Where are these extra beakers coming from?

[Cornstalk]

This is probably something most people don't even pay attention to... and for the life of me I'm not even sure what to search for if it's been covered already.


On a typical ancient start, usually I see 10 commerce right from the get go. 8 from the palace, 1 from the city tile, and then 1 more (hopefully) from the worked tiled. 8+1+1 = 10... and at a 100% science rate, that should be 10 beakers a turn, right?

This is what's confusing me. I pick a science that needs 65 beakers, let it go by a turn... and it gets 11 applied to it. Okay, a 10% bonus for some reason? Neat. If only it were that simple... I switch to a science that takes over 100 beakers, let it go up a turn and I get... 13 beakers?!

There was NO role over from a previous science because I had never actually finished a science yet (this is the first like... 5 turns of an ancient start game). Also there are no buildings in my city other then my palace, with my capital (and only city) showing 10.00 for beakers.

I first noticed this on noble difficulty, so I tried it real quick on immortal and got the same result. Leader wised I noticed it on shaka then tried it again with rosavelt (for no particular reason other then he was fast to click on to get started).


After all that simple to understand commerce math that goes on in the city... where is it getting these oddball beaker numbers to add towards researcing the science itself?


Not that I'm complaining about more beakers then advertised. I'm just curious!

 

[Theoden]

You can get research multipliers in several ways:
- knowing civs that know the tech you're researching, more civs gives a larger multiplier.
- by having researched optional prerequisites to the tech, more prerequisites gives greater bonus, also counts if the tech only has one optional prerequisite.

 

[Solver]

You have one free beaker in your empire at all times. So when you found your capital, you'll always have at least 10 beakers. 8 from Palace, 1 from the city tile and 1 free beaker.

You'll notice that, if you turn research slider down to 0%, you'll still be producing that one beaker.

 

[LucyDuke]

If only the bonus was 10%! Like was said, somehow your mere existence guarantees a beaker per turn, though that doesn't explain the 13 beakers/turn. Had you started working another tile at that point?

 

[CivDude86]

Theoden explained it. He either meet someone else who knows the tech or is researching something other than the techs in the 1st row so he would be getting the prereq bonus.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

For every pre-requisite tech that you know beyond the first one, you get +20% beakers researching it. It's there to discourage beelining.

 

[Rince]

I learn something new every day.

 

[_alphaBeta_]

Yeah this confused me a lot months ago until I found out what was happening. I don't know why these modifies can't be viewed by the player. It would be nice to see these things in the advisor screens.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

Wow, that's good to know. I had read that you got the bonuses mentioned but I admit I never looked that far into it. I just knew that going back for earlier techs after a beeline made the earlier techs much quicker to research. Now I know that it's because everyone else already knows that tech.

 

[LucyDuke]

Wow, that's good to know. I had read that you got the bonuses mentioned but I admit I never looked that far into it. I just knew that going back for earlier techs after a beeline made the earlier techs much quicker to research. Now I know that it's because everyone else already knows that tech.

Part of that is usually that your research rate is higher, too, which helps confuse me. If the rate changes, you can't tell as easily what bonuses you're getting from prereqs, other civs' knowledge, etc. It should be visible the same way the hammers and whatsuch are broken down in the city screens, with the bonuses and multipliers and stuff. Anyone know of any mods that show this stuff?

 

[KMadCandy]

i'm not sure what the modifier is. i've heard that if another civ that you know already knows the tech, then the "base beakers from each of your cities" is increased for each one of those civs. reading that still didn't help me know how it actually applies math-wise tho.

 

[ori]

Tech Cost and Research Mechanics are explained here

Calculating the Known Civilizations w/ Tech modifier

1) Multiply 0.30 by the number of KNOWN, LIVING civilizations, who have the tech.

2) Divide by the number of civilizations which STARTED on the map and ROUND DOWN to the hundredth place (0.01) of the quotient.

3) Add 2) to 1

Tech Known by Civilizations modifier = 1 + RDDW (0.30 * # known Civs who have the tech / # of Civs who started the game

Calculating the Prerequisites modifier

1) Start with 1. If the technology does NOT have a minimum requirement (i.e., the starting techs = Fishing, The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Mysticism, Mining), then use 1 AS the modifier.

2) Add 0.2 to 1) if a Technology has a MINIMUM Requirement that the player has met. Note: Even if a tech has MANY MANDATORY PREREQUISITES, it will still only give you a boost of 1.2 because you MUST have all those prerequisites to research the tech. (IOW, the minimum requirement IS all of those prerequisites.)

3) Add 0.2 to 2) for EACH ADDITIONAL OPTIONAL Prerequisite that the player has met.

Requirements modifier = 1 + (0.2 * MINIMUM Req. met) + (0.2 * # of Optional Prereq. met)

Calculating the Actual Amount of Beakers Generated Toward a Tech

To calculate the amount of beakers which you generate toward the technology:

1) Take the total sum of beakers generated by all your cities (the result from the basics part).

2) Add 1 to it if you have a city.

3) Multiply 2) by the Known Civilizations w/ Tech modifier and take the FLOOR of the product.

4) Multiply 3) by Prerequisites modifier and take the FLOOR of the product.

The formula to calculate the amount of beakers applied to your technology is:

Beakers applied to Technology = FLOOR (FLOOR ((Total Base Beakers + 1) * KCwT modifer) * Prerequisites modifier)

 

[KMadCandy]

so that means ... if i need money more than faster tech atm i just kind of turn down science to still get the tech in the same turns but build up gold to take advantage of that formula that makes my head hurt.

right?

 

[LucyDuke]

Thanks, Ori!

 

[ori]

right?

In a way: yes - basically this puts someone who beelines for a tech to be there first (think: liberalism ) at a disadvantage because he'll probably only have the absolutely required techs and nobody else knows it...
I doubt you'll be able to make money AND research at the same turn, though since you'll need most of you rivals to go past you while you stop research in order to pull that off...and all of that in a few turns - I doubt that will ever happen.

 

[Bushface]

As I've reported elsewhere, in the Bugs forum, I have been offered a choice of, among other techs, Astronomy and Military Tradition. Both cost 3220 flasks, but Astronomy would take 5 turns and Mil. Trad. only 4. I know all other civs, and none of them has either tech: both techs have 2 necessary prerequisites, which obviously I have. Only by working down to the roots of the tech tree are there any possible "optional" techs, these being )for Astronomy) either Fishing or Agriculture and (for Mil. Trad.) Divine Right, Literature, and any two of Priesthood (and Polytheism or Meditation), Pottery (and Fishing), or Animal Husbandry (and Hunting). So either Astronomy and Mil. Trad. have the same number of prerequisites or Mil. Trad has more "optionals",and in either case Astronomy ought not to take longer than Mil. Trad. I do, of course, have all the techs mentioned.
There's an anomaly somewhere, I believe.

 

[KMadCandy]

In a way: yes - basically this puts someone who beelines for a tech to be there first (think: liberalism ) at a disadvantage because he'll probably only have the absolutely required techs and nobody else knows it...
I doubt you'll be able to make money AND research at the same turn, though since you'll need most of you rivals to go past you while you stop research in order to pull that off...and all of that in a few turns - I doubt that will ever happen.

i'm weird, remember? i'm currently stuck on the HoF gauntlet. we have to win by time. can't let the bad guys launch, so me teching too fast and giving them a beaker advantage is a bad thing i'd already considered before this thread poppped up. so, what i basically wanna do is hurt some early on, make sure i get to liberalism first and get something juicy from it, then cripple more of them and make money that way, blah blah, tech some more to cripple/eliminate more of the 14 others, blah blah again.

hasn't worked out yet. i'm horrendously bad at going to war as early as i ought to. ever since civ2 (i never did play civ1) i've had this "well i want to be ready before i declare war!" thing going on, silly me.

but for games i know for certain will be long games (this HoF game has to be won by time but all victory conditions have to be enabled, so it's a tricky one!), even without knowing the formula, the advantage i give them by learning something first has always been in the back of my head. and i just might build the internet in this game purely to deny it to them!

 

[ori]

There's an anomaly somewhere, I believe.

You are right

Spoiler reason :

I found the problem
The quote I gave above says "Minimum" and "Optional" In fact those are:
"ANDPrereq" and "ORPrereq"
Now you you nead all ANDPrereq's AND atleast one ORPrereq. Any ORPrereq will give you the .2 modifier.
For whatever reason Programmers have given Astronomy 2 ANDPrereq's (Calender and Optics) and Military Tradition 1 ANDPrereq (Music) and 1 ORPrereq (Nationalism).
The endresult is the same (you need two techs and there is just on possible path) but you get the .2 modifier for having a ORPrereq for Military Tradition
I'd classify this as a minor bug in the xml - but maybe there is some great plan I don't see

 

[namliaM]

@Ori: "hallowed be the Ori".... You are a Stargate fan I presume??
Maybe the point beeing that MT should be slightly cheaper than Astronomy, thus intended and not a bug.
I think you need all AND + atleast 1 OR for the tech to be researched. Thus that beeing the MINIMUM requirement. Therefor your explenation of the MT oddity is not right...
IIRC you get a (minor?) bonus when researching certain techs that have synergy with your traits, but I am far from sure about it.

I think any Arrow in the techtree is an "OR" while the pictures in the bars are "AND" prereq's .
There are a few AND only techs:
Flight
Astronomy
Devine Right

They are all KEY techs that provide KEY things. Flight and Astro explain themselves I think. DR is so because I think it provides a short cut to Nationhood => MT.
Research Monarchy + Theo, Lit + Music, DR => Nationhood.
Offcourse the strange thing about MT is that it is nearly no good getting it without Gunpowder, tho Gunpowder is not a pre-req.

@MadCandy: Jummy
The best way to slow research in a game is to be LAST to research everything, this way you conserve beakers => Gold for your self and not give it to the AI.
Offcourse beeing last to research everything has its disadvantages (i.e. Liberalism and even MT or Currency)

Note that the ghost beaker (the free 1 beaker) comes from this formula:

Calculating the Known Civilizations w/ Tech modifier

1) Multiply 0.30 by the number of KNOWN, LIVING civilizations, who have the tech.

2) Divide by the number of civilizations which STARTED on the map and ROUND DOWN to the hundredth place (0.01) of the quotient.

3) Add 2) to 1

Tech Known by Civilizations modifier = 1 + RDDW (0.30 * # known Civs who have the tech / # of Civs who started the game

Note the 1+ part. I think this has 3 possible explenations
1) Allways having 1 beaker prevents you from running into devision problems when deviding by 0. While deviding by 1 is never a problem, circumventing that little issue.
2) A lot of CIV revolves around religion and the fact that IIRC Sid is religious as well. You could theorize that if there is a God (allah or who ever, dont want to offend anyone ) and he is ALL knowing. Then all techs are also known by him, but all we have is faith that he does excist and does know. Therefor we get 1 free beaker in researching from Him
3) Our populous is self thinking therefor generating some beaker ad random by just beeing. Tho... how 10.000 population can generate 1 beaker and 10.000.000 also add 1 beaker would then be beyond me...

Anyway taking the formula and calculating it... Lets say there are 10 civs in the game and you know ALL of them. You are about to research CoL. You Know Writing, Math and Priesthood (no currency).
I think this doesnt count with Priesthood beeing an OR requirement (I think the MT is a different thing!!!) You need Writing + (Currency OR Priesthood)...
Therefor you have fullfilled the minimum requirement of CoL giving you 20% Bonus.

Researching Currency before starting CoL will give you an additional 20%

For every civ that allready knows CoL, 0.30 * 1/10 = 0.03 or 3%
Every civ that knows it will give you a 3% bonus in researching it in a 10 civ game. 3% bonus = 1 / 3 * 100 = 34 beakers you civ has to generate for every FREE (3%) beaker! ! ! Or make 100 beakers for 3 free beakers. This ramps up (or down) depending on the number of civs that started the game.
NOTE: Taking out (or down where the are useless) will hurt in this! ! !
If 1 civ knows the tech and you started with 15 civs you get 2% bonus, this is the table:
15 2%
14 2%
13 2%
12 3%
11 3%
10 3%
09 3%
08 4%
07 4%
06 5%
05 6%
04 8%
03 10%
02 15%

Presuming you wait you can get 27% additional bonus (there is allways one civ that doesnt know it... You!).
Without Currency this makes for 27/120 = 22.5% additional bonus. The 1.2 you ALLWAYS get, so it really makes NO sence to me, why add a bonus you ALLWAYS get??

If you research currency prior to CoL you get an additional 20% even if no one knows CoL => 140%
Now waiting for everyone to research CoL will give you 27 / 140 = 19.2% bonus. For a total of (obiously) 167% !
BUT seeing as you are allways going to research all/most techs at 120% it is only a bonus of 47 / 120 = 39.1%
So researching in the right order (Currency => CoL) AND waiting till (nearly) everone has all CoL will net you a bonus of roughly
20 / 120 = 12 % for researching Currency.
21 / 140 = 15 % for waiting till atleast 7 out of 10 civs know it.

If above map is Continents and/or you only know 4 other civs that know the tech, 4/10 * 3% = 12% cap on research bonus.

21 / 120 = 17.5 % bonus if you dont research Currency AND wait till 7 out of 10 civs know CoL.
These bonusses are nice, but dont compare to techtrading and/or tech leader.... Having currency last may just cost you more than you care for.
suppose you have 5 cities pre-currency. That is atleast 10GPT you are missing out on. And if your civ is generating say 50 BPT your bonus will be 17.5% = 8.75BPT so there is a good point in beelining something sometimes.

Now currency is pretty quantiviable, but MT is a much less so... But we all know how damaging Cavalry can be when facing LBs instead of Musketmen or even Grens, I dont even want to use Cavs when facing Riffles .... which will happen if you are last to research MT.

The best way (if there is such a thing) is binary research, this allows for civs to research CoL while you are building Cash. Then research deficit to 0 gold in the bank while getting CoL on the same turn you would normaly. This maximizes the turns you may get a bonus (and maximizes the bonus itself) while not slowing you down.

Now how to "make it work for you" or in any case NOT for the AI. You want FAST Cavalry but dont want to give away bonusses (or the least possible) cause you are techleader and want to stay that way!!!
Making it work for you is to delay discovering techs. Lets presume this situation.

You have Macemen walking about: CS + Machinery. Also you bulbed Philo (bulbing is bad for the beaker bonus but .... we found Taoism). Also you got music for the free artist offcourse....
Now we are particularly intrested in Knights to supplement our Macemen ASAP, but dont have Feudalism yet but (nearly) all the AI offcourse do as they just love it.
Now run 0% research long enough to run 100% science thru Feudalism AND Guilds. This maximizes your bonus on Feudalism while getting the target tech Guilds at the same time as if you had run say 70% for all that time.
Now you are techlead on that branch again + No one has Nationalism yet.
Pick a tech you need... Either Gunpowder or Nationalism...
Now for your bonus you should wait... but you dont want to wait... cause you want those Cavs running and upgrading your Knights. Research either tech to near as possible researched. Just MMing the slider a little BUT dont discover it yet, to prevent giving the bonus to the AI.

Now if you have researched both techs to <1 turn and you want to go MT... First run 0% long enough to be able to run 100% on MT.
Now steamrole at 100% research Nationalism => MT => Gunpowder.
Doing it this way will delay your giving bonus (3%) to AI as long as possible but net you Cavalry in the same amount of turns.

It saves 3 beakers per 100 beakers the AI is generating for EACH AI. 3 * 9 = 27 BPT lost to the AI research pool.
Now if you can delay your own techs for a collective 100 turns, this accumulates to 2700 beakers lost to the collective AI or 300 to each AI.
While it may add to your beaker count... (hard to quantify)
Offcourse all this comes at some opportunity costs, in above situation:
1) Later feudalism => LBs, Vassalage and Serfdom come later.
2) Later Gunpowder => Later musketmen (if you use them at all anyway)
3) Later Nationalism => Later Taj Mahal (if at all, cause the AI may now beat you to it)

I hope all that is not as clear as mud, and I didnt make any (to) obvious mistakes
Feel free to shoot me down... and/or ask questions.

 

[ori]

@Ori: "hallowed be the Ori".... You are a Stargate fan I presume??

Stargate? Nah, i'm too to relate to an aging MacGyver - I am a better audience for this Ori

Maybe the point beeing that MT should be slightly cheaper than Astronomy, thus intended and not a bug.
I think you need all AND + atleast 1 OR for the tech to be researched. Thus that beeing the MINIMUM requirement. Therefor your explenation of the MT oddity is not right...

I'd be glad to get a correct explanation though since I am an apprentice when it comes to C++ I'd like to know whether my reading is correct, so:

int iPossiblePaths = 0;
    int iUnknownPaths = 0;

    for (int iI = 0; iI < GC.getDefineINT("NUM_OR_TECH_PREREQS"); iI++)
    {
        if (GC.getTechInfo(eTech).getPrereqOrTechs(iI) != NO_TECH)
        {
            if (!(GET_TEAM(getTeam()).isHasTech((TechTypes)(GC.getTechInfo(eTech).getPrereqOrTechs(iI)))))
            {
                iUnknownPaths++;
            }

            iPossiblePaths++;
        }
    }

If I read it correctly both "possible path" and "unknown path" start at 0 if there is atleast 1 OrPrereq it goes through the loop and sets iPossiblePaths +1 if it finds an unknown OrPrereq it sets iUnknownPaths +1

for Astronomy this means it does not got through the loop and both iPossiblePaths and iUnknownPaths are 0, for Military Tradition it goes through the loop once and iPossiblePaths=1 and iUnknownPaths=0

Now the code says:

iModifier += (iPossiblePaths - iUnknownPaths) * GC.getDefineINT("TECH_COST_KNOWN_PREREQ_MODIFIER")

for Astronomy that means (0-0)*Modifier for the known prereq modifier and for Military Tradition that means (1-0)*Modifier for the known prereq modifier - Tadaaaa my explanation is correct (if my reading of the code is correct, that is, which is not necessarily the case )

Spoiler complete Research Modifier Code :

int CvPlayer::calculateResearchModifier(TechTypes eTech)
  {
              int iModifier = 100;
   
              if (NO_TECH == eTech)
              {
                          return iModifier;
              }
   
              int iKnownCount = 0;
              int iPossibleKnownCount = 0;
   
              for (int iI = 0; iI < MAX_CIV_TEAMS; iI++)
              {
                          if (GET_TEAM((TeamTypes)iI).isAlive())
                          {
                                     if (GET_TEAM(getTeam()).isHasMet((TeamTypes)iI))
                                     {
                                                 if (GET_TEAM((TeamTypes)iI).isHasTech(eTech))
                                                 {
                                                             iKnownCount++;
                                                 }
                                     }
   
                                     iPossibleKnownCount++;
                          }
              }
   
              if (iPossibleKnownCount > 0)
              {
                          iModifier += (GC.getDefineINT("TECH_COST_TOTAL_KNOWN_TEAM_MODIFIER") * iKnownCount) / iPossibleKnownCount;
              }
   
              int iPossiblePaths = 0;
              int iUnknownPaths = 0;
   
              for (int iI = 0; iI < GC.getDefineINT("NUM_OR_TECH_PREREQS"); iI++)
              {
                          if (GC.getTechInfo(eTech).getPrereqOrTechs(iI) != NO_TECH)
                          {
                                     if (!(GET_TEAM(getTeam()).isHasTech((TechTypes)(GC.getTechInfo(eTech).getPrereqOrTechs(iI)))))
                                     {
                                                 iUnknownPaths++;
                                     }
   
                                     iPossiblePaths++;
                          }
              }
   
              FAssertMsg(iPossiblePaths >= iUnknownPaths, "The number of possible paths is expected to match or exceed the number of unknown ones");
   
              iModifier += (iPossiblePaths - iUnknownPaths) * GC.getDefineINT("TECH_COST_KNOWN_PREREQ_MODIFIER");
   
              return iModifier;
  }

IIRC you get a (minor?) bonus when researching certain techs that have synergy with your traits, but I am far from sure about it.

I am sure about this: there is no such thing

Feel free to shoot me down... and/or ask questions.

I am still practicing my reading skills in C++ and Python stuff so pointing out any errors would be welcome...

PS: I just had to try out the new smilies, now I just have to find out what to do with: