Founding A City On A Resource

Gidoza

Emperor
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Jul 26, 2013
Messages
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So I'll tell you what prompted me to start this thread.

I founded two cities in one game on a resource - in this case, Sugar. Both tiles were river tiles. However, one was a Grassland tile, and one was a Plains tile.

The Grassland tile with Sugar yielded 4 Food, 1 Production, and 1 Gold, while the Plains tile with Sugar yielded 3 Food, 1 Production, and 1 Gold. You can test this yourself if you don't believe me.


What's interesting about this is that even though the actual tile type in this particular case is irrelevant with respect to the standard city yield (both plains and grassland on a River always yield 3 Food and 1 Production), somehow the tile type *is* relevant to how much of a bonus the Resource is providing. This strikes me as very odd.

I guess a Vote could be started if I thought it warranted it, but just a couple reflections on starting a city on or off of a Resource tile and the benefits/drawbacks thereof. I'll presume here *founding* on a tile.

Advantage - The City gets immediate bonuses from that resource.
-> But does it? If the City started next to that tile, it would get the bonus anyways - so unless you have enough tiles to provide for the population, nothing is actually changing.

Disadvantage - No Faith Pantheon/other yields from the requisite Improvement type.

Disadvantage - One less Supertile for a GP Improvement.

Advantage - Convenient positioning for when you can't build a Farm there anyways.

Advantage - Can connect certain resources more quickly (but this only really matters for the Capital as far as I can tell).


One could also throw in the note that Floodplains don't yield an extra food for a City founded on them as compared to Grassland/Plains that naturally hold less yield. It always makes founding on them a little painful because you not only lose the yield for that tile, but also all the other potential yields for Farm triangles and the like.


For me this begs a few questions, seeing as the above strike me as more disadvantages than advantages:

1. Should a founded Resource tile always give the full bonus that it would give naturally?

2. Should it also give the bonus of its improvement (when available)?

3. Should a City count as a Farm tile or Eki for calculating Farm Triangles?

4. I think it's at least reasonable that whatever situation is otherwise the case, a Resource should provide a bonus uniformly (e.g. Sugar provides the same bonus on a river tile regardless of if the tile is Grassland or Plains).

5. Or something else? Like +1 Production regardless of what Resource type it is.

6. Other considerations?



I just haven't seen this topic discussed at all at any point, so may as well bring it up now.

Cheers!
 
Luxuries that have a +x% to yields monopoly are also good targets. Copper on flat desert is a good example because you can quickly get the monopoly without spending worker time on a crappy flat desert mine
 
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The rules here are pretty weird. The first rule is that production never decreases. So if you settle on flat plains horses, (1:c5food: 2:c5production: ), the city will have 3 food and 2 hammers. If you settle on flat grassland horses (2:c5food: 1:c5production: ) the city will have 3 food and 1 hammer.

If the resource gives gold, you always get the gold. Same for faith/culture, and probably science if it existed.

Food is weird though. Settling on non-fresh water grassland wine will give an extra food, but settling on freshwater tiles with 4 food does not.

Monopoly bonuses apply to resources themselves, not improvements. If you settle on top of silver, your city will get the 2 culture once you connect the monopoly. Any building that buffs a resource will also apply (if you settle on sugar, the market still gives its yields). However stuff like the herbalist won't give +1 hammer to a city on sugar (because its not a plantation!)
 
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