AU 100-A DAR 1: 4000 BC - 1520 BC

[nbarclay]

This DAR ("During Action Report") covers events in AU 100-A from the beginning through approximately 1520 BC. As examples of things that could be interesting to include, consider the following questions. What research strategy did you use? How did you manage growth, production, and tile improvements? Did anything interesting happen in regard to relations with other civs, barbarian activity, and so forth? Which of the civilizations you've met are following what religions, and have you established or adopted a religion yet? (When you open negotiations with an AI, there is a religion symbol in the upper left corner if it has a state religion.) Did anything else interesting happen? And perhaps most importantly of all, did you learn any interesting lessons?

DARs can take any form you want: a story, a timeline, answering some or all of the above questions, or whatever other form you might prefer. It is best if you try to make your DAR interesting for readers, but a dry, "just the facts" approach is acceptable. Screenshots of any especially interesting events and/or of your status at the end of the reporting period are always appreciated.

Please state what difficulty level you are playing on at the beginning of your first DAR, and it would be useful if you remind people in the later DARs as well. (I often use the "subject" field for that purpose.) Knowing the difficulty level people are playing on is especially important in regard to figuring out whether differences in AI performance and behavior in different games might be due to differences in difficulty level.

For those not familiar with Civ IV screenshots, hitting shift-PrtScr while playing causes the game to capture a screenshot and ask what file you want to save it to. The game then saves the file as a .jpg that can be edited with other software. As I recall, Apolyton has a limit of 800 pixels image width if a file is uploaded as part of the message posting process, which would require editing the saved file. Larger images can be handled by uploading the image to Apolyton and incorporating a link into the message, but since I've never used that process, I'm not prepared to explain how to do it.

[nbarclay]

This is going to be my first complete game on Prince difficulty level, assuming I finish it. I’m still relatively early in the process of learning Civ IV since Amazon was slow sending my copy and then I had to get a new video card because a bug in the game bit my old one.

---

In the year 4000 BC, Lord Nathan, leader of the American tribe, came up with a new idea. Always before, the Americans had been wanderers, drifting from place to place as the seasons changed. But the land around had more food than even the oldest member of the tribe could ever remember seeing, with vast flood plains and a field of corn. The American people could live there forever and never worry about starving.

The first step in the new project was to train a group of workers to create a farm for the corn and irrigate the flood plains. With pigs in sight across some water, Lord Nathan decided to order his wise men to investigate better ways to care for animals.

America’s scientists finished studying Animal Husbandry in the year 3520 and started studying Mysticism with an eye toward perhaps someday developing a religion. The first group of workers started their first farm in 3400, and Washington started work on a band of warriors while the city grew.

As time went on, Mongol and German scouts reached the fringes of Washington. The city finished its band of warriors in 2840 and, now with a size of four, prepared to start sending out settlers. New York was settled in 2400 as an American warrior encountered the Spanish. In 2080, another settler moved out too quickly to be escorted properly or to retreat if it encountered barbarians and was killed by barbarians who happened to be in exactly the wrong place, forcing Washington to shift production from a worker to a replacement settler.

In 2040, America’s gamble delaying research into The Wheel in order to try to establish Judaism succeeded and the Jewish faith was founded in New York. Research shifted to The Wheel. Boston was finally, albeit belatedly, founded in 1720 BC.

By the year 1500, America had researched Animal Husbandry, Mysticism, Polytheism, Masonry, Monotheism, The Wheel, and Writing (or perhaps was a turn away from Writing). Its next projects would be Mining and then Alphabet for tech trading. Relationships with all of the other civilizations were at +1, although Isabella’s Hindu religion would become a problem when America decided to bite the anarchy bullet and officially make Judaism its state religion.

F9 Status:

As of 1400 BC, I’m first in crop yield and land area, fourth in GNP, fifth in Mfg. Goods, and seventh in soldiers. (I didn't think to check at exactly 1520.)

Things to think about:

1) Since settlers are more costly in Civ 4 than Civ 3, protecting them is more important. Some risks may be acceptable, but not nearly as many.

2) Irrigated flood plains can be really handy for cranking out settlers, and the fact that they provide a gold as well as food is handy for research. It was the gold from the flood plains that caused me to decide that pursuing Judaism was worth the gamble.

---

The screenshot below is as of 1440 BC.

[n1gHtmAr3]

it is my first time in AU so i'm just curious, do you want the reports to be a post in this thread or just make a new thread for it?

[Sirid]

NOTE: Sorry this is so long, but brevity's not one of my strongpoints and there were a lot of details I wanted to include. I'll try to make my next DAR shorter.

I begin by looking around to see what my surroundings look like. I noticed quickly that the starting location is in something of a hammer/shield poor area, but was heavily packed with food resources (with two floodplains tiles in the initial 9 squares and 3 more after border expansion). Deciding not to waste any time, I founded Washington on the first turn, hoping that all that food would help me pump out a settler in a relatively short time to get a production city going. Meanwhile, my warriors visit the small tribe near the city and collect 56 gold to add to the treasury. Things are off to a decent start. I open the tech tree and select Mining, set Washington to work on a Worker, and end the turn. My goal with the techs is to gather more productive technologies before making the run for a religion (in this case Mining because I want to set up a production city pretty quickly) - I've found in most of my games so far that I can do fine without grabbing Hinduism and Buddhism so long as I work in one of the later religions into my strategy at some point. In the meantime my Warrior heads to the East/Southeast into the hills to find a suitable location for that production city.

Mining is researched in 3720 BC and Animal Husbandry is selected in order to take advantage of the Cattle and Pigs near Washington in addition to causing Horses to appear on the map. My warriors haven't had much luck in heading south (aside from spotting the cattle), so I decide to turn them west upon hitting the tundra so that they can loop around Washington and hopefully find some decent city sites in the vicinity. A second tribe south of Washington nets me 33 more gold, so things are looking good financially.

After a run in with a wolf I find a plains-heavy region southwest of Washington, which is also adjacent to the coast. For lack of a better choice I mark this spot as my next city site with the strategy layer and keep my warrior moving. The Worker in Washington is finished in 2400 BC, and is sent to the southeast to build a farm over the corn there.

3320 BC brings some bad luck when I run into a village of hostile barbarians. After I end the turn they attack, but the American army proves the victor! My warrior gains a rank and I select the Combat I promotion for him (not really enough large patches of forest to justify a Woodsman I right now). The same turn, Animal Husbandry is discovered and The Wheel is selected as next on the agenda. Time to start planning that new city.

3000 BC brings the discovery of the Wheel and Mysticism is next. The next turn a second warrior is completed in Washington and a Settler is selected. Although it's a risk to send it out into the wild on its own leaving Washington undefended, this is Noble and raging barbarians isn't selected. I decide to take the risk for the sake of exploration and send the warrior north to search the more equatorial latitudes.

In 2760 BC I learn Mysticism, opening the way for some culture generating improvements and wonders. Now I could take a big risk and research Meditation, which would grant me an early religion (Buddhism) along with the benefits that it entails, but there's a good chance an AI may snatch it up before I get there. Since this is a learning experience I take the risk and go for it.

I meet my first AI in 2720, the Germans, and sign for peace. The Mongols encounter me next in 2680 and I sign for peace with them as well. In 2560 my warrior gains experience from a tribe and wins a lion battle a turn later, allowing me to give him the Combat II promotion and letting him heal. 2520 sees the founding of New York in the area I described earlier; the road is completed the very next turn and New York is added to the American trade network.

Bad luck on the next turn - a foreign civ founds Buddhism, and just one turn before I get to it! Ah well, I can still use this situation to my advantage. When I discover Meditation, I begin research on Priesthood, which is a relatively cheap tech. My goal now is to make a break for Confucianism (Code of Laws) then head back towards the cheaper techs to catch up.

My exploration has revealed a plethora of production friendly tiles to the northwest of Washington; I switch work back to a settler and prepare the available worker in the area to start heading northwest. In 2360, my explorers find the Mongolian homeland, which is a pretty fair distance away from America. A bit later in 2240 my warriors find soldiers from Egypt and Arabia, adding to my list of contacts. The same turn I discover Priesthood and queue up the following techs: Hunting, Archery, Writing, and Code of Laws. The first of these, Hunting, is discovered in 2120.

Boston is founded in the northwest in 1960, near a production rich area that should pay off in the future. Because the city is right next to the river that leads to Washington, it's already connected to my trade network so a road isn't necessary. Time passes, and in 1680 BC I discover both Writing AND the Spanish homeland in the east. In 1640 Washington breaks into unhappiness because in my haste to do other things I never actually managed to garrison it with a unit. So I change production to a warrior.

As of 1520, the American Empire has three cities, is on the way to researching Code of Laws, and things seem to be going well. My closest neighbors are both a pretty fair distance away, and America is tucked in its own corner of the continent, so there shouldn't be many territorial issues anytime soon. According to F9 I'm 2nd in population, 1st in land area, 3rd in crop yield (I must need to build more farms), 5th in gold, and 5th in production. I'm also first in score with 287.

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[nbarclay]

Originally posted by n1gHtmAr3
it is my first time in AU so i'm just curious, do you want the reports to be a post in this thread or just make a new thread for it?

There is one set of DAR threads for everyone, so post your first DAR to this thread, your second to the next, and so forth.

[nbarclay]

As Sirid's DAR points out, one of the drawbacks of such a food-heavy starting position is that it's easy to outgrow your happiness if you aren't careful. One way to handle that situation is to focus cities that have a hard time not growing quickly on building settlers and workers, thereby taking advantage of the fact that building them suspends growth, and use other cities where excessive growth isn't a problem for building military units.

That's essentially the Civ IV version of the old settler/worker pump concept from Civ 3. Even the best pump in Civ IV (which the capital pretty much is in this game if it's used correctly) is only about half as fast as a corresponding Civ 3 pump, but since civs aren't supposed to build as many cities as quickly in Civ IV, that's fine.

[polarnomad]

(Difficulty: Noble)

I seem to always have difficulty starting when a leader that is chosen does not already have Mysticism. I never know whether it's better to forego other areas of research and try to go for some form of religion, or forget religion and develop my cities instead. In this game I intially decided to ignore religion.

I moved my settler over one tile to the east as I wanted access to the hills and trees for chopping. Some flood plains could still be accessed and the corn would be available once the Washington's borders expanded. The silk left me somewhat neutral since I knew it would be a while until I discover the calendar anyways.

The three nearby villages share maps twice (coast and ocean to the south, and then coast and ocean to the east), and give me Sailing.

My first warrior opens up some of the map to the east, then gets killed by a lion. I produce 2 scouts but both get killed by the same bear just turns after leaving Washington. The result being that I don't have much detailed knowledge about my surroundings, and waste time producing scouts that could have been put towards producing a settler.

I quickly make my way to Bronzeworking for two reasons. I want to chop some trees to help production, and I would like to see where there might be copper before I found another city. As it turns out, in the area that I have uncovered, copper is not revealed anywhere...

I build a settler and simultaneously research animal husbandry. Since I don't have copper, do I AT LEAST have access to horses? The settler is built before Animal Husbandry is discovered. I leave Washington unprotected so as to provide the settler with an escort.

I set about producing the Stonehenge in Washington (2000BC) and decide to help it along by chopping some more forests that have grown, which at this point won't help too much with only one city and second on the way, but what the heck!

Initially I thought I would settle near the pigs to the west with access to the coast, but as I'm moving my settler, I am confronted with the same bear (now over a millenium old) that mauled 2 of my scouts. We play cat and mouse for 3 turns and then I am shocked to find myself with 2 lions and the bear on 2 sides! Feeling doomed, I hit enter.

1 lion leaves (must have picked up the scent of a nearby female), the bear moves to where I want to settle (bastard has some previous life score to settle with me) and the 2nd lion attacks... I breathe a sigh of relief as my warrior prevails.

The next turn I discover Animal Husbandry and horses are revealed near the cows to the southeast. So I change my plan and head there and settle New York (perhaps the bear knew about the horses and was just trying to keep me from making a mistake... Thanks... um, buddy). When the borders of washington expand for the 3rd time all the wild animals are caught north of Washington, since for some reason they never seem to have their passports handy.

New York is founded in 1880BC.

Really late into the game I figure perhaps I still have a chance at Monotheism. Research Polytheism, Masonry, and then start Monotheism, but the very next turn... Judaism is discovered in a distant land. So now I have no religion and only 2 cities! This a terrible start.

So I switch to Ironworking in 1720 (which also means that my next DAR is extremely short) and with a scout built in New York I head out to uncover some of the fog of war that remains in place...

Oh, during this time I have met Saladin, Bismark, Isabella, and Hatty.

My main thoughts about this are:

1) I took too long to produce settlers, possibly aggravated by moving my settler over one tile (less flood plains) to the east on turn 1.
2) I should have stuck to my initial thoughts about ignoring early religions, rather than making a last minute bee-line for monotheism, wasting precious turns and not getting it anyway.
3) I just had some piss poor luck with those bloody animals...

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a124/polarnomad/AU100-A_DAR1.jpg

[polarnomad]

(wanted to edit previous post but actually quoted myself here) :blush:

2nd post deleted

[teriakiburger]

Eh well time for my first game on monarch difficulty, plus I never tried the normal game speed always done epic before so it should be a learning experience.

Teriakiburger has been foiled into trying to shape the dim-witted and lazy americans into a semblance of a civilzation. The gods have seemingly blessed the other civilizations, with the americans coming from the short end of the gene pool.:lol:

So Washington is layed to rest at 4000BC, and the nearby villagers in pity fill our empty coffers with 57 gold. Demands placed for a worker to till the fields and with warrior reports of 'hills' we go for mining. Our warrior scouting the lands, sees some useless pigs and cows rutting about which we promptly ignore. The village to the south pities us again with 54 gold.

In 3680BC mining is ours, and we want something to do with this metal, so we pursue bronze working. The enterprising warrior has discovered beavers:love: and some ice flows. Some wierd chant of buddhism echoes over the land.

3480 disaster is at hand when a pride of lions spots our warrior on the southern plains, some how the clutzes pull through.

3400 the workers finally lift up their skirts and get to work. Our warrior takes cover in the forest to heal, as we start plans to build a new city. While waiting they hear of hinduism on a bird song. The next village gives us again gold, 75 of it!

Our farming of the flood plains is done, and so we find timber with bronze working. The research starts on stacking bricks, they call it masonry.

Contact made with the Mongols, they did not seem entirely pleasant, so once the settler is finished a warrior is ordered. Our worker starts to seed the corn plot, in 2720 we finish up the masonry and start on mystism. We start on another warrior to explore the lands, as we need garrisons in the city.

In 2680, New York is founded with stone and pigs in sight on the plains coast. A worker is ordered to help the city grow, with our first worker heading to help the clear the forest.

Wonderful Isabella, the buddhist, is spotted by our warrior in 2640. By 2480 mysticism is ours so we start on meditation. After our 2nd worker is made in New York, we start on the Pyramids, a crazy scheme with 150 rounds to complete.

The Stonehenge is started in Washington, after a warrior is made in 2240. In 2200, the swamp life causes some unhealth in Washington at size 4.

Ahh robes are in fashion as Priesthood is ours in 2040, so we begin to research how to scribble in Writing.

A shocker in 1960BC, as we are rated 6 of 7 as most powerful, we hang our heads in shame
:eek:

But at least Washington has completed the Stonehenge, thru the power of wood, a warrior is ordered up to escort the next settler, as barbarians have been spotted.

Also we twiddle with Washington as it trying to skyrocket to size 6 which would not be good.

New York decides to shift gears towards the Oracle instead.

In 1840, we start on settler #3 in Washington. Our warriors hear again a faith of Judaism has been founded, and we meet Hatchesput in 1720 BC, claiming to be the founder of Hinduism.

Bad luck in 1640 when a barbarian warrior kills my warrior by attacking across a river, for revenge detach my warrior from Washington.
:angry:

Writing is finished and animal husbandry research is started to use those pigs.

And again in 1520 BC lose a warrior to a barbarian, not my day.

New York's boundaries have expanded so my worker begins to start on a quarry.

So let's see where I stand at 1520 BC.

GNP is #2, Mfg Goods is #7, Crops are #2, Military is #7, Land Area is #1, Population is #3.

I am 3 turns away from completing the Oracle in New York, and 3 turns away from a settler in Washington.

Lost 2 warriors to barbarians which hurts, and no source of bronze on the map yet.

At least at 263 points I am in the lead.

[Fireb]

Objective - First time on emperor. Lets see how long it takes before I'm overrun either by hordes of rampant barbarians and the marauding AI's.

Plan - Diplomatic victory. On this difficulty level, I'll have a hard time overrunning a single civ, let alone the whole world. A space race seems equally daunting. I'll need to found a religeon (judaism looks like the best thing to go for), and spread it fast and far, then use the income to fund my research (beeline to the spiral minaret, then UN), and survive long enough for me to build it (UN) and claim victory.

Game start - Nice growth position, will make a fantastic great person zone if I can get health/happiness resources. Not much in the way of production, so looks like I'll need great engineers to do the building for me.

Starting warrior heads north. Washington set to building warrior.
City expansion makes money from the hut.
Starting warrior runs into goody hut, and 2 hostile warriors leap out. I kill one, then my warrior dies.

Warrior built, building another warrior.
Warrior #2 explores south. Moves into a forrest, gets attacked by a lion, and a wolf in the same turn. Wow these animals are rampant on this level. He defeats both, and gets promoted to woodsman #1. He moves south, and finds a hut and this time gets money. As it's tundra below me (therefore no ai's there), he then heads north-east.

Warrior #3 built. Washington size 3, can't grow bigger without unhealthiness/unhappiness. Building a worker. Warrior #3 heads west. A few turns later, he moves on a hill. He gets attacked by a lion, kills it, then by a wolf (same turn again), and dies. Warrior #2 (woodsman) spots a bear, and so moves onto a wooded hill. The bear attacks, and dies. Haha.

Worker #1 built. Building a settler. A few turns later I run into the spanish. Grr, why couldn't it be a peaceful civ, like Hatty or Gandhi...never mind. Next turn the Mongols (another nasty civ!) and Saladin appear. Looks like it's crowded somewhere. Hopefully not too close to me.

Circa 2000 BC: Settler #1 built, building warrior. Settler heads north and founds New York on a hill, next to lots of resources. Looks like there will be marauding barbarians, judging by all the animals there were (now gone). New york building a warrior too (those animals kept me from exploring anywhere!). I discover judaism. Phew, I didn't fancy having to go for one of the later religeons, particularly with Isabella and Saladin about.

Warriors explore a bit more (finally, a bit of peace!), a couple of barb warriors are defeated, my warriors keeping to forests whenever possible. Washington now size 4, and won't get any bigger until a civic change. Another settler is built, and heads for that stone, with ivory and wheet close by too. Founded 1 spot from the shoreline, decided resources now were more important than trade later.

Future plans - 2 more settlers being built, the plan is to use them to take the land between me and the closest civs. All the civs appear to be in the northeast, which is very good, as I can then build cities west and south at my leasure (excepting barb cities of course). Researching hunting, then archery. There are 4-5 AI warriors patrolling around my cities, and whilst they're keeping the animals/barbarians away (thanks guys), I think I'll need good defences earlier rather than later on this level. The initial plan (spread judaism, give in to all demands made of me and go for a diplo victory) remains unchanged. Later on I might team up with an AI to make them like me more, and increase 'friendly' population. Other than that, I'll be playing defensively, building extensive cottages and a large empire (might as well make use of the traits!).

[vovan]

I start the game on Noble difficulty. The warrios get some gold from the village nearby, and the starting location looks good enough from the get-go to found a village there immediately. Starting to build up some defences right away. On the research front, our first order of business is mining. Another tribal village in 3760BC gives us more gold still. Yay. :) Mining is finished the next turn and work starts on hunting. By the time we get it, we also finish a warrior in Washington. Research starts on the wheel, and Washington starts producing a barracks, waiting for one more population point to roll in before starting on the first settler. My reasoning here is that we will have to wait for the population increase the same number of turns as we would shave off the settler production with the extra production. Hence, it strikes me as a good trade-off, as, overall, when the settler is produced, we have a stronger city.

One of the huts provides our warrior with experience, and we promote him to woodsman 2 so that he can explore faster. In other news, we invent the wheel, and start work on animal husbandry. My score is now 120, and I still haven't met any neighbors? :eek: Man, either I have been playing real crowded maps up till now, or this one is really empty. :)

Incidentally, just as I type that in, I meet a Mongolian scout the next turn. :) It would appear that Genghis is the one that founded Hinduism. Even though he claims his horde can beat my horde any day of the week, we decide to defer the final judgement of that for now.

As luck would have it, in 3040BC, our warriors are put to the test, as they find themselves surrounded by lions and bears. :eek: They survive the attack of the bears with 0.6 strength left, but fortunately, the lions decide to forego the easy pickings that our warriors represent, and just move on into the jungle. The warriors take the opportunity to haul their behinds off to the nearest forested hill and station there to regroup. In the mean time, we discover Animal Husbandry and start on Archery. You never know with Mongols around when you'll need some forces. :) We also notice that we have some horses nearby, and that would be a good thing.

As we discover Archery, I'm getting impatient for that settler! Looks like he'll come around next turn though. Research starts on pottery, us being financial and all. As the settler in Washington is built, work starts on an archer.

Soon enough, New York is founded to the south-east of Washington. I also meet Saladin, Bismarck, and Isabella, the founder of Buddhism. As Pottery is discovered, we start work on Bronze Working. As the Archer is produced in Washington, the city also grows to size 4, and that seems like the prime opportunity to starting building that first worker. That and we also run into Genghis' borders, and into Hatshepsut's scout. Hey, looks like this continent is not so empty after all, just that we have some room to expand here. Only thing that slightly bothers me is the tundra to the south. It means we'll have to push expansion to the north, straight into Genghis. And that is unnerving. I'm a lover, not a fighter. ;)

As the scout is finished in New York, work starts on a worker there, too. With the invention of bronze working, we start on Masonry. And find also that there is no copper whatsoever anywhere in sight. Maybe we should go for iron working and hope that resource.

As Washington builds a worker, we decide to concentrate on growing it another point, and then building another settler. In the mean time, it resumes construction of the barracks. As Washington increases its population adn we switch production to a settler, and Masonry is founded and research starts on iron working, our scout is killed off to the south by the barbarians. Quite a pity that, even though he pretty much explored everything there was to see down there.

Towards the end of the first report period, we discover another Spanish city quite close to us and decide that it really is time to found a third city to the north of Washington to cut off a nice chunk of the continent for us to settle at our own leisure. :)

This is how the world looks like at the end of the first report:

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=600&file=12160_AU100AR01Political.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=12160_AU100AR01Political.JPG)

And this here is the resource map. We got quite a bit of stuff to go around, but no copper whatsoever:

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=600&file=12160_AU100AR01Resource.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=12160_AU100AR01Resource.JPG)

Also, in case someone cares for a save, it can be found here:

http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=12160_AU100AVovanBC-1520.Civ4SavedGame

[Swissy]

Noble Level:

Founded city on spot as nothing looked better.
Find Mining in first hut
3360 BC found Hinduism in Washington
3280 BC meet Gheghis Kahn of the Mongols
Find Masonry in hut
2720 BC Meet up with Bismark of the Germans
2480 BC found Judaism in Washington
2400 BC Meet Saladin of the Arabs
2000 BC Meet Isabela of the Spanish, she don't like me as she founded Buddhism
My lucky day, Horseback Riding in a hut!!!

Washington size 7 Stonehedge in 2
New York size 2 settler in 13
IronWorking in 9

F9 Stats: GNP 2, Mfg 7, Crops 1, Soldiers 3, Lands 3, Pop 1, Aprv 7, LE 7, I/E 1

I pretty much have entire map revealed upto the Mongols in the north and the Spanish in the east. I have tons of room with sufficent rivers to burry the other civs in tech research. Looks like no more huts, but I'm quite satisfied with three techs, 72 gold and no barbs from the huts I did pop. Went for Stonehedge to try and snap up a couple more religions with Great Prophets. As long as I have metal I see no problems dominating this game.

Techs Research Order: Mysticism, Polythesim, Hunting, Wheel, Monothesim, Pottery, Bronze Working, Iron Working.

http://img286.imageshack.us/img286/4141/au100swissy1480bc9sj.gif

[Dubhghlas]

Looks like a trend has developed. Most everyone is founding New York to the SW. I didn't; I'll post the DAR tomorrow, but I went for a try at cutting off the obvious source of furriners to the NE. Hopefully, I can have the whole damn area to myself, though it will cause friction with someone, most likely the Mongols! :eek:

[V3nom]

I played down to Monarch difficulty this game as I wanted to test out the effectiveness of heavy pop rushing as opposed to the treecutting everyone seems to be so fond of. I'm hoping to pull off the Civil Service rush AND get the Pyramids AND not dent my expansion by doing so... easy as pie eh? :P

please be gentle, this is my first DAR so any advice or critisizm is appreciated. Comments like 'just go away' will be considered as well :lol:
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Game starts at 4000bc (big suprise eh? :P) and I found washington on its starting square and immediately head to mining and then bronze working. I que a worker and then warrior in my capital and set emphasize food on. When completed the worker will devote himself entirely to irrigating crops and floodplains.

My warrior heads north and lets the border expansion pop the goody hut (this way there's no risk of it being a hostile village) I end up getting a few gold from it and my warrior pops another to provide me with a scout.

a groan of annoyance escapes my lips as my scout provides dinner for a wandering bear. However my warrior bravely holds off a pack of lions so it wasnt a completely loss. a girlish squeel of delight escapes my lips as my warrior discovers mysticism in a village (and also gaining me several strange looks from people wondering why a 20year old man is making such high pitched sounds).

Washington hits size 5 as the warrior is finally produced and I set it to crank out a settler, something that will take only 10 turns (less once I get more irrigation set up). I send the little man on his way unprotected but knowing he's going to a relatively safe area, I then switch to slavery so that I wont waste any turns with my new city in anarchy.

During all this the wheel, pottery and writing. are done and I pop rush a granary into my capital before starting on another settler to avoid going above the now reduced happyness limit. 8 turns later the settler comes out and is sent out on his own and after playing hide and seek with a warrior is founded on the spot I want him to. A library is started and then pop rushed into my capital before two scientist specialists are assigned to ramp up my research and get me an academy.

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At 1520 (turn 62):

*3 cities.
*2 workers.
*1 library and 1 granary in the capital.
*the wheel, pottery, writing, mining, masonary, bronze working, mysticism, polytheism and priesthood all researched.
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f9 stats:

*Land area - 1st
*crop yeilds - 2nd
*population and GNP -4th
*life expectancy & soldiers -6th
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screenshot including planned places for next cities:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v231/VenomLord/Civ4ScreenShot0006.jpg

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Conclusions and thoughts for the next period:

-Pop rushing is indeed more effective than I thought. Without a granary you basically turn every excess food into a shield (very close to a 1:1 ratio). with a granary suddenly every excess bit of food becomes 2shields.

-I am unsure if I'll get the pyramids or the oracle, I should be able to grab 1 but I dont like my chances of getting both unfortunately. I am currently unsure of which city is going to build what.

[chriseay]

DAR 1: 4000 BC - 1520 BC (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4158935#post4158935)
DAR 2: 1480 BC - Beginning of Classical Era (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4159533#post4159533)
DAR 3: Classical Era (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4160190#post4160190)
DAR 4: Medieval Era (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4164329#post4164329)
DAR 5: Renaissance Era (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4166449#post4166449)
DAR 6: Industrial Era (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4166457#post4166457)
DAR 7: Modern Era (http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4166466#post4166466)

4000 BC: Washington was founded on the spot, and my warrior is used to pop the goody hut. This being a low difficulty, warlord, the villagers provided me with a worker! This is an excellent turn of events, probably completely ascribed to the fact that I am playing on warlord. Research is begun on mysticism in order to try for some religions, while a warrior is queued up to be built.

3720 BC: My warrior is scouting to the east, and finds elephants and stone near the coast. This will be taken into consideration for a new city. I always plan my cities around resources. I don't know if this is the optimal plan, but I feel that resources provide the most for each individual city and for my empire as a whole.

3560 BC: My warrior pops another hut, and this time the villagers are hostile. I guess it's a little karma coming back at me. Hopefully my warrior will be able to fend them off. My second warrior is finished in Washington, and fortified for defense. A settler is started.

3520 BC: My warrior defeats one barbarian, but loses to the second. I will have to build another warrior or two to scout now, as well as protect my settlers with the barbarians running around.

3360 BC: I found Hinduism in Washington.

3120 BC: My first settler and a warrior are sent to the Southwest, towards the pigs and the coast. I want to found a city by the stone and ivory in the east, but it is too far away right now.

2960 BC: I grow in Washington and start on a settler. I considered a worker, but I don't think I need one quite yet. My second city hasn't been founded and the free worker I got is working the tiles I need for Washington. I think after this settler I will build a couple of warriors, one for scouting and then a worker before I build another settler.

2880 BC: I found New York, with the pigs and a river in it's radius. It is also a coastal city, something I like to get as soon as possible. I start on warrior, with a worker probably to come next.

2720 BC: I found Judaism in New York. I am very far behind on other techs though, and I am questioning why I beelined for Judaism. I will switch civics and switch to a state religion now. I start on research for the wheel so I can connect my resources.

2480 BC: I finish the warrior in New York, and I send it exploring. There is another hut to the south, so I send the warrior there.

2440 BC: I discover the Wheel, and start on Animal Husbandry. I want to be able to use the pigs by New York as soon as it's borders expand.

2400 BC: I get a map from the barbarian hut. I want to settle in the south, with furs, stone and fish around. I wish I had explored here first, though it looks like I have this area to myself, so I can take my time. I also meet the Mongols, who are scouting and come upon the northeast border of Washington.

2200 BC: I found Boston by the ivory and stone, and realize there is also wheat in the radius. I will need to hook up these resources and also the city to my trade network.

2080 BC: I realize that I will need to rush infrastructure in both New York and Washington so I decide to forgo Hunting and Pottery for now, and research Bronze Working. I will continue on the worker techs after. I pop a hut, and get a free tech: Horseback Riding! I would have waited quite a while to get this tech, so it is nice to get it for free.

1800 BC: Bronze Working finishes, I switch to slavery and start on pottery. If I'm going to be pop rushing I'll need the food stored by granaries to get my population back sooner.

1680 BC: I have pop rushed a Hindu Missionary in Washington to take care of a few problems: I needed my state religion in New York, and I had both unhealthiness and unhappiness in Washington. The missionary can help me with both problems. I also send a settler to the southeast of Washington to enclose the southern portion of the continent past my borders. Hopefully this will allow me to expand at my leisure.

1560 BC: I found Philadelphia, cutting off the southern portion of the continent.

At this point I am doing well, but I regret my choice to go for Judaism after my unlikely win of Hinduism. It was a tech I didn't need at the time, and it actually set me back, because I didn't get the benefit of state religion in my second city until I built a missionary in Washington. This is because I founded New York too quickly, which I will remember if I go for more than one religion in future games. It is important to get all the holy cities in the capital if possible.

My goals moving forward are to expand to the north and west until I hit other civs, and then to take the land to the south that I have blocked off. The view of the American empire, circa 1520 BC:

http://img486.imageshack.us/img486/7936/1520bc00006tz.th.jpg (http://img486.imageshack.us/my.php?image=1520bc00006tz.jpg)

[Aeson]

Started this one up figuring to focus on economy as much as possible. The first hut gave a Scout, which was very helpful. Founded Orangesodia on the starting tile after debating whether to move towards the Hills or not. Decided to use the Capitol as a Food/Commerce pump and mostly build Workers and Settlers there.

Started out on the Wheel and a Worker.

The Scout paid off quickly, grabbing Animal Husbandry, Mysticism, and 86g in total from huts. Also made contact with everyone pretty early on.

After the Wheel finished, it was right on to Pottery. The Worker farmed and roaded the Corn, then built 3 Cottages on FP for my capitol to use. In the meantime I researched Writing.

Happiness has been a bear, limiting my cities to size 3 and 4. At first I was heading to Drama and/or Calendar to address the happiness concerns, but after I got Mysticism from the hut, I decided to try for Confucianism and the Oracle. By this point I hadn't seen the AI doing too well, Stonehenge wasn't even built yet. I guess the AI didn't get the extra starting units? (Which explains the number of huts I was able to grab too.)

I had Open Borders with everyone after Writing finished. Ghengis and Saladin didn't like Hatshepsut, and so I ended up having to cancel the Open Borders. Since then Hatshepsut has been stuck on "won't talk" mode. That's a pretty steep price for cancelling a deal.

My first Settler went SE and built inbetween the Cattle and Horses on the coast. Started an Obelisk to expand to the Horses, then right in on the Oracle. Second Settler went W and settled on the coast next to the Lake, within range of the Pigs.

2 more turns until Code of Laws. 12 more turns on the Oracle. Bismark built Stonehenge a few turns back, and I can cut the build time down by about 4 turns once the Horse Pasture is finished, so I think I'm probably safe. In a regular Deity game, I don't think there would be much chance to get the Oracle after having built 2 cities and 2 Workers, with no chopping so far.

Barbarians have been a bit of a nuisance so far, but one good thing about Deity (especially if you have open borders with everyone) is that you're pretty well defended early on by your neighbor's exploring unit spam. So far I've only had 3 Barbarian Warriors invade my territory. Each time I've been able to defend with good odds and 2 Warriors. Can't wait for the Chariots to feel "safe" though...

------------

Techs:

Animal Husbandry (hut)
The Wheel
Mysticism(hut)
Pottery
Writing
Meditation
Priesthood
Code of Laws (2)

[Cort Haus]

DAR 2 - Rest of Ancient Era (http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4159378#post4159378)
DAR 3 - Classical Era (http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4159527#post4159527)
DAR 4 - Medieval Era (http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162293#post4162293)
DAR 5 - Renaissance Era (http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4165411#post4165411)
DAR 6 - Industrial Era (http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4166691#post4166691)
DAR 7 - Modern Era (http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4166712#post4166712)


OK, nice river and insane amounts of food, but very few production tiles on the first spot, so move East to include hills in the city radius.

Choppers could get in trouble here, as there's -1 health from the floodplains that needs 3 forests to counteract. Not to mention a the sparse hammers that would be left if hills weren't in radius. So, Bronze is not yet a priority.

I'd like to try and use the CS-Slingshot here, to see how it compares with other starts, which means library, scientists, acadamy, code of laws, Oracle, Civil Service free tech. With such a high-food start there will be an early settler while thse hills are mined. So, mining is needed by the time the first couple of farms are done. Of the starting techs farming will be immediately useful, fishing not so with the inland start. Fastest route to library is via animal husbandry, which is now more valuable post 1.09, to see where the horsies are. Fast growth and low health make a case for an early-ish wheel to hook up the corn, though -1 food from exceding the health cap by one will probably be OK.

Another route for this capital with this leader might be a settler-worker-GP factory, and/or with cottage-spam topping. Org + Fin = affordable expansion.

----


<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=18997_first_map.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=18997_first_map.jpg)

Hitting the hut opens up a map to the North East, including an excellent-looking coastal-river site with Ivory (early luxury) and a hut. Washington is founded with the hills in radius, starts on AH and builds a worker while the warrior heads SE into the darkness before turning NE towards the hut, discovering a source of Stone en-route. Two city sites identified and it's only 3880 BC. Who said maps suck? Yeah, we all did, I know, but this time not so bad. :) The city radius expands revealing pigs and cows to the south. Make that FOUR probable city sites noted, and its only 3880 BC.

Arriving at the second hut - and another map! This time showing territory to the north and the east and OMFG there be Spaniards! :eek: A lion too, but happily the other side of the river, and the warrior survives. After some pondering over the geometry, the tiles for the ivory and stone cities sites are decided.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=18997_city_sites.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=18997_city_sites.jpg)

The completion of Animal Husbandry reveals horses south of the capital. Mining next,as the warrior heads north and gets 46g from the 3rd hut. The worker completes and starts farming while a warrior is built. Mining completes, and Writing started. I want to get all those hills mined up asap for the library build. The warrior completes and a second worker is ordered (6 turns, with the Corn and 1 mine being worked at size 3). Meanwhile the plucky exploring warrior finds the Mongolian border. Marvellous - Isabella and Genghis as neighbours. All we need now is Montezuma. 4th hut gives a warrior :cool:

There's a lot of empty land around - so it might get a bit barbtastic - at least by non-raging, sub-monarch standards. The 2nd worker completes in 2720 BC, with 2 turns till writing so a 2nd warrior is ordered. More Horses and several Wines are revealed to the north. Writing completes in 2640 BC, Open Border deals are signed with the various AIs, and Mysticism is ordered. Washington starts on its library, but maxes out on food first to get the pop up so as to use those nice mined hills.

When it gets to size 4 the library is 9 turns away. A 5th hut gives 40g, and after Mysticism comes some serious agonising over whether to go for the Wheel before Meditation or not. Hooking up the corn for a health-up and starting a road out to the Stone site would be nice, but I don't want to delay Code of Laws too long. Eventually I press on through Meditation towards Priesthood.

Meanwhile my second built warrior (first garrisons) explores south, and picks up another warrior from the 6th hut. Sweet, my adventurers are reproducing! One of the northern warriors, on his way home to help guard the fort meets a bear NW of Washington and decides to give it a Wide Berth. Those 3-strength mofos are not to be met anywhere but wooded hills, in my experience.

The Library completes in 2200 BC. Now to build a Great Scientist for the Acadamy. At size 4, with 2 scientists, it'll take 20 turns for a settler, so I max out food for two turns to get size 5 before starting it. This shaves a turn off the settler (now 17 turns) and add 1 bpt, but delays the academy by two turns. The scientists will take 17 turns to bake their cake too, so that'll be a Big Day :) With lib & scientists, I can grab The Wheel in 4 turns and do so.

In 2000 BC a 7th hut gives Bronze Working, and a potential commerce city site staked out in the tundra with furs, fish and stone. At this point Mechiavelli describes our Civ as the 3rd largest in the world. After the Wheel comes Priesthood, and during all this time my exploring warriors have fended off countless animal attacks. I'm being careful to avoid flat ground wherever possible and particularly to avoid bears, so as to maximise survival-chances. IN 1880 BC the Corn is roaded, and the 1 extra food from the health point (begone, green face of ague!) shaves another turn off the settler.

In 1800 BC we start on Code of Laws, and start meeting our first human barbs. Luckily on wooded ground, and both fights are won. The AI's are all busy adopting Slavery at this point, wheras the poor dumb human player has never used poprushing in Civ 4 and still thinks it'll bugger up his cities like it did in Civ 3. Another thing the AI's are doing is getting Annoyed with Hatsheput. Dunno why, but I'm already in Genghis's bad books for refusing to break off deals with Hattie. I've heard she's a good ally, so I snubbed the nasty Mongolian.

1560 BC and my 8th hut finally gives barbs - and lots of them. Farewell, sweet warrior, you served us well. On 1520 BC, our last turn of this DAR and the settler is ready next turn, with the Great Scientist arriving in two.

Military - 2 Worker, 4 Warriors (2 from huts)
GNP - 5th
Mfg - 7th
Crops - 5th
Soldiers - 7th
Land - 4th
Pop - 5th

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=18997_Civ4ScreenShot0064.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=18997_Civ4ScreenShot0064.JPG)


Builds

Worker
Warrior
Worker
Warrior
Library
Settler

Tech
Animal Husbandry
Mining
Writing
Mysticism
Meditation
The Wheel
Priesthood
Bronze Working (from hut)
Code of Laws

[polarnomad]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
I'd like to try and use the CS-Slingshot here, to see how it compares with other starts, which means library, scientists, acadamy, code of laws, Oracle, Civil Service free tech.

Hi Cort. Could you please explain your strategy in a bit more detail? I'm left scratching my head... CS-Slingshot? :confused:

[monkspider]

Prince Difficulty

I founded Washington on the suggested spot. After that, I built a warrior for exploration, and started researching hunting. My intial plan was to go hunting first for scounts, and then mysticism-->Polytheism.

After building a warrior, I built a scout and managed to located Ghenghis Kahn in the Northeast. Mongols, right next door eh? Greeeaat. :D

I then researched the wheel, and animal husbandry. No one had discovered Judiasm yet, so I thought I would take a crack at that. I reasoned that. After building my scout, I took an unusual step and started building a settler instead of a worker. I didn't see anything particularly interesting at the time for my worker to do, but this was a step I had some reservations about later. Time will tell if this was a prudent move.

I continued to explore, and thanks to a lucky warrior-in-a-hut, i managed to explore the better part of the continent, as far I can tell.

By 1480, I discovered Judiasm, and was in 3rd place with a settler on the way. I was quite pleased in being able to discovered Hinjewism, and I hoped to spread some rellgious love to my neighbors soon.

I plan on making a run at Stonehenge, with the help of some stone to the east. It may be difficult however since Washington is not exactly overflowing with production. But those great prophet points would really help right now.

WHen I discovered monotheism, i had the choice to switch to organized religion. I opted not to at the moment, as I wanted to strengthen my finances, and ensure strong research and expansion.

Several things I have noticed, there is a lot of open land to be claimed, and I plan on using Washington's traits to control as much of it as efficiently as possible.

[monkspider]

oops forgot the screenshot.

[Velociryx]

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=1327_Civ4Screen1520BCAmericans.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=1327_Civ4Screen1520BCAmericans.JPG)

Mine seems to be a slow, plodding sort of game thus far, but I will duly report my findings so far:

* 4k BC - washington founded in the starting spot. Settler begun. Map from village showing excellent lands, eastward. Yummy. Begin by researching Wheel.

3800 - 1st border expansion

3640 - The wheel is mastered. Straight on to Pottery.

3600 - Buddhism founded....elsewhere.

3280 - Pottery is ours...now researching Mining. Hut reveals 2x Barb Warriors. We kill one, and the other one gets us. We are now reduced to sitting and waiting for things to come to us.

3160 - Hinduism is founded, but not by us.

3000 BC - Mining is ours, and we set our sights on Bronzeworking. Washington's settler completes, and that city begins working on a Worker.

2920 - New York established on a plains hill (8-8-8-9) North of Washington. Begins a worker.

2680 Germans find us.

2520 Mongols find us.

2480 Bronzeworking is ours. Now our attention turns to Writing.

2440 Worker completed in NY. Begin a Warrior. Workers go farm some corn.

2400 - Washington's worker completes. They too, turn into corn farmers in the immediacy (that's two tiles producing a total of 12 food for the empire, btw....before we even GET on the subject of FloodPlains!....NICE).

2200 - Barbs spotted in the west. Prolly the same sap suckers that killed our starting warrior. We re-arrange some production to speed the completion of our warriors.

2040 - Barbs defeated west of washington. Promotion - Woodsman I. We heal.

2000 - NY's warrior completed (fortify). NY begins working on a barracks to give us that first, freebie promotion (Vel's philosophy...build it once...build it well).

1960 BC - Writing is ours! Forest growth near Washington. Washington's warrior completes, and that city begins work on a Library. Cottage completed on NY's singular floodplain (they'll get more once we have a border expansion).

1920 - More barbs appear out of the west (and slightly north).

1840 - Barbs attack us cross-river before we are fully healed, and defeat us. Washington contingent moves out to engage them.

1760 - Open borders with Mongols and newly met Spaniards. Barracks completed in NY (begins another warrior). Washington contingent defeats the barbs and begins moving southward, toward the goody hut that got revealed with the latest washington border expansion.

1680 - More barbs appear, this time, due north of NY. The move off in another direction the following turn, and we vow to follow and find them.

1520 - Another Warrior from NY (Woodsman I promotion), heads north in search of barbarians.

Washington garrison pops a hut and gives us a Scout, who moves south into the Tundra to explore and push back some more of the fog. Plan is to return Washington garrison home, beginning next turn.

F9 Stats

4th in Gold and Hammers
1st in Food
7th in Troops
4th in Pop

Assets:
2 Workers
4 Warriors
1 Scout

Production
Settler (9)
Library (1)

Techs in-hand:
Wheel
Pottery
Writing
Mining
Bronze Working
Mysticism
Meditation
Fishing
Agriculture

Priesthood in 5

We'll see what that gets us in the coming segment....

-=Vel=-

[Taian]

4000BC - Found Washington on starting square. Plan is to pursue mining and bronze then wheel and pottery. I'm choosing not to go after an early religion; normally I DO pursue at least one of the early religions but I'm not sure I can still pull it off on Monarchy (usually play Prince) so I'll take a different route and maybe pick up one of the later religions.

I must say, I like the loads of food kicking around. With the Americans starting with agriculture, priority #1 is getting a worker out and hooking up that corn. I also want to try a bit of a gambit that I haven't used yet in my other games but looks like it may be promising in this one. My initial builds are going to be a worker while I research mining and the first bit of bronze working and then follow it up immediately with a settler. I know that will slow down growth of the capital early on but combined with a chop during the settler build, it should allow me to get 2 cities up and running reasonably quickly. Anyway, that's why the mining/bronze path for the first 2 techs. The wheel/pottery path is to let me get cottages up on the flood plains as soon as possible. With the other American trait, financial, putting a cottage down on the flood plain turns it into a 3 gold generator very early on which should add up to allowing faster growth overall during the early game.

So, a bit of a risk in neglecting to get a warrior built to supplement the first one that I went out exploring with. However, barbs don't usually appear quite that early and, with careful movement (one space at a time for the settlers), I should be able to avoid any wild animals while I plop down that second city. Then I can put out a few more warriors to help patrol the borders.

3720BC - Mining.

3560BC - Spanish found Hinduism.

3360BC - Egypt founds Buddism. Appears the gambit to avoid an early religion is paying off. There's no way I would have been able to get to either of those that fast.

Sometime in here (don't remember the exact date) I got a scout from a hut. Sweet! Time to kick the exploration up a notch. Moved him two squares and...a lion appeared beside him. Poof! Dead scout. Stupid wild animals :rant:

3120BC - Bronze Working and revolution.

3080BC - Adopt Slavery. I'm planning to try and control the unhappiness and unhealthiness with some selective pop rushing...especially for libraries and possibly markets early on.

2800BC - New York founded.

2720BC - The wheel.

2480BC - Pottery. Cottages will start to go down very shortly hereafter. Since there is still a number of turns left before this first block is done on the report, a few of the cottages should be able to make it to hamlets.

2160BC - Writing.

1960BC - Boston founded.

1640BC - Mathematics and entered Classical era.

1520BC - Spanish found Judaism.

Cities:
Washington - Library, 2 hamlets on flood plain, 22 science per turn
New York - One hamlet, one cottage on flood plain. Constructing library. Will pop rush it once able, 10 science.
Boston - Nothing of note, 2 science per turn. Using this one as a troop station. One AH is researched, will put a pasture on its cow.


Techs:
Mining
Fishing
The Wheel
Agriculture
Pottery
Bronze Working
Writing
Mathematics
1 turn away from Animal Husbandry

I want to get towards Calendar asap but I will probably make a detour to Currency first to get both markets and the +1 trade route and then go for Calendar.

Units:
4 Warriors
2 Workers
1 Settler

Contact:
Mongols
Germans
Egyptians
Spanish
Arabs

In the screenshot I've noted the locations for my next 3 cities. The #1 site is about to be taken care of and I want to try and get the other 2 up and running relatively quickly as well.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by polarnomad


Hi Cort. Could you please explain your strategy in a bit more detail? I'm left scratching my head... CS-Slingshot? :confused:

Complete Code-of-Laws before building the Oracle and you can take Civil Service as a free tech and switch to Bureaucracy for a super-capital.

[lockstep]

Decided to move the settler one tile to the east because I want (semi-)high production in my capital. Washington is still founded in 4000 BC - 2-movement-settlers are one reason why I'm in love with Civ 4 :cool:. Build queue: worker/warrior/settler - without agriculture as starting tech, I'd build the warrior first to grab more huts, but right now I want to irrigate those flood plains.

Exploration with my starting warrior reveals a potential city site to the east with stone/wheat/ivory :eek:. I like to build Stonehenge even when I have no stone to expand my borders quickly, but with stone it's a must-have, and the Pyramids become also tempting.

Research order: Animal husbandry (to see where those horses are), then mysticism - masonry - polytheism - monotheism (for a chance to found one of the early religions). Hinduism is founded by someone else while I'm still researching AH (I nearly expected this), then also Buddishm while I'm still trying to figure out mysticism (well, too bad), then also Judaism only four turns before I get monotheism (:mad: ).

Contacts: Bismarck, Saladin, Genghis Khan and Isabella - in short warmongers and religious fanatics. Saladin and Isabella have already founded a religion - I might as well forget about a diplo victory.

New York is founded in 2360 BC near the stone and immediately starts building Stonehenge - my first worker had been standing idle for two turns to start the stone quarry ASAP.

Results of further exploration: Lots of good city sites in the vicinity! I choose the horses/cow site to the southeast for my third city - Boston is founded in 1960 BC and starts working on a barracks. Washington produces another worker, then switches to the Pyramids.

My hut results have been extremely pleasing so far: One warrior, five experience points, one tech (sailing) and a total of 207 gold! This will allow me to keep the tech rate at 100% for quite some time.

Research, part two: The wheel (I need to connect Washington with stone to speed up the Pyramids) - mining (to get some hammers out of those Washington hills for the Pyramids), bronze working (to chop some Washingon forests for ... I guess you knew already).

The general situation in 1520 BC: 3 cities with 9 pop points, two workers, a couple of warriors. According to F9, I'm everything from no. 1 (population, land, mfg. goods) to no. 7 (soldiers), with an average rank of 3.

Some details: New York should complete Stonehenge in five turns, notwithstanding the fact that I didn't road the stone until now because I foolishly assumed that ressources within the 9-tile-city radius are automatically connected :rolleyes:. Washington's growth has been stopped at size 6 - everything above that would result in unhappy citizens. (I really miss my early temples.)

[Dubhghlas]

Edit: Noble Difficulty (I'll pay for that, later! :lol:)

Beginning

It is the Year 1 in the history of the Scottish people. Dubhghlas of the Scots has wrested control of his clan away from the loutish brute who ruled through fear of his club. Too bad he didn't understand the subtle concept of not looking at a loud noise when confronting someone with a smaller, but quicker club. Mourned, he was not.

Dubhghlas has a unique idea. From his agile mind has come the idea of staying in one place to grow food, rather than moving around in the hopes of finding food. If you take care of the grasses, they will grow tall and you can harvest their seeds more easily, then store them for the winter. The trees will provide the basics for huts in which to huddle during the winter months. The local animals can be hunted for their skins and meat, as they always have, but there will be no more peripatetic efforts to find the next ripening berry, the next stream of fish. People can wander, but there is no place like “home,” he thinks. He hopes he is right.

The clan has come out of an area of desert, by moving towards the setting sun over a range of hills. There is a strong river, along which grasses and reeds grow in profusion. Although the area is dry, the river provides life. And in the near distance there are forests of green. The area looks likely to support the clan. Although there are a few local humans, the area is relatively unpopulated; the fierce tribes they ran into in the direction of the rising sun are missing. The order goes out: begin to build a camp, a camp that will not move.

Dubhghlas and his warriors visit some local residents. They have no helpful advice, and are unwilling to join the crazy Scot in his unusual plans. They are, however, willing to offer some pieces of gold in order to be allowed to remain unmolested in the area; perhaps at a later date they will join the Scots in their camp.

And, so, the Year 1 ends with the building of the Camp. Someday in the future, for obscure reasons known to none, the city founded on this site will be known as Washington. The women are sent to begin tending the river-side grasses, with the hope of collecting seeds for planting more grass in the coming years, and watering these grasses in times of less rain. The young men and boys are set to learn the use of clubs and hand axes. Because scouts have seen large amounts of wild pigs in the area, Dubhghlas sets some of the men to the task of figuring out if the pigs can be kept in some way, so that they can provide a ready source of food. He doesn't know the term “Animal Husbandry;” he simply knows that pig ribs are “good eats.”

First Contact

Four hundred years have passed since the Scots clan settled by the River Dubhghlas and started to make a permanent home there. The years since have been kind to the clan. Explorations to the lands of cooler air show that there are many animals to be found and used. Eventually, though, the lands get quite cold, difficult to live in, the clan thinks. Wolves and bears roam the area, and constant vigil is needed.

The home city has grown. Fully five handsful of hundreds live there. A permanent mud building houses the clan chief and his family; the Dubhghlasses are living well and their building draws awestruck praise from those few wandering souls who stumble upon the village. Grasses are still farmed along the river, and the nearby forest is used to help make sturdy homes for the members of the clan, along with useful implements. The current chief wonders if the strange pods made by worms that inhabit the trees can be somehow turned into something to wear, or at least tie things up; the pods are made of a long, thin, strong thread. For a long time, no one dared leave the village that far to work, but after some two hundred years, the power of the clan's prestige kept workers safe even when not on nearby lands.

Just within the last few years, this turned out to be a good thing, when contact was made with a scouting party from a tribe that calls themselves the Mongols. They came out of the lands towards the rising sun, and although they spoke of friendship, the clan worries that they may be fierce warriors at heart. Still, they agreed not to attack members of the clan, and the Scots agreed not to attack them. However, the clan intends to expand its base of warriors, just in case, and will send some out to explore the lands down river. Rumor of a very large body of water that can't be drunk brings curious looks from the young warriors of the village.

The clan almost has the knack of keeping the pigs and cows captive and alive. It was not an easy skill to learn. There are wonderful beasts down the river that run swiftly and are strong enough the clan believes they could be ridden; the current Dubhghlas intends to capture and train them for riding; he imagines putting warriors on them and making swift progress from place to place. They would be unstoppable. He calls them horses, because a horse is a horse, of course, of course...

Expansion

More than a thousand years have passed. The Scots clan's leaders claim it is the year 1520 since the founding, but not all believe that an accurate count has been kept. No one yet has thought to write things down. The Dubhghlasses still run the clan; they keep the oral history, the traditions of the clan, and the really good ribs.

Much has happened. Not too long after the first contact with the Mongol tribe, warriors exploring the lands located towards the setting sun found people who were working the streams and hills to extract metals; the warriors lived with them long enough to learn this new skill. It has not yet been put to use, however; there are other priorities and the clan does well enough as it is, harvesting the grasses along the river.

The clan now works to figure out how to take rock and shape it, so that it can be built with. Mud bricks only go so far; they can be worn down by rain, and by wind. A splendid set of structures could be built with carved rock. Maybe their grandchildren will do such things.

The horses have been tamed, and can be ridden. But they prove of little value for the warriors; clubs are no good when riding, and some other weapon must be developed. The Scots begin to learn that what seems a good idea at the time isn't always helpful without coordination with other good ideas.

However, a big step has been taken. A group of the clan has left the village and has settled in another village, a village that some will call “New York” in ages to come. For right now, it is simply the “Other Village.” The current Dubhghlas clan head sent these villagers to the hills located in the direction of the warmer weather. Scouting parties have already identified many horses, and wild grapes in the area. But the Dubhghlas is thinking more of defense. Already contact with both the Mongols and the Germans has been made; the Germans are even more shifty and bellicose than the Mongols, though again, agreement was reached with their scouts not to harm each other's warriors. These scouts, too, came from the warmer lands, and it is the Dubhghlas' idea to string villages from shore to shore, to the sunset of the great desert, keeping the Germans and the Mongols from settling in the good lands the Scots have scouted further sunsetward. The Dubhghlasses want all the lands between the sea and the desert for the Scots.

And, so, the Scots prepare to send more settlers even further into the warm lands. Some cry that there should be trained those who can work the land better, but the Dubhghlasses do not heed them. Expand and seal off the prime lands, then worry about working them. He who gets there firstest with the mostest seems to do the best in this world.

First Era Ends

Still another thousand years have gone by. For fully 2500 years have the Scots dwelt alongside the river Dubhghlas. Now two additional villages exist: the one someday to be called Boston (maybe because of the beans that grow in the area) now exists further towards the warm lands, between forests and jungles. Trained workers are now beginning to farm the strange grasses that produce what some call an “ear” of seeds near the Main Village. More workers are being trained each day, in the hopes of being sent to the other villages to help out.

The clan now keeps written records. They are crude; mere pictures that represent ideas, but they allow the storage of information for future use. No longer is the untimely death of an elder a loss of knowledge. And the clan works to perfect the pictures, so that they can be written more quickly, and learned more easily. Some even talk of the pictures being just symbols for sounds, though most cannot conceive what this would mean; it sounds like magic for the shamen.

Nevertheless, it may be powerful magic that is needed. The world around them is filled with other tribes that are quite aggressive. The Spanish, the Arabs and the Egyptians have all contacted the Scots. So far, no blood has been shed, but most of these tribes beat on their shields with their clubs and act as if they alone are worthy of being praised. The Dubhghlasses consider themselves fortunate to have settled the lands they have; soon, the lands behind their villages will be safe from the other tribes.

The Scots are a happy, healthy people. They are not the most numerous, or the best at growing food, but they have more land that they control, they believe. And they intend to hold people in awe of them; they are building repositories of written records in each of the new villages. They hope this will bring people to study there, who can help them learn new things, foster new ideas, and cause those who they meet to regard them with wonder. It is not swords OR plowshares that will win for the Scots; it is the hearts and the minds of men the hope to conquer.
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=57320_EndofEra.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=57320_EndofEra.jpg):lol: :lol:

[DeepO]

Monarch difficulty, game 32 (+ multiples for test games)

Introduction
I decided to step back a level for this AU course (which I noticed too late, BTW, I never expected it to take of so quickly after the patch!). The reason being that I'd like to show some of the details for efficient play... You need those if you want to compete on higher levels. You can't care about such details when you're constantly battling for survival ;)

But first, a couple of goals. I've been interested in tech beelining lately, so certainly the early game will be focused around that. Comparing my game to others is easier if I try it to an extreme. A Civil Service line is the obvious choice before opening the save, so I'll try to reach that asap. If others have done the same, we can compare strategies easier.

This also means that the DAR structure is going to be a bit limited for me: I'll try to reach the Classical Era around 1500 BC by getting to CoL, and the Medieval era a bit later on. DAR 1 to 3 could be combined in a single post ;)

But those are just empty plans right now... let's see what the map holds.

4000BC Early decisions

The opening shot
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A very interesting decision early on. Floodplains and a river, but not much production in sight.

I decide not to move my warrior, but settle the city first. I can see enough of the land, the choice is between where the settler starts, and 6 from there.

3 reasons why I eventually moved the settler:
- I was going to pop the hut with settling the city. Never seen it produce anything bad, but that might be superstition ;)
- 2 grass hills in sight are the only good options I got for production. There is too much food here, you need to be able to balance it. If you go for only forests, you're lacking commerce... a floodplains+hill is a lot better.
- 3 floodplains in sight, but it looks like settling on the starting spot will give you 5 fp in reach. That's going to cost 2 health... I can't lose health, as I want to be able to run specialists early on.

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I pop the hut and... yes sir... a scout! Wow! :eek: Talk about good luck: This most certainly made the move worthwhile. Now, I've gotten early scouts before, and there is one thing I learned the hard way: They die easily. There is nothing so bad as running into a lion on turn 5, losing this advantage again. So I'm going to be more careful this time, or at least I'll try :D

The scout, or the hut, give a few more map tiles as well: they show wine up North. I'm sending my warrior to explore it.

I set my city to a warrior first. The fp needs irrigation (a tech I already have), but it is also giving me commerce. I want that to speed research along, so I plan on using up to 2 floodplains while my warrior completes. Only 1 hpt will mean I've got to wait 15 turns, but I consider that an investment. After those 15 turns (14 it turned out), my city will be size 3. That will give me +2fpt and +2 cpt, so I should be able to catch up quickly in building a worker.

Further, I need mining asap. But, I don't have a worker yet, and it will take at least 25 turns to build one. I decide to beeline to writing through the priesthood path: it's the shortest way. I'll need to put mining somewhere in between, most likely after Mystcism and polytheism or Meditation (not sure yet which of those last two to pick).

If I'm lucky (again ;)), this will give me a religion as well, but there is not much hope for that.

DeepO

[DeepO]

4000BC - 3680 BC: Mysticism
With two explorers, I try to think of a good pattern to explore my surroundings. I don't want the warrior to wander far as I could use him later on. Also, it looks like the South has Tundra right below my capital. I doubt I'm going to see many civs coming from there.

So, my warrior moves up North, to circle around my capital counter clockwise. The scout moves up North as well, but will go clockwise. As I'll probably lose one of them, this should give me the interesting regions first.

In the South, I'm going to run into barb problems. Tundra always does that... I need a warrior there as soon as I can spare him. For the moment, I'm safe though.

The wine sites turns out to be an excellent one: it has 3 wines, and a wheat. It also has a plain/hills tile, however I'm not sure this will be the perfect site for the city. It's obvious I need to settle right next to the wheat: the wheat near my capital will not give his health bonus until I road it. The other one is one the river, though, and help my capital without a road. I'm not planning on the Wheel anytime soon, so this means that the wheat near New York gives it health to Wash, but not the NY itself. But that's okay, NY will be small at first.

My scout explores to the east, and finds more maps from the hut. A nice patch of resources there, with 2 elephants! So far, it looks like I'll go for the wine first, then hurry to get the ivory. I may not go for hunting soon, but war elephants are incredibily useful.

My warrior up north moves to a cow resource (trying to find another city spot), and discovers a hut. But first... Mysiticsm completes in 3680 BC.

3680 BC - 3320 BC

The scout discovers 56g in a hut in 3680 BC, but the warrior spawns 2 hostile warriors in the other hut. Bye bye warrior. So much for my grand circling explorer strat :cute: The scout returns home sooner, going for the cow down below, and trying to circle through the tundra to the East.

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After Mysticism, I'm wondering on which religion to take. I've seen many times, that the AI tends to favour Meditation if it starts with Mysticism, in which case it will finish by the time I get mysticism. If buddhism would get founded, it happens a bit later. And founding both very early on doesn't happen many times.

I decide to minimize the risk: I'm starting on Meditation now, with the option to switch to Polytheism in case Buddhism would get founded within the next 3 turns.

As it turned out, I gambled right: Hinduism gets founded in 3480 BC, 5 turns after making the choice. Buddhism would have been founded before that, so there is a very good chance I'm getting it now. It'll always bring tension and anticipation to go for one of the techs, even if the real focus here is writing ;)


It's time to start to think about specialisation of cities. Yes, they haven't been built yet, but I pick priority in locations depending on why I need a certain city, and very rarily because it will unlock a resource.

As I get a better feel of my capital, I see that more than in other CS-beelines, it's going to be hurt for production. Without a granary and slavery, or chops, this means it will be good for building settlers, but won't have time to do so. it certainly won't have time for building warriors.

Which means I need a barracks city, and I need one now. That's going to be my first priority: to find a site which needs not a lot of improvement to become productive (as I can't spare my worker: it has to stay close to Washington). The elephant patch looks good, but needs a worker before it can blossom, and masonry as well. Plus, there is something awkward about it: it's very difficult to fit in an excellent city, while you can cramp in two moderately good cities if you want.

So, the wine city is going to build our military, probably be our only supply of units in a long time to come. It only needs a farm on the wheat, after which it can use forest/plains and forest/hills to get a good production going. The difficult thing to do is going to have discipline: I can't build a wonder there, no matter how much I want it, as it will mean other cities which are not ideal for it will need to build units.

The alternative would be to build the Oracle there, but my capital makes a poor barracks city. I can't wait for city #3 to be a barracks city, too high risk.Further, with the wine, and eventually the founding of confucianism there, it can later switch to more commerce... but by the time I'll get monarchy, I hope I've got another city to become a barracks city.

(BTW, I tend to draw out plans for each city, with very little broad cities, or cities that get founded just to fill a gap until about 6 or 7 cities large. Focus makes cities efficient, if you don't know what you're going to do with a city, you probably don't want to settle it)

One thing though: it looks like the plains/hills tile would be ideal for the wine city, but that would give me less production, and will take part of the capital's tiles. I don't need the production that fast, so I want to go for the grass/hills tile instead. It doesn't look like my capital is going to run as a GPP factory, which means it can use all the tiles around it. (cottages on fp :love: )

As to the elephants: maybe I can have a coastal city there, going for the great lighthouse. It looks like it is going to have a lot of production down the road.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Micro managing:
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With my capital only needing 1 more turn to grow to size 3, and 2 more turns before completing my warrior, I decide to take a peep. There is still some micromanaging that can be done in CIV, even if it is a lot less common than in Civ 3.

As I suspect, I can set one floodplain to the silk: it gives both warrior and worker next turn. I still keep the 2 commerce, which is important too: I need to get to Meditation asap,
and can't afford even a single lost beaker.

In 3440 BC, my first warrior is built. I start to work on a worker the moment my capital hits size 3, with 3 more turns before meditation.The worker will complete in 10 turns time (so 10 turns after you could possibly get it when going worker-first). My capital is giving me 12 bpt.

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The scout discovers another hut to the South East, and I move my new warrior down there as well. I spotted a lion and some wolves down there, maybe I can get some XP before bears appear.

3400 BC: the scout discovers 34g, spots the wolves. It moves towards some forests for protection. The lions have been sighted again as well. It kills the wolves the next turn, and gets a Woodman I promotion. And heal that last 0.1 as well...

3320 BC - 2320 BC
Budhism gets founded in 3320 - BC. I start on mining. I don't have my worker yet, but it will be close... but it can irrigate fp while waiting for mining to complete.

I kill the lion, discover another hut with the scout (38g plus a good city site close to sheep. But also wolves next to it), and move my warrior to the large part North East (which my first warrior was going to explore, before it got killed). There, it finds another hut giving maps, but dies by the lions next to it (didn't spot them before). Ouch. My only military unit right now is a scout, and I'm building a worker ;)

The worker completes (right before mining, but I decide for some farms first, it's better for commerce), I start on a warrior to get to size 4 before starting on a settler, and start on a warrior. After it completes (timed: exact size 4 again), I start on a settler. The warrior stays near to Washington this time: it can sniff out the wines site but that's about it. I need him before I can get to size 5 in Washington. Running unhappy citizens is very seldomly worth it...

I also start on writing, after priesthood is discovered. Apart from the mining detour, it has been the fastest possible path to writing: the lowest beaker count, and as much commerce as possible.

I discover writing in 2320 BC. I still need 2 more turns on the settler before I can start on a lib. My worker has completed 2 farms, and will complete a mine in 2 turns as well. Only after the settler completes am I going to need that mine, so that is also pretty nice. I haven't improved the wheat though, and I want to get another mine first.

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2320 BC - 1520 BC
As I spot a barb warrior and a bear, I decide to build a warrior before the lib. Technically, that puts me back 3 turns on my path, but I can't risk it: 2 cities, protected by 1 warrior while barbs start to attack? Better not.

Also, I haven't met anyone yet: I suspect them on the North East (as I more or less covered South and the West, I can see coast everywhere because of the maps), but the rest of the explored land hasn't seen a lot of AIs yet. I'm going to see more barbs there.

First problem, though, is the wines site: I carefully have to move there, as there are 2 bears and panthers nearby!

Then, I make a mistake. The settler was ordered to move onto the hills a couple of turns ago, and the warrior ready to scout it out first. But because of me not paying attention, the settler moved onto the hills before the warrior could... right next to bears. I moved my warrior on top, but lost.

I decided this was a bit much for a simple mistake: so far, nearly everything had gone perfectly, now I both lose my first settler, but also my only military unit who was acting as scout... as it is a learning game, I reloaded, and moved my settler onto the plain hills instead. I could have moved my warrior to the same spot, but as I knew I was going to lose him, I decided against it: with the settler taking the plains/hills, the warrior would be safe from the bears.

A cheat? Perhaps. But I'm not going to crawl out of that hole for my first demonstration game ;) It was a genuine mistake: I would not have lost the settler if I would have moved the warrior before the automove of the settler. And I normally always do that.

Turns out the bear decided to take a turn, and it headed up North. Next turn, I could move settler+warrior to the right spot anyway. Upon settling, my warrior went after the bear, circling towards the elephants in order to make sure my next settler wasn't going to have the same problem.

2080 BC: I settle New York near the wine. It starts to work on a warrior, and the wheat. My worker arrives the next turn to start on the farm, after it has 2 farms and 2 mines on grass/hills near Washington. The wheat near Wash is still not farmed (which, in hindsight, might have been a mistake, but I felt I needed the commerce more)

Also, this same turn, I encounter Saladin. I encounter Bismarck a turn later, and Hatshepsut 2 or 3 turns after that. I sign OBs with them all.

After I built a warrior (which stays at home this time), I start on a lib. It completes in 1680 BC
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Now, I've got to choose. I start on the Oracle, of course, while still continuing on CoL. I normally would run 2 scientists to get the academy asap... however here, I need production more. So... only 1 scientist (more later, once Oracle completes), CoL in 14 turns, CS in 18 turns... good ;) My capital is making 17 bpt, which is decent. Compare that to 2 bpt from New York, which even works a river tile. At this stage of the game, your capital is always going to do 80-90% of the research work, unless you're able to have gold or gem mines in other cities (and these require extra food too).

1520 BC
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My capital is running at 17 bpt, 8hpt. CoL in 10, CS in 14 turns.

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My tech path... next tech is one page away ;) Now of course, if you go for a more flat approach, you can have more techs. If you go for more expansion, you can have more commerce too. But this tech chart looks so empty because I've been investing in getting an academy + CS... I intend to double my beaker output soon.

Build paths:

Washington:
- warrior
- worker (size 3)
- warrior
- settler (size 4)
- warrior (necessary but not intended)
- lib (reaching size 5)
- Currently Oracle (with 1 scientist, eta 14 turns)

New York
- warrior
- currently barracks (size 3, 7 more turns)

I'm 4th (out of 5) in score, 6th in GNP, 2nd in production, 2nd in area. This seems to be going the right way..

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[edit: read the next part here (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4160353#post4160353).

DeepO

[DeepO]

Aeson, do you always space that densely on deity? I try to spread my initial cities out as much as I can, backfilling later. Do you feel so pressed up there that you want a closer spacing, eyeballing AI cities for expansion?

DeepO

[Aeson]

A few reasons.

Barbs. Animals are everywhere very early, and there's no bonus against them. Sending a Settler out of cultural borders, even with a Warrior escort, is a big risk. Being able to settle the turn you move out of cultural borders means no risk from animals.

Barb Warriors show up rather quickly, invade pretty early, and so cities need to be able to help each other defend. This game seems a bit off, as the Barbs took a long time to start with Archers. Normally Deity Barbs would have been to Longbows by the same time. (And possibly built a Wonder. ;) ) Guess it has to do with the scenario.

Health/Happiness limitations. Cities aren't getting very big early on. So to use all the good tiles, need to space closer together.

Maintenance. Need every last drop of commerce just to stay in the tech race, especially early on when 2-3 gpt can mean the difference between being hopelessly backwards or keeping up (ie. getting monopoly techs to trade around). Closer spacing means less distance maintenance. Every little bit helps early on. Later on when/if I have more cities, the number of cities maintenance factors in more, but by that time I can have developed my economy to be strong enough to offset it. Especially true for ORG/FIN.

Pushing into AI's borders ticks them off, so I like to delay border tensions as long as possible. In most cases it's better to have a couple less cities and not be at war until a viable military can be built up.

Also, it increases warning time early on. If I had built N or NW, I probably would have lost that city later when I was attacked.

It's hard to even have half the military the AI does and still stay in the tech race. So everything you have has to be defended by a military that can't hope to compete numerically. That means keeping cities closer together so their garrisons can support each other when necessary, and so that your main force can cover them all.

Basically it comes down to sacrificing some long range potential just to have a chance to survive.

[DeepO]

CH, it's interesting to compare our starts: even if the tech rate is different between Prince and Monarch, production is not.

We both took the same tile to start on, with you focusing more on production first, while I went for commerce. I'm thinking your path is better here, but it might depend on difficulty.

We discover writing in the same turn (2320 BC), and also start the lib around the same time.

You complete the lib in 2000 BC, I do in 1680 BC... as a result, I can't turn 2 scientists to use, as it would mean my Oracle will be too late. Only having 1 scientist is also going to hurt my tech situation...

The problem I'm seeing, is that you have 2 workers, while I only had one. That was fine, though, I never needed a second one. But by working the wheat near Washington a lot earlier, compensating the extra food with desert mines it seems you can reach a better tech rate. I'm still a bit in front with my extra commerce: I'll reach CoL in 10, you 'only' in 13 turns. But you'll probably build the Oracle sooner, and have an academy sooner.

The only real advantage I can see to not going worker first (which you need if you want to have two of them before 1500 BC), is the religion: a gamble, which in my case paid off.

Oh, and I did need to compensate by building a warrior, a 3-turn delay you didn't encounter. But still, your start would have been faster

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson
A few reasons.

Barbs. Animals are everywhere very early, and there's no bonus against them. Sending a Settler out of cultural borders, even with a Warrior escort, is a big risk. Being able to settle the turn you move out of cultural borders means no risk from animals.
Now this one is true on any level, I gather... I had to run from bears as well ;)

Interesting... I never considered that if you settle the turn you leave your borders, you're not going to have any problems, period. I know it too, of course, but haven't decided on which sites to go for based on this. I'll try to watch for this one...

Barb Warriors show up rather quickly, invade pretty early, and so cities need to be able to help each other defend. This game seems a bit off, as the Barbs took a long time to start with Archers. Normally Deity Barbs would have been to Longbows by the same time. (And possibly built a Wonder. ;) ) Guess it has to do with the scenario.
Yeah, so far (up to literature atm) I've only seen one barb city, and a couple of warriors. No free archers yet. Uncharacteristic for me as well, although I am patrolling heavily.

Health/Happiness limitations. Cities aren't getting very big early on. So to use all the good tiles, need to space closer together.
This has always been true, but I found so far that CIV is different from Civ3 here. Waiting on good tiles seems to be less important as the ability to grow later on. Gone are the days of close spacing, all cities getting exactly 12 tiles to work.

Was this feeling difficulty dependent, and the higher you get, the closer you need to space? Health/happy is obviously going to be harder, but staying close also nets you less resources. Do you foresee a stage of (military) resource hunting later on in every game? Trade isn't going to cut it here, 2 wines and a wheat to trade away.

Maintenance. Need every last drop of commerce just to stay in the tech race, especially early on when 2-3 gpt can mean the difference between being hopelessly backwards or keeping up (ie. getting monopoly techs to trade around). Closer spacing means less distance maintenance. Every little bit helps early on. Later on when/if I have more cities, the number of cities maintenance factors in more, but by that time I can have developed my economy to be strong enough to offset it. Especially true for ORG/FIN.
Hmmm... true that. I have yet to start playing towards my traits. Or at least I can improve. Good thing you're telling me this before I get to far ;)

Pushing into AI's borders ticks them off, so I like to delay border tensions as long as possible. In most cases it's better to have a couple less cities and not be at war until a viable military can be built up.
Well, yes, but isn't this map different here? I mean, you chose to go for the cows before going for the wines. You eventually settle both sites (as I'll do, hopefully), isn't it better to settle closer to the border first, after which you leave enough room for the AIs to expand into? Or, by the time you settled near the wines, did you consider your military viable yet?

It's hard to even have half the military the AI does and still stay in the tech race. So everything you have has to be defended by a military that can't hope to compete numerically. That means keeping cities closer together so their garrisons can support each other when necessary, and so that your main force can cover them all.

Basically it comes down to sacrificing some long range potential just to have a chance to survive.
Hum. Must think on this a bit more. I know I'm experiencing some problems on Emperor, where the chance of success seems to deminish early on. The risks are indeed higher, they'll be a lot worse on deity.

DeepO

[Aeson]

Originally posted by DeepO

Now this one is true on any level, I gather... I had to run from bears as well ;)

Yah, but on Deity you have the worst odds, and the most barbs, and they show up the earliest. It can be ugly. For instance, at one point I had a Warrior on a Forest Hill with 6 barb animals in view, and that was with 2 tiles blocked from line of site. 3 Bears, 2 Lions, and a Panther...


This has always been true, but I found so far that CIV is different from Civ3 here. Waiting on good tiles seems to be less important as the ability to grow later on. Gone are the days of close spacing, all cities getting exactly 12 tiles to work.

Not really. 12 workable tiles can still be pushing the health limitations even at the end of the game. That's because food is much more abundant in CIV than it was in Civ III, and Specialists are much more useful. So a size 20 city can be working 12 tiles, and have 8 specialists, and be pushing the limits of health.

Was this feeling difficulty dependent, and the higher you get, the closer you need to space? Health/happy is obviously going to be harder, but staying close also nets you less resources. Do you foresee a stage of (military) resource hunting later on in every game? Trade isn't going to cut it here, 2 wines and a wheat to trade away.

Certainly is difficulty dependant.

Trade is much more likely to work than unsafe expansion.

Well, yes, but isn't this map different here? I mean, you chose to go for the cows before going for the wines. You eventually settle both sites (as I'll do, hopefully), isn't it better to settle closer to the border first, after which you leave enough room for the AIs to expand into? Or, by the time you settled near the wines, did you consider your military viable yet?

The Horse/Cattle site was the best production site for the Oracle, and I needed Chariots since I didn't have Archery. I never settled near the Wines, Genghis got it. (And Saladin would have captured my city if it was there anyways.)

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson
Not really. 12 workable tiles can still be pushing the health limitations even at the end of the game. That's because food is much more abundant in CIV than it was in Civ III, and Specialists are much more useful. So a size 20 city can be working 12 tiles, and have 8 specialists, and be pushing the limits of health.
True, but then it depends on specialists. I set out to build up Washington with only few specialists and big production, however I played until construction now, and after my 2nd prophet (and a GS), I'm still running specialists there. It comes too natural... wonders and specialists mix well.

I'm at size 12 now, and am using mostly the tiles to the North of the city. I intend to grow though. You seem to have put more focus on GPP in Washnigton.

Trade is much more likely to work than unsafe expansion.
Hmmm... but with limited expansion you won't have anything to trade away.

Unsafe expansion never works, it's only much more apparant in your case. I didn't go for the sites near the mountain ridge either, and have fared well so far. Vel extended, and seemed to have angered the AI too much.

But you take it to the extreme: by moving away from the wines, you give the AI as much space as you can. That will buy some time, yes, but it's interesting to see it work too.

The Horse/Cattle site was the best production site for the Oracle, and I needed Chariots since I didn't have Archery.
That's something I'm going to need to get used to: horses hiding until AH. You were lucky in getting the tech for free, but probably not going for one of the revealing techs (AH, BW, IW) would be suicide on deity. On Monarch and Emperor you can nearly always stay with warriors until after you research CS, even if a couple of axes or archers could help.

I didn't see the horse until much later. The cow city was also settled much later, not much point to it with only one resource in range when there are better sites to settle. I certainly didn't see it complete the Oracle in time ;)

DeepO

[Aeson]

Yah, Mining, BW, and IW were going to be the next techs I researched after Pottery. Probably with AH after finding either Copper or Iron (or neither). I wasn't planning on trying Oracle->Civil Service until getting AH and Mysticism from huts made it look much more likely to work out.

[clarkcd]

My DAR will just hit the highlights of my first 2500 years as leader of the great American peoples. Boring huts, battles against barbarians/animals and normal builds/researches have been omitted. If anyone wants to know I can let you know since I'm pretty much playing my standard game.

4000 BC - Built Washington

I usually build on the opening square unless I find a resource with my warrior/scout within one move.

3320 BC - Founded Hinduism in Washington

I generally try and beeline for as many religions as I can get. Playing mostly on Noble or lower it isn't hard to do

2960 BC - Hut gave Animal Husbandry

Fortunate for me! Probably saved me 4-6 turns of research which gets me that much closer to nicer techs.

2440 BC - Built New York

I saw those wine fields and just had to plant a city up on those hills to snag em all. The horses sealed the deal since I don't know at this point whether I have any copper or iron to build troops with. If the horses hadn't been there I probably still would have built there to try and cut off the western portion of that continent from other civs expansion.

2360 BC - Founded Judiasm in New York

As part of my religion beelining I try and snag Judiasm at the least. It's a great fallback for those times when I went for Hinduism but failed.

2120 BC - Met Genghis Khan

Could be worse...

2080 BC - Met Saladin

Not a bad neighbor to have actually.

----------

Breakdown of my techs:

L1 Techs: Fishing, The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Mysticism, Mining
L2 Techs: Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Archery, Polytheism, Masonry
L3 Techs: Monotheism
Currently Researching: Bronze Working 2/9 turns

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=48856_AU100A1.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=48856_AU100A1.JPG)

[Bobtoad]

Outlook...
Playing as Washington and the Americans, my initial goals for research are to get Pottery (to take advantage of his financial trait) and Code of Laws (related to his organized trait). Ideally I'll found Confucianism with CoL and get some religious happiness benefits - the fast growing floodplains will require it. And the culture bonus would be excellent for George's lack of creativity. As far as my build order, I'm always a bit slow to expand but am trying to quicken the process. After warriors/workers/settlers, libraries are my number one priority this time around. If I don't found Confucianism then I'll be relying on them to provide the culture to expand my borders. Also, with the financial direction, I seek to take advantage of commerce and science as much as possible.

Chronology...
4000 BC - Explored hut for 38 gold. Washington founded.
3800 BC - Borders expand. So far just surveying immediate surroundings.
3600 BC - Buddhism founded elsewhere.
3400 BC - Warrior killed by barbarians while exploring to the SW of Washington. First worker finally trained.
3160 BC - Hinduism founded elsewhere.
3040 BC - First contact with AI. Isabella found me.
2680 BC - Learned Writing (through The Wheel/Pottery) for libraries. Now grabbing a few worker techs before going after Code of Laws.
2640 BC - Growth halted in Washington. Happiness and health soon to be problems otherwise.
2040 BC - Saladin seeks open borders (have been meeting a few more AI). I agree to his terms. Also, New York is founded due West.
1960 BC - Greatest Civilizations ranked (largest). I'm in second place.
1760 BC - Going for Code of Laws now (through Mysticism/Meditation/Priesthood path).
1600 BC - Boston founded to the north.

Information Rankings at 1520 BC...
Gold - 1st
Prod - 3rd
Food - 4th
Soldiers - 6th
Land - 2nd
Population - 1st

Technology - Fishing, The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Mysticism, Mining, Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Meditation, Priesthood, Writing.

Links (New to forum, had trouble posting the pictures):
Tacitus ranks The Largest Civilizations in 1960 BC (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73761_AU100-A1960BC.JPG)
My Empire in 1520 BC (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73761_AU100-A1520BC.JPG)

Thoughts: My treasury and my point totals are both solid. My military is very weak though. After CoL is researched and the libraries are built I desperately need to get more than the 1 warrior per city (and the scout). I can definitely foresee barbarians being a major pain.

As far as city location, I chose New York's location because of the river access (easy trade route) and proximity to Washington. For Boston, it gave me horses and expanded my borders North. The only worries South and West at the moment are the barbarians, so I wanted to get some borders established towards the AI. East didn't look as appetizing when it will only take one road (through corn) to connect Boston to my trade network.

Upon reviewing other strategies posted here I realize that Slavery could've been very valuable with the starting placement of Washington. Instead of shifting focus in Washington between food/commerce/production tiles to prevent over population I guess I could've just raised the people and then, well razed the people. I've never even attempted Slavery (just hasn't appealed to me yet I guess), but this game might have been an excellent chance to experiment with it. Oh well. I'll definitely have to see how well it works for those that implement it.

Strategy...
And in case you're wondering what my overall strategy is for the game is I'll explain it now. Since this game is broken up into stages to evaluate it I think I'll break my strategy up into stages also. Here are my overall goals...

Ancient Era - Make use of Washington's traits through research and establish empire.
Classical Era - Balance out my empire by giving attention to things that were neglected.
Medieval Era - Further exploit my advantages (i.e. science) to gain some leverage.
Renaissance Era - Evaluate my empire and compare it to the rest of the world. Based on this, decide which victory path I should devote efforts to.
Industrial Era - Execute towards chosen victory path.
Modern Era - Hopefully achieve victory.

I also don't plan on building many wonders at all - at least until late in the game if I do. In previous Civ versions wonder building was all I really wanted to do. And once I was able through the editors I would cancel all the expiration dates on them so I could build them and bask in their glory forever! With CIV I'm trying to actually become a better player (though all the options presented upon starting a game make the challenging road hard to accept) and so less reliance on chance seems like a good strategy to explore. So through the first few stages, if I have the option of building a wonder or another building I want in the city, I'll be choosing against building the wonder.

The Saga (DAR Links)
4000 BC - 1520 BC
1480 BC - Start of Classical Era (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4161043#post4161043)
The Classical Era (http://apolyton.net/forums//showthread.php?postid=4161101#post4161101)
The Medieval Era (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162262#post4162262)
The Renaissance Era (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162727#post4162727)

[Rhothaerill]

Rhoth's DAR 1, Part 1 - Prince Difficulty

First off, I'm still fairly new to Civ4, having only just bought it about a week and a half ago instead of when it came out. That said, I haven't yet completed a game past around the Renaissance era as I've been interested in testing out the beginning of the game and all it's quirks and leader types, etc.

Second, my internet was down yesterday when I started this game, so I wasn't sure what the cutoff points were. Hence I don't have screenshots at the end of the various DARs (the first few at least), only some interesting shots. As I type this I’m actually in the 12th century AD, but I’ve made notes etc.

Third, this is my first go-around with the organized trait. I’m not really sure yet how good it is, though I’m sure I’m missing something. The cheap lighthouses are nice since I have a lot of coastal cities, but I’m not sure how useful the -50% civic upkeep has been. I’m not the type to go into deep analysis of how a trait works. I prefer just to play and have fun. :D

And awaaaaay we go...

4000bc - Upon loading up the game I discover a flood plains start. I haven't read much of the thread about the design of this game so far, but I have to wonder if the flood plains start was deliberate because of Washington's financial trait. Cottages are perfect on flood plains. Yes you can build a farm for that extra food, but why? :hmmm: The farm only gives an extra food, while the cottage immediately gives one extra commerce, plus one more because of the financial trait...and it grows to a town eventually. The immediate tradeoff for a flood plain is either 4 food and 1 commerce or 3 food and 3 commerce, eventually growing to 6 with a town (even more with later modifiers for certain techs). I'll take that cottage any day. :)

So the short of it is I settle in my starting spot after using my warrior to take a look on that hill he was near to see if there was anything better. There wasn't so I settled. Flood plains to the N and NW, plus corn and silk, and a nice river running through. My capitol won't be a production powerhouse, but it will certainly be a commerce powerhouse. The wheel is my first tech to get to pottery and those nice little cottages.

I've read a few threads in the strat forum, one of those being Vel's thread (sidenote: Vel's Civ 3 strat thread are what made me register at 'Poly, so thanks Vel :D). I hadn't yet tried his settler first strat so I decided what the heck. This course is as much for learning as anything. It almost backfired though, as you'll see later.

[Rhothaerill]

Rhoth's DAR 1, Part 2 - Prince Difficulty


3960bc – Pop the hut for 28 gold. So far in the games gold has been by far the most common item I’ve received from huts.

3640bc – Finish research of The Wheel. Start pottery. Yummy cottages, flood plains and financial trait :drool:

3400bc – I meet my first opponent: Genghis Khan. Lovely. I haven’t met him too much in my games yet, but he was the most warlike AI leader in Civ3 and I don’t expect too much change.

3280bc – Finish pottery and start research on mining. Most of the games I’ve played so far have been with a spiritual based leader (Isabella, Saladin, etc.) where I would deliberately go for the religions first. Only one game before this had I started without a spiritual based leader so I’m still getting used to not having a religion at this point. The first two early religions have already been discovered by others so at this point my intent is to find out whether I have copper and iron. My next techs will be bronze working and iron working after this. Even though I don’t have any workers yet, I don’t have any big special tiles (such as cattle) that require more than farms at the moment so I have plenty of time to get those other techs later.

3200bc – My lone scouting warrior at this point gets attacked by a lion and a wolf in succession and almost wins both, but not quite. I now have one size 1 city and no units. If there were any warrior barbs around instead of animals then I’d probably be toast by now.

2920bc – My settler had finally been built a few turns ago and I sent him toward more floor plains to the NW. Even though I’m planning on putting cottages down on the flood plains, they are still among the best non-improved tiles for building settlers and workers since they give 3 points toward building those units, as well as the commerce.

And here is where following Vel’s settler first strat got dicey. There had been several animal barbs floating around, but since my warrior was killed I hadn’t been able to clear any out. It all seemed okay until my settler got to the desired location and I discovered three animal barbs surrounding him, with one of them able to kill him. :eek: Sheesh. I really don’t know why the barb didn’t attack. Instead it moved elsewhere and I was able to settle my city with a big sigh of relief. I’m not sure if that settler first strategy would work on higher levels of difficulty. It barely worked on this one because of all the animal barbs. If I had lost that settler I would have really been in the hole.

Anyway, both Washington and New York were now set to producing workers. I wanted to get a move on with tile improvement, and I hadn’t seen any warrior barbs yet. At least the animal barbs wouldn’t be able to attack my workers since they would stay safely in my cultural borders for now. And a sidenote…because my first warrior died, I didn’t see the gold resource that was just out of New York’s fat cross until after I had settled the city. If I had seen it, I probably would have settled one tile north of the current location just to get that gold resource. It would be a long time before I actually hooked it up.

[Rhothaerill]

Rhoth's DAR 1, Part 3 - Prince Difficulty

That scare gone I proceeded with my research plans. I met Isabella in 2680bc and she was the one who founded Buddhism.

2560bc – Research completes on bronze working. NO copper anywhere my eyes can see. There goes a chance at building axemen. Research begins on iron working. Hopefully I’d at least have that.

1880bc – Research completes on iron working and I have a source in my capitol city already. Yay! Plus it also will help with the production in Washington since the city has so far been more of a growth and commerce city. I’ve produced a couple of warriors for defense, but that’s been it other than settler and worker builds.

My next project is to go after a religion and get some culture in my cities. I start research on mysticism, then masonry, then polytheism. That completes in 1400bc, and Judaism still hasn’t been discovered so I’m hopeful that I can get it as I only have 5 turns to finish research on monotheism.

Yes I’ve gone on a little farther than the 1520bc, but as I had said I didn’t know the DAR breakdowns until just a little while ago.

At 1400bc I had two cities built, several warriors out exploring, and workers creating cottages on flood plains for excellent use with the financial trait. A settler would pop out in Washington next turn and I already had a site picked out to the SW on the forest tile next to the ocean and lake. Not only would I get the fresh water bonus, but that city has pigs, iron, and can share Washington’s corn.

Which brings me to another point…supposedly Civ4 was set up so you don’t have to micromanage as much as in Civ3. I haven’t really found that to be the case yet. I’m still switching tiles around, raising and lowering sliders, etc. to maximize my nation as much as I can. I don’t go in for zealously checking every city every turn (unless I’m in a PBEM or democracy game ;)) but basic micromanagement on the same level as I did in Civ3 has been the order of the day so far in my Civ4 games. I don’t always get it, as I hadn’t even noticed until writing this that Washington was only a turn away from growth when I started work on a settler, but hey I’m not Aeson. ;)

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Rhothaerill
(sidenote: Vel's Civ 3 strat thread are what made me register at 'Poly, so thanks Vel :D).
Yeah, Vel popped my cherry as well with this thread :b:

DeepO

[Dubhghlas]

Slight hijack:

How do you get screenies without the screen shot naming box to show up? Do you not use the in game function for that?

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Dubhghlas
Slight hijack:

How do you get screenies without the screen shot naming box to show up? Do you not use the in game function for that?
I just hit PrintScreen. Shift-PrintScreen will let you name a screenshot, but the others get generic names (0001...). They end up in the Screenshots map which you can access through "My Games" (a folder in "My Documents")

Sadly, they don't always work, so in case you absolutely need to have a screenshot you've got to make sure you have it. Diplo things are never screenhotted, while stuff like wonder movies, city views, and advisory screens sometimes work, sometimes don't. It has to to with having proper focus and pop-ups, but I haven't found the precise cause of problems yet.

These are great, though. I take screenshots of everything that happens. A warrior finds a hut? Hit PrintScreen. Next turn, it discovers gold? Another one. Etc. It's easy to take notes, and it can give excellent replays when later browsing in the screenshot folder.

DeepO

[Thrar]

This is another beeline game, although quite different from the CoL ones I've read in this DAR: I'm going for Alphabet! A detour to Hunting->Archery may be needed, we'll see.
Warning: this is long.

As you will see, I also picked the city location east of the starting tile, and I'm very curious to compare my start with the CoL beeline (also going for tech, with a different approach), maybe at the end of DAR3.


4000BC: Starting location: may lack a bit in production, but will have big time food. Send warrior to the hut, and get maps!

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_4000BC-BeforeStart.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_4000BC-BeforeStart.jpg)

Looks like one tile eastwards will give a better production, while keeping the corn in range. This will still have 3 floodplains, and will be a production powerhouse.
Move settler as planned, and settle Washington.
Since this is Emperor, Washington will be able to get to size 3 before getting unhealthy, and size 4 is the current happiness limit. A worker might be useful for the extra research from a cottage on a floodplain (but that requires tech), or the food from a farm, but first growth is what's needed, and then a second settler will do more good. So for now, 2nd warrior.
Tech: Wheel, then Pottery.
I used a very similar start in my only other Emperor game so far (writing as 3rd tech), had only 4 cities for a long time then, but kept up in tech til the end, lost to spaceship though. Let's see if I can do better!

3800BC: borders expand. Moving the settler didn't lose any visible resources...good.

3720BC: more maps from a hut! Ok, tech would probably be better, but this is useful!
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_3720BC-2ndtimemaps.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_3720BC-2ndtimemaps.jpg)

3680BC: The Wheel comes in.

3560BC: On consecutive turns, the scouting warrior gets attacked by a wolf and a lion. Survives, Woodsman I. Found the west coast.

3440BC: Thanks to some micro the second warrior is trained exactly when Washington grows to size 3, with no food stored and 1 hammer overflow. Call me perfectionistic if you want. ;) Settler in 17 though. Second warrior goes scouting too, that leaves Washington at the limit for both health and happiness.

3320BC: Pottery. Next is Writing, mostly for open borders in case I meet someone. Death seems to be spelled for the first warrior, he ends the turn next to a lion, on open ground.

3280BC: He survived. The next lion he just met will kill him though. Lotsa lions around the place!
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_3280BC-AnimalKingdom.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_3280BC-AnimalKingdom.jpg)

3200BC: Died as expected. However, I just got a scout from a hut. Nice.

3080BC: more maps from a hut, that reveal mongol borders to the north! Another lion attacked my now only warrior, he survives fortunately. No more taking chances now, he'll guard the settler when it's done instead of doing further scouting.

3000BC: Bismarck says hello. I greet him back. Also, the scout reaches the mongolian borders, for some more conversation.

2840BC: 2 lions, 1 wolf and 1 bear within 4 tiles of Washington. Animal kingdom or what?!? And I have to get a settler thru this in 2 turns...

2800BC: Bismarck adopts slavery.
Scouting so far:
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_2800BC-situation.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_2800BC-situation.jpg)

2760BC: before I even get the tech message, both Genghis and Bismarck ask me for open borders. Writing finished, on the same turn, the settler is done.
Question is, what tech is next? Alphabet will be a gamble, since I wouldn't get ANY defenses soon. The other option would be Hunting and Archery.
Take a deep breath, and go with the gamble. Alphabet in 33.
Another benefit of that is that it leads to drama, which enables culture spending, for more happiness. And I need that badly!
Next thing to build is another warrior. There's definitely too much stuff running around here. Then a worker I guess.

2680BC: after careful moving forward (first join with the warrior 2 tiles away, then move 1 tile, then another and settle), the settler reaches the determined spot for NY. Second city in 2680, probably fastest in this game?
Problem is the health, already at the limit with size 1. Worker in 15, leaves Washington to do something else after the warrior (in 2).

2640BC: meet Isabella, establish open borders.

2600BC: Warrior done, next will be another settler (in 17, like the first). Did anybody say there is no REX in Civ4? Btw, Madrid is in a craptastic location:
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_2600BC-Madrid.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_2600BC-Madrid.jpg)

They founded Buddhism anyway.

2480BC: Some stat-checking: I'm still the only one with a second city (5 turns already), Bismarck has larger pop (20%, I'm at 16% with 4 total).
2nd in land area, my guess is there's a creative leader out there. Or I'm even with someone else who has 2 cities (if that counts as 2nd then). Only 4th in pop - yes, I know, thanks, I would like to grow too! Production sucks (5th), but hey, I'm building a settler and a worker (with food mostly)! 2nd in food, 1st in GNP (yay! That's what I want for teching!).

2400BC: Meet Saladin, open borders. He has a second city! The others still don't. Good that I have the scout, these turns would be quite boring otherwise. There seems to be a zoo somewhere around Washington.

2280BC: Isabella founded a second city, 20 point leap in score. She's on top now. My scout walks thru Bismarck's territory, he's going crazy with farms it seems.

2160BC: Meet Hatty, who's BIG in score. She has a second city, and is #1 in land area. Ah yes, she's that creative one I supposed before. My stats are going down, no expansion going on at the moment (worker in 2). 2nd in GNP and land area, middle of the road in the rest.
Bismarck has founded Hinduism. Very late.

2080BC: Worker done in NY! Now for barracks, the worker hooks up the corn to finally allow some growth!

2000BC: Saladin also goes to Slavery. Some mad writer claims we are not wealthy! Maybe because we're at 0g...

1920BC: Barbs! Is it time to pay now? Washington just finished the settler, builds warrior now. NY switched to warrior.

1880BC: We got corn!!! Growing-time! (NY in 1, Washington in 4)

1840BC: goodbye...you've been incredibly useful!
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_1840BC-goodbyemyfriend.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_1840BC-goodbyemyfriend.jpg)

1760BC: Finally! After 2 turns waiting, there are no barbs next to the site for our 3rd city. Boston founded, I'm the only one with 3 cities. If the barbs don't mind...

1720BC: first obvious tactical mistake: Washington grows to 4, but has no garrison for happiness. Will be rectified in 2 turns.

1640BC: Alphabet comes in! 1 turn faster than in my other game... ^^
ahm...one question: what do I do with DAR2? I entered classical before finishing DAR1!
Tech situation: Nobody has Sailing, I'm up writing (except to Saladin!) and at least 1 other tech to everyone. All other tech in my reach are known, although not all by everyone.
First-day trades:
Genghis: Fishing+Pottery -> Animal Husbandry
Isabella: wheel -> Mysticism
Nice, there are horses near NY.
Next tech to research will indeed be Drama, for some fun (culture spending). Washington does what it's best at: another settler!

1600BC: next tech trading round.
Isabella: Animal Husbandry -> Masonry. That was basically a freebie that came with the Genghis trade last turn. Too bad she wouldn't go for Hunting+Mining (dunno why, would still be a good deal.)
Isabella: Pottery -> Mining. She considers that driving a hard bargain!
Saladin: Pottery -> Hunting. Bad deal, that.
Isabella doesn't want to teach me to meditate, and Poly is too expensive - would require writing in trade. So far I held on to that, for more expensive trades next turn.

1560BC: 3rd tech trading round.
Bismarck: Pottery -> Archery.
Hatshepsut: Writing(!) -> Polytheism. Can't get it for Pottery+Mining, which she also lacks.

1520BC: 4th and so far last trading round.
Saladin: Polytheism+Archery -> Bronze Working.
Unless someone has Iron Working and wants to share it, the trading is done here. Isabella and Saladin (apparently) know Writing, and it may be possible that Saladin even knows Alphabet - it's not on the trade screen. Isabella is up Meditation and Priesthood, but doesn't want to give them away. Once she does, I still got Writing waiting for her. Hatty is down Pottery and Mining, but has Writing, the others lack Writing but have the rest.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_1520BC-DAR1finalsituation.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_1520BC-DAR1finalsituation.jpg)

I think I may say at this point: The Alphabet gamble has paid off BIG TIME!
2nd in score, 3 cities (competition has 2 or 3), comfortable tech advantage to most. Middle of the road in stats, and lacking in terrain improvements in comparison - does the AI get a free worker on Emperor?
I have to say, I'm a bit surprised by this result. This looks damn good for the future, and there's still lots of land to settle.

Here's the next in DAR3 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4163111#post4163111).
DAR4 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4171349#post4171349).
DAR5 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4274950#post4274950)
DAR6 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4277989#post4277989)
DAR7 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4278024#post4278024)

[Dubhghlas]

Thanks, DeepO! :)

I love Boston in the last post. Boston, land of the REALLY baked bean (from sitting out in the desert sun!!).:lol:

[lastchance]

Map-Specific things:
Americans have a lot of room to expand. I didn't fully take advantage of all the room available to me, unfortunately, couldn't get the beakers + coin flowing fast enough. But, still, it's not hard to get tons of land. Very good starting position, IMHO.

Financial is a very good trait. Looking at the surroundings and the traits, it looks like Americans are begging to go for The Wheel - Pottery, especially on that map without early horses, copper, and the requisite techs to do anything else, though I suppose founding a religion could also work. I think a nice clean shot at the Oracle might be worth it, though I would not want to delay Pottery too long. (if at all).

Even with the Americans, one of the most tech-happy civs in the game (IMHO), you still have to worry about military. I think you need to pick up archers quickly, spearmen quickly, and make sure you hit Longbowmen ahead of most. Getting invaded sucks, and so do Barbarians.

[DeepO]

Yeah, it's an interesting pick of city locations, Thrar.

I've done plenty of alphabet beelines myself, and there certainly is a place for them. However, I found lately that after the trade rounds I run out of steam. That's why I like the CS beeline: by the time you complete alphabet, you've got at least 2 techs (+ alphabet) nobody else has. Trading can continue for longer, it seems.

DeepO

[petermarkab]

AU 100-A During Action Report

Preliminaries...
Select Prince difficulty level. I have played 2 or 3 games at prince level and feel confident enough to take a game to completion!

Action
4000 - Warrior moves to hill to uncover more terrain. I want to choose the best starting location from this rather good selection. Settler crosses the Potomac and founds Washington with two resource-rich looking hills in its sights. Corn not an advantage just now cause have flood plains too. I may want to use that for my second city. Culture will make it available in 10. Research mining (followed by bronze working). Look at all those trees! I've tended to build cottages on Flood plains in previous games - will lean towards irrigating them this time for extra growth. Pottery will therefore also be a priority.

3840 - Warrior sights grapes and corn to the north - thats where my first city will go.

3760 - Goody hut produced a scout. lucky me!

3640 - Buddism founded (by Isabella I later discover)

3200 - Bismark shows up to NE - I'd better explore there. Hinduism founded somewhere but we don't care.

3120 - Discover Bronze; I want cottages so I go for Pottery via the wheel.

2640 - Baltimore founded north of Washington - similar sort of site, so will provide the second economy-food engine.

2000 - Ghengis gets in with a request for open borders on the turn i discover writing (personally i find this irritating - am i not in control of the information going out of my empire?)

1880 - New York founded to take advantage of the pigs, and also as a safe city site (I'm assuming all my enemies are based to the north/north-east)

1640 - Ghengis is annoyed with Isabella "<i>Isabella is no better than <b>he</b> should be (annoyed)</i>" A sordid encounter in Ghengis' tent maybe?
Also discovered a barbarian state to the SW so sent 3 warriors to beat them up. So far so good...

1520 BC End of DAR 1.

http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=25109_USA1520BCclose-up0000.JPG

Thoughts

I plan to expand north and east particularly to get the ivory and copper (if ghengis is sluggish himself). Also, that mountain chain (NE) forms a nice natural barrier behind which i can consolidate.

My initial plan to go for heavy logging didn't materialise as much as i'd intended. One factor was the negative health aspects of flood plains. I'd stupidly cut my forests down to 2, so wasn't getting any benefit from them at all. Lesson is to learn the thresholds.

I'm pleased with my tech status, especially with alphabet arriving in 6 turns - I'll be able to capitalise on that and hopefully found one or two of the later religions. Once I get the pigs hooked up (health reasons) I'll grow Washington and Baltimore into great people producing cities.

Stats: GNP 2nd, MFG 6th, Food 1st, Military 6th, Land 1st, Score 2nd place (252)

Regards,
Peter

[DeepO]

Is it just me, or did most of the players got a scout at some part in their early expansion? I've seen at least two scouts at 4000 BC (Aeson and my own), but plenty report scouts later...

DeepO

[lockstep]

For me it was six goodie huts, no scouts. (OTOH, no barbs, too.)

[Fluffybunnyfeet]

Starting out

My first thoughts on exploration are that there is a lot of good land near by, and the competing cultures are a good distance away. I'm hoping to be able to set down a good half-dozen cities and to make a building-centred civilisation.

Opening rounds included learning experiences, such as :

Chasing and missing out on religions (Hinduism, Bhuddism, even Judaism)
Good exploration (have uncovered about 400 tiles of the map, lost no units so far)
Worker with little to do - could not create Pasture, (no Animal Husbandry) and also found that I had no Pottery, so no cottages either!

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=73826_Civ4ScreenShot0001a.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73826_Civ4ScreenShot0001a.JPG)

The future

I will be militarily weak for quite some time, probably at least until the advance of Cavalry. Even then, I don't plan on using military conquest except to hold aggressive competitors in check. If I make it to the modern era though, anything could happen ;)

My next task is to create a Barrack Town, in the perfect spot north of the Capital (lots of food and lots of hills to mine).

[Aeson]

Originally posted by DeepO
Is it just me, or did most of the players got a scout at some part in their early expansion? I've seen at least two scouts at 4000 BC (Aeson and my own), but plenty report scouts later...

After seeing all the similar games going on, I decided to stop and try a different approach. I played out the start the same way and got a different result. No Scout.

I figured this meant that loading a game as a scenario starts the game with a random seed, as Civ III did. So I tried again to see if it gave a different result. But it gave the same result as the second attempt. Tried it 2 more times, same result the first time... second time I got the Scout from the hut again. The second time I had first gone to "Custom Game" by accident, before going to "Play A Scenario", so I tried that again. And voila, a Scout from the hut.

So it seems there is some sort of change in the RNG state due to going into "Custom Game". There is no change in the RNG between loadings of a scenario though.

(Perhaps this has something to do with all the "same" maps being generated?)

[petermarkab]

Hey thrar,

just comparing your start with mine - a very similar strategy going for alphabet (you got there first), you moved washington 1 tile east. you founded 2nd city north, but why place it where you've got 3 peaks in your fat cross?

It raises an issue i've not come across yet having not played past Divine Right - Gunpowder level. What improvements can you build on desert?

good dar btw,

regards,

Peter

[Aeson]

Can only build Roads and Railroads on Desert (not including Flood Plains). Can build resource (or feature) specific improvements on the resources (or features) if they show up in Desert though.

[Bobtoad]

I didn't receive a scout from a hut. Lots of gold and a map with the starting hut.

I did build one though. The early death of my first warrior left me behind in exploring. Since Hunting is cheap and leads to Archery, and scouts are cheap, I figured I needed the extra movement at the time to get some shroud uncovered.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson


After seeing all the similar games going on, I decided to stop and try a different approach. I played out the start the same way and got a different result. No Scout.

I figured this meant that loading a game as a scenario starts the game with a random seed, as Civ III did. So I tried again to see if it gave a different result. But it gave the same result as the second attempt. Tried it 2 more times, same result the first time... second time I got the Scout from the hut again. The second time I had first gone to "Custom Game" by accident, before going to "Play A Scenario", so I tried that again. And voila, a Scout from the hut.

So it seems there is some sort of change in the RNG state due to going into "Custom Game". There is no change in the RNG between loadings of a scenario though.

(Perhaps this has something to do with all the "same" maps being generated?)

Hmmm... I'm not sure this is wanted behaviour here, especially not in case there is a hut to pop in 4000 BC. There wouldn't be an option when setting up a scenario, to preserve random seed?

This does give the ability to make test games for other purposes, though. There was some concern about that: loading the same save always gives the same seed, so all your tests would be the same as well.

DeepO

[Caligula 37 AD]

(Caligula is a little nervous before putting the head inside the giljotine.
Her is my first DAR, I hope my non-native english is understandable)

DAR 1 and 2 for the finance havens of Caligula IX
I post them together for I too reached Classical era before 1520BC. I Guess that comes with the difficulty level in my case.

Americans:read::
Financial & Organised, starts with agri an fishing.
Memo:The combo of +1 commerce and cheap lighthouses for +1 food on coast tiles favours coastal cities.

UU: Navy SEAL (for Marine) +promotion March (heal while moving), needs Industrialism and Rifling
Question 1: What promotion will a Navy SEAL get if build in city with Red Cross (Medic I)?
(Ohh well, that's a long way into the game, will forget about the UU for a while)

Goal number 1 (Overall Strategy):
Playng with the traits: Will try to make a strong commercial civ by developing trade havens in coastal cities. This means taking decisions toward trade and commerce whenever there is a choice.

Essential WW: Great Lighthouse (+2 trade routes in coastal cities), needs Masonry.
Essential building: Harbour(compass)
Essential tech: Astronomy
Good resources: Dye(Calendar), Fur(Hunting), Gems(Mining), Gold(Mining), Incense(Mining), Silk(Calendar),
Silver(Mining), Spices(Calendar), Uranium(Mining), Wine(Meditation)
Best civics: Free trade

Lets play:
Setting the level to Warlord so I'll be able to build without so much disturbance from AIs and barbs. And so far I can't cruise Noble well enough to be able to focus on Strategy.

4000BC: Hut gives Worker! Prime start. Washington founded on spot. No bronze for chopping means I go for 1 warrior for extra scouting. Farming the corn. Beelining for Bronze.
Capitol Hill is not on coast, but I find a prime coastal spot to the east for my second city.

3600: Some AI founded Buddhism. Oh well, my initial goal will be masonry for Great Lighthouse.
3650: Sign peace with Genghis coming from north. Hut gives Masonry, I cant believe my luck!
3360: Another hut gives Settler! I'm not cheating, honest! New York founded on bay N-E of capitol.
Research set to 90%.
Note to self: New York should have been set a bit further south to make more workable coast tiles.

3360 Tech list (f=free, t=traded, r=now researching)): agri(f), fishing(f), mining, masonry(f), bronze, sailing(r)

3240: Hinduism founded somewhere. That was late, even I could have gotten that one.
Note to self: Should have let Washington grow to size 4 (1 turn) before starting 1st settler. Lost 6-7 hammers before corrected.
3080: Hut gives Hunting, Lions give promotion to first warrior.
Woodsman I, b/c it looks like there is some jungle and forest in the north.

Status 3000 BC:
-Washington size 5, 1 unhealthy, 7fpt surplus, 3hpt, 12base commerce (2gold, 10beakers),
producing worker to prevent grovt, to farm flood plains and to create trade network.
-New York size 1, 2fpt surplus, 2hpt, 2base commerce (1 gold, 1beaker),-1maintenance(distance), producing worker.
-Boston, deciding to settle one tile away from recommended "blue" tile for coastal city, this according to strategy. Question 2: Was that smart?
1ftp surplus, 3hpt, 1base commerce (1gold, 0beaker), -1maintenance(distance), producing worker.
-Peace with Genghis and Izzy(Buddhist)

2920: Scout from hut
2760: Peace with Saladin
2680: Beelining for alphabet for backfilling by trade, Setting 1 worker to Auto-trade-network-build. (later stopped)

2400: Behold all americans! Our Woodsman II Warrior is reported killed in combat against some vile barbarians far north of our borders.
Our heroes stumbled upon two groups of barbarian villains resting in a hut near the Mongolian borders.
The barbarians attacked our men unprovoked, and all though our men fought well and was able to kill one of the groups,
the sheer number of barbarians was to much for our woodsmen trained for combat in forest and jungle. The generals on Capitol blame themselves for giving bad orders and beeing too greedy.
A short service will be held as soon as we build a Temple.
Their pioneer work on our frontiers of knwoledge will never be forgotten.
Requiesat en pasce.

2240: Worker killed by panther near New York
2080: Hut gives 70 gold, Open Borders with Genghis
2000: Peace with Bismarck
1960: Peace and open Borders with Hatty (Hindu). Philly founded far north (too far?) Riverside with 7 workable coast tiles. Good spot it is, defended by 1 warrior.
1600: Discovering Alphabet, Entering Classical Era.

Status:
4 Cities (3 on Coast). (size7+2+3+1)
Tech line: agri(f), fishing(f), mining, masonry(f), bronze, hunting(f), sailing, pottery, writing, alphabet, iron w(r)
Total commerce: 30(all base) Total beakers(90%): 24bpt, Total gold(10%): 6gpt
Producing: Library(6 turns left), Granary(11), Great Light(zillion; will chop), Lighthouse(6).
Military: 7 warriors (minimal promotion), lost 1scout, 1warrior to barbs.
Trade: 1 route in each city for 5 commerce (2 from Karakorum to Capitol)

Strategy evaluation:
My coast cities are still too poor on culture to get access too good resources, no trade havens yet.

It will be exiting to see what Great Light will do to commerce, but there is probably not many good foreign cities to trade with yet.
Capitol is still the driving force in commerce, but Boston is closing in, expecting Philly to be good soon too.

I see that this is a somewhat different approach than what others have played. If you see an obvious reason why my approach won't work, it is much appreciated. Well hey, any comments are appreciated (even "you mis-spelled..."-ones:))

Technical report: No problems, toggling to notepad and back is ok but not smooth.
(image hopefully included)

[Derelict]

INDEX

Early Ancient (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162328#post4162328 )
Late Ancient -- Brief!! (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162455#post4162455)
Classical (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162514#post4162514)
Medieval: Parts 1 & 2 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162899#post4162899)
Medieval: Part 3 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4162902#post4162902)
Renaissance: Part 1 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4164494#post4164494)
Renaissance: Part 2 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4164509#post4164509)
Industrial (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4164909#post4164909)
Modern (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4191978#post4191978)

Goals:

Since Washington is a Financial/Organized leader, I plan to engage a strategy that will focus on a heavy science/tech advantage as well as late game engineering for the capture of some key late game wonders. Due to this, it's likely I'll also pursue a space race victory but we'll see how it plays out in the end.

In the interim, I'll also quite possibly pursue the capture of a rival civ's cities to expand the empire along the way. Religion will not be a direct focus though I intend to inherit someone elses religion and try to establish at least one very strong ally along the way.

Depending on what is available for the earlier era's, the only wonder(s) I'll have any central focus on are the Great Library (for scientists), the Hanging Garden's (for engineer) and possibly the Collosus (for merchant), though the latter is unlikely. I'll also be shooting for forges sooner than later to get engineer specialists and the obvious increase in productivity. I'm holding a bit of a preference (untested with Washington as that may be for me) for engineers both to assist in late game wonders and because they tend to offer chances at discovering techs that will be a bit more important to me along the way, in this game.

Other than that, I'll wait to see how things play out before honing any further strategy points.

Also this is my first ever DAR so I decided to play this out on noble (though I've mostly been playing on Prince of late all the same). Dunno why, just did.

----------------------------------------------------

I establish the city of Washington and start building a warrior. My existing warrior visits with a nearby village who provides a map revealing a stone source not far away. The likelyhood that the hanging gardens will be American just improved, assuming I can get that stone source situated away. It also brightens the odds (and changes my perspective) on perhaps pursuing one or more other wonders sooner rather than later.

That also helps determine my tech course a bit, as I'll be now going mining -> masonry -> wheel -> pottery.

The stone appears to be 6 spaces away, with a very lean desert stretching to most of the west of it--less than ideal for the city I plan to settle there. On the bright side, it will also include a wheat source and elephants, once the borders have expanded.

Received a scout thanks to the help of another village. For now I'll leave my original warrior out scouting as well.

At 3,520 B.C. my first warrior is built. Tempted as I am to get a settler out early, no other civ's are in sight and I decide to build another warrior to let Washington grow to size three, first.

3,280 B.C. and Buddhism and Hinduism have been founded elsewhere. That's all well and good. 2nd warrior has been built and have started on that settler with a size 3 Washington. I've also made contact with Bismark.

3,120 B.C., my scout encountered a village who offered up the hunting tech. Wonderful since I can go for bronze before long and hopefully locate a source of copper. Encountered Genghis at home to the far NE.

2,880 B.C. and I now have all of the above mentioned techs out of the way + hunting, thanks to the village. Started on bronze working and should have the settler out very soon.

2,760 B.C. Encountered Saladin at home. My brave scout was slain by lions.

2,400 B.C., settler enroute toward stone. I've decided, to my chagrin, to settle him 7 squares out to better take advantage of surrounding terrain, including additional elephants and a nearby river. Still less than ideal but will prove quite useful all the same. I also started on archery since there is no brone in sight.

2,280 and New York is settled. I've also met up with some warriors of Hatshepsut. My crack caveman scientists are now working on writing.

2,000 B.C. and I've got a worker out, who will first get a road between Washington and New York. I've got another settler being built now and am bringing out an archer in New York in the meantime. I'd like to get 4 cities up before I start on either the Great Library or, sooner, the hanging gardens in Washington. We'll see though. Also met up with Isabella. I don't like her much and she seems to be my ongoing arch-nemesis. Did I mention I don't like her?

1,800 B.C. Much as I don't want too I start on Iron working. It's quite possible that horses are in range (I can't see them due to a lack of animal husbandry) but I'd prefer units requiring iron first, if possible. If an iron source is nearby I can ignore horses for the time being and continue on toward the techs for the wonders I want.

I open borders with Genghis and Isabella. Shortly thereafter Saladin and Hatshepsut coming calling for the same deal, which I grant.

I over ran a little without noticing that it was now 1,440 B.C. Iron working is 6 turns off and all is well.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?file=71414_AU-100_ancient_01.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=71414_AU-100_ancient_01.jpg) | <img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?file=71414_AU-100_ancient_02.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=71414_AU-100_ancient_02.jpg)

[Thrar]

Originally posted by petermarkab
just comparing your start with mine - a very similar strategy going for alphabet (you got there first), you moved washington 1 tile east. you founded 2nd city north, but why place it where you've got 3 peaks in your fat cross?

reminder:
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22592_1520BC-DAR1finalsituation.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22592_1520BC-DAR1finalsituation.jpg)

First thought was that I wanted NY somewhere in the north of Washington; the south was uncontested and can be settled later. East (the Boston spot or around that) didn't look very promising, so NW was the choice for general direction.
Alternatives to my choice (and why I picked this):
- further west: same peak problem, corn not in initial radius, even more floodplains.
- south or southeast: lots of overlap with W.
- SW: not much scouted yet (even now, by 1520BC), also lots of floodplains.
- north: off the river. Didn't even consider that really.
- east: on the corn, IIRC you only get a partial food bonus from that. 1 tile more overlap, but that's a minor point.


I'd also be interested in some more comments on choosing city locations, especially by DeepO and Vel, who settled in the same area as I did. Do you consider the wines that important, even though they require Monarchy to access them?

[Dubhghlas]

I'll take a crack at that.

More than ever before, it seems to me that the coders of this game are trying to force you to think really long term. That's the reason that they have abandoned the usual "expansionist, rational, civilized" approach is the winning approach which has been the model for Civ, CivII, SMAC and CivIII. It's not about being fast, it's about being well-placed and maximizing the placement in the long term. Note that you don't get immediately hammered by your neighbors in this game (at least I haven't, yet).

So under those circumstances, it is really vital to go and get resources when available. Three wine squares able to be utilized by one city is an absolute godsend; you have your own cities covered, you have two extra to use to trade with, and they are easily defended with the installation of a strong point right next to them. If you don't go grab them, I am certain that Genghis will. :D

Besides, Monarchy is easily reached without much trouble. As usual, I head for it very quickly.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Dubhghlas
, and they are easily defended with the installation of a strong point right next to them. If you don't go grab them, I am certain that Genghis will. :D
Euh, Dubhglas, what difficulty level? Aeson is talking about deity, where things aren't exactly the same. You can't have a strong point... even barbs can ruin your empire and kick you out of the game.

That's why it's so interesting to hear about this from another perspective: Genghis will want those wines in any game, on any level. In the noble games, he might not be able to be able to get it, and there is no risk whatsoever. You can even try to get more territory between the wines and his core, by e.g. trying for the bronze site. At Monarch, the bronze site is no option anymore: I can't see anyone settling, and holding it. On deity, it seems that the wines is even too near to him: if you settle it, you will lose it later (Genghis has the power to do so). So your tactic revolves around settling away from him.

Interesting... not all noble games are going to have that nice easy patch of land to settle before war erupts. In those situations, the 'deity settling strat' might be the way to go.

DeepO

[Aeson]

Well, you can have a very strong early military even on Deity, but you can't have it and go for an Oracle->Civil Service beeline. I think even on Deity you could get the Bronze site. And if not going for IW right after BW, it probably is the right move for someone with early military ambitions. If you go with Archery right off, then to Bronze Working, then send the Settler with a couple Archers and a Worker, you should be able to start pumping out Axes and Spears, and can definitely take out Genghis if you go quickly. With the AI starting without it's bonus units, this really isn't Deity early on.

It probably wouldn't be worth it knowing that Iron is right there in the capitol, but if you didn't know that, or if the Iron wasn't there...

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson
Well, you can have a very strong early military even on Deity, but you can't have it and go for an Oracle->Civil Service beeline. I think even on Deity you could get the Bronze site. And if not going for IW right after BW, it probably is the right move for someone with early military ambitions. If you go with Archery right off, then to Bronze Working, then send the Settler with a couple Archers and a Worker, you should be able to start pumping out Axes and Spears, and can definitely take out Genghis if you go quickly. With the AI starting without it's bonus units, this really isn't Deity early on.

It probably wouldn't be worth it knowing that Iron is right there in the capitol, but if you didn't know that, or if the Iron wasn't there...
That's something I'm missing in the DARs so far: war! The game gives so much options to build up at first, that a CS beeline becomes a much more viable option.

I was hoping someone would have gone the other way, and done the 'conquer first, research later' strat...

DeepO

[DeepO]

BTW, the AI not getting their bonus starting units? :mhhh: That hasn't changed this patch, has it? I've seen emperor starts near me with plenty of units (no extra settler though, deity would get a srious advantage there)

DeepO

[Dubhghlas]

Originally posted by DeepO

Euh, Dubhglas, what difficulty level? Aeson is talking about deity, where things aren't exactly the same. You can't have a strong point... even barbs can ruin your empire and kick you out of the game.::Blinks dazedly and confusedly::

Um, I wasn't addressing Aeson. I was addressing Thrar, who isn't on Deity to my knowledge... :hmmm:

Originally posted by DeepO That's why it's so interesting to hear about this from another perspective: Genghis will want those wines in any game, on any level. In the noble games, he might not be able to be able to get it, and there is no risk whatsoever. You can even try to get more territory between the wines and his core, by e.g. trying for the bronze site. At Monarch, the bronze site is no option anymore: I can't see anyone settling, and holding it. On deity, it seems that the wines is even too near to him: if you settle it, you will lose it later (Genghis has the power to do so). So your tactic revolves around settling away from him.

Interesting... not all noble games are going to have that nice easy patch of land to settle before war erupts. In those situations, the 'deity settling strat' might be the way to go.

DeepO Yes, obviously you have to take into account that sort of thing in your settling strategy, but if you are scared of Genghis at Deity, you shouldn't be playing at Deity. :D

[Aeson]

Originally posted by DeepO
BTW, the AI not getting their bonus starting units? :mhhh: That hasn't changed this patch, has it? I've seen emperor starts near me with plenty of units (no extra settler though, deity would get a srious advantage there)

I'm pretty sure it's because it's a scenario.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Dubhghlas
::Blinks dazedly and confusedly::

Um, I wasn't addressing Aeson. I was addressing Thrar, who isn't on Deity to my knowledge... :hmmm:

Oops... it handles the same topic, though :D

Yes, obviously you have to take into account that sort of thing in your settling strategy, but if you are scared of Genghis at Deity, you shouldn't be playing at Deity. :D
I'm scared of Genghis, and I'm nowhere near Deity :D

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson


I'm pretty sure it's because it's a scenario.
Should that get reported?

DeepO

[Dubhghlas]

Bah, as you will see tomorrow when I crank out and post the DAR on today's play, Genghis was a pussycat, though Boston did take some hits to its surrounding infrastructure.

Early war was missing, I think, because it turned out that Washington was pretty far from the other starting points. Seems to me that the real cause of war in this game is tension over borders or religion, because it wasn't long after Boston started eating into Genghis' personal space that he came knocking with his war elephants.:lol:

[DeepO]

Time to go one level up, I think.

DeepO

[Morrissey]

DAR1 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4164182#post4164182)
DAR2 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4164215#post4164215)
DAR3 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4164294#post4164294)
DAR4 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4167267#post4167267)
DAR5 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4167274#post4167274)
DAR6 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4167275#post4167275)
DAR7 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4167298#post4167298)


So anyway... this is my second ever attempt at doing a DAR, the first just kinda petered out when I didn't play Civ for ages. Don't think it'll happen with the new game though.

Playing on Noble as this is only my 6th game of Civ 4.

Founded Washington on the spot and sent the other warrior off exploring to look for nice new city locations and other civs, so the first build was another warrior to stay nearby and scare barbs and animal off. This was a nice starting place to do this thanks to the long river, wait for the big bad animals to come towards you and stand at the other side of the river - works every time (or it has so far, anyway).

Decided to research the wheel first of all, so I'd be nice and prepared when my workers want to build some roads connecting each town. After that, I wanted a religion, so went down the Mysticism route. Someone got to Buddhism before me, but I managed to nab Judaism.

Whilst exploring, my warrior discovered everyone else on the island pretty quickly. I've also found out that if I expand straight up, I can cut other civs off the west of the island as evryone's to the north and east. No open boarders until places are settled then...

Built three cities, plan to send another further east to nab the stone and others to continue northwards to cut off. As soon as I saw tundra to the south I didn't bother going any further, don't think there's anyone else down there.

[joncnunn]

Jon's Dar AU 101 : Noble. Version 1.09

Dar I thru 1520 BC.

4000 BC: Found the capital in place seeing no reason to shift.
Send the warrior to the village, passing Go and collecting 48 gold.
Decide to build a warrior and research Mystism


3800 BC: Washington's culture expands

3720 BC: Finish Mystism and start Polythesism, hoping to found Hindism.

3640 BC: Visit a hut, pass go, and collect 105 gold. Perhaps Financial civs have a higher probabilty of getting cash from goody huts

3520 BC: Finish the warrior. Start a settler. Hindism founded in a distant land.

3400 BC: Budism founded in a distant land.

3360 BC: Visit a 3th hut. This time get 56 gold.

3320 BC: While defending, kill a lion. No damage to the warrior. Start researching the Wheel.

3240 BC: While defending, kill a wolf. Start healing.

3120 BC: Attack and kill a wolf. Next turn promote to Woodmen 1.

3040 BC: Start Masonry

2720 BC: Start a warrior, start reseraching monothesism. Attack and kill a wolf.

2680 BC: Damaged warrior killed by another wolf. Found New York

2480 BC: Start a settler.

2440 BC: Meet the Mongols

2360 BC: New York finishes a Warrior and starts another.

2280 BC: Found Judism in New York and convert. Start researching animal husbany.

2240 BC: Start the switch to Organized Religion. Successfuly defend against a bear, choose Woodmen 1.

2160 BC: New York's culture expands

2080 BC: Kill a Lion, following turn choose Woodmen 1.

2040 BC: New York starts a worker.

2000 BC: Meet Isabella.

1960 BC: The Mongols adopt Slavery

1920 BC: Start reseraching Writing. Discover Horses near New York. Huh, maybe the sugesting of that tile new about it?
Barb warrior discovered guarding a village.

1880 BC: Meet Egypt and Arabs

1720 BC: Meet Bismark

1640 BC: Found Boston

1560 BC : Finish writing and start reseraching the Pristhood. Open the boarders with everyone except Spain & Mongols.

1520 BC : Exploring warrior near Spain killed by a Barb warrior. Bismark converts to Budism.

[ZargonX]

Here's my game thus far, played at Prince.

A History of America

4000 BC: High Chieften George surveyed the lands before him, and he saw that they were good. Lush stalks of corn grew to the southwest, and to the north lay fertile floodplains ripe with possibility. "These lands will feed my people for millenia to come," said George, and thus his people lay down their packs and made their new home: Washington DC.

Immediately George set to work delegating tasks. The training of a new troop of warriors became top priority. Meanwhile, the wisemen of the village began looking into the secrets of the so-called "Wheel."

Elsewhere, George's forward scouts, the 1st DC Regulars, paid a visit to a friendly looking hut in the nearby woods. No one was home, but the found a small sack filled with golden baubles and a note (which they could not yet read) saying merely "33g for your birthday, America."

3640 BC: While the 1st DC continued tromping off to the northeast, High Chief George was pleased to hear that the sages had figured out the secrets of The Wheel. With all of the leftover corners shaved off square stones, George decided to build himself a new throne. From there, he directed the wisemen to look into the secrets of Mining, to see what they could dig up to haul in their new carts.

3600 BC: Over dinner, George receives word that somewhere in the world, a group of people have started worshipping a jolly plump fellow. After some further research indicated they did not mean Santa, George made note of this newfangled "Buddhism."

3520 BC: In a joyous ceremony replete with hats and banners, the 2nd DC Regulars completed their 480 years of training and immediately took up guard duty for DC. George next directed the formation of a worker corps to get busy working those promising floodplains.

3480 BC: Far off in the northeastern wilds, the 1st DC Regular engage in their most exciting activity thus far: a fight to the death with viscious wild panthers! They emerge damaged, but victorious. Armed with this new knowledge of dangerous **** being in the woods, they hunker down to rest.

3400 BC: The American wiseman prove their worth once again, figuring out the secrets of mining. "Yes," said George, "but can't we dig up anything more... interesting?" And so it was that the wiseman headed back to their dark little huts to figure out the concepts of Bronze Working.

3320 BC: Off in the wilds, the 1st DC is shocked to run into another group of stone-club toting gentlemen! They bear word from their attractive leader, Isabella, that Spain is most definitely in existance. They are also apparently the founders of Buddhism, but are polite enough not to try indoctrinating the Americans. Yet.

3240 BC: The meet and greets continue in the woods! The 1st DC stumble upon representatives of Saladin, currently an atheist. At the same time, back at home, George receives word that Hinduism has been founded in a distant, unknown land. How this information reached him? Magic.

3200 BC: The party just doesn't stop! The 1st DC find both Mongolian and German warriors in the woods, sharing stories and lion shanks. After a few rounds of jungle grog, they bond over their mutual atheism, then part on their separate ways.

3040 BC: From the DC Municiple Public Service Hut, a proud new force of workers emerge, ready to road and plant their way into history. With the labor situation looking secure, George gets back to training warriors, because he really loves hitting things with clubs.

2880 BC: Good news and bad news reach George's ears as he sits on his stoney throne. The wisemen have figured out Bronze Working, but there isn't an ounce of bronze to be seen near American lands. So upset by this development, George orders the wiseman to look into Pottery so that he may have something to spit into in disgust.

2800 BC: The 3rd DC Regulars take up their clubs and face the world! Met with cheers and whistles, they head off to the unexplored southwest. With the troops away, George decides its finally time to expand, and orders the assembly of a group of intrepid settlers.

2720 BC: Still in the exotic north, the 1st DC encounter representatives of Hatshse... Hachets... Hasxec... the Egyptians. They are also godless heathens.

2600 BC: Tragic news reaches George from the south: The 3rd DC has been eaten by lions. George, understandably, is heard muttering "Lions? ****ing lions!?" Fortunately, the wiseman have completed reseach into Pottery and have the aforementioned spitting pot at the ready. George orders them to figure out the secrets of Writing so that he may record his anger in a mythic "diary."

In better news, the 1st DC exact vengeance on nature by destroying an assumedly unrelated pack of lions, earning themselves the title of "Woodsman."

2440 BC: After years of hard work, the labor corps. succeeds in connecting delicious corn to Washington DC. George celebrates by eating corn out of a pot, just because he can.

2320 BC: With hugs and kisses from their families, a bold group of settlers heads forth from DC towards a choice spot to the southwest. George knows it is dangerous to send them out alone, armed only with their meager wits, but history rewards the bold. He hopes. On an unrelated note, George starts readying another group of settlers.

2880 BC: In a glorious day for America, the port city of Baltimore is founded. George celebrates by dancing a jig on his lionskin rug while smashing pots with clubs. George orders Baltimore to start training defenses, because while he may be bold, he's not irresponsible.

2080 BC: "Dear Diary, today the wisemen taught us all the mastery of writing." So were written the first words on the Americans. Between fits of giggling, George also managed to write a decree for the wisemen to look into *chortle* Animal Husbandry, so as to take advantage *snicker* of the Baltimorian pigs.

2000 BC: A messenger from Saladin arrives bearing news that the Arabs desire Open Borders with the Americans. Conveniently, the 1st DC are right on his borders, and a shortcut would be most acceptable. George agrees.

1920 BC: The next group of settlers heads north, to the hills beyond the floodplains. George orders the training of a new group of warriors to make up for the 3rd DC lion debacle...

1800 BC: The wisemen complete research on Animal Husbandry, though George decides he really doesn't need the details. He sends them off to work on Iron Working, because the idea of metal clubs is essentially irresistable. Luckily, it also reveals some horses in the vicinity of the soon-to-be settled New York.

Meanwhile, Baltimore trains the 1st Baltimore Regulars, who entrench themselves in town. Now, George is a wise and just leader, but he is a also a man who craves for battle. He hungers for a heap of battle between two slices of conquest, served with a side of pillaging. In short, he tells Baltimore to build a barracks.

To the north, the city of New York is founded in the hills overlooking the mighty floodplains. The city begins training defenses immediately.

Finally, at home in DC, the 4th DC Regulars complete their training and make a beeline for New York. George decides that a granary would be good to prevent all the seasons delicious corn from going to waste.

1600 BC: Haxelthusphtsb contacts George asking if they can have an Open Border agreement. Not wishing to cause a diplomatic upset by calling her by the wrong name, George quickly agrees and concludes the meeting.

1560 BC: More religions! Judaism is founded in a distant land, and George just can't figure out what all the fuss is about. Speaking of religion, Isabella asks for an Open Border agreement despite George's dedicated atheism. George is suspicious, but accepts.

And so comes to a close the first chapter of the History of America. A look at the Empire thus far...

http://www.robotoaster.com/au/au100_1500bc.gif

[Thrar]

Originally posted by DeepO
At Monarch, the bronze site is no option anymore: I can't see anyone settling, and holding it.

Well, I don't have the bronze site (will get it once I flip Isabella's city there I hope), but I'm on Genghis' own gold - does that count? In fact we both have a city there, but mine is the more cultured one.

Relations are perfect with him, I don't see any war coming up, we are trading several resources. Of course things may change, but so far (end of DAR3) it looks pretty secure up there. On emperor.

[vulture]

Joining in rather late..

The executive summary:

(EDIT : Prince difficulty)

The strategy I end up following is to try and expand towards the relatively blockable neck of land to the NE to control both lobes of the peninsula - the bottom can be filled out later. To that end, I've refused all offers of 'open borders' treaties, which may come back to bite me later. I've met just about all other civs. Tech wise, I'm trying a strategy going for alphabet and trading my way into a good position. The downside is that I'm way behind in tech, haven't got any of the 3 early religions, and don't have many improvements or useful military units to build. And I still can't chop trees, which is hampering me slightly.

Back to 4000 BC:

We have wines and corn in view, and a goody hut. The warrior moves to the hut, and gets a map of the area, revealing the coast, three ivory sources, one cow and one gold. The settler builds a city where he starts, and the FoW revealed b the borders show a nearby silk source to the SE, and some pigs to the SW. We start researching roads with a view to connecting to the nearby resources as soon as possible; animal husbandry will likely be the next tech to go for. Building starts off with a warrior, but will switch to worker when we hit size 2. We want to try and preserve the 5 forests in the city radius to counteract the effects of the floodplains.

The warrior starts exploring towards the goody hut to the east, and quickly discovers a nearby bit of coastline with some cows. We have three health resources very near by, and one luxury. Not too bad, and given the floodplains, the health will be useful. The next move uncovers stone - very useful for building stonehenge quickly for early culture.

Our warrior reaches the hut in 3760 BC (discovering some wheat en route), and is rewarded with the discovery of mining.

In 3600 BC, someone founds Buddhism, and my warrior is complete. I changed plans and finished the warrior off before moving on the worker (only 2 extra turns).

Our first exploring warrior kills a lion, and the second one finds some tundra and another goody hut. He gets jumped by a wolf before getting to the hut, but survives with only a scratch. Then we meet a Mongolian scout, who has nothing useful to say for himself. The following turn Bismark turns up in the same spot, up by the gold. Neighbours to the north is seems.

Uncovering the hut to the south gives us a scout, so the scout heads off to explore more efficiently while the warrior heads back home to do some guard duty. That plan lasts all of one turn, until the scout gets eaten by bears. Warrior goes back out exploring again.

For research, the strategy is to go for archers and then on to alphabet to trade for the othertechs we lack. Hinduism has been founded, and Judaism probably isn't far behind - we have no chance of getting to it first, so we have to aim for a later religion. As we explore more, it looks a lot like we need to expand to the north and east, and can control the land to our south via a chokepoint to expand in to later.

Our warrior exploring the south gets revenge on those bears, and then kills some lions for good measure, before finding another hut which gives us another scout. Once again, he heads for home, but is unfortunately killed by wild animals on the way (damn - should have healied him more). The southern region has a good supply of furs and other resources. We definitely want to control this area, which means blocking the chokepoint and not signing open borders treaties until we've got the area safe.

Back home the city has produced 2 warrior, and is now building our first settler. We have farmed the corn and one floodplain, and will but a cottage on another one (as soon as we have pottery) to boost our science output. Until then, we have a pretty good settler pump here, with a lot of excess food. Our science research detours to take in pottery after writing to enable cottages. We also find another village, which gives us 54 gold. Village results have been doing pretty well so far.

Our first settler goes out, rather late, in 2160 BC, with an aim to settling the blue spots in the first wave, and try and get some cultural expansion to control this peninsula. Shortly after this we run in to the Arabs, and then the Spanish. Looks like things are going to be rather crowded in the north. We turn down an open borders deal with the Mongols, which is a bit of a damned if you do, damned if you don't proposition. Washington carries on building settlers, while New York start on a barracks.

The 2000 BC tech review reveals that we are last in technology. Not wholly surprising, since we are going for more expensive techs to get to alphabet, and hopefully make up the difference in trading. Whether this will work in CIV or not...

Having fully explored our peninsula, we are now exploring out to the north, and have come across the first Mongol borders. Also turned down an open borders offer from Isabella. I think it will be tough to blockade the whole peninsula, but we can hope. Shortly after this we run into Egypt. It seems like just about everyone is on this continent.

By tradition I miss the DAR report date. My third city is founded in 1440 BC, which is only 2 turns after the date, so that's a good a point as any to stop for this one. I'm still a few turns from alphabet, but can churn out settlers as fast as I need to now. I need to start getting some luxury resources hooked up as my next priority, and getting some culture going. Most of this is going to depend quite strongly on how much tech trading I can get done to catch up.

The end of DAR screenshot is below:

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=10515_DAR1520BC.JPG>

Only 3 cities, and way behind in tech, does not a happy civ make. There is a definite downside to the alphabet beeline.


My approximate city layout plan is below:
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=10515_CityPlanning2.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=10515_CityPlanning2.JPG)
The city sites are colour coded roughly in order of prioty: blue, red, green yellow, with yellow obviously being the least important (to me).

The initial idea was to settle the blue city sites first, then the red. I've got the first two blue sites, but I may give up on the third. Genghis isn't far away, and taking the two red city sites (1 and 2 on the diagram) will let me block off the peninsula once the borders expand. The third blue site doesn't really contribute to that - I'd still need city '1' anyway to shut things off quickly enough.

After those cities are built (if they are), the next cities will be placed according to need, but obviously aiming for the green sites. I'm happiness limited at the moment, so need to get some luxury resources in use. I might also need to get a good manufacturing center - I'll have to see how things are looking once I get to 5 cities. I dearly need to get a religion before too long. Right now my only culture buildings are libraries, which are expensive. There are basically a lot of things I need to do, which I can't right now due to lack of appropriate techs. The one thing I can do is build up a military to make usre my 4-city blockade can be defended adequately.

I think I'm going to have a very short DAR for the next one - the classical era is just around the corner.

For those keeping score of hut results, I got 1 map, 1 tech (mining), 2 scouts and 54 gold.

[Cort Haus]

Which level is that, vulture?

[vulture]

Prince - I must have edited it in to the top while you wer e reading...

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO
CH, it's interesting to compare our starts: even if the tech rate is different between Prince and Monarch, production is not.

We both took the same tile to start on, with you focusing more on production first, while I went for commerce. I'm thinking your path is better here, but it might depend on difficulty.

We discover writing in the same turn (2320 BC), and also start the lib around the same time.

You complete the lib in 2000 BC, I do in 1680 BC... as a result, I can't turn 2 scientists to use, as it would mean my Oracle will be too late. Only having 1 scientist is also going to hurt my tech situation...

The problem I'm seeing, is that you have 2 workers, while I only had one. That was fine, though, I never needed a second one. But by working the wheat near Washington a lot earlier, compensating the extra food with desert mines it seems you can reach a better tech rate. I'm still a bit in front with my extra commerce: I'll reach CoL in 10, you 'only' in 13 turns. But you'll probably build the Oracle sooner, and have an academy sooner.

The only real advantage I can see to not going worker first (which you need if you want to have two of them before 1500 BC), is the religion: a gamble, which in my case paid off.

Oh, and I did need to compensate by building a warrior, a 3-turn delay you didn't encounter. But still, your start would have been faster

DeepO

The effective difference was that you got a settler out before the library, wheras I did a 2nd worker. So, you got a second city far sooner where I was using the 2nd worker to road the corn for a marginal food boost and to start roading to the 2nd city site and stone. As it turned out, that roading only took a couple of turns off Stonehenge in the end, and I bottled out of the Pyramids as I wanted settlers and units for some Rexing. With this much land to occupy and the time to do it on Prince, expansion seemed better than Pyramids. The Mongols built the Pyramids, and they were short of land - which cost them dear.

As my first settler was built while running 2 scientists, it was much later to get out and found New York.

[Cort Haus]

The other difference, DeepO, was that I went to Writing via AH (detouring for mining) rather than through the religious techs. Starting with Agriculture and not Mysticism, AH(100)-->Writing is approx half the cost of Mysticism(50) + Meditation(80) + Priesthood (60), is it not?

[DeepO]

Originally posted by vulture
Uncovering the hut to the south gives us a scout, so the scout heads off to explore more efficiently while the warrior heads back home to do some guard duty. That plan lasts all of one turn, until the scout gets eaten by bears. Warrior goes back out exploring again.
:lol:

I know that feeling. You spend 5 minutes looking at the map to get some nice little tactic going... next turn something switches everything around again.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
The other difference, DeepO, was that I went to Writing via AH (detouring for mining) rather than through the religious techs. Starting with Agriculture and not Mysticism, AH(100)-->Writing is approx half the cost of Mysticism(50) + Meditation(80) + Priesthood (60), is it not?
Aha, this might explain a few things: I've been seriously miscalculating costs! Of course, you start with agri, which means only AH to go for before writing. I didn't count that one...

It's not so much difference in total though. I needed the research to get to CoL, which means I need to have priesthood as well. In that way, it's the least expensive to pass on AH, and go through the priesthood way to lib. That doesn't mean it will give you the biggest bpt, though: if you can start a lib faster, you will have the bonusses faster. Which means you will be faster in reaching priesthood.

I should have seen that. I should have gone through AH... I'm not sure I can build a lib before starting on priesthood, though. But at least more of the CoL research would have been done by 2 scientists +25% bonus.

Probably, I'm going to test this out when this game finishes. AH didn't seem like much of a deal with no cows near, but knowing there are horses, and knowing the tech advantage if you play it well (probably one worker + one warrior before lib. Worker definately first. settler after lib.) you should be able to get better results.

I'm curious to what is going to be the absolutely best start here, research wise. Already the discussion has given me new insights :b:

I'm also curious to see what the best expansion is going to be. I think I saw 4 cities at 1520 BC once, and most players on 2 or 3 cities. The difference after that seems to happen exactly after this 1500 BC mark: some people are continuing in full expansion for a couple more cities (to e.g. 5), others go for a wonder first, and for a long period are with only 2-3 cities. Then, they expand to 5-8 at once.

DeepO

[DeepO]

BTW, going for mysticism first is a bit cheaper than the (50) shows: because at least a couple of civs already have the tech, it will be cheaper for you (actually, the tech costs remains, but you generate more virtual bpt). AH will be full price: nobody will have it.

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Has anyone found that a policy of move-and-check on flat ground can preserve a scout? I haven't had enough scouts to try this with so far, It's the second move that tends to meet the bear, by which time it's too late. Single moves, unless a forest is available for the second, and retreating if needed, might be slow, but it's quicker than building another warrior and sending it out to where the ex-scout got to.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO
BTW, going for mysticism first is a bit cheaper than the (50) shows: because at least a couple of civs already have the tech, it will be cheaper for you (actually, the tech costs remains, but you generate more virtual bpt). AH will be full price: nobody will have it.

DeepO

I see. I wondered why the beaker cost often didn't match the No of Turns required for it.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Has anyone found that a policy of move-and-check on flat ground can preserve a scout? I haven't had enough scouts to try this with so far, It's the second move that tends to meet the bear, by which time it's too late. Single moves, unless a forest is available for the second, and retreating if needed, might be slow, but it's quicker than building another warrior and sending it out to where the ex-scout got to.
No... but a mistake I've made so many times it's just silly is moving 2 tiles at once, and passing a barb warrior when I could have retreated. Or even worse: attack stuff unwanted (e.g. archers in jungle) because you set a longer automove through some grey FoW and while not looking a barb jumped into your path.

In special cases, I've used a move-and-check poilciy for exploring workers or missionaries though. And I tend to do it regularly with settlers.

The problem are those panthers. Wolves too, but Panthers... ouch!

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


I see. I wondered why the beaker cost often didn't match the No of Turns required for it.
The idea is similar to the one in Civ3: when you're last to research a tech, it will only cost you half the turns as compared to the first one.

Its implementation is better, though: by giving a bonus to the bpt generated instead of subtracting from the cost, the effect is much more smoother. In Civ 3: when all the AIs got a tech and traded it amongst themselves, your cost dropped so significantly that in most cases you were doing overruns, losing money even.

Now, only the part that is still left gets a bonus: if an AI discovers a tech one turn before you, you might be able to put the slider back 10% for this turn, but it's not like Civ3 where you set the slider back all the way and were still spilling beakers.

There's another choice here, BTW. You can save your beakers. By not picking a tech, your beakers get added... next turn you will put twice as much in the tech you choose. You're able to keep that up for several turns, meaning that you can scout out whatever tech the AI has researched, and pick another one. In one turn, you discover it, and can instantly trade it to the AIs.

The problem with this, is that the bonus is not applied to what has been stored in your spill-queue: if you would after having saved up beakers pick a tech that somebody already has, you still pay the price like it was you researching it first.

That should balance the use of something which otherwise might become a serious exploit (although I'm not so sure it wouldn't be possible in certain circumstances to abuse this spilling)

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO

Probably, I'm going to test this out when this game finishes. AH didn't seem like much of a deal with no cows near, but knowing there are horses, and knowing the tech advantage if you play it well (probably one worker + one warrior before lib. Worker definately first. settler after lib.) you should be able to get better results.

DeepO

With worker, warrior, library though, would there be enough hammers around to make the quick Writing turn into a quick library? Without mining there'll be an excess of food, with which the optimum things to build are surely a settler or a worker?

Certainly one to try - but I should really get back to my Industrial Segment first. :D

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO

That should balance the use of something which otherwise might become a serious exploit (although I'm not so sure it wouldn't be possible in certain circumstances to abuse this spilling)

DeepO

I really like the spill-retrieval system of Civ 4. It would be a shame if it became a focus of over exploitative play. I'm mulling over the advantages of prebuilding (but not finishing) various unit types in numerous cities, then finishing them each off in consecutive turns to save on support costs. Would that be cheesy? It has it's limits, but it sounds like good use of game mechanics to me.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


With worker, warrior, library though, would there be enough hammers around to make the quick Writing turn into a quick library? Without mining there'll be an excess of food, with which the optimum things to build are surely a settler or a worker?
I'm thinking it should be something like this:
- worker
- warrior while going to size 3. meanwhile you go for writing
- worker farms in the mean time. There are at least 4 tiles worthy of a farm, so he won't get idle
- after writing, mining.
- if you don't know what to build before a lib, go for a warrior, possibly even a settler. Otherwise, start building a lib right after your warrior. Switch to full production to get the lib faster.
- the worker starts to mine. Probably twice before the lib completes.
- lib completes, go for irr. tiles (should be plenty of those), and a settler build. Set 2 scientists.
- Cruise to priesthood and CoL. Start the Oracle the moment you can. Before reaching CoL (long before, even), you will get an academy. At this point, you can switch to production to get the Oracle faster.
- Oracle completes, and settlers galore.

The faster you get that academy, the better. And any time you've got too much production, build a settler. Also, and this is something which didn't become needed for me during the Oracle build, but later was used for many cities: don't be afraid to run a food deficit! If you're lacking health, expansion won't help much, which means your queued food is just a way of getting more production by using e.g. desert hills.

Certainly one to try - but I should really get back to my Industrial Segment first. :D
I'm half way in the Renaissance era. One thing I'm proud of: I managed to avoid reading any DAR later than my current period so far... but even reading the 'older' ones takes a while ;)

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


I really like the spill-retrieval system of Civ 4. It would be a shame if it became a focus of over exploitative play. I'm mulling over the advantages of prebuilding (but not finishing) various unit types in numerous cities, then finishing them each off in consecutive turns to save on support costs. Would that be cheesy? It has it's limits, but it sounds like good use of game mechanics to me.
I think unfinished builds decay just like tech does. I have no idea about the decay rates, but I can imagine these were balanced as well. Most 'exploits' should get hindered by that, but you can't stop all of them.

DeepO

[Kidinnu]

Well, reading everybody else reveals plenty of errors. But here's what I did:

Built Washington on the starting square. {Wish I'd moved east.} Queue warrior, worker.
I don't have mysticism, so I won't try for an early religion. Thinking of the capital as a settler/worker pump, I'm not going for Pottery first off. Technology plan: wheel, mining, bronzeworking. {I was thinking road to the corn, but already knowing about all the flood plains I should have realized I'd hit happiness caps before health. In hindsight, the AI has apparently been really slow with religions - Isabella got Buddhism early, but Hinduism didn't come until after 2000 BC!}
My first warriors explore southeast; spotting the desert and ocean, they turn southwest and skirt the tundra. Second warrior, when built, heads north and west. {So I missed both the stone/ivory to the east and the hills by the wine to the north.}
Village in the southwest yields bronzeworking, just a couple of turns before I would have discovered it myself. (All the other villages I found yielded gold, about $200) This leaves me really unsure of a technology plan - I didn't have a chance to scan for copper nearby. I go for pottery and writing, thinking about alphabet - although I have my doubts, not having met anybody yet.
Washington queues a settler.
Meet Bismarck's scouts in 2960, Genghis Khan's in 2520.
I now see I have no copper nearby, and worry about defense.
Tech plan: hunting, archery, masonry, alphabet.
I send the settlers southwest to the coast of the peninsula near stone, founding New York. {In retrospect, this site was too food-poor to grow; I should have stayed farther east, as most others did. One of my goals in this game was to get out of the habit of a close spacing, but the resources I got access to - sheep, fish - aren't resources I really need, since happiness looks like much more of a problem.} Workers have irrigated corn and floodplains near Washington and built road; now they run a road to NY and start a quarry.
Genghis Khan has a warrior and three scouts around me, so I start worrying, and build a barracks in Washington. {Another mistake - it'll always be low in production. But New York's site won't be much better.}
Meet Isabella in 2320; she got Buddhism early, but no sign of other religions having been discovered. Saladin in 2280, Hapshepsut in 2000. I find Karakand about now
Gibbon's power assessment in 1960 ranks me #4 (Saladin, Genghis, Bismarck, me, ?, Hapshepsut, Isabella)
After Gibbon's announcement, I realize Washington's grown too much - it's into unrest because it's unprotected. {A common failing of mine is to build too little military. Luckily I can usually get away with it early on Noble, and I've had enough setbacks in games that I'm getting better about it most of the time. I'm not used to being so production-poor, though, and although I realized it early I haven't behaved consistently because of it. Sometimes I think my play suffers because I'm often interrupted. Here I built a barracks, not thinking that I should just churn out a warrior and then let some other city specialize in military.}
In 1760, I spot my first barbarian warriors. By 1600, there are several near me in the south, but they all tussle with the AI warriors and scouts rather than taking my undefended cities. At this point I have open borders with Saladin, Genghis, and Isabella, trying to be friendly, but still neutral (Cautious, +0) relations.

The screenshot's one turn too late, but shows what I've got to work with. Having met nearly everybody I'm hoping an early Alphabet lets me do some tech trading, or at least get a better idea of where the competition is. I need to: get two to three more cities out (N, E, and maybe NW), start producing great people in my capital (and a couple more workers), and get some military on the frontier. Plenty of errors already; AU's teaching me, and I just hope I can learn something from it.

[Arrian]

Ok, I'm really late to the party. My notes, which are really good for this DAR, are at home, but I wanted to comment on a few things. I played on Prince, btw.

First, like a few others (Cort, Lockstep, DeepO and Thror), I moved my settler east and settled there, so as to get the hills in the workable radius.

I researched Animal Husbandry first, but got it from a hut 4-5 turns before I'd have finished it, which was a little annoying (I'd rather have gotten something else and finished Animal normally).

My starting warrior was eaten by bears not long into the game, despite being in a forest and across a river. Toast.

I later built a scout that did ok after having several close calls (lions, wolves).

I built New York at Washington 2223 (coast, near cows, horses once I got a border expansion). Boston was to the SW, directly between the coast and the lake by the pigs.

I have no screenshots from ancient times (what is the hotkey to take/save the screenies I see people in this thread making??) and my first save is from 1400 AD (!). :lol: Typical me, eh?

Some things I noticed in other people's screenshots:

1) Many people went with a looser build than I did. I feel my somewhat tighter build helped me, but it *did* cost me the ivory site to the east. Isa-freakin'-bella got there first.

2) Lots of people seemed to prioritize grabbing the wines to the north/northeast. Why? I mean, wines are nice, but no more so than seveal other luxuries. I saw a number of New Yorks built up off the river on a hill to grab all the wines. Didn't seem worth it - you lose the health bonus from the river. You do gain +25% defense for that city, of course.

More later, once I can access my notes.

-Arrian

[chriseay]

Originally posted by Arrian
I built New York at Washington 2223 (coast, near cows, horses once I got a border expansion). Boston was to the SW, directly between the coast and the lake by the pigs.
-Arrian

Ok, just a quick question on this - what does Washington 2223 mean? I am I correct in assuming that is the numpad movement from Washington?

[Arrian]

Correct. My Washington, of course, is "6" of most people's, because I moved one tile east before settling.

-Arrian

[Kidinnu]

Arrian, I think the other reason to build on a (plains) hill is that they produce 2/2/1, instead of 2/1/1 like all other city sites. So you get an initial production boost, even without a worker, and long-term I think it's about equivalent to a windmill on that hill?

[Arrian]

Right, right. I didn't realize that was a plains hill.

Another thing I noticed: many people expanded aggressively north/northeast, whereas I expanded a bit more "organically" in that I kinda expanded equally in all directions. This clearly cost me ivory and the chance to really hem Ghengis and/or Isabella in. On the other hand, neither one attacked me for a good long time (Isabella eventually took a crack at me, too little and too late) and I still ended up bigger & stronger. Ghengis, however, is a power in my game.

-Arrian

[Aeson]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Has anyone found that a policy of move-and-check on flat ground can preserve a scout? I haven't had enough scouts to try this with so far, It's the second move that tends to meet the bear, by which time it's too late. Single moves, unless a forest is available for the second, and retreating if needed, might be slow, but it's quicker than building another warrior and sending it out to where the ex-scout got to.

I don't think it's worth it vs animals, unless heading for somewhere specific and not in a rush. Like ending exploration phase, and moving to sentry. Once the Barb Warriors show up though, I tend to go exclusively move and check with Scouts if I want to keep them. Sometimes it's better to free up the unit support costs though, in which case full steam ahead.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson
Sometimes it's better to free up the unit support costs though, in which case full steam ahead.
Something more or less related:

I've thought before on going very worker heavy at first, disband them when every early thing is build, and later build workers again when lumber mills/RR appear (which will still eb around by the time Biology needs a couple of adjustment in terrain as well). I don't do that, though, as I figured that the support cost is not hurting me that much... so I simply tend to build fewer workers, and use them longer.

If you're very Dutch about your support costs, does that mean you tend to overbuild workers at first, disband them later, and rebuild (or conquer) them afterwards?
And, do you keep obsolete units around for happiness issues? I very rarely will disband a warrior when using hereditary rule, even if it won't give me a bonus at that very moment.

DeepO

[Arrian]

DAR I:

Prince Level.

4000 BC - Start looks solid. River, corn, floodplains, forest, etc. Popped hut w/warrior, got maps L This reveals some promising terrain to the east, however, including another hut near some ivory on a river. Mmmm.

Moved settler one tile east and founded (to get the hills in the radius).

Ah! Silks too. Nice. Work silks, begin worker. Set research to Animal Husbandry (I always think of Ani-MAL! from Sesame Street… ANIMAL!!!).

3880bc – our exploring warriors see stone! Mmm, Pyramids!

3760bc – 2nd hut popped. Well, I got good news and I got bad news. Good news: tech, yay! Bad news: I got Animal, which I was already researching. Still, not bad. Research set to the wheel.

3520bc – DISASTER! Our brave warriors are slaughtered mercilessly by bears. I had moved them so they were in a forest and the bears had to cross a river, but still the bears won. Damn.

3400 – Worker built, wheel discovered. Next up – mining. Build warrior.

3120 – Mining discovered… my exploration to this point has been terrible due to the death of my starting warriors. I therefore chose hunting, which I wouldn’t normally do yet.

3040 – warrior complete, Washington size 2, now using farmed corn and the silk. I decide to start on a settler, with the intention of sticking a scout in there once hunting is done in a few turns.

2880 – hunting discovered, build switched to scout. Writing next.

2600 – Scout complete. Washington now size 4 (farmed corn, farmed floodplain, silk, regular forest). Back to the settler.

2520 – Scout narrowly defeats lions. Well, at least they lived.

2440 – meet Ghengis Khan (oh, great), who has the same score as I do.

2360 – Our scout, still healing from his last battle, narrowly survives a wolf attack. Promoted him to hill defender type. Settler complete, warrior next. Writing complete, mysticism next.

2280 – New York founded on the coast by the cows (Wash 2223). Washington size 5.

2200 – Gold from hut (scout). Meet Bismarck. Open borders with him and Ghengis. I’m leading in score now.

2160 – Warrior complete. Start another settler… risky since I want the Oracle, but I’ll take the risk.

2040 – Warrior complete in New York, begin another. Meet Saladin. Open borders.

1720 – Boston founded 1144 of Washington (coast, pigs, lake). Research proceeding toward priesthood. Washington now up against its happiness limit, is using two (undeveloped, arg!) hills and a citizen laborer while building a library.

1600 – Priesthood. Start CoL & Oracle. Meet Hap of Egypt and Isabella of Spain. Open borders w/all.

HERE THERE BE DRAGONS. To put it another way, my notes trail off into oblivion for a while. The next event I saw fit to record was in 900 bc.

-Arrian

[Aeson]

I've disbanded or even given away Workers. I don't make a point of it, but especially after conquering a developed neighbor, and capturing so many Workers, I find I have way too many Workers. (I've also given away entire armies to the civ I just made peace with, so they can fight my ally... ;) )

Unit support costs can strangle an economy. City maintenance and civic upkeep have to be dealt with, but unit support costs don't. I'd rather have fewer units, and more potential to build/rush/upgrade/draft units, than the other way around.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson
I've disbanded or even given away Workers. I don't make a point of it, but especially after conquering a developed neighbor, and capturing so many Workers, I find I have way too many Workers. (I've also given away entire armies to the civ I just made peace with, so they can fight my ally... ;) )

Unit support costs can strangle an economy. City maintenance and civic upkeep have to be dealt with, but unit support costs don't. I'd rather have fewer units, and more potential to build/rush/upgrade/draft units, than the other way around.
If so, at least this doesn't change over levels. I did the same thing gifting units away from noble onwards (the moment you don't know what to do anymore, gifting or disbanding is a logical choice). The need for that seems to have lowered in 1.09, as Soren tweaked the AI, it seems. You won't capture workers so easily anymore.

and unit costs: the first time you're losing part of your attack force because you're running a deficit while at 0 gold, you are learning a lesson. A single look on F2 can learn a lot of things.

One thing I don't know, though, is how the different unit costs are calculated. It seems easy: one part for all units in general, one part for those outside your borders. You get a couple of freebies in every category. However, I can't ever figure it out precisely. Have you?

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO
Is it just me, or did most of the players got a scout at some part in their early expansion? I've seen at least two scouts at 4000 BC (Aeson and my own), but plenty report scouts later...

DeepO

I don't recall getting any scouts - I think 2 warriors, 2 maps, 2 gold caches and then the 7th hut surrounded me with barbs, almost Civ-1 style.

Over and over in these DAR's I see the barbs founding a city on the exact same square in the SW tundra - with lots of resources around. That's consistency and quality! We all kept it. I think many of us also had AI settling crap spots down there that even the barbs wouldn't touch!

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO

One thing I don't know, though, is how the different unit costs are calculated. It seems easy: one part for all units in general, one part for those outside your borders. You get a couple of freebies in every category. However, I can't ever figure it out precisely.

DeepO

That F2 unit cost display has been driving me mad - I can't work it out, I can't plan the costs for a campaign or defensive boost, and I can't even predict whether 1 more or less unit wil make a difference. That 'handicap' number seems to make itself up as it goes along.

[Arrian]

I got maps from the first hut, tech from the 2nd, then my unit died. When I built a scout I popped 2-3 more huts and IIRC I got gold from them all.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Over and over in these DAR's I see the barbs founding a city on the exact same square in the SW tundra - with lots of resources around. That's consistency and quality! We all kept it. I think many of us also had AI settling crap spots down there that even the barbs wouldn't touch!

Yeah, I noticed that furs city was in many games. Did many people get the northwestern barb town I did (Vandal, in my game)? I didn't see it... but that's a solid spot. It's got a sea resource and a land food source (corn or wheat, I think).

-Arrian

[chriseay]

Originally posted by Cort Haus Over and over in these DAR's I see the barbs founding a city on the exact same square in the SW tundra - with lots of resources around. That's consistency and quality! We all kept it. I think many of us also had AI settling crap spots down there that even the barbs wouldn't touch!

It seems to me that the barb cities must be based on something that is present in the initial scenario. It would be an interesting comparison to look at where outlying AI cities are in different games and see if the same thing occurs, or if it is just the barb city decision that is hardwired from the start of the game (land being available of course).

I would hope that though the barbarian AI might be locked in to certain spots, that the rest of the AI have some decision process built in to their city placement. Hopefully they can base it on how well the player (and other AI's) are doing in the game, and what the threats and goals are both in the short and long term. I have no idea how the AI city placement process works, so this might be way out there, but.....

[Cort Haus]

To be fair to the AI, it has to pick from the few lonely tiles outside the borders, while barbs usually have a large area to pick from. I'd expect the barbs choose city sites using the same criteria as the AI would.

[Fosse]

I played the game on Prince, using version 1.00 (haven't updated yet because of some long running MP games).

I'm putting my notes in the approrpiate DAR threads. I have over 150 pictures to sort through, and if I don't at least put these up I might never make a showing here... so forgive the lack of illustration for now (if anybody as questions I might be able to dig up relevant screenshots).


4000 BC
Map from barb hut shows a big desert to the east, and fertile land NE. I plant settler where he is, and see a food heavy, hammer poor starting location.

I start building a Settler... I want to stretch out quickly, and a worker wouldn't be able to do much for a while here... until cottages probably I don't need him. Start The Wheel to head for Pottery.

3880 BC
My warrior explores close to home (I decide not to run straight for the hut in the NE... might not get it anyway since it's so far, and might be another closer to home. I'd rather know the best spot for the first Settler. He finds cows and horses SE of Washington! Happy day.

3600 BC
Meet Isabella, scout appears NE of Washington.

3400
Discover POttyer, was going start mining. I'd like to see copper as I plant my first settler. Probably should have gone for bronze first since I wanted to see it. But, since I know I have horses I decide to go Hunting --> Husbandry. I could go straight for husbandry, but I'd like to send a scout or two out because it looks like a big world. The worker will be busy enough with a floodplaines cottage before he could build a pasture anyway.

3280
I pop a hut. Spain SHOULD hvae... and could have, with a scout. But didnt'. I get a scout from the hut... so decide to switch to mining. I'll finish the 2 turns of Hunting later on. get mining now, then husbandry... then...????

3080
Hut pop gives Mysticism. Nice. Cool mountain/valley configuration in the North. Warrior is heading toward home, uncovering bits of fog along the way. He'll stand on a hill to keep fog of war off of potential barbarian areas. The settler will walk one at a time, with no escort, to the SE to avoid barbs.

3000 BC
I'm 1000 years old. I discover mining, head to Husbandry. My settler finishes, and Washington starts a scout. I now pause to draw on the strategy layer where I want all of my cities. This will almost certainly not come to pass.

I plot three cities. One SE to get cows, horses, coast. One in the far NW, that's for GPP later on. Three food sources all in one radius, tons of coast. Merchants galore!

One straight North. It has lots of useless land, and overlap. I choose it though to take advantage of food and commerce in the area. It'll run specialists, so it won't ever need all of its tiles anyway. Late game it won't be my best city, but midgame it'll be a commerce powerhouse. What I don't have mapped out is a high shield city. The Cow/HOrse one will have to do that until I set up a proper town for it.


2920
Build New York, it starts a worker. Two workers being made. I met Germany the turn before, with his scout being NE of Washington. I need to get scouts and warriors out to uncover all of this fog... it's scary how vast this landmass seems. No sign of foreign cities yet.


2600

Still waiting on workers. The warrior is SW, heading toward the black area. Both units fight animals almost every turn. There are two lions east of washington. The scout defends in a forest tile against a bear! The warrior fights two wolves in two turns. Both units get Woods I. I discover Husbandry, and go for Masonry. I decide I can probably dedicate New York to the Pyramids soon. Stonehenge would be nice on this vast continent, but Pyramids will do more longer. I'm not going for an early religion at all.... probably shoot for Code of Laws soon, use artists to pop borders, and spread that religion out.

2280

Discovery masonry... need to get stone soon for Pyramids. New York builds Obelisk... I hate doing it but working that mine and those forests will matter. Meet Saladin... NE of washington again... Must be crowded up there.

Warrior in Washington... at least three barb warriors to my SW. Scary stuff.

Nothing too eventful until I discover Alphabet... so on to the next thread...

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


I don't recall getting any scouts - I think 2 warriors, 2 maps, 2 gold caches and then the 7th hut surrounded me with barbs, almost Civ-1 style.

Maybe better to distribute some inside info here, after discussions Aeson had with Soren.

Scenarios are possible in 2 varieties. A worldbuilder save is different from a python scenario. Simply taking the save without any editing means that every player will start with his initial units saved. Start the original game on Noble, and the AI won't get any free units. Use this save to start a new game on higher level, and the AI's units are already saved: they will start with the same units then on Noble. Only the bonusses they get productionwise are like they supposed to be.

Thus, if you play Prince, you expect the AI to start with a worker. It didn't in AU 100 A. Which explains the slow starts we're seeing: no early rushes, the players expanding faster than the AI, early research being hampered (the AI will probably start building either a worker or a settler, thus does not grow), early wonders falling late on high difficulty, AI scouts only meeting you in 1500 BC, etc.

This also partly explains why people on higher levels are doing so well: normally they should have gotten a higher initial threshold to take to get even. On Prince and above, the AI starts with a worker (and a scout?). On emperor and above (may be immortal), the AI will start with an extra settler. On deity, the AI will start with several scouts, 2 settlers, 2 workers, and several military units. Except in this game: none of all that happened. On noble, the game is probably the same as normal, and on prince there won't be much difference (although it will be noticeable). On Monarch and above this becomes quite apparant, and Aeson on Deity saw some very strange things compared to normal games.

To fix this, normally it would be enough to delete the units, and put only the starting locations in the WBS (I have no idea what I'm saying here, mind you, just rephrasing Soren. But I'm sure there are people who will understand what he means)

--------

For the scouts thing: It's been properly identified, in a reproduceable bug. Which makes solving it easy. On higher levels, going to 'Custom game' first before going to the scenario (as you were looking for the file, or simply because you made a mistake and clicked the wrong menu option) will give you an identical seed. As luck would have it, if you do this with this map, you will be getting a scout in 4000 BC. Stay away from custom, and it's random like it supposed to be. This also has implications for the identical-map bug people have been reporting but wasn't catchable.

Thank Aeson for figuring this one out. It might not be apparant from the very small comments posted here by him, but one of the bigger issues this game still had just got identified properly.

PS: noble players won't get a scout in 4000 BC, as they never get a scout from huts (it seems).

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
To be fair to the AI, it has to pick from the few lonely tiles outside the borders, while barbs usually have a large area to pick from. I'd expect the barbs choose city sites using the same criteria as the AI would.
Blue dots algorithm... I suspect it gets reused for about anything. If you defog one blue tile, barbs will go for the next one. I didn't get the SW fur city, simply because I was patrolling the area, and wanted to build my own city on the spot I liked, and not the one the AI liked...

AIs are similar: they will go for the blue spots too. By the time they can run out of place to settle in this game, you will have expanded as well... leaving only the more crappy locations to pick from. With their penalties (on Noble), the AI are not always making a bad choice either: pure fisherman villages are in most cases worth it. It's because we're getting penalized that we will never consider building there, but for the AI it won't be that bad

(there are always exceptions: tundra with ice will get settled as well, and takes hundreds of turns to become viable. But the settling algorthim gets constant attention for what I can tell. Improving this will never stop.)

DeepO

[Aeson]

I'm not sure of the exact formula for unit support costs, but it's tied to population. (As is the bonus from Feudalism.)

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson
I'm not sure of the exact formula for unit support costs, but it's tied to population. (As is the bonus from Feudalism.)
That's the handicap bonus, right?

DeepO

[Aeson]

The handicap is in addition to it. You definitely get more than 1 free unit on Deity for instance. How many is dependent on population (and Feudalism).

[Makahlua]

I'm still breaking about 50/50 on Noble, so that's where I'm staying fro this one :)

4000 BC - I popped the hut, actually hoping for a map, but humm, hills. I decided to settle one E of the start. I picked up Vel's settler first strat from that thread, and it's been wotking nicely for me :b: We'll be starting with an early religion and then see if any one's close, needing bw/iw/mc beeline.

3280 BC - no sign of neighbors yet, but I did get hinduism :b: Nothin' but coast to the N and W and SE - looks like I can use culture blocking to grab a chunk to backfill. Going to grab mining/wheel for now, unless I meet someone. Maybe hunting after if this continent looks much bigger - need map data to plan with! :doitnow!:

3240 BC - Hello! I spoke too soon - here's bismarck coming from the ne germans= panzers = die bleeper, die! will chung up the bw/ iw path asap

2920 BC - Well here's the initial expansion plan - swine and wine! And although it's part hidden I have plotted a city on the N coast too, right in that right angle turn :b:
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=22677_Civ4ScreenShot0026.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=22677_Civ4ScreenShot0026.JPG)

And oh joy - Saladin (also probably coming from the ne). Aw crap. Lions ate my settler ;_;

(somewhere in between) And Isab****a. rrr. ... -And- Ghengis? ;_; Time for a quick diversion to hunting - think I need a scout or 2

1600 BC - built Napa w/o incident, and iron? You'll have to wait for the next DAR ^^

[Arrian]

Aw crap. Lions ate my settler

:eek: :eek: :eek:

Unescorted, I presume?

-Arrian

[Makahlua]

Yes, I was too busy poking about with my lone warrior :( I figured they'd be fine, only going a short distance from the border, but noooooooo! :wall:

It's worth noting that for the dozen or two games I've played and used Vel's "Settler First" start, that's the -first- time I've had that happen. Come to think of it, it's never happened in earlier games either.. AU games hate me! :lol:

[Rhothaerill]

It almost happened to me too. I had two lions and a bear surrounding my unescorted settler right before I settled. It's definitely a risky strat. Of course I've only tried it once though. ;)

[Arrian]

This game was definitely animal-heavy. Bears ate my starting warrior, and I saw lions & wolves all over the place. America was a wild kingdom in the beginning.

-Arrian

[joncnunn]

In Civ IV, it's a really bad idea to have a unescorted settler outside your cultural boundary for more than one turn.

But if you slow down your settler builds a bit, the capital culture will grow and wild anamals never cross into player owned terriory and in fact get an instant kick out if you found a city that places them within your territory.

Not to mention that a size 3 to 4 city can spit out a settler much faster than a size 1 or 2 city can.

[Dubhghlas]

Another reason that "settler first" sucks.:D

[Arrian]

"Settler first" pretty much requires that you only do a little bit of exploring (enough to find a city spot) and circle back with your exploring warrior. If you don't do that, you're playing roulette.

-Arrian

[kptb]

Noble difficulty.


Ancient I (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4178891#post4178891)
Ancient II (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4178932#post4178932)
Classical (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4178965#post4178965)
Midieval (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4179052#post4179052)
Renaissance (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4179052#post4179052)


The year 4000 BC sees the foundation of Washington one square to the east. We research the wheel, build a worker and a hut yields 85 gold. Washington prospers and its borders expand in 3800 BC. The year 3680 BC sees the defeat of a wolf and the start of pottery. Another hut yields 24 gold in 3560 BC. In 3400 BC the worker is finished and we start to build a warrior. Only 40 years later we finish pottery and start mining. In 3240 BC we defeat a lion and choose the woodsman I promotion. Hunting is started after mining in 3120 BC. Shortly thereafter, in 3080, we get more gold, 69 this time, from a hut.
The year we made contact with Bismarck was 3040 BC. Our brave warriors defeat a bear, we finish hunting and begin animal husbandry in 2960 BC. Our city defenses are bolstered and a new scout is commissioned in 2920 BC.
A long period of quite comes to an end when our first settler is begun in 2680 BC while only 40 years after we discover the secret of animal husbandry and begin dabbling in bronze working. We meet Genghis Khan in 2600 BC and after the defeat of yet another lion choose the woodsman II promotion. We meet with Saladin for the first time in 2280 BC. So far all meetings have been peaceful ones.
The advent of bronze working brings the first change in civics, we adopt slavery in 2240. In the same year we start archery and meet Isabella of Spain and hope for everlasting peace with her.
The year 2160 will always be remembered as the year when the first band of settlers set out for a place in the east to found a new city near some ivory. We send all the protection we can afford (our only warrior) with them. Washington, now defenseless, will create two more warriors. One is finished in 2080 and another in 2000, when a new settler is started. In 2040 BC we unveiled archery to our citizens and initiate an investigation into the mystic arts.
In 1960 BC we are ranked third in the list of most advanced civilizations. We need to work harder.
New York is the name chosen for our first outpost, which was founded in 1920 BC and we immediately coach a new group of warriors. 1880 is greeted with the coming of mysticism and the scribes will next pursue writing.
In 1760 we meet Hatshepsut with whom we agree on a peace and we construct a road to New York to increase commerce. A barbarian warrior is spotted and defeated in 1680 BC. While the year 1600 brings us writing and the research is pointed toward meditation. We agree to open borders with the leader of Egypt and Washington finishes another settler that will be sent north with a warrior. The first unit of archers is going to be trained in Washington next.
In 1560 BC we receive more gold from a hut.
By 1520 BC we are second in area and GNP, fourth in production and score and fifth in food, soldiers and population. We are looking forward to meditation in 2 turns, an archer in 3, a new city in 4 and a settler in New York in 16.
So far, so good.

[jshelr]

Monarch -- Dar One up to 1520

What a yummy start. Thanks Nbarclay -- except this leaves no excuse :)
The plan is to create a stack of warriors while population grows in the capital. It looks like a powerful base to build settlers and workers quickly.

We will explore the surrounding area carefully with a goal of not losing any warriors (or building any scouts). I think the payoff from huts is minimal and that map trading comes relatively early, to say nothing of open borders. So a rush to explore has a small payoff most times. If the settler flood is as rapid as hoped, it will be difficult to keep up with the need for warriors without sacrificing early barracks.

First decision was to leave the hut alone for now.

3920 -- Northern hut yields a map :(
3800 -- Capital expands, pops a scout from the hut ¡V the scout goes east and finds ivory and lions.

3640 -- Still no horses seen so researching mining second (after wheel). Warrior pops 112 gold from hut by the west coast. The capital is working two flood plains at this point.

3300 -- Working 3 flood plains now. On to bronze working. We meet the Khan and nip his scout in a race for a hut. He will probably never forgive us. Warrior is busy running away from bears and lions, oh my!

3120 -- popped sailing from a southern hut. Very happy about that. If I can get to Alpha first, as I expect, sailing will likely be a tradable item.

2920 -- the capital hit 5 pop a couple of turns ago and we just met Spain. We have only 2 warriors in the capital and one exploring. Pumping out a worker first. We have a green face on health to fix. Disappointed to find no copper and no horses seen either. Moving on to iron working but would rather be doing writing.

2600 -- lucky indeed, popped mysticism in far west hut. (Remind me not to whine any more about huts.)

2120 -- more luck as the kind mapmakers provided iron in the capital. First settler hit the road. The area is still crawling with dangerous animals. We decided to build only 3 spaces away on a hill in the flood plain region to provide a compact space to defend, since we have hardly any units. The upside is pop growth in the downside is lack of shields, er, hammers. Research is now pots „³ writing „³ alpha.

At the end of Dar 1, we hit writing and have the capital settler pump operating as shown. Another farm next turn and soon the capital will be operating full tilt. George is on top of the civ list and we should be able to proceed largely via settler expansion.

I'll be very interested in reading what others have done before proceeding.

[jshelr]

One quick question: some people seem to have horses and others not. Is that a random appearance feature in the new game?

[Arrian]

You need Animal Husbandry to see the horses, but they should be there in all of the games...

-Arrian

[jshelr]

duh, you're right. have not noticed the arrival of horses with animal husbandry in earlier games. thanks

[Arrian]

The patch changed it - they used to be visible at game start.

-Arrian

[joncnunn]

The resource locations should be the same in all games in a given AU course; unless someone gets lucky working a mine with no resource and creates one.

But as Arrian mentioned, horses now requires Animal Husbany; so the timing of when they get it will very.

Also many resources are placed in positions where the AI could get as easily aquire them as the human.

[Addled Platypus]

going for broke and playing Prince for the first time
4000BC: Great first turn
Founded Washington
Goody Hut with free Tech- Mining
Now Studying Myst

Goal-Clockwise explore around Washington
3800BC: Washington Expands
3760BC: goody hut 86gold
3720BC: Studying Wheel
3600BC: Buddhism founded else where
3400BC: Spotted Lions in open field, retreated to protect soon to completed worker
3360BC: Studying Animal Husbandry, grow towards cows or pigs?
3280BC: Lions on a hill spotting me!
3160BC: Hinduism founded else where
Lions back on top of hill-
3080BC: Washington size 2
roading towards what I hope is greener pastures
2960BC: I thought the lions would always be poking and prodding to my north
so I was roading south….guess what, retreat the worker
2920BC: Second warrior built, now to go back to roading
studying Pottery
2880BC: Building settler
2600BC: Studying Hunting – need to know where and who are my neighbors
2460BC: Studying Bronze working
2320BC: Genghis Khan finds me
warriors promote to woodsman thanks to some wolfs
1800BC: Adopt Slavery
AI lions never harass AI civs ? (see screenie)
1720BC: Bismarck finds me
1640BC: New York founded and connected by roadn will have horses shortly
Washington building obelisk
Studying Masonry
New York going for Stonehenge
1600BC: Judaism founded else where

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Platypus Rex
AI lions never harass AI civs ? (see screenie)
No, the AI get attacked too. However a scout has a 100% vs animals, plus the AI are getting bonusses vs barbs on higher level (at prince , bonusses are still moderate). A lion attacking that scout would not have been good.

Besides, early on, all barbs will run away from your units... only the defenseless they will attack (and not inside your own borders, only out in the open)

DeepO

[Blake]

And so, this is my first AU game. Wheee.

I'd read through the reports, but that was long enough ago that I've forgotten most of the map by now.

Anyway I'm going to play a bit differently for varieties sake and go for some serious conquest right off the bat, I may enjoy a good CS Slingshot but it's been done to death by other players, probably better at it than me. Anyway, early conquest in a start that is good for building isn't an easy thing to do, it's a lot like pounding a square peg into a round hole, hopefully it will be educational anyway.

I start by founding Washington 1 tile to the east... you've heard this crap before, i'm not even going to bother screenshotting it. I make a warrior as my first build, as my starting warrior is scouting north. I'll need the 2nd warrior to scout my territory. Research starts off with a beeline to Bronze Working and Wheel.

Once the warrior completes I start on a worker, there's some easy improving to be done with both Agriculture and Mining under my belt, so there is no excuse for not building a worker.

Some screenshots? Okay okay!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/1scoutingnorth.jpg
My warrior has been scouting north, he popped a scout who is also scouting. My warrior finds the Mongols.

We now zoom to my new warrior...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/2rawr.jpg
The villagers are hostile? Maybe I'M hostile! There are 4 of them? ... Lets look at something else.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/3yum.jpg
I see Mr Mongols worker hasn't been having much luck either. Or maybe he will enjoy life under his Americans overlords more. I'd left my warrior on the hill south of the marble, and when the worker went for the (most obvious) bait, I went for him! Yoink! The AI is prompt about hooking up resources making them good spots for oppurtunistic warriors to loiter near.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/4newyork.jpg
New York is founded in a place where no doubt many other New Yorks have been founded. The settler having been built after the Worker. With so much good land it's pretty much essential to make more cities, also I need to make this conquest work for me, not just something to do for fun. Therefore I need to solidify my OWN territory, it's all very well and good to conquer someone else’s lands... until you realize other civs have settled all around your Capital, oops. The main difference between my game and other peoples more buildery games, is that I'll be building an offensive army in place of wonders, it comes down to having a larger, lower quality territory, and less opponents. Is this a good idea for the Americans with their buildery bonuses and lack of combat advantages? Probably not! However, the Organized trait does make it possible to pull off succesfully, and a large territory with many financial boosted cottages is a good thing.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/4.jpg
Boston will be founded here, next to the horses. I'll then be connecting them up. Since I didn't find any copper in my borders I decided to go with horses for my early attack instead, so I've hooked up the road so I can start building them as soon as Boston has been founded and the pastures completed. I also need to finish Horseback Riding and Archery research.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/5thegreatroad.jpg
So what did I do with Mongol Worker? Had him build a road for ease of conquering his old masters! (take notes, aspiring warmongers!) By this stage I've decided to conquer Genghis rather than Isabella, mainly because of this extremely convenient road. You'll also note that I have the warrior escorting him, captured workers have this unfortunate tendency to die if left undefended. The weak Mongol called me up and asked for peace, I accepted. Thanks to my worker yoink he still hasn't connected up the horses in his territory, he’s been set back considerably.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v23/ltgrater/6forwardcity.jpg
And so this report ends, the dates a little off, my timekeeping never is particularly good.
My plan is to found a city at the copper and cows where I've marked on the map, then with the Mongol cities and just one or two filler cities I'll have a continuous stretch of American culture to seal off the western lands, my empire will form a nice line. This isn't the ideal shape for an empire in terms of distance upkeep, but it will give me lots of room for expansion.


--> Onwards to the next part! (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4188135#post4188135)

[Artuero]

AU-100A – DAR 1 (Beginning of Time until 1520 B.C.)
Artuero
Noble Difficulty

In 4000 B.C., I ordered my settler to found Washington in the area it happened to be in at that particular time. I then set the Washingtonians about getting a work party together to build farms to help harvest food from nearby flood plains and a wheat field. They took over a thousand years to comply. The shaman began to consider mysticism.

I sent the hardy 1st Warriors scouting to the east. On their way they passed a village later annexed to Washington for the price of 87 gold. In 3760, our shaman learned mysticism and I instructed him to try to invent a new religion called Hinduism by way of learning about polytheism.

The 1st Warriors came two useful villages. One taught masonry to them, and the second taught them how to fight better, giving them two promotions.

In 3640, I learned that someone had founded Buddhism. Not to be outdone, I founded Hinduism in 3320 and began research on the wheel. In 3120, I met the founder of Buddhism, Isabella. Because the 1st wanted to exercise their skills, and her capital was in my sights, I declared war upon her.

Turned out that her capital was defended by a single warrior band. The 1st went straight for it, using the two city raider promotions to defeat the band in a very close battle. That brought an end to the Spanish civilization and gave me a second city, on the coast with a number of nearby resources, and a group of worker slaves.

Thus was the year 3040 a watershed for American development. We were now, with two cities, an empire.

Rather than leveraging this strength, I foundered a bit. My worker continued to improve the lands and the Spanish slaves did the same around Madrid. Washington built a barracks, but did not need to begin to create units because my workers discovered a loyal warrior band in another village, which then discovered a third warrior band in yet another village. I decided that we should expand further and build a town between Washington and Madrid and so began work on a settler in Washington. Madrid started on a workboat.

I eventually founded a second city, New York, on the coast past the desert near cows and elephants. My warriors continued to scout although I brought back the most experienced to serve as a guardian. Having spotted a barbarian warrior I have decided to garrison all of my cities immediately.

Although I had different plans (early conquest) at the outset, I have decided that my learning (counting the capture of Buddhism) the only two religions would put me on a good course towards taking over all of the religions and ruling the world through culture or diplomacy. Therefore I determined to focus on technologies that will help me build my empire. After learning monotheism and founding Judaism, I have embarked on a path that will eventually leave me with (sole, I hope) control of the alphabet and thus allow me to fill in the numerous technological gaps I currently suffer from.

Summary:

Cities:
Washington (5, Stonehenge in 3).
Madrid (5, Library in 20).
New York (1, Library in 35).

Washington and Madrid are on the no growth approach due to unhappiness in the city. A garrison should help somewhat. Washington has built a barracks and a worker; Madrid a Jewish Temple and a workboat. New York was just founded (1880 B.C.) and has completed nothing. Workers are trying to build a great road to connect the three cities.

Not paying attention to finances means that I have no gold although 100% of my 16 commerce is going into research. I am losing 6 gold per turn on city maintenance. Not too long ago I switched to Organized religion. I do not have knowledge of any other civics.

I have met Genghis Khan, Bismark, Hatshepsut and Saladin; all are cautious of me. Bismark is a little angrier at me because apparently Isabella was his friend. My military consists of only three warrior bands. I also have two workers.

Technology is primarily religious (Mysticism, Polytheism, Monotheism, Priesthood) plus Masonry, Agriculture, The Wheel, Fishing, and Writing. I am 13 turns away from learning alphabet. Washington founded Hinduism, Madrid Buddhism and Judaism.

I am the score leader (287) compared to Khan’s 241. Hatshepsut is at 235, Bismark 230 and Saladin 165. I am 6th in GNP, Soldiers, Approval rate, and Life Expectancy. Otherwise I am in first except for production in which I am 2nd. Washington and Madrid are the worlds’ top two cities and I appear to be the only person working on a wonder but we shall see. I have killed two warriors, a panther, wolf, and a lion, and captured one worker.

Here is my view of the world at this time:

http://bresnahan.smugmug.com/photos/48569097-O.jpg

Problems:

Far too weak militarily. It is time to solve that problem fast, but I want to create another settler after Stonhenge.

Not sure why I am building Stonehenge—never a good sign. It helps for the cultural victory if that is what I want to go for. I should have built some warriors instead, but at the time was planning to do more military work early.

Early scouting was not so great. I went in a few different directions and backtracked somewhat, and then was slowed by taking Madrid and did not build more warriors early to continue the scouting.

The techs I have ignored mean that I have little information for founding my next cities—I don’t know where horses, copper, iron or practically anything are located.

Successes: The risk reward for trying to take Madrid was there—capitol, coast, holy city versus the loss of one warrior. Since it turned out well there are no second guesses from me. Had it not gone well I would be down a warrior and have an enemy for the game. I don’t think I’ve had other successes so far except for the decision to press my religious advantage.

Strategy. Sooner or later I will allow open borders but at the moment since I have no negative effects from my negative cash flow I may as well continue it.

I will get alphabet and then hopefully hook up some stone to try for some stone wonders.

I would like to get oracle but not sure if that is feasible given lack of access to marble. Same for Parthenon. However, perhaps I will locate some in the near future. I am hoping that alphabet will allow me to train something better than warriors shortly as well.

I plan to use religion to create some early wars. Spread one religion to my nearest neighbors and another to those farther away.

Any suggestions?

[MadDjinn]

ok, so I'm really still trying to figure out this one...

I started out well with the local village giving me a Scout to wander around and visit the other nice people in the area.

We proceeded to build a Warrior then a Settler within Washington, sending out the the first and 2nd warriors to also see who was around.

To no ones suprise, Isabella founded Buddism early on. We responded with founding both Hinduism (Washington) and Judaism (New York) then converting to Organised religion with Judaism. This was a strategic move as we founded New York directly on a stone tile, as we're looking for everything we can get to boost production speed here while we attempt a shot at some ancient wonders.

Techs:
(Fishing/Agri)
Mysticism
Polytheism (f. Hinduism)
Hunting (from Hut)
Masonry
Priesthood
Monotheism
Wheel
Archery
Mining (right at the last second)

we're headed for Bronze Working and will hopefully make the Oracle to jump to a new era tech. With 2 of the religions already, and Isabella close, we are likely to take Theocracy as our free tech to gain fast access to the Sis. Chap.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=75427_1480BC0000.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=75427_1480BC0000.JPG)

F9 stats:

#1 Crop Yield/Land area
#2 pop
dragging behind in pretty much everything else.

Strategy:

Not defined yet. It appears Cultural Victory may be started, but can always fall back to an easier way to win. We'll launch an assault on Isabella once most of the religions are founded, to try to gain all of the founding cities. Then spread out the messages from there.

#edit: oh yeah, and I'm winning despite my lack of focus...

[clinton]

Edit: I had only played up to the first DAR with the 1.09, so I have decided to restart with the 1.52 patch. I have played pretty much the same way, and avoided using map knowledge as much as I can (by pretending I don't know the locations of resources). This DAR is very much like the DAR I posted for the 1.09 patch, as I've played the opening sequence and settled in the same places.

This DAR takes me to the classical era. I discovered iron working in 1480BC.

This is what my world looks like at the moment:

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73090_map.JPG />
(http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73090_map.JPG)

And current tech:


<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73090_tech.JPG /> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=73090_tech.JPG)

I also have 3 warriors and 2 workers.

I settled in place, noticing I was two squares away from desert on the east. Did a bit of exploring with my warrior, first east, stopping at the desert then clockwise around my capital. Started on a worker. First techs were The Wheel, and Pottery, so I could build cottages on the flood plains.

Before producing my first settler, I built a couple of warriors waiting for Washington to reach size 4, its max happy size. This would get it working those cottages for the extra science.

After some exploring, I noticed the stone, and decided to settle my second city, New York, one square from the stone. I concentrated my research on Mysticism, Mining and Masonary now, so I could build the stonehenge, and build it quickly in New York. Convieniently, I finished these techs early enough so that I could grab bronze working as well, so after a couple of turns and one chop, the stonehenge was complete. Stonehenge will also expand New York's borders to grab those furs in the tundra.

After bronze working I went for Animal Husbantry, which I discovered a couple of turns before founding Boston. I've got Boston working on a warrior, after that I'll start it on the pyramids.

I've just discovered Iron Working, so now New York has a bit of production potential. I'm researching sailing next to get the Great Lighthouse running in New York.

Plans:

My research plan after sailing is hunting (for camps for +1 happy), writing then alphabet. I'll switch to representation when pyramids are complete, and let my cities grow. While my cities are growing, I'll explore north. When my cities hit max size (8 for capital, 7 for others, with furs), I'll pump out settlers in my high food cities til I fill the northern area. Then I'll go with some workers to improve those cities. In the mean time after the pyramids are done (which will be mostly chop rushed) Boston should be working hard to produce up to date military units to defend those cities.

Points of Note:

I'm building a lot of wonders. I'm going to chop the pyramids and lighthouse quickly to grab them. Maybe this isn't the most efficient use of my resources, I don't know. But I don't particularly want to go to war at the moment, against Diety opponents, and if worse comes to worse, I can always cut science, and with my high commerce quickly upgrade my warriors to axemen/swordsman.

The barbarians have been tricky to deal with so far. I've tried my best to reveal the fog, particularly in the south. That worked until I had to bring my warriors back to defend my cities, which ironically caused more barbarians to spawn. But once I get iron and horses hooked up, they should be easy to manage.

[MadDjinn]

ok, try #2 here...

(after reading up on some better starting strategies, I decided to restart this AU map. I had some bad placements of cities, and wasn't leveraging the religions properly)

We decided to shift Washington one square to the east, as the hills in the east would provided us with some much needed hammers later, and it will minimize the harsh effects of living in flood plains to a degree.

the initial hut was very willing to fund our new culture, and the next 2 huts managed to provide us with some nice Scouts to help map out the land around us.

We managed to find a nice group of people that provided us with the mysterious Bronze Working Technology. Which helped speed my tech strategy, allowing us to learn some useful building notions instead.

Building Strat:

Washington
Warrior-Warrior-Settler-Worker-Settler-Settler-(started Oracle)

NewYork
Warrior-Warrior-StoneHenge-(started Worker)

Boston
(started Warrior)

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=75427_14800000.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=75427_14800000.JPG)

I was able to chop the last 2 settlers made in Washington, which is going to help me be aggressive in the placement of my cities. I've denied Open Borders for all so far, until I can get most of the key cities up.

My inital building strat is Warrior heavy, since I needed to focus on religious tech early, and couldn't spare the time to get to Archery yet.

there are *alot* of animals and barbarians around, so defense is mandatory here.

Techs:

Myst-Polyth-Mining-Masonry-Priesthood-BronzeWorking(hut)-monotheism-Wheel-Pottery-Hunting-(working on Writing)

I founded Hinduism in 3320 BC in Washington and Judaism in 2200 BC in New York. StoneHenge was built in New York in 1560 BC.

Future Strat:

Tech Strat:

I'm once again headed for the religious win. So if I can get the Oracle chopped soon, I'll take Theology, and tech Code of Laws myself to get that one. I should be getting a GP somewhere in there, so if I can get Meditation out of the way, I should be able to use the GP for Civil Service then. I'll also swing over to get Music, both for building the cathedrals and for the free Artist. then try to get to Philosophy and Divine Right first. I'll try to trade out for the other Classical/Ancient techs to make Geng. happy, which is part of my long term strategy.

I'm also going to try to be aggressive with my city placements. I want to use that ridge line as a nice defense against mass invasion, and it'll give Geng. a clear shot at Isabella.

I'm hoping to keep the others off of this part of the island, and if I do, that will make me the largest empire here. then it's off to the races with a Caraval to try to circumnavigate the globe.

the next 2 DARs won't be long, since I'm jumping straight to the medival era... so no classical era DAR for me.

[rrs_racer]

As a long time lurker, I thought I'd have a go at this. Only got Civ4 last week, so might struggle with this, but I've had a game on Monarch with some success. So I took the plunge and went for Monarch difficulty - soon wishing I hadn't.

DAR1 – 4000BC – 1520BC.
Monarch level. (hah! Should be good for a laugh.)

Starting location. Interesting one – do I found at the place I’m at, or do I go one square to the right and found next to all the nice trees and hills?

I decide to go to the right – Washington founded 4000BC. Got a map from the village.

Tech-wise, I don’t really know what I’m doing yet (this is my third ever Civ4 game) and I’m torn between going towards Bronze Working and Pottery. Pottery wins out in the end, as the terrain nearby looks good for cottages. Currently working a flood plain 3-0-1 square.


3840BC – Switch to the 2-1-1 square as I want to go explore.
3680BC – The Wheel discovered – Pottery in 8.
3640BC – Buddhism founded elsewhere, I’d not bothered with the earlier religions. Warrior completed, another warrior being built in Washington.
Still exploring to the south and west – there’s some stone down there :) but also some wolves :(
3400BC – more gold from a hut – 83 this time.
3360BC – Pottery discovered, Mining taken with a view to Bronze Working. (I did warn you I didn’t know what I was doing yet!) Warrior completes in Washington.
3320BC – Big nasty horrid bear met to the west. Valiantly, my Warrior in a forest fights him off :D
3280BC – Hinduism founded elsewhere. Washington now size 3, one more warrior before I start a worker (is it obvious I don’t know what I’m doing yet?)
3160BC – Mining discovered. Bronze Working in 11.
3120BC – met a panther to the east. Didn’t even know they existed.
3080BC – now an ex-panther.
3000BC – both warriors now building up a nice portfolio of experience – one with 3, the other 2. I give them both woodsman bonuses, in the hope of upgrading them into exploring units in years to come. City now size 4, and a worker is started.
2920BC – one of our explorers snuffs it at the hands of a lion. The other survives a panther attack somehow.
2720BC – Ohhhh good grief, Genghis Khan. Lovely.
2680BC – Bronze Working discovered, just in time for some nice chopping action. I take Hunting, for lack of a better goal – and the spearmen will come in handy.
To go Slavery, or not to go Slavery? Hmmm….Slavery adopted..
2640BC – Bismarck discovered.
2600BC – worker completed, off to chop a forest or two for my settler.
2480BC – Saladin discovered to the NE.
2440BC – Hunting discovered. Writing taken, after that I’m going to head down the religious techs.
2320BC – Hmmm, now then. Do I sacrifice a person to rush the Settler. I’m thinking not – this will lose me 4 turns of a new city, but I’m not sure it’s the right thing to do. Building a farm now on the corn to the SW.
2160BC – Bloody settlers. They take an age. Finally completed though. Going to found just 3 squares to the SW, one space S of the little lake. That should give us plenty of access to food and production.
2120BC – New York founded. Building another settler at Washington, with the Worker chopping for it – going to road to New York after that.
2040BC – Writing discovered.
1960BC – Isabella discovered. As for the most advanced Civs – I’m 7th. Quelle surprise.
1840BC – Settler #2 completed. Heading 4 squares to the north to found on a hill.
1800BC – Hatshepsut discovered. So is Mysticism.
1760BC – Washington rushes Granary – settler founds Boston.
1560BC – Meditation discovered – Animal Husbandry next.

Thus ends the first instalment of my report. It probably won’t go down in history as the greatest 2500 years of any civilization, but it’s a solid-ish start, I think, on a difficulty level I’m not massively familiar with.

I’ve got 7 population – 55,000 in civ terms – which is way, way behind the best AI, who has a quarter of a million or so.

The initial strategy was to take advantage of the nice local terrain, and make sure that we got some good infrastructure. 1520 is probably a bad time for a screenshot, but the good news is we have three cities when in reality I was only expecting two. If we can get a core base of 8-10 cities up early on (though I’m not sure how viable this is, given that America is an organized civ).

The plan now for the immediate future is to pump workers out as quickly as possible. Workers are currently being built in all three cities, and further expansion should follow there shortly after. Hopefully after that we will be in a position to decide further goals – cottages will need to go up for technology, while military may have to take a back seat for a while due to lack of production.

I haven’t got a research plan yet, apart from possibly going for Iron Working at some point in the near future.

[wardhali]

goin with the simple informative style

plannin to be a builder civ that stands well diplomatically AMAP



4000 BC

found washngton, build worker, research wheel
explore east

3680

warrior sees good location to east stone. ivory, wheat

latter he dies in an encounter w/ not so frendly barbs

get wheel->pottery

3400

worker finished, start a warrior

pottery->writing

2960 warrior built, do again
going to make $$$$ with capital
writing->alphabet

2560start settler see wine/corn location to north. warrior to the north eaten by bear

2200 send settler north with the only warrior guardin washington, bear has wandered off,

2160 Meat hattie + discover alphabet +meet bismark= learning mysticism, AH,hunting,mining, and archery while only losing writing + pottery :) :) :)


2040 build NY on site to north , build obelisk

2000 discover masonry

1840 discover bronze working

1760 meat sally, get meditatin for AH

Open borders w/ everyone xcept gengis

1500 trade writin, meditatn to gengis for poly+priesthood

[dacole]

Ancient II (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4215427&t=2051#post4215427)


Ok going to do this as a story to work the old creative muscles if things are confusing let me know. General strategy is to go for a quick (before modern era? Conquest victory)

General Washington looked over the troops who had followed him and invested absolute power in him. A ragtag bunch at best, but soon all would feel the power of the Americans of that he was sure! They had followed him as he split from a group that had begun calling themselves the English. A wuzzy obelisk polishing group if their ever was one. There had been amazingly little blood shed as he left, a tribute to their shameful peaceful ways! In 4000 B.C. Washington was founded and several years later the first warrior trained, and several years later the second. During this time his "scholars" developed tricks to hunt the plentiful game around their city and developed plans for a fast moving unit that was immeaditly built to explore the surrounding terrain. A local village of tribesmen gave him money recognizing, rightly, that it was either that or be destroyed. As this was going on his scholars developed plains to remove minearls from the ground-they called it mineing. Though it didn't seem to be of much use, Washington thanked them and was about to send them on their way when several citizens broke into his tent demanding to know what he was going to do about the reports of knowledge given to various other unknown groups from beings called Budha. Barely controling his anger he ordered them out of his tent and ordered several of his warriors in training to see them flogged in the city square. After they had left he ordered his schlors to investigate the claims. Before leaving to enjoy watching the flogging he looked again over the reports his scout had sent about a group of warriors claiming to be from the Spanish. Turning to his messanger he orderd them to be followed.

That night he had a dream that to this day several years later gave him chills. From a Storm the likes of which he had never seen he heard a voice. "Call me Jehovah, and know I am the one and only God. Follow me and I shall lay these Buddhists and Hindus followers of false relligons at your feet. Ignore me at your peril. In the fullness of time I shall send ones for you to follow, for know build me a temple in the city square worship me every seventh day and before each meal and call yourselves followers of Judaism." The next day, barely able to control his shaking body, he saw the orders carried out dunking himself in the river to show his and his civilizations rebirth. That night he could barely control himself as he scanned the reports of the meetings with Saladin and Bismark to the north. Thankfully his sleep that night was dreamless.

Things proceeded quickly after this several more cites were founded one close to the spanish and soon one close to bismark hopefully to keep him away from some precious stones. The pottery and Arrows his scholors had recently discovered should make this hopefully easier. Soon the barbarians who had dared build a city north of his capitol would feel his wrath and perhaps then the spanish would be the first to fall to the wrath of the Americans.

----
ok hope this was clear, big thing I learned here was that if you want to get either of the early religons go for them early becuase the AI researches them quickly. Both Hindism and Budhism were discovered before I had researched my second tech-amazing. Also the barbarians have a good city building AI picked a site I was going to use! Attached my save game had another scout with two promotions that was killed by a panther (combat one and medic 1) and a warror killed by a lion. Not sure if I will be able to read this forum so if you have any great advice for me pm me..a lott of posts here. Enjoy! (Oh sailing came from a hut to the north) How does one upload civIV saved games I changed the extnesion to .sav but surly there is another way?

[dacole]

Bad luck on the next turn - a foreign civ founds Buddhism, and just one turn before I get to it! Ah well, I can still use this situation to my advantage. When I discover Meditation, I begin research on Priesthood, which is a relatively cheap tech. My goal now is to make a break for Confucianism (Code of Laws) then head back towards the cheaper techs to catch up.


-------------------------------------------- [/QUOTE]

Curious is there a reason you didn't go for masonry and then monotheism at this point? Found the ability to build Graniers very useful and since you had mineing already it would seem like you could get it before the AI pretty easily..(I see the oracle but would not having an earlier religon and then being able to switch to organized religon outweigh the need for this early? especially since you don't have stone yet and really two new cities might be better before you think of building a wonder..)

[Shaka II]

Romans/pangea/epic/emperor/standard size
(space and diplomatic victory disabled, all others enabled)

Whoops! :eek: Sorry, I didn't understand what AU1.00 was all about. Well, ignore my posts, or take them as a diversion from the standard map.

DAR 1 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4217777&t=8416#post4217777)
DAR 2 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=144194&pagenumber=2)
DAR 3 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=144196&pagenumber=3)
DAR 4 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=144238&pagenumber=2)
DAR 5 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=144263&pagenumber=2)
DAR 6 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=144293)
DAR 7 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=144366)

4000BC Founded Rome beside a river with three sources of ivory. I decided not to build a worker or settler first for security reasons. Rather, I built a second warrior and set research to bronze working.

3160BC I have now met the Chinese, Germans, Indians, Aztecs, Spanish, while my second warrior has discovered gold near the shore. One more turn for BW and 11 turns for my first worker. I’ve discovered 75 gold in huts so far. Research is set to 100% of my 11 gold per turn.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/Bogwalker/Shaka_II_Romans_3160BCa.jpg

2160BC Upon discovering bronze working, I noticed a deposit of copper, so I decided that I had better now research hunting and archery to make use of this. Also, my ivory needs a camp. Normally iron working and Praetorians would be key, but axemen allow me to forgo this in favor of more critical techs. Also, I plan to wage early war and discover alphabet early, so I can trade for missing techs, including iron working. My worker is now set to start chopping in a settler. I have recently met Washington, the seventh Civilization. I lost one warrior to a barbarian attack and the remote warrior leaves Rome defenseless. Not to worry though, archery will be mine in three turns.

2120BC My settler is ready as I start chopping in an archer to defend Rome. My roaming warrior has made it back, noticing the Chinese border in view to the jungles of the North, while German border comes into view far to the East. The copper to my South West will be the choice for my second city. I have discovered the wheel and am researching pottery, so I can build cottages and granaries, which are half price for Romans. I want early cottages to support my expansion, and a well-built Roman road system to connect my cities, and with copper.

1525BC I have connected my road to Antium and built work camps on ivory to make my people happy and boost production. My copper mine is in. My defense consists now of two archers and my original warrior. My second worker now chops in a settler for my third city, as Antium is about to get a workboat for it’s clam resource. My new settler will go South East to claim the desert gold for happiness and coastal riches, though I’m not thrilled with the desert part. I researched mysticism to build obelisk, since Romans have no culture to expand borders, making it a problem at times to secure valuable resources. After mysticism, I’m beelining to writing and alphabet to trade for techs.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/Bogwalker/Shaka_II_Romans_1525BCa.jpg

[dacole]

2680BC: after careful moving forward (first join with the warrior 2 tiles away, then move 1 tile, then another and settle), the settler reaches the determined spot for NY. Second city in 2680, probably fastest in this game?
Problem is the health, already at the limit with size 1. Worker in 15, leaves Washington to do something else after the warrior (in 2).



Why did New york have such bad health? Though I didn't put a city there I can't see a reason for it..I play on noble most of the time though..

[dacole]

Ok read through most of these now and noticed a couple things I wanted to comment on. Several people were skipping archery and evidently using axemen and spearment to protect with. Is this a common strategy? The 25% bonus archers get for city protection (and the ability to get city defense 1 and 2 if you build a barraks and switch to fudalism later) means I've always used archers for defense over other units until I reach the gunpowder age.

Also when do the barbarians appear now? I usually leave huts alone until I get scouts so that I don't get barbarians. Unessecary or to cautious strategy? Thanks!

[BigDaddyOttawa]

My first DAR so bear with me

Noble Level

4000BC
Opening city site looks good, so found Washington there. Warr gets 74 gold from nearby goodie hut. I've always played my games with religion being very strong, so decide to research Polytheism (someone always gets Hinduism first if you don't have Mysticism). First build is another warrior.

3760BC
Washington's borders expanded the turn before and I discover Mysticism. My warrior gets another 47 gold from a nearby goodie hut. Washington will grow to Pop 2 in the next two turns yeilding 7 food, 2 shield and 11 commerce. A few turns after that, someone else founds Hinduism (big surprise)

3520BC
Washington produces its first warrior, who will join his brother-in-arms by exploring the map. Start production on a Settler. A couple of turns later, someone founds Buddism (DAMN). Okay... well I've got pigs to the south and cows to the east so I decide road and animal husbandry should be the way to go... I'll try for Judaism after that. One of my warriors gets experience from a goodie hut, so I promote him to Woodsman II (I love using forests like roads when you don't have scouts yet).

Couple of hundred years pass with some exploration and several animal attacks, all of which I survive.

3120BC
Goodie hut yields me Priesthood. YAH BABY!

3000BC
Get Animal Husbandry and start researching the wheel. Shortly after, yet another tech from a goodie hut! This time Writing. First time ever in a game I've gotten tech TWICE from goodie huts.. usually barely ever get one!

2720BC
Discover the wheel and decide religion can wait. With all the forest around, I want to chop if I need to for further wonder builds. Set my research path to Mine, Masonry and Bronze Working (will need quarries for the stone soon anyway). Washington finishes its settler and starts work on a worker to farm the corn and flood plains.

2520BC
Found New York to the West of Washington. The mix of river tiles and mountains will make for a decent commerce center and ocean access. With Washington's borders expanding soon, the hills to the east can be mined if I want to convert to an early military prod city.

2000BC
At this point Mining, Masonry and Bronze Working are all discovered. Decide to make a shot and Monotheism. By this point, I've met Saladin and Bismark, Washington has built a worker and is working on Settler #2. America is rated the Wealthest Civ.

1920BC
NY finishes its warrior and starts work on another worker. Judaism founded somewhere else. Frig! First game I've ever played where I didn't get one of the first three religions (although I didn't exactly beeline to Monotheism... maybe I should have).

1680BC
I've now met Gengis and Isabella. Washington is done its settler and starts on another warrior. I get my exising worker building a road to what will be Boston to the SW.

1560BC
Discovered Hunting and now researching Archery so I can start getting a military to defend myself a little bit. Boston is founded and within a turn or two is connected to the capital by road. I keep the worker around to get the pigs connected to the trade route.

Feelin' pretty good about things... by 1520 I have 3 cities going, a good feel for the land, and although I don't have religion, I'm pretty confident about my research.

Didn't snap a shot at 1520, so one at 1480 will have to do.

[lethe]

Difficulty set to Monarch.

Settler takes a step east across the river and founds Washington. We get 55g from the hut. Warrior goes to explore the floodplains and we start researching Mining, to get to Bronze Working soon enough. Washington is working on a settler.

3920 - Warrior finds 63g in the desert between mountains and flood plains. Continous northward.

3720 - Mining discovered, working on Bronze Working.

3160 - We discover Bronze Working and start work on The Wheel. Warrior is up the NW after rounding the mountains, resting a spot after defeating wolves in the dense forests. We are holding off 4 rounds with slavery to first finish settler.

3120 - We pop a hut for 73g. Warrior is heading back to escort first settler.

3000 - Settler born. Heads north to live on the Corn resource. We switch to slavery and start work on a worker.

2960 - Cleopatra says hi.

2840 - Finish The Wheel and meet Isabella. We build New York after some serious Lion dancing. (Warrior was too slow! I am a momo and can't count squares!) Working on Pottery. New York starts on worker.

2680 - Genghis says hi.

2560 - We discover Pottery and start work on Writing.

2480 - Warriors get experienced by entering village, news at 11.

2360 - Both cities finish workers, Washington start Granary, New York is building a settler. Workers moved to a forest each. Operation Chop'n'Pop commencing. If the NY settler moves north to the coast we should be able to block entry to our peninsula, if that is what it is. Everyone is sighted to the east so far.

2320 - Bismarch says hello. Northern city will have to be a barracks town. Seems New York will become a specialist rich town eventually.

2160 - Discover Writing. Getting NY and Washington a farm each.

1880 - Met Saladin. Fairly sure we have blocked of a peninsula by now.

1800 - New York finishes Settler and starts work on Granary.

1760 - Washington finished Granary and starts Settler.

1720 - Boston founded.

When 1520 rolls by Washington is still building it's settler, as I decided to get two cottages up and running instead of chopping for the settler. Hopefully this wasn't a mistake.

[xxFlukexx]

Hello, my first attempt at this, got a lot of screenshots. Tell me if it is good or not or what to change. Played this all in one day, takes a long time with all the alt-tabbing. This was played all on 1.52.

Emperor Difficulty
DAR Record, links work:
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4219771#post4219771
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4219774#post4219774
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4219779#post4219779
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4219786#post4219786
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4221092#post4221092
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4221125#post4221125
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4221160#post4221160

Read parts of the AU-100-A games here but still donít remember the starting position, so I am starting from a fresh start. With that in mind, I picked Washington, normal speed, and Emperor difficulty and away we go

4001 B.C. - Plan is for a Domination Victory, lots of war, lots of blood. War is my business and business is good, most people go with a peaceful Washington style, my plan is to go heavy axe men and work over the first civ nearby then consolidate and then war war war.

4000 B.C. - I start off knowing more tiles than I should, dunno what is up with that. Ohhhh wine, that'll be useful as I don't plan on getting any religions, Hereditary Rule + winery should give me a lot of happys. Starting location looks bad, very bad, I can't see a single hill in my fat cross. I move one tile to the east and settle there to grab those two grass hills. I get 62 gold from the hut and start on a warrior and the Wheel.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=68058_4000BC.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=68058_4000BC.JPG)

3920 B.C. - Mysticism from a goody hut. Wow, really lucky, I very rare for me to get a tech from a goody hut (or any goody huts at all) on Emperor. I could go for a religion, but nah.

3640 B.C. - I meet Izzy and finish the Wheel at the same time. Even though I am a fiendish heathen that needs to be wiped from the land I tell Izzy that we can still friends. Started Pottery.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=68058_3640BC.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=68058_3640BC.JPG)

3560 B.C. Warrior kills a wolf and heals for a turn, oh yeah and Izzy is Buddy now I hope she spreads that and makes a shrine, gonna be real great when I capture her holy city.

3320 B.C. Pottery is done, 2nd warrior is done, initial warrior killed a wolf and a lion now heís Woodsman II, wooty woot. Start on Writing and a worker in Washginton(10 turns) Ick, look at all that tundra to our south, I am guessing we are at the southern end of this continent with the rest all above us, hmmm to open or not to open with Izzy?

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=68058_3320BC.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=68058_3320BC.JPG)

3240 B.C. Hindy founded somewhere and Izzy nabs this hut right before I can get it, grrr Izzy, bad Izzy.

2960 B.C. Two huts, one for 39 gold and another for a scout. Little late for a scout to be of much help oh well he'll help with the barb patrol.

2920 B.C. Worker done, starting on Settler(17 turns) Going to work that food resource then I dunno.

2800 B.C. Finished Writing. Starting Mining then to Bronze-Working. Barb set up to clear Fog of War so no barbs spawn up there. Oh yeah and Saladin said hi, hehe he'll be an easy victim.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=68058_2800BC.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=68058_2800BC.JPG)

2760 B.C. Open borders with Izzy since she has Buddy. I hope she'll send over some missionaries to me (aka waste resources) This map is huge no way I can block her expansion with cities + borders. I also meet Bismarck lol what is this the game of the wussy civs?

2680 B.C. A bit of micro here, Corn is done farmed so I switch from a settler to a warrior. Will have a warrior and growth done in 5 turns. I need the warrior to meet the happy cap of 4 on Emperor(capital is empty at the moment)

2480 B.C. Cap at Size 4 now and back to the settler. Pig is to the west a bit and we can do a little trick here. We can share that Corn resource between two cities since my cap won't work that Corn tile until I can increase my happy cap and that's pretty far off. Pig + Corn + Floodplains, main uber Great Person Production center here. Be Advised, our Cap can support 4 people, that means we can run 2 grass cottage and 2 grass hills or 2 grass cottages and 2 plains cottages, so I build my improvements accordingly.

2200 B.C. First Settler is done and will be sent west. Lots of production options, heck let's go for Stonehenge, we can always pump a Great Scientist in city #2. BW takes so long to complete, come on BW!.

2160 B.C. Second city founded (New York) and uses the Corn tile and starts a worker that will be done in 9 turns (see how that works out) 1 City Maintenance and 1 Civic Upkeep, nice. Judaism is founded somewhere and the next turn Izzy adopts Organized Religion, hmm methinks Izzy founded two religions, gogo Izzy.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=68058_2160BC.JPG> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=68058_2160BC.JPG)

2040 B.C. BW finally done, lots of tech options, hmmmm Iron Working is a good choice for my war plans but heck I don't see any enemy cities near me, if I capture anything this soon I'll die in the maintenance costs. I start researching Animal Husbandry. 15 turns left on Stonehenge, gonna finish the second mine then chop that Stonehenge

1760 B.C. We are now Husbands with the Animals. We Select Alphabet, but then rethink things and start Iron Working. New York complete its worker and starts an obelisk then I think wtf I am building Stonehenge, and start a warrior(15 turns)

1680 B.C. With the help of a single forest chop we complete Stonehenge, haha my unstoppable army is now complete, errr Washington starts on a settler and will switch to 3 grass cottages tiles once they are done, but works the Corn tile again for a few turns, New York was growing way too fast.

[DrSpike]

Bit late from me, as I got hooked on MP. However, since I dropped well out of the top 10 whilst away for Christmas I decided to take a break, and get around to finally playing some SP.

I'm playing 1.52 unfortunately, which puts me at quite a large disadvantage. The increase in unit costs is a real killer early on when expanding and building workers. Also some of the tech costs have been increased.

It's only my fourth game, so I made a few errors, which actually was a shame as the land was the nicest I've had yet and the game could have been really impressive.
However, there are some great elements too; as to which dominates, well, it would be crass for me to comment. ;)

I've not kept notes, so this will be more of a rambling discussion with key events and strategies discussed.

[DrSpike]

Monarch Difficulty

Founding

I always agonise over the starting screen. To found or not to found, that is the question. Looking at the food resources, I decided that moving one square to the right to get access to the hills would be wise. Wirh 2 move settlers you can still found in 4000BC. :D

Early game strategy

I had already decided I wanted to try a spaceship victory this game. This means that my first goal was to get the somewhat overpowered bureaucracy (more on that later!). However, the straight beeline (even with Oracle) offends my civving instincts, and this is Monarch, so I cheekily decided to open with a worker. Due to the heavily forested terrain I went for mining and bronze first. I figured chops would get me back the time later, and help me expand prior to setting up my cap with a library and specialists.

Highlights. :cute:

Worker popped after 15 turns (damn those increased 1.52 costs :( ). Settler started. Worker irrigated the wheat, and chopped the forest to the left of the founding square, before irrigating a flood plain.

3000: Bronze finished. Went for Writing via Animal Husbandry as I had my eye on the pig. No jokes please.

2800: New York founded on pig. Both cities doing warriors.

2160: Got writing. Go for Priesthood via meditation. I had popped mysticism from a hut quite early.

I had chopped a second worker in Washington, one of which stayed around Washington to ensure the library went up fast, and later the Oracle, and also to make some mines. The other helped NY get the pig up and running, and chopped the second settler when NY was size 2.

1840: Library finished, run Washington with 2 scientists.

1760: Oracle started, Code of Laws started. With some chops it worked out fine. But that's another story. :)

1760: Boston founded, started on warrior. New York was also (apart from the settler) doing warriors.

In 1760 had 2 workers, 1 scout (popped immediately) and 10 warriors.

[DrSpike]

DAR1:

[DrSpike]

Part 2:

http://www.apolyton.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=4219911#post4219911

[joncnunn]

Dacole, in my part it's because I try to fight the wars in enemy territory rather than my own and would never want to have my forces stuck inside a city while the opposing forces chose the time and place of the attack.

On the huts and odds of barbs from them; that depends heavilly upon which difficulty level your on. The difficulty level also determines the first turn animals can appear, barbs can appear, barb cities can appear and the max count per unexplorerd tile for all of these.

Originally posted by dacole
Ok read through most of these now and noticed a couple things I wanted to comment on. Several people were skipping archery and evidently using axemen and spearment to protect with. Is this a common strategy? The 25% bonus archers get for city protection (and the ability to get city defense 1 and 2 if you build a barraks and switch to fudalism later) means I've always used archers for defense over other units until I reach the gunpowder age.

Also when do the barbarians appear now? I usually leave huts alone until I get scouts so that I don't get barbarians. Unessecary or to cautious strategy? Thanks!

[joncnunn]

It's mostly the difficulty level.

Other contributing factors: You get +2 health if the city is along a river; I'm not sure if catty-corner counts under the latest patch.

Nearby flood plains give a health penalty.

Nearby forest gives a health bonus.

Also, this early on there are few if any health resources connected.

Originally posted by dacole

Why did New york have such bad health? Though I didn't put a city there I can't see a reason for it..I play on noble most of the time though..

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by joncnunn
Dacole, in my part it's because I try to fight the wars in enemy territory rather than my own and would never want to have my forces stuck inside a city while the opposing forces chose the time and place of the attack.


Yes, if you sit on the defensive even the AI is smart enough to trash your land.

Archers need 2 techs and are quite expensive - you should consider very carefully whether you need them each game. I usually only get them when pinned in early and needing to throw my weight around before I get the techs for resources for better units.

A bunch of warriors will do most of the time (and they are military police for later) unless axes are coming at you.

[dacole]

hmm I am still using archers as fortified in my cities until I get longbowmen. I realize it is a good strategy to come out and attack maurading attackers but surly you leave something in the city to protect it in case someone slips behind you..the AI did that to me once. Was attacking the spanish in this game and taking her cities when a ship unloaded attacking units around one of my cities deep in my territory I was impressed and surprized..even if they didn't last long (though I did have to build some attacking units to take them out since I only had archers..guess it would be good to defend with attacking units in that case as well..hmm thanks for the info.

Does anyone have the numbers on when barbs and such appear at each difficulty level? For example in this game is there any level where popping the hut on the first turn might have given barbs? Thanks!

[DrSpike]

The AI doesn't attack very well (though I think better than in other games). You should be defending early game on good terrain away from your cities wherever possible. If he wont attack you force him on to open ground and if you have decent attacking troops massacre him there. Remember with a 50/50 chance you win half the time ( :) ) but even when you lose you come out even as your second attacker will finish him off and get xp. :)

[Fribur]

DAR 1 (http://apolyton.net/forums//showthread.php?postid=4222211#post4222211)
DAR 2 (http://apolyton.net/forums//showthread.php?s=&postid=4222338&t=4688#post4222338)
DAR 3 (http://apolyton.net/forums//showthread.php?s=&postid=4222762#post4222762)
DAR 4 (http://apolyton.net/forums//showthread.php?s=&postid=4223429#post4223429)

Good day! I’m finally getting off my duff and taking a shot at this first AU game. I’m playing at the Prince level of difficulty, which for me has yet to be beaten.

4000 BC: The world is granted the honor of housing my civilization once more. One can only imagine the havoc to be wreaked! Washington is founded at its starting spot. That luscious corn was simply too much to ignore—I’m a fan of movies, which makes popcorn an obvious necessity.

Hrmm starting tech… with financial trait and a starting position with flood plains, it’s tempting to me to get an early start on a few cottages. On the other hand, I’ve been looking at the earlier Civil Service tactic a few on these boards have mentioned, and would like to try it. What’s more, all this bread could help with production if I pulled for Bronze Working and the slavery civic.

Mining it is, then.

My warrior left the barb village intact for the culture of my city to grab, and headed to the nearest hills to the east to see the lay of the land.

3960 BC: woah, it’s a big desert to the east. Warrior turns to the south, as he can see a bit of coastline on the horizon.

3840: Found cows milling around to the SE of Washington on the coast. Make mental note to start a McDonalds at earliest convenience. Warrior turns westward and south, following the coast.

3760: Seeing tundra to the south, my warrior turns westward following the edge of the cold.

3720: The secrets of mining lay under my grasp! There is much rejoicing, and work is immediately begun on Bronze Working.

3680: My city expanded, and the barb village it swallowed granted me a map of the area to the north of my city. I can now see another barb village up to the north of my city, as well as more corn. The hill between the corn and the wine seems to be an obvious choice for another city, although I worry that I cannot immediately take advantage of the wine.

My warrior down south also picks up another barb village and a new Scout offers it’s services to me. I send the Scout toward the other village, and my warrior continues his trek west toward the Spices and Pigs nearby.

3640: Buddhism is founded in a distant land.

3560: On the way to the village, my scout spots another village a little further away to the west. He makes a detour to go say hi.

3520: My first warrior is born, and as my city isn’t very large yet (and thus won’t suffer from unhappiness without protection), I send him off toward the northeast to watch for barbarians. Work begins on a worker.

Meanwhile, the barb village my scout grabs deigns me worthy of receiving the masonry tech, for which I am certainly grateful. Unfortunately, a lion appears next to him, and I can only pray that he lives through the encounter. Getting masonry unexpectedly causes me to consider making my second city coastal and shooting for the Great Lighthouse, since this takes advantage of my Sailing tech advantage and sets up commerce (via a lighthouse) for my financial trait to enjoy. Hrmmm.

My warrior to the south has discovered stone and a lot of beavers to the south west.

3400: oops! Looks my warrior to the south east is going to meet a horrible death. A barb village far to the west probed to be hostile, popping four barbarian warriors surrounding his poor, defenseless position.

3380: Hinduism has been founded in a distant land.

3240: Bronze Working is in my grasp! Mysticism is begun. I convert to slavery. The village to the north of my city (revealed by the earlier barb village map) is finally absorbed by my scout, giving me some gold to work with.

3200: Fribur adopts slavery. Scout continues north. Worker is hurried.

3120: Worker created and moved into position to chop a settler. Warrior started since it’s a single turn. Scout finds the north coast.

3080: Warrior created and left in capital for protection. Another warrior is started, but will switch to a settler after population goes up (2 turns). Worker begins chopping.

3000: Made first contact with Bismark via his scout in the north. Worker finishes his chopping earlier than I expected, popping my warrior, heh.

2960: Mysticism done. Started Polytheism. I chose Poly over Meditation because I already have masonry (via the barb village) and thus have everything necessary for Judaism. In fact, if it isn’t claimed by the time I finish Polytheism, I will be pretty tempted to give it a shot: I love having an early religion.

My worker sheepishly moves to another forest, lamenting his idiocy.

The new warrior I now had is to be the garrison for my second city. Hrmmm, where should it go? To the north or north east I have a neighbor, so perhaps expansion in that direction is wise to cut off development. However, the wine in that spot is not immediately usable. To the northwest is a spot where placed right I get gold (after culture expansion) and still have lots of flood plains and a few hills as a bonus. This seems promising, but doesn’t cut off development by other civs at all. To the southeast is an ocean and cows. Coastal city + lighthouse + sailing = go for great lighthouse. But I have already committed to the oracle, so I think I’ll pass on that one. And finally, to the south west is stone, sheep, and beavers, and also can be a coastal city. This one is pretty appealing also because after the initial cultural expansion, it completely blocks anything that may be in the inky blackness beyond. However, since my warrior down there was killed by the hostile village, it’s not completely explored, and putting the city there may be later revealed to be not the best spot for it.

Southwest it is. I will take the chance to possible block development from other civs. The Northwest spot will likely be my third city, and be my great person city. My warrior moves out in preparation. My scout, which has cleared fog on the northwest and west sides, moves down toward the southwest to completely clear the area around the proposed second city spot.

Of course, there are still two barb warriors down there, I already know…

2600: My warrior standing guard in the north meets a scout from Ghengis Khan. Now there are two civs I know of in the north, and so I begin to consider placing my second city up there to prevent growth in my direction.

Ahh, my scout has cleared the fog—it’s a dead end. Development needs to go north west. My second city will go on a hill between the corn and the wine.

My worker, after finishing his second chop, just finished farming the corn.. In this bread rich capital, I plan out—farms for the grasslands, and cottages for the floodplains. Population will grow far too fast, and we’ll use slavery to pop out developments and keep it under control.

2560: Settler is done, sending him up to the second city location. Worker is following, to work the corn near the second city. Washington goes to work on another warrior.

2520: ooo the temptation. Polytheism is founded, and no one has gotten Judaism yet. Do I go for Priesthood for the oracle, or Monotheism for the religion?

Oh wait, Code of Laws is another religion—let’s stick to the plan. Priesthood here we come! I may need to stop for the wheel soon, to connect my cities and my corn.

2480: I decide to move the settler a little more west, to only pick up a single wine spot, and the corn. This allows room for a third city in the north / northwest area immediately above my capital.

2400: New York is founded. With the hills nearby, this will likely be the site of my Oracle. My worker begins work on the corn for faster growth. After the corn will be two mines, will the city makes another warrior.

2320: Hatshepsut of Egypt and Saladin of the Arabians say hello! That’s five rival civs so far on my continent, and I’m only ahead of Saladin in score.

Washington finishes it’s warrior, and starts on another worker.

2280: Priesthood is discovered. Writing is begun, which will be followed by Code of Laws.

2160: The second corn is farmed! This has the bonus of being connected to my capital via the river, nice because I don’t have the wheel yet (and thus, roads) in my gambe for early civil service. The worker heads to the hills to create a few mines.

2040: Worker created in Washington. He heads over to create a farm, while Washington gets to work on a third settler.

1960: It is revealed that I am seventh in wealth. “Fribur the Hopeless,” it says… humph! I’ll show you, Thucydides! On the good side, I passed up Bismarck on the score list, and now am looking up at Genghis and Hatshepsut. And I’m tied to Genghis!

1920: Barbarians are starting to close in on my civ from two sides. I haven’t gotten warriors all the way around my civ to keep them at bay yet, so I’ll have to deal with them as they come. Both cities have warriors in them at this point, there is one exploring far to the north, another heading east, and one standing guard to the southwest.

1880: hah! All the barbs I saw appear mysteriously drifted back into their fog! My warrior which I had pulled out of my capital to a choice defending spot to the east is sent back.

1840: Writing discovered. Hap of Egypt immediately asked for open borders, which means she has writing as well. I decline as I like to use my cities to block other civ development early on. Sucks to be you! Civil Service started—31 turns. The Oracle that I already started in New York will be done in 18, which means I’ll have to give it something else to do.

There is another problem, too. I’m currently running -2 gold per turn at 100% research—unsustainable for 31 turns. I need cash, and I have no pottery. I may hold of founding that third city until I have Code of Laws, to avoid the cash penalty. With this realization, I stop construction on the settler, and switch to a library, allowing Washington to grow.

1760: Contact with Isabella! I’m beginning to wonder if this is a Pangea map. There is, however, a *lot* of room to develop on this map. Isabella is the first contact I’ve made via actually discovering the edge of her realm, far to the east and a little north.

1560: Judaism is founded. That burns that bridge! 22 turns to Code of Laws, although it will likely be more like 25 turns (will have to turn research to 90%). I’m hoping to speed it up by rushing the library as soon as I can currently building in the capital.

Speaking of my capital, it’s a little unhealthy right now because of unchecked growth, but still growing. Because I’m going to rush my library, I’m letting it grow anyway—it’s still growing at a healthy clip. I’ll knock it’s population down when I pop that library out—four turns.

1480: The end of the first DAR. Code of Laws is 20 turns away, plus a little more when I run out of gold and drop to 90% research. The Oracle is seven turns away, and will have to be halted. I’ll likely start work on an obelisk for expansion while I wait for Code of Laws. In Washington, I’m two turns from having enough population to pop rush the library, and then as soon as it’s population recovers I’ll make a few specialist scientists.

Militarily, I’m weak. I have enough warriors to keep the barbarians at bay (for now), but nothing else. Archery hasn’t been researched, figuring that warriors fortified in forests would be good enough for a while. Bronze Working didn’t turn up any copper anywhere around me. I do, however, see ivory and may be able to work toward War Elephants if I can grab it with a city. Future conflict remains obscure and unplanned, since currently I see no near neighbors. I do, however, have a barbarian city that has formed to the southwest.

Expansion is mixed. Because of my cash problems and researching Code of Laws, I didn’t want to found a third city just yet, and stopped production on a settler. Assuming I get Code and the Oracle done, the next job for both of my cities will be settlers, and research will grab pottery, followed by the alphabet. With bread all around me, I already have six floodplains set aside for cottages. Combined with the financial trait, I’m hoping this will help me pull ahead.

In score, I’m currently in second place, behind just Hatshepsut. Frankly, this is the best start I’ve ever had in a Prince level game, and with all this room for development, I have high hopes. Dare I hope for my first win at this difficulty? Only time will tell.

Here’s my current position:

http://www.bsu.edu//web/MASUTTON2/images/AU 100 DAR 1 0000.JPG

My tech so far, obtained in this order:
Fishing (USA Civ start)
Agriculture (USA Civ start)
Mining
Masonry (barbarian village)
Bronze Working
Mysticism
Polytheism
Priesthood
Writing

Working on: Code of Laws

Feel free to comment! I find that simply logging my turns like this alone is an eye opener-- I'm considering things at least somewhat more than I generally do otherwise.

[gdgrimm]

Pre-Game Thoughts (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4223510#post4223510)
Ancient Era (DAR1 and DAR2) (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4223650#post4223650)

I'm coming late to the game, but still hope to good feedback on what I'm doing. Every little bit of help, well, helps. :D

Hopefully, this will be my first success at Prince. I've won about 5 times on Noble, and have aborted about 3 tries on Prince (due to not liking mistakes that I made). I'll see if this one plays through to the end.

Also, I've always played the Epic (and now Marathon) levels, so I've been stunned at how fast things zip by in this Standard mode! I wonder if the speed change will impact strategy.

I shot through the entire Ancient Era by 1680 BC. So in this thread, I'll just discuss pre-game thoughts. I'll put the write-up for the entire Ancient Era in the DAR 2 thread.

Pre-game thoughts:

I try to play a role, rather than just follow a method to beat the game. So one primary influence for all decisions is the leader. With that in mind....

UU - Navy Seal -- A marine With March and extra First Strikes.
This means a preference to research towards Rifling and Industrialization.
There's no upgrade path to Navy Seal, so no preference for earlier combat units.
To leverage the UU, I'll have to be in a late game, offensive war.

Favored Civic -- Universal Suffrages
Research preference towards Democrocy

Financial Trait --
Research preference toward Banking (bank)
Likes cottages/towns, coasts, and rivers/hills to leverage +1 commerce.

Organized Trait --
Research preference toward Code of Laws (courthouse) and Sailing (lighthouse).
Preference toward more costly Civic choices to leverage 1/2 civic cost.

Combined --
This leads toward large empire building (cheap courthouses), coastal and river cities (even more so than normal), and potential late game military attacks (something I usually avoid).
Wonder hording or a cultural victory are pretty much out, and religion won't be a focus, either. Diplomacy Victory should be possible. But SS or Domination are looking the most likely.

Game Details

Initial start summary.

4000 BC -- Found Washington. Not on a coast (boo), but a very nice river. Corn nearby (already prepped for it's use, since I start with Agriculture), but no hills or such within city vicinity. Flood plains look good for potential slave labor and recovery in the Washington, but as a Financial leader, I'll probably focus more on using them to get rich quick, while still growing.

Started building a Worker in Washington. There's no need to wait for city growth since there's no second tile with significant added value.

First choice for research is the Wheel->Pottery line, which should make cottages ready right after the Worker is done. Agriculture is already known, so building farms and cottages should keep the worker busy for a while.

[Aro]

Noble difficulty
Dar 1 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4230272#post4230272)

Set to Noble (it’s a challenge for me, I never played at this difficult level). I’ve founded Washington in the initial spot. I’m trying to get an early religion, even not being spiritual, and beeline to meditation. Let’s hope.
Get it, and just 2 turns before someone gets Hinduism! Lucky me, because I thought about research Polytheism, but meditation was cheaper! :D
Ok, one turn of anarchy and Buddhism was founded in Washington. Three huts gave me one tech (hunting, the one near the start point) and some money twice.
2600BC: New York is founded.
So far, I made contact or I was contacted by Isabella, Genghis Khan and Saladin.
No bronze… :scared: This could be a problem, but I’m researching Iron Working. 3 turns left. I have hope! ;)
Hum… Judaism was founded in 1720 BC in a distant land.

Anyway, I have corn and pigs, and there are horses and cows nearby. My warrior found stone, and it seems to be a rich land. My stats aren’t so good, though. :( I’m 5th in military, this is bad. I suck in Mfg, too – I’m in 7th place. I’m 4th place in pop. I need to do something about it.

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?file=21028_Demographics2.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=21028_Demographics2.jpg)

I’ve connected my two cities (no need – there’s a river, but my units can move faster) and built a cottage, a farm (corn) and I’m building a pasture. I have two workers, some military. I’m building a settler in Washington, and worker in NY. But Isabella is too close, so I’ll built some more military and then barracks. The research slider is at 100%. Time to expand, maybe? I have a settler almost ready. But I’ll have to consider this. In many games I began to lose money as soon as I founded my third city. We’ll see. I want full research now, trying to be close of the AI. At Noble, I really don’t now… Yet.

I have no long shot plans. My first plan was get a Religion, it’s done… What next? Build military, because I don’t trust Isabella. …Btw, she founded Hinduism. Problems in my future, I see. But I want to try Stonehenge.

Points (hey, I’m ahead!):
<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?x=800&file=21028_Points.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=21028_Points.jpg)

So far, so good.

Here is Washington nowadays:

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?file=21028_Washingtonb1480BC.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=21028_Washingtonb1480BC.jpg)

And my little Empire:

<img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/thumb.php?file=21028_MyEmpire.jpg> (http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=21028_MyEmpire.jpg)


Note: Please, forgive my bad English. ;)

[fed1943]

DAR1 - Noble
My first AU and non-creative game;so noble.
First thoughts:a)location:5 floodplains,1 corn,1 silk,5 forests,1 plain and grasslands,so,optimum food and commerce,poor prodution;but my leader is about commerce,so I will accept it.b)research path:not easy.What do I need?I need develop my land(weel and pottery)defense(hunting,archery?or mining,bronze working?perhaps iron working?)cities radii/culture(mysticism or all the writing path?).I decided not to priorize religion(finantial trait)and not to try the stonehenge.Let us begin:
4000 BC : found Washinghton at the start location(7 health,6 happy);warrior recruits scout;warrior starts little travel north,scout south;begin wheel;building worker.
3840 BC : 49g.p. from hut south.
3680 BC : researched wheel;begin pottery.
3640 BC : buddhism founded elsewhere;hut sw:47gp.
3400 BC : researched pottery;begin mining.Finished worker;begin granary.Hut nw experience to scout.
3280 BC : hinduism founded elsewhere;hut n gives sailing.
3200 BC : researched mining;begin bronze working.
3160 BC : Washington grows to 2.Corn worked;now cottages to floodplains.
3040 BC : Germany contacts:peace.
2920 BC : Washington grows to 3.
2800 BC : Washington grows to 4.
2760 BC : Bronze working(but no bronze);begin iron working.Adopted slavery.
2680 BC : found Genghis Khan to the north and contact Hatshepsut,both peace.
2320 BC : granary;1 unhappy;begin settler.
2200 BC : researched iron working;begin writing.Iron near Washington.Scout finishes the discovery of nearby lands.
2000 BC : finished settler;pop rush axeman.
1960 BC : researched writing;begin alphabet;worker.
1920 BC : axeman and setler go to east to found a city with river,cow,wheat and ivory.
1880 BC : open boards with egipcians.Washington begins axeman.
1760 BC : open boards with spanish.
1680 BC : open boards with Saladin.
1640 BC : founded New York;begin granary.
1600 BC : Washington builds axeman;fortify.Begins barracks.
1560 BC : open boards to mongols.
1480 BC : researched alphabet.Trade with Saladin writing for mysticism and hunting.Trade with Haus pottery for masonry.Trade with Genghis sailing for animal husbandry.Begin mathematics.

[Vulcanis]

I know I'm starting this very late, but here goes...I've always considered myself a good Civ player, but I know I'm probably one of the worst on this site, from looking at how everyone else is doing, and I figure I might as well learn to play better before I start playing MP

DAR 1 : 4000BC-1520BC

Technology Researched(order researched):
Mysticism, Mining, Hunting(tribal hut), Animal Husbandry, Masonry, Meditation, Priesthood, Bronze Working, Writing

Religions Founded:
Buddhism(In 3680BC) by: Spanish
Hinduism(In 3080BC) by: Mongols
Judaism(In 1760BC) by: Unknown at this time

Cities Built:
4000BC- Washington
2240BC- New York
1880BC- Boston

Notable Events:
3480BC: Met Mongols
3240BC: Met Arabs
2960BC: Met Germans
1820BC: Met Spanish
1800BC: Met Egyptians
1520BC: Sacrificed a settler to the barbarians to the north

Received 3 Maps, 42 Gold, Hunting from Tribal Huts
F9 Rankings:
GNP: Rank 2
Production: Rank 7
Food: Rank 1
Soldiers: Rank 5
Population: Rank 5
Land Area: Rank 2
Points: 200(third place)

Things I did well:
I did extremely well at exploration, as far as I can tell, almost the entire continent, outside of enemy territory, has been explored by my scouts and warriors.

Things I could improve on:
I did a lot of research, but it didn't really have any particular focus. I think I need to get more focus into my research.

Things I completely sucked at:
Washington shouldn't have spent time producing a warrior, worker, and two scouts before making settlers.
Because I waited so long, I gave up my fairly large early point lead, and have made myself far behind my rivals in terms of productivity and population.

DAR2 to come once I finish playing to that point

[lordrune]

Noble Difficulty

Quicklinks
DAR 1 4000 BC - 1520 BC (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4262713&t=3488#post4262713)
DAR 2 1520 BC - 250 BC (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4264121t=3738#post4264121)
DAR 3 250 BC - 740 AD (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4264188&t=3738#post4264188)
DAR 4 740 - 1390 (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4264323&t=3738#post4264323)

DAR 1 4000 BC - 1520 BC

As a habitual casual player who players on warlord by preference, my first AU game shall be on noble difficulty :) (Starting a little late, but I've only just discovered this place so why not!)

I surveyed my starting location. A long river. Nice. Floodpains, okay. Corn. Yummy! A good location to start to grow a wealthy and powerful civilisation. I wasted no time, and founded Washington in 4000 BC. The neighbouring tribal village provided a scout, who I sent to explore to the northwest, while my warrior explored east across the desert. In my city, I began producing a warrior unit to protect against prowling animals, and whatever else lurks in the unknown lands.

I began to research Mysticism, hoping to learn a religion. I then researched Meditation, but somebody else discovered Buddhism first, in 3680 BC. Stubbornly, I went on to research Polytheism. Washington, upon completing the warrior, began to build a settler. My scouting units had discovered stone and wheat to the east, and I was keen on claiming those resources. Also, there was a nice site for a coastal village where the Washing River entered the ocean to the west.

While I was researching Polytheism, Hinduism was founded elsewhere (shrug). Meanwhile, lions and wolves had torn one of my warriors into pieces to the south. I'd spotted a dangerous bear wandering around to the northwest. This world wasn't so safe after all, at least all the humans we had encountered were friendly tribesmen, who were only too happy to supply us with gold and maps. Up until 3240, when my scout met a peculiar chap by the name of Genghis Khan. He advised me that 'his horde could beat mine any day'. I promptly agreed, and we decided to be friends. Then, close by, my scout encountered Isabella of Spain, and in 3040, Bismarck of Germany. Arrogant, the both of them. Isabella was Buddhist.

Back near Washington, I sent my remaining warrior to scout around and clear the area of wild animals so that my people could settle a second city in safety. He defeated a pack of 2 lions, and got a promotion, which was nice. He wandered around some more, and I noted that there were too many animals and too few warriors. So once my settler was built, I began building another warrior. I founded New York just to the north, on a hill near some plains that would be good for vineyards.

Meanwhile, my scout had a near-death experience when he met a fierce bear. He managed to get into a defensive position, across a river from the bear and in a forest. The bear attacked, and was miraculously defeated. (noble difficulty+tactics :D ) The next turn, we met Saladin, and we introduced ourselves politely. A couple turns later, Hatshepshutsomething said hello.

Then, in 2360 BC, Judaism was founded in New York. I adopted the new faith, and began to research The Wheel. Shortly after that in 1960 BC, I got my first worker in New York (while building a second in Washington) and started to finally improve my lands and build roads. A little late, perhaps.

Around 1700 BC, I had explored the lands to my north, south, east, and west. With some pleasure, I noted the tundra to the south was full of resources and unoccupied. It would be useful to occupy over the next millenium (We Americans think long-term). The enemy civilizations seemed concentrated to the northeast. All in all, the American civilization was in a good strategic location for future power and prosperity. It was then that my warriors encountered our first truly hostile humans, barbarian warriors, in the forests across the eastern desert. My warriors positioned themselves in the woods, and fought off the assualt. Then we were disturbed to discover that the barbarians had settled in the northern part of the forest - a tribe calling themselves the Yue-Chi.

So was our status at 1520 BC.

The American accomplishments were maybe not that special. Compared to the AI, we rank 2nd in score, second in GDP, seventh and last in production (ouch), 2nd in crop yield, and seventh and last in army size.
I have much work to do.

A little bit of self-criticism - I suspect my rush to found a religion early was ill-fouded, because I neglected the basic technologies of hunting, mining, archery and pottery (only just researching mining now). There is some way to go before before I get writing, alphabet, and can trade technologies. Also, I think I may have started building my settler a little too early. Still, one can only improve.

[joncnunn]

Lordrune, on your self-criticsm, the only mistake I see is trying to reserach Mediation first when not starting with Mysticism.

If you go for all the basic working techs first, you'll get beat out to Monotheism.

[lordrune]

Lordrune, on your self-criticsm, the only mistake I see is trying to reserach Mediation first when not starting with Mysticism

Indeed, in hindsight that's obvious to me now. Odds are very high in any typical game that at least one AI will start with Mysticism, and go on to research Meditation first. Now that I've just finished DAR 2, I'm glad I did go for Monotheism, because Judaism seems to be establishing itself well in both my own and the AI civs, following a bit of open-border trading.

[Vulcanis]

quick question, how do you make those signs on your screen shot? do you do that in Civ4 or after you save the shot?

[lordrune]

That was a feature in a recent patch, I believe.
Hold down alt-S - you can make the signs inside the game.

[Vulcanis]

nice, that'll make it easier for me to plan things ahead of time...don't gotta remember everything in my head

[Thrak]

Edit: I originally posted this all the way to 1520 BC, but I decided to backtrack to 3280 and play with slavery a bit.

I chose Monarch as that is what I normally play.:tongue:

Ok, start off, starting place looks great I can see desert to the east so plonk , there is Washington. I start on a worker straight off and research mining (guessing, correctly, that there would be some more trees around to chop given I have quite a few nearby) to do a standard bronze working/chop beeline.
Yes yes I plan to do the oracle civil service thingy but I like to get my chop on first.

I leave the nearby village for my culture to get, and send my warrior up north. Et voila, a few turns later:

http://www.sadlonelygamers.net/pictures/AUDAR/3680.jpg

I think I spent one turn on bronze working before I got it from the village :naughty: Anyway I move on to mysticism, figuring that the CS rush is well within my grasp now. I follow this route for a while now, mystic->poly->priesthood.

I turn the warrior away now, to come back in a loop to the right ( I like to avoid contact where possible, and its obvious there will be no goodie huts near the brown guys).

My worker pops out I set him off farming the corn straight away, and set a warrior building while I let my capital grow some.

Nothing much happens until:

http://www.sadlonelygamers.net/pictures/AUDAR/3280.jpg

Yay for blind luck so far.

Rest coming in a bit!

[Flash]

Hello All,

Here is my version of events.

This AU is modified to Warlords 2.08. Noble diff.

...

4000 BC ... Warriors sent NW. Settlers sent E.

3960 BC ... Washington founded. Warriors renamed "1st US Militia Regiment" sent NW and sees Hut.
Washington: set to build 2nd US Militia Regiment. Research set to MYSTICISM.

3920 ... 1USMR giving secret to "THE WHEEL" by tribe.

3760 ... Washington Culture expands.

3720 ... Wise men discover MYSTICISM then go on to Polytheism. 1USMR sees hut.

3680 ... 1USMR see bears in area. gets 101 gold from hut. plans to play "Hide and Seek" with bears.

3640 ... * Buddhism founder in Foreign land. * Washington: 2USMR formed. set to build barracks.

3520 ... Washington: Pop increase to 2. Switch to settler.

3320 ... Washington: Founds Hinduism. Set to research MASONRY. * 2USMR meets Genghis.

3280 ... 1USMR attacked by Lions, Wins, heals.

3000 BC ... Discover MASONRY; set to MONOTHEISM

2920 BC ... Washington Borders expand.

2880 BC ... 2USMR attacks lions; promoted to C1; no loses.

2680 BC ... * 1USMR attacked by lions; Prom. to C1; heals. * 2USMR attacks lions; prom. C2; no loses. * Washington: builds Settler, switches to Worker. * Settler sent E to 1 tile past stone.

2640 BC ... 2USMR sent to new city site.

2520 BC ... * 1USMR finds ISabella and Madrid. Borders huge, must have Buddhism. * New York founded. set to worker. * Washington founds Judaism. research mining. switch to organized religion.

2480 BC ... Bismarck stops by. Am. converts to Judaism.

2280 BC .. Mining complete; switch to BW

2240 BC ... 1USMR fights off wolves; heals and meets Salad Dressing or Saladin.

2200 BC ... Washington completes worker; switches to settler. Worker set toward building road to NY.

1960 BC ... NY builds worker, set to monument. Worker set to build quarry for stone.

1920 BC ... Hatsheput stops by.

1880 BC ... BW discovered switch to Priesthood.

1800 BC ... NY switches to Stonehenge.

1680 BC ... Priesthood discovered. switch to hunting

1520 BC ... Hunting Discovered switch to Animal Husbandry.

[Flash]

Rankings:
Score: 1 ... 210
GNP ... 5
Mfg ... 5
Crop: ... 7
Soldiers ... 7
Land ... 3
Pop ... 7
Approval ... 1
Life ... 2