Your Building Sequence in the Early Game

[Mountain Sage]

Hi everybody,

I thought it would be interesting to put together our different strategies on WHAT, WHEN, HOW and especially WHY we build city improvements and/or military units in a certain sequence.

Do you start with Warrior-Warrior-Settler-Temple?
Or Warrior-Worker-Granary-Warrior?
Or Warrior-Settler-Wonder?
Or...

I understand much depends on the civ you're playing, the level, the land, your goals etc., but are there 'good' and 'bad' ways to start?

[Epistax]

Good: Warrior, Warrior, Settler.
Bad: Colossus

[Mountain Sage]

Originally posted by Epistax
Good: Warrior, Warrior, Settler.
Bad: Colossus

I can understand that if you build the Colossus first you won't build any settlers for a long time, but why is it 'better' to build Wa-Wa-S instead of Wa-Wa-T-S, or Wa-Wa-Wo-S?
Tis is what I'd like to understand. Why do you go for a specific building queue instead of for another one?

[Epistax]

Well I typically do W-W-S, then depending on my tech, real defense then another S, a building then another S (rare), or perhaps additional warriors.

I've never really done the grainary route. Depending on my starting location, population may not be the last thing to be enough for settler production, that is, it may take longer for me to accumulate the shields for a settler than two expand twice. This isn't always the case however.

Depending on what others put here, I may try a grainary. Perhaps I don't see it as an advantage because the improvement only helps that first city, whereas it will be the first city to stop the rexing process, and may build a wonder.

[Dominae]

Single-Player, Emperor level:

Expansionist: Scout, Scout, Granary, Settler/Worker/Warrior+

Militaristic: Warrior, Archer, Settler, Archer+

Americans: Warrior, Granary

Aztecs: Jag, Jag, Jag, Jag, Settler

Depending on the map I sometimes build a Settler before the Granary, but on most reasonable starts I typically build a Granary now. The AI is just too easy to keep off your back. I've been experimenting with building Warriors, then a Granary, then a Temple before the first Settler. I'm not sure if that's a super idea, but it sure is fun and makes for a very strong capital.

Delaying the first Settler with the Aztecs seems sub-optimal, but I'm betting that I'll be able to use those first four Jags to begin taking out my nearest neighbor, which is arguably worth the cost of a slower REX.


Dominae

[badman]

I almost never bother to build ancient wonders, building lots of settlers is more important to me.
My queue looks like this

warrior-warrior-settler-warrior-... or
warrior-granary-settler-settler-...

If I'm expansionist I'll replace those first warriors with scouts.
MS: it's better not to build temples too early because you need to grab as much land as possible as fast as possible.

[Arrian]

Hmm...

With most civs, particularly non-militaristic ones, on my usual standard map:
3-4 warriors, granary, settler.

With China, if I have forest to chop: warrior, archer, warrior or archer, then I decide whether or not to go granary or settler, barracks.

-Arrian

[lmtoops]

Almost always it's warrior, warrior, settler, warrior (spearman?). I was reading about the archer rush, which I have never attempted, and that sound interesting. In the early build que, I generally don't concern myself with buildings.

If I find a good settler farm, then I build a granary. If I have a border city or I lack luxary resources, I will build a temple. But all of this is later in the game.

[OPD]

With a standard start - 2 grassland sheild tiles and no bonus resources I'll go

warrior, warrior, warrior, warrior, warrior, settler, granary

then the second city builds

granary, stlr, stlr, stlr, stlr ....

the next few cities build barracks then units only

I swore never to build a wonder in my capital after being beaten to the GL too many times all that early production wasted can ruin a game.

I'm going to try granary before stlr does this make expantion alot quicker?

[Arrian]

OPD,

I do the granary first because of the way goodie huts work.

For those who don't know, you can only pop a settler from a hut if:

1) you do not have an active settler
2) you are not currently building a settler (easy to just switch production to foil this one)
3) you do not have more than the average number of cities per civ in the world

I have found that if I go straight for the granary after having built 3-4 warriors to explore with, my chances of getting a settler from a hut are decent. And if I don't, so be it, the granary will pay off.

-Arrian, the gambler

[Chemical Ollie]

Warrior-warrior-settler or
Scout-scout-settler

[ghen]

Usually I do Warrior x3 then a settler, but I don't think this has paid off for me very much. If I get a luxury early I always build a granary as fast as I can and forgo military in favor of workers early.. but if I have to wait 20 turns for pottery then the granary comes after my first settler. If I get pottery out of a goodie hut early (which happens alot it seems like) or start with it I build 2 warriors if they're 5 turns or 1 at 10 turns and then start my granary. If my capitol starts on wheated flood plains though its obviously not needed

[cumi]

I usually play with french.

Depending on my starting possition, I build worriors until the build time for settler is exactly the same time, as until my first city reaches size 3. So at the moment, when the city is 3, the settler is ready. In the meantime I got 3-4 worriors.

After the first settler, I build another one, and then I usually start with the pre-build for GL. Maybe a settler more before that. If the capital is on good terrain, for beeing a settler-factory and the chances for other (potencional) cities for beeing it are bad, I start a wonder in other city (non-settler-producer city). I usually also "name" a city for ptoducing military.

Which city will start wonders, will be the/a settler factory or "baracked" army-producer mostly depends on the terrain, starting position and the distance of my neighbours.

cumi

[trev]

I generally play aztecs, and produce jags initially, aiming for settler when city reaches size 3, on most cities early will contiue with jag, jag, settler.

The jags are used for rapid exploration and maybe stacked for attack when suitable enemy located and explored.

Once a war starts build mostly archers instead of jags and add barracks to the higher production cities.

These days I generally start a war early in the game, and so need the veteranarchers for the war. Capturing cities early from an enemy is better stategy than building your own with settlers

[Mountain Sage]

Very interesting so far...

It seems that building a worker is not one of the first priorities, correct?

And when do you start building temples/granaries/barracks?

Cumi:
as a 'French expert' , my building order is very often:
Wa-Wa-Wo-Wa-G-Se. The second worker (you get the first for free) immediately starts building a road (double-speed!), while in the meantime the first improves 4-6 tiles, then starts another road. Try it once and let me know.