I was hoping to collect some general opinions about settlers preferred in the current patch from people.



Generally I pump out settlers t1-40 but sometimes I'll see a juicy triple indie spot or the only source of mithril and I'll end up getting one later than that.



The issue is, I feel after a certain while, you really aren't going to do be doing much with the later cities, even those that come with three villages. The extra influence cost is quite painful and salting every 20 turns just makes the city a gold/influence generator for me at the cost of expansion disproval to my other cities. This is compounded by the fact that, in single player, it really seems the best "settler" after turn 40 is just an expedition attack force since you're taking more established cities and directly weakening the AI.



While there seems to be no single correct answer as obviously outliers like Broken Lord/Cultist play on extremes, I was wondering how many settlers other players prefer?



What are factors that you look for in establishing a new city post t20? post t40? post t60? etc. (assuming normal speed) (fast is fine as long as clarified)

Assuming you are not playing for early military, Cult, a weird custom, or something else changes the general flow.... Values given are for normal speed. Related; One factor I think a lot of people miss is that; Slower Game Speed = More Exploration per Era = More RNG.



Turns 1-20: 1-3 Settlers



- Sometimes a start will enable going 3-4 settlers and giving up on a policy because resettling costs more then a policy gains

- Sometimes you have a 2nd city that can produce a settler by 19....

- Village quests, more then any other factor, can make wide viable



Turns 21-40: 1-3 Settlers



- I almost never go more then 5-6 total cities, even playing wide



Turns 41-60: 0 Settlers



- Influence and Approval are usually scarce and important in this period

- Undeveloped Cities = Net Liabilities

- Military Aggression has good returns during this period...



Turns 61-End: 0-? Settlers



- Almost always for islands or coastal provinces I managed to "pocket" (water buildings are cheap and powerful)

- Dust Economy, more likely, as you can efficiently jump start new cities by 60+ era

- Production Economy, you can use stockpiles, but usually not viable until 80+ era

- Often I leave new cities on pure food until they hit 6 or so (buying all T1 + a granary helps a lot)



When you take a city: it takes X turns to become useful (rebellion), Y investment in D/P (rebuilding/building), Z cost in military investment, and Q cost in approval across your empire.



When you buy a city: it costs X turns to hit real pop, Y investment in D/P (building), and Q cost in approval across your empire.



Comparing the two is ... well, situational. Somewhere behind the curtain is a ROI calculation that usually you do subconsciously, but you can go nuts if you want and do it the long way. The deciding factor is often that when you take a city, someone else loses a city. Just keep in mind the hidden resource - Micro Time

Thanks! As always I find your analysis on point. Generally I have been doing wide first start with two settlers start (aim to completely two around t20) and two more (post 20-40) for five cities as my openings. Usually I find one more city because I get temped by a triple village or a clustered anomaly post 40 but that's almost solely dependent on whether I win the luxury booster or not. I'm starting to think I'm perhaps not picky enough with my initial few cities and get tempted easily by pacified village quests etc early on to give me some free workers for my initial cities.

Personally, I don´t think going economic wide is very effective, as in building many cities instead of conquering them. Considering fast speed, the only scenario I go for 2 early settlers around turn 10 is when my capital lacks both strategic resources and I have found them in regions around me.



If I have one of the strategics I´ll settle one city on Turn 10 looking for the other one, if I have both I´ll settle one city on turn 10 for a good relation of Minors´ availability/usefulness.



After that I´ll only produce settlers outside my capital. One for turn 20 if there´s a very good spot or if I need a certain terrain type. One or two around 30-40 in the cases I lack T3 strategics. One or two around turn 50-60 in case I lack T5 strats. But all of these last ones are considering I don´t plan on invading people; if you do, the chances you´ll be getting the things you lack are pretty high.

I keep changing my mind



I like to expand to a total of 3 cities ASAP. On or before fast turn 20. Usually, the faster you pump these out, the better.



Then I don't usually revisit expansion until approaching T3, due to the Market Alchemist strat deed. If it's the version where you need an extractor of each strat, I like to have settlers ready to go for this, sending them to settle on top of whatever extractors I'm going to need.



Whether I keep these settlements or not just depends. The strats are nice, but I'd rather have focused cities than more spread out production, because...



In T4, I might just salt the earth with a few. If I'm not at war yet, I will be soon, and the Mil4 empire plan is top priority. I can do this with 3 cities if I'm careful, but not usually with more, and sometimes I forget to think about it. Of course these salted cities are resettled on whatever extractors are around, but they're basically chaff at this point, not worth redeveloping.



It depends on faction though. Sometimes I need a 4th city with AM to advance the quest. WW don't have much influence problems thanks to their (ridiculously awesome) Visions of Glory, and their wonder is so easily achieved that I'll probably send out some T4 settlers to sit on deposits. Drakken can stay at a single city for a while to maximize megapole + museum odds, using advanced diarchy for an early sci 2 plan but suffering in science when they do so. Necrophage can get a lot of mileage out of an early combat settler for militia farming purposes. And of course Cultists.

Expansion demand will generally vary depending on your faction, the map, your neighbors and your strategy.



However, Copperwire said it pretty well. I tend to go for three cities almost immediately (before turn 20 if possible). I will potentially make another city or two (in extreme cases) if I find myself needing a luxury or strategic resource in more abundance than I have it and it's in a nearby region, but building cities after turn 20 sets them back pretty strongly. If I really need more cities, I usually just conquer them.

Avilyss wrote:
Expansion demand will generally vary depending on your faction, the map, your neighbors and your strategy.



However, Copperwire said it pretty well. I tend to go for three cities almost immediately (before turn 20 if possible). I will potentially make another city or two (in extreme cases) if I find myself needing a luxury or strategic resource in more abundance than I have it and it's in a nearby region, but building cities after turn 20 sets them back pretty strongly. If I really need more cities, I usually just conquer them.

I hear a lot of people say immediately after turn 20 to reduce your first Empire Plan costs. But has anyone actually crunched numbers as to whether the hit on the first Empire Plan costs is worth an early 2nd city? I don't know if this is even remotely calculable, but I'd like to see if people are doing the 2nd city before turn 20 based on game "feel" or intuition - or whether they've done some sort of rough calculations.

Xenophon wrote:
But has anyone actually crunched numbers as to whether the hit on the first Empire Plan costs is worth an early 2nd city? I don't know if this is even remotely calculable, but I'd like to see if people are doing the 2nd city before turn 20 based on game "feel" or intuition - or whether they've done some sort of rough calculations.

To leave it settled is not worth it.



Endless Legend allows you to keep (or, actually, lower) the costs of empire plan and luxuries if you salt the city - which I think it´s lame and nonsensical, but it´s there, it´s a mechanic, what can we do? - so depending on what the tiles will give you, or if you can settle directly on top of some resource, then yes it´s worth it to settle and salt sometimes.

You have to keep in mind exactly what the value of the first empire plan is. For me, the two to consider are +20% science and -20% unit cost reduction (or whatever it is). But of course unit cost reduction isn't worth it unless you're going to build some units, and I usually am not. With science, you're looking at maybe 120 science, deduct the influence and you're probably at 80 science gain. That's better than the food and industry you'll waste with a settlement created at fast turn 9, but it is science, less important than industry at this stage of the game, and as you settle earlier, you're wasting more and more turns worth of food and industry. For sure, if you're not going to use a plan, there's no reason to salt, and that first plan is very much optional.



If you figure that an extra city costs 10 Influence, that's basically 20FI (2 influence per-pop, 4FI per-pop). If you're wasting less than 20 food + industry by salting the earth, do it. Otherwise, even if you need your plan, try to make extra influence instead.



Complicated by what else you can do by salting: trigger a boost, move to a better location. And the main reason I end up not salting is to prevent failing a snark and awe quest.



I wouldn't at all mind seeing settlers included in luxury and boost costs, personally.