Stu's privleged cities

[defrancoj]

WLTxD - is not generally available to a city that has fewer than two decent trade routes (with the Capital or SSC) and it is not generally cost effective trying to achieve celebration with improvements until the trade routes are in place. Once a city can consistently celbrate it is worthy of consideration for upgrading to Priviledged status - but watch the exchequer too many priviledged cities can drain funds better spent upon rush buying 'vans and military.

Ok then.. I think i have a problem treating too many ciites as privileged.

So let me ask you this: "once a city can consistently celebrate..." what exactly is your definition of consistently celebrating? That is, what sizes/improvements/lux rate are we talking about?

The way I have been playing, if i have a size three city with two trade routes, I'll generally spring for a marketplace and a harbor on the hope that it'll grow to size 8 and, later on, beyond.

Then, later, faced with cash constraints, I find I have to decide which of the size 8 cities i want to bring up to the next level, and upon reading your advice, i believe it has been my tendency to jack up the tax rate and improve the hell out of too many cities

Hm.
maybe you guys wouldn't mind criticising a save?

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Well.

First off, why do you need such a high tax rate? 60:0:40 is a lot of income/turn, especially considering that you have Adam Smith up and running.

Rule of thumb for me: Set taxes at the minimum necessary to avoid a per-turn deficit. Set them even lower if I have a lot of cash and a lower setting is needed to achieve a benefit in one of the other 2 areas (e.g. if I want to have science higher to get 1 tech per 2 turns as opposed to 1 per 3.).

If you find yourself running low on cash, deliver some caravans, or demand cash from the AIs if you aren't in a representative government. 60% tax is almost always a waste of resources... you're better off having a tech lead than a cash lead. Techs will get you access to Wonders and governments that will make celebrations easier.

If you can't celebrate easily, don't try to force it. You'll find celebrations a lot easier when you have more trade routes and happiness wonders.

Point 2: You're building a lot of stuff that could be Caravans. For example, Jerusalem is much better off with a Caravan than a Library at this point. Even a Temple would be better - that would make the city celebrate.

Rule 1 of CivII - when in doubt, build a Caravan.

Point 2.5: You'd need less Harbours if you would improve terrain with Settlers instead (e.g. Pompeii, Veii). I will almost never build a Harbour unless the city cannot grow otherwise. A Harbour does get you two food and an extra arrow vs. Grass or Plains, but if all you're doing is working Ocean, the city will grow slowly (2 food for Harboured Ocean vs 3 for Grass) and will produce things (like Caravans) at an atrociously slow rate.

Point 2.5.1: Your home island could use a few Settlers to do some terrain improvement. You have tons of rivers (and only 3 Settlers in your whole civ!). Why not build roads on them and then turn them into forest? And at the same time, cut down your non-rivered forests and irrigate and road everything other than your rivered forests. I bet you'd have double the shield production, 50% more food production, and virtually the same trade production on the home island by taking that approach. Yes, all that terrain improvement takes time, but I count 7 Harbours (420 shields) on the home island. 10 Settlers could do the work pretty quickly, probably quicker than it took you to build all those Harbours. And at the end of the day, you'll still have those 10 Settlers.

Rule 1.1 of CivII - when in doubt, build a Caravan, or a Settler. My personal rule of thumb is to try to have one Settler for every 2 cities, at minimum.

Point 3: You have a very small military... and half the world is at war with you.

With the shield production you have currently, you're not in a position to build defenders to counter an invasion without a lot of rushing. Is that why the tax rate is so high?

Point 4: No Super Science City. That's fine. But what you may want to try sometime is packing HG and Shakespeare in the same city - once you get Sanitation, that should be your "privileged city" because it will Celebrate easily (until HG expires). That's the one city you'll want to give everything to to keep it celebrating and growing. And when I say everything, I mean everything should be rushed, and the rest of the time should be spent pumping out and delivering Caravans.

Most of your other cities aren't going to grow much anytime really soon without a lot of effort - so they should just be Caravan, Settler, and unit factories.



So what would I do?

Consolidate. Rush some Settlers and defenders. Take a bit of a breather from expansion - you're already Supreme. Turn your settings to 1 tax and split the other 9 between science and luxuries as you see fit - not much to luxuries now since celebrations are hard to come by. Start constructing a shipchain to Egypt - and defend it. Going back to Republic is an option. Once you have some defenders and Settlers, stop trying to build so many Banks and Universities and build Caravans. Yes, the yield on a Bank/Uni goes up when you have so many arrows in a city, but Caravan yields go WAY up.

Good luck.

Oh - I define "consistently celebrate" as a city that has 2-3 trade routes, and a Temple, and will celebrate at a 20% lux rate up to size 6 or 7. Once there, add a Marketplace and then Aqueduct. The key for me is to keep luxuries low (20%) most of the time, and once I have obtained a key milestone (Mikes Chapel, or switching to Republic) I turn my luxuries up to 40-60% (however much it takes to make MOST of my size 3+ cities celebrate) for enough turns to grow them to the point where most of them stop growing due to Aqueduct/Sewer requirements or red faces popping up. At that point, I turn luxuries back down to 20%, go back to delivering Caravans, and wait for the next milestone (enough Aqueducts/Sewers built, or switching to Democracy, or building JS Bach to go with Mikes) before cranking luxuries up to 40-60% again for a few turns. And so on.

[rjmatsleepers]

I think it was one of the SGs who said when in doubt, build a van unless there is a really good reason for building something else - and then build a van anyway.

RJM at Sleeper's

[Bloody Monk]

Re: Stu's privleged cities

Originally posted by defrancoj

Hm.
maybe you guys wouldn't mind criticising a save?

Your choices of WOW built is the one thing I understand about your save. The rest is so different from my game that I'm scratching my head trying to decide what to start with. Getting those Wonders shows that you had a decent beginning. But really, I think you squandered your advantage by hap-hazard choices.

1- Too many cities coupled with non-development of older cities, as well as questionable placement. Building a city on a site where only 3 shields are available, especially the Capital Rome, is not the highest use of your settlers. Why build around Fish where no shield potential exists?? All those cities in the heart of the Home Island are a puzzle.

2-- What have you got against Temples?? I know you had HG and Mike's but Temples are essential for growth. No amount of Trade Routes or MP's will substitute for making 2 citizens content. And the mass of Libraries, and building Banks, before Temples is questionable. Libraries don't have much impact with zero Science.

3-- As soon as you built MPE and got maps from the other Civ's, you should have realized the need for many many boats. There was a grand opportunity for offshore trade which would have been way more advantagious than all those extra dirt-hole cities and the glut of white goods.

4-- You should not be in Democracy. Until you can build a new fleet of Galleons, your Caravels cause too much disorder when they leave port. Until you get Temples built, most of your cities will not celebrate. In Republic, one unit can be out of the city without causing problems.

5-- I really think you need to build more camels, both for trade and to stockpile for WOW's. A trade route of +2 to 4 arrows per turn plus an initial bonus of 200-400 gold (+ an equal number of beakers) is a better deal than most any white goods.

6-- (as in STYOM) The very old Man had excellent points too, so, ditto.

7--Think about more balanced growth for your cities, and prepare for stages of WeLove growth. If you have Temples and MP's in place before you go to Republic, then the growth can begin immediately. Harbors are great for getting an extra few pop but if all your citizens are in the ocean, you will be in shield deficit. And road those shielded grass tiles if nothing else.

8--One final point and then I have to get some sleep. (Hopefully you will have a chance to respond.) Take another look at the Strategies for Tech gifting to your Key Civ. You have 18 more techs than the purple civ. That is a large penalty added to your research costs. If you had 10% Science then it would be 21 turns. After a tech dump to the Indians it drops to 17 turns. That's a big penalty.

Good Luck,
Monk

[defrancoj]

All right, thank you all. What I've heard is: temples, not harbors, and fewer white goods (though regarding the libraries, I wasn't keeping my science at 0... i kept fiddling with the sliders... is this a bad idea?)

But what comes first, the temples or the camels that finance them? Ie, should I be building temples before I can rush them? I'm guessing you're going to say, no.

What I'm not sure about is, SG was talking about this 4-gold rule to determine when a city ought to have a marketplace, but then old man was telling me he always keeps the tax slider very low... so is it a 4-gold or four-lux rule, or, what?

What are some criteria for allowing growth past size 8, 12?

[Bloody Monk]

Originally posted by defrancoj
All right, thank you all. What I've heard is: temples, not harbors, and fewer white goods (though regarding the libraries, I wasn't keeping my science at 0... i kept fiddling with the sliders... is this a bad idea?)

More to the point, don't build white goods until or unless they are necessary. Sometimes, harbors are just the thing. But, if you are getting redheads already, the priority is Happiness control; and for that Temples (or additional martial law units if in Monarchy) are called for...if you want to grow the city size.

There is nothing wrong with "fiddling with the sliders" if there is a reason for doing same.

But what comes first, the temples or the camels that finance them? Ie, should I be building temples before I can rush them? I'm guessing you're going to say, no.

Playing in Deity, Happiness Control is the first big challenge for beginers. You have the Mike's Chapel WOW and HG, so your cities have some breathing room before needing a Temple. When that time comes a Temple will make 2 more citizens content. You can tell when that time is about to dawn by looking at the Happiness Screen in the CityView. Look at Happiness for Tarentum (and put all citizens to work, 3 on trees). Notice the line next to the Mike's Chapel Icon. The 3 redfaces were handled by Mike's, but any new pop increase will produce another red. You either build a Temple or reposition workers to stop the food surplus. And notice the 10 shields you get!! The next line shows the effect of having a Caravel out to sea under Democracy.

Temples are a special case, IMHO. Even if you can't rush them in 2 turns they are a necessary addition to the city and should be started ASAP when the redfaces appear. Assuming that you want to grow the city and/or want to avoid loading up on Lux, that is. I hate Lux, btw. The game is won with Science and Gold. Luxuries are a drain on Productivity. Those so called citizens in my Empire have to work. No lazing about living on the dole. You will need Lux to start celebrating but beware. If you grow too many cities too much, then you will have to keep Lux setting high to control Happiness. This means your Science will lag.

What I'm not sure about is, SG was talking about this 4-gold rule to determine when a city ought to have a marketplace, but then old man was telling me he always keeps the tax slider very low... so is it a 4-gold or four-lux rule, or, what?

I don't think that is what Stu meant. The 4G Rule tells you the minimum criteria for a MP to be helpful. It doesn't say you MUST build it, only that at that level, 4G, it might be useful. Because at 4G the city is above breakeven for the maintence.

What are some criteria for allowing growth past size 8, 12?

Here is something for you to think about. Your ICS strategy--at least in the heart of the Home Island--is incompatible with large cities. So, why do you want to grow big cities with an ICS style?? Anyway, to answer your question needs a bit more information. Do you mean why or how to achieve growth past 8, 12??

I hope that thinking about these points is helpful to you.
Monk

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Originally posted by defrancoj
All right, thank you all. What I've heard is: temples, not harbors, and fewer white goods (though regarding the libraries, I wasn't keeping my science at 0... i kept fiddling with the sliders... is this a bad idea?)

But what comes first, the temples or the camels that finance them? Ie, should I be building temples before I can rush them? I'm guessing you're going to say, no.

What I'm not sure about is, SG was talking about this 4-gold rule to determine when a city ought to have a marketplace, but then old man was telling me he always keeps the tax slider very low... so is it a 4-gold or four-lux rule, or, what?

What are some criteria for allowing growth past size 8, 12?

I'll chime in again.

Fiddling with the sliders is okay, of course. Setting them and ignoring them is a recipe for missed opportunities - sometimes a great benefit can be obtained by moving one slider 10% (e.g. 2 turns per tech vs 3). And once I do something significant that will affect happiness - such as building Mikes, or HG - I'll want to check to see if moving luxuries up by 20% will generate celebrations.

Like Monk, and in general, I think luxuries are a waste. I try to avoid leaving them jacked up unless I get something pretty good in return. For example, in Fundamentalism, 60% luxuries isn't unreasonable. Why? Because it's almost pointless to have a high science rate in Fundy (half of it is wasted), a high tax rate is generally overkill (Fundy generates plenty of cash on its own), BUT celebrating cities in Fundy are wonderful - they collect arrows like a representative government, they don't suffer from disorder, and you can be a warmongering b*stard all you want The only downside versus Democracy is the fact that your cities won't grow astronomically fast (ad if you want to quibble, the AI can bribe them).

Anyway. Regarding luxuries (some of this is obvious, but bear with me):

In early Monarchy, try to keep luxuries at 0. I always try to run 70% Science in Monarchy, and this is seldom hard to manage. In the early game, 30% tax should be plenty - you shouldn't have any maintenance costs except for those in your capital or Super Science City. All other cities should have warriors or horsemen for martial law. Once you build HG, the host city (usually the capital or SSC) will celebrate up to size 6 with a Temple and 3 units for martial law. Once it grows to size 7 (assuming you haven't already gone to Republic), you may want to tweak the luxury slider to keep the celebrations happening. Usually I try to convert unhappy #7 to an Einstein instead, and see if the celebration keeps going. This is where trial and error kicks in - try various combinations of 10% lux, 20% lux, Ein, Elvis, or Marketplace in your capital. Check your Advisor screens to see which combination produces the most science, and go with that. When I bump up luxuries in the early game, it's always at the expense of tax, not science.

Once in Republic, I generally run at 20% lux. This is usually because I have units in the field and may not have enough Temples to offset that. If you're lucky, you may be able to run at 10%, especially if you have Mike's Chapel. And if/when you do get Mikes, then you may want to have a run of celebrations. What I do is bump luxuries up to 40-50% for about 3-6 turns, just enough to grow my cities to where they drop out of celebration, or run into Aqueduct limitations. And then I drop the luxuries back down to 20%. If there's unrest after that, I'll build Temples (or sometimes Markets, see disclaimer below) and/or convert unhappy people to Einsteins or Elvises.

This same principle applies to all future growth. I'll turn luxuries up, check the Attitude Advisor to see if many cities will grow, and if they won't, I'll just turn it back down before ending the turn. No harm in checking.

Your second question re: Temples vs Camels - I always go with Camels. The only Temples I build in the early game are in my capital and SSC. Other cities will be kept happy through HG and Mikes, martial law, or Elvises as a last resort. If you don't get Mikes, this can be difficult to manage... but if you do, a 20% lux rate + Mikes should be enough to keep cities of size 5-8 content. And that's all they have to be - if they start getting too big, build Settlers in them. Or rearrange your workers to maximize shield/arrow production and eliminate your food surplus. The only job your smaller cities have in the early to early middle game is pumping out Settlers for growth and Caravans for trading and Wonder construction in your capital/SSC. Later on, when those cities have 3 trade routes, they'll be growing on their own.

I'll try to reconcile SG's 4 gold rule for markets with my minimal tax axiom. First, set taxes at the minimum that avoids a deficit, and look at how much gold the city produces. If it's 4 or more gold, then the marketplace (+50% gold) will pay its own maintenance and generate 1 extra gold coin/turn.

If you have your taxes set artifically high (like 30-40%), a lot of cities will meet your 4 gold standard. Trouble is, if/when you subsequently turn taxes down, you'll have a lot of unprofitable marketplaces. So run the 4-gold test when you have taxes set at the lowest level you're likely to be running. And even then... you'll probably still want to build a Caravan, unless the city has something like 8 or more gold

(disclaimer: In the late middle game onward, I build a lot more markets than libraries because of one point we haven't mentioned - the 50% increase in luxuries that a market generates. Often this will be enough to make a city with (for example) 4 happy and 5 content people celebrate - the extra lux will turn one of the contents into a happy, and presto - celebration)

[Bloody Monk]

Bravo, Six!!

Very well written, and I personally agree with your points. That's a very clean, efficient way to run an Empire.

The bit about dialing back the sliders to 'default' levels applies to making decisions about whether--or not--to actually grow a city to the next level. Once a city has grown to its limit, it is okay to have a few redfaces as long as there are at least as many Happy's at the lower Lux setting. If that is not possible then you have to decide if the extra expense of a Colosseum is worthwhile.

About Libraries: I build one in the SSC early on but wait til later to add in other cities. Once the cities have grown up and established 3 routes, I pick a few of the best cities (in terms of beaker output) for Lib and maybe a Univ. or three. These cities usually have trade specials that set them above the rest. These decisions come during the high cash flow part of the delivery phase before Invention and Navigation cut the bonuses. The goal is to get to 1 or 2 turn research rate so that with deliveries the Empire gets at least one Advance per turn.

Monk

[Straybow]

Nobody expects the Robust Constructive Criticism Inquisition! The element of surprise is my chief weapon... and a fanatical devotion to the Pope! Plus, the secret power of Hidden Specials. That, and I love Canals.

Errr, anyway... Hidden Specials. The special tiles are in patterns rotated 90° from each other. I usually think of them as 2-4-2 and 1-3-3-1. But Grasslands do not manifest the presence of a special resource.

Identify the pattern and you can Mine the Grasslands into Forest (Pheasant or Silk), and then irrigate to Plains (Buffalo or Wheat) if necessary. Your home continent is ripe for mining Hidden Specials, shown here as pink highlights... get some Settlers out there pronto!

[Scouse Gits]

... you can always cheat and d/l my HutFinder utility which will identify all your hidden specials

Stu

[Grigor]

I too run 0% Luxuries in Monarchy and 20% Luxuries in Republic. But I always have this nagging feeling that 20% Lux is sloppy and indulgent in Republic, because I often have to temporarily cut back science in order to keep the treasury in the black. Suggestions for handling 0% or 10% Luxuries in 20-city empires (or larger) in Republic are welcome.

I am also waiting to hear from Solo, who likes to run 100% science in Democracy (!!). He seems to be solving Civ IV right now, but he'll be back. I can run 10% Lux in Demo if I am lucky, but I usually need 20 or 30.

[Bloody Monk]

Hey Grigor,

Two ideas--

Is it possible that your cashflow problems stem from not delivering enough vans?? If that's not it then there's not much you can do. If there are AI on your continent, then they would probably respond to tribute demands. Drop out of Republic and demand away. If you do it to take advantage of the Oedo year, you can get back to Republic next turn.

Secondly, do you need to celebrate and WLxD?? If not, why use Lux?? Are you overgrowing your feeder cities?? If your 2nd tier cities are too big already, then give them Colosseum distractions. Being able to run 90 or 100% Science is the reason to build Colosseums (something Stu never has to worry about being in Fundy with its Science Cap). Once the SSC, or STC, has maxed its food, drop out of celebrations until you can prepare any others you want to grow-- in one slug. Perpetual celebration for only one or two cities is not efficient, imho.

90 or 100% Science plus multiple deliveries yielding two or three advances really rocks!!

@Stu,

Would you link to the thread with your latest version of Hutfinder, please?? Or bump it back to the top. Maybe some folk haven't seen it or appreciate all that it does.

Monk

[Bloody Monk]

Originally posted by Straybow
Nobody expects the Robust Constructive Criticism Inquisition! The element of surprise is my chief weapon... and a fanatical devotion to the Pope! Plus, the secret power of Hidden Specials. That, and I love Canals.

You are so right, Straybow. Nobody is ever really prepared for the appearance of the Spanish Inquisition!!

Old hands always look for opportunities to build "Straybow's Folley" canal cities somewhere on the map. And it is good to once again see one of your uploaded images showing all the Hidden Specials. Two of the ideas you are known and remembered for as a great teacher and advisor...like your namesake.

Monk

[Straybow]

Ah, kind words, Monk. Some would say "obsessive/compulsive" rather than "great teacher." I say six of one is half a dozen of the other...

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Originally posted by Bloody Monk
Hey Grigor,

Two ideas--

Is it possible that your cashflow problems stem from not delivering enough vans?? If that's not it then there's not much you can do. If there are AI on your continent, then they would probably respond to tribute demands. Drop out of Republic and demand away. If you do it to take advantage of the Oedo year, you can get back to Republic next turn.

Secondly, do you need to celebrate and WLxD?? If not, why use Lux?? Are you overgrowing your feeder cities?? If your 2nd tier cities are too big already, then give them Colosseum distractions. Being able to run 90 or 100% Science is the reason to build Colosseums (something Stu never has to worry about being in Fundy with its Science Cap). Once the SSC, or STC, has maxed its food, drop out of celebrations until you can prepare any others you want to grow-- in one slug. Perpetual celebration for only one or two cities is not efficient, imho.
Monk

This is probably why I hardly ever get to 1 tech/turn from internal science (as opposed to Caravan delivery) alone.

I can never be bothered to build Colosseums. I figure that with Mikes (and later JSB) I won't need further happiness improvements. So I sort of default to 20%, or 10% if I want to push science (and put up with the Elvises).

Something to think about - thanks!