Monarch with AI workers?

[chumly]

I might be asking something painfully obvious and stupid here, but I'll give it a shot

Is it possible/realistic to win a game on ~Monarch level using the AI controls for workers? Or possibly managing them for the early game, but then transitioning over to all AI managed workers?

When I'm in a certain mood, I enjoy the micro. Other times, I absolutely hate it, and I'd rather focus on big picture goals.

Is this achievable, or is it an interesting but doable challenge? Or is it neither?

[TheArsenal]

I’ve done it. I played a few games where I automated (with the exception of road building) from the very start. It is nowhere near as efficient, or fun, and is often frustrating beyond words, but it is entirely possible to win handily while doing it.

[eris]

It all depends on what your other skills are. Above Regent, you are losing effiency to the AI. The point becomes to use your human intelligence to make better decisions than the AI to overcome the AI advantages. By automating workers you are giving up one of your advantages. All such decisions in Civ are trade-offs.

I would suggest a compromise, as you hinted at in the original post. Micromanage your core cities. At the initial stages of the game, every worker decision counts. At some point it becomes tedious. This is a subjective issue, and we will all define the point of tediousness differently. I play on huge maps a lot and when I get dozens upon dozens upon dozens of workers, I am going to start losing interest in the micromangement. I mark that transition point like this: When it takes more than 5-10 seconds to make a decision of what the highlighted worker should do next, automate (shift A) that worker and go on to your next decision. Give that little worker self determination and free will! Just like the self determined, free-willed folk in real life, they will make mistakes, repeatedly. Most often they over-irrigate; sometimes you need a particular forest chopped. Whatever. Always keep a few workers on manual, to fix the obvious mistakes the self-willed workers will make. This gives you the best of both worlds. The workers will not be bothering you over and over again for instructions, like a 3 year old asking for candy or a dog who keeps bringing you that soggy tennis ball so that you can throw it again. The tiles will end up well worked, even if it seems nearly criminally inefficient to work a tile twice to get it right.

This can also apply if you are warring and getting tons of captured workers. (If it makes sense to say "tons of workers", how much does a worker weigh?)(Anyway...) The captured land is going to be filled with worker mistakes (by our standards) and need re-working. Once mistakes are fixed, set the workers free. (Well, maybe not set them free completely, just let them think they are in control of their own seritude. It's amazing how many folk will settle for that.)

One other trick is to try to get your managed workers ahead of the automated ones. Have them mine that grassland before a self-willed worker irrigates it. Have them cop grassland forest and irrigate so that you can get the extra food to grow and work a hill. Have them mine hills for extra shields while the self-willed workers are working other priorities. When railroads come along, set a gang of controlled workers to build a single rail line across your empire. As they go, they will encounter occasional tiles (usually irrigated ones) that have already been railroaded. Sooner or later, you will have the backbone of a very good transortation system and the automated workers will be connecting cities up to that system as part of their other priorities.

I am sure you can think of other combination tricks.

There is some play value to managing workers. There is a statisfaction of building and shaping your empire for infrastructure and military purposes. We all do it differently. Sometimes the differences are subtle, but they are still there. It partially defines our play style. This compromise allows you to avoid the tedium of too much micromanagement while not losing the worker fun, and hopefully, not losing the game either.

(Now, if I can only find those two workers out of over a hundred where I accidentally hit "a" instead of "A", I'd be a lot happier. They are chopping forests that I don't want chopped! I see the little notices on the screen. Then they immediately take the rail system somewhere else and I can't find them. Arrrgh! Oh yeah, this is supposed to be fun.)

[Solomwi]

On that last note, I've had the same problem a few times. Ultimately, I decided just to make it a priority to find them as soon as the production phase ended. If you don't give them a chance to use the rails, you can stop them.

[Theseus]

Originally posted by eris
It all depends on what your other skills are. Above Regent, you are losing effiency to the AI. The point becomes to use your human intelligence to make better decisions than the AI to overcome the AI advantages. By automating workers you are giving up one of your advantages. All such decisions in Civ are trade-offs.

I would suggest a compromise, as you hinted at in the original post. Micromanage your core cities. At the initial stages of the game, every worker decision counts. At some point it becomes tedious. This is a subjective issue, and we will all define the point of tediousness differently. I play on huge maps a lot and when I get dozens upon dozens upon dozens of workers, I am going to start losing interest in the micromangement. I mark that transition point like this: When it takes more than 5-10 seconds to make a decision of what the highlighted worker should do next, automate (shift A) that worker and go on to your next decision. Give that little worker self determination and free will! Just like the self determined, free-willed folk in real life, they will make mistakes, repeatedly. Most often they over-irrigate; sometimes you need a particular forest chopped. Whatever. Always keep a few workers on manual, to fix the obvious mistakes the self-willed workers will make. This gives you the best of both worlds. The workers will not be bothering you over and over again for instructions, like a 3 year old asking for candy or a dog who keeps bringing you that soggy tennis ball so that you can throw it again. The tiles will end up well worked, even if it seems nearly criminally inefficient to work a tile twice to get it right.

This can also apply if you are warring and getting tons of captured workers. (If it makes sense to say "tons of workers", how much does a worker weigh?)(Anyway...) The captured land is going to be filled with worker mistakes (by our standards) and need re-working. Once mistakes are fixed, set the workers free. (Well, maybe not set them free completely, just let them think they are in control of their own seritude. It's amazing how many folk will settle for that.)

One other trick is to try to get your managed workers ahead of the automated ones. Have them mine that grassland before a self-willed worker irrigates it. Have them cop grassland forest and irrigate so that you can get the extra food to grow and work a hill. Have them mine hills for extra shields while the self-willed workers are working other priorities. When railroads come along, set a gang of controlled workers to build a single rail line across your empire. As they go, they will encounter occasional tiles (usually irrigated ones) that have already been railroaded. Sooner or later, you will have the backbone of a very good transortation system and the automated workers will be connecting cities up to that system as part of their other priorities.

I am sure you can think of other combination tricks.

There is some play value to managing workers. There is a statisfaction of building and shaping your empire for infrastructure and military purposes. We all do it differently. Sometimes the differences are subtle, but they are still there. It partially defines our play style. This compromise allows you to avoid the tedium of too much micromanagement while not losing the worker fun, and hopefully, not losing the game either.

(Now, if I can only find those two workers out of over a hundred where I accidentally hit "a" instead of "A", I'd be a lot happier. They are chopping forests that I don't want chopped! I see the little notices on the screen. Then they immediately take the rail system somewhere else and I can't find them. Arrrgh! Oh yeah, this is supposed to be fun.)

eris provides a very well thought response. Nothing wrong with it. I particularly like the "5-10 second test".

I say...

/me gags

Automate in the early game? You kidding? Do... not... do... it.

Shields are power. Food is power. Gold is power.

Roads (think Rome in RL) are power.

The Worker is the foundation stone upon which your entire empire will rest.

[chumly]

I'm hip to ultra early game worker control, that just seems like game smarts to me. It bogs down significantly for me as I draw towards the mid game though, and I start to lose interest. At that point, I'm just wondering if I can automate and safely move on to other considerations without losing massive efficiency.

On a related note, is it possible to set up build queues and governors to be a useful component of your empire management?

I just picked up C3C, haven't played in a few years

[Theseus]

I was just giving you grief, man. So many players don't get the power of the Worker in the early game (sounds kinda Marxian ).

My rule is that until I get a military RR network in place, and thus likely my high-value tile improvements done, I'm TOTALLY on manual.

[vmxa1]

You have to consider the map as well. If you are on a land mass that you own exclusively, then you do not have to worry about anything, but inefficencies.

If you have several rivials on your borders, you could get workers captured. They can go into their land and force the AI to demand they be removed.

If I was to do auto, it would have to be after I cleared my land of other civs.

I have not tried it in maybe two years, but I remember workers not clearing pollution in a timely manner. Taking a path to a tile across the bay and going into others land to get there.

[TheArsenal]

To elaborate: When I did it (just because I wanted to see what it was like), as noted, it was highly inefficient even by my non-micromanagement standards. I did get around the problem of their wandering across foreign lands by automating them in the “this city only, no altering” setting. I prioritize road building, which the AI seemingly does not, so it was not possible to fully automate every worker otherwise I would have had disconnected cities for far too long. The automated workers were also very slow to connect extra resources and luxuries which I wanted connected for trades, so that is something else I had to direct myself. Once I got to about 40 or 50 workers though - which means my core was well up and running - it seemed to run more smoothly and the inefficiency less egregious (translation: I paid less attention to what each worker was doing).

After trying it, and still winning while doing it, I wouldn’t recommend it.

[Arrian]

"Guess what? I got a fever! And the only prescription is ... more cow bell!"

Holy ****. That is just too weird.

I just heard that skit (or rather parts of it, intermixed with music) on the radio this weekend. It kinda became the theme of the entire weekend. After a while, we were tossing it in everywhere ("yeah, that set was ok, but I coulda used more cow bell").

Heh. Christopher Walken rocks.

-Arrian