How many cities do you think you need?

[FredLC]

Hi, guys...

There’s a question that is always bugging me in the CIV III… what would be the perfect numbers of cities to have?

I mean, there’s a few factors involved. For one, the need of luxuries/resources encourages the player to go after a large territory. And, at least in y games, it’s the civ with larger area that leads the game always. Lots of city produces lots of gold and lots of money and allows you to have the largest permanent army.

And it’s awful to have to trust deals to have resources. I mean, in my 1th game, I knew nothing about them, and ended up having to deal with middle ages without horses. And in my last game, my commerce partner cancelled my only income of saltpeter in the middle of a war (darn)!

However, it’s hard enough to expand in the beginning of the game. At least to me, in any difficulty over chieftan, I always start in the less productive part of the less crowded continent and surrounded by the most aggressive civs, like the Zulus or the Germans or the Americans.

So, while I have to slow down my expansion and build defenses and loose time with meaningless wars, my opponents in the other, less crowded continents, usually build continent-like countries before even having a decent fight. So, after I consolidate my position, I oftenly have to waste a few centuries in conquest wars to try to have a competitive number of cities, what slow down plenty my research and my cultural expansion.

However, even when I manage to get that much cities and a large empire, the micro managing becomes painful, and corruption really is a problem.

So, I wanted to know this: Have any of you really expert players (you that operates the miracle of playing emperor/deity for instance… I don’t understand how you survive, considering the trouble I have as warlord) have any preferred number of cities… like, “I get that much, and there on I’ll raze anyone I happen to conquest”.

Just to put it in perspective, I usually play in “standard” or “large” maps.

Regards .

 

[Mozenwrath]

I ain't no whizz-kid (currently on one after warlord) but I usually just aim for the most cities and quickest expansion rate I can get. Corruption is easily fixed with the editor and micromanagement isn't really a problem... Always use expansionist civs...

 

[Zachriel]

Life will fill all available niches. If you don't, others will. Normally, on a standard map, you should make settlers continuously until everything in your "natural" territory is covered. The "working radius" of the town is what is important. Make sure every square is covered by a working radius. Once you build your temples, your cultural borders will swell to fill it the working radius.

Leave about three to four squares between your capital and surrounding towns, and possibly a little less between other towns. Once everything is covered, then build or pop-rush temples.

http://www.crowncity.net/civ3/Expansion.htm

 

[IronicWarrior19]

You need as many cities as possible. The best way I believe is to plan out a core of productive cities, nicely placed, around your capital. You wil want to build a second core of cities around your forbidden palace as soon as you can, as well (often these cities are conquered from an AI opponent, hopefully getting a GL from the conquest allows me to rush the palace). The rest of your cities are just space fillers/strategic cities and hopefully will trap some resources later in the game.

 

[Immortal Wombat]

I find "all of them" gives the best results...

 

[jimmytrick]

Zach has posted an erroronous method of founding cities. The correct way is to build permanent cities five tiles apart on the horizontal, vertical and diagonal (within the parameters of existing terrain.). This will leave "holes" of four tiles each that should be used for feeder towns-producing workers and settlers and troops. In these you should build only granuaries and barracks if anything at all.

This is the optimal strategy and will result in permanent cities that can use 21 tiles in the late game.

Take care of Zach's posts as he is clearly deranged...he thinks bombardment is okay in the game for example.

jt

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by jimmytrick
Zach has posted an erroronous method of founding cities. . . . Take care of Zach's posts as he is clearly deranged...he thinks bombardment is okay in the game for example.

jt

There is no single correct way. There are a large variety of playstyles that work. I merely post my own experiences, as one of equals.

In any case, Immortal Wombat is certainly right. All of them.

 

[marshal zhukov]

There isn't a good number of cities what you should do is expand indefinitetly and mindlessly. The more cities you have the more points you get. After the world has been colonized you should start thinking about war to keep on expanding. Just pick the weakest IA get some allies and go to war

Jimmytrick is right, eventhough I have never tried to fill the empty " holes" in the middle. Builing your towns in that manner saves lots of territory and keeps your towns closer together makingit easier to defend .

That is the oficial opinion of Marshal Zhukov (the conqueror of Berlim in the Second World War)

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by marshal zhukov
There isn't a good number of cities what you should do is expand indefinitetly and mindlessly. The more cities you have the more points you get. . . . Jimmytrick is right, eventhough I have never tried to fill the empty " holes" in the middle. Builing your towns in that manner saves lots of territory and keeps your towns closer together makingit easier to defend .

In the Roman expansion above, you will see there are about four squares in between each town. This "classical" expansion leaves no room for rival civs, uses every available square and every town can reach 20 pop. Building little feeder cities is a type of exploit usually required on Deity, a sort of beehive approach. In this particular game, on Monarch with standard everything, the cities are spread a bit to establish early control of the penisula.

Generally, the higher the level, the closer you want your towns. For emperor, I let most of my towns (excepting a couple of wonder builders), max at 12-16. After all, half the game is has a 12 pop limit anyway. I prefer Monarch, as I can space all my towns in the "classic" fashion for 20 pop. When you play on a crowded map, the more dangerous the position, the closer you want your towns.

But you are certainly right. The best strategy is to build as many towns as possible in order to fill every available niche. I don't even usually bother with Ancient wonders, I just expand.

Terrain and position with the enemy are very important, so just dropping towns on an arbitrary grid point is not often best -- unless you are blessed with a long straight river down a grassland, of course. Every position is different. Here is a very crowded map where I put my third and last town right next to the Japanese capital. It immediately robbed him of space around his capital. Of course, it led to war.

http://www.crowncity.net/civ3/Culture.htm

 

[Mîtiu Ioan]

Originally posted by fredlc
So, I wanted to know this: Have any of you really expert players (you that operates the miracle of playing emperor/deity for instance… I don’t understand how you survive, considering the trouble I have as warlord) have any preferred number of cities… like, “I get that much, and there on I’ll raze anyone I happen to conquest”.

Well, I obtainded third time score near or better than 5000 on Deity or Emperor level so here is my opinion :

- ideally is a number of 8-9 cities for the "beggining" of the game. Rush Temple and Walls where is necessary. After this level of expansion build military units for conquest. When you feel to have enough - try to build more cities, but this time also with military units for defense !!
The first 8-9 cities is ideally to be placed on a "wheel" formation - capital in the middle, the rest of them surrounding ...

This strategy work well on Pangeea or Continent maps - on Archipelago is very debatable if is really useful to build cities on a island where is hard to bring military units in case of a attack !!

But after the initial number of cities build is very debatable if is neccesary to build cities from scratch or to conquer ennemy cities and build worker for "ethnical proportion change" ...

My trick - use map setings with minimal land area - this way the computers will find a little space to expand and very possible the computer-controled civs will fight each other ... Otherwise the computers expand like crazy and is purely and simply almost impossible to conquest 15-20 cities to knock down a civ !!

 

[IronicWarrior19]

'My trick - use map setings with minimal land area - this way the computers will find a little space to expand and very possible the computer-controled civs will fight each other ... Otherwise the computers expand like crazy and is purely and simply almost impossible to conquest 15-20 cities to knock down a civ !'

No need to minimise land area - all you need to do here is start the conquest earlier on. I like to play on small maps, the best thing to do on this map size I feel is to build about 3-5 cities early on (less is better I feel). If you have luxuries, pop rush some temples. Then pump out barracks and build an army! Go conquer the nearest civs, then fill in any gaps from razed cities, and raze and cities which are too large to avoid flipping. It works very well and you will often find yourself with several civs in awe of your culture and afraid of your military too. I find this tactic works very well on standard and small pangaea or continental maps.

 

[Mîtiu Ioan]

Originally posted by IronicWarrior19
I find this tactic works very well on standard and small pangaea or continental maps.

Yes - you're right - on smal or standard Pangeea map is O.K. - but on large archipelago map ( for example ) you will have great trouble with a large land area ...

 

[Anglophile]

Getting back to the original question. Fredlc, you give a lot of the right reasons for having many cities and barring Immortal Wombat's preferred status, having the most and usually by far the most cities is required to win on the higher levels. How you get there is a matter of personal preference and should affect some of your map choices. If you want to get there through conquest, choose a tiny/small map, lots of other Civs and panagea and fight your way to the top. Lots of good threads on ways to do this and a lot of excellent tips in this thread. If you want to expand your way there, go for the biggest map possible, lots of land and 8-12 other civs. Find a couple of very fertile sites early (2 food bonus squares), build cities there as settler/worker farms and just expand as fast as you can. Turning down the barbarian level makes this strategy much easier so for a real challenge do it with raging barbarians - but wait a few games before doing so.

On Monarch plus, on very large maps, you will need 100+ cities to win.