Analysis of commerce for Towns vs Coast

[Quantum7]

So, you're saying that CIV is still ultimately about "the bigger your empire the better" just like CIII? That all that is changed is how we go about it?

What's so bad about that? It makes perfect sense that having 10 'class-5' cities and managing them well will be better than having 5 'class-5' cities and managing them well. If that wouldn't be the case I'd be rather annoyed at Civ IV .

(and yes, there's naturally a limit at which an extra city becomes more of a burden then a boon, but that limit still seems to be pretty high)

 

[Wodan]

What's so bad about that? It makes perfect sense that having 10 'class-5' cities and managing them well will be better than having 5 'class-5' cities and managing them well. If that wouldn't be the case I'd be rather annoyed at Civ IV .

(and yes, there's naturally a limit at which an extra city becomes more of a burden then a boon, but that limit still seems to be pretty high)

The difference is that on most maps, there are some good city spots, and some crappy ones. Sure, you can cram a city into a crappy spot (with deserts, mountains, and a few actually workable tiles) but would you want to? Especially with maint costs as they are?

Regardless of play level.

Wodan

 

[PugFugly]

Another thing to consider is the health benefits of a harbor. The size of your capital city is usually limited by health.

 

[Wodan]

When you start playing at higher levels, I think you'll find that making efficient use of the space you can get becomes considerably more important.

Exactly my point. Efficient use. Not "cram a city into all available spaces" use.

Wodan

ps please don't throw out the "when you start playing at higher levels [as I have]". It's demeaning and doesn't contribute to the discussion. If you think a strategy won't work when the AI has Deity benefits, or whatever, then simply say so, and say why.

 

[DaviddesJ]

If you think a strategy won't work when the AI has Deity benefits, or whatever, then simply say so, and say why.

That's exactly what I did. At higher levels, you need to use the space you have. And "using the space" means working the productive tiles available to you---you aren't using the space if you don't have any cities that can work those coastal tiles.

 

[Quantum7]

The difference is that on most maps, there are some good city spots, and some crappy ones. Sure, you can cram a city into a crappy spot (with deserts, mountains, and a few actually workable tiles) but would you want to? Especially with maint costs as they are?

Regardless of play level.

Wodan

It would (naturally) depend on whether or not I believe it will be able to support itself (and whether my economy can support the additional city before it can support itself). Assuming a very crappy city site (no food resources and very few possible cottage tiles), no. (unless I really need it for a luxury =()

In practice I hardly ever have to make that choice as I either have enough space to settle on only mediocre-good spots or I wage war and don't really need rotten spots. Meaning I do have the economy to expand, I just choose not to do that by settling crappy spots.

Note: Highest difficulty game played was an Immortal one .

 

[Wodan]

It would (naturally) depend on whether or not I believe it will be able to support itself (and whether my economy can support the additional city before it can support itself).

I guess that's where we differ. You're willing to spend a great effort and a lot of resources to start a city and get it to the point where it's breaking even. When has it paid for itself? Who knows. A while.

Occasionally, I'd hazard to guess that some of these cities don't pay for themselves (in beakers, hammers, and gold) by the time you've finished the game.

Note: Highest difficulty game played was an Immortal one .

I prefer to play where I can experiment with different strategies. I guess that's why I'm willing to entertain the possibility that there are other ways which might be better, and to explore those options, either here or in the game.

In the end, regardless of play level, it's a question of sheer income, compared to the costs involved. Either of two play styles will have a graph of hammers/gold/beakers vs gametime. Comparing the costs is much more difficult. Say, for example, a player totally ignores everything, builds 3 cities, and pumps out Quecha. The costs there are horrendous, in hammers. But, the benefits of a couple hundred Quecha would be hard to spell out.

Wodan

 

[LawLessOne]

A coastal city gets higher commerce from overseas trade routes. Exactly how much extra seems to involve varibles outside the players control. Cities on rivers that lead to the sea can also get this extra commerce from overseas trading. Check it out sometime. When you invent 'Sailing' all coastal cities get an extra trade route. Inland cities will have fewer. Now look at a city on a river which flows to the sea, It will also have an 'extra' trade route.

That does not mean that your first city has to be one. I prefer my first city to be a production city and another city to be the commerce capitol. Be prepared though. This fundimental change will radically change your strategy. For instance, you dont want you Capitol to be your Holy City so dont found a religion until you have another city built.

 

[DaviddesJ]

When you invent 'Sailing' all coastal cities get an extra trade route. Inland cities will have fewer. Now look at a city on a river which flows to the sea, It will also have an 'extra' trade route.

This is not true. Sailing doesn't change the number of trade routes. And it doesn't make any difference (for this purpose) whether a city is connected to your trade network by a road or a river.

 

[linjon1]

often in the late game i look to see what is my biggest commerce earners, in order to place wall street and such. Coastal cities often seem to be on top.
Interseting analysis, but i think there are too many assumptions that tend to prove your initial hypothesis.

 

[Dreef]

A side benefit not mentioned of coastal cities. They are instantly "hooked up" you don't need to bother with a road network to get those resources and trade routes flowing. Also, ocean food resources can be monstrous, in the early game a city can be a production powerhouse using slavery to crank out items/units if you have 2 fish/clam resources.

Coastal cities can be significantly easier to defend as well. When you only have to defend one approach to your city and your resources are at sea you don't need to be as pro-active about your defense. That barbarian is not going to pillage your fishing boats in the early game.

An unstated negative of coastal cities. You have a significantly smaller chance of having important late game resources (aluminum, coal, uranium). I found out the hard way in my last game on monarch. No horses/elephants/iron/copper/coal/oil/aluminum because I was placed on a land poor peninsula. What good is being the tech leader if you can't make any of the good units?

Edit: Just thought of something though. A sea based empire would have nothing to fear from global warming correct? So next time I get stuck working the ocean like last time I am going to nuke everyone else straight to hell.

 

[KerThud]

A sea based empire would have nothing to fear from global warming correct? So next time I get stuck working the ocean like last time I am going to nuke everyone else straight to hell.

Maybe someone will make a mod that makes this more realistic: global warming melts the ice and sea level rises...flooding out all cities, resources, improvements. I think the real Dutch have got to be concerned about global warming! Also, isn't most of Florida less than 10 feet above sea level?

 

[Zombie69]

I think it was fairly obvious for anyone reading the other thread (except for the OP of this thread) that as far as commerce is concerned, the ideal situation is to be on the coast, with as few water tiles as possible. This way, you get improved trade, but still get your cottages.

As for bigger is better, is still is, and very much so. No matter how many cities i have, adding an extra city on a one-tile island with 2 sea food ressources will always pay off. The extra commerce gained from the sea far outweighs the added maintenance cost. Slave rush a granary, a lighthouse, a library and a university (in that order) and the city will be so good that you'll want to add an academy to it the next time you get a Great Scientist. Especially if you're playing a financial civ.

 

[alexti2]

I think that Wodan's analysis doesn't take the dynamic into account and because of that it's missing few critical points:
- coastal cities get their commerce without any worker activities (no need to build roads for routes or cottages). This means no need to build much workers and no need to research otherwise unneeded technologies;
- coastal cities (with Great Lighthouse) bring positive balance right away which means that you can go on settling spree and match AI's expansion rate;
- as a result of the faster development, you'll be able to take over AI cities earlier (with whatever they've build there and around);
- all previous points contribute to exponential growth, so the benefit from some extra cottages around home cities will never catch with the benefits from faster development and earlier conquest;

The only special case I can think of is if you're aiming for cultural victory right from the start, meaning that you plan to win cultural vs space race against AI fairly (rather than by clubbering AI to near death and then getting cultural victory at your leisure). Then towns become viable alternative (at least on some kind of maps), because you don't really need to expand much, and the ultimate commerce output is more important as the bulk of your culture is going to be produced in the final stages when you'll be running 100% culture. Whether this will cover slower start or not, I'm not sure, it's probably very difficult to estimate.

 

[alexti2]

Slave rush a granary, a lighthouse, a library and a university (in that order)

Why in that order? I would definitely put harbor much earlier. It gives more benefits to commerce than a library or university. I'm not sure about granary either. If you've seafood around, the populaiton is growing so fast even without granary, so that unhappiness from the rush, rather than lack of population becomes a limiting factor.

 

[Zombie69]

This assumed that it was still early in the game (say, not long after calendar), so trade routes aren't that big a deal yet. Most of the expected commerce would be from the tiles themselves. The fact that i play financial civs also contributes to this.

The granary is very useful for sure. The first thing i do, as soon as the population is high enough to allow it, is to rush this building. Then i rush the lighthouse as soon as i can. At this point, whether to rush the library or grow depends on math. Adding a few more tiles from growth will often result in more extra commerce than adding a library. This allows for some time to recuperate from the early slave rushes.

In any case, happiness is never much of a problem, even when rushing. You only get -1 from slave rushing. Since this keeps bringing your population back down, you're typically nowhere near your happiness limit. Even if you do get there, you can simply add a scientist specialist or two as you reach the limit, to reduce growth. The granary is useful even if you do reach the limit, because it allows you to get there faster, thus getting extra scientists faster. Besides, you'll have the whole city (with all required buildings) set up faster using the granary than without one, so there's really no point not getting one.

In Civ 4, i would never, ever slave rush anything without a granary, except for slave rushing the granary itself!

 

[alexti2]

Does trade route income depends on the phase of the game? - I thought it's only dependent on city population. With couple of sea foods (which is a typical setting for those kind of cities), they grow every 4-5 turns anyway and there's no time to recover from previous unhappiness before you rush the next building. I wonder if this dynamics may depend on the difficulty...

 

[DaviddesJ]

In Civ 4, i would never, ever slave rush anything without a granary, except for slave rushing the granary itself!

The lighthouse is often worth more than the granary. The lighthouse is worth +1 food per water tile you're working. The granary is worth 50% of your food surplus. The former is often a lot more than the latter. E.g., you have a coastal town which has no useful land tiles to work (because it's on a small island, or surrounded by desert, etc.). Let's say it has one crab/clam resource, with fishing boats (4f without lighthouse). Then we can make a little chart:

City Size    Food Surplus    Granary Value    Lighthouse Value
1            4               2                1
2            3               1.5              2
3            2               1                3
4            1               0.5              4
5            0               0                5

The lighthouse is considerably better, overall. Also, this calculation slightly overstates the value of the granary compared to the lighthouse, because the granary doesn't accelerate the next growth, but only the ones after that. While the lighthouse accelerates growth right away.

 

[Zombie69]

Does trade route income depends on the phase of the game? - I thought it's only dependent on city population.

If the AI has better cities to trade with, you'll get better trade routes, and the AI typically will have better cities as the game progresses.

 

[Zombie69]

The lighthouse is often worth more than the granary. The lighthouse is worth +1 food per water tile you're working. The granary is worth 50% of your food surplus. The former is often a lot more than the latter. E.g., you have a coastal town which has no useful land tiles to work (because it's on a small island, or surrounded by desert, etc.). Let's say it has one crab/clam resource, with fishing boats (4f without lighthouse). Then we can make a little chart:

City Size    Food Surplus    Granary Value    Lighthouse Value
1            4               2                1
2            3               1.5              2
3            2               1                3
4            1               0.5              4
5            0               0                5

The lighthouse is considerably better, overall. Also, this calculation slightly overstates the value of the granary compared to the lighthouse, because the granary doesn't accelerate the next growth, but only the ones after that. While the lighthouse accelerates growth right away.

I was once perplexed at whether it was better to do the granary first or the lighthouse. I chose the lighthouse and regretted it. Now i always make the granary first.

Remember that i was talking about a city with 2 sea food resources. Without a lighthouse, worked fish provides 5 food, while crab and clam provide 4. Let's assume 1 fish and 1 clam in our example. Of course, you'll want to work the fish first.

City Size    Food Surplus    Granary Value    Lighthouse Value
1            5               2.5              1
2            7               3.5              2
3            6               3                3
4            5               2.5              4
5            4               2                5

The granary is better at city sizes 1 and 2, while the lighthouse is better at city sizes 4 and 5. Since you're slave rushing, you'll be bringing your population down as low as possible, as often as possible. Therefore, the granary is better.

Basically, you want both. But because of slave rushing, you want the granary first. Without slavery, i agree that you should make the lighthouse first. But i would argue that without slavery, you should just get slavery asap if you want this city running properly!