The first 40 turns

[Franses]

This thread is an investigation into the "best" building sequence in the first 40 turns.

In Civ3 the first 40 turns are generally quite important for the rest of the game. I expected this to be true for Civ4 also.

Besides this investigation was triggered by an intriguing remark of (I think it was Velociryx ?) who suggested to start the game by building a settler.

Goals
I set myself the following goals:
1. To investigate the best starting sequence for building a warrior, settler and worker.
2. To investigate the effect the sequence has on gold/science production

I started out by calculating the best sequence and gold production theoretically. But wanted to "prove" my calculations to be true in a real game and therefore restarted a game three times. Each time using a different building sequence.

I used AU100-A as the test game since many of us have played this game and therefore know the starting environment which may be helpfull when discussing my results / criticizing my approach.
In all games science was set to zero which made it relatively easy to compare the gold output of the sequence.

[Franses]

The results

Sequence	Gold	City 1	City 2
Worker, warrior, settler	414	Size 3	---
Warrior, settler, worker	444	Size 2	Size 2 in 2 turns
Settler, warrior/worker	426	Size 1	Size 2

Worker,warrior,settler remarks
The many floodplanes and the corn do give the feeling that starting the worker is good for this map. The table above does not immediately back that feeling. However one should take into account that, contrary to the other two sequences, this one has 3 farms and some road ready at the end date.

Warrior,settler,worker remarks
Note that in this case the worker was not really finished at the end date (arbitrary set at 2400 bc). In fact the worker still had 4 turns to go.
On the other hand, the second city did produce since 2640 BC.

Settler,warrior/worker remarks
In this case the warrior was actually build in the second city. In the first scenario my settler was eaten by a lion so I had to do it again to get the figures presented in the table.
The funny thing in this scenario is that the capitol is smaller in size than the second city which is halfway to size 3 at the end date.

[Franses]

Conclusions

My conclusions are:

1. The best sequence is not obvious
For me this investigation does not immediately show a superior sequence. This is supported by the impression I had from the AU thread about the first turns. I read that before doing the investigation and, to my surprise, it seemed that, although several sequences were used, the outcome did not differ to much.

Imho, that is a good thing since it enables you to play the game and not do stupid investigations like this one

2. Building a settler first is to dangerous
That it is dangerous is obvious. If you just play the game in single player and don't mind to restart now and then and/or to start from un impossible position (in higher levels) this strategy is not a problem. But if you are playing a tournament or MP game where you have a one time change, this strategy is just to dangerous. Especially so because the advantages are not as clear as I would have expected.

[Cort Haus]

{EDIT : This is BS - I didn't realise at first that the thread was AU-specific. }

Sorry, Franses, this is the wrong forum for that. Only AU stuff is in here - you want the Strategy Forum for that. Either repost on the Strat forum or contact a Moderator who may be able to move the thread for you.

[Skatterbone]

There are also the issues of starting techs and leader attributes.

If I start with 'mining', its logical to start researching bronze working and build a worker first. They tend to finish around the same time, and then let the chopping begin. Also, unusually resource-heavy start locations suggest a worker first approach.

If I start with say....'mysticism' and no agricultural techs, its logical to research toward founding relgions and build settler/warrior. No sense building a worker just so he can sit around and sharpen his axe. On monarch at least, early inefficiency can be a game killer.

On large/ huge maps, exploration and aquiring barb hut goodies can make a big difference in the early game. Also the greater amount of 'uncultured' land tends to promote more barbarian trouble...so you better be ready when they come for a visit. The military/scout types are more useful in these early games.

I agree, Firaxis has done a good job keeping the early game fairly non-linear. I have had success playing monarch games with at least three completely different first tech/first build stratagies.

[Franses]

Skatterbone,

I fully agree that the starting sequence depends on traits and the like. I made it easy on myself to limit the investigation to one particular game.

It is good to know that you also concluded that this Civ is not very dependent on starting sequence. Although I did find a remarkable side effect that I will post if the below is solved.

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Sorry, Franses, this is the wrong forum for that. Only AU stuff is in here.

We do not analyze the games in this thread? I mean, this is discussing the starting sequence of game AU-100 A.

Strange. But if so, operator feel free to move the thread elsewhere. I will await posting my other observations from this investigation until it is clear where it should be posted.

[Cort Haus]

We do not analyze the games in this thread? I mean, this is discussing the starting sequence of game AU-100 A.

Ah, my apologies. I thought it was a generic thread, as the AU-100A wasn't in the title. Yes, a good idea.

[Cort Haus]

Re: Conclusions

Originally posted by Franses
My conclusions are:

1. The best sequence is not obvious
For me this investigation does not immediately show a superior sequence. This is supported by the impression I had from the AU thread about the first turns. I read that before doing the investigation and, to my surprise, it seemed that, although several sequences were used, the outcome did not differ to much.

Imho, that is a good thing since it enables you to play the game and not do stupid investigations like this one

2. Building a settler first is to dangerous
That it is dangerous is obvious. If you just play the game in single player and don't mind to restart now and then and/or to start from un impossible position (in higher levels) this strategy is not a problem. But if you are playing a tournament or MP game where you have a one time change, this strategy is just to dangerous. Especially so because the advantages are not as clear as I would have expected.

Yes, settler-first didn't fare well in this game, but the other, varied approaches did OK. Some similar openings, like the Oracle-Civil Service beeline were pulled off in different ways, with different build orders and different sub-priorities.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Franses
We do not analyze the games in this thread? I mean, this is discussing the starting sequence of game AU-100 A.

Typically, analysis is done in the DAR threads... these are more then just reports, some discussion happens in there as well.

I don't mind you posting a separate thread, BTW, just pointing out that there are other ways.

DeepO

[Dubhghlas]

One thing to consider in the settler first approach is that the early "barbarians" are animals which don't come within your areas of cultural influence, so you can leave a city unguarded without too much worry. But your unguarded settler will be lion/bear/panther/wolf too often to make one comfortable if you send him off without protection, particularly at the higher difficulties.

This suggests a modified strategy: make a warrior first, then a settler. Send them both off to the new city, where you make a settler and use the warrior already there to guard that settler unit, ad infinitum. Once a settler has left, make another warrior for defense of the original city, which probably won't be molested in the time being.

Now, as to the OP, I'm only going to pick one nit:

If you are engaging in a "settler first" strategy, it is likely you will do the same thing with the second city as soon as IT is founded. In which case, you don't see it growing like in your playtest. That test would be more accurate if extended to, say 50 turns and then you compared, and if you have the second city follow the same production sequence as the first city.

Finally, the "settler first" approach does have one particular downside: you don't have a city with the heft in production to take on early wonder building. If you use a warrior/warrior/settler/worker/wonder approach (or switch the worker and the settler), you have maximum benefit in 's from military presence, you have a worker to do appropriate improvements, and you are ready to proceed with a wonder. With certain civs, you can even skip the worker, given that you likely don't have anything the worker can profitably do (Isabella, for example).

Has anyone looked at their AU-100A games to see what rate the AI civs expand at?

[Velociryx]

As a big proponent of Settler first (less so these days, but I still use it, prolly on average more than the rest of the folks here...some 25% of my games), I applaud the efforts made here.

Number of settlers needed is entirely dependant on difficulty level....the goal is to get at least one, yes, but more than that if you're playing lower difficulty levels (typical rule of thumb I use is Prince and below = 4 cities total, Monarch and above = 2 cities total).

On Monarch +, the first 25 turns or so are pretty linear, as there's not a whole lot "going on" in the capitol except waiting.

Note too that I have moved away from using Settler first unless the starting terrain is only marginal, and/or there's a ferociously good site nearby. Otherwise, I'll go worker first + chop settler...some 8 turns slower, but opens up vastly more options...a worthwhile tradeoff in most circumstances, IMO.

And in other news...I started AU 1 again, dominated up thru 1762 (used Farseer, rather than CS Slingshot), but the game crashes at 1762 I guess I'll wait till the next course....*sigh*

-=Vel=-

[Modo44]

Originally posted by Velociryx
And in other news...I started AU 1 again, dominated up thru 1762 (used Farseer, rather than CS Slingshot), but the game crashes at 1762 I guess I'll wait till the next course....*sigh*

Did you try increasing the swap file? Civ4 takes a lot of memory in the late game. Think 2 GB total (RAM + swap) to be safe.

[Velociryx]

Will try that....but given that this course was "Monarch-Lite" I might just wait til the next go 'round anyways. Still, it's a fantastic map....LOVED it!

(Brief synopsis of the game to the point just prior to the crash, for those interested is this:

I opted to play "my way" rather than trying to adapt CS Slingshot to my style...just played intuitively to see what happened. Founded Washington one tile right (DeepO), NY in the same spot (on the plains hill) I did last time.

The clincher was in getting Ironworking from a hut! When that happened, the game was essentially over.

Got three free cities from barbs, too....which was a huge boon.

Built Oracle, Pyramids, Collassus, and G-Lib in the ancient age (took metal casting as my free tech, not so much for the forges, but for ONE forge and a headstart on Collassus). After that, it was coastville.

Only had to fight one war up to that point, too....spain...She founded Buddhism, and tho I eventually founded Confusianism, I adopted her religion (as did Ghengis...we were all three pretty tight until I went free religion....she jumped me three turns later, so I took half her cities (well, four of her seven), and left her alive....

Circimnavigated the globe, dominated the two largish islands west of our starting continent (Size 7 barb city on one...WITH THE HANGING GARDENS!)....guarded by three warriors. Sent a pair of cavalry over and took it out, then spamed settlers to fill it up.

that's about the point the crash occurs...oh well...much fun...

-=Vel=-

[Franses]

I promised some other results from this investigation. I forgot about it but here they are.

In the 5 AU1 games I started in this investigation I reached the hut at 3800 BC. I received the following from it: the wheel, 49 gold, 54 gold, animal husbandry and 74 gold. So each time it was different, which imo is a good thing.

However, a strange thing happened regarding the founded religions by other civs. I generally go for hinduism in my games and I generally make it (monarch or below). The computer civs "always" build buddhism first. So it was here but only when I started building a warrior. In those three cases where I started building a settler or a worker another civ reached hinduism in 3560 BC, BEFORE buddhism was founded and before I could have made it when building a warrior. Now this may have been a coincidence (three out of five does not prove to much) but I thought it worthwhile to mention it. Especially because in a thread someone mentioned that civs build hinduism first which is not my experience at all.

[kptb]

Originally posted by Velociryx

And in other news...I started AU 1 again, dominated up thru 1762 (used Farseer, rather than CS Slingshot), but the game crashes at 1762 I guess I'll wait till the next course....*sigh*

-=Vel=-

I was having problems with the crashes, too. I found that if I save the game every other turn I can avoid crashes altogether. In my experience, if I wait for three or four turns the game may still crash, at least in the later stages. This usually works after I reload the autosave after the first crash. Note that I do not have to reload the game, just save it and it works fine, although toward the end a little slow.
I think that the game tries to keep all moves since the last saved game in its memory and those are cleared out when you save. This would explain why the game crashes at the later stages - more moves! Also note that the saved game file increases from about 75K at the very beginning to more than 350K in the late game on a normal map.
I do not know if this actually helps others but I found it to be a valid strategy to enjoy this great game. Just save your game every other turn (with the same name to save HD space).