Heroic Epic + Ironworks = Overkill?

[Eqqman]

I've been finding it handy to setup my best production city with both HE & IW so that I can nearly always produce my most expensive military unit at a rate of 1 unit / turn. But I'm wondering if others find it more effective to split these up and combine them with other useful things like West Point & Red Cross so that you get a quality-over-quantity approach.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

I almost always combine hero ep with West point, as the ironworks city I find is (obviously) the best producer, and can often be tied up building things like Statue of Lib at precisely the time I need troops fast..

I don't like to tie my super-military city up with anything but the odd necessary improvement (grocer, market for example) when with epic and west pt., it builds by far my best troops, and at the speed of several cities combined.

 

[gdgrimm]

I have similar tactic. HE with WP --> Military City. Ironworks --> Production City.

Generally speaking, I don't worry about the Red Cross. It's pretty easy to get a few Medics to keep your mobile army healed (having more than one in a stack doesn't gain you anything). At which point, and if you're warmongering you'll probably have plenty of health resources and won't really need Medecine for the Hospitals. That makes Medecine a dead end tech for Domination/Conquest victories.

For military purposes, I'll often use the Ironworks Production city to build war wonders (like Pentagon and Mt. Rushmore), or to make naval units.

 

[OceansEleven]

Same here. Heroic Epic + West Point - Military City. In my capital, it's usually the Ironsworks + Wall Street, because it insanely brings in the most commerce and production.

 

[jimbob27]

Same here!

I think it's the only way to go. Heroic epic+ west point to produce a huge amount of experienced units, and ironworks to build late-game wonders.

 

[NaZdReG]

well post warlords you have to factor in the +25% from a great general producing its building. with heroic epic and west point your best off. let a different city produce the iron works and you should be fine. late game you want multiple high production cities anyway. your heroic epic one might not be the highest base production center.. its multipliers are what let us spawn troops soo quickly. but ironworks lets you take a sub-optimal production center and bring it drastically up to speed.

NaZ

 

[yavoon]

I too tie up heroic w/ ironworks, its pretty simple really. heroic is almost always built in my best production city early, and iron works is almost always built in my best production city late. no use splitting em up just for the hell of it.

I stick west point w/ globe theatre if I can.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

I've been finding it handy to setup my best production city with both HE & IW so that I can nearly always produce my most expensive military unit at a rate of 1 unit / turn. But I'm wondering if others find it more effective to split these up and combine them with other useful things like West Point & Red Cross so that you get a quality-over-quantity approach.

I usually find it more effective to group them differently.

Because the Whip is so much more effective than working mines, Heroic Epic + Globe Theater is game changingly effective.

Also, if you have a good production city, you can usually pound out a unit per turn with only one of those wonders. A simple production city during the state property era kicks out 63 hammers per turn. Forge Factory Power plus one production wonder gives you a factor of three - 189 net per turn. Add a few resources, an extra food bonus, maybe attach a couple specialists, and you can get up to 70 hammers per turn without working too hard. You've also the option of attaching specialists, or switching to Police State for the extra boost you need to reach the 240 needed for Modern Armor.

If you have two good production cities, you should probably split the wonders so that you can stack them with something else. With only one good production city, pair them - especially if the city isn't good enough to build the units in one turn.

For Adventure 8, I ended up pairing Heroic Epic with the Globe Theater, Ironworks with the National Epic (the city was building nothing but wonders, and I had burned my best GP farm on the Heroic Epic), and matched West Point with Red Cross and an airport, to airlift CG III Medic defenders into each city I captured.

My favorite Ironworks combo is still Shrine + Wall Street, supplemented by Angkor Watted priests. If you are going to be running a lot of watermills and high science, Ironworks + Oxford also works.

 

[obsolete]

I usualy couple my ironworks with hero epic too. Cranking out a very expensive military unit each turn from just one city is a huge benefit.

 

[Mr. Civtastic]

I think it might be overkill, but it all depends on your cities. I had HE in my capital city that WASNT my best hammer city (it was 2nd) and I was building modern armor in two turns.

Another thing to consider is how early (or long) youre waiting on iw or wp. Lets assume that your best hammer city is your capital (which is often is, along with usually your best gp city and best science city)...do you want to save that spot for iw or wp, or use it right away (and get more use) for National Epic or Oxford?

 

[cabert]

(vanilla here)
i agree with Mr Civtastic on the timing approach

Very often i build the heroic epic in my first production city=the one with copper, which is far from the best in the end. No sense building IW there.

I stick with a rather common HE+WP combo.
I use RC with IW quite often (IW is giving you unhealthiness, you need the hospital quite soon)

 

[Paeanblack]

I can't recall the last time I built a Heroic Epic anywhere but with the Globe Theater. I'm having trouble imagining a reason to not build them together.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

It often depends on many other factors too.....on a huge map, often the city that will one day be your best producer has only been founded recently, at the time literature comes along (or better still actually belongs to someone else at that time ) so do you build hero epic in a fledgling city "planning for the future"?, or do you build it in your best production city at that time?

Decisions, decisions

 

[JimT]

I've been finding it handy to setup my best production city with both HE & IW so that I can nearly always produce my most expensive military unit at a rate of 1 unit / turn. But I'm wondering if others find it more effective to split these up and combine them with other useful things like West Point & Red Cross so that you get a quality-over-quantity approach.

On any large maps don't do it. Building Ironworks in your seccond major production city only moderately reduces the bonus it offers while the benefit of west point to your speedy unit production is huge.

If playing small maps when your struggling and may only have five or six cities it might be worth it. I used to mix ironworks and heroic epic but not anymore as 200% production is brilliant and 300% seems like overkill.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

I can't recall the last time I built a Heroic Epic anywhere but with the Globe Theater. I'm having trouble imagining a reason to not build them together.

Well since I've normally got national epic, and globe theatre in the same city seems reason enough (gp farm anyone?)

 

[carl corey]

Hmm, most of the time I pretty much go for very early Literature. (before Construction for ex.) That, combined with early wars allows me to build the Heroic Epic fast. And it might just mean I'll place it in my best production city at the time - probably not the capital though*. As for Ironworks, it comes so late I'm almost certain to have a better city to place it in. I don't have a rule for combining Ironworks with something else, but Heroic Epic goes with West Point.

* The reason for this is that the capital is most of the time in a very good position, possibly with lots of food, and so I use it as a GP farm more than for military. National Epic goes there, and, depending on the context Oxford University or Globe Theatre (if I have lots of food - ex: 4 clams & 1 fish with Cathy... oooh, yeah ) or...

 

[cabert]

I can't recall the last time I built a Heroic Epic anywhere but with the Globe Theater. I'm having trouble imagining a reason to not build them together.

can you sustain building good units every turn this way?
If you can't then you're suboptimal (and i don't think you can, you need to work the tiles for the food to come in).
+ you lose the drafting ability of the globe theater (= you could have 2 cities churning out units every turn at some point)
+ you lose the ability to have lots of highly promoted units

enough reasons?

 

[DaveMcW]

HE and IW have no synergy. They both give hammers but they don't multiply each other.

HE and West Point give more soldiers and they are ALL highly promoted. The result is better than the sum of the bonuses.

HE and Globe Theater multiply each other if you are pop rushing, but not if you are drafting.

 

[a4phantom]

Of course heroic epic should go with westpoint. Red cross with iron works on a coastal city isn't bad.

 

[ese-aSH]

remember remember :
HE : each turn you spend building anything else than military means 100% hammer lost !!!!

I dont believe this is a good synergy, HE city is dedicated to military production, IW is dedicated to high production.
its not exactly the same...