Help! how to settle a city!?

Hi guys,
I’m working on a project on “Civlization 5” for my one of my courses in Engineering. I need some people to help me collect some data for benchmarking.
Please compare the following factors while choosing to settle a city. Identify which factor you consider more important within that context, and give that factor a score on a scale of 1 to 10 to denote its significance:

• Terrain vs. Resources
• Terrain vs. Opponents
• Terrain vs. Fit with other cities
• Resources vs. Opponents
• Resources vs. Fit with other cities
• Opponent vs. Fit with other cities

i.e. Terrain vs. Resources
Answer: Terrain 5 – This means that the player considers “terrain” to be moderately more important than “resources” while placing a new city.

For scoring, please use the following reference:
1 = Factor is of equal importance
3 = Factor is weakly more important
5 = Factor is moderately more important
7 = Factor is strongly more important
9 = Factor is absolutely more important

Thanks very much guys. I look forward to hearing your responses, and if anybody is interested I can always message you the results.

Why don't you do your own homework.

charon2112 said:

Why don't you do your own homework.

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Honestly now, he's asking for PEOPLE'S benchmarks, and you give that kind of haughty response? Jeez.

• Terrain vs. Resources = 1. Honestly, the terrain and resources interact, so...
• Terrain vs. Opponents = 9 in favor of terrain. If it's defendable, the opponents don't matter.
• Terrain vs. Fit with other cities = 3 in favor of fitting with other cities. If there's too much overlap, then it's a no go.
• Resources vs. Opponents = 9 In favor of resources. See Terrain vs Opponents.
• Resources vs. Fit with other cities = 1. The 'overlap' also includes the resources, so yeah.
• Opponent vs. Fit with other cities = 9 in favor of Fit with other cities. Again, see above.

least he can do is make some sort of survey on surveymonkey.

I don't even understand how to answer his questions.

This is incoherent. It's impossible to believe that Terrain is less important than resources?

I need some people to help me collect some data for benchmarking.

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You would be better off observing MP games instead of asking for opinions. One is fit for an engineering class, while the other is fit for a statistics class.

Not that you can make an objective statistical analysis from the formatting of the question and delivery.

• Terrain vs. Resources - 7; both food and production are very dependent on terrain; I'll gladly accept missing the odd iron deposit or some cattle over good terrain.
• Terrain vs. Opponents - 3; I think opponents are somewhat more crucial for how your game will go. If your starting terrain isn't great but your opponents aren't stopping you fro expanding into better surroundings, than that seems better than the other way around.
• Terrain vs. Fit with other cities - 7; it's nice if good city spots can be found 4 or 5 tiles away from the capital, but if better spots are further out I'll go further out. Maybe in vanilla this wouldn't be wise with the more aggressive AI, but since Gods & Kings outward settling has become a lot more viable.
• Resources vs. Opponents - 1; resources you miss you can trade for if you have good opponents, but even plenty of resources aren't much good if you have reluctant trading partners.
• Resources vs. Fit with other cities - 7; resources are still more important than keeping an ideal distance between cities.
• Opponent vs. Fit with other cities - 9; I think the 'vs.' in this question is a bit odd, because it's for opponents you want to 'fit' cities with each other, to be able to defend them against opponents. Without those opponents you would just sprinkle them around anywhere.

'Terrain' is a bit of a broad category. A border city might want to be on a hill for defence; a hinterland city would rather be on a flat riverside for water and wind power. If there's no seafood, then a vaguely coastal city might want to be built inland so as to avoid being levelled by Frigates and stormed by a Privateer.

If it's early in the game, settling on a luxury - especially on a hill or a terrain I can't yet clear - is desirable. Not so much when I've got Calendar, Bronze Working and a squad of Workers.

If I've got a couple of Great Generals, I might settle on a rival's border to have Citadels barge in towards their capital.

Every city is different, and my weighing of factors like resource acquisition, proximity of rivals and fitting with my existing cities varies tremendously based on the situation.

I just asked Hiawatha and he said "Any empty tile is as good as another, just get it built and find the next available tile"; at least I think that's what he said.

MIE1403, just post your results in this thread when you are done

I've just got a little problem with your research. It's simplified to the point that it results will most likely be useless. There are 2 reasons for that:
1) Localization decision is based on 2 general factors: general strategy and localization. You are taking into consideration only the 2nd element. If I'm going to spam cities (unlikely in BNW), i'll be willing to forgo strategic/luxury resources because other cities will claim them anyway soon afterwards. But if I'm playing tall, I'll be maximizing access especially to luxury resources and certain strategic ones.
2) There are resources and there are resources. I couldn't care less about additional horses, but when I'm able to steal coal from my opponent, I usually go for it. Same with the issue of obtaining the 5th ivory or the 3rd furs. There are many detailed factors hidden inside your much more vague factors presented for us to evaluate in opposition to other general factors.
I could also add the 3rd element: specific situation. There are cases when you want to bridge two basins with your canal-city. In other cases, you may be going for a mountain or the ability to block your opponents' movement with your territory. I've just done that twice in my latest game.

There's also a simple methodological issue. You are asking us to evaluate these factors in opposition to each other. In such case, 1 should mean that factor A is more important than factor B, 5 should name them equally important, and 10 should indicate importance of factor B. Otherwise, you'll get responses completely unrelated to one another. I really think you should consult your teacher about your methodology.


But let's go on with your version of this study (and my evaluation system laid out above)
Assuming that I'm playing a typical immortal-difficulty BNW game:
• Terrain vs. Resources (6)
These factors are extremely correlated. Terrain is a slightly long-term issue because good resources give you simply faster start. I can move a little towards good resources as long as it won't chase me away from good general location.
• Terrain vs. Opponents (3)
On higher levels, you cannot afford to settle bad land only because your opponents are looming. If you do so, it's a walkover. Some reason needs to be applied, ofc.
• Terrain vs. Fit with other cities (7)
This is crucial in BNW games. You need to grow your cities fast and high, what is impossible when your cities cannibalize each other. Having your cities all around the continent is also very problematic.
• Resources vs. Opponents (2)
As I said above, screw them. I'm giving 2 instead of 1 only because sometimes it's a good idea to deprive your opponents of some resources.
• Resources vs. Fit with other cities (9)
If your cities are properly placed, you've already covered all the resources. It's rare to see cities move only because of a single resource, though it can happen.
• Opponent vs. Fit with other cities (9)
Again, you need to focus on yourself in BNW. If you don't, you lose. It doesn't mean, ofc, that it's a good idea to settle your city in the middle of a circle created by 3 zulu cities.

lindsay40k said:

'Terrain' is a bit of a broad category. A border city might want to be on a hill for defence; a hinterland city would rather be on a flat riverside for water and wind power. If there's no seafood, then a vaguely coastal city might want to be built inland so as to avoid being levelled by Frigates and stormed by a Privateer.

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I'll try to give this some thought later today. However, I do want to agree that "defense" is an important category in its own right that I'll often factor into city locations. Sometimes I might give it disproportionate weight just because it's more fun (likewise, I give canal cities more weight than they're worth because they're hard to pull off).

Quick question. If we think the second factor is more important, do we give negative numbers or how does that work?