Office of Expansion-Settlement Discussion 2

[snipelfritz]

Hey, where do we settle our second city? Discuss, discuss.

attached is a map of the surounding area (in widescreen!!!)

 

[YNCS]

The other cow isn't showing on your screenshot. We need to grab it and the gold before the Indians do. So the 2nd city should be on the hill just north of the river mouth, 2 squares SW of the gold, or on the hill south of the river mouth.

 

[MOTH]

I think we should place the 2nd city on the coastal hill due west of the worker next to the other cow. This location will discourage India from settling to closely and will also allow irrigation to pass to the cow more quickly.

Edit: cross posted with YNCS. We are both indicating the same tile.

 

[DaveShack]

If we build where the cow is in the 2nd radius, I wonder how long it will be until we can use it? Will the people want to build culture so we can expand, or would we be taking that spot so we can grow into it later, but only if the Indians don't decide to build right next to it and claim it?

Should we consider the option of building next to the cow even without the river site, so we'd actually get production from the bonus?

 

[mad-bax]

For anything other than 20K we should settle on the red dot next.

This location gives +5 food using one of the wines and enough shields for a 4-6 pop and 4 turn SF. It is not on a river, but too bad. Since this is quite tight to the capital it should only get a granary and build nothing but settlers. It can be converted into a settler in the MA to give more breathing room to Camelot.

For 20K....

The Green dot should be settled, and after joining a worker a temple whipped. Third town would then be the red dot in the first picture which can use the cattle for SF purposes until the 20K town matures to the point it must have the second cattle.

We really need the Eastern lands explored PDQ. Since the Indians have pottery it is almost certain that they have met an expansionist Civ, which in turn means the starting continent must be at least big enough to hold 3 civs. We need to find the beest terrain we can for the first few cities.

I am not wholly sold on the idea of another coastal town immediately. We need to find the land configuration first. If we are on a Pangea for instance then the seafaring trait is diminished and we will need to maximise our commercial trait. This would best be done by expanding inland around the rivers to the north and West.

Incidentally, and slightly off topic, it is surprising that Ghandi has only one town on turn 17. The AI's first build is ALWAYS a settler. Either he only has +2fpt or he is building a spear for escort (which in turn would indicate that there are barbs on the map). The fact that he has BW means that it should be available from the civ he has met, which in turn means we can get it too. The long and short of this is that if Indian land looks likely to be the most fertile, then this is the direction in which we should expand. We can declare on India right now and take two workers. Ghandi will have only his 6 starting warriors to come at us with. We will have 10 turns in which to prepare a defence and will if necessary be able to whip a spear. Once he has suicided a couple of warriors on the spear we should be able to sue for peace and take his new city and maybe a tech in the deal. This will increase our rate of expansion somewhat, and essentially win the game on turn 25. The risk is obvious, in that he might just sack our capital and it will be game over

 

[Chieftess]

My suggested city placement (I know there's a gap...). Don't have time to discuss it though (work). (city's about to riot, too).

 

[Ginger_Ale]

Exactly what I was thinking Chieftess, before I saw that post! Looser build around our capital, tighter on the coast. I would also place a fishing town by the river in the southern tundra.

I would go for the NW one by the cow first, then the other cow.

 

[mad-bax]

Yes Chieftess' dotmap is definitely better. The NW site by cow could go 1 space SE to fill the gap, but only if we rushed culture there. It does also mean the second settler factory will be late since the second city will not share improved tiles with Camelot as they oscillate in population.

 

[Chieftess]

The grassland 1NE of the mountain (next to the desert near the warrior and India) would be good, too. We could try to expand up there quickly.

 

[classical_hero]

I say that CT's idea is very good and one that I would follow.

 

[Ashburnham]

I, too, agree with CT's proposal.

As an aside, I'm not at all a fan of abandoning cities once they've lived out their use. While I understand that it oftentimes makes sense on a gameplay-level, I feel that it's inappropriate for a government-simulation like the Demogame. I can't imagine England disbanding Windsor on the grounds that it's "too close to London". I would prefer we keep any city we settle.

 

[mad-bax]

Maybe - but in England at least, big towns expand to swallow the surrounding villages and eventually those villages lose their own identity and there is a transfer of power to the major town. In this way small towns and villages become suburbs of the bigger town. Are Soho, Knightsbridge, Chelsea, separate towns or just districts of London?

 

[MOTH]

First let me say that I like the 2 city locations Cheiftess has near the cows.

Second, The real point of this thread is to find the next city site. I think the coastal hill next to the cow is the best spot for our 2nd city as it also conforms with the strategic idea of pressuring India.

Third, the problem I have with Chieftess' dot map is that it is not in line with the (current trend of the) Strategic poll on settlement density. The current option winning is "medium to low density inland and caution in settling at the coast. I would see this as inland cities have 13 usuable tiles, not counting mountains.

CT's plan has cities with 18 or 19 tiles plus sharing 3 or 2 more tiles. We need to plan a bit more densely.

 

[Xerol]

This is what I was saying in the turnchat: We can achieve a tighter build by moving the northernmost settler 1 NE and then settling on the gold for a 4th city. However, with it being revealed that the tile I was referring to is, in fact, a BG, that kinda throws that plan out of the window.

However, if we move 1S from there, we close that gap near the capital and make room for a city on the lake north of there. I completely agree with the other settlement location, however.

Even then, the currently chosen location has the potential to make at least a halfway decent settler factory, and when combined with Camelot's food potential, should be enough to postpone settling the second cow in favor of moving towards India in the direction of the blue arrow.

 

[greekguy]

I think we should builid our next city by the western cow and our third city should be on the BG SE of the closer cow.

 

[vikingruler]

i agree with CT idea on building the second city sw of the first cow, closet to camelot. It will get us the cow and gold. Also, we plenty of mountains to mine, and a few spaces to irrigate. plus, it's close enough to india to apply some pressure, we shouldn't build any closer, it might piss off the indians and declare war. with no defense, our 2 warriors far away and them with 5, we don't stand a chance. this placement will excert pressure yet not in a place to infuriate them enough to declare war, its a nice strategic and safe placement

 

[snipelfritz]

Here's the proposals that have been mentioned. They are colored and numbered for easy discussion(the numbers have no significance). As the next TC has been moved back, I will probably wait to poll until late tomorrow.

If I missed a proposal, feel free to point it out to me.



EDIT: Made numbers easier to see (that 8 took me forever to draw).

 

[Xerol]

Use a color like yellow or bright blue so that it stands out against the background; I can barely see your "7" and "1".

(P.S.: VOTE 7!)

 

[mad-bax]

Here is another proposal for a tighter build. Note that the city that takes the Western Cattle is not sited on the coast because of the number of worker turns required to hook it up to the road network. The Northern cattle is still taken by my original proposal since it is still the only location that allows the option of a 4 turn SF. Towns 6 and 7 are last because we will definitely get them, and 7 is just a glorified fishing village anyway. It is unlikely in my view that the two northwestern sites are possible without an early war with India. When posed like that our position looks cramped already. Depends a lot on what is to the North and East.

 

[donsig]

If there is only one spot that gives us a settler factory then the question becomes do we want a settler factory or not? If the answer is yes then deciding where to build our next city is simple. I'll stop here because I think we need a settler factory. I'll be voting for site number 2.

I like the idea of dismantling the city once its usefulness is gone. That sort of thing can be made part of our country's way of doing things. We don't have to get all attached to one city now people. Anyway, it's not like we'd be torching the place and killing all the citizens. We'd just be exercising eminent domain and having them pack up and move. That's much more acceptable than whipping citizens till they die and using their bones to build temples...