Forts

[bonafide11]

Forts really are sweet now, I use them all the time, especially in the late game.

 

[Spartan117]

i am just wondering, havent got the game yet but dies the ai use the forts. In previos versions they did not use forts at all.

 

[UncleJJ]

So why couldn't I send ships through my fort on a 1-plot island?

Ships can only enter a fort inside your cultural borders.

I don't always do the Fort on a resource outside of the fat cross. Mainly because Fort usually take 10 turns to complete, and building the improvement usually costs less than 10 turns. Obviously it depends.

I agree it depends but an advantage of the fort is that you can build the improvement before your cultural boundary has expanded. Say you have silver in the tundra 3 tiles from your new city. You can spend 10 turns building the fort on it while the culture is building up, rather than the 6 (or so) after the border pop with a mine. That is an big 6 turn advantage for the fort if you need the extra happiness urgently. And you get a free airbase later in the game and an extra defence from pillaging if it is in a vulnerable area.

 

[meatwad4289]

heres question.. People are saying Forts get you resources yada yada yada..

So if theres Iron, I can build a fort on it and get the iron? Then why bother building Mines, plantations, oil wells, Ect? or do you get a better deal with mines?

 

[Tavenier]

They're the same as before, plus the following:

Ships can enter them.
You can garrison aircraft in them (which becomes very useful because you can only place 4 aircraft in a city now, 8 with an airport, which makes airports key espionage targets...)
They provide access to any resource on the tile on which they are built.

If you have 8 planes in a city and an enemy spy destroys the airport, will you immediatly lose 4 of your aircraft? Or do you have one turn to send them elsewhere?

 

[Tavenier]

heres question.. People are saying Forts get you resources yada yada yada..

So if theres Iron, I can build a fort on it and get the iron? Then why bother building Mines, plantations, oil wells, Ect? or do you get a better deal with mines?

Well, if the resource is in your city radius, you need a mine or plantation to het the extra hammers/food/commerce for your city. So the forts are handy for resources outside your fat crosses.

 

[hotstuffjsn]

Nobody answered the question as to whether or not the AI utilizes the "build fort" improvement.

As soon as I get the game i'm definitely going to give them a try. 10 turns to build is a bit harsh, I don't remember them taking that long on Civ 2; then again if your workers have nothing to do why not? lol

 

[tilleul]

Nobody answered the question as to whether or not the AI utilizes the "build fort" improvement.

As soon as I get the game i'm definitely going to give them a try. 10 turns to build is a bit harsh, I don't remember them taking that long on Civ 2; then again if your workers have nothing to do why not? lol

yes the AI does build forts and even on resources outside their city radius and on resources they can't exploit yet because they don't have the appropriate technology.

For instance, I've seen a fort on an oil tile years before the AI got Combustion.

However, I don't know if the AI uses the forts for defense.

On the other hand, now that the forts can act as ports for ships and airbases for planes, maybe they should be renamed ? Maybe to something like Advanced Base/Post
Also the graphics should be more adapted to the situation: for instance, a fort built on the seashore should look more like a port IMO. It is really weird to see a ship on a hill, within a fort !

 

[hotstuffjsn]

While I do like the new fort improvements, it may be a bit unrealistic due to the fact you can base planes in them. I'm not debating the usefullness of them but to house an airstrip in the field is no small task, very vunerable, and needs a lot of protection. I think they should add some limitations to it as well as a port for ships as these are generally expensive as well.

Maybe they could add an expense to having a fort. Say 10 gold per turn upkeep or something like that to prevent spamming them.

 

[Danielos]

Now when Firaxis has made a fort a valuable improvement, isn´t it about time to upgrade the workshop as well? I suspect they are very rarely used.

 

[hotstuffjsn]

Now when Firaxis has made a fort a valuable improvement, isn´t it about time to upgrade the workshop as well? I suspect they are very rarely used.

On the contrary, with State Property the workshop has no food penalty and usually in the late game when food is plentiful thanks to Biology, workshops are the way to go for a production city Unless of course you have a lot of hills

 

[Bast]

If a resource is outside any of my cities fat squares, I just put a fort on top instead of the actual improvement.

I am not going to be able to work the resource and gain its improvement bonus, so with the fort I still gain the resource for trade and also have a place for some later bombers.

That's a really good idea. Actually I saw AI do that and I was wondering why. In fact, when that tile became mine, I actually turned it into a pasture (it was cows). So you learn something new every day - even from AI these days.

 

[Alsn]

Now when Firaxis has made a fort a valuable improvement, isn´t it about time to upgrade the workshop as well? I suspect they are very rarely used.

Are you crazy? Caste system + state property = 4 hammers compared to a mine which is -1 food +4 hammers(including the hill +-1 as well as railroad).

The only reason why you would want something else is if you needed a farm or a watermill(if theres a river near) to max out the city size. The only real benefit with hills + mines is that you can discover resources which can bump it up to -1 food +6 production(with railroad) but it can also lower the production if its gems/silver/gold.

In short, workshops own but are pretty "meh" if you arent running CS+SP.

 

[TheRealCzar]

Are you crazy? Caste system + state property = 4 hammers compared to a mine which is -1 food +4 hammers(including the hill +-1 as well as railroad).

The only reason why you would want something else is if you needed a farm or a watermill(if theres a river near) to max out the city size. The only real benefit with hills + mines is that you can discover resources which can bump it up to -1 food +6 production(with railroad) but it can also lower the production if its gems/silver/gold.

In short, workshops own but are pretty "meh" if you arent running CS+SP.

what does caste system have to do with it?

 

[whakojacko]

what does caste system have to do with it?

IIRC caste system now gives workshops +1H

 

[Draknith]

I noticed that my workers actually build forts now. Each time they did this i realized they were putting them in very good defensible areas. The only problem I found was that they would sometimes build one on top of a resource. I understand now that the resource is still worked, but having an actual winery is better than having a fort on top of grapes i think, if just for aestetic purposes. So far though the use of forts for my civ has worked to my benefit.