Decisions, Decisions

[LowEndUserII]

Your not being Rude at all. There`s a lot to the Game I`m still learning. I irrgated rather then mined the grassland the Cities were on to boost City pop. quickly. Was that incorrect ? I appreciate the advice on Scouts as well.

This may be a misperception, but with Japan, Persia, and Zulu, key early buildings like Barracks and UU`s seem to get built much faster, all things being equal.


[/QUOTE]I'm sorry if this sounds rude, but do you know how production works? Each civilization can produce at the same rate if they have the same number of shields. You increase the number of shields by mining tiles, increasing population, more land per city, reducing corruption, and (eventually, railing mined tiles). The things mentioned may not directly or immediately increase the shields generated by a city but in the long run, they will. So this thought: "Very slow unit builds compared to Persia, Zulu and even Japanese, my Warmonger Faves." is not truly correct.

I think your production problem is mainly a terrain thing. Plains only give 1 shield (and should be irrigated not mined). Grassland also only gives 1 shield (mined not irrigated) but has the chance to be bonus grassland (grassland with a white dot in the middle), which gives 1 extra shield. Your terrain is half plains (which sucks) and mostly irrigated or unimproved grassland. Your land is also very crowded, and you have few rivers to increase your population size. All this contributes to what you may see as slow production.[/QUOTE]

 

[Aabraxan]

Your not being Rude at all. There`s a lot to the Game I`m still learning. I irrgated rather then mined the grassland the Cities were on to boost City pop. quickly. Was that incorrect ? I appreciate the advice on Scouts as well.

Irrigating grassland seems like the logical thing to do, but if you did it while under despotism, then all you did was waste worker turns. The rest of this paragraph is about the Despotism Penalty. If you're already familiar with it, you can feel free to skip this part. Under despotism, any tile producing 3 or more of food, gold or shields gets 1 unit subtracted. So if you irrigate (+1 food) an unimproved grassland tile (2 food), that makes it a 3-food tile and the despotism penalty kicks in, knocking it back to 2 food. You used worker turns for 0 benefit, until you switch governments. OTOH, a grassland cow tile (4 food before the penalty) has already triggered the penalty and is a 3-food tile under despotism. Irrigate that and it goes back to 4 food. The Despotism Penalty is not a cap, but a one-time subtraction.

This may be a misperception, but with Japan, Persia, and Zulu, key early buildings like Barracks and UU`s seem to get built much faster, all things being equal.

There may also be some truth here, at least in terms of buildings. Japan & the Zulu are militaristic, so raxes only cost 20 shields. Persia is industrious, so mines get built a little faster.

 

[Spoonwood]

Bump what Aabraxan said. When in despotism... other than for food bonus squares like wines, wheat, cattle, and game (oasis if you're agricultural and maybe some others), irrigate brown and mine green. When not in despotism or when you will shortly transfer to despotism irrigating/mining comes as dependent on what you want/need for your strategy. Do you not need as much growth, but need more production? Then mine or better still use more mined hills and mountains. Do you want more growth? Irrigate like crazy. This comes as all rather game dependent, so it comes out a somewhat complicated answer. Still, it works out simply enough under one condition. Probably sometime in the high middle ages before hospitals... especially if you add in workers to size 7+ cities, or possibly even sooner... open the city display and count how much extra food your city has size 12. Then mine tiles/use other ones, and *forest* tiles until you have no extra food, but you have maximum production. You'll want to mine brown, and forest only the regular grassland squares... not the bonus grassland ones since forestry there won't yield extra shields but will in regular grassland squares. You'll have extra production in the high middle ages then and in the early industrial ages before hospitals (given that you build them). If/when you start to chop those forests for more growth after hospitals you'll also get a small production boost here. At least that's what I do and it makes sense to me

 

[Tribute]

Well irrigation is all well and good, but you have to follow through with aqueducts if the town needs one. (Settlements adjacent to a river or lake do not need to build aqueducts.) This is especially necessary for the settlements nearest your capital since they have the lowest corruption rates. These settlements have the maximum potential (generally) compared to other settlements (, which is why I advised capturing those nearby Iroquois towns, since they'll be very good for your empire).

Aabraxan has said it; the Japanese and the Zulu are militaristic, which gives them a discount on barracks. Persia is industrious like America is, so I don't know why there would be a difference. (Perhaps better land, or you were thinking of their cheaper libraries?) America's only advantage in production is that it is industrious, making it's workers better. However, it has no building discounts, which agricultural, seafaring, religious, militaristic, and scientific all get. (Commerical, industrious, and expansionist get no discounts.)