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

[Jvstin]

Originally posted by Verrucosus

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.

Really?

I've never had good results in delaying my game start more than one turrn (even on Epic) by delaying the placement of my initial city. I'll certainly move the settler one square if it improves my initial cross significantly, otherwise I get nervous delaying that initial city just to improve its spot. I hate getting behind early.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by Jvstin


Really?

I've never had good results in delaying my game start more than one turrn (even on Epic) by delaying the placement of my initial city. I'll certainly move the settler one square if it improves my initial cross significantly, otherwise I get nervous delaying that initial city just to improve its spot. I hate getting behind early.

Wow. You make it sound like a Big Deal (tm). Waiting 1 or 2 turns is so huge, that you'll decide whether you win or lose the game, right then and there.

Wodan

[Verrucosus]

Well, it probably is a big deal. Spending even a single turn looking for a better spot is always a risky move because your opponents are already training workers and researching wondrous technology while you take in the sights. However, when your starting terrain is bad enough and your warrior/scout's initial exploration is promising enough (with regard to your starting technologies and your intended research path), there may be cases when it's worthwhile. In my experience, the "technology match" (starting with the technologies needed to exploit the capital's resources) is extremely important because it allows me to pick a more strategic research goal (Bronze Working, early religion, even Pottery) rather than one for my first worker to have something to do. Sometimes it is possible to buy this advantage by spending two or three turns moving the settler to a tech-matching position. These turns are such a high price to pay that these cases are really exceptional. However, in relative terms, the more expensive it is to build and research stuff (epic/marathon), the easier it should be to make up for a single turn's lost income by having the advantage of your technology matching your resources right from the start.

[wodan11]

You're talking about what you research first. Whether you settle right away and then perhaps choose to change technologies (after your warrior/scout looks around), or move the settler and then settle, is the same delay in regard to initial tech research.

For some reason, I think people think you can't change techs once you begin researching one....

Wodan

[Kuciwalker]

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

Whether or not the human is controlling it.

[Verrucosus]

Originally posted by wodan11
You're talking about what you research first. Whether you settle right away and then perhaps choose to change technologies (after your warrior/scout looks around), or move the settler and then settle, is the same delay in regard to initial tech research.

That is true, but I find it difficult to think of a reason to switch research from the technology that allows to improve the resource in the capital's radius.

I am afraid that I have not been very clear about the situation of which I am thinking.

Let me use an example: You start with Agriculture and Mining with cows the only resource in the settler's initial radius. After moving on a hill, your warrior detects a corn field three squares outside the settler's radius.

Now, if you settle right away, you will probably want to go for Animal Husbandry as soon as possible to have it available when your first worker is finished in 15 turns (normal speed). Of course you can switch to Bronze Working at any time, but that would postpone the improvement of the cow square for longer than it takes to build the worker.

By contrast, if you spend two turns moving the settler towards the corn field, you already have the technology that the worker will need once he is trained. He will, of course, be trained two turns later than he would have been. Depending on your plans that may or may not be a price worth paying for the ability to go for Bronze Working immediately without compromising your capital's development. (When you substitute The Wheel or Mysticism for Mining, the same applies to an early Pottery/religion opening.)

Getting back to the poll question, the starting terrain is important, but it is, in my opinion, a factor that can be balanced in the long term if the general terrain is good enough and if there are not too many neighbours to block one's expansion. Moving the settler before founding the capital is just one (admittedly exceptional) example of such a balancing exercise.

[couerdelion]

I can’t understand my current game. For a while, the AI seems to be going into overdrive and expanding rapidly into spaces. On island/archipelago games, I had civs sailing past my island to found a city on an island that should, by rights, have been mine. This was before I had even built a boat or founded my third city. On Pangaea, the AI were swarming over all the available land.

Now the game I have I got a very strong civ – Hatsheput (great traits, good starting techs, strong early UU) – and a strong starting position on a coastal plains hill with pigs, wine, spice and 5 flood plains. With animals as the first research, worker as the first build, I had everything I needed for the UU and one border expansion later, I had horses near the capital.

And with all this to play with, the AI seems to have fallen asleep. By 400 BC Spain has just four or five cities and Brennus, who in my view is one of the strongest, is even smaller and also failed to get any of the early religions. I even think that Confucianism might still be up for grabs at this late stage. What’s more, it was well past 1000 BC before any of my trading partners gained access to a strategic resource.

Makes me think that I should have left the barbs alone and gone straight for Roosevelt while he was busy with his wonder-building.

*******

When it comes to moving from a starting location the biggest risk is when you do not know what is in the fat cross and when you have a warrior start (so exploration is slow). Probably the simplest example of where movement benefits you is when there is a plains hill nearby. Playing on Epic speed, I can get a worker out 5 turns more quickly if I have 2h on the city tile, so I will have recovered my investment by 3300 BC even if I delayed founding for 5 turns.

The times when you are more likely to move if you have a doubtful start but do not uncover any hugely better site with your first scout/warrior move are

1) If you start with Fishing and there is coast nearby – especially financials
2) Financials also gain disproportionately from founding on a riverside wine, silk or fur
3) Imperialists and BTS Expansives gain even more from founding on a plains hill (or on stone, marble or plains ivory)

As for changing techs, this is, as often as not, an admission that a wrong choice was made. Most people find that quite difficult and will instead choose to soldier on with the lesser tech.

[Footie Mad]

In the end I would say the general terrain with access to river tiles, fresh water for health, hills for mining, forest for chopping and special resources is the largest determining factor.

[Blaupanzer]

Originally posted by couerdelion
As for changing techs, this is, as often as not, an admission that a wrong choice was made. Most people find that quite difficult and will instead choose to soldier on with the lesser tech.

The AI is programmed to "soldier on." Being flexible is a human choice. If another tech makes more sense, switch away. It's not like the other tech is going to go away. It will still be available later.