Dumb auto Workers

[Theseus]

"a" will allow them to change improvements, whereas "shift-a" will not.

To reiterate some previous posts, check out cracker's EXCELLENT treatise on workers in the early game.

Do not automate until pretty far along... for me it's usually not until I AT LEAST have my military railroad network in place, and even then I always keep at least some decent number of workers on manual.

[AIL]

I never had problems with my workers. As soon as they are built I hit the "a" key and never again take care of them. I think they are doing a relatively good (of course not perfect) job saving my time for more important issues. I don't like Shift-A because they do not change Mines into irrigation when they get access to water they did not have before. I also have not noticed em to ignore pollution. They always cleaned the laned on with the normal "a"-mode.

[Stuie]

I always automate in the late game, usually once my rail net is in place and I have hooked up all the resources including uranium and aluminum. The exception would be workers in any area where a conflict is occurring or may occur. I want to be sure the tiles are worked to best effect where fighting may take place. For instance, if the auto workers create roads all over mountain or jungle tiles, then I lose choke-points. I need to control that.

[bongo]

Even if I wish workers to be more intelligeng i would be satisfied if I could give a stack of them the same order. Pressing shift-c to remove pollution 6-12 times on a single tile is just too much.

[MoonWolf]

I normally don't use automated workes before I get the railroad, but then I use shift-a and does the most necesarry work manually. I find it always wise to keep some in manually state, at least untill most of the work is done and I have a railsystem. If you're an industrious civ and have repleacable parts, you get your land covered in rails with very short time.