Goody hut booty

[1889]

What do you think is the best use of those cities and settlers that scouts often get from goody huts?

When they are more than 10 tiles from home they produce little. It seems best to keep the populations at one or two.

I was thinking of producing workers, but barbs would just eat them up as they march someplace usefull. Warriors are not much protection at demi-god, so producing them is a waste. Scouts may be a good idea.

Also what could be done about unhappiness? Could I do better than letting pop grow to 2 and making a scientist?

[michaell]

When they're far off i typically use them to secure a lux or a resource, not worrying about their production value.(ie. a lux nearby an opposing civ who otherwise would have gobbled it up)

[Kloreep]

How far did I get it from my capitol?

Unless I got it ultra-far from my capitol, I'll move it back so I can found a core city with it.

[Nor Me]

If settlers are close enough to the capital to move them somewhere useful safely then I would.

Remember that pop-rushing is likely to be useful for far away cities.

I've done things like warrior, warrior, pop-rushed settler and then giving the city away in far away cities with 2 food surplus before now. That'd give me another settler in a useful position (i.e. the capital by teleportation) in 30 turns. Unlike with abandoning cities, the pop-rushing unhappiness stays when you give them away.

It even might not be a bad idea to attack with one. A 24-turns 2 regular warrior and 2 regular archer team might only be able to take out 1 settler but that's still useful even on Demi-god. You would have to give the city away to a third party to avoid it being razed which would hurt you in peace negotiations.

If you can get on a resource, I would. If it's early enough to produce useful scouts then I'd definitely do that.

[Epistax]

By the time my explorers are ultra-far from the capitol I'll have more than one (four?) city working on settlers so they will always be under production or a settler will currently exist, making it so I'll never get a settler goody hut. The only time I ever get a settler is at the beginning before I build my first, and after my second city. In both cases the settler doesn't have too far to go. Still, if there is no advantage to settling where I found the settler I'll drag it a distance to a more core / better spot. Usually whenever I'm about to put a city down there are two spots I consider: where I want to put the city, and where I should put it. I let myself place this new settler into one of the "want to" spaces.

Disclaimer: I suck at this game, yet I am very good at making convincing arguments to do exactly the opposite of what is correct. :. you should do the exact opposite of any advice I give.

[conmcb25]

Its situational.

If its far away and can be used to secure a critical resource or luxury, then maybe do it.

If not the 8 turns you use to move it will be more than paid back very quickly by founding a core city with relatively low corruption.

[joncnunn]

To furthest one city choke point inside planed REX boundary of my empire would be my top choice on a free goody hut settler, next would be resource grabbing, after that it usally goes to either the next planed spot for a city or else the closet spot to where it's standing that I was planning on founding a city.

[Harovan]

You're all sissies. Real men disband settlers from huts. It's wrong to gain advantage over the AI in such a simple way.

[Modo44]

It's also wrong to gain advantage by having extra settlers and units at the beginning, don't you think?

My extra settlers basically claim the best land they can see. If I get them near my first city, they will expand my core. If they show up farther away, they will usually secure a resource, a luxury or a chokepoint.

[Arrian]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
You're all sissies. Real men disband settlers from huts. It's wrong to gain advantage over the AI in such a simple way.

[alexman]

Originally posted by Nor Me
I've done things like warrior, warrior, pop-rushed settler and then giving the city away in far away cities with 2 food surplus before now. That'd give me another settler in a useful position (i.e. the capital by teleportation) in 30 turns. Unlike with abandoning cities, the pop-rushing unhappiness stays when you give them away.

Never heard of that one before.
Very creative!

[Arrian]

Holy ****, that is creative. I too never thought of that. Granted, playing on standard maps as I do, it's quite rare that I pop a settler from a hut waaaaay far away from my capital and/or a luxury. The only time I'd want to use Nor Me's strategy would be if I couldn't grab a lux (or other resource) and also couldn't march it into a spot that would be "core" within say 10 moves.

In the PTWDGII, Cake or Death marched a settler from a hut something like 17 tiles. If we had built where we got it, it wouldn't have been able to clear size2 (tundra, hill, coastal tiles and that was it).

-Arrian

[joncnunn]

Originally posted by Arrian
In the PTWDGII, Cake or Death marched a settler from a hut something like 17 tiles. If we had built where we got it, it wouldn't have been able to clear size2 (tundra, hill, coastal tiles and that was it).

-Arrian

Of course, if Saltpeter, oil, or coal had been discovered near there, and there wasn't a closer spot to your core empire ...

[Theseus]

Originally posted by Nor Me
If settlers are close enough to the capital to move them somewhere useful safely then I would.

Remember that pop-rushing is likely to be useful for far away cities.

I've done things like warrior, warrior, pop-rushed settler and then giving the city away in far away cities with 2 food surplus before now. That'd give me another settler in a useful position (i.e. the capital by teleportation) in 30 turns. Unlike with abandoning cities, the pop-rushing unhappiness stays when you give them away.

It even might not be a bad idea to attack with one. A 24-turns 2 regular warrior and 2 regular archer team might only be able to take out 1 settler but that's still useful even on Demi-god. You would have to give the city away to a third party to avoid it being razed which would hurt you in peace negotiations.

If you can get on a resource, I would. If it's early enough to produce useful scouts then I'd definitely do that.

Very creative, NM. I'd say that the lesson here is to think outside the box... instead of the simple decision as to moving or settling, as represented by this poll, one should think about what a distant town might be able to do beyond the norm.

[lmtoops]

I agree with Theseus, that NM idea is very good.

One can do the same with distant cites received from a peace treaty.