Power Plants: Everything You Wanted to Know But Were Afraid to Ask

[Arrian]

Hmm, isn't there a chance of it happening during Anarchy (even if the city isn't actually rioting?)?

Of course everybody goes for Hoover. Me, I usually try to set aside a great leader for it while building ToE

-Arrian

[Jawa Jocky]

Nobody ever thinks about the Migrating Fish when they through up Hydroplants. Hydroplants have several drawbacks....Oh yeah....there aren't any Salmon in Civ3.

Great Write-up. You forgot to give the Iron Works honorable mention.

[Arrian]

And they left out wind power, but whatcha gonna do, eh?

IW is a nice toy. Get a 40-base-shield city, throw in the IW, Factory, and Hoover, and you've got 120 shields/turn (aka 1-turn MA). I think.

-Arrian

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

A job well done, Catt!

My only question is: why would anyone bother building a coal plant, period, even in support of building Hoover or another wonder? At that point in the game, I at least never seem to have enough time to build a PP. There's always a unit to build...

[Catt]

Glad to participate and help . . . now stop the cheerleading!

WRT meltdowns, I didn't test the anarchy / meltdown possibilities directly, but always thought anarchy was a form of civil disorder and thus there was a chance for meltdown. I'll test it in my test scenario tonight just to be certain. Pending the resolution of that issue, a nuclear plant will not meltdown in periods of calmative order .

Hoover's does indeed rock. To be honest, I can't remember with clarity the last time I [i]didn't[i] manage to build Hoovers when it was available or the last time I actually felt the need to build a nuclear plant. But in the interests of completeness (since we all have different playstyles and victory conditions enabled) I added info on the nuclear plant.

I can remember (without much clarity) several games over the last few months in which I didn't build Hoover's because I did not have a river within my territory, anywhere. Even had a map with no rivers in the entire world! Makes you appreciate the dirty coal plants, the ridiculously expensive solar plants (which otherwise serve almost exclusively as SS parts pre-builds), and the availability of nuclear plants.

Originally posted by Yahweh Sabaoth
My only question is: why would anyone bother building a coal plant, period, even in support of building Hoover or another wonder? At that point in the game, I at least never seem to have enough time to build a PP. There's always a unit to build...

I prioritize factories immmediately and expect Hoover soon afterwards. Without Hoover I am likely to prioritize plants as well. For me at least, at that point of the game I am either peacefully widening my science / economic advantages and holding off for tanks before the next deliberate offensive (if there is one), or I am whipping an AI -- I find at that stage of the game I can pretty easily slip power plant builds into my production queues and still produce as many units as I need. The AI is pretty awful at Industrial Age warfare, and a slow grinder of infantry, some cavalries, and artillery does the job. Wars for me at that point are more about attrition than numerical superiority and the AI is, as I noted, very bad at the tactics of attrition warfare.

I've even found that with a less than decent pre-build for Universal Suffrage, it is oftentimes more efficient to switch the pre-build to a factory (and even lose some shields) and then restart US from scratch (sometimes a rushed coal plant is needed to make up the lost pre-build accumulation).

Catt

[Nakar Gabab]

Nuclear Plants are fun if you get to the Modern Age with a tech lead and rush to Robotics. Nuke plants in every city that can handle it plus manufacturing plants makes for a fearsome endgame indeed. You'll win easily (even behind on the space-race, that's how good your production winds up being), but it's still interesting. Mainly for cranking out unfathomable numbers of radar artillery in a couple of turns and pounding things into dust.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Catt
WRT meltdowns, I didn't test the anarchy / meltdown possibilities directly, but always thought anarchy was a form of civil disorder and thus there was a chance for meltdown. I'll test it in my test scenario tonight just to be certain. Pending the resolution of that issue, a nuclear plant will not meltdown in periods of calmative order .

Anarchy is not a form of civil disorder and will not, by itself, provide an opportunity for meltdown. So long as your cities remain sufficiently content during the anarchy, it appears that no meltdowns will occur. I have added clarifications to the initial posts.

Catt

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

What is the possibility of your brain suffering a meltdown while playing Civ? Does it increase with the amount of hours you play? Does the likelihood increase during periods of Emotional Unrest?

[Catt]

Originally posted by Yahweh Sabaoth
What is the possibility of your brain suffering a meltdown while playing Civ? Does it increase with the amount of hours you play? Does the likelihood increase during periods of Emotional Unrest?

Limited; yes; yes.

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Thank you for the clarification.

[Master Zen]

If you have enough luxes or happyness wonders, building Nuclear Plants in your most productive cities is one of the smartest moves of the modern era. The extra 50% for factory production almost makes the effort of getting Manufacturing Plants moot. Plus, by that stage your big production cities can build one in like 4-5 turns, sometimes less so its pretty much a no brainer.

Some other power plant things I do:

- Never build Coal Plants since I always go for the Hoover Dam (and usually get it).

- Never build Solar Plants either.

BTW, getting the ToE is a surefire way of getting the Hoover Dam as you can beeline to Electronics instantly. It's best to already have a city producing something (Palace) so that you can get it as soon as possible in case you don't have a GL. It is also good to whore Atomic Theory and Electronics as most of the time the AI is slow to get them and you can get some major $$$ by doing so.

[King_Henry]

Thanks Catt! I just got to Industrialization in my game and your section really helped. I never knew Manufacturing Plants weren't considered plants. Now I'm not as confused.

[badman]

If I don't have a significant tech lead, I only build a coal plant in the city which will produce Hoover's, otherwise I won't build them at all since I really hate polluzion.

[CerberusIV]

It is worth building coal plants in a few cities even if going for Hoover (unless you have the luxury of a spare leader). I usually build 3, for US, ToE and Hoover followed by appropriate prebuilds for the wonders.

I often find the AI beats me to Industrialization by a few turns and even starts Universal Suffrage before I have the tech but the AI tries to build it in a city without a factory and 600 shields takes a long time that way. I can almost always overhaul an AI trying to build this wonder by prebuilding for a factory (with palace or military academy, even just a couple of turns on an expensive unit), build a coal plant and then go for the wonder.

It looks like a lost cause when you get a pop up that an AI has started Universal Suffrage and you are still 4 turns from industrialisation but is very satisfying when you can still snatch the wonder