CIV Illustrated #3: City specialization explained!

[FlyingSwan]

I think you missed the point,in that citys will and can get specialised if need be.I think the argument seriel is making is that of pragmatism-you build what you need now rather than for a future that may not exist-ie-you won already.Also city specialization on a small scale is neither here nor there-worker/spy/missionary pump-what else you going to build anyway.

EDIT.just re read you post,I think were singing from the same song sheet

 

[Falabello]

Again, if you appreciate our (my) effort, please don't forget to rate the thread. Feedback also appreciated.

Well, I started now to read it, but I'll need to do it several times to understand the ideas (I need more free time ...). What can I say about your effort? Your way of explaining, adding so much examples with prints, goes above and far beyond of expected. For my part, I voted Five Stars. Congrats on the excellent work !

 

[Seraiel]

@ LowtherCastle: What you miss, already is in the guide. I encourage the readers to evaluate improvements and buildings on a case to case basis. This will naturally lead to cities taking different roles. What I posted was just an example (which is already said in the introductorty part) of how city-specializatioin could happen. I didn't advise "build all Farms and Mines in your cities and build every building from a Barracks to a University" ^^ I wrote, that everything should be on the citie's and the empire's needs, and that includes all the super-minor-roles in which normal cities distinguish themselves.

 

[Seraiel]

@ Falabello: Thx for that feedback mate . If the current Major Deity Gauntlet wouldn't take my whole time, I'd already have published guide #3, about hybrid economy.

 

[Doshin]

I like this guide, Seraiel. I think it improves on CIV Illustrated #2.

If you are interested in refining these entries, I would suggest two things, both relating to presentation and reader comprehension.

1. For the city specialization section, I would create a standardized, bullet-point break-down to head each entry, ala CIV Illustrated #1. Find a format that can be used across each post and keep things as concise as possible. This will make the various city types easier to digest, before readers turn to your more extensive analyses. Something like (but better than ):
   
   
   Spoiler :

   Globe Theater City​

   
   

   Spoiler :

   

   
   

   Requirements​

   Available: Drama
   
   Buildings: 6 Theaters (6* 50H = 300H) + Globe Theater 300H = 600 total (Philosophical leaders: 450H total)
   
   
   

   Where/When to Specialize​

   
   Build this: in a city with 3+ resources (e.g. Corn/Pigs/Wheat), or +8 surplus from other sources (e.g. Sid's Sushi, Biology Farms).
   
   Do not build this in: the capital; any low food city; any city with access to several hammer or commerce resources.
   
   Useful for: whip/draft production on Large/Huge maps; Space Race victories (Prince and above); Culture victories; quick Corporation spread.
   
   Not useful for: Domination/Conquest victories on regular/small maps at Normal or Quick speeds; AP victories.
   
   City Importance: 3/10
   
   

   Analysis​

   
   [Your current post here]
   
   The numbers and bullet-point assessments will be simplified and arbitrary, of course. But a beginner who sees (e.g.) that a Globe Theater city is only ranked 3/10 in importance should consequently study the analyses for those entries that rank 9/10 or 8/10 (the HE or NE cities, etc.) more closely. This, for a beginner, is the right call.
   
   
   
2. Consider your target audience's level of knowledge. I'll quote post #7 in a spoiler:
   
   
   Spoiler :

   Explaing "Whip-stacking" with screens from Kakumeika's SGOTM 18:
   
   
   (Special thx to WastinTime and elitetroops who checked this example for its correctness!)​

   
   

   Spoiler :

   
   
   

   
   
   This is the capital, and it whipped a Temple with max-OF on the last turn. As you can see, we have about 30 base- of OF, which got taken over to this turn. In this turn, a Market got whipped with max-OF again, and as the Market needs 150 , up to 75 base- can be taken over to the next turn while having multipliers for 200% production, which is more than enough, because 33 base +30 base OF from the Market are only 63 base , which you see here:
   
   

   Spoiler :

   
   
   

   
   
   Those 63 base get multiplied to 146 with including the production of that turn. Now we 2-pop-whip a University again with max-OF and even work the Marble for 4 :
   
   

   Spoiler :

   
   
   

   
   
   And with working all Hammer-tiles + even working an Engineer Specialist while starving the city for three , the wonder happens, Oxford in 1T:
   
   

   Spoiler :

   
   
   

   
   
   Note that this would have been impossible without being IND, and that it's only to demonstrate OF-whipping into NWs in general. If you're not IND, you need to add Forests on the final turn, or you need to drag out the production by inserting Oxford in the queue for 1T, to get rid of the existing OF at that time. The key again is, to pre-produce useful buildings up to the point of max-OF before Universities and Oxford become available, to then whip that OF indirected into Oxford, because whipping it directly would suffer the usual rush-penalty for NWs and WWs.

   This post assumes quite a lot of your readers. I would (1) define the principal behind whip-stacking, and why/when it is important; (2) outline the numbers involved in your example exactly; (3) explain and distinguish between base hammers and post-modifier hammers; (4) emphasize the effect of modifiers, especially since this is an Industrious leader building a Stone wonder in a capital that has a Forge while in Organized Religion; (5) explain why the buildings are whipped: Temple ---> Market ---> University ---> Oxford, and not (e.g.) University ---> Temple ---> Market ---> Oxford
   
   "In this turn, a Market got whipped with max-OF again, and as the Market needs 150H, up to 75 base can be taken over to the next turn while having multipliers for 200% production" kind of gets at #5. But why just 75H? I know, you know. Will your target audience know?

Keep up the good work.

 

[Seraiel]

Dear Doshin,

I appreciate your feedback, but already the first proposal goes completely against my principles. I'm no player that plays CIV solely on Standard / Normal / Pangaea, I have played CIV on all maps-types, all map-sizes and all speeds. If I took your proposal, my data had to include the costs for all speeds. Because I also play all map sizes, the 2nd value would also be non-trivial, because National Wonders need different amounts of unlocking-buildings, depending on the size of the map, so now I'd have added 4 costs for 6 map sizes which multiply to 24 different values for the complete cost that unlocking a specific national wonder costs. As some leaders get discounts though, the data for the costs is doubled so we now have 48 different values for the building in single under all circumstances, and we'd have summed the total cost that unlocking the national wonder costs. (To be 100% true, I would even have to add different national wonder costs for IND too) .
So we'd offer a huge 50+ values table for users, that could simply hover over the building inGame, which would always give them the right value and display the right amount of buildings needed.



Regarding whip-stacking: There is an introduction to it, which explains it quite well imo. I probably should explain a little more about overflow-mechanics, because the difference between base-hammers and the production shown in the production bar is quite important, but it wasn't my goal to enable everybody to 1T-build Oxford. The example was morely to illustrate how high the SGOTM-teams value the speed at which they can construct something, while newby-players would waste very many turns on choosing the wrong cities or not using overflow to build a (national) wonder faster.

I btw. also believe, that whipping and overflow mechanics are already explained in full detail in guides that have whipping as the main topic. If I'm wrong with that, I'll write the essay you want from me .

 

[kossin]

Conversion costs are not as complicated as you make it sound, they are simply multipliers (e.g. Quick = 0.66, Standard = 1.0, Epic = 1.5, Marathon = 3). Besides, this is already covered somewhere else as you say.

Doshin's point #2 can be explained in one sentence, that's his point. Explain why it is so.

I think his post is very point on in general... try to follow the general format that was introduced with issue #1.

Keep up the good work.

@Doshin
Not sure what Philosophical leaders have to do with Theatres or GT

 

[Seraiel]

I'd propose, that we discuss this internally in the CIV Illustrated usergroup.

 

[Seraiel]

kossin, Doshin and me are still discussing internally, what would benefit this guide. As a product of that, you can already see, that every part has pictures now. Therefore I wanted to ask you, the readers, if you felt that anything is missing in this guide, or if this guide should improve in a certain way.

Tia,

Seraiel

 

[Todelotti]

Perhaps a little addition to the Oxford "Whip stacking" paragraph:

"Note that this would have been impossible without being IND and without having access to stone"

Red added by me. Probably I'm the only one who needs this emphasis... But I just stack whipped a whip stack and ended in Oxford getting around 170/400 hammers and still 16 turns to produce. Well... that's the result without access to stone as I noticed after this fail whip...

 

[Kallikrates]

A quick question for whipping as it seems somewhat on topic (and I finally read some of the posts on this topic).
If bonuses like library for CRE leader etc. apply: whip the cheaper building/unit or whip INTO the cheaper building unit?

With (IND) forges I usually try to "2-whip" them, that is whip while building the reduced cost building. But apparently because of overflow caps it is in many cases smarter to whip something else generating overflow and have the overflow multiplied by resource access or reduced cost for the NEXT build. I got confused about this having started a game as Pacal last night with his EXP cheaper workers and granaries. Whip monument to get overflow for granary or whip granary, regardless of overflow to get it before the monument? (It seems better to have the monument first, unless enough good yield tiles in first ring.) Whip settler to get overflow for worker seems certainly the better option because settler is so much more expensive.

(I am somewhat embarrassed that I am playing IMM with some success without knowing all that stuff...)

 

[Seraiel]

Perhaps a little addition to the Oxford "Whip stacking" paragraph:

"Note that this would have been impossible without being IND and without having access to stone"

Red added by me. Probably I'm the only one who needs this emphasis... But I just stack whipped a whip stack and ended in Oxford getting around 170/400 hammers and still 16 turns to produce. Well... that's the result without access to stone as I noticed after this fail whip...

Done .

A quick question for whipping as it seems somewhat on topic (and I finally read some of the posts on this topic).
If bonuses like library for CRE leader etc. apply: whip the cheaper building/unit or whip INTO the cheaper building unit?

With (IND) forges I usually try to "2-whip" them, that is whip while building the reduced cost building. But apparently because of overflow caps it is in many cases smarter to whip something else generating overflow and have the overflow multiplied by resource access or reduced cost for the NEXT build. I got confused about this having started a game as Pacal last night with his EXP cheaper workers and granaries. Whip monument to get overflow for granary or whip granary, regardless of overflow to get it before the monument? (It seems better to have the monument first, unless enough good yield tiles in first ring.) Whip settler to get overflow for worker seems certainly the better option because settler is so much more expensive.

(I am somewhat embarrassed that I am playing IMM with some success without knowing all that stuff...)

To know how much OF you can carry over to the next turn, you need to devide the amount of that the building costs through the production multipliers. I actually had to look up the costs of a Library on normal speed, so you don't have to be embarrased for not knowing how the whip exactly works. As I found out, a Library costs 90 , so let's assume that you're running OR at that time. You take the 90 and devide them through your production which in this example is 100% + 25% for OR + (as suggested by you) + 100% for being CRE, so 100% + 100% + 25% = 225% = 2.25, Library still costs 90 which are devided through 2.25 = 40 . The last is the amount of you can carry over to the next round, so if you i. e. already whipped something else with max-OF (= 29 ) you can now store additional 11 .

Would be nice if anybody who knows 100% how whip-OF works could confirm or correct the math above.

 

[Kallikrates]

Thanks, but I know the standard mechanism and the factors, it's just some of the nagging details...

My question was more specific.
With an Exp leader the Granary costs only 30 ore 1-pop-whip. So it costs exactly the same as a monument. So a new city that needs both can grow to 2 and whip one or the other.
Say it accumulates 10 hammers while growing to 2. If I whip the monument I get 10 or 11 hammers overflow. These go into the granary and are therefore doubled? So whipping the monument gives me 20-22 for the granary?

If I put 10 hammers into a granary while growing, these will be 20 hammers because of Exp. Than I whip 1pop away. This would yield 60 hammers, so if the overflow works in the same way as above (I am not at all sure about that!) I'd also get about 20 hammers overflow for the monument. So it would not matter much wrt overflow hammers. But I think there is some difference with the overflow between the cases. I am unsure about overflow caps and how exactly the bonus for EXP is applied (all hammers are doubled, incl. hammers from whipping) but what happens with the overflow going into a non-bonus building? If this is reduced it would probably better to whip the monument and get overflow into the granary.

Of course the other thing is that with granary first the city will get faster back to 2pop (and then to 3 and so on) and with monument first this will produce culture for the 5 or so turns I have the monument earlier and therefore earlier border pops.

So in the end one should maybe not decided because of a few hammers more or less overflow (and as I said, I am not sure how much the difference is) but whether it is more important to grow fast or to pop borders ASAP (because of more food or so).

 

[Seraiel]

OF is not doubled (or higher) from whipping a building that gets fastened up by a trait. That was one of the very first things I learned, because of course, I also wanted to know if I can abuse buildings like that .

 

[Iwo Jima]

The one possible purpose of GT could be rival big city, especially capital with settled GGs.

So, you achive several goals at once: 1) Remove all 2) Move your drafting center closer to the frontline 3) use not your own GGs for your troops

The only problem to build it fast enough. But here there are many tricks, you've wrote some already.

 

[Seraiel]

The one possible purpose of GT could be rival big city, especially capital with settled GGs.

So, you achive several goals at once: 1) Remove all 2) Move your drafting center closer to the frontline 3) use not your own GGs for your troops

The only problem to build it fast enough. But here there are many tricks, you've wrote some already.

What tips to building it faster didn't I write about?

And how do you draft in a city, which has tons of enemy culture?

 

[Iwo Jima]

What tips to building it faster didn't I write about?

And how do you draft in a city, which has tons of enemy culture?

For example, OF trick with units.
Or you could take some OF hummers and then buy it

You dont need a lot of your own culture. Only 10%. And it could be, that you achieve it fast due to culture from GT and Artists.

A little bit fantastic, but if you have GA and GE, you could use them. GA for culture bomb inside captured city. 4000 should be enough to get 10% of your own culture. It also stops rioting and save you about 8-10 turns. And GE could build GT for 1 turn. So, it saves a lot of time, that could excuse such a sacrifice.

 

[Seraiel]

Which OF trick with units? I mentioned whipping OF in the Globe.

And 10% can be a lot when it's a capital. AI builds all kinds of stuff that give in them.

And there are definitely better uses for a GA + a GE, a Golden Age and rushing a World Wonder are only two that greatly exceed an instant Globe Theater.

 

[Iwo Jima]

Which OF trick with units? I mentioned whipping OF in the Globe.

And 10% can be a lot when it's a capital. AI builds all kinds of stuff that give in them.

And there are definitely better uses for a GA + a GE, a Golden Age and rushing a World Wonder are only two that greatly exceed an instant Globe Theater.

Will not debate, but sometimes perfect drafting farm could be the World Wonder, that you need the most. Once again, later in the game one GE is not enough for single wonder, and if you fired a chain of 2-3 Golden Ages before, than value of great people not so high. Specially, if you play with PHI.

Anyway, we all know, that GT is not very often NW, so even exotic use could be consider.

 

[Seraiel]

In HoF we aim for 4-5 Golden Ages, and the Hit-Wonders or the Christo Redentor, which are really good wonders, can all be rushed by a single GE. Even if the GE isn't enough to rush a full wonder, like with the SoL, it's still good to cut the build-time in half and get the bonus-specialists earlier.
GE-rushing the Wallstreet I can understand in a game with Corps, but the Globe is way too cheap and far to easily built via OF-whips.