Micromanagement is alive and well in Civ 4!

Zombie69 said:
Pop rushing is way overpowered in this game, and should be abused to the max if you intend to master this game. Part of the reason why it's so overpowered is because of a bad calculation that they haven't even bothered to fix in patch 1.61.

Some aspects of the problem were fixed, but, you're right that it still doesn't seem to be working right. :blush:
 
To their own admission, they only fixed a part of the problem that occured at speeds other than normal. At normal speed, it's just as buggy as it's ever been, because the part that they fixed didn't apply. And the part that they didn't fix also happens to matter at other speeds as well, it just wasn't as obvious as the part that they did fix. I hope i'm not being too obscure here!
 
"Failed to fix" is not the same as "didn't bother to fix". That's all I'm saying.

I will try to make sure this gets fixed in the expansion.
 
Which is useless as far as i'm concerned since i have no intention of buying the expansion. But thanks anyway.

I say failed to fix and didn't bother to fix are the same. Both problems were known and they only fixed one. That to me says didn't bother.
 
Zombie69 said:
I say failed to fix and didn't bother to fix are the same. Both problems were known and they only fixed one. That to me says didn't bother.

If a person tries to hit the ball, but strikes out, would one say he "didn't bother" to get on base?
 
If i throw two balls at you, one after the other, and you don't even try hitting the second, then i can say you didn't bother with the second ball. We all knew there were two balls, yet they only bothered with the first one.
 
Zombie69 said:
If i throw two balls at you, one after the other, and you don't even try hitting the second, then i can say you didn't bother with the second ball. We all knew there were two balls, yet they only bothered with the first one.

You're wrong. I guess there's nothing more to be said.
 
I was gonna say let's agree to disagree, but i guess you're not that civil.

I only play normal speed. The problem that they fixed never applied to me. It only applied to other speeds. The problem that did apply to me (which was obviously a different problem altogether) was never fixed.

Either they didn't know it existed (even though they could have found out just by reading the other thread properly, so this amounts to not bothering getting the information needed), or they knew it existed and didn't bother fixing it (and we've seen many times in the past how lazy their programming is, so this is also quite likely).
 
Or they knew about it, attempted to fix it, and were unable to.
 
perhaps the fix was not complete by the deadline to release the patch, or the fix was completed but caused other bigger problems. those working the different 'fixes' were probably given a deadlind, and did as much as could be done in the amount of time available. i think "didn't bother" is kind of a harsh judgement to make without having the insight of the other side of the story. i hope others give you little more credit. in your original post you missed several points others brought up in the thread. you yourself said you would need to include. i don't think you "didn't bother". we would never be so harsh...
 
Zombie69 said:
I would micromanage it this way. On the first turn, i will make him move 3 tiles. He still has 1/2 movement left. Then i ask him to make an improvement there. It could be anything i know i'll need there in the future. Then i cancel the order. Part of the improvement will already be done for later when i come back to it. For example, if i ask for a cottage (4 turns) and cancel, when i come back to it, there will only be 3 turns left to do. Therefore the turn hasn't been wasted.
Zombie - when you come back to the tile that has had 1/4 cottage build on it - how do you know that it has 1/4 cottage and not 1/4 farm (or similar)?
 
Ruff_hi, read the first post of the second page. Roland explains it perfectly.

Codeman, please point me to those points that i need to include and i'll see what i can do.
 
Zombie69 said:
Ruff_hi, read the first post of the second page. Roland explains it perfectly.
Thx Z - it doesn't fully answer the question. It only tells you how many turns to completion. I play different games at different speeds and haven't committed all of that information to memory (ie turns to chop @ normal, turns to cottage @ epic, etc). When I mouse over, it just says '3 turns to cottage' while I would have liked it to say '3 turns to cottage - 25% complete' or something similar.
 
If you don't know how many turns it normally takes, then just do the same with a tile you know hasn't been improved yet to compare the results.
 
Good addition on the whipping, Zombie. Whipping is really powerful, I agree. And the bug makes it even more powerful. I personally don't like the micromanagement that is needed to get the optimum power from it.

I would like to add one thing. Each farm that you use to facillitate the whipping could have been a developed cottage (or other good tile improvement). If you whip your city to be on average 2-3 sizes below it's maximum happiness/health level, then the cost of that is also 2-3 developed cottages not being used. I haven't done any calculations on this, but the costs could be quite high. Especially at the start of the game, when you need every penny to maintain your empire, these costs could maybe not be worth it in some cases.

Could you comment?
 
In most cases, i still use cottages rather than farm, and whip with whatever amount of food i have left, which is usually quite enough.

As for not using some tiles while growing back up, usually that's not so bad, but in tough to call cases i'll calculate the Food/Production/Commerce lost and compare that to the Production gained before deciding whether to whip. In general, this becomes less of a factor the more food surplus the city has because you regain your pop faster.

In addition, i try to whip in a way that only costs me marginal tiles. I try to keep all the really good tiles still in use after whipping, and decide how many pop points to whip accordingly.
 
Ok, thank you. Then I think that we roughly play the same (on this point at least) only you probably play a bit more precise with more calculation. I can't bring myself to do that kind of micromanagement as I generally play on huge maps.

I'm also still looking for ways to balance the game, haven't been playing a lot lately. But it's good to hear how a player like you looks at these things because I know that you really think about it and don't just do something because it sounds good.
 
I forgot to add something to the article. I'll add it right now.

Whenever you've got a big overflow from whipping, it's often a good idea to use that overflow on a worker or settler. This way, you're not wasting your time making them the normal way and getting only 1 hammer per food. Also, workers and settlers make good candidates to whip themselves for the same reason.
 
I am not as much of a fan of whipping in my science centers. Here's my reasoning: In those places all I'm building is a granery, a library, maybe a market, and a university, Oxford University, etc...

I whip the granery if it's going to be finished shortly after a pop increase. But I don't usually whip the others, because my goal is to completely maximize the number of citizens working in cottages. That maximizes my science centers' output in later turns.

So if I have extra food available I'd love to use it by working more cottages rather than building more buildings (in science centers). The exception is where the city already has hit its happiness peak, and then whipping makes a little more sense (although I don't mind having one or two unhappy citizens waiting for me to connect another resources and start working a cottage.) Another exception is where I want to quickly finish my last couple universities, so that my capital can build Oxford.

But this discussion only applies to my science centers. Other places, where I'm focusing on production or GP farming are more likely to get the whip.
 
Zombie69 said:
Codeman, please point me to those points that i need to include and i'll see what i can do.

i thinik you've pretty well added most of your additional thoughts as well as the insight of some others. and thank you. i was only saying we all know the little things not in the original post weren't left out because you didn't bother. some of them you just needed to complete before including. but very informative and helpful article. thank you.
 
Top Bottom