Any advice for Incan with horrid start location?

[joncnunn]

Multi-player [8 players], so restart isn't an option.

I appear to be stuck on a tiny landmass without fresh water.

The southern most section has plains, the northern section is tundra, a handful of grassland tiles at the extreme western edge of the landmass. There's a ridge of mountains, what I see beyond it is all tundra / tundra with forest on top.

Accel production is on.

[Solomwi]

Screenshot?

[Dominae]

Explore your island fully to ensure that you are indeed alone.

Only put cities on tiles that provide less than 2 Food. Do not be afraid to ICS a little.

Build Granaries in every city, unless your capital is decent and you can make a dash for the Pyramids.

Beeline to Map Making, both for Galleys to get off your accursed rock, and for Harbors to increase your Commerce to acceptable levels.

[joncnunn]

One Chican scout under production as first build. Starting scout reached the western tip of the island already and is heading east.

Captial was indeed founded on the starting plains tile no bonsus.
No forests around to chop.

A few scattered sugar bonus tiles in the plains, heaviest concentration near the capital. [Looks like 3 of them will be in CR of capital upon first cultural expansion.] Yeah, an accelerated production Pyramids might be doable there if either a goody hut with a settler is found or else once a second city is founded.

I'm thinking that the four seafaring civs are going to love this map.

So far, the only advantage I've gotten out of the expansiont traight is knowing I'm on an accused rock in 3900 BC instead of not finding out until 3500 BC.

The island is very far north and appears to have a SW to NE orientation.

Originally posted by Dominae
Explore your island fully to ensure that you are indeed alone.

Only put cities on tiles that provide less than 2 Food. Do not be afraid to ICS a little.

Build Granaries in every city, unless your capital is decent and you can make a dash for the Pyramids.

Beeline to Map Making, both for Galleys to get off your accursed rock, and for Harbors to increase your Commerce to acceptable levels.

[joncnunn]

That would technically a rules violation. [No screen shots allowed to be shared without Navigation]

Originally posted by Solomwi
Screenshot?

[punkbass2000]

Sounds like SVC MP!

[joncnunn]

I'm the one who hosted this game, I better not hear any complaints about starting locations from the other players.

It was an autogenerated map, size large, random barbs and random map settings.

If my portion of the world is any indication, the four players who picked a Seafaring civ are going to love this map.

The oddest thing about the picks were that no body picked a Militaristic nor Religious civ and also nobody picked a race with an offensive land unit UU. (2 Naval UUs, 4 Land Defensive UUs, 2 other UUs)

Originally posted by punkbass2000
Sounds like SVC MP!

[Theseus]

Sounds more like the start that UnO provided in his rant thread...

My prescriptions:

* ICS like crazy.

* Get to Curraughs ASAP.

* Depending on the location of resources (i.e., fish/whales), and also the lack of luxuries, you may want to get a few Temples built ASAP.

* Get to Harbors / Galleys ASAP.

* You'll need an offensive force... hard to advise, but if you think you may have horses, I'd lean in that direction to match your UU.

I disagree with Dominae re Granaries and the Pyramids... crap land does not lend to such, and the ROI for low-food-generating towns is not worth it. Build military instead, and go a-warmongering.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Theseus
I disagree with Dominae re Granaries and the Pyramids... crap land does not lend to such, and the ROI for low-food-generating towns is not worth it. Build military instead, and go a-warmongering.

Granaries and the Pyramids are only good when you have good land?!?

Assuming you do manage to grab the Pyramids (focus being the key), it is the one Wonder that can actually dig you out of such a hole (with the Great Library being a distant second). Consider: Legoland. Of course, if the island is so small that it can only accommodate a few cities, the Pyramids may not be a good investment Shield-wise.

As for Granaries, they provide the same ROI regardless of what kind of land you have: they cut the time it takes for your cities to grow by one half, from 20 to 10, 4 to 2, or whatever. Put another way, a 5fpt town makes up its 60 Shield investment faster by virtue of being a 5fpt town (compared to a 2fpt town), not by virtue of being a 5fpt-town-with-a-Granary. It is true that when you are Food-rich it is best to put Granaries in your high Food output cities, but this does not imply that when you have no Food bonuses you should avoid Granaries altogether. AU503: Pillage and Plunder (with the Incans) is an example of this.

Now, the plan of going to bonk some heads to get back in the game I have a tougher time disagreeing with. The main reason I would be reticent to do such a thing is that on a Pangea map I am not very confident that an IC invasion would work. By the time I get Map Making (remember, joncnunn's start has low Commerce), enough Galleys and troops, and actually reach another island, I might find that I am outmatched by an economically superior opponent. There's also the possibility that I cannot get off my rock before Astronomy, which would make my military buildup a bit premature. I guess it all depends on how big the island is: if you can grow reasonably well (say, 8-12 cities), I would probably go the economic route and hope for the best; with anything fewer than that, I would be more desperate and do what Theseus suggests.

Edit: By the way, while Uno's game may sound similar superficially, it's not entirely clear that joncnunn's game calls for the same courses of action. First, Uno's game is SP, where it is much easier to mount an IC invasion against an unsuspecting and poorly defended opponent. Second, in Uno's game the home island had so many Plains but no fresh water that it was clear that economic buildup was not an option. Third, in Uno's game, a crossing to another larger continent was available and immediately discernable, but in joncnunn's game it is possible that the home island is quite isolated.

[joncnunn]

I think it's also important to note that this MP game like most of them have accelerated production on. Pyraimds is half price. (I think I'd also win any "ties" in wonder building due to being in the first player spot.)
Growth is also twince as fast, athough until mapmaking, most city sites are going to be stuck at size 2.

Update: My Chican Scout completed this past turn and is now exploring along the inital hill range in the southern part of the landmass heading east. The normal scout got back from the western extreme of the map (not very far at all) and is exploring along the northern part of the landmass leading east. Landmass appears to be getting a bigger north-south extent.

Yes, under an ICS pattern [displacing as needed to not plant on a 2 food tile], there is a minimum of 8 cities possible. Shields will be at much more of a premimum than commerce after Harbors.

Still no luxaries nor goody huts.
Strategic resource probabilities:

Horses : Medium-Low
Iron : Medium
Saltpeter: Low
Coal : Medium-Low
Rubber : Low
Oil : Very High
Alluminum: Low
Uranium: Low

I should know more the next time the turn gets to me; this round is going much faster than the last two rounds; I guess the other players are taking vacations where they still have internet access.

[punkbass2000]

Haven't had time read everything, but I see some good thoughts. Just here to make sure someone has mentioned 'Feudalism'.

[joncnunn]

Update: 2 More plains + sugar sources discovered (coastal). Unfortunately the coast & mountains combine to where to fully use either tile, the other's sugar food bonus gets killed.

More tundra / tundra-forest discovered.

The southern coast is drifting north at an equal rate the norther coast is drifiting north now.

Well, Fedualism only makes sense in combination with an a large army. A large army requires that I be able to reach an opponent to fight, which is still very much up in the air.

Now up to 12+ city sites using ICS, this includes some non-coastal sites that will be permeantly stuck at size 2. Actually make that 3 when I leave Despotism.

[joncnunn]

Lucked out and got a SGL. Rushing the Pyramids.

[punkbass2000]

Beautiful.

[joncnunn]

I'm going to have to change the description of the land mass:

Was: Tiny landmass with no fresh water, over half tundra. No players sharing it.

Now: Small landmass, 1 fresh water lake tile surrounded by tundra / hills, 80%+ tundra / forest on top of tundra. No players sharing this landmass. 20+ cities possible using ICS

[Yosho]

Well, my normal stratagy when starting out alone on a small landmass is that you can afford to skimp a little bit on millitary production; depending on the size of your island, you should be able to wipe out almost any forces that land on your island with a small number of horsemen, especally if you explore and figure out which directions the ships have to come from in order to avoid sinking (usually, there's only one way to get to an island like that without going over ocean tiles, and if he tries to sail around your island to hit you somewhere else you should have pleanty of time to see him). Especally with your pyramids, and the shields you can save on military units, you should be able to get an early lead on developing your cities and building improvements and settlers; focus on early economic development and expansion, you'll need that advantage to keep up with civilizations who make early contact with each other and thus get to trade techs quickly. Just make sure you fully develop your island as soon as possible, before someone else lands a settler and builds a city on that ugly desert-covered part of the coast you didn't really bother to care about, forcing you to eather start a war you don't want or let your opponent have a beachhead to bring in as many units as he wants.

[joncnunn]

What Desert???

I'd love to replace all this Tundra with Desert! It could be irrigated. (Doubly since I'm Agricultural)

First Settler completed, will form a city next turn, 2-1 from the capital at the coast taking in the fish instantly. I'll probably have it take over working the mined roaded plains sugar tile next to it.

So far neither my starting Scout nor my Chican Scout have found a possible sea invasion route either onto or off my island. I might know more as soon as Alphabet completes as a Curragh is built. I've discovered the entire landmass and have just been having the scout units look at what sea tiles can be seen from it.

No luxaries whatsoever found.

[alva]

I remember taking over an MP game like that: small island, no fresh water, mountains and jungle.

Should I mention I didn't win this one.

[joncnunn]

Well, Jungle can be greatly improved upon with a large worker force.

Can't improve tundra much.

Originally posted by alva
I remember taking over an MP game like that: small island, no fresh water, mountains and jungle.

Should I mention I didn't win this one.

[joncnunn]

First city founded in 3300 BC. I'm now trying to decide where I'll want my second city to be while building it in 3250 BC.

At least one other player doesn't like his starting area either:
No luxaries either and described as horrible / awful.

[joncnunn]

2950 BC update:

Curragh built. Immedately rules out directly towards center of the map as an escape. Will check out adjoining areas in following turns.

Town number 3 to be built next turn.

Both towns alternating between settlers and units.

[joncnunn]

2670 BC update:

a second landmass discovered; appears to be another mostly tundra one. appears much smaller than my starting one.

a third landmass discovered, having my curagh explore that one before finishing up the other.

And one of the players declared war on another. I'm suprized he told everyone about it. Unless I'm the only civ missing contacts.

[joncnunn]

2590 BC update.

discovered a 4th landmass and the Greeks

Hoping the Greeks have techs to trade.

[Solomwi]

Got to be a tense period waiting to find out just how behind you are.

Good luck.

[Thrar]

Good luck! At least you can't complain it's not challenging ^_^

maybe you can put a city on a tundra tile next to the fresh water, and then irrigate an adjacent plains or grassland tile (if geographically possible)?
Not sure if this works, on hills or mountains it doesn't, but I never heard anything about tundra. It certainly works on "normal" ground tiles.

[joncnunn]

The fresh water lake is surronded by two levels of non-irrigatable tiles. In Civ II, cities could be founded back to back to form a chain but not in Civ III. (But in Civ II, ocean counted as a source of irrigation)

Yes, I sent an email to the Greeks and am awaiting their response. I was kind of suprized that the point of contact is apprently at the Greek landmass and not mine considering the Greeks start with Alphabet and the ability to build Curraghs.

My homeland coastal cities are building Curraghs between settler builds for later upgrades to Galleys.

[joncnunn]

Update, I'm slightly ahead of the Greeks:

I'm 1 turn from Writing. They are 5 turns away; but will have the tech cost cut by 12.5% very quickly.

We both have Cerimonal Burial.

They lack Pottery and Masonry

I lack Bronze Working. Maybe more, but doughtful.

I've proposed both a current trade for now, and a future trade.

I think both are obvious.

[kiurkugord]

[QUOTE] Originally posted by joncnunn
Update, I'm slightly ahead of the Greeks:

I'm 1 turn from Writing. They are 5 turns away; but will have the tech cost cut by 12.5% very quickly.



How did you manage to know that the greeks were 5 turns away?

[joncnunn]

Simple, along with my contact message I disclosed I was almost done finishing Writing, they replied back that they were 5 turns away. I then sent back that they'd discover it slightly ahead of their schledule since I was (on my next turn) now 1 turn away.

On my following turn, we wrapped up a my Pottery [2] for their Bronze Working [3] deal, and have a deal for the future trade of my Map Making [12] that I just started reseraching at max speed for their Literature [10] which they will start reseraching as soon as they finish writting. I just found out they have The Wheel so I've proposed a my Masonry [4] for their Wheel [4] deal as well. (Allows unit I can't really use in exchange for a wonder that's already been built, so a nothing for nothing.)

To find out a human's status, ask them.
Now to find out an AI's status, you can't get # of turns they have remaning, but if you have their tech and the AI has enough cash on hold, you can find out what percent they have towards it based on how much they are willing to pay.

[QUOTE] Originally posted by kiurkugord

Originally posted by joncnunn
Update, I'm slightly ahead of the Greeks:

I'm 1 turn from Writing. They are 5 turns away; but will have the tech cost cut by 12.5% very quickly.

How did you manage to know that the greeks were 5 turns away?

[joncnunn]

2470 BC update:

Their reserach time for writting got cut down to 2 turns.

Executed the Masonry for Horses trade.

OMG! My home island is cut off from horses until Astronomeny!
That landmass I see the horses has one good city spot.
Horses on Hill and founded there with cultural expansion works a whale and fish. When growth maxed out can work the hill north.
Rest of that island is all tundra, and it's much smaller.