What the hell happened and how do I counter it? (Great Scientist Acquisition)

[RoboEmperor]

Ok so I was gunning for Albert Einstein. This is PRINCE difficulty btw because I was experimenting. And as soon as modern era hit, I passed the first great person. I accumulated double great people points compared to the other leading AI. But the moment an AI grabbed the next great person, the next 4 great persons were claimed by subsequent AIs even though I had the most points by far.

What the hell happened and how do I fight it? If passing doesn't let you get the great scientist you want, then what do you do when the game makes it so that if you take the current person, you can't get the next one because of another AI is close to nabbing it?

How do you snipe specific great people? Maximizing your GPP obviously failed here. So what am I supposed to do? I don't care about any of the great people except hypatia, isaac newton, and albert einstein. Am i supposed to get a terrible but not 0 GPP generation and rely solely on patronage somehow?

 

[MrRadar]

In one of the latest patches all AI across the board were given a large science bias as of the Classical Era. As a result they all tend to build a campus in each and every of their cities, with respective buildings, and they also do a few science projects from time to time.

That means that before too long all AI start accumulating large amounts of GS points and they recruit all the GS from the current era and next in line is a GS from the era ahead.

When the first GS is offered from a more advanced era than the world era is, that GS comes with a "surcharge", that is, the first GS of the era ahead is more expensive to recruit than it would have been if the GS came in their own contemporary era. It's like a higher dam had been built for the river to overcome, and all AI accumulate even larger amounts of GS points.

When finally the first expensive scientist of the era ahead is recruited, the price for the other GS of that era loses the "surcharge" and drops back to normal for that era. If the AI who bites the bullet and takes the expensive scientist goes right after or very soon after the player, there is now a long line of AIs going before it's the player's turn again, and they all have enough GS points to clean out the whole pool of GS from that era, so this entire pool is gone on the same turn and when the player gets to go again they see an even more expensive GS in line from another era ahead.

How to fight it?
You can go into the file and modify the culprit value to a more reasonable number, but then you'd not be playing the same game as most players and that kinda invalidates all discussions about strategies, etc.

Otherwise, try to adapt and watch the GP screen more closely. You have to compete with assuredly high GS points generation from all AIs in the game, so the more sources of respective gpp you have the better. That means increasing the number of campus cities for yourself and decreasing that number for AI.
War, in other words. Reduce the number of those competing buggers Also, campuses are now everywhere, get yourself some mobile cavalry and send them on student exchange programs worldwide. And while AI is rebuilding their campuses after wild farewell parties, their gpp generation will be interrupted/reduced.

Great faith generation is also extremely helpful in case you have to make a fast recruitment. Due to AI being hell bent on science they now neglect other aspects of the game, so you have more opportunities to build a good religion for yourself and have huge amounts of faith pouring in, for an explosive settling campaign with Golden Monumentality and praying the wanted great people into existence later, Jesuit Education and such.

Am i supposed to get a terrible but not 0 GPP generation and rely solely on patronage somehow?

I doubt it, as then you'll be mostly relying on pure rng of who gets offered first for the next era and committing to pay an exorbitant Patronage price. And then you'll likely see none of the other GS from that era and have problems to scrape up enough for the next GS.

 

[RoboEmperor]

snip.

Thanks for the detailed info. This sucks. The 2nd GS is like 50% of the cost of the "surcharge" scientist. If the GS I want is the next one after the "surcharge" one I can't get it even on prince.

ah well. No more relying on GS anymore I guess... can't rely on kilwa on small maps on the account of the low chance of science CS spawning, can't rely on GS especially on higher difficulties, can't rely on clustering 4+ city's campuses around one government plaza for the adjacency because luxury resources are often in the way and newly discovered strategic resources also completely ruin everything.

Losing motivation to continue playing this game......

 

[MrRadar]

... can't rely on kilwa on small maps on the account of the low chance of science CS spawning

You can select which CSs can be in the game when you create a new game, iirc, you could leave mostly scientific ones, I guess.

Btw, I was running another AI-only test game for that another thread and took some screenshots of what happens with Great Scientists (Deity AI), so here are some visuals.
The earliest ones still go somewhat apart:

Spoiler :

But the next batch already goes out in one turn:

Spoiler :

as does the next one:

Spoiler :

The last two batches went in two turns, but probably because they (and the previous one) were already two eras ahead, some scattering appeared:

Spoiler :

So there's still some tiny chance to catch what you want. But yes, that +150 science modifier in Classical did mess up the things in a major way.

 

[RoboEmperor]

Alright thanks man. I'm gonna stop going for oracle now.

 

[UWHabs]

Yeah, the uneven GPP costs are a real pain. More often than not, especially if I am way ahead in GPP, you just have to bite the bullet and recruit ones you don't want. Especially with engineers I find, I can run into a case where I'm going to beat them to the next great person anyways, so skipping the current option just slows you down. Heck, sometimes if I'm way ahead in points, and have a ton of gold/faith burning holes in my pockets, I might even outright buy a great person I can't use just to cycle through and budget for when I want to target the next one.

 

[aieeegrunt]

In one of the latest patches all AI across the board were given a large science bias as of the Classical Era. As a result they all tend to build a campus in each and every of their cities, with respective buildings, and they also do a few science projects from time to time.

That means that before too long all AI start accumulating large amounts of GS points and they recruit all the GS from the current era and next in line is a GS from the era ahead.

When the first GS is offered from a more advanced era than the world era is, that GS comes with a "surcharge", that is, the first GS of the era ahead is more expensive to recruit than it would have been if the GS came in their own contemporary era. It's like a higher dam had been built for the river to overcome, and all AI accumulate even larger amounts of GS points.

When finally the first expensive scientist of the era ahead is recruited, the price for the other GS of that era loses the "surcharge" and drops back to normal for that era. If the AI who bites the bullet and takes the expensive scientist goes right after or very soon after the player, there is now a long line of AIs going before it's the player's turn again, and they all have enough GS points to clean out the whole pool of GS from that era, so this entire pool is gone on the same turn and when the player gets to go again they see an even more expensive GS in line from another era ahead.

How to fight it?
You can go into the file and modify the culprit value to a more reasonable number, but then you'd not be playing the same game as most players and that kinda invalidates all discussions about strategies, etc.

Otherwise, try to adapt and watch the GP screen more closely. You have to compete with assuredly high GS points generation from all AIs in the game, so the more sources of respective gpp you have the better. That means increasing the number of campus cities for yourself and decreasing that number for AI.
War, in other words. Reduce the number of those competing buggers Also, campuses are now everywhere, get yourself some mobile cavalry and send them on student exchange programs worldwide. And while AI is rebuilding their campuses after wild farewell parties, their gpp generation will be interrupted/reduced.

Great faith generation is also extremely helpful in case you have to make a fast recruitment. Due to AI being hell bent on science they now neglect other aspects of the game, so you have more opportunities to build a good religion for yourself and have huge amounts of faith pouring in, for an explosive settling campaign with Golden Monumentality and praying the wanted great people into existence later, Jesuit Education and such.


I doubt it, as then you'll be mostly relying on pure rng of who gets offered first for the next era and committing to pay an exorbitant Patronage price. And then you'll likely see none of the other GS from that era and have problems to scrape up enough for the next GS.

How was this typo not been fixed. It screws up so much!!!! Now you have stupidly advanced barb units, as just one knock on effect

 

[leif erikson]

Moderator Action: Off topic posts removed. Please stay on topic