Workers and Water Mills

I like watermill more than what I'm reading here. Improved tiles are great, but the building has its benefits like not costing 2 food to work, and not beeing pillaged by troll barbarians

Solutionfinder said:

Water mill - well it really is worth building where I plan to set up a guild. That`s 1 free specialist.

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River for mill means the city can build a garden too -- buff to the 1 free specialist.

Coming to this game after having played I, II, III and IV, it took me a while to wrap my head around what granaries and water mills now do and why that matters strategically. I generally agree with the importance of workers, but everything is map dependent. You can prep are the tiles you want, but if you are too low in population to work them, it takes a while for that to pay off. With water mills, you get extra production and food for only the price of maintenance and the hammers. In fact, if you are swimming in gold but not hammers, it could make sense to buy a water mill in a city that needs a jump start.

In answer to the original question, I see three reasonable choices for water mills in each city:
1) A water mill in this city will not sufficiently offset the cost in gold or hammers and/or maintenance.
2) A water mill in this city will be useful, but can be prioritized low.
3) This city was located where it is for reasons other than food. It will be OK once it grows a bit, but it needs a water mill asap to boost population and hammers. I can afford the maintenance cost. I'll either build it or buy it as soon as possible in this city.

ER, I agree that you have correctly listed the three possibilities.

EditorRex said:

1) A water mill in this city will not sufficiently offset the cost in gold or hammers and/or maintenance.

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I remain unconvinced that your (1) is ever true. Yields in V are so much tighter than with previous iterations. So then it is down to (2) or (3), but that’s a more difficult call.

beetle said:

I remain unconvinced that your (1) is ever true. Yields in V are so much tighter than with previous iterations. So then it is down to (2) or (3), but that’s a more difficult call.

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I've placed a city in the middle of desert, tundra, AND snow (as in 3+ cities overall across multiple games) solely for oil/aluminum/uranium at times when the map really lacked it and I couldn't get it in another fashion. In those cases I basically just said "the 5% (technically less, mind you) and 10% culture hit is worth it because I need those resources." And in those cases I didn't give a damn what the city itself did, keeping it at 1 pop and working some production or gold was fine...definitely didn't need a water mill.

But that's really more of an edge case.

beetle said:

ER, I agree that you have correctly listed the three possibilities.



I remain unconvinced that your (1) is ever true. Yields in V are so much tighter than with previous iterations. So then it is down to (2) or (3), but that’s a more difficult call.

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I see your point, but think of it this way: Situation 1 is really just situation 2 in which you win without ever getting around to building the mill. Something else is always more urgent, but had there been more time, you would have built that mill.