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- Mar 11, 2008
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hmmm...I guess Utrecht spot is okay actually. Can share horses and corn...and then settle 1E of Copper, where that city will eventually take the corn from Utrecht as its main food source, but has strong copper tile to work. 3 strong cities all close by and overlapping...and all with a good food source.
TW>POT is perfectly fine on this level, but I was thinking with low commerce and AH in, just go straight to Writing with ability to knock out a creative library in Dam quickly for some early scientists.
This is a very good question. Pre-chopping is a thing indeed, but you don't necessarily need to wait if a chop is ready. Putting a chop into the settler can speed it up for whipping leading to a faster settler. Then go prepare a chopof another forest and likely finish at or just after your 4>2 settler whip - putting the OF from settler whip and chop into a new worker.. Also, it is important to keep track of base hammers of your city while producing settler and the production points of the settler that allow for 4>2 whip, which =<69H of production into the settler. If you hit 70H then it becomes a 1pop whip. (think about the fact that a citizen = 30 hammers and a settler cost 100H)
Note that if you want to get some growth in between chops or delay a turn of settler production due to timings, you can always queue something else for a turn like a warrior or whatever. Learn to move things around in your build queue. OR in the case where you are still size 3 and want to grow to 4 to whip, but a chop is ready, you can add settler for a turn to take chop then switch back to whatever you were building to grow.
ah yep, good point from sampsa. Binary research is a pretty important concept once you hit deficit research after settling your 1st city. Keep in mind that you are still progressing a tiny bit toward whatever you are teching due to the 1 beaker from Palace, but you are fully maximizing your gold for a while until you have enough to finish the tech. Sometimes it is just a turn or 2 but as you start hitting more expensive techs like Alpha, Maths, or Aesths, you may go quite a few turns longer to max gold, which also helps fund your extended expansion.
And then with Libraries in you can run scientists too for increased research rate wile you run 0% slider. With an early creative library you can get those beakers going sooner and get your Academy eventually.
Lastly, on another note, it is probably good idea to get some warriors out to spawnbust, especially the area due W of the copper where you will settle your 4th city. But I'd like to see the area to the SW of scouted soon for seafood. (Not sure what that 1 warrior is doing near Dam)
edit: Okay, I opened the save as I thought you should have more warriors and I could not see them in pics, plus I wanted to plan some spawbusting.
First, a single unit can spawnbust a 5X5 tile area from the tile it stand on. This is very useful in preventing barb spawn and protecting future city sites. Now Noble is less a concern for barbs, but this gets far more important as you move up levels...and even here with all the jungle you are going to run into some barb issues sooner than later with no nearby AIs. (granted you will have copper soon enough)
Extended scouting is secondary to spawnbusting. So that warrior way up N is not doing the right thing here. Bring him back S to stand 1NE of the western corn for now.
Note that the area SE of Dam is extremely easy to spawnbust. You can send that warrior near Dam down there to stand 2E of that corn down there and never worry about barbs in your backyard. (Just be careful when you send him down there as there might be an animal running about down there..not sure if you have any more free barb wins left)
If you have warrior popping out soon from somewhere, I might.send him N or NW of Utrecht a bit. Utrecht's borders will pop soon giving visibility to a good bit of tiles up there so I think NW near the sugars is good for now. Anyway, good idea to put this concept into practice now.
Coastal scout is a better option later to open trade routes, so maybe pop a Workboat outta Dam soon and put it on auto-explore.
edit2: I played a few turns to setup next settler whip. I'm posting a screenshot of Dam the turn after I whipped the settler (ha..forgot you were not in slavery yet so it threw me off). Anyway, not where I hover to left of production bar and see the results of overflow as well as a new chop that just finished, resulting in a 1t worker:
Keep in mind here that Amsterdam currently has 1 base hammer in that city (yeah it does have 4 base hammers if it works the horses again. But the point is maybe 4 to 5 base hammers at max this early. We just generated 59 pure hammers in one turn from that whip and chop. THAT is how you win this game.
oh..uploaded the save that turn so you can look at things more closely
TW>POT is perfectly fine on this level, but I was thinking with low commerce and AH in, just go straight to Writing with ability to knock out a creative library in Dam quickly for some early scientists.
Thank you sampsa I didn't know about that! One thing I am wondering is since I am going to grow to 4 before settler was it a mistake to already start chopping? Will I just pre chop the forest and leave it until I start the settler?
This is a very good question. Pre-chopping is a thing indeed, but you don't necessarily need to wait if a chop is ready. Putting a chop into the settler can speed it up for whipping leading to a faster settler. Then go prepare a chopof another forest and likely finish at or just after your 4>2 settler whip - putting the OF from settler whip and chop into a new worker.. Also, it is important to keep track of base hammers of your city while producing settler and the production points of the settler that allow for 4>2 whip, which =<69H of production into the settler. If you hit 70H then it becomes a 1pop whip. (think about the fact that a citizen = 30 hammers and a settler cost 100H)
Note that if you want to get some growth in between chops or delay a turn of settler production due to timings, you can always queue something else for a turn like a warrior or whatever. Learn to move things around in your build queue. OR in the case where you are still size 3 and want to grow to 4 to whip, but a chop is ready, you can add settler for a turn to take chop then switch back to whatever you were building to grow.
ah yep, good point from sampsa. Binary research is a pretty important concept once you hit deficit research after settling your 1st city. Keep in mind that you are still progressing a tiny bit toward whatever you are teching due to the 1 beaker from Palace, but you are fully maximizing your gold for a while until you have enough to finish the tech. Sometimes it is just a turn or 2 but as you start hitting more expensive techs like Alpha, Maths, or Aesths, you may go quite a few turns longer to max gold, which also helps fund your extended expansion.
And then with Libraries in you can run scientists too for increased research rate wile you run 0% slider. With an early creative library you can get those beakers going sooner and get your Academy eventually.
Lastly, on another note, it is probably good idea to get some warriors out to spawnbust, especially the area due W of the copper where you will settle your 4th city. But I'd like to see the area to the SW of scouted soon for seafood. (Not sure what that 1 warrior is doing near Dam)
edit: Okay, I opened the save as I thought you should have more warriors and I could not see them in pics, plus I wanted to plan some spawbusting.
First, a single unit can spawnbust a 5X5 tile area from the tile it stand on. This is very useful in preventing barb spawn and protecting future city sites. Now Noble is less a concern for barbs, but this gets far more important as you move up levels...and even here with all the jungle you are going to run into some barb issues sooner than later with no nearby AIs. (granted you will have copper soon enough)
Extended scouting is secondary to spawnbusting. So that warrior way up N is not doing the right thing here. Bring him back S to stand 1NE of the western corn for now.
Note that the area SE of Dam is extremely easy to spawnbust. You can send that warrior near Dam down there to stand 2E of that corn down there and never worry about barbs in your backyard. (Just be careful when you send him down there as there might be an animal running about down there..not sure if you have any more free barb wins left)
If you have warrior popping out soon from somewhere, I might.send him N or NW of Utrecht a bit. Utrecht's borders will pop soon giving visibility to a good bit of tiles up there so I think NW near the sugars is good for now. Anyway, good idea to put this concept into practice now.
Coastal scout is a better option later to open trade routes, so maybe pop a Workboat outta Dam soon and put it on auto-explore.
edit2: I played a few turns to setup next settler whip. I'm posting a screenshot of Dam the turn after I whipped the settler (ha..forgot you were not in slavery yet so it threw me off). Anyway, not where I hover to left of production bar and see the results of overflow as well as a new chop that just finished, resulting in a 1t worker:
Spoiler I love to whip :
Keep in mind here that Amsterdam currently has 1 base hammer in that city (yeah it does have 4 base hammers if it works the horses again. But the point is maybe 4 to 5 base hammers at max this early. We just generated 59 pure hammers in one turn from that whip and chop. THAT is how you win this game.
oh..uploaded the save that turn so you can look at things more closely
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