Vel's Strategy Thread, Volume II

[Son of David]

Originally posted by Yosh
I'm attaching an image to this post of a settling spot; I've marked with colored dots(!) locations and types of improvements - I'd like to see if you all agree with me.

My apologies for the quality of the screen shot; I'm at work and can't generate a better one atm! javascript:smilie('')
big grin

Green = farm
Blue = mine
white = windmill
brown = lumbermill
yellow = cottage

The theory behind my positioning is that being a capital city, it is going to be somewhat more balanced than later cities; therefore balance it out!

When I have a food square I want to maximize it's food output; hence the farms on the grass. I DID miss out on one forest square that I think I ended up chopping and putting a cottage on... I can't remember though :P
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Wouldn't it be better to chop down those forests instead of leaving them for lumbermills much later on? The concept of early (turn) advantage and all that.

[xxFlukexx]

Yosh: looks like a good plan to me, that'd make a balanced city. I'd just farm all the grasslands, mine all the hills and make a super production city myself. When you get biology, swap out irrigated plains with workshops. I'd chop those forests and probably cottage some of them. But that's just me, I usually like to make my capital a commerce giant, but with all those hills, mmm.

Forrester: Taken from page 1 of this thread written by Vel:

""FarSeer"
An Oracle trick. Time the completion of the Oracle with completing all the pre-requisites for Metal Casting, grab that as your free tech, and build Forges in all your cities well before the opposition. Fast way to get a (temporary) 25% production boost.

"CS Slingshot"
Another Oracle trick. Time the completion of the Oracle with your research of Code of Laws, and take Civil Service as your free tech. This, coupled with a Library with two specialists assigned (and a previously generated Great Scientist to found an Academy) can give you a massive boost to research in your Capitol, upon switching to bureaucracy, which can drive your research throughout the entire middle ages."

[Dog of Justice]

Originally posted by DeepO
It doesn't matter it will take 40 turns to build that lib, if there is nothing else that can be builty in the mean time... slowly getting there will be good too.

This is one of the situations chop-rushing and Slavery was made for. Frequently you are "losing" quite a lot of commerce every turn your Library is delayed.

[xxFlukexx]

Before I log off for awhile, how do you guys play on Emperor+. I notice that Emperor is quite a leap from Monarch, you get only +3 happys and +1 healthys and that can really slow down growth. I find that I need every city to be by fresh water or near a bunch of forests and I need to not whip my people until I have the pyramids or hereditary rule up or I get extremely lucky with happy resources. An expansion city that used the whip once early on can only grow to size 2 for 10 turns, egads. I just feel like a lot of these strategies are great, but on Emperor I think they won't work or are too risky.

Basic Emperor, standard size/normal speed, path for me(would like to hear yours):
Bronze working + worker, chop out 2 settlers
build 2-3 warriors and improve terrain
Agriculture/animal husbrandry depending on the resources I can use right away, then straight to pottery.
Masonry and start the Pyramids(hopefully around 1800 BC)
Then finally writing, then shoot for monarchy in case Pyramids fail. Then a mix of Alphabet then Ironworking, I can usually trade monarchy to grab a few techs I missed.
I do have a lull inbetween when I have 3 cities till I expand again and the AI being the dork he is makes many cities and cuts off my growth lightning fast. If I delay my pyramids anymore I'll have no chance at it and my size 3 cities usually have to make military vs the horde of barbs that is incoming.

I don't really go for alphabet right away because I don't have much to trade(AIs have everything)
I try to grab as many cities as I can but after switching my cap to Pyramids if I don't have forests I can be stuck at ~4 good cities, and if I do grab 6 good cities I am desparately needing cash and have barely any military.

Early aggression doesn't usually work too well for me because I am very unlucky. I would love to grab an early religionm but man techs cost so much I doubt I could get one and if I don't grab an early religion it's like I wasted a bunch of turns, hmmm. I could whip early and just keep that city at 2 pop for awhile, for some reason keeping cities at 2 pop for so long just seems like a bad idea.

Would like to hear others on Emperor+(land maps and with everything turned on)

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Dog of Justice


This is one of the situations chop-rushing and Slavery was made for. Frequently you are "losing" quite a lot of commerce every turn your Library is delayed.

True, choprushing will certainly help in production-less cities aiming for commerce only. Not true that you need to chop rush in all situations, though. There are plenty of situations where you don't want to lose 1 or 2 pop, as it will show all game long. If you can't compensate with running more food later, you might be getting a 25% bonus a bit faster, but miss out on e.g. 12 commerce each turn for the whole game.

Be careful with chop rushing: you might get too addicted to it.

DeepO

[Heroes]

Originally posted by Velociryx

If I said to you....make sure every city has at least SOME production so that it can at least provide for itself the basics that it needs, everyone would nod and agree that this is right and proper. Hammers are good. Every city needs them.

No, I don't nod and agree.
The reason is that in civ 4, pop rush is very viable. You can transfer food into hammer. A city with 1 fish, 1 clam, 1 deer but no hammer production otherwise is very good to me.

[Heroes]

Originally posted by DeepO

Now assume representation is available, and you don't have trouble with happiness or health. A specialist needs 2 food to support, therefore 1 food = 3 gold.

The problem here, is that you're talking about specific situations. I try to have a ratio depending on no special playstyle, and early in the game. I don't like rep that much as normal: sure, it's powerful, but in many instances I need her. rule more.

The moment you hit biology, everything changes again. Food will become less important. The moment you add more trade routes to cities, the commerce value goes down. And consider the importance of a single hammer when industrious and building a wonder, and you will also get to other numbers.

To determine whether a tile is worth working, you compare its output with the 6 gold + 3 GPP from specialist and 30 hammer from pop rush.

So what conclusion do I get?

1. A tile with >= 3 food is always worth working, because that's worth >= 9 gold.

2. A resource with proper improvement is often worth working, but NOT always. For example, a fur on ice generates just 4 gold, an incense on desert gets just 6 gold. Both are too few.

Woah! 6 gold! before any multipliers, in a spot where you won't have food for specialists anyway! You always have to play the situation handed to you, but incense is one fo the few attractions deserts are getting...

3. A tile with < 2 food has problem, because it delays growth. Unless you have some really good reason (it's a gold mine, for instance), it's better to work high food tiles first.

4. A tile with 2 food becomes interesting. A river grass (2/0/1)? 7 gold > 6 gold, but the excess 1 gold is too little comparing with 3 GPP. You should make a farm or cottage on it before working. A sea tile (2/0/2)? Hard to say, but it can't grow more, so if you have a cottage somewhere else, work the cottage. A forest grass (2/1/0)? Also not quite good. Better off chopping the tree and make some improvement.

5. A general conclusion is that a tile without improvement is almost never worth working, -- the same thing as civ 3!

You would probably agree with these conclusions even if without agreeing foodgold = 3:1.5:1.

Nope. Not at all

You see: what base value a tile has has very little importance in CIV. a 0 fpt tile is as good as a 1 fpt or a 2 fpt tile, as long as you can compensate the food from somewhere. The typical example here is a fp site: in many cases fps are in an area with desert hills, deserts, and at most plains. Your strategy would ask to windmill those desert hills, and watermill those fps... a good use, but depending on where you are in the tech tree, mined hills and farmed fp will be better. (well actually, it's especially the mine which is important: fp don't get any special bonus from having a farm. It's +1 food like everywhere else)

It's improvements that will decide what bonus you'll be getting from your land, and not the underlying land... but of course, a purely flat land can't build mines.

And in that sense, I personally rate 1 extra gold about as high as 1 extra food or hammer in the early game. you don't need to grow, or to produce a lot if your commerce situation stinks so hard that you can't reach any techs in time...

DeepO

The most important point I want to make is NOT any specific rule, but that you could draw RATIONAL and (semi-)ACUURATE conclusion about whether a tile should be worked. In these days, people love to say anything is dependent on situation and that's the beauty of civ 4. That's true, but as a scientist (specialist) , I want to make the choice as reasonable as possible. "Everything depends" is not an excuse to do it randomly.

I am "talking about specific situations", quite true. The situation is that you build pyramid in the early game. Otherwise the base value of a specialist is 3 gold, not 6 gold, which makes specialist much less attractive comparing to working tiles. Once you understand my line of reasoning (or get your own), when the situation is different, you can get new conclusions easily.

About incense on desert: surely it's better to have an incense on desert than nothing, but my point is, if you run representation and can hire specialist, you gain more by leaving that dear incense empty and hiring a specialist! It might change if leader is financial (makes working tile better), or you dearly need commerce but you can only hire an engineer, or, of course, you don't run representation. But you get the reasoning.

I don't quite get your discussion about tile's base value and improved value. What do you object there? I would say in general any tile should get some improvement before being worked (unless in the very beginning, sure). In the early ages, you really don't have many choices: farm, mine, cottage, that's it. But the base tile indeed makes difference. A hill on plain gets 4 hammer with mine, a hill on desert gets only 3. So a hill/desert is quite awful to work, I would rather hire a specialist or work a sea tile. Don't you agree?

For a new city, would you like to work a 1/1/1 tile or 2/0/1 tile? Without considering pop limit and granary, I would definately pick 2/0/1. From my formalism, 2/0/1 = 7 gold, 1/1/1 = 5.5 gold. From experience, working high food tiles first makes your city grow faster, and get more total output in the long run. An more extreme example is: will you pick a 0/0/4 tile over a 2/0/1 tile for a new city? I bet you won't, because it completely stops growth. If you agree with these 2 examples, you would agree 1 food > 1 gold.

Again, I don't say gold is less important than food or hammer. Getting tech as quickly as possible is my major concern in civ 4, much more important than in civ 3. But you have to make a RATIONAL order among these things, after all.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Heroes


The most important point I want to make is NOT any specific rule, but that you could draw RATIONAL and (semi-)ACUURATE conclusion about whether a tile should be worked. In these days, people love to say anything is dependent on situation and that's the beauty of civ 4. That's true, but as a scientist (specialist) , I want to make the choice as reasonable as possible. "Everything depends" is not an excuse to do it randomly.

Heroes, I agree completely. We should avoid saying that 'anything goes'. It is true that you are given choices, and in general can pull of any crazy but well-thought strategy you can think of. But to me, it's more a disclaimer. I frown everytime I see someone post "wow, look at this, I never tried it before but this strat beats all others, and from now on is the only way I'm playing!".

The response to that is every time the same: 'true, good strat, but there are others which you might be overlooking".

This is what I wanted to say a couple of posts up: it's the debate that matters, and not who is right. By thinking on the debate, you learn the advantages and disadvantages from any strat. Look at specialization: Vel doesn't really believe in it, I try to fight that by providing some strategies based on them. Different use than a balanced cities approach, and both have plusses and minusses. Both ae valid, and in some situations you might need to go one of the two ways. In other situations it really depends on your playing style.

I am "talking about specific situations", quite true. The situation is that you build pyramid in the early game. Otherwise the base value of a specialist is 3 gold, not 6 gold, which makes specialist much less attractive comparing to working tiles.

Well, and I try to avoid that Pyramids prerequisite. The reason is that on higher levels, it becomes hard to consider the pyramids a given... and the higher you get in level, the more hereditary rule becomes important. Representation is a lot less attractive if you have to go for constitution first, or if at the time of reaching it all your cities bump into their happiness limits, not just your largest ones.

Which is why I consider your situation (with Pyramids and rep) a lot more specific than mine (without either of the two).

About incense on desert: surely it's better to have an incense on desert than nothing, but my point is, if you run representation and can hire specialist, you gain more by leaving that dear incense empty and hiring a specialist! It might change if leader is financial (makes working tile better), or you dearly need commerce but you can only hire an engineer, or, of course, you don't run representation. But you get the reasoning.

Yes, but I got that reasoning before too. And I object it: in most cases, a incense on desert is going to be more important to you than an extra scientist. Especially early on, when you might not even be able to use a scientist (no lib, or no caste system). 6 commerce is exactly the same as what a scientist under rep will bring you (which makes it the better choice as it also gives GSP) under 100% slider.

If your slider is not at 100%, part of that 6 commerce is going into gold. Now you can say: okay, but a merchant under rep generates 3 gpt+3bpt, so is obviously better. True, but again, this requires alot of stuff: a market or caste system, plus either the pyramids or constitution (and thus rep.). So, it's my feeling that you're talking about the exceptions here, where I try to follow the basic rule, in which your situation is an exception.

I don't quite get your discussion about tile's base value and improved value. What do you object there? I would say in general any tile should get some improvement before being worked (unless in the very beginning, sure).

No objection to that: any non-improved tile you work is losing something. You might not be in the situation where you can improve whatever you like as there are under constraints, but improving everything (except forest-growth tiles you leave unimproved) is the ideal situation you must try to obtain.

In the early ages, you really don't have many choices: farm, mine, cottage, that's it. But the base tile indeed makes difference. A hill on plain gets 4 hammer with mine, a hill on desert gets only 3. So a hill/desert is quite awful to work, I would rather hire a specialist or work a sea tile. Don't you agree?

First of all: I was talking about that base values of tiles is less important for your choice than you might think. In the sense that desert and tundra are never good choices, but that grass and plains is equal in their merits, only a bit more difficuly to improve sometimes. Hills are needed because they are the best source of hammers early on and you can't mine a flat grass, but otherwise they are not important at all.

Now, if you are going to compare grass/plains to desert/tundra, it's obvious: desert is less.

That doesn't mean that desert will always mean a specialist is better, and especially in the general situation (no rep) that is true. Desert hills are so important because they appear near fp, or coast. You need production there, and not more beakers... hence working a desert hill might be absolutely needed. I found that in general, over half of my desert hills are being worked asap. They stop growth (or at least hamper it), but I can get to food in some other way (or I don't need it as I'm maxed out already), while desert hills are typically in areas where there is no production around... its relative importance went way up.

Mind you, I'm in love with specialists, but if you want to get most out of them, you need to specialize them just like you need to do everything else. A scientist in a desert city is lousy, but add a scientist to your best science city (copernicus) and you gain a lot more.

For a new city, would you like to work a 1/1/1 tile or 2/0/1 tile? Without considering pop limit and granary, I would definately pick 2/0/1. From my formalism, 2/0/1 = 7 gold, 1/1/1 = 5.5 gold. From experience, working high food tiles first makes your city grow faster, and get more total output in the long run. An more extreme example is: will you pick a 0/0/4 tile over a 2/0/1 tile for a new city? I bet you won't, because it completely stops growth. If you agree with these 2 examples, you would agree 1 food > 1 gold.

I lost you. 1/1/1: f/p/c, right? In that case, early on I'll try to have a mix of 2/1/0 and 2/0/1. However, health is going to run out quickly, and I certainly do not have to keep a +2fpt city wide... which can let me put to 2/1/0 tiles to 1/2/0 or 1/1/1 or anything else which will let me trade in a food for a commerce or a hammer. as I will always try to maximize my commerce, and not my food (food is only needed in those circumstances you want to grow), I consider commerce more important than food.

As to picking a 0/0/4 tile: yes, most definately. The extreme example of this are gold mines on desert hills: 0/3/5 once improved, or 0/3/6 near river. Desert hills, stopping all growth... and still I will prioritize these asap, and choose the rest of my improvements around them. They take priority over cows...

You sound like you will make sure you will have food in your city, and once you don't know what to pick anymore on food tiles, you go for production tiles. Once you get all the best production, you go for commerce. This is what I'm reading when you post 1 food = 1.5 hammers = 3 commerce (and not gold!). Am I right in this?

This was the Civ3 way... CIV is different. I said all of these were similar in value, meaning 1f=1h=1c. Depending on the situation, I will either pick food over commerce, or commerce over food. Early on, you might be tempted to think food is everything, but I dispute that. By focusing on commerce instead of on food, you can most of the times gain a serious advantage. As there are also other situations, I don't say 3f = 1.5h = 1c (the opposite of you), I average it out and say that the 3 types are equal. Relative to you, I put more emphasis on commerce.

DeepO

[Velociryx]

Specialization does not mean you can't use hills, as there are grass tiles you want to put a cottage on instead. No, in my games I will always make sure I've got enough food, and at least some production in every city.

I would wholeheartedly agree with this approach, and since this is the stated approach, I would contend that we are actually arguing from 85%+ the same position, with the differences being largely at the margins. I say this because in my MRC approach, this too, is a pre-requisite.

Never put all your eggs into one basket in CIV. And cities should be changeable too: when your situation changes, it's relatively easy to put 10 workers on a city, and completely change its characteristics around in less than 10 turns.

Again, agreed, however, your ten turn timeframe to city reconfiguration hits a couple of snags. Sure, a boatload of workers could modify the terrain in that timeframe, but, for example, if you were re-tooling a production center into a more commerce focused city, that does not take into account the time needed to build the appropriate infrastructure OR the time to work the cottage tiles you just built so that they become more profitable than the 2gpt they'll start out at. During that timeframe, your new commerce city will be sorely lagging. Advantage here goes to the MRC. Using Pop-N-Chop, I've already got the infrastructure set up and in place, and I've already been working 3-4 cottage tiles to maximum profitability, whereas you're starting from scratch. That means that while the infrastructure I've had in place in this city has been earning less returns than those in your highly specialized approach, it's still been earning more of a return than your up-and-coming commerce city (which has none of the infrastructure in place yet, and thus, has been netting no return on it at all).

Versatility is indeed important, but efficiency as well.

Total agreement here. Stylistic differences put me placing more importance on versatility, and less on efficiency, but I think it's safe to say that we both agree that both are important.

Specialization holds one big disadvantage, and I want to be honest enough to mention it: civics. These in general apply to specific types of cities (e.g. Org. rel. providing a 25% to buildings). If you switch civics a lot, balancing your empire could become a bit more efficient again, as you are able to build in all cities exactly that type that you are receiving a bonus for.

Yep. I generally gravitate toward Org. Rel. for this very reason. It creates a nice synergy with my early game drive toward Slavery and Chop. Each hammer I gain thus, is 25% more efficient than it otherwise would be, and makes creating MRC's a much easier proposition.

Hold on, Vel... markets are the perfect example, one that needs specialization.

especially in smaller empires, but in well-run larger ones too, you will get to 80% tech on the slider or higher. In order to get any bonus from a market, you need a city to generate 20 cpt.

20cpt * 20% = 4 gpt. +25% for a market gives you 5 gpt.

Any city below 20 cpt will not gain anything from a market.

This, I suspect, drives to the heart of the matter. Profits in the form of gold jingling in my pocket is very important to me, long before I can use that cash for rush buying infrastructure. I don't like wasting time rebuilding units, so I try to make sure that all my units are a) well-trained, and b) upgraded to their latest and greatest configurations as soon as possible. This, of course, takes serious cash.

The only time I run anything close to 100% science is in the very early game, and then only until expansion forces me away from it. By the middle ages, I try to be at a place where I'm keeping pace with tech, while running at ~60% Research. This, as your math above indicates, makes the "break even point" for markets significantly lower, and in fact, within easy reach of all cities. Same thing applies for Libraries, though I would be inclined to build them early even before they could net me an additional research beaker, because the faster they go up, the faster I start raking in 2 culture per turn from that city....something you are missing out on and will be far behind in using the specialized approach. Culture = bigger borders, pillage zones, early warning, and city defense factors, all of which combines to more than make up for the fact that I'm building a library perhaps 20 turns before I'll see any research gains from it. That's more than worth it, IMO.

Bah... you're not thinking economically sound. It's not because I could see a use for a TV in every room of my house, that I'm willing to buy 10 TVs... I just have one, and watch TV in one room

That depends....if a TV in every room gave you an extra $1.00+ a day, per TV, you might feel differently about them....

Sorry, but that's not true in an empire. You still need units. More markets means less units. Sure, you can build markets in multiple cities at the same time, but that also means that multiple cities aren't building units at that time. Whether it can happen simultaneously or not hardly matters (barracks cities and specialization requires more planning and foresight, that's true), it's the combined cost over several turns which does matter.

Absolutely true. And I build units. I build them in-between building infrastructure. IMO, it is the infrastructure that drives and defines the Empire, not the units. They are....an insurance policy for me. Eventually, I'll build up such a force that I'll blow the doors off of one of my neighbors, but for the first 4500+ years of the game, my units' only function is to deter an attack, and I build just enough to do that (that, coupled with diplomatic activity). The main difference, I suspect, is that you have indicated previously an aversion to chop and pop-rushing, while I use it regularly, and *because* I use it, I can drop in basic infrastructure and keep pace with the AI in units without breaking a sweat. There's just not that much to build, and using Pop-N-Chop, it's easy to get everything in place.

Ah, but if cottages are used in commerce cities, they will get all the nice bonusses from e.g. having 3 monasteries in there (together with all other modifiers). Putting cottages in barracks cities will only give their base value, without, or with very few modifiers. Those 26 cottages you calculated, might become 30 cottages spread out, while only 20 cottages in the right places....

True, and I tend to build heavy infrastructure in all my cities. More hammer intensive, yes. Specialization's true strength lies not in the fact of its greater profitability, but in its efficiency and economy. You spend less hammers and make each gold more productive. I spend more hammers and get more total yield (more $, but a lower rate of return). The reason this is so is that cottages take time to gain maximum value and profitability. By working a few in each city from very early on, I see more cottages reach that point of maximum profitiabilty before you would with only assigning city pop points in your commerce cities. So yes, while each pop point is working a cottage and generating very efficient returns, I'm working a greater number of cottages at the same level of output per turn, with lesser returns on hammers spent, and making more aggregate cash/research.

Ah, but if cottages are used in commerce cities, they will get all the nice bonusses from e.g. having 3 monasteries in there (together with all other modifiers). Putting cottages in barracks cities will only give their base value, without, or with very few modifiers. Those 26 cottages you calculated, might become 30 cottages spread out, while only 20 cottages in the right places....

MRC's get those same returns, just on fewer total cottages worked, and more hammers spent (cos I'm building more total infrastructure). No argument at all that a specialized approach will net you bigger gains for the hammers spent, but in terms of aggregate returns, that has not been my experience.

You know why many BU approaches fail, right? Because their managers tend to see their BU as an island, outside of the supporting structure from the larger whole. Sure, you will get a minimum efficiency going, and are able to get rid of the bad apples more easily, but you can't ever beat a centralized approach.

In economics, there is something else at work, though. Your dealing with humans, and humans in large organizations tend to lose their motivation (communism is the extreme here). Smaller BUs will mean they feel more connected to their company, and thus are better motivated. And more motivation means more production, which can offset the efficiency hit you'll be receiving from running a decentralized system.

Luckily, though, CIV deals with AIs, and cpu-cyle citizens. they don't mind if you put them in unbalanced situations


Very true....but in Civ, I'm in charge of all the business units, and can make sure that they don't fall victim to the abovementioned trap...

No, you're comparing several things which aren't of the same nature. Thus, you can't make general assumptions on them: what's true for one type is not true for the other.

Food is a pure city thing, and has nothing to do with your empire. Every city needs food, every city needs to be selfsufficient in that regard. You can't use an abundance of food either (except for settler or GP pmups, but both are specializations). So you need some moderate, balanced food.

Production is half city, half empire dependent. Sure, every city will need some production, or it can't build anything (although rushing strategies do work). But the empire use of production (units and wonders) are better off if you put as much production as possible into one city. Wonders obviously: one city going for wonders will mean you can make sure it is ideally placed to use them too (GPs, IW, settling GPs, etc.)

Commerce, OTOH, is a pure empire thing. You don't need any commerce on the city level, as all commerce is added to the empire treasury (and beakers sink), and every city is 'paid' from that. There is no gain at all by letting a city be selfsufficient, goldwise. Instead, maximum efficiency is reached when you bundle as much commerce together as possible: you only need to build on market, one bank, and one wall street.
I agree with 90% of that, which is what makes it so interesting that we arrive at different conclusions! For me, it is BECAUSE coin is an "Empire-Level-Thing" that makes it all the more important that each component of the Empire contribute to maintain its viability...by requiring all cities to at least pay their own upkeep, it makes the MRC's that are currently slanted toward commerce even more profitable, cos they're not having to "carry" any dead-wood cities.
This is true, by specializing you will lose your flexibility, and are taking a more planned approach. I find that in my religuos games I don't specialize a lot


I find this to be the case as well! Interesting how the presence of a founded religion changes the equation so....and definitely something that needs more looking into, in order to discern exactly WHY....

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

There are plenty of situations where you don't want to lose 1 or 2 pop, as it will show all game long.

As an avid pop-rusher, I'm not sure I agree with this statement. Especially on Monarch and above, with health and happiness limits being what they are, it seems to me that it only makes the case STRONGER for pop-rushing as a means of keeping the population in check. Rather than avoiding growth, let them grow and sacrifice the "slackers."

Frequently, I hear people discussing the points at which they'll work non-food tiles specifically to avoid growth....this tells me that growth will be capped at a certain level in each city for an extended time (and exactly what that cap is, is dependant on both terrain and difficulty level).

With a cap in place, it is definitely not the case that the loss of a point or two of pop due to rushing will be felt for the whole of the game. If that were the case, then it could also be said that any period of stagnating growth would be felt for the rest of the game, which is not the case, because growth avoidance can be a necessary feature of a healthy empire (assumine you're pop-rush averse... )

-=Vel=-

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Specialization does not mean you can't use hills, as there are grass tiles you want to put a cottage on instead. No, in my games I will always make sure I've got enough food, and at least some production in every city.

I would wholeheartedly agree with this approach, and since this is the stated approach, I would contend that we are actually arguing from 85%+ the same position, with the differences being largely at the margins. I say this because in my MRC approach, this too, is a pre-requisite.

Vel, please remind me, what did MRC stands for again? I'm sure it's somewhere in here, but hey... I'm lazy

I know what you mean, though, we're not that far apart in the basics. I do play test games where I take it to an extreme, but in general, I will have a couple of extremes in my territory, and a couple of balanced cities as well.

I've noticed, that even doing 2 'extreme specialization' cities in an average empire can make a big difference. At least have one barracks city: no commerce, only production, HE, IW and/or WP. At least have one gold city: shrines, settled GPs, Wall street, cottages. Very little production (superpriests will take care of that, or some form of rushing).

That might be a different from your approach, and fall within that 15% we don't share the same approach. One barracks city is huge: it's in many cases enough to provide defense for your whole empire. And you will need to upgrade your defense continously, which means it's no loss that units are built there the whole time.

Never put all your eggs into one basket in CIV. And cities should be changeable too: when your situation changes, it's relatively easy to put 10 workers on a city, and completely change its characteristics around in less than 10 turns.

Again, agreed, however, your ten turn timeframe to city reconfiguration hits a couple of snags. Sure, a boatload of workers could modify the terrain in that timeframe, but, for example, if you were re-tooling a production center into a more commerce focused city, that does not take into account the time needed to build the appropriate infrastructure OR the time to work the cottage tiles you just built so that they become more profitable than the 2gpt they'll start out at. During that timeframe, your new commerce city will be sorely lagging.

Commerce is slower, that's true. But at least you can recover easily from losing your barracks city: all you need is 10 workers, a forge, and barracks. When you're out of trouble, it can build a factory or so, but it will let you recover quickly from disaster.

And cottages need to grow for commerce cities: Actually, it's easier than you seem to think. Coming from high production, you can use 10 turns where your production let's you build libs, markets, a uni perhaps. Then, your cottages complete, and you start making profit. Also, you will build windmills, and use sea tiles instead of e.g. forests. It will take a while to become the best commerce city, but in 10 turns (or lets say 20) it becomes a worthy commerce city with a healthy future.

But these are recovery strategies, for when disaster strikes. I don't lose a lot of commerce cities in my games...

Yep. I generally gravitate toward Org. Rel. for this very reason. It creates a nice synergy with my early game drive toward Slavery and Chop. Each hammer I gain thus, is 25% more efficient than it otherwise would be, and makes creating MRC's a much easier proposition.

No, that's not what I meant. Org. Rel. gives a bonus to all commerce buildings. If you switch often, you will have an advantage in a balanced approach (as you switch, build infrastructure, switch back and start on units everywhere). Don't switch often, and it doesn't matter whether you are running Org. Rel. or not.

Also, even 'pure' barracks cities need infrastructure too: growth, CH, happy, production. Just no culture/commerce things. In periods of Org. Rel., you can focus on those buildings that further your cause... you don't have to build libs.

This, I suspect, drives to the heart of the matter. Profits in the form of gold jingling in my pocket is very important to me, long before I can use that cash for rush buying infrastructure. I don't like wasting time rebuilding units, so I try to make sure that all my units are a) well-trained, and b) upgraded to their latest and greatest configurations as soon as possible. This, of course, takes serious cash.

The only time I run anything close to 100% science is in the very early game, and then only until expansion forces me away from it. By the middle ages, I try to be at a place where I'm keeping pace with tech, while running at ~60% Research. This, as your math above indicates, makes the "break even point" for markets significantly lower, and in fact, within easy reach of all cities.

It's the same thing, though. The bonusses are rounded down, so unless you MM to the extreme (as to put exactly 10 cpt in a 60% to gain 4 gpt), the jumps are still there. I can write out the math for you, but it will be the long... in short the fewer of these roundings occur, the less you lose to them.

Think of it this way: at 60%, every 10 cpt will let a market give +1 gpt. When your many cities with one cottage all get 10-20 cpt, you will on average lose 0.5 gpt in each of them due to rounding down. (15cpt --> +1.5 gpt --> +1gpt) A big city OTOH can get to 60-70 cpt, also only losing 0.5 gold on average due to rounding (65 cpt --> +6.5gpt --> +6gpt). If your commerce is thus bundled into very few very high commerce cities, you're not losing that much on roundings... and this can be a quite significant percentage.

This effect is present on both lib and market's side, and is present on all slider settings. However, it is more pronounced at the extremes: while a given empire might give me +10 gpt where you only get +7 gpt at 60% slider, that same empire could give me +5 gpt where you get +1gpt at 80% slider.

Specialization always nets at least what you'd be getting, but in some situations it nets you a lot more.

Add to this the production cost: not only am I gaining more from my markets, but I also invested less.

Same thing applies for Libraries, though I would be inclined to build them early even before they could net me an additional research beaker, because the faster they go up, the faster I start raking in 2 culture per turn from that city....something you are missing out on and will be far behind in using the specialized approach. Culture = bigger borders, pillage zones, early warning, and city defense factors, all of which combines to more than make up for the fact that I'm building a library perhaps 20 turns before I'll see any research gains from it. That's more than worth it, IMO.

I'm not missing out on anything, on the contrary I'd say. Culture is for me a worthy specialization goal too. It's close to commerce, but focusses on cultural buildings, and gets a bit more production. In general, these cities become good (but not excellent) commerce centers, and also missionary producers. Missionaries don't need barracks, so I don't build those.

In some cases, coastal versions of these culture cities become shipwharfs later on: with docks, even that half-good production will throw me in a ship every once a while (50% production bonus!), while still being very strong on culture/commerce.

Absolutely true. And I build units. I build them in-between building infrastructure. IMO, it is the infrastructure that drives and defines the Empire, not the units. They are....an insurance policy for me. Eventually, I'll build up such a force that I'll blow the doors off of one of my neighbors, but for the first 4500+ years of the game, my units' only function is to deter an attack, and I build just enough to do that (that, coupled with diplomatic activity).

I treat units in exactly the same way, Vel. But you need a constant supply of them, even if you are bent on upgrading good units instead of building new ones in each era. Every new city, or every neighour which needs to be deterred adds a couple of units to the defensive pool. The difference during this period is, that you have too much production in your commerce cities, so to speak, and you need to build units in between infrastructure. I don't have that problem: commerce cities which have nothing better to do build workers, missionaries, or go specialist heavy for a while.

The extra production is all put into either more cottages, or in that one super city which builds my whole defensive force. Again, it's a matter of not spilling any unnecessary hammers around.

The main difference, I suspect, is that you have indicated previously an aversion to chop and pop-rushing, while I use it regularly, and *because* I use it, I can drop in basic infrastructure and keep pace with the AI in units without breaking a sweat. There's just not that much to build, and using Pop-N-Chop, it's easy to get everything in place.

Well, aversion would be a bit strong, but yes, in general pop-n-chop is not my playstyle. You'll have a very hard time convincing me of a Locust approach. I've made a note to myself to concentrate like crazy on pop-rushing in next game, as I have not used it enough lately, and it will have an effect on the game.

I do use it, though, and it works very well with this approach. Commerce cities don't need forests, so chop them, and put those hammers in getting your commerce buildings up. High on food? Pop a lib.

For production cities, I don't chop near the city, but just outside of it I will do as much as possible to get wonders, and necessary buildings. I'm not going to chop a unit, though, that's waste.

The main problem I'm having with poprushing is that I don't want to have all that food in my cities. Cities tend to grow slowly, or controlled (MMed). Early on, I focus on commerce, not on growth. And I rely heavily on specialists too: another deterrant to pop-rushing. But as I said, I need to play this one before I can really comment on the difference.

The reason this is so is that cottages take time to gain maximum value and profitability. By working a few in each city from very early on, I see more cottages reach that point of maximum profitiabilty before you would with only assigning city pop points in your commerce cities.

that's a valid point, however I never run into it. Again, cottages are being directed from above, so to say... I see I need more commerce, so I say to myself: okay, 3 cottages more, starting now. Then I look around, and pick my commerce cities to start on them. You do that a couple of times, and your cottages start early enough in commerce cities, exactly at the same time you would start one in a production city.

Besides, there is more to commerce than cottages, one of the major advantages with this approach is that you can focus on trade routes better. These are only good in coastal cities with harbors (without them, they're okay, but not impressive at all). Coastal cities = commerce cities. One of the things I frequently do is to make the conscious decision of not working a cottage, but poprushing a harbor instead...

Same applies for stuff like tundra furs, desert incense, etc. They're worth a town, and you don't need to wait before it grows.

I agree with 90% of that, which is what makes it so interesting that we arrive at different conclusions! For me, it is BECAUSE coin is an "Empire-Level-Thing" that makes it all the more important that each component of the Empire contribute to maintain its viability...by requiring all cities to at least pay their own upkeep, it makes the MRC's that are currently slanted toward commerce even more profitable, cos they're not having to "carry" any dead-wood cities.

Okay, think of it in this way then: my barracks city is barely able to break even (and only because it will be close to my capital). But, it can 'sell' its units to other cities. These other cities don't need to build units them self, so they are 'renting' them from the barracks city... thus a bit of the wealth they are generating gets transferred to the to barracks city.

Now, by letting each city focus on what it is good at, your efficiency will rise both on the military side, and on the commerce side... twice profit! It does hold a 'cost' too: more planning, more logistics, a better forecast of what you are going to run into over the next 50 turns. But these are all player costs, so to speak, and not game costs.

This is true, by specializing you will lose your flexibility, and are taking a more planned approach. I find that in my religuos games I don't specialize a lot


I find this to be the case as well! Interesting how the presence of a founded religion changes the equation so....and definitely something that needs more looking into, in order to discern exactly WHY....

-=Vel=-

Vel, I was not talking about founding religions, I was talking about relgious leaders... you know... REL

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Velociryx
There are plenty of situations where you don't want to lose 1 or 2 pop, as it will show all game long.

As an avid pop-rusher, I'm not sure I agree with this statement. Especially on Monarch and above, with health and happiness limits being what they are, it seems to me that it only makes the case STRONGER for pop-rushing as a means of keeping the population in check. Rather than avoiding growth, let them grow and sacrifice the "slackers."

Frequently, I hear people discussing the points at which they'll work non-food tiles specifically to avoid growth....this tells me that growth will be capped at a certain level in each city for an extended time (and exactly what that cap is, is dependant on both terrain and difficulty level).

With a cap in place, it is definitely not the case that the loss of a point or two of pop due to rushing will be felt for the whole of the game. If that were the case, then it could also be said that any period of stagnating growth would be felt for the rest of the game, which is not the case, because growth avoidance can be a necessary feature of a healthy empire (assumine you're pop-rush averse... )

-=Vel=-

You may have a point that I avoid pop rushing too much. I did start from the idea it's not so good, and developed my strategy around it... now I use it in specific instances but not terribly much. I should start from the other side in a test game, and see what I need to change in my strategy.

But that's for later. I can tell why not pop rushing that much is good for me.

I very rarely need to get rid of abundant pop. Some cities simply have little food, and spend the whole game chasing health limits (even on Emperor). Others are more tweaked towards production/commerce... for instance I will use all gold/silver mines the moment I can, which means at either size 1 or 2.

Specialists... in the cities I've got enough food, I never have enough food to support the number of specialists I want to have there. Now, poprushing is directly opposite to running a specialist: you're poprushing that specialist away. As I've got a specialist-fetish, that certainly doesn't seem a good idea to me.

One of the best ways of improving your health situation, is trade or military expansion... either one of those two is needed in every game I play. Without them, I would use poprushing quite heavily myself. There are situations where you start alone, and can't trade or conquer, but in that case you almost certainly have 2 seafoods closeby... harbors in all your cities will give you an extra 4 health, which is all you need before making contact with someone.

DeepO

[Son of David]

Latest monarch game. (I've won a single monarch game out of about 15, sucking up a lot of hours I must say!)

Great start with Napoleon. Even got the Oracle first. Neighbours not very close so I am losing lots of military units to barbarians. Build a forge in my capital. Nice terrain. Everything starting to take off by about 1000BC.

THEN! Montezuma, who is half-way across the map, whose capital is at least 50 tiles away from mine, lands: he has about a dozen jaguar warriors, chariots, and archers compared to my two cities and about half a dozen defenders. Tile improvements - gone. Defending units - gone. Cities - gone. Game - over.

I really am starting to think you need a PhD or just a lot of damned luck to win this game at Monarch.

[Velociryx]

Wow....that's an unfortunate turn of events. I think, however, your technique was not at fault as much as your diplomatic efforts, in that instance. Would need to see the map to know for sure, but that's my guess. Try again tho!

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

Vel, please remind me, what did MRC stands for again?

MRC = Multi-Role City. The essence of the plan revolves around the worker crews improving far more tiles in a city radius than the city will be able to use for a long time (in all probability, for much of the game). By terraforming well "in advance" of use, I'm just a couple mouse clicks away, at any given point, to totally reconfiguring any city I control. Need to go production-heavy for a while to drop in infrastructure or build units? The mines are ready and waiting. Need food for specialists or pop rushing? The farms are already in place. More gold for a key tech or a round of upgrades? Cottages standing by. Good stuff. Keeps the workers busy, cos if I'm not pre-terraforming, then I'm tweaking as new technologies become available.

you don't have to build libs.
Very true, but Libraries come early in the game (during my "expansion phase," at a point when the only other culture generator is the Obelisk, and while it is cheaper, it only provides half the cultural output, and no other benefits, long term. So my decision is an easy one when picking between the two...I seldom build an Obelisk at all.

Regarding the "rounding error" effect with Markets in specialized vs. MRC cities. I'm on the same page with you, and the "rounding error" is where you *get* your greater return on invested hammers. Significant enough to be noteworthy, but not enough to offset the greater aggregate increase in hammers doing it the other way. It's mostly a question of circumstance. If you are so close to the line that you MUST, in every circumstance get the biggest "bang" for every hammer you spend, then specialization will do that for you. If you reach a point in the game where you have some breathing room, you can afford to spend more, even if the returns are less, because in total, you'll wind up with even more (it would be like comparing a situation where you, with excruciating care and research, invested $1000 to gain 12% interest, vs. someone else investing $10,000 less carefully and getting 7%....sure, you're getting a higher interest rate on your money, and if that's all the money you have in the world, then you're absolutely getting the most out of it that you can....on the other hand, there are WAYS of generating more money (or in the context we're discussing, hammers), and a person who invests more upfront will invariably make more in aggregate, even if it's less efficient.

I'm not missing out on anything, on the contrary I'd say. Culture is for me a worthy specialization goal too.

But there's the rub. If you're only going culture heavy in "culturally specialized cities" (perhaps 30-50% of your empire), and I'm investing culture heavy everywhere, assuming a like number of cities, then I'm at least that much "ahead" in terms of total culture, making it relatively harder to take my cities, pushing the borders back further, etc.

WRT units...I use the f9 summary almost every turn. I don't have to be the biggest, I just have to be somewhere in the middle and maintain active diplomacy. If I do that, the warmongers will pick on the folks with the smaller military, and I can go on my merry way. Religions help in this regard, as it is often possible (either leading or following) to become a "brother of the faith" with at least one of the warmongers and (in cases where there are multiple present), playing them off against each other. Militarily, until I'm ready to strike, my goal is just to be snugly in the middle. Too big to be considered an "easy target" and too inobtrusive to be considered an overt threat. That's a good place to be. Even better, because I tend to build what I suspect is relatively more cities than the average, I can usually GET to that point by simply properly garrisoning my cities and posting guards at strategic resources. I *may* have half a dozen units in my "attack force" in the first two ages of the game (the exception being if I start very near to some other civ, and there's a gain to be had by early aggression). As to the "too much production" problem...this too, is resolved via MRC methodologies. If I don't need to focus on production at any given point, I've already got my options in place.

Locust: I was enamoured of it very early on, but find myself saving forests much more strategically these days. Pop rushing is another story, because unlike forests, pop is a "renewable resource," especially in the early game. Where pop rushing itself is concerned, my playstyle has evolved into one of considering the "lifecycle" of any given city.

A new city has nothing, and as such, is ill suited to any particular task. Given that, its first goal will be to focus on food, and I will use the fast-growing population as a means to speed-build basic infrastructure in place, chopping forests I don't need that are in the vicinity to further this process along. The net result is that I'm building a city improvement every ~4-7 turns (chop/pop--ten turn delay, filled in by more chop/pop, repeat). In this way, a new city can get everything it needs to begin contributing in a significant way, very quickly. Once it begins to reach maturity, pop rushing becomes increasingly rarely used, as I'm more and more reluctant to tear workers/specialists away from their assigned roles, although if the gains are good enough (ie - making sure I get a wonder I'm building, for example), I'll do it anyway.

that's a valid point, however I never run into it. Again, cottages are being directed from above, so to say... I see I need more commerce, so I say to myself: okay, 3 cottages more, starting now. Then I look around, and pick my commerce cities to start on them. You do that a couple of times, and your cottages start early enough in commerce cities, exactly at the same time you would start one in a production city.

Very similar to the approach I use, with the exception being that my cities are geared for multiple purposes at once. If I see a need for more commerce, then one of my cities will start (or get back to) working the already established cottages, leaving off the mines, or in some cases, the excess food. The difference is that while you tend to concentrate this, I tend to spread it over relatively more cities. Same effect tho.

Good notes re: Barracks cities. In my way of planning the Empire, the units are the Barrack's city's "profits," while the paying maintenance they generate is simply that city's "price to play."

And a big smack to my own forehead for not realizing you were talking about religious leaders....I'm at work on a Saturday...that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!

-=Vel=-