City Placement

[Obnoxious Bread]

I'm kindda new to the whole "city specialization" concept, but so far I can't seem to land the best sites for my cities. I just started a new game as Ragnar and was wondering if I could get any advice on where to place my cities and what to specialize them in on this map:



Any other tips about what i'm doing wrong are welcome...

[Shafi-is-back]

post a save of the game. we can then mark all the city locations in game and share with you.

[Obnoxious Bread]

Here is the save.

Thanks in advance

[vranasm]

I found out that it's better from start to focus more on grabbing good city spots and making good overall strategy then to specialize from T25.

If you catch good spots, you usually improve food first, hills second (or specials as metal, horses etc.) and then you worry about what to place in the city next...

you will eventually find out what to do with the city after a while

[Mantic0re]

Early commerce resources are important. I'd probably try to get my first city running early on the gold. The thing I struggle with is whether or not to make 2 gold cities or just do one. There is some nice pretty green nearby (with crappy unworkable mountains I think :-( ).

I think I'd do a gold/horse/pig city and and another with the sugar and as much grassland as possible while still getting the 2nd gold.
You could settle on the eastern gold for a nice single city but settling on resources is still something i dislike.

3rd city is a judgment call that will come as you meet neighbors and explore more I think. Copper/stone is a nice city but we don't see any food for it so that may not be best. I like the wheat/cow/clam city for a worker/settler pump and GP farm maybe as a third city (if no food near copper/stone).

[vranasm]

btw that easter corn+sheep+horses+wine spot is not well scouted. Tough to say how to place there cities without knowing the seafood situation.

the same on western side with 2xsheep+horse spot.

oh and the 2xgold+pigs+horses+silk on north east should be scouted better too. Tough to judge if you can make some coastal seafood+horse spot and 2xgold+silk+pigs or there you have to place only 1 city for all those resources.

there is plenty of good land. I see at least 6 good city spots, with good early happiness, good map

and you even have stone nearby... (badly scouted too btw)

edit: can you provide 4000BC save?

[lymond]

I recommend getting the BUG mod too

Also, scout your nearby land a little better - remove fog to east and west.

Learn to do without Stonehenge. Get out some fog busting warriors and expand.

[Shafi-is-back]

Ok, here's a dot map of city locations i would pick (assuming the AI wont take up any of these spots of course)









Ok, so if i am to categorise these cities and justify my choices -

1) RED - Commerce city. Wheat and Deer as food resources for growth + you get the furs for commerce and more importantly its a hapiness resource. More often than not, hapiness is an issue and hence you need to make sure you claim as many happy resources as possible. The reason i would settle this city is for the Furs. It is an average city in my opinion. Not too bad once you cottage those riverside tiles.

2) YELLOW - Production city. Pigs for growth. Most importantly you get access to Stone for the mids.

3) GREEN - Production city. Corn + Sheep provide the food for growth.

4) TURQOISE - Commerce city. Gold + Silk resources provide loads of commerce + hapiness too. Riverside tiles can be farmed and cottaged to allow enough food for growth. Due to the presence of flood plains this city will grow fine even without food resources.

5) Dark Blue - Awsome commerce city. Cottage all of those flood plains. sit back and enjoy. You dont need any food resouces with all those flood plains + wine to boot.

6) Yellow 2 - Gives access to copper. Production city. Pigs + bananas for growth.

7) White - Commerce city. Gives access to Ivory. Banan for food. Cottage all of the land. An average city but will be great once the cottages mature + the access to ivory is important.

8) Pink - Super commerce city, with all those gems + dyes you will be rolling in commerce. Rice for growth too.

9) Black - Commerce city and / or GP farm. Cows+Rice+Banana provides plenty of food and you can run specialists with all that food surplus or you can cottage the rest of the land and expirience rapid growth or do both (i.e. run specialists and cottage the land as well)

Note - without IW you cannot improve all those cities in the jungle. Also, you would have to move really fast if you want to claim all that land near the AI. It may be somewhat doable on warlord level i guess.