Settling on resources

[Rhaeghar]

It seems like I always manage to build a city on an eventually strategic resource(In ~2-3 of the past 5ish games I've managed to settle cities on Oil, keeping in mind that I've only played ~10 full games that seems very often!) I'm doing a prince difficulty game at the moment (so I can try out the SE without worrying TOO much about winning/losing) and I managed to settle my second city on an Iron node ... personally I don't like it when this happens it seems like a wasted possible improvement; However, I couldn't help but notice Dave mentioning in the what tech would you choose thread that he'd pick IW so that he could settle Rome on an Iron node.

SO I guess what I'm asking is what are there any other benefits to settling on a resource other than you don't have to improve it to use the resource and are there any other drawbacks that I can't think of other than you don't get to use the bonuses from improving the square?

 

[iCaesura]

Ivory, Marble and stone are amazing settling points because the last two give major production bonus while ivory gives 2 gold and 2 hammer for a good cap or new city. However he may be stating that he would place a city on iron with rome in order to gain the advantage of Praetorians as fast as possible.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

SO I guess what I'm asking is what are there any other benefits to settling on a resource other than you don't have to improve it to use the resource and are there any other drawbacks that I can't think of other than you don't get to use the bonuses from improving the square?

If you settle a city on a tile that is inherently stronger than 2/1/1, you get to keep the profit.

The classic example is settling on a plains hill, which gives you 2 / 2 / 1 in the center tile.

Note that you aren't getting the extra hammer from the resource, but from the tile yield. For instance, settling on a grassland ivory tile doesn't give you an extra hammer (it's a 2/1 tile which becomes 2/1/1), but settling on plains ivory does (the 1/2 tile becomes a 2/2/1).

So...

• Hammer resources on a plains tile or a hill gives 2/2/1
• Plains hills give 2/2/1 also
• Hammer resources on a plains hill give 2/3/1
• Food resources on grassland give 3/1/1
• Commerce resources next to rivers give 2/1/2 (2/1/3 for financial - the bonus applies to the city tile)
• A commerce resource on a plains hill adjacent to a river augments both production and commerce - you get 2/2/2 or 2/2/3 (financial).

The additional benefit you are missing is that it is really hard to pillage a resource when you've dropped your city on it.

 

[Sian]

one of the possiblely best tiltes to settle on imo is riverside plain hill wine, 2/2/2 or Sugar, 3/1/1

 

[Guardian_PL]

Nah, nothing beats settling capitol on a plain hill with marble/stone when there's some food in BFC too - you'll be amazed what a monster such city is - like a free mine from the very beginning, so workers etc will be popping out like there's no tomorrow. A mine that is always in use and do not require food

 

[JTMacc99]

Finding oil, or possibly uranium, under one one of my grassland commerce cities is usually just about the best thing that can happen. Finding it under a TOWN one square away from the city is much less ideal. (The only thing worse would be not finding it at all.)

Thankfully you can see the food tiles right from the start. I would be enormously annoyed if I ever settled a capital, and then discovered it was on a corn tile after I researched agriculture. (Actually, I'm pretty sure I'd just start over or WB it over one space.)

 

[Warmessiah]

I NEVER settle on resources. The number 1 way I get hammers, food and gold and probably the way most people do is by farming resource tiles. There's a BIG difference between having a city on a 3 food corn tile and farming 2 with 6 food each. Trust me, unless you are rly rushing to get a resource, ALWAYS farm tiles. They are pretty much the backbone of your city. Let's go to that Rome example that iCaesura posted:
"However he may be stating that he would place a city on iron with rome in order to gain the advantage of Praetorians as fast as possible."
He's right about the tiles, but mines there only take 6 or so turns with a road, and the bonus is that by not settling on that tile he gets +6 hammers instead of +2 so he can train pretorians in 2 or 3 turns each instead of 4 or 5. The secret to most large empires are well times, well reinforced rushes, and you can only get them with the juicy resources a resource tile offers. I always situate my cities so I can farm max resources, it is one of my no. 1 priorities. I only ever plop my city on a resource if i get at least two more in the farming range. Same with naturally high production/food tiles. I NEVER settle on floodplains coz it only gives 2/1/1 instead of a possible 4/0/1 (With farms) or a 3/0/5 (with a town). I place my cities so I can farm key tiles and improve. People may play different, but I find that I can NOT play at all without some sort of resource or high food/hammer tiles to farm.

 

[slobberinbear]

I generally prefer not to settle on resources, but there are exceptions:

1. You need immediate access to a strategic resource such as copper, iron, stone, marble, horses, or ivory. This is particularly useful if the tile is already connected to your trade network via roads, rivers, or Sailing. Settling on the resource can give you access to it many turns sooner, though you may be sacrificing some long-term production value.

2. The tile you wish to settle happens to contain a resource. This happens most frequently when trying to place your cities for optimization purposes (grabbing all the bonus tiles you can) or when you are trying to block the AI from settling an area. I seem to run into this situation a lot when trying to grab seafood tiles.

 

[Silv Something]

What would any of you do if you captured an enemy city that was on a resource?

 

[Guardian_PL]

What would any of you do if you captured an enemy city that was on a resource?

Same as what I'd have done with any other captured city - keep it or not, depending on the situation.
For example, if it's ~1500AD I don't mind if a city is settled on horses for instance - around these times cottages/lumbermills/watermills are better than improved Horses tile. But if I don't like the location (crappy tiles) it's better to give a junk city to your vassal or raze it. Or relocate it 'cause lousy AI planted city way too close to each other and tile overlap is just scary.

 

[§L¥ Gµ¥]

meh, not a big deal. You settle a city without thought of future resources, you count your food, hammers, commerce tiles for what you can see. So what if it ends up sitting on iron, or oil? It's luck, and more often than not, it'll end up in the city radius rather than under the city itself. So we benefit more than we lose.

 

[Dragonxander PR]

What would any of you do if you captured an enemy city that was on a resource?

I BURNZ IT TO DA GROUND BABEH!! Of course, that is if they don't have something REALLY valuable (Holy City or that wonder I lost when I was 1 turn away from completition).

I REALLY hate to settle atop resources, but I only do it if the city location is far worse when settling besides them.

 

[Silv Something]

Yes, I would agree with you Dragon. I just wanted some other feedback. I would probably burn it unless is was a holy city or something.

But if it is the best spot for tiles around, I might keep it.

 

[DMOC]

What would any of you do if you captured an enemy city that was on a resource?

I almost always raze if the city has been built on gold, silver, or gems. This happens a lot.

 

[wioneo]

I almost always raze if the city has been built on gold, silver, or gems. This happens a lot.

I noticed this...AIs seem to seriously undervalue commerce.

 

[DMOC]

Yeah. They farm floodplains a lot, too. That means bad news for me capturing their cities.

 

[Silv Something]

Just capture their workers too! No problem.

 

[Norzin]

i like to settle on top of calendar resources. id rather get plus 2 commerce for all that time it takes me to trade for it.

 

[mi6agent]

sometimes I settle on gold mine to have all 3 food resources in my BFC (aim for a big production city) . Call me crazy

 

[robbyextreme]

It really depends on what you have around you. Most cases you'd be settling on a corn or wheat/calender resource to pull in one extra resource of more flood plain tiles. But I'd probably never settle on gold, nothing more exciting then seeing a big $ bag with coins spilling out of it several turns into the game.