[PTW] New City Build Order, Worker Mgmt and Railroads

[HEEL_caT666]

Hi there! New player, my first post.

So, recently I decided to git gud and read all of the war academy, starting off specifically with Cracker's guides. I read all about Terrain Impovement and Forestry Operations.

I then tried to play a game (Chieftain, Germans, PTW) to try out my new skills but I stumbled into an interesitng situation. You can see in the screenshot ive got like 12 workers there doing nothing, and in addition all of my terrain tiles literally everywhere are improved, so now I'm in a situation where my workers are essentially doing nothing because without warring with the Celts (which I'm not prepared for) there is no new cities, and all I can essentially do is build trade links with other civs. My self assessment tells the that I built too much workers early game, which is why I'm here.

What is (if one exists) the standard build order when you build a new city? How many workers should I build for my city and when? How should I sequence worker, improvement and military unit production? And how many should I garrison?

Side question about railroads - is there like a procedure for it (link between cities first then improve all the terrain tiles f.e.) and should I consider using Automate No Alter (which i assume doesnt change the improvements, but could change railroads?)

Thanks everyone for advice!

 

[justanick]

Build more settlers and build them early. Workers are supposed be recruited when the population extraction for settlers is more or less complete and thus population ready to use improved terrain becomes available.

In the screenshot you provide there is very much room left for settling. Settling is what you should be concerned with first. Sooner or later you should also go up to regent. Below it AI gets serve mali and cannot be a challange. Hence all the mistakes you make are obscured. Remove this kind of obscurity and you will gradually learn to better assess your situation.

 

[HEEL_caT666]

Sure I mean I can try settling the next peninsula I guess I'll send them there. I was definetly looking at upping the difficulty later but this is just a trial game.

Also what do you mean by population extraction for settlers? I mean it takes 25-30 turns ish to get a pop of 3 for settlers, what would I build before that? Barracks? Warriors?

 

[justanick]

Also what do you mean by population extraction for settlers?

Settlers take 2 citizens away, workers 1. One could regain that population by making them join a city, but that is usually not sensible. You need settlers for founding and you need some workers for railroads and pollution control. But for that you need to first enter the industrial age. That can occur reasonably early. Industrial age in turn 238(1230 AD) is possible.

I mean it takes 25-30 turns ish to get a pop of 3 for settlers, what would I build before that? Barracks? Warriors?

You donnot needs barracks till you have left Despotism. Warriors are one of the obvious choices. Still it should not take more then 20 turns. Usualy less, possibly much less.

Untill you have say 10 cities of size 10 the game is mainly a case for food. Optimizing food within the given limitions is what you need to do in the first 100 to 150 turns. Around turn 100 you should have left Despotism and thereby get rid of the despotism penalty.

Also you donnot need to actually reach pop 3. Growth is calculated before produktion, so if growth to population 3(or higher) coincides with finishing a settler, then this is quite convenient.

 

[HEEL_caT666]

Never heard of Industrial age at 1230 before, I guess I'm not good enough

I see what you mean by pop extraction now, basically I should only start bulding workers once Im done building the first settler, plus ofc there is the extra first worker you get.

I also noticed that pop before production thing, came in handy. I didnt realise though that barracks at despotism are impractical, thanks! Ofc i could use those warriors to scout on the freebie unit support for despotism.

Also read further into Crackers guide, Engineered forests. At arround 1000BC for industrious and 550BC for normal I should be able to have dedicated workers for forestry operations. But I already played through to the 19th century so Ill have to try that later.

Thanks for the tips!

 

[tjs282]

Side question about railroads - is there like a procedure for it (link between cities first then improve all the terrain tiles f.e.) and should I consider using Automate No Alter (which i assume doesnt change the improvements, but could change railroads?)

The general rule of thumb that I use is to build the 'thin-rail net' to connect all my (core) cities first, yes. Since your entire territory should already be roaded by that point, 4-5 sufficiently large Worker- or Slave-stacks (stack-size depends on whether or not your civ is Industrious) should be able to get a thin-net up pretty fast (RepParts also helps, doubling Worker-speed; even your Slaves will get a boost). Once the thin-net is done, I bring all my stacks back along those rails to my capital, and then work outwards, railing every tile in my core-towns' Fat Crosses (and adjusting improvements as needed to re-balance food and shield-harvests).

Automation is the lazy/inefficient way to do this: for the thin-rail net, use Ctrl-Shift-R ('Rail to') to connect adjacent cities. The computer will assign as many Workers to the task as you have, and they will all follow the 'path of least resistance', railing along the easiest route(s), i.e. the lowest number of moves/Workers required, without regard to which tiles along that route you might prefer to have railed first (e.g. mined Hills, to boost your shield-outputs). For total-rail coverage, bring all the Workers and/or Slaves into a town, and hit Ctrl-Shift-I (for "Improve, no altering") -- but the computer will only assign 2 Workers/Slaves per tile, so once you've got your (max.) 40 Workers beavering away per town, Ctrl-Shift-I stops working for that town.

For the thin-net, or the total rail-cover, the high-level/efficient method is to assign Workers to the tiles manually, one-by-one, starting with the most important tiles.

Engineered forests. At arround 1000BC for industrious and 550BC for normal I should be able to have dedicated workers for forestry operations. But I already played through to the 19th century so Ill have to try that later.

Can't remember which version Cracker wrote his article for, but Forest-chopping takes longer in PTW (10 turns for a single non-IND Worker) than it does in C3C (4 turns).

 

[justanick]

Forest chopping is not that powerful in C3C either. If the goal is to become a reasonably good player this is not the kind of thing you should focus on first.

 

[HEEL_caT666]

Can't remember which version Cracker wrote his article for, but Forest-chopping takes longer in PTW (10 turns for a single non-IND Worker) than it does in C3C (4 turns).

4 turns seems kinda a lot... that means forestry could be started much earlier. Regardless, Cracker did write articles for pre-C3C: in the table for worker turn required to clear forest/jungle and build road it does indeed say 10 turns.

I kinda got the gist that to git gud you'd have to never automate - so I did not, but then I made the stupid decision to make even more workers, which went fine but in the end I had too much of em doing nothing. I also had nowhere to expand so I just mobilised to war-time and declared war on 3 civs at once. Pushed em back quite a lot - but now I have 30+ infantry units cos all I did was build those . Also 3 transport boats filled to the brim with em ready to assault literally any city.

Oh and another question: I'm sure you can see from the screenshots I've got a lot of cities producing wealth - those cities have no new improvements to build, and I already have enough military units to pretty much wipe out anything (10 more infantry will do against the French and Russians combined I reckon). Plus Ive got too much workers already and building new ones would be sabotaging their delicate tiles I microed. Ofc new settlers I'll build for all that new space and strategic resources available but I feel like making wealth is wasting their production potential - what should I do in situations like this when I have nothing to do with them?

 

[justanick]

but I feel like making wealth is wasting their production potential - what should I do in situations like this when I have nothing to do with them?

Avoid getting into such a situation in the first place. Concentrate on what matters and aim for 4 turns per tech. If yu advance in tech fast enough, then you will have trouble building everything that is available.

If however you still run out of useful things to build you can build military and disband it in a different city. This gives back 25% of the shields. That of course is quite inefficient, but less inefficient than building wealth and then using cash to buy shields.

Regarding settling there are many spaces left unsettled. At least in C3C it is not wise to leave such amounts of possible cities unfounded.

Infantry is good at defence. At attack is is not better than cavalry, but cavalry is faster. This speed matters.

 

[tjs282]

Plus Ive got too much workers already and building new ones would be sabotaging their delicate tiles I microed. Ofc new settlers I'll build for all that new space and strategic resources available but I feel like making wealth is wasting their production potential - what should I do in situations like this when I have nothing to do with them?

How do you want to win the game?

As a general rule:

If space, build improvements (mainly/only) in and near your capital, concentrating (mainly/only) on those that will get you beakers (and later shields) faster. Use the more marginal towns to build units as needed to take more territory/ repel incursions. On the fringes, fully irrigate and rail for beaker-farms.

If diplo, build units to capture resources, and/or improvements that provide cash (or Wealth, I guess), to bribe enough AI-Civs to vote for you.

If domination/ conquest, just build (fast) units, go out and kill. Germany can haz Panzer!

If Civ-wide Culture (100K on a Standard size map), build Settlers from your core, and more marginal zones, plant 'city-pox' towns as close together as possible in the fringes, and (cash)rush all the basic Cultural buildings (Temple, Lib, Cathedral, Uni) in those poxy towns: you'll need mucho dinero to do this under Republic, though (usual procedure is to whip-rush under Feudalism, but you've left it a little late for that)

One-city Culture (20K) has to be planned for: if you're this far into the game and haven't already got all your Wonders in one town, this one's probably not feasible in this game.

Germans are generally pretty good for science/military games, not so much for Culture.

 

[justanick]

On the fringes, fully irrigate and rail for beaker-farms.

Does that work well in PtW?

 

[tjs282]

Does that work well in PtW?

It's not as profitable in PtW as in Conquests — you only get one beaker/coin per Specialist — but it can still be helpful, especially when you consider that (IIRC!) corruption/waste is capped at 95% rather than 90%.

OTOH, a large chunk of the 'expected' core corruption/waste can also be loopholed away in PtW, because Ring City Placement still works (this exploit was fixed in Conquests) — and the FP also still gives a fully productive second core, if you build it sufficiently far from your Palace (say, 3rd or 4th ring, at OCP). And since PtW-MGLs can be used to rush-build all Wonders, concentrating on (military-assisted) expansion during the early game (especially if your Civ has a decent offfensive UU) is a good tactic, because the FP can then be built in 1 turn, e.g. in your nearest (deceased) enemy's (former) capital.

 

[HEEL_caT666]

How do you want to win the game?

A good question - I usually just play to get all the techs then dominate - so mostly Conquest, Dominations and Space.
All these strats are waay to advanced for me - I have yet to read all of the War Academy to educate myself on those.

Avoid getting into such a situation in the first place. Concentrate on what matters and aim for 4 turns per tech.

Well, how would I be able to do 4-turn tech? I would have to have the bar set on 80% science at all times pretty much... And from what I've heard it gets much harder to do on higher difficulties. Does that mean I have to save as much gold as possible and build as many cities as possible in despot? From this a question arises - which sort of government should I switch to after despotism - Monarchy or Republic? From one point of view the Republic gets much less corruption, but does that outweigh the potential gold losses on unit support? I guess if you have a lot of cities on the fringes that constantly waste gold it maybe worth to stay on monarchy for a while?

Rrgarding srttling there are many spaces left unsettled. At least in C3C it is not wise to leave such amounts of possible cities unfounded.

Yes I can see some bits you mean but if I try and settle even more it would really screw with OCP, especially because the biggest towns were built by the stupid AI. Plus I only really like using OCP because at the end I get big and stronk powerhouses!

On the fringes, fully irrigate and rail for beaker-farms.

As in, let them grow over their limits ASAP and switch the extra to scientists for research? Why would you not build improvements there though? (and what if they literally have nothing more to build i.e. army too big?)

OTOH, a large chunk of the 'expected' core corruption/waste can also be loopholed away in PtW, because Ring City Placement still works (this exploit was fixed in Conquests) — and the FP also still gives a fully productive second core, if you build it sufficiently far from your Palace (say, 3rd or 4th ring, at OCP).

Sounds like a really advanced strat for me, plus my ring placement is screwed. Talking about FP building and my Capital location, maybe I should change it a bit to suit the empires shape, because my FP is like in Munich, and the Palace in Berlin, pretty much making my empire corruption ridden. (I built it back when I was smol, havent changed since)

Another question: you see Heidelburg there? 20 Turn growth, because all the terrain round it mainly mined out cos its either Grassland or Grassland Bonus. Is it worth at all, in these situations, to irrigate some of that terrain? Because in Crackers guides it says to just Mine Grassland and Grass Bonus, and irrigate Flood / Plains? What about in the early game? Should I irrigate more to build more cities?

 

[tjs282]

Yes I can see some bits you mean but if I try and settle even more it would really screw with OCP, especially because the biggest towns were built by the stupid AI. Plus I only really like using OCP because at the end I get big and stronk powerhouses!

But you can't even get that benefit of OCP until you've reached the Industrial Age, learnt Sanitation (=optional tech) and built Hospitals!

Until then, you'll be 'wasting' the output from nearly half your territory, because you don't have enough people in those OCP'd towns to work all the 20-odd tiles in the FatCross. And (at least as you go up the difficulty levels) Civ3 is won/lost mainly by your buildup and actions in the first 2 ages, not the Industrial/Modern age. Plus, with towns 3-5 tiles apart, you may/will find it much harder to defend your territory, until you have sufficient roads and fast units (or rails) to scoot around and mop up AI-incursions before they've done too much damage.

So it's usually better to build your (core)towns closer together (2-3 tiles' separation, Cx(x)xC, instead of 4-5 tiles, Cxx(x)xxC), but earmark half of them as 'future-OCP Metros'. Those build more infrastructure and maaaybe, eventually, Hospitals (if you haven't already won using Cav-rushes before then!).

The 'inbetweeners' should be allowed to reach Pop10-12 if possible, and primarily build units (though they can also assist with research/Culture in the early game): once you have Hospitals, they can be shrunk down by spinning off Workers to add to your future-Metros (which is quicker than growing the Metros from their own food-harvest).

As in, let them grow over their limits ASAP and switch the extra to scientists for research? Why would you not build improvements there though? (and what if they literally have nothing more to build i.e. army too big?)

Yes, that's what "beaker-farming" means.

Irrigated Grassland gives 3 FPT, so a Pop5-6 town can work 3-4 irrigated Grass-tiles, and harvest 11-14 FPT in total: i.e. 3-4 labourers and 2-3 Scientists (or Taxmen, if you're 'gold-farming' instead), plus a little extra food for slow-building Workers or Settlers (while the farm is growing; switch to Wealth after it's maxed out). Similarly, a Pop11-12 farm can work 5-6 tiles, and run 5-6 Specialists. Once you've railed those tiles as well, the food-yield goes up, so you can run more Specialists and fewer Labourers per farm.

And you build only minimal infra in these farms, because with the town only earning 1-2 uncorrupted commerce per turn (which will then be converted to a beaker, if you're following @justanick's advice regarding your SCI%-slider setting!), any buildings will likely be a net drain on your economy.

If you're interested, you could have a look at the screenies in the 'JAR03' game linked in my sig: we were going for Space at Demigod (in Conquests), and used beaker-farming extensively in the corrupt (mostly southern) areas of our continent.

Because in Crackers guides it says to just Mine Grassland and Grass Bonus, and irrigate Flood / Plains? What about in the early game? Should I irrigate more to build more cities?

That rule-of-thumb applies to the early game! While you're still under the Despot-penalty (= all base food/shield/commerce tile-harvests > 2 are penalised by -1), irrigating Grassland doesn't help you, because the +1 FPT from irrigation is penalised away.

But once you switch to Republic (or Monarchy, but Republic is preferred, for the commerce-boost), you might/would be well advised to irrigate some (Bonus-)Grassland for faster growth. Once a city reaches Pop12 (which is assumed to happen well before you have Hospitals!), you'd mine again (or use the irrigated lands to support miners in Hills and Mountains), so that the city harvested just enough food (24-25 FPT) to keep from starving, while its population also worked a full 12 tiles.

 

[SuedecivIII]

So first of all, congrats on all the workers. Seeing all those improved tiles is absolutely beautiful.

I'm not a huge fan of Cracker's guides because I feel they don't emphasize simple concepts that will help new players make progress into higher difficulty levels. The problem you're having is your prioritizing all kinds of not very useful stuff over settlers. If there is unclaimed land on the map, settlers should be top priority.

That means no aqueducts. Settlers will keep your population below 7.
That means no colosseums. Colosseums give happiness, but you no what else gives happiness? Keeping your city's population low.

I usually wouldn't build libraries or temples unless you're worried about a culture flip, until all the available land is claimed.

Barring specific circumstances, I wouldn't even recommend building wonders until all the land is claimed. Or at least, build fewer of them.

If you're sick of expanding over all that land, and all that settling is tedious, pick a smaller map or an 80% water map. If the land exists on the map you're playing, the best strategy is to claim it as soon as possible. Otherwise you're handing over a massive advantage to the AI.

If you build more cities, your problem of too many workers will solve itself.

>>Another question: you see Heidelburg there? 20 Turn growth, because all the terrain round it mainly mined out cos its either Grassland or Grassland Bonus. Is it worth at all, in these situations, to irrigate some of that terrain? Because in Crackers guides it says to just Mine Grassland and Grass Bonus, and irrigate Flood / Plains? What about in the early game? Should I irrigate more to build more cities?

The reason you do that is to avoid the despotism penalty. You're not in despotism any more. You can do whatever you want.

You've run out of usable tiles, so more citizens will be of limited use. They'll be specialists. So if you irrigate one of those bonus grasslands, you'll be trading 2 shields for 2 food, which can support 1 specialist. So 2 shields (more if you have a factory) for 3 science (library bonus doesn't apply to specialists). That's not a trade I'd usually make but it depends on what you need at the moment.

 

[justanick]

That means no colosseums. Colosseums give happiness, but you no what else gives happiness? Keeping your city's population low.

Technically that just avoids unhappiness. But in either case building temples is a bad idea till quite late in the game if at all. Temples cost 1 gtp, but give only one content face. So that is not better than the luxury slider.

Building military instead helps to secure luxury goods and 8 luxuries goods combined with a market place give 20 happy faces, which is enough for metropolises.

Well, how would I be able to do 4-turn tech?

You need to optimize for food first and commerce second. So republic is preferable by a great margin. One sensible benchmark i can think of is having 10+ cities of size 10+ in a republic as early as possibly.

Practically speaking you will be a republic long before you have 10+ cities if size 10+. Getting out of despotism ASAP is the challenge in the ancient age. After that your still small cities need to grow a lot and larger cities have no trouble building cheap libraries soon and later the not so cheap universities.

Where applicable aqueducts are of course needed. Getting citites to size 7+ is another important milestone in the early game.

Once you have completed the early game and hence have 10+ cities of size 10+ in a Republic, then the game is (often) essentially won. You will likely be able to complete techs in 4 turns and still reduce the science slider in the last turns of the respective tech and hence build up a gold stockpile for (100% - lux slider) on research.

As in, let them grow over their limits ASAP and switch the extra to scientists for research? Why would you not build improvements there though? (and what if they literally have nothing more to build i.e. army too big?)

Buildings cost maintenance. This maintenance should really be worth it, else spare the expense.

Workers, settlers, catapults+ and wealth are viable production.

Yes I can see some bits you mean but if I try and settle even more it would really screw with OCP, especially because the biggest towns were built by the stupid AI. Plus I only really like using OCP because at the end I get big and stronk powerhouses!

The first order of business is to get (almost) every tile used. Minimizing the amount of cities you need per tile is only the second order of business.

In practice this means that in the long run you should aim at 15 to 18 tiles per metropolis. Else you waste tiles and that is unforgiveable.

Since you cannot have metropolises till quite late in the game you will have to use a few temporary cities as well. They are to be abanoned once that is convenient, so they donnot get the full spectrum of buildings. Aqueducts, barracks and libraries are likely ok. But the more expensive buildings from the medieval age are probably not worth it.

 

[tjs282]

What is (if one exists) the standard build order when you build a new city? How many workers should I build for my city and when? How should I sequence worker, improvement and military unit production? And how many should I garrison?

No-one really addressed these questions specifically yet — possibly because there is no good answer!

Because of variation between civs (traits + UUs), difficulty-level (higher = fewer citizens born content), map-type, terrain + bonus resources (start position and defensibility), and game priorities (intended victory condition), Civ3 starts are so widely variable that a standard 'magic-bullet' build-order for any new town isn't really feasible.

Spoiler Wot I do... may not be optimal... :

I play at Emperor, and usually randomise everything except the map-size, maximise opponents, and aim for domination or space (depending on which Civ I roll). So when I start a new game, I have very little idea of what to expect, and one of my highest initial priorities will be exploration.

So generally I'll build at least 3 Warriors out of my capital to begin with. With a 'standard' flatland start harvesting at least +2 FPT net and 2-3 SPT, and without any micromanagement, the first Warrior (built 4-5T after founding) will go off exploring, the second (8-10T after founding) will stay home to act as military police (as the town grows to Pop2), the third (12-14T after founding, now that I'm getting 3-4 SPT) will go off exploring in another direction (e.g. if I already started on or near a river, Warriors1+3 would begin by exploring up-/downstream from the capital).

While Warrior3 is being built, my capital will already be filling its food-box towards Pop3, so at that point I would need to decide whether to start building my first Settler (if growth would be expected just as or after that build would complete, likely in 8-10T), or a 4th Warrior as a 'filler' build (if a Settler would otherwise complete before growth) and then the 1st Settler. If a 4th Warrior, then he will act first as mil-pol to keep order at Pop3 as the Settler finishes, and then as escort to the best city-site located within a 3-4 tile radius (i.e. just beyond the capital's FatCross) by Warriors1+3 — preferably a site with freshwater and/or food-bonuses! Warrior4 can then also continue to explore outwards.

Build-order in Town2 (and subsequent towns) may be (much) more variable, though. Although I will probably also build an initial Warrior (to keep order upon growth), this time I will likely want a Worker as my second build (again, assuming that the town will reach Pop2 just as/after this build would complete), to improve Town2's tiles and leave my initial Worker free to carry on improving my capital. The 3rd (and 4th?) build(s) will then depend very much more on game-specific factors, e.g. what techs I've learnt to date, what (Lux) resources I have hooked, who my nearest neighbours are, etc.
e.g.
— Another couple of Warriors (if the town is nothing special), or
— A couple of Scouts (if Expansionist), or
— Boats for coastal exploration (in Conquests, Alphabet allows 'Curraghs' to be built), or
— Another Settler-pair (if the town is food-rich), or
— Maybe a Granary (if I know Pottery already, and a town is watered/food-rich)
That last possibility assumes that a town will become my 'Settler-pump', allowing me to avoid unecessary reduction of my capital's population (of course, I would also be spinning off occasional Workers/Settlers from my cap to prevent overpopulation-unhappiness leading to disorder).

 

[HEEL_caT666]

So it's usually better to build your (core)towns closer together (2-3 tiles' separation, Cx(x)xC, instead of 4-5 tiles, Cxx(x)xxC), but earmark half of them as 'future-OCP Metros'. Those build more infrastructure and maaaybe, eventually, Hospitals (if you haven't already won using Cav-rushes before then!).

You say to mark half of them as potential metropolises - does that mean that in the future I should abandon them to free up space for developing metropolises, and not bother building too much infrastructure on them?

If you're interested, you could have a look at the screenies in the 'JAR03' game linked in my sig: we were going for Space at Demigod (in Conquests), and used beaker-farming extensively in the corrupt (mostly southern) areas of our continent.

I did notice those playthroughs in your sig - I had a look. I found your Dutch SG with Acronym and your "Bow to the pRNGods, foolish mortal!" thread and was quite interested. I havent gotten to having a look yet, too much things on my hands right now but I've got those threads open so I can look through them and maybe even have a few playthroughs on the save you have (if I figure out how to use save editors for lower difficulty), I think it would be very educational.

That rule-of-thumb applies to the early game! While you're still under the Despot-penalty (= all base food/shield/commerce tile-harvests > 2 are penalised by -1), irrigating Grassland doesn't help you, because the +1 FPT from irrigation is penalised away.

But once you switch to Republic (or Monarchy, but Republic is preferred, for the commerce-boost), you might/would be well advised to irrigate some (Bonus-)Grassland for faster growth. Once a city reaches Pop12 (which is assumed to happen well before you have Hospitals!), you'd mine again (or use the irrigated lands to support miners in Hills and Mountains), so that the city harvested just enough food (24-25 FPT) to keep from starving, while its population also worked a full 12 tiles.

I see, I see! That makes much more sense. I didnt think that the Despot penalty had something to do with that. Thanks for the clear up!

Technically that just avoids unhappiness. But in either case building temples is a bad idea till quite late in the game if at all. Temples cost 1 gtp, but give only one content face. So that is not better than the luxury slider.

Building military instead helps to secure luxury goods and 8 luxuries goods combined with a market place give 20 happy faces, which is enough for metropolises.

Interesting, I always thought it would be best to always build all the infra that you could. But of course it's always very annoying to see those options in the production menu . At emperor difficulty it seems that luxury hunting is much much more prioritised. Oh and were did you get the 20 happy faces figure from? As in, how many happy faces do marketplace and each luxury give you? Also does that mean 8 different luxuries, or just any 8 luxuries?

Once you have completed the early game and hence have 10+ cities of size 10+ in a Republic, then the game is (often) essentially won. You will likely be able to complete techs in 4 turns and still reduce the science slider in the last turns of the respective tech and hence build up a gold stockpile for (100% - lux slider) on research.

I was always under the impression that any unused science at the end of researching the tech is carried over to the next tech - is that not true?
I also dont really understand what you mean with the slider, you mean have the slider at 100% luxury when its the last turn before new tech?
Oh and also could you please tell me more about the sliders and how to properly use them? How much should I allocate to luxury and science, and how do I balance the two?

Spoiler Wot I do... may not be optimal... :

Thanks tjs, thats interesting build order, I definetly never used that (mainly cos I'm bad). A very much appreciate the advice!

Also just a funny thing - in all of the games so far I've gotten to modern age in around the late 19th century, when somehow on my very first game (these games are all chieftain difficulty btw) I managed to get to modern age is 1655 AD and dominate. (It seems I've gotten even worse since when I was completely clueless about the game lmao)

 

[tjs282]

You say to mark half of them as potential metropolises - does that mean that in the future I should abandon them to free up space for developing metropolises, and not bother building too much infrastructure on them?

Umm, not quite as you've written.

The potential-future-Metros would build whatever buildings you needed, including Factories, Power-plants, Hospitals, (Wonders) etc., all the way into the Modern Age. The Cities-to-disband-after-Sanitation are the ones where you'd be aiming not to build anything in them beyond the (needed!) generic Ancient buildings (Library, Courthouse, Aqueduct, Market, Barracks/Harbour), plus maybe a Uni (or certainly a Uni, if your Civ is Scientific!)

I guess a rule of thumb might be, in the Cities-to-disband-after-Sanitation, don't build any building that will cost you more than 100 shields -- though that in turn should not be taken to mean "Build all the buildings that cost less than 100 shields!".

I was always under the impression that any unused science at the end of researching the tech is carried over to the next tech - is that not true?
I also dont really understand what you mean with the slider, you mean have the slider at 100% luxury when its the last turn before new tech?
Oh and also could you please tell me more about the sliders and how to properly use them? How much should I allocate to luxury and science, and how do I balance the two?

So many questions!

To the first, no, there is no carryover of beakers (or shields, or food) in Civ3, so if you want to avoid wastage, especially in the early game, micromanagement is needed (Civ4 does have carryover, AFAIK).

To the second, no you don't max. the LUX% slider instead! You just reduce the SCI%-slider to the minimum needed to still get the tech in 1 turn. If you have Scientists active already, their beakers alone may be enough to reduce SCI%-spending to zero and still get your tech.

To the third, you don't always need the LUX%-slider.

In the early game, if you only have 1-2 (core) towns in danger of disorder, it may well be more cost-effective to turn an unhappy citizen into a Specialist (ideally a Scientist, since they give you the best return). However, if you find you that you now 'need' to run Specialists in most/all your core-towns to prevent riots, that's a pretty good indication that the LUX%-slider would be a better option. But it should be set to the minimum needed to prevent riots, i.e. just enough to make sure that the unhappy citizens do not outnumber the happy ones (content citizens and Specialists can be ignored). You can get an overview of this in the Domestic Advisor (F1) screen.

So the procedure is: set your LUX% (if needed), then set the SCI%-slider to max. e.g. if you set LUX%=20%, then SCI% should be set to 80% (assuming that won't send you broke next turn!).

Your TAX% income is what's left over after SCI% and LUX% are subtracted from 100%, which means you can earn a cash-windfall at the end of every tech by minimising the SCI%-slider on the last turn, as described above. Due to the rounding involved, this windfall may be larger than the total cash you would have earned if you'd simply set the SCI%-slider at the minimum setting needed to get the tech in 4T.

Oh and were did you get the 20 happy faces figure from? As in, how many happy faces do marketplace and each luxury give you? Also does that mean 8 different luxuries, or just any 8 luxuries?

It has to be 8 different Luxes, i.e. one of each type on an unmodded map.

Without a Market, you get only +1 happyface for each Lux-type you have access to (either hooked up within your borders, colonised, or bought from an AI-Civ), i.e. max. 8 happyfaces if you have all 8 Lux-types.

But with a Market, the happyfaces are multiplied, like this:

Lux1: +1 happyface, running total = 1
Lux2: +1 happyface, running total = 2
Lux3: +2 happyfaces, running total = 4
Lux4: +2 happyfaces, running total = 6
Lux5: +3 happyfaces, running total = 9
Lux6: +3 happyfaces, running total = 12
Lux7: +4 happyfaces, running total = 16
Lux8: +4 happyfaces, running total = 20

 

[justanick]

First let me give you the maybe most important peace of advice: Please switch to C3C. I am really only competent on the later and in my opinion it is by far the better version.

Interesting, I always thought it would be best to always build all the infra that you could.

That is typical mistake by people new to the game. Overcome it!

Oh and were did you get the 20 happy faces figure from? As in, how many happy faces do marketplace and each luxury give you? Also does that mean 8 different luxuries, or just any 8 luxuries?

Only different ones help your happyness. Any abundent luxury you should trade away.

I also dont really understand what you mean with the slider, you mean have the slider at 100% luxury when its the last turn before new tech?
Oh and also could you please tell me more about the sliders and how to properly use them? How much should I allocate to luxury and science, and how do I balance the two?

The luxury sliders should be as high as necessary, but as low as possible. Once you have 20 happy faces from luxury goods 0% luxury slider are expected to (more than) suffice. Your citizens are suppoed to barely not revolt. Any happiness more than needed is (mostly) wasted.

The science slider should be set so that you get a tech in 4 turns while also minimizing waste. So assuming 0% luxury slider this tends to be 100% at the first few turns and less in the last turn or the last few turns. Please note that only turns where you spend anything at all on research count for the 4 turn limit. So 100%, 100%, 30% and 20% might be what will be best. It depends on the relevant details. Scientist experts count also regarding the 4 turn limit. In C3C scientists give 3 beakers per turn.

I guess a rule of thumb might be, in the Cities-to-disband-after-Sanitation, don't build any building that will cost you more than 100 shields -- though that in turn should not be taken to mean "Build all the buildings that cost less than 100 shields!".So many questions!

In some cases it can be convenient to abandon before you have sanitation. That is because of the way corruption works. But that is a question for more advanced players. HEEL_caT666 needs to learn the basics first.