Food city

[Civsassin]

In a recent game, I founded a colony that had several seafood reasources and optimum farm tiles. I founded this city as my first one, and began bringing in farmers and fisherman to work those tiles. Before too long, I was pumping out 30+ extra food per turn and generating colonists every six turns or so. Many of which, I sent to local Indian reservations to acquire new skills. This was a great pump to get my other colonies up and populated and with the right mix of colonists. I then found another High food location on the cost that I started setting up as my production city. I assigned colonists to generate coats and cigars (my best local resources), and I found three other colonies for the sole purpose of feeding that colony with furs and tobacco. My two food rich cities eventually became my production cities, and I was pumping out enough horses, guns, and tools to finish all tool-reqiuring buildings and build up in preparation for the REF.

Another key was having enough wagon trains to keep the flow of goods moving, so I wasn't losing anything. I think I probably have a very high efficiency using the fruits of the land.

I haven't finished the game, but it seems like a very promising strategy. Thoughts, comments?

 

[historix69]

Food Cities are a well known strategy from Col1.

In Col1 they were combined with a University, producing Veteran Soldiers and other specialists ... due to increasing educational costs in Col2, usefullness of Universities is reduced.

If you want to increase your food-production even more, use the following :
- 100% Rebel Sentiment -> 50% production bonus
- FF Cyrus McCormick -> +1 Food per Tile (where 2 or more Food is harvested)
- Slavery -> + 25% Food

 

[Bad Brett]

Yeah, I'm sorry to say it but you're 14 years late.

The best strategy from Col 1 was undoubtly to settle near the Incas and build some farming towns around their capital. In their captial you could often educate unlimited Farmers. After a while you'd have 15 colonies with 5 farmer in each, which would generate about two new colonists every turn.

 

[Civsassin]

Yeah, I'm sorry to say it but you're 14 years late.

The best strategy from Col 1 was undoubtly to settle near the Incas and build some farming towns around their capital. In their captial you could often educate unlimited Farmers. After a while you'd have 15 colonies with 5 farmer in each, which would generate about two new colonists every turn.

As I said, I never played Col I, so it is all new to me. But, after all of the complaining about Col I that I've heard in this forum, its nice to hear that at least something has remained consistent. Personally, I like Civ II.

For me having two major food producing cities and two or three resource cities has so far been a great strategy. I haven't had to rely on immigration or purchasing colonists from the homeland, so I could be selective on the ones that I did buy. On top of that, those cities, once fully operating supported all of my military production - guns, horses, tools - because they could support a large population.

I like to try different strategies, so next time, I may try trading with the Indians to see the benefits of doing it that way.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

Yeah, I'm sorry to say it but you're 14 years late.

The best strategy from Col 1 was undoubtly to settle near the Incas and build some farming towns around their capital. In their captial you could often educate unlimited Farmers. After a while you'd have 15 colonies with 5 farmer in each, which would generate about two new colonists every turn.

You could never educate more than one colonist in any native village or city.
And if another European civ beat you to it, you got no expert at all from that native village.

 

[tour86rocker]

I've been combining this with shipping excess food to the food city for a slight bonus

 

[scottcstoness]

You could never educate more than one colonist in any native village or city.
And if another European civ beat you to it, you got no expert at all from that native village.

You could educate an unlimited number at their capital, though

 

[Öjevind Lång]

You could educate an unlimited number at their capital, though

WOW. I must have missed that all these years... Is that in the old Colonizopedia?

 

[Freddy K]

Luckily food supply isn't too much of a problem. It's possible to supply a city with 3 full factories, and a lumber mill by using just 4 farms.When there are cornfields or rivers it's possible to have all industrial production in one place, which is great.

On the other hand having a city which generates a new (uneductated) citizen every couple of turns, can be extremely annoying during mid game.

When food is scarce and workers are few however, I sometimes import all food to the capital city to produce new citizens more quickly, this is handy when a peripheral city generates only one resource. (The +3 resource the central city tile creates quickly become a logistical nightmare, something to consider when looking for places to settle).

 

[Civsassin]

On the other hand having a city which generates a new (uneductated) citizen every couple of turns, can be extremely annoying during mid game.

Just put them in defense mode outside of the colony, and turn them into either soldiers or dragoons when you have the guns and horses to do so. This way, they don't consume food either.

 

[Bad Brett]

The problem is that a big population doesn't help you in Col II. If I understand the game mechanics correctly, it's better to have 10 pop 1 colonies than 10 pop 10 colonies.

 

[GeoModder]

Big population is = big potential army.

 

[Civsassin]

Big population is = big potential army.

I agree. Even though the REF is going to be large, you can counter with a large army. The first time I won, the REF was huge, but I won at a ratio of 3/1, so I am not afraid of a large army. Your army must be positioned strategically to take advantage of terrain defense bonuses and deny those same bonuses from you enemies. As you win, you will get upgrades, which will make that unit even more dangerous next round.

Also, once you are aiming for independence, economy is less important if you prepared properly, and you should be able to turn most of your citizens into soldiers.

 

[Bad Brett]

Big population is = big potential army.

...And bigger REF.

 

[tour86rocker]

...having a city which generates a new (uneductated) citizen every couple of turns, can be extremely annoying during mid game.

As you probably know, there's a "magic number" of food that causes a population increase. In normal length games it's 200 and in epic length it's 300. If you simply keep your settlements from reaching this quantity of food, you won't have unwanted population increases from that source.

You can sell the food to Europe, or simply put all of your cities in food deficit (or very low food increase: if there are 50 turns left in the game and it'll take 51 turns for a population increase, you shouldn't have a problem)

You'd want to suspend cross production, as well. On the missions front, there's nothing you can really do to prevent new converts, unless you raze those settlements or something drastic.

 

[tour86rocker]

Big population is = big potential army.

...And bigger REF.

...and a bigger threshold of bells to reach 50% rebel sentiment. :\

 

[Bad Brett]

As you probably know, there's a "magic number" of food that causes a population increase. In normal length games it's 200 and in epic length it's 300. If you simply keep your settlements from reaching this quantity of food, you won't have unwanted population increases from that source.

You can sell the food to Europe, or simply put all of your cities in food deficit (or very low food increase: if there are 50 turns left in the game and it'll take 51 turns for a population increase, you shouldn't have a problem)

You'd want to suspend cross production, as well. On the missions front, there's nothing you can really do to prevent new converts, unless you raze those settlements or something drastic.

You just described what's so wrong with this game.

Avoid liberty bells except for in the end, avoid farming, avoid cross production... These are the things that ruin the game.

 

[Freddy K]

Actually they didn't want the game to become a chore (building roads, cleaning pollution...), growth can be achieved just by buying European workers of choice, once your economy is soaring.

It's pretty pointless to build a second tobacco factory for instance, when one is already working to full capacity, especially since turns tend to take longer. It's just more of the same, once your colonies are productive you can cut the umbilical cord to the old continent.

The game -as it is now- is well paced, and making colonies a breeding ground is a bit creatively lacking, so the schools/education system got a nerf. What's the point of building citizens, sending them to school, sending them to work, when you can just select them from a drop down menu in Europe. Cobble a working industry together out of random arrivals is fun, but breed/educate/employ becomes dull fast.

 

[tour86rocker]

I don't like your use of the word "breeding" to refer to humans reproducing but I'm not sure exactly what to take exception to since it's a computer game where the player directs the activity that causes population growth.

 

[MrWhereItsAt]

Yeah, I'm sorry to say it but you're 14 years late.

The best strategy from Col 1 was undoubtly to settle near the Incas and build some farming towns around their capital. In their captial you could often educate unlimited Farmers. After a while you'd have 15 colonies with 5 farmer in each, which would generate about two new colonists every turn.

My best strat was to cobble together a small Galleon force of troops, locate the Inca or Aztec cities, then wipe out all their cities, preferably after having got Hernan Cortes. With the cash from that, no matter the size of my population, I could buy the Statesmen, Masters that I was lacking for a Gun-crazed populace to get their NRA memberships, and Soldiers if I needed to.

You just can't conquer anymore to win this game It's not realistic enough, dammit!