The Precise Order of City Builds and Technology Acquisition

[SittinDown]

When you whip you work less tiles.

You lose the least-good-tiles first. And you have less food to get back to growth. So, yeah, don't whip away a pig. but whipping away a 2F1H tile (or +1H tile), nets you 2F, because you don't have so far to go to refill the food bin.

 

[dankok8]

It depends on the count of food surplus and green hill mines. Mines converts 1F=>3H. Whip (with Granary) converts 1F=>+/-3H.

Usually food surplus is larger than green hill mines so whipping is preferred. Like in coastal cities, with flood plains cottages.

Because many game rolls end with cities with only 1-2 green hills it seems that working mines is not an alternative. But as always it is situational.

Will be glad to hear about faults in my thinking that mines are equals to whip (if you have enough of them).

This isn't correct because whipping gives me the unit right away whereas slow building it gives it to me much later. If you're talking about long-term cumulative productivity of the city I agree that mines can be better but in the early game, the speed at which you get your Workers, Settlers and army units in case of rush is crucial. Short term is more important.

If a location has no food and lots of mines I'm almost never going to settle it early unless I really need a strategic resource. Food is king. Simple as that.

 

[gavenkoa]

This isn't correct because whipping gives me the unit right away whereas slow building it gives it to me much later.

Another person in another thread pointed that mines are not about early game. Reasoning: During REX you chop, that is basically 1T=>5H (20H/4T, 1T for move + 3T for chop).

So workers are busy chopping around new cities (settlers/workers for avalanche effect), REX means your forest is an infinite resource (depends on the map) - you just move chopping to new cities.

In my plays I don't eradicate forest tiles, chop only few situationally and wait for Mathematics and some Wonders. As Deity is not about building Wonders but conquering them I'm awful Imm player ((

Of course I haven't tested total chopping, and cannot tell Deity support cost after avalanche early chopping for 5-6 cities. I'm wondering if quick chopping plays nice with a research. Early Pottery/Writing/Alphabet/Sailing is must to avoid negative income on 0% research.

 

[sampsa]

In my plays I don't eradicate forest tiles, chop only few situationally and wait for Mathematics and some Wonders. As Deity is not about building Wonders but conquering them I'm awful Imm player

Well, you will stop being an awful imm player by chopping settlers/workers asap, expand to 6 cities, build cottages. Saving forests for maths is often a huge mistake. Of the techs you mention, all you need is pottery.

 

[gavenkoa]

expand to 6 cities

One my problem is placing cities far away of the capital. Like to claim land / block AI and next fill the space in between, which introduces greater upkeep earlier.

It can be more effective to build a compact empire, giving AI with handicap an opportunity to build everything for you.

And I tend to play in a sandbox instead of building military. I don't know but it can be that on Deity it is inefficient to compete with AIs solely economically (except the cases of isolation).

Sorry for deviating from the topic of the thread...

 

[dankok8]

One my problem is placing cities far away of the capital. Like to claim land / block AI and next fill the space in between, which introduces greater upkeep earlier.

It can be more effective to build a compact empire, giving AI with handicap an opportunity to build everything for you.

And I tend to play in a sandbox instead of building military. I don't know but it can be that on Deity it is inefficient to compete with AIs solely economically (except the cases of isolation).

Sorry for deviating from the topic of the thread...

Blocking AI is overrated in most cases. Just build cities with lots of food and as close as possible. Try to use rivers to connect to trade routes with few or no roads. BFC overlap is ok because cities take a long time to work most of their tiles. Extra early maintenance is indeed crippling.

Anyways with regards to whipping, the only time I have food and avoid whipping is with Gold or Gems. Citizens working those you don't want to whip because of the truly massive commerce boost. That's the only case I can imagine where I would resort to slow building early when I have the option to whip. One example I can think of is the last NC Charlie game.

 

[sampsa]

Blocking AI is overrated in most cases.

This. Blocking AIs is massively overrated. If you plan to go for war, it serves no purpose. Main reason not to go for war is that there is no AI close.

 

[civac]

I ran some numbers recently for 4->2 whips. While whipping with a granary is pretty much always better than hardbuilding the advantage of the whip is significantly less for settlers and workers than for any other build. The reason for that is that your regrowth cycle is much slower because you have 2 turns of not growing and thus you lose more tile yields.

Without a granary hardbuilding worker and settlers is superior from a pure efficiency perspective. However, you require more worker labor for the additional improvements, the first settler/worker comes later and this also only builds if you produce nothing but settlers/workers. If you build warriors/work boats/axes in between it gets akward. My guess is that the advantage of hardbuilding disappears then but i haven't calculated it.

 

[sampsa]

While whipping with a granary is pretty much always better than hardbuilding the advantage of the whip is significantly less for settlers and workers than for any other build.

This is going to take some convincing.

The reason for that is that your regrowth cycle is much slower because you have 2 turns of not growing and thus you lose more tile yields.

Yes, 2 turns of not growing compared to some 7-8 turns of not growing. Pretty sure you can come up with tiles that make whipping less desirable, but the point of whipping is always to whip away weak tiles. When you plan to whip, you don't build mines for example. You have better uses for worker turns.

 

[civac]

Indeed the worker turns are an issue. I'm not saying you should hardbuild workers. I'm saying that the conventional wisdom that whipping workers or settlers is particularly advantageous is false.

Example: City building worker/war elephant with wet rice + fish + 1 unimproved flood plain + 1 grasland forest. Hardbuilding the worker yields 11 foothammers per turn.

worker:
size/food/hammers
4/13/0
4/13/11 2pop whip
2/13/20 worker done
2/21/21
3/17/22
4/13/23

83 total hammers in 5 turns for 16,6 hammers per turn.

war elephant:
4/13/0
4/22/2 2pop whip
3/18/3 war elephant done
4/14/4

64 total hammers in 3 turns for a total of 21,333 hammers per turn.

 

[drewisfat]

The whole point is that we want war elephants and workers. Expand your example to include both, i.e. whipping worker and building war elephant and alternatively whipping war elephant and building worker. The obvious difference is in the latter you go through a bunch of turns not growing.

It can make sense to slow build workers/settlers if your food surplus is so high that it is overwhelmed by whip anger, and we wouldn't want to start losing high yield tiles. Typically though we'd want such a food powerhouse to simply share its big food tiles with other cities for a more efficient empire. You could concoct a situation where this isn't plausible, (and angry citizens do not eat up 2 food when building settler/worker), but it's rare.

 

[sampsa]

I'm saying that the conventional wisdom that whipping workers or settlers is particularly advantageous is false.

I understand. What I'm saying is that your statement is false. You are comparing whipping an elephant to whipping a worker, when you should be comparing whipping a worker to slow building a worker. Whipping an elephant is indeed "better" than whipping a worker just for the reason you say - there are two turns of not growing when whipping a worker. This is because the turns slow building (transforming 1->1) are bad, thus you should try to minimize the amount of turns doing so, thus you should not slow build workers/settlers.

 

[Fippy]

Am i missing an important part mentioned? Earlier settlers and workers (whipped) can found cities or get to work sooner, so basically empire progress happens quicker?

Usually i whip them for that reason, looking at whip efficiency in just that city (without a granary) can seem unconvincing.
But such a calculation would be really flawed without considering they are crucial snowball units.

 

[sampsa]

Earlier settlers and workers (whipped) can found cities or get to work sooner, so basically empire progress happens quicker?

You are right, that is obvious, but still should be mentioned.

Usually i whip them for that reason, looking at whip efficiency in just that city (without a granary) can seem unconvincing.

Without a granary, yes. Civac was talking about with a granary (post #28).

 

[civac]

Please read my original post again. This is exactly what I said. Granary whips are always better, hardbuilding can be more efficient without a granary. I even mentioned all of the drawbacks of hardbuilding like later first build (subsequent ones are earlier though) and more required worker labor. The point that the advantage of whipping over building is less for workers and settlers also stands.

 

[sampsa]

I already agreed that

Whipping an elephant is indeed "better" than whipping a worker just for the reason you say

Only your conclusion

I'm saying that the conventional wisdom that whipping workers or settlers is particularly advantageous is false.

is incorrect, or should I say misleading. Whipping settlers/workers is particularly advantageous because slow building settlers/workers is particularly disadvantageous (with a granary).

 

[civac]

I ran some numbers recently for 4->2 whips. While whipping with a granary is pretty much always better than hardbuilding ...

...
Without a granary hardbuilding worker and settlers is superior from a pure efficiency perspective. However, you require more worker labor for the additional improvements, the first settler/worker comes later and this also only builds if you produce nothing but settlers/workers. If you build warriors/work boats/axes in between it gets akward. My guess is that the advantage of hardbuilding disappears then but i haven't calculated it.

This is in my initial posts. You ascribe statements to me I never made. I did not say hardbuilding is better than whipping with a granary. I repeatedly said the opposite.

 

[sampsa]

And I'm only saying the quoted part in my last post is incorrect (a statement you clearly made). I understand what you mean, but the "conventional wisdom" is not false. If you need a settler, you build a settler, not an elephant.

 

[civac]

This is a misunderstanding. I meant exactly what I demonstrated: that whipping workers with a granary produces less of a advantage over building them conventionally then in the case of units which don't stop growth, nothing more.

 

[sampsa]

This is a misunderstanding. I meant exactly what I demonstrated: that whipping workers with a granary produces less of a advantage over building them conventionally then in the case of units which don't stop growth, nothing more.

You didn't demonstrate that though. You demonstrated that whipping an elephant is more favourable than whipping a worker due to 2T of not growing which is a completely valid point.