Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[Turner]

Yes, they work at half normal worker speed, I believe. So if you're Industrious, they'd be quite a bit slower than your native workers.

 

[Spoonwood]

To clarify what Turner said, slaves take half the time of non-industrious workers pre-Replacable Parts. Post Replacable Parts they take half the time of whatever trait you have.

 

[HistoryLines]

Hello -

Yes, foreign workers work only half speed.
Therefore let towns grow with them, when the civ is dead, so they do not make any trouble. Do not mix them with your speedy ones, so you do not get things messed up, e.g. two free workers left in the turn, to built the essential railroad, and they suddenly DONT, because one of them is a foreigner.

 

[Spoonwood]

Know how long worker tasks take, and use your workers accordingly.

 

[Bartleby]

Hello -

Did You wonder what the point of guerillias are, despite the fact, that they do not need rescources? When a city is under siege of artillary, they are not going to be hit. So the attacker counts the units in the city with his ari and when he thinks, everything is clear, the guerilla is stil there waiting to surprise him.

I think what's happened there is that the guerilla was on board a boat.

 

[vmxa]

Hello -
Do not mix them with your speedy ones, so you do not get things messed up, e.g. two free workers left in the turn, to built the essential railroad, and they suddenly DONT, because one of them is a foreigner.

Mixing them is fine, you just have to have the correct numbers. If it takes 3 workers to make a road, 6 slaves are going to do the same. 4 slave and 1 workers will be just fine.

Where you may get into having too many in a stack, because of the order of use. An example is sending workers and slaves to a tile to road. It goes worker worker slave worker.

You just wasted the slave. It is easy with small task to get them correct, but mountains, you can get lazy. It is as Spoonwood said, know the task and pay attention. I often use two slaves and a worker to irrigate after rails are up. Mixing is not the problem, carelessness is the issue.

I may get to the point where I have a couple hundred slaves and I will not bother to see to it that all stacks are matched. Lazy, but it is not important at that point.

 

[TheOverseer714]

The other reason to use slaves is they are units you don't use support on. I almost never merge them ito a city, they never seem to be happy and even if they are from extinct civs, they make a city vulnerable to flips.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

Mixing them is fine, you just have to have the correct numbers.

Mixing is not only fine, it is what actually should be done.

Especially when you are in a situation where you have really strong workers, such as when you are industrious (even more so in C3/PTW) and/or have Replacable parts. You are just bound to waste lots and lots of work potential if you use homogenous stacks of native workers, because those strong workers often do not approximate the work needed to complete a task very well.

For instance, in C3/PTW as an industrious civ with RepParts it takes 1 1/2 native worker turns in oder to build a railroad on flat ground. Now you could either use 2 native workers, you could use 3 slaves, or you could use a mixed crew with 1 native and 1 slave. The first option obviously wastes the equivalent of work that a slave worker (ind, RP) can perform in a single turn, while the latter two options fit the the task exactly.

 

[Verarde]

Thanks guys. I just wanted to know. So you're saying use a mix of native/slave?
In my current game I'm still in early middle ages, just after invention, so no Replaceable Parts yet.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

The other reason to use slaves is they are units you don't use support on. I almost never merge them ito a city, they never seem to be happy and even if they are from extinct civs, they make a city vulnerable to flips.

Only if there is cultural pressure on the city (and maybe if there is local culture from a non-dead civ).

 

[Lord Emsworth]

Thanks guys. I just wanted to know. So you're saying use a mix of native/slave?
In my current game I'm still in early middle ages, just after invention, so no Replaceable Parts yet.

It really depends on your situation. If you are not industrious, have no special government (Democracy, Fascism), or have no RP yet, then it is pretty irrelevant. The cost of the various tasks the workers can complete can be paid exactly. It is only when you have stronger workers where you might end up paying more than you would need to.

 

[splunge the 2nd]

Quickie question-
After my son was playing a mod (Star Wars Clone Wars) when I play a regular game, the units all move very quickly. The caps lock is off and I checked animate moves in prefs.
Any ideas?

 

[Lord Emsworth]

Quickie question-
After my son was playing a mod (Star Wars Clone Wars) when I play a regular game, the units all move very quickly. The caps lock is off and I checked animate moves in prefs.
Any ideas?

There is a setting for showing moves. That might be it. Not even showing is even faster than not animating, looks a little like teleportation.

 

[Verarde]

Oh and is it possible for two civs to have the same color? I just met the Mayans, and they are light blue, just like the Americans who are also in my game.

 

[TheOverseer714]

Oh and is it possible for two civs to have the same color? I just met the Mayans, and they are light blue, just like the Americans who are also in my game.

Yes it is possible. One time I had that situation where the Maya and Sumerians had the same color, were neighbors at war and before I realized, the Sumerians were dead.

 

[vmxa]

Grab one of the 31 color palette to stop that. I use Darski's.

 

[EMan]

...So you're saying use a mix of native/slave?...

I play with hundreds of (industrious) workers and a Republic Government. Once you get to Replaceable Parts (Most important Tech Milestone IMO: Faster Workers + Civil Engineers + Artillery), and you're not paying cash for extra units, I add slaves to cities and if the slaves' civ is extinct there's no penalty; if the slaves' civ is still active you might have to eliminate it or move cheap/obsolete military units to the slave-cities to eliminate a city-flip.

 

[Spoonwood]

Gotta love Eman and his histographic style!

 

[DrZaiusDrZaius]

First off I want to say what a great resource this is; it's really enhanced my appreciation for the game. I've been reading up on this forum and in the war academy, and I have a few questions. First off, it seems as though I don't quite have a "feel" for certain aspects of the game. I'm going with a mine-green/irrigate-brown strategy for the moment, but I'm not sure what to build in my cities; I find myself building everything in every city, and I sense that isn't the right idea, because of upkeep costs; I just don't know when and where I'm supposed to stop. What general strategy should I pursue? Lots of commerce buildings on a coastal city, lots of production/military buildings on a city surrounded by hills?
Second, I wonder if I have too many military units. I find myself putting a spearman (or it's equivalent) in each city for defense, but since I usually try for the Republic slingshot, I wonder if this isn't counter-productive in the long run.
I feel like I've made progress from when I started (I no longer automate workers, I try and have 1 city dedicated as a "Settler pump", I research left to right instead of up/down), but there is still plenty of room for improvement. Thanks ahead of time for all your help.
-DrZaius

EDIT: I also am convinced I'm getting fleeced on every trade I make. Maybe I just need to become more familiar with the technology tree, but the Computer seems able to get a high price for any tech I'm selling them compared to what I get in return.

 

[CKS]

To help you decide what to build (improvements and military units), we really need to know what kind of victory you are looking for. Space races are vastly different from conquest victories, for example. If you don't know what you want, pick something to try. You can probably get some good advice then.