Benoit:
It is amazing however to see the effects of good management. Whenever villagers are clustering or walking too far it means that your gathering rate is probably well under 0.30 w/s when your opponent could be pitting more often and keeps clustering to a minumum and can maintain a higher rate.
Also this average is taken over a 10:00 span. It will be slightly higher, not much more than 0.36 w/s however, if you end the trial at 5:00. I think 10:00 is a very pertinant number to base things off because most often people pit around 4:00 and the sea battle is determined usually by 14:00, and also by 14:00 the Tool woodcutting upgrade is completed.
My numbers also base what seems correct in Zone play. I typically have 23 woodies in Stone and I stop making boats/using wood 1 minute before I hit Tool button. That is 3 mins or 180 seconds of gathering which brings (23*180*0.345)= 1,428. Once I minus barracks and housing this leaves a number I always seem to achieve which is getting to Tool Age and having 1200-1300 wood for 8-9 Scout Ships (13-14 if Minoan) immediately.
These numbers are actually on the high side because most Zone players aim for 1,000 wood entering Tool for Scout Ships and it is often not achieved. More often than not there is wood for only 6 Scout Ships max immediately entering Tool.
If we considered achieving 0.40 w/s in Stone Age, which I think is close to if not totally unachievable, I would have (23*180*0.40) 1,656 wood or 228 wood more. I can't recall ever entering Tool Age and noticing I have 1,600+ wood ever. Furthermore if I added another pit to achieve that 0.40 it would only bring in a net difference of (228-120)= 108 wood.
Then there is the wedsaz dream. I would have (23*180*0.56)=2,318 wood. That is so far off from being reality. If I had that entering Tool I'd have enough wood to build 24 Minoan Scout Ships or 15 Archery Ranges. It is using calculations like these that we can see that wedsaz has used a calculator much more than he has simply played the game. Now I see where wedsaz claims he can do these dumb/amazing feats.... he uses incorrect math and never plays the game -- LOL.
I think it is important to make sure no villas are trapped by others while chopping, or that nobody ends up just standing at the pit. However this still won't give you anywhere close to 0.40 over any period of time. Try it and see.
Something else to think about is Palmy's average is 0.423 w/s and Phoenician is 0.39 w/s. Palmy's wood gathering advantage is over 22%, where Phoenicians is down around 13%. Once again all numbers are based on 10:00 and in Stone Age where there are no technology upgrades.