Cottage question.

[Alsn]

Ok, so i play at prince usually and pull off a win probably 60-70% of the time but i have a specific question about production and cottages.

I usually designated 2 cities as being hammer factories, what i wonder though is that since workshops are pretty much useless before you get chemistry or at least guilds, should i cottage up the tiles that i cannot mine and then convert them to workshops later or just leave the tiles unimproved? I generally feel that i sometimes produce more than needed which is why im asking. Should i just go to war instead or is cottaging while waiting for workshops a better idea?

(For reference i like going to war after i reach military science and cannons which obviously means that at that point im gonna be able to use the full +4 hammers that workshops provide).

Basically im wondering if its worth it since i generally feel that i would want another science city or to somehow tech a little faster than i do right now but i dont know if i should perhaps cottage my free tiles in the production cities during periods of "low action" or perhaps try and squeeze in another city.

 

[Roxlimn]

Go for Civil Service and Farm them to allow the city to exploit Hammer-only tiles. Excess pop will usually go to Specialists, especially if you're in Representation.

Generally speaking, I don't like flatland tiles that don't have access to water in a production city, since I can't farm them, and they don't contribute to production. If I have several such cities, I beeline Civil Service to get online ASAP, if just one, I contemplate on making it a Commerce or Hybrid City instead.

 

[futurehermit]

Farm them.

 

[Leventis]

Yeah, I usually farm them and whip away at the right time, or even run an engineer or two with any excess food.

 

[lordofcivs]

You obviously need to Farm them.

I usually have 1 "Production City" - with Farms and Mines - For Wonder Production. There in another City of similar kind with lesser ability to grow - due to this, it becomes "Military Production City". All the others become candidate for Cottage rush.

 

[Alsn]

Alright, thanks for the tips!

 

[BrantleyL1]

I usually have 1 "Production City" - with Farms and Mines - For Wonder Production. There in another City of similar kind with lesser ability to grow - due to this, it becomes "Military Production City". All the others become candidate for Cottage rush.

What do you do with the tiles that you can't farm yet??

 

[Roxlimn]

Make roads so that it'll cost you less movement to move into the tiles and farm them later on.

 

[BrantleyL1]

I think I am a little slow on a couple of things. This may turn out to be one of those "Aha" moments. (Like when I finally saw that a powered factory contributes 50% more !!)

Production city - I am still a little unclear on this concept - the "fog of clarity" is not yet cleared completly. I can't seem to reconcile "production" with "farms"...

Let me see if i've got this...

Some cities are located near (on) a river with lots of grassland tiles and if you are lucky, some flood plains. Grassland tiles provide 2 (and NO ) and when farmed, it becomes 3 , so over time, the extra food will turn into an extra unit of population. The granery helps you to grow quicker - because the excess food is not all used to give the extra population. After Civil Service, you can build farms that are not next to a fresh water source. Each unit of population uses 2 , so a worked grassland tile really only sustains itself and your city will not grow. Wheat, rice and corn (and later biology) provide extra .

Food is the key to city growth. Since Tundra does not provide food, that is why tundra cities have a hard time growing.

are production. Since farms do not provide , I'm not sure how I see farms relate to a "production city". (Now, worked mines do provide , so maybe that's what I'm missing.

Factories increase by 25% -- 50% if powered. So build factories to add to production.

Citizen specialists add 1 So when you are working all your tiles and have excess population, create them - or better create scientists - they provide 2

I'd appreciate some help in clarifing how building farms relates to a "production city".

 

[Meanness]

Because mined hills or other production specials produce less than 2F, so you need high-food tiles to compensate (or otherwise your production city is not working all of its production tiles.)

Also, while running slavery, food = production.

Also, engineer specialists.

 

[Roxlimn]

As we said earlier, tiles that are high in production typically produce 1 or 0 food. Think of that tile as a hyper-productive Engineer. That means that working production tiles uses up excess food. You'll want to concentrate on farms (instead of cottages) in a production city so that you can run more production tiles and more engineers.

Obviously, you can't use production heavy tiles that aren't in the BFC, so an efficient production city uses up just enough Farmed tiles to feed its population, the rest of which work on production heavy tiles.

If you have too much hills in the BFC, the city will never use all the tiles because it won't grow large enough. If you use cottages, you're not maximizing production capacity.

 

[johnny_rico]

Here is a link to an article at the civfanatics war academy. It covers the basics on specialization of cities, of which a category is the production city.

http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/city_specialization.php

The war academy is a trove of great information covering basics to advanced strategies. The only caveat is some of the articles may be old and a lot has changed with the advent of the warlords and beyond the sword expansions.

 

[Weird Piggy]

Once state Property is an option, switch over to workshop from whatever you were doing. 4 production per grassland x modifers = Good.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

I'd appreciate some help in clarifing how building farms relates to a "production city".

Adding another perspective to add to the confusion.

A specialized city is one in which your allocation of citizens, the improvements to the tiles, and the buildings in the city are all focused in the same direction. This normally has two effects - it reduces the amount of investment you need to put in infrastructure (your military city doesn't need a university, your science city doesn't need a factory), and it maximizes the return you get from your unique national wonders.

There are a number of sub species of production cities, but what they all have in common is that you are trying to maximize your sustainable rate of hammers.

(Sustainable rate could be a steady state, where you are getting exactly as much food as you need, or it could be a short cycle, where one citizen alternates between a tile with a food surplus and a tile with a food deficit, or it could be a long cycle where you get a bunch of hammers at once, and then regrow the lost population/food).

Therefore, there are two reasons you may need farms in a production city. First, because the surplus food is necessary to work the deficit food/high production tiles. Pretty trivial, really.

Second, because high production tiles stunt your city's growth. Rule of thumb is that, unless production now is particularly urgent, your long term interests are best served by growing the city to the next larger size as quickly as possible. So when you reach a point where you have to grow, you pull the citizens off of the weakest production tiles to have them farm for a bit, and then - having hit the growth point - you resume your new sustainable production configuration.