Workers - auto or not?

L

lcm1947

Chieftain
Joined
Apr 16, 2013
Messages
34
I am assuming that putting workers on auto is good as they repair or improve stuff that you otherwise wouldn't even be aware needed attention but am I correct?
 
The general consensus is to never automate workers. They can make the wrong improvements, wander off and get captured by a barb, or build roads nilly-willy that are useless and will kill your bank account.

You're definitely better off controlling the workers.
 
Never never never. The worst thing they do is build unnecessary roads, costing you money.

But you really want to control what they're improving - focus luxuries first, farms second, mines and roads third, and trading posts in puppets fourth.
 
I automate workers usually ~turn 150ish. After that, most of my core cities have all the tiles improved, so workers just go off and spam trading posts in all my puppet cities. Would still be better to manually use them, but honestly I don't have the patience to individually build 100 trading posts and manually try and update all the roads into railroads. Not concerned about barbs or stolen workers, as I end up getting way more than I need through capturing enemy cities anyway.
 
I always manually control my workers until i develop railroads, then I automate because the first thing they will do is convert all roads to railroads, and by about that time i'm discovering aluminum and oil anyway, and they'll automatically track them down and harvest them.

But I'm not that great at Civ so.. :crazyeye:
 
I find they wander off and do stupid things so I always manually control them. The few times I miss click I am usually stunned at what they do as it's so not a good choice and invariably it's the worst of all possible choices.
 
beestbijnacht said:
I always manually control my workers until i develop railroads, then I automate because the first thing they will do is convert all roads to railroads, and by about that time i'm discovering aluminum and oil anyway, and they'll automatically track them down and harvest them.
Click to expand...

I'm the same way. I never automate if it's on a jungle map though, because they just love to clear cut everything for a farm.
 
Necrotaur said:
I'm the same way. I never automate if it's on a jungle map though, because they just love to clear cut everything for a farm.
Click to expand...

There is a setting to tell them not to clear terrain features (jungle/forest/marsh). Not that this makes the worker much better when automated.
 
I never automate for the reasons already listed.

If you automate to deal with railroads, then you should just use the relay command that tells a worker to build a road across multiple tiles. Set them on the road outside one city, click on the road outside another, and they will automatically upgrade the roads to railroads until finished. They don't deviate from the path, either.
 
I automate workers if all my cities are in the same place. Otherwise, I never bother, since they will attempt to cross oceans and get squished by barbarian caravels.
 
I will usually automate once I discover railroads. This is usually due to the fact that by that time I have a sprawling puppet empire and the AI knows to spam TPs all over the puppets, and by that time you'll be close to discovering and mining Coal, Aluminum, and Uranium. These will almost always be worthwhile to mine. Of course, if I'm going Tall I just control the workers myself.
 
I'm in awe of those of you who never automate. When I have more than ~5 core cities and just as many puppets, I'll focus on my key 4 cities.

Once I'm happy with where they're at, I set them to automate and intervene on occasion.
 
I never automate. If there's nothing better to do than automate my workers, I'll just delete them and save myself some GPT.
 
whyidie said:
I'm in awe of those of you who never automate. When I have more than ~5 core cities and just as many puppets, I'll focus on my key 4 cities.

Once I'm happy with where they're at, I set them to automate and intervene on occasion.
Click to expand...

I just prefer knowing that I am in complete control of my infrastructure. Even with remove features turned off they don't tend to build the improvements that I want; they just follow whatever is suggested.

I usually play wide so I'm used to micromanaging workers across 8+ cities. I can see how it could get monotonous, but it's part of the fun for me. I enjoy taking my time with the turns rather than mashing next turn over and over until I win.
 
Not. Workers usually build things that aren't needed sometimes, while rushing through the turns is already fast, automated workers will make the turns even faster.
 
Next game I play I'm going to take this advice and not automate. I'm an admitted lazy Civ player who sticks to what he's good at and enjoys the conquest and building. After awhile, I automate workers... but I did notice in the last game that they were building stupid roads... my understanding is that if I have harbors connecting cities on an island map, I don't really need roads at all, right?
 
Harbors will provide trade route connections, so roads should not be necessary to connect coastal cities to a coastal capital (as long as the seas are clear). However, if you have an interior city, youll still need a road to the nearest city with a harbor. Also if you need to move units quickly from one side of an island to the other, road may still be useful.
 
Especially on higher difficulties when you need to meticulously manage everything, automating workers is the last thing you need to do.
 
You also get a production bonus from a railroad, and that may be worth it by itself.
 
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