Expansionist Trait and First Strike.

[BlindEyedJack]

I've been able to figure out the advantages of the leader traits except one: expansionist. From my understanding, it helps early civs deal with flood plains and jungles in their fat cross, but I just don't see what the point is in the later levels of the game. I'm currently in 1600AD (roughly) and most of my cities have 8~10 more "healthy" than "unhealthy" (thanks to copius amounts of resource related health bonuses) and its not like having an extra 2 healthy is going to give my any more of an advantage. Could someone give me some insight into this trait?

Also, are first strikes guaranteed hits or does a first strike simply give your units a chance to cause damage before the enemy can? Are the only used in defense or are they also used when attacking units?

 

[Sailsa]

Early in the game, you will normally have enough health to cover your cities unless you play on higher difficulties where you start with less. On higher difficulty levels this trait may be very beneficial. In normal games. the early bonus is the cheap granaries as they will let you grow more quickly. Then, once you get big enough to exhaust your original health and become unhealthy, the expansive trait basically gives you 2 extra food which is not lost. This is enough to have a specilist in the city so basically the expansive trait is an extra specialist in all your big cities, which is a nice bonus.

 

[eotinb]

Given the name of the trait, it's not unreasonable for it to help mostly in the early stages of the game.

 

[ToadFaerie]

On the lower difficulties, when one starts with sufficient Health bonus that cities don't get poor health at low populations, the Expansive trait doesn't have a benefit until later in the game.

On the higher difficulties, one could get an unhealthy city at low population sizes, which means it will have a very real benefit in the early game phase.

 

[Good Omens]

It can also help your production later because you don't need to worry about the health effects of factories, coal plants, forges. Let 'em choke!