How many workers do you use?

[MrMulan]

Just want to hear how many workers people keep around. I use 1 per city in the beginning and try to get up to 2 or even 3 per city by the time railroads can be built. After that I plop them mostly into cities and keep only about 10% of them.

Any more effecient way? I keep tons of them for railroads so I can build them ASAP, to get the movement and commerce bonus. Am I losing $ by having so many around?

 

[petey]

I always try to have 1-2 workers per city. There are long stretches when they aren't very busy, but when a new improvement like railroad comes out, or pollution pops up, I'm always glad to have a big gang of them.

During the slow times, use them to clear jungles - you can sometimes add space for another city or two.

Also, one tactic that I like using them for is to build roads/railroads to cities that I'm about to invade. Workers aren't seen as offensive units, so the AI civs don't ask them to leave. If you build connections to their cities before the invasion, you can bring up your slower defensive units quickly to garrison your new possessions and not have to have your fast moving offensive units slow down their assault to let the defenders catch up.

 

[Bamspeedy]

I have 1 worker/city for each city I was able to get in the initial expansion phase. By the time I get railroads my land is about 70-80% developed, so the railroads are built pretty quick. Also, at this time I start invading so I get some captured workers. I suppose I should have a few more workers earlier on so they have nothing to do, but build railroads, but you have the problem of not having the money to support all of them. Once pollution is the only thing left to take care of I will disband most of them. If I have enough captured workers I won't even need to support my own workers.

 

[Shaitan]

No set goals for me, just as many as I can get. Any time a city is going to lose growth (at max population, city "yellowed") that city will build a worker. If my entire territory is developed I'll start adding workers to the lower pop cities. Once railroads are complete the majority of native workers will be added to cities, keeping foreign workers to handle pollution.

 

[erix]

For me 1 worker per city is generally enough. IMHO the answer to this question depends on your strategy.
I like to have a lot of cities in a small area so don't need 2 or more workers per city.

 

[CivAl]

In my last game as Egypt, I switched all production in 200 AD to Workers. Soon I had a horde of 32 (for my fifteen cities) and I completely developed all my land. Meanwhile my cities were catching up fast pop-wise, so by 500 AD not only was I ready for rails when they came, but all my cities were size 12. It was a drag on my budget for about a century, but workers are VITAL. In the beginning of the game after Temple, Barracks, Courthouse, build workers and you will easily outstrip the AI in "military" and thus dominate trading. Workers come half as cheap as a spearman for instance. Then when you're finished with them you can add them slowly back to cities, who are now fully developed and ready to produce spearmen at one every turn or three.

 

[brody]

I horde workers as well. Just takes too long after the enemy pillages/bombards my land otherwise. The french were sending 5+ bombers per turn to cut off my trade routes in an area where just 3 roads destroyed meant I lost 2 luxuries. They were unsuccessful for the most part, as I had so many idle workers that my roads were constantly being rebuilt. I was never more than one turn away from having all my roads back in place. And since the bombers usually only took out 2 or my 3 "bottleneck" roads, I was only without luxuries once.

During this battle I was at war with 2 other civs and couldn't concentrate on stopping the french (their bombers were about the extent of their attempts to hurt me, whereas the zulu were constantly trying to invade my cities), so it was great to have all those workers handy.

Other than that, I like that even on massive pollution turns (like 4 or 5 cities all pollute in one turn), I have it cleaned up before the turn ends.

 

[Go Banana!]

Don't forget the civ characteristics. If you have the industrious trait you can use a lot fewer workers. Otherwise I would have two per city and maybe an extra if there is a lot of jungle terrain to clear.

 

[Carver]

Originally posted by CivAl
so by 500 AD not only was I ready for rails when they came, but all my cities were size 12.

This may be one of my problems; I'm always slow to build workers, thus slow to build roads & commerce, thus slow to tech, thus I've never had rails by 500AD . I usually don't have a lot of workers until I've captured a bunch in a war or two. Untill then, I probably have less than one per city.

 

[Mike B]

They also make good bait. You can generally get another civ to send out a unit, especially an offensive unit, to capture an unguarded worker. This can put them in clear terrain, and it uses up their attack. If done right, you can use one unit to recapture the worker while you kill the unit that took it and or take the position (like a city) you drew him out of.

 

[griffon65]

Mike you can do that but you wont get back the worker. The AI almost always disbands workers as soon as they are captured.

 

[Hurricane]

The AI only tries to keep the worker if it was next to the border. They will in that case move the worker in to their own territory, where it will be easy enough to capture.

My tactic about workers is to try to use mostly foreign workers. I always buy them when I get the chance, and of course use captured workers. I seldom have more than 10 own workers. A saving if 20-30 gold per turn sums up to a substantial amount over the time of a whole game.

 

[brody]

one exception: don't use foreign workers if you are industrious. Yes they're cheap, but DAMN ARE THEY SLOW!! I have a few foreigners and it seems like it's taking them twice as long to do anything as my regular guys. I can build a road on a hill now in one turn (democracy helps out there, too), but the foreigners always take two... so if you keep a lot of foreigners around, make sure you know who you're sending to do a job if you desperately need roads connected ASAP or something.

 

[Goat_Guy]

I just have my mass of say, 50 workers who go from city to city, first connecting them w\ roads, then irrigating and mining them, and then railroads, and pollution cleanup ass nessecary.

 

[Arenar]

that many workers would take a long time to build and cost you a lot of shields and gold in maintainance... i'd say build one with each city once it reaches pop of 2...

i try and build a HUGE food producing city and keep churning out settlers and workers and either having them work or rejoining them to the smaller cits that have just been established in oder to jumpstart their industries... it has worked a few times for me, although it can be allitle tough to get a big food producing city early on. (pardon my run-on sentences.. i'm too sick to care)

 

[Go Banana!]

I did not realize the foreign workers were slow. Even so, it seems like you capture whole flocks of them at a time and so you could double and triple load a single improvement to shorten the time.

Speaking of which, is it possible to add them to a city and pop rush sacrifice them? There should be a rule that you could sacrifice these guys with no mood penalty.

 

[Klasanov]

I keep as many as I need to. If I feel I need more, I'll build some more. Knowing what I know now with foreign workers not rquiring upkeep, they're a lot more valuable now (I used to disband them whenever I got them). Now, whenever I get the chance, I buy one. You can double their speed if you use two of them.

 

[Lab Monkey]

The number of workers I use depends a lot on the terrain. I've just had to clear a whole continent of jungle, as well as laying railroads before my trade source of coal ran out. I had about 3 or 4 workers per city. In an emergency don't forget that stacking workers gets the job done a lot faster.

By the way, if a usually busy neighbouring civ suddenly withdraws all it's workers away from the borders it's a good sign they'll declare war! I always keep an eye out for this....

 

[Mapache]

Originally posted by brody
one exception: don't use foreign workers if you are industrious. Yes they're cheap, but DAMN ARE THEY SLOW

Industrious foreign Workers also have doubled speed which means they work like a regular Worker.

I usually have >1 worker/city. When industrious <1Worker/city.

 

[Hurricane]

Just move the foreign workers in stacks of 4. Then they can build a RR in one turn.