trying to achieve? Are you researching towards a specific tech for a specific goal? I would first decide on a goal, and then on research speed. (My prediction: we'll keep on researching at "moderate" speed throughout the game, because there will always be a new goal).

Just to give an idea: my province could run four 4-turn settler factories at the cost of 100 gpt. I would need additional money to rush culture improvements in corrupted cities. I am pretty sure that DoubleStack, governor of Fanashire, could easily use more cash than that; he has a much larger and more corrupt province.

Have we put any beakers into Replaceable Parts yet? (meant to be on the way to work by now, so no time to open the save)....

No beakers yet (it's 50 turns at minscience).

 

[DaveShack]

We are carrying on research to get our cities as productive as possible, we don't really need it for conquest now and yes the faster workers will help, but we have so many we'll quickly complete our railnet and have very little for them to do. so I'm in no hurry to research Replaceable parts.

Replaceable parts gives us the ability to make Civil Engineer specialists, which produce two uncorrupted shields each. Thus MM for food and get the population way up, and even the outer rim is productive. The only drawback is that Civil Engineers can only be used on improvements -- but that is what we want to build anyway.

 

[Furiey]

Ah yes - I play far too much Vanilla.....

 

[GenMarshall]

We should try to squeese as much gold into our research coffers so we can hire civil engineers to construct our improvements .

 

[zyxy]

Ok, I think I can see the advantage of engineers.

Let's see, Replaceable Parts costs 5600 gold to research. That's equivalent to 5600/4 = 1400 shields. Each engineer gives 2 shields per turn, so we need 700 engineer-turns to get our investment back. We currently have about 75 cities, some 30 are corrupt. Assuming some 30 engineers, it would take ~25 turns to get our investment back.

Is this reasonable? Let's look at the alternative of pure cash-rushing. At 0 science, we would currently be making about 700 gpt. We still need to build some 75 settlers I think, plus maybe 100 temples and libs (I didn't count temples/libs, it's a rough guess). Let's say half the settlers, and all the temples/libs need to be cash-rushed. That makes about 60000 gold, or 85 turns of savings.

That's much longer than 25 turns + about 10 turns to research engineering, so I guess engineers would be a decent investment.

We should try to squeese as much gold into our research coffers so we can hire civil engineers to construct our improvements .

I disagree. We also need settlers. To build settlers, we need gold. A 50%-60% science rate looks quite ok. It will give us engineers at the end of next TC, which is nice timing, and a biot of money to play with.

 

[classical_hero]

I also like 60%. Gives us 100+ gpt and a reasonable research rate. Best of both worlds.

SaaM

The best plan. That is exactly what I would do.

 

[Furiey]

OK, the Engineers sound good, I would prefer more gold than 60% gives us, but engineers at the end of the next chat would also be good and give the governors the opportunity to adjust the cities.

I notice that we have lost our Chemistry monopoly (I don't know when) - Maya have it, unfortunately everyone else has very little gold and we could only get Music Theory for it. Byzantines may have given more, but they declared on us, although we can't tell whether they have it or not as they won't talk at the moment.

 

[classical_hero]

OK, the Engineers sound good, I would prefer more gold than 60% gives us, but engineers at the end of the next chat would also be good and give the governors the opportunity to adjust the cities.

I notice that we have lost our Chemistry monopoly (I don't know when) - Maya have it, unfortunately everyone else has very little gold and we could only get Music Theory for it. Byzantines may have given more, but they declared on us, although we can't tell whether they have it or not as they won't talk at the moment.

I did come up with a way that we could have gotten something for our monopoly, but that would have meant trading with the Byz, so I am not sure if they would still have attacked us with this deal.

 

[RegentMan]

After reading the discussion, I am planning to request a 60% research towards replaceable parts (10 turns, +203gpt).

 

[vikingruler]

I think 50% would be the best choice. First of all everyone is saying 60%, that will give us Replacable Parts in 10 turns and 203 gpt. 50% is RP in 11 one less then 60% and we get an extra 57 gpt. Therefore 50% gets us RP and will line our pockets with gold. BTW, I think we should research Sciencetific for the obvious reason of getting the chance to build ToE.

 

[Bertie]

I've been proposing running lone scientist for some time, and part of me still wants to go that route. The reason is we really need gold to rush improvements.

However, DaveShack makes a really good argument about the value of civil engineers (one he's been making on and off for about a month now). I don't believe I've ever used a civil engineer (my loss) and it sounds like they're perfect for our stated victory goal: a cultural win. I think Dave is right about this.

So I support following a moderate research rate towards this, then reverting to lone scientist. What's moderate? Vikingruler's suggestion of 50% research meets my definition of moderate.