Will you settle with low production or no water?

I never settle a city not on a green tile. Are there cases where settle on a non-water tile?

Also, If I can't get three gears (production) in a location as soon as I settle I just don't anymore. Considering the small amount of production on most maps this is pretty limiting. What are your minimum standards for production in a new city?

 

I'll pretty regularly settle a coastal city without access to fresh water - the 1 extra housing off the bat helps a bit, and then the bonus housing from a lighthouse allows it to get up to a decent size. Otherwise I tend to settle by water until it gets later in the game, at which point I might look at places that would require an aqueduct. I rarely will settle entirely non-water cities unless there's a special reason (maybe place a random city in the middle of other cities to chop in Colosseum and nothing else).

Production I don't really have requirements on - it all depends what the purpose of the city is. Some I'll place just to block off other civs, some I'll place to get access to strategics/luxuries, some I'll place to chop in a certain district or wonder. I'll usually end up with 5-9 'core' cities that grow to at least a moderate size and have good production, and then the rest may or may not end up being very productive.

 

Thats pretty much it for me.

For starting tiles for a city I prefer a little more food than production so a 2f+/2p tile is my favourite. Otherwise I just go with 3/1 or even 4/0 first. Sure production is great but you need the pops to work the great production tiles anyway. Also you need more pops for districts (at least a few). Most of the time you can chop out one to three districts and then just buy the buildings anyway.

 

Although I prioritize more water over less, it all gets settled sooner or later (until I get sick of running Colonization), short of some terrible un-aqueduct-able spot, which I know my neighbor will be more than happy to eventually settle for me anyway.

I prioritize better first rings over worse ones, but it all gets settled unless it's all pure foodless desert or tundra, which... see above.

 

But there are so many times that a city is just worth it's campus! No matter what I do, mostly science or domination, a city ist almost always better than not a city - unless you have so much space, that I can't imagine how this will be the case on fairly standard settings. I recently even stopped to build granarys. Those desert holes just get a food tile and a mine to build a monument and getting a university chopped.

 

If you want really fast science victories, trash cities with a campus are a waste of turns and worker cost scaling. As soon as Industrial age hits, great scientists become obsolete. 25% of your science will come from your top 2 cities, other 30% from 3-4 other powerhouses and around 45% from International Space Agency policy card. If you go low culture and no space agency (which you can, with a godlike capital: Pingala + tea corporation with 3 tea products in capital + Kilwa), 40% of your science will come from your capital and the rest from core 7-9 cities.

If you are placing filler cities, you gain more from a market or lighthouse (1 trade route) than from a new campus, basically converting settler production hammers into space project hammers in your Ruhr city.

 

Unless I see a nice bunch of coast/ocean resources I don't pay much attention to the water. I prefer to get most of my cities high on production and resources as soon as possible, then have a city that prioritizes on the coast or having a Harbor early for scouting/trading purposes.

 

Production > water bonus, every time.

Especially on the first city. By the time the housing bonus means anything, you're already way behind if you don't have decent production.

 

I see these youtube video's about 'where to found your city' and I see city sites better than anything I have ever seen in five years.

I've gone back to CiV.

 

You can setup the map a bit like if you want more hills, resources abundant, etc. That might explain the videos. That and a lot of restart.

 

I only really care in the very early game. Maybe just the first 4-6 cities. I like to have water in those so I won't have to worry about growth being stunted. Later satellites only need a couple districts to be worthwhile. You can use internal trade routes to build them or just buy those districts with governors.

Just setting the map to "wet" improves starts a lot. More trees and marshes means more production and food in the early game.

 

One thing I don't really like about Civ6 when compared to HK. particularly if core question comes to mind whether should a city growth maxed out with 3-hex radious or having a good access to freshwater or eligible to build an Aqueduct.

 

Give me anything and I’ll give it a go. I just roleplay it if it’s bad so it feels good. Variety is the spice of life. You do not need 3 cog starts, your brain should have enough cogs to compensate.
To answer the OP, I would take lack of water