Need Help: No Luck at all on Noble Difficulty Level...........

[MrPhil]

Wow, I gotta say the whole mine oversight of mine is a BIG deal. I used to build mines on hills because it says you have a "chance" of discovering a resource there. Man, those extra hammers ARE huge.

This is a silly question but I have noticed the animations for mines vary slighty. Sometimes the mines show little cars coming out and flames out the stack but, sometimes it appears dormant with no movement. Does this make any difference?

[Solver]

Forget the chance to discover a resource. It's extremely small. Specifically, one in ten thousand each turn. There are 8 resources that can be discovered, but each can only be discovered once you have the tech for it. With the early mines, that would be Copper, Iron, Gold, Gems and Silver, 5 resources. That gives a one in two thousand chance each turn at that point to discover a game. So obviously, resource discovery is something that's not even likely to happen in any given game.

Dormant mines = not worked by a city. Flames and carts with resources = worked by a city.

Actually, it's the same for the other improvements. In cottages/farms, the lights are off if they aren't worked. Unworked lumbermills don't move, worked ones show moving sawblades cutting wood.

[MrPhil]

Originally posted by Solver
Forget the chance to discover a resource. It's extremely small. Specifically, one in ten thousand each turn. There are 8 resources that can be discovered, but each can only be discovered once you have the tech for it. With the early mines, that would be Copper, Iron, Gold, Gems and Silver, 5 resources. That gives a one in two thousand chance each turn at that point to discover a game. So obviously, resource discovery is something that's not even likely to happen in any given game.

Dormant mines = not worked by a city. Flames and carts with resources = worked by a city.

Actually, it's the same for the other improvements. In cottages/farms, the lights are off if they aren't worked. Unworked lumbermills don't move, worked ones show moving sawblades cutting wood.

Ahhh, ok that makes sense. Thanks for the explanation.

[gilfan]

Farms suck, if you're not building enough other tile improvements, this could be your problem. For the vast majority of the game, they only give you +1f. Only build the absolute minimum number of farms necessary for the city to be big enough to work every tile in it's radius. If there's no overlap, a size 20 city can work every tile. If 1 tile is used by another city and 2 tiles are mountains/deserts (or unforested tundra), then only let the city grow to size 17. If you want a lot of specialists to generate Great Persons in a particular city, obviously this rule doesn't apply then. A city needs 2 food for every pop point, so a size 20 city will need 40 food.


Here are the tile improvements from best to worst, IMO. I count 1 food as 1 point, 1 hammer as 1 point, and 2 commerce 1 point. When you use gold to hurry production, it takes about 2.5g per hammer, but I'm rounding down because commerce is more flexible and because the buildings to increase gold/research generally come along earlier in the tech tree.

All totals assume you have all tech upgrades and are using the most advantageous civic.



Watermills.... 4 points: 1 food, 2 hammers, 2 commerce (State Property civic, replacable parts, electricity)

Towns......... 3.5 points: 1 hammer, 7 commerce (universal sufferage, printing press, free speech)

Windmills...... 3 points: 1 food, 1 hammer, 2 commerce (replacable parts, electricity)

Workshops.... 3 points: 0 food, 3 hammers (State Property civic, guilds, chemistry)

Mines.......... 3 points: 3 hammers (railroad)

Lumbermills... 3 points: 3 hammers (railroad, also gives .5 health)

Farms.......... 2 points: 2 food (biology)


Although mines and windmills are equally good, you should build windmills instead, because of the +1 food. Every windmill you build is one fewer farm that you have to build, and farms are the worst tile improvement. If your city is lucky enough to have plenty of food already with no need for farms, then go ahead and build mines,

Note that watermills, towns, and windmills will benefit from financial trait, giving them an extra .5 points if your civ has the trait.



It's not necessary, but I recommend building to a tile's strength... i.e. farms go on grassland, workshops go on plains. That way you can switch emphasis... say you decide you want a city to grow rapidly, you click the food button and they use all those grassland farms, or you need to build stuff quickly, and they start using the workshops on plains to max out hammers.

Of course these are all just guidelines. If it's early in the game and your city has nothing but plains tiles, of course you'll have to irrigate all of them

[Willem]

Originally posted by gilfan



Mines are +2, wood is +1 until replacable parts. That's a LOOOONG time to wait while you're missing out on that extra hammer.

Yes it does require a sacrifice, but I think it's worth it in the end for the health benefits. It makes it much easier to keep your city growing that way. I also don't chop Plains/Forest unless I really need it for food. Grassland/Forest is the only kind I'll cut down. It makes a big difference in my cities health, I quite often see +4 health from Forest. That's fairly substantial.

[Crossfire]

I'm with Willem here. I try hard to save my plains/forests for when I get lumber mills. The rest I chop when I need to rush something or to build something else there. In the early chopping of settlers I try to only chop tiles that I know I will want to use later (like grasslands along rivers, or hills). Also, I just about never farm a flood plain tile, it always gets a cottage unless I am severely short of food in that city. Another point is that you don't need to get every city up to 20 pop. Some might stop growing around 12 pop because you are using all the extra food to work mines/cottages/lumbermills.

[gilfan]

Originally posted by Willem


Yes it does require a sacrifice, but I think it's worth it in the end for the health benefits. It makes it much easier to keep your city growing that way. I also don't chop Plains/Forest unless I really need it for food. Grassland/Forest is the only kind I'll cut down. It makes a big difference in my cities health, I quite often see +4 health from Forest. That's fairly substantial.

I don't think that's the most advantageous way to handle it. A forest without a lumbermill is essentially a 1 point tile improvement (1 hammer). On grasslands and plains, you can't do any better than that in the early game, you can only replace it with a farm or cottage. However, on hills you can replace that +1 hammer with +2 hammers immediately. If you're going to cut any forests at all, hills should be the first target.


I'm not suggesting you should clear-cut every forest in sight to rush workers and settlers, but I DO think you should cut down every forested hill.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by gilfan
Farms suck, if you're not building enough other tile improvements, this could be your problem. For the vast majority of the game, they only give you +1f. Only build the absolute minimum number of farms necessary for the city to be big enough to work every tile in it's radius.

Unless you are building a GP city.

Originally posted by gilfan
Watermills.... 4 points: 1 food, 2 hammers, 2 commerce (State Property civic, replacable parts, electricity)

The bummer here is you can only build watermills on one side of a river. That is, once you built it on a tile, you cannot build another one on the tile directly across the river.

This makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Does anybody know how to fix this?

Originally posted by gilfan
Windmills...... 3 points: 1 food, 1 hammer, 2 commerce (replacable parts, electricity)

You get windmills and watermills after machine tools (something like this), the one you can research after metal casting.

[gilfan]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Unless you are building a GP city.

Yeah, I said the same thing

Originally posted by gilfan

If you want a lot of specialists to generate Great Persons in a particular city, obviously this rule doesn't apply then.

Originally posted by Urban Ranger

You get windmills and watermills after machine tools (something like this), the one you can research after metal casting.

The techs I listed were the ones that give a bonus to that tile improvement, not the techs that allow you to build them in the first place.

[Strudo]

I generally chop forests directly next to my cities. I don't want enemy there getting an extra 50% defence bonus while I attack them.

[Willem]

Originally posted by gilfan
I'm not suggesting you should clear-cut every forest in sight to rush workers and settlers, but I DO think you should cut down every forested hill.

Well I have a different opinion. If the yield with a Lumbermill is exactly the same as with a Mine, why not save it and get the health benefits from it. The loss of Hammers is only an issue in the early part of the game, and there's usually enough bare Hills available to keep my people working on them. Very seldom do I even have enough population to work the forested Hills. So losing a few Hammers here and there is really no big deal. And of course there's all those Jungle/Hills I can work.

[gilfan]

Originally posted by Willem


Well I have a different opinion. If the yield with a Lumbermill is exactly the same as with a Mine, why not save it and get the health benefits from it. The loss of Hammers is only an issue in the early part of the game, and there's usually enough bare Hills available to keep my people working on them. Very seldom do I even have enough population to work the forested Hills. So losing a few Hammers here and there is really no big deal. And of course there's all those Jungle/Hills I can work.

My point is they aren't the same, not until into the late middle of the game. For about 3500 years, the mine is better.

It's a judgement call, and if you think the +.5 health is worth the loss of +1 hammer for all that time, then more power to you. However, I don't see the logic in chopping forests on grasslands where you're basically getting a free tile improvement of +1 hammer and can't replace it with something better, but not chopping on hills where you CAN improve on what you already have.

[Willem]

Originally posted by gilfan
However, I don't see the logic in chopping forests on grasslands where you're basically getting a free tile improvement of +1 hammer and can't replace it with something better, but not chopping on hills where you CAN improve on what you already have.

I use my Grassland for Cottages, that's why they get chopped. Sometimes I'll use them for food too, if I need to, but primarily they're used for Cottages.

[MikeH]

I discovered gems in a mine once. Was a nice random surprise.

Another advantage of mining nearby hills and connecting them to the trade network is that I regularly get new resources appearing in places I already have mined and connected. Especially Coal and Aluminium when they come along. It's great finding out you already have them both the same turn you research the tech.

[jonta]

It's just wonderfull to see all the diffrent strategies
on just a simple aspect as chopping/mining

And im sure there is not a "the one" right answer
Everything depend on Your style off play, and the
actual situation in game.

Anyway i hope you'w got the main idear.



Personaly i do a lot of mining in early game.
And in fact i'we been able to get 2 gold & and 1 silver
"popup" in the same game, so it is possible !

But i'we also playes many games with 50-60 mines and
no popup bonus.