Whats the best initial rex/build strategy when your capital city looks like this?

[Artifex]

4000 BC, new game. Emperor. Celts.

Your capital city is founded on flood plains with a wheat resource on flood plain as a workable tile, a plains tile, and the rest flood plains in the immediete 8 tiles surrounding the city, then when city expands you will have a few forest tiles as well.

So what would your initial rex/build strategy be for this situation?

[DaveMcW]

Mine/road the plains, then start irrigating.

Warrior
Settler
Worker
Granary (disease should hit here)
Settler
Settler
Settler...

[Dominae]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
Granary (disease should hit here)

Have you figured out a pattern for when disease hits?


Dominae

[Dominae]

I would bypass the Granary in that situation, going for Settlers as quickly as possible. If you're feeling lucky you could even build a Settler first, before any Warriors.

As for the Worker actions, I would irrigate the bonus Flood Plains, mine the Plains, and try to hook up a Luxury as quickly as possible!


Dominae

[Artifex]

Would you eventually build a granary in that city or just forget about it?

When is it a good idea to build the granary, how early? What type of initial city setup cries for a granary? Or is there one?

I see where you are coming from since production is weak there.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Artifex
Would you eventually build a granary in that city or just forget about it?

Forget it until you've founded enough cities. You get +3 extra Food from the irrigated Bonus Flood Plains, and +1 for each irrigated Flood Plain. That's more than enough growth. A Granary would not be worth the 60 Shields, IMO, especially considering there are so few production tiles available (one Plains, one Forest).

When is it a good idea to build the granary, how early? What type of initial city setup cries for a granary? Or is there one?

I'm still trying to figure this one out myself...If your capital site is decent (Bonus Grasslands, Rivers, a bonus Food tile), I would build a Granary. Availability of Forest to chop is another factor. But if you uncover a second site that is equally good or better (especially in Food output), I would seriously consider settling that site before a Granary.

Again, I'm not entirely sure about the whole issue, I'm just throwing out my current opinions.

I see where you are coming from since production is weak there.

Exactly. I'm puzzled as to why DaveMcW suggested a Granary...


Dominae

[Charis]

How can one NOT build a granary asap in such a settler farm?? Answer - if and when the required shields are more than you can come up with for a faster settler generation rate.

At size 4, once expanded you'll work-
Irrigated wheat flood (5f,0s)
two forests (1f,2s ea)
mined plains (1f, 2s)
And of course your city center, 2f 1s

That's 7 shields per turn, and excess food 2, or
swap a FP for forest, 5 shields, excess 4.
- Without a granary, that's 6 turns per settler.
- With one, that's 5 turns per settler.

Letting it grow bigger you pull in more of the irrigated
flood plains, 3f, 0s.

Size 5? (5-6-7-5) 7s/+3f, or 6s/+4f, 5s/+5f
- Without granary, run the 6/4 for an even five turns per settler
- With a granary, running 7/3 still can't get you 30s in four turns.

If there is one more forest, or a grass or plains you can mine, i.e. an 8th shield, and you're all set to produce one settler every FOUR rounds. To do so however you'll need that granary and +5 food excess.

Note however, at 5 shields, 5 food, with a granary you can produce a worker every other turn, a very nice worker farm, after you've produced enough settlers.

If you do get hit by disease a bit given this unusual start, a granary will help you recover population faster.
My build order would be similar to Dave's but I would get a second and perhaps a third warrior faster, for exploring (and for MP since I will run a larger city than others might.) I would probably whip the granary as well, given the paucity of shields.

Charis

[Emma]

i might give it a granary, but it depends on your neighbours. i would pop rush units...

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Charis

That's 7 shields per turn, and excess food 2, or
swap a FP for forest, 5 shields, excess 4.
- Without a granary, that's 6 turns per settler.
- With one, that's 5 turns per settler.

Four excess food without a granary is 5 turns per pop growth, or 10 turns per settler, sustainable settler production rate. Yes, from that starting point, you could build your first settler in six turns, but your population and production would keep dropping and your settler production rate slowing down until eventually you hit a 10-turn equilibrium.

[nbarclay]

Basically, aside from the flood plains with wheat, your tiles in this situation average one shield per turn after improvement. So if you try for two-turn growth with a granary, your production essentially equals your city size. The problem is, settler production can't keep up with that growth rate.

What does work (assuming a sufficient supply of forests and/or plains) is five-turn settlers, with the city at size 5 for two turns and size 6 for three. The first turn at size 5, you get 5 shields. The second (when it grows to size 6), if you haven't changed the governor settings, you get 7 shields, thanks to having your new laborer land on a forest or mined plains. Now your food surplus is four, but you can keep getting 7 shields per turn (maybe a tad more with enough micromanagement). So the third turn at size 6, you grow to size 7 but instantly (during the production phase) finish the settler and shrink back to size 5. Then the cycle repeats itself. As long as disease doesn't strike, you have the next best thing to a 4-turn settler pump. (Further optimizations may be possible, but the best you'll do is five turns unless you can chop forested grasslands and find shields underneath at least two of them.)

Also note that at size 5 with a granary, the city can function as a 2-turn worker pump, so you may eventually want to have the capital focus on workers while other cities handle settler production. And forests can be chopped for extra production and irrigated or mined (depending on whether the underlying terrain is plains or grassland). The extra production can both speed up the granary and, once the granary is finished, give a production boost to build 4-turn settlers instead of 5-turn settlers. (Just be careful timing the chops so the shields aren't wasted, and make sure you keep your growth at a 2-turn rate when going for chop-assisted four-turn settlers..)

One last trick: using tiles that provide 2 food and 1 shield instead of combinations of flood plains and 1-food, 2-shield tiles reduces your risk of disease. So you probably eventually want to have a total of four irrigated plains and/or mined grasslands if you go the settler pump route.

Nathan

Edit: I got so caught up in the general theory that I'm forgetting we're dealing with a non-industrious civ here. That makes the cost/benefit ratio of chopping and irrigating or mining forests instead of balancing forests against flood plains a lot iffier.

[Theseus]

Never go up against a Sicilian when a Settler Pump is on the line.