[GS] Tile management tips? Improvements/districts/building placement?

SupaCiv

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Completely new to Civ, 1st ever playthough, was hoping for general advice. Settler difficulty Korea, I'm going for science victory. (I used a mod all specials available to all civs in the start but turned it off as I realised I have to get used to the game 1st).

1) Which districts/improvements/buildings would you recommend and on which tiles? I'm confused how to lay out optimally. I have some nice food tiles so how many farms should I build and where? it seems hard planning the farms in traingles when my cities are close together. Should I focus on quarries/mines for production if I do already have enough food?

2) How important is religion/culture if I'm not going for those as victories? Should I still build the monument? I just met a city state and another civ already has 2 envoys with them, their quest is a great prophet. Should I ignore since I'm not doing a religion run and just conquer it instead?

3) What happens when my pop 'work' a tile, does it increase the yield by a set amount? And a bonus resource like deer gives +1P naturally if it's within my city, but when I built a camp did I 'get' the deer (meaning +1F)?

4)Also I don't benefit from any resources within my territory until my city expands to that tile? What if I improved the tile before my city expanded to it?
 
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1) I think a commercial hub would be okay. CHes get adjacency bonuses from being near rivers, so those spaces to the left of Gyeongju are probably good. Assuming you're playing as Korea, Seowons probably wouldn't do too badly here. Note that Seowons get worse when there are more districts near them, but Seowons give bonuses to nearby farms and mines.

2) Culture is still pretty important for a science victory. You can't really ignore culture; the civics tree is basically a second research tree that's got a lot of bonuses that can help. Researching the Recorded History civic, for example, gives access to the Natural Philosophy policy card, which doubles the adjacency bonuses for your Campuses when inserted in your government. There are some religious bonuses that can help with science victories as well, but a religion is not mandatory at all. Don't beat yourself up if you don't get a religion, but if you do want one, you'll have to commit to it.

3) While a Citizen works a tile, the city that the Citizen belongs to produces the yields of that tile, at the start of each turn. The deer tile that your Builder is on grants 2 food, 3 production and 1 gold. A tile that is not being worked does not produce any yields at all. Improvements such as a Camp can increase the amount of yields that a tile will generate, but improvements generally can only be built on certain tiles.

4) You can't improve tiles that are outside of your cities' territories. You generally always want to improve tiles within your cities' territories, but expanding to a tile doesn't mean the city immediately gets the benefits. The city needs to expand to the tile, then also have a citizen working that tile.

Some links that might be useful to you:
https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/District_(Civ6)#Types_of_Districts
https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Civics_(Civ6)
https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/City_(Civ6)#Citizens_as_a_workforce
https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Population_(Civ6)

Edit: I missed part of Q2, but yes, you should still build the Monument, and feel free to conquer the city state if you really don't feel like being buddies with them. Getting envoys isn't difficult though, and as the game moves along, city state quests will change, so you will have more opportunities to become friendly with city states later on.
 
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Monuments are nice early because any source of culture from a city helps expand its borders, as well as getting you down the civic tree toward your first real government. I think Rome is the best starter civ because all cities start with monuments and its one less thing you have to worry about squeezing into your production queue.

Youtube is a great source of info. While he plays deity so it may be overkill for you, thegamemechanic spends a lot of time planning out cities and districts and maybe his current 'test of time series' where he plays a game as every civ is worth taking a look at. There are also others who post videos with newbie tips, Potato McWhiskey comes to mind.
 
You don't really need a monument now, since you can easily get six points of culture from Cliffs of Dover. Just buy both tiles ASAP.
Monuments still would be of use, but it can wait until much later.
 
1) I think a commercial hub would be okay.

Monuments are nice early because any source of culture from a city helps expand its borders, as well as getting you down the civic tree toward your first real government.

You don't really need a monument now, since you can easily get six points of culture from Cliffs of Dover. Just buy both tiles ASAP.
Monuments still would be of use, but it can wait until much later.

Thank you for the replies, really helpful, yup I'm Korea.

1) Could I get a precise build order (and on which tiles) for the next few turns to focus on to help me on my way? Am I right in thinking I have enough food so won't need to build any farms and focus on mining/production instead?

2) Seems like the bonuses a city state gives would be more useful than just more real estate, so in general it's better to send envoys than conquering? Is it worth trying to get a great prophet for the city quest, and how would I do that? What did you mean by I would have to commit to a religion? Would it indirectly detract from my science progress (if I spent turns going after the great prophet/religion)? Thank you again.
 
You can ignore the great prophet. Faith does have its uses in a science game, but you don't need a religion to get faith. Prophets are only for founding religion.
First thing I'd do is send that builder over to the sheep and put a pasture up, Jeonju needs the production badly.

Specific build orders can vary. In general, for science you want to expand quickly and get campus hubs out. There are a few ways you can handle the expansion, but tough to know for sure until you explore some more. I think settler in Gyeongju while you tech towards writing is a safe bet (hopefully your units meet a neighbor to finish writing faster) then you can get your science districts up.
 
When a population work a tile, the food/production/money from that tile is added to the city. Unless a city is very big it will have more tiles than population, so all the tiles won't be worked. It's therefore best to work tiles with natural high yields, improve these tiles, and work them.

Religion can be ignored, culture is important, and the monuments are good investments.

Districts can be placed on whatever tiles give them highest adjacency.

A resource is not in your territory unless a city has expanded to it, and you cannot improve it and get it unless a city has expanded to it.
 
You can ignore the great prophet. Faith does have its uses in a science game, but you don't need a religion to get faith. Prophets are only for founding religion.
I suspected as much, since the city state already has another civ with 2 envoys, what I'm wondering is will I likely lose the state to them (esp if I ignore the prophet quest) and therefore is it wise to just conquer now, or is it safe to just have a few envoys and take those benefits? Is it more important to deny other civs the extra levy military? If I conquer, I'm guessing I can't still have those envoy benefits?
 
If I conquer, I'm guessing I can't still have those envoy benefits?

correct.

I often don't conquer city states, but that's my preference. Not necessarily the best strat. In general the yield you get from having the city state as one of your cities will benefit you more in the early game (when it really matters). But the city state envoy bonuses can be significant like say if you had 6 envoys in a religious city state and you had holy sites in every city. It just takes a while before you can get a holy site in every city. As a personal preference I usually don't conquer them unless I am starved for land to expand and build my own cities.

In any case, even if you aren't the city-state's suzerain you still get good bonuses from having 1, 3, or 6 envoys provided you have the accompanying district related to the type of city state. So just because you can't become suzerain doesn't mean you should conquer it. You can still get some benefit from it. Just keep in mind if you do go to war with the city state's suzerain, the city state will also be at war with you.

As for religion you can probably ignore it for your first game until you learn the ropes more. It's nothing you have to have, especially as Korea going for a science victory. Faith can be useful, but more so for religious and cultural victory (for naturalists and rock bands). And as mentioned, you can get faith even without a religion.
 
When I started playing I just played a few games and discovered for myself. They were some of my most fun games because it was about discovery. Once you have a few games and a feel advice will make more sense. aTM just learning everything is hard enough.
 
When I started playing I just played a few games and discovered for myself. They were some of my most fun games because it was about discovery. Once you have a few games and a feel advice will make more sense. aTM just learning everything is hard enough.
I've been really enjoying learning how to play this game, I've discovered that Turn based Strategy is my favourite genre, having spent all my gaming years on console with JRPG's (now my 2nd fave) wish I'd discovered them sooner :crazyeye:

Regarding optimal city tile placement I found this:


P for industrial district, C for commercial hub (around a river corner), mq for mine/quarry when possible, and the city center of each city must be within the grey area (preferably on the outer ring to maximise the available tiles, but you must take into account the terrain, mainly access to fresh water).


But how would the ideal placement differ with Seowons/Korea tactics added into the mix? Any chance of someone doing a similar diagram to help me get my head around it?
 
Seowon are unique as well in that ideally you want them away from any other district, and adjacent to as many farms or mines as possible.

So in the above screenshot, I would likely plan one Seowon on the hill between the 2 cities, since that has 2 mines right now plus another 2 if you harvest the stone/sheep. You could consider a holy site on the sheep tile since it would be +3 or +4, but keep in mind that any district next to the Seowon drops its value, and generally speaking you don't want it dropping below 3 (since later policies need that to be at their best). The second Seowon I would probably suggest on one of the hills west of Gyeongju, since that looks like a lot of hills to mine in that area.

The area north of Jeonju if you want to maximize districts is pretty perfect for an industrial zone/aqueduct/dam complex, since you will see that the floodplains span 2 separate rivers so you could dam both of them. And if you pile your cities in close, you could basically have 3 cities "share" the floodplain (ie one city on the jungle 2W of the scout, another 1E of the slinger). And from that point, I would suggest just dropping pins for the districts you are thinking about, and trying to get the industrial zones adjacent to as many dams and aqueducts as you can (keeping in mind dams do need adjacent 2 river tiles, so you can't build a dam 1W or 1E of the rice).

Of course, alternately, you don't use that floodplain for districts, and you use it for a massive farm complex. If you plan correctly, you can put a Seowon 1W of the Scout with a lot of floodplains to farm nearby to it to gain a bonus from. You could also throw a Seowon on the Sheep tile to the east which could border 3 floodplains/farms and 2 plains hill/mines if you wanted.

Really, if I were playing the game out, which I do might simply be a case of whether the floodplains flood a lot before I get a chance to get the districts down. A couple 1000-year floods and suddenly I want the yields from the tiles, if not then I might take this as a fun puzzle to get as best an industrial zone as possible.
 
I've been really enjoying learning how to play this game, I've discovered that Turn based Strategy is my favourite genre, having spent all my gaming years on console with JRPG's (now my 2nd fave) wish I'd discovered them sooner :crazyeye:

Regarding optimal city tile placement I found this:
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But how would the ideal placement differ with Seowons/Korea tactics added into the mix? Any chance of someone doing a similar diagram to help me get my head around it?

The diagram regarding district placement is specific for maximizing the gold/production of three cities in an ideal case. It is good as a mental exercise, but you will have to look at the map in your game and see patterns in that world. This particular diagram is old, yet not outdated, though there are more adjacency bonuses to industrial zone as of GS (dams, aqueducts,...), as described in the guide of Sostratus.

I would like to answer your older questions, though I think you are not playing that game anymore. Settler difficulty is very easy, as AI does not provide any challenge (sometimes stays at 1 city till turn 100).
1) Improvement placing is quite limited. Resources use their specific improvement only, flatlands farms and hills mines, at start. Cities may only work as many tiles as there is population, and it is best to have those tiles improved. Districts have their adjacencies, in general it is okay to clamp them together, but you are not getting many of them in each city (4-5 effectively).
2) Religion is not important if you go for another victory, but you may lose unexpectedly. The CS quests disappear either when the condition is fulfilled, or no longer eligible (like there are no more prophets to get, you cant get the eureka, since you hard researched the technology, etc.)
3) Working tiles is how you get the yields. Unworked tiles do nothing (city centres are worked by default by a 0 pop, and districts and buildings always give their yields). Deer in the example give 2f/3p/1g to Gyeongyu if worked, 3f/3p/1g if you also improve it, but 0f/0p/0g/... if unworked.
4) You may not act upon tiles outside your territory in general. Exceptions are settling, roman/toa forts and perhaps other military engineer actions and of course pillaging.

I play on King and sometimes on Prince difficulties and the AI are not performing much while I am not min/max-ing. Just play around >D
 
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