When should I use specialists?

[jdp311]

I'm moving up to the harder difficulty levels now and I think I need to fix an area of my game that I've ignored until now: specialists.

Usually, I see no need for them. Of course, if I build the Statue of Liberty or something and I get free specialists that's great but I find that I'd rather have a peasant farming a field (or mine or whatever) than just sitting in town being an artist or scientist or whatnot. I've some things about people making specialized cities and whatnot but when I try that it seems to cripple my production and growth in those cities for not enough specialized gain.

I'm specifically asking people playing on Monarch or higher, when do you use specialists? How many do you use per city? Just one? As many as possible?

Thanks for any help and suggestions.

 

[Crimso]

I start using specialists in cities that are size 7 or 8, in the mid to late classical age. I usually build a specific improvement in one city earlier in the game (library) and once I'm sure my food production is sufficient, I turn a citizen into a specialist (scientist). Then as new techs are discovered I make one city for each specialist/great leader type (or at least attempt to do so).

The benefits from specializing your cities are huge, and the earlier you can do it, while not stifling your growth, the better. You can be dwarfed by other civs in population and land but because your cities are specialized you'll still be ahead in score, discovering techs faster, producing more hammers etc.

You seem to have a problem with producing enough food and hammers to keep your specialists. Just one in each of your top five cities makes a big difference, but if that drains your resources too much perhaps you're not using your land to its full potential. If you're going to make specialists, maximize food first.

 

[Gufnork]

I don't use them unless I'm trying to limit my growth or the city is in a tundra or desert with a few good food tiles. The only thing they're good for is producing great people and I'm not a fan of those. Even with Representative and Sistine Chapel.

 

[Crimso]

So academies, golden ages, instant wonders and techs, shrines, culture bombs etc are things you can ignore completely?

 

[Astax]

At higher difficulty u might need to start sooner. But I usually use it at 7+ pop if I have more than 2 food surplus per turn. And at early game Ill limti my city growth with a specialist.

 

[eewallace]

I use specialists--particularly scientists--from very early on. Carefully placed cities usually are in a position to generate excess food, but I don't particulary want them to grow as fast as they might if I don't use specialists. If you grow them too fast, you end up with health/happiness problems.

 

[Kylearan]

Hi,

I'm specifically asking people playing on Monarch or higher, when do you use specialists? How many do you use per city? Just one? As many as possible?

My main reason to use specialists is to produce great persons. If needed, I set up a city with lots of food to produce a certain type of great person: Engineers if I want to rush crucial wonders; Artists if I want to fight culturally, you get the idea. To do this, I build specific wonders in the city that increase Great Person Points for the type I want, and then I add A LOT of specialists from that type as well, as they also add Great Person Points. The result is a lot of Great Persons.

For example, I had a city with 14(!) specialists (1 from running mercantilism, 1 from the Statue of Liberty, 12 hired) which, together with some wonders, produced way over 100 Great Person Points (IIRC +139) per round. This provided me with a lot of great persons from that type - I'll have a report on that game on my site during the next few days.

Another use for specialists is to build a temple very early, then add a priest specialist until you generate a Great Prophet. This can be used either for a Shrine, or converted into a Great Priest, whose extra shield/gold is very strong in the early game.

Additionally, if you REALLY want to get certain techs first (liberalism, music, ...), scientists can do wonders! Use them in conjunction with civics that increase science output per specialists.

There are more examples, but I hope you get the general idea.

-Kylearan

 

[Gufnork]

I get a few great people even without specialists, I just don't go out of my way for getting them. I did try a specialist heavy strat with Peter that worked pretty good. Not my type of game though, very micromanagement heavy and way too peaceful.

 

[Kylearan]

Hi,

I get a few great people even without specialists, I just don't go out of my way for getting them.

That's perfectly fine for many games, but sometimes it's fun (or even needed ) to go heavily on that route. Overall, I got about 20 great people in my monarch game, and IIRC 12 from the one type I was mainly going for (could have gotten more, but had some unlucky breaks...)

It won't need that much micromanagement, and it can be fun.

-Kylearan

 

[jdp311]

Thanks for the replies.

It seems the best thing they do is generate the Great people. However, on the other difficulties I guess I was getting enough GPs without the specialists. For instance I almost always got a Prophet early to build my shrine (Solomon's Temple, Nativity, etc).


I have to admit I think I'm a little in love with big cities because I'm always trying to build, build, build whatever the next big thing is and more people means more workers for the squares in the city.

However, I think I'll try a game as a Philisophical civ and see how many GPs I can make appear with some well-placed specialists. Maybe that will more productive.