Watermills and Levees

[Ex Mudder]

Does anyone use watermills? I remember experimenting with them once upon a time and getting frustrated with the difficulties of placement. They would seem to be even less useful now that the Levee has been introduced. I'd rather farm or cottage my freshwater tiles and wait for a levee than fight with watermills. Does anyone have a good analysis that would make watermills worth it?

I'm also wondering if people still put workshops on flood plains any more, or do they wait for the levee to boost production.

 

[AfterShafter]

I love watermills. Eventually becomes a solid gold/production square that produces a bit of food too. True, you can wait for levees to give some production on a farm/cottage, but a watermill will give more producution than a cottage/farm, and more gold than a farm, after levees come into play.

True, their placement is limited - but when you can put them down, why not? Well rounded squares that put production on a square that normally doesn't have much are great.

In my opinion though, they should make watermills get the railroad bonus for production... Make them a clear river production square.

 

[Stylesrj]

Watermills go well on Arctic tiles with a river and desert tiles with a river. How do you get those tiles without Global Warming? Isn't any desert tile with a river called a Flood Plain!?

 

[AfterShafter]

Nah, I get desert/river tiles all the time. My friends laugh their heads off because they claim to have never gotten one before. I get them in droves at the start of the game.

 

[Blaarg]

A watermill, in state property, worked by a city with a levee, at the end of the game gives an astounding:
+1 food, +3 production, +2 commerce.

Compared to a farm in the same conditions:
+2 food, +1 production

Compared to a town in Universal Sufferage and Free Speech:
+2 production, +7 commerce

The Watermill is certainly a good use of a tile, even under less than ideal conditions. Also, note it takes awhile to build that town while a watermill can be built.

 

[jray]

Watermills go well on Arctic tiles with a river and desert tiles with a river. How do you get those tiles without Global Warming? Isn't any desert tile with a river called a Flood Plain!?

That's just a bug in the Civ map generators. Rivers are sometimes added after starting location placement to "beautify" the capital locations. Deserts that happen to fall along these late added rivers do not receive the flood plains as they're supposed to. So take a look next time it happens, and you'll notice that it's along a river leading to someone's capital.

 

[zenspiderz]

water mills are pretty good for an SE using state property. They produce a fair whack of hammers and commerce while at the same time being at least food neutral (plains water mill produces enough food to feed the citizen that works it a grassland watermill actually produces a food surplus enough to feed half a specialist.)

 

[alpaca]

Yeah if I have a large empire and am running state property I'll always use them (usually over farms).
After Electricity I sometimes use them even without state property, especially if I have a Fin leader or in cities with low production.

In general though I don't find them all that worthwhile. In most cities I'd rather have a farm and a hill instead of two watermills. If watermills would get the railroad bonus they'd be a bit too good in my opinion but there might be another commerce bonus introduced (maybe on Economics or something) to make them more juicy (and possibly rebalanced by lowering the Electricity bonus to 1), that'd at least add another interesting option for Financial leaders.

 

[Blaarg]

I don't know what could be more juicey than a 4 food, 3 production 3 commerce tile? (Watermill on Floodplains, with Levee, running state property) That's better than working most bonus resource tiles.

 

[Orion071]

I don't know what could be more juicey than a 4 food, 3 production 3 commerce tile? (Watermill on Floodplains, with Levee, running state property) That's better than working most bonus resource tiles.

Well, I still would rather that tile be 3 Food, 2 Production, 8 Commerce (Town with a Levee running US and Free Speech). I hate putting anything but Cottages on Flood Plains. But I love Watermills and use them all of the time.

Watermills are more usefull for me when I capture AI cities that are usually all Farms. I don't necessarily have time to wait for Cottages to mature so I fill them up with Watermills and Workshops. You can get some astonishing production cities very quickly with these improvments. I can use them for more troop generation since they're already close to the front.

 

[Diamondeye]

Watermills are very good! Infact, they outslap farms by far between SP and Bio I usually spam as many of them as possible and then fill in the other river tiles with farms or cottages.

 

[Blaarg]

I almost never run US anymore, Representation's +3 science per specialist is just too big to give up.

 

[lilnev]

Watermills are more usefull for me when I capture AI cities that are usually all Farms. I don't necessarily have time to wait for Cottages to mature so I fill them up with Watermills and Workshops. You can get some astonishing production cities very quickly with these improvments. I can use them for more troop generation since they're already close to the front.

Exactly. River tiles in my initial empire will mostly get cottaged unless I really need the food or it's a dedicated production city/GP farm/Globedraft. But when I go a-conquerin' in the late game, all I want is another production city, and watermills are better than farm+workshop combos.

The Levee is irrelevant to the discussion, since it provides the same boost whatever you do with the tile.

Note that placing watermills can be tricky, because you can't have two on opposite sides of a river segment. If you build one in a tile bordered by two or more rivers, it will choose one of those segments (I think at random) and then the opposite side is excluded. So sometimes you have to build your watermills in a particular order to get them on all the spots you want.

peace,
lilnev

 

[Merkinball]

This is a game the thrives on specialization. With that in mind, I will only use them in the tundra and the snow. They make no sense otherwise. Again, the name of the game is optimizing cities. If I want commerce, I'll put down a cottage. If I want production I put down a farm or a workshop. If I'm GP farming, then just farms. Putting down waterwheels simply detracts from premium optimization of city specialization. Waterwheels certainly make those artic outposts worthwhile though.

 

[Peng Qi]

I never, ever use them except in very unique circumstances. There are almost always better improvements; the only time there aren't is if you're in State Property, which basically means you're losing the game because State Property is awful compared to all of the other economic civics now that corporations have been added to the game.

I think that state property shouldn't shut down all corporations in your borders, I think it should shut down the effects of any corporation you've founded for everyone but you.

 

[AfterShafter]

This is a game the thrives on specialization. With that in mind, I will only use them in the tundra and the snow. They make no sense otherwise. Again, the name of the game is optimizing cities. If I want commerce, I'll put down a cottage. If I want production I put down a farm or a workshop. If I'm GP farming, then just farms. Putting down waterwheels simply detracts from premium optimization of city specialization. Waterwheels certainly make those artic outposts worthwhile though.

Eh, most of my cities tend to be quite generalized, a mix of production and gold focus... True, it's always key to have a few very specialized cities, but it's also quite effective to mix it up in your cities. That's why I love me waterwheels

 

[Blaarg]

This is a game the thrives on specialization. With that in mind, I will only use them in the tundra and the snow. They make no sense otherwise. Again, the name of the game is optimizing cities. If I want commerce, I'll put down a cottage. If I want production I put down a farm or a workshop. If I'm GP farming, then just farms. Putting down waterwheels simply detracts from premium optimization of city specialization. Waterwheels certainly make those artic outposts worthwhile though.

If you're using Farms and Workshops in your production cities, then you might be interested in knowing that at full tech, with neutral civics,

1 farm(+2 food) + 2 Workshops(-2 food/+6 production) = 3 watermills (+6 production)

If you're using state property then the watermills are superior by 1 food. If you're running Caste System then Workshops are superior by 2 production.

Still any way you slice it, the watermills give you +6 commerce.

 

[HiroHito]

I like watermills, plus you can remove them anytime.

 

[Muslim]

remove you mean destroy?
Ive always wondered why you cant pillage your own improvementes :S

 

[Blaarg]

Yes you can, you just can't pillage your own roads or railroads.