Micro Challenge

[kossin]

The granary can carry maximum half of the required food to grow.

In that case, the food to grow is 30, so 30/2 = 15

Each turn, you store your food surplus.

If food surplus = 0, you've stored 0...
If food surplus = x, you've stored x... not x/2.

 

[Jastrow]

Wow! So this means that building a granary with the bar just under half full, or even exactly half full (after it finishes) gets the full benifit of the granary just as if I had built it back when the bin was empty !?

Somehow, I never realized that. I am going to have to seriously reconsider some of my micro based on this revelation! Thanks.

 

[kossin]

You can sometimes even complete it after it is half full to get the full benefit

 

[Mitchum]

Spoiler :

I got to 13. Now to check for the solution...


EDIT: To be fair, I got 12 the first time I did it like Lymond but I knew after this first time that partial farming the rice would be better. I did have to play it a few times though because the city governor kept hiring citizens when I wasn't looking. Emphasize food button helped with that.

By the way, I also tried a variant where I built a second worker. It seemed wasteful to be working all of those non-improved squares. However, I slow built the worker while alternating to the granary to grow onto tiles just as my first worker improved them. This resulted in 8 or 9 pops, can't remember which. It's hard to beat a quick granary.

 

[Mitchum]

Great idea, Kossin.

This reminds me of a challenge series put together several years ago by one of my early Civ heros (we all have Civ heros, right?). I can't remember if is was futurehermit, DaveMcW, VoiceOfUnreason, ??? The challenge in those scenarios was to play until 4 cities were built or some mid-range goal that included not only worker micro but also coordinating builds, settling locations, etc. I wish I could find it again. Maybe one of the others knows. What you're doing breaks it down to essence of worker, citizen and build micro... something that we could all improve. Great job!!

I did stumble upon some of VoU's tutorials/challenges when looking for the ones I was referring to above:

Foundation and Empire #1
Foundation and Empire #2
Foundation and Empire #3
Foundation and Empire #4
Rexercise
Management Excercise

 

[VSarius]

Well then, that's certainly quite a blast from the past there!
The focus on micro is certainly entertaining, probably my weakest point in civ 4 is optimized micro. Can never be damned to do the math.

 

[RJM]

Thanks for posting this. It's fun and instructional. I look forward to the others.

Spoiler :

I still haven't managed to get to 13, but I'm working on it.

 

[Gumbolt]

Spoiler :

I got size 10. Then I realised my city had been storing citizens. Replayed the final 5 turns to size 12. Perhaps i could of got size 13 if I had realised the game was adding citizens instead of 2f tiles.

Always view the city screen is the moral of my story.

 

[RJM]

Spoiler :

I got size 10. Then I realised my city had been storing citizens. Replayed the final 5 turns to size 12. Perhaps i could of got size 13 if I had realised the game was adding citizens instead of 2f tiles.

Always view the city screen is the moral of my story.

Me too. I got caught by that the first time I tried!

 

[Kaitzilla]

This micro challenge idea seems like fun...

Ok, my 2nd try without peeking felt about right.

Spoiler :

Time to read if it was the right choice.

** Woot, seems so

 

[Mec AntiKythera]

Seems I still have a bit to learn, I'm ending up one pop short. Good challenge though.

 

[Nials]

Seems I still have a bit to learn, I'm ending up one pop short. Good challenge though.

Same here, although I quickly realized my mistake. Kind of silly, since it's a common micro trick I do in normal games but completely neglected here

Spoiler :

Avoid wasting worker turns - while moving towards the pigs at the start, spend a turn improving the rice on your way. Do the same thing on your way back.

EDIT: That and fully improving the southern/northern rice before moving further north/south - interesting!

 

[rfcfanatic]

1. Without Granary: size 10, 10/40

Spoiler :

Improvement order: Pig - Corn - Pig - Rice. Grassland Pig and irrigated Corn have the same output. Movement to a Pig resource requires an additional Worker turn, but improving it will take a turn less than improving the Corn resource.

2. With Granary: size 12, 32/44

Spoiler :

Improvement: order: Pig - Corn - Rice - Pig
Tech order: Pottery - BW. As soon as Pottery got discovered, I switched the production in the capital to Granary. After discovering BW, I adopted Slavery and whipped the Granary at size 4.

Edit:

Spoiler :

Oh, I forgot to mention that I clicked the "Emphasize Food" button on the city screen. I had to do it because the city governor kept assigning Citizen specialists.

 

[Lazarus_Cato]

Firstly, thanks to Pedro78 for recommending this, it was a lot of fun. Sorry for the necromancy but I thought this deserved a bump.

With more than a few false starts because of not paying attention I was able to get the magic 13. Looking through I did it the same as Snaaty so I'm not going to bother typing out my turns.

 

[SittinDown]

I managed to get 13 on the first try. (did not expect that).

Afterwards saw I did the same thing as others who got to 13. Good example of how to micro flat-land with workers properly.

(Played it out idiotically to a Diplomatic win.... also found out you cannot airlift units to foreign city, even if you have a defensive pact, and I could not get a vassal on this map because my land was too far away, so I never found out if I could airlift to a vassal).