Later game improvements

[couerdelion]

Many of the “later” improvements arrive, at a time when they are not as valuable to you as they would be later in the game. Windmills, watermills and workshop all start to improve with replaceable parts, electricity or late game civics.

Now I can see a few arguments for building these in the early game. A city with lots of hills might forego some immediate production to maintain growth rate by building windmills with a further benefit being a little extra commerce. The only problem I have is trying to justify to myself that this is worthwhile over the longer period of the game.

Let’s say I am already mining a hill and at city size 10. Let’s also assume I have +2 food surplus with a mined hill and it is 15 turns to the next population point. I will also assume that my unlimited supply of grassland hills and will either continue to stick mines on them or continue to build windmills. There are no rivers or resources to affect my choices here and I will work on Epic speed basis with a granary.

Option 1
Working the mined hill we have +2/+3/0 for 15 turns
Working a second mined hill we have +1/+6/0 for about 33 turns
Working a third mined hill we he 0/+9/0 until we get replaceable parts

Option 2
Keeping windmills operating our food surplus remains a constant +3 throughout the timescale of these figures
Working first windmill hill we have +3/+1/+1 for 10 turns
Working second windmill hill we have +3/+2/+2 for about 11 turns
Working third +3/+3/+3 for 12 turns
…..fourth +3/+4/+4 for 13 turns
etc.

Now let’s assume that replaceable parts comes in 100 turns after machinery. Maybe long but it’s just a working assumption. Option 1 gives us 711 hammers in this time =(3*15) + (6*33) + (9*52).

Option 2 gives us 464 hammers and 464 commerce in the same period, so has, in that period lost about 247 hammers and gained 464 commerce. Not a bad deal really. It is also 5 population heavier.

With RP, the larger city suddenly switches to +24 hammers so will rapidly catch up on the deficit.

For me the argument is clearly in favour of the windmill since this will yield the longer term benefit but there will be situations eg a low production city with lots of food, where the mine might be preferred. Also, with happiness limits, the mine might be considered a temporary solution before a later switch to windmill.

I’m still figuring out a similar thing for watermills which seem to been beaten most times by cottages. Guess I need to look at this more since I can’t really see myself building cottages up in the tundra areas by the river.

[Hermann the Lombard]

Re: Later game improvements

Originally posted by couerdelion I’m still figuring out a similar thing for watermills which seem to been beaten most times by cottages. Guess I need to look at this more since I can’t really see myself building cottages up in the tundra areas by the river.

Think of them as charming little commercial igloos.

[smbakeresq]

I have always thought that windmills were a great build, especially if you plan for them and then go for RP a little earlier. Financial with Windmills gets to three coins, which is great, makes them even better. I am not sure, but I also think it has a subtle effect on pollution. With all the extra cash, you can just buy anything you want later in the game, even wonders. Since your supply of food doesnt decrease, you can also run more specialists if desired, which helps in other ways.

Watermills are great also, since you put them on tiles with coins anyway, and with financial you always get the coin bonus while getting some production. All of the benfits are immeadiate, whereas you have to wait a while for cottage -> town conversion. To me, the strength of financial is that you are LESS dependant on cottages, so you can use windmills/watermills more, for their more broad based benefits.

As a side note, games like this are always designed by environmentalist types, therefore it seems to me that they are built with a "better way" to do things then strip mining, clearcutting that sort of thing. The games are always buit so that the conservation way will get your more in the long run.

[kittenOFchaos]

By the time you get to Universal Sufferage hammer production isn't that important, whilst gold production will do the rest - especially if you net Kremlin.

[drank]

I think this analysis is right. You should generally try to grow a city up to its health/happy cap, substituting windmills for mines as necessary. Once you're at the cap, you may as well use a mine or specialist to stop the growth.

The caveats I'd make are:

- If you have ample food to reach your cap, then you should generally use a mine.

- It's important to revisit this later in the game. A city with a bunch of Machinery-era windmills might reasonably switch to mines post-Biology if it's going to be building spaceship parts or advanced military units.

- It's helpful to have a couple of each type of improvement in a city during the mid-game. If you NEED hammers (e.g. building a wonder), then you switch to the mines and stop the growth. Otherwise you run the windmills.

[platypotamus]

Originally posted by kittenOFchaos
By the time you get to Universal Sufferage hammer production isn't that important, whilst gold production will do the rest - especially if you net Kremlin.

Not much of a space racer? Those hammers are mighty useful in building the non-rushable space race parts.

[kittenOFchaos]

it is easy to change land from windmills to mines in late game, give those lazy workers something to do (who cares about slow starvation). But in general don't both too much about production of hammers in late game...unavoidable to make a decent amount in some places however.

[Hermann the Lombard]

Originally posted by smbakeresq As a side note, games like this are always designed by environmentalist types, therefore it seems to me that they are built with a "better way" to do things then strip mining, clearcutting that sort of thing. The games are always buit so that the conservation way will get your more in the long run.

Ah, but they are ALSO designed that if you are a sufficiently ruthless warmonger there won't BE a long run!

[Aginor]

The value of the late game improvements tends to vary on when your win condition is achieved.

Watermills may be a phenomenal investment if you're going to win by culture or launching a spaceship, but if you intend to win by domination or elimination, odds are the game is going to end (or effectively end) quite a bit earlier, and those improvements will be considerably less valuable.

Same with the Forests...if you can convert them into a sufficient advantage to win outright before Replaceable Parts has been online for a long time, clearcutting starts to look like a pretty attractive option.

[Yosho]

(shrug) I usually think windmills are a lot better then mines, in most places, unless you already have a lot of extra food.

On the other hand, the only time I build workshops is if I have a fishing village with a food resourse, in which case a few hammers can really help get it built up.

[swat-spas2]

A windmilled hill as a financial is 7 total (1-3-3/2-2-3) whereas the RR mine is 5 total (0-5/1-4). You get a 3-2 trade for money and hammers plus a slight food offset. I would rather just rush build what you can late in the game anway. If you need hammers or have plenty of food, build the mines.

Watermills shine in state property. Here is the river-grassland vs cottage (both financial and with uni-suff/free speech)
Watermills: 3-2-3
Town: 2-1-8

You get extra food to offset mines and extra production, but lose most of the commerce. I find using the watermills in less science cities (no academy city for example) or places that seem to need a few hammers. Towns are awesome late game and hard to beat.

If you are not financial, then these improvements are not always as good. Although watermills in state property are still perhaps pretty good against towns in the late game.

[couerdelion]

Early game/LAte game

The problem with many of the answers is that they seemed to be looking at this as a “late-game” argument. I’m trying to approach these questions at or around the time that the new improvements become available with replaceable parts being some time later than other advances.

Another comparison might be the watermill on river grassland giving a rather pathetic +1 hammer. Contrast with a cottage which gives a financial civ +2 gold (with the prospect of a further 3 gold in 30 turns when it is a village – when we might assume that printing press has been developed. For me this is a no-brainer and the cottage becomes easier to justify for the financial civ.

On the other hand, I think that the windmill does become viable as an alternative for the mine if you have sufficient food and production is not too low. Where food is in ample supply and there are few production tiles, the mine looks to be the most obvious choice unless other significant source of production can be found.

[Hermann the Lombard]

Well, you did say "Later game improvements" -- it's just a subjective matter of "later" vs "late."

[Yosho]

(shrug) The thing is, unless you have a lot of farms built, or some food resources, you usually can't work all of the hills in a hilly area around a city unless you have windmills on at least some of them.

Windmills are always worth building as soon as they produce +1 gold. Remember, hills make hammers even without the mines, and if you have windmills you can work more hills. And of course, they get better later in the game.

Let me put it this way. Let's say you have a grassland square and a hill, and in order to work all the land around a city, you need the two squares to produce 4 food. Would you rather have a farm and a mine, or a town and a windmill? I'd say, 90% of the time, I'd rather have a town and a windmill.

[smbakeresq]

If you need hammers or have plenty of food, build the mines.

This statement is correct, except is usually needs to be

If you need hammers and have plenty of food, build the mines. Since mines have no food, a food surplus is needed. To get that surplus, you need a special or a farm. Then mining is better early for the hammers, with a switch to windmills once your empire starts buying things instead of producing them.

Really it all depends. I play on large or huge maps at epic or marathon, so early rushes are limited by size contraints, as is domination victories until late game. The size of the map pushes windmills and watermills much to the fore, as you have longer to reap the benfits.