First of all, I’m going to need a lot of houses for 10,000 people. My plan is to build 9 housing blocks as follows:

Why 9 blocks instead of a few larger ones? Because for a 100% Culture Rating I’m going to need a lot of Entertainment, Religious and Education Facilities.

ENTERTAINMENT:

For each block the following table will show the number of Pavilions (Pav), Bandstands (Ban), Booths (Bth) and Senet Houses (SH) that I plan on building in each block. Also listed are the number of Dance Platforms (Dan), Music Stages (Mus) and Juggler Stages (Jug) that this will provide.

Will this be enough? Let’s check. The formula is Number of Venues * Capacity of Venue = Coverage (Maximum Population).

Senet Houses: 3 * 5000 = 15,000
Dance Platforms: 9 * 1200 = 10,800
Music Stages: 16 * 700 = 11,200
Juggler Stages: 27 * 400 = 10,800

For a population of 10,748 we are perfect.

For having a 100% entertainment rating in every venue, we will get a citywide bonus of 20 points (16 if you have Cleo installed). This means that only one Juggler needs to pass you houses in the Common Residence (w/o Cleo) and Spacious Homestead blocks to keep them from devolving. Also, the two Manor blocks and the Estate block will have 160 entertainment points with all of the venues working (and the bonus). Stately Manors only need 70 and Palatial Estates only need 90, so as long as you keep the Senet House furnished with beer (a requirement for both blocks) you can miss a few performances from the other venues and still be ok.

RELIGION:

Baki worships four of the five Gods in the game (one Patron and 3 Local).

While only one Temple is required in the Common Residence and Spacious Homestead blocks, I plan on placing 3 Temples in each of the nine blocks (for a total of 27). I will also build a Temple Complex to the Patron God, and 60 Shrines through out the city. (Shrines are great desirability buffers between the backs of worker housing and industries, so utilizing 60 of them will not be a waste.)

For the Patron God I will have 1 Temple Complex (Capacity=8,000) 3 Temples (C=375 each / 1,125 total) and 12 Shrines (C=150/1,800) for a total capacity of 10,925.

For each of the 3 Local Gods I will have 8 Temples (C=750/6,000) and 16 Shrines (C=300/4,800) for a total capacity of 10,800. Perfect again.

EDUCATION:

Each Palatial Estate, Stately Manor and Common Residence block will have 2 Libraries and 2 Scribe Schools. One Spacious Homestead block will have one of each, one will have only a Library and the other only a Scribe School. This will give me a total of 14 of each. Each Library has a capacity of 800, and 800 is also a safe number for Scribe Schools (which is actually based on the number of “children”, which I don’t think anyone knows how to calculate, with the ageing population an all). 14 * 800 = 11,200 (perfect).

A Spacious Homestead does not require a Scribe School or Library, so these don’t have to be supplied with Papyrus. Common Residences need one or the other. So long as one is getting a supply of Papyrus, you will be ok.

HEALTH CARE:

Health care is based on actually coverage, so each block will have a Physician, Dentist and Mortuary. This is just because one of my goals is 100% health care coverage.

PROSPERITY:

Prosperity is based on several things, but one thing is certain. Your Prosperity Rating cannot exceed the total prosperity level of your housing (which sets the Prosperity Cap). Nero Would covered how to check this in his post “Housing Data Table” so I won’t bore you with it here. Needless to say, if you are going for a high Prosperity Rating, you need to verify that the housing that you plan on building will support it. I did check, and the Prosperity Cap for the housing I plan on building is 431.

FINAL COMMENTS:

Why did I choose the blocks that I did?

The Palatial Estate block is for the Prosperity Rating (which I have more than enough of), but mainly because I love to build them. They are a challenge all in themselves. You could say that they are just another of my special Mission Goals.

The Stately Manor blocks are for the high population requirement, and for population control. If I have unemployment problems, then I will evolve them. If not, these blocks will probably stay at Fancy Residences. If this happens, I will upgrade the Common Residence blocks to make up for the population loss.

I stopped at Common Residence on 3 of the “worker” blocks because they don’t need a second food type and (especially) linen. I can’t grow flax in Baki, and imports are limited. It will take a lot of linen for all of the Mortuaries, and to keep the Manor and Estate blocks supplied. Also, these blocks have a lot of room to grow if I can’t evolve the Manors and need to increase my population.

I stopped the other 3 worker blocks at Spacious Homestead because they don’t need beer. Again, I can’t grow barley, and barley and beer imports are limited.

I expect the main challenge in this mission (according to the goals that I have set) will be created by the lack of raw materials (barley for beer, flax for linen and reeds for papyrus). It will take a long time (25 years just to import all the limestone needed for the monuments) to complete this mission, so the plan is to build slow and stockpile finished goods to be used in a big ratings rush near the end of the mission.

One last step required before I start the mission. I need to design the housing blocks that I just described. When I am done with them, I will post them here.

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 08-16-2001 @ 01:56 PM).]

If I'm not mistaken, senet house coverage (requiring beer) is required for palatial estates, even at Normal difficulty.

A question: did you decide that it was impossible to supply papyrus to all of the schools and libraries required for 100 Culture? We each have our personal "rules", and one of mine is to never have a school, library, mortuary, or senet house that I can't keep supplied.

A functioning Senet House is required for Stately Manors, Modest Estates and Palatial Estates at normal difficulty. I have already corrected the post. (Thanks for keeping an eye on me, I knew better.)

The papyrus shouldn’t be a problem. I plan to start stockpiling it as soon as possible in the mission. I can only buy 1500 reeds, but can import 7500 papyrus if things get tight.

I like your rule. I’m going to add it to my list (even though I think the requirement for Libraries and Scribe Schools is excessive in this game). To evolve my blocks in this city I only need 4 or 5 of each, but 14 are required for the Culture Rating.

Do you also require that all of your entertainment venues maintain steady performances? I haven’t been. (I think that the number of venues required is very, very excessive.)

Importing that much papyrus will be expensive, but you should have a lot of tax income.

Stately manors are possible at Hard difficulty without any senet houses (as in my Meidum, without Cleopatra). It appears that modest estates would be possible at Normal difficulty without being passed by senet players, as long as there was perfect city-wide coverage for all entertainment including senet houses.

120 is the maximum entertainment points, including city-wide bonus, without Cleopatra. There is no benefit to being passed by walkers from multiple venues of the same type.

Until recently, I was satisified (in both Caesar III and Pharaoh) if all entertainment venues had shows a significant fraction of the time. However, in my last few Caesar III cities (remakes of Lugdunum, Tarsus, and Lugdunum again), I made sure that all venues always had shows. It's possible that someday I'll try to do the same in Pharaoh, but maybe not (and I may drop the requirement in C3). After all, it's reasonable for a booth to close for a little while between juggling acts, but a senet house should never run out of beer!

Lovely post, almost take your breath away

However, pls. note with Cleo installed you are only able
to reach 70 in culture rating in Baki since no Zoo available.

No money worries in Baki after the city is up and running. (Money is always tight in the beginning of a mission.) You can mine gold and gems, sell jewelry and copper. I will hold off on the copper export until I have a good-sized standing army for troop requests. Gems, clay, bricks, pottery and sandstone are also possible exports. With all this and tax income too, I should be rolling in debens by missions end.

What I meant to say (should have said) is that “the two Manor blocks and the Estate block will have access to venues which could produce 160 entertainment points (with the bonus)”. With a Senet House (+40) and the bonus (+20) I will have 60 of the 90 required for Palatial Estates. If the dance platform (+30) is operating, then I will be ok even if there are no performers at the other venues. If one of the two music stages (+20) and one of the three juggler stages (+10) are operating, then I would still be ok, even without the dance platform. The point was, there is a large safety factor built into the block when it comes to entertainment.

Like papyrus, you can import 2500 flax and buy 6500 linen if the situation gets desperate. It’s really the beer that I’m worried about. I need a lot of beer for the housing and for the 3 Senet Houses. You can only import 4000 barley and buy 1500 beer. I haven’t crunched the numbers yet, but it’s going to be close (yes Nero Would, I do this too – just haven’t got to it yet). And like I said, I plan on stockpiling beer, linen and papyrus for the end of the mission, so my import costs shouldn't be that great.

Nimlot Persson,

Knowing the changes that Cleo makes to Pharaoh, I decided on a “dual install”. I have one game on my system that is just Pharaoh. I did a second install of Pharaoh (in a different directory) and installed Cleo on that one. I don't have to worry about this problem.

Thanks to all for your comments.

I have a (cruel) suggestion to nominate for the Brugle/VitruviusAIA list of ideal city conditions (many of which I share -- mine would probably consist of: all houses common res or better, no culture parks, all industry draws labor from blocks rather than isolated houses, all services supplied with necessary goods all the time)

...Namely, that a city be stable in hands-off running for a couple of years after it is completed.

[This message has been edited by JWorth (edited 12-05-2000).]

Excellent post and very entertaining reading. I'm one of those who just "wing it" but I'm looking forward to your future posts.

Would love to see the progression of your city in the downloads.

Good gaming,
Vriesea

I,m already on my third ring binder it just about says it all.

BTW after I used a near perfect match on your housing blocks, I've just posted my highest ever score. It may take a while but Rocky's getting there. Im playing the whole lot again...Pharaoh & Cleo on Normal, just finished Meidum, phew is there a longer scenario?

I may suggest something on the Competition forum about a monthly mission and a subsequent league table, problem is organisation & volunteers....If I can help i will
anybody care to comment?

You asked me earlier “did you decide that it was impossible to supply papyrus to all of the schools and libraries required for 100 Culture?” I speculated that with being able to import 1500 reeds and 7500 papyrus there shouldn’t be any problem, other than being able to afford it. I have since “crunched the numbers”, and here is what I discovered.

If I am able to execute the plan I have laid out, I will have 14 scribe schools in the city which consume 10 papyrus per month. There will be 14 libraries consuming 20 papyrus per month. This gives me a total of 420 per month, or 5040 per year. Plus, I will need an additional 7000 papyrus to place the libraries (14 @ 500 each). So the answer is “yes”, it can be done.

I also looked at beer and linen. Since consumption is calculated on a per-house bases (as opposed to population) it will be very important that all houses evolve as 2x2 structures. The following numbers are based on the assumption that I am able to do this, and I don’t see any reason that would prevent me from being able to do so.

Fully evolved as 2x2 structures, I would have 71 houses consuming 2 beer per month. There would also be 3 Senet Houses which will consume between 15 and 20 beer per month each. Total beer consumption would be between 187 and 202 per month, or 2244-2424 per year. I am able to import 2500 barley and 1500 beer.

There will be 26 houses consuming 2 linen per month, and 9 mortuaries consuming 20 per month (each). Monthly consumption of linen will be 232, or 2784 per year. Plus another 3200 linen will be required for burial goods. Imports available are 2500 flax and 6500 linen.

These numbers will only be required near the end of the mission, when all the housing has evolved to it highest planed stage, and all support structures are in place. Hopefully, this will happen right before my last pyramid nears completion, and all other requirements have been met. If I have calculated correctly, and if I maximize my exports and import all the goods necessary to maintain the city, my imports will exceed my exports by approximately 4000 debens per year. (This includes importing a few extra goods in addition to what would be required if distribution was “perfect” and every imported good was going directly to where it was required. We all know that that’s not going to happen.) This deficiency is compounded by the fact that I will have to import the second type of luxury good to evolve the estates. While this will not cost anything (setting import to zero), I will no longer be able to export jewelry at this time, and will have to go to exporting gems instead (which is much less profitable).

With gold mining and taxes, there will be no problem paying for all this. However, your prosperity rating is adversely affected when your imports exceed your exports. I expect that my prosperity will be so high at this point, that this will be of no consequence. Also, my plan is to import the maximum number of raw materials early in the mission, and stockpile the surplus finished goods for use when the time comes. Maybe this way, I can avoid the import exceeding export problem altogether.

A final comment: One other thing that I will have in my favor is that Path is worshiped in this city. I plan on keeping him very, very happy. I have not included blessings from Path in any of these calculations, although I am sure to receive them on a regular basis.

This weekend I plan on posting the housing blocks that I am planning on using. Then maybe I can start playing the game instead of just playing with it. I will admit that planning the mission is as much fun for me as the actual playing of it.

It sounds like you've worked it out, assuming that schools and libraries send out walkers once/month. With that assumption, it wouldn't be possible at Hard difficulty (where I play) without stockpiling.

Having a negative trade balance affects only the rate at which Prosperity rises, not the "cap". Unless you're trying to raise Prosperity very rapidly near the end, it shouldn't be a factor.

I know what you mean about playing with the game. I've been planning a try at Hammanat (from the Pharaolympics) for a month.

The road tiles in the inner loop do not require plazas (for desirability). The small statues may be replaced by gardens if you prefer their appearance.

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 12-11-2000).]

The road tiles in the inner loop do not require plazas (for desirability). The small statues may be replaced by gardens if you prefer their appearance.

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 12-11-2000).]

The road tiles in the inner loop do not require plazas (for desirability). The small statues may be replaced by gardens if you prefer their appearance.

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 12-11-2000).]

All road tiles in the inner loop require plazas (for desirability).

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 12-11-2000).]

All road tiles in the inner loop require plazas (for desirability).

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 12-11-2000).]

Note: The "back door" through the bandstand is for deliveries from gold mines to the City Palace. This layout is consistant with the city that I have planed for this mission.

All road tiles in the inner loop require plazas (for desirability).

[This message has been edited by VitruviusAIA (edited 12-11-2000).]