What does that have to do with anything? You either build it because it makes sense (most of the time) or you don't (because it's too late and thus negligible ROI).
Water Mill Pros and Cons
- Thread starter socrateach
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What does that have to do with anything? You either build it because it makes sense (most of the time) or you don't (because it's too late and thus negligible ROI).
Not everyone plays to min-max, some folks like some immersion too. Guess that was the point.
I like them to help kickstart an early city a bit. If I don't have much cash laying around, I will make sure to spend what I do have on hand on a Water Mill early on, so that the city can build the various other important pieces a bit faster while boosting growth. This is of course especially good in low-production cities.
Yeah it's effects diminish later on, but in a new city? It's just a good building.
Don't really see the con of them to be honest. For their maintenance and hammer cost they're almost always going to be worthwhile and will pay for themselves hammerwise over the length of the game - as you're likely to be building them from about the classical era - or if its later then they can give you a quick boost - but nothing special.
Always remember that anything that gives you 2 food means that a specialist can be worked - or a non-food producing tile without sacrificing growth so that's important;
Re: the fact that the 1 hammer increase is nothing - yes but these things add up. Once you start getting buildings that give you percentage increases on your hammers, like workshops, factories, hydro plants, solar plants, nuclear plants etc then every hammer counts!
Always remember that anything that gives you 2 food means that a specialist can be worked - or a non-food producing tile without sacrificing growth so that's important;
Re: the fact that the 1 hammer increase is nothing - yes but these things add up. Once you start getting buildings that give you percentage increases on your hammers, like workshops, factories, hydro plants, solar plants, nuclear plants etc then every hammer counts!
You can think of the watermill as +4 hammers since it gives you a hammer and allows you to work an extra mined hill without starving.
If you're growing the city then the upkeep is negligible since the bigger city will give you more gold from your city connection.
Well worth it. Anything that gives hammers should be built. I'll build a stable with 1 pasture. Every hammer counts. Anything that gives you food allows you to work more production.
If you're growing the city then the upkeep is negligible since the bigger city will give you more gold from your city connection.
Well worth it. Anything that gives hammers should be built. I'll build a stable with 1 pasture. Every hammer counts. Anything that gives you food allows you to work more production.
anthropophage
Warlord
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Building a stable with one pasture is a total waste. It costs 100 hammers in construction costs and one gold per turn in upkeep.
Personally I always build Stable; but I've modded the stable to not require upkeep.
It's rare that I build watermills. The reason is that at the time watermills show up there are so many other things to build:
Units, libraries, settlers, workers, caravans, wonders, happiness buildings... and the list goes on.
Granary is right on track on the tech-path and +2 food early is a significant increase if you only produce 1-4 food.
There are situations where I think it's worthwhile to build watermills (high production and happiness and low food and nothing with higher priority to build). These situations are rather rare though...
Units, libraries, settlers, workers, caravans, wonders, happiness buildings... and the list goes on.
Granary is right on track on the tech-path and +2 food early is a significant increase if you only produce 1-4 food.
There are situations where I think it's worthwhile to build watermills (high production and happiness and low food and nothing with higher priority to build). These situations are rather rare though...
The stable gives you tons of free hammers when building horse units plus more production for the rest of the entire game. Things which compound your production by giving you 10% or 15% production make every single hammer count all the more.
this ^^
Gamewizard
Emperor
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I always try to prioritize watermills if I have the happiness and gpt to support them. Allows for an extra specialist or mine to be worked without sacrificing growth.
Memoryjar
Emperor
I didn't think about specialist slots. Thanks all.
budweiser
King of the Beers
I just had a thought that, yeah, a water mill could let you run a merchant for free once you get a market. No wonder no one uses them.
anthropophage
Warlord
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Assuming one hammer is equal to two gold then the break even point for for a stable with only one pasture that doesn't build any horse units is 200 turns. So how many horse units can you reasonably expect to build in the average game? 2? 3? Because you'll gain about 1/7th of their hammer cost by producing from a city with a stable.
I have not been considering buildings this carefully! With every early build being so critical, this bad habit may be why I have such difficulty with immortal. Still, water mills always seem worth it.
Most wars are largely xbows plus knights before renaissance. A lot of xbows and a lot of knights. Then it switches over to artillery and mass mass cavalry so I would say that a stable pays for itself rather quickly. In industrial my army will often consist of more than 50% cavs & lancers.
Also, that extra hammer gets compounded by workshops(10%), iron works(15%), golden ages(20%), the stable itself, then later factories, nuclear plants, solar plants, railroads, etc.. I am probably missing stuff I can't think of off the top of my head.
When you are at war all you care about is having more hammers to get units out quicker than your opponent. Your GPT doesn't matter a whole lot when you're dead. So, building it is kind of like saving up hammers for later when you really need them.
I mostly play Korea, so all the food and specialist buildings help.
Gamewizard
Emperor
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Totally off topic, but GM, GS and GE should each have its own GP counter and each should be nerfed to the level of the GM. /endrant.
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