ALWAYS wait until 3 pop?

[nosoup4crr]

to build a settler/worker? What's the ideology behind this? It seems to me that if after building my first warrior/scout I can build a worker in 12 turns, I should do it--as opposed to waiting 4 turns to grow, and then another 10 for the worker. Why wait?

 

[walkerjks]

A lot of it depends on your tech. If you build a worker in 10, and he can't do anything, why build him?

I'm becoming a big fan of build the worker first and simultaneously develop bronze working. Then use limited deforestation to rush your first settler (or two). Depending n difficulty, you may need to rush archers along with this.

You end up with both a worker and an extra city (or two).

 

[nosoup4crr]

A lot of it depends on your tech. If you build a worker in 10, and he can't do anything, why build him?

I'm becoming a big fan of build the worker first and simultaneously develop bronze working. Then use limited deforestation to rush your first settler (or two). Depending n difficulty, you may need to rush archers along with this.

You end up with both a worker and an extra city (or two).

Yeah...I've tried that strategy a few times. The only problem is that I end up squandering the forests, leaving an unhealthy city. I guess a lot of this has to do w/ the difficulty I play on. I play on prince, right now, which could affect it. Generally, I'll get either agr. or Animal husbandry, get that worker out as soon as possible and push the envelope. The only reason I see waiting is if the 3rd tile you'll be using is extraordinarily productive(rare for a 3rd tile) or if it produces gold on its own AND you're in a race to a certain tech.

 

[PoweredBySoy]

The ideology is that the more city tiles that are being used, the fast population growth and production will be. Building workers/settlers halts that growth for the duration of their production.

Of course this is all common sense, and things we are aware of. I guess it comes down to, which is faster: building a worker for x amount of turns with 2 city tiles, or waiting ~10 more turns until population 3, and then building a worker for 1/2x amount of turns??? There are many factors that go into this decision, and it's far too early on a Friday for me to want to think about it anymore.

As my general rule, I build a Worker at population 2, and my first Settler at population 3. Lately I've been playing Large Terra maps in which the AI civs start very close to my borders. In this case I've had to accelerate my Settler build.... or even build a Settler before a Worker. Crazy, I know.

 

[Nildo22]

Also consider your positioning compared to the other civs. I had a game where if I could push out a second settler quickly enough, I could completely pin the Indians on a peninsula of the continent. When the cultural border of the second city grew once he was completely cut off from expanding and the rest of the continent was mine.

 

[Astax]

Liek they say it depends. If I were you I'd have 2 or three different startign strategies to go with your surroundings. I build worker first when I can drop a farm on a resource since my start uses agriculture/mysticism for starting tech, and I research religions. If I dont have anything resource that will benefit from farm in my city radius, I start warrior or settler. Other starts work with worker first too. Like tree chopping or if you go for all worker improvement techs and you have more resources in your starting location, then buildign a worker first would work too since you would quickly catch up on pop with improved tiles. But either route seems more balanced, not like civ3 where there was one strategy overall. You probably won't get behind if you do worker at 1 pop or at 3, both seem pretty balanced and it usually depends on your starting location and tech.