Civilisation choice for beginner

[Black Knight 427]

Don't forget the importance of cottages.

[Rasputin]

Biggest beginner early move mistake - building warriors and scouts as your first units.

What if barbarians are an issue in local area?

Surely making an undefended worker is not good.


In BtP I lost my opening unit "a scout" very early and was inundated with Barbarians for thousands of years.

I had started following the type of start you describe but once the first barb warrior entered the city radius of my capital i had to rush build warriors instead,

So each opening moves is different dependant on where you located.

Usualy i build work boat if on caost and capable or a worker if not.

but is a big risk leaving yourself unprotected.

[Pinchak]

For the first 20 turns or so the only "barbs" are of the animal variety, and they won't enter culture boarders, so your workers are safe.

Keep in mind, I didn't say ignore an early military. The key is to either hook up copper early for axemen, or get archery before building units. The main reason behind this is that warriors are practically obsolete by the time you build one.

You really don't want to spend those critical first turns building obsolete units. The only time a scout useful IMO is if your civ starts with one. Again, by the time you build a scout it's usefulness has diminished (most huts will have been popped by others).

Just as a side note... learn to embrace the barbs! When I see barbs I think of easy unit promotions. Try to lure them into your borders (for the GG points), then simply place a counter-unit on a terrain bonus. The dumb barb will either attack at a disadvantage, or move into a square with no advantage for the barb.

Uprisings and raging can be a problem. One good stratagy for dealing with that is to city garrison some archers, let them fortify, and let the barbs bang their head off your multiple defense bonus defenders. They tend to B-line for cities, which spares you excessive pillaging which can occur with a good human invader.

[rah]

Try to lure them into your borders (for the GG points),

You don't get GG points fighting barbs do you?

Biggest beginner early move mistake - building warriors and scouts as your first units

In SP, I agree, but in MP, I love finding someone's cap that went worker first. Game over for them and a great advantage for me.
Depending on who's in the game or my starting position, I will usually put a few turns in towards a warrior so if someone shows up I can switch back and finish it before they can reach my cap.

[OzzyKP]

Just as a side note... learn to embrace the barbs! When I see barbs I think of easy unit promotions. Try to lure them into your borders (for the GG points), then simply place a counter-unit on a terrain bonus. The dumb barb will either attack at a disadvantage, or move into a square with no advantage for the barb.

The only way your borders make a difference for GG points is if you have the Great Wall (which doubles GG points inside your borders). (Imperialistic doubles GG points everywhere).

But not only, as Rah pointed out, do you not get GG points for barbs in the first place, but luring them into your borders is impossible if you have the great wall.

[rah]

Since I rarely build the GW sometimes you have to be creative to deal with the barbs when you get unlucky with early metal and horses. Since I know I'm going to have to detour to research ironwork earlier than I normally would, I hate to waste any tech turns so I'll sometimes cheat and not research archery. As a result, you're awfully vulnerable to barbs. I'll build a few spare workers and post them at my borders. When barbs show, I'll move the workers out to bait the barbs. Once they've aquired the scent, I'll lead them to my neighbors.

[St Jon]

That is a really evil Rah type trick!

Why didn't I ever see that?

[Black Knight 427]

I wonder how many players had been crippled early because of that trick.

[Rasputin]

For the first 20 turns or so the only "barbs" are of the animal variety, and they won't enter culture boarders, so your workers are safe.

Keep in mind, I didn't say ignore an early military. The key is to either hook up copper early for axemen, or get archery before building units. The main reason behind this is that warriors are practically obsolete by the time you build one.

You really don't want to spend those critical first turns building obsolete units. The only time a scout useful IMO is if your civ starts with one. Again, by the time you build a scout it's usefulness has diminished (most huts will have been popped by others).

Just as a side note... learn to embrace the barbs! When I see barbs I think of easy unit promotions. Try to lure them into your borders (for the GG points), then simply place a counter-unit on a terrain bonus. The dumb barb will either attack at a disadvantage, or move into a square with no advantage for the barb.

Uprisings and raging can be a problem. One good stratagy for dealing with that is to city garrison some archers, let them fortify, and let the barbs bang their head off your multiple defense bonus defenders. They tend to B-line for cities, which spares you excessive pillaging which can occur with a good human invader.

in the BtP game, i had warroir invaders before i had the tech for archery...

I built a worker first only to discover i diditn have any techs that allwoed him to do anything. simple mistake for a beginer, no roads no chopping no farms nothing.


once i got archers the barbs would leave the citys alone but then attacked my improvments, mainly targeting my copper supply.

so now i had to build more defenders to send there.

this alll limited my improvments of city or chance to build more settlers.

Now the barbs were deveopliong faster than i was. my archers were attacked by axemen .

i dont think truly there is any strategy that can be used by a newbie in these type of encoutners with barbs.

[Black Knight 427]

If that was your problem I would have just B linged to the Great Wall.

[rah]

Or you could just post scouts out in the borderlands since barbs only appear in areas of fog. No fog areas near, very few barbs.

[Rempedaalops]

Egypt is also not bad, because of the obelisk giving you free specialists, and because of the early more powerful chariots, which makes defending a bit easier. Also, the combination of Ramesses spiritual and industrious traits is quite handy if you want to get things built quickly and change civics without anarchy. Hathshepsut also has the +2 cultural bonus, which is nice at the start. Not to mention having the Wheel already at the start. But, yeah, the Dutch and the Ethiopians are probably even better choices

[OzzyKP]

You don't get free specialists, you just get to place specialists. It can be very useful, but I wouldn't at all describe it as newbie friendly. Same thing with the spiritual trait.

[Theben]

I'll add the Native Americans, mainly since they're my favorite civ, but also b/c their UU is available very early and quite useful in both SP and MP. Since the AI civs will have warriors defending their cities early, and barb cities warriors for a long time, 2-3 Dog Soldiers (that don't need copper to build) can add quite a few cities to your empire. Against humans with chariots your protective archers will further benefit from the totem pole bonus, and with a little practice those extra Great People will boost your tech and money.

In SP on higher levels, Dog Soldiers are best used as defense vs. barbarians. I prefer either Woodsman II/III for an early armed scout and combat 1, cover, and medic 1 for the ideal defender vs barbs.

[Heraclitus]

I'll add the Native Americans, mainly since they're my favorite civ, but also b/c their UU is available very early and quite useful in both SP and MP. Since the AI civs will have warriors defending their cities early, and barb cities warriors for a long time, 2-3 Dog Soldiers (that don't need copper to build) can add quite a few cities to your empire. Against humans with chariots your protective archers will further benefit from the totem pole bonus, and with a little practice those extra Great People will boost your tech and money.

In SP on higher levels, Dog Soldiers are best used as defense vs. barbarians. I prefer either Woodsman II/III for an early armed scout and combat 1, cover, and medic 1 for the ideal defender vs barbs.

We're talking primarily MP here.

NA are a hard civ to play in Diplo. Like Japan they have a problem of being too geared for war (albeit a defensive war in their case, though I have seen strong cases made for an archer rush).