Micromanagement of cities

[GeoffreyCZ]

Hi,

I was searching this forums but I have not been able to find how should I micromanage my cities, what size of them is ideal, what tile improvements should i prioritize etc. Is there something like this?

 

[budweiser]

Welcome!

You want to grow as much as possible. Make sure you have 1 worker at least per city, maybe 2. Improve all your luxuries and work your special tiles and you should succeed. Watch out for barbarians. Get a few archers.

Have fun!

 

[Puhi]

I don't know of any good micromanaging guides, but a few tips are:

When you are building a settler, you can go into negative food without losing population. Play around with working hills or other tiles with production, and you can usually shave off several turns of production time.

Another significant consideration is happiness. Basically, you want to grow as fast as you up to your happiness cap. When you happiness is at 0, consider emphasizing production and even halting growth. So improving luxuries is key as it allows you to grow more.

In the very beginning, the computer usually defaults to working a 2F2G tile (like unimproved marble), while I would rather work a 2F1P tile (like unimproved stone or wheat), because it will allow you to build a scout in 7 rather than 5 turns if you did not settle on a hill.

 

[GeoffreyCZ]

Thanks! What about city specializations and how should I choose tile improvements?

 

[Puhi]

For tile improvements, first priority should always be luxuries and strategic resources (horses, iron), and also food (cow, sheep, wheat, etc.). Once you improve those, if you have happiness to spare, farms are best as you can grow. If your happiness is low, then go with mines. For riverside hills, I like to build farms, as you usually can get enough happiness. This means Civil Service is an important tech. Later on, build trading posts as needed- especially on jungle tiles, because jungles give you science with a university.

AS for specializing, this is really not an issue in civ 5 as it is in 4. Just build your guilds in cities with plenty of food (probably your capital).

 

[budweiser]

Thanks! What about city specializations and how should I choose tile improvements?

I like to work lots of food first, then some hammer tiles like a horse. I dont think specialization is much of a factor like in games past. Civ V is heavily capital centric.

 

[GeoffreyCZ]

Thank you very much. Last question: should i spend my great persons to improve tile rather then boosting gold/hammers/...

 

[budweiser]

Thank you very much. Last question: should i spend my great persons to improve tile rather then boosting gold/hammers/...

Except for 1 academy, most people burn them rather than settle.

 

[killmeplease]

Except for 1 academy, most people burn them rather than settle.

i saw ppl advice to plant for academies before plastics and save for bulbing afterwards

 

[stormtrooper412]

nah, that's been debunked ages ago, you perhaps only plant 1-2 academies if you're playing as Korea. Alternatively, plant a few more as Babylon since you will get lots of GS over the entire game

 

[pollock]

Micromanaging your capital early to get balance growth with hammers is certainly worth it. Getting good timings like pop 3 in 6 turns and shrine in 6 turns so you can start on settler then. Moving to production when building settler.

There are times you want to go on growth spurts like before building the NC so it can go to production with as many people as possible. Growth before you get your specialist buildings e.g. guilds and universitys. You might want to jig the tiles worked to get something a turn early if you see you are very close with the bars.

I'm not sure if its micromanaging but specialising your cities. I break them down in my mind into guild cities , science cities and everything else defaults to production. Money making and trade route cities can be either ones of these.

 

[beetle]

nah, that's been debunked ages ago, you perhaps only plant 1-2 academies if you're playing as Korea.

So you are saying to bulb all GS?

I thought the rule of thumb was if you can work the tile 100+ turns, then it is okay to plant. The 100+ turn rule works for Babylon, just means one more plant. Planting more for Korea is okay too, because he gets extra science from academies, but I have not see what that translates to. 50+ turns? 75+ turns?

 

[ShakaKhan]

Since the OP asked about micro, I'm surprised no one has mentioned the infamous production focus trick; I'll let someone else tackle this since I prefer not to use it myself.

As far as the plant/bulb question goes, I'll first point out to the OP that G-scientists, G-Merchants, and G-Engineers all source from the same Great Person pool, so you'll want to weight scientists (arguably engineers as well) heavily enough that the rest don't spawn as much or at all. If you do spawn an engineer, it's best use is to rush a wonder if you're playing at a competitive difficult level or multiplayer. Although if there are no wonders available that will help your cause that much, you may want to save him for when one does become available. Planting G-engineers can be the best option at lower difficulty levels, as it's shaving off several turns from each wonder or other build you pursue instead of all the turns from just one wonder, but as you grow with the game, you'll find that this is sub-optimal for competitive levels. G-prophets first found then enhance, and that's often all the prophets you'll encounter since you'll want to save industrial era+ faith for other great people. With a faith heavy game, you may end up with a few extra G-prophets, in which case decide what is more important to you, converting neighbors (which also may come with a diplomatic penalty) acknowledging the AI will probably flip them back, or planting to increase faith returns. Also note that piety makes planting an even better option by increasing the yields. Generals can plant for citadels, which don't add to yields (save historical landmark proposal), so you won't want those within a cities 3-ring. However, they can steal luxuries and strategics from outside your 3-ring which you might not otherwise get, and can take back land that you were planning on using before the AI sent out a troll settler and planted 4 tiles away from your city. Citadels are also remarkable at chokepoints, fortify a unit in a citadel on a hill that blocks terrain that the AI NEEDS to traverse in order to reach you, and then laugh as it suicides unit after unit against your impregnable defense.

As for bulbing vs. planting, you'd need to be able to predict the exact turn in which you finish the game to determine which option maximizes your return. But there are other intangibles that might make the option that gives you fewer beakers better for you in the long run. For example, bulbing after your capital has had its RL up for 10 turns may give you more beakers than bulbing earlier, but if bulbing shaves 10 or 12 turns off of getting plastics and consequently gets all your RLs up 10-12 turns earlier, it may be better especially if JE or gold surplus allows you to get them in all your cities instantly, or if access to infantry prevents losing a city, having every tile of a city pillaged, or allows your offensive to progress. There's also the question of victory condition, an academy adds some dirt culture with historical landmarks and provides an additional 2 tourism with hotels/airports which is subject to all multipliers.
As for bulbing all GSs except the first academy, I can't say I agree with this. Again, there's factors that will vary from game to game which will determine which option is best. The window for planting would be longer for Liberty than Tradition, how quickly you grew ( a factor of the terrain you were dealt) will factor in, how many research agreements you have and how many beakers your research partners produce will factor in... the list goes on. One constant is that the earlier it is, the more you'll get out of planting it. As such, I usually plant all scientists before the industrial era, later if the opposition is more competitive which usually means a longer game.

 

[GeoffreyCZ]

Thank you all for your answers, it really helps. I guess I should clarify few things:

I am not new to Civ V (nor to Civ franchise, I played all games including my beloved Alpha Centauri), but i am not pro either and I usually play on immortal. Since I was able to find few guys who are willing to play this awesome game, we started to play multiplayer against each other so I am in the process of finding what I am doing wrong to be able to defeat them. I was really unsure if my tile improvement tactic is good or not. Here are few things I do and I don't know if I do it correctly so feel free to criticise me:

• I prioritize farms on tiles adjacent to rivers/lakes
• I prioritize mines on hills with any terrain
• I prioritize lumber mill on forest, i never chop it down
• I prioritize trading posts on low yield tiles (tundra, desert, plains with no access to fresh water)
• I used to build great person tile improvements on tiles with low yield but in my last game, I bulb'd them and it really worked for me
• I really don't know what to do with jungle so I build trading posts on them
  
• I usually play tall and build almost all buildings in all cities. I read that you should only buy necessary buildings but I have never had problem with gold (usually 250 gold income with reasonable army).
• I use the trick with production focus in citizen management and manually assign working tiles to high food tiles.
• My starting tactic is usually great library rush, is it worth it?
• I recently found out that I usually finish tradition/liberty quite fast before rationalism unlocks, what policy should i have or what to do to don't get in this situation?

Thanks and sorry for my English.

 

[claudiupb]

My advice is from a SP experience but in general things are similar as this is about maximizing yields.

• I prioritize farms on tiles adjacent to rivers/lakes

This is a good idea because you need the growth. Of course get the luxuries, strategic and bonus tiles improved first.

• I prioritize mines on hills with any terrain

You should build farms on river hills, 2f2h is a lot better then 3h. You can work the river hill even while you are focusing on growing (almost all the time) so in the long run it's a lot more hammers. Also by the time you get Chemistry all those hills should be improved, but in that case it may or may not worth it to switch to mines.

• I prioritize lumber mill on forest, i never chop it down

This is generally very bad, those early hammers are a lot more valuable than working a 1f2h tile (by the time it becomes 1f3h it doesn't really matter). It's best to chop them as a boost to critical projects like settlers (so you stay a lot less in that no-growth mode), wonders (to get them faster, or in some cases simply to get them at all), libraries in expos and of course national college. So unless you are Iroquois chop, chop, chop (but even then you still want to chop a little). The one exception is forest on tundra.

I usually chop all forests in first 3 rings, but sometimes I go for the 4th also (especially if I have Pyramids). If there aren't many source of hammers I may keep forests in outer rings.

You should try early chopping once to see how much it improves the early game (and from there the entire game).

• I prioritize trading posts on low yield tiles (tundra, desert, plains with no access to fresh water)

Low yield tiles should be worked last, so they should be improved last. Generally it is better that a low yield tile will support itself so it should produce at least 2 food. Plains should get farms, and even tundra should get farms but I would avoid working empty tundra at all. Flat desert without Petra should get nothing (except kabash if you play morocco). You are better off deleting the worker and saving the maintenance cost.
Later on, you when you have grown and the money to hammer ratio for rushing is better you can switch some of these tiles to trading posts, but by that time you probably have Fertilizer so dry and wet tiles are the same. It all depends on how much you want to grow.

• I used to build great person tile improvements on tiles with low yield but in my last game, I bulb'd them and it really worked for me

Generally it is better to bulb GP, except for maybe 1 academy (more with Babylon or Korea) and holy sites. If however you do want to plant, pick a high yield tile that you would want to work all the time: cow, deer, horses, bison. If not, at least plant on grassland so that tile can support the citizen working it. Avoid planting on river grassland as you lose too many yields. Plains is another option if nothing better is available.

Be careful when planting GP in the industrial era if you don't have archaeology. If a player has archaeology the ruins will be revealed. When they first appear they don't spawn on existing GP improvements, but if you don't have archaeology yourself you can plant the GP on a ruin and not know it. This means that anyone with Open Borders can come and completely remove your GP tile if you don't protect it.

• I really don't know what to do with jungle so I build trading posts on them

It takes 14 turns on standard speed for a worker to put a TP on jungle, that is a lot. Chop jungle on hill for mines, and river jungle for farms. Later in the game when there aren't any things to do, you can add the TP on the jungle so you can get a decent tile to work. It sucks that plains is always under jungle, but it is still the best option to chop hills and wet tiles.

• I usually play tall and build almost all buildings in all cities. I read that you should only buy necessary buildings but I have never had problem with gold (usually 250 gold income with reasonable army).

Having all buildings in all cities is not very optimal, you need some buildings in all cities (science buildings, granaries, aqueducts, workshops, markets, monuments, etc) but in general you need to carefully evaluate each building and see if it really is worth building.

For the situational buildings like stables, seaports, forge you generally need at least 2, preferably 3 tiles that are buffed in order to make them worth it. Forge is an exception if you plan to build lots of units as the buff to unit production makes them quite good. From what I know forge also buffs production to civilian units like archaeologists and caravans (this is also valid for seaport with cargo ships and work boats, but that is a lot less useful).

Stone Works and Circus should always be built for the happiness. Water Mills are also top priority for river cities. I don't really know about gardens, I usually build them in capitals, in other cities I do them if nothing better is available. If they give you an extra GS then they may well be worth it but I suspect they only give it slightly earlier, and since it's best to wait and bulb them later it really doesn't matter. I think they are a lot better if you stack them with other buffs like Porcelain Tower, Humanism, Science Funding from world council and the one from order/freedom.

Also keep in mind that not all National Wonders are worth it, it's all about the opportunity cost.

• I use the trick with production focus in citizen management and manually assign working tiles to high food tiles.

This is good, but remember to do it as forgetting to switch citizens after growing can have disastrous consequences.

• My starting tactic is usually great library rush, is it worth it?

Almost never. Unless you already have an empire set up with cities and workers, you shouldn't be going for wonders. There is one exception to this, if you go liberty you can afford delaying settler production until you get collective rule (but only if you rush collective rule) so you may be able to squeeze a wonder like Pyramids or ToA in there. Even in that case GL is probably not really worth it.

If you don't do that you should not build any wonders until you have at least 3 cities settled. By rushing GL you get one free tech but you are behind in number of cities, so you produce less yields. This will create a gap between you and the others who didn't rush wonders, and in most cases that gap only expands even though you might be tempted to think that that free tech will help you catch up.

This may be the main reason you are facing difficulties in defeating your friends. You can try not to rush it and see the results.

• I recently found out that I usually finish tradition/liberty quite fast before rationalism unlocks, what policy should i have or what to do to don't get in this situation?

This is entirely situational and depends on several factors. How many SPs do you estimate to get before being able to open rationalism? What is your main strategy? How's the current situation? etc.

For one SP the best "filler" is probably Patronage opener, but in some cases Piety opener can be quite good (especially if you have a temple UB).

For 2 SPs there are many combinations:

-you can get Honor with warrior code to have a big number of generals. In MP this may help you a lot if you plant citadels in good spots.
-piety with organized religion has a nice synergy.
-patronage with consulates for influence boost on all CS is quite good, this basically gives you 25 more turns or allied or friends status for all quests you perform after it kicks in. You need like 16 turns for it to kick in.
-commerce with wagon trains is also a solid choice for warmongering as you will build lost of roads (and maybe even send an occasional caravan as they are harder to pillage)
-exploration with maritime infrastructure is quite solid if most of your cities are coastal. At that point in the game it's somewhat like a workshop, so quite strong. Another advantage is that later you can also get naval tradition if you really need the happiness.

-you also have the option of two openers, like piety+patronage, but generally that is weaker then other combinations

At 3 filler SPs before rationalism there are even a lot more possibilities, but I will mention the best 3 in my opinion:
- Commerce up to Mercantilism (cheaper everything especially with big ben; you also get a small number of beakers which are not to be ignored)
- Piety up to Theocracy (more faith and a buff to gold, solid all rounder)
- Patronage up to Scholasticism (in MP this may be weaker as it's harder to keep alliances but you do get some science for it, and you can get CS easier with money).

If you have 4 filler policies it means you are probably teching too slow, but you can try for reformation if you have a religion, it might be the best choice.

 

[Nigel_Tufnel2]

Man, that was a great reply! I'll throw in a few small twists based on how I play.

I always leave some forest if there are 2 or fewer hills for a city -- if you beeline Radio for Ideology you likely will have advanced Lumber Mills for quite a while before Chemistry's boosted mines (1f3h vs a regular mine's 3h). I ALWAYS chop wooded hills - for mines, but also because the forests block LOS for your range units on defense on an adjacent hill.

If a city has several Stable resources, planting a GS or GP on a cow still gets you the production boost from the Stable. People usually pick the cow because the food is better.

 

[GeoffreyCZ]

Thank you for your answer claudiupb, it is really helpful. I will use those advices in my last game.

i don't have problem beating my friends on multiplayer since they are fairly new to civ and are still learning basics. Last game I won by culture while my last part of spaceship was nearly done and my overall score was twice as big as theirs. I was just looking for my own wrong decisions.

 

[Volcanon]

Chop most forests to power early buildings and wonders. Might want to leave the forest for deer, truffles, etc. You get the most hammers from adjacent forests so leave the more distant forests if you want to have mills or whatever. Farms on river hills is a good idea, so is settling on hills for the extra production.

Don't chop jungle unless you absolutely have to, though. Jungle gives you science with universities.

Road your empire up as soon as you can for the money and defense. Build stables or forges if there's a lot of the relevant resources around. Get a pantheon that makes your capital's resources better. If you're on the coast with a lot of fish, the one that gives fish another hammer is great, for example.

 

[ShakaKhan]

I ALWAYS chop wooded hills - for mines, but also because the forests block LOS for your range units on defense on an adjacent hill.

Also an SP player, but played enough MP to know that this is a reason NOT to chop forests on wooded hills. Yes, as you mentioned, it prevents your ability to fire two tiles away, but it also prevents the attacker from firing two tiles away, while your city can always bombard two tiles away. As such, the attacker has two very bad options if you leave that forest in place: First, they can move to the hill behind it and then onto the forested hill itself, suffering two full turns of bombardment damage before it attacks once. The other option is to have all ranged units move in the same direction around the forested hill in order to attack more efficiently, and knowing this you can have your ranged units in place to get first shot at them since you know which directions they'll be going. Furthermore, if the threat is severe enough, you can place a citadel adjacent to the tile that they would need to go to avoid the forest/hill dilemma and completely neutralize their threat.

 

[gobbledydook]

Only if you are trying to defend though. If you are planning to rush your would be aggressor, chop everything and get comps