resource tile usefulness order

[nishant1911]

hello everyone,,
what do you think is the order of utility of improved tile of resources..
like-
1.gold
2.silver
3.corn
4.etc...
(not to consider strategic advantages ,health,happiness etc.)

 

[DaveMcW]

1 food = 4
1 hammer = 2.5
1 commerce = 1

You can calculate the rest yourself.

*This formula only works in the early game, but later you should be working ALL your resources anyway.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

*This formula only works in the early game, but later you should be working ALL your resources anyway.

Later you get a range of tile improvement options though, and some people have trouble with picking them.

According to you (on grassland):

Bio farm: 16
SP caste/guild/chem shop: 18
Town (non-FIN with civics): 17.5

AI weights food/hammer/commerce 10/6/4 underneath the growth cap. The same improvements according to the AI:

Bio Farm: 40
SP shop: 44
Town: 54

Note: I believe at growth cap food = hammers, so @ cap:

Bio farm: 24
SP shop: 36
Town: 46

This valuation seems a little off to apply usefully IMO, but it may explain why the AI spams non financial coast like crazy if you leave the governor on. AI flavors/improvement favorites will affect this valuation though I'm not sure the extent numerically. I'm also not 100% sure it sets food = hammers w/o touching commerce at cap...but it's pretty clear one needs rep for bio farms to be useful. On the plus side for bio farms, they are the only one of these that is not heavily civic-dependent. A bio farm owns a shop in eman/env like crazy generally speaking (though if this is how the AI does it, it considers them equal at growth cap with that civic set).

Note: This is a coded AI value assignment. It unfortunately fails to use it in practice, or it would be somewhat better than it is right now.

The primary difference here is that you are weighting commerce lower than the AI (if you divide 10/6/4 the AI is valuing 1 = 1.5 and 1 = 2.5 .

I find it interesting that you drop commerce value relatively speaking. You're basically saying that an early farm (12 ) the same thing as a town (12 before civic bonuses like bureaucracy, FS, US, or the PP tech. Basically applying what you say here suggests that outside the capitol (intended for bureaucracy), farms > cottages until probably lib + democracy, if not longer.

Maybe you value later commerce more, but based on your early rule here one should not build cottages anywhere if they won't make good use of bureaucracy commerce (where 1 = 1.5 and a village is slightly better than a farm)

I ignore riverside in this analysis since it's passive commerce, but of course it is also boosted by bureaucracy and isn't quite irrelevant to evaluating food vs commerce in the capitol...

Also note that according to you a caste workshops is almost as good as a farm with guilds and also better than anything but a town. Adding a forge makes it win over farms. Adding a library alone does not make most cottage progressions beat farms. Library + academy would, but then we're back to just 1 city generally (maybe 2 if there is a really good site).

When you're throwing your 1-5 liner up there, is this the kind of analysis you're expecting of a rookie who doesn't automatically improve corn before gold/silver without a second thought ? (Do note that both dave and the AI weight food sufficiently highly to improve food resources before a gold mine, and for good reason. Too bad the AI doesn't plan micro actions or even follow its own value structure consistently (it will work a grass forest over a mine oftentimes despite the latter weighted @28 vs 26).

 

[nishant1911]

When you're throwing your 1-5 liner up there, is this the kind of analysis you're expecting of a rookie who doesn't automatically improve corn before gold/silver without a second thought ? (Do note that both dave and the AI weight food sufficiently highly to improve food resources before a gold mine, and for good reason. Too bad the AI doesn't plan micro actions or even follow its own value structure consistently (it will work a grass forest over a mine oftentimes despite the latter weighted @28 vs 26).

i will improve corn before gold...
my order was in the sense that i will choose a city location having gold than corn.

 

[PartAnon]

i will improve corn before gold...
my order was in the sense that i will choose a city location having gold than corn.

I may be misunderstanding what you're saying, but... I will never found a city just for gold. Whenever I see gold I look to pair it up with at least one food resource in the same city, preferably one that yields +5 or better in order to work the gold and still grow. Farming 2 grasslands in order to work a gold mine and be food neutral is not efficient enough (1 gold mine is not worth 3 citizens, imo).

The gold is as much for happiness as it is for early commerce, if not more (it's difficult not consider the strategic benefits). So I might settle near it to get it on the second border pop which might be around the time happiness becomes more of an issue, or even settle on top of it if I need the happiness right away, since settling on top of it resolves the issue of having -2 from working gold (edit: but in most cases there should be a food resource near the gold).

 

[Zexx]

I have to disagree with you, ParAnon, often times I see Gold and I rush for it, more for the early commerce then for the luxury OR the citizen growth cost.
Working a Gold in the right place can mean one more city before you have to stop growing.
It can also mean the difference in Aesthetics in 10 turns, or in 6.

As far as "favorite" tiles go, I like:
Pigs, (Food is good.)
Corn, (Food remains good. Shocking eh?)
Gems, (Because they tend to spawn in groups, and because they spawn on green tiles.)
Gold,
Dye (Amazing earlygame commerce potential. And one of the few Calender Resources that don't diminish too much from towns earlygame.)

 

[PartAnon]

I have to disagree with you, ParAnon, often times I see Gold and I rush for it, more for the early commerce then for the luxury OR the citizen growth cost.
Working a Gold in the right place can mean one more city before you have to stop growing.
It can also mean the difference in Aesthetics in 10 turns, or in 6.

Not to say that Gold isn't an early commerce booster, because it typically is. Just that it needs to be set up properly, or as you say, "in the right place." Rather than considering "gold vs. corn" for a city site, it's more like the "gold and corn site" vs. the "rice and ivory" site, or what have you. I'm not sure if the OP is considering this or not. The point is that food more important than luxuries and I think we agree on that one.

btw, my favorites:
Pigs
Corn
Fish
Gems
Gold
Stone (i know, it's strategic but it's damn good)
Ivory

 

[Gliese 581]

I think this list holds the secret to great play:

1. Corn
2. Pigs
3. Any other resource giving 5+ food from start
4. Gold
5. The rest shall remain unlisted

 

[nishant1911]

5. The rest shall remain unlisted

too bad, i was actually looking for the rest of them..

 

[Fleme]

The next best thing after those would be Gems, Iron, Copper, Horse, Stone, Marble, Cows, Plains Sheep/Grass Hill Sheep (considering that a flat grass Sheep falls under the category of 5 food) and so on. In this particular order, atleast for me

I won't even discuss the calendar resources as I don't really feel that they have a huge impact. Early on, a riverside dye is good to cottage on, as Sugar is good to farm or settle on but that's about it.

 

[StrategeryBush]

In another thread someone pointed out that the best terrain feature is a river, preferably a nice long twisty one.

I prefer gems to gold, since gold is always associated with a negative food tile. The game never puts you in a spot where you can't work that Grassland Gem. Coastal Fish go pretty high on the list, high food, decent commerce, particularly if financial.

 

[Kid R]

Re. the simple formula (4=2.5=1) I don't understand how that could ever help you decide what improvements to build. At any moment you want food or hammers or cash to service your short term game plan, and typically have a very limited number of worker turns to get stuff done. In addition, as it is always remarked, city specialization is crucial. Building a cottage versus a mine in a military production city surely can't be assessed with the same weightings as for a commerce city. Even if said weightings made any sense in the first place.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Re. the simple formula (4=2.5=1) I don't understand how that could ever help you decide what improvements to build. At any moment you want food or hammers or cash to service your short term game plan, and typically have a very limited number of worker turns to get stuff done. In addition, as it is always remarked, city specialization is crucial. Building a cottage versus a mine in a military production city surely can't be assessed with the same weightings as for a commerce city. Even if said weightings made any sense in the first place.

You'd be surprised...

Actually the AI weights a riverside cottage = a grassland mine (higher since it grows). A non-riverside cottage would have to have grown twice for some turns to break even. Not only could this help you choose which tiles to improve, it could help you dictate which cities to specialize.

But specialization is really a matter of national wonders generally, and those multipliers are so strong that they can allow an improvement type that wouldn't otherwise be competitive to completely overtake the other. A mine BLOWS OUT the same cottage if the hammers get 100% to the cottage's nothing. Bureaucracy + library + academy makes the cottage > mine immediately and greatly favors your working it first.

 

[Harv]

1 food = 4
1 hammer = 2.5
1 commerce = 1

You can calculate the rest yourself.

*This formula only works in the early game, but later you should be working ALL your resources anyway.

I understand where you get the 1 food = 4 in the early game because that is the farm versus cottage conversion. I am not sure where you get the 1 hammer = 2.5 from. I have been using 1 hammer = 3.0 recently based on the conversion from Universal Suffrage, but that is not an early game civic.

Generally I agree with Dave, but I am interested in that 2.5 figure.

ADDIT:

My opinion is in the early game, hammers seem to matter much more than commerce. Hammers build units. Hammers build improvements. Hammers build units. Hammers build wonders. Hammers build units.

Food matters even more because it grows cities fast. Granaries grow cities even faster. You can convert food into hammers with a whip. See the above on hammers. Later food gets converted to hammers and commerce by working tiles that produce less than two food.

Gold is a useful tile because it gives a +1 happy bonus that is available in the very early game. Silver and Gems are also in that category and so are Ivory and Furs. The other luxury resources require a good bit of research before they become available. One early luxury resource like this means a settler every ten or eleven turns.

Otherwise I am in general agreement with the above.

 

[Kid R]

@TMIT

Hmm, I'm not really convinced. I suspect the reasoning is so far over my head I just don't understand why it's even relevant, let alone how it works

But letting the terrain entirely dictate specialization seems rather passive, not to say hopeful. Everybody dotmaps their cities don't they - "military", "commerce", "gp farm" etc. You choose a balance of cities based on the land available, and expected diplo. Then hammer cities will recieve mostly food and hammer improvements, even if applying the "magic equation" would result in cottaging them up. They're hammer cities!

Re. National wonders, obviously they can only specialize one city each, but it seems like you're saying that city specialization is only really relevant in ... let's call it the "core empire" of say 6 cities, and after that during conquests it almost doesn't really matter, just make general purpose cities by applying the equation. If that's the advice then, well fair enough I know you're a much better player than I am so I'll take it.

 

[Gaizokubanou]

You can convert food into hammers with a whip. See the above on hammers. Later food gets converted to hammers and commerce by working tiles that produce less than two food.

I always had an impression that this type of conversion made it really hard to put definitive value on different types of resources.

 

[Gliese 581]

I prefer gems to gold, since gold is always associated with a negative food tile. The game never puts you in a spot where you can't work that Grassland Gem. Coastal Fish go pretty high on the list, high food, decent commerce, particularly if financial.

Yeah but early on you're going to have enough food that it doesn't matter, most of the time and any time that is the case the gold is +1 commerce. Gold also gives hammer discount on the SP.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

@TMIT

Hmm, I'm not really convinced. I suspect the reasoning is so far over my head I just don't understand why it's even relevant, let alone how it works

But letting the terrain entirely dictate specialization seems rather passive, not to say hopeful. Everybody dotmaps their cities don't they - "military", "commerce", "gp farm" etc. You choose a balance of cities based on the land available, and expected diplo. Then hammer cities will recieve mostly food and hammer improvements, even if applying the "magic equation" would result in cottaging them up. They're hammer cities!

Re. National wonders, obviously they can only specialize one city each, but it seems like you're saying that city specialization is only really relevant in ... let's call it the "core empire" of say 6 cities, and after that during conquests it almost doesn't really matter, just make general purpose cities by applying the equation. If that's the advice then, well fair enough I know you're a much better player than I am so I'll take it.

Later in the game you get stronger civics and your choices there start to dictate your tile improvements (and notably civic choices promisingly affect which improvement you might value most highly)...and cities start looking an awful lot like "hammer spam empire" or "teching empire". I would go so far as to say that this is reasonably uniform outside of national wonder cities. It's not an exact science but close enough.

Earlier in the game most cities that get farmed are technically "production" (In the best form available to you then) outside NE.

The "magic equation" (which it is not) will not dictate putting cottages in hammer cities in any example I've ever come across. For one, you're putting hammer multipliers in that city (raising the effective yield of hammer tiles) and two, you aren't planning to put commerce multipliers in this city unless it's to unlock national wonders generally.

On the flip side, the numbers will tend to make you favor sites that already have commerce in some form as your specialized commerce site(s).

Everyone does this to a large extent in their head already, they just don't quantify it.

 

[vicawoo]

There is no reasoning to the AI formula. It is not an asymptotic approximation, they just tinkered until they found something that seemed to work ok. You either accept it or you think you can beat it.

Here's a reasoning problem: does a financial civ value mines relative to cottages more than a non-financial civ early game or does the non-financial civ value them more?

 

[pi-r8]

There's never going to be a universal conversion between the resources. It's totally situation dependant. If you want to grow a small city, then of course food is by far the best to have. But if the city is at it's growth limit, and you don't want to whip it, food is far less important. Or, in a city with oxford but not the heroic epic, commerce can be better than a hammer.