workers just sitting in my city

[shy121]

my workers are just sitting in my cities... are they doing anything there? this is usually late in my games but there is still things to do, but when I "automate" them they just go and sit in my city. Are they helping the city or just doing nothing?

 

[Mutineer]

They are doing nothing.
reasons automated workers sit in cities:
1) They have nothing to do.
2) They feel treatened.

 

[shy121]

thank you ... I think it often happens when I am at war so they are probably threaten... I guess I will have to stop automating them. I am just on my third game ever and it seems like there are so many things to have to think about.

 

[Twiglet]

I think it's important not to automate workers early on, since the choices you make then have a mahoosive effect on the rest of the game. A basic rule of thumb: out of the gate you want food, and to hook up whatever resources you can see. Then you need to decide things like: going for cottages or specialists (if financial, cottages is usually though not always a good plan; if not, esp if you roll a Phi leader, specialists can be a better choice) and farm or cottage accordingly.

One worker per city or so is a good ratio - it's largely pointless having more than n tiles developed round a size n city (as by definition no-one will be there to work the tiles). Stealing workers rather than building them in the very early game is often a Good Move, however worker-first is a default strategy that will stand you in good stead (do vary it as circumstances dictate though - early scouting is really helpful so you know where your opponents' resources sit and if you start on the sea and have seafood then workboat-first can be excellent; if there's nothing for your worker to do just now, build something else first).

However I'm sure I'm not alone in automating my workers after a certain critical mass has been reached - no hard and fast rules, but after I've taken my first opponent out is probably a fair rule of thumb. After that it just gets too tedious (for me) to micromanage everything.

There can be issues with automated workers: for example, sometimes the AI likes to ignore the fact I want to make a science city based on cottages and overwrites my hamlets with farms. To stop it doing this I check the box in Options that says "automated workers don't build over other improvements".

Problem then being that when workshops and windmills kick in and you need super production some places they won't do things like overwriting towns with workshops or mines with windmills - or even overwrite a farm with a mine when a late game resource appears (not mining your single Aluminium source can really...hinder your late game progress, if the game's lasted long enough for it to be an issue that is...).

So I tend to automate all but 2-3 workers and make sure I know where they're garrisoned. Whenever I pop a tech which reveals a resource I push my "manual workers" onto it. When I decide on a cultural or space-race path late on and decide I need production more than commerce, again it's my manual workers which put workshops where towns used to be - and so on. For me that strikes a balance between keeping control and spending all my time directing my workers in the mid-game, which I'm too lazy to do...ymmv...

 

[JimT]

If you do want to do mass improvements hold shift while setting up a workers task and it will set up a queue so for example.

Move - Chop- Cottage - Move - Cottage - Move - Mine - Road

Following earlier advice when you do want to build over a number of improvements set a worker or two to each city with a mass build queue and they won't bother you again for fifty turns (but beware if they are near your borders when you start a war).

 

[Winston Hughes]

it's largely pointless having more than n tiles developed round a size n city (as by definition no-one will be there to work the tiles).

This isn't always true.

For example, in my present game my capital has got:

(a) three high-food (4 food) commerce tiles (clams, coast, financial trait)

(b) four low-food (0-1) production tiles (mines)

(c) a load of food-neutral (2) commerce tiles (grassland cottages).

But, thanks to the health/happy cap, I can't grow the city large enough to use them all at once.

So, to get the most out of my economy with the tiles and population available, it makes sense to work (a) all the time, and to switch between (b) and (c) as necessary.

This approach uses the (c) tiles to grow the cottages and population whilst researching to a specific tech (Writing for libraries; Iron Working for swordsmen;etc.), then uses the (b) tiles (and the whip) to build the newly available building/units, before switching back to the (c) tiles to chase the next tech target (and to grow back the whipped population).

Improving those extra tiles (the city currently has 12 improved tiles and varies between 7 and 9 in population) is vital for this kind of early-game micromanagement.

It isn't always the best policy, but in some situations it can be the difference between getting up amongst the tech leaders and getting left behind.

Also, personally I just don't trust the worker automation or the city governor to make the right choices (a civ3 hangover?) and so always do my management by hand. It can be a little tedious when your civ gets larger, but, having seen the improvement patterns of the AI civs, I reckon it gives the human player a definite edge on them (if he/she makes the right choices, of course).

 

[JackOfClubs]

...Problem then being that when workshops and windmills kick in and you need super production some places they won't do things like overwriting towns with workshops or mines with windmills - or even overwrite a farm with a mine when a late game resource appears (not mining your single Aluminium source can really...hinder your late game progress, if the game's lasted long enough for it to be an issue that is...).

So I tend to automate all but 2-3 workers and make sure I know where they're garrisoned. ...

There is a simpler way to deal with this. If you have automated workers you can always click on them to give them new orders. So when that late-game resource pops or when you decide to turn your farms into water-mills (or whatever), you can just comandeer some automated workers until the task is finished then have them go about their business by re-automating them. Much less wasteful than having two workers sit around idle most of the game.

One of the chief points where this becomes especially useful is as soon as the railroad tech is discovered. I usually get all of my workers building a single railroad artery from one end of the empire to the other to facilitate troop movements and connect all cities. Once the artery is complete, I can send most of the workers back to general automation. I usually have two (or more if required) go around and build railroads on all mines and lumbermills to take advantage of the commerce bonus, after which I assign these two to "build trade network" which makes them fill in the gaps between cities.

 

[jdw171984]

Ill automate 2 or 3 when i have about 5 cities but i like to keep a couple handy to cut down forest if i need some more hammers to finish a wonder in the case of a close race. but automating everyone can be pretty shatty for ur civ.