Would you call this cheating, or clever?

snarzberry

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I haven't done this before but the possibility occurred to me during a game I played yesterday and today.

Imagine this scenario. I have access to 4 uranium. I also have a lot of gold. In four of my cities I begin building nukes but I switch production in each city to something else with one turn to go. Then I purchase 4 nukes and use them, which gives me back the 4 uranium, so I can finish off the one turn build left in the cities for another 4 nukes on the next turn.

Is this pre-building combined with purchasing something that you would consider an allowable tactic, or something that should be put in the naughty bin?
 
go ahead and launch them - units who operate at -X resources are "nerfed" big time, and i don't know how it would effect nukes.
 
why would anyone consider this a not allowed tactic?

I dont even know if you can use nukes the turn you buy them. Besides that even if you could, its highly unlikely to have 4 targets within 4 different cities and if you relocate them you cant fire them that turn.

If you had 40k gold and 10 uranium you could use 10 nukes a turn so what? what am i missing here?
 
No, you'd have to wait a turn before you use them after purchasing but then you'd be able to finish the builds in one turn in the cities. They wouldn't suffer a combat penalty as the units from the cities production aren't realised and the production would be canceled if you were actually still trying to build them when you purchased the units.

But I think I'm right in saying that the built up hammers are still reserved, even though you lost access to the resource. I'd have to check that.

***edit. actually, I'm sure of it - think of the analogous situation when you lose access to iron while building a sword. The hammers are retained.***

It's kind of bending what strategic resources are meant to do, and gives you double the amount of units you'd be able to get otherwise in a very short time frame.

Hanzou, talking about whether or not it would be unlikely to have 4 different targets for two turns etc is irrelevant as that doesn't get to the principle. Reduce it to 2 or 1 if you like. You only have one uranium resource but you save up enough cash to buy a nuke and pre-build one to one turn from completing at the same time. By purchasing and then finishing the build that turn you can have 2 nukes in 3 turns.
 
snarzberry is always good for a clever surprise. However, what am I missing here? Why not just build the nukes completely, use them and then buy the others. Wouldn't that yield the exact same scenario as yours?
 
It's a little different since building them first yields launches on turns 1 & 3 while buying first yields launches on turns 2 & 3, which is presumably a little better. Doesn't feel cheaty to me, the high hassle:payoff ratio would proabably keep me from doing it though.
 
You're right. Facepalm

Yeah, the real problem seems to be that you immediately get your uranium back after using nukes, creating an incentive to use them ASAP. Never getting any uranium back would make nukes very hard to use, but surely there's some middle ground to prevent this sort of double dipping.
 
Yeah, the real problem seems to be that you immediately get your uranium back after using nukes, creating an incentive to use them ASAP. Never getting any uranium back would make nukes very hard to use, but surely there's some middle ground to prevent this sort of double dipping.

A timed recovery could do that. I.e. it needs to "grow back" (or processed) before you can use it. Some sort of "X turns before you can use this again".

I know you could argue this for any strategic ressource, but with Uranium this is somewhat more necessary than i.e. iron or oil.
 
Also, if you have 4 uranium, built/buy 4 nukes, aren't you automatically unable to build the next four nukes because you lack the resourecs?
 
What? I think Snarzberry's original plan worked excellently. I also think its mean, but not quite cheating lol.

It doesn't matter which set you rush buy. Either way you can't use them until the next turn. So it would go like this:

Buy first
-Almost build all nukes
-Purchase nukes
(Next turn)
-Fire bought nukes
-Switch production back to nukes
(Next turn)
-Finish and fire hammer'd nukes

Produce first
-Almost build all nukes
(Next turn)
-Finish and fire hammer'd nukes
-Buy new nukes
(Next turn)
-Fire bought nukes

Same outcome. Either way, still evil.

One thing to note is that you have to make sure you are still capable of purchasing/producing the nukes after you use the first set. So if you think your hammer production might decline (from the DoW or something) then produce first (and produce first if you don't have enough cities that can make nukes simultaneously). If you are going to lose money somehow, then buy first.

Of course, buying both sets will be just as obnoxious and effective, but then you bought 2 sets of nukes...ouch my wallet.
 
In my games, as soon as I queue up a unit which requires a resources, the resource is immediately assigned to that unit: thus unavailable for trying to build or buy another unit with that instance of the required resource.

So, I guess what you are saying is that you queue up some other building or unit. Then after you use the atomic bomb you queue up another bomb and move it to the top of the list.

I think I have seen that work some times, but not necessarily every time. It does seem to work with the immediate overflow after building a product. Does it really work after you have several turns of production into the original building target?
 
In my pre-building thread i talk about this kind of strategy(no rush buy). Can be done with every units taking ressources. Not exactly what you said, but here is the trick :

Assuming you have 2 uranium, you pre-build 2 atomic bombs in 2 cities at 1 turn of completion. Then you start 2 other things. Since they are not finished, you can start 2 other bombs in 2 other cities. Finish them, then buy 2 extra uranium to finish 1 turn later the 2 others you have initially started. ;)

Can be done with swordmen, catapults, rocket artillery, tanks, etc.
 
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