AU 100-A DAR 1: 4000 BC - 1520 BC

[lastchance]

Map-Specific things:
Americans have a lot of room to expand. I didn't fully take advantage of all the room available to me, unfortunately, couldn't get the beakers + coin flowing fast enough. But, still, it's not hard to get tons of land. Very good starting position, IMHO.

Financial is a very good trait. Looking at the surroundings and the traits, it looks like Americans are begging to go for The Wheel - Pottery, especially on that map without early horses, copper, and the requisite techs to do anything else, though I suppose founding a religion could also work. I think a nice clean shot at the Oracle might be worth it, though I would not want to delay Pottery too long. (if at all).

Even with the Americans, one of the most tech-happy civs in the game (IMHO), you still have to worry about military. I think you need to pick up archers quickly, spearmen quickly, and make sure you hit Longbowmen ahead of most. Getting invaded sucks, and so do Barbarians.

[DeepO]

Yeah, it's an interesting pick of city locations, Thrar.

I've done plenty of alphabet beelines myself, and there certainly is a place for them. However, I found lately that after the trade rounds I run out of steam. That's why I like the CS beeline: by the time you complete alphabet, you've got at least 2 techs (+ alphabet) nobody else has. Trading can continue for longer, it seems.

DeepO

[petermarkab]

DAR 1, Prince Level

AU 100-A During Action Report

Preliminaries...
Select Prince difficulty level. I have played 2 or 3 games at prince level and feel confident enough to take a game to completion!

Action
4000 - Warrior moves to hill to uncover more terrain. I want to choose the best starting location from this rather good selection. Settler crosses the Potomac and founds Washington with two resource-rich looking hills in its sights. Corn not an advantage just now cause have flood plains too. I may want to use that for my second city. Culture will make it available in 10. Research mining (followed by bronze working). Look at all those trees! I've tended to build cottages on Flood plains in previous games - will lean towards irrigating them this time for extra growth. Pottery will therefore also be a priority.

3840 - Warrior sights grapes and corn to the north - thats where my first city will go.

3760 - Goody hut produced a scout. lucky me!

3640 - Buddism founded (by Isabella I later discover)

3200 - Bismark shows up to NE - I'd better explore there. Hinduism founded somewhere but we don't care.

3120 - Discover Bronze; I want cottages so I go for Pottery via the wheel.

2640 - Baltimore founded north of Washington - similar sort of site, so will provide the second economy-food engine.

2000 - Ghengis gets in with a request for open borders on the turn i discover writing (personally i find this irritating - am i not in control of the information going out of my empire?)

1880 - New York founded to take advantage of the pigs, and also as a safe city site (I'm assuming all my enemies are based to the north/north-east)

1640 - Ghengis is annoyed with Isabella "Isabella is no better than he should be (annoyed)" A sordid encounter in Ghengis' tent maybe?
Also discovered a barbarian state to the SW so sent 3 warriors to beat them up. So far so good...

1520 BC End of DAR 1.



Thoughts

I plan to expand north and east particularly to get the ivory and copper (if ghengis is sluggish himself). Also, that mountain chain (NE) forms a nice natural barrier behind which i can consolidate.

My initial plan to go for heavy logging didn't materialise as much as i'd intended. One factor was the negative health aspects of flood plains. I'd stupidly cut my forests down to 2, so wasn't getting any benefit from them at all. Lesson is to learn the thresholds.

I'm pleased with my tech status, especially with alphabet arriving in 6 turns - I'll be able to capitalise on that and hopefully found one or two of the later religions. Once I get the pigs hooked up (health reasons) I'll grow Washington and Baltimore into great people producing cities.

Stats: GNP 2nd, MFG 6th, Food 1st, Military 6th, Land 1st, Score 2nd place (252)

Regards,
Peter

[DeepO]

Is it just me, or did most of the players got a scout at some part in their early expansion? I've seen at least two scouts at 4000 BC (Aeson and my own), but plenty report scouts later...

DeepO

[lockstep]

For me it was six goodie huts, no scouts. (OTOH, no barbs, too.)

[Fluffybunnyfeet]

Prince difficulty

Starting out

My first thoughts on exploration are that there is a lot of good land near by, and the competing cultures are a good distance away. I'm hoping to be able to set down a good half-dozen cities and to make a building-centred civilisation.

Opening rounds included learning experiences, such as :

Chasing and missing out on religions (Hinduism, Bhuddism, even Judaism)
Good exploration (have uncovered about 400 tiles of the map, lost no units so far)
Worker with little to do - could not create Pasture, (no Animal Husbandry) and also found that I had no Pottery, so no cottages either!



The future

I will be militarily weak for quite some time, probably at least until the advance of Cavalry. Even then, I don't plan on using military conquest except to hold aggressive competitors in check. If I make it to the modern era though, anything could happen

My next task is to create a Barrack Town, in the perfect spot north of the Capital (lots of food and lots of hills to mine).

[Aeson]

Originally posted by DeepO
Is it just me, or did most of the players got a scout at some part in their early expansion? I've seen at least two scouts at 4000 BC (Aeson and my own), but plenty report scouts later...

After seeing all the similar games going on, I decided to stop and try a different approach. I played out the start the same way and got a different result. No Scout.

I figured this meant that loading a game as a scenario starts the game with a random seed, as Civ III did. So I tried again to see if it gave a different result. But it gave the same result as the second attempt. Tried it 2 more times, same result the first time... second time I got the Scout from the hut again. The second time I had first gone to "Custom Game" by accident, before going to "Play A Scenario", so I tried that again. And voila, a Scout from the hut.

So it seems there is some sort of change in the RNG state due to going into "Custom Game". There is no change in the RNG between loadings of a scenario though.

(Perhaps this has something to do with all the "same" maps being generated?)

[petermarkab]

Hey thrar,

just comparing your start with mine - a very similar strategy going for alphabet (you got there first), you moved washington 1 tile east. you founded 2nd city north, but why place it where you've got 3 peaks in your fat cross?

It raises an issue i've not come across yet having not played past Divine Right - Gunpowder level. What improvements can you build on desert?

good dar btw,

regards,

Peter

[Aeson]

Can only build Roads and Railroads on Desert (not including Flood Plains). Can build resource (or feature) specific improvements on the resources (or features) if they show up in Desert though.

[Bobtoad]

I didn't receive a scout from a hut. Lots of gold and a map with the starting hut.

I did build one though. The early death of my first warrior left me behind in exploring. Since Hunting is cheap and leads to Archery, and scouts are cheap, I figured I needed the extra movement at the time to get some shroud uncovered.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Aeson


After seeing all the similar games going on, I decided to stop and try a different approach. I played out the start the same way and got a different result. No Scout.

I figured this meant that loading a game as a scenario starts the game with a random seed, as Civ III did. So I tried again to see if it gave a different result. But it gave the same result as the second attempt. Tried it 2 more times, same result the first time... second time I got the Scout from the hut again. The second time I had first gone to "Custom Game" by accident, before going to "Play A Scenario", so I tried that again. And voila, a Scout from the hut.

So it seems there is some sort of change in the RNG state due to going into "Custom Game". There is no change in the RNG between loadings of a scenario though.

(Perhaps this has something to do with all the "same" maps being generated?)

Hmmm... I'm not sure this is wanted behaviour here, especially not in case there is a hut to pop in 4000 BC. There wouldn't be an option when setting up a scenario, to preserve random seed?

This does give the ability to make test games for other purposes, though. There was some concern about that: loading the same save always gives the same seed, so all your tests would be the same as well.

DeepO

[Caligula 37 AD]

Warlord level


(Caligula is a little nervous before putting the head inside the giljotine.
Her is my first DAR, I hope my non-native english is understandable)

DAR 1 and 2 for the finance havens of Caligula IX
I post them together for I too reached Classical era before 1520BC. I Guess that comes with the difficulty level in my case.

Americans:
Financial & Organised, starts with agri an fishing.
Memo:The combo of +1 commerce and cheap lighthouses for +1 food on coast tiles favours coastal cities.

UU: Navy SEAL (for Marine) +promotion March (heal while moving), needs Industrialism and Rifling
Question 1: What promotion will a Navy SEAL get if build in city with Red Cross (Medic I)?
(Ohh well, that's a long way into the game, will forget about the UU for a while)

Goal number 1 (Overall Strategy):
Playng with the traits: Will try to make a strong commercial civ by developing trade havens in coastal cities. This means taking decisions toward trade and commerce whenever there is a choice.

Essential WW: Great Lighthouse (+2 trade routes in coastal cities), needs Masonry.
Essential building: Harbour(compass)
Essential tech: Astronomy
Good resources: Dye(Calendar), Fur(Hunting), Gems(Mining), Gold(Mining), Incense(Mining), Silk(Calendar),
Silver(Mining), Spices(Calendar), Uranium(Mining), Wine(Meditation)
Best civics: Free trade

Lets play:
Setting the level to Warlord so I'll be able to build without so much disturbance from AIs and barbs. And so far I can't cruise Noble well enough to be able to focus on Strategy.

4000BC: Hut gives Worker! Prime start. Washington founded on spot. No bronze for chopping means I go for 1 warrior for extra scouting. Farming the corn. Beelining for Bronze.
Capitol Hill is not on coast, but I find a prime coastal spot to the east for my second city.

3600: Some AI founded Buddhism. Oh well, my initial goal will be masonry for Great Lighthouse.
3650: Sign peace with Genghis coming from north. Hut gives Masonry, I cant believe my luck!
3360: Another hut gives Settler! I'm not cheating, honest! New York founded on bay N-E of capitol.
Research set to 90%.
Note to self: New York should have been set a bit further south to make more workable coast tiles.

3360 Tech list (f=free, t=traded, r=now researching)): agri(f), fishing(f), mining, masonry(f), bronze, sailing(r)

3240: Hinduism founded somewhere. That was late, even I could have gotten that one.
Note to self: Should have let Washington grow to size 4 (1 turn) before starting 1st settler. Lost 6-7 hammers before corrected.
3080: Hut gives Hunting, Lions give promotion to first warrior.
Woodsman I, b/c it looks like there is some jungle and forest in the north.

Status 3000 BC:
-Washington size 5, 1 unhealthy, 7fpt surplus, 3hpt, 12base commerce (2gold, 10beakers),
producing worker to prevent grovt, to farm flood plains and to create trade network.
-New York size 1, 2fpt surplus, 2hpt, 2base commerce (1 gold, 1beaker),-1maintenance(distance), producing worker.
-Boston, deciding to settle one tile away from recommended "blue" tile for coastal city, this according to strategy. Question 2: Was that smart?
1ftp surplus, 3hpt, 1base commerce (1gold, 0beaker), -1maintenance(distance), producing worker.
-Peace with Genghis and Izzy(Buddhist)

2920: Scout from hut
2760: Peace with Saladin
2680: Beelining for alphabet for backfilling by trade, Setting 1 worker to Auto-trade-network-build. (later stopped)

2400: Behold all americans! Our Woodsman II Warrior is reported killed in combat against some vile barbarians far north of our borders.
Our heroes stumbled upon two groups of barbarian villains resting in a hut near the Mongolian borders.
The barbarians attacked our men unprovoked, and all though our men fought well and was able to kill one of the groups,
the sheer number of barbarians was to much for our woodsmen trained for combat in forest and jungle. The generals on Capitol blame themselves for giving bad orders and beeing too greedy.
A short service will be held as soon as we build a Temple.
Their pioneer work on our frontiers of knwoledge will never be forgotten.
Requiesat en pasce.

2240: Worker killed by panther near New York
2080: Hut gives 70 gold, Open Borders with Genghis
2000: Peace with Bismarck
1960: Peace and open Borders with Hatty (Hindu). Philly founded far north (too far?) Riverside with 7 workable coast tiles. Good spot it is, defended by 1 warrior.
1600: Discovering Alphabet, Entering Classical Era.

Status:
4 Cities (3 on Coast). (size7+2+3+1)
Tech line: agri(f), fishing(f), mining, masonry(f), bronze, hunting(f), sailing, pottery, writing, alphabet, iron w(r)
Total commerce: 30(all base) Total beakers(90%): 24bpt, Total gold(10%): 6gpt
Producing: Library(6 turns left), Granary(11), Great Light(zillion; will chop), Lighthouse(6).
Military: 7 warriors (minimal promotion), lost 1scout, 1warrior to barbs.
Trade: 1 route in each city for 5 commerce (2 from Karakorum to Capitol)

Strategy evaluation:
My coast cities are still too poor on culture to get access too good resources, no trade havens yet.

It will be exiting to see what Great Light will do to commerce, but there is probably not many good foreign cities to trade with yet.
Capitol is still the driving force in commerce, but Boston is closing in, expecting Philly to be good soon too.

I see that this is a somewhat different approach than what others have played. If you see an obvious reason why my approach won't work, it is much appreciated. Well hey, any comments are appreciated (even "you mis-spelled..."-ones)

Technical report: No problems, toggling to notepad and back is ok but not smooth.
(image hopefully included)

[Derelict]

Noble Difficulty

INDEX

Early Ancient
Late Ancient -- Brief!!
Classical
Medieval: Parts 1 & 2
Medieval: Part 3
Renaissance: Part 1
Renaissance: Part 2
Industrial
Modern

Goals:

Since Washington is a Financial/Organized leader, I plan to engage a strategy that will focus on a heavy science/tech advantage as well as late game engineering for the capture of some key late game wonders. Due to this, it's likely I'll also pursue a space race victory but we'll see how it plays out in the end.

In the interim, I'll also quite possibly pursue the capture of a rival civ's cities to expand the empire along the way. Religion will not be a direct focus though I intend to inherit someone elses religion and try to establish at least one very strong ally along the way.

Depending on what is available for the earlier era's, the only wonder(s) I'll have any central focus on are the Great Library (for scientists), the Hanging Garden's (for engineer) and possibly the Collosus (for merchant), though the latter is unlikely. I'll also be shooting for forges sooner than later to get engineer specialists and the obvious increase in productivity. I'm holding a bit of a preference (untested with Washington as that may be for me) for engineers both to assist in late game wonders and because they tend to offer chances at discovering techs that will be a bit more important to me along the way, in this game.

Other than that, I'll wait to see how things play out before honing any further strategy points.

Also this is my first ever DAR so I decided to play this out on noble (though I've mostly been playing on Prince of late all the same). Dunno why, just did.

----------------------------------------------------

I establish the city of Washington and start building a warrior. My existing warrior visits with a nearby village who provides a map revealing a stone source not far away. The likelyhood that the hanging gardens will be American just improved, assuming I can get that stone source situated away. It also brightens the odds (and changes my perspective) on perhaps pursuing one or more other wonders sooner rather than later.

That also helps determine my tech course a bit, as I'll be now going mining -> masonry -> wheel -> pottery.

The stone appears to be 6 spaces away, with a very lean desert stretching to most of the west of it--less than ideal for the city I plan to settle there. On the bright side, it will also include a wheat source and elephants, once the borders have expanded.

Received a scout thanks to the help of another village. For now I'll leave my original warrior out scouting as well.

At 3,520 B.C. my first warrior is built. Tempted as I am to get a settler out early, no other civ's are in sight and I decide to build another warrior to let Washington grow to size three, first.

3,280 B.C. and Buddhism and Hinduism have been founded elsewhere. That's all well and good. 2nd warrior has been built and have started on that settler with a size 3 Washington. I've also made contact with Bismark.

3,120 B.C., my scout encountered a village who offered up the hunting tech. Wonderful since I can go for bronze before long and hopefully locate a source of copper. Encountered Genghis at home to the far NE.

2,880 B.C. and I now have all of the above mentioned techs out of the way + hunting, thanks to the village. Started on bronze working and should have the settler out very soon.

2,760 B.C. Encountered Saladin at home. My brave scout was slain by lions.

2,400 B.C., settler enroute toward stone. I've decided, to my chagrin, to settle him 7 squares out to better take advantage of surrounding terrain, including additional elephants and a nearby river. Still less than ideal but will prove quite useful all the same. I also started on archery since there is no brone in sight.

2,280 and New York is settled. I've also met up with some warriors of Hatshepsut. My crack caveman scientists are now working on writing.

2,000 B.C. and I've got a worker out, who will first get a road between Washington and New York. I've got another settler being built now and am bringing out an archer in New York in the meantime. I'd like to get 4 cities up before I start on either the Great Library or, sooner, the hanging gardens in Washington. We'll see though. Also met up with Isabella. I don't like her much and she seems to be my ongoing arch-nemesis. Did I mention I don't like her?

1,800 B.C. Much as I don't want too I start on Iron working. It's quite possible that horses are in range (I can't see them due to a lack of animal husbandry) but I'd prefer units requiring iron first, if possible. If an iron source is nearby I can ignore horses for the time being and continue on toward the techs for the wonders I want.

I open borders with Genghis and Isabella. Shortly thereafter Saladin and Hatshepsut coming calling for the same deal, which I grant.

I over ran a little without noticing that it was now 1,440 B.C. Iron working is 6 turns off and all is well.

|

[Thrar]

Originally posted by petermarkab
just comparing your start with mine - a very similar strategy going for alphabet (you got there first), you moved washington 1 tile east. you founded 2nd city north, but why place it where you've got 3 peaks in your fat cross?

reminder:


First thought was that I wanted NY somewhere in the north of Washington; the south was uncontested and can be settled later. East (the Boston spot or around that) didn't look very promising, so NW was the choice for general direction.
Alternatives to my choice (and why I picked this):
- further west: same peak problem, corn not in initial radius, even more floodplains.
- south or southeast: lots of overlap with W.
- SW: not much scouted yet (even now, by 1520BC), also lots of floodplains.
- north: off the river. Didn't even consider that really.
- east: on the corn, IIRC you only get a partial food bonus from that. 1 tile more overlap, but that's a minor point.


I'd also be interested in some more comments on choosing city locations, especially by DeepO and Vel, who settled in the same area as I did. Do you consider the wines that important, even though they require Monarchy to access them?

[Dubhghlas]

I'll take a crack at that.

More than ever before, it seems to me that the coders of this game are trying to force you to think really long term. That's the reason that they have abandoned the usual "expansionist, rational, civilized" approach is the winning approach which has been the model for Civ, CivII, SMAC and CivIII. It's not about being fast, it's about being well-placed and maximizing the placement in the long term. Note that you don't get immediately hammered by your neighbors in this game (at least I haven't, yet).

So under those circumstances, it is really vital to go and get resources when available. Three wine squares able to be utilized by one city is an absolute godsend; you have your own cities covered, you have two extra to use to trade with, and they are easily defended with the installation of a strong point right next to them. If you don't go grab them, I am certain that Genghis will.

Besides, Monarchy is easily reached without much trouble. As usual, I head for it very quickly.