Critique my game

[Brael]

Well, I've wanted to write one of these for a long time, I might as well do it now.

First of all, here's my settings (took them a few turns in, but it doesn't matter). What the setting screen doesn't reveal though, is that I set up custom continents. I don't remember the precise settings now but I believe it's 12 civs (whatever the default is for 12 civs), 4 continents, and random placement. The map shape is torodial. The save file is attached at the end incase anyone wants to try it out (assuming it's even compatible with 3.19, I seem to remember a patch in the past invalidated all saves).

Oh, and I should mention since I had just recently reinstalled civ 4 (this is my second game after ~10 months off), I forgot to patch meaning I'm running 3.01 without any mods. Though, I did make a couple of small edits to the defines file

• I removed the chance of global warming occurring since I find it extremely unfun to see my land turn to desert with no way to stop/reverse it, for no reason other than an AI goes overboard with nuclear power plants.
• I removed the max exp cap on barbarians (but left the animal cap at 5). This is my first time ever making this change, and I'm curious to see how it turns out. I justify this because I like not wasting exp, and I'm hoping it gets not just me some super units to watch out for (AI warlords are almost always lost before becoming real beasts) but the AI gets some strong units as well.
• I removed the max exp cap for promoting units. The reason for this one is that I never found forcing my units back down to 10 exp to be all that fun. I also feel it's justified as the AI generally makes more use of promotions than I do, especially on a higher level when it can generate more coin than me. So, this hopefully not only lets me play with my promoted units more, but the AI will as well.

Anyways, here's the settings.

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So, I start out like you see in the screenshot, on top of a plains hill with 6 spices, clam, fish, and crab in the fat cross and unknown territory to the east. I decide to move one square east. From what I can see, I have more of a need for hills than for another high commerce tile so it seems like a smart play. Once my city is founded I work on fishing so that I can get those food tiles in play. My thinking behind this is that I have raging barbs turned on so it's better to work some sea tiles that I don't need to put a premium on defending as my hammer supply seems a bit limited.

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My initial play in the city is to work the plains hill preventing growth, and to pump out as many warriors as I can until fishing is researched. My starting warrior is sent to the east for the hut. I get a little gold from it but discover something more important. I have a natural choke point. Jungle covered, 1 tile wide thanks to the peak, and on a hill. This combined with the bowman gives me confidence that I'm virtually immune to barbs from the east for a long time.

My Warrior continues to scout and I discover that I have not one but two choke points and a third semi choke (you can see the third peak on the right hand side). The second one doesn't have a hill, but that's going to be some good useful terrain when it comes time to expand.

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Then I meet my neighbor. I don't interact with Suleiman much so I'm not really sure how he treats people, meaning I'm not sure if I should treat him like I would treat Monty, Alexander, Justinian, or Gandhi. I decide to go for peace with him. I found his scout coming from the east so with 18 turns and my exploration pattern I can guess he's somewhere between 36 and 54 moves away from my city depending on how rough his terrain is. Besides, there's no benefit to declaring war right this moment.

I continue on my way, and two turns later run into this

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I can only conclude that scout I saw just met his untimely demise. Well, free exp for my warrior. While this happened, I made two warriors and explored west. It turns out there's a peninsula that way, which should be very easy to fog bust. I set my first warrior to do just that and keep my second warrior in town for happiness. Upon going back and looking at this, I realize I could have had the second warrior out since my population is still one. Oh well.

I figure I've got time for one more non military tech given my extraordinarily strong defensive terrain and start pottery. My city continues to work the plains hill to speed construction of a workboat. I don't see the point in working food tiles right now, when a faster boat will bring me more food for a fairly small investment.

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In 3580 BC Buddhism is founded. It's been awhile so I'm not sure, but 28 turns seems awfully late for Buddhism against an Immortal AI. I must not have any of the hardcore religious nuts out there. Maybe not even any with mysticism, but I'm not sure on that.

In 3520 BC (turn 32) I get the War Chariot quest. My scouting Warrior is still doing well, he now has two kills under his belt and earns woodsman 1. I'm still scared of bears, but other animals don't have much of a chance against me in heavily forested/jungled terrain such as what I'm discovering.

In 3490 BC (turn 34) Hinduism is founded. So atleast two civs out there were going for early religions. Going by my own tech speed I'm judging 34 turns to be mysticism+monotheism/polytheism. If I remembered AI traits of each civ better, I could probably use this information to make a good guess as to what civs are out there. In other news, my warrior popped a hut and got me 52 gold bringing my treasury to 98. That should be useful.

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One aspect of my playstyle that I've found helpful is to map out my eventual city borders. It's not that big of a deal in the early game, but when my civ gets bigger, it's nice to have city borders drawn out so I can easily tell which cities to give what tiles to as a way to aid with specialization. I also place signs in my city spots. These are subject to change, especially this early, but it's a habit I developed.

As you can see in my screenshot, I realized I could move my second warrior out to my choke and did so. This way I've got the fortify bonus when barbs can start appearing. My other warrior was clearing the fog on that western coast tile to check for more possible food. I figured now would be the time to do this since I should be safe from barbs for a little longer, and it would be an important factor in city #3.

In 3415 BC (turn 39) my work boat finishes and goes to the clams that turn. I begin working on a warrior. I had to make a choice here between clams and fish. The fish are ocean so can't be pillaged for a long time but are one commerce less and one turn longer to get the boat to. I decide to go with the clams, by the time barbarian boats are an issue I'll have the fish anyways.

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As you can see here, while exploring my warrior picked up woodsman 2 and found mysticism for me. I'm further behind Suleiman than I would prefer at this point, but it's to be expected with just one city.

Two turns later I finally begin hunting with the intention of teching to archery. It's getting time for barbarians.

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Here you can see that my worker finished. I started on another work boat figuring I should get some more food hooked up while I still can. My goal at this point is to grow my city as fast as possible. The worker is building a cottage on the spices, and Babylon is working the clams until it hits size two. Once it hits 2, my plan is to work the forested hill and alternate a grass forest and the plains hill.

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Contact with the barbarians is made. Surprisngly it's an archer, not a warrior. I guess they've been out for awhile.

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After my cottage finished I began building roads. I do know agriculture, but I cottaged the only place I could put a farm seeing as how I can't cut wood yet so I figure I might as well get my road network up now so that I can quickly go through the hills/forests later. I'm a little nervous with my western warrior. I don't remember AI behavior well enough, so I think that he'll be bait for any barbs that spawn west of him, but I can't be certain. I figure though that if something does pass by I should be able to run through the forests/jungle and make it back to my city with one turn to spare, and another turn to earn a 5% fortify bonus should my cottage be pillaged.

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Here's a view of Babylon starving to get the work boat out. Seeing those 2 and 3 commerce tiles go unworked is making me cringe, but the payoff is worth the risk as long as my two warriors can hold out slightly longer.

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I notice here that I can see Suleiman's tech. I assume this means he's splitting his espionage points towards me and another civ, but I forget that I can hover over his name to check this theory so that I can figure out how much of his 4 points/turn I'm getting.

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Let this be a lesson as to why you should never set units to move two spaces through barb infested territory. Had my warrior been moving one per turn I would have stopped on that jungle hill that's across a river. Instead I went one more turn and really hurt my position. The warrior at this point is up to woodsman 3 so he has a chance, albeit not much of one. As it turns out though, he lives with 1.1/2 strength, and I get to start taking advantage of my custom setting for exp as the warrior is now at 12/17.

Once archery completes, I set the research path to iron working. I don't normally like IW this early in the game, but given all this jungle I see my choices as IW or being limited to two cities.

In 2460 BC (turn 104) I realize I can hover over Suleiman's name to check his espionage spending. He's at 336/344. In hindsight after having played to 1 AD I think this makes sense. There were 4 points the turn he found me, and then 8 points ahead during my turn, 4 points during his turn. I do wonder though. As of now I still haven't found his territory... or anyone elses.

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You can see here that I built another work boat. I debate using this one for the fish or for scouting. I choose to have it scout. I also start getting a military out, I ended up delaying that Bowman for so long because I haven't run into any barbarian troubles yet. I think I'm way past pushing my luck at this point though. In any other game I know I would be dead right now (of course, in any other game I wouldn't have delayed like this either).

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Judiasm was founded in 2190 BC (turn 131). In other news, you can see how my warrior has been making use of my promotion rules. Combat 1 for being aggressive, the entire woodsman line, and cover. Archers are still more risky than I would prefer, but this guy has had a nice lifespan. I would like to keep him around for awhile.

You can also see my -1 gold per turn. That work boat explorer knocked me out of free supply.

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Well well well, what do we have here? It looks like I found Suleiman's territory finally. He was far to the south. On top of that, he seems to be struggling with the barbarians seeing as how Edirne is the second Ottoman city. I have mixed feelings about this. I had concerns about him possibly being a contender for the land grab but I don't want him dead either. My warrior is too far away to help him, if I decided to so I can't do anything either way, but I'm suspecting it's only him and I on this continent. From my exploration so far it looks to be a pretty good sized chunk of land too. With him falling, I'm not only going to be the sole barbarian target, but my only viable trading partner is also gone. I do see though that he's working masonry, and I think he went for slavery. Maybe he can whip out some walls and live. To be honest though, I'm skeptical. Even Gandhi is enough of a fighter to usually survive raging barbs. With Suleiman losing a city I don't think he's capable of protecting himself.

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Free commerce. I'm back to breaking even. I'm also all the more confused by my lack of barbarians given the rest of the continent.

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Nothing much happened for awhile. You can see on my map that I continued to explore, and moved my warrior south to check on the Ottomans. They're still alive so that's good. In 1770 BC (turn 173) I finally got my second city built. I also found an island chain with my work boat and follow it north hoping to run into another civ.

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My warrior made it south and took a few units off of Suleiman. Unfortunately, we don't have open borders right now (no writing for either of us) so I need to be careful. Despite having strong promotions, he's not invincible and just fought one hell of a battle so there's nothing I can do about that warrior other than to run. I may want Suleiman around, but not badly enough to vainly sacrifice that unit.

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In 1540 BC (turn 196) Suleiman dies. I had hoped I could save him, but it seems I just prolonged his suffering.

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In more cheery news, in 1420 BC (turn 208) I begin my second city is coming along nicely, a while back I discovered IW, my anti barbarian choke is well established, I have some towns, production is beginning on a third settler (I'll switch for one turn to grow babylon for a 2 pop whip when the settler is at 120/300) and I'm taking a shot at metal casting to get The Colossus. You'll notice I have one tile of fog there. Because of the jungle, I can't see far enough. It came down to a financial decision of one tile fog vs an additional point of upkeep. I chose the more economic decision confident that if it came down to it, I could fight off any barb that may spawn.

There is one bit of bad news about IW however, it turns out I don't have Iron, or copper for that matter since I didn't mention it before. It's a good thing I have an archery UU... I'm going to need it.

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You can see my third city here, with it's territory mapped out. I debated for a long time whether to found this city where I did or on the grass hill. It basically came down to 2 coast vs 1 hill. I went with the hill following the logic that while the extra coast would eventually provide more commerce by founding on the grass I leave the hill available to make more buildings like markets, banks, grocers, and so on, and that it would take virtually the entire game (if not longer) for the hill founding to pay off. Plus, this saves me a little more maintence.

You can also see that my work boat continues to explore. So far nothing of worth has been found. Some tundra, ice, and glacier (I didn't think torodial maps had those... maybe I didn't pick that setting), and a few resources. I also found a few more island chains.

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This all changes in 1170 BC (turn 233) when I find Alexander. His city isn't coastal so I can't see it, but with a score only 50% higher than me and a religion he didn't found I'm hoping someone already beat him up a bit and that I can use him as a trading partner. Though this is unlikely unless he lacks both metals, like me.

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Exploring some more I find this, he has atleast three cities at this point and phalanx. My hopes of Alex being a wounded trading partner are destroyed. I was able to get open borders to explore though, maybe I can get some religion spread.

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Another civ found. This time it's Justinian. I'm rather glad to see him, and to learn he founded a religon. I don't really understand Justinian's AI, but my experiences with him in the past have always been that he puts up a good early game, but always winds up licking someones boot later on because although he's willing to fight wars, he's not able to do it well. Being a different religon than Alexander is a good thing too. Alex isn't going anywhere with his Phalanx, and Justinian is strong enough at this point of the game. I may be able to stay religion neutral and use both for trading partners, while each of them keeps the other down. Aside from the upkeep cost and research times I have to say, this doesn't feel like an Immortal game. It's all been way too easy so far.

Around this point (a few turns before) I started to prechop my forests for the colossus but I forgot I need a forge first. So I simply prechoped, built up to whip the forge, and then went for it.

[Brael]

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Almost there... I'm close enough at this point to whip it, but the slaves don't agree. Needing to keep my 4 population for the whip I pick the third option. You can also see what Alexander did here. My plans to stay neutral towards both and use them as trading partners failed. Alex had to go and convert. It actually happened before this turn but I forgot to screenshot it.

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It finishes. I forgot to use the whip in the end.

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At this point, I realized my warrior is still alive, and what an accomplishment this is. 322 turns, almost 4000 years of fighting later and he's still out there mapping out the last few tiles of my continent, while fighting off the barbarian hordes. I change his name to reflect his status. Afterwards, I realize having (Warrior) on the end of his name makes the pun even better.

And finally, this brings us to 1AD. Here's my demographics at this point.
Score

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Gold

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Production

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Food

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Power

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Culture

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Espionage

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And here's my capital. Sometime in the last few turns the Pyramids became possible to build again. I'm not sure what happened, but some civ took one heck of a beating if it lost the pyramids. I didn't see any messages saying a civ was wiped out though so I don't think anyone died. Regardless, I doubt I have the building power to get them right now but I make a try anyways. In this shot you can also see city #4 which was recently founded. I moved my choke point out to the second mountain range and chopped the forest on the first one so that Nippur can work the hills. The ones it could borrow from Babylon are being used for the pyramids and it needs some production other than the whip.

I thought I had gotten screenshots, but I guess not. I found some iron but it's still too far away to make a play for. In order to get it I'm going to need to break down my second choke point, expand past it, and then make yet another city to get it. I completely missed it at the time, and didn't even notice it while writing this but in this shot

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That empty patch of grass on the west is where the iron is, it measures to something like 11 spaces east and 5 spaces south of my capital.

Oh, I still haven't had a single barbarian come to my choke point. Something about this just isn't right.

[brandonjm8]

wow, only 4 cities thus far, are you far behind as far as cities go? interesting story btw.

[Brael]

I can't say for certain how far behind I am, but I guarantee I'm atleast 3 cities behind both Justinian and Alex. I found Justinians capital, his jewish holy city, and two others with my work boat (in those last shots you can see it having gone far around the continent, until it hit ice and I disbanded it). Since he's guaranteed to have some non coastal cities too, I know he has more than just those 4. Alex is sure to have expanded beyond what I saw there as well. In this stage of the game at higher levels you don't get ahead with good play, especially when fairly isolated... you just fall behind less.

Oh, and another thing I didn't mention/screenshot. At about that point (actually, a couple turns before 1 AD) it turns out I'm in third place research wise.

And this is weird, some of my spoiler tags for images won't show although they're in the post when I look... oh well.

[DaveV]

Your screenshots are awfully big. I usually try not to post anything wider than ~1000 pixels. I'll read some more if you resize them, since I hate horizontal scrolling.

[Theben]

And here's my capital. Sometime in the last few turns the Pyramids became possible to build again. I'm not sure what happened, but some civ took one heck of a beating if it lost the pyramids.

?? I knew you could rebuild lost national wonders, but you can rebuild world wonders also?

As for the barbs, I've noticed that they automatically "know" when an area is blocked off due to GW borders or a strong defender. When I fortify choke points I've watched barbs walk around them the long way. My guess is you have a large horde of barbs milling about out there and if you opened the choke point you'd soon get a rush of barbs approaching you.

[rah]

Yeah, if you have the tech, unless it's already built, you can build it. The only time you can't select it in a city (if it's not already built) is if you're building it in another city.

[Theben]

Clear as mud.

[Calvin Vu]

Thanks for posting. I'll download and try to play it later today.
I guess I will settle in place though. Two reasons: (1) the extra hammer at the beginning of the game is too much for me to forgo (at the point where your city has to starve to produce the work boat using the forested plain hill, I can produce the same number of hammers using the forested grassland hills without starving, for example) and (2) I'm a big fan of the levee and settle in place will give me 6 extra hammers for free later after Stream Power. That's more than a worker can get working on the plain hill which you try to save to get the hammers.
As for not having enough hammers, I like to stay with Caste System as long as I can (until the unhappiness from not having Emancipation is really becoming unbearable and costs me 20% gold or more to avoid the red-faced citizens), so with Guild and Caste System, the grassland square is equivalent to a grassland hill so it won't be too bad at mid game. At the point where I'm forced to move away from Caste Sytem, I should be close to having Steam Power so I won't worry about hammer here. I will look for another hammer-rich site for military production. This capital seems to be good as a GP farm (NE + Globe) or as a research center (NE/Globe + Oxford) with its abundance of food.

[Brael]

I reposted the file, the one I uploaded before was the wrong one, it had the fish in the wrong tile (had a friend change that and make a few other random changes to it so I could mess around later), the right one which I'm playing is up now.

Your screenshots are awfully big. I usually try not to post anything wider than ~1000 pixels. I'll read some more if you resize them, since I hate horizontal scrolling.

I uploaded some 1024x768 versions, and edited the post to use those ones instead, they're smaller now.

Thanks for posting. I'll download and try to play it later today.
I guess I will settle in place though. Two reasons: (1) the extra hammer at the beginning of the game is too much for me to forgo (at the point where your city has to starve to produce the work boat using the forested plain hill, I can produce the same number of hammers using the forested grassland hills without starving, for example) and (2) I'm a big fan of the levee and settle in place will give me 6 extra hammers for free later after Stream Power. That's more than a worker can get working on the plain hill which you try to save to get the hammers.
As for not having enough hammers, I like to stay with Caste System as long as I can (until the unhappiness from not having Emancipation is really becoming unbearable and costs me 20% gold or more to avoid the red-faced citizens), so with Guild and Caste System, the grassland square is equivalent to a grassland hill so it won't be too bad at mid game. At the point where I'm forced to move away from Caste Sytem, I should be close to having Steam Power so I won't worry about hammer here. I will look for another hammer-rich site for military production. This capital seems to be good as a GP farm (NE + Globe) or as a research center (NE/Globe + Oxford) with its abundance of food.

It's true about the levee and I hadn't even considered it, but at the same time I'm not really worried about hammers in the city at that point of the game. My plan was to have the capital eventually become a science center. Oxford+Globe maybe. It also has the makings of a strong merchant center but I don't see that happening until late game as it doesn't have any religons. I suppose the other eventual benefit of the plains hill, and one that may have altered my decision is that it can have one additional fish. I never really pointed it out so you may not see it on the map there, but 2 east and 1 south of the capital is a coast fish, I had given that to my second city to feed it permanently, but I suppose you could keep that in the fat cross of the capital, give it to the second city for now, and use it for more capital specialists later on.

Caste System is something I've never really used much so I can't comment, it's not that I underrate the civic... it's just that I'm addicted to having some way to rush production so I always talk myself out of using it. One day I'll put a priority on the pyramids (for rep, not cash rushing) and give an honest shot at caste system.

[Ming]

Thnks for the edit... that does make things easier to follow along.

And yes, it is strange that you didn't have more barbs to deal with considering all the open land.

[Brael]

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After the year ticked over to AD I kept going in roughly the same direction, I rushed buildings into my cities as I could and made a shot at the pyramids. Not having any forests to chop though makes that really unlikely. You can see here that I had yet another slave revolt in 80 AD. My old standard response was to just crack down on them, but this game I've been trying to evaluate the situation a bit better and have been going with the local authorities unless I need the city back right away.

On the map you can see that my work boat finished exploring and was disbanded. I didn't mention it earlier but off my coast is a small island that would make a good spot for a 6th or 7th city. On the minimap it's to the top right of what's currently visible, though it can't be seen otherwise in my shot.

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Here you can see that I've started a settler to get yet another city out, I also made another ship so that I have a trieme guarding each side of my coast. My cities are coming along nicely but Babylon gets hit with a hurricane, costing me a library and forge.

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My 5th city comes up at about 360 AD and my super warrior has been making his way back to my territory. I've seen a few barb axes/swords at this point so I can no longer reasonably keep him out other than for fog busting, which I'm trying to avoid doing. I don't have a road going all the way to my new city yet because the barbarian activity has been too high, but I'll get it cleared out soon. Given the situation of that land, a lighthouse looks like the smart build but I decide to go with a granary instead. My reasoning here is that I'll have land cleared out before long and a granary trumps a lighthouse if you have any 2+ food tiles to work. You can also see that my warrior is in a bit of a tough spot, but I leave him there confident in his ability to clear out weak barbs. Highly promoted units really are nuts. I hope the AI's have a few.

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One turn later my warrior lives... barely. That's his last fight until I can hook iron up for a promotion.

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In 505 AD Hinduism spreads to me. Despite it only being in my newest and currently worst city I switch for the relations boost with the other civs I know. To tell the truth however, I'm kind of glad it spread to that city, now I don't have to worry about a monument for a fat cross to hook up the clams which are to the south (tough to see but they're next to my flag on the UI). I also haven't been able to get enough time free of barbs in that city to hook up that final road tile. The barbs really start raging against my city too. You can also see my bowman in the mouse over. It hasn't taken much time and he's already at 12/17 exp. Even though it can't fight I can still get use out of my warrior as a medic.

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In 515 I pop a silver on one of the hills Babylon and Nippur share. Between that and religon my happy worries are over for quite awhile. You can see in the screenshot that Akkad is building another settler as well. This is a mistake I made, that I realized almost immediately afterward. I made the settler and then made some bowmen to escort. I should have made the bows first and then the settler as it just sat around costing me coin for a bit. Regardless, the settler is made because I plan to found a city for iron next.

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When 630 rolls around I get a great engineer from my colossus. I figure that I'm being hit hard by barbarians, just founded an exposed city, and am about to found another city that can be hit from all over, so Chichen Itza would make a good use of him. It seemed like a good idea to me at the time, but in hindsight it was a colossal waste.

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Here you see alex trading tech with me. I've never liked trading at such huge disadvantages, but at the same time I recognize I can either trade a 2000 beaker tech for an 800 beaker tech (they seem to be trading at about a 45% ratio for me) and effectively earn 2800 beakers for my research or I can keep it and only earn 2000. Still, a little more is better than nothing, particularly when AI's easily out research you so I take it.

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My iron city is founded and I start making a monument. This was another issue when deciding placement. The options were either get the iron now, or get a fat cross to get the iron later. I decide that with 3 hills, iron, lots of grassland, and a couple of forests that waiting a bit longer (30-60 turns depending on religon spread) for the iron is ok. I'm not in any real danger yet. There's plenty of units in the city and as my warrior taught me, I just need one or two to eventually survive. I do some roads and jungle chops ahead of time with the iron using one worker while the rest of my guys work on making my other city productive. Really, my plan here comes down to abusing promotion rules. In just the few short turns I've had that city up I see how fast raging barbs can promote a defensive unit. I may not like that 10 exp cap on barbs but I understand the reason for it now. Unless I get some great wars later as a result of it I don't think I'll be keeping that change. My research path for awhile now has been towards getting caravels. I'm still doing ok in the tech game but I need some trading partners before it's too late, and not having seen any boats yet, even an exploring ship from Justinian/Alex I think I may have a shot at circumnavigation which would be a first for me in a large civ high difficulty game.

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All of these generals fired in close proximity but I couldn't get the announcements together. I'm not sure who's fighting but it sounds like a pretty big war. I'm guessing two of those went to an imperialistic civ and one went to a regular civ.

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After I get optics I aim for Divine Right. I've always thought of that tech as good trading material, the AI's seem to love it for the wonders and don't seem to prioritize it from my experience so I figure I've got a good shot at picking up Islam while I'm at it.

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A quest pops up here. Build 11 Trireme's and I can have a reward. I love this quest, especially in these types of scenarios where I'm largely coastal. That +1 commerce from harbors would be welcome, so I que Babylon to start pumping out ships. First two caravels, and then the others. I get a couple of ships building in one of my other cities as well.

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Here you can see that the borders of my iron city have expanded. I timed my workers to finish everything they were doing so that only two moves would be wasted, one moving to the iron mine and one away. I want iron two turns after that expansion. You can also see just how much I cleared out for my other city. It's currently working the cottage and clams. Once my iron is hooked up I'll give it a few more tiles since it's almost at size 3. The moment the iron gets hooked up I promote my warrior. I should probably get a few more axes up as well but I'm confident in the ability of a couple well promoted bowmen and a lone axeman to defend my empire if this is all the barbs are going to throw at me. I've lost a lot of respect for Suleiman as an AI after seeing these promotion settings. Either the AI can't deal with it well, or he was doing something like disbanding his own units to save barbs the trouble of killing them.

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Here I get another quest. My navy still isn't online, (the first caravel came out this turn) so it will have to wait. Not having 11 cities and a modern era time limit makes it a low priority for me too. I know the colosseum is my UB and all but an extra 2 health from them, plus a happy face from this quest still doesn't motivate me to build the things. In world news, during same turn a message pops up that saying Taoism is founded.

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I start exploring south west, and after three turns see this. That's still not enough for contact but one turn more will get it for me. During this turn I sat to myself wondering if it was Japan or Russia.

Spoiler:

It was Peter of Russia. Darius seems to have had a unit in the area as well since I got contact with him at the same time despite not seeing him. Right after meeting I gift each of them 50 gold, the reason for this was to go from cautious to pleased which allowed open borders, hoping to offset the religious hit right away.

Spoiler:

Darius sells me his map a couple of turns after we meet. I figured I would be the one getting his map and coin but apparently not. To be paying 370 with the amount I've explored means he has a good chunk of land mapped out. I think about this deal for a few minutes deciding if I can get a lower price for it, and then accept. He doesn't have contact with Alex or Justinian so I can make the money back by selling to them. Or I could if I one of us had paper. I may have to go for that tech next, the coin from some map trades can cover a good chunk of the research cost.

Spoiler:

After seeing the map I start hoping for some Confucianism to spread to me. Alex/Justinian are clearly the loser alliance here. That light blue is Darius, the yellow is a still unknown Egyptian, the light green is Monty (he of all people founded Buddhism in his capital). The dark blue east of Egypt is the Maya, also following the Persian religon.

And Alex offers me a bad deal here. I think I eventually took this, but it was initiated by me.

On the next turn I make a trade with Caesar right who I also met and gifted 50 coin to. I get calendar, he gets compass and 65 gold. The reason I took this is that, my capital is founded on spices... by having calendar I get another happy point. My next city, which you can kind of see in the screenshot also happens to have a spice resource next to it and nothing else for food, just lots of river grass to farm. It's not ideal but combined with my iron city, will be the production backbone of my empire so I need to focus on what helps them out.

Spoiler:

Later on I see this, I find it amusing not just that Caesar of all leaders lost to barbarians, but that he lost his capital and didn't regain it until 1170. It serves him right though, he tried to demand my entire treasury (~900 coins) just a few turns earlier.

You can also see in this screenshot that my exploration and maps have pretty much confirmed this is a standard map. I swore it was torodial but I guess it's cylindrical. And in other news, I met the french. By this point they have one or two tundra cities and no tech of value to me. It seems Peter took all their territory. If you look closely on the south east side of the southern continent you can see a small amount of isolated purple. That's what De Gaulle has left.

Spoiler:

Circumnavigation. It's been a lot of games since I managed to get this on a higher difficulty. It should eventually come in handy for naval battles, but for now it's just preventing others from having gotten it instead.

Spoiler:

I get beaten to Islam in 1205. Later this turn I meet Hatshepsut and confirm through the trade window that she got Divine Right. I was close but I guess I can't win them all. It's still good trading material however and so long as hatty doesn't get a great engineer I think I can make a wonder from it in my iron city.

That's up to what I've played so far now. I felt I did a lot better in the early game, in this portion I just feel a lot like I've been spinning my wheels. I'm keeping up in research pretty well, and maybe I'll do better again being able to trade with more civs, but I can still feel myself falling behind. I also can't decide what to do with expansion. Here's a couple shots of my continent, they're a bit wider than the rest though since I cropped rather than resized the images.

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

It seems to me that I can either expand through the middle and get lots of grass and rivers, without much food, go south for some food and more resources, or north for more food. I'm thinking south here but would be interested in others opinions. Another benefit to north is that I can still use the colossus for awhile, and northern resources are largely near the ocean. Judging by AI size however, if I go south Monty or Darius will settle north, and if I go north Darius will settle south. I also have one AI left to meet by my count, so there's probably someone up on the northern continent. Assuming 12 civs like I thought my initial settings were for, I've got the mayans, egyptians, persians, and aztecs on the eastern continent, the romans, russians, and french on the southern, and myself plus the ottomans (before being wiped out) on mine. Then there's the other two on the northern continent. That's 11 civs and north is all that's unexplored. I think there's some marginal civ up there if they weren't wiped out.

Anyways, if anyone has some ideas for moves I could make or suggestions where I could have improved I would love to hear them. I want to get to the point where I don't struggle on Immortal (though this is hardly indicative of an Immortal game), since I usually just survive until the late game when tech catches up and then out war the opponent. That's a lame way to have to play since it means I have to turn off a few victory types.

[a.kitman]

i think you should start building alot of D units whit CG promotion.

[brandonjm8]

rather drill promos so they can be good attackers unless you plan to never attack and only defend with them.

at your time (turn and year wise) id build some more SoD's and waves of new cities, they have alot more than you. but your starting area wasnt the greatest, i know how that goes. goodluck btw .

[Theben]

Not that I play Immortal games as I still struggle at Emperor, but I'd push south towards the old Ottoman empire. Maybe use that navy of yours to establish a beachhead near the stone (still good if you want Spiral Minaret), and then take Istanbul, which is surely a good city to own. Also there are more diverse resources south than north- copper, crabs, and sheep, in addition to the new ones that are north and south but you currently lack. Lastly I'd be more concerned about Darius landing on your continent than Alex or Justinian.