8 Cities by 275 B.C.: Is That Typical?

[yin26]

I'm finally getting some of the pacing down, etc., and seem consistently able (unless geography is really against met) to get about 8 cities by 275 B.C. on Noble difficulty. Is this about the pace for everybody else? How does this compare with the number of cities in Civ 3 by this point?

Also, all but the most recently-founded city has defenders in it (most have a warrior + archer, 3 are waiting for the archer). I have 3 workers (a 4th on the way), with plans now to get that to 8 workers, one per city.

[TheDarkside]

-5 gold per turn

edit: And man, they stuck you in some harsh terrain didn't they

[yin26]

The gold should go positive fairly soon with the added workers and growth phase. Is this your normal pace on cities? I'm trying to get a feel for how far people are pushing city numbers.

[TheDarkside]

I wouldn't say it's my normal pace, definitely higher than my average.

[yin26]

I'm curious to see if pushing this hard as a general rule opens me up to attack. I'm trying to cycle in defenders (War Elephants, Axemen, etc.) now. Any growth in city numbers from here will have to come from taking enemy cities, so it looks like 8 cities for a long time.

[Arrian]

Reasons for founding Xian and Chengdu at this point? Are there key resouces down there in the tundra I'm not seeing in the screenie? EDIT: I just noticed... iron, I think, next to Chengdu, so nevermind that...

Meanwhile, there appears to be nice land west of Guangzhou...

Anyway, it does seem a little bit fast, but I haven't been paying all that much attention to # of cities by date in my games. I've been ending up with around 10-12 on normal maps/noble/standard across the board.

-Arrian

[DrrD]

So much depends on geography. It looks like he's by himself on a pretty large continent, so no one can settle it until they get astronomy. In that case it makes sense to spam cities so by the time astronomy comes the entire continent is yours and no one can sneak a city/base in there.

If your sharing land with another civ, it may be better to build fewer, larger cities so you can get science and production going sooner.

[TheDarkside]

If you take another look at that screen shot you'll see some orange borders next to his empire, so he's not alone...

And while it may not necessarily open you up for attack it may lead you to increasing your tax slider (therefore reducing your science slider) and thus dropping behind in the tech race- which is just as bad if not worse. It all depends on whether those new cities can produce enough commerce and therefore revenue to maintain themselves... and with what resources and terrain they seem to have available I don't think that's very likely

[Harovan]

I had a similar setup in my last game. I pushed hard to get 10 good cities out, and I built military only after I was done. And no, the AI did not punish me when it could.

You can't call that ICS though, it's just REX. And if you beeline for markets and courthouses, you can definitely live with the upkeep.

You don't need that many workers though. I found out, that about one worker for 2 cities is enough, unless you plan to road everywhere, which I avoid because it just looks hideous. Else you will get to a point, where they have nothing to do anymore and just stand dull doing nothing. Unless I missed something, you can't add them back to the cities like in earlier civ games.

[TheDarkside]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph

You don't need that many workers though. I found out, that about one worker for 2 cities is enough, unless you plan to road everywhere, which I avoid because it just looks hideous. Else you will get to a point, where they have nothing to do anymore and just stand dull doing nothing. Unless I missed something, you can't add them back to the cities like in earlier civ games.

Right you cannot, because they do not represent populations anymore- just normal units. As normal units though if you build alot of workers you will push up your unit count and may have to start paying gold to maintain them AND an adaquate defensive army. That's another thing- AFAIK You don't get a # of free units per city anymore, but per nation., So building alot of cities you need to build more units to defend but you aren't allowed any more free units so it ends up being yet another financial burden.

-5 gold is a pretty big deficit at this stage of the game and with that small treasury there's not much wiggle room. Gonna have to readjust those sliders

[Harovan]

-5 gpt is nothing, I have lived with higher deficits at this stage. I think if he lowers the slider to 80% science, he'll get roughly even.

[TheDarkside]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
-5 gpt is nothing, I have lived with higher deficits at this stage. I think if he lowers the slider to 80% science, he'll get roughly even.

That's my point though... less science Drop behind in the tech race

[My PitBull Tank]

that's about my normal pace, once built, get a couple of units in each and then get all the important buildings built...

and in the game i'm currently playing, i've got about 15 cities (noble, Kubla Khan, 1st in points, second in culture, about 3-4th in techs), and about ten workers sitting idle. but i'm not sure if that didn't help me get up to speed quickly once i expanded, so may be worth it for them now to sit and wait on irrigation and stuff later.

now i'm just planning my world domination i've had one small war, took two chinese cities, looking his way again!!! (he's got two left, muhahahaha)

[kolpo]

I most of the time expand until I have 4-6 good cities. With good do I mean really good. I also leave a lot of space between my cities(often enough to have a considerable amount of unworked titles).

I see that many titles are shared by muliply cities(in the south west), by doing that might you be paying more maintenance without gaining long term benefit(more spaced out cities would in the end work the same amount of titles but with less maintenance)

While your budget is not in very bad shape can even 10% extra science be very crucial when you go for a space race victory. For the space race must you be a tech leader not a follower.

I would aim for great artists in this situation, a culture war(or military) seems unavoidable

[yin26]

Here's my setup now. 80% science with +13 gold. I've also paid attention to science buildings and great people doing science things to keep pace. It's now 1170 a.d.: