Where to settle my Science City?

[iamnleth]

My current game is going well (or so it seems). My one trouble is finding a place to plant my GP Farm/Science City (I seem confused as to the difference between the two as my GP Farm only ever runs scientists). I'm playing as Pericles of Greece in an attempt at a BtS SE. Since light bulbing seems to be obsolete, I plan to plant all of my GS's in one science city.

I need some helpful advice in the following departments:

1. GP Farm and Science City- what's the difference? They are similar for me because my GP Farm usually runs only scientists. This will be tough, I'm attempting to run slavery the whole game to see how that goes down. My only guess is that the GP farm manipulates it's specialists to generate a certain type of Great Person.

2. Running Slavery - I'm horrible at it. I plan to have each city run at least 2 grassland mines, if I can manage it. Whipping will be used militarily for the high-food cities and for infrastructure in all cities (sparingly in those without much food).

3. My current city placements - feel free to comment. The idea of Sparta was to hook up happiness resources and settle on the way to the copper; Corinth to hook it up. Both will be hybrid cities- they probably won't specialize in any field.

4. My big concern- where to put my science city? My thought is to raze Moscow and re-settle 1 south of its current location... 1 Clam, 2 Corn, and 3 freshwater lakes (each with 3 food thanks to a lighthouse) would be suitable in my opinion. A good idea, or not? If so, the best option would be a construction beeline: I have a hefty source of ivory to the south and Stalin has access to both horses and copper, making an earlier war much more difficult.

Here are the maps (in spoilers for you Dial-up users)... They are large:

The North (my position):

Spoiler :

The South (Stalin):

Spoiler :

Thanks in advance- I trust your wisdom!

EDIT:
...Why does St. Petersburg contain some of my culture?

Spoiler :

 

[Haika]

In general, a GP farm is where the national epic goes, a science city is where Oxford goes. Although they can be the same, it's not always the case. Mostly, the GP farm runs farms as much as possible to increase food output -> more GPP points. The oxford city would generally cottage as many tiles as possible, a town produces the same or more raw science as a scientist under rep, but only counts as 1 against the happy/health cap, as opposed to 2 (farm worker+ specialist). If you are not running rep, your GP farm won't even be producing comparable beakers to a large cottaged city.

Long story short, GP farm -> try to max GPP, science is a nice side effect.
Oxford city -> Max science (usually from commerce, but also trade routes, etc).

This distinction only really becomes useful when you want to decide where to settle a GS (go for Oxford city for the big multipliers).

About St. Pete, it could be that the culture is from America, which has a similar color to Greece, I think.

Edit, just realized that the border shape is not correct for an American town. In that case, .

 

[iamnleth]

That makes much more sense, but seems irrational for my current position as I'll be getting little (if any) beakers from commerce because the research slider will be very low.

 

[Haika]

This is me getting a for not reading the entire post and going right to the pretty pictures. If you are running a SE, then of course your city that runs scientists will contribute a lot of your science. To make up for it, here's a 5min dotmap:



You have a good eye, Neo-Moscow would indeed make quite a fearsome science city/GP farm hybrid.
Early:
8 (2x Corn) + 3 (Clams) + 1 (Lake) = 12 food (6 scientists at size 10.
Later On:
3 (Clams) + 8 (2x Corn) + 8 (4x BioGrassFarm) + 3 (3x Lake) = 22 food (11 scientists) at size 21.

A cleared jungle city like grey IV might make a good wall street if you want to run high cash slider. It might be better to let Stalin settle and clear the jungle for you, then go confiscate it with some elephants.

If you think you still have a shot for pyramids (depending on difficulty, and your current city's production level, I would whip a settler out of sparta and settle one southeast of grey 6 in the next 10 turns (have workers start preroading in the meantime), research masonry, chop rush the mids in Athens. That stone city site will be awful, but it gets you stone ASAP, and can run two scientists or work the gold on the sheep.

Anyways, sorry for the disjointed post. Don't really know enough about your game to comment precisely, but good luck! And give Stalin the good , he is quite the rude neighbor I hear.

 

[DaveMcW]

Your science city should go S,S,SE,SE,SE of Athens. Build 3 farms to help with growth/whipping, and cottage the other 17 tiles.

P.S. Press Ctrl+B when taking screenshots of empty terrain.