Hills (Mine or Irrigate)

seanwel

Emperor
Joined
Jun 27, 2002
Messages
32
Does everyone mine, rather than irrigate, a hill prior to the development of explosives (engineers/land transformations)?
Assuming that there is not a scarcity of food, is there any purpose in irrigating a hill?
 
I try to build cities so the city radii have a couple of hill, the rest ocean or plains/grassland or forest/swamp/jungle. I don't irragate my hills, just mine them, I mow down the trees and improve my farmland, the mines churn out sheilds, that's their purpose.
 
I like to have 4 or 5 hills in my city radius. In the end of the game it will bring you more than 80 shields (had had cities with more than 150 shields production!) with all production-raising improvements.
I only irrigate hills to irrigate plains and grass in the center of the city radius if it isn't possible otherwise.
I will transform grassland to hills if the city has a lack of production, especially on squares which could be "hidden specials".
(For the newbies an example: A city has got two or three specials you can see. Try to transform the field where a 3rd or 4th special could be - the pattern is easy to find out. You will often get wine, coal silk, pheasant or something like that).
 
I'll build near a lot of mountains if there's like Gold/Coal/Gems or whatever... otherwise I like to get as much production from my squares with little hassle
 
The hut and special map is on this thread. :)

I prefer forests to hills as you can put a railroad through it for 3 shields later on and the specials are better. I'd make a hill grassland before irrigating it as at the start of the game they aren't worth a great deal. Sure, mine mountains, but if you've got a hill and a forest then just switch the worker from one to the other for better production. I'm not fond of hills, but they are better than desert and tundra.
 
Neither.

If I want to build a spaceship, then I would make one or two highly productive cities where I mine all the hills within their city radius. Otherwise I don't touch the hills. There are better tiles to work.
 
Don't bother irrigating the hills, you don't get any trade from hills (unless there is wine of course ;) ) and you should be producing food in your grassland or plains tiles anyway. Definitely mine them!

I tend to want all of my cities balanced with food and shield production :cooool: so that each city is "pulling its own weight". In my view, each city contributes equally to the best of its ability. When I get engineers, this can be accomplished with just a few transformations. :goodjob:
 
I'd only consider irrigating a hill if there is a food shortage (which you excluded in your question. Otherwise, dig a hole!

Duke o' York, mined wine is better than silk! 1/3/4 instead of 1/2/3...
 
Originally posted by Sodak
mined wine is better than silk! 1/3/4 instead of 1/2/3...

Not to mention if you build an airbase! :goodjob:
 
Mines in the beginning, lot´s of them. But later most of the hills will be transformed to grassland anyway. :yeah:

I also consider the airbase bug a cheat and since the only Civ2 games I´m currently playing are the GOTMs, it really IS a cheat!
:D
 
Originally posted by MarkVanDamme
Mine them, only irrigate if you can't irrigate anything else!

Better yet, irrigate the hills ONLY if you need to get irrigation to an area surrounded by hills/mountains. After getting the water in, you can mine the hills/mountains! :cooool:
 
Even better yet, try the automated settler trick first to get water to that "dry" square. If you do it early enough, ie, before too many roads in the area, you have a very good chance of irrigating that lone grassland square surrounded by hills, forests, and mountains!

Another point: before you build your city, check to see if any squares will be cutoff from water by the city itself. If so, you can irrigate the future city square, than start irrigating the next square. once the settler starts irrigating that square, another settler can now build the city, and the isolated square still gets its irrigation, even through it is now cut off from a water source. :)


:beer: :tank:
 
by Lucky:
I also consider the airbase bug a cheat and since the only Civ2 games I´m currently playing are the GOTMs, it really IS a cheat!
Like anything, the rules must simply be consistent. The Airfield is most definitley not a cheat in and of itself. If a group of people decide to forbid a technique, or even a game function like Airbase, that still does not make it a Cheat, but it does make it a violation of the agreed rules. The Civ 2 GOTMs allowed the Airbase last year, and now they don't . The main thing is that it is consistent.

In a GOTM, if one used Airbases to cover a map now (as opposed ot last fall), that game would be simply disqualified. It is not a cheat, but would invalidate the game for comparison purposes, since everyone else restrained themselves from using Airfields.

The main thing is that newer players not go around thinking that the game function of a Airbase is a "cheat", even if used for food and movement. Using the Airbase to teh max extent possible is fair, unless the given players of a game agree not to use it (just like they can agree to any other restrictions). The game designers knew about it, BTW...

I just posted some more about the Airbase function here.


The War Academy will teach people more about how to use the Airbase to maximize terrain production, BTW. Take a look
here for more more info, and use them to the max!


On the topic of mining a hill... yes, I mine it (not irrigation), unless I'm transforming it. I only irrigate it to bring early/mid game water in. In late game, just build an Airbase for irrigation (unless you've agreed not to, like the GOTMs currently stipulate ;) ).

:)
 
In general I would only mine a hill but there are circumstances when irrigation is required.

1. City is cut off from water, need to get irrrigation in and can then mine the hill arfterwards. Why build a city when there is no water? Obvoiusly it's in a good position with 3 specials. What about the automated settler, I don't like this and personally consider it a cheat because IMHO it shouldn't be possible.

2. Space filling city, later in the game when all those prime locations are already taken, I will build cities with only a few tiles and they need all the food production they can get.

ferenginar
 
I always mine the hills, because you get 3 shields instead of 1 food.
 
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