What more to build?

[Sparrowhawk]

My fellow Ministers have started a number of polls to clarify the opinion of the people on what our Imperium needs to crush the remaining resistance to our forces.

Unfortunately, their polls conflict somewhat, and I post this poll to clarify the results of theirs (whatever that result may be).

Our Minister of War asks whether we need more Calvary and suggests that we switch to Cannon. Regardless of the results of that poll, I ask whether we need largescale production of any additional units. We are currently producing Calvary in 14 cities, and have barracks in 42 cities. How many cities should be producing offensive units (and I include Alpine Troops in these "offensive units" in that they are used in the attack on the enemy)? I recommend switching production in as many of these 42 cities as is feasible. Further, I recommend that we build barracks in those cities that do not require further infrastructure, and add units to the build ques in those cities as well.

Our Foreign Minister asks for more diplomats and asks that we produce less engineers (though engineers are the lifeblood of the City Planner office and we are sensitive to any office suggesting that their work is unneccessary or that these clearly overworked individuals are not deserving of additional assistance ). Our food surplus is minimal in many cities, and actually in a negative in many cities with Engineers so we cannot likely produce many more engineers regardless of the results of that poll. The diplomats are currently being trained in 19 cities, and many of those cities without the production capacity to produce (and support) much other then diplomats. Should we change the number of cities producing diplomats? It seems many will be required if we intend to take down city walls prior to taking cities and therefore my recommendation is that we increase the number of cities producing diplomats.

Our Science Minister asks whether we should again put our scientists to work , and I ask...if the result is to put them to work...do we provide them places to work? We currently have 23 Libraries and 1 University sitting empty in our cities, and in truth, our office does not beleive there is any value in maintaining more places of higher learning, regardless of the results of the Science Ministers poll.

Our President/High Priest has successfully been able to get most of our cities to celebrate, and while some cities require additional infrastructure, for the most part little is required. Currently construction of Temples/Colleseums/Courthouses has essentially come to a stop. Construction of Marketplaces/Banks/Stock Exchanges have continued and our net income has risen to close to 2000 gold per turn. Our city growth is negligible, and as a result we are building few Aquaducts or Sewer Systems. To summarize, while we still require some cities to construct infrastructure, not much is required. Therefore, the question is: do we change the majority of our cities to unit production? Again it is our position that unit production is all that is required to assimilate the remainer of our enemies into the Imperium.

The office of the city planner is recommending the following:
Produce units for the Minister of War in the majority of the cities that have barracks (up to 42 currently). (these would include either Calvary or Cannon as well as Alpine Troops).
Produce diplomats (rushed if necessary) for the Foreign Ministry in those cities without barracks or those cities with low production.
Produce engineers only in those cities that can support them without facing food deficits (not many).
Not to produce any large scale infrastructure, building only those which would provide immediate help (such as temples in newly "acquired" cities and barracks in unit producing cities).

You have 3 days to vote.

/me City Planner

[atawa]

The War Ministry would like to see a lot more units build off course
More dips and engineers would also be very welcome

As for improvements I think we are now so close to victory that this will only drag the game on longer then needed. If we vote on 0% science we can even sell all our librery's and uni''s for extra bribe money

Instead of building aquaducts/sewers I propose we build engineers from those city's.

/me Minister of War

[shade]

vote has been cast...
and diplomats have been asked.

Shade

[Ben Kenobi]

I voted for building engineers in those cities with a food surplus, rather than aqueducts, and for all the military options, barracks and troops.

Engineers are my lever, and with a big enough lever I can move the world.

[cavebear]

Cavalry and Diplomats/Spies can move our world, too.

[Sparrowhawk]

Just thought I would give some additional information on our current infrastructure:



The Granary is in the newly taken city of Hannover, and while I am certain our President intends to sell it prior to playing his next turn, a reminder will be included in the report of the City Planner.

/me City Planner

[Sparrowhawk]

These are our cities production orders as of the 1842 save.



Any questions or comments will be appreciated.

[MrWhereItsAt]

We can still build Engineers in cities that can support no more, as long as they are on the RR and can rehome to other cities straight away.

Otherwise all your proposals are very appropriate as they are

[cavebear]

Good point MWIA... Properly homing Engineers should not be a problem.

[Sparrowhawk]

While this is possible, it is not possible to support many more engineers, we have many cities in food shortages now, and not many cities with large food surplus's. If we were to rehome the Engineers that come from cites that have food surplus, I don't think we could support any more Engineers (without running a food deficit).

[cavebear]

The Citizens cannot determine this from their own knoeledge to judge the seriousness of the treat of starvation to themselves if more Engineers are sent forth from some cities.

Do any of the venerated priest-ministers have information on our various cities concerning the state of their food surpluses or lacks that they could impart to the general public?

[Sparrowhawk]

I just prepared a summary, and am glad that is was requested, as the situation is not as dire as I made it sound.

Currently we have the following food situation.
Deficit = -
Surplus = +

-5___1
-4___1
-3___0
-2___3
-1___9
0___12
+1___18
+2___14
+3___14
+4___4
+5___2
+6___2
+7___4
+8___2
+9___1 (Delhi)
+11__1 (Zimbabwae)
+15__1 (St.Louis)

All in all, I suppose we can support more engineers with rehoming, though the majority of the surplus's are in the former American river delta.

/me City Planner

[Ben Kenobi]

Seems like some rehoming is in order.

Anything higher than -1 should be rehomed. Just 5 cities, and

-5 + -4 + -6 = - 15 or 8 engineers would need to be rehomed.

Another way to tell if you are outstripping your food supply is through the demographics. Any number below 2 indicates that your entire population has a net food loss. IIRC, we are still around 4.

As for the American delta, once we connect those cities to the general line, we should have no problem rehoming.

[Ljube]

Yes, but the calculation shows we have no room for more engineers if we want our cities to continue to grow. And we have no need for more of them if I may say. Those that we currently have should be enough.

[Ben Kenobi]

We are in the endgame, ljcvetko. City growth won't help us all that much.

I agree we don't need many more engineers, another 9 would be enough for me, to bring us to 90.

[Ljube]

Nine I can suffer

But keep them at 90 and build more diplomats. I would sure like to see 90 diplomats as well.

[cavebear]

Surely 80+ Engineers are sufficient for alomost any purpose. They must be practically running over each other with their equipment as it is!

90 Diplomats becoming 90 Spies, now THAT is something to get excited about!

[atawa]

With the engineers we have now we can road and railroad fast enough. As it looks now we're going to take 1-2 turns rest before we attack Germany anyway and in that attack only 15 or so are needed.

This means the rest of our engineers can make roads around newly conquered city's and finish the RR to the delta.

90 spies would be.....

[Hydey]

seems we want more of everything

[Sparrowhawk]

And with 89 Cities maybe we can get more of everything!

Your City Planner will do his best to fulfill all requests.

/me remember that you can please some of the people some of the time, some of the people all of the time, all of the people some of the time, but no matter what you do, Hydey won't be happy (or something like that...don't mean to pick on you Hydey, but I needed a name to fill in, and as you we the last to post, you were the first I thought of )

[Sparrowhawk]

Poll is closed and report has been sent to our President.

/me City Planner