Do you ever make resource colonies??

justanick said:

Navigation is often skipped in order to reach the later eras more early.

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I guess it comes down to game play style .I go for the trade routes and I trade world maps asap.

I only build a colony when i reach the city limit. If the colony could transport the goods over seas through a harbour or airport i'd use them regularly. No harbours without cities and airfields don't work that way. I also really want to be able to build shipping canals bridges and reclaim land from the sea. I've considered making sea terrain into land (land units impassable in the blue and ships impassable on the green). That would make VTOL and Amphibious units Work better but it would make other aspects of the game faulty. Even using LM land with a coast graphic to build bridges will impact on shipping. Also if the colony could be converted into a city at a later date by investing some money (not using a settler) i'd be perfectly willing.

I've used colonies a couple of times. Rarely there is a large desert area in the middle of my territory. A desert city would be pathetic and it would take a long time before the culture boundaries from cities surrounding the desert would grow enough to reach the resource. Once there were only two saltpetre deposits on my continent - one in my desert and the other was on a easily accessible hill in Mayan territory. Good use of a slave worker.

One time the only elephant was a long way off and a colony allowed me to build Statue of Zeus. I sneaked a worker past the Aztecs before their culture closed the alleyway. The ivory was delivered with the help of Aztec roads. I repaid their generosity by annihilating them with Ancient Cavalry.

The only outpost I ever built was on a single pixel hill in the middle of a strait. The outpost lit up the gap between two of my coastal cities. It was a waste of a worker.

In my latest games the AI use forts on about a third of the resources beyond city lines. Some civs only use forts.

I had a game today during which I benefitted from using a colony late in the game.

I was playing as Germany. I was the leading power on my home continent, but I still had a respectable rival (Babylon- I was No. 1 in the world, but Babylon was No. 3). Babylon had the only source of Rubber on my home continent, and it was next to one of its old core cities. I conquered that city, but I razed it out of culture flip concerns. I then used one of the workers generated after the razing to build a crucial Rubber colony.

I could have built a city there instead of a colony, but it would have been too close to other cities and interfered with my city spacing scheme. I ended up building a suitably spaced city nearby the turn after I built the colony. Eventually, that new city grew enough in culture to eclipse my Rubber colony. But for the 10 or so turns needed to grow the culture, the Rubber colony enabled me to churn out units.

I thought that's what slave workers are good for?
Actually, it depends on many circumstances. For example, hilly areas with iron on a mountain or a hill with 4-5 culture tiles away is doable, if there are better places for a city. I guess it's same with a desert area. Often other AI-s get to important tiles(with luxuries and strategic resources) pretty fast, so conquering those cities is another option.
In overall, it depends on return-of-investment. Sometimes the least intuitive decision is the right one.
Speaking of outposts - I guess this one really needs a boost. Even using a slave worker for that would be a waste.

We do use outpost in the early game 'occasionally'.

For outposts the range 3 (so one more) on mountains can make them worthwhile if you want to keep track of enemy troops or a large mountainous area. Otherwise they have the same range as a unit, so I only use them rarely if there is a place I cannot see that might have an enemy landing or such, but don't want to waste a unit to watch.

I'm considering allowing standard infantry units to build outposts and colony's to take immediate advantage of an opportunity. I'm holding off not because of the cost of a combat unit just that combat units building colony's seams odd. If I was to send a specific unit I'd send a settler. A naff city is still better than a colony, an outpost, a fortress and an airfield combined.

I will build them on a periodic basis if it looks like it will be a while before I can get a city into the area or if the resource is in the mountains and it is not possible to build a city. When that happens, I also build a fortress on it and put in a couple of capable defenders, as if I do not, my nasty barbarians home in on it and pillage, plunder, and destroy it. Then there are my dinosaurs. I hate having colony eaten by a T-Rex.

I have been playing Civ III since it first came out and I don't think I have ever used more than 2 colonies in that time. <my bad>>> I have been known to plop a city near an AI civ colony just for fun.

darski said:

I have been playing Civ III since it first came out and I don't think I have ever used more than 2 colonies in that time. <my bad>>> I have been known to plop a city near an AI civ colony just for fun.

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That is a fun thing to do, I would agree.

Strong Reaction said:

How 'bout the explorer unit. I am guessing no one uses that unit.

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You would be mistaken. They make for a good pillaging unit. Even by themselves. And if you put a pack of them underneath a fast army, you can pillage a lot of squares in a short amount of time.

Spoonwood said:

You would be mistaken. They make for a good pillaging unit. Even by themselves. And if you put a pack of them underneath a fast army, you can pillage a lot of squares in a short amount of time.

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For a really nasty unit, try an army of Spanish Conquistadors for pillaging, or a stack of individual ones. Not only can they pillage, but they are able to fight as well.