Where to build cities.

foreverlost

Chieftain
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Mar 13, 2015
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I is driving me nuts, I know some where there was a guide to tell what terrain to build on to have the best production. I am tired of losing to those cheating AI that can build anything in less then 10 turns. I know the guides say by water but you will still take 40 turns to build anything, especially in the beginning. Plain suck; 1 food source lose. Any suggestions.
 
Build on a hill. Preferably a hill with a Luxury Resource like Gold/Copper/Salt/Silver or a bonus resource like Sheep.

Build/Steal a worker fairly early so you can start adding the improvement yields to the tiles.

Build Workshops ASAP.

Settle near Forests so you can worker chop them at that critical time when you are building that critical building/wonder.

Don't build in the middle of a massive Marsh. Same goes for desert unless there are lot of desert hills and floodplains (or you can guarantee you'll get Petra, or you're Morocco).

Work your bonus food resources first. Wheat, Banana, Citrus, Sheep, Cattle. These tiles often provide 3 yields pre-improvement which will help you grow faster (for the 3Food) or grow while getting 1 hammer (the 2Food 1Hammer). Grassland Stone or Grassland Marble are also good for that.

If you have more than 1 Sheep/Cattle/Horses, get your Stable built in that city ASAP as that will add Hammers.

Settling next to A mountain is nice for the Observatory science bonus, but don't settle next to a mountain RANGE. You can't work mountain tiles so having a bunch of them in your first 3 rings is wasted space.



I'm sure there's other tips as well, but that should get you a good start.
 
"40 turns to build anything"? Are you exaggerating for effect? What game speed are you playing on?

sixty4half's list is a good one.

Settling by a river (riverside hill is my favorite) also allows you to build water mill, garden and in the later game hydro plant, all of which are useful. Having fresh water access generally (rivers, lakes, oases) is important for early to mid-game food production (post-Civil Service).

Desert starts can also benefit from the pantheon belief Desert Folklore, so that is part of the mix there.

On settling near mountain ranges, only exception would be Inca, where terrace farms benefit greatly from multiple adjacent mountains (but it's optimal there if the mountains are in ring 3 or 4 of your city's radius, not ring 1 or 2)
 
Well it sounds to me like OP is absolutely playing tradition and not Liberty. And even on quick speed, a flatland tradition expand surrounded by non-hammer tiles will take 40ish turns to build a granary.
 
I know that I am missing out on alot of growth potential early game by not having my capital being inland but I absolutely love having all coastal cities and playing with cargo ships and using the Exploration Tree. To me this is critical and perhaps other players would agree but say this is part of the late game.

Any thoughts would be great.

Brew God
 
Well it sounds to me like OP is absolutely playing tradition and not Liberty. And even on quick speed, a flatland tradition expand surrounded by non-hammer tiles will take 40ish turns to build a granary.

Really, does this dispute have to bleed into every thread on the front page?
 
When somebody says they have a problem with slow production times, and asks why that is, and the answer is because of tradition, then I'll say it's because of tradition
 
That's not the question here though. He specifically asked about terrain that would help him get better production. Suggesting a policy tree doesn't even address the question.
 
I wasn't "suggesting a policy tree", or else I would've suggested a policy tree. I explained the reason why construction was taking so long.
 
I am tired of losing to those cheating AI that can build anything in less then 10 turns.

I'm going to guess that you're trying to build early wonders? cut the wonders out and build early settlers instead. The earlier you get settlers and workers going the faster you'll have those early buildings in. If you try and get some wonders and then build settlers you'll start an expo at turn 60 and only have a few basic buildings in by turn 100. If you get your cities in from turn 35 they'll have the same stuff built by turn 75. That's an extra 25 turns of value you get from a city.

On a continent or pangaea map you should start with building 2 scouts so you can get more ruins. Even 1 free culture ruin or population early in the game will have a noticeable effect and can be used towards +production policies or settlers.
 
So you guys recommend settling directly on Luxury/bonus/strategic resources?

I only do that when the best location for the city happens to be on the resource OR its a strategic resource I want to ensure I have access to immediately and/or ensure it cannot be pillaged later.

Doesn't doing this technically lose potential Food/Hammers/Gold for your city?
 
I recommend looking for a resource that you can settle on that is also fits the some of the other criteria that I listed. (I prefer lux, because you can trade it immediately after researching the tech for it and without a worker)

You won't ever find a riverside hill with Gold next to a mountain on the coast with wheat, horses, iron, and 2 other mining/masonry luxes. Okay, you might once in 100 games, and when you do, up lode the save so the rest of us can play in Magic Civ 5 Christmas Land.

What you can do is, take the list of things to look for and find a spot that meets a few of those criteria. If you do find a coastal riverside hill without a lux where there is a hill with silver 1 tile inland, settle the coastal hill instead.
 
It depends on the resource. They were recommending doing that sometimes here because it starts your city with bonus hammers which helps it build everything faster. (The OP's question) You can save 50 or more turns on build times for early buildings given terrain which is huge. It's not always the long-term potential you need to think about as every turn matters early too in speed games.

Recall that most early cities are small and growing most of their early life. If you settle on basic flat terrain and work growth tiles first for faster growth (generally recommended) in many grassland cities you literally have only 1 hammer to work with for a while so your buildings are snail slow (The OP's situation). But you can't work a hammer tile without giving up growth from your 3 food tiles. Eventually workers improving stuff like cows or bison gives you a few hammers but this takes time, and some growth tiles never give hammers (bananas & wheat).

Whereas, if you start on a few different terrain features you get an extra starting hammer or two for good early production of buildings (100-200% faster) and can still work all the 3+ food tiles. You usually give up a little bit of improvement potential later but it's often worth it to jump-start your city. Also as inthesomeday pointed out republic helps you build earlier buildings by giving every new city +1 starting hammer (so no city gets below 2 and some get 3-4) and 5% to buildings.

The rule to keep in mind is every city will have at least 2 food 1 production no matter what. If your base tile has more then 2 food, more then 1 production, or more then 0 gold, faith, culture, etc...it'll add the extra to the base tile. The resource you settle on is maintained as well so if you ever build a building in the future or have a religion that buffs it, it'll also get added to the base tile even after settling.

Favorites are:
Settle on hill: for fortification advantage, and 2 starting hammers, could mean 100% to production if terrain is pure food.
Settle on mining lux hill: extra hammer, instant lux connection, 2-3 extra gold
Settle on calendar luxury resource: 2 extra gold and instant lux connection
Settle on iron-plains or horse-plains: comes out same as hills, I am more hesitant to do this though as the tech to improve and get 3 production comes early and I prefer the 3 hammer, 1 food tile to work. It is an extra early hammer though if you want that.

Lastly, If there is no tile like the above ones, I typically pick the worst, central tile location. Settle on snow, tundra, marsh, or desert: Isolated flat desert or tundra is perfect. All base tiles are "improved" to 2 food 1 production so in the case of tundra and desert you get 2-3 extra yield out of the tile early game and have more tiles to work later as your city grows. Settling flat desert or tundra locations is especially good with dance of aurora or desert folklore as the faith is also included in base tile and you couldn't work the tile you settled otherwise. :) These settling strategies may not be significant for smaller cities that don't fully utilize their hexes but big ones from a tradition game it makes a difference as it'll mean a better extra tile to work when your city gets big. Don't move too far away from the optimal position to do this, but keep it in mind as you grid in your early cities and it'll improve them long-term.

The reason many people like to settle on calendar resources is they are hard to work, especially in plains as the food is poor and the production isn't good enough to justify it either. They give basically only gold even after improvement which, though nice, is not what cities need in the beginning. Also if your lux is desert incense it's always better to settle on it if it is near the optimal position as it gets buffed to food-neutral. You probably couldn't work it otherwise. If you settle on it though you get the gold in your base tile which is an extra early 2 gpt that you probably couldn't have gotten for a while anyway since you couldn't work the tile till you grew big, don't need calendar to connect it, and have happiness to keep building cities. It can mean faster expos if you are going liberty especially. Generally hill is the best deal though as you give up very little--even in the case of a mining lux just 1 hammer for most of the game after you mine it and you couldn't be working very many of those anyway as it'd slow your growth until late-game.

Some things you should never settle on imo:
Bananas: under jungle is always plains which already has the base 1 production. So you lose food by removing the jungle and in fact before granary settling on a banana tile gives you no bonus at all. Much better to settle somewhere else and work the banana. Later you also get 2 science from it too.
Iron/horse on grass or similar: Base yield is already 2 food 1 production. So you get no bonus and give up the improvement bonus of extra production. This is the same for all 2 food 1 production tiles. You only lose settling on them--prior granary at least. Also you give up building buffs for things like +1 production from all quarries, etc.
Deer: Deer in forest are 2 food 1 hammer, a very nice early workable tile with improvement potential. But if you settle on it you remove the forest. So you get no bonus for doing this on plains before granary. If it is a flat grassland you get a small bonus of 3 food from base tile but it is generally better to work it as you still get the extra food from doing so and then later get the improvement opportunity AND the chopping hammers from clearing the forest (if you choose).
Cows/Bison/Wheat: generally any food-boosting tile I avoid. You do get a 1 food bonus from the base tile but these are better to work as you still get the extra food and then get the opportunity to improve them for even more extra hammers or food.
Sheep hills: I personally never settle these. Settling on it or improving it and working it is both 2 food 2 production. Since settling on it does give the same yield as improving and working it some people do it anyway but I typically don't because there is no objective bonus to doing so. Only do it if it is the best possible spot for some reason. Otherwise you are just giving up the potential to work it later. Settling on a normal hill gives the same bonus and then you could be working the sheep too.

The best benefit comes from working food or food-neutral tiles and settling on heavy hammer/gold tiles for this reason. In all cases yes you give up a few points of yield doing this, but in many cases the benefit is greater from getting the early bonus. Usualy you don't have the extra food to be working poor food tiles for a while anyway so you give up very little settling on them early game but get free yields from them in the base tile. Think about this choice, especially if in an area with lots of food but poor production as your build times will be super-slow if you build on flat ground.

I hope this clears things up.
The absolute best tile to settle on for an early production boost is iron/hill. It gives 2 extra hammers (3 total and 4 with republic). It gives a bit more later if you don't settle on it, but it takes a while to get the extra food to work an iron-hill so I think the +3-4 base hammers is a better deal. You'll speed through early build order in that city. The most powerful base tile for production is Russia, liberty, iron-hill for a bonus of 5 hammers.

Here's a discussion of the pros/cons of settling on resources: http://gaming.stackexchange.com/que...-i-get-from-the-tile-on-which-i-place-my-city
 
The absolute best tile to settle on for an early production boost is iron/hill. It gives 2 extra hammers. It gives a bit more later if you don't settle on it, but it takes a while to get the extra food to work an iron-hill so I think the +3-4 base hammers is a better deal. You'll speed through early build order in that city. The most powerful base tile for production is Russia, liberty, iron-hill for a bonus of 5 hammers.

Here's a discussion of the pros/cons of settling on resources: http://gaming.stackexchange.com/que...-i-get-from-the-tile-on-which-i-place-my-city

Interesting, I always avoid settling on strategic resources, maybe I should be more willing to settle on iron in the future.
 
Settling on an iron hill doesn't make me too mad, but I'd usually advise against planting on horses. Horse tiles are just so nice to work. However if your horse is on a hill and it's the only hill in the region then don't feel too guilty. The only hills I feel too guilty planting on are sheep, or stone.
 
yeah I rarely settle on a horse as they have a bit of food in the base tile 1-2 usually so I can work them for early hammers with a citizen. For iron, I typically only settle on it if it is a hill for similar reasons. It will give you no bonus on grass and the same as hill on plains. Plains, though you technically get a bonus I usually still won't settle because I prefer to work the 3 hammer, 1 food tile after mining. It's only the iron/hill combo I really recommend as it will take some time unless you ship food to the city early to be able to work the iron hill anyway--so you aren't giving up an early workable tile to get your bonus.

Do horse/hills occur? I can't recall ever seeing one on my random rolled maps. They are still worse then iron/hill if they occur because you give up the option for +1 hammer from stable. Same for sheep hills. Stables come early enough I count it as an early potential loss in my consideration, esp. if near multiple pasture sites as I'll be building that one fairly early.

The main downside to settling on anything, even if the yields show no loss, is you lose a good tile to work, which is why I favor tiles I couldn't be working for a while anyway if I do it.
 
Settling on horses or stone/marble is a terrible idea. You'll not only lose the pasture benefits as mentioned above but you'll also be unable to build a circus or stoneworks.
The circus is the best happiness building you can get - low cost and no maintenance.

Stoneworks is also interesting in that is costs only 320 gold instead of the normal 400 gold for a building of that cost.
 
I say, settle on a hill no matter what, and I clump marble in with mineral resources for the purpose of settling on them. Of course you should never settle flatland marble because you should never settle flatland. However I would avoid settling stone hills just because I have a biased love for stone the same as I love sheep.

The best city locations are on hills that contain either gems, silver, gold, copper, or marble. Hills in general are the next best. Adjacent mountains are not as important as nearby or adjacent river systems, for farming and/or water mill and garden. One unique luxury is cool, but one luxury in general will do normally, as trading exists and most other civs at some point usually have a trade lux of their own. Nearby growth tiles and hills are the most important thing about a settle, however. In order not to have 40 turn building speeds, settle near workable deer, wheat, horse, stone, or salt. I'd say the only things I ALWAYS want in my expands are, in order of importance:

1. AT LEAST one hill in the first ring, AT LEAST one 2 :c5food: 1 :c5production: or 3 :c5food: tile in the first ring.
2. Settled ON a hill (preferably with copper, gold, silver, gems, or marble)
3. AT LEAST one luxury within the second ring

^Most important things

4. River system or good lake nearby, pref. with adjacency
5. One adjacent mountain
6. Coastal (double-edged sword, especially for multiplayer

Things to specifically AVOID are below, in order of most unpleasant to least unpleasant:
1. Roughly 50% "dead" tiles in first two rings (any flatland with no fresh water, any no-resource water tile, flatland desert with no flood, stone, or iron, mountain tiles, flat jungles)
2. Roughly 50% tiles in first two rings have no growth potential
3. No luxury
4. No unique luxury, specifically
5. More than roughly 75% tiles in first two rings are flatland (terrible for hammers)

If you assigned each of the benefits with a point value, with coastal having 1 point and growth + hills in first ring having 6 points, etc for the other attributes, I'd hope for a score of about 15 for each settle.
 
I say, settle on a hill no matter

I wouldn't go that far. Another factor that should be brought into account is how much forest you have around your new city. I'd rather settle on a flat land and be immediately adjacent to a few forests then be 2-3 tiles away (assuming resource access is the same). If I can chop 2-3 forests immediately that's the equivalent of a free ancient era building.
 
i don't really get the debate about 'where to build a city'. Once you start a game you'll have to cope with the map you are given. Any city after the first is about 6 tiles away from the first. Most of the time the choices are limited 'cause of other players. So if you are lucky you can choose the second, but it's not as if you can be very picky.
 
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