Need some helpful advice on basic gameplay issues

[Bob Loblaw]

Hello. Here are my questions:
How closely should I place my bases? I notice that bases that are too close can overlap resource squares and are inefficient. Likewise, when I take over an AI faction's base, they are typically packed into a Levittown of clustered bases. Are these bases pretty much going to be useless?

After control of some bases, I will appoint a mayor. It seems all they do is crank out isles of the deep ad infinitum and not once consider a creche. Is this just an AI issue or is there something I can do about this?

Thanks in advance

 

[The Person]

I would say put your bases about three or four squares apart. That's pretty much my rule of thumb in all Civ games. And yes, the AI has an annoying tendency to cluster its bases very close to each other. No wonder it is so easy to beat...

I always put my governors on "Build". That way they seem to build more facilities. But when they have no more to build, they churn out natives and military units (but mostly natives).

 

[Lazarus Plus]

I personally would not entrust my cities to a governor. Efficency is best served by doing everything manual. Takes longer but it is worth it.

 

[Silibili]

Building 3 spaces apart allows rapid defense and does not overcrowd too much but I usually play on huge maps so I often will move many spaces to take a strategic point in the early game.

And Lazarus Plus is right - do NOT use governors.

If you do use governors setting them to build would probably help stop them cranking out natives - but do NOT use governors

 

[The Person]

Well, setting governors to "Build" makes the bases build base facilities until there are none left to build, then they go native. That's my experience.

 

[DaveD]

I'm in the military, and they micromanage me to death! The last thing I want to do is play a game that simulates my workplace.

I'm pretty new at this, but I position bases manually, run them myself for the first few turns and then turn the governor on. I shift base priorities every 5-10 turns or so, depending on what's happening.

By the way, do you guys know if the base governor settings take precedence over the research priority settings? If you have bases set to build, for instance, with research priorities set for discover, how does it affect the gameplay?

 

[Proletariat]

How closely should I place my bases? I notice that bases that are too close can overlap resource squares and are inefficient. Likewise, when I take over an AI faction's base, they are typically packed into a Levittown of clustered bases. Are these bases pretty much going to be useless?

Depends. Optimally, you want to space out your bases so that there are no overlaps, but often this means sacrificing the use of a decent square early in the game when your base doesn't have enough population to make use of it. If the amount of available land is limited, this will slow down your expansion. Large, sprawling colonies also tend to be difficult to defend, and inefficient (due to distance from HQ.) Also, if your support, police, and growth values are high, then you might find that quantity of bases is much more valuable than quality.

Of course, since I usually play on large or huge maps with a strong tendency to switch to Free Market/Democratic at the earliest opportunity, I don't really have much experience with city clustering, so maybe someone can correct me on this.

As for captured bases... pretty much. Not only does the AI tend to place them haphazardly, but they usually have almost no existing infrastructure and won't generate enough energy to cover the costs for them even if they did thanks to inefficiency. They'll also be plagued by drones until you get some psych facilities up or they lose their "Captured Base" status.

One thing I like to do with bases I've captured is to turn them over to a pact brother/sister nearby with very few bases of their own, usually someone who has already surrendered to me. Not only does this save you the trouble of managing them, those bases will also generate commerce for your own bases. You'll still have military access and be able use them as repair/refuel points in future campaigns (though probes will still withdraw to your own bases.)

And yeah, governor AIs are teh_suck.

 

[Proletariat]

By the way, do you guys know if the base governor settings take precedence over the research priority settings? If you have bases set to build, for instance, with research priorities set for discover, how does it affect the gameplay?

The two are completely different things. The research priority is to tell your research department to focus on certain types of tech (you'll notice each tech is marked as "E/D/B/C #" (# being the tech level.) The governor settings just uses the same names and have no real significance beyong giving the player a general idea of what the setting does. For that matter, the tech categories don't mean a whole lot either...