What makes my cities go floodplains?

[MarkJohnson]

OK, I got it figured out I think. I went and restarted it and it said it was a Forest/Grassland tile before settling the city. apparently chopping the trees around it caused it to turn into a flood plains according to what I've read above, and gave me unhealthiness(I didn't play that far, I just settled the city and it said it was just a grassland tile as the forest was consumed).

also, I seen the tile next to my city say Desert/Flood Plains but it had 4 forest tiles around it. so does my city need a certain numbers of forest/jungles adjacent or the whole city crosshair area?

-=Mark=-

 

[Willem]

apparently chopping the trees around it caused it to turn into a flood plains according to what I've read above,

No, how many times do we have to tell you? Floodplains are a terrain feature that get placed on Desert rivers when the map is created. They are always there and they do NOT generate at any time during the game. The only change that can occur regarding them is that they can be destroyed if a city built on one is razed. They are never added once the map is created. Even if you get a Desert river forming because of Global Warming, you will never see a Floodplain being generated there. They are fixed at the beginning of the game and DO NOT increase regardless of how many trees you chop down.

 

[King Flevance]

The easiest way to explain this is perhaps a visual aid.

Just to be clear my last post was wrong:

Jungles are worth 0.25
Floodplains are worth 0.40

Jungles may have been .33 in vanilla I dont know. ANyways below is a picture of a city with 6 floodplains. 6 x 0.40 = 2.40 As you can see I have 2 unhealthiness from floodplains. And the 2 forests are giving the city 1 health. (2 x 0.5). That +2 from flood plains has been there since the beginning of the game and will be there for the rest of the game. SO it is my job to supply more health to the city. After I finish building the Aqueduct (+2) I could chop those forests but I probably wont and will most likely keep them there to be able to grow to a size 16 comfortably.

Only the floodplains and forests (tiles) in the red cross can effect that city's health issues.

OK, I got it figured out I think. I went and restarted it and it said it was a Forest/Grassland tile before settling the city. apparently chopping the trees around it caused it to turn into a flood plains according to what I've read above, and gave me unhealthiness

Somehow this is what is getting in the way. A flood plains cannot form in a game. The tile either is or is not a flood plains it cannot turn into one.

also, I seen the tile next to my city say Desert/Flood Plains but it had 4 forest tiles around it. so does my city need a certain numbers of forest/jungles adjacent or the whole city crosshair area?

This is however you want to do it. I personally keep some forests around for defensive/health purposes. (A forest/jungle is THE best defensive attribute a tile can have.) As you can see though my health is mostly coming from other things. I am expansive in that game for +2, got the +2 health random event from herbology, but resources add up to +9, and soon buildings will offer +3 instead of +1.

Some people chop every forest down. Others don't. Thats a judgement call really. You don't "need" forests around every city though.

If I grow 1 more population, I will have health issues because my will be lower than my

The picture of a size 14 city:

 

[MarkJohnson]

The easiest way to explain this is perhaps a visual aid.

Thanks for the picture, it truely was worth a 1,000 words with your explanation and math formulas.

Just to be clear my last post was wrong:

Jungles are worth 0.25
Floodplains are worth 0.40

Jungles may have been .33 in vanilla I dont know. ANyways below is a picture of a city with 6 floodplains. 6 x 0.40 = 2.40 As you can see I have 2 unhealthiness from floodplains. And the 2 forests are giving the city 1 health. (2 x 0.5). That +2 from flood plains has been there since the beginning of the game and will be there for the rest of the game. SO it is my job to supply more health to the city. After I finish building the Aqueduct (+2) I could chop those forests but I probably wont and will most likely keep them there to be able to grow to a size 16 comfortably.

Yes, now that I've restarted and played a few dozen turns it makes total sense now. I wasn't realizing that the forests were giving me health. I thought the game was just giving me unhealthiness only. I now see why the AI never deforests his cities in early game. Now that I see that each tile affects the city, it will improve my game a lot.

Only the floodplains and forests (tiles) in the red cross can effect that city's health issues.

Somehow this is what is getting in the way. A flood plains cannot form in a game. The tile either is or is not a flood plains it cannot turn into one.


This is however you want to do it. I personally keep some forests around for defensive/health purposes. (A forest/jungle is THE best defensive attribute a tile can have.) As you can see though my health is mostly coming from other things. I am expansive in that game for +2, got the +2 health random event from herbology, but resources add up to +9, and soon buildings will offer +3 instead of +1.

Some people chop every forest down. Others don't. Thats a judgement call really. You don't "need" forests around every city though.

If I grow 1 more population, I will have health issues because my will be lower than my

The picture of a size 14 city:

My confusion was the flood plains tiles and the flood plains penalties. Now I'll need to find a good city's tiles article and learn how to improve my city management skills.

And any good links to city management would be great, so I don't have to wade through dozen of messages trying to find one.

Thanks for the help once again. and thanks everyone else that I didn't reply back, there just too many responses and too little time.
-=Mark=-

 

[6K Man]

Just as an aside - unhealthiness is very rarely as big a problem as unhappiness. If you have an unhealthy citizen, the only minus as far as I am aware is that you get -1 food production in that city (and an occasional nag to build health-improving buildings). Since even an unimproved floodplain provides enough food for the citizen working it plus another 1 food unit, a floodplain's food production more than offsets the health minus. So it's rare that floodplain-unhealthiness will be a problem, unless it is the very early game on a moderate to high level and you have, say, 8+ floodplains and no health resources/buildings. That can prevent a city from growing at all.

Unhappiness is much worse in that an unhappy citizen doesn't work at all, which is a much bigger negative than a mere -1 food.

 

[Willem]

I now see why the AI never deforests his cities in early game.

That's not really true. The AI makes no attempt to save forests like the human does, it just doesn't chop as systematically. It usually only chops in order to build some sort of improvement, rather than just for the sake of the hammers. If you see their early cities late in the game, you won't see a single stand of Forest in them. Many players though will at least save a couple tiles for the health benefits.

 

[Solomwi]

FP =/= corn. Irrigated corn is SIX food...one of the best tiles in the game (coastal lighthouse fish and grassland cow are pretty amazing too).

Farming floodplains is USUALLY a bad idea, far from any past what to do with the cow dilemma. Floodplains are only +3 food over the health cap, and if you farm them that's exactly where you'll go. Cottaging them lets you get commerce and retain farm-level food, so you can run specialists and cottages simultaneously in a FP city (or mix cottages and production). Generally farming them is a bad idea because of the health cap though.

That's only a problem if you strictly adhere to farming as a rule. I tend to decide on improvements based on a city-wide plan, which means I'm going to do the same thing with respect to the health cap whether I farm the floodplain or cottage it, since that decision will affect the improvements I put on other tiles to reach my desired f/h/c levels for the city. In the context of a city-wide plan, I prefer to farm my floodplains and, say, cottage a grassland, rather than the other way around, since that allows me to better manipulate my food production. Farmed floodplains and cottaged grass means I have a choice (limiting it two tiles for simplicity's sake) between a 2f tile and a 4f tile, which in turn allows me to avoid growth if I want to. Reversing those improvements gives me two 3f tiles, which limits my ability to regulate the growth of the city. The combined output of the two tiles remains the same, 6f plus whatever commerce is being generated by the river and nascent cottage, so farming the floodplain puts me at no disadvantage if I'm working both tiles.

That said, I'm not averse to cottaging floodplains at all, assuming it fits into the larger plan. If I need to generate commerce and a food surplus with a single citizen, I'll happily cottage the tile, but if I have the choice, I'll specialize tiles to allow maximum flexibility in the city.

 

[soverkun]

That's only a problem if you strictly adhere to farming as a rule. I tend to decide on improvements based on a city-wide plan, which means I'm going to do the same thing with respect to the health cap whether I farm the floodplain or cottage it, since that decision will affect the improvements I put on other tiles to reach my desired f/h/c levels for the city. In the context of a city-wide plan, I prefer to farm my floodplains and, say, cottage a grassland, rather than the other way around, since that allows me to better manipulate my food production. Farmed floodplains and cottaged grass means I have a choice (limiting it two tiles for simplicity's sake) between a 2f tile and a 4f tile, which in turn allows me to avoid growth if I want to. Reversing those improvements gives me two 3f tiles, which limits my ability to regulate the growth of the city. The combined output of the two tiles remains the same, 6f plus whatever commerce is being generated by the river and nascent cottage, so farming the floodplain puts me at no disadvantage if I'm working both tiles.

That said, I'm not averse to cottaging floodplains at all, assuming it fits into the larger plan. If I need to generate commerce and a food surplus with a single citizen, I'll happily cottage the tile, but if I have the choice, I'll specialize tiles to allow maximum flexibility in the city.

I tend to irrigate some of my flood plains for the same reasen (to better regulate growth) - but I find that even more important than avoiding growth, is the possibility to have short spells of rapid growth by only using the farmed flood plains.

 

[Solomwi]

I tend to irrigate some of my flood plains for the same reasen (to better regulate growth) - but I find that even more important than avoiding growth, is the possibility to have short spells of rapid growth by only using the farmed flood plains.

You're right; that's just as important. I only worded it as I did because the problem presented by TheMeInTeam was growing too much and exceeding the health cap.

 

[soverkun]

You're right; that's just as important. I only worded it as I did because the problem presented by TheMeInTeam was growing too much and exceeding the health cap.

Ah, I see!

BTW, this thread reminded me of a start position I once got. Flood plains are good, but it can be too much.