Wealth or Research?

[EdwardtheElder]

I've just come back to Civ 4 vanilla (after 6 months off for Caesar 4 and others) and blundered my way to an Emperor points win with Frederick. But one of the many things I don't know is when to build wealth or research and which one is better.

This may have been discussed before, but I can't find anything on it at the moment.

 

[lilnev]

Either is multiplied by your production bonuses (e.g. forge) but not wealth/research bonuses (e.g. libraries). So if most of your commerce is receiving higher research bonuses than wealth bonuses (you have more libraries/universities than markets/grocers), you should build Wealth and set the research slider higher.

There's a third option, which is to build a Wonder for which you have the resource to speed it up, but don't finish it. This actually gives a better return than building Wealth, though you have to wait for it. You can only build a particular Wonder in one city at a time, but if it's almost done you can remove it from the queue and start it in another city.

As for when to do these things.... Not very often. Especially in Vanilla, the return on building Wealth/Research is pretty terrible. I sometimes do in the late stages of a peaceful victory, where armies become largely irrelevent. And sometimes it's worth it to get to a key tech -- for example Construction if you're boxed in without metal. The return on a failed Wonder is not so bad when you have the appropriate resource, and it's sometimes a good idea if nothing else is urgent.

peace,
lilnev

 

[CivDude86]

Its the other way around in vanilla (you get and increases from libraries and banks but not the increase from forges) and only 50% is converted. So if your want wealth the wonder route is better option.

 

[EdwardtheElder]

Thanks Iilnev, I understand the second two paragraphs and have read a couple of the threads re not finishing wonders, but I am still unclear on para 1.....

See if I have got this right? My hammers are multiplied by production bonuses - ok and then turned into gold or beakers (at 50&#37. But surely, if I have more libraries/universities than markets/grocers, don't I want to build research?

 

[Ecofarm]

Enough with the starting wonders you have no intention of finishing. Especially in multiple cities! Deep in your heart, you know it's wrong.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

I think the answer depends on why you're building or in the first place:

• Fast cash. If you need money now, then you're almost always going for Wealth.
• Fast tech. If you need a tech, and you need it now: Research.
• Big $$$. If you have nothing better to do and just want a really good return on your investment of , start building a Wonder you never intend to finish.

In Warlords, building Wealth and increasing the Science slider % generally does the same thing as building Science and decreasing the Science slider (+/- a or two).

When in doubt, set your city building whichever, set your sliders, then press <F2> to see what your final and output is. Then, reverse everything and press <F2> again to see how things changed.

 

[UncleJJ]

See if I have got this right? My hammers are multiplied by production bonuses - ok and then turned into gold or beakers (at 50%). But surely, if I have more libraries/universities than markets/grocers, don't I want to build research?

No you have not got it right That is a mix of the Warlords and the vanilla system for building Wealth and Research and they are very different systems

Warlords applies production bonusses to the hammers but has a straight 1 hammer = 1 gold or 1 beaker or 1 culture with no effect from building bonusses.

Vanilla uses only base hammers (no production bonusses) and converts 2 base hammers to 1 gold or 1 beaker or 1 culture and then applies the appropriate building bonusses (e.g library and university gives +50% to beakers)

The Warlords system is an improvement in my opinion.

 

[EdwardtheElder]

My question arose, because I was trying to stick strictly to specialised cities and at times (for just a few turns maybe) I didn't want to build anything as I was waiting for a tech to complete or something. I didn't know what to do and just made it up as I went along. But at the end of the game in 2047AD when I was well ahead on points and near a domination victory as well, I experimented with all my cities building wealth and moving the slider from 0&#37; research to 100% and checking F2 to see the difference, and then again building research. As it happened building all research + 100% science slider made me 3569 beakers and 372 gold (total 3941) which was the best and all wealth and 0% science made me 75 beakers and 3447 gold (total 3522) which was the worst. So a bit of a difference. However, building research with 100% science was very similar to building wealth and 100% science. Similarily, 0% on the slider. So my conclusion was building wealth or research didn't make much difference, but where you put the slider did.

But I am picking up Warlords this weekend, and the new system does seem easier to understand.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

But I am picking up Warlords this weekend, and the new system does seem easier to understand.

Yep. The new system allows you to leave your slider put -- as commanding a city to build has the same affect as building (by comparison).

 

[lilnev]

Its the other way around in vanilla (you get and increases from libraries and banks but not the increase from forges)....

I didn't realize this. My point for Warlords: Suppose you've built Library+Uni+Obs+Lab in all your cities and Market/Grocer/Bank in none of them. Suppose further that you've got 100 hammers to devote to either Wealth or Research, and 100 commerce from tiles, and your maintenance is 100 gold. You could: Build Wealth and set the slider at 100% for 200 beakers/turn at break-even, or build Research and set the slider to 0% for 100 beakers/turn at break even. Having all those Libraries etc. to power up your research from tile-based commerce (but not hammer-built Research) means you should favor Wealth to cover your costs, and keep the slider high.

This may seem like an extreme example, and in many cases it won't much matter. But some of my space races come reasonably close to this. I'll have a few Markets/Grocers for happy/health concerns, but not more than I need; and I'll have Oxford in my best city to give triple commerce->beakers conversion; whereas I almost never get around to building Banks.

peace,
lilnev

 

[bassist2119]

My input:
1.)aside from speeding an important tech (CoL, CS) or prepping for mass upgrades, building wealth and research is most effective after assembly line and builidng factories and plants, whereby the hammers are converted to beakers/gold at a 2:1 ratio. If there is nothing particulalry interesting to build, doing this in the IW city has a 300&#37; multiplier, higher than any commerce multiplier possible! Extreme best case scenario: Beaurocratic Tokugawa w/ IW in capital, with forge, factory, shale plant = 360%.
2.) Regarding specialists: if the city is building wealth/research, switch all engineers and priests to merchants/scientists. Remember that the engineer/priest hammers become gold or beakers, so an engineer makes two beakers whereas a scientist makes three - don't rip yourself off! Exceptions:
-you have an obsessive compulsive complex about GP pools.
-Ankor Wat priests
3.) One of the best times to build research/wealth is during the parts building phase of a spaceship race - when a good production city finishes a build with an impressive overflow, build wealth or (more frequently) research until the very turn a new, expensive part becomes available. The overflow is NOT converted into beakers, rather, it carries over the next time you switch builds, regardless of how many turns pass. When you switch to the SS part, the overflow from several turns ago gets applied to it, and multiplied by aluminum/lab/elevator bonuses.

 

[bassist2119]

One more thing, watch your tiles. For example, switching to building wealth/research means that working a coast w/ lighthouse (2F/2C) is better than, say, working a grass forest (2F/1C)

 

[InvisibleStalke]

With a forge, building science gets more beakers than a scientist will with just a library if you don't use representation and are in a secondary city that won't get any great people. Similarly for wealth. Its really not a bad option at all and extremely useful on maps that give a lot more production cities - eg highlands or rocky maps.

You can:
- Build culture in a new city for a couple of turns to save whipping a theatre for fat cross growth.
- Build wealth in a newly captured city with high production to pay its maintenance costs. OR do a trade - have a production city in the backline switch to wealth and have the new city build units.
- Build science in cities with 100&#37; research when maximising science output (and get your gold by selling your older techs)
- Build wealth in cities with forges but no research multipliers and raise the science slider so that cities with research multipliers do more of the research.

Late game I always switch the majority of my cities to building wealth and raise the slider as high as I can. When you know the game is in its end stages, most of the buildings you build won't have time to payback or even time to finish.

 

[EdwardtheElder]

InvisibleStalke - thanks. Some good points there and I agree with them all. I'm still playing vanilla and the big problem here is that you get only 50% of your hammers and it feels bad giving up so much even for the greater good. But I picked up Warlords at the weekend, and will be moving on after my current game and from what I gather from this thread building wealth / science / culture is simpler to understand and probably more attractive (esp after forge) and can be used with more subtlty. Ouch, I feel a bit of micromanagement coming on!

 

[Colossian]

I've just come back to Civ 4 vanilla (after 6 months off for Caesar 4 and others) and blundered my way to an Emperor points win with Frederick. But one of the many things I don't know is when to build wealth or research and which one is better.

This may have been discussed before, but I can't find anything on it at the moment.

If you have 100% for the research, do not use "Wealth".

 

[mrt144]

running a higher research &#37; across the board and covering deficits with wealth in cities is more beneficial than running research and running a lower % of science. I think the reason behind this is the accumilation of research points vs gold coins.

+1 above bankruptcy with every city producing more science is better than one city producing more research with every city producing less science

I dont know if that makes any sense, Im at work and high on cheesecake.

but anyway, ill post a few screenshots later that illustrates my point.

actually no i wont. I dont have time now. boo!

 

[A+ombomb]

Yep you want to get 100&#37; science first, and produce wealth in production cities so your science cities can pump out the beakers with 100% science rate.

A point about the wonder building technique to produce money: Even though it's twice as effective as building wealth in the longrun, in order to actually cash in you have to finish the wonder. Since you can only build the wonder in one city at a time, that usually means a very very very very long time to cash in. Also, the hammers towards that wonder are usually wasted hammers, because any wonder you would want to delay that long to build is not a useful wonder to your civ. So you have to subtract the hammers for the building from your final total. Also there is the aspect of opportunity cost - if you produce wealth now then you can support more cities and have better tech for better buildings and civics sooner, usually producing more in the longterm than the unfinished wonder cashins.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Where the wonder building trick is rife for abuse is with Industrious Civs with the required resource. Each hammer gets a return of around 2.5 gold (not sure exactly - someone must have worked this out though).

If you have a tech lead you could use this trick even on wonders you do want to get.

If you don't have a tech lead you can use this on wonders you don't want to get - and just let the AI build them. The risk you take is how long the AI waits to build - but usually they get them up fairly quickly.

I think its an exploit though - and for an Industrious civ the GPP benefits of any wonder make it worth building if you have spare production at the time. If I am playing Industrious they get built in a single city which ends up with monstrous production and GPP. With industrious + forge + bureaucracy + org religion + settled great people, most wonders are going up in less than 10 turns anyway.

 

[A+ombomb]

Well I usually play MP so I don't have ai's building stupid wonders rapidly. Allowing the ai to cash you in works fine. Otherwise not worth it.

 

[Giaur]

In Warlords wealth is better while both research/wealth are not influenced by anything. I tend to have more bonuses to research, so higher slider of science is what I want. I can only achieve this by producing wealth.

However in some certain occasions (Lib race, Economics Race etc.), I'd rather produce research.