Camp Placement Strategy

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

<hr size=1>
The DTRATEGY SERIES
Dtrategy Threads
Volume One - Camping Placement by GhengisFarb
Volume Two - PreFabricated Settlement by GhengisFarb

Dtrategic Exercises
Exercise One - City Placement Scenario by Panzer32
<hr size=1>


Volume One - Dtrategic Guide to Camping and Zenning
(Part of the ongoing Dtrategy Series from the Glory of War)

This will probably be of little use to many people but since a few have commented on my city placement "camp" system I decided I'd put it all down in a step by step illustration.

Basically this came about from me wanting to absolutely minimize corruption and maximize city production for Diety level and Multiplayer. The added kicker is that in Multiplayer the minimization of land use gives you an artificially low score compared to others and your opponents tend to discount you as a minor threat.

After I build my first city I establish the camps. The system supports up to four but sometimes there's a mountain or water tile in the way so it doesn't always work out perfect. They go right in the "Achilles Corners", you know those nasty little corners where the enemy can move his two movement units into your territory and still have a movement left to attack.

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

The first thing a Camp does is build a barracks. Typically I only use the four camps as construction bases. They build units to establish the empire and that's about it. Since no city can utilize more than 12 tiles until Sanitation they tend to exist until I build Sewer Systems in the first ring of cities and then I disband the camps. This gives each city in the first city ring 18 tiles to itself once the camps are gone.

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

The ring of cities goes around the camps and fits into the camps' Achilles Corners and five tiles directly out from the capital city. This gives you four camps and 8 cities all with exactly 12 tiles each.

The four corner cities are 4.5 tiles away from the capital, the four other cities are 4 tiles away from the central capital, and the four camps are 1.5 tiles away from the central capital for distance corruption calculation purposes.

[trickey]

Hmm, that is very interesting, Ghengis. I'm definatly goin to give this a try in my next game.

How do you find it works? It looks like it would be a good starting strategy for a warmonger. Five cities suffering from no corruption at all could really be able to pump out some units.

Btw, are you playing a mod? Cause last time I checked, the Greeks had hoplites, not the Germans

[Dominae]

Each of the "City-Sites" on the last screenshot would be better off going one diagonal tile inward toward the capital. This would prevent unused tiles once the camps get disbanded.

The camp idea is nice, but as with all city placement strategies it depends heavily on the local geography. If it's near-optimal as in the examples above, then certainly the method presented works well. But in most other games things are not quite as pretty (unless one restarts until a "suitable" map is obtained).

In my experience, the best way to use camps is to figure out how many tiles are going to be unused in the near-future in a certain area, and if it's around 3-4 good ones (Grassland, etc.) I'll plop a temporary city in there. Clearly the areas closer to the capital are used first, to avoid Corruption. No pattern, really, just an evaluation of what I can do with what land I've been given.

Still, thumbs-up GhengisFarb for posting something like this: it forces players to rethink their city placement strategy.


Dominae

[vmxa1]

Yes it looks good, but I can't remember getting a chunk of land that looks like that. Also you are kissing off any coastal power house cities and the early wonders that go with them.
I applaud the effort and appreciate the idea.

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

It does make for a good warmongering strategy. The central city can only utilize 12 tiles leaving you eight for manipulation of the camps which then filter the slack onto the ring of cities, and yes this is an optimal illustration, but that actually was a map generated by the unaltered game engine.

I've found it somewhat uncanny how often the citysites in this system hit river tiles. I almost wonder if it has to do with whatever system the game uses to generate the rivers.

This is a mod I used. Its the one we set up for the GoW PBEM #2 where the eight players chose their civs and then all the UUs for the non-played civs were given the Hidden Nationality ability and made accessible for all.

[PeaSoup]

I was just going to comment on how your capital as well as all four camp sites have access to river tiles, for the map generator if that was randomly generated

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

Originally posted by PeaSoup
I was just going to comment on how your capital as well as all four camp sites have access to river tiles, for the map generator if that was randomly generated

I'm not kidding in the previous post when I said that happens alot. Four out of the last five games I played allowed half the city sites to be adjacent to rivers. Now I do play with the Wet Setting because I like rivers but it is kinda weird how that works out.

Even some of the last PBEMs I joined have the camps all on rivers.

[DaveMcW]

That location for Camp Chucky is horrible. You can't use the wheat until you build a library or temple. It would be much better off one tile north.

[lmtoops]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
That location for Camp Chucky is horrible. You can't use the wheat until you build a library or temple. It would be much better off one tile north.

Chucky does not exist for growth. The camp is for unit production and to minimize corruption. If the campl is moved, you increase the corruption.

I think your better off leaving the wheat for your next city.

[Theseus]

Question re both "farbing" and "ralphing": At what point do the camps get abandoned?

[Master Zen]

I always keep my camps until sanitation, and still perhaps a teeny weeny bit longer.

Anyway, I still don't like the fact that the ring of "core" cities is too far away, you are wasting too many tiles in that regard especially consdiering the odds of them getting rivers is not 100% and also that even if you have rivers, it'll take a while before they get over size 6 (and whether you actually want them to get over size 6 at the very beginning.)

I've been playing with a hybrid system, it's basically a 3-tile/4-tile/camp system (please don't end up calling it "Zenning"...) . I have tried it twice in SP and both times I've achieved Ultimate Power in the middle ages. I have just begun this in another PBEM which got started last week so it'll take a while before results show.

The premise is this: on standard maps, I have found Ralphing not to be clearly superior to 3-tile. 3-tile on the other hand does not separate core cities from military cities. However, a camp system with 3-tile is impossible.

Thus, my solution was to make the first "ring" of cities around the capital with 4-tile spacing (notation note: 4-tile equals 3 spaces between cities). That allows 2 camp cities (perhaps even 3 if you're lucky) in the inner ring especially if you plan on using your capital as a settler-pump (what I usually do). However, after the inner ring is done, all other cities are pure 3-tile. Why? Defensive purposes. No other city placement offers the defensive benefits that 3-tile does (well 2-tile... ) and in MP, you will NEED defense.

If anyone is interested, I'll post some screenshots later on...

[BRC]

Yeah MZ, please post.

[Theseus]

Zenning it is.