Josh's Civ 4 memoir. Chapter 2

[Tarkeel]

In general, I tend to not whip enough, so I'm not the right person to tell you not to whip :P My policy is to mainly whip off low-value tiles when happiness allows it, and try to not build up too much whip anger. During times of war you need to whip more though.

It sounds like your issue is that you want to prune your faster growing cities, and in that case I'd try to two-whip with as much overflow as possible, to make the most out of it.

[joshybravo963]

It sounds like your issue is that you want to prune your faster growing cities, and in that case I'd try to two-whip with as much overflow as possible, to make the most out of it.

That's exactly it, I'm in the weird spot where I build units in 4 turns, so I wait 1 turn to put hammers into it and not get penalty, so it's 3 turns until unit finishes, and 1 turn if I whip so doesn't feel like it's worth whipping to just save on 2 turns, but that means I'm not being efficient on food , so is it better to whip 1 pop and save 2 turns or just let it grow

[civac2]

Do you really need more units? It seems Jesse is defeated.

I also agree with your assessment not to let vanrober get Hamburg.

[joshybravo963]

Do you really need more units? It seems Jesse is defeated.

I also agree with your assessment not to let vanrober get Hamburg.

Well that has been my plan for all the cities thus far but vanrober just keeps getting em. 
You're probably right, but I don't have anything useful to build, just wealth? But in the future what would be the right thing to do? Just let the city grow and not make any use of the food? Or 1 pop whip to save 2 turns? Are there any rules that I should go by

[civac2]

Try to offload the food to another city. If you absolutely cannot I would still try to set up 2pop whips so that you make a catapult and then two praetorians in 4 turns or something like that and then do it again.

[joshybravo963]

How does that work ? Explain like I'm 5. Don't you need to put a turn into each unit to stop the whip penalty?

[civac2]

Er, can't be that much if you need 4 turns for a praetorian. But yeah, put <=12 (forge) or <=19 (no forge) into a catapult and the whip for 2 pop. Overflow and good base production should finish 1-2 more units. Repeat.

[joshybravo963]

But then after catapult, you begin praet production, so you need to put a turn into the praet before whipping, otherwise you get a whip penalty? So wouldn't it be something like this , turn into catapult, whip, get the unit and put a turn into praet, whip, get unit and put turn into praet, whip, get unit. So that's I would get 3 units on turn 7, what am I doing wrong?

[civac2]

There should be overflow. Say you got 12 hammers, no forge. Put 12 hammers into praet, then whip. You made 24 hammers from production and 60 from whip. That's 39 hammers overflow. Next turn you finish a second praet, 6 hammers overflow. Put 18 hammers (12 prod + 6 overflow) into catapult. Then whip. You get 40 hammers overflow, so another praet will be done the following turn. Finished 3 Praets and a cat in 6 turns.

You can also put overflow into cheaper units like spears or axes or chariots. In this situation, against PRO archers that's probably not useful but in a catapult/axe war it would be.

[joshybravo963]

My understanding was any fresh units will have a +1 angry pop penalty if whipped with no hammers built into the unit. Overflow or no overflow. If that's not the case, when is the whip penalty applied?