granaries and barracks: when?

[Marquis de Sodaq]

I only build granaries in cities with really slow growth (+1 wheatsheath), if at all.

Barracks usually come later in high production cities. I just use them for pumping out bad guys as soon as the city has any happiness issues resolved. I rehome units in cities that are busy building improvements or caravans. If I sack an AI city with one, I never sell it unless I have SunTzu's. Or if the city is unwalled and the war rages on nearby...

[geofelt]

Granaries are good, but I only build it in my SSC if I can fit it in early. The pyramids are a good buy. Early on, I might build a barracks in a high shield city and use it to produce vet defenders for everybody. Later on, every city producing units that are expected to be used will have a barracks.

[SlowThinker]

Originally posted by Marquis de Sodaq
I only build granaries in cities with really slow growth (+1 wheatsheath), if at all.

I disagree with this approach.

I think you should build granaries in cities that often grow (ideally cities that pump out settlers or cities that admit food caravans).

Imagine you have just 2 cities of size 1, 1st city has the food surplus 1, 2nd city has the food surplus 2, both will grow next turn, one of them has a granary.
1st city will build 1/30 of a new square each turn, with the granary 1/15, i.e the granary gives you an additional 1/30 of a new square each turn.
2nd city will build 1/15 of a new square each turn, with the granary 1/8, i.e the granary gives you almost 1/15 of a square each turn.

I often turn 1-surplus cities into 0-surplus cities (working a forest...).

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Barracks:
Vets are almost 2times more powerfull (1.5 times higher attack and defense means the vet unit is about twice stronger against units of a similar strength and 1.5 times stronger against units of a very different strength (for example warrior against armor or armor against warior)), i. e. the use of shields must be more than 2times effective (the difference between survival/death).
(You can "train" units in battles (I mean send them to a defensive terrain near AI activity, fortify and let the stupid AI make them veterans). But this way is costly (shield support). )
Conclusion: I think barracks are a must in most cases.

Granaries:
Unfortunately, deity is extremely unbalanced, the shields are too important. In the beginning of the game you just need to build settlers and settlers.
This fact causes granary doesn't pay off. Maybe in chieftain, but I never calculated that.
Granary may be good for special purposes only (pumping out settlers or pumping in food caravans).

[TCO]

I very much like both Pyramids and Sun Tzu. I rarely build barracks or granaries.

[rah]

I'll also sometimes build it in that slow growth city just to get it to size three for celebrating faster (normally because it's built on gold). And then only when it's an outpost, because if it's close to your core, it's easier to send a settler or two to grow it that way.

RAH