SE changed my life

[thomson_2001]

hey there guys. if you havent already tried an SE approach (specialist economy) strategy of play i urge you to give it a go. i just whipped the AI two levels higher than what i usually play on.

Basically grow and grow (irrigate everywhere!) and drive for science specialists. Build selectively (not everything) and aim for libraries, unis, observatories as well as groceries, aquaducts etc. at other times maybe a few units or other things but mainly keep it on research. possibly dedicate a high production , medium growth city for units only.

Try to pump as many guys onto scientist specialists as can (increased by libraries etc). This will increase your great scientist GP rate which is crucial. in my last game i pumped out 38 great people in around 700 turns! ok helped that i was philosohpical but thats HUGE advantage having that many!

As for civics: representation (pyramids), mercantilism for free specialist and pasifism for +100% GP rate. so ideally, pasifism with philosophcal trait and parthenon (+50% GP) means 250% rate. additionally the fact youll be running many specialists will just the rate sky high. With the great scientists (and other GP) i tend to lighbulb techs. this is huge. i usedto be scared of this as it seemed pointless...but its not. it means having a tech early whihc means more turns of benefit from said tech in the game. also by beelining effectively you can drive far ahead (beeline techs that give free tech,free GP etc). Furthermore you cantrade your one tech for ones you passed that other civs will have. let them research it fro u. inturn your one tech can net you a few trades with dif people...bargain.

the larger cities also mean more control, not relying on "bulk" 10% changes in the sliders. i tend to leave them at ~10% my research is so good. as a test i switched away from representation and my research went from 10 turns to 35!

as for wonders: the fact you can get tech advance gives you huge bonus here...can start earlier or just run priests/engineers at these times to boost hammers. go for pyramids (chop rush most likely), great library (+2 free scientists!), uni of sankore (+2 beakers per state religion build), statue of liberty (+1 free specialist).

it can be tough to begin with as you require rapid expansion and growth. but slavery can aid here as the conversion of food to hammers cna be useful. however it does decrease pop and lead to less specialists so i only used a few times. as said, dont build everything everywhere. research like mad. yesit can be hard to ballance an army and espionage. but hopefully by being tech advanced your tanks can scare off those knights.

takes a bit of getting used to. i made many mistakes such as not expanding enough early enough and so forth but what a way to play! it just takes adifferent mindset to the norm.

hope this helps

 

[Bast]

Which leader?

 

[Legal_My_Deagle]

I have tried to run this but I like some players I think do not know how to manipulate the City management options very well, since us noobs usually leave citizen management to the governer

 

[thomson_2001]

i was playing as russia with i think peter. i then beelined towards superconductors very early to get the much moaned about UB (lab thing with +2 free scientists). also got electricity and biology on the way to it (+1 food, +1 health with supermarket). was the game of my life.

war was touch and go though...nexttime ill be paying a bit more attention to it. an late game spies were doing my nut#! everyturn poison or blowing stuff up as id neglected the spy stuff. still minor inconvinience and you never get it all your own way

legal, you should just try a low diff seting and practice this kind of game. is really fun to get so many GPs

 

[Seras]

personally i can't get enough of caste system+angkor wat+priest specialists

hammer time! =)

 

[Figaro]

Indeed. The one problem I always find is that, while the strategy is unbeatable for researching new technologies, I often have to wait painfully long for units to be built without taking off the scientists and putting them onto productive squares.

Another suggestiong: have your first GS build an Academy in your best city then settle ALL other GSs into the same city. You'll get a lot more science in the long run than if you put an Academy everywhere.

 

[thomson_2001]

still cant beat the instant tech advance from bulbing, although alot of people are reluctant to (i myself until recently). seras i used to run that combo often also but as nice as hammers are i prefer the science from scientists. that and it also lowers the % chance of G scientist (as is priest points). caste good as unlimited scientists rocks (dont think allows unlimited priests does it? not sure). mercantilism for me was my biggest shock. i had never used it ever in civ 4 b4 this game for fear of money lost...but it works amazingly as the free specialist much more useful that stupid gold coins

as fpor units. in this game i had my 4th city a production hub and my generals were added here as well as heroic epic and ironworks. barracks, stable, drydock and production buildings and hey presto millitary

 

[Seras]

you're right, caste system doesn't give unlimited priests

 

[bonafide11]

I like hybrid economies with a combination of Cottage cities and Specialist cities. This way I can get extra commerce from the cottages and still get good research from the specialists. Plus it's an early back up in case you don't manage to get the Pyramids, and the Specialist economy without Representation is not nearly as powerful.

 

[AnaNg]

personally i can't get enough of caste system+angkor wat+priest specialists

hammer time! =)

Angkor wat, 7-headed hydra and/or Saladin and/or Egypt, priest specs = hammer time

(as others said, Caste doesn't give priest specialists, but founding most/all of the religions is NICE for this as is Eqypt (?) that gives a priest for the monument or Saladin with his 2 priests specs with the library)

 

[thomson_2001]

hammers are nice...but science...cant be beaten guys. have played few games where ive gone for production and just not as deadly as science pushing. that plus having lots of scientific specialists increases great scientist points which allows bulbing of "more useful" techs. guess to some degree its about ballance but specialising cities is a muct (e.g. found religion, corporation in city wiht wall street. plus lots of cottages and farms for merchant specialists etc. spy city with scotland yeard, etc...

still the mian take home message ...grow grow and grow wit hmercantilism and representation

 

[Seras]

thing is...hammers can be applied to science as well...or gold..or pumping out troops...or upgrading your cities =)

 

[UnspokenRequest]

hammers are nice...but science...cant be beaten guys. have played few games where ive gone for production and just not as deadly as science pushing.

Sometimes I think hammers are more important than commerce or science. Try to repel an invasion without enough hammers.
Also, if it takes forever to build more than one or two buildings you'll be in trouble. Populous cities without much buildings in them except library are not very useful. They'll get health and happiness problems quite easily which will stop their growth...

BTW, do you play with agressive AI turned on?
I don't see how you can be effective without a few good production cities to produce a fairly sized army. A few high tech unit will eventually fall pray to hordes of lower-tech unit.

And if you manage to have Infantry while the rest of the world is still stuck with Musketman, Longbowman or axeman, you're not playing on the appropriate level.

 

[Sephlock]

7 headed hydra?

 

[Antilogic]

I like hybrid economies with a combination of Cottage cities and Specialist cities. This way I can get extra commerce from the cottages and still get good research from the specialists. Plus it's an early back up in case you don't manage to get the Pyramids, and the Specialist economy without Representation is not nearly as powerful.

This is the one reason why I don't play specialist economy as often as cottage: I don't like having to build a particular wonder to really make the strategy work.

 

[Conroe]

Basically grow and grow (irrigate everywhere!) and drive for science specialists. Build selectively (not everything) and aim for libraries, unis, observatories as well as groceries, aquaducts etc. at other times maybe a few units or other things but mainly keep it on research.

That is also the basis of a good cottage strategy. Grow your cities and not build any unnecessary buildings, but instead of specialists you work cottages. Food is power, no matter whether you are hiring scientist or working cottages with your citizens. And not building any unnecessary buildings, and in general terms just staying focused on your goals, is always good advice.

 

[BYC]

SE definitely changed my game a lot. I used to spam cottages, and not just because really good, but I couldn't figure out a way to increase my commerce, and therefore, increasing the research, the gold, and the culture.

I was getting really bored with Civ until I read about the SE. It's not always the best, but it played so much more dynamic than just spamming cottages, with all the specialist placement, the micro, etc. It was really really fun, and I've been a big fan of it ever since. I don't always play SE, but it's nice to know there's 3 ways to play Civ.

By the cottage, by the sword, and by the specialist.

 

[Underdawg]

I like hybrid economies with a combination of Cottage cities and Specialist cities. This way I can get extra commerce from the cottages and still get good research from the specialists. Plus it's an early back up in case you don't manage to get the Pyramids, and the Specialist economy without Representation is not nearly as powerful.

Same here. Especially in war ravaged (ie newly conquered lands), sometimes just farming the damn place is better than waiting for fledgling cottages to grow. I end up cottaging over the specialist cities later in the game though, or at least to some of the specialist cities.

 

[Indiansmoke]

After playing around with both cottage & specialist economy I think that a hybrid aproach is optimal. Specialist economy at the beggining is definately better, even more if you get the pyramids, but at the end you will need the cash from cottages in order to be more flexible, not tech faster necessarilly.

Especially in the case of invasion, it is good to be able to turn the science slider to 0 and update all your old units in 2-3 turns. You cannot do this with specialist economy.

I will also agree with the value of production, to me it is production first, short everything else after.

 

[thomson_2001]

i agree completely with having a few high production cities. as i said above. i try to have one uber hammer place for millitary (with great general settled) and another for general production of things. furthermore a gold city with lots of town and wall street, corps etc is very useful. but on the whole almost all other cities farmed for growth works very nicely. and if need be just pump the specialists to priests, engineers and civilians when need a production boost. this way it is possible to get higer production that for city wine mines etc.

end of the day its each to own and abotu ballance to fair extent.

am now a HUGE fan of the mercantilism and representation combo though....so powerful!