Irrigation in Despotism

[ramses II.]

Yes, I know, no use -
except you irrigate a buffalo.
Noticed that in my civ version (original civ with patch 2.42).
Am I right?

[War4ever]

this makes me want to go test .........why can't i remember now, er..uh...yeah, i don't irrigate in MP during despot, if i do, the loser screen will follow shortly

but good question...i am off to test, MGE though

[Scouse Gits]

IIRC Despo reduces any resource that is greater than 3 by 1, so irrigating grass 2 food -> 3 food does no good, but any square that 'naturally' produces 3 or more food (and was not destroyed by irrigation) would benefit from irrigation - I think that 'muskox' is the only such example...

SG[1]

[LDiCesare]

Irrigating plains is worthwhile in despotism (1 food -> 2 food), thus buffalo is interesting.

[Scouse Gits]

Of course - sorry I missed that!

SG[1]

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Buffalo and plains, sure... but roads are probably more worthwhile than irrigation in the early going - certainly until Monarchy.

Irrigating means tying up a settler for a lot of turns - and using the settler to found a new city would probably save more food (as in support required) than the irrigation would produce, would it not? To say nothing of the greater utility of an extra size 1 city vs a few irrigation squares...?

[Elephant]

Originally posted by Scouse Gits
IIRC Despo reduces any resource that is greater than 3 by 1,

Despotism reduces any resource greater than 2 by 1, so Whale becomes 2-2-2 and Fish is 2-0-2. Gold would be 0-1-5. Irrigation pays for Plains and Tundra, if thats all you have around you (like GOTM23 over at CFC), but it is probably strategically wiser to found another city instead (unless you have crazily opted for OCC!). Irrigation takes five turns for a settler on Grass, Plains and Desert; ten on Tundra. Roading takes only two turns for all of them.

[LDiCesare]

Irrigation is worthwhile if you have already many cities. Particularly for buffalos, and if your city would (tactically) benefit from a forest or sea tile being worked instead of a plains for instance. Your remaining settler could be used to found an unhappy city, but what use would it be? I agree that roads are probably more interesting, but once you have reached a good number of cities, a road network between them, you may want to grow one of them a bit before you have monarchy.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Obviously you want to avoid unhappy cities (build 4-6, depending on map size, then stop) ... and road up between them. But by the time I've done all that, I have Monarchy already... don't we all rush to that?

By the time a city needs irrigation, I'm probably close to having the option to go to Republic.

[Caesar the Great]

you shouldn't even be in despotism long enough to irrigate

[ramses II.]

I sometimes pre-irrigate buffalo field to force expansion - I'll do that only with NONE-settlers.
I sometimes disband advanced tribes when the site is too bad.

[LDiCesare]

I think the real reason why it is no use to irrigate in despotism is in fact it is no use to irrigate in the early game. And no, we don't all rush to monarchy. Some of us have been known to beeline for Republic early, though I would do that only in OCC.

[Elephant]

Short of a couple of key starting techs I do not see a way to get Rep in less techs than Mon, and getting out of Desp is top priority. Often there are one or two other techs from huts screwing up your early path too (although occasionally they help). If playing Deity, getting Mys is pretty important early, and that is also on the path to Philosophy, which gets you a freebie of YOUR choice, unlike the huts.