Specialist Economy - are you guys really buying this?

shivute said:
Great tips on SE Wodan and I think you have debated your ideas eloquently. A pity that the main CE debater wasn't up to the challenge and resorted to derogatory language.
I like and enjoy playing both strategies and I find that depending on terrain, resources, leader etc one or the other is of more benefit.
The more strategies and tactics that a player is aware of, gives him more options when playing, makes him more flexible and responsive to change and therefore makes him a stronger player and allows advancement up the difficulty levels.
For anyone to completely dismiss another's ideas for an option or strategy when it is so well argued is simply absurd and that person will likely be limited in their success whether in gaming or in life in general.

actually I consider all ppl like wodan to be the fluffers. if the situation was flipped and SE was better they would argue for CE. with just as much a lack of analytical rigor. because its not about actually figuring out which is better, its just about fluff. or, if u will, preference. but not intellectual rigor.
 
yavoon said:
I have no problem w/ my infrastructure as concerns whipping. unless ur suggesting u build 2 libraries or 2 banks, then I assure that I have all necessary infrastructure.
Ah, but you paid more for it. More in terms of food, time, return on investment, and in opportunity cost.

yavoon said:
and u can't build a big enough lead, frankly u wont get an amazing lead. some but not huge. so any attempt to turn 180 degrees and develop a cottage empire will just get u spanked by the cottage player.
Do you have any evidence to back up this bald statement?

yavoon said:
I'm not sure what "using food to make slaves mean"
Back to logic/proofs 101...
--When you whip slaves you lose population.
--Repeated whipping requires population growth to replace those losses.
--Population growth requires food.
--Therefore, it requires food to make slaves.

yavoon said:
I assume u mean u want a certain food surplus because ur being dragged down by ur specialists, or something.
Not what I meant. See above, please.

yavoon said:
so now u will stagnate ur population to work cottages? brilliant idea.
Yes, in the relatively few cities that (1) don't already have towns, (2) aren't production cities, and (3) aren't my GP farm, yes I am going to stagnate them.

What use is being non-stagnated? Let's list the ways.
-- whipping
-- city size growth

Umm, that's about it.

At the point in the game we're discussing, you and I both have admitted that either a SE or a CE running Slavery already has its max infrastructure available. You will want Slavery to whip units, if and only if you are at war and going for your conquest victory right then (otherwise you will only want to produce the occasional unit in your HE/warlord city). We both have also admitted that the circumstances in question preclude a war. If going for an immediate conquest victory, then by definition you aren't playing a long-term game and you don't want to switch from SE -> CE.

Thus, losing Slavery doesn't cost you a damn thing.

City growth. At this point, your cities are limited by health and happiness. Why did you want extra food? To whip. But, we just agreed that you are no longer whipping.

Thus, your city no longer growing doesn't cost you a damn thing.

Wodan
 
shivute said:
Great tips on SE Wodan and I think you have debated your ideas eloquently. A pity that the main CE debater wasn't up to the challenge and resorted to derogatory language.
Ha. Thanks.

shivute said:
I like and enjoy playing both strategies and I find that depending on terrain, resources, leader etc one or the other is of more benefit.
The more strategies and tactics that a player is aware of, gives him more options when playing, makes him more flexible and responsive to change and therefore makes him a stronger player and allows advancement up the difficulty levels.
For anyone to completely dismiss another's ideas for an option or strategy when it is so well argued is simply absurd and that person will likely be limited in their success whether in gaming or in life in general.
Totally agreed.

Wodan
 
Wodan said:
Ah, but you paid more for it. More in terms of food, time, return on investment, and in opportunity cost.


Do you have any evidence to back up this bald statement?


Back to logic/proofs 101...
--When you whip slaves you lose population.
--Repeated whipping requires population growth to replace those losses.
--Population growth requires food.
--Therefore, it requires food to make slaves.


Not what I meant. See above, please.


Yes, in the relatively few cities that (1) don't already have towns, (2) aren't production cities, and (3) aren't my GP farm, yes I am going to stagnate them.

What use is being non-stagnated? Let's list the ways.
-- whipping
-- city size growth

Umm, that's about it.

At the point in the game we're discussing, you and I both have admitted that either a SE or a CE running Slavery already has its max infrastructure available. You will want Slavery to whip units, if and only if you are at war and going for your conquest victory right then (otherwise you will only want to produce the occasional unit in your HE/warlord city). We both have also admitted that the circumstances in question preclude a war. If going for an immediate conquest victory, then by definition you aren't playing a long-term game and you don't want to switch from SE -> CE.

Thus, losing Slavery doesn't cost you a damn thing.

City growth. At this point, your cities are limited by health and happiness. Why did you want extra food? To whip. But, we just agreed that you are no longer whipping.

Thus, your city no longer growing doesn't cost you a damn thing.

Wodan

I dont whip units from my towns lategame. sorry. and I never said anything precluded war. now ur intentionally not going to war in some bizzarre attempt to make ur strat look better? does it get any more dishonest than that?

and yah growing cities are totally useless....hahahaha.

and how did I pay more for it? banks dont magically cost more. and while I was making mine I was maturing cottages. and ur saying that I get less return on investment from a bank then a person running SE does? are u seriously saying that? that borders on plain dumb.
 
yavoon said:
actually I consider all ppl like wodan to be the fluffers. if the situation was flipped and SE was better they would argue for CE. with just as much a lack of analytical rigor. because its not about actually figuring out which is better, its just about fluff. or, if u will, preference. but not intellectual rigor.
YGTBFKM. OMGWTFITS.

Let's exercise some analytical vigor on this thread. :cool:

This thread alone (one of a half dozen in which yavoon posts using similar "analytical vigor" of his own). This thread being 3 screens only at the present moment.

Posts by yavoon: 11
Bald unsupported statements by yavoon: 8
Facts or supporting evidence presented by yavoon: 0.5
Conclusions based on the above (that is, a conclusion based upon a bald statement rather than upon factual analysis): 12
Derogatory or demeaning statements of others: 16

I'm about done with all this. It's a waste of time.

Wodan
 
yavoon said:
I dont whip units from my towns lategame. sorry.
Exactly, neither do I. Why should I be ashamed to give up the food that I was using for whipping and to put that food into specialists?

yavoon said:
and I never said anything precluded war. now ur intentionally not going to war in some bizzarre attempt to make ur strat look better?
Neither did I.

Let me restate it in more plain english. If you're going to war, then you won't choose to switch from SE to CE in the first place. You'll stay SE.

Wodan
 
Wodan said:
YGTBFKM. OMGWTFITS.

Let's exercise some analytical vigor on this thread. :cool:

This thread alone (one of a half dozen in which yavoon posts using similar "analytical vigor" of his own). This thread being 3 screens only at the present moment.

Posts by yavoon: 11
Bald unsupported statements by yavoon: 8
Facts or supporting evidence presented by yavoon: 0.5
Conclusions based on the above (that is, a conclusion based upon a bald statement rather than upon factual analysis): 12
Derogatory or demeaning statements of others: 16

I'm about done with all this. It's a waste of time.

Wodan

if thats all u can do is trump up this stupid flame post instead of argue. its best u stop. real argument isnt meant to be carried out by fluffers anyway.
 
Wodan said:
Exactly, neither do I. Why should I be ashamed to give up the food that I was using for whipping and to put that food into specialists?


Neither did I.

Let me restate it in more plain english. If you're going to war, then you won't choose to switch from SE to CE in the first place. You'll stay SE.

Wodan

not done yet huh?

yah why not stagnate urself just to mature cottages, I mean u wont fall behind a non stagnated CE player who already has towns? no way. Im sure u'll keep up.
 
MrCynical said:
It may have been aimed at a different person (this thread sprouted about 8 huge replies while I was typing the last one, and I'm getting a little confused), but I made a point earlier that most cities (barring lousy placement) will have at least a couple of high food tiles (corn, wheat, cows etc). These generally make up the bulk of a city's food surplus in a cottage economy, and are a significant chunk of the tiles used when whipping at small sizes like 5. A CE will thus when whipped, take a number of cottages out of use, but grow back very rapidly (bringing them back into use in the process). Now in an SE you've got farmed grassland, so will have more potential surplus food, but when you whip you're taking grassland farms out of use, reducing the surplus. If you whip a city at size five it's not going to have made tiles left in used, probably just the 2 or 3 high food tiles, which would still be high food under the CE. It's slightly faster to use slavery for the SE, but not as much as you might think.
I think the difference in recovery times between a CE city and a SE one is much more noticeable as the city size grows. Let's expand your example of a city with 2 good food tiles giving a surplus of 5 food together with the city square. Now let's add 8 grassland tiles and assume it can grow to at least size 10. In a CE it will get 8 cottages and no additional food, while the SE will get 8 farms and a maximum of 8 extra food. Now :whipped: in a University which we'll assume takes 4 pop. Both cities will fall to size 6 and require the following amounts of food to recover:
6 pop needs 16 food to grow to 7, then 17 food for 8, then 18 food for 9 and 19 food for 10. So 16+17+18+19 = 70 food will be needed to recover to size 10 which will return to the starting condition.

For the CE city the constant 5 food a turn means it will take 14 turns to recover. The SE city is more complicated and at size 6 will work 4 farms and hence have 5 + 4 = 9 food. When it grows to size 7 it will have 5 farms and hence 5 + 5 = 10 food and so on for an accelerating rate of growth.

Here is a simple model of the regrowth with farms. The granary is assumed to have 16 food in it after the whip (same condition as for CE case)
Code:
Pop	Fd Need	Fd Base	Food	Total	Food	Total
6	16	0	9	9	9	18
7	17	2	10	12	10	22
8	18	5	11	16	11	27
9	19	9	12	21

It takes 2 turns at 9 food / turn for size 6 to get 18 food and hence grow to size 7 with 2 food carried. Then 2 more turns at size 7 with 10 food to get 22 food and hence grow to size 8 with 5 food carried over. This shows it takes only 7 turns in total to grow from size 6 to size 10 for the SE case ... which is twice as fast as the CE case. The SE city would then reconfigure its pop to run its specialists (probably 4 farms for 5+4 = 9 food and 4 specialists -8 food for a net growth of 1 food)

Since the original 4 pop that were :whipped: gave 120 base hammers (probably multiplied by forge and OR bonusses to give 180 hammers) and it took 70 food to regrow we can calculate that each food is worth an average of 1.71 base hammers. As the city size grows it will take more food to recover the pop used in a whip.

In practice of course I'm blurring the line between SE and CE a little. I'm starting off with a couple of farms and some whipping before the cottages. I can always cottage over them later. I could even when the city is small have some tiles farmews and some cottaged, and only switch to the farms when I need to use the whip.
I often add farms into the mix of tiles in new CE cities as well, if there are a lot of infrastructure buildings needed. The farms effectively provide hammers that get turned into markets and so on developing the city much faster. I guess mixing farms and cottages together makes it a hybrid economy but if it works who cares what it's called?
As to the GPs (which is a different question really from the slavery issue), a CE simply doesn't produce as specific GP types (granted, an SE is much better for this). It can however run a decent number of specialists thanks to the library, forge, temples, a shrine if you're very lucky, markets and so on. It's pot luck what you get (though if you get the great library you'll get at least 50% scientists).
Well as my SE never runs the Caste System, the specialists I run are also restricted by the buildings.
 
I have not used a pure SE economy. I prefer financial leaders and so play a CE or a hybrid CE/SE when I reach happiness/health limits.

Having read this [and other threads] comparing CE and SE I am first of all surprised by the level of emotion on both sides of the subject. More importantly, however, I infer the following:

SE benefits from philo/indus civ traits and is greatly helped by the Pyramids

CE benefits enormously from the financial trait

SE economies are modestly less vulnerable to pillaging than CE

SE requires much more micromanagement than CE

SE may yield better results in the early/mid game because of the delay in creating towns in CE

CE economies improve greatly in late game [Biology, Printing Press, etc] and SE do not grow as fast in the late game.

SE produce more GP than CE

It may be desireable to transition from a SE to a CE in the latter part of the game and it is possible to do so effectively.

This last point puzzles me because the time entailed in growing hamlets to villages to towns [even with US] would seem to be substantial. Is this best accomplished by moving specialists to work cottages or by working cottages with new citizens made possible by higher happiness/health limits in the late game?
 
Pretty accurate summary. Nicely done.

I can't think of anything to add but I'm really tired so maybe someone else will have additional points.

Tyrant Roger said:
SE requires much more micromanagement than CE
I don't know about "much" more. Definitely "more". Not as much as someone abusing Slavery, though. Slavery when best used is extremely carefully timed and requires moving citizens around all the time to optimize food and production both up to and then again after the whipping, in every city.

A SE can easily be run simply by setting up a couple of scientists in each city with food, as soon as it gets a Library. From that point, you don't really need to mess around much more.

Yeah, you can tweak and micromanage quite a bit if you really want to. The same is true of a lot of strategies.

Tyrant Roger said:
SE may yield better results in the early/mid game because of the delay in creating towns in CE
Not just that but you don't have the CE bonuses you get from Liberalism, Paper, and Democracy.

Tyrant Roger said:
CE economies improve greatly in late game [Biology, Printing Press, etc] and SE do not grow as fast in the late game.
Biology helps SE quite a bit.

Tyrant Roger said:
SE produce more GP than CE
Not necessarily. A CE with a good GP farm will make a lot of GP.

Now, a SE will probably produce some GP earlier, because the odd city here and there will pop out a great scientist.

Tyrant Roger said:
It may be desireable to transition from a SE to a CE in the latter part of the game and it is possible to do so effectively.

This last point puzzles me because the time entailed in growing hamlets to villages to towns [even with US] would seem to be substantial. Is this best accomplished by moving specialists to work cottages or by working cottages with new citizens made possible by higher happiness/health limits in the late game?
First off, I think I've said a couple times :D that it's not every city that needs to transition.

Both SE and CE have production cities. These are cities with mostly farms and mines, or forests in grassland. Their purpose is to crank out wonders and/or military units. People who plan on conquest want a good number of production cities. Even people who are playing a long-term game want at least a couple. One city to spit out military and gets heroic epic, warlords, military academy, west point, etc. Others for really tasty wonders. I've never seen anyone debate this point, but as we all know, there are people out there who'll debate anyone who challenges their preconceived notions.

I suppose it's possible to run a CE with 100% cottage/town cities, assuming you have a continent with a ton of grassland and food resources. It'd probably have to be a contrived map instead of a randomly generated one.

Anyway, production cities look exactly alike in both SE and CE and don't get "converted".

Now, a SE needs money just like a CE. Empire and city maintenance is the same, no matter what economy you have. A SE will get commerce from rivers, resources, etc. Some SEs run the slider at 0% to change all this commerce to money for maintenance. Other SEs run the slider at 50-90%, and put in one or more commerce cities to get money. Even a SE running at 0% benefits from having a super commerce city with Wall Street etc.

Anyway, all these commerce cities look exactly alike in both SE and CE and don't get "converted". In fact, they already have villages and towns. Thus, they instantly kick in when you switch to Emancipation, Univ Suffrage, etc. No growth is necessary because you planted cottages in them in the beginning of the game.

Another city which both SE and CE often have is the "GP farm". This gets tons of farms and runs max specialists. It looks exactly the same and doesn't get "converted". Often, this farm is running scientists and also doubles as your super science city, running Oxford.

If not your GP farm, then you probably have a super science city as a separate city. This has villages/towns already.

So, you're running SE. You've gotten Liberalism and are thinking about Nationalism & Democracy. You're thinking about converting. Statue of Liberty would be nice boost to your SE, too, so maybe you'll stay SE. Which?

First, an assumption: you can do a SE better than your opponents can do a CE, early in the game. If you don't or can't, then SE is not a good choice in the first place. I know it's possible, because I've replayed games both ways. At least some other people can do it too, and those games are posted.

So, consider:
-- your production cities will remain production cities
-- your commerce cities will actually get better and produce more commerce after you switch, without any management
-- your GP farm will drop a bit of science, but will continue to produce a lot
-- your super science city (if not your gp farm) will get a lot better

The only cities you need to worry about are the ones left. The "average" cities suited to no special purpose. Like I said earlier, just before this time in the game Slavery has started becoming non-efficient. Plus, you've whipped probably all the buildings you can. These cities are at max population, limited by health and/or happiness. Some SE players crank up the culture slider to artificially give more happiness. I don't usually do this because health is usually the limiting factor anyway, especially on higher levels, where you have added health penalties in every city.

So, your cities have the food to feed more people, you're not whipping anymore, and you're starting to get unhealthy peeps. Instead of getting unhealthy guys, send your workers into the cities as they begin to go unhealthy. They'll be staggered, so it's not like all your cities will do it at once. Have those workers start to cottage.

It's really that easy. You don't suffer losses to your research, which is still outstripping to your CE opponents. Remember, you have a tech lead, so you get Liberalism and Democracy first. The key is to start your switch to CE in advance of this point, and once you get to this point and change civics, you already have some hamlets and villages. End result is that you keep your tech lead even when your opponents get their own CE bonuses. Obviously, don't trade techs during this period. :)

Firaxis had to plan the timing on this because it comes out so neatly.

Note about GP farm: If your GP farm is your super science city or super commerce city, you may want to retask this city to a cottage city, but that has little to do with a CE switch and everything to do with the fact that you've produced so friggin' many GPs so far this game that it is taking more and more GPP to get new ones (the costs escalate). If your GP farm is focused on artists (excellent if you're going for a cultural victory), then I'd keep it a GP farm, or possibly switch to a production city.

Wodan
 
Tyrant Roger said:
It may be desireable to transition from a SE to a CE in the latter part of the game and it is possible to do so effectively.

This last point puzzles me because the time entailed in growing hamlets to villages to towns [even with US] would seem to be substantial. Is this best accomplished by moving specialists to work cottages or by working cottages with new citizens made possible by higher happiness/health limits in the late game?

the best way to transition from SE to CE is to have already won the game and have it not matter what u do anymore, luckily for most ppl this is the case by rifles. at best a transition from SE to CE will be massively behind a normal CE player, and maybe eventually ahead of a straight SE play. so at best its a reasonable bad choice in a place where u've already made the wrong decision.
 
I find a hybrid economy is most natural and expect it's most efficient. First, specialists are better early because of the enormous power of GP's early in the game. The tradeoff is basically 3 cottages vs. 2 farms and a specialist early = that's 3 vs. 3, which is a wash, except those early GP points are worth 3 or 4 commerce each, so the specialists come out way ahead. As time goes on, the cottages get better and better, eventually to 6 with Free Speech, while the GP points become less valuable, more like 1.5 to 2 each. At that point it's 18 commerce for the cottages vs. 3 + 3 (with Representation) + say 5 worth of GP for the specialists = 11. Often later in the game the GP points end up wasted and it's 18 vs. 6, which is pretty lopsided. Just on general economics principles, you'd expect it to be worth it to give up some early specialists to work cottages to reap the benefits later - diminishing marginal returns and all that.

On a practical note, I like to have 4 to 6 extra food for city growth so it's reasonably fast, but then what do I do with that extra food when I'm at a pop cap? 2 or 3 specialists is perfect - almost always available by the time I hit a cap, and no requirements for a large number of good tiles available and improved. So, in the end, that's what I end up doing - having some extra food for growth, using it for specialists when I'm at a pop cap, but having all development beyond the first few tiles geared for a cottage economy.
 
curtadams said:
I find a hybrid economy is most natural and expect it's most efficient. First, specialists are better early because of the enormous power of GP's early in the game. The tradeoff is basically 3 cottages vs. 2 farms and a specialist early = that's 3 vs. 3, which is a wash, except those early GP points are worth 3 or 4 commerce each, so the specialists come out way ahead. As time goes on, the cottages get better and better, eventually to 6 with Free Speech, while the GP points become less valuable, more like 1.5 to 2 each. At that point it's 18 commerce for the cottages vs. 3 + 3 (with Representation) + say 5 worth of GP for the specialists = 11. Often later in the game the GP points end up wasted and it's 18 vs. 6, which is pretty lopsided. Just on general economics principles, you'd expect it to be worth it to give up some early specialists to work cottages to reap the benefits later - diminishing marginal returns and all that.

On a practical note, I like to have 4 to 6 extra food for city growth so it's reasonably fast, but then what do I do with that extra food when I'm at a pop cap? 2 or 3 specialists is perfect - almost always available by the time I hit a cap, and no requirements for a large number of good tiles available and improved. So, in the end, that's what I end up doing - having some extra food for growth, using it for specialists when I'm at a pop cap, but having all development beyond the first few tiles geared for a cottage economy.

in ur 3 vs 3 example, ur saying 1 scientist is the same value as 3 cottages? I dont see how its plausible for a cottage econ to average less than 2 commerce per cottage, so thats 6 commerce now is beat out by 3 science and the promise of a GP 50 turns from now? and if u make the GP a super scientist, ur looking at payoff when? 150-200 turns later?
 
yavoon said:
in ur 3 vs 3 example, ur saying 1 scientist is the same value as 3 cottages? I dont see how its plausible for a cottage econ to average less than 2 commerce per cottage, so thats 6 commerce now is beat out by 3 science and the promise of a GP 50 turns from now? and if u make the GP a super scientist, ur looking at payoff when? 150-200 turns later?
At the start, each cottage produces 1 commerce, so 3 cottages = 3 commerce. Growth takes time, and of course FIN changes the equations (as does PHI in the other direction).

I was calculating GP value in bulb value. You can bulb a GP for a tech worth several hundred at least (over a thousand if you slingshot) so the second GP produces, say 600 hundred commerce worth of research for 66 of specialist activity. That's a bonus of over 9 commerce per turn of specialist activity. Settling does take 100 turns or so to produce equivalent benefit for a GS, but that's not all so long and he keeps producing and producing afterwards. Plus there's the hammer, which is mighty handy.

CE become equal around villages, and superior with towns. But that does take a while and we all know early has advantages. For FIN drop a category and then, yes, CE is probably better.
 
curtadams said:
At the start, each cottage produces 1 commerce, so 3 cottages = 3 commerce. Growth takes time, and of course FIN changes the equations (as does PHI in the other direction).

I was calculating GP value in bulb value. You can bulb a GP for a tech worth several hundred at least (over a thousand if you slingshot) so the second GP produces, say 600 hundred commerce worth of research for 66 of specialist activity. That's a bonus of over 9 commerce per turn of specialist activity. Settling does take 100 turns or so to produce equivalent benefit for a GS, but that's not all so long and he keeps producing and producing afterwards. Plus there's the hammer, which is mighty handy.

CE become equal around villages, and superior with towns. But that does take a while and we all know early has advantages. For FIN drop a category and then, yes, CE is probably better.

thats serious worst case. I mean 10 lousy turns and ur doubled. I think the correct comparison would be done on "average" stage of ur cottage empire. so unless they're all cottages u'll get some number over 1.
 
It seems that partaking in non-civ related life activities for a few days has left me several days behind my own post. Sorry. First off, thank you and congratulations to all for maintaining mature debate pretty much throughout the post. This is greatly appreciated by the OP.
It seems I'll have to re-read everything with a notepad open to do my usual line-by-line comparison with quotes. A few responses off the top of my head, though.
1.) Somewhere in the first page, someone mentioned a quote of mine regarding a two-headed hydra and assuming I was implying a mythical beast for military. Though quite amusing, this was (obviously?) not my reference. Relatively new civ lingo imparts that an x-headed hydra refers to a city in which x-# of religions have been founded. Aside from the obvious espionage benefits, this city can produce massive amounts of cash that do not require the coin-money conversion (coins on city grid - stacks of coins representing money; Civ debate was much easier when trade was arrows...) Again this is available to either economy, but was posted as a counter to the CE's supposed inability to manage finances without dropping the research bar much.

2.) A general disclaimer: I play Prince-Monarch (unsuccessfully trying emporer now) and everything I have ever posted may not apply well to higher levels of play

3.) Someone further emphasized the CE-empire-financing difficulty to a degree in which it had to drop the Rsllider to 0 and still barely make ends meet during wartime acquisitions. I cannot fathom this ever happening to a relatively competant CE player. In my CE games, early (>1000BC) wars often go on until the enemy is wiped out, I raze only cities that are useless (usually the bottom 1/6th in value) and have only once had to drop research to 60% to make gains. Later wars (<1 AD) rarely result in dropping the slider below 90%.

4.) Another post was made regarding inefficiency of CE buildings - Rslider being high and having to make (library/uni/monastary/grocer/bank/etc...) resulting in high inefficiency. This is why most cities in a CE don't make all the buildings (as is with SE). The only cities likely to make all buildings are the capitol, the big $ city, the big beaker city, and GP farms (usually a redundancy here). With U-wonders that require 6 of a building, it's a tossup between either A.) finding cities that would be most efficient to build it or B.)simply making them in high production cities that can throw it up in 1 turn, sometimes two.

5.) Someone made a comment that the OP should have been comparing Financial CE civs to SE civs with Pyramids for fairness. Sorry, I disagree. Financial is guaranteed upon selecting the civ. The pyramids are not guaranteed until built, and may not able to be acquired by an SE-friendly civ until after it's effectiveness is gone (other continent, et al.)
6.) Yes, PHILO helps SE and should be the trait to compare to FIN for SE/CE debates. But how many more GP's are really created? The game I just finished (Mansa-Prince) ran CE with two GP farms (big$/bigbeaker cities). Last GP acquired was the one gained from the 2300 GPP's(? - the one after 2000) then switched from PAC to FR. If an SE (with philo) is unable to get at LEAST 10 more GP's than that, I can't see any equality here.
7.) I'll digress that I overlooked whipping being more powerful with the SE than the CE. In the comparison though, this weight still doesn't put them in the same league.
8.) A counter to my inclusion of Beaurocracy into the analysis stated that it helps the SE as well. True, but the SE then gains gold whereas the CE gains beakers. I find it much more useful at that stage, particularly if a CS slingshot has been acheived, to have beakers over gold: An extra 5-45 gold per turn is less valuable than being able to research higher end techs (PP, EDU, Nationalism) in 2-5 turns.

Disclaimer revisited: The SE is fun, different, and somewhat practical. I would not suggest that anyone exclude it's application to their experience; I excluded Creative from my experience for a long time due to parallel arguments and later found that it's nowhere near as bad as people made it out to be, and that I was shortening my options and degree of fun. Nonetheless, if min/maxing is to be the rule-of-thumb in these strategy articles, The SE doesn't hold water.
 
UncleJJ wrougth a good acticle which practically reflected my opinion of SE.

He did it even better then I can. I make to many spelling and gramma mistakes. But his description come very near to how I run SE.

For people who like to see practical implementation can look on some of my no coottagess succession games.

Immortal
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=178607
There should be Emperor and monarch games futher down, I am to lazy to go and look for them.
 
yavoon said:
thats serious worst case. I mean 10 lousy turns and ur doubled. I think the correct comparison would be done on "average" stage of ur cottage empire. so unless they're all cottages u'll get some number over 1.

Actually it's 15 turns to hamlet, and then 30 to village. 60 more turns to town. I figure a specialist set is about equal to a village set (prior to tech bonuses), so it's 15*2 + 30 = 60 more turns to make up the difference - 165 turns for straight-up equality. Then there's time discounts, so initially specialists will be much better. Things channge a lot with Printing Press - village becomes the old town; payback drops to 105 and the benefit afterward become much larger (about twice rather than +33%) That's why I think you're better off building for specialists early and then switching towards cottages as the boon of Printing Press approaches.
 
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