Tech acquiring plan : to the Medieval Era !

[Spiffor]

As you probably know it, some Civs have the techs required to enter Medieval Era : Brits have construction, France and Persia have construction + currency.

I designed a small plan to get these techs at an affordable price, even if we won't make profit with them. The plan is as follows :

We buy Currency from Persia for 312 gold.
We sell Currency for Construction to the Brits (anticipated)
We sell construction to Greece for 174 gold (anticipated)
We sell Literature to Germany for 31 gold (anticiapted)
We sell polytheism to Russia for 17 gold. (anticipated)

Pros : acquired Construction and Currency
Got to the Medieval Era
Doesn't jeopardy Plan Gold

Cons : Lost 90 gold
Helped Britain and Greece to get to Medieval Era

We can avoid to spread Lit and Polytheism, without jeopardizing Plan Gold (we'll need 2 turns to have the required treasury again)

Comments ?

[UnOrthOdOx]

OK, dumb question time.

How do you know:

Brits will take currency for construction without additional funds?
How much Greece is willing to pay for Construction when we do not have it?



And thank you.

Now I think I can finish up the paper for this week.

[Spiffor]

Since I now won't play ahead to prepare trades, I can't be sure. I'll edit my previous post to say these are anticipated prices.

BUT :
- Currency is much more valuable than construction when you didn't research it. Proof is : even at 100% tech, we couldn't research currency faster. We can research construction in 26 turns instead of 40.

- When we'll get currency, it will be as much spread as construction, so their relative values should be the same.

[Inverse Icarus]

I'd support this plan, i hope it goes the way you have planned it.

TO FEUDALISM!

[Kuciwalker]

I think playing ahead should be allowed for trades, but ONLY if the turn is never ended and no units are moved.

[Apocalypse]

I support this plan. Greece entering the Middle Age isn't that bad. We may need them to take on France if Persia decides to go after us during the war.

[GodKing]

Cautiously look at and say OK.

And no skywalker, no playing ahead, for any reason. That is a large part of the fun in playing a game, unless you are one of those who play and reload everytime something bad happens.

[adaMada]

Sounds like a solid plan. I'm for it, and move to put it to a poll .

-- adaMada

[Aggie]

I like this plan but let me propose an alternative:
Buy from france for 278+tm, tm saves us 1g
Then sell as mentioned. Though in my games the comp still manages to stick it to me on such deals, but hopefully england will feel generous in this game. Even if we need to pay something( I hope we don't, but the ai is the ai) it would be be worth it. Also wherever possible, if we need to offset cost, remember that each civ will pay 1g a turn for our maps every turn we want to go through the trouble of selling them. So i suggest we do this between every turnchat as a matter of practice(doing before is best), then post a save so everybody doesn't have to do it. Also in all negotiations remember tm is a currency worth 1g. Still a very good plan . I will be leaving tomorrow so I hope ya'll have fun and can't wait to see our glorious empire when I return in a week.
Aggie

[Shiber]

Originally posted by skywalker
I think playing ahead should be allowed for trades, but ONLY if the turn is never ended and no units are moved.

I agree. If we limit ourselves to not playing ahead then we prohibit ourselves from doing things that are possible in real world trade, such as bluffing.
E.g. In the real world, we could call Britain and say "Yes, we have currency. How much are you willing to pay for it? Really? Ok, I'll call you back later". However, if we limit ourselves to not playing ahead, such tactics become impossible.

[Shiber]

Not a very appealing plan IMHO... we can get all those techs when we conquer French cities. They might even have Feudalism or Monotheism by the time we get there and we'll be able to steal that as well.

[Shiber]

Sometimes it seems that our research money is going to waste.
We're researching currency, yet we'll complete it just a few turns before we'll be able to steal it from the French when we invade their cities. IMHO we should have researched Monarchy or Republic which AIs usually don't research until later on so our research money will not have gone to waste.

[Spiffor]

Shiber :
The "few turns" you're referring to are 14 turns. That's many turns actually.
Our research money hasn't be sent to waste, on the contrary. Normally, currency is much more expansive than construction. Yet, the cautious Persians sell it for 312 gold, and the polite French 278 gold. The Brits will sell construction for about 450 gold (didn't do the haggling precisely for this uninteresting trade).

So, we'd pay more for construction than currency... Why ? Because we researched currency so far, and the AI is aware its relative value is much less than construction. If we didn't go for currency, it would have been much more expansive than it is (I'd say about 700 gold). We've invested 51 gold total in our currency research. After calculating, we didn't waste our resources at all.

[Robber Baron]

Would this plan leave us with enough gold to maximize the impact of Plan Gold (which IMO means, 400 gold, to create 10 swordsmen)? If so, we can afford it. If not, then no: let's just beat these techs out of the French.

And actually I like the idea of strengthening England (to buttress Liz's position visa vi the Aztecs and Persians) ((On second thought, would Liz turn around and sell this to potential enemies? Hmmmm...))

[Shiber]

Originally posted by Spiffor
Shiber :
The "few turns" you're referring to are 14 turns. That's many turns actually.

Even if we got construction and currency today, that wouldn't really help us other than advance us to the next era because most of our cities are still busy building other improvements such as temples or busy preparing for the war. We'll be free to start production of marketplaces, colosseums and aqueducts in quite a lot of turns from now.

Originally posted by Spiffor
Our research money hasn't be sent to waste, on the contrary.

You are absolutely right. I should have been more clear.
What I meant was that we've known for quite some time that we're going to invade France, and when we do we'll be able to steal some techs from them. Therefore we should have researched Monarchy or Republic which are techs that the French are unlikely to possess since the AIs usually don't research these techs until later on because they're in a rush to get to the medieval era and because most civs prefer to leave revolutions for later in the game.
If we do invade France and steal currency then all the money we've put into researching currency will really go to waste.

[Spiffor]

Skywalker, Shiber :
I will not play ahead. I've already done it once, and it was a mistake. Basically, I'd play ahead only to check if the plan will work properly... meaning I'll reduce the risk, which is exactly what playing ahead is about, whether you move your units ahead, send your galleys on ocean tiles ahead, or anything you do ahead.

I'm 99% sure this plan will work. However, there is a slight chance something wrong happens. If we accept this plan, we have to accept this risk. Exactly like we accepted the risk when attacking America with our archer stack.

BTW, in Civ, you can't bluff, and it works both ways : the AI will never lie to you : when it tells you'll get currency for 278 gold, you'll still get it for the same price, even if you come back some time later during the turn.

[Shiber]

I don't play ahead anymore either (I used to when I was still a lurker). I'm sorry, it was a bad choice of words. What I meant was playing ahead *within the current turn*.
As long as the turn isn't over I believe it's not cheating to run some plays and test your trading strategy.

[Spiffor]

Shiber :
You raise good points. I thought this tech-whoring would be accepted by everyone (and I've set up this thread in order to discuss the specifics), but I didn't think of these points.
I'll set up an official poll in a few hours. What do you think of :

Here is a tech-acquisition project for the year 750 B.C

The project says :
- buy Currency from the French for 278 gold + territory map
- sell Currency to the English for Construction + WM
- sell Construction to the Greeks for 174 gold + WM
- sell Literature to Germany for 31 gold + WM
- sell Polytheism to Russia for 17 gold + WM

Estimated treasury after the complete plan : 443 gold
Estimated treasury if we don't sell Literature and Polytheism : 395 gold

Question is : Do you agree with the plan ?

Answers :
- YES, I support the plan as written
- YES, I suport the plan, but am against selling Literature and Polytheism
- NO, I want the plan to be held differently (please explain)
- NO, I am against this whole tech-acquiring project

This poll will follow the grouping procedure : the option which got the most votes within the majority group wins.

This poll will close in 3 days.

[Apocalypse]

When do you think Germany and Russia would get these techs without us selling it to them?

[Shiber]

Yeah, that's a better plan IMHO. But let's not buy any more techs afterwards, we should let the French acquire new techs and then steal those techs from them.

[Spiffor]

Apocalypse :
I can't give a precise estimate. Both countries seem to have a steady amount of cash (around 2-3 gpt), and I can't tell how much the AI values these techs. Moreover, they might research these by themselves.
A prudent estimate will be less than 15 turns. A more daring estimate would be less than 7 turns : the AI can make demands (like the Babs when they wanted CoL), trade maps, or even trade communications if another AI is on Greek Island.

[Shiber]

There's no sure way of knowing, but since this is emperor level AIs trade with one another more often, so it's likely that they'll get those techs in a few turns. This is also another reason why we should sell them these technologies: if we won't then somebody else will, and we'd rather sell it to them because it'll improve our foreign relations and decrease the effective costs of getting currency and construction.
I think we should set up a strong lobby to push this plan forward and have it executed in the next turn, before Germany and Russia get these techs from other sources.

[Spiffor]

EDIT : never mind

[Kuciwalker]

Shiber, just one question: if you had a telephone to call Britain with, would you logically have already developed currency?

[Shiber]

Most likely I have, unless the telephone is operated by a calling card rather than coins.
I don't see the connection though.

Perhaps I haven't made myself clear about this bluffing business. I didn't really mean bluffing in terms of lying. I meant that in the real world, you can ask the British how much they would pay for currency, but in civ you can't unless you actually have currency and you can put it on the bargaining table.
If we prohibit ourselves from playing ahead (within the limits of the current turn of course) when making trade agreements then we cannot do such things as evaluate how much the other civs will pay for a certain negotiation item which we don't have yet.

[Shiber]

I've tried the plan and it doesn't work (not on my game anyway). The Persians won't settle for less than all our money and some gold per turn and the Brits aren't so generous either.
(I'm using the 750BC savegame)