04-02-2001 10:10									#1
	City improvement build order? Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

I'm wondering, in a typical game, what you build first as a permanent city improvement? And is there a point where you always build a particular improvement, for example when a city reaches a certain size?

I'm wondering mostly about the marketplace/bank and library/university combinations. I think I read in an old thread here that libraries are only economical when the city is generating 6 beakers, and marketplaces when the city has 5 coins. And since then, I've sort of blindly followed that formula.

So for me, build order is usually units or caravans until I get to the 6 beaker point... then a library. Marketplace will follow usually. Temples are built somwhere in there, depending on the game level and the wonders I have. I usually try to get aqueducts built even if I have happiness problems, just because I hate to see growth stall. After that, it's pretty haphazard.

Any thoughts?


STYOM

	05-02-2001 01:04									#3
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

At deity, I rarely build any improvements for quite some time. I build units for defense and martial law, settlers to expand, and caravans to build wonders with. Only the capitol gets the super science city treatment with early library, temple, and marketplace. Other cities wait until I get Adam-smiths, and then they get mkt, harbor, library, etc.

	05-02-2001 10:03									#4
	Got spare money?

Temples are almost always the first City Improvement I build. Early in the game I focus on the production of settlers, founding cities, land improvement, caravans, and wonders. Eventually, however, population growth catches up with me and I start getting large levels of discontentment. If I built the Hanging Gardens I can keep City Improvement production on the racks for a bit longer.

My experience generally is that the opportunity cost of building City Improvements is too great early in the game...producation on other tasks (ie settlers and wonders) results in higher future benefits for a civ as a whole. In addition, technology is scattered early in the game and trading base techs with other civs early in the game (later is a different story IMO) is very beneficial without affecting the tech balance. Tech trading reduces the need for science-based improvements early in the game. As for production, small cities are usually operating at low capacity early in the game so the short-run benefit of a production-based wonder IMO is not that great.

At lower difficulty levels, I would consider building a granary (though I almost always have my capital building the Pyramids at levels below King), but at higher levels population growth breeds discontent and the high cost of granaries relative to their benefit in these cases leads me to not produce them at all. Once I begin the conquest stage of the game, I often zero in on the foreign city with the Pyramids to get the growth benefit they bring to an established civ.

P.S. I read posts here a lot for advice but have not posted here before...thanks to all here for helping out so much!

	05-02-2001 18:15									#5
	Remove this text

temple > marketplace > granary (I usually have pyramids, ...)

I always build these building first, then, it depends on the situation of the city...

	05-02-2001 19:16									#6
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

My 'ordinary' game often seem to go like this: I consentrate on early expanding with no improvements at all (except my capitol which is often a SSC too). I build an early HG and rush for Mike's and Bach's. When I'm getting close to demo (usually I'm in monarchy up then), I start building marketplaces + aqueducts to get ready for WLTxD growth. I don't build granaries except to my capitol. I also try to establish trade routes. Then I often need a temple to go up to size 12. Then of course sewer. I usually must rushbuy all those.

In coastal cities I build harbor followed by aqueduct as my first two improvements. The three arrows the ocean gives helps the city celebrate without other 'happiness' improvements, with help of wonders of course.

My empire really goes off like a rocket at this stage. Money is flowing in in increasing speed to help rushbuy all those improvements. I don't build libraries a lot, my SSC takes care of sciense

When a city has all the necessary improvements to keep WLTxD going I rushbuild settlers/engineers and add them to my newly found cities to get them to size 3 so that they start WLTxD-growing as well.

I usually set tax/sciense/luxury to 30-30-40 for celebration. After most of the cities have grown to the current max, I drop luxuries to 20%. After more roads/irrigations/improvements I start the cycle of WLTxD's again.

I have read a good advice somewhere here. The rule of thumb is that don't build other than 1-maintenance cost improvements until you have 3 trade routes! I've found this as a good advice
[This message has been edited by Marko_Polo (edited February 05, 2001).]

	05-02-2001 20:35									#7
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

STYOM (about Libraries anq MP)
You are right: someone wrote about 5 or 6 trade arrows, or beakers or gold coins being the limit (when it becomes reasonable to build MP or Library), but IMO that is NOT sound advice.
ST explains why it might be considered the limit: if your city produces 6 arrows, this means 2 gold coins + 4 beakers (tax rate 30% = taxmin under Monarchy). Then a Market Place gives you 1 more gold/turn, but it costs 1 gold/turn; hence building a MP in that situation costs 80 shields and gives nothing: not a very good bargain! (reread ST about Libraries: you get 2 beakers/turn for a cost of 1 gold/turn after an investment of 80 shields: not a very good bargain either).
Of course opportunity costs and long term effects also should be taken into account (as DQ stresses). To make it short, my advice would be: don't build a Library or a Market Place in a city producing less than 12 or 15 trade arrows (unless you are fairly sure that your city is going to grow quickly quite soon).

	08-02-2001 23:08									#8
	Remove this text

The problem, cher monsieur de La Fayette, is that you assume that the tax level, case A, is 30% (70% res.)
Consider now that the tax level, case B, is 40% (60% res.), if you make a small computation, you will see that for small cities - no improvements - there is no difference between A and B. (execpt 4 arrows. A: 1g-3b; B: 2g-2b ).

Now, starting with 7 arrows, the problem becomes interresting:
A: 2g.-5b.
B: 3g.-4b.

In case A, I will not build a MP nor a lib.
In case B, I could build a lib.., for a net 2g.-6b., better than case B.
and it is even more interresting with 8, 9, ... arrows

Now the question is how much does it cost me to build that lib?
A city producing 7 arrows in monarchy is - in my games - typically size 5, thus producing 5 shields. A lib is produced in only 16 turns, usually less because I pay...
It could be worth it, isn't it?

BTW, how big is your city producing 12 arrows? How do you maintain order - without MP - in such a city?
Surely not with HG only, and if you say with MC, then you have MC reaaaaaally early. Caravans? Then you have spend much time in producing them and moving them - more than 20 turns for sure.

	09-02-2001 02:37									#9
	Get a bigger avatar today!

Monsieur Dry,
je ne suis pas d'accord.
BTW, I thought this language had died yet
Latin too, of course.

quote: <font size=1>Originally posted by Dry on 02-08-2001 01:08 PM</font> A city producing 7 arrows in monarchy is - in my games - typically size 5, thus producing 5 shields. A lib is produced in only 16 turns,

I don't think that the time you need to build an improvement has any meaning. (Do you want to compare with 20 turns for caravan?? Caravan block off the production in your city 50/5=10 turns only, not 20)

You need to compare expense and profit only:
case B:
1. your proposition: to build the library
instant expense: 80-200 gold (1 shield is between 1 gold (sell improvement, disband unit) and 2.5 gold (incremental rushbuild))
expense/day:1 gold
profit/day: 2 beakers

2. to build caravan
I believe it is much better (La Fayette might send you some calculations, he is expert about caravans)

3. suppose you are at ocean(1 food+2 trade) and you cultivate it (it seems you go for beakers, since you want the library so much) and there is food surplus at least 1.
Even to let work one Einstein (3 beakers) instead of one ocean square and to build a granary is better solution than 1.
comparison with 1.:
instant profit: 20-50 gold (granary costs 60 shields only)
expense/day: no expense
profit/day: 1 beaker+food surplus (granary doubles food surplus) -1 food

quote: usually less because I pay...

Do you want to say you rushbuild the library? It clears "80-200 gold " a little. Gold will partly come near 160.
[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 08, 2001).]

	09-02-2001 15:57									#10
	Increase Your PM Length

SlowThinker: I think you misunderstood me (or me be I misunderstood La Fayette).
I was talking about an early game situation. I don't remember exactly the research tree, but I know that in my games I am able to build (complete) libraries before I discover Trade.
There is a time in the game where I really need to improve my research. I need:
trade (caravans), bridge building (2 arrows in rivers), monotheism (Mike's chap.), harbors, feudalism, ...
So, like many people I first thought that a maximum in research was the best solution, I am just asking myself if there is not another way.

The 20 turns for caravan I was talking about are: 10 turns to produce + minimum 10 turns to reach destination (I remember a caravan, sent in a wrong direction because at that time I did not discovered any other civ, wandering for 500 years before being destroyed by a barb... really expensive, right ?).

The question was not libraries or (exclusive) caravans, it was: maybe it is possible to have libs even before
being able to send caravans.
La Fayette wrote that he did not build any improvement before he produced 12-15 arrows. Besides the fact that I wondered how big such cities were, I did not agree with him and I explained why.
Those libs *are* expensive in a 3-7-0 situation, but maybe affordable in a 4-6-0 situation.

I am no library lover, but in some games I tried the 4-6-0 approach and it was not so bad... I have the feeling it is even better, but I need of course to improve this (new) gamestyle.

Now about granaries. I don't build granaries in the early turns, because - beside the fact that I don't need them at deity level and that they are expensive to maintain - they help me building the 80 shields improvements (MP, lib., court., aqua):
produce some shields, rush build a granary, switch immediatly back to original building and finish the production of the last 20 shield in a few turns. The maximum such building cost is 110 golds (less than a barb leader) in 6 turns.

	09-02-2001 16:57									#11
	Remove this text

The question is how bad you want it. Sometimes 2 more beacons means a faster key discovery (wonder, governement, so on) and you would be pinchy to count the 80 shields and uncredibly greedy to think about the 1/gold per turn. In my opinion, it is tougher to get the science you want, than money. Any money is good money ! Librairies are often useful very early and temples too. When you get trade, marketplaces are great too, for the caravans income. But as for anything else, it depends on the situation and your style of play.
A part ça, c'est sympa de voir plein de gens qui parlent français !

------------------
Oh Man, when will you understand that your greatness lies in your failure - Goethe

	10-02-2001 01:39									#13
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

Bonjour,

Ribannah,
Warning: in this thread, it is polite to include one french sentence.

(Actually, I am flaunting my language abilities: I want to highlight that not only my english is perfect )

quote: In general, I only build city improvements when I can rush-build them.

If you don't build improvements, what do you build? Settlers? I try to build settlers only in cities with granaries and in cities that reached size limit.
Or, (if I will express more generally) if decrease of number of citizen caused by a settler production
1. is welcomed (prospective growth of a city is impossible/inefficient/will be impossible in near future)
2. will be easily compensated (i. e. number of citizens will grow back fast: small cities, cities with a granary, cities with a large food production)

I suppose you can home the settler in the right city easily.

BTW, it is ideal to finish the production of a settler so that the food storage of diminished city will be almost full but not overfull. Hmm, I start to miss the topic.

quote: ...when I can rush-build them.

I would agree with following sentence: If I rushbuild, I rushbuild an improvement. (1 shield is cheaper than for a unit).
I don't understand why to agree with following sentence: If I don't rushbuild, I don't build an improvement.
Could you post any reason?

Julius Brenzaida,

quote: In my opinion, it is tougher to get the science you want, than money.

I agree. You may obtain beakers from trade only. You may obtain a gold from trade, shields, diplomacy, a plunder.
Gold is transmutable to other resources and back.

Dry,

quote: The 20 turns for caravan I was talking about are: 10 turns to produce + minimum 10 turns to reach destination

Second 10 turns aren't painful: they delay (thence decrease a little bit, I agree) the profit only, they don't block the city production. You cannot compare these 20 turns with 16 turns of building of a library.

quote: Those libs *are* expensive in a 3-7-0 situation, but maybe affordable in a 4-6-0 situation.

I still don't agree with you. I think that the example "3." attests that
if you want to augment beaker production in 4-6-0 situation then it is better to use scientists.
Could you comment my comparison between 1. and 3. in my last post?

BTW, I constructed the example 3. since I wanted to find ANY example that is comparable and works better than a library for a 7-gold situation. I didn't want to say you should replace libraries by granaries in civ games : I needed to compensate a loss of one food that occured when I substituted one ocean square by Einstein.

quote: I don't build granaries in the early turns, because - beside the fact that I don't need them at deity level...

In my opinion, it is painful to build a settler in a non-granary city. See my answer to Ribannah.

quote: produce some shields, rush build a granary, switch immediatly back to original building and finish the production of the last 20 shield in a few turns.

I agree. If you want to accelerate the production it is preferable not to rush build the end of the production (since you would lose the last turn production).

[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 09, 2001).]

	11-02-2001 20:36									#14
	Get a bigger avatar today!

SlowThinker,

quote: <font size=1>Originally posted by SlowThinker on 02-09-2001 03:39 PM</font> I try to build settlers ... ... if decrease of number of citizen caused by a settler production 1. is welcomed (prospective growth of a city is impossible/inefficient/will be impossible in near future) 2. will be easily compensated (i. e. number of citizens will grow back fast: small cities, cities with a granary, cities with a large food production)

	12-02-2001 10:19									#15
	Full PM-box? Change here!

I start with a temple, followed by barracks and city walls if it's a border city.. if it's not, city walls are not on the list... after those most important buildings, I construct courthouse (unless democracy or nearby capital in republic), library, market place... the rest really depends on the situation, mostly aqueduct as the next though!

	16-02-2001 00:19									#21
	Put an end to popups!

Ribannah,
That city produces 7 trades.

	16-02-2001 04:38									#22
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

And you ARE able to employ scientists?
That's what you get if you don't keep your NONE Settlers around.



------------------
If you have no feet, don't walk on fire

	16-02-2001 05:38									#23
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

BTW, LOL
I learn quickly.

(BTW, don't laugh too loudly ( ). It doesn't suit you.)

1. I thought I taught you basics of logical thinking a little. Read my posts and think about them more thoroughly. (Notice it is nicer not to open a mouth so much)
I compared utilization of scientist with building of library. I didn't declare that the scientist is the best solution, I declared that it is better than library. It means there exist some better solution than a library: It means library is not a good solution. It is what I wanted to demonstrate.

2. It may be very useful to employ a scientist in a city with ANY trade production if it accelerate research of monarchy for example.

	17-02-2001 19:36									#24
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

I usually build a marketplace first, then library, etc. I do build quite a lot of settlers in between. Pyramids are always a priority, so I never build granaries.
I am not a very good player, though, so don't use my strategy if you want to be successful.

	17-02-2001 19:37									#25
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Hmm, my previous (identical) post regarding this matter seems to have dissapeared.

	17-02-2001 21:03									#27
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

Roman,
See my reasons against a marketplace and a library in this thread.
Science is usually set higher than taxes: I would prefer library then.

Ribannah,
What are tricks to overtake size 5?

[This message has been edited by SlowThinker (edited February 17, 2001).]

	20-02-2001 10:05									#28
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Excusez-moi, mes bons amis.
I was away from Apolyton last week (training period in Paris ).
Luckily ST was on topic and posted results close to mine.
Thank you ST!
I post a more detailed reply to morrow though.