Official Imperial expansion proposals for new city sites (925BC)

[Spiffor]

Cities 1, 4 and 5 are musts. I also like city 7.
However, I don't think we need City 2 until we ahve our palace / FP in Del Monte : because of corruption, the small advantage we'd get by placing a city right next to Del Monte will be nil at short term, and it will handicap DM in the long run.
City 6 and city 3 shouldn't be prioritary, because they won't have SUCH a military impact, but will have a very small impact in the buildup of our forces / infrastructure (crappy spots, corruption)

[MrWhereItsAt]

5 and 6 are very good, and strategic city placement here, helping to curb our rivals' expansion towards us, is a high priority early on. 7 is OK too, for the same reasons, but certainly almost a total dead end as far productivity is concerned.

2 is OK by me, and I need to look more closely at 3 and 4.

1 is fine, but how would you all feel about it moving one square SE? That would allow the grown radius to include the two wheat on flood plains near Boston. However, we would not be able to reach the game until the radius grows either. In my games I like cities that take advantage of as much good terrain as possible, but I do recognise of course that ours is a very speical set of circumstances.

So what do you think? Is the medium term (as soon as the radius is expanded) growth worth sacrificing the immediate result from the game?

[Harovan]

Will 5001 did an amazing job and I gladly approved it, to make it official. The city sites he proposes, are well thought and good balanced what concerns food, production and commerce. Only 2 things bother me:

• Who will give our office 7 settlers and 7 defenders at once?
  
• If the answer to the first question is "Wait, it may take a while", the AI will have settled most at of the spots, and probably not at the ideal places.
  

So the question is, in which order these cities should be built. Should we begin with nearer cities, which I would prefer, or should we start with the farther ones and try to box the AIs in, which increases the risk of getting attacked.

My preferred build order would be 6, 5, 7. May be even 7, 6, 5, so we have one less tile to road on the way to the iron.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by MrWhereItsAt
7 is OK too, for the same reasons, but certainly almost a total dead end as far productivity is concerned.

You are right, this city is useless what concerns productivity. But strategic thinking makes it necessary. It guarantees, that the road to our iron source goes through our own territory. Imagine, in the early medieval era Germany attacks us. By this time, Munich will have expanded, may be even twice. The iron road would go through enemy territory and would thus been interrupted and we could not build Knights. Horror, nightmare! A connection over sea is impossible, because I was enforced to build Ubergorsk quickly and not at the optimal place in order to steal the iron from the persian settler stack. I wanted to build it on the tile SE of the iron. But the Persians were faster there. So the land route is all we have and we must secure it before Munich expands.

And it is a good place to culturally squeeze Munich. I would build this city and rush a temple in it, may be later a cathedral.

[rush]

5 is priority, it isolates Munich from the other German cities and it provides an alternative route from Atlanta to Ubergorsk.

1 would be next, if we can move down 1-2 squares SE to take advantage of the wheat square. It can be used to churn out settlers for future cities.

6 is next. It consolidates our NE frontal. It gives us more dyes for trading.

2, 4 and 3 would be next. If we can generate a flow of settlers from cities 1 or 5, then we can build 2, 4 and 3. If not, we should just focus on the War with the French.

7 could be useful, but only for short term. When Munich flips, we would have no use for 7.

[Will 5001]

Thanks a lot Jonny, I have used your link as the link for the main picture! I think that these cities are a priority and Uber isle should not take more than one settler, since we anticipate no competition. I think that City 2 should be built since the Greeks are expanding very quickly in this direction, we need to stop them, unless we want Del monte as a frontier city! Most of these cities will benefit greatly once the FP is built in Del Monte, or somwhere not as as remote as Apolyton or we change governments. The order in which we build these is up different interpreattions of our needs and desires !!!

[Will 5001]

Originally posted by MrWhereItsAt
1 is fine, but how would you all feel about it moving one square SE?
So what do you think? Is the medium term (as soon as the radius is expanded) growth worth sacrificing the immediate result from the game?

At some time in the future we will take control of Boston and even if we move it one square to the South east we wont get the wheat since Boston is likely to take the wheat since it will expand in ten turns as it is now the capital.

[Kuciwalker]

We're thinking about the future here - in the long run, City 1 would be better off with the Wheat in it's radius. Also, what's this nonsense I hear about two having a higher growth rate? Excuse me, flood plains are the ULTIMATE in the food department.

[jdd2007]

we should build either 1 and 2 in swift succession or 3 and 4. after that, 5 and 6 would be priorities...

[Donal Graeme]

I say that 1 is fairly well place, but 3 and 4 seem a bit redundant, you could easily merge them into one super city that would be far more effective in the long run. Of course, you would need to destroy Boston for this to work though. I do believe that when we return our attention to Amererica, Boston should be razed and two cities be put nearby. Because of the fact that its borders will increase in size, the enemy AI shouldn't crowd it out.

edit: City 1 should be moved one tile south-east, and cities 3 and 4 merged, with the city on the floodplain north-east of the mountain east of Boston.

[Robber Baron]

I don't see the northern cities as being nearly as important for US to build as the eastern ones. I like the idea of squeezing Munich -- preferably peacefully (I still hope to buffer the Aztecs with a strong Germany, until we are ready to deal with that sector). In any event, we should let the Americans spawn some of the northern spots, and claim them when the time comes for round two with the Yanks. Assuming we are preparing to go to war against France, and possibly build a galley for exploration of the landform to the south, we need to prioritize rigidly on any new city construction.
Perhaps we should designate one city (Banana HQ) as a settler/garrison builder, and focus expansion eastward, developing sites 6, then 5. Lay the groundwork for a culture/growth push there later, to try to flip Munich.
And meanwhile throw everything else into the war effort.

[Epistax]

ubergorsk is our most alien city. See where munich is? We need a city RIGHT THERE... too bad munich is in the way. Don't suppose they'd trade it for a map or something

[Will 5001]

Originally posted by skywalker
We're thinking about the future here - in the long run, City 1 would be better off with the Wheat in it's radius. Also, what's this nonsense I hear about two having a higher growth rate? Excuse me, flood plains are the ULTIMATE in the food department.

I never said that city 2 would have a higher growth rate !! I agree with many here that City 1 should be built one square to the SE, however we will still not have wheat in the radius immediately, we will also lose the benefit of the game in the forest immediately. Also if we build on the orginal site there is still more than enough food due to the flood plains, also with the original site there will be more mountain and hill squares in the radius later in the game, which could make it a centre of production, but we will not lose too many of these squares if we move the site. (I seem to have contradicted myself many times there )


Epistax: I agree, but if we put enough cultural pressure (or military!!) on it we will take control, but that may take time. We can't take control immediately, so we might as well secure our borders!!

[Kuciwalker]

We can prebuild 10 sheilds and poprush a temple in Ubergorsk.

[Spiffor]

skywalker :
Getting the second pop. poin,t in Ubergorsk will be longer than building temple the regular way