ALC Game #25: Celts/Boudica

[Ultimocrat]

5 turns for 30 hammers (6 if you consider movement), that's 6 (5) hammers per turn to chop. Compare that to the 3 hammers per turn you lose to not building a mine.

(and to anyone else insisting that settling on the copper is minus 3 hammers)

Settling on the copper turns a 0f6h tile (production value = 6) into a 2f3h one (production value = 5). So you're really only losing 1 production by doing it, not 3 (OK, you're losing 2 by the time late-game rolls around, when the tile would be 7h with a railroad, but who cares?).

 

[Bandobras Took]

Put another way, settling on the plains and working the copper nets you 2f7h.
Settling on the copper and working a plains mine nets you 2f6h.

 

[Artichoker]

Put another way, settling on the plains and working the copper nets you 2f7h.
Settling on the copper and working a plains mine nets you 2f6h.

It's even better than that.

The on-copper tile has 2F3H, and a plains hill mine has 4H.

...whereas the 1NE tile has 2F1H, and the copper mine has 6H.


So it will be 2F7H for both cases.


None of this considers, of course, the extra commerce potential of the grassland tiles to the SW...

 

[iamnleth]

I'll have to disagree with you for a change. The potential of the on-Copper site to act as a hybrid production/commerce city by having the Spice and extra Grasslands will far outweigh the slight production advantage the 1NE-Copper site has in production after the nearby tiles are developed.

After Saladin's cities are taken, the priority will shift to economic recovery, and the extra commerce of the on-Copper city will give it the advantage over the 1NE-Copper site.

The additional production of the site NE of the copper isn't "slight" in any way. In fact, I'd say that the additional commerce obtained from settling on the copper is only slightly beneficial while the production of Vienne 1NE of the copper is a huge boon as an aggressive/charismatic leader.

Medina and Mecca appear to be very nice commerce cities. If Sisiutil settles directly on top of the copper, he will lack a good production city after the war with Saladin. In fact, it is not as if settling 1NE of the copper is going to somehow "waste" x amount of commerce... the fish/spice city (judging by the dot map, so correct me if I am wrong) can support eight cottages.

 

[Hero]

Settle on the copper. We need those hammers now.

 

[JTMacc99]

This is a really good discussion for this series! It's almost like a political debate:

"Senator Boudica, the Celtic people seem to have a lot of confidence in your foreign policy abilities (especially the Kill Saladin doctrine), but they are very concerned about your domestic policy. Would you please give us your views on how you, a person with characteristics that do nothing to help generate commerce, plan to provide jobs and education for the people?"

 

[Bandobras Took]

The additional production of the site NE of the copper isn't "slight" in any way. In fact, I'd say that the additional commerce obtained from settling on the copper is only slightly beneficial while the production of Vienne 1NE of the copper is a huge boon as an aggressive/charismatic leader.

Provided we're still emphasizing production rather than economy by the time Civil Service is researched, which is the only way you're going to work all those plains hills to the north, since Medina will want to be working cottaged floodplains.

 

[Artichoker]

The additional production of the site NE of the copper isn't "slight" in any way. In fact, I'd say that the additional commerce obtained from settling on the copper is only slightly beneficial while the production of Vienne 1NE of the copper is a huge boon as an aggressive/charismatic leader.

Medina and Mecca appear to be very nice commerce cities. If Sisiutil settles directly on top of the copper, he will lack a good production city after the war with Saladin. In fact, it is not as if settling 1NE of the copper is going to somehow "waste" x amount of commerce... the fish/spice city (judging by the dot map, so correct me if I am wrong) can support eight cottages.

Not true...there's a very good production city available 1NE of the Wheat.

 

[iamnleth]

Provided we're still emphasizing production rather than economy by the time Civil Service is researched, which is the only way you're going to work all those plains hills to the north, since Medina will want to be working cottaged floodplains.

As Boudica, wouldn't you typically focus on production for the majority of the game's length?

Not true...there's a very good production city available 1NE of the Wheat.

That is a good production city. Since settling on the copper makes the fish/spice city nearly useless, how would you alter the dot map?

 

[Ultimocrat]

This is a really good discussion for this series! It's almost like a political debate:

"Senator Boudica, the Celtic people seem to have a lot of confidence in your foreign policy abilities (especially the Kill Saladin doctrine), but they are very concerned about your domestic policy. Would you please give us your views on how you, a person with characteristics that do nothing to help generate commerce, plan to provide jobs and education for the people?"

I suppose this is a good point, but what does it prove about settling on the copper?

You don't need to answer your opponent's questions to win a political debate.

 

[Bandobras Took]

As Boudica, wouldn't you typically focus on production for the majority of the game's length?

No. Since she has no economic traits, you've got to get your economy the hard way. It's war that she makes easier.

 

[Ultimocrat]

The additional production of the site NE of the copper isn't "slight" in any way. In fact, I'd say that the additional commerce obtained from settling on the copper is only slightly beneficial while the production of Vienne 1NE of the copper is a huge boon as an aggressive/charismatic leader.

Even post-CS, co-opting the cow and working a farmed floodplain, there's not enough food to work all the hill tiles in the 1 NE city (+3 from wheat, +2 each from cow, floodplain, city center -> food for the copper, and 3 plains and 1 grassland hill, or 26 total hammers, at size 8). Other tiles beyond these are just plains farms -- there's no more food until bio!

EDIT: OK, missed the grasslands in the southwest -- so post CS it would be size 11, 30 hammers. Better than I was figuring, but the copper city gets a lot more potential workshops, so I don't think its production would compare all that unfavorably in the mid-game.

 

[Jet]

"settling on the copper makes the fish/spice city nearly useless"
The three tiles of overlap would between a city on the copper and a city with fish and spice in the inner ring would be a very minor deficiency in the middle or late game. But even if it was as bad as you said, the importance of that would be negligible now. Short term benefit is what's important now.

 

[oyzar]

How does settling on the copper give more short term benefit than just settling on the plains hill between the wheat and the copper? You get earlier wheat hooked up and don't have to build a monument and +1 hammer...

 

[LiberiGlacialis]

But you don't have to hook up the copper for Axe/Gallics if you settle on it, and you still get the food later. >>

But I play way below this level, and rather casually, to. >>

 

[oyzar]

You hook up the copper way before you want to start building axes / gallics anyways...

 

[brades]

On top of the copper is where I'd settle. You can immediately start pumping out axeman, and you still have access to 2 food resources, and the calendar resource later.

 

[Gliese 581]

I don't think either on copper or 1NE will have a huge impact. There will be very little time lost hooking up the copper since there are several other builds that must take precedence. I prefer NE but on top of copper is not going to make a huge difference really.

I don't like 1E of copper though as beyond the rush it seems really wasteful to not have the food from the cow for this food-poor production city.
Just pick a spot Sisiutil Í think we've debated this long enough.

 

[Bandobras Took]

You hook up the copper way before you want to start building axes / gallics anyways...

But that's turns your worker isn't chopping.

Another question: what are the merits of a city 1 NW of the wine? Looks like you'd get an awful lot of riverside tiles for steam power, and snag some deer to help work some waterwheels when the time comes.

 

[oyzar]

Chopping won't speed up the rush compared to imporving the really good tiles.. heck it's even worth it to improve a plains hill to max out at size 3(13 production). By settling on the copper you are basically wasint a forest on building the monument anyways...