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**SlowThinker** · February 4, 2001, 08:23

quote:

Originally posted by Six Thousand Year Old Man on 02-03-2001 12:10 PM
I'm wondering, in a typical game, what you build first as a permanent city improvement?

I think there's no typical game: strategies depends on the difficulty level, on starting locality, barbarian activity...
Even in deity, I build one granary for settler production very soon. (I go for the monarchy as a 5th advance, so I usually decide between Pottery and Bronze working as the 1st advance).

quote:

Originally posted by Six Thousand Year Old Man on 02-03-2001 12:10 PM
I'm wondering mostly about the marketplace/bank and library/university combinations. I think I read in an old thread here that libraries are only economical when the city is generating 6 beakers, and marketplaces when the city has 5 coins. And since then, I've sort of blindly followed that formula.

Count it yourself: If you have 6 trade, and taxes set to 30%, science 70%, then you have 2 gold and 4 beakers. Marketpl. profit is 50% of 2 = 1, but you have to pay 1 gold as upkeep, so you have 0 profit per turn. There is profit 1 for Library, but this is very low profit for 80 shields.
BTW, marketplace/library profit is rouned down.

Be careful, there may be an error in my deduction

[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 05, 2001).]

**geofelt** · February 4, 2001, 16:04

At deity, I rarely build any improvements for quite some time. I build units for defense and martial law, settlers to expand, and caravans to build wonders with. Only the capitol gets the super science city treatment with early library, temple, and marketplace. Other cities wait until I get Adam-smiths, and then they get mkt, harbor, library, etc.

**Don Quixote** · February 5, 2001, 01:03

Temples are almost always the first City Improvement I build. Early in the game I focus on the production of settlers, founding cities, land improvement, caravans, and wonders. Eventually, however, population growth catches up with me and I start getting large levels of discontentment. If I built the Hanging Gardens I can keep City Improvement production on the racks for a bit longer.

My experience generally is that the opportunity cost of building City Improvements is too great early in the game...producation on other tasks (ie settlers and wonders) results in higher future benefits for a civ as a whole. In addition, technology is scattered early in the game and trading base techs with other civs early in the game (later is a different story IMO) is very beneficial without affecting the tech balance. Tech trading reduces the need for science-based improvements early in the game. As for production, small cities are usually operating at low capacity early in the game so the short-run benefit of a production-based wonder IMO is not that great.

At lower difficulty levels, I would consider building a granary (though I almost always have my capital building the Pyramids at levels below King), but at higher levels population growth breeds discontent and the high cost of granaries relative to their benefit in these cases leads me to not produce them at all. Once I begin the conquest stage of the game, I often zero in on the foreign city with the Pyramids to get the growth benefit they bring to an established civ.

P.S. I read posts here a lot for advice but have not posted here before...thanks to all here for helping out so much!

**rixxe** · February 5, 2001, 09:15

temple > marketplace > granary (I usually have pyramids, ...)

I always build these building first, then, it depends on the situation of the city...

**Marko_Polo** · February 5, 2001, 10:16

My 'ordinary' game often seem to go like this: I consentrate on early expanding with no improvements at all (except my capitol which is often a SSC too). I build an early HG and rush for Mike's and Bach's. When I'm getting close to demo (usually I'm in monarchy up then), I start building marketplaces + aqueducts to get ready for WLTxD growth. I don't build granaries except to my capitol. I also try to establish trade routes. Then I often need a temple to go up to size 12. Then of course sewer. I usually must rushbuy all those.

In coastal cities I build harbor followed by aqueduct as my first two improvements. The three arrows the ocean gives helps the city celebrate without other 'happiness' improvements, with help of wonders of course.

My empire really goes off like a rocket at this stage. Money is flowing in in increasing speed to help rushbuy all those improvements. I don't build libraries a lot, my SSC takes care of sciense

When a city has all the necessary improvements to keep WLTxD going I rushbuild settlers/engineers and add them to my newly found cities to get them to size 3 so that they start WLTxD-growing as well.

I usually set tax/sciense/luxury to 30-30-40 for celebration. After most of the cities have grown to the current max, I drop luxuries to 20%. After more roads/irrigations/improvements I start the cycle of WLTxD's again.

I have read a good advice somewhere here. The rule of thumb is that don't build other than 1-maintenance cost improvements until you have 3 trade routes! I've found this as a good advice
[This message has been edited by Marko_Polo (edited February 05, 2001).]

**La Fayette** · February 5, 2001, 11:35

STYOM (about Libraries anq MP)
You are right: someone wrote about 5 or 6 trade arrows, or beakers or gold coins being the limit (when it becomes reasonable to build MP or Library), but IMO that is NOT sound advice.
ST explains why it might be considered the limit: if your city produces 6 arrows, this means 2 gold coins + 4 beakers (tax rate 30% = taxmin under Monarchy). Then a Market Place gives you 1 more gold/turn, but it costs 1 gold/turn; hence building a MP in that situation costs 80 shields and gives nothing: not a very good bargain! (reread ST about Libraries: you get 2 beakers/turn for a cost of 1 gold/turn after an investment of 80 shields: not a very good bargain either).
Of course opportunity costs and long term effects also should be taken into account (as DQ stresses). To make it short, my advice would be: don't build a Library or a Market Place in a city producing less than 12 or 15 trade arrows (unless you are fairly sure that your city is going to grow quickly quite soon).

**Dry** · February 8, 2001, 14:08

The problem, cher monsieur de La Fayette, is that you assume that the tax level, case A, is 30% (70% res.)
Consider now that the tax level, case B, is 40% (60% res.), if you make a small computation, you will see that for small cities - no improvements - there is no difference between A and B. (execpt 4 arrows. A: 1g-3b; B: 2g-2b ).

Now, starting with 7 arrows, the problem becomes interresting:
A: 2g.-5b.
B: 3g.-4b.

In case A, I will not build a MP nor a lib.
In case B, I could build a lib.., for a net 2g.-6b., better than case B.
and it is even more interresting with 8, 9, ... arrows

Now the question is how much does it cost me to build that lib?
A city producing 7 arrows in monarchy is - in my games - typically size 5, thus producing 5 shields. A lib is produced in only 16 turns, usually less because I pay...
It could be worth it, isn't it?

BTW, how big is your city producing 12 arrows? How do you maintain order - without MP - in such a city?
Surely not with HG only, and if you say with MC, then you have MC reaaaaaally early. Caravans? Then you have spend much time in producing them and moving them - more than 20 turns for sure.

**SlowThinker** · February 8, 2001, 17:37

Monsieur Dry,
je ne suis pas d'accord.
BTW, I thought this language had died yet
Latin too, of course.

quote:

Originally posted by Dry on 02-08-2001 01:08 PM
A city producing 7 arrows in monarchy is - in my games - typically size 5, thus producing 5 shields. A lib is produced in only 16 turns,

I don't think that the time you need to build an improvement has any meaning. (Do you want to compare with 20 turns for caravan?? Caravan block off the production in your city 50/5=10 turns only, not 20)

You need to compare expense and profit only:
case B:
1. your proposition: to build the library
instant expense: 80-200 gold (1 shield is between 1 gold (sell improvement, disband unit) and 2.5 gold (incremental rushbuild))
expense/day:1 gold
profit/day: 2 beakers

2. to build caravan
I believe it is much better (La Fayette might send you some calculations, he is expert about caravans)

3. suppose you are at ocean(1 food+2 trade) and you cultivate it (it seems you go for beakers, since you want the library so much) and there is food surplus at least 1.
Even to let work one Einstein (3 beakers) instead of one ocean square and to build a granary is better solution than 1.
comparison with 1.:
instant profit: 20-50 gold (granary costs 60 shields only)
expense/day: no expense
profit/day: 1 beaker+food surplus (granary doubles food surplus) -1 food

quote:

usually less because I pay...

Do you want to say you rushbuild the library? It clears "80-200 gold " a little. Gold will partly come near 160.
[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 08, 2001).]

**Dry** · February 9, 2001, 06:57

SlowThinker: I think you misunderstood me (or me be I misunderstood La Fayette).
I was talking about an early game situation. I don't remember exactly the research tree, but I know that in my games I am able to build (complete) libraries before I discover Trade.
There is a time in the game where I really need to improve my research. I need:
trade (caravans), bridge building (2 arrows in rivers), monotheism (Mike's chap.), harbors, feudalism, ...
So, like many people I first thought that a maximum in research was the best solution, I am just asking myself if there is not another way.

The 20 turns for caravan I was talking about are: 10 turns to produce + minimum 10 turns to reach destination (I remember a caravan, sent in a wrong direction because at that time I did not discovered any other civ, wandering for 500 years before being destroyed by a barb... really expensive, right ?).

The question was not libraries or (exclusive) caravans, it was: maybe it is possible to have libs even before
being able to send caravans.
La Fayette wrote that he did not build any improvement before he produced 12-15 arrows. Besides the fact that I wondered how big such cities were, I did not agree with him and I explained why.
Those libs *are* expensive in a 3-7-0 situation, but maybe affordable in a 4-6-0 situation.

I am no library lover, but in some games I tried the 4-6-0 approach and it was not so bad... I have the feeling it is even better, but I need of course to improve this (new) gamestyle.

Now about granaries. I don't build granaries in the early turns, because - beside the fact that I don't need them at deity level and that they are expensive to maintain - they help me building the 80 shields improvements (MP, lib., court., aqua):
produce some shields, rush build a granary, switch immediatly back to original building and finish the production of the last 20 shield in a few turns. The maximum such building cost is 110 golds (less than a barb leader) in 6 turns.

**Julius Brenzaida** · February 9, 2001, 07:57

The question is how bad you want it. Sometimes 2 more beacons means a faster key discovery (wonder, governement, so on) and you would be pinchy to count the 80 shields and uncredibly greedy to think about the 1/gold per turn. In my opinion, it is tougher to get the science you want, than money. Any money is good money ! Librairies are often useful very early and temples too. When you get trade, marketplaces are great too, for the caravans income. But as for anything else, it depends on the situation and your style of play.
A part ça, c'est sympa de voir plein de gens qui parlent français !

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Oh Man, when will you understand that your greatness lies in your failure - Goethe

**Ribannah** · February 9, 2001, 09:07

quote:

Originally posted by Six Thousand Year Old Man on 02-03-2001 12:10 PM
I'm wondering, in a typical game, what you build first as a permanent city improvement? And is there a point where you always build a particular improvement, for example when a city reaches a certain size?

I'm wondering mostly about the marketplace/bank and library/university combinations. I think I read in an old thread here that libraries are only economical when the city is generating 6 beakers, and marketplaces when the city has 5 coins. And since then, I've sort of blindly followed that formula.

In general, I only build city improvements when I can rush-build them. When I have some money to spare, I go through my cities and select the ones that can profit the most from a new improvement.
In a large empire, the usual order is Temple - Library - Marketplace, but if the city has two or more fish or whales tiles a Harbor has the highest priority.

If I don't have the Pyramids, Granaries are built only in a couple of cities, these will constantly produce Settlers who will then be re-homed, if necessary, to other cities.

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If you have no feet, don't walk on fire

**SlowThinker** · February 9, 2001, 16:39

Bonjour,

Ribannah,
Warning: in this thread, it is polite to include one french sentence.

(Actually, I am flaunting my language abilities: I want to highlight that not only my english is perfect )

quote:

In general, I only build city improvements when I can rush-build them.

If you don't build improvements, what do you build? Settlers? I try to build settlers only in cities with granaries and in cities that reached size limit.
Or, (if I will express more generally) if decrease of number of citizen caused by a settler production
1. is welcomed (prospective growth of a city is impossible/inefficient/will be impossible in near future)
2. will be easily compensated (i. e. number of citizens will grow back fast: small cities, cities with a granary, cities with a large food production)

I suppose you can home the settler in the right city easily.

BTW, it is ideal to finish the production of a settler so that the food storage of diminished city will be almost full but not overfull. Hmm, I start to miss the topic.

quote:

...when I can rush-build them.

I would agree with following sentence: If I rushbuild, I rushbuild an improvement. (1 shield is cheaper than for a unit).
I don't understand why to agree with following sentence: If I don't rushbuild, I don't build an improvement.
Could you post any reason?

Julius Brenzaida,

quote:

In my opinion, it is tougher to get the science you want, than money.

I agree. You may obtain beakers from trade only. You may obtain a gold from trade, shields, diplomacy, a plunder.
Gold is transmutable to other resources and back.

Dry,

quote:

The 20 turns for caravan I was talking about are: 10 turns to produce + minimum 10 turns to reach destination

Second 10 turns aren't painful: they delay (thence decrease a little bit, I agree) the profit only, they don't block the city production. You cannot compare these 20 turns with 16 turns of building of a library.

quote:

Those libs *are* expensive in a 3-7-0 situation, but maybe affordable in a 4-6-0 situation.

I still don't agree with you. I think that the example "3." attests that
if you want to augment beaker production in 4-6-0 situation then it is better to use scientists.
Could you comment my comparison between 1. and 3. in my last post?

BTW, I constructed the example 3. since I wanted to find ANY example that is comparable and works better than a library for a 7-gold situation. I didn't want to say you should replace libraries by granaries in civ games : I needed to compensate a loss of one food that occured when I substituted one ocean square by Einstein.

quote:

I don't build granaries in the early turns, because - beside the fact that I don't need them at deity level...

In my opinion, it is painful to build a settler in a non-granary city. See my answer to Ribannah.

quote:

produce some shields, rush build a granary, switch immediatly back to original building and finish the production of the last 20 shield in a few turns.

I agree. If you want to accelerate the production it is preferable not to rush build the end of the production (since you would lose the last turn production).

[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 09, 2001).]

**SlowThinker** · February 11, 2001, 11:36

SlowThinker,

quote:

Originally posted by SlowThinker on 02-09-2001 03:39 PM
I try to build settlers ... ... if decrease of number of citizen caused by a settler production
1. is welcomed (prospective growth of a city is impossible/inefficient/will be impossible in near future)
2. will be easily compensated (i. e. number of citizens will grow back fast: small cities, cities with a granary, cities with a large food production)

You were a too fast thinker and writer within your last post.

Point 2:
Efficiency of settler production depends not only
a) on the number of turns needed to refill the food storage to the original condition.
You forgot to include
b) on the frequency of subsequent city growths: any future city growth will be delayed by number of turns mentioned in a)

This presuppose that the level of food production will be unchanged in comparison with an original course (the course in the city not producing a settler). Point 1 alerts to the situation where the food production may be increased (needn't be retarded).

[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 11, 2001).]

**Chaos Warrior** · February 12, 2001, 01:19

I start with a temple, followed by barracks and city walls if it's a border city.. if it's not, city walls are not on the list... after those most important buildings, I construct courthouse (unless democracy or nearby capital in republic), library, market place... the rest really depends on the situation, mostly aqueduct as the next though!

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