Hey, where do we settle our second city? Discuss, discuss.

attached is a map of the surounding area (in widescreen!!!)

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads9/citydiscussion2.JPG

The other cow isn't showing on your screenshot. We need to grab it and the gold before the Indians do. So the 2nd city should be on the hill just north of the river mouth, 2 squares SW of the gold, or on the hill south of the river mouth.

I think we should place the 2nd city on the coastal hill due west of the worker next to the other cow. This location will discourage India from settling to closely and will also allow irrigation to pass to the cow more quickly.

Edit: cross posted with YNCS. We are both indicating the same tile.

If we build where the cow is in the 2nd radius, I wonder how long it will be until we can use it? Will the people want to build culture so we can expand, or would we be taking that spot so we can grow into it later, but only if the Indians don't decide to build right next to it and claim it?

Should we consider the option of building next to the cow even without the river site, so we'd actually get production from the bonus?

For anything other than 20K we should settle on the red dot next.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads9/DG6-MB01.jpg

This location gives +5 food using one of the wines and enough shields for a 4-6 pop and 4 turn SF. It is not on a river, but too bad. Since this is quite tight to the capital it should only get a granary and build nothing but settlers. It can be converted into a settler in the MA to give more breathing room to Camelot.

For 20K....
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads9/DG6-MB02.jpg

The Green dot should be settled, and after joining a worker a temple whipped. Third town would then be the red dot in the first picture which can use the cattle for SF purposes until the 20K town matures to the point it must have the second cattle.

We really need the Eastern lands explored PDQ. Since the Indians have pottery it is almost certain that they have met an expansionist Civ, which in turn means the starting continent must be at least big enough to hold 3 civs. We need to find the beest terrain we can for the first few cities.

I am not wholly sold on the idea of another coastal town immediately. We need to find the land configuration first. If we are on a Pangea for instance then the seafaring trait is diminished and we will need to maximise our commercial trait. This would best be done by expanding inland around the rivers to the north and West.

Incidentally, and slightly off topic, it is surprising that Ghandi has only one town on turn 17. The AI's first build is ALWAYS a settler. Either he only has +2fpt or he is building a spear for escort (which in turn would indicate that there are barbs on the map). The fact that he has BW means that it should be available from the civ he has met, which in turn means we can get it too. The long and short of this is that if Indian land looks likely to be the most fertile, then this is the direction in which we should expand. We can declare on India right now and take two workers. Ghandi will have only his 6 starting warriors to come at us with. We will have 10 turns in which to prepare a defence and will if necessary be able to whip a spear. Once he has suicided a couple of warriors on the spear we should be able to sue for peace and take his new city and maybe a tech in the deal. This will increase our rate of expansion somewhat, and essentially win the game on turn 25. The risk is obvious, in that he might just sack our capital and it will be game over :)

My suggested city placement (I know there's a gap...). Don't have time to discuss it though (work). (city's about to riot, too).

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads9/dg6_BC3200_ctsettle.jpg

Exactly what I was thinking Chieftess, before I saw that post! Looser build around our capital, tighter on the coast. I would also place a fishing town by the river in the southern tundra.

I would go for the NW one by the cow first, then the other cow.

Yes Chieftess' dotmap is definitely better. The NW site by cow could go 1 space SE to fill the gap, but only if we rushed culture there. It does also mean the second settler factory will be late since the second city will not share improved tiles with Camelot as they oscillate in population.

The grassland 1NE of the mountain (next to the desert near the warrior and India) would be good, too. We could try to expand up there quickly.

I say that CT's idea is very good and one that I would follow.

I, too, agree with CT's proposal.

As an aside, I'm not at all a fan of abandoning cities once they've lived out their use. While I understand that it oftentimes makes sense on a gameplay-level, I feel that it's inappropriate for a government-simulation like the Demogame. I can't imagine England disbanding Windsor on the grounds that it's "too close to London". I would prefer we keep any city we settle.

Maybe - but in England at least, big towns expand to swallow the surrounding villages and eventually those villages lose their own identity and there is a transfer of power to the major town. In this way small towns and villages become suburbs of the bigger town. Are Soho, Knightsbridge, Chelsea, separate towns or just districts of London?

First let me say that I like the 2 city locations Cheiftess has near the cows.

Second, The real point of this thread is to find the next city site. I think the coastal hill next to the cow is the best spot for our 2nd city as it also conforms with the strategic idea of pressuring India.

Third, the problem I have with Chieftess' dot map is that it is not in line with the (current trend of the) Strategic poll on settlement density. The current option winning is "medium to low density inland and caution in settling at the coast. I would see this as inland cities have 13 usuable tiles, not counting mountains.

CT's plan has cities with 18 or 19 tiles plus sharing 3 or 2 more tiles. We need to plan a bit more densely.

This is what I was saying in the turnchat: We can achieve a tighter build by moving the northernmost settler 1 NE and then settling on the gold for a 4th city. However, with it being revealed that the tile I was referring to is, in fact, a BG, that kinda throws that plan out of the window.

However, if we move 1S from there, we close that gap near the capital and make room for a city on the lake north of there. I completely agree with the other settlement location, however.

Even then, the currently chosen location has the potential to make at least a halfway decent settler factory, and when combined with Camelot's food potential, should be enough to postpone settling the second cow in favor of moving towards India in the direction of the blue arrow.

I think we should builid our next city by the western cow and our third city should be on the BG SE of the closer cow.

i agree with CT idea on building the second city sw of the first cow, closet to camelot. It will get us the cow and gold. Also, we plenty of mountains to mine, and a few spaces to irrigate. plus, it's close enough to india to apply some pressure, we shouldn't build any closer, it might piss off the indians and declare war. with no defense, our 2 warriors far away and them with 5, we don't stand a chance. this placement will excert pressure yet not in a place to infuriate them enough to declare war, its a nice strategic and safe placement :D

Here's the proposals that have been mentioned. They are colored and numbered for easy discussion(the numbers have no significance). As the next TC has been moved back, I will probably wait to poll until late tomorrow.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads9/Cityproposals2bold.JPG

If I missed a proposal, feel free to point it out to me.

:goodjob:

EDIT: Made numbers easier to see (that 8 took me forever to draw).

Use a color like yellow or bright blue so that it stands out against the background; I can barely see your "7" and "1".

(P.S.: VOTE 7!)

Here is another proposal for a tighter build. Note that the city that takes the Western Cattle is not sited on the coast because of the number of worker turns required to hook it up to the road network. The Northern cattle is still taken by my original proposal since it is still the only location that allows the option of a 4 turn SF. Towns 6 and 7 are last because we will definitely get them, and 7 is just a glorified fishing village anyway. It is unlikely in my view that the two northwestern sites are possible without an early war with India. When posed like that our position looks cramped already. Depends a lot on what is to the North and East.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads9/DG6-MB03.jpg

If there is only one spot that gives us a settler factory then the question becomes do we want a settler factory or not? If the answer is yes then deciding where to build our next city is simple. I'll stop here because I think we need a settler factory. I'll be voting for site number 2.

I like the idea of dismantling the city once its usefulness is gone. That sort of thing can be made part of our country's way of doing things. We don't have to get all attached to one city now people. Anyway, it's not like we'd be torching the place and killing all the citizens. We'd just be exercising eminent domain and having them pack up and move. That's much more acceptable than whipping citizens till they die and using their bones to build temples...

My vote goes for spot #2, war or no war.

I'm in favor of the settler factory. It should be able to grow very fast as it can share one of Camelot's Wines as soon as it is size 2 and Camelot's Granary finishes.

I'm also in favor of eventually moving/abandoning it.

That city WILL have corruption, too, so factor that in. I also don't like abandoning cities, nor placing them 1 tile from rivers, so for now, I'm voting for space site 1 moved a tile SW.

If there is only one spot that gives us a settler factory then the question becomes do we want a settler factory or not? If the answer is yes then deciding where to build our next city is simple. I'll stop here because I think we need a settler factory. I'll be voting for site number 2.
I thought that Camelot was our settler factory. Four bonus food meets my requirements for a settler factory.

I still want to put the next city on the coastal hill SE of the NW cow.

I thought that Camelot was our settler factory. Four bonus food meets my requirements for a settler factory.

I still want to put the next city on the coastal hill SE of the NW cow.

All I've heard proposed for Camelot are warriors and curraghs...

If we do not build on spot two then our only hope for a settler factory of some sort is Camelot - which means we won't be building boats there for a while. Or if we do build boats there then it's not being used as a settler factory. I think we're better off using site two as a temporary settler factory and letting Camelot grow so it can build boats and military units for our ever expanding empire.

You claim that the coastal site 1 would take more worker turns to hook up when in fact the difference is nothing compared to the coastal advantage of the city. Unfortunately our warrior is busy scouting out India, but if he weren't, we should look at what's off the coast there -- if there's a fish of some kind, once we get a harbor there that's a +3 food tile (+4 out of despotism).

All in all, I think we would get more use out of 3 mini-settler factories (Camelot and sites 1 & 2 in my picture) than from a single dedicated one. We could probably go warrior, settler in the inland city, and boat, settler, warrior, settler in the coastals. The only disadvantage is having to build three granaries.

Also, even though we may fill up our space rather quickly(depending on what's NE), we can use our boats to go around these civs and possibly fill in other gaps even after our original area has been filled.

So, in the most recent image, if you move (1) one tile SW and (2) 1 tile W we could end up having 3 seperate combo pumps going within 20-30 turns or so, or less, depending on where/when we build and/or capture workers.

I vote for spot #2, and like the idea of having two oscillating settler factories. We need to produce as many settlers as we can as quickly as possible. IMO we'll need to claim land quickly or we may risk being caught in a geographic box. We won't know this for sure until our explorers push back the black at the frontiers, but we already know India may block our expansion to the northwest. The north and east are mysteries, but with 11 opponents it's highly likely another civilization is nearby. I also agree with those that suggest we may want to dismantle this city when its utility is over.

All I've heard proposed for Camelot are warriors and curraghs...

If we do not build on spot two then our only hope for a settler factory of some sort is Camelot - which means we won't be building boats there for a while. Or if we do build boats there then it's not being used as a settler factory. I think we're better off using site two as a temporary settler factory and letting Camelot grow so it can build boats and military units for our ever expanding empire.

Camelot is finishing the current warrior, then building a settler then granary for the settler factory.

I selected spot 2 because it can share tiles with camelot. Not doing so means that one wine will not be used 2 turns from 3. By sharing tiles you are actually saving worker turns, and you don't have to wait for tiles to be improved. Thus the city gets up and running quicker. Add to this the fact that site 2 can pump settlers in 4 turns and there is little contest really.

Xerols comments are a perfectly reasonable argument. But moving site 2 to the coast does mean it will take 30 worker turns to connect as opposed to 17 and there is no way of telling what is offshore. Using exploration turns to reveal sea tiles rather than land tiles is tactically weak IMO.

poll is here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=114008)

As you can see in the attached image, it's the same number of worker-turns to road to either of the Western cow sites.

EDIT: Oops, wrong picture.

Do you have security cameras aimed at your neighbor's bird feeder?

Actually that's our bird feeder, and I took the picture with my webcam from my window. You can't really see it(the window screen is permanent) but there was a falcon hanging around the neighborhood for a few days.

For anyone wondering, this was the pic that I accidentally clicked on when I uploaded:
http://www.lggaming.com/user/xerol/pics/falcon.jpg

Let's settle first next to the birdfeeder and then on the bushes to the NE. Don't forget to mine the birdfeeder.

Let's settle first next to the birdfeeder and then on the bushes to the NE. Don't forget to mine the birdfeeder.

Excuse me, shouldn't the birdfeeder be irrigated? And can we get that falcon back to attack Ghandi?

Must be some secret Fanatannian military base or something...

Actually, you can see the top of what's most likely Plums about 3 SE. Might be Apricots, I'm not sure which tree that is.

Anyway, back on topic: Unless someone else sees a better way that wasn't obvious to me, it'll take the same amount of time to connect either western cow location.

do we even have bird feeder technology yet? This is all very suspicious.

As you can see in the attached image, it's the same number of worker-turns to road to either of the Western cow sites.


Xerol:
When I first constructed the map I had site 1 to the SE of its shown location. I forgot that I had moved it. You are obviously correct. I have no issue now with moving that site to the coast. It is a better site for us depending on Tundra. It is still a little too distant for a second town for my liking. My argument for site 2 still stands. It's closer, and will be up and running more quickly, has 4 turn potential, will share wines with Camelot and therefore not waste those tiles so much and we will suffer less corruption due to settling progressively away from the capital rather that grabbing faraway land and backfilling which gives rise to higher corruption.

don't we want our capital to have all its squares.

don't we want our capital to have all its squares.

This won't matter until quite a ways into the industrial age. In a large area of balanced food and shields, where there is enough workable land for enough cities, it is acceptable and even advisable to build far enough apart that there is no overlap. OTOH before hospitals, anything more than 13 tiles (including the center) is wasted. If the available space is small, then it would be advantageous to build closer.

What we don't know yet is how big the available space is.