Understanding Vox Populi and making decisions

[crdvis16]

For Tier 1 wonders (Stonehenge/Pyramid) its all about the hammers.

For Tier 2 wonders (Maus and ToA) I think science is most important.

Past that, I think culture is far more important than science for most wonders. I am much more often limited on policies than I am on getting the needed tech. There are exceptions (Roman Forum is more tech limited for example), but most wonders I think its culture that's the bottleneck.

This is mostly my experience as well. You pretty much have to beeline for Stonehenge/Pyramids (of course) as well as ToA/Maus. For Hanging Gardens/Roman Forum I can detour for Pottery first and still get them so they aren't gated by techs (if I skipped Pottery and went straight for them I would end up waiting some number of turns for the policy requirement). Every wonder from then on I've gotten without a 100% beeline and if I did beeline them 100% there's a decent chance I'd end up waiting on the next policy anyway. This usually gets more apparent by the time you get to wonders like Pisa and Porcelain- I can often unlock those techs but still be 2 policies away from being able to build them depending on the game. At that point it's culture that's gating me.

If we are talking Ethiopia, then both Stalker0 and CrazyG are right. Ethiopia is great for Progress tree, with her two buildings in one and her almost guaranteed religion.
Also, free techs every now and then from her Unique Ability are converted into culture from Progress scaler.
Probably not optimal, but I've been playing tall progress Ethiopia for a while. Ethiopia strong start makes up for tall Progress slow start, as long as I have peaceful neighbours. Then Artistry, and I get ready to encroach. Mehal Sefari is such a good defender. As I said, probably not doable in highest difficulties.

I'd agree that Ethiopia is best played Progress since it leans into their natural early strength of a strong spammable UB and free techs to jumpstart Progress. Can certainly go Tradition though, of course.

I disagree. If culture is the barrier playing tradition you are doing something wrong.

Didn't you just say in a previous post that you highly prioritize science buildings and put culture buildings fairly low on your list? Given that you prioritize science so much how are you getting enough culture for wonder policy requirements starting around the Renaissance?

 

[JamesNinelives]

This is mostly my experience as well. You pretty much have to beeline for Stonehenge/Pyramids (of course) as well as ToA/Maus. For Hanging Gardens/Roman Forum I can detour for Pottery first and still get them so they aren't gated by techs (if I skipped Pottery and went straight for them I would end up waiting some number of turns for the policy requirement). Every wonder from then on I've gotten without a 100% beeline and if I did beeline them 100% there's a decent chance I'd end up waiting on the next policy anyway. This usually gets more apparent by the time you get to wonders like Pisa and Porcelain- I can often unlock those techs but still be 2 policies away from being able to build them depending on the game. At that point it's culture that's gating me.

Ah, this might explain some of my confusion. I don't really bee-line wonders beyond the Ancient Era. I feel like this is the system working as intended though, in that things like rushing straight for the Great Library are no longer viable. It always annoyed me when that was built super early because it felt like I had no chance unless I was hyper-focused.

In English both Russia, Egypt, and Germany are weak. In my mother tongue Russia is she-weak, Egypt is he-weak, and Germany are it-weak.

Not sure why you chose that example but OK. In French, all three are feminine .

 

[crdvis16]

I would disagree with a notion that tradition needs only capital and sattelite cities are just to get monopolies, don't need to grow etc. You need those cities to give your production and gold. And you can make at least two, three if possible shiny cities, with great production to give you income, units, NOT guilds, but engineers, later scientists, and build wonders that don't need to be in the capital or during time when you rapidly unlock several wonders. I tend to delegate sistine chapel, eiffel tower to such cities.
Not always, but because you should have pile any great person modifier in the capital and scale price so much which will make secondary guilds useless, you don't want those guilds in those high growth and production cities, but in worse spots fourth and fifth city.
Tradition and rationalism give strong bonuses to grow to all cities, not only to capital, which is a fact that many people forget and tend to focus on capital in things they shouldn't and invest in guilds in secondary cities that they give them one writer or artist for entire game, instead of working more good tiles, growing, and locking engineers and scientists.

If you're going OCC you'd do best to pick Tradition, right? Why is that? Because Tradition can compete even when they only have their capital. Because in Tradition play the capital is far and away the biggest source of yields, great people, etc. You don't need your secondary cities for much other than to offload things like building military, trade units, secure land/resources, defense, etc.

If you're building wonders in secondary cities because your capital is already building a wonder then you're probably winning pretty hard anyway. My guess is that your monster capital could probably build both wonders before that secondary city actually finished the one.

There's a pretty good argument to be made that working any specialists in your secondary cities is somewhat inefficient when playing Tradition. You're just not likely to get many GPs out of secondary cities so those specialists are more for yields than anything. But at least with guilds you don't even have to work the specialist slots because the guilds themselves give a very large amount of great person points. So you end up getting great people from guilds at a higher rate than other types (scientists, engineers, etc) in secondary cities from that alone with much less investment.

 

[Cokolwiek]

Didn't you just say in a previous post that you highly prioritize science buildings and put culture buildings fairly low on your list? Given that you prioritize science so much how are you getting enough culture for wonder policy requirements starting around the Renaissance?

That was post about general order in any city. Tradition capital is something very special (to my kpop heart). I would still value production and science buildings first though. I play culture tradition somewhat differently than many people many times with only three cities, any more are nothing but a massive drain to you culture and tourism in my opinion. And even it this setting capital is responsible for about 70 to 80 percent of my culture output, the later in the game, the more. Wonders, tradition opener, city states, I always found, so I make my religion around GP and culture when tradition, guilds, theming bonuses. And statecraft (easily minus two policies), many times if I went artistry I feel I could not win culturally or scientific (or survive due to lack of uranium) while going statecraft makes both victories open.

If you're building wonders in secondary cities because your capital is already building a wonder then you're probably winning pretty hard anyway. My guess is that your monster capital could probably build both wonders before that secondary city actually finished the one.

I am not that strong by renaissance or modern when it happens many times and mostly due to about 300% more wonders cost modifier I have by that time which ai doesn't have because I build wonder after wonder after wonder. Also some wonders are locked by terrain which my capital may not have and are still nice to have. I am not willing to risk loosing sistine and eiffel in particular.

There's a pretty good argument

That's why I proposed it, engineers and scientist are more important in secondary ctities, capital should focus on guilds as soon as possible. This is my experience with tradition and in fact many times with authority also.

 

[crdvis16]

That was post about general order in any city. Tradition capital is something very special (to my kpop heart). I would still value production and science buildings first though. I play culture tradition somewhat differently than many people many times with only three cities, any more are nothing but a massive drain to you culture and tourism in my opinion. And even it this setting capital is responsible for about 70 to 80 percent of my culture output, the later in the game, the more. Wonders, tradition opener, city states, I always found, so I make my religion around GP and culture when tradition, guilds, theming bonuses. And statecraft (easily minus two policies), many times if I went artistry I feel I could not win culturally or scientific (or survive due to lack of uranium) while going statecraft makes both victories open.

I think it's fairly standard to keep your number of cities low when playing Tradition so I don't think you're particularly different in that regard. I'll usually stick to a total of 3-5 cities as Tradition myself. Less cities is probably better short term, more cities might be better in the long run (unless the extra cities made you miss out on a chance to snowball better early on).

I think you're totally right that a Tradition capital is overwhelmingly the biggest source of your total yields. Which is why I still think your secondary cities are just not as important and better thought of as support to build things I don't have to build in my capital (military, trade, etc) and to secure land/resources/defensible locations. I still wonder why you push back against this framing when you acknowledge that the capital is the main strength in tradition?

You're probably right that Statecraft is a bit overtuned right now, though. It always feels stronger to me even when it probably shouldn't be, like in games when I'm not really going overboard seeking CS alliances. It seems like even if I friend/ally the relatively nearby CSs statecraft tends to pay off big and only fails if for some reason I can't really ally anyone.

I am not that strong by renaissance or modern when it happens many times and mostly due to about 300% more wonders cost modifier I have by that time which ai doesn't have because I build wonder after wonder after wonder. Also some wonders are locked by terrain which my capital may not have and are still nice to have. I am not willing to risk loosing sistine and eiffel in particular.

Doesn't the production penalty for building more wonders apply regardless of where it's built in your empire? That 300% production cost modifier is presumably active in your secondary city as well which has far less population and production relative to your capital, right? Or maybe that's a big oversight on my part and the penalty is city specific (which I would argue is a bad implementation of this limiter on runaways and should apply empire wide). So again, I would probably be able to build 2 wonders in my capital faster than that secondary city could finish one of them unless that production penalty is capital specific.

Now, in the case of terrain specific wonders (Machu, Petra, etc) then sure- if a secondary city needs to build it then that makes total sense.

That's why I proposed it, engineers and scientist are more important in secondary ctities, capital should focus on guilds as soon as possible. This is my experience with tradition and in fact many times with authority also.

Again, I still don't understand why you think this. Scientists/Engineers are no more likely to be born in secondary cities when your capital has more slots, more modifiers for great people, etc. If you value the yields so heavily that you are willing to pay the food price to work them then that's fine (though in the case of an engineer it would probably make more sense to just work a mine and save yourself the food penalty). The cultural specialists from guilds give a pretty valuable yield too, though.

Or are you saying that you don't work engineers/scientists in your Tradition capital and only work them in secondary cities and at that point your secondary cities are producing those great people? That would seem inefficient to me. I typically work all available slots in my Tradition capital starting from the time I finish the Tradition policy tree. You get food cost reductions in your capital, you get great person generation rates in your capital, you get %modifiers that increase the value of those yields in your capital, etc. A scientist or engineer in your capital is more valuable and less costly than one being worked in your secondary cities.

 

[CrazyG]

many times if I went artistry I feel I could not win culturally or scientific (or survive due to lack of uranium) while going statecraft makes both victories open.

Then you're playing artistry wrong. It's such a good tree, by default I think its way better than statecraft, and it works excellently for tourism victories. I literally can't win by science with artistry because I always win by tourism first, even if I wasn't pursuing that victory.

I am not that strong by renaissance or modern when it happens many times and mostly due to about 300% more wonders cost modifier I have by that time which ai doesn't have because I build wonder after wonder after wonder. Also some wonders are locked by terrain which my capital may not have and are still nice to have. I am not willing to risk loosing sistine and eiffel in particular.

If you are building "wonder after wonder after wonder" like this, then you've snowballed to the point the game is already won. I've been there too on older patches, I think all it meant was that the AI was too easy.

 

[Cokolwiek]

Then you're playing artistry wrong. It's such a good tree, by default I think its way better than statecraft, and it works excellently for tourism victories. I literally can't win by science with artistry because I always win by tourism first, even if I wasn't pursuing that victory.

I don't argue that. Maybe I am, though most of its bonuses can't really be played wrong, because they are just flat bonuses to the thinks you would normally do. I am just glad that even with cultural tradition you can keep options open and expermient with statecraft or even fealty for great artists, than choose artistry every time. Or rebrand to science in atomic, if there's a

I think all it meant was that the AI was too easy.

I generally agree, but the most recent version may have overtuned this a little.

I still wonder why you push back against this framing when you acknowledge that the capital is the main strength in tradition?

Because once again, capital is enabled to be main source if you have better secondary cities more and synergy emerges. It can make up with buildings,

Scientists/Engineers are no more likely to be born in secondary cities

That is not the point. Their yields is what matter. They are not for GPp. More engineers, better production, better complimenting capital at building secondary wonders, units, buildings etc. And tend to value growth so much, the city will be able to work most if not all valuable available tiles and engineers. Only then I work guilds.

Or are you saying that you don't work engineers/scientists in your Tradition capital and only work them in secondary cities and at that point your secondary cities are producing those great people?

No, capital is big and shiny, with all slots. Just yields.

Doesn't the production penalty for building more wonders apply regardless of where it's built in your empire?

It does. That is not the point. The point is ai won't have it )because you buildings most of wonders) and may beat you even if you was fastre at tech, because it has to wait while capital will finish earlier one.

So again, I would probably be able to build 2 wonders in my capital faster than that secondary city could finish one of them unless that production penalty is capital specific.

The whole point you can't, or I am just unwilling to take a risk. And some doesn't need to be in the capital. Sometimes you need breath to allow normal buildings to catch up in capital when they are unlock amids many wonder like grocer and opera house during pisa, sistine, taj mahal, leaning tower, uffizi, globe spree. You simply cannot have all of them in one city, if you begin with 150% penalty already. Furthermore if you really wonderwhore hard, ai that is close technologically, doesn't have such a penalty and may grab something, I want to rule that out. Also, I usually build two sattelites to be as high in production as capital by renaissance.

I think it's fairly standard to keep your number of cities low when playing Tradition so I don't think you're particularly different in that regard.

I was referring to popular thinking in these forums that you always should have as many cities as possible to your hapiness, and VP scales better for cities (which is generally true but not to culture, tourism) and advocating 6 cities to tradition, or even 7, 8. Which I saw many times here. Of coursee, for science or diplomatic victory it scales differently, it is mainly cultural thing, due to how one sided in tourism you capital will be.

 

[CrazyG]

That is not the point. Their yields is what matter. They are not for GPp. More engineers, better production, better complimenting capital at building secondary wonders, units, buildings etc. And tend to value growth so much, the city will be able to work most if not all valuable available tiles and engineers. Only then I work guilds.

In my last tradition game I was able to get all relevant buildings constructed while using engineers in secondary cities very, very little.

I think working all engineers slots before guilds is really suboptimal. This isn't even unique to tradition, culture is a really important yield, and engineers aren't even the most efficient way to get production. I tend to use mines if given the choice, but this also changes a lot between different starts.

 

[Cokolwiek]

In my last tradition game I was able to get all relevant buildings constructed while using engineers in secondary cities very, very little.

But you probably didn't use them for buildings wonders. And maybe was not next to warmonger, which neccessitated unit production, hence less time for buildings from both. Many things are location and setting dependent,a s they should be in strategy games.

I think working all engineers slots before guilds is really suboptimal. This isn't even unique to tradition, culture is a really important yield, and engineers aren't even the most efficient way to get production. I tend to use mines if given the choice, but this also changes a lot between different starts.

I tend to disagree in my case, but I don't say you are not right. In my warmongering games I am nearly always on the top, first or second to adopt ideology, and most of that is through captured wonders, great works, vassal yields (esp. after you subjugated some tradtion empires), buildings and killings. I value terracotta very much also. So these are circumstances in which own guilds are really tertiary culture source. But I agree they are slim, I just tend to play this style often.

If you are building "wonder after wonder after wonder" like this, then you've snowballed to the point the game is already won. I've been there too on older patches, I think all it meant was that the AI was too easy.

Yeah, because I was building wonder after wonders in renaisance and it never stops. Too early to win a deity. That's why I advocate stroger middle and late game bonuses for AI.

 

[crdvis16]

I'm in a game as Egypt currently. I have ~1/3rd of all wonders (which has me at a 95% production increase currently, not sure where you got 300% increase from). My capital is easily building every single building it wants (basically every building period). My secondary cities are favoring production tiles so that they can produce my military and trade units (I've been at my unit cap basically from t50 onward and always at my trade unit cap) but otherwise my secondary cities aren't contributing much otherwise. They don't work any specialists and most especially don't work engineers when mines are available.

My capital easily doubles the production of secondary cities so there's no scenario where building a wonder in a secondary city makes a whole lot of sense aside from terrain requirements. It's simple math- my capital's production is double that of my secondary cities so I can build 2 wonders faster in my capital than 1 in my capital and 1 somewhere else. I'd have to have at least 3 wonders I want at the same time for that to make sense and if that's a 'problem' you're running into then the game is probably in the bag either way.