As I posted elsewhere, you can found a capital on a rivered forest square with access to rivered silk and then build a settler (even two) while the capital is at size one - without falling behind on early research.

You are invulnerable to barb attack until you found the second city and, while you are building the settlers, your exploring units can get themselves a long way from your solitary city thereby maximising the chance of non units from huts and, later, maximising the chance to occupy good choke points in time to pen in the AI.

When you manage two quick settlers the timing just rocks! The capital goes to size two and thereafter, being shield rich but relatively slow growing, it is ideal for building the first wonder or two. You can pretty well guarrantee the Gardens and then the slow growth keeps the city celebrating with hardly an ounce on micromanagement required. Add the Collosus and you have one hell of a trade arrow powerhouse! Meanwhile the two settlers found just as the capital goes to size two and your exponential expansion starts at two with (if you're a perfectionist) the non settler still busy improving the land.

Try a game set on wet and 5 million years old and you've a fair chance of finding the necessary terrain near the equator.

Specials make all the difference in the world. I try not to found a city that has less than two specials, and would definetly not found a city that had none.

I am currently playing a game in which a city has four specials in it's zone.....is it possible to get more than this?

Single production. Yes, you are likely to switch to work a grassland square for the turn or two it takes the settler to go off and found - so as to keep the capital growing towards size two. But as soon as the settler founds, and assuming you want to continue the shield/trade rich, slow capital growth approach, then you switch back to working the rivered silk again.

I'm at work and can't remember if there is any essential subtlety of timing involved when you get to make a second settler. From recollection there isn't. I think I've simply rushed the second settler when the food box has been one wheatsheaf short of being full, and then switched to working a grassland square to keep the two settlers supported until they found.

Yes, you could perfectly well build on the silk. As far as I can remember, my thinking has been that I would expect to deafforest the capital's home square at some stage and I usually like to keep the trade benefits of silk. But you might be happy to convert the silk, or be happy to leave the home square untouched. I should have mentioned that what started me down this path was a discussion of whether the defensive bonus for river and for forest are cumulative. The conclusion was that they are and I can confirm that matches my experience. So this tactic has extra merit for those who like all their cities to have good defences.

I did have one minor accident. In a fit of over exuberance in one game where I tried this out I let my initial warrior continue exploring and sent no-one back to defend the capital saying to myself that even the first settler would be sufficient defence, if needed, while no other city had been built. Of course I was forgetting the need for martial law when the capital goes to size two. So I went into disorder. I don't think, even then, that I lost a settler. But it took a while to bring a unit back to establish martial law which cost a chunk of the flying start. Also I realised that this gives up the chances (quite good maybe as it's happened in two separate games played this way) of capturing a barb chief. If you have built a road in the square next to the capital, after the barbs immolate themselves against your humble but invulnerable warrior, when the chief retreats he may well hit a two movement square whereupon the warrior sallies out on the road and picks him off. Once, the barb chief [i]elected[i/] to try to move into the two movement square - so they are no brighter than other A1 creatures.

No one answered my question: Is it possible, by rules of the game/map, to have more than 4 specials in a cities zone?

I don't mind imbalance; I go for total number of assets on the idea that I will gain from them in the long-run if not the short-term.. I'll do the managing to get what I need from them. The more total numbers I can get pay off eventually. And I have been enjoying building *ON* resources, lately.

I don't do too much terrain-changing, but I will certainly consider creating a river-silk square, etc, when I have a surplus of engineers.

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quote: Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola on 11-10-2000 03:20 PM . I have heard that is is posiible to have 5 specials at the Colunm 0 seam in the map becuase of an incomplete pattern.

I don't think this is possible. I've looked for it and did not find it. And never got any proof. It is some Loch Ness monster type of story.
See this thread for more informations : ../../Forum5/HTML/000542.html?21

But whales are still my favourite!

BTW, does anyone know what you get when you transform or reforest grassland w/shield?

quote: Originally posted by Bradiator on 11-12-2000 01:58 AMBTW, does anyone know what you get when you transform or reforest grassland w/shield?

Of course it has to be in a potential specialty location, but otherwise there is no way of knowing. It could be any of the two specials, or none.

I also think that if you are going to be a perfectionist, you should DEFINITELY have 4 specials in one city radius. This is how I lay out my cities (with a square grid, you can't do iso in ASCII)so that they don't overlap...(S=Special, R=Radius, C=City)

|Srr
|rrrrS
|rrCrr
|Srrrr
r|rrS|rrr
rr | rrrSr
rr | rrCrr
rr | rrrrr
r | rSr

...Or something like that!(Damn ASCII art :mad

I also like desert oil that's been irrigated and roaded. Pretty potent and it holds its own for food.

quote: Re: Using 4 specials If you use 4 specials in one city for long, you show foolish gluttony. Two, at the most, should suffice. You're giving away potential cities if you use all specials for one city. IMO.

I agree with this if you're playing on a smaller map where resources are not as plentiful. On a larger map, there is quite a good chance that you won't need to share the resources between cities....just go out and find another cluster of specials.....

quote: Originally posted by DaveV on 11-13-2000 10:38 AM Actually, Blaupanzer, my favorite secondary square next to a gold/iron city is ocean. Then your enemies can't starve your city by occupying your food squares.

This is a very important point!

quote: Another great thing about building a city on top of a trade square is that it adds an automatic road, for +1 trade. Instead of spending several turns of settler effort (or having to wait for bridge building if it's a river square), you get the road right now. In the case of several of the specials, you also pick up an extra food and/or shield.

Perhaps this has been discussed in great depth before I began perusing the halls of Apolyton, and perhaps it warrants its own thread. But I'm curious. Is it truly better to build on a special? I'm betting there're two camps of thought on this.

But otherwise I sometimes build on a special, sometimes not. Agree about gold but rarely get that lucky.

Like to build secondary cities on Buffalo - especialy ones that are miles from water. The automatic road/irrigation saves a lot of work.

The water point is well made. One thing I hate is when you found a city expecting to get the benefit of working a whale square only to find that there is an unsuspected AI city already using it. Pinching use of land specials off the AI is like taking candy off a baby but nothing can be done about a whale square short of taking the city - and even after that both cities can't (usually anyway) use it at once.

For some reason never tried founding on fruit. Have to give it a try. Although making good use of high food production is not my strong suit. I've got a current game going in which my capital is on a river with use of rivered pheasant and two wheat. I reckoned that I could use the capital as a settler factory but am not handling it well. (It's an interesting game though. I'm stuck in a corner of a water world and have met no-one for ever and a day. It's a specials rich map and by the pace at which the AI is building WoWs there are going to be some powerful civs out there when I finally get to meet them. I had to choose between Marco Polo's and Lighthouse as my only early wonder and went for Lighthouse. OK I'm getting behind in techs but I'm in charge of my research path and (SG you'll like this) - the SUPER IRONCLADS are gonna rule OK!)

quote: Originally posted by kcbob on 11-13-2000 10:58 AM Perhaps this has been discussed in great depth before I began perusing the halls of Apolyton, and perhaps it warrants its own thread. But I'm curious. Is it truly better to build on a special? I'm betting there're two camps of thought on this.

Well, as always, I think it depends. On ICS, you would gladly build cities on ressources to use them at their max, but if you're perfectionnist, you will try to build them in the middle of the 4 ressources pattern. Depends on the size you intend to get your city to. 2,3 or 46.