The Taskmaster Theory

[Bluefrog]

This strategy didn't really occur to me until my current game. It's not that involved, but there are a couple of things in it that are pretty intriguing.

Some people are split between razing cities and installing new governors in conquered cities. The benefits of installing a new governor are few, really...instant population, maybe some city imps, and most importantly is the strategic foothold of a city on the front lines. Use of roads, possible resources, and having more cultural hold aren't shabby. But...resistors. Cultural reversion. Foregin nationals in general are bad mojo. After playing one or two games, we all should know this. Especially after the "Cultural Reversion Exposed" thread shows that the number of garrisoned troops has little impact on reversion, installing new governors in cities without wonders is quickly becoming a lost cause.

So what do you do? Become a taskmaster!

If you plan on starting a war, build several settlers to use as part of the invasion force. Have them travel to the front lines with guards, raze the cities you take, and plop down new cities. When you raze a city, you get a number of workers made from the city's population. I'm not sure of the exact equation, but from large cities or metropolises, you can get plenty of workers. Fast. And more, they are at the front lines, so they can construct roads to facilitate troop movement.

A nice side effect is that these captured workers don't add to your troop upkeep cost. Workers you build yourself do. I'm not certain if this is a flaw in the game or not, but it's worth noting. It only became apparent to me after a siege on Germany yielded sixty workers, and according to my Mil Advisor, I was only paying for 25 workers I built myself.

Like I said, this isn't a gamebreaker strat by any means. But by conquering other cities and putting their population into what amounts to slavery, you can get a huge workforce quickly and not have to support them.

[Arrian]

You pretty much described any war I fight after the Middle Ages. Prior to that, you can keep captured cities with a fair degree of certainty, particularly if you play like me - I emphasize culture. However, in the Industrial and Modern Ages, it's just better all around to bring settlers along - at least for the enemy's core. The outliers you can still usually keep.

I have found bringing settlers to be the best method of invading a hostile continent. Load up several transports of Modern Armor, with a few setters as well. Drop them all on a hill in enemy territory. Next turn, build a city, and relocate your entire bomber force over there. Next turn, kill.

Oh, about captured workers - just so long as their 1/2 speed doesn't irritate you. It doesn't irritate me (I just use more of 'em), so I normally end up using nothing but slaves - my own workers go pump up the population in newly built cities, assuming they have nothing better to do.

-Arrian

[bogatir]

PC games can lead to such un-‘PC’ statements…

Slaves rock!

I’m only playing my fourth game of Civ3 (which means I’m just now starting to pay attention to some of the mechanics), but it looks to me like you pretty much get one slave worker for each point of population when you raze an enemy city. In my current game, I just chewed through most of a neighboring empire – razing all but two cities I needed to get a port on the ‘other side’ of a continent – and I bagged about 30 workers in the process. All of which is good timing, because as soon as finish building a road to one of the two (only!) coal tiles on the whole map, I start building my rail net.

The half-speed building is no problem at all. They're free. ("Stack all you like. We'll capture more.")

Cheers

[Hermann the Lombard]

Do the slaves stay free?

(How's that for a contradiction in terms?)

I saw speculation elsewhere that beyond a certain number you may have to pay for some of your foreign workers.

[Skanky Burns]

I havent had to pay for my slaves. I had hundreds of them, right until 2050, and my worker upkeep costs were 0.

[roadcage]

You get one slave per pop point at the lowest difficulty level. You get significantly less at higher difficulty levels.

[MrWhereItsAt]

Is that confirmed?

[Skanky Burns]

Well, in the current tournament, Monarch difficulty I think, I razed a size 5 Roman city and got 2 or 3 slaves out of it. So this seems to be true, but more testing would be useful.

[Arrian]

I definitely don't get 1 worker per pop point (Monarch level). I'd say it's more like 1/2 rounded down (so 2 from a size 5... 6 from a 12, etc.)

-Arrian