Originally posted by Old n Slow
Thoughts:
Take two settlers or engineers, first begins the mine, second then founds the city. After the first is finished, you have a city with two foods and three shields -- not too bad. Mine a couple of more hills and your size 2 city now has four foods (no more growth) and nine shields (12 with RR, 24 with factory & Hoovers) -- and JSB is good enough. (I'll have to check & see if a temple is good enough -- I think that HG/Cure should be.) Build the vet units elsewhere, re-home here, repeat with a number of cities as required. A half dozen cities in Appalachia should field the army youve discussed.
I think that your Mech defense example is 6, + 50% for Vet = +3,plus 100% for hill = +6 plus 100% for fort = +6 = total = 21 (I dont think that the "fortifying" adds when one is in a fort or city) but 21 is still seriously tough.
I recall seeing a thread discussing the charging of engineer activity -- iirc, the charge is kept within one unit, and two units contribute per space max* (*however, that can be adjusted by working, waking and leaving one unit to carry the charge of the others so with some tricky work TEN engineers can contribute & the one unit would carry the ten charges). Also I believe that the charges ARE transferable -- so one charge from RR is = one charge of pollution removal is = to one charge towards transforming a mountain, etc.
Some good thoughts -- I particularly like the drop an Eng, found a city, move the boats in & save moves idea.
I do like your term "Appalachia". It accurately describes the kind of terrain that is ideal for military cities (MC) - forests, hills, mountains - and which usually is too costly to develop for normal cities.
I'm afraid I don't quite follow your first thought. If I understand correctly, you build a city (terrain of actual city square not specified) with hills + mining as a supply square and end up with a size 1 city with 2 food and 3 shields. As the mined hills produce 3 shields (no RR) and 1 food, then I don't understand how city square can produce 1 food and no shields and still be useful for an MC.
Assuming that you put the city on a regular forest square, you would end up with 2 food and 6 shields. However, such a city could not be expanded to size 2 by mining a couple of more hills as supply squares. Because a size 2 city can use only 2 supply squares, total food production would be 3 not 4 - not enough to support the population. A size 2 city has to be on, or be supplied by a square that produces at least 2 food if all other squares produce only 1.
Regarding MC that support military units without any possibility of unhappiness, in an earlier thread Xin Yu described how Bach could be used to create size 2 cities. I have tried to show that you don't need either Bach or the Cure for Cancer to build up to size 2 MC; that having the Cure permits up to size 3; with Bach you can build up to size 4 and with both wonders size 5 is possible although of limited practical use. In reply to your thoughts about size 2 MC: yes, HG/Cure will keep a size 2 MC happy but a temple will not. You need trade arrows plus possibly a courthouse.
Actually, in the download I was wrong in the maximum size possible for MC when you have NEITHER wonder. The true size limit is 3, with the city on grassland or forest (+ pheasant) and three supply squares (hills or forests) that have a river. With a factory, manuf. plant, power plant or Hoover, temple, marketplace and courthouse the city can support a minimum of 25 units and a maximum of 40 units if you're lucky enough to have coal on one of the hill squares.
My key point is that, even in the worst case when you have neither wonder, you can build basic size 1 MC that can support 15 - 25 military units. Simply build the city on a forest square, use forest or hills for a supply square, and put a courthouse in the city. If forest or hill squares with rivers or other trade generating features are available, city size can be increased so the city generates more shields. For players who prefer democracy as their government, this means that the size of their armed forces is limited by the number of MC they can or want to build and not by either the need to keep their citizens content or the ownership of HG, Bach or Cure.
Regarding the defense value of a veteran mech. inf. in a fortress on a hill, I was obviously wrong to include the unit fortify bonus in projecting its eventual defensive strength once it was fortified. However, I think that its present defensive strength is correct as stated. The most exhaustive thread about defense bonuses that I am aware of is on Apolyton and can be found by searching that site for "DEFENSE MULTIPLIERS". After extensive testing, their final conclusion was that defense bonuses are multiplied rather than added. So, I think the correct defensive strength for the unit is:
Mech Inf = 6
Veteran (+50%) = 9
Fortress (+100%) = 18
Hill (+100%) = 36
or Defensive strength = 6 * 1.5 * 2 * 2 = 36
I believe that the thread on defense multipliers at CFC concludes the same thing but with the extra conclusion that river bonuses (+50%) are added rather than multiplied.
Thank you for the tip on existing posts about loading charges or points to create combat engineers. The method I use sounds pretty simple by comparison. I'm very interested in the previous posts so I'll do a search because there are times when I have a lot of engineers and want a fast terrain transform.