Master Builder Thread

[Tiberius]

I have to admit that I couldn't find better places for the planned cities (and I tried!). The only one I don't like is Port Hammer (I'd move it back north; I don't see why should we increase the distance to the Lux area and the fish is not that of a priority).

I also don't really like the position of Tarzania (it is yet isn't coastal), but looking at the other spots, we don't really have alternative to this one. Too bad, we could have had a city there with a fish and a cattle (one tile SE from where it is in the plan), but we would either lose land or build 2 small cities. (Zargonia and one more, NE from Tarzania, SE from Farmerville).

As for the city founding order, my 2 cents:
1) Farmerville->Forkmouth
2) Legopolis->Tarzania or Zargonia
3) Farmerville->Sharpeheaven
4) Legopolis->Karina (starting building the FP)
5) Forkmouth->Benelux
6) Farmerville->Tarzania or Zargonia
7) Legopolis->Dye Fields
8) Farmerville->Crossing
9) Legopolis->Logville
10)Sharpehaven->Kloreepville
11) Panama->Port Hammer

[ZargonX]

Vondrack: I also was weighing the choice of putting Karina on the river or not; I see your arguments, I just weighed in favor of growth and not having to waste time (and payments) on an Aqueduct in the future. But, as I said, your thoughts are quite valid as well.

Where we are in agreement is that I would also like to see Karina settled first. I think it will give us a dominant position in the south, which is a good thing

For the second picture, the location I like most is on the hill between your 2 proposals (N from 1, SW from 2).

Tibi: the reason I didn't go for that was so regardless of which way we went with, we could squeeze another city either to the north or the south without too much overlap. In the grand scheme of things, I would go with site 1, possibly moved a tile NW or W, so as to allow Zargonia Bay (under Vondrack's plan) plenty of space.

[Sharpe]

I agree with Vondrack - we should decide where we would want to put all of our cities and then prioritize on settling the best ones first.

Clearly Forkmouth is one of our better positions and would help greatly in REXing the south eventually (especially after we cut the forest in the game forest down perhaps), so it should probably be first.

I would need to see more of the underlying terrain (hard to see it with Vondrack's bright colours - though those colours are very useful in seeing the outline and overlaps of the proposed cities), but I would think that Karina would be a good possible 2nd location or perhaps Zargonia. I also have been debating whether Karina (I was calling it the horrible name of South Cow ) would be better beside the river or not.

I think that SharpeHaven can wait, especially if it is better to put the wheat in the outer ring instead of the inner ring for the long-run health of the city.

One thing that we have to consider in the long-run is the irrigation paths - with all those hills and mountain chains that could be tricky and we will need irrigation especially for the Quanto Mechanico site and probably others.

[Tiberius]

We still didn't decide which should be the first 2 cities we are going to build.

IMHO, first 2 cities:
Farmerville -> Forkmouth
Legopolis -> Karina or Zargonia Bay

Next 2:
Farmerville -> Sharpeheaven
Legopolis -> Karina or Zargonia Bay

The further order should be decided later.

[ZargonX]

I was under the impression that the general concensus was Farmerville->Forkmouth, Legopolis->Karina. That would be my choices as Karina will be needed for our southern expansion, which is looking more and more pressing as other people take to the seas.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by ZargonX
I was under the impression that the general concensus was Farmerville->Forkmouth, Legopolis->Karina. That would be my choices as Karina will be needed for our southern expansion, which is looking more and more pressing as other people take to the seas.

Yep, that was my impression, too. And it would have been my choice, as well.

[Tiberius]

This general consensus thing doesn't work always (see the O2E discussions; the plan was a consensus too, until a point) so I thought it is better to ask.

I agree with Karina being our first city in the south.

Anyone against it?

Next: what should be the first build in Karina? Should we start directly with the FP or something else before that ? (like a worker, a settler, temple?).

For Forkmouth I think it's obvious that we need a unit first, or maybe a worker first and a unit immediately after.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Tiberius
This general consensus thing doesn't work always (see the O2E discussions; the plan was a consensus too, until a point) so I thought it is better to ask.

Yep, it is always better to ask... though I believe O2E is a consensus now again...

Originally posted by Tiberius
Next: what should be the first build in Karina? Should we start directly with the FP or something else before that ? (like a worker, a settler, temple?).

I would hold on the FP for a while... building the FP at 1 spt has no point, really... building workers at 1 spt makes sense, as those will improve the Karina radius to increase the shield output... I would start with the FP only with a potential of 5 spt minimum - until then, I would keep producing workers (and settlers, maybe).

Originally posted by Tiberius
For Forkmouth I think it's obvious that we need a unit first, or maybe a worker first and a unit immediately after.

I'd decide based upon the actual shield output. If it is just 1 spt, then a worker first (should take 10 turns to grow/build). If it is 2 spt, then a military unit (probably another warrior-sucker ), then a worker (should take 10 turns in total again).

[Tiberius]

I'd go for a worker first, both in Karina and Forkmouth.
Then a unit in Forkmouth (maybe archer, hmm) and a temple in Karina? We should let it grow.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Tiberius
I'd go for a worker first, both in Karina and Forkmouth.
Then a unit in Forkmouth (maybe archer, hmm) and a temple in Karina? We should let it grow.

Well, if Forkmouth produces 2 spt (quite possible, as 1 spt would suggest corruption over 50%... if Farmerville is any indication, we will be producing 2 spt in Forkmouth, wasting the third one), we would be done with a worker too early - Forkmouth population could not support spitting him out without disbanding the city. That's why I suggested that if we produce 2 spt there, we should "fill" the first five turns with a warrior, and the next five turns building the worker.

Temple in Karina sounds like an option, I agree.

[Tiberius]

Or we could build the archer first and the worker after.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Tiberius
Or we could build the archer first and the worker after.

Agreed. I would wait for the iron deposits to show up first, though. If we have iron conveniently located somewhere close to our core (=easy to connect), I would go for a warrior, planning to upgrade him to a swordsman later. If iron is too far, we may as well build an archer to bolster our "offensive" military (just in case we need to fight someone trying to land on Legos Major, keeping our Mercs out of the GA trigger risk).

[Sharpe]

Just wondering - should we consider sometime soon irrigating the Legopolis cattle to increase the city food growth from +3 to +4 per turn ? - That would decrease the growth rate from 4 turns to 3 unless we can't afford the -1 in shields/turn that would initally involve (until we got the hills operational to compensate for that).

Should we also consider irrigating the Karina cattle to increase its food to +4 (especially due to the shield corruption there)?

[Tiberius]

The cattle irrigation near Legopolis seems like a good idea. However, we should mine a hill first and irrigate the cattle after, IMHO.

As for Karina, do we really need it to grow fast? It will have plenty of time to grow while building the FP. Or do we want to build some settlers first, in which case irrigating it could be a good idea.

Time for some simulations. Only if I had more time

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Sharpe
Just wondering - should we consider sometime soon irrigating the Legopolis cattle to increase the city food growth from +3 to +4 per turn ? - That would decrease the growth rate from 4 turns to 3 unless we can't afford the -1 in shields/turn that would initally involve (until we got the hills operational to compensate for that).

Should we also consider irrigating the Karina cattle to increase its food to +4 (especially due to the shield corruption there)?

Irrigating the cattles is something we will eventually do, that's for sure. For the moment though, I would not irrigate the Legopolis' cattle, since speeding up the growth by one turn does not seem to justify losing the shields. Once we let Legopolis grow to pop 5-6, though, we will irrigate it to have food enough for laborers working the mined hills.

OTOH, I would immediately irrigate Karina's cattle. Karina is going to operate mostly on food, spitting out workers and settlers for some initial period of time. Plus, we can mine the iron hill then and use it and still get pop+1 every 7 turns.