Several questions from returning player.

[DeletedUser11247]

I was never a biggie on city planning and as a consequence my city is a huge mess with a half-hearted too-late effort to make it organized. Should I bother returning to it or start in a new world? I really hope I don't want to do the latter, because I didn't want the time spent finding all of my great buildings' blueprints to be wasted. But then again, I can't see a non-apocalyptic solution to it (More on this a bit below).

Picture of my city: http://imgur.com/a/aOowy

I considered deleting every non-important, replaceable building and building from the ground up. Is this a good idea? I'm hoping to hear from people who did this but I'll welcome any.

Also, is it better to be a player focused on attacking or goods producer (Mass build a bunch of goods buildings so the coins and supplies you make can more or less be converted to goods)? By being militaristic, you could supplement whatever resources you have from plundering, but it felt like forever waiting for my units to be healed or trained, which was a common occurrence since most people have a decent defending army that could quickly do damage. By being a goods producer, you would have a ton of goods for trades, bargaining, and negotiating, but you'd be missing out on the victory medals from PVP, which means loss of expansions.
I was more militaristic than a producer, but man did I feel extremely discouraged. And yes, I realize how stupid it must sound for someone who liked attacking others to be complaining.

And lastly, is now a good time as any to return?

 

[wolfhoundtoo]

I was never a biggie on city planning and as a consequence my city is a huge mess with a half-hearted too-late effort to make it organized. Should I bother returning to it or start in a new world? I really hope I don't want to do the latter, because I didn't want the time spent finding all of my great buildings' blueprints to be wasted. But then again, I can't see a non-apocalyptic solution to it (More on this a bit below).

Picture of my city: http://imgur.com/a/aOowy

I considered deleting every non-important, replaceable building and building from the ground up. Is this a good idea? I'm hoping to hear from people who did this but I'll welcome any.

Also, is it better to be a player focused on attacking or goods producer (Mass build a bunch of goods buildings so the coins and supplies you make can more or less be converted to goods)? By being militaristic, you could supplement whatever resources you have from plundering, but it felt like forever waiting for my units to be healed or trained, which was a common occurrence since most people have a decent defending army that could quickly do damage. By being a goods producer, you would have a ton of goods for trades, bargaining, and negotiating, but you'd be missing out on the victory medals from PVP, which means loss of expansions.
I was more militaristic than a producer, but man did I feel extremely discouraged. And yes, I realize how stupid it must sound for someone who liked attacking others to be complaining.

And lastly, is now a good time as any to return?

I routinely tore down and rebuilt my city as I moved through the ages so you can absolutely tear down most of your buildings. You just need to make sure you have sufficient coins and supplies to rebuild. You'll need to make sure you keep enough houses for some initial buildings (or plan on building a bunch of houses then other types then more houses as needed).

Whether you want to be a plunderer or make goods depends on you. If you practice and devote enough City space to it you should be able to break thru many defenses. You should also consider the value of how many goods your Great Buildings can provide you to supplement what you plunder or make otherwise. I'd suggest since you seem to prefer the attacking option you practice with various unit types and styles of attacks. You should join a guild which would let you (hopefully) discuss tactics on attacking. But generally speaking you need many barracks if you want to plunder your goods. Also you should try and get rogue hideouts as well as design your city to help you successfully attack other players (this will mean barracks, GBs for attack bonuses, the Alcatraz etc...).

 

[DeletedUser26965]

Some people hate city planning, some people love it. I like it. Don't see the need to start a new world or just tear most everything down at once, just do only what you have to. Like Wolf I too constantly build to my most current age buildings; Residential/Supplies/Happiness/Goods. Here I am in mid transition from CE to TE (Residential done, goods almost done, just starting in on replacing supplies buildings and almost done with the tech for happiness buildings to replace the Shopping Malls with Concept Vehicle Fair's, once the core is down then I'll go for military:

And here's generally what I'm going for though not done completely right, just messing around with the city planner linked below.

Here's the city planner, you have to register but so what, it's good and the only one out there available now that the other closed down;
http://foemanager.com/city-planner/app/

oh, and at least upgrade them roads

Here are some tips, or general guidelines I follow for city design (everything of course is dependent on your playstyle and what you want out of the game):

1) Keep the city as square as possible
2) Put largest buildings on the outside perimeter
3) Attempt to make sure buildings are only touching one road (can't always be helped of course)
4) Have the shorter side of the building touching the road (can't always be helped of course)
5) Almost always have your current age buildings (you can sometimes get through an age without updating some things like residential or supplies production until you get to the next age but always have the current age goods buildings and trade down).
6) Always have your current age roads and have as few roads as possible
7) 1x1 Decorations are generally useless
8) Don't have empty space for too long, you can always use it for something.

 

[DeletedUser26965]

By being a goods producer, you would have a ton of goods for trades, bargaining, and negotiating, but you'd be missing out on the victory medals from PVP, which means loss of expansions.

Well, I guess that's sort of true if you build no military at all. Unfortunately Inno gives kind of a misleading perception when it comes to the "PvP" towers and "Tournaments" so you can get medals for expansions. See, the points you gain for those come from all your battles; PvP, Guild Expedition, GvG and Continent Map battles. So they're not really PvP towers and it's not really a tournament, it's just "Battle Point" towers. I've never really worried about getting medals from them and seem to have gotten along just fine getting medals with events and such, I'm on the 40,000 medal expansion. Table Guide to all buildings, units, towers and expansions

 

[DeletedUser26965]

And lastly, is now a good time as any to return?

As good as time as any I suppose. We got a teaser last November about the new age coming Oceianic Future which you can also see teased at the end of your tech tree https://blog.forgeofempires.com/?p=1480

 

[DeletedUser27096]

Some people hate city planning, some people love it. I like it. Don't see the need to start a new world or just tear most everything down at once, just do only what you have to. Like Wolf I too constantly build to my most current age buildings; Residential/Supplies/Happiness/Goods. Here I am in mid transition from CE to TE (Residential done, goods almost done, just starting in on replacing supplies buildings and almost done with the tech for happiness buildings to replace the Shopping Malls with Concept Vehicle Fair's, once the core is down then I'll go for military:

And here's generally what I'm going for though not done completely right, just messing around with the city planner linked below.

Here's the city planner, you have to register but so what, it's good and the only one out there available now that the other closed down;
http://foemanager.com/city-planner/app/

oh, and at least upgrade them roads

Here are some tips, or general guidelines I follow for city design (everything of course is dependent on your playstyle and what you want out of the game):

1) Keep the city as square as possible
2) Put largest buildings on the outside perimeter
3) Attempt to make sure buildings are only touching one road (can't always be helped of course)
4) Have the shorter side of the building touching the road (can't always be helped of course)
5) Almost always have your current age buildings (you can sometimes get through an age without updating some things like residential or supplies production until you get to the next age but always have the current age goods buildings and trade down).
6) Always have your current age roads and have as few roads as possible
7) 1x1 Decorations are generally useless
8) Don't have empty space for too long, you can always use it for something.

That is a beautiful city, @sloppyjoeslayer! I also love city planning! I am only in LMA but I redesign my city and upgrade everything I can whenever I reach a new age. Great tips, too! Tx!

 

[DeletedUser8420]

I love planning too, although I take a different approach...I keep a theme going in my city. I, contrary to sloppy, love my 1x1 decos as fill ins and the estatic and aesthetically view of it. So I have kept certain buildings from previous ages as fit into the scheme of the city. If you are in Cirgard take a look and let me know how you like it. Always, again, contrary to what some people think interested in others opinions....LOL....

 

[DeletedUser8420]

I too have relied on quests, continental map and events for medals...I maxed out at the 240,000 level already and I am waiting on the new age for additional medal expansions, so if you don't want to do pvp or gvg (I rarely do either) please keep military for defense and GE (at least level 1 although with the new changes coming not sure if that is going to be worth it anymore) .

 

[DeletedUser26965]

I love planning too, although I take a different approach...I keep a theme going in my city. I, contrary to sloppy, love my 1x1 decos as fill ins and the estatic and aesthetically view of it. So I have kept certain buildings from previous ages as fit into the scheme of the city. If you are in Cirgard take a look and let me know how you like it. Always, again, contrary to what some people think interested in others opinions....LOL....

Can't argue with aesthetics looks like a nice place to take a stroll in. It's too bad the game design doesn't really lend itself to building cities towards a more aesthetic approach. I think they can do it without having to worry about balance but it would probably mean a complete restructuring of the code so I doubt they would do it. If they gave an option for "Aesthetic mode" your buildings would create some space around them for decorations, land alteration, etc and nothing else. Or something like expansions only for aesthetics. And I would like the decos not to be able to be polished which is the problem with them if you don't manage happiness well or keep your happiness rather tight depending on polish.

 

[DeletedUser11247]

Thanks for the answers. I reached IndA but I don't remember a better source for consistent medals than battling. Also, I guess I'll try to work on my city, even though it has a weird row of houses jutting out, which was my half a---- attaempt to emulate everyone else's nice row of houses.

I'd like to hear from more people on whether they prefer to focus on military or goods production.

 

[DeletedUser8420]

astNas

Can't argue with aesthetics looks like a nice place to take a stroll in. It's too bad the game design doesn't really lend itself to building cities towards a more aesthetic approach. I think they can do it without having to worry about balance but it would probably mean a complete restructuring of the code so I doubt they would do it. If they gave an option for "Aesthetic mode" your buildings would create some space around them for decorations, land alteration, etc and nothing else. Or something like expansions only for aesthetics. And I would like the decos not to be able to be polished which is the problem with them if you don't manage happiness well or keep your happiness rather tight depending on polish.

Thanks appreciate the compliment, I wish we could have a street level view as if we were really walking around in the city....that would cool.
As far as polishing decos I don't have a problem with it. I maintain somewhere around 80,000+ in C world and almost 20,000 in E world additional happiness at all times. I just try to keep a mixtures of things and let them flow from one theme into another. Certain areas are somewhat solid as I do not want to change the look therein unless a new building/deco would somehow enhance it.

ie - Cirgard - city hall with the park area look with the HOFs.

or My East Nagach world with the walkway of Wishing wells.