Here's one I've never seen before.

[War4ever]

its the leaving of caravans by a city that is suspicious

[rah]

yes, enemy caravans discover quite a few of my poised diplos. Especially if I have one poised waiting for a certain tech to be finished and their tech rate sucks.

Ships are much better, but there are only so many costal cities to pluck.

[War4ever]

yes, anothe reason i try not to build right on the coast...plus you can always add a city on the tip later if you run out of room....

but mainly to avoid ships with those sea trannys

[rah]

I'll sometimes do that, the last time I got pinned in and rushed mapmaking just to discover after researching it that i had no coastal cities to build ships in.

[War4ever]

thats the worst, if you dont' have sea your in some trouble i think. Sea squares can make all the difference. nothing worse than haveing hills plains and sea with mountain rock, without the green its hard to grow

especially with all those tiny lakes, you end up having to connect 6 cities and lakes just to reach the shore

[Caesar the Great]

map making ---> polytheism

who needs trade?

[La Fayette]

Originally posted by Caesar the Great
who needs trade?

ask solo

[War4ever]

care to explain

[La Fayette]

War4ever,

solo and samson are the best specialists of early landing (therefore those who have discovered most important features about how this game works).

solo is currently busy improving his previous records on standard and big maps, and also giving detailed and well thought advice to those willing to read.

His thread about pre 500AD landings (currently on top of Apolyton's strategy forum) is a masterpiece.

... and trade is VERY important for early landing

[War4ever]

well yes thanx for the reply, those early landing dn't really interest me, landing is landing IMO, but now you have sparked my curiousity, i am off to read pages of threads,

you technical guys are great, before i did everything b/c it worked for me through trial and error and my mind works in this sort of way, for you guys to add rhyme and reason to my findings or experiences is just icing on the cake

[La Fayette]

War4ever,

You can count me in when talking about "technical guys", since I am one of those who made thorough testing about "how it works" (like Xin Yu, Slow Thinker or Marquis de Sodaq, for example).

Don't count me in when talking about "early landers" because I play mostly conquest games, and especially scenarios.

My proposal would be to state that the club of early landers would be restricted to players who have managed to land before 1000AD, namely:
samson, solo, Ribannah, SG(2), ...? (I can't name anyone else at the moment).

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by War4ever

you technical guys are great, before i did everything b/c it worked for me through trial and error and my mind works in this sort of way

Well you play MP, and some of early landing technique isn't useful in this sphere. For MP you just need the roaded cities knowledge.......though I'm sure the 'technical guys' helped a lot there.

[War4ever]

actually for mp you need to take chances, find land, and be able to fight if assualted. Mp is so different, but its not like i didn't learn how to play the game in SP mode.

but like i said, stuff i did was on my own, and i am not the best teacher. i know what works, finding apolyton allowed me to refine strategies i already had , and make for better landing times, or faster conquests.

now apolyton is tearing the game apart bit by bit, and like an accident i can't look away even though it takes away the naivity of the game that i so enjoyed (not sure on the spelling there)

sp is fun, but only under difficult circumstances or games with unique positions etc......

mp i like b/c if it comes down to war, then you are going up against (hopefully) a master strategist.... thats where the fun comes in.

of course human interaction over icq phone is icing on the cake , especially after a few wobbly pops