Definitely build that granary. It will pay for itself immediately. Orleans should immediately start on a granary too. In civ3, you want to the granary to finish just before the cities grow. Otherwise you waste the food in the box. Once the granaries are finished, one city, probably Paris, should build a settler while the other trains a worker.
A granary is going to be helpful eventually, but in this case, it won't be for a while. A granary costs
60 shields, 1gpt maintenance, and takes
5 turns to fill up. The net result is double growth. Because of the grassland and no additional food bonus, this means the granary, in this case, has a value of
+2 food.
Your first 4 cities after the capital also have a
+2 food value, because they will all be near grassland, but a settler cost
30 shield, and 3 turns to reach their site and settle. In addition, these cities will also generate extra commerce, unit support and produce shields on their own.
Those granaries can wait, maybe they won't be build at all on this map.
More Lux in a such a dense area ... great ... so grab it, at such an early stage the more happy people you have is the most important thing (the less you have to worry about keeping them happy the better) personally I would prefer building a Settler than than a Temple (or using the lux slider)
Lux is good, but there is a time for everything. Grabbing those ivory is not going to be a problem in this case, so why worry about getting them a.s.a.p?
For the first 100 turns or so, none of his cities are not going to be past size 4, he will build a few more warriors between settlers that can be used for MP, and this difficulty level allows 2 natural content. with a little bit of luck, he won't need to use the lux slider at all until he finally grabs those ivory with his 7th, 8th, or 9th city.
And even if he does need to use the lux slider for a few turns here and there, I would value the early extra growth and power far more than the commerce lost to lux.
MAS, you're suggesting to put a ring of cities 2 tiles away from the capital. That's very close, you're gonna have a lot of overlap of city radius. MAS, is your decision to build so close based upon the terrain limitations- you simply have a very limited landmass around Paris, or would you even build so close when you would have more space available?
A bit of both.
Yes, if I had more land available, I would build the first ring a bit further away from the capital than I suggested in this case. Even If build the cities 2 tiles away anyway, (what I normally do) I would still prefer to avoid the one I suggested to be 1 tile away, right below the capital, but in this case, the small land mass makes it necessary.
But even if I had all the land in world, I wouldn't mind a bit of city radius overlap. Until you get hospitals, your cities are not going to be past size 12 anyway. If you avoid all overlap, you'll waste 8 out of 21 tiles per city for the first half of the game,(even more, as you'll have at least 4 to 3 tiles between cities that can't be worked by any citizen) the most important half, because by the time you reach the industrial age, you should be settled in your winning position.
And even then, metro's are often more costly than worth it, a hospital is 2 gpt upkeep, city-sizes above 12 cause pollution, lots of pollution (1 triangle per citizen above 12) and it will be more difficult to keep all those extra pop happy or content. (especially if you also have war weariness) And the extra production that a size 20 city has will not always lead to less turns to build a
tank or
modern armor. And even if it did, 2 size 12 cities could still build more tanks per turn than 1 size 20 (depending on the situation)
It helps for building wonders, but pre-builds will net you all the late game wonders you ever want anyway. (you can plan, the AI can not)
I would say, plan 12 tiles per city, (and a 13th for the core) especially in conquest, where the ring-placement is no longer useful.
Unless there is not enough food around for a city to grow that large anyway, then plan whatever amount of tiles you can possibly get the citizens for for.
Please don't fight over my back, it makes me feel uncomfortable, and please don't give to many compliments and thanks in a row either, it also makes me feel uncomfortable.
I'm not the best player in the world.
For example: I learned the trick to determine when to use a granary and when not to from WackenOpenAir's posts.
I play mostly Monarch and sometimes Emperor, but that should not be an indication of the value of my comments. It is quite possible to win an emperor game while making lots and lots of stupid mistakes.
Some people won Deity games in the early days of Civ3, when no one knew how things worked and how to value stuff, just on their gut feelings.
(though case by case calculations are still always better than gut feelings)