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

[Cort Haus]

Which level is that, vulture?

[vulture]

Prince - I must have edited it in to the top while you wer e reading...

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO
CH, it's interesting to compare our starts: even if the tech rate is different between Prince and Monarch, production is not.

We both took the same tile to start on, with you focusing more on production first, while I went for commerce. I'm thinking your path is better here, but it might depend on difficulty.

We discover writing in the same turn (2320 BC), and also start the lib around the same time.

You complete the lib in 2000 BC, I do in 1680 BC... as a result, I can't turn 2 scientists to use, as it would mean my Oracle will be too late. Only having 1 scientist is also going to hurt my tech situation...

The problem I'm seeing, is that you have 2 workers, while I only had one. That was fine, though, I never needed a second one. But by working the wheat near Washington a lot earlier, compensating the extra food with desert mines it seems you can reach a better tech rate. I'm still a bit in front with my extra commerce: I'll reach CoL in 10, you 'only' in 13 turns. But you'll probably build the Oracle sooner, and have an academy sooner.

The only real advantage I can see to not going worker first (which you need if you want to have two of them before 1500 BC), is the religion: a gamble, which in my case paid off.

Oh, and I did need to compensate by building a warrior, a 3-turn delay you didn't encounter. But still, your start would have been faster

DeepO

The effective difference was that you got a settler out before the library, wheras I did a 2nd worker. So, you got a second city far sooner where I was using the 2nd worker to road the corn for a marginal food boost and to start roading to the 2nd city site and stone. As it turned out, that roading only took a couple of turns off Stonehenge in the end, and I bottled out of the Pyramids as I wanted settlers and units for some Rexing. With this much land to occupy and the time to do it on Prince, expansion seemed better than Pyramids. The Mongols built the Pyramids, and they were short of land - which cost them dear.

As my first settler was built while running 2 scientists, it was much later to get out and found New York.

[Cort Haus]

The other difference, DeepO, was that I went to Writing via AH (detouring for mining) rather than through the religious techs. Starting with Agriculture and not Mysticism, AH(100)-->Writing is approx half the cost of Mysticism(50) + Meditation(80) + Priesthood (60), is it not?

[DeepO]

Originally posted by vulture
Uncovering the hut to the south gives us a scout, so the scout heads off to explore more efficiently while the warrior heads back home to do some guard duty. That plan lasts all of one turn, until the scout gets eaten by bears. Warrior goes back out exploring again.

I know that feeling. You spend 5 minutes looking at the map to get some nice little tactic going... next turn something switches everything around again.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
The other difference, DeepO, was that I went to Writing via AH (detouring for mining) rather than through the religious techs. Starting with Agriculture and not Mysticism, AH(100)-->Writing is approx half the cost of Mysticism(50) + Meditation(80) + Priesthood (60), is it not?

Aha, this might explain a few things: I've been seriously miscalculating costs! Of course, you start with agri, which means only AH to go for before writing. I didn't count that one...

It's not so much difference in total though. I needed the research to get to CoL, which means I need to have priesthood as well. In that way, it's the least expensive to pass on AH, and go through the priesthood way to lib. That doesn't mean it will give you the biggest bpt, though: if you can start a lib faster, you will have the bonusses faster. Which means you will be faster in reaching priesthood.

I should have seen that. I should have gone through AH... I'm not sure I can build a lib before starting on priesthood, though. But at least more of the CoL research would have been done by 2 scientists +25% bonus.

Probably, I'm going to test this out when this game finishes. AH didn't seem like much of a deal with no cows near, but knowing there are horses, and knowing the tech advantage if you play it well (probably one worker + one warrior before lib. Worker definately first. settler after lib.) you should be able to get better results.

I'm curious to what is going to be the absolutely best start here, research wise. Already the discussion has given me new insights

I'm also curious to see what the best expansion is going to be. I think I saw 4 cities at 1520 BC once, and most players on 2 or 3 cities. The difference after that seems to happen exactly after this 1500 BC mark: some people are continuing in full expansion for a couple more cities (to e.g. 5), others go for a wonder first, and for a long period are with only 2-3 cities. Then, they expand to 5-8 at once.

DeepO

[DeepO]

BTW, going for mysticism first is a bit cheaper than the (50) shows: because at least a couple of civs already have the tech, it will be cheaper for you (actually, the tech costs remains, but you generate more virtual bpt). AH will be full price: nobody will have it.

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Has anyone found that a policy of move-and-check on flat ground can preserve a scout? I haven't had enough scouts to try this with so far, It's the second move that tends to meet the bear, by which time it's too late. Single moves, unless a forest is available for the second, and retreating if needed, might be slow, but it's quicker than building another warrior and sending it out to where the ex-scout got to.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO
BTW, going for mysticism first is a bit cheaper than the (50) shows: because at least a couple of civs already have the tech, it will be cheaper for you (actually, the tech costs remains, but you generate more virtual bpt). AH will be full price: nobody will have it.

DeepO

I see. I wondered why the beaker cost often didn't match the No of Turns required for it.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Has anyone found that a policy of move-and-check on flat ground can preserve a scout? I haven't had enough scouts to try this with so far, It's the second move that tends to meet the bear, by which time it's too late. Single moves, unless a forest is available for the second, and retreating if needed, might be slow, but it's quicker than building another warrior and sending it out to where the ex-scout got to.

No... but a mistake I've made so many times it's just silly is moving 2 tiles at once, and passing a barb warrior when I could have retreated. Or even worse: attack stuff unwanted (e.g. archers in jungle) because you set a longer automove through some grey FoW and while not looking a barb jumped into your path.

In special cases, I've used a move-and-check poilciy for exploring workers or missionaries though. And I tend to do it regularly with settlers.

The problem are those panthers. Wolves too, but Panthers... ouch!

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


I see. I wondered why the beaker cost often didn't match the No of Turns required for it.

The idea is similar to the one in Civ3: when you're last to research a tech, it will only cost you half the turns as compared to the first one.

Its implementation is better, though: by giving a bonus to the bpt generated instead of subtracting from the cost, the effect is much more smoother. In Civ 3: when all the AIs got a tech and traded it amongst themselves, your cost dropped so significantly that in most cases you were doing overruns, losing money even.

Now, only the part that is still left gets a bonus: if an AI discovers a tech one turn before you, you might be able to put the slider back 10% for this turn, but it's not like Civ3 where you set the slider back all the way and were still spilling beakers.

There's another choice here, BTW. You can save your beakers. By not picking a tech, your beakers get added... next turn you will put twice as much in the tech you choose. You're able to keep that up for several turns, meaning that you can scout out whatever tech the AI has researched, and pick another one. In one turn, you discover it, and can instantly trade it to the AIs.

The problem with this, is that the bonus is not applied to what has been stored in your spill-queue: if you would after having saved up beakers pick a tech that somebody already has, you still pay the price like it was you researching it first.

That should balance the use of something which otherwise might become a serious exploit (although I'm not so sure it wouldn't be possible in certain circumstances to abuse this spilling)

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO

Probably, I'm going to test this out when this game finishes. AH didn't seem like much of a deal with no cows near, but knowing there are horses, and knowing the tech advantage if you play it well (probably one worker + one warrior before lib. Worker definately first. settler after lib.) you should be able to get better results.

DeepO

With worker, warrior, library though, would there be enough hammers around to make the quick Writing turn into a quick library? Without mining there'll be an excess of food, with which the optimum things to build are surely a settler or a worker?

Certainly one to try - but I should really get back to my Industrial Segment first.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO

That should balance the use of something which otherwise might become a serious exploit (although I'm not so sure it wouldn't be possible in certain circumstances to abuse this spilling)

DeepO

I really like the spill-retrieval system of Civ 4. It would be a shame if it became a focus of over exploitative play. I'm mulling over the advantages of prebuilding (but not finishing) various unit types in numerous cities, then finishing them each off in consecutive turns to save on support costs. Would that be cheesy? It has it's limits, but it sounds like good use of game mechanics to me.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


With worker, warrior, library though, would there be enough hammers around to make the quick Writing turn into a quick library? Without mining there'll be an excess of food, with which the optimum things to build are surely a settler or a worker?

I'm thinking it should be something like this:
- worker
- warrior while going to size 3. meanwhile you go for writing
- worker farms in the mean time. There are at least 4 tiles worthy of a farm, so he won't get idle
- after writing, mining.
- if you don't know what to build before a lib, go for a warrior, possibly even a settler. Otherwise, start building a lib right after your warrior. Switch to full production to get the lib faster.
- the worker starts to mine. Probably twice before the lib completes.
- lib completes, go for irr. tiles (should be plenty of those), and a settler build. Set 2 scientists.
- Cruise to priesthood and CoL. Start the Oracle the moment you can. Before reaching CoL (long before, even), you will get an academy. At this point, you can switch to production to get the Oracle faster.
- Oracle completes, and settlers galore.

The faster you get that academy, the better. And any time you've got too much production, build a settler. Also, and this is something which didn't become needed for me during the Oracle build, but later was used for many cities: don't be afraid to run a food deficit! If you're lacking health, expansion won't help much, which means your queued food is just a way of getting more production by using e.g. desert hills.

Certainly one to try - but I should really get back to my Industrial Segment first.

I'm half way in the Renaissance era. One thing I'm proud of: I managed to avoid reading any DAR later than my current period so far... but even reading the 'older' ones takes a while

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


I really like the spill-retrieval system of Civ 4. It would be a shame if it became a focus of over exploitative play. I'm mulling over the advantages of prebuilding (but not finishing) various unit types in numerous cities, then finishing them each off in consecutive turns to save on support costs. Would that be cheesy? It has it's limits, but it sounds like good use of game mechanics to me.

I think unfinished builds decay just like tech does. I have no idea about the decay rates, but I can imagine these were balanced as well. Most 'exploits' should get hindered by that, but you can't stop all of them.

DeepO