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Subtle inside joke for those who played the 1980's Star Wars videogame: "We've lost our shields!!"
In the beginning of the game, there is ample room for micromanagement without any real boredom, and in fact, it can be quite an interesting "game alongside the game." I'd like to take a look in this thread at some of the most common early-game food/shield "best counts" (counts achieved when a city is using the terrain that provides the most FOPs*, and problems or "problems" related to them. Only shields will be considered, as just this subject alone is already complex enough.
Cases where shield counts rise in mid-build/mid-growth will be mostly ignored here, as simple cases are complex enough. Only the early game will be considered, and only common food/shield counts.
An implicit guideline in the below is the "10-turn guideline": where no strategic consideration is involved (of course, one generally is), a city should try to get something built in 10 turns.
SHIELDS
1 shield - An uncommon shield count in the very beginning, this becomes more common once (if) you start REXing beyond the range of your workers. Horribly low, but no shield-count micromanagement problem here, except for the issue of a city that reaches 11 shields on turn 10 (due to growth) and thus must choose between a more expensive build and a waste of 1 shield (10%, which is low compared to many cases below). Especially if the city also has one food or if the next square will not increase the shield count, the best builds (all else being equal) for such cities are warriors or workers (and considering that such cities are often unconnected border cities, both are actually fairly appropriate builds even without micromanagement). For religious civs, a rushed temple also works. Basically, you want to get at least SOMETHING out of this city in reasonable time.
2 shields - will go into any multiple of ten, though your shield count will generally rise, possibly causing shield wastage, before you build anything more expensive than 10 shields.
3 shields - the first really interesting case. 10-shield items get built with 20% wastage in a 3-shield city. Often, even when you really need a 10-shielder, you can micromanage the city (if you can remember...) to trade one or both of those 2 extra shields for food or gold. Otherwise it's on to the next rank, 20-shield items, which get built with 5% wastage, not really all that bad. If you're obsessed with avoiding shield wastage and the city will be at 3 shields for a whole 30 shields (unlikely; more common is locking into a multiple-of-3 groove and 3-shields production at the same time), you can build 30-shield items, but this generally means overobsessing with avoiding wastage, as the only such items are horsemen (you should be building chariots instead if you're still in the micromanagement stage), swordsmen (you should be building warriors), religious temples (if they'll bring an advantage, fine, and at 30 shields they often will, but building them just to avoid wastage is silly), and settlers (you should be building them from your granary cities unless a non-granary city is outgrowing your tile development, and if you're outgrowing your tile development, a new settler will often only worsen the problem unless you can build a worker elsewhere to compensate).
A special case here is the ultra-early 3-shield capitol: do you build an archer/spearman to avoid that painful 20% wastage, or a warrior/scout because they are more useful in this phase? I agonize over this probably more than I should.
4 shields - generally the result of shield waste or not having access to two 2-shield squares, yet still a lovely count. Goes perfectly into 20-shield items (generally even before the count rises) and fairly well into 30-shield items (6.7% wastage), though the shield count may rise inbetween. Goes perfectly into 40-shield items (though these are rare in the beginning, and the shield count will probably rise inbetween).
5 shields - the king of early counts: a high count that goes perfectly into everything, including the hard-to-fit 10 shields needed for the highly useful warrior, scout, and worker units.
6 shields - a painful fit for 10 shields. A hideous fit for 20 shields (same percentagewise as for 10 shields, but 20 shields is so easy to fit otherwise that it hurts more emotionally). A perfect fits for 30 shields. Not counting variations in shield count and settler builds, 6 shields is a level that is best saved for after you've got HBR or hooked-up iron.
7 shields - terribly wasteful for everything but 20-shield items, 40-shield items, and really expensive items.
8 shields - like 6 shields, but more so, with the difference that it is viable for building really expensive items in reasonable time.
9 shields - painful wastage for everything less than about 60 shields -- this count is best left avoided, raised, lowered, or used for expensive builds.
10 shields - no comment.
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Since an average granaryless city (counting high-food cities) will grow in 8-9 turns, since workers will often raise shield counts in mid-build, and since a city may change squares worked to avoid food wastage when reaching the next size in that city or a neighboring city, most builds longer than 4 turns will see changed shield counts in mid-build, but still, there are enough constant-shield cases that the above considerations are often important.
Because lower counts are generally harder to fit well (each wasted shield is a higher % of wastage, at the very least), one guideline -- all else being equal! -- is to set each city to building a 10-shielder, raise it to 20 if there'll be considerable wastage, and later also raise it to 30 if there'll be considerable wastage.
Enough for now!
USC
* Factors of Production. For the purposes of this thread, we will count 1 post-waste shield as one FOP, 1 food as one FOP, and one post-corruption gold as 1/4 FOP. Gold is a bit fuzzy here, as it could end up wasted on 40-turn science or, when using the luxury slider, wasted on luxuries; meanwhile, it may take a long time (depending on level, map parameters, etc.) to reach a gold-rushing government, and until you do, gold's value will vary from worthless (no spending options) to 1/2 FOP (upgrades) to nearly-unquantifiable (ROPs, maps, techs, etc.)
In the beginning of the game, there is ample room for micromanagement without any real boredom, and in fact, it can be quite an interesting "game alongside the game." I'd like to take a look in this thread at some of the most common early-game food/shield "best counts" (counts achieved when a city is using the terrain that provides the most FOPs*, and problems or "problems" related to them. Only shields will be considered, as just this subject alone is already complex enough.
Cases where shield counts rise in mid-build/mid-growth will be mostly ignored here, as simple cases are complex enough. Only the early game will be considered, and only common food/shield counts.
An implicit guideline in the below is the "10-turn guideline": where no strategic consideration is involved (of course, one generally is), a city should try to get something built in 10 turns.
SHIELDS
1 shield - An uncommon shield count in the very beginning, this becomes more common once (if) you start REXing beyond the range of your workers. Horribly low, but no shield-count micromanagement problem here, except for the issue of a city that reaches 11 shields on turn 10 (due to growth) and thus must choose between a more expensive build and a waste of 1 shield (10%, which is low compared to many cases below). Especially if the city also has one food or if the next square will not increase the shield count, the best builds (all else being equal) for such cities are warriors or workers (and considering that such cities are often unconnected border cities, both are actually fairly appropriate builds even without micromanagement). For religious civs, a rushed temple also works. Basically, you want to get at least SOMETHING out of this city in reasonable time.
2 shields - will go into any multiple of ten, though your shield count will generally rise, possibly causing shield wastage, before you build anything more expensive than 10 shields.
3 shields - the first really interesting case. 10-shield items get built with 20% wastage in a 3-shield city. Often, even when you really need a 10-shielder, you can micromanage the city (if you can remember...) to trade one or both of those 2 extra shields for food or gold. Otherwise it's on to the next rank, 20-shield items, which get built with 5% wastage, not really all that bad. If you're obsessed with avoiding shield wastage and the city will be at 3 shields for a whole 30 shields (unlikely; more common is locking into a multiple-of-3 groove and 3-shields production at the same time), you can build 30-shield items, but this generally means overobsessing with avoiding wastage, as the only such items are horsemen (you should be building chariots instead if you're still in the micromanagement stage), swordsmen (you should be building warriors), religious temples (if they'll bring an advantage, fine, and at 30 shields they often will, but building them just to avoid wastage is silly), and settlers (you should be building them from your granary cities unless a non-granary city is outgrowing your tile development, and if you're outgrowing your tile development, a new settler will often only worsen the problem unless you can build a worker elsewhere to compensate).
A special case here is the ultra-early 3-shield capitol: do you build an archer/spearman to avoid that painful 20% wastage, or a warrior/scout because they are more useful in this phase? I agonize over this probably more than I should.
4 shields - generally the result of shield waste or not having access to two 2-shield squares, yet still a lovely count. Goes perfectly into 20-shield items (generally even before the count rises) and fairly well into 30-shield items (6.7% wastage), though the shield count may rise inbetween. Goes perfectly into 40-shield items (though these are rare in the beginning, and the shield count will probably rise inbetween).
5 shields - the king of early counts: a high count that goes perfectly into everything, including the hard-to-fit 10 shields needed for the highly useful warrior, scout, and worker units.
6 shields - a painful fit for 10 shields. A hideous fit for 20 shields (same percentagewise as for 10 shields, but 20 shields is so easy to fit otherwise that it hurts more emotionally). A perfect fits for 30 shields. Not counting variations in shield count and settler builds, 6 shields is a level that is best saved for after you've got HBR or hooked-up iron.
7 shields - terribly wasteful for everything but 20-shield items, 40-shield items, and really expensive items.
8 shields - like 6 shields, but more so, with the difference that it is viable for building really expensive items in reasonable time.
9 shields - painful wastage for everything less than about 60 shields -- this count is best left avoided, raised, lowered, or used for expensive builds.
10 shields - no comment.
---------
Since an average granaryless city (counting high-food cities) will grow in 8-9 turns, since workers will often raise shield counts in mid-build, and since a city may change squares worked to avoid food wastage when reaching the next size in that city or a neighboring city, most builds longer than 4 turns will see changed shield counts in mid-build, but still, there are enough constant-shield cases that the above considerations are often important.
Because lower counts are generally harder to fit well (each wasted shield is a higher % of wastage, at the very least), one guideline -- all else being equal! -- is to set each city to building a 10-shielder, raise it to 20 if there'll be considerable wastage, and later also raise it to 30 if there'll be considerable wastage.
Enough for now!
USC
* Factors of Production. For the purposes of this thread, we will count 1 post-waste shield as one FOP, 1 food as one FOP, and one post-corruption gold as 1/4 FOP. Gold is a bit fuzzy here, as it could end up wasted on 40-turn science or, when using the luxury slider, wasted on luxuries; meanwhile, it may take a long time (depending on level, map parameters, etc.) to reach a gold-rushing government, and until you do, gold's value will vary from worthless (no spending options) to 1/2 FOP (upgrades) to nearly-unquantifiable (ROPs, maps, techs, etc.)
Or, for that matter, PTW Demogame I... IIRC, there was some pretty serious micromanagement of Eye of the Storm (not to mention other cities) for, oh, like most of the game. To the point where it was beyond me.
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