[BNW] What is a good science victory time at emperor level?

[zxcvbob]

I know turn 300 is not good at deity, but I'm not playing at deity so I can't ride the AI's coattails in the early game, and they don't have money to but my horse and luxes until much later. So I don't know if this is good or not.

I finally got one before 1900 AD; it's the earliest I've been able to achieve so far. I picked the Huns mainly for the extra production from pastures. Played peacefully for the most part (I paid the AI's to fight each other) until Rome stole some of my land with a great general and I stomped him for it.

Social policies were Tradition, Patronage, Rationalism, Order (because I knew I had coal), and a few points in Commerce.

I could have shaved about 4 turns off if I'd built a holy site with a GP I had just standing around. I had to wait that many turn for my faith to build up enough to faith-buy a 3rd scientist, and I think a holy site would have made the difference. I should have gotten one more scientist from specialists, but I didn't manage that quite well enough (but better than usual), I got one engineer that I didn't want. Also I was hoping a CS would give me a scientist, but all I got was a Khan and a musician.

 

[so_what]

Haven't play emperor for some time but I would think good SV timing can vary alot depending on whether you are playing with S/L or no S/L. Assuming a certain degree of reloading is allowed, then I think a good SV is about 240 for deity, 260 for immortal, 270 for emperor, 280 for prince on average map and average Civ.

It also depends on the map (can vary a lot) and strength of Civ (varies about +-10t).

 

[zxcvbob]

good SV timing can vary a lot depending on whether you are playing with S/L or no S/L.

S/L?

I was surprised by how strong Attila is in a semi-peaceful game. All those extra hammers from the pastures, and horse archers for defense even if you don't have horses or you sold them all. Will try him again, and try to get a few more cities up this time. Or I should have taken out Rome early enough to get the free aqueduct (so it would grow well even as a puppet and be worth annexing sooner)

 

[so_what]

S/L?

I was surprised by how strong Attila is in a semi-peaceful game. All those extra hammers from the pastures, and horse archers for defense even if you don't have horses or you sold them all. Will try him again, and try to get a few more cities up this time. Or I should have taken out Rome early enough to get the free aqueduct (so it would grow well even as a puppet and be worth annexing sooner)

S/L refers to save and load.

Just sharing my thoughts I would say get 5 cities on tradition, reason being it helps with the great scientist generation. At more than 5 cities ,the you need to be cautious of social policy getting too high, and the later cities slow down the empire. Liberty can support 7-9 cities, but liberty is quite weak if you are not playing on immortal/diety.

Another point I feel that can be optimized is that you have could have use more cash to buy science buildings or factories.

Finally, the GE is not really useless, since there are 6 spaceship parts and you have 5 cities. You could probably have one GE to rush spaceship parts.

 

[zxcvbob]

Thanks for the help. I bought science buildings and the factory in my capital (even tho' it could build them quickly) because it had the national college, and built them everywhere else. One thing that slowed me down a little was no observatories.

I had *so* much production; I built the first 5 parts in my 3 core cities and was waiting around for Particle Physics to complete. (each city had a spaceship factory, hydro plant, and a nuclear reactor) Or for my faith counter to get to 2500 so I could buy one more scientist and bulb it, which is what I did halfway thru researching it. I used the engineer from Spaceflight Pioneers to finish the last piece (the engine?) rather than wait another 4 or 5 turns to build it the old fashioned way.

I needed one or two more good cities, not for the production but for the science. Rome could have been a good city but I captured it pretty late in the game so left it a puppet. I also probably should have made more use of food caravans.

I think I like the Freedom method of just throwing gold at the space race, but I still would have been short one or two scientists.

I'm getting there (slowly)

 

[BlackWizard]

You should not go full patronage when playing science. It is ok to have one or two filler policies on it before opening rationalism. You should open and fill rationalism asap. You can leave finisher for some sweet tech.

Some good players can open rationalism as next policy right after filling Traditionalism

 

[zxcvbob]

You should not go full patronage when playing science. It is ok to have one or two filler policies on it before opening rationalism. You should open and fill rationalism asap. You can leave finisher for some sweet tech.

Some good players can open rationalism as next policy right after filling Traditionalism

I had 2 filler policies in Patronage (IIRC, I filled Tradition while still in the classical era) then full Rationalism. Came back and finished Patronage after Rationalism was filled and 6 in Order.

What do y'all think about a detour to pick up Industrialization before Radio to see if you have coal? (I did that this time, that's how I knew to pick Order instead of Freedom)

 

[so_what]

I had 2 filler policies in Patronage (IIRC, I filled Tradition while still in the classical era) then full Rationalism. Came back and finished Patronage after Rationalism was filled and 6 in Order.

What do y'all think about a detour to pick up Industrialization before Radio to see if you have coal? (I did that this time, that's how I knew to pick Order instead of Freedom)

That's why liberty is strong for SV, when you have a wide enough empire, you are almost guaranteed with coal. Take industrialization and rush buy 3 factories will be way faster than radio.

 

[phillipwyllie]

4city Tradition a good time is pre 270, 5city 250-260. Spain with GBR or 2 good NW it's 250 and under. If you can do a 6city empire you might see 200.

 

[zxcvbob]

Maybe it's just the maps I've been playing, but I always end up right next to Attila or Alex (Alex can actually be worse than Attila) and have to use most of my early classical era hammers for defensive units instead of settlers, also can't find enough unique luxuries (I'm including horses because circus) to settle quickly more than 3 or 4 cities. I also know part of that is just me.

At least playing as Attila, I know another Attila is not in the game, and if Alex is next to me, my horse archers can take his hoplites and companion cavalry.