L of A's observations on his latest Monarch game

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
2. On my bigger cities, they all usually have Universities, Libraries, Temples, Banks. Marketplaces, Graineries and Barracks usually dont get built. However, after this latest game, I think I will build more barracks and marketplaces in my not so productive cities, and less expensive things like universities, and banks.

My rule of thumb is that cities rarely build a barracks until they're ready to build military units, but they essentially always build a barracks before building any military units. Veterans have a better chance of winning and are a lot more likely to eventually produce leaders.

Granaries aren't that big a deal up to size six, or when happiness would be a problem if cities get too big. But they can help cities grow bigger faster to generate more wealth and production in the long term. That's especially true with cities that have a relatively limited food surplus.

3. I agree with that, but I never have the time to build lots of tile improvments there because my workers are tile improving my bigger cities

The solution to that is to build more workers. In non-corrupt areas, there should be enough work crews to at least almost keep up with the expansion rate in size and number of cities. Otherwise, a lot of potential wealth and production gets thrown away.

Those terrains are worth setteling, but don't put too much stuff in them because it will cost you more than you benefit.

I strongly disagree. An extra worker to clear jungle costs ten shields (plus wastage) and a pop unit to build and one gold per turn for upkeep. The pop unit is virtually a non-issue if you build in a max-population city that's ready to grow again; build the worker, and one turn later, your population is back to full. As for the shields and the gold, you'll get them back with interest.

Even with 75% corruption, four mined grassland tiles (or less if some of the grasslands have shields) will pay back the cost of building the worker at the rate of one shield per turn. Depending on government, either two or four road tiles will pay for the worker's upkeep for the entire rest of the game. And the worker can keep on working beyond that, providing a greater and greater profit over time. (Oh, and those financial figures don't count the eventual marketplace bonus.) The cost/benefit ratio of irrigating desert can be even better if it lets a desert city grow bigger than it could have otherwise.

Clearing jungles certainly isn't a job that belongs at the top of the priority list, especially early in the game when there's a trade-off between building workers and building settlers. But once the higher-priority work is done (and if you have jungles, you probably want enough workers to get caught up on your other work relatively quickly), you definitely want to clear any jungles in areas where corruption isn't completely ridiculous.

Nathan

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So how many workers/city do you think I should build?
Jungles have high commerce so maybe you should leave one or two.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
So how many workers/city do you think I should build?
Jungles have high commerce so maybe you should leave one or two.

I don't pay attention to the ratio, and I've never really tried to develop a specific algorithm (set of rules) to govern my worker building pattern. What follows is the best approximation I can come up with off the top of my head. Maybe when I start a new game sometime, I can pay more attention and see if I can provide a more detailed pattern.

What I look for is whether my workers are keeping up with the number of tiles my cities are working. If the workers are just a little behind but not falling farther behind, I'm okay, although adding workers wouldn't hurt if it's convenient. If my workers are very far behind (sorry I can't quantify it more) and not catching up much, or if the number of tiles my cities are working is growing faster than my workers can improve tiles, I need more workers. If I have jungles around, I most likely won't put workers on clearing jungles right away, but it does provide an incentive to overbuild on workers compared with what I might otherwise. Then when the workers get caught up on their other work, I can divert some to jungle clearing. (And I'm especially likely to start clearing jungles relatively early if I have a good settler/worker pump city and no more land to settle.)

By the way, if I have a city completely surrounded by jungle, warrior/worker/warrior/worker is a fairly attractive build pattern. That way, the city can produce its own workers to clear some of the jungle around it instead of getting stuck at size two.

Also, jungle does NOT provide any special commerce bonus. It's possible you saw a jungle tile with rubber on it and used that as a basis for valuing commerce from jungle tiles, but normally, jungle is about as worthless as terrain can get. It produces one food, and a road through jungle can produce one gold, and that's it. (A river next to the jungle can provide an extra gold, as usual.) Worse, jungle can make anyone who lives in it sick. Whoever came up with the value of jungle in this game most certainly wasn't an environmentalist out to sell the merits of keeping jungles intact!

Nathan

[King of Rasslin]

Useful Units
-Settlers
-Workers
-Warriors
-Spearmen
-Archers
-Swordsmen
-Horsemen
-Musketmen (!) These aren't cost effective...
-Longbowmen
-Cavalry
-Artillery
-Riflemen
-Infantry
-Marines
-Paratroopers (!) Too weak.
-Bombers
-Fighters
-F-15
-Mechanized Infantry
-Modern Armor
-Battleship
-Nuclear Submarines
-Cruise Missiles (!) What?
-Tactical Nukes

Units I didn't build
-Knights (!!!) How could you not use them?
-Pikemen
-Helicopters
-Submarines
-Destroyers
-Cruisers
-AEGIS Cruisers
-ICBM
-Stealth Fighter
-Stealth Bomber
-Tanks (!) You used MA, but not tanks?
-Cannon
-Catapult
-Ironclad
-Frigate
-Privateer
-Carrier
-Transport (!) Not a fan of invading other continents?
-Galleon
-Caravel

I think you need to take a look at what you made and what you didn't make. You made some poor units and ignored the good ones! I mean, who doesn't use knights extensively?

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So, instead of musketmen, what should I make? Should it be more spearmen, or pikemen?
I didn't use tanks because by the time I got them, everyone had MI already
As for transports, I had my hands full with the Babylonians and Zulus who were on the same continent.
As for why I did not build knights, I'm not sure. It might be that you need like 10 of them to take out one musketmen in a size 8 city.

nbarcklay

Alright. I think that I'll do that next time. Thanks for the help.

[Lord Merciless]

Units I didn't build
-Knights -- How could you miss this well-balanced unit?
-Pikemen -- 2 Pikemen are better than 1 Musketeer, but cost the same.
-Helicopters
-Submarines
-Destroyers
-Cruisers
-AEGIS Cruisers
-ICBM
-Stealth Fighter
-Stealth Bomber -- Best mobile artillery in late games
-Tanks -- The best unit during the industrial age. They cut finally break the offensive gridlock caused by the Infantry. You can also upgrade them later to MA for 20 bucks each.
-Cannon
-Catapult
-Ironclad
-Frigate
-Privateer
-Carrier
-Transport -- I guess you never play on water maps. They are the most valuable unit in cross-continent invasions.
-Galleon -- same as Transport.
-Caravel

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Ok, so two pikemen, both 1/3/1, cost the same as 1 musketmen, who is 2/4/1. How are they better off?
I never got the technology for stealth, so I couldn't build any.

[Lord Merciless]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
Ok, so two pikemen, both 1/3/1, cost the same as 1 musketmen, who is 2/4/1. How are they better off?
I never got the technology for stealth, so I couldn't build any.

First of all, 2 Regular Pikemen have 6 total HP, 1 Musketman only half of that. One greatest strength of an Army is its HP. That means the survivability of 2 Pikemen is far greater than 1 Musketman. In addition, Pikemen get bonus against mounted units. It's very likely that Pikemen's defensive strength against Knights is greater than Musketman's. I have to remind you that Knights, Riders, Samurais, and Cavalries are preferred units of most players.

Second, if you are not under democracy or republic, 2 cheaper units give you better police power for the price of 1 expensive one. Most players, by this stage, are very likely to be under Monarchy.

Third, Pikemen can put a new city under protection quicker than Musketman.

The only negative I see here is potential increased unit support cost. If you think you are paying too much for unit support, then go ahead with Musketman.

[Catt]

I would add to Lord Merciless' explanation of the benefits of 2 pikemen over 1 musketman what I consider the most improtant argument: that, other than an army, there is no unit with the blitz ability (multiple attacks on the same turn) until tanks - this means that no matter the strength of the attacker in comparison to the pikemen / musketman (i.e., cavalry), it will take at least two victorious attacks to destroy the garrison of pikemen and only one victorious attack to destroy the musketmen.

Originally posted by Lord Merciless
In addition, Pikemen get bonus against mounted units. It's very likely that Pikemen's defensive strength against Knights is greater than Musketman's.

Is this true or just your belief based on anecdotal evidence? Where do you find the authority for this point?

Catt

[Lord Merciless]

It's anecdotal evidence. My impression is that my Cavalry has more problems beating Pikemen than Musketmen. But again, that point is not too important compared to my first 2 points and the one you brought up.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Lord Merciless
It's anecdotal evidence. My impression is that my Cavalry has more problems beating Pikemen than Musketmen. But again, that point is not too important compared to my first 2 points and the one you brought up.

Agreed - the least important point. My horsemen seem to have more trouble with spearmen than with swordsmen - just anecdotal and I've now convinced myself that it is merely the human mind playing tricks on itself - but I wouldn't be flabbergasted to learn of some quirks on inter-unit offense / defense stats (okay, I might be flabbergasted that it could go on this long without proof by someone or comment by Firaxis, but I wouldn't be completely flabbergasted .

L of A - add my name to the list of folks amazed that you made do without knights!

Catt

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So more is better. I understand now.
I think that one of the reasons I did not have any knights is because I was seriously lacking in the war department: no barracks in any city. Next game I will put barracks in cities, then I can upgrade instead of having to rebuild from scratch.
Also, no more musketmen, and more knights.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia

Also, no more musketmen, and more knights.

No hard and fast rules - I will frequently upgrade pikes to musketmen, and will build musketmen as needed - don't abandon them completely, just remember to think about the most effective use of your resources.

[rush]

L of A, I am also amazed that you are not using Knights, Tanks, Cannons, Cataputs, Ironclad.

1. Knights, Tanks - I usually start Wars at 3 different stages in the game, when I have sufficient number of
i. Swordmens (3,2)
ii. Knights (6.3)
iii. Tanks (10,6 i think)
All these units have strong attack points relative to the defence points enemy units have, at their eras.

2. Cannons, Cataputs - I have loads of them. 80% of them attacking enemy cities. 20% in strategic bottlenecks & conquered cities to encounter enemy attacks.

3. Ironclads - I never use them until ... in one of my games, the Russia sent about 10 Ironclads bombing away happily at my coastal cities and improvements. They end their turn at least 2 blocks away from my coast. So, I can't bomb them using Cannons. And my frigates are just too weak to handle them.

Just my 2 cents worth ...