The Wisdom Of No Hospitals

[stonewall]

For my last and current games I thought I would try a strategy of not building hospitals. Building hospitals does allow you population to grow and utilize more squares, but you pay maintenance and have more expenses keeping the people happy.

This worked fine for my last game, which I won by conquest. However, my current game I have had a more challenging time. I have been able to keep up in the size of my territory, but my total population is behind (not unexpected), my military defense was thin, and I am at least 3/4 of an era behind in tech. This part surprised me. I have been playing the Babylonians and I usually take a builder approach. My build list usually prioritizes Temple, Library, and then University.

So I was thinking, maybe those extra citizens have much more influence than I thought. The extra shields for building, the extra commerce for research. And when the 21 city squares are full, the scientist specialist helping research.

I have only tried this on two games so I am not sure if the no hospital thing is a valid stategy. Any thoughts on not using hospitals?

[Arrian]

Well, if you're not going to build hospitals, you better be packing your cities in tighter so you can use all your terrain tiles. Just set it up such that each city gets around 12 tiles of land.

-Arrian

[Cruddy]

Going for a no hospitals approach is generally beneficial with Arrian's point above, but there are a few things that reduce its efficiency;-

1) You are gong to have to build more settlers to begin with, to fill up the space. This can slow down your military if you're a fan of early conquest.

2) The city tile itself only produces 2 food - so building cities on grassland/flood plains loses some potential score. You have to do this sometimes to fill up the cracks - but if hills are plentiful, build on them for the extra food. If they are not, the extra production from working them instead makes more sense than the food.

3) As for your current game; did you have any starting penalities like starting close to a jungle or with a large mountain range nearby? Did the AI civs have access to flood plains or lots of wheat for early expansion? The start position is crucial - I will usually bin an unpromising start, because I'm not really very good yet at the early game.

Doing without hospitals is a different strategy to the normal supercity one - it requires practice and thought to make the most of it. I like it because it avoids the unhappiness problems of large cities. But as stated, I'm not really very good at it yet.

EDIT: I will ALWAYS build a marketplace before the university, sometimes before any others! It doubles the commerce and it boosts the effects of multiple luxurt resources too, the most powerful individual improvement you can have. Shame it has no culture points. That doubled commerce boosts your tech research too, so I think it is the root cause of your problem.

[Arrian]

50% tax income bonus, not double commerce, IIRC. But you're right about the power of markets.

They are a huge priority for me. I may build them before libraries in some cases (if I'm doing 40-turn research, milking the Great Library, for instance).

-Arrian

[stonewall]

Cruddy,

1) I really think I did a good job pumping out settlers and expanding. I think I did have more territory than any other civ until they starting stealing from each other.

2) Not really any issue for me here.

3) I think I really had a good spot. Actually my capital became my settler factory. Not sure about the other civs. Like I said, I think I did real good during the initial expansion faze of the game.

4) Marketplace - you could be right here. For the most part they came after the University. I am such a culture whore that I didn't build it early because it generates no culture.

Thinking about my current game some more, I also had a big period of war (about 40 turns against the Persians followed by about 15 turns against the Russians) that really hurt my research. Although I was already behind before then, this really made the problem worse. I think the AI was really picking on me because I focused so much on expansion and city improvements that my military was weak and the AI really took advantage of that.

Like I said, 2 games is a small sample to see if this strategy of no hospitals is valid or not.

[Cruddy]

Oh yeah, one other factor - do the other AI civs have rivers and you don't? I wasn't convinced about the power of rivers to generate tech, until I actually got a start on one. I preferred coastal cities up to that point.

Now I've had a river start, I prefer them - but having a good coastal stategy for commerce does me no harm.

Arrian: Totally right about the tax thing - but if you have a marketplace and a library, that gives 100% boost total to research, which is where I got muddled.

[Nakar Gabab]

Originally posted by Arrian
50% tax income bonus, not double commerce, IIRC. But you're right about the power of markets.

They are a huge priority for me. I may build them before libraries in some cases (if I'm doing 40-turn research, milking the Great Library, for instance).

You kidding me? Sometimes I'll prioritize a marketplace over a TEMPLE. Okay, rarely, but the marketplace is usually the second or third thing built in ANY city.

Say you have four luxuries. That's a difference between most of your city happy and WLTKD for the next thousand years.

[stonewall]

I just loaded the save game, and while my capital was on a river, most of my other territory that I did not conquer did not have rivers. I checked the other civs and they seem to have alot of rivers. Maybe this was also a factor.

[Catt]

I've found that not building hospitals has its plusses and minuses (not surprisingly), but that the minuses tend to outweight the plusses for my preferred playstyle. I think it is very important to plan your city locations carefully from early on if you know you'll not be building any hospitals -- using a city spacing plan that results in many cities having more than 12 tiles available to be worked meanings you're wasting potentially productive tiles. The first time I ever played Emperor (one of the early minitourney games) I decided to avoid more than a few hospitals in order to better manage happiness -- unfortunately, I spaced my cities in such a way that each city had 15 - 18 tiles available, meaning up to a third of my land was not producing for me -- the only time I've ever established a decent tech lead in the Industrial Age and watched as it withered away faster than you can say lickety-split. (I did build 5 hospitals so I could build the Battlefield Medicine small wonder). The extra citizens really do have a profound effect -- over the course of the last several months I have steadily increased my preference for getting to Sanitation earlier -- just for the productivity (mainly commerce and research) that hospitals can unleash early in the Industrial Age.

Even assuming that you pack in cities in a way that generates few wasted tile opportunities, you still need to factor in the increased maintenance costs associated with each city -- a size 20 city needs only one market, library, etc., whereas a pair of size 12 cities needs two of each. If you fail to seal the game in the Industrial Age and are actually in a tight tech race for the spaceship, the smaller cities will have a much harder time building spaceship parts (although effective pre-building could eliminate much of this drawback, I think).

All in all, I've come to favor a denser build (cities will grow to 15 - 18 size, occassionally no more than 12 or 13 and occassionally a full 20). After experimenting with a more or less "no hospitals" approach, I find it less powerful for my preferred playstyle.

Originally posted by Cruddy
Arrian: Totally right about the tax thing - but if you have a marketplace and a library, that gives 100% boost total to research, which is where I got muddled.

Bear in mind it's not quite a straight-line 100% boost. Markets only increase tax revenue from the city (putting aside the happiness factor); libraries only increase science revenue from the city -- both are subject to the whims of the slider position. Assume a city produces 20 gold (after corruption). With a library and a market, and the sliders at 50% tax 50% science, the city will generate 15 tax and 15 science. Without the market, it would produce only 10 tax -- the extra tax generated by the market can be used to increase sceince spending, but even moving the slider up to 80% science (a pretty darn big jump for just building markets - i.e., I doubt markets alone could generate sufficient additional income to move the slider that far), the city will then only produce 24 science (and only 6 tax) -- not quite a doubling. Another way to look at it is, with science set to 100% building a market will not affect your income in the slightest (except for the maintenance cost of the market) -- with no gold being devoted to taxes, there is no gold being multiplied by the market.

Catt

[Arrian]

You kidding me? Sometimes I'll prioritize a marketplace over a TEMPLE. Okay, rarely, but the marketplace is usually the second or third thing built in ANY city.

Hmm... well, yeah. That's about right. It depends, though. If I'm off to a great start and am already even or ahead in tech, I will probably build the libraries first and continue to research myself, and build the markets next.

Believe me, I love what markets do for you. The dual benifit (tax renevue and happiness) is awesome. But if I'm researching at 80%, building the libraries first makes sense (just as building the markets first makes sense if I'm researching at 10% or 1 scientist). It all depends.

-Arrian

[stonewall]

City spacing is one thing I didn't really consider fully. My only thoughts on it was that I was going to continue with my normal spacing so that I would occupy territory faster. I really didn't consider all the tiles that would not be worked as being an issue.

As far as having one city with one library, etc versus two cities each with a library, etc. I guess that can have a big economic impact as far as support costs go. However do I get more commerce and shield output from two size 12 cities compared to on size 20? And will have have to have more happiness improvements to support the larger city population? Also, wouldn't I get double the culture from having 2 smaller cities compared to one larger?

I think my head is spinning

[CerberusIV]

The way I try to play is to identify 5 city sites that are either inland or coastal but mostly land very early on and settle my cities so those 5 can have 19 or 20 tiles to work. I pack other cities a bit tighter. When I get sanitation I build hospitals only in those 5 megacities, and then battlefield medicine.

I usually have quite a few coastal cities that don't benefit that much from hospitals until the commercial dock and offshore platform become available. At that point it is worth building hospitals and mass transit in those cities because the extra commerce from the coastal tiles then more than pays for the improvements.

This certainly works pretty well at monarch and allows your smaller cities to catch up on improvements during the industrial era or build infantry and artillery to support the tanks from your main cities in trampling the neighbours.

[Cruddy]

Originally posted by stonewall
1) City spacing is one thing I didn't really consider fully. My only thoughts on it was that I was going to continue with my normal spacing so that I would occupy territory faster. I really didn't consider all the tiles that would not be worked as being an issue.

As far as having one city with one library, etc versus two cities each with a library, etc. I guess that can have a big economic impact as far as support costs go.

2) However do I get more commerce and shield output from two size 12 cities compared to on size 20?

3) And will have have to have more happiness improvements to support the larger city population?

4) Also, wouldn't I get double the culture from having 2 smaller cities compared to one larger?

1) CerberusIV has given an able reply here - it's not the only solution but it is a good one.

2) Given the same improvements in each, you would get slightly less commerce (to pay for improvements), about the same production. However, with the 2 size 12s, you get up to max very quickly - it takes a LONG TIME to get to size 20. Getting that gold and production earlier gives you the tools to do the job quicker.

3) A size 20 city is hard to keep happy. 8 luxuries and a marketplace with all other imrprovements will just about do it on Deity - one bit of war weariness and you should hiring entertainers or adjusting the lux slider.

The size 12s are MUCH easier to keep happy, even with a long war under Democracy. It means you don't have to buy luxuries off the AI (or use military to conquer the resource areas).

4) Of course you get double the culture! That's one of the best reasons to do it (seeing as you are a sell confessed culture sex industry worker).

[Catt]

Originally posted by stonewall
As far as having one city with one library, etc versus two cities each with a library, etc. I guess that can have a big economic impact as far as support costs go. However do I get more commerce and shield output from two size 12 cities compared to on size 20? And will have have to have more happiness improvements to support the larger city population? Also, wouldn't I get double the culture from having 2 smaller cities compared to one larger?

I think my head is spinning

Yeah - you're on to some of the factors that weigh in the calculation. You will get more culture; you may get more production (net of maintenance costs); you will need less happiness; and you will have more corruption. In fact there are a whole host of influencing factors that, in my mind at least, pushes me towards city placement and city growth strategies dictated more by the available terrain than by a conscious play tactic from the get-go. Where appropriate, I pack cities in tighter, and where appropriate, I spread them out to encompass an OCP or near OCP playout (all twenty tiles available). But I'd say that if you start the game with the intention of building few if any hospitals, you probaly ought to use as denser city build -- if someone played an OCP city spacing (full 21 tiles) but never built hospitals, almost half of their empire wouldn't be producing -- all that fallow land . Another way to think of that situation is that an AI empire the same geographic size as yours, but with typical AI city size of 20+, would be twice as productive as yours.

Catt

[stonewall]

I am getting more convinced that the best strategy is to use hospitals, but not necessarily everywhere. That is what I normally do, but thought I would try the no hospital thing.

Actually, in my current game I did start building some hospitals 'cause I was just getting whooped on. I just advanced a turn in that game and noticed a couple of cities built marketplaces and my research time for Computers went from 5 turns to 2 turns! Just from a couple of markeplaces Don't underestimate the power of chee...marketplaces

[Catt]

Originally posted by stonewall
I just advanced a turn in that game and noticed a couple of cities built marketplaces and my research time for Computers went from 5 turns to 2 turns! Just from a couple of markeplaces Don't underestimate the power of chee...marketplaces

Marketplaces shouldn't affect tech cost or time to research at all - did you adjust your science slider? And 2 markets certainly can't make that dramtic an impact on a very expensive modern age tech.

I suspect that an AI or two discovered / traded for Computers, reducing the research cost (which is the reason many research lengths drop dramtically during your efforts in a tight tech race). Are there AI civs that are competitive with you in research?

Catt

[Cruddy]

Originally posted by stonewall
1) I am getting more convinced that the best strategy is to use hospitals, but not necessarily everywhere. That is what I normally do, but thought I would try the no hospital thing.

2) Actually, in my current game I did start building some hospitals 'cause I was just getting whooped on. I just advanced a turn in that game and noticed a couple of cities built marketplaces and my research time for Computers went from 5 turns to 2 turns! Just from a couple of markeplaces Don't underestimate the power of chee...marketplaces

1) I generally aim for size 16-20 max. I'm trying this no hospitals thing, and to be honest, I'm not very good at it. It takes quite a few games to switch styles.

2) Techs get cheaper to research the more Civs that know them. If the number of turns to tech drops suddently, that's usually the reason why.

[stonewall]

Originally posted by Cruddy

2) Techs get cheaper to research the more Civs that know them. If the number of turns to tech drops suddently, that's usually the reason why.

Your right. I went back a turn to see what happend and in addition to those markeplaces, I also built a couple of librarys and one civ discovered computers.

Still, based on the discussion above, I think I have been discounting the value of the markeplace. Need to fix that...

[Cruddy]

Don't foget banks, stock exchanges (on PTW) and Adam Smith's. Check out the "Favourite Wonders" discussion - a lot of people really rate this one. Although Collossus does amazing things to the early game as well.

[stonewall]

I always build banks (eventually). Adam Smith's is usually my top priority in that era. I have always ignored Colussus and focused on G. Library and or Pyramids. I will have to give it more consideration in my next game.

[dexters]

If having no hospitals is advantageous, it wouldn't be in the game.

While having no hospitals mean your cities are less liable to get discontent and it may make your job easier when it comes to not purchasing luxuries, it also faces significant disadvantages

1) Spreading tile use between 2 cities whereas normally we would only have one city using the tiles are not equivalent. One of the cities will get slighty higher corruption, so you'd be losing production and commerce

2) loss of multiplier effects from wonders such as newtons, SETI, etc. These double your sciencerate. Having a size 12 city with this wonder isn't the same as having a size 12 city which you can grow into a size 25 city later on.

3) loss of multiplier effects for improvements.
As noted above, more cities = more corruption as you slowly move out. 2 cities tilling the same soil is not equal to one city doing it. 1 of the 2 cities will experience higher corruption, and those corrupted shield and commerce will cost you even more in loss marketplace, science multipliers

The no hospital strategy is, as I can see it, only advisable in small island continents where your goal is to spread out and work all the tiles as early as possible to keep pace with AI. In this case, hospitals can be traded off for a compact city placement as they come too late in the game to make a difference anyways.

The no hospital strat is definately not advisable in any continents pangea maps where your goal is to spread out as far as you can to cut off AI civs from grabbing land.

As I see it, you can get the city spacing down as much as you want, but if you're not expanding fast enough in the early game and miss a crucial luxury or resource, you might as well have played normally and grab the resource and luxury and deal with the discontent issues as they come up. Frankly, the strategy has a very limited use.

[bongo]

There have been a lot of talk about city placement strategies here. One that looked very tempting was to place your cities in a 4*5 pattern to allow them to reach max size. Before hospitals at least 7 tiles belonging to each city would not be worked, the trick was to place 'military camps' in between the future metropolis. Small towns that only make units and never grow bigger than size 6. When hospitals are built in the bigger cities these 'military camps' are disbanded. While this strategy sounds promising I havn't tried it out yet.

[Mountain Sage]

Originally posted by stonewall

4) Marketplace - you could be right here. For the most part they came after the University. I am such a culture whore that I didn't build it early because it generates no culture.

After universities?
By then you should have completed banks, not marketplaces, and be on your way for stock exchanges (in PTW).
Who is going to pay for the upkeep of your temples, libraries, universities etc. and a fast research?

Ah! I got carried away. This thread was about hospitals, wasn't it?

[Arrian]

I think we've hammered home the importance of marketplaces, MS. Then again, it really can't be overstated.

-Arrian

[Cruddy]

[QUOTE] Originally posted by dexters
...The no hospital strategy is, as I can see it, only advisable in small island continents where your goal is ... [QUOTE]

Good post Dexter - I just have one major problem with it.

SMALL map? Isn't corruption distance LESS on small maps? Can't you have less corruption in the same area on bigger maps?

I would say the bigger the map, the bigger the advantage of size 12 cities for a bgger culture boost.

Or am I missing something?

[stonewall]

Originally posted by Mountain Sage


After universities?
By then you should have completed banks, not marketplaces, and be on your way for stock exchanges (in PTW).
Who is going to pay for the upkeep of your temples, libraries, universities etc. and a fast research?

Ah! I got carried away. This thread was about hospitals, wasn't it?

You are probably right. I think I developed tunnel vision and I was really focusing on building culture improvements before anything else. The library and university really became more of a priority in my current game as I fell behind on research - I never considered the effect on research that marketplaces and banks have

Its kinda funny how trying something new just threw my whole game off....

[dexters]

[QUOTE] Originally posted by Cruddy
[QUOTE] Originally posted by dexters
...The no hospital strategy is, as I can see it, only advisable in small island continents where your goal is ...

Good post Dexter - I just have one major problem with it.

SMALL map? Isn't corruption distance LESS on small maps? Can't you have less corruption in the same area on bigger maps?

I would say the bigger the map, the bigger the advantage of size 12 cities for a bgger culture boost.

Or am I missing something?

Ok, sorry.

Look what you quoted and read what you think I said.

I said it is worthwhile in small continent island maps (probably continents with lots of water), especially when you're cut off from a larger land mass.

I didn't mean small maps. Even if it is a smaller map, while corruption is less, your Optimal city is also less, and there's even less room to make a mistake. If you exapnd too slowly in the early game, there is usually no uncharted territory to expand into. I would argue the slow expansion strategy required by building a tight compact empire for the no hospital strategy to work will still against you.

The way I see it, a compact city placement is meant to maximize land usage in the early to mid game without waiting for cities to get hospitals. And You only really need to do that if space for expansion is limited and you need to get as much gold, production and research as possible to stay competitive against larger AI civs.

Otherwise, I see the strategy as a collosal waste of time and effort since expanding far and wide yield so much more. The extra luxuries you need to buy in the late game is inconsequential. In fact, if you expand quickly enough, you'll either capture extra luxuries or be in the position to take it by force. So the luxury saving argument doesn't work for me.

I mean no offense to the guy who thought of the idea. But i'm skeptical.

[stonewall]

Originally posted by dexters

I mean no offense to the guy who thought of the idea. But i'm skeptical.

I guess that would be me (And I take no offense)

You know, I am skeptical too - that is why I wanted to get other people's input. I only tried this on a whim for something different to do. My first game on a standard map using this method I won by conquest, but my current game on a huge map has been much more challenging. In fact, I abandoned "no hospitals" because I was getting in too much of a hole.

[Theseus]

Chiming in on marketplaces:

stonewall, what jumped out at me was your building of markets while researching Computers.

HOLY HAPPINESS, BATMAN!!!

How can you even THINK of hospitals when you haven't built markets yet??!! Sure, the income boost helps, but it's the happiness that really kicks in.

Markets and AS MANY LUXURIES AS POSSIBLE... don;t forget, this is Civ3, The Happiness Game.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by dexters
The way I see it, a compact city placement is meant to maximize land usage in the early to mid game without waiting for cities to get hospitals. And You only really need to do that if space for expansion is limited and you need to get as much gold, production and research as possible to stay competitive against larger AI civs.

The entire length of time before the arrival of Hospitals is the most important part of the game. If you're playing to win, you do not plan to wait for Hospitals in order to get big impressive cities. Instead, you really are trying to get as much Gold, Production and Research as possible, in order to turn get an advantage and keep it.

The strategy then is to build up a compact and efficient core of cities, which suffers little from Corruption and maximises the use of land around the starting location (among other things, like making micromanagement more effective). This will translate into the tools necessary to either 1) expand into more land if it is available, 2) produce military units to conquer said land. The AI makes so little use of the land it gobbles up that your empire can be half as big as the leading civ's in terms of Land Area, yet you're clearly the dominant force. If this has never happened to you, I suggest you try tight (3-tile) placement, and let me know how your games go.

Otherwise, I see the strategy as a collosal waste of time and effort since expanding far and wide yield so much more. The extra luxuries you need to buy in the late game is inconsequential. In fact, if you expand quickly enough, you'll either capture extra luxuries or be in the position to take it by force. So the luxury saving argument doesn't work for me.

The Luxury argument is actually for your position (loose city-spacing), but unfortunately it does not hold water. As stated above, with tight spacing you'll be in better shape to acquire those Luxuries later on (either by trade, force or expansion). There is nothing preventing you from building a nice tight core, then spreading a little thinner outside of this in order to claim Resources and/or Luxuries.

I mean no offense to the guy who thought of the idea. But I'm skeptical.

Try tight-spacing, and your skepticism will go away, I promise.


Dominae


P.S: Marketplaces rule.