[NFP] The Profit for Burning Trees

[Lily_Lancer]

Just tested the effect of burning trees.

A charge can cause 2 adj trees to burn, the burn follows the following pattern.

1: The tile suffers -1 food/prod, depend on forest/rainforest for ~5 turns.

2: For the 5~10th turns, the burning ends and the burnt tree brings back the original bonus

3: After ~10 turns, the tree regrows and the yield of the tile increases by 1 food and 1 prod.

4: If you chop down the regrown tree, the 1 food 1 prod fertility bonus keeps.

So basically burning trees does not conflict with chopping trees. If you find a tree that you're not going to chop within 10 turns, you can let it burn to fertilize the tile, then chop it after it regrows.

By burning down trees you basically get 1 food and 1 prod 10 turns later, a soothsayer can burn 4 trees (2*2), so 4 prod and 4 food altogether.

If you wish to get return in 20 turns and consider 1.5faith=1food/prod, then it is profitable to use only the 100 faith soothsayer to burn trees.

If you wish to get return in 30 turns and consider 1.5faith=1food/prod, then it is profitable to use the 100,200,300 faith soothsayer to burn trees.

If you no longer wish to burn trees, don't forget to chop them.

 

[AntSou]

4: If you chop down the regrown tree, the 1 food 1 prod fertility bonus keeps.

This is very interesting.

Maybe it's easier to attach a bonus yield to a tile rather than a feature.

I suspect if one were able to remove volcanic soil (probably modable) we'd find the bonuses would persist because they're attached to the tile underneath it.

 

[RealHuhn]

Forest fires actually set every adjacent forest tile ablaze until they run out of adjacent forests. There's no limit. One charge can buff 10+ forest tiles, no problem.

However, the fire never jumps from jungle to forest and vice versa. If you want to burn a big area of jungle, you have to start the fire on a jungle tile.

It gets more tricky on forested tundra tiles because sooth sayers can spawn a forest fire or a blizzard. It feels completely random to me and you might have to waste a few valuable charges before you get the fire.

 

[Kwami]

Forest fires actually set every adjacent forest tile ablaze until they run out of adjacent forests. There's no limit. One charge can buff 10+ forest tiles, no problem.

Is that guaranteed, though, or is it kind of random? I've seen a lot of 1- and 2-tile fires that I expected to spread further, but didn't. Those were natural fires, though. I haven't tried setting fires with the Soothsayers.

Also, the math changes when you have more charges on your Soothsayers. It'll cost you something to get there, though. You could use Production to sacrifice your own units, Gold to sacrifice city-state units, or some combination of both. But do you ever get that initial cost back from forest fires?

 

[Equilin]

Is that guaranteed, though, or is it kind of random? I've seen a lot of 1- and 2-tile fires that I expected to spread further, but didn't. Those were natural fires, though. I haven't tried setting fires with the Soothsayers.

yes it can. in a huge europe map i set a fire in (geographical) russia and it burns hundreds of forest tiles, the limitations to it is the map generation. i actually realize that i don't even have to light it up since there are multiple fires already scorching the area ( and killing my scouts), by turn ~80 i was already seeing 9 food tiles (fire do go back and forth i think, not sure)

and yes i generally use CS units for sacrifice as well, since i won't be keeping them and their experience anyway.

 

[leandrombraz]

The fire seems to temporarily remove the wood/rainforest, so, into it regrows, you also lose appeal on that tile, which temporarily shuts down any strategy that's using woods to boost appeal. This was a 40+ tourism national park:

 

[Kwami]

yes it can. in a huge europe map i set a fire in (geographical) russia and it burns hundreds of forest tiles, the limitations to it is the map generation. i actually realize that i don't even have to light it up since there are multiple fires already scorching the area ( and killing my scouts), by turn ~80 i was already seeing 9 food tiles (fire do go back and forth i think, not sure)

and yes i generally use CS units for sacrifice as well, since i won't be keeping them and their experience anyway.

I wasn't asking whether larger fires are possible. I was asking if they always happened. In other words, if I use a Soothsayer to light one or two forests, am I guaranteed to get fires on all forests? Or is there some randomness to the spread?

 

[_hero_]

So basically burning trees does not conflict with chopping trees. If you find a tree that you're not going to chop within 10 turns, you can let it burn to fertilize the tile, then chop it after it regrows.

By burning down trees you basically get 1 food and 1 prod 10 turns later, a soothsayer can burn 4 trees (2*2), so 4 prod and 4 food altogether.

If you wish to get return in 20 turns and consider 1.5faith=1food/prod, then it is profitable to use only the 100 faith soothsayer to burn trees.

If you wish to get return in 30 turns and consider 1.5faith=1food/prod, then it is profitable to use the 100,200,300 faith soothsayer to burn trees.

If you no longer wish to burn trees, don't forget to chop them.

Adding onto this, it is optimal to chop isolated forest/jungles first, as they can't spread fires to other hexes. Meanwhile, big clumps of forest/jungles can be exploited multiple times to get massive yield bonuses on multiple hexes, and then be chopped later in the game with no penalty. Using the soothsayer on large clumps of forest/jungle will change the 20 turns for return on 1.5 faith=1 food/prod math considerably, however.

 

[RealHuhn]

I wasn't asking whether larger fires are possible. I was asking if they always happened. In other words, if I use a Soothsayer to light one or two forests, am I guaranteed to get fires on all forests? Or is there some randomness to the spread?

It's guaranteed.

 

[Equilin]

Figured i would come back to this thread and ask if i'm observing my game correctly: can forest fire spread onto an already burnt woods (not yet regrown)? How would their regrown yield work then?