OK, what I've read here seems to indicate that a lot of experienced players don't automate their workers, rather focusing them on:

Early forest clearcutting for settler production:
Building more cottages than the AI workers normally would
?? Other tasks not quite clear to me.

In my own mind, I can see how manually moving around the workers for the first 50-100 turns or so might be possible, but afterwards things get far to micromanagey, unless perhaps you could queue up orders that would take 20 turns to complete.

What preceicely do automated workers do? They certainly seem to focus on resources first before city improvement. I've caught myself hitting the A key and then yelling 'No, wait! Stop!' as they run off to get rice outside my city radius.

Is there a point at which it's safe to automate workers? Road/Rail networks might be safe. Is the AI Worker's choice for landscape really that bad? I really have quite enjoyed the end of worker micromanagement by just hitting the A key and going on with the rest of the game, but I'm worried my workers are keeping me on noble....

I micromanage my workers until my first major war. Then when I start getting annoyed at them I just push A and hope for the best. There is an option to tell them to improve nearest city if you don't want them running off connecting resources first.

Last game on Emperor I automated them at around 1000BC then never bothered with them except to mine the new resources that popped up (they didn't even mine the aluminium squares that had no previous improvements on them for some reason). I finished the game with a 6k score, second best civ had a little over 2k. So they don't do that bad a job and if your first cities have a good infrastructure it should be ok. Worst case scenario you'll just have to take control of the workers at one point and fine tune their work.

The decisions made for the automated workers tend to be sound, but they are short-sighted and no necessarily in compliance with your strategy. They make their decisions as if their city is the only one in the world (which is fine when you only have 1 or 2 cities). Just as in Civ3, workers seemed determined to put roads in every single tile on the map.

I don't recall ever seeing an automated worker voluntarily leave the city radius, but perhaps the AI had calculated that your borders will have expanded by the time the worker finishes the improvement.

What's wrong with having roads everywhere if there's nothing else to do? Just curious as I'm a noob.

Civ IV answer: Roads do nothing except facilitate movement. Once a direct road is built, further road tiles serve no purpose.

Civ III answer: The key point in your question is "nothing else to do". Road-building had much too high a priority IMHO.

Civ IV answer: Roads do nothing except facilitate movement. Once a direct road is built, further road tiles serve no purpose.
I'm still working on getting out of this habit, I find myself building roads when I've got much more important things to do.

Civ III answer: The key point in your question is "nothing else to do". Road-building had much too high a priority IMHO.
Aye, money money money, plus the later bonus when dropping a railroad onto every single tile. Really made the map look terrible end-game.

I don't like cutting down forests, but I surely would never ever automate my workers.

Civ IV answer: Roads do nothing except facilitate movement. Once a direct road is built, further road tiles serve no purpose.

Civ III answer: The key point in your question is "nothing else to do". Road-building had much too high a priority IMHO.

Roads don't have any purpose but movement? So I don't need roads to connect certain resources to my cities? Sorry for being a noob but the worker aspect is what I'm having so much trouble with.

For those of us who MM'ed our workers in civ3, MM'ing them in civ4 seems really easy and quick!

Civ4 worker AI doesn't think ahead (I'm about to learn how to farm in 2 turns) and doesn't know my long term plans.

I've also taken to disabling the city governor; it's better than civ3's city governor, but it still ticks me off. I use it sometimes--especially with worker and settler builds--but I'm turning it off more and more.

I leave roading til there is nothing better to do. It can be useful when attacked (takes AI longer to pillage everything it sees) and for mobility around AIs. Early game I try to connect things with the rivers; saves time.

Oh, and I'm a micromanager of workers, usually.

I always control workers manually.

The AI builds too many stupid, dead-end improvements -- windmills on hills better served with mines, farms when cottages turning in to towns have much better long-term value, and not enough watermills. It also cuts down trees indiscriminately without strategic foresight.

If there were a way to disable tree-cutting, windmills, and auto-farm building, and to set a preference for watermills in every suitable river square, I would probably automate.

When should you build roads though and where? I usually build road on every square with a resource, cottage, or mine (anything that I've built with the worker to begin with) but I build the road as I build the improvements. Like build cottage, then road, then next tile build mine, then road, etc. Should I just build the improvements and then the roads later? I really wish someone could elaborate on just this portion of worker micomanagement.

Only build roads to resources that say "Requires route" when you mouse-over them, such as Wines, Horses...practically every resource.

Hopefully they take this into consideration when developing the expansion (As I'm certain they'll release one). Having a preference page to fine-tune worker automation would be really nice. I micromanage my workers, but it's a tedious affair.

Hopefully they take this into consideration when developing the expansion (As I'm certain they'll release one). Having a preference page to fine-tune worker automation would be really nice. I micromanage my workers, but it's a tedious affair.

It would be a hugely beneficial upgrade, as micromanagement takes a lot of time and the AI decisions are often short-sighted. It would be really nice to be able to turn on or off specific improvements and worker actions (i.e.: no cutting trees, no windmills, but do cut jungles and build cottages, mines, watermills, resource-specific improvements)

Only build roads to resources that say "Requires route" when you mouse-over them, such as Wines, Horses...practically every resource.

Thank you, that's all I needed hehe. Now I can maximize my workers' efficiency.

When should you build roads though and where? I usually build road on every square with a resource, cottage, or mine (anything that I've built with the worker to begin with) but I build the road as I build the improvements. Like build cottage, then road, then next tile build mine, then road, etc. Should I just build the improvements and then the roads later? I really wish someone could elaborate on just this portion of worker micomanagement.

Roads must be used to connect any resource to your city. So, if you've built a mine on some gold, you must have a road connecting that tile to your city in order for the resource to have it's effect (Happy citizens). Without the road, you can still reap the food, hammers, and/or cash of any tile being worked by a citizen, including any bonus associated with that tile's resource and the improvement built there.

Aside from that, the only other benefits provided by roads are increased movement (Unless you're in hostile territory - then you need a particular promotion to be able to utilize their roads for increased movement) and connecting city trade routes.

By "resources", i mean the resources on the map (iron, spices...), not the ones that you build ann improve (cottages, farms...).
It's really a waste to build a road on a cottage or farm because it doesn't help you at all. (besides the movement bonus, of course)

Yeah hehe I understood the first time you said it. Thank you both MSTK and pajarito79.

I'm still working on getting out of this habit, I find myself building roads when I've got much more important things to do.

Same here:blush:

The only roads you will ever REALLY need, in order of priority:

1. Roads for trade network. Make use of rivers! A resource near a river can be connected by just building a road to the river. For resources right beside the river, you only have to build a road on the resource itself to connect it.

2. Roads to connect cities.

3. Roads to speed movement of units to the front.

That should be all you need, although there are a few exceptions. For example I often build roads on every tile in my border cities so that the city garrison can respond quickly to any pillagers the ai sends.

Well having roads/railroads on every tile is useful in that every tile can be accessed (again the key point is the 'nothing better to do' phrase) they can be a very low priority.

In Civ 3 I foulnd that past the early period, I would normally automate my workers, with the do not replace improvements, and then have a few 'non-automated workers' that I assigned to various tasks. (optimizing cities mines<->irrigation as needed... since the initial would already be there)

I micromanage everything up to around 500AD, then I slowly put more and more workers on automation. I take control of a few when new resources are discovered to link them up asap.

Worker micromanagement past 1000-1500AD is such a pain in the ass that I'm not likely to do it anytime soon despite the small efficiency drops.

Later in the game the workers always road every square. Mine are now busy RR'ing every square as well. I thought we weren't going to see this again? While strategically it's nice that if the enemy pillages one square they won't be denying you resources, I'm dreading trying to fight Navy Seals in the modern era.

I used to automate my workes in Civ III, since there were nice features like "No Altering" and such.

At first I MM'ed my workers in Civ IV, got bored and automated them. As a result, stupid workers removed my strategically placed Forts and replaced them with mines.
I didn't notice that until I was attacked by evil Spanish. Conquistadors just wiped my first defenders since they were standing on a bare ground!
So I just need to MM my citizens to protect them from their own stupidity!

I used to automate my workes in Civ III, since there were nice features like "No Altering" and such.


You can still do this: there's a setting in Options for "Keep original improvements." Definitely worth turning on to avoid the situation you describe.

You can still do this: there's a setting in Options for "Keep original improvements." Definitely worth turning on to avoid the situation you describe.

Thanks! :goodjob:
I really should RTFM before the next game.