Short Tip about Food Overproduction

[CivAl]

In the midgame before hospitals, I usually have tons of size12 cities. It struck me yesterday as I was micromanaging a bit that all of them were doing one totally useless thing: producing extra food. I could use that food to make "storage" Workers for when I get hospitals, but I already have a huge army in Democracy and I don't want to pay more. Solution? I pull off citizens and turn them into entertainers, until I get "Zero growth" instead of "Growth in 9999 turns". This almost always tips off those aesthetically pleasing fireworks that mean my citizens are praising my wisdom. And the bonuses from WLT-D always more than make up for the perhaps 5-6 shields/commerce lost.

Make sure to try and pull off the most food while losing the least shields, obviously. Usually taking off a few flood plains will do the trick. And it does wonders for my treasury. You're not worrying about commerce because WLTKD will make up for it.

 

[Spawnbob]

thanks good idea even though i also forget these things when im playing and end up losing miserably, i h8 it when you do lose and they all make fun of you even though some of them done as bad as you.

Anyway you say make them into an Entertainer, is there any benefit over apart from the obvious of making them either an entertainer, taxman or science man?, i.e. which works out to be the most profitable, i would usally tend to make them a taxman as thats a result i can see straight away but im not sure its the best use of these excess population.

 

[Ironikinit]

I like tax specialists, myself. By reducing food production, you lose commerce as well, so making tax specialists helps make up the loss, and it seems like you need a lot of scientists to make a difference in research rate. With gold, every bit helps.

 

[CivAl]

It depends. If the extra gold/shields from a WLT D outweighs the gold from taxmen or the research from scientists, then obviously entertainers are the way to go. Otherwise taxmen are usually better than scis.

 

[Moulton]

Make whatever is appropriate at the time. A few extra beakers doesnt matter much by that time, and probably not the gold either, but no point is letting them spin their wheels. I leave enough entertainers to get WLTK...
I usually was letting AI manage the city life, instructed to emphasize production, and maintain happiness... Got to looking last night... Had cities at 6, no aquaducts yet... but all production was food, with only a few shields. Needless to say, production, the no 1 job, was lagging...
No wonder the AI does dumb things.
Also, noticed they started some wonders in Pop 1 cities.... wasted a lot of shields...

 

[Ironikinit]

There are a lot of situations where you can sneak in a taxman and not mess up the WLTK. At population 6, depending on your luxury situation, you might need two specialists to induce WLTK. Two entertainers causes 4 happy, 2 content (let's say for sake of example). You could change an entertainer to a taxman and not mess up the WLTK. It's micromanagement, but I don't mind much.