Available for your amusement and amazement, just in case you thought you'd tried everything, is Machiavellian MarvL. The block fully develops at Very Hard, and the article contains various hints including the use of a Military Gauntlet, rather than Gatehouses.

The block is designed to snuggle up against the edge of the map, as indicated by the red squares. Consequently, it can be jammed into areas that other designs couldn't even consider.

Aggressive placement of the Administrative City, the Emissaries are forced to use the servant's entrance for a travel distance of ONE tile, is one charactistic of the design.

The other interesting feature is the two Elite Houses that are located between the Palace and the Common Housing loop. By importing two units of Silk and two units of Ceramics, I can get two Lavish Siheyuans on the cheap, well before you would normally see Elite Houses, with the consequent military advantages.

If you wish, you can also download the Excel Spreadsheet that I've developed for documenting my designs. It uses macros to provide backgrounds with both colors and patterning (for black and white printing) for each building category.

[This message has been edited by MarvL (edited 10-27-2002 @ 11:18 AM).]

Thought I'd share this block with you all. I like to build large housing blocks, but I've been a little frustrated that when it gets to the higher levels of common housing, it seems that one food vendor wasn't enough. If you use a common market place, you have to use 2 vendors to keep a block feed. This bugged me, since it didn't leave any room for the tea vendor. The following block was my attempt at an aesthetically pleasing solution. I ran it on Normal difficulty for 10 years with luxurious apartment housing level and it was stable. There are 46 houses with a population of 3404. Inspector, watch and well will all upgrade with the buildings placed as shown. The Buddhist and Daoist shrines can also be replaced with temples if you wish. The res. gates on the 2 roads leading into the block should be set open for market employees only. The 2 res. gates on either side of the market on the service road should be set for inspectors only. The market employees do tend to back track into the market, but at least one announcer will loop the block and the randomness of the market vendor keeps the houses supplied with food, even when the market is temporarily out of food.

Legend

[This message has been edited by JimMRooney (edited 11-21-2002 @ 10:13 PM).]

Bumpity bump

JimM I fixed the residential gates so you can now actually enter the character used

Thanks, Jayhawk! I've editted my post so they show now.

here's a n00b square... this is about the best I can do hehe Any of you experts who can still remember using this kind of layout???

Legend

Greetz

Hehe, that's kinda funny. I can't brag though, most of my housing blocks are nothing fancy, just good enough to get by.

Tips:
farms need to be further from the road with road leading to them so you can get maximum number of squares. Also, the mill is too far away from the market. Try to have only one mill too. Put more buildings to evolve housing whear you put the residental wall that cut off the space by the side of the road.

That's as good a I can do.

[This message has been edited by ramases_88 (edited 11-24-2002 @ 10:14 AM).]

woah hard to understand :P

I still have the glyphy code... Maybe you could edit that??? :P LOL

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-°°hh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!22]]]00@@-..
-°°hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh::!!!!-..
-°°hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh::WW@@-..
-°°==============================::WW@@-..
-hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!RRR+######-..
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-@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@!RRR=######-..
-@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@!!!!=!!!!!!-..
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========================================..
wwwvvwwwwwwvvwww8888889999................
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that's the code...

anyhow... I'll try the stuff I understood (the only one mill etc stuff)

Well that glyphy code is beyond me - but - back to your newbie square - hmmm... that's got me thinking (rare but possible).

What if.... the tiles were still 58 in total length, with an admin block in the centre (one end of the block), and the market square INSIDE the block (at the other end of the block). Perhaps this just results in reduced housing capacity ...

Always looking for something different as I get a bit sick of creating the same old, same old (even though it works ).

hehe well I tried to add an admin city to a block once... it reduced desirability somehow :s

Thought I would contribute a little something to our growing Housing Block Thread here.

Legend

Here's a block I've been using for quite a while now with a great deal of success.

Starting with an ever-versatile seneter housing block, I revised it for use in Emperor. Well, it's one of many possible revisions anyways.

Using an 8x20 loop with Grand Ways along the inner side of the loop, all required facilities fit nice and snug within...with room for a nice Tai-chi park. The Daoist Temple can be knocked out to add 4 more houses, as well as the Tai-chi park for another 4 houses; though I haven't tested to see how/if desirablity is affected.

The outter-most loop around the houses leads off to various other parts of the city...since I usually build my blocks off the Imperial Highway (or Kingdom Road, or whatever you want to call it )

All in all, it contains 31 houses, with the possibility to add up to 8 more if the previously-stated changes are made. Total population, fully-evolved, is just under 2300. 2294 if memory serves me.

What I also like about it is the fact that it can be revised a bit and used as an Elite block. I'll post that tomorrow...too late right now and this little rodent is very tired.

more houses can be added if some of the services (i.e. accupuncturist, watch tower, daoist shrine) aren't needed/wanted.

/Edit
Some further notes:
The Daoist temple and/or shrine can be replaced with a Buddhist Pagoda and/or shrine if desired. Also, the placement of the Market Square can be changed to suit your needs.
/End Edit

Works just fine under Normal difficulty. Haven't tested it in hard yet. Perhaps I should do that.

[This message has been edited by Rat (edited 11-26-2002 @ 01:36 AM).]

First a few words of explanation.

I, like most people, used to build large housing blocks to fit in as many people as possible. I also have a personal rule of always have "perfect harmony" in Feng Shui - including during the build-up of my cities

After having seen the amazing results from the beauty contest over at ICU (especially the winning entry by Taelia) I kind of have seen the light. Small seperated blocks give a much nicer look to the city and makes perfect Feng Shui more "easy" to obtain. Also gives good possibilities to blend in monuments, palaces, industrial neigbourhoods, trade areas etc. in your city.

I then made up this little block which will hold 1168 people if fully upgraded to lux. apart.

The statues can be replaced by pavilions, flowering trees, gardens, you make it out Also the grand ways goes all the way around the block, but my 'puter doesn't have the signs for north + west grand ways. The residential gate between the block and market square set to be "open" for building inspectors and market traders and the back door closed to everybody.

Legend