Second Best Leader Trait?

[oyzar]

IT still cost an awful lot of hammers to build the wonders... Those hammers are often way better spent on settlers and workers... Or just units to conquer someone.

 

[Rex rgis of Ter]

Philosophical! GP are the bread of life! You can bulb 'em, settle them, use them to steal 10 techs....

 

[DarkSchneider]

The problem I always had with the Industrious bonus, is that it is 50% on top of any other bonuses you already get. The early wonders I generally build only if I have the building material (IE Marble or Stone) So the 50% bonus means that it's completed only 10% faster than it would have been otherwise. Later in the game, you should be getting a 25% production bonus from the Forge and a 25% bonus from Organized Religion, and in your capital, a 50% bonus from Buerocracy.

The thing that I think makes Financial so strong, is that the extra commerce is mutiplied by any other bonuses you have. People think that getting an early shrine is good, 1 extra gold per city. How does that compare to getting an average of 8 extra commerce per city?

 

[Silence101]

The problem I always had with the Industrious bonus, is that it is 50% on top of any other bonuses you already get. The early wonders I generally build only if I have the building material (IE Marble or Stone) So the 50% bonus means that it's completed only 10% faster than it would have been otherwise. Later in the game, you should be getting a 25% production bonus from the Forge and a 25% bonus from Organized Religion, and in your capital, a 50% bonus from Buerocracy.

I like IND - not because it's necessarily a good trait, but because I still suffer from wonder lusting from time to time. IND doesn't guarantee anything, though - under the right (or wrong maybe) circumstances, you could still get beat to building any of the wonders. Its prime advantage comes from being able to capitalize on wonder production. So many people are describing IND as if it provides some sort of direct benefit, but it really doesn't (other than cheap forges and national wonders). Admittedly, the bonus to national wonders is awesome though - it's nice to be able to get those up and running sooner.

People think that getting an early shrine is good, 1 extra gold per city. How does that compare to getting an average of 8 extra commerce per city?

Financial provides an average of 8 extra commerce per city? I hate to keep bringing this back to my original point, but while that may occur if you're playing your traits, it's entirely circumstantial - you're not guaranteed an average of 8 extra commerce per city. (If you are getting that kind of return, it shows you've been playing your traits, so good job.) With different strategies however, Financial might be close to worthless. The "best traits" depend on what it is that you're doing.

 

[popejubal]

Yep I agree, it usually takes me forever to build West Point and Wall Street, and exactly when I need them too.

Plus, consider that wonders are "more benefit the longer you have them". e.g., if you get Wall Street or Pyramids earlier, then you get its benefit for more turns, thus its value is more.

Wodan

...not to mention the cheap happy-boost you get from your half price forges. I hear that the Engineer you can run and the production boost from that building are popular too.

 

[madscientist]

The problem I always had with the Industrious bonus, is that it is 50% on top of any other bonuses you already get. The early wonders I generally build only if I have the building material (IE Marble or Stone) So the 50% bonus means that it's completed only 10% faster than it would have been otherwise. Later in the game, you should be getting a 25% production bonus from the Forge and a 25% bonus from Organized Religion, and in your capital, a 50% bonus from Buerocracy.

The thing that I think makes Financial so strong, is that the extra commerce is mutiplied by any other bonuses you have. People think that getting an early shrine is good, 1 extra gold per city. How does that compare to getting an average of 8 extra commerce per city?

No, if I have access to stone and industrious I get 150% hammers. If I have a forge and OR, it's 200%. If I have civil service it's 250%.

An early shrine get's multiplied by 25% for markets, 25% for Grocers, 50% for banks, 100% for Wall Street.

8 commerce per city is almost the same beakers as 1 sceience speciaist if you got the pyramids and run early representation. More since you have the extra +3 happy and can build the city faster.

I am not arguing against Financial, I love the trait. IN fact I love them all, even protective. My point is that Industrious is very powerful, as powerful as Industrious in my book. I rated ORG tops because of a personal preference.

 

[DarkSchneider]

No, if I have access to stone and industrious I get 150% hammers. If I have a forge and OR, it's 200%. If I have civil service it's 250%.

An early shrine get's multiplied by 25% for markets, 25% for Grocers, 50% for banks, 100% for Wall Street.

8 commerce per city is almost the same beakers as 1 sceience speciaist if you got the pyramids and run early representation. More since you have the extra +3 happy and can build the city faster.

I am not arguing against Financial, I love the trait. IN fact I love them all, even protective. My point is that Industrious is very powerful, as powerful as Industrious in my book. I rated ORG tops because of a personal preference.

I'm saying that if you already have a +100% to +150% boost, the extra 50% doesn't mean as much in terms of reducing the # of turns it takes to build.

And 8 extra commerce is generally around 12 extra science since you should have at least a library in every town, and a university in most towns. So even with representation, you need two extra science specialists per town to equal what you are getting passively from Financial. And there's nothing saying you can't run specialists with financial anyway.

 

[madscientist]

I'm saying that if you already have a +100% to +150% boost, the extra 50% doesn't mean as much in terms of reducing the # of turns it takes to build.

And 8 extra commerce is generally around 12 extra science since you should have at least a library in every town, and a university in most towns. So even with representation, you need two extra science specialists per town to equal what you are getting passively from Financial. And there's nothing saying you can't run specialists with financial anyway.

50% production saves you the same number of hammers regardless if you have stope or marble.

Libraries and univeristies apply to scientist beakers also, so 1 scientist with a library/university and representation gets 9 beakers compared with 12 commerce (assuming 100% on the science slider) compares OK. Then you have the extra GP points plus the +3 happiness.

I'll take either situation in a game, but my point is the modifier building apply to beakers in general, not commerce which has to be turned into beakers via the slider.

 

[DarkSchneider]

I didn't know that modifiers were applied to the beakers. I'll haev to look into that. I had thought from other posts that they were not. I think I might start another post on the topic of CE and SE and Organized vs Financial.

I took some numbers from my last game:
The bottom line is that Financial provides roughly 9.25 additional commerce per city while Organized provides 4.6 more gold via reduced Civic costs per city. Even with the half-priced Org buildings that's not much of a contest. Certainly the 9.25 per city is with relatively large cities all around, but the Civic discounts scale up and down with empire size too.

 

[dragodon64]

I'm saying that if you already have a +100% to +150% boost, the extra 50% doesn't mean as much in terms of reducing the # of turns it takes to build.

And 8 extra commerce is generally around 12 extra science since you should have at least a library in every town, and a university in most towns. So even with representation, you need two extra science specialists per town to equal what you are getting passively from Financial. And there's nothing saying you can't run specialists with financial anyway.

True but think of this: Industrious reduces the Opportunity costs of wonders (thereby allowing you to build more) and it reduces the relative importance of stone/marble (and the other stuff) since you're guaranteed a bonus. Therefore, you are allowed a little bit more flexibility in your city choice, like if you had to choose between a city that gave iron and one that gave stone. Personally, I would pick iron either way, but you get the message.

 

[kakitadairu]

If you have IND AND the right resource, putting production into the Wonder is risk free. Even if you don't get the Wonder, the gold refund you get is the best Production -> Gold ratio possible.

1H -> 2.5-2.75 gold, which means working a mined plain hill is like generating 10-11 Gold.

And in your capital with Beauracracy:

1H -> 3-3.25 gold. MPH -> 12-13 Gold.

All without having to build Market/ Grocer/ Bank, and much, much more efficient than running Merchant specialists.

So Industrious helps turn building World Wonders into win-win situations.

Cheers,

Dai

 

[popejubal]

50% production saves you the same number of hammers regardless if you have stope or marble.

This is not true.

1000 Hammer Wonder with no modifiers: 1000 hammers

Industrious: costs 2/3 * 1000 = 667, save 333 base hammers vs. non-Industrious.

With Stone, no Industrious: costs 1/2 * 1000 = 500 base hammers.

With Stone and Industrious: costs 2/5 * 1000 = 400, save 100 base hammers over Stone, not Industrious.

Industrious is not nearly as beneficial if you have other bonuses to stack. That's why stacked "penalties" are so much more significant than stacked bonuses. An unique building that gave an extra 50% discount on city maintenance in addition to the courthouse would make the city maintenance free in every city that had both buildings. Compare that to a building that gives an extra 50% bonus to production and you see only a 12.5% reduction in the number of turns to complete a space ship part from your fully furnished Iron Works building (which starts at 3.5 x normal hammers for space ship parts IIRC.)

 

[kakitadairu]

This is not true.

1000 Hammer Wonder with no modifiers: 1000 hammers

Industrious: costs 2/3 * 1000 = 667, save 333 base hammers vs. non-Industrious.

With Stone, no Industrious: costs 1/2 * 1000 = 500 base hammers.

With Stone and Industrious: costs 2/5 * 1000 = 400, save 100 base hammers over Stone, not Industrious.

Industrious is not nearly as beneficial if you have other bonuses to stack. That's why stacked "penalties" are so much more significant than stacked bonuses. An unique building that gave an extra 50% discount on city maintenance in addition to the courthouse would make the city maintenance free in every city that had both buildings. Compare that to a building that gives an extra 50% bonus to production and you see only a 12.5% reduction in the number of turns to complete a space ship part from your fully furnished Iron Works building (which starts at 3.5 x normal hammers for space ship parts IIRC.)

100 Hammers is still 100 Hammers. That's around 2.5 turns in an average beauracracy capital, even more turns in a normal city.

Also your math ignores the fact that the 100 hammers you are saving from IND + Stone are worth more actual hammers than that of just Stone, ESPECIALLY if its Hammers from a Beauracracy capital (which is where most Wonder building generally take place).

Cheers,

Dai

 

[madscientist]

OK, let's put it this way: Say a wonder costs 1500 hammers (making mu math easy)

Capitals that has 10 base hammers

no bonus = 150 turns

Stone = 75 turns

Ind only = 100 turns

Ind and Stone = 60 turns

Ind saves 15 or 50 turns depending the resource, in this example.

Yes the resource helps more, but you are getting the help from ind and that applies to any wonder, not all require stone or marble or copepr.

Would you say creative is a worthless trait because you have a forge and OR and you do not need the fast speed libraries, of course not.

 

[popejubal]

100 Hammers is still 100 Hammers. That's around 2.5 turns in an average beauracracy capital, even more turns in a normal city.

Also your math ignores the fact that the 100 hammers you are saving from IND + Stone are worth more actual hammers than that of just Stone, ESPECIALLY if its Hammers from a Beauracracy capital (which is where most Wonder building generally take place).

Cheers,

Dai

What??

100 hammers is certainly 100 hammers, but it's not 100 hammers vs. 100 hammers. It's 100 hammers saved with Industrious + Stone vs. non-Industrious Stone by itself compared to 333 hammers saved with Industrious without Stone vs. non-Industrious without Stone. Here's a breakdown.

Building a 1000 hammer wonder that gets a +100% production bonus from Stone.

No bonus: at 20 hammers per turn, completes in 50 turns.
Costs 1000 base hammers.

Industrious, but no Stone: at 20 base hammers per turn, completes in 34 turns.
Costs 680 base hammers and Industrious gives 340 hammers. (with 13 hammers of overflow for the next turn)

Non-Industrious with Stone: at 20 base hammers per turn, completes in 25 turns.
Costs 500 base hammers with Stone giving 500 hammers.

Industrious with Stone: at 20 base hammers per turn, completes in 20 turns.
Costs 400 base hammers with Stone giving 400 hammers and Industrious giving 200 hammers.

In the last example, it looks as if Industrious gave you 200 hammers, but it really only gave you 100 hammers because it stole 100 hammers from what you would have gotten from Stone.

To sum up: Industrious gives 333 free hammers to the wonder if you do not have Stone. Industrious gives only 100 free hammers to the wonder if you do have Stone.

Industrious gives a large bonus to early wonders where you do not have the appropriate resource (or where no such resource exists). Industrious gives only a small bonus to early wonders where you do have the appropriate resource. Industrious gives only a tiny bonus to late game wonders.


Consider the Statue of Liberty with Copper, Forge, Factory, Power and Organized Religion:

Costs 1500 hammers.
City has +200% bonus to SoL from the list above, but no Industrious bonus.
At 20 base hammers per turn, the city is generating 60 hammers per turn toward the SoL and will complete the wonder in 25 turns.
That's 500 base hammers with 1000 free hammers from Copper, Forge, Factory, Power and OR.

With Industrious, the 20 base hammers per turn are made into 70 hammers toward SoL. That means the SoL will complete in 22 turns with 11 base hammers of overflow. Those 11 hammers will be turned into 22 hammers from the Forge, Factory and Power on the next turn.
That's 440 base hammers with 880 from Copper, Forge, Factory, Power and OR. You get 220 free hammers from Industrious, but remember that you're losing the free hammers from Copper, etc. by doing that. This means you are only picking up 60 base hammers which translates to 120 hammers with Forge, Factory and Power.

That's only 120 free hammers from Industrious out of an entire 1500 hammer monstrosity like the Statue of Liberty AND I'm even counting the "worth more actual hammers" bit that you claim I neglected. It not any better with Bureaucracy, but I'm leaving that analysis out since this post is already too long as it is.

Industrious is a nice trait. It gives you flexibility in the early game when that flexibility matters most. It translates to a real bonus of about 10-15% rather than the listed 50% bonus on most of the wonders of the game, however. The real bonus is in the cheap Forges and in the ability to consider building an early wonder without the bonus resource. It's more like Jaguar Warriors or Holkans than Praetorians.

 

[madscientist]

What??

100 hammers is certainly 100 hammers, but it's not 100 hammers vs. 100 hammers. It's 100 hammers saved with Industrious + Stone vs. non-Industrious Stone by itself compared to 333 hammers saved with Industrious without Stone vs. non-Industrious without Stone. Here's a breakdown.

Building a 1000 hammer wonder that gets a +100% production bonus from Stone.

No bonus: at 20 hammers per turn, completes in 50 turns.
Costs 1000 base hammers.

Industrious, but no Stone: at 20 base hammers per turn, completes in 34 turns.
Costs 680 base hammers and Industrious gives 340 hammers. (with 13 hammers of overflow for the next turn)

Non-Industrious with Stone: at 20 base hammers per turn, completes in 25 turns.
Costs 500 base hammers with Stone giving 500 hammers.

Industrious with Stone: at 20 base hammers per turn, completes in 20 turns.
Costs 400 base hammers with Stone giving 400 hammers and Industrious giving 200 hammers.

In the last example, it looks as if Industrious gave you 200 hammers, but it really only gave you 100 hammers because it stole 100 hammers from what you would have gotten from Stone.

To sum up: Industrious gives 333 free hammers to the wonder if you do not have Stone. Industrious gives only 100 free hammers to the wonder if you do have Stone.

Industrious gives a large bonus to early wonders where you do not have the appropriate resource (or where no such resource exists). Industrious gives only a small bonus to early wonders where you do have the appropriate resource. Industrious gives only a tiny bonus to late game wonders.


Consider the Statue of Liberty with Copper, Forge, Factory, Power and Organized Religion:

Costs 1500 hammers.
City has +200% bonus to SoL from the list above, but no Industrious bonus.
At 20 base hammers per turn, the city is generating 60 hammers per turn toward the SoL and will complete the wonder in 25 turns.
That's 500 base hammers with 1000 free hammers from Copper, Forge, Factory, Power and OR.

With Industrious, the 20 base hammers per turn are made into 70 hammers toward SoL. That means the SoL will complete in 22 turns with 11 base hammers of overflow. Those 11 hammers will be turned into 22 hammers from the Forge, Factory and Power on the next turn.
That's 440 base hammers with 880 from Copper, Forge, Factory, Power and OR. You get 220 free hammers from Industrious, but remember that you're losing the free hammers from Copper, etc. by doing that. This means you are only picking up 60 base hammers which translates to 120 hammers with Forge, Factory and Power.

That's only 120 free hammers from Industrious out of an entire 1500 hammer monstrosity like the Statue of Liberty AND I'm even counting the "worth more actual hammers" bit that you claim I neglected. It not any better with Bureaucracy, but I'm leaving that analysis out since this post is already too long as it is.

Industrious is a nice trait. It gives you flexibility in the early game when that flexibility matters most. It translates to a real bonus of about 10-15% rather than the listed 50% bonus on most of the wonders of the game, however. The real bonus is in the cheap Forges and in the ability to consider building an early wonder without the bonus resource. It's more like Jaguar Warriors or Holkans than Praetorians.

The main point about IND is not just the extra hammers, it is the saved time which helps get the wonder versus a non-IND AI and starts the city building something else. Impossible for a non-IND AI to beat and IND to a wonder given the same discovery time, base hammer production in the city, and resources.

It's an edge, not meant to be overpowering (no trait is). Even financial falls short in your on the coast with no river and the nearest AI who is not financial has rivers and gold. Financial would be pretty insignificant for a good long while.

 

[Airefuego]

I'm still at a loss as to how a SE is supposed to work. The city specialists themselves are much less efficent then just running a lot of cottages. Every GP that you produce makes the next one that much more difficult, so they provide diminishing returns as the game goes along, whereas cottages grow into towns that provide even more commerce.

OK you talk about efficiency, but skip the complex debates about lightbulbing, GPPs etc...

The SE should not try to compete with CE in "efficiency". It's biggest advantages are flexibility, fast starts, and being less vulnerable.

Flexible - you can switch specialists to hammer tiles, or food for whipping any time, and grow back very fast.

Fast starts - you get the benefit from specialists NOW, not after your cottages mature. And you don't need many buildings.

Less vulnerable - you can rebuild fams easily (or change improvementsfrom farms to workshops to watermills depending upon your tech level and civics). In CE you are locked into cottaging, and if your towns gets pillaged you are toast.


(Final disclaimer - yes both CE and SE are good, and the debate should not be limited to "which produces the most gold/beakers").

 

[needsomesleep]

I love the great person bonus. MY playing style requires them, so pholosophical is the best for me. I like founding religions, whether anyone else thinks it's a good idea or not, so popping a great prophet to light bulb Theology or CoL is a great help to my game. Also, getting a great engineer, and then starting a wonder, which he can finish in one turn in the first two thirds of the game, is great. Financial is nice, I'll give you that, but Orginzed might be a tie in my opinion.