|
Post by Elledge on Jul 3, 2006 15:02:08 GMT -5
Farming without consequence has no point - the main reason you are growing in the first place is so you will have a very high production later, although you could conceivably have an all food city dedicated solely to producing workers/settlers and building by slavery (I have done this, it's not so bad, except people tend to get unhappy really fast in ancient if you whip too much). Although I agree with most of Atomation's post (and if I had the workers to spare reworking farm tiles I would do the same, but usually I lack the forethought and time to churn out that many,) I think he underestimates the value of slavery. On quick speed you can whip every 6 turns without stacking unhappiness, and once you get Hereditary Rule 1 unhappy face should not be a concern. Once you get there, you should be whipping pretty much all the time, all over the place, units, improvements, or whatever, every time the unhappiness timer counts down, unless you have a priority like Serfdom, Caste System, or Emancipation that makes Slavery an unacceptable choice at the moment. (Being able to swing your civ around and practically micro back and forth between them is my second favorite advantage of spi civs, right after being able to swap between Universal Suffrage and Representation at will.) Working a farm and whipping every 6 turns makes more hammers than working a mine instead. Once you have enough food to whip regularly and still grow faster than you can whip it away, then get your men on production tiles. Really, the only reason not to use slavery like this is in a commerce city where you are getting your cash from working lots of cottages.
|
|
|
Post by churchill1 on Jul 3, 2006 15:55:01 GMT -5
btw i see far too often guys cottaging every single tile in their cap - while cap is sometzhing like size 7 or 8. u need only work tiles that u use and cottages grow only if city uses em! Yes it seems so obvious that u only need to improve the tiles that u can work. But it seems it isn't obvious enough for a lot of players. I use farms alot more in teamers. Where it can be really important to work all your mines. But this depends a lot on the circumstances and city position etc etc. But it just sickens me to see people making loadsa farms just to grow their cities way before winning by points is a factor to consider. Especially when they are not in slavery. Only reason to grow is to make specialists or work tiles with less than two food. On that note i read an article about working out how many farms u will need to make a city size 20. I guess this is much more applicable for SP and longer games, but does anyone actually do that? BTW, listen to Elledge he taught me a lot, without getting a whole lot in return i feel. At last I am learning how to use slavery. But beyond feudalism I can't usually find a use for it. Serfdom is so fantastic. For the same reason i rarely if ever see a need for caste system. Tho I don't like the added 'pressure' or thought needed when playing a philisophical civ, so i don't play them very often in teamers. Also I'm not very good at microing my civics beyond the most basic level. In reni teamers it's basically organized religion til u spread ur religion and got ur cities up (btw getting a missionary to those cities in time is pretty profitable, ur getting 25% more on those forge chops etc. but i rarely manage to do it when i'm in the back and going mega expansion). Then theocracy whilst ur pumping out the units. Hm when u say u switch between representation and US, does this mean u stack up tons of gold whilst in rep and switch to US for the minimum amount of turns and just buy like crazy? That just occured to me. Totally off point, sorry.
|
|
|
Post by Elledge on Jul 3, 2006 16:35:19 GMT -5
Hm when u say u switch between representation and US, does this mean u stack up tons of gold whilst in rep and switch to US for the minimum amount of turns and just buy like crazy? That just occured to me. Yeah, churchill, that's just what I mean. Since representation with mercantilism is really a huge tech boost, it's a big shame when you have to spend more turns than you need to under US, so if I need an army soon, or some new workers and settlers, or whatever - I pile up the cash in advance so I can just rush buy rush buy rush buy constantly for a few turns then switch back to rep for awhile. I've never done the math on how much difference it must make but I imagine it has to be a huge one. (Plus consolidating building like that means that I probably only need to be in Theocracy for those turns, too.) With Spiritual the recurring theme is trying to clump together the time you take to do different things. You want to be in Serfdom when all your workers are working. You want to be in Organized Religion when you're building improvements and you're ready to spam a bunch of missionaries real quick. You want to be in Universal Suffrage when you have money to rush buy a lot. If you can plan your actions in advance and think "okay, I'm going to finish this here, and this here, and build missionaries" or "I'm going to finish these four units at the same time, so I need to be in Theocracy when I do" you can get a whole lot of mileage out of the trait. I could do better at it myself. Of course, if you're in the front line on a renaissance teamer, then not much of that applies, because you're just going to be spamming out units with Theocracy. So don't overestimate the importance of it.
|
|
|
Post by churchill1 on Jul 3, 2006 18:06:00 GMT -5
Or if ur playing tbg ( a personal fave of mine - own or be owned), u spam units everywhere.
But pretty well all the back civs in inlands sea are spamming units once they have grown. In theory I know exactly what ur saying in practice tbh i never manage to organise myself so well. I'm always making units so i want theocracy. Oh i just need one missionary, not worth getting org rel, I'll make a quick monastery. I need to start on this wonder now, b4 anyone else gets it, once again it's not worth having org rel just for one building. blah blah blah. guess it takes practice to perfect. I need to be aware of it more and see what works.
|
|
|
Post by Elledge on Jul 3, 2006 18:36:53 GMT -5
The trick is, twenty turns before you want to build the wonder, you think okay, what buildings are on my to-do list? This city has loads of food and I'll need an aqueduct; my capital will want a grocer; this city gets a library; this city gets Heroic Epic, this city needs a lighthouse. So then you figure out if maybe you can put off one and build one early and switch to OR at a time when you can build them all at the same time.
Then again, I actually tend to build a lot more improvements than most people, I think. I definitely never just spam units in inland sea maps except when I'm on the front line; I'd say that except for a few situations (like Napoleon immediately at gunpowder, when I have been rigging my civ to be at full throttle production right in time for the musketeer era, or Isabella and CQs) I am building improvements in at least half my cities at any given time. Every single city is going to need a forge and eventually an aqueduct, and then most cities need barracks, some need lighthouses and grocers and harbors, and some might need libraries and/or banks, and one or two might want observatories and universities. All that's interspersed with my military production and gets done whenever my front doesn't need quite as many units immediately.
Microing around civics like that is a good thing to be aware of; not least of all because it makes you think hard about what you are doing and what you are building, and what is and isn't vital. It's a good practice in the same vein as planning your worker actions so that your cities grow timed just so that you have enough improvements for them.
|
|
|
Post by churchill1 on Jul 3, 2006 18:44:04 GMT -5
Ok yeah. I think I would need to write down on a pad what buildings i need whilst in org rel so i don't forget. I'm pretty sure this is something that just needs a bit of getting used too. Like slaving and packing ur city's in tight. I didn't like it but I forced myself to and now I do it naturally. btw, please read my latest post on that points thread. "You want to be in Serfdom when all your workers are working." Well heres a big problem i forsee with going out of serfdom. All ur workers are working for a pretty long time. Anyways I tend to find (especially if I cottage spam - which is no bad thing) I am almost always working useful tiles and cities very quickly get pretty big. And after u explained about using slavery (and it really made sense to me) my 2 rules for using it are when i am working unimproved tiles and when my city is fairly small. In cities which have no production it is a must of course. But well I must say I have never been in the slavery civic for a ren era game. That probably sounds awful, but it's totally true.
|
|
|
Post by Elledge on Jul 4, 2006 0:21:15 GMT -5
It kinda depends how many workers you tend to make. Personally I have a tendency to really squeeze on workers and not have any extras, which means I also have a hard time ever going out of Serfdom early in a renaissance era game. However, in almost every Renaissance game by about turn 60 I've worked everything I need, I have all my more important roads, and my workers are sitting around working tiles I won't need for ages and roading things I don't need roaded. I go Slavery then.
|
|
|
Post by churchill1 on Jul 4, 2006 8:06:49 GMT -5
Hm well i guess this is my problem. The only times I get a real good use out of slavery (or the only times I know for sure it is worthwhile) is when I don't have enough workers, i.e. I am working unimproved tiles, so I might as well slave. This happens most often in ancient and when I want units superquick for a mad rush. Really the only other time i use it is when a city has no forests and virtually no mfg as the only way to get the buildings in there that I want is to use slavery. And well I guess it very often makes sense to slave a granary. May be I'm talking in unfathomable riddles. If so nm.
|
|
|
Post by crimsonchaos on Nov 18, 2006 22:58:06 GMT -5
Heres how I place my improvements: Resources: The right improvement. Plains (Flat): Farm if water, cottages if not. Grassland (Flat): Cottages Floodplains: Cottages Mountains: Mines. Hope this helps
|
|
|
Post by armageddon1 on Nov 19, 2006 6:36:19 GMT -5
After reading some of these it's no wonder why I've been sucking at this game
|
|
|
Post by mutax2003 on Nov 28, 2006 18:40:39 GMT -5
In MP games, I found that sometimes my cottages don't grow because they are not being worked. I didn't notice before since most games I let the governor manage the tiles. So my question is, do you guys manually select tiles to work or emphasize commerce in the game?
|
|
|
Post by tamijo on Nov 29, 2006 10:24:39 GMT -5
Yes You need to keep an eye on the needs of the moment and shift to the tile you want to work. Is not possible every turn (to me it isnt) but as soon as y can spare a second.
|
|
|
Post by mutax2003 on Nov 29, 2006 11:46:15 GMT -5
What would work out better in the long term? Let's say you are building a library and want it completed in a reasonable time, should you emphasize production at the expense of working the cottages, or emphasize cottages and whip out the library? BTW, my ladder account has been deleted twice in a row now, what is the minimumn activity you need to stay on the ladder?
|
|
|
Post by tamijo on Nov 29, 2006 12:11:20 GMT -5
Rules says: Inactivity If you haven't played a match in 42 days you will be automatically removed for inactivity in order to keep the Ladder as dynamic as possible and give everyone a chance to move up. Removal for inactivity is completely automated. No exceptions are made to this rule. Our players want an active league full of opponents who can be easily found. We offer optional "Gold & Platinum Membership" programs. One of the benefits to these program is the fact that you cannot be purged for inactivity. This program is recommended for frequent travelers or those in the military. Signup information can be found here .
|
|
|
Post by tamijo on Nov 29, 2006 12:21:24 GMT -5
The other question im not the right person to answer.
My guess would be that you will gain on making the lib. fast 85% off the time, if in your cap. ; that will also free the city to make other things after. In other citys its hard to say, depending on so many things.
|
|