The 'size six' strategy

[La Fayette]

Aeson,
The second threshold is at size 12. It works exactly the same as the one at size 6: you must have a hospital and a granary, then you grow the city to size 13 and build a worker. The city is reduced to size 12, but the foodbox is full, due to the change of size (4 food in a row at size 12, and 6 at size 13). After that first move, you build one settler/turn as long as you wish and the citysize remains 12.
I could name this 'La Fayette's size 12', but in fact it is exactly the same as what happens at size 6, so I keep the previous name:
'SIZE 6 = As many workers as you need'

(La Fayette, designer of the 'size 12' strategy )

[The Hermit]

Wow..

You guys just figured this one out? I picked this up in my third game, Japanese conquest of the small world, a few weeks back. I sort of tripped over it by accident, but I had two cities ripe for doing this. I ended up with a giant mobile force of workers. More than I needed, really, but they were quite fun.

I wish I could develop some other strategies, though. That's about the only "good" thing I ever get right by everyone else's standards here. I just can't seem to get in to this thirty-well-defended-cities-by-A.D. groove that seems to be the norm.

I would have said something sooner if I hadn't thought it was common knowledge, so sayeth The Hermit.

"It's not enough, I need more
Nothing seems to satisfy,
I don't want it, I just need it.
To feel, to breathe, to know I'm alive." Tool - Stinkfist

[La Fayette]

The Hermit
Do you know what this forum is about?
It's about exchanging knowledge and ideas in order to play this game better. Therefore I am ready to believe you if you say that you had some kind of size 6 strategy in use before reading this thread. But what you should have done, if this is true, is take your pen and write about it in order to share your better knowledge with your fellows Apolytoners.
If you just come a few weeks later and say 'yes, I did that' anybody will be ready to laugh at you, or at least to ask 'why didn't you tell us then?'.
I am convinced that 'size 6' is a strong strategy and many people playing civ3 will be using it within a few weeks from now. None of those will be saying 'The Hermit was the one found out', just because you 'forgot' to write about it.

(La Fayette, designer of 'size 6' strategy...since no one wrote about it before he did)

[HalfLotus]

La Fayette, this is a gem. No need to defend yourself from hermit. His response was immature at best.

I betcha Soren sees this as an exploit and changes it in the next patch. The food box should go back to half full (thus losing some food), after building the worker. A great strat, and great analysis of the "threshold" concept.

I fear that in MP, anybody who doesn't use this will get whipped. Much like ICS in civ2, I think it would make the games formulaic and less fun.

BTW, someone brought up this strat as a "bug" in general forum, I pointed them in your direction.

[The Hermit]

Wellllll...

Actually until two days ago I was only lurking over on general. I didn't read strategy forum because I really didn't want to hear how much better everyone else was than me at this. *chuckles* Anyhow...

I will attempt in the future to share what I know if by some strange miracle I should happen to find some sort of decent strategy by accident again. I actually stumbled upon this in my third game, on a small map, as the Japanese. I had coincidentally run out of things to build around the same time my capital hit size seven, and the workers I had weren't getting what I wanted done as fast as I wanted it done. Call it Civ 2 impatience. So I queued six workers, figuring it'd give my capital time to grow back around the same time I got to the next wonder (I was in that lull between Sistine and Copernicus). Once I noticed after three or so turns my population wasn't decreasing...I wore an evil little grin.

Is it an exploit caused by an unintentional loophole in the rules? Possibly. We'll know next patch, I suppose. Is it game-breaking? Not really. But it is an improvement over requiring an upkeep of food and/or shields. Then again, with current corruption levels, it's had to tell the difference. *grins*

And while we're not on the topic of immaturity, thank you for your constructive, mature, well-researched, and wholly non-judgmental post, Lotus, so sayeth The Hermit.

"Don't cry,
Or feel too down.
Not all martyrs see divinity,
But at least you tried." Tool - Eulogy

[HalfLotus]

One sentence of my post was directed at you Hermit. There were lots of other sentences.

To say: "You guys just figured that out?" is condescending and patronizing.

Having read the Firaxis chat transcript, Dan M. says Soren likes to read the strat forum and squash exploits. Apparently the next patch weakens the despot rush.

Vegas has the "size six strat" being squashed by Soren at 3:1 odds.

Merry Christmas.

[The Hermit]

Oh contraire?

To say: "You guys just figured that out?" is condescending and patronizing.

Sorry to be the ruiner, but that was actual, sincere shock and amasement. I don't consider myself a very top-of-the-line player, and to think that for some odd reason I'd found something out that the guru crew here hadn't yet gotten to just sort of threw me off. I will admit I probably could have worded it better. Such are the imperfections of non-oral communication. I will further admit that I did blow your sentence out of proportion, I made a reactionary retort to a hastily made conclusion that probably offended me more than it should have.

Anyhow, giant miscommunication. Can we try this again?

Not looking to make any enemies, so sayeth The Hermit.

"Remember, we are eternal - all this pain is an illusion." Tool - Parabola

[HalfLotus]

No worries, mate.

BTW, whats with the "so sayeth the Hermit" stuff. Is that a roleplaying thing?

[solo]

La Fayette,

I've been away, so sorry for the delay in answering your question. The answer is NO to being able to win OCC in deity yet, but I am trying only for spaceship wins. Best so far is 3 parts, before an AI launch. I may do better using your size 6, and will let you know how this works.

In 5-city deity games I have managed spaceship wins twice. I believe some others have managed OCC cultural wins at deity, which are impressive, but still easier to achieve than launching first.

[La Fayette]

Originally posted by HalfLotus
La Fayette, this is a gem. No need to defend yourself from hermit. His response was immature at best.

I betcha Soren sees this as an exploit and changes it in the next patch. The food box should go back to half full (thus losing some food), after building the worker. A great strat, and great analysis of the "threshold" concept.

BTW, someone brought up this strat as a "bug" in general forum, I pointed them in your direction.

Half Lotus,
Thank you for defending me against The Hermit. I suppose he's a very young man and didn't take enough care before writing. I think he apologized. OK, it's over.
(I wish I were as young as he probably is )

About the threshold at size 6 (and the other one at size 12), it is not a bug at all: it is exactly the same system as in civ2, but the programmers of civ3 decided not to grow the size of the foodbox every time the size of the city is increased, but to grow it at size 7 and at size 13. The foodbox works exactly as it should at size 6 (and also at size 12), but the change in size of the foodbox produces that marvelous effect that The Hermit and I noticed .
In civ2, there is a threshold effect at size 5 (due to the fact that specialists appear at that size and the city is able to starve every other turn). Xin Yu noticed that and built his well known 'size 5' strategy that anyone can find in the 'Great Library' (top thread of the civ2 strategy forum, initiated by my friends the SGs).
This remains true after several years (no civ2 patch has modified this) and many players go on 'Xinning'. And this also remains true for many other bugs or cheats or exploits or whatever you wish to name them: Ming started a thread where dozens of them are described in detail, and honest players decide which are going to be allowed or not when they start a game.

What is going to happen with civ3? This is clearly a decision in the hands of Sid or Soren or 'Firaxis'...
Never mind: whatever they modify, we shall find new ways of winning.
I loved civ2 (and probably spent thousands of hours playing it and certainly won't stop playing it before many months from now, since I have 4 different games going and another one in project).
But I feel that I am also going to love civ3, with or without a threshold at size 6, because it is a very different game and I enjoy feeling like a rookie in front of it (and knowing that there are many details to be understood or discovered).

solo
I started at Chieftain when I got the game from you a fortnight ago. I am now playing 'tournament 3' at Monarch. Probably join you at Deity within a fortnight or so. Merry Christmas.

[The Hermit]

Not precisely...

BTW, whats with the "so sayeth the Hermit" stuff. Is that a roleplaying thing?

Despite the fact I do role-play, I do not do as such on internet message boards. It's just a tag line, a catchy one as I'm told, that I happen to use. I've posted under this name on a lot of boards in the last decade or so, and I enjoy doing so. However, it is, paradoxically, a rather popular name, I find. So my tag line serves the double purpose of identifying WHICH hermit I am, since I frequently need to modify the name to not clash with the other local hermit(s).

Thank you for defending me against The Hermit. I suppose he's a very young man and didn't take enough care before writing. I think he apologized. OK, it's over.

If that were the truth, oh, if that were the truth. Actually I've just got a tad too much Irisih in me (blood or alcohol, you decide), and it makes me a mite bit tempermental at times. Likely to take offence, you see. Though I really don't think I was so severe as to need defending against, do you? Terribly sorry if so.

Happy whatever your celebration of the season is, so sayeth The Hermit.


"What are you but my reflection,
Who am I to judge or strike you down?" Tool - Pu**** (All versions)

[cheerful]

1. To set up a worker factory, you can join worker to that city. Once you reach size 6 with a full foodbox, you will get one worker per 1/2 turns. You will soon recover the workers you added to the city. The only consideration here is you need time to build granary (and maybe temple to keep them content).

2. I am guessing this will soon be corrected by the programmer unless this is intended behavior. This is caused by readusting from the total number in the in the foodbox, including the lower half in granary. In stead, they can keep only the effective No. of wheats (the top portion). On size change (build/add worker or settler), the bottom half will be adjusted to the new size, but the No. of wheats in the top half will remain the same.

[Marquis de Sodaq]

Bonjour, La Fayette! I see the CivLab has some new equipment...

I played my first game of Civ3 yesterday, and it looks like fun. As I am still learning "how to", I've made no effort to optimize or strategize at all. However, I stumbled upon the size 12 version of this strategy. Not because I planned to, but rather because I was unable to build hospitals. Unable to grow, I ordered workers to be built each turn. The food surplus would keep me at size 12 - essentially turning extra (otherwise wasted) wheatsheaves into workers. I'll try it with a size 6 city next time.

Some beginner worker questions:

1. How many workers do people typically have by 1ad (or per city, if that is a better way to ask)?
2. Do colonies made with foreign workers behave as if they were my own workers settling them?
3. Can one add foreign workers to my capitol without fear of the city changing hands? (This is far fetched, but might be good to know) Would this cause unhappiness in wartime that would be too much to handle?

[Aeson]

Marquis -

The number of workers is something that can vary greatly from game to game. Often I will have hundreds of captured workers from razed cities by the end of the BC's. If warfare isn't part of the game I'm playing, I usually build 1 or 2 workers per city by that time. Less if I am playing an Industrious Civ.

There isn't any difference between colonies built by captured workers either, and it's a good idea to use them for that task.

As far as adding those captured workers to your population, it can sometimes lead to trouble. I've had a size 33 city in the heart of my empire defect after adding 15 captured english workers to its population. This city was only 8 spaces from my capitol, and at least 50 from the only city the English had left, which was size 5. My people were in distain of their culture, and I wasn't even at war with the English at the time. Going to war with a Civ after adding a lot of their captured workers to your cities is very harsh on happiness, and should be avoided. I have read a couple of posts where people have said that the AI has lost it's capitol culturally, but have never seen it happen.

[solo]

I tried it at size 12 using a hospital, but the granary of a size 13 city only holds 30 food, which is 10 short of filling up the size 12 food box, so a worker per turn while maintaining size 12 is only possible if you are producing 10 extra food.

In contrast, at size 7, the granary supplies 20 food, which completely fills the size 6 box.

This is not so bad, as the strategy is most useful at size 6 anyways, and enough workers can be produced while waiting for a hospital, by building one whenever needed when the size 12 food box fills. Enough are accumulated for railroading and building up to size 20 and above, later.