[GS] So confused about timing Districts, Settlers and Builders

[ISuckAtCiv]

Hey everybody, I need to some help understanding some of the advice I've been reading here lately, specifically about delaying your investment in techs and civics to keep districts cheaper, delaying settlers until you get Early Empire for the policy card, and delaying builders until you reach Feudalism.

My normal play style is to try to get as many early Eurekas and Inspirations as I can to go through the early parts of the tech and civic trees quickly, but then I read that this can increase the cost of your districts and should be avoided?

Similarly, I would normally try to rush as many settlers out in the early game as I could, sometimes buying multiple builders to chop them out faster in an effort to expand before the AI hemmed me in. I've now read that this is inefficient, and you don't want to use too many builders before Feudalism and you don't want to spend hammers on Settlers until you have the Early Empire card, which might take me to turn 40 or so. That seems way to late to start trying to expand.

Finally, there's district placement. I'm still fuzzy on exactly what drives up the cost of each district, but in general it seems like the advice is to place as many campuses as you can (but not finish them) as early as possible, to lock in the cost - however, often this means I have to purchase a good tile for it, when gold is critically needed for other things like unit upgrades.

Am I totally off track here with my understanding of the advice? Does it maybe only apply after you've done your initial expansion push of 2 or 3 cities? Is it more important to speed through the tech and civics trees or get cheaper districts? Help!

 

[lotrmith]

Does it maybe only apply after you've done your initial expansion push of 2 or 3 cities?

This. Generally you want two expansions (3 cities total) before the Ancient Era ends, and at least one, possibly two builders out. You want to improve at least 3 tiles to inspire Craftsmanship, and among those improved tiles you'll be wanting a farm, pasture, quarry, and shortly after an iron mine for the assorted tech eurekas. Maybe even two fishing boats depending on map (ocean maps), luxuries (early luxuries sell to AI for $$) and/or city state quests (they may want you to eureka for celestial navigation, or build a harbor). Getting 3 cities up expands your production potential and also helps you inspire Early Empire.

 

[ISuckAtCiv]

Thanks, lotrmith! That makes sense, and is closer to how I normally play. What about district timing? Another tech I would often prioritize early is Bronze Working so I could see Iron on the map, but since this unlocks the Encampment, does that mean I'm hurting myself by boosting the cost of Campus, Commercial Hub, and City Plaza districts? I'm not sure I understand this mechanic, nor understand how important it is in the scope of overall expansion and city development.

 

[Bibor]

There’s nothing wrong with placing an encampment.
Generally speaking production and gold turn science and culture into practical objects, so no point in rushing something you cant capitalize on.

 

[Aabraxan]

Hey everybody, I need to some help understanding some of the advice I've been reading here lately, specifically about delaying your investment in techs and civics to keep districts cheaper, delaying settlers until you get Early Empire for the policy card, and delaying builders until you reach Feudalism.

My normal play style is to try to get as many early Eurekas and Inspirations as I can to go through the early parts of the tech and civic trees quickly, but then I read that this can increase the cost of your districts and should be avoided?

Similarly, I would normally try to rush as many settlers out in the early game as I could, sometimes buying multiple builders to chop them out faster in an effort to expand before the AI hemmed me in. I've now read that this is inefficient, and you don't want to use too many builders before Feudalism and you don't want to spend hammers on Settlers until you have the Early Empire card, which might take me to turn 40 or so. That seems way to late to start trying to expand.

Finally, there's district placement. I'm still fuzzy on exactly what drives up the cost of each district, but in general it seems like the advice is to place as many campuses as you can (but not finish them) as early as possible, to lock in the cost - however, often this means I have to purchase a good tile for it, when gold is critically needed for other things like unit upgrades.

Am I totally off track here with my understanding of the advice? Does it maybe only apply after you've done your initial expansion push of 2 or 3 cities? Is it more important to speed through the tech and civics trees or get cheaper districts? Help!

This. Generally you want two expansions (3 cities total) before the Ancient Era ends, and at least one, possibly two builders out. You want to improve at least 3 tiles to inspire Craftsmanship, and among those improved tiles you'll be wanting a farm, pasture, quarry, and shortly after an iron mine for the assorted tech eurekas. Maybe even two fishing boats depending on map (ocean maps), luxuries (early luxuries sell to AI for $$) and/or city state quests (they may want you to eureka for celestial navigation, or build a harbor). Getting 3 cities up expands your production potential and also helps you inspire Early Empire.

I think I've misunderstood what I've been reading. I've been having a devil of a time coordinating expansion and building districts. To be more specific, I can't figure out how anyone: (a) gets Political Philosophy by T50; or (b) gets a district built in time for Early Empire. I've gotten PP by T53, but that was using the Romans, with a pretty lucky start. As to EE, I'm pretty well lost. I don't buy builders like the OP does, but I agree that T40 seems awfully late to start pushing settlers if my goal is to have 10 cities by T100, and enough military to fend off the hordes.

 

[ISuckAtCiv]

There’s nothing wrong with placing an encampment.
Generally speaking production and gold turn science and culture into practical objects, so no point in rushing something you cant capitalize on.

Hi, thanks Bibor. I think either I'm confused or I'm not being clear about my question. I'm not necessarily saying I'm trying to avoid placing encampments, but my concern is more related to the mechanic that increases the cost of all districts whenever you unlock a tech or civic that enables a new type of district. Is that not how it works? In other words, does finishing Bronze Working automatically increase the cost of Campuses, Commercial Hubs, and Government Plazas, or do I have that mechanic wrong?

 

[Fluphen Azine]

I think I've misunderstood what I've been reading. I've been having a devil of a time coordinating expansion and building districts. To be more specific, I can't figure out how anyone: (a) gets Political Philosophy by T50; or (b) gets a district built in time for Early Empire. I've gotten PP by T53, but that was using the Romans, with a pretty lucky start. As to EE, I'm pretty well lost. I don't buy builders like the OP does, but I agree that T40 seems awfully late to start pushing settlers if my goal is to have 10 cities by T100, and enough military to fend off the hordes.

It runs goofy for me.
Some games I get PP up around turn 42 and other times very late at turn 63.
I think you just have to prioritize getting the boosts.
Most of them should be able to be had if you focus on them.
You may have to delay or detour your tech/civics path.

 

[Aabraxan]

I've been aiming for the techs and civics for which I have the boost or, alternatively, trying to go get the boost for the tech/civic that I want. So I get that part, but I'm not even close to having a district completed by EE. And without that, getting PP by T50 is a miracle for me.

 

[JesseS]

Hi, thanks Bibor. I think either I'm confused or I'm not being clear about my question. I'm not necessarily saying I'm trying to avoid placing encampments, but my concern is more related to the mechanic that increases the cost of all districts whenever you unlock a tech or civic that enables a new type of district. Is that not how it works? In other words, does finishing Bronze Working automatically increase the cost of Campuses, Commercial Hubs, and Government Plazas, or do I have that mechanic wrong?

So, there's two mechanics that affect district cost. The first is the district cost scaling mechanic--the cost to place a district scales up in cost linearly as you research through the tech and civic tree, based on whichever you have researched furthest. In other words, researching any tech/civic, if it's the most advanced tech/civic that you can currently unlock, will increase your district cost. Note that this mechanic works through all techs/civics, not just those that unlock districts. Your chop yields also scale up at the same pace, however, meaning that for efficiency you want to research and place the districts you want as soon as you can and then chop them in later, when the chops are more valuable relative to the locked-in district cost.

In addition to this district cost scaling mechanic, there's a district discount mechanic. This works by discounting by 40% the production cost to place districts which are less prevalent than your empire-wide average of placed and finished districts, if you have finished at least as many total districts as you have unlocked. For example, if you unlock holy sites and campuses (and no other districts) and finish 2 holy sites, 1 campus will be discounted by 40%. If you finish 3 holy sites, 2 campuses would be discounted. However, if you researched holy sites, campuses, and encampments, but only finished 2 holy sites, no district would be discounted until you finish a third district. See here for the full math: https://forums.civfanatics.com/resources/civ-vi-district-discounts.27783/. It can pretty hard to make it work reliably in practice, as it means finishing a lot of districts early and somewhat neglecting military/builders/settlers.

If you want to try it out, I'd recommend going for a faith-powered science race with Japan or Russia. The build order is something like: 2 scouts, settler, builder, buy monument, finish 2 holy sites/lavras, settler (either with the 50% boost card or as a pantheon settler), build a discounted government plaza (placing it before unlocking campuses), build a third holy site, place 2 discounted campuses, chop out Ancestral Hall after Political Philosophy, mass settler expand. It only really works if you have strong early tiles, some city state first meets, good district adjacency, successful redirection of barb scouts away from your cities, and no super aggressive neighbors, but it's a strategy that can snowball you into very fast science wins with chained monumentality golden ages. There's a Chinese player who recently posted a turn 161 Japan science victory using this basic outline for the early game (albeit with a lot of reloading saves, tile micromanagement, optimal Magnus chopping, and very tedious trade deals).

 

[tiamats4esgares]

I think every time I advised someone not to [continue to] build settlers until Early Empire, I've also mentioned that they should preferably get to 3 cities first. There's not much time between 3 cities and Early Empire, especially if you rush it. Finding a second continent is usually easy, and getting your population to size 6 is easy too with 3 cities (but very hard with only 1, which is yet another reason why you should build at least 1 settler before EE just for its very boost).

That time that you have between 3 cities and EE should be spent to build an early district and, if you can, also its building; or to build military units to help prevent or fight off invasion.

I recommend getting builds with gold, not production, but I think it's an OK first build in a new city, especially if granaries are not yet unlocked or the city is on a river/lake (making them less needed).

 

[ISuckAtCiv]

So, there's two mechanics that affect district cost. The first is the district cost scaling mechanic--the cost to place a district scales up in cost linearly as you research through the tech and civic tree, based on whichever you have researched furthest. In other words, researching any tech/civic, if it's the most advanced tech/civic that you can currently unlock, will increase your district cost. Note that this mechanic works through all techs/civics, not just those that unlock districts. Your chop yields also scale up at the same pace, however, meaning that for efficiency you want to research and place the districts you want as soon as you can and then chop them in later, when the chops are more valuable relative to the locked-in district cost.

In addition to this district cost scaling mechanic, there's a district discount mechanic. This works by discounting by 40% the production cost to place districts which are less prevalent than your empire-wide average of placed and finished districts, if you have finished at least as many total districts as you have unlocked. For example, if you unlock holy sites and campuses (and no other districts) and finish 2 holy sites, 1 campus will be discounted by 40%. If you finish 3 holy sites, 2 campuses would be discounted. However, if you researched holy sites, campuses, and encampments, but only finished 2 holy sites, no district would be discounted until you finish a third district. See here for the full math: https://forums.civfanatics.com/resources/civ-vi-district-discounts.27783/. It can pretty hard to make it work reliably in practice, as it means finishing a lot of districts early and somewhat neglecting military/builders/settlers.

If you want to try it out, I'd recommend going for a faith-powered science race with Japan or Russia. The build order is something like: 2 scouts, settler, builder, buy monument, finish 2 holy sites/lavras, settler (either with the 50% boost card or as a pantheon settler), build a discounted government plaza (placing it before unlocking campuses), build a third holy site, place 2 discounted campuses, chop out Ancestral Hall after Political Philosophy, mass settler expand. It only really works if you have strong early tiles, some city state first meets, good district adjacency, successful redirection of barb scouts away from your cities, and no super aggressive neighbors, but it's a strategy that can snowball you into very fast science wins with chained monumentality golden ages. There's a Chinese player who recently posted a turn 161 Japan science victory using this basic outline for the early game (albeit with a lot of reloading saves, tile micromanagement, optimal Magnus chopping, and very tedious trade deals).

Ah! This is definitely the source of some of my confusion, I didn't realize there were two different cost/discount mechanics at work. Seems like the "place early, chop after a few more techs/civics" strategy fits more easily into general game play, while exploiting the discount system takes more planning and micro. Thank you for clearing that up, it's really helpful.

I think every time I advised someone not to [continue to] build settlers until Early Empire, I've also mentioned that they should preferably get to 3 cities first. There's not much time between 3 cities and Early Empire, especially if you rush it. Finding a second continent is usually easy, and getting your population to size 6 is easy too with 3 cities (but very hard with only 1, which is yet another reason why you should build at least 1 settler before EE just for its very boost).

That time that you have between 3 cities and EE should be spent to build an early district and, if you can, also its building; or to build military units to help prevent or fight off invasion.

I recommend getting builds with gold, not production, but I think it's an OK first build in a new city, especially if granaries are not yet unlocked or the city is on a river/lake (making them less needed).

Thanks for clarifying. I think my takeaways here are 1) Focus on Eurekas and Inspirations to beeline Early Empire, 2) Rush to 3 cities whenever possible but try not to spend more than that on Settlers in the early game, 3) Use builders very sparingly, either to get helpful Eurekas or for high ROI chops like for Pyramids. 4) Don't worry too much about the district discount mechanics unless you want to craft your early game strategy around them specifically. 5) Place districts as soon as they are available to lock in cost, and then try to wait to finish them so tech/civic tree progress makes chops more effective

 

[Bibor]

Hi, thanks Bibor. I think either I'm confused or I'm not being clear about my question. I'm not necessarily saying I'm trying to avoid placing encampments, but my concern is more related to the mechanic that increases the cost of all districts whenever you unlock a tech or civic that enables a new type of district. Is that not how it works? In other words, does finishing Bronze Working automatically increase the cost of Campuses, Commercial Hubs, and Government Plazas, or do I have that mechanic wrong?

The main takeaway here is that the district discounts are nice, but they come at the expense of other opportunities. There might be some very, very specific strategies, possibly with certain civs like Japan, but between the benefits of early settlers, workers, units, trade routes etc., the district discount suddenly shows itself in it's proper light: it's just a mechanism that makes it so you're not too harshly penalized for emphasizing districts over other builds.

Take for example a really great idea of getting, say, 2 campuses at a discount. More often than not, the best campus locations are purchased tiles, and while the tile purchase cost is relatively low, it will burn your budget for any sort of an early upgrade rush you might've planned. And those archers or swordsmen might've taken a city with a finished campus with a library.

As for the increased costs from research and culture, yes, they are a factor, which in turn asks you to plan your research path based on what you want to do in the next X turns. For example, if you're going for an early rush, you can completely avoid researching Writing. Research it when you're ready to place your first campus - the tech isn't going anywhere

 

[ISuckAtCiv]

The main takeaway here is that the district discounts are nice, but they come at the expense of other opportunities. There might be some very, very specific strategies, possibly with certain civs like Japan, but between the benefits of early settlers, workers, units, trade routes etc., the district discount suddenly shows itself in it's proper light: it's just a mechanism that makes it so you're not too harshly penalized for emphasizing districts over other builds.

Take for example a really great idea of getting, say, 2 campuses at a discount. More often than not, the best campus locations are purchased tiles, and while the tile purchase cost is relatively low, it will burn your budget for any sort of an early upgrade rush you might've planned. And those archers or swordsmen might've taken a city with a finished campus with a library.

As for the increased costs from research and culture, yes, they are a factor, which in turn asks you to plan your research path based on what you want to do in the next X turns. For example, if you're going for an early rush, you can completely avoid researching Writing. Research it when you're ready to place your first campus - the tech isn't going anywhere

Thanks! I'm going to take the feedback from this thread and take a shot at the GotM with Gran Columbia. I appreciate your comments.

 

[knighterrant81]

Hey everybody, I need to some help understanding some of the advice I've been reading here lately, specifically about delaying your investment in techs and civics to keep districts cheaper, delaying settlers until you get Early Empire for the policy card, and delaying builders until you reach Feudalism.

My normal play style is to try to get as many early Eurekas and Inspirations as I can to go through the early parts of the tech and civic trees quickly, but then I read that this can increase the cost of your districts and should be avoided?

Similarly, I would normally try to rush as many settlers out in the early game as I could, sometimes buying multiple builders to chop them out faster in an effort to expand before the AI hemmed me in. I've now read that this is inefficient, and you don't want to use too many builders before Feudalism and you don't want to spend hammers on Settlers until you have the Early Empire card, which might take me to turn 40 or so. That seems way to late to start trying to expand.

Finally, there's district placement. I'm still fuzzy on exactly what drives up the cost of each district, but in general it seems like the advice is to place as many campuses as you can (but not finish them) as early as possible, to lock in the cost - however, often this means I have to purchase a good tile for it, when gold is critically needed for other things like unit upgrades.

Am I totally off track here with my understanding of the advice? Does it maybe only apply after you've done your initial expansion push of 2 or 3 cities? Is it more important to speed through the tech and civics trees or get cheaper districts? Help!

I think you're worrying too much about advanced mechanics. Mostly, just know that it is good practice to lock in your Districts before you actually build them. My guide in my sig is a bit outdated, but it lays out the basics of the early game. To sum up, try to only build things when you have the appropriate card slottted if you can. It really is a balance. Yeah, theoretically, it is more efficient to train Builders under the Serfdom card, but if its going to be 30+ turns before you get that and you have a resource you really need to hook up, go ahead and build a Builder. It isn't going to wreck you. The nice thing about the Policy Card system is, yeah, there's generally a more efficient way to do things, but it usually requires waiting/investing research. You the player have to decide if you need that thing NOW, efficiency be damned (play for tempo), or I can afford to wait and benefit from the efficiency (play greedy). That just takes experience.

Getting cities is really important, but not at the expense of dumping EVERYTHING into chopping Settlers. Build 2-3 cities, then you'll probably need to focus on something else (probably military). Once you've got 6-7 units (favor Warriors if you plan on going on offense, favor Slingers for defense, if you aren't sure, build a Slinger), start building your Government Plaza. Use the Colonization card and the Ancestral Hall (they stack in the same city) to build your Settlers. Once you've played through a bunch of times, you can worry about advanced topics like gaming the District discount mechanism.

 

[ISuckAtCiv]

I think you're worrying too much about advanced mechanics. Mostly, just know that it is good practice to lock in your Districts before you actually build them. My guide in my sig is a bit outdated, but it lays out the basics of the early game. To sum up, try to only build things when you have the appropriate card slottted if you can. It really is a balance. Yeah, theoretically, it is more efficient to train Builders under the Serfdom card, but if its going to be 30+ turns before you get that and you have a resource you really need to hook up, go ahead and build a Builder. It isn't going to wreck you. The nice thing about the Policy Card system is, yeah, there's generally a more efficient way to do things, but it usually requires waiting/investing research. You the player have to decide if you need that thing NOW, efficiency be damned (play for tempo), or I can afford to wait and benefit from the efficiency (play greedy). That just takes experience.

Getting cities is really important, but not at the expense of dumping EVERYTHING into chopping Settlers. Build 2-3 cities, then you'll probably need to focus on something else (probably military). Once you've got 6-7 units (favor Warriors if you plan on going on offense, favor Slingers for defense, if you aren't sure, build a Slinger), start building your Government Plaza. Use the Colonization card and the Ancestral Hall (they stack in the same city) to build your Settlers. Once you've played through a bunch of times, you can worry about advanced topics like gaming the District discount mechanism.

Thanks, knighterrant81, I appreciate your thoughts. I'm actually not a brand new civ player, although I did just start playing again after about a year off when I picked up GS and the New Frontier pack. My early game always seemed decent because I would get to my 6-8 cities by T80 and feel like I was doing ok because I'd get a fair number of Eurekas and Inspirations, be moving pretty well through the tech tree, etc...but then my mid-game always stalled and I have been scratching my head as to why. I think the biggest leaks in my game have been burning too many builders early (but I do hear your comment about not being a miser if you have legitimate uses for them), investing too much early production into buildings and tile improvements, and putting way too little focus on commercial hubs. That had me stuck trying to beat Emperor for a long time before I took a break from the game, and I think the tips in this thread are going to give me a dramatic performance boost. My first 60 turns on the GotM with Simon Bolivar is going pretty well so far, and this is my first attempt ever at Deity, so I'm hopeful!

 

[knighterrant81]

Thanks, knighterrant81, I appreciate your thoughts. I'm actually not a brand new civ player, although I did just start playing again after about a year off when I picked up GS and the New Frontier pack. My early game always seemed decent because I would get to my 6-8 cities by T80 and feel like I was doing ok because I'd get a fair number of Eurekas and Inspirations, be moving pretty well through the tech tree, etc...but then my mid-game always stalled and I have been scratching my head as to why. I think the biggest leaks in my game have been burning too many builders early (but I do hear your comment about not being a miser if you have legitimate uses for them), investing too much early production into buildings and tile improvements, and putting way too little focus on commercial hubs. That had me stuck trying to beat Emperor for a long time before I took a break from the game, and I think the tips in this thread are going to give me a dramatic performance boost. My first 60 turns on the GotM with Simon Bolivar is going pretty well so far, and this is my first attempt ever at Deity, so I'm hopeful!

Good luck on your Deity run.

I do think there's a natural slowdown in the game around turn 80-100. A lot of the Eurekas/Inspirations at that time are much more awkward to get, so that is the point where you switch over from a "boost-based" economy to an actual Science/Culture-based economy, at least a little. Trade Routes used to be super meta back in Vanilla, so I actually had to work on taking them out of my playstyle a bit. In general I do think the bulk of your Builders should come under Serfdom. As far as tile improvements - it is much better to have a Pop working an unimproved tile than to waste a Builder charge on improving a tile that isn't being worked. In general, improvements (except for mines) aren't that strong in VI. Mostly though, I just want to say this:

 

[Bibor]

Yeah, Medieval Faires and guilds are not worth it. Trade routes are still good, at least for some civs (Rome comes to mind, if you can Congo-line your cities.

 

[Victoria]

but then I read that this can increase the cost of your districts and should be avoided?

It’s a tricky combo. Basically if you want to get your inspirations you cannot rush culture too early, and an early science rush can be similar. Both have their paybacks but for example building your first district should not take 10 turns. Over a 200 turn game that is 5% of the game.

I can't figure out how anyone: (a) gets Political Philosophy by T50; or (b) gets a district built in time for Early Empire. I've gotten PP by T53,

However you do need to get to PP pretty fast. It is in fact possible to get it in the early 30’s but that is thanks to a new natural wonder. New cities building monuments means your culture will start slow then blossom. Monuments is not enough so you need some culture luxuries, natural wonder culture and city state culture. The last being the easiest. You can even buy monuments which speeds up PP and did you really need a +4 Campus when +3 is the key... and did you really need that +3 campus when you could convert it to +3 later with district adjacency. Even +.4 from each pop should not be shunned. Getting a city to 4-5 pop early has its benefits.

Medieval Faires and guilds are not worth it.

You really need to add Mercantilism to that list because it’s 3 inspirations not 2 and personally culture is rare enough. You said in another thread how 3 archers or production gets you machinery and is a cheap way of getting science and then diss the culture here. I am not going to argue because you do not need machinery eureka to win just like these three but they all are about efficiency and everyone takes their pick. Are they worth it for me when I am suze of Rapa Nui? No.... Suze of Kumasi? Yes. If I have very little culture, yes.

 

[Fluphen Azine]

Thanks! I'm going to take the feedback from this thread and take a shot at the GotM with Gran Columbia. I appreciate your comments.

I've been playing a few games kind of practicing before playing the GOTM.
@DanQuayle made a comment of a goal of Domination pre-turn 100 if he has horses.
So I've been trying to work on more speedy domination.
I seem to be able to roll 1 to 2 AIs by turn 80-85 but things get problematic afterwards.
Usually problems with pesky Barbs and not getting a Classical Golden Age.
I'm struggling with focusing on mass builders.
I'll say that I was chopping out massive troops with Magnus.
I still think it would be difficult for me to finish under 150 turns.
All that being said I am sure that @DanQuayle and others will finish under 100 turns or thereabout.

However you do need to get to PP pretty fast. It is in fact possible to get it in the early 30’s but that is thanks to a new natural wonder.

Talk about a Culture Rocket!!

 

[Bibor]

You said in another thread how 3 archers or production gets you machinery and is a cheap way of getting science and then diss the culture here.

Oh I don't diss the culture here. I would very much like to get all the inspirations. But getting 3 marketplaces up for 4 trade routes, that's tough.