Seafood - Avoid for more Landtiles?

[ahcos]

hey,

simple question: which position would you settle and why?
personally, i lean towards the right position, the left needs a borderpop (and as you can see i randomed spain) for fish, has low production and alot more of junk seatiles. right doesnt need a borderpop right away, has instant gems, alot more production and alot more landtiles, but therefore lacks a food resource. be assured that either way the given land will be used without "leftover", so forget about that. both coastal and on river.
left could forget about a lighthouse/workboat and start with a granery right away, left would need borderpop (monument/artist specialist), workboat ...

overall it's a general question: are there situations (not talking about the extreme situations, e.g. all tiles sorrounding mountains/desert and a lone fish to grab... think about situations like the one i posted) where it's better to avoid even high-yield seafood tiles like fish when the alternative spot would be decent aswell, even if you then give up the food? fish tends to be in awful positions, often i'm tempted to worldbuild the missplaced tiles although i never do it actually...

edit: holy &%($ screw that image, attached, sorry i'm too stupid it seems.

 

[UWHabs]

In this case, I would skip the fish if otherwise I would not have a good city to work the 5 or so tiles that change hands. 4 grassland tiles/1 plains tile > 1 fish/4 ocean or coast.

However, if you did have another city that wouldn't be badly placed that can get the extra tiles, then I'd go for the seafood, consider this a good moai statues city, and use it for an all-around city.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Settle for the fish...but that is DEFINITELY not a high-priority site to settle (who are you blocking, how does this help immediate econ regardless, etc?). You need IW for it to shine although you can farm to whip a border pop thing like a monument.

You can work all of these tiles regardless, but the fish is reasonably valuable. Note that the city is riverside regardless!

 

[madscientist]

I agree with TMIT's assessment. a 5 food tile is valuable for any city and you still get the gems in teh BFC.

 

[Fleme]

Spots like that are ideal for Moai. Heck, you even have your riverside for additional health and production potential. It'll make a very good production site one day.

 

[CivilizedTiger]

Land tiles are valuable, but you must understand that the bread and butter of any civ city is... food.

If you take extra land in this choice, that city will seriously lack food. Most tiles are green, so it might not seem like a big deal at the moment, but I've tried food-less cities filled with green land, they just don't grow fast enough. Sure, 5 extra land tiles are nice. But when will you get the chance to work all of those if it takes so many turns for your city to grow to enough food to work all tiles?

Also note that that city is irrelevant until you get iron working, and that in the early game, you want most of your cities to help the empire right-away, you can't afford too many cities whose benefits can only be felt after development. If that city site is not in danger of being settled soon by an AI (it doesn't look like it in the screenshot), then you should postpone it.

~~~
Are there any situations in which...?
If there is enough food, you might consider it, but even then, it might be a good idea to rather settle closer to the sea and settle a second city. I think that rather than one city with a lot of land tiles and missing out on a food resource, it's better to have two cities, get the sea food tile and also get the extra land.

 

[vicawoo]

Good 2nd cities shouldn't have to wait for a monument border pop to be useful.

 

[sherbz]

i generally never settle one of my first four cities unless it has access to at least one food source. Sometimes you are forced to because of crappy land/few resources. But generally i will be able to find enough decent spots.

What annoys me is when you get seafood and the only way to work it in any decent sort of way (or even at all) is by settling on top of another resource (especially if its good like copper, iron or another food resource).

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Good 2nd cities shouldn't have to wait for a monument border pop to be useful.

They also generally have a food resource and are useful before IW. I see absolutely no reason that city should be 2nd, probably not even 3rd.

But once settled, IMO actually getting the fish is still better.

 

[goodolarchie]

Spots like that are ideal for Moai. Heck, you even have your riverside for additional health and production potential. It'll make a very good production site one day.

I agree here. The one issue is that you'll probably have to do a huge whip to finish, with no production squares on the fish site.

If you move 1E you're essencially gaining 3 production tiles (2 green hills, 1 plains), which is roughly what you'd get by using Moai anyway.

My suggestion is settle for fish, build a granary, then start saving up population to whip Moai. Unless of course you have some other super coastal shipfactory where Moai could be better used?

 

[georgjorge]

I tend to not build Moai unless I have 2+ (more often 3+) seafood in a city, or inland lakes with additional food from Lighthouses. I don't really get how it would make a city like that in the example a good production site, the coastal tiles will still only be as good as plains farms with an additional gold, and I still wouldn't want to work them over any land-based tile for a long time. Of course, it will be better with Moai then without (d'oh), but I'd rather grow the cottages than spend population on it. What am I overlooking?

 

[DaveMcW]

What am I overlooking?

You're right of course, but there will always be people who chase any wonder at any cost.

 

[Kid R]

Some thoughts

• Even with the minimal scouting visible that is definitely the wrong city 2 (I don't think you were suggesting it for city 2 though were you?)
• When the time comes, fish is too good to pass up...
• ...unless you decide to go cultural in which case 1S of the gems looks like a good legendary site if you have nothing better.

Lovely lush green-looking start area though. Good luck

 

[ahcos]

this city wasn't even in thought for the first 6 cities, it's just a general question. mb think of this:

you have 6 decent cities already, either placement gives minimal overlap, you have ironworking and enough spare workerturns to quickly convert those jungletiles into farms until the city has grown (or even beyond, rather a productioncity overall, better cottagecities are elsewhere) - would you then consider settling right over left?

would anyone agree that the right spot is superior post-biology? not that it really would matter 'cause this city would've been the 7th or so city anyway (so long before biology), but just as a general thought x)

i could worldbuild a comparable situation which is more "clear", somehow i feel that i'm rather often in such situations.. oh well, whatever. it's just ... i hate those "out-of-the-borderpop-seafood-and-mass-junk-seatiles-spots", i'd have never thought of settling the right spot in most cases but here i kinda felt like it would be such a situations where you COULD think about it.

 

[Kid R]

Yeah, too many variables really - any placement might be "right" depending on the game situation. Might see some strategic resources pop up somewhere, ar a capital "cottage helper" city east of the gems might be good, or as you say there's a great production city buried under there if you need one, what with all those hills. Green land with good riverage can do pretty much anything.

 

[beest]

Getting the fish would be good, but it leaves some tiles in between that fish-city and the one you founded on the right of the picture. Where would you put a third city that uses those tiles?

 

[Fleme]

^By the river, SW of the corn being improved by the worker. Seeing that it's the capital it most likely has food to spare and even if it doesn't, it's green save for 1 tile.