AAHZ's UnOrthOdOx Challenge... (Monarch AAR)

[snoopy369]

I don't object to building the pyramids, I built 70% of them and happily turned the cash into Currency (literally). There's not much else to do in that stage in the game, even if you nearly beeline to astronomy there's huge amounts of time where your older cities have nothing to build (at least until currency).

[ZEE]

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[snoopy369]

Well, given where i'm at, I don't hold much hope... I still haven't hit astronomy yet as of 1AD and am two techs away. Also back down to 40% tech rate, having spent my pyramids funds

[ZEE]

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[snoopy369]

Missing Agri is probably the main problem for you right now... I don't have CoL either, it's not going to help enough at the moment compared to getting some trade routes via Astronomy. I'm pushing hard on that right now... glad that I have currency and can build gold, at least.

[ZEE]

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[DirtyMartini]

Originally posted by AAHZ
i do not build farms except on resources.

I'd say that's gonna be a problem on that island. It's all just sheep right? Probably gonna need some more food. I agree in principle though: farms = necesssary evil to be minimized.

edit: Forgot. No happy. Maybe don't need more food.

[snoopy369]

Yes, but the lack of food resources in this particular map makes several cities much smaller than they could be otherwise... particularly the capital, though you settled in a different spot than I, it has plenty of hills to use; and if you built a city a bit NE of your capital near the horses, it can very much use the extra food for a few tiles...

[snoopy369]

Oh, food is very useful. GP farms for one, but even more so, for growing a city to max size early. Typically it's best to farm when a city starts up, and then if it doesn't need the food once it's grown, then de-farm those tiles.

[DirtyMartini]

Originally posted by snoopy369
Typically it's best to farm when a city starts up, and then if it doesn't need the food once it's grown, then de-farm those tiles.

That's what I do now. I used to be of the "farms bad, build cottages only, if city won't support cottages -- don't build" mentality. Kinda sounds like that's how AAHZ approaches it. Now I am of the "build cities everywhere. Farm enough for a decent food surplus. Reassign/rebuild as conditions change" mindset.

[wodan11]

Generally without fail I'll start each and every city with a couple of farms. This gets fast growth and also allows early whipping if I want. Or, I can do an early SE and run 2 scientists per city, which is pretty huge at that stage of the game.

This allows me to defer the CE/SE/whatever decision until I can see the total available terrain. On a map like this one, that's critical information.

If I decide to do CE, then later on, I cottage them over, like Snoopy says. Usually the capitol first so that it gets more from Bureaucracy.

Wodan

[snoopy369]

I actually usually watermill over many of my farms if they're on a river (as they usually are)... typically at the point that is possible to do so, it's very useful to have the extra couple of hammers. This assumes it's a mostly-grassland city of course; most hammer-producing cities (ie, hill cities) need the farms later on. Cottages are done when the city doesn't need the hammers, but I often find many need the extra two hammers from a few tiles for flexibility.

[Modo44]

I don't understand why nobody said anything about a beeline to Caravels. Optics comes much earlier in the tech tree than Astronomy, and just being able to trade techs should probably keep you in the game, especially with your land being very easy to defend. Yes, Astronomy is still needed, but not the basis for survival IMO.

[snoopy369]

The problem I had was that beelining to caravels would have been too expensive. Optics is indeed much further up the tech tree, but I needed currency at least in order to not be running 80-100 turn techs...

I probably should've ran for it a bit earlier than I did (especially to give me the ability to search out where my galleons will go ), but Currency is still needed first IMO...

[Modo44]

Originally posted by snoopy369
The problem I had was that beelining to caravels would have been too expensive. Optics is indeed much further up the tech tree, but I needed currency at least in order to not be running 80-100 turn techs...

Well, I didn't mean a strict beeline, because those are extremely hard without the ability to trade. I meant getting Optics (long) before Astronomy.

Originally posted by snoopy369
I probably should've ran for it a bit earlier than I did (especially to give me the ability to search out where my galleons will go ), but Currency is still needed first IMO...

Agreed, no question about it.