manu-fan
Emperor
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2006
- Messages
- 1,005
But worker first will delay growth of your city by X turns. Are those X turns made up for by the extra that the worker will give you.
My head hurts!
Cheers.
What to build on the very first turn?
- Thread starter Seanirl
- Start date
But worker first will delay growth of your city by X turns. Are those X turns made up for by the extra that the worker will give you.
My head hurts!
Cheers.
ParadigmShifter
Random Nonsense Generator
Try reading this from the war academy... don't know if it will make your head pain go away or not...
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/earlygrowth.php
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/earlygrowth.php
popejubal
Emperor
I usually go warrior or scout first because I want to know what is around my city so that I can plan for the future. I find that knowing what is around me is even more valuable than having most resources improved.
Obviously, if I have the technology to improve a really juicy tile (food resource, Gold, Grassland Gems, etc) then I'm a lot more likely to go Worker first.
Knowing where to place your second city and knowing who (and where) your neighbors are is an enormous asset, though. Don't neglect your initial scout/warrior just because consensus says you "should". Sometimes it's worthwhile waiting until the warrior/scout is complete and sometimes it's not.
Obviously, if I have the technology to improve a really juicy tile (food resource, Gold, Grassland Gems, etc) then I'm a lot more likely to go Worker first.
Knowing where to place your second city and knowing who (and where) your neighbors are is an enormous asset, though. Don't neglect your initial scout/warrior just because consensus says you "should". Sometimes it's worthwhile waiting until the warrior/scout is complete and sometimes it's not.
Photi
Governor
yep, i agree. i have lucked out so many times when the ai was particularly bad at finding the goody huts and i ended up getting something like metal casting by sending those guys out exploring. metal casting from a hut is quite the rush. granted that does not happen often, but all the gold, the potential free scout etc is worth it to get the huts. but i build a worker first sometimes, like the other day when i started w/cows and gold in the inner ring . i improved the cows first, but later i started thinking that maybe improving the mine first may have been more advantageous. like work the cows until the gold was mined, then work the mine until the cows were pastured, then work the pasture for growth. i may play it out that way to see.
popejubal, i agree too.
After reading some articles, i had taken the habit of going worker first all the time. And sometimes, my worker would stand there doing nothing. Now, i only go worker first if the timing is right. For example, at Epic, a typical city (2F + 1H for the city and a 3F/H unimproved tile, for example a forest) will produce a worker in 23 turns. Coincidentally, if you start with Mining, it takes 23 turns to research Bronze Working. Cannot get a much better timing than that =P
After reading some articles, i had taken the habit of going worker first all the time. And sometimes, my worker would stand there doing nothing. Now, i only go worker first if the timing is right. For example, at Epic, a typical city (2F + 1H for the city and a 3F/H unimproved tile, for example a forest) will produce a worker in 23 turns. Coincidentally, if you start with Mining, it takes 23 turns to research Bronze Working. Cannot get a much better timing than that =P
alex sword
Raging Barbarian
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2007
- Messages
- 126
Don't you consider a warmonger alternative: Warrior + Warrior + Warrior + Worker + capturing AI worker by your initial warrior + first warrior you built. Second you built (actually third) warrior should be moved somewhere between AI and your capital to provide a captured worker with defense against animals. Fourth warrior should defend the city.
Research priorities - Pottery (which allows Granary) or BW which allows chopping. If pottery comes first, built granary before starting settler (which makes whipping more effective) and start cottege spam by your two workers. If BW, chop your settler ASAP and look for a bronze site. The priority depends on which area you capital is, if there are too much forest - BW comes first, otherwise Pottery.
Please note - on Emperor level, AI workers are almost always guarded by one archer. So one of your warriors is going to be killed with 90% chance. Anyway, one warrior per one worker is a good investment.
Benefits - perhaps this plan is few turns slower than the "build worker first" plan but your neighbor will leave you much more land and he is going to be a easy prey as soon as you've bronze. Just move your survived warrior (which get some expirience with archer and hopefully promoted to archer killer) to some forest and fortify. Don't attack the city, just sit here and look. AI will build new worker but while your warrior is here, will stay in the city. Move another warrior (the one which provided captured worker with safety) there as soon as the captured worker is in a safe place. Result - your friend needs a lot of archers to kill your two fortified warriors. And all this time his new worker will stupidly sit in the city afraiding. And all this time you will mprove your territory. BTW, you can turn AI capital into your "worker factory" and "military factory" (which I described in another thread) instead of capturing it if city maintenance is going to be an issue.
I am not sure about higher levels but it works on Emperor just perfectly.
And if you play Incan, don't waste a time and capture a couple of AI capitals, workers can wait. Four quechas of level 2 (combat 1 + cover, quite easility to promote them by hunting wild animals) will kill 2 fortified unpromoted archers (in city with +40% bonuse) with ~80% chances. Five quechas will have chances better than >95%.
P.S. I am playing Maraphon games. This is important because, at different speeds, I can imagine it takes relatively longer time to move your units, including the captured worker.
Research priorities - Pottery (which allows Granary) or BW which allows chopping. If pottery comes first, built granary before starting settler (which makes whipping more effective) and start cottege spam by your two workers. If BW, chop your settler ASAP and look for a bronze site. The priority depends on which area you capital is, if there are too much forest - BW comes first, otherwise Pottery.
Please note - on Emperor level, AI workers are almost always guarded by one archer. So one of your warriors is going to be killed with 90% chance. Anyway, one warrior per one worker is a good investment.
Benefits - perhaps this plan is few turns slower than the "build worker first" plan but your neighbor will leave you much more land and he is going to be a easy prey as soon as you've bronze. Just move your survived warrior (which get some expirience with archer and hopefully promoted to archer killer) to some forest and fortify. Don't attack the city, just sit here and look. AI will build new worker but while your warrior is here, will stay in the city. Move another warrior (the one which provided captured worker with safety) there as soon as the captured worker is in a safe place. Result - your friend needs a lot of archers to kill your two fortified warriors. And all this time his new worker will stupidly sit in the city afraiding. And all this time you will mprove your territory. BTW, you can turn AI capital into your "worker factory" and "military factory" (which I described in another thread) instead of capturing it if city maintenance is going to be an issue.
I am not sure about higher levels but it works on Emperor just perfectly.
And if you play Incan, don't waste a time and capture a couple of AI capitals, workers can wait. Four quechas of level 2 (combat 1 + cover, quite easility to promote them by hunting wild animals) will kill 2 fortified unpromoted archers (in city with +40% bonuse) with ~80% chances. Five quechas will have chances better than >95%.
P.S. I am playing Maraphon games. This is important because, at different speeds, I can imagine it takes relatively longer time to move your units, including the captured worker.
alex sword
Raging Barbarian
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2007
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- 126
P.P.S. On second thought, I dislike an idea to create military and workers factory from AI capital. reason is simple - capitals sites are great. So it's better to let AI establish second city (declare a peace just for this reason) and redeclare war & capture his capital after that. The city AI established will be your workers/military factory but in the same time you will have all the great resources his former capital provides.
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
i don't consider worker stealing because i am really really bad at early wars. and early = before steel pretty much *giggle*.
but the difficulty level changes things so drastically even as a peacenik. monarch the AI starts with an archer. but jump to emperor, they start out with 2 archers and a scout, and it goes up from there. before they even settle their first city! that's a huge difference and they are going to beat you to the huts.
so, i guess i'm saying i don't do what you do at all (i'm not that brave!), but my perspective on "build a unit to scout with first" is impacted by the difficulty level in the way that your approach is
.
alex sword
Raging Barbarian
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2007
- Messages
- 126
Man, don't be afraid! So called improved AI is stupid. Yes, he has 2 archers on Emperor and builds another couple of archers in the beginning. If I were him, having his four archers I would erase my "warmonger civilization with 4 warriors, only one of them in the capital" just as some strange design error, God's failure. But no! Your warriors can terroze him and get his worker because - 1 archer is scouting somewhere, 2 archers are sitting in the city "defending" and looking how your 2 warriors are killing their friend and capturing their worker.
I am not sure how exactly it works on Deity but as soon as things go, he will have a couple of more starting units and techs, also he will have less maintenance and better tech progress. But its level of stupidity is just the same. So I think even on Deity if you start wars earlier, more chances you have to use his stupidity and win. Later war means he has better chance for win you by overexpansion (due to less maintenance and better speed of units burn) and overmilitarism.
I am not sure how exactly it works on Deity but as soon as things go, he will have a couple of more starting units and techs, also he will have less maintenance and better tech progress. But its level of stupidity is just the same. So I think even on Deity if you start wars earlier, more chances you have to use his stupidity and win. Later war means he has better chance for win you by overexpansion (due to less maintenance and better speed of units burn) and overmilitarism.
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
well, it's "chick don't be afraid" *giggle*, but it won't work, i am perma-afraid! i'm better at the mind-games part than i am at clobbering heads, usually
. i use diplomatic mojo to the best of my ability to control things so that i get to decide the timing of the wars. if there are even going to be any. you'd probably fall off your chair if you knew how many of my games i never got into a single fight. and the only deity games i play are OCC. i get one fantastic city, and i don't have to spend any effort at all expanding, which cancels out in a way their huge advantage in that area. it's still super hard, and i have to be in the mood since i lose those games far more often than i win. and i've never won deity through warfare and i never will, that's crazy talk
!i just basically don't go by conventional wisdom. but hey, i do agree that workers are crucial, gotta improve those tiles
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