Opening Gambit

[triqui]

Originally Posted by Zorfwaddle

Triqui, I did not think of it that way... thank you for the insight.

I do not think I lose more than 1-2 mage-worth-of-research before I stumble into a scout province. I do plant a lab if feasible for the provinces w/ a magic site that generates something useful like a sage or mages I cannot generate, for a bootstrap into a path I don't have.

That is the great thing about Dominions... so many ways to do stuff :-)

That's not relevant, you still lose the 80 research per year per mage you didn't buy.

Quick math:

Lets suppose you don't buy a mage in turns 2, 3 and 4, where you could, to buy 3 scouts. Let's suppose you conquer a province with mages one of those turns, and you go and buy a lab in turn 5 to buy druids. Let's assume your mages have research 7. Druids and the like have research 5

So your research for the first 12 turns is:
0+0+0+0+7+(7+7+5)+ (7+7+7+5+5) + (7*4+5*3) + (7*5
5*4 ) + (7*6+5*5)+ (7*7+5*6) + (7*8+5*7) = 384 research

Let's suppose you now buy mages in those first turns, and then you buy the same lab and buy the same druids (there's nothing forbidding you to do so)
0+7+7*2+7*3+7*4+(7*5+5)+(7*6+5*2)+(7*7+5*3)+(7*8+5 *4)+(7*9+5*5)+(7*10+5*6)+(7*11+5*7)= 600 research.

The fault in your reasoning is that you think you are just losing 1 research turn. You arent. You are missing 1 researcher, which means you lose 1 research turn per turn after the turn you missed the researcher. That compounds through time, so a 7 point researcher you missed in turn 2, by the end of year 3, you would had lost 34*7=238 research, that mage alone. If you miss mages in the, say, first 5 turns, you will be 7*34+7*33+7*32+7*31= 910 research in turn 36.

That does not mean you should buy researchers every single turn of your life due to this opportunity cost you miss if you don't. But you should miss the buy only when what you are doing produces a benefit that is greater than the oportunity cost you miss. Buying a needed commander, maybe buying a H3 priest to prophetize into H4, buying extra troops first couple of turns to get 2 expansion parties, or going to site search with a mage are worth the research cost. Buying a scout, is not.