Emphasize Food vs. Emphasize Production

[Spoonwood]

If one opens every city upon growth (funny, we talk of a city's 'growth' a biological term which happens continuously, while growth of cities happens in discrete steps, but I digress), and one has the 'emphasize production' setting on, then one can get more total shields, commerce, and food overall. This happens since one gets extra production upon a city's growth. See the four saves here for a demonstration. This, of course, involves micromanagment.

On the other hand, if one never opens a city screen, then a city will grow faster with 'emphasize food' on. This results in a bigger city size earlier. Generally, experienced players seem to agree that faster growth of cities generates more shields, commerce, and food overall. So, given expert players as correct here, if one never opens a city screen, then one will get better served to put the governor on 'emphasize food'.

This article argues for the importance of food in general. At bare minimum the strategy there works, because more food allows for more easily produced workers.

But, I suspect that most players don't always open the city screen and change the tiles the citizens work, nor do they never do so. They sometimes will micromanage (MM) in such a manner, and sometimes won't. So, then the question becomes, how much does of this MMing does one need for 'emphasize production' to work out better? How little of this MMing does one need for 'emphasize food' to work out better?

I don't view these questions as easy to answer in general for a good guideline of how to play Civ III well. Not only do players vary in the amount they MM, the supposed threshold here, almost surely, varies from game to game. For example, in a game where I have (near the beginning of the game or ultimately also) 5 towns, if I have all cities to 'emphasize production' I surely need to MM less than in a game where I have 20 towns, for 'emphasize production' to work out better overall than 'emphasize food'. In a 20k game, 'emphasize production' works out better for one's 20k site, but the other cities don't matter as much. In a 100k game production doesn't matter at all, and there's A LOT of possible MMing to do via whipping, such that it inevitably comes as easier and thus more interesting to have 'emphasize food' on. And so on.

Still, if one supposes that one MMs only one city in the game, then for that city 'emphasize production' will produce optimal output for that city, while for the rest of the cities 'emphasize food' will produce optimal production for that city. Likewise, if one only MMs two cities, then for those two cities 'emphasize production', and for other cities 'emphasize food'. And so on for n cities.

Since most of us don't MM all our cities, and even when I've tried to MM hundreds of my cities I've noticed that I sometimes make weak MM choices, I'd suggest any settler or worker factory to get MMed with 'emphasize production' on. The rest of the cities don't get MMed and have 'emphasize food' on. Hopefully, this strikes a balance between MMing (which can feel tedious to everyone), while still enjoying its benefits. In my opinion, 20k games naturally help provide such a balance also.

I wish to reiterate my question here "How much does of this MMing does one need for 'emphasize production' to work out better? How little of this MMing does one need for 'emphasize food' to work out better?"

 

[Daeron]

Personally, I use CAII to notify me when a city has grown. I actually always have the governor turned off, unless it is needed to make a settler factory work. Not sure what kind of effect that has on tile selection on growth though.

I do know that I'm often at fault for trying to squeeze as much shields out of my cities in the early game, hampering my growth and economy. Lately I've begun to doubt whether productivity is better than commerce. I'm planning to play an Emperor game at some point where apart from the first ring, I irrigate everything and go for a slingshot to Republic.

 

[Spoonwood]

I actually always have the governor turned off, unless it is needed to make a settler factory work. Not sure what kind of effect that has on tile selection on growth though.

See the four saves here for what effects the governor has.

Guess I should clarify what I mean by 'governor'. I mean the "general" screen, which you can see below. All aspects of that screen qualify as part of the 'governor'.

 

[Puppeteer]

I don't use the governor to manage citizens (or anything else), but I do often manipulate the "emphasize" choices per city, because on the turn a city grows, the setting affects where the new citizen is placed, and shields are counted after growth, so frequently it is useful to emphasize production to get an extra shield or two on the growth turn, especially in settler factories.

Emphasize food gives no comparable interturn advantage, but I use it on high food cities that I want to keep growing quickly without frequent micromanagement. If I have a +5fpt city, often the new citizen will work a low-food tile to gain more shields and/or coin unless I select emphasize food.

Emphasize commerce I think also does not give an interturn advantage, because I think commerce is figured before food and growth. I do occasionally use it to encourage new citizens to work the sea or other high-gold tiles to avoid frequent MM.

With the exception of settler pumps and urgently-needed production (catch-up troops for a war, racing to a wonder, etc.) my MM doesn't take that much effort. Basically every time production switches, see if MM is helpful. For example, 8spt is wasteful for an archer when 7spt will still finish in 3 turns, and the jump from 9spt to 10spt is huge when building swords, MDI or longbows. And CAII or MapStat can alert you when a city grows, and then peek at that city to see if its production still makes sense.

As far as food versus production, I would guess it's similar with the governor as it is when micromanaging. When the city is small, high food is beneficial to increase population (or pop settlers or workers) quickly. When it's hitting its happiness limits or needs an aqueduct/hospital to grow more, then emphasizing production (or commerce) is more effective than +5fpt with a full granary.

 

[Daeron]

See the four saves here for what effects the governor has.

Guess I should clarify what I mean by 'governor'. I mean the "general" screen, which you can see below. All aspects of that screen qualify as part of the 'governor'.

Yeah, but what is the tile selection if the governor is turned off completely? That's what I always do. It seems to take it by order of power, the total of food, shields and commerce a tile gives combined. But what if it had to choose between a mined plain and an irrigated plain?

 

[Spoonwood]

Yeah, but what is the tile selection if the governor is turned off completely? That's what I always do.

I believe the computer weights shields, commerce, and food. Then whichever tile produces the greatest sum of these weights gets selected. At least Cracker seems to imply such:

It is also helpful to know what happens if you construct no improvements using your worker. This case might apply if the worker were destroyed by barbarians or an enemy of if the worker moved off to another task. With no changes in place, the city governor will assign a citizen to the most powerful square until the city gains a pop point and the cultural boundaries expand in 3500BC at turn 10. Then the second citizen will work the wheat square and produce three food units per turn. The third citizen will be hatched at turn 17 and the AI will assign this citizen to work the next bonus grassland if you emphasize food or one of the forest squares next to the river if you emphasize production.

Testing of several different cities with different terrain would come as needed to confirm this, and we'd need to know how the computer rates food, shields, and commerce.

 

[Daeron]

Ahh, thank you, I might experiment a little with this. Commerce is probably ranked lowest, considering the AI will always ignore the commerce bonus from rivers for a food or shield bonus.

 

[Lanzelot]

Last weekend I noticed something very strange. For the full details see SGFN-08 #401. (A .sav file for trying it for yourself can be found in post #331 in the same thread.)

Here is the short form: Berlin was making 6spt for two turns and on turn 3 it was supposed to grow and pick up a roaded river forest for two extra shields and finish a 20 shield archer: 6+6+8 = 20.
The governor settings in Berlin are like this: (I marked the wonder settings in red, because originally I thought that these were the ones that might have caused the bug, but apparently they didn't.)

But still, on growth the governor picked a grassland tile (2/1/2) instead of the forest tile (1/2/2) leaving the production box with only 19 shields:

I have been using "Emphasize Production = Yes" for three years now, and have never seen anything like this happening. In this particular game it happened several times (one time the governor was even picking an unimproved grassland for 2/0/0, when there was a roaded silk forest available for 1/2/3 = 6 total power!) while at other times it picked the forest as expected.
Some of the team members said it has something to do with the surplus food the town is currently making. With +3 or more food, the governor would pick the forest, with only +2 food it would always pick the highest food tile. But this is contrary to my previous experience. I'm sure I've used the free extra shields from forests on growth in towns with less than +3 food before

Thanks, Lanzelot

 

[The Professor]

My understanding is that the governor will always choose tiles that keep the city at +2 fpt, if possible. It is only after that, that it will emphasize production, if instructed to do so. So, the "emphasize production" setting works on Settler Factories, which generally have +5 food, but not so well on archers, necessarily.

 

[Optional]

I find it difficult to predict sometimes what the governor will pick, and I appear to have no influence over it. The screenshots below show an example with 'emphasise production' on, but whatever the setting, the same thing will happen.

Here's the situation; a new town is going to be founded, and Tenochtitlan will grow:

Here are the tiles that the governor chose to be worked:

In the case of Teotihuacan he chose a river-forest tile over a river-bg tile, in the case of Tenochtitlan he did something different. Why???

 

[Daeron]

I would say that corruption and waste might play a role? Though I doubt one of those first 2 shields in Teotihuacan would be corrupt.

 

[Optional]

I've never seen corruption/waste play any roll in the governor's decisions. As far as I can tell he's unaware of it. I often switch a citizen from a bg to a roaded river tile, as the shield get wasted in a corrupt place, while 1 of the 2 gold might be saved.

 

[Spoonwood]

In the Tenochtitlan case the governing going for a forest wouldn't have changed the finish date of the warrior, while in the Teotihauacan case the forest will change the finish date of the warrior. This would seem to contradict Lanzelot's archer case. Let's keep in mind though that we have TWO screens for the governor, "general" and "prodcution". He's only given us the general screen. In the production screen we have settings for "produce growth", "produce production", "produce happiness", "produce wealth", and "produce trade".

If these all get set to "sometimes", then emphasize production on "yes" along with a sometimes, would appear to imply that we would more often than not get the "emphasize production" effect, but we'll sometimes get an "emphasize food" effect if the computer's "decisionmaking" algorithm works that way. Or at least that's my guess so far. I think we could "test" this by turning "preserve random seed off" and then reloading a save A LOT of times and seeing if we always get the same result with various "sometimes" settings on. Not quite sure if such a "test" will work as conclusive though.

Addendum: The professor might have the better explanation here, but I don't see how it squares with what Optional presented (given he has the settings the same as The Professor does).

 

[Spoonwood]

Do you have the 690BCE save where this happened Lanzelot?

 

[Daeron]

I think this is the save just before growth, I completely turned off the governor everywhere. I've fooled around with it a bit and the only way to get desired result is to switch a citizen from a mined bg to a forest. Then on growth the mined BG will get selected. But this can only be used because the food box was at an uneven number.

 

[Optional]

In the Tenochtitlan case the governing going for a forest wouldn't have changed the finish date of the warrior, while in the Teotihauacan case the forest will change the finish date of the warrior.

I'm pretty sure he's blissfully unaware of that as well (also the warrior in Tenochtitlan will be there next turn on working a forest).

Let's keep in mind though that we have TWO screens for the governor, "general" and "production". He's only given us the general screen. In the production screen we have settings for "produce growth", "produce production", "produce happiness", "produce wealth", and "produce trade".

I'm thinking that these choices do something similar as the editor settings, by which one civ will produce more culture, another more units, again another civ will produce more banks, etc. I'm assuming this has absolutely no effect on which tiles will be worked.

But I've downloaded your 4 saves, Spoonwood, and I'm noticing that the governor is indeed 'listening' there; he makes different choices as to which tiles to work, depending on the settings. The problem we have here now, and Lanzelot has put that forward, is that in SGFN08 the governor isn't listening, and we're trying to figure out why sometimes the governor is listening and sometimes not.
He doesn't listen in my games, but I'm downoading your saves and I'm noticing the governor is listening. Why?

 

[Aabraxan]

Do you have the 690BCE save where this happened Lanzelot?

I don't know who played that turn, but it might also be worth asking in SGFN08, if it wasn't Lanzelot.

I don't know if this helps, but here's what I get if I dig around in my somewhat-foggy memory of what I've read here: Regardless of the emphasis settings, the governor will always choose the high-food tile if food production is at +2 surplus food/turn or less (or maybe it's just at less than +2 surplus food/turn), and will always choose something else (either commerce or shields), if food is at +4 surplus food/turn or more. The governor does not seem to recognize any need to have +5 surplus food/turn.

 

[Lanzelot]

Let's keep in mind though that we have TWO screens for the governor, "general" and "prodcution". He's only given us the general screen. In the production screen we have settings for "produce growth", "produce production", "produce happiness", "produce wealth", and "produce trade".

If these all get set to "sometimes", then emphasize production on "yes" along with a sometimes, would appear to imply that we would more often than not get the "emphasize production" effect, but we'll sometimes get an "emphasize food" effect if the computer's "decisionmaking" algorithm works that way.

Interesting idea, but didn't work either. Attached is the turn before growth, where I did two things:

• Gave the BG to Frankfurt, so that it is not available to Berlin's governor on growth. So de facto he can choose only between 0-shield tiles (grassland) and 2-shield tiles (forest).
• Set the "Production" settings like this:
  
  

But still the governor chooses the river grassland (2/0/1) every time.
Actually, I'm not quite sure, what this "Production" screen is good for. Up to now I thought "Produce Production" meant that the governor should select improvements that help with production (Factory, Coal Plant, etc), "Produce Happiness" means Temples, Cathedrals, etc, etc. But I could be wrong here. That screen didn't interest me so far, because I always manually select the things to build in all my towns.

I've fooled around with it a bit and the only way to get desired result is to switch a citizen from a mined bg to a forest. Then on growth the mined BG will get selected. But this can only be used because the food box was at an uneven number.

Excellent. If we do find out that the governor always tries to restore +2 food on growth, this may help in some cases!

 

[Spoonwood]

Lanzelot: Right after I wrote my post, I fired up a game and tried that with the settings you showed above. I had it on a warrior and used a lake on the last turn, with 7 shields in the box before it grew, and a forest around. It didn't select a forest, it selected a grassland. After that I added the addendum, which seems to make sense of this.

But, it doesn't make sense of Optional's example. Well, maybe it's not +2fpt for the city as Aabraxan and TheProfessor have suggested. Maybe 1. the line comes as +3fpt for the city as a whole. Or 2. maybe you only get the forest upon growth if you have a non-center tile in your city radius which has at least 3fpt. Or 3. we have to have a food bonus square, such a wheat, game, or cow in use (NOT an irrigated grassland). Actually, 1. can't work due to Optional's example with the Aztecs. Testing 2., 3., and 2. vs. 3. would require comparing the effects noticed in one game where you have a non-despotic government with an irrigated grassland vs. what happens for a despotic government where the city has a food bonus square in use.

The Teotihuacan example might not contradict any of this. The selection of tiles upon founding a city may come as based on the tile which has the greatest number (f+p+c) where f indicates the number of food gained by using that square, 'c' commerce, and 'p' production. Thus, it need not square with the selection of tiles upon growth, as the program might work differently for cities founded than for tiles selected upon growth.

Excellent. If we do find out that the governor always tries to restore +2 food on growth, this may help in some cases!

Unless Optional has some sort of strange setting causing something highly irregular to happen, we already can tell that such doesn't happen. Before growth Tenochtitlan has 3fpt, since it sits at size 1, and thus requires 2 food for the denizens. 2 food comes the citizen in the field, and 3 from the city center, for 5 fpt produced, for a net gain of 3fpt. So, it simply can't come as purely based on the amount of net food per turn for the city. The idea COULD still come as basically on the right track in a sense, and either hypotheses 1. or 2. basically would confirm this, if we corrobated them.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

[/LIST]

But still the governor chooses the river grassland (2/0/1) every time.
Actually, I'm not quite sure, what this "Production" screen is good for. Up to now I thought "Produce Production" meant that the governor should select improvements that help with production (Factory, Coal Plant, etc), "Produce Happiness" means Temples, Cathedrals, etc, etc. But I could be wrong here. That screen didn't interest me so far, because I always manually select the things to build in all my towns.

I think you are correct and the setting affect what improvement or unit the governor will put into the build queue next. Most of the time it is irrelevant, since you'll set the next thing to be built manually anyway.

It does have its uses though, and if you cleverly tweak the settings you can make the build orders default to "Wealth," "Worker," or even "Temple" in newly created towns. Think of really big maps where you plop down hundreds of towns. Or at least manage to get the governor to make more sensible choices in automatically picking the build orders (so you don't have to override them nearly every time).