Incremental buying

[ramses II.]

Everybody has heard of it, most of us have done it - incremental buying, I do it, too. But there are still some questions.
If you want to buy a caravan, you must switch the production to a warrior/phalanx after a turn, buy it, then switch ... and so on.
So my conclusions and questions:
1) That must be possible with city improvements, too. Am I right?
2) That must be possible with WoW, too. Am I right?
(Think of the fact that there ar 4-, 6-, 8- and 12-caravan-wonders).
And what do you have to think of, too?

[Messer Niccolò]

Ramses II
The benefit of the incremental buying (AFAIK, Gits, La Fayette, Xin & others feel free to punch me if I'm wrong), is related to the last "row" which cost less than the others.

In case you want heroically to buy a warrior (10 shields) you will have to pay 4*10=40gold. But, in case you have already started (with a shield) the "last" row, this row will cost you 25 gold (2.5 per shield).

This is the reason why you buy the caravan with warrior, phalanx, diplo etc steps...

[OTmode on]


re-read what I wrote and it doesn't make much sense... my english is a little rusted...
[OTmode off]

back to your question, I don't recall of these jumps (10 shields, 20, 30 etc...) in buildings... what can you do i.e in building Marketplace is to switch to temple when filling the last temple row, and then re-switch to marketplace, doing so you'll save some shields.
You can't use the "units steps" because of the loss of 50% shields when changing production.

For Wow building use caravans.

[rah]

For units, buying each row is the cheapest.

For buildings and WOW, (after you have at least one shield) it makes no difference. (It used to in CIV I) but they changed it for CIV II, but left it for the units.

The fact that they changed it, is the main reason why a lot of people think it's a cheat. But for myself and others in the MP community allow it in our games.

[La Fayette]

Ramses II
I have just started a new thread that should give you detailed explanations (apart from what Messer Niccolò and Rah already explained).
Thread: 'building camels...' should be on top of this forum.

[La Fayette]

Just 2 more points though:
1) You should NEVER build a WoW with anything else than stacked camels (so much cheaper, and allows you to change your mind).
2) You can also use stacked camels to build costly improvements (it is not cheaper than rushbuilding, but it gives you freedom, since your treasury becomes pure gold instead of camels).

[rah]

1) One exeception. Some people start on their first wonder prior to discovering TRADE.

2.) Deliver those caravans then buy the improvements.
You might as well get the science beakers too.

RAH

[Marquis de Sodaq]

To clarify, the cost of rush buying a row of shields is not a constant 2.5g/shield, that is just an approximate cost - figure a bit less for the first row, 25g for each successive row, usually up to 50 shields for a camel.

IIRC (and I probably get one or two wrong...), the
Cost per number of shields remaining:
10 - 25g
9 - 22g
8 - 19g
7 - 16g
6 - 13g
5 - 11g
4 - 8g
3 - 6g
2 - 4g
1 - 2g

As rah points out, it's always 4g/shield with an improvement, regardless of how many remain.

[rah]

2g/shield for improvements, it's only 4 when you have 0 in the box. (yes, I know that's what you meant.)

It's 4g/shield for wonders. Unless you have 0, then it's 8.

Rich

[La Fayette]

Marquis
Read my new thread 'building camels...(on this forum)
I think the numbers are OK there.

Rah
I agree with you on both points...
but
1) In almost any game I play (SP,... perhaps it wouldn't work playing MP) Trade has such a high priority that I almost never start building any WoW before having camels available.
2) Commodity caravans should be delivered, oh yes indeed! but if the stack is food caravans and you have no better use for them than waiting for the next wonder, then some more gold might be prefered.

[Messer Niccolò]

Just a question about building Wows with Camels: I've always used food caravans since I've started to understand something of Civ but, I wonder, what if I use a "good" caravan?
Will the slot be used in the home city as if the good has been delivered or not?

[rah]

Originally posted by La Fayette
Rah
I agree with you on both points...
but
1) In almost any game I play (SP,... perhaps it wouldn't work playing MP) Trade has such a high priority that I almost never start building any WoW before having camels available.
2) Commodity caravans should be delivered, oh yes indeed! but if the stack is food caravans and you have no better use for them than waiting for the next wonder, then some more gold might be prefered.

1) Mostly agree. But it depends on the starting position. In MP, if you don't start on HG early, you'll never get it. It's way too much of an advantage to have it in MP and a lot of players start on it early. But not including HG, it's wait to trade.

2) Wasn't considering food caravans, so on that point I agree. Sometimes it's good to use them when you're incremental rush buying an improvement and you use it to get the city close enough to build it in one turn so you don't waste the shield production for that turn, and don't have to spend the extra money.
It depends on the situation, but I usually save them for wonders. In MP games, you have to build the wonder the turn you get the tech or risk having someone steal it and beating you to it. And if you're out there stealing, you never know when you can catch someone with their pants down. If a player developes a wonder tech and sees that it's white, sometimes he'll misjudge and decides he can wait a turn if he's a caravan short. It's a lot of fun to steal the tech and ace them. I've been known to drop my science rate so I won't develop it until I have the caravans ready. Especially if an opponent has an embassy and has diplos poised to make a move.

Rich

[La Fayette]

I must definitely play some MP games (my restricted experience of PBEMs against strong players like DaveV and the Gits has taught me that it is great fun ... with more explosive surprises than in SP ).

[La Fayette]

Originally posted by Messer Niccolò

Will the slot be used in the home city as if the good has been delivered or not?

As soon as your computer is OK, you open your lab, you send ONE camel and you will remember the result for ever .
(it's a smaller lab than STYOM tipping thousands of huts, but it might be a good start)

[rah]

If I remember correctly. (getting old sucks)
The city will mark it as a taken commodity until it's delivered to complete a wonder. Then you will get the avail slot again. But use crappy commodities if you know it's 95% going to go to a wonder. I.e When I have the choice of commodities and it's something like copper. Since copper is usually demanded you select it.
SO I deliver it to my cap, and it's in demand, but I want it to finish a wonder. Fine, but then when that city built it's next caravan, the Commodities had change to mediocre ones and I couldn't build a caravan that my cap would build. Granted there are other events that trigger commodity changes. (like someone else getting trade, and many others.) But early in the game on your first few caravans, this seems to happen enough that I consider it a pattern.

RAH
But again, I could be wrong. Playing in MP games doesn't leave you enough time to super micro manage trade routes. Unless you're will to move so slow, that no one will ever want to play with you again.

[debeest]

Just to make it explicit for you, Niccolo:

When you build the caravan, the slot is used. When you convert the caravan into Wonder production, the slot is opened up again, but you may find a different commodity available instead of the one you "used."

[rah]

Gee, that type of explicit response made mine look quite wordy.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Originally posted by rah
If I remember correctly. (getting old sucks)
The city will mark it as a taken commodity until it's delivered to complete a wonder.

big 'snip'

OK, I'm with you for all the rest of the above post. However, on many, many occasions, I wind up without any commodities to build in key trading cities, despite having delivered all caravans/freights previously built.

I find that delivering freights to the city without commodities can sometimes free up new commodities to build. And sometimes it seems that if new advances are discovered, or the city grows, new commodities to build are generated. For example, uranium only seems to show up after NF is discovered.

Do any of you smart guys (meant without irony ) know any definitive ways to free up build commodities? Or when and how it happens naturally?

[rah]

If they're delivered to build wonders instead of trade, they should free up.

For what changes, I've seen it change when another player gets trade, or when I or another player gets banking, economics. Not all cities change.

I had one the other night in an MP game, where the caravan was one square away from the city and it was demanded, I hit the wrong button and continued moving it. But since I had 2/3 left i moved it back out of the city and when i went to deliver it back, IT WAS NO LONGER DEMANDED. ????????????? Now we don't allow tech trading so no one could have gotten a changing tech in the time it took me to move the caravan.
SO even just answering the delivery question can effect demands. (this seems to happen more in fringe cities than core cities)
Yes I too will sometimes deliver non-demanded commodities hoping to shuffle the deck.

These are some examples on why it has never been fully understood. The basic concepts are known, but the exceptions are many.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Originally posted by rah
If they're delivered to build wonders instead of trade, they should free up.

That makes sense.

For what changes, I've seen it change when another player gets trade, or when I or another player gets banking, economics. Not all cities change.

Trade... Banking... Economics... those are all on the same tech path, correct? I need to look at my tech tree (I can't unfold it at work, people would talk) but perhaps if there is a relationship between certain techs and changing of supplied commodities, it could influence research paths? If your trade city (or OCC city) is capable of 500g caravans but can't build any, it would make sense to divert the tech path... in order to get subsequent techs faster. I think.

These are some examples on why it has never been fully understood. The basic concepts are known, but the exceptions are many.

I haven't finished my hut tests... so don't look at me

[rah]

One thing that I did notice, is that I have seen changes in my outer cities, when my Captial didn't. So some of these may not be approriate for OCC.

[La Fayette]

You guys are too smart!
I try to put my friend Niccolò at work finding the answer for himself and you give him the answer.
Luckily the answer is so complicated that Messer Niccolò will probably be compelled to open his lab nevertheless
(BTW I think that Xin Yu has an almost complete theory about 'refreshing' demand, but he is very busy with his civ manager at the moment ...)

[rah]

Yeah, Xin is good, but there always seems to be an exception to the rule.

[SlowThinker]

Originally posted by Marquis de Sodaq
To clarify, the cost of rush buying a row of shields is not a constant 2.5g/shield, that is just an approximate cost - figure a bit less for the first row, 25g for each successive row, usually up to 50 shields for a camel.

IIRC (and I probably get one or two wrong...), the
Cost per number of shields remaining:
10 - 25g
9 - 22g
8 - 19g
7 - 16g
6 - 13g
5 - 11g
4 - 8g
3 - 6g
2 - 4g
1 - 2g

In other words cost of the 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc. shield are
2 2 2 2 3 2 3 3 3 3
So I like to buy 1-4 shields, then 6, then 5, then 7...

BTW see When to rushbuild, and when not?

[SlowThinker]

sorry, bad hit

[La Fayette]

Originally posted by SlowThinker

BTW see When to rushbuild, and when not?

Thank you for the link, SlowThinker.
It is real fun to reread it now and notice that supposedly good players had really strange ideas about rushbuilding, and that was 18 months ago