Specialist citizens

haluu

Confused Troglodyte
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Hi all, I searched the web for this but saw very little input regarding the usefulness of specialists in Civ 3 Complete/Conquests.

Does anybody regularly use the Specialist citizen types? If so, which ones and in which situations?

I never feel the motivation to use specialists, outside of the occasional entertainer to stop unrest, because I feel like the specialists do not provide high enough bonuses. What am I missing?

Edit:. I ask because I'm thinking about increasing bonuses specialists give in my mod. Example: tax collectors would give +3 gold and scientists +4 beakers. Would that make specialists more fun or would it create too much game imbalance?
 
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Hi all, I searched the web for this but saw very little input regarding the usefulness of specialists in Civ 3 Complete/Conquests.
The definitive discussion is here:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/the-role-of-the-specialist-citizen.108789/

Bear in mind, though, that it was originally written for Vanilla CivIII, not Conquests/Complete, so the screenies are often not representative of the latter, except where indicated.
Does anybody regularly use the Specialist citizen types? If so, which ones and in which situations?
Yes, I use them in both epic-games and mods.

If a town(s) is about to riot (i.e. the unhappy people now outnumber the happy people), and it is not yet worth raising the LUX%-slider just to preserve order in that one/few town(s), then one or more unhappy citizen(s) can/should be converted to a Specialist(s), and the town's worked tiles micromanaged if necessary to avoid starvation.

Since all Specialists are counted as "content" citizens, this removes the excess unhappiness which would have caused the riot (and thus nullified the town's entire output for that turn), at the cost of losing only that one citizen's contribution to the town's total yield.

If a Specialist is required in the early game (in the epic game), I will usually use a Scientist, who gives 3 beakers per turn. This is the highest available Specialist-output, and thus preferable to both the Clown (who gives only 1 Happyface), and the Taxman (who adds only 2 gold per turn to the Treasury).

In the late game, I may also selectively use Civil Engineers to get important improvements (Courthouses, Aqueducts, Marketplaces) built in marginal towns; or a mixture of CEs and/or Policemen in core towns (depending on what improvements those towns already have, and/or what I need them to build, and/or what shield-targets I want them to hit).

If War-Weariness gets really bad, I may consider using Clowns at least as a stopgap (e.g. if I get a jump in WW over the interturn which causes rioting in my capital, I may set the Governor to manage happiness in all towns, just to preserve order in the remainder of my core), but will look for a better solution ASAP (on the following turn, if possible).
I never feel the motivation to use specialists, outside of the occasional entertainer to stop unrest, because I feel like the specialists do not provide high enough bonuses. What am I missing?
A lot!

What more do you want them to do?

Specialists can be incredibly powerful in the human player's hands, e.g. by "Beaker (or Gold)-farming" in the 90%-corrupt areas, you can convert excess food directly to beakers (or gold), in far greater quantities than you would have obtained by putting all those citizens to work on tiles instead — because you would obtain little to no benefit from running their (90% corrupt) commerce-output through the SCI% (or TAX%)-slider conversion.

But as with a lot of things in CivIII, the AI uses nearly all Specialists incompetently: e.g. it will tend to use Clowns to keep order, even when raising LUX% would actually be a better option (and even if using Clowns would cause the town to starve).

So adding even more Specialists into a Mod (as some mods do) may actually be counterproductive, at least in terms of making the AI a better opponent.
 
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Thank you both for the links and great explanation! I did not realize many things about specialists. It seems highly corrupted cities would benefit most from specialists?

I also forgot to make an additional comment in my original post, so I added it. Would it be a bad idea to increase the benefits of specialists, considering the AI does not use them properly?
Here's what I was thinking of increasing specialists to in my mod (but now with the great advice you guys have me, I'm not so sure I want to do this).

Entertainer: +1 happiness & +1 gold
Scientist: +4 beakers
Tax collector: +3 gold
Hard hat (Architect in my mod). +2 shields to buildings/wonders, +1 beaker
Policeman:. Reduce corruption, +1 gold

Or maybe I should increase everything except scientists (keep scientists at +3 beakers) so that there is more motivation to use the other specialists, to your point @tjs282 ?
 
It seems highly corrupted cities would benefit most from specialists?

Indeed.

Another thing to consider is that once all available tiles are used, using specialists is one of the few remaining way to increase your economic output. But that is more a consideration for the ultra late game. Turning mines into irrigation can then help you to research future tech 10 one turn faster. This is extremely niche.
 
Indeed.

Another thing to consider is that once all available tiles are used, using specialists is one of the few remaining way to increase your economic output. But that is more a consideration for the ultra late game. Turning mines into irrigation can then help you to research future tech 10 one turn faster. This is extremely niche.

Good point regarding use once all available tiles are used. Can you explain how turning mines into irrigation can help you research faster? Doesn't irrigation increase food, not research?

Sorry for my lack of understanding here. :blush:
 
Good point regarding use once all available tiles are used. Can you explain how turning mines into irrigation can help you research faster? Doesn't irrigation increase food, not research?

Say before turning mines into irrigation your metropolis uses the city tile and 20 tiles via citizens and produces 40 food for a net food of 0 at size 20. Now you turn 10 mines into irrigation. This increases food production by 20, so you can reach size 30 and thus employ 10 specialists, namely scientists. Then you gain 30 beakers.

For metropolises to use 20 tiles is usually not a good idea as you would want to avoid leaving a single tile unused, but this requires some overlap. So around 16 tiles per metropolis is the sweetspot.
 
Or maybe I should increase everything except scientists (keep scientists at +3 beakers) so that there is more motivation to use the other specialists, to your point @tjs282 ?
If you're interested, in my epic-game mod-in-progress (which, among other things, aims to de-power human-only exploits like farming), I made the following changes to the Specialists:
-- Only Scientists are available at the start of the game (end-of-first-era techs Literature and Currency allow Entertainers and Taxmen, respectively)
-- Clown's output increased to 2 Happyfaces to mitigate the AI's dependence on them (and also make happiness-management less of a chore, e.g. on Archi-maps where Luxes may be in short supply during the early game)
-- Similarly doubled the Policeman's effect (may be OP, will have to check this)
-- But... all Specialists now need to be "paid" (i.e. they "add" -1 gpt) -- apart from the Taxman
 
Say before turning mines into irrigation your metropolis uses the city tile and 20 tiles via citizens and produces 40 food for a net food of 0 at size 20. Now you turn 10 mines into irrigation. This increases food production by 20, so you can reach size 30 and thus employ 10 specialists, namely scientists. Then you gain 30 beakers.

For metropolises to use 20 tiles is usually not a good idea as you would want to avoid leaving a single tile unused, but this requires some overlap. So around 16 tiles per metropolis is the sweetspot.

Got it, thanks for explaining. Very interesting possible strategy to do away with production for specialists in the late game. I like it!
 
If you're interested, in my epic-game mod-in-progress (which, among other things, aims to de-power human-only exploits like farming), I made the following changes to the Specialists:
-- Only Scientists are available at the start of the game (end-of-first-era techs Literature and Currency allow Entertainers and Taxmen, respectively)
-- Clown's output increased to 2 Happyfaces to mitigate the AI's dependence on them (and also make happiness-management less of a chore, e.g. on Archi-maps where Luxes may be in short supply during the early game)
-- Similarly doubled the Policeman's effect (may be OP, will have to check this)
-- But... all Specialists now need to be "paid" (i.e. they "add" -1 gpt) -- apart from the Taxman

Very interesting, thanks for sharing! Would love to try it.

What would be the reason for Scientists being available over other specialists early in the game? Do you like the flexibility of science vs the other specialists in early game?
How do you deal with not having entertainers at the start of the game? In my mod games, entertainers seem vital as a quick way to making sure cities do not go into 'disfunction' or whatever you call it (due to unhappiness). I understand there are other ways to quell unhappiness such as buildings and the luxury slider, but if those options aren't readily available in the early game, do you ever have issues getting happiness to where it needs to be in your cities without entertainers?
Interesting move to double the policeman's effect! That does seem very powerful.

I love the outside the box thinking regarding specialists costing gold. That would do a good job of mitigating benefits of human players from spamming specialists in the late game when they run out of tiles to work.. I would assume that is why you have implemented this?
 
What would be the reason for Scientists being available over other specialists early in the game? Do you like the flexibility of science vs the other specialists in early game?
It appears to be necessary to have at least one Specialist available from Turn 1, to allow the human player to manually alter a town's tile assignments (where the Specialist can act as an intermediate step) and also to deal with disorder.

Since I would usually choose to use a Scientist for both purposes, I set that as the first accessible Specialist more for the AI's benefit.
How do you deal with not having entertainers at the start of the game? In my mod games, entertainers seem vital as a quick way to making sure cities do not go into 'disfunction' or whatever you call it (due to unhappiness). I understand there are other ways to quell unhappiness such as buildings and the luxury slider, but if those options aren't readily available in the early game, do you ever have issues getting happiness
When a town is getting (or gets) 'too big' to stay happy, there are always options available, but it very much helps to be proactive rather than reactive. There are multiple ways of dealing with disorder other than assigning Clowns.

Requires some forward planning:
-- Add/build a military unit (if usable under the current government/Sphere) to quell unrest
-- Convert the unhappy citizens into a pop-consuming unit such as a Worker/Settler
-- Build a happiness-building
-- Connect a Luxury resource (OK, not so many of those in ToC, and they're very rare, but still...)

Reactive measures:
-- Convert an unhappy citizen to any Specialist
-- Use the LUX%-slider (always available -- and since many of the early Spheres in ToC have a 70% rate-cap, there is also always spare commerce available to convert!)
 
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I understand there are other ways to quell unhappiness such as buildings and the luxury slider, but if those options aren't readily available in the early game, do you ever have issues getting happiness to where it needs to be in your cities without entertainers?

I would argue that using specialists in the early game is indication that you are doing something wrong, at least regarding any unmodded game.

Every specialist uses up 2 food, thus reducing your net food production by 2. In the early game this net food production is a major limitation of your expansion via settlers. Settlers take 2 population points and in despotism military police via cheap warriors makes up to 2 discontent citizens content.

One way to deal with unhappyness early on is to simple reduce population by building settlers and workers. Once that angle as been exploited to the degree that it is sensible you probably are ready to become a republic and as a republic the luxury slider is a natural way to deal with unhappiness in your core cities. Far outside the core is where the favour changes towards specialists.
 
Since I would usually choose to use a Scientist for both purposes, I set that as the first accessible Specialist more for the AI's benefit.

Ah good idea!

Reactive measures:
-- Convert an unhappy citizen to any Specialist
-- Use the LUX%-slider (always available -- and since many of the early Spheres in ToC have a 70% rate-cap, there is also always spare commerce available to convert!)
So if there is civil disorder in a city, a non-entertainer specialist will also quell the resistance?
 
One way to deal with unhappyness early on is to simple reduce population by building settlers and workers. Once that angle as been exploited to the degree that it is sensible you probably are ready to become a republic and as a republic the luxury slider is a natural way to deal with unhappiness in your core cities. Far outside the core is where the favour changes towards specialists.

So building workers/settlers and military police would be the best way to stomp unhappiness in the early game? I've seen some players recommend the luxury slider in the early game as well. Do you think the luxury slider is a bad idea early on?
 
My current game (which I'm lukewarm about at the moment - Korea/Monarch/Standard/Continents) I have several taxmen to quell unrest, but still do not have enough gold coming in to support research at all (my research slider is set to zero), and the other civs (the ones I know about, anyway) will only sell me the next one (Education) for everything I have-plus. I'm getting very close to abandoning the game altogether & starting another one.
 
I have several taxmen to quell unrest, but still do not have enough gold coming in to support research at all (my research slider is set to zero)
Not sure I'm following?

Are you saying that your unit and building maintenance costs, and any GPT you're paying to the AI-Civs, are in total too high for you to afford to raise your SCI%-slider above zero without going broke over the next turn?

If so, then you have likely overbuilt and/or under-expanded. The usual solutions are therefore to disband excess units, sell excess buildings, and/or start a war.
 
Are you saying that your unit and building maintenance costs, and any GPT you're paying to the AI-Civs, are in total too high for you to afford to raise your SCI%-slider above zero without going broke over the next turn?
No, it's not that bad. I'm not paying any GPT to the AI for, so I have some incoming each turn. But raising the SCI%-slider above zero does result in "shrinking" such that it's not practicable (IMO) to do it. If I buy Education (for example - there are other techs I'm behind on), then that would be the problem, though, as each one (that I'm in contact with) wants the same thing: all my gold plus most of my per turn. I can talk them down a little, but not a lot.
If so, then you have likely overbuilt and/or under-expanded. The usual solutions are therefore to disband excess units, sell excess buildings, and/or start a war.
I have a little more (non-war) expansion to go, but not much. I'm not building temples or cathedrals or the like - just libraries and some barracks. Starting a war is not practical because my military is still weak compared to the surrounding civs. I'm wondering, at the moment, whether the problem is not enough workers. (I'm headed out the door & have another few hours before I can open the game up.)
 
So if there is civil disorder in a city, a non-entertainer specialist will also quell the resistance?

Resistance is a different concept. Resistors emerge upon taking a city with force.

The thing relevant here is that a citizen starts unhappy, but a specialist has no such negative attribute.

Say you have a size 5 town. There are two scientists, one unhappy citizen, one content citizen and one happy citizen.

Now if you made one scientists to become an entertainer and put the other to works as a citizen, then you end up with 2 happy citizens an 2 unhappy ones. This is not preferable unless this fourth citizen works a very high yield tile.

If it is only size 4, then one scientists will give you one unhappy citizen, one content citizen and one happy citizen. An entertainer would give you one unhappy citizen and two happy citizen. This is wasteful.

So building workers/settlers and military police would be the best way to stomp unhappiness in the early game? I've seen some players recommend the luxury slider in the early game as well. Do you think the luxury slider is a bad idea early on?

Not necessarily. If we assume 1 shield to be worth as much as 1 commerce, then the investment of 10 shields into a warrior are earned back fast. With 2 warriors as military police you can allow at least size 3 without tapping into the luxury slider. Depending on the difficulty setting and the amount of connected luxuries a higher size can be maintained without tapping into the luxury slider.

The question is which option is cheaper and more efficient in the terms relevant to your situation.
 
No, it's not that bad. I'm not paying any GPT to the AI for, so I have some incoming each turn. But raising the SCI%-slider above zero does result in "shrinking" such that it's not practicable (IMO) to do it. If I buy Education (for example - there are other techs I'm behind on), then that would be the problem, though, as each one (that I'm in contact with) wants the same thing: all my gold plus most of my per turn. I can talk them down a little, but not a lot.

I have a little more (non-war) expansion to go, but not much. I'm not building temples or cathedrals or the like - just libraries and some barracks. Starting a war is not practical because my military is still weak compared to the surrounding civs. I'm wondering, at the moment, whether the problem is not enough workers. (I'm headed out the door & have another few hours before I can open the game up.)

Your problem could be too many workers and other units. Also building libraries while being unable to fund research is fare from efficient. Some major mistakes seems to have been made. Building some settles to found temporary cities can mitigate such troubles in the early republic.
 
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