Specialization is for Insects

[naterator]

But some buildings like library are useful all over. Early border pops is an important factor, opening up the way for universities, +25% beaker boost, and running 2 scientist.

If you don't specialize any cities then ya, all of the buildings are "useful all over". If a library is going to net you something like 63/100 of a beaker per turn in a production center then a theater will pop your borders quicker and cheaper AND provide happiness, which is more useful to a production city then scientist specialists. Of course my production cities usually get libraries anyway, since they build the universities quicker to get oxford started earlier, but that's simply using the specialization of a hammer city to enhance the specialization of a science city.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Non-specialization isn't about cloning cities. It's not a a strategy to ensure 'all cities have 30 hammers' or such. Not about absolutes.

Geography/terrain dictates a big part of what each city has. A city in flood plains or one in jungle or one in hilly terrain will have marginal differences. But some buildings like library are useful all over. Early border pops is an important factor, opening up the way for universities, +25% beaker boost, and running 2 scientist.

Perhaps the 12 ballerinas with flaming machetes is a better comparison than the Swiss Army knife.

If you like bean counting play style then there are plenty of strategy articles for that. This is one right fun way to win. Specialization = death fight fire with water

High pressure water can kill people almost instantly.

If you really insist on non-specialization, just put a border pop, granary, and barracks in every city.

Then, you get to build units or wealth. Do that exclusively. Make sure to get monarchy or pyramids to grow.

Spam units if they can capture cities or to grow onto good tiles, otherwise just build wealth until you reach a technology that lets you kill somebody.

Throw cottages everywhere. You'd do a little better if one city went food for specialists but you'll probably be OK doing that off surplus in a food-rich city.

As long as you trade intelligently and don't do anything stupid with your units, this strategy will win on anything below deity. I've not dared attempt it on deity.

 

[Bibor]

Philosophically, I have problems with the quote. It's supposed to come from R.A.H's author avatar / ubermensch Lazarus Long. Yes, the superman who can do no wrong and is immortal to boot can well have that attitude. For us mere mortals who must live in, depend on and support a community of other mere mortals specialisation is the way to go. We all just have to specialise in different things.

Well you might be right. But its not in my case. Life made me learn how to do a lot of things. I can play piano, write a short novel, design a magazine, write an article or press release, build a PC from parts, shoot with a rifle, make annual marketing plan, cook myself a meal, write a 100-page computer game concept, clean the house, lead a team of 10 people, and several other things. Except cooking, cleaning and playing piano, I did these things on a level that's acceptable for major companies in Croatia in their field, so I would say I mastered them on acceptable levels. I lack surival skills that R.A.H. pointed out (never had the chance to hunt game or pilot anything), but being profficient in several dozen things is certainly not impossible. And i'm 32.
At the same time, some people were probably working on the same job description for 10 years. But that doesn't mean they are more profficient, because the more related things you do, the more your profficiency grows. And faster.

Matter of fact, I'm probably one of the top 5 people in Croatia to have if you want to be 100% sure that anything that goes into the press comes out exactly as you wanted (DTP finish overseeing), and I'm talking difficult stuff like spot color gradients, targeted plastification and DVD covers. At the same time, most designers that vastly suprass me in creativity and skill.

Actually that's a good example. If I get the best designer in Croatia for a DVD cover, he'll make a kick-ass design. But I'll be the one to supply him with headlines, be the lector and corrector for the same text, help him work the spot colors, bid for the best price for printing the DVDs, sign the contracts, add the transparency layers, write down the technical details to the printing company, check the PDF for curves, layers and typos, upload the file to an FTP server and finally go check and sign the master before mass production begins. And that's just one of the 10 things I'm fairly confident I could do for any company in the world.

OR

I could hire 10 more people to do all the things I just did. And go bankrupt.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

Me. Twenty swiss army knives with the corkscrew out opens twenty bottles of wine simultaneously. Twenty swiss army knives with the knife out cuts twenty pieces of cheese. The ability to use my twenty knives to open twenty bottles of wine and then twenty pieces of cheese in TWO TURNS is better than waiting TWENTY TURNS for two knives to do the same.


NB - not that I agree with IAM, ad infinitum: just saying he has a point.

Do you have twenty hands?

 

[katipunero]

Hi

Ideally each city in your empire should have a specific purpose and be optimized to fuflill that purpose. Having an empire all doing the exact same thing in the exact same way would be like having a swiss army knife where everyblade is exactly the same.

Blades of swiss army knife all designed to be optimal for specific purposes and the cities of your empire should be like that ideally.

By parity of reasoning, a specialized empire where one city does only one specific thing and can do no other, is an empire that is just one big swiss knife in itself. A generalized, so to speak, empire however, where each city can do more than just one thing and adapt when the situation or circumstance require it, is an empire OF swiss knives.

This is just language play. I am not one to speak about strategies because I'm just your garden variety civfanatic in this boards who happens to do fine on emperor and randomly good on immortal. I know better not to support an obviously unpopular idea on a strategies forum. Everyone can get so intense with their ideas. Peace!

 

[PartAnon]

20 swiss army knives can open 20 bottles of wine, but none of them work as efficiently as a real corkscrew. And neither of these tools can light a candle or drive a nail into a board. A massive empire can get away with more generic cities, but in all likelihood none will have legendary culture.

 

[alfon]

Hi

I like the swiss army knife example cause it think it good example about how specialization is a GOOD thing in civ game. Ideally each city in your empire should have a specific purpose and be optimized to fuflill that purpose. Having an empire all doing the exact same thing in the exact same way would be like having a swiss army knife where everyblade is exactly the same.

Blades of swiss army knife all designed to be optimal for specific purposes and the cities of your empire should be like that ideally.

I guess I shouldnt say "should" as in I mean its some kind of rule or law or something(not that my word being absolute law would be BAD thing hehe ) just that doing it that way tends to make the game easier more often than not.

Kaytie[/QUOTE

I tottaly agree with this. The OP didnt really use a good example.

He writes like Attacko but says things a little bit clear. At least the anphibious war elephants work though...

 

[IAM]

Strategy: Direct energy of entire empire towards goal. War is the ultimate example of this strategy. The United States, during the second world war, turned car factories into tank factories, turned unemployment lines in to troop formations, etc. This is the non-specialized philosophy.

Advantage: A new military tech that gives your civ an advantage must be leveraged. Every city should be pumping the new unit out longbows, rifles, bombers, frigates must be maximized. Create a desicive edge.

History: If you are not losing any cities in a surprise attack then ask yourself; "What am I doing wrong?" If you have the ability to stop your opponent dead in their tracks then why haven't you already stomped them? If you have secured the borders of your empire then expand them. Specialization = death fight fire with water

 

[PartAnon]

Strategy: Direct energy of entire empire towards goal. War is the ultimate example of this strategy. The United States, during the second world war, turned car factories into tank factories, turned unemployment lines in to troop formations, etc. This is the non-specialized philosophy.

This application of all resources towards one goal has little to do with specialization.
U.S. during WWI = Universal Suffrage + Nationhood + Emancipation.
GP farm and hybrids draft units, cottage cities rush buy units, production cities build units.

 

[kosiosko 1]

Corrected:

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

-Robert A. Heinlein

like henry ford says (the supreme specalist), when asked questions about things during suing for being called uneducated ( can't be bothered finding exact quote, I'll get my PA to do it at work tomorrow) Thats what i employ colledge grads for.

And all Emperors know thats what citzens are for, someone has to peel their grapes

 

[DrakenKin]

History: If you are not losing any cities in a surprise attack then ask yourself; "What am I doing wrong?"

Looks like I found a new pet signature.

 

[PutCashIn]

I can do all the things that Heimlich guy or whoever said, except die gloriosly, I'd be more of an angry ranting screamer.

Then again, I can't really win above emperor.

I wonder if thats connected.

 

[azzaman333]

Y'all be posting in a troll thread.

 

[NonPrayinMantis]

The preying mantis may be an insect, but it surely isn't a specialist.

Preying mantises will eat anything they can catch!

NPM

 

[PieceOfMind]

I suppose you could also rename the city when the airport is built, like put an asterisk after the name.

I like that idea. Not just for airports but to rename cities based on hammers. buildings, science basically any information that you deem important. Three or for items could be added to the name with just a few symbols or numbers.

This must be especially useful for specialised cities!

 

[IAM]

Strategy#1: Use the most non-specialized civ and win the game.

Information: Best non-specialized features for civs:

Traits:
#1 Spiritual
#2 Expansive

Starting techs:
#1 Wheel
#2 Agriculture

Unique units
#1 Fast worker (Indian worker 3 moves // note: worker does not do well against barbs)
#2 Quechua (Incan warrior +100% vs. archery and start with combat I)
#3 Bowman (Babylonian archer +50% vs. melee units)

Unique buildings
#1 Terrace (Incan granary + 2 culture)
#2 Ithanda (Zulunese barracks -20% maintenance)
#3 Mint (Malinese forge +10% gold)

Stratagy #B Isabella of the Incas. This is the most versatile unrestricted leader combo.

Advantage: Spiritual great for changing civis as needed and for diplomatic points without anarchy hassle. Expansive has synergy with Terrace. Half build time and more importantly getting workers on line improving tiles faster. Workers typically needed are 2.3 to 2.5 per city in the REX stage. Through building and... Quechua can find volunteers for you from other civilizations.

Quechua has the best starting promotion of any unit. Combat one is versatile and comes at the start of the game so it is useful throughout the game. Quechua is the most versatile dominant unit in the game.

Agriculture tech leads to pottery for Terrace.

Conclusion: Civ V should contain a new generic civilization that incorporates the best of the non-specialized civs. specialization = death fight fire with water

Common counterarguement: But isn't Boudica of the Romans the best unrestricted civ combo?

Answer: No. One trick pony and without iron it's like a horse without the horse... just flys and crap. specialization = death fight fire with water

 

[georgjorge]

Just wanted to add, my recent game is the first where I couldn't really specialize. I had a strange map (with the Tectonic generator) - a LOT of plains and only on the coast some patches of grassland. Lots of rivers as well...I basically had cities that were doing fine in the mid to early game, but getting them above 10-11 population didn't make much sense. VERY little hills as well, so the production side was very bad (I haven't had a game where I whipped so much as this one). So I ended up having a lot of hybrid cities with cottages, watermills, workshops, and farms, especially once I had Universal Suffrage and Steam Power for the hammer bonuses on cottages and rivers. It was ok, but I definitely felt that I was losing out on a lot of potential beakers and hammers...

 

[jauggy]

High pressure water can kill people almost instantly.

If you really insist on non-specialization, just put a border pop, granary, and barracks in every city.

Then, you get to build units or wealth. Do that exclusively. Make sure to get monarchy or pyramids to grow.

Spam units if they can capture cities or to grow onto good tiles, otherwise just build wealth until you reach a technology that lets you kill somebody.

Throw cottages everywhere. You'd do a little better if one city went food for specialists but you'll probably be OK doing that off surplus in a food-rich city.

As long as you trade intelligently and don't do anything stupid with your units, this strategy will win on anything below deity. I've not dared attempt it on deity.

I tried this strategy on Monarch standard pangea using Saladin (random) and it was pretty good, but after taking out two civs (with mostly catapults and maces) I had to build courthouses. I had maintenance costs of about 10+ on some of the newer cities. I was making negative commerce on 0 slider if I put none of my cities building wealth.

 

[PartAnon]

I tried this strategy on Monarch standard pangea using Saladin (random) and it was pretty good, but after taking out two civs (with mostly catapults and maces) I had to build courthouses. I had maintenance costs of about 10+ on some of the newer cities. I was making negative commerce on 0 slider if I put none of my cities building wealth.

Building wealth is part of the strategy..

 

[jauggy]

Yes I understand that. I made the statement just to show how deteriorated my economy was. With lots of cities building wealth its hard to match the AIs production to generate the next army. I will try it again anyway and experiment a bit.