What are the most significant factors in the long-term growth of a civ

[couerdelion]

Originally posted by jbp26


while i agree that that early war is critical, don't wage it against sitting bull ifyou have any other options. protective + barracks + totem poles archers are impossible to dislodge.

Probably only makes them extra-protective. If so, it would put the Native Americans probably on a par with any old Creative civ in the "difficulty" stakes.

And still some way behind Mansa Musa

[couerdelion]

That reminds me of another possible reason for a strong/weak game. It’s a combination of the civ and capital resources and might be described as a “starting tech/resources fit”. How useful is it to get a good fit of resources to starting techs or is it quite costly to catch up if all the resources you have are wrong.

Good fit: Start with Agro/Mining and get Corn and Gems
Bad fit: Start with Mining and Wheel and get Pigs, Stone and Clams

I actually got Cows, Clams and Marble in a recent game with Mansa Musa and there are many conflicting demands on the research while the Marble is just begging to be used for the Oracle which is another tech branch altogether. If Animal Husbandry does not give you horses then Bronze Working or Archery is almost obligatory in order to give yourself a decent level of protection.

[Thrak]

Originally posted by jbp26
while i agree that that early war is critical, don't wage it against sitting bull ifyou have any other options. protective + barracks + totem poles archers are impossible to dislodge.

well, he ain't gonna get any easier to kill
at least for a while
if I had bronze I would hit that sucka so early...

[couerdelion]

If I assume that I start with Mining, I will still need Wheel, Bronze and Iron as techs. The first two would take me something like 30 turns to research at Epic speed/Emperor level which would take me to 3100 BC. Iron would probably take another 40+ turns so I’m now at 1900 BC.

At this stage, all my workers can do is build mines and roads, chop forests and jungles and perhaps improve any hunting or farm resources if I started with that tech. In fact, if I don’t start with Agriculture, I’ll probably be short of food.

Now let’s assume that I already have a worker (presumably he’s been pretty lazy up till now). If iron is within borders then I can hook this up in another 10 turns (1600 BC).

Now let’s assume that I can put together around 20 hammers per turn (base production + chop + whip). Perhaps I’ll build one spear, one axeman and 8 swords for a total cost of 584 hammers. So that’s another 30 turns which takes me to 850 BC.

Apart from not having Bronze, I’ve been pretty generous here with the times and I haven’t even got my troops to the border. What’s more, I’ve got almost nothing useful for my workers to do.

All in all, I don’t like this idea. If I have no Bronze, then I’m almost certainly going to look for Horses before Iron. And by the time I do get Iron, I will probably not think it too important to “rush the rush”. Doing the work with Swords is different from doing it with Axes. It’s a lot cheaper and they don’t have a lot of problems with well defended archers so the delay is not so critical. Better, I think, to use the early game to get the pivotal techs first and a basic infrastructure with which to crank out the swords army later, but more quickly.

[Thrak]

I think you're making it look bad there.

I can run through a start tonight if you like, I don't even consider it risky as strats go.

Edit: ok ran through a game, this is turning into a hijack but I said I would so... sorry?
Settings: Normal speed, Prince difficutly, standard continents map, 6 ai civs.
I'm playing Pericles, who stats with hunting and fishing, Cre/Phi.

As you can see this starting location has only 3 things going for it: Chop, a cow and fresh water. But as a proof of concept, lets get it on.

First turn: Hut pops archery, I settle and start on a worker. Researching mining (8 turns).

3120 BC: After mining I finished bronze working (eventually). But as you can see, no bronze Isabella is off to my right and is looking like a promising victim. Scouts have been busy, I now have some cash and a warrior \o/

Right, now to the clever part. I pre-chopped most of the trees on grassland around my capital, while using the 2 food/2 commerce and cow to grow my city and boost my (rubbish) research rate. Straight onto Iron Working.

There is no point building a settler until I know where Iron is - and if its already in my fat cross I will just build a city inbetween me and Isabella where I can chop barracks and some troops.

Fast forward 2080 years... to 1040BC.
How did I do? well iron popped up near Isabellas third city. I had to take a slightly sub-optimal placing but I got it (thankyou creative).

It's 1040BC and I'm ready for war. w00t! I went mostly for swordsman, with some of my UU axeman (Phalanx) just in case. I've got 4 swordsmen and 2 phalanxes ready to move in next turn, and a few others coming along to help with the clean up shortly after.
Note my gold is kind of going south - its gonna get worse before it gets better! I'm just playing through as proof-of-concept, but you can see I am doing ok on the old research, if not exemplary. Isabella has buddhism so I don't need to do any religious stuff really.

775BC - ah how the mighty fall. I've got troops outside Isabellas last city. From here I could have kept her alive, got alphabet and got tech off her (or sent spies till I had it all), but I just killed her so I could get it over with.

Job done. I have now have the largest empire in the game. And all from a rubbish start I think wit ha decent start I could probably have built 1 or maybe two small wonders and teched up significantly.
Now I really need to go and eat.

[Thrak]

added example above ^^

[couerdelion]

So you did research Mining/Bronze/Wheel/Iron? You’re not saying when you finished Iron although I still don’t like putting this ahead of Animals in this case. As it is, you’ve probably found a starting point that is best suited to early aggression. Alternatively, you could simply use your Creative trait and some of those woods to spam your own cities and then use the marble to churn out an early wonder which would complement that Philosophic trait of Pericles.

Personally, I might have been inclined to move from that location because it offers so little. Having said that, there’s not much else in the vicinity and settling in a better location is much easier to say once if know the surrounding area. Still, a couple of moves to the south and you’ve got marble to work with which should get you thinking of the three early Greek wonders. Was it not Pericles who started construction of the Parthenon?

I notice that you take just 10 turns to get from the border to the last city. And all this with a relatively small force. I’m assuming that Isabel would have linked up the Copper by this time so you should really have had to face Axemen (at least one or two). Add to this the culture from Madrid and I would have thought it quite tricky to get so far in that time.

But the big difference is that we are not comparing the same thing.

Game speed: In the period to 4000 BC Epic turns are 30 years vs Normal of 40 years. With Epic build times at 150%, this means normal speed will be a little over 10% faster in the period to 1000 BC

Difficulty level: I think there’s 20% extra research costs when comparing Emperor to Prince. What’s more, I think the resistance at a higher level would be a little more serious and there would also be the faster AI expansion which might have required a larger force that you used. I would expect, for example, that the AI to have around 4 cities by 1000 BC.

What I guess I am really saying is that the problem is in the “need” to go to war – turning to your original post. With that marble around and your creative/philo trait, there are plenty of other strong cards to play with here. With Iron, there isn’t really a “rush”. In fact, you might even let Isabel do the work of founding her Shrine and then taking it. However, the Oracle is something that you can’t just leave lying around. And it pays back quickly for a Philo civ

[Thrak]

Yeah, but its just a proof of concept. Isabella is an aggressive AI in my experience, so killing her would have been my primary objective.

Its an awful start where it is - I just took it where it was and played through to show it.

As an aside I had a great start later on last night and got copper fairly close, looking at going to war well before 2000 bc. Its more than doable and its not exclusive - it just is in my example cos I had no other objectives than to show it can be done pretty much every time.

You didn't mention what difficulty you were playing on (I'm still scaling up from Prince on BTS, been out of the civ loop for a while) but if you want me to do Emperor/Epic, I can have a crack saturday morning or something. Got a group MP game tonight...

[couerdelion]

No that's not important. I'm suggesting that there is often a better alternative to the early rush. There's not doubt that it is a decent enough strategy and it's something you would definitely look for if

a) You are aggressive or charismatic
b) You have an early UU

For others, it's perhaps worthwhile if there's a lot at stake (eg neighbour is Rome or has Ivory, there's a holy city involved, lots of resources in neighbours territory)

Even with these conditions, things may still turn out that you have no suitable candidates for whipping-boy/girl No.1

My current game is Qin and I got an island start. Not much use an early rush there and it so happens that I did not get any of the three early strategic resources on the island. It’s just not on the cards.

Actually, returning to the first post, I can compare this game with two earlier games that I had played on an Island map. The main difference there was that I selected the leader (Ragnar) and the map. Now I’m around 300 BC and I still seem to be behind in development versus both Ragnar games. The one that I played at Emperor level – same as the current game – I was comfortably ahead of where I am now. Great Lighthouse was built and I had Currency and Literature techs compared to Qin who is still working through Alphabet and has just five cities to Ragnar’s seven. Even in the Immortal level game, Ragnar was ahead in number of cities and slightly ahead in techs.

If there might be one significant factor affect these games I would say it was food. Ragnar I (Emperor Level) had a peach of a start - Clams (x2), Corn, Ivory (x2) and Gold and the fishing start and the financial trait could feast on that. In the Immortal game, I think I had an obscene amount of food (3 seafood, riverside Corn and Wheat (and Spices too) in the capital. By contrast, Qin had Wheat, Cows and Gold which is not bad but really needed a little extra food to get the other cities out. Qin also did not get a coastal start.

I have perhaps wondered that one of my problems is a lack of flexibility. Maybe this is also influenced by the fact that I have played further into the game that I might normally do in one shift. Your early strategy and plans might be relatively sound but a little re-evaluation never did anyone any harm. Looking back, I could still see an benefit in acquiring the Great Lighthouse which would not only pay off on the island map but would also use Qin’s Industrious trait. It would have meant thinking of the second city earlier – since this would have to build it – and leaving techs like Mysticism and Pottery until after Sailing and Masonry. But maybe during the course of the game, I’m not looking any further than the end of my nose and so end up going for techs that I think I need sooner.

To add even more to the mix, however, I’ve seen some games where I have had lots of food and have run into all sorts of problems.

In general, I always have either too much food or too little.

[Thrak]

yeah I guess I just don't see it that way, if you have a neighbour I see an early war on a par with getting a good wonder or a nice set of resources - free stuff! the AI just doesn't cope that well early on with an invasion, UU/aggressive/charismatic or not.

I do find myself wishing there was a phi/cha civ with a better UB/UU than lincoln though.

[Blaupanzer]

I always do archery then horses then bronze. If that doesn't provide resources enough for chariots and axemen, then the raging barbarions i play with will be the death knell, no matter who my neighbors are. I play a different civ on each start and only vary that pattern for spiritual civs. Post that is very dependent on the civ (UU, UB) and the starting location (for pottery and sailing). Loving this expansion.

[Stratovaria]

Ive found that sometimes, especially in sea maps, (which i love) can be a downright gem if you get lucky, (which i did) and can give you a huge boost early on with slavery, and help support a massive city that can fund others that arent doing so hot. (let me upload the image of this city in question, and i did push up to more advanced techs to try to monopolize on the religous aspects.) Anyone know a good way to cut down on a 1440x900 aspect to under 800? Amsterdam is a size 17 city, despite repeated slavery world wonder building, and at 220 ad. (i have five coastal specials there for five food each.) Food and the terrain really matters alot ive found, as a high food amount means easy building, and with a few right civics, you can just stack cheap units and counter the hate you get from slavery.

[Verrucosus]

Welcome Stratovaria,

The easiest way (maybe there are better ones) is to open the jpg-file with the "MS Paint" programme which is usually included in Windows Installations and select the stretch/skew option from the image menu. Resizing both height and width to 50 % should be enough.

I agree that the starting location is more important on archipelago maps than on other map types. Generally speaking, the harder it is to get away from your starting spot (either by relocating before founding or by quickly establishing a second city) the more important the starting terrain becomes. Another aspect in this context is the game speed. Spending a few turns to look for a site whose resources match your technology (as explained earlier by couerdelion) is more efficient on epic or even marathon speed because the longer time of researching a technology that matches your starting resources makes such a match more valuable.

[Pinchak]

I have voted "general terrain", "number of neighbours" and "map type". These seem to be the most difficult ones to work around. The others are also important, but easier to balance.

With the last two being the most important in general.

[Doge]

I voted "Your starting civ/leader" and "Resources/terrain of capital". But I just about always play OCC too...