Unimportant Food
Printed From: Illyriad
Category: Strategies, Guides & Help
Forum Name: General Questions
Forum Description: If your gameplay question isn't answered in the help files, please post it here.
URL: http://forum.illyriad.co.uk/forum_posts.asp?TID=6043
Printed Date: 17 Apr 2022 at 18:28
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Topic: Unimportant Food
Posted By: Dragonwort
Subject: Unimportant Food
Date Posted: 24 Dec 2014 at 12:51
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I have another military question (it never ends...lol..) I have skimmed through most of the general questions within the last 2 years and can find nothing on the 5/5/5/5/5 military city. I was once told in GC that the thread "Why a 7 food city is so important" is obsolete and that statement was not opinion but fact and provable. While I may be highly opinionated, I do try to keep an open mind and those opinions are subject to change with new information. My experience (limited) has shown that military size is dependent on gold production which is dependent on the tax rate of the buildings(pop) which is dependent on food. IF there is a better way, I'd love to see it. Maybe it's about sovereignty and troop rebuilding times; and of course you can drive any resource, gold included, into the red if you resupply from another city. There are no limits if you are willing to do that. I'm not, at least not during peace with no tournaments under way. And so......will one of the players familiar with the 5/5/5/5/5 military city explain how it works? Better yet; create a help topic on the matter. If one exists, please point me in that direction..Many Thanks  Dragonwort------------- Just another wrench in the works.. |
Replies:
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 24 Dec 2014 at 14:38
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I will take a crack at it. When you choose a 7 food plot, it makes the final city size 40% bigger. But you usually have a 3 plot of another basic resource. Troop sov consumes all basic resources evenly, so eventually that 3 plot limits the final sov the city can support without going negative in that resource. A 5/5/5/5/5 plot gives equal amounts of all basics, and removes that limitation, allowing for considerably more production sov to be claimed. Since the city is 40% smaller, the gold production is 40% smaller, too, and the final army size would be smaller. But your replacement speed would be very fast, up to 5/3 faster. It is an interesting theory, but probably not very useful in practice. You will likely never hit 10 cities using 5 food towns. Also, some buildings like infantry quarters consume basics, which would cut into basics for sov. Finally, you probably wouldn't be able to use all the main production buildings, which would limit your items (but I haven't run the math on that). I think it would be easier to just buy or ship in basics, and run negative on the 3 plot resource during tournaments. |
Posted By: Dragonwort
Date Posted: 24 Dec 2014 at 15:24
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OK, I think I get the theory... It's all about troop rebuilding speeds; being willing to trade 40% less troops (in the case of tier one spearmen) for a much faster rebuild time and no tenth city.. I suppose this might be a viable alternative for a mercenary alliance who is constantly losing and rebuilding troops or during a war or tournament. I would think the best option for many players would be something between the 2 extremes of 5/3 faster build times and unmodified build times....one I have seen employed is the 5/5/5/3/7 city. I'm guessing the idea that once the city buildings and wall are leveled up to max, the least necessary resource is stone. If somebody successfully blockades you and starts tearing down your wall; you'd be in a world of hurt though..  ..I have 7 food cities for clearing and sieging abandoneds and have been able to achieve decent rebuild times...of course, it would not be fast enough for a tournament; but this is an interesting theory and might be fun to experiment with variations of it. Thanks for the info Brandmeister UPDATE: Again thanks Brandmeister for clarifying the 5/5/5/3/7 city purpose and function
------------- Just another wrench in the works.. |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 24 Dec 2014 at 16:18
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The 7 food cities to which I referred were the typical 5/5/5/3/7. That configuration probably represents 80% of Elgea, minimum. Most such cities will have +150% to +200% troop sov when they are building troops for a tournament. Some players temporarily drive that higher by going negative in research points, or cutting taxes and suffering a large gold deficit, or both. The "least necessary resource" for choosing the 3 is whatever resource your military buildings don't use. Infantry quarters use stone and iron, so it would be a 3 wood or 3 clay city. Cavalry parade grounds use wood and clay, so they would be a 3 iron or 3 stone city. I don't know what's inside a 5/5/5/5/5 city. You'd have to ask someone who uses them (if anyone). I would be curious if they have military or diplomacy buildings inside, as those would ruin the symmetry of the 5 resource plots. |
Posted By: Solanar
Date Posted: 11 Jan 2015 at 19:48
| In regards to the "Likely never hit 10 cities" thing, what about once you already have 10 cities? I'm apt to relocate everything in the near future. When I'm looking at places to move to, I find myself less concerned about 7 food than city placement. I suppose it's possible to terraform the spots, but in all honesty, it feels like perhaps the effort is more than the results will be worth. A focused city can accomplish a lot without needing every possible plot at level 20, and moreso when your other 9 cities are nearby and can compensate for deficiencies. I haven't done the math, but I find myself pretty comfortable with the idea of cities either of 7 food, the 5/5/5/5/5 variety, or something in between. |
Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 11 Jan 2015 at 20:30
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Even after you have 10 cities, a 7-food city will allow you to run a higher tax rate to maintain a larger army. So again the major consideration is whether you are going to maintain a large army in the long term or consistently be losing troops and wanting to replace them fast. The basic tradeoff is between ability to maintain large forces or replace lost troops. Since there tend to be large gaps between tournaments and wars, many people tend to build for the ability to maintain large armies rather than replace them quickly. What I've seen in practice is that many times in a war or tournament players will change sovereignty flexibly: food sov when armies are big and need tax support, military sov (paid for by lowering taxes and increasing resource production) when armies have been depleted. With this flexible approach, the advantages of a 5/5/5/5/5 city in terms of being able to support additional military sovereignty are not as noticeable. I haven't tried it myself, but I would imagine that for a 5-food city with an emphasis on quick troop replacements, the presence of military sov bonuses could become a significant additional factor in terms of city placement.
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Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 11 Jan 2015 at 20:51
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I would like to point out that with multiple cities, you don't have to make them all the same. It is entirely possible to mix some 7 food cities for larger peacetime armies, with these theoretical production-focused cities for rapid troop replacement. Solanar, a middle ground might look like a forest tile favored by elves: 6 wood, 4 clay, 5 iron, 5 stone, 5 food. That raises the 3 resource bottleneck to 4 (a 33% gain). It also allows for at least 1 archer's field. Forests tend to have lots of +2% ranged sov or +2% spear sov in large clusters. Presumably you could find a hill with 6 clay, 5 iron for a spear city there. Or just go all 5's. Maybe a 6 food tile is a balance between the two approaches, assuming there is at least 4 of every resource. |
Posted By: Tamaeon
Date Posted: 11 Jan 2015 at 21:57
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5 equal offers by far the most flexibility. The choice ultimately comes down to the troop upkeep reduction buildings. There is one for each type of unit in the game. These buildings consume 2 resources in addition to food. Main resource consumption: 2700/h Secondary resource consumption: 1100/h Taken from: http://arcanum-illyria.com/wiki/Building_Charts#Lodging" rel="nofollow - http://arcanum-illyria.com/wiki/Building_Charts#Lodging As Rill pointed out; generally players will lower taxes and increase military sovereignty when their armies have been depleted; then gradually switch military sovereignty for food sovereignty, as their armies grow in numbers. The reason for this is that military sovereignty requires basic resources (in addition to gold and RP) for upkeep. In contrast, basic resource sovereignty (including food) only requires RP and gold. Military upkeep reduction buildings can reduce total gold upkeep by up to 52.5%, which ultimately makes them the most important factor in deciding what kind of troops to build in each city. The sovereignty plots around a city should be the very last thing to consider when choosing what kind of troops to build. ------------- "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned." |
Posted By: KillerPoodle
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 04:01
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I looked at 6 food squares pretty seriously towards the end of the war. 5 food is really restrictive in terms of buildings that I felt I really wanted to have at a high level etc. The issue was that as far as I remember finding 6 food in the distribution that is useful is pretty hard. ------------- "This is a bad idea and we shouldn't do it." - endorsement by HM "a little name-calling is a positive thing." - Rill |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 06:27
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Tamaeon, if you are building a 5 food city to maximize sov structures, why would troop sov be the last thing you consider? When you use the 5 food approach, do you still use infantry quarters and other upkeep discount buildings? Doesn't having 2 or 3 really cut into the possible sov? What tax rate do you set? I had been assuming 0% or otherwise very low. |
Posted By: Tamaeon
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 07:26
Troop sovereignty should be the last thing on the checklist because troop production will almost always be ad hoc. In a war situation for example, you'll find that troop production will be adapted to meet the needs of the moment. If you're fighting an adversary on mountains you'll find cavalry and infantry units to be pretty useless. And thus, terrain becomes the main consideration. The main advantage of 5 food cities is that it allows for maximum flexibility, as a player will be able to produce any kind of unit at 250%+ rates if needed. The main drawback, the maximum city size of around 10k to 14k when producing troops at full potential. As for troop sov; it becomes less important when you consider that actual troop production will depend on the needs of the moment. A 2% production bonus p/level becomes negligible if you have to defend a forest square with archers. ------------- "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned." |
Brandmeister wrote:Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 13:06
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Okay, if you might switch army types multiple times, then I guess the discount buildings are irrelevant. And if you are quoting 14k as the 5 food city size, that is 25% taxes (100% resource production). I am interested enough to try the technique. I have wanted to rebuild Ritterrustung Platz for quite some time, as the 2 iron and 2 stone have severely limited the sov there. Perhaps I will have it Terraformed to a 5/5/5/5/5 distribution, so I can see this approach firsthand. |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 13:31
| Another question: does this approach use a Chancery of Estates, since most sov will be level 2 or 3? |
Posted By: Albatross
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 16:29
I did some cursory calculation a couple of years ago. Although I don't have the calculations to present as evidence here now, I can outline my conclusions:
Summary points:
If you take all the above into account when settling your new military town, you'll likely get the best result. Example: http://elgea.illyriad.co.uk/#/World/Map/-173/229/6" rel="nofollow - http://elgea.illyriad.co.uk/#/World/Map/-173/229/6 Your mileage will differ. I'd be interested to see if anyone else runs deficits (and supply from elsewhere) in order to specialize effectively.
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Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 17:46
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I am aware of people subsidizing during tournaments. If the 3-plot is the limiting factor, then isn't a 4-plot 33% better? If you picked up a city square with a 6 in the major discount building resource, wouldn't that enable you to build 1-2 cost reducers without much sacrifice? How do you subsidize between cities? If the 3-plot is deeply negative, doesn't that mean that the other resource plots are producing close to 0 because you are maximizing sov? |
Posted By: Tamaeon
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 18:06
Warning: watch out when building the chancery of estates, that building only lowers the cost of sov level 1! ------------- "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned." |
Posted By: Tamaeon
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 18:36
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@Albatross Spot on, no additional comment needed. Disagree with 3, 4 You don't need to build a town on a 7 food plot to afford 3 upkeep discount buildings. I would advise against building four military discount buildings unless you intend to accumulate very large sums of troops (100k+) in a city. Reason being that the effective savings provided by each subsequent upkeep discount building is reduced by 50%; so the actual discounts will translate to...
That extra 3.75% discount would only be justified in cases of an extremely high gold upkeep. To put this into perspective... you'd be saving a mere 3750 gold p/hour on a total upkeep cost of 100k gold p/hour. Which is the approximate upkeep cost of a 50k T2 cavalry army. Strongly disagree with 5 As said above... WARNING: the Chancery of Estates only provides discounts to level 1 sovs. Any higher and it will be burning your resources for nothing. Only build this if you're in some kind of sov battle far away, or plan to claim more than 20 lvl 1 sov squares. It makes no sense to claim 50x lvl1 sov for military production, so the chancery is a definitive no-no for military cities. I remember vaguely that Anjire did an experiment claiming 50 squares... there should be info and screenshots somewhere on the forums. ------------- "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned." |
Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 19:21
| Since you can only build 20 sov buildings, it's useless for production purposes to claim more than 20 sov squares. There might be other reasons to do so, such as preventing settlement. (Or, as Anjire did, just for the fun of it.) |
Posted By: Anjire
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 19:26
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I did extensive experimentation with regards to the Chancery including claiming the max # of sovs for one city and a total of 500 sovereign squares overall just to do it. My final conclusion was: books were always the better option to buy and convert up to a price of ~2000 gold before the Chancery would be a worthwhile investment. Additionally, my city configurations (7 food w/various 3 resource)per Albatross' suggestion allowed for the following troop level support during non-war time only running negatives in research and with ~250% troop recruitment bonus depending on how lazy/motivated I was. t2 spear city 108K t1 bow city 108K t2 sword city 72K t2 cavalry city 54K At the start of the war, I believe only one city was actually at full troop levels with the rest between 60-80%. I had min/maxed it further to allow 84K swords to be supported with only a negative in research using 4 military discount buildings. This was my capital so it had the +10% to food production discovery. I had 10 cities with 9 dedicated to full military and the 10th running Nature's bounty giving 22% bonus food to all cities and 5 other alliance member cities. This 10th city was still able to maintain a troop level = to at least 1/2 of the above stats. There are many pro's and con's to such a set up that I won't go into at this time. This fit my play style and if I were ever to play again under the current rule set I would run a similar build. Mind you, I would also make sure to Exodus 7 foods on top of mountain squares for the added defensive bonus bet you can also guess which race I would choose. ~Anjire ------------- http://elgea.illyriad.co.uk/a/p/26125" rel="nofollow">  |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 19:31
| I have never built a Chancery of Estates, that's why I asked. My bottleneck is never the gold and research point cost of extra sov. It's the basic resources consumed per hour. It didn't seem worth cutting a small part of the gold and RP cost on half of my sov (I use twenty sov 2 during building phases, and CoE only modifies the first level), at the expense of basics. |
Posted By: Tamaeon
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 19:55
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+1 to @Rill and @Anjire. What tax rate are you running @Brandmeister? ------------- "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned." |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 20:20
| I run 65% in most tournament-ready cities. 50% right now, as I am changing some city layouts and needed the resources. |
Posted By: Tamaeon
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 20:57
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@Brandmeister There you go. If you lower your tax rate to 35% you should be able to claim some lvl3 sovereignty. Of course this should only be done while you build up your armies. Once you reach your target army size, you can then switch all sovs to food and increase your taxes to around 75%. That's how most of us manage very large armies. ------------- "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned." |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 21:19
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Right, but that's the standard approach to kick above 200%. Basically what Albatross described. I wanted to know more about this 5/5/5/5/5 thing for extra speed. You guys were very helpful with the details. If I did it for troops, I still think that I would do a 6/4 with 1-2 discount buildings, and lots of sov bonuses for one unit type. Otherwise the gold per hour would get intense, even for a tournament. No doubt I will learn a lot when I try this technique in Kul Tar. The results should be impressive, as the entire city is surrounded by solid +3% sov. If I could get that all to 50-60 sov levels, it would be +400% to +480%. |
Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 21:24
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The most common 6/4/5/5/5 squares are low clay or low wood, which would be undesirable for elves and humans (for cav and bows). Are there tiles that have 6 food and 4 stone or 4 iron?
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Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 21:52
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Why would a 6 wood 5 iron 4 clay be undesirable for a bow city? That's the correct distribution for Archer Fields, and typically a forest tile embedded in lots of +2% ranged unit sov. Am I missing something? |
Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2015 at 22:12
| I was referring to the low wood squares being undesirable for bows. |
Posted By: Albatross
Date Posted: 13 Jan 2015 at 02:37
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Thanks all for comments. My point 5 is only really of use if you have pressure on your Clay resource; sorry not to have pointed that out. And yes, needing four military discount buildings (point 4) is rare, but there is sometimes a case for it. When generating military units, I agree that Chancery buildings are not so useful: I usually have L5 Sov at Radius 1 for basic resources, and L2 or L3 Sov for military unit generation for the remainder of the 20 available sovereignty buildings. That's distribution gives the weakest benefit of the Chancery, which is best when making more distant or distributed L1 or L2 claims - there are times I've used that, but it's a fairly outspoken strategy, and atypical of most players' needs. That cost for Books (given by Anjire) is a good statistic; I never got around to running the numbers on that. I guess I should now sell some Books at Centrum, given that Chanceries have been declared useless for military cities :op ------------- |
Posted By: Leinad__
Date Posted: 18 Jan 2015 at 13:48
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I don't see how chancery can be considered totally useless for military cities; if you have, for example, an elven city close to a large forest with tons of 2% ranged prod bonuses than you can sov 1 every of them payin a few gold/res per hour and having that bonus you could not claim otherwise. let's take my only spear city (i m elf!) #/World/Map/-584/-2600 as you can see there is a lot of Wooden Glades(2%spear bonus) at a few squares from. I m building a chancery of estate there because i considered 10+ squares of that type are present at a reasonable distance from me. Now, reading this thread i see you all consider the chancery useless so can you guys tell me if in your opinion would be worth to have one there? it would cost me way more gold and res p/h without it.....while having it i would get of course all those juicy-too far 2% bonuses!
------------- https://elgea.illyriad.co.uk/a/p/258061" rel="nofollow"> 
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Posted By: Anjire
Date Posted: 18 Jan 2015 at 14:33
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While a city can claim up to 150 sov squares around them it can only glean the bonus from 20 of the squares. The Chancery only gives you a discount on the first level of sov claim but it also eats up valuable basic resources that you will be using for military support buildings and min/maxing recruitment speed. For a military city you should be claiming at least level II on the nearest 20 squares for greatest efficiency with level III claimed on as many extra squares as research/resources permit and you are comfortable with in regards to negative values. I think JimJams has a link on his profile to a spreadsheet that allows you to play around with the various city parameters. I am sure there are a number of other like documents that are floating around and would probably be a good idea for the new players to become familiar the ins and outs. Feel free to create an account on the http://www.diggik.com/forum/" rel="nofollow - Harmless Diggik forum if you wish a more detailed walk through ehrtr I can be more free to post various IGM's that I've saved and collaborations documents between players since I don't have an active game account. ------------- http://elgea.illyriad.co.uk/a/p/26125" rel="nofollow"> |
Posted By: Anjire
Date Posted: 21 Jan 2015 at 14:18
To expand on this - a 7 food city composition also allows you to have more maxed out equipment production buildings (spears, swords, plate, saddles...) through out your empire so that you are more self-reliant. Mind you, if you also have 2 permasat accounts you can use those to fund your military enterprise and thus the 5 food city becomes more feasible. ------------- http://elgea.illyriad.co.uk/a/p/26125" rel="nofollow"> |
Posted By: Brandmeister
Date Posted: 21 Jan 2015 at 15:03
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That's an interesting point. If you have several accounts feeding you gold and resources, then a 5 food account could be a real tournament or battle monster. Or really, the reverse. Your 5 food accounts could build items like crazy. Although it seems more popular to farm gold and just buy stuff. |
Posted By: Baron Harkonnen
Date Posted: 22 Jan 2015 at 21:08
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In elgea there are 29K+ squares with 6 Food & 4 Stone, and 35k+ squares with 6 Food and 4 Iron |