Posted February 15, 2010
Hi all,
I thought I'll put up a short tutorial how to get started into the game. This strategy can be adapted to any map, player color and victory condition, although this guide refers to the Green Fields scenario starting as the green player. This is kind of an rush strategy which gives you a big advantage over the AI from the beginning.
Green starts on Underhill estate. First thing to do is build the Wood Yard. Build it with the smallest footprint possible directly NW of your headquarters. Move both work gangs in at once. Don't forget to add your two spare workers to ONE of the work gangs.
Once the Wood Yard is finished, move the large work gang in to start production. At the same time, Buy building plots for all 5 of your Soweto Huts on the same estate (1 NE of your HQ with same width as HQ, 1 NE of Wood Yard with same width as the mill. the remaining 3 in the remaining space on the NW border of the estate, evenly spaced). Start building these with your smaller work gang and move L1 tenants in ASAP. These tenants should produce move L1 tenants. Don't build fences, room upgrades, anything yet.
While your workgang is busy building, buy the next estate (the one SW of Underhill, forgot the name) and put plots for 8 houses onto it. If you run out of money, go to the bank and get a loan. You won't need to build them immediately because you don't have enough tenants in the beginning, but as the number of houses of the same type has a global limit, you reserve them for yourself before the AI can do so. Once your houses on Underhill estate are finished, start construction on the other estate. Finish one house of each type first to unlock the Cement Yard. Once that is done, buy the estate NW of Underhill estate. Put the Cement yard into the W corner of that estate. You should have 2 L1 houses left to build at this point (if you were fast enough). Build one SE of your Cement Yard. You should have enough space remaining for the Gadget Factory in the S corner of the estate. Build it ASAP because the first requests for trees should be coming in any minute now. Put the plot for the last L1 building (if still possible) onto the estate, too. In the meantime you should have new L1 tenants, so start constructing the buildings on the remaining plots (the ones you have set up before), moving tenants in and collecting rent. Set up a subway system too. I always put a subway site in the S corner of each estate (you can build sites on estates you don't own yet, thus making your subway system much more effective).
Next, build a full set of L2 houses. You don't have L2 tenants yet, but that does not matter right now, you can put in L1 tenants for the time being. You will have to purchase another estate to build all of them if you were able to build all 15 L1 houses, but that is worth it. After you finish the 3 houses you will get the Brick Yard. By the way, if you have money left. feel free to upgrade your factories. Somewhere at this point tenants will start complaining about trees, which you should get them ASAP. Also somewhere at this point you will get your first mission, to remove a hostile tenant. This is relatively easy to do (place ALL your workers between the house and the next subway site and attack the tenant AFTER he passes your workers. He will try to run back to his house, will get hit even more, and will eventually die. This gives you 200 white marks which you can convert into 20k cash.
Build a hospital and a school. Heal your workers in the hospital and start producing L2 tenants. If you are playing at a level above EASY, build MrFixit at, or near your enemies estate and start blowing up his buildings using the gas thingy. You should be able to reduce your opponents estates to a heap of rubble within... (insert a very short timespan here). Hint: Start with Gadget Factory and Police Station. Then undesirables. Then Houses.
From there it's pretty smooth sailing. Satisfy your tenants requests (primarily start building fences!), build more L2 houses and put tenants inside to get more money, and then get working on whatever goal you are trying to achieve.
This is a strategy relies heavily on being faster then the AI in the first couple of minutes. After that the computer is so far behind, that he does not pose any real problem, just a minor annoyance.
Hope that helps some people...
If you have any questions or remarks... just go ahead.
shlainn
I thought I'll put up a short tutorial how to get started into the game. This strategy can be adapted to any map, player color and victory condition, although this guide refers to the Green Fields scenario starting as the green player. This is kind of an rush strategy which gives you a big advantage over the AI from the beginning.
Green starts on Underhill estate. First thing to do is build the Wood Yard. Build it with the smallest footprint possible directly NW of your headquarters. Move both work gangs in at once. Don't forget to add your two spare workers to ONE of the work gangs.
Once the Wood Yard is finished, move the large work gang in to start production. At the same time, Buy building plots for all 5 of your Soweto Huts on the same estate (1 NE of your HQ with same width as HQ, 1 NE of Wood Yard with same width as the mill. the remaining 3 in the remaining space on the NW border of the estate, evenly spaced). Start building these with your smaller work gang and move L1 tenants in ASAP. These tenants should produce move L1 tenants. Don't build fences, room upgrades, anything yet.
While your workgang is busy building, buy the next estate (the one SW of Underhill, forgot the name) and put plots for 8 houses onto it. If you run out of money, go to the bank and get a loan. You won't need to build them immediately because you don't have enough tenants in the beginning, but as the number of houses of the same type has a global limit, you reserve them for yourself before the AI can do so. Once your houses on Underhill estate are finished, start construction on the other estate. Finish one house of each type first to unlock the Cement Yard. Once that is done, buy the estate NW of Underhill estate. Put the Cement yard into the W corner of that estate. You should have 2 L1 houses left to build at this point (if you were fast enough). Build one SE of your Cement Yard. You should have enough space remaining for the Gadget Factory in the S corner of the estate. Build it ASAP because the first requests for trees should be coming in any minute now. Put the plot for the last L1 building (if still possible) onto the estate, too. In the meantime you should have new L1 tenants, so start constructing the buildings on the remaining plots (the ones you have set up before), moving tenants in and collecting rent. Set up a subway system too. I always put a subway site in the S corner of each estate (you can build sites on estates you don't own yet, thus making your subway system much more effective).
Next, build a full set of L2 houses. You don't have L2 tenants yet, but that does not matter right now, you can put in L1 tenants for the time being. You will have to purchase another estate to build all of them if you were able to build all 15 L1 houses, but that is worth it. After you finish the 3 houses you will get the Brick Yard. By the way, if you have money left. feel free to upgrade your factories. Somewhere at this point tenants will start complaining about trees, which you should get them ASAP. Also somewhere at this point you will get your first mission, to remove a hostile tenant. This is relatively easy to do (place ALL your workers between the house and the next subway site and attack the tenant AFTER he passes your workers. He will try to run back to his house, will get hit even more, and will eventually die. This gives you 200 white marks which you can convert into 20k cash.
Build a hospital and a school. Heal your workers in the hospital and start producing L2 tenants. If you are playing at a level above EASY, build MrFixit at, or near your enemies estate and start blowing up his buildings using the gas thingy. You should be able to reduce your opponents estates to a heap of rubble within... (insert a very short timespan here). Hint: Start with Gadget Factory and Police Station. Then undesirables. Then Houses.
From there it's pretty smooth sailing. Satisfy your tenants requests (primarily start building fences!), build more L2 houses and put tenants inside to get more money, and then get working on whatever goal you are trying to achieve.
This is a strategy relies heavily on being faster then the AI in the first couple of minutes. After that the computer is so far behind, that he does not pose any real problem, just a minor annoyance.
Hope that helps some people...
If you have any questions or remarks... just go ahead.
shlainn
Post edited February 15, 2010 by shlainn