How to build better cities?

[shadow_archmagi]

So, my friends and I often play Civ together, and I've noticed that one of us invariably hugely out-does the rest.

Spoiler :

Here, he's playing Eygpt, and he has more food and more production and more population than me, despite the fact that I just absorbed most of Mongolia. Suddenly doubling in size should have been a pretty big boost, but I'm still only 'almost' equivalent. I'm pretty sure I heard him say he only has four cities.

I'm only winning at science because I built pretty much all the free tech wonders, and got a pair of great scientists for my troubles. I'm not even sure how literacy works.

 

[Aysee]

If he only has four cities and they're well developed, yes I can see how that could happen, since less cities=less unhappiness.
The cities are probably really big.. I Can't help much here.

 

[Biske]

He has a military value of....0.
Not too surprising, although I wonder how he repels barbarians without a single military unit.
He's focused on infrastructure and left himself incredibly vulnerable, so you should go make him pay for that.

 

[Michl2602]

He has a military value of....0.
Not too surprising, although I wonder how he repels barbarians without a single military unit.
He's focused on infrastructure and left himself incredibly vulnerable, so you should go make him pay for that.

Correct. Getting his cities will make you really grow.
But start the war with looking at the trading screen how many gold and GPT he has. Otherwise you could be surprised, how much military he suddenly has, when you show up. Also look for his strategic resources to know which units you'll face.

But to get back to the question:
1) cities should be located besides a river whenever possible (not exactly for the watermill, but for the +1G and the early +2F farms)
2) cities should have 1 or more luxuries. at lower levels it's not necessary, that the luxury is a new one. luxuries are always good tiles and bring in gold, even when you can't sell it all; i count all special ressources as luxuries that way, because when you happen to eg. find a city-spot with 5 deer a granary brings +7F at ~2000BC (more than a hospital). your hapiness has to support what you are doing, that's all.
3) production is king, so get the appropriate techs and build mines and lumbermills (wood) whenever food situation allows; build TPs especially on jungle-hexs and plain/grassland-tiles without a wood or river
4) put in specialists manually, play around with the values and take what you like best
5) take SPs that add to that; for a scientific specialist game, focus on Rationalism and Freedom, after having taken from Tradition and Liberty what you need; Patronage-tree is also helpful.

 

[snarzberry]

You have the military advantage, go and take his stuff and be mindful to thank him for building such nice cities for you. You have the science, production and military lead. Use them.

 

[shadow_archmagi]

He doesn't actually have zero soldiers. I know he has boats and scouts and at least one archer, because I've seen them wandering. The game just seems to have broken (That's why I remembered to take a screenshot, because having no military units at all is so silly)

 

[duxup]

He doesn't actually have zero soldiers. I know he has boats and scouts and at least one archer, because I've seen them wandering. The game just seems to have broken (That's why I remembered to take a screenshot, because having no military units at all is so silly)

Only one way to be sure how much he has....

FINISH HIM!

 

[shadow_archmagi]

So, out of curiosity, what are some benchmarks? Like "A healthy civ should be capable of at least 90 beakers, 200 hammers, and a total population of around 60 by turn 100"

 

[Michl2602]

So, out of curiosity, what are some benchmarks? Like "A healthy civ should be capable of at least 90 beakers, 200 hammers, and a total population of around 60 by turn 100"

That depends very much of level, but on prince I would estimate that those values give you a lead (200 hammers and pop 60 sounds even hard to reach). Below prince they give you a lead for sure, because your opps seem to be sleeping most of the time.

For higher levels I'm missing experience.

 

[shadow_archmagi]

I picked those numbers completely at random and highly doubt they're achievable.

 

[snarzberry]

That depends very much of level, but on prince I would estimate that those values give you a lead (200 hammers and pop 60 sounds even hard to reach). Below prince they give you a lead for sure, because your opps seem to be sleeping most of the time.

For higher levels I'm missing experience.

I like to aim for 300 by turn 200.

I think a decent benchmark to use as a gauge would be the time that your per turn equals the turn number itself...I'm not sure if others have discussed this as a benchmark already? I feel like I've heard it somewhere before.

Higher difficulty levels do gain an advantage from the extra income from selling resources being used to ally CS and run scholasticism. I normally open that policy in the turn150 to turn175 range and that is when my per turn overtakes the turn number.

 

[Tabarnak]

I like to aim for 300 by turn 200.

I think a decent benchmark to use as a gauge would be the time that your per turn equals the turn number itself...

Don't have much experience offline for science benchmarks but in multiplayer i always try to aim 60 bpt for turn 60,80 bpt for turn 80(quick speed) and 100 bpt for turn 100. After that mark i try to double up before turn 140(280 bpt).

If 140 turns equals 210 for standard speed with 280 bpt, i guess we almost follow the same rule. But no RAs and an almost obligatory delay of NC in such games slow down research somewhere.