Refining science victory?

[Gdown94]

For some reason, no matter how hard I try I can't get my science as high as I would like it. I'm prioritizing Libraries, Universities, Public Schools, etc, rushing to National College, Civil Service, Education, etc. I almost always have the largest population in the world, and usually have somewhere between 18-25 cities. Still, I have a hard time getting my science up above 2200, and I don't reach that until I've almost finished my last spaceship part. What can I do? A friend of mine consistently reaches 2500, and sometimes >3000, without trying. What am I doing wrong?

Take my last game, for instance, with the Maya (on Emperor). I led in literacy since the classical era. I hit the information era by 1850. Still, I didn't get the science victory until 1921 (turn 510-520). My goal is to drop that to under 1900, preferably 1890 (my friend's record). Sigh... I can't figure out what I'm doing wrong. Perhaps I should switch to another primary victory type. I got a culture victory with Egypt before 1890, so perhaps that's going to be my best route, until Brave New World.

 

[Gdown94]

If it helps, I was delayed a bit in my Maya game by Siam. They were a tough nut to crack, as they were surrounded by hills/forest/jungle, across rivers, and were spamming Naruesan's Elephants. They had something like 20 elephants (I destroyed about 12, and they still had another 12-15). So I didn't expand through conquest as early as I'd have liked.

I also tend to favor farms over trading posts, as I like to build up a pretty large population. This, I imagine, is hurting my science a good bit. Maybe.

 

[szcott]

Are you putting population into your universities? Also after Education you need to get observatories (assuming your planting cities next to mountains). Also getting pop up as high as possible and going with science focus. Finishing out Freedom after the left 2 items in Rationalism will help a lot too. Don't forget Research Labs. Are you planting GS in your science city and manually locking citizens onto them?

That's all I can think of atm, my last game my Capital was putting out 900+ Beakers by itself, with only a pop of around 23 I think.

 

[Gdown94]

I tend to have a hard time getting cities that would do well next to mountains. Maybe I need to prioritize that a little more.

I've been forgetting about putting scientists in my universities. Thanks.

So you go with Freedom? I've almost always gone with order, for the +25% science bonus on factories.

As for the GS, yes.

Finally, 900 in one city?!? I've managed up to 400-500, I believe, but not 900.

 

[Unresolved]

Don't go for Freedom in a science game. You'll finish it far too late to be of any use. That's if you can even finish it in the first place, which is unlikely in a competitive science victory. You'll want either Tradition or Liberty, Rationalism, and 2 in Order if you can.

 

[Gdown94]

I usually finish Liberty and Rationalism, and pick up Tradition early (border growth), and go two into Order.

 

[Unresolved]

I would cut out the tradition opener if you're completing Liberty. The border growth isn't worth the increasing policy costs. If you have extra policies before you can open Rationalism, getting Aesthetics in the Patronage tree is always great.

 

[Catan_Settler]

Max out your scientists, probably the most important part. In a science game you're going to want a minimum of 3 academies in your best science city (aka: your observatory/national college city) and more is better. After around turn 200~250 you should stop building academies, and instead start saving up your scientists for a huge science rush at the end of the game.

Make a decided effort to get all the science buildings up ASAP. This means making beelines to the appropriate techs-- Writing, Philosophy, Education, Astronomy, etc, etc. Beelines doesn't mean *ignore all other techs* it means, keep yourself alive by keeping up with military techs, but other than that you should be working towards your next science tech at all times.

Yes, you should make a point of founding cities by mountains. No, you won't get every city next to one. Well, you might but it would be a fluke. But yes you should really try and make sure the city you put your National College in is by a mountain. The way I do this is... if my capital can't start next to a mountain, I will build my second city so that it IS next to a mountain, and put my national college there. Observatory is 50% more science, for the price of just one building. This makes a huge difference.

 

[Gdown94]

Do you prefer a tall civ or a wide civ for science? I tend to go moderately tall, but with at least 15 cities. I know the public schools provide +3 science per building...

Also, what about tradition vs liberty? I've heard arguments both ways, and both sound like they'd work.

 

[Catan_Settler]

Tradition wins hands down. The base calculation for science is 1 population = 1 science. There are two policies in Tradition that give you direct food or population growth, so it is the clear winner in terms of that. I personally prefer Tall, as in-- 3 or 4 large core cities. Any other cities I capture are razed or puppets, although in some games I do end up taking large chunks of the map. I still consider it tall, as I try to stunt the growth in all the puppets, while letting my core cities grow as much as possible.

 

[Civ4Pengbo]

My best science games have always been where I went full tradition then rationalism while going for growth like a madman. 4 Size 30+ cities by the end game give insane beakers.

Then when I can open order I do and start puppetting like mad. If happiness permits I will puppet sooner but it really takes off when I get order. When I puppet I spam trading posts everywhere on puppeted cities.

In my last game as China on King by the time I won in 1986 (turn 406) I was outputting 4953 bpt. SO I guess I was doing around 2000 bpt at about 1920 maybe a bit more. Now it's not Emperor but I would hope to be able to match that on Emperor simply because there is hopefully more money around to buy more things faster so what I would lose from more aggressive AI I would gain from more aggressive selling of luxuries enabling me to buy the science buildings that bit earlier. That's what I hope when I make the jump anyway.

I think you need to stick to either liberty and go wide very fast or Tradition and go tall very quickly not go widish and semi-tall which seems to me to be hedging too many bets but what do I know

 

[Gdown94]

I'll try the tall strategy in my next game, but the math seems to indicate that it's best to go wide. For instance, consider two empires, one with 5 cities with 30 population each, and the other with 22 cities with 10 population each. Civ A (5 cities) generates a base of 150 science, while Civ B (22 cities) generates a base of 220 science. Assuming you manage to get observatories in every city, the science for Civ A with buildings is as follows:

Library: 225 University: 299.25 Observatory: 449.9 Public School: 539.9 Research Lab: 829.9 Factories with Order: 1037.5


With the same conditions for Civ B, the science is as follows:

Library: 330 University: 439.9 Observatory: 659.9 Public School: 835.9 Research Lab: 1341.9 Factories with Order: 1677.5


Civilization B, after research labs, is generating about 62% more science than Civilization A, without specialist bonuses considered (which would weigh toward Civ A, as Civ B would likely have no specialists). Am I missing something? Everyone seems to prefer the tall strategy for science, so there has to be some aspect that I'm neglecting...

 

[Karmah]

I'll try the tall strategy in my next game, but the math seems to indicate that it's best to go wide. For instance, consider two empires, one with 5 cities with 30 population each, and the other with 22 cities with 10 population each. Civ A (5 cities) generates a base of 150 science, while Civ B (22 cities) generates a base of 220 science. Assuming you manage to get observatories in every city, the science for Civ A with buildings is as follows:

Library: 225 University: 299.25 Observatory: 449.9 Public School: 539.9 Research Lab: 829.9 Factories with Order: 1037.5


With the same conditions for Civ B, the science is as follows:

Library: 330 University: 439.9 Observatory: 659.9 Public School: 835.9 Research Lab: 1341.9 Factories with Order: 1677.5


Civilization B, after research labs, is generating about 62% more science than Civilization A, without specialist bonuses considered (which would weigh toward Civ A, as Civ B would likely have no specialists). Am I missing something? Everyone seems to prefer the tall strategy for science, so there has to be some aspect that I'm neglecting...

Yes.
Tall doesn t mean no puppet , it means you only found a few core city and let em go tall.
22 cities of pop 10 that you founded , seems quite a lot to me, especially with all of them having factories and science building up to research lab...if that ever happens for your 15+ cities , you should have won by now
I guess what I m trying to say is : unless you manage to found 22 cities pretty early in the game (and for immortal+ i dunno the recipe) , the latest cities are gonna be too late to contribute.
If you consider puppets in your 22 cities , then ...that goes back to the beginning of my answer + calculation would be wrong (puppets have like n% less science , 20 or 30).

Since in tall it is quite easy to get every infrastructure up and running , it is pretty easy to settle academies in cities with college + observatories.

 

[Sidor1982]

I'll try the tall strategy in my next game, but the math seems to indicate that it's best to go wide. For instance, consider two empires, one with 5 cities with 30 population each, and the other with 22 cities with 10 population each. Civ A (5 cities) generates a base of 150 science, while Civ B (22 cities) generates a base of 220 science. Assuming you manage to get observatories in every city, the science for Civ A with buildings is as follows:

Library: 225 University: 299.25 Observatory: 449.9 Public School: 539.9 Research Lab: 829.9 Factories with Order: 1037.5


With the same conditions for Civ B, the science is as follows:

Library: 330 University: 439.9 Observatory: 659.9 Public School: 835.9 Research Lab: 1341.9 Factories with Order: 1677.5


Civilization B, after research labs, is generating about 62% more science than Civilization A, without specialist bonuses considered (which would weigh toward Civ A, as Civ B would likely have no specialists). Am I missing something? Everyone seems to prefer the tall strategy for science, so there has to be some aspect that I'm neglecting...

You have to take into account some of the following things:
1. Going for so many cities will most likely delay your NC, but that's not the most important issue
2. Going for so many cities will enormously increase the policy adopting cost and therefore delay adopting of crucial policies, that increase the science in %, causing a snowballing effect. For example (just estimated to show the point, not an actual calculation) with 5 cities you can get sth like 50% increase in overall science from 3 rationalism policies 100 turns earlier than when going with 20 cities. The 5 city game therefore will cause you to unlock public schools and science labs earlier. Additionally when generating more science earlier you will get more science from early signed RA's.

Your calculation shows only a static situation at point x in the game. But with 20 cities you'll take way more time to get to this point, and this is why your friend is getting the victory faster. Plus with so many cities it will be difficult to maintain happy for the whole game to get the 15% bonus from rationalism opener.

3. Mayans are not the best nation when going for the quickest science victory due to their UA. Fastest science victory bases on generating as many great scientists as possible and generating only great scientists. The Mayan UA forces you to take useless great people, which cause the price for great scientist go up by a lot.

 

[tomtom5858]

3. Mayans are not the best nation when going for the quickest science victory due to their UA. Fastest science victory bases on generating as many great scientists as possible and generating only great scientists. The Mayan UA forces you to take useless great people, which cause the price for great scientist go up by a lot.

While I agree that Mayans suck for quick science victories, I would argue that generating a large number of GSes is not necessary. I've seen a T182 as the Babs, generating maximum GSes, and a T183 (with a turn lost to part movement) as the Koreans, simply ICSing and working as many specialists as possible.

 

[Unresolved]

I would actually consider the Mayans the third best civilization for fast science games. You will get 2 GS, a GE, and 2 useless GP's that will raise the price of additional GS's. That comes out to 3 good great people and 2 bad ones generated from their UA. That becomes a net profit of 1 GS that you wouldn't have gotten with another civilization(aside from Babylon). If you get Theology at turn 60, then it becomes a net profit of 2 GS. That's not even considering the free GPr, admiral, and general you get as well as the awesome UB.

 

[happycamper]

OP, I just finished up a project recently on warlord and had my science over 30k. I'm like you I build all my science related buildings first, take all the science related wonders and have relatively high population in each city. I refuse to build trading posts and I think they just look ugly on the map. Now granted I do play with a lot of mods, including one which offers additional beliefs for my religion. Taking that aside, I've always been able to easily hit the 2-3k mark for science before I get to the information age. I also NEVER make science my city priority, it's always production.

If you want to look at the screens from that game, this *should* link to them .... http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197971725268/screenshots/

 

[Catan_Settler]

OP, I just finished up a project recently on warlord and had my science over 30k. I'm like you I build all my science related buildings first, take all the science related wonders and have relatively high population in each city. I refuse to build trading posts and I think they just look ugly on the map. Now granted I do play with a lot of mods, including one which offers additional beliefs for my religion. Taking that aside, I've always been able to easily hit the 2-3k mark for science before I get to the information age. I also NEVER make science my city priority, it's always production.

If you want to look at the screens from that game, this *should* link to them .... http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197971725268/screenshots/

No offense, but stacking dozens of mods with insane cheat-mode buildings is not gonna help anyone's strategy for playing the actual game.

 

[The Pilgrim]

It's not about how high is your science, but how fast you manage to pump it. I'm not good at translating epic timeline to standard timeline. In any case you're behind the schedule.

Your goals should be:
1) All science buildings (NC, universities, observatories, public schools and research labs) up and running and all scientists emloyed asap.
2) High population in all core cities.
3) Rationalism opener, Free Thought and Secularism followed by Order opener and Planned Economy asap.
4) Planting at least 2-3 GS and keeping the rest for the end for bulbing (prioritize PT and Hubble as well).
5) High faith to faith purchase at least 2 GS.
6) As many Research Agreements as you can get. Especially late in the game when you have RA boosters.

 

[Sidor1982]

While I agree that Mayans suck for quick science victories, I would argue that generating a large number of GSes is not necessary. I've seen a T182 as the Babs, generating maximum GSes, and a T183 (with a turn lost to part movement) as the Koreans, simply ICSing and working as many specialists as possible.

That depends much on the map size. When playing larger maps (8 players and larger) you have a lot of RA's possibilities. When playing 4-6 players you don't have that option (no friends due to close borders) and you have to rely on academies for a long period of the game.