Its has nothing to do with the starting location per se... The first city has two clams, wine, and wheat... but there is nowhere to expand at all... literally nowhere... I'm not a very good player... I haven't beaten Prince level yet... so I really didn't try to see what would happen... but would anyone play this... and if so how?

well you could get two more cities (one to the north west the other to the east) in there if you build on the desert(making it usable) and can handle the crossover (would still be ok commerce cities). best bet is to beeline for sailing get a galley and start ferrying guys past those mountains. Set up a new city and go from there.

Current city has good chop potential as well.

It's far from hopeless. I've played (and won) much worse starts over my years of Civving. (My record worst start is a 7-tile island, 5 tundra and 2 plains. Didn't win that one.)

Well, you can drop one more city on a desert tile to the east for something. I'd say diagonally between the hill and that patch of grassland. Not the greatest site, but passable.

Other than that, go straight for Sailing and get some Galleys out there. You need to know more about the neighborhood (i.e. where can you expand to overseas) to really tell what your prospects are.

get fishing and sailing immediately, then you can expand to the west...
tough start though...

Head straight to Sailing and start ferrying a settler, worker, and protection to the other side of the mountians, a scout too if you can build one. I guess the one thing about that start is no enemy civs can get at you right away.

Its not unlike playing Japan on the Earth scenario. You must start using galleys really early. Its definitely a burden over just using land units, but its not a total disaster.

I would build 3 more cities in the region that can be seen right now (one on the plains tile below the plains hill, one on the eastern most desert and one somewhere in the desert to the west probably where the warrior is standing now). Also I would start developing the technologies necessary to work sea tiles and to build a lighthouse for the + 1 food in coast and ocean tiles. Then build a galley to colonize the rest of the land.

If you're alone on an island, then it can be a reasonable start. If there's someone else on the other end of the mountains, then it will be more difficult.

Starting on an island can be beneficial, especially if the map generator has been kind with the resources. In the current game I'm playing I had a truly bizarre start, on a four tile island, but with 8 assorted seafood resources within reach. Not surprisingly, it's going very well.:D

This start isn't too bad, since you can sail round the mountain barrier with only galleys. Your capital site is reasonably good, so getting to galleys shouldn't be a problem.

behind those rocks should be napoleon, he already met him. should be a rather small island with starts so close to each other. if you're lucky you have some bronze nearby, pump out some axemen, transport them over and grab paris. should have some nice resources ;)

Napoleon's unlikely to be occupying all the land by the time he gets there, and in any case a civ that's in the way could prove a good target for conquest.

played this one for half an hour. pretty bad combat odds and gameplay though. but managed to settle 5 cities, grab iron and horses, conquer orleans and paris (had pyramids) and razing napoleons last city by ~300 ad. lost 11 axemen and 8 swords by doing so... if played with more concentration and such this start could be played out very nice. it's not that bad at all.

Well I guess some have tried it and done well, but that's the worst start I've ever seen.

Played this start for a bit, the start is not too bad, the capital can be a GP farm later on with three food sources. I settled in place, and also built two fishing villages. I used the warrior and initial explorer as fog buster to prevent barb spawing. My priority research were fishing->animal husbandry->masonary->wheel-> pottery->sailing->mysticism->archery. To make good use of my industrial traits, I built two workers, and chop built the pyramid in the capital, then switched to representation. Now I am making a galley and then a settler, and getting ready to settle the land on the other side of the mountain peak. I have seen similar starts for Incans in the Earth 1000 AD scenario, except it was much tougher game since I was so far behind and playing at monarch level.

http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/6803/civ4screenshot00187hy.jpg

At least you didn't have to fight barbs up front, and other civs' intending military incursions into your homeland will find it difficult. LOL

I think I'd really enjoy playing this one out... not sure how I'd fare on Prince level though. LOL

Mutax, I would have put Munich 1 square south. It would give you a naval shortcut through that peninsula, which would be important when you're trying to invade your neighbor with slow galleys. It would also give you the option of working a couple of non water tiles if you ever wanted to build stuff without slavery.

This start does look horrible at a glance, but it isn't actually too bad. Notice how you have 3 bonus food resources within your starting raduis. Also, I count 8 forests around your city, so you have a pretty good base to chop-rush from. Additionaly those mountains basicly mean you've started on the equivilant of an island, so you can afford to leave your capitol rather undefended while you expand.

Basicly, get fishing to sailing along with bronze wokring and agriculture. Improve those food squarse and watch that city explode in size. With liberal use of chop-rushing and slavery (which becomes extra viable because of your great food resources) you should be able to get a few settlers/millitary onto the mainland pretty fast. My advice, don't put any more settlers on your little island. There arn't enough resources there outside your capitol's radius to justify wasting them there.

There arn't enough resources there outside your capitol's radius to justify wasting them there.
How do you figure they'd be wasted? Even that city Mutax made that was all water, peak, and desert (bar one grassland) will be making money the entire game. That city spot to the east of the capital (where the scout is) will have nearly as much production as the capital for a long time.

Mutax, I would have put Munich 1 square south. It would give you a naval shortcut through that peninsula, which would be important when you're trying to invade your neighbor with slow galleys. It would also give you the option of working a couple of non water tiles if you ever wanted to build stuff without slavery.

There is a clam resource 2 square north of Munich, so I want it in the city's workable tile coverage.

Actually this isn't a bad start at all. With assured defenses for a good long time, there are several strategies you can pursue to do well. With 3 warriors for garrisons, 100% of military can be used overseas and cottage spamming is assured of no barb raids. The only drawback is that you have to build a galley or two.

Actually you could turn your forced galley production into an advantage by doing galley seas dominance: spam galleys and attack all AI ships to prevent them from any sea access.

Wodan

lighthouses in each city and colossus (sp?).
be careful when you expand west and you wont be able to easily reinforce that city should monty come calling.

So I decided to try for the fast expansion approach by ignoring the pyramid, built galley, and colonized the second city on the other side of the peak. As soon as I had 4 cities, and iron working, I mass built axemen and swordsmen, and over a period of 600 years and two wars, I wiped out Napoleon. At the end in 1000 AD, my tech was abyssimal and I could only afford 20% science. Next phase I spammed cottaged and emphasized commerce, built courthouses, soon I was back to 60% research. Astronomy was vital in getting me back in the tech trading circle, afterward I beelined for communism and cash bought the Kremlin (I captured the pyramid in Paris). Afterward I focused on space tech, and never fought a war the whole game. Of course, part of the reason is I gave the tributes to Aztecs and Greeks when I was weak, then I built a sizeable army, then they didn't dare to ask for tribute afterward. Anyway, I finished the Apollo project about 20 turns ahead of Romans. Greece was wiping out Rome near the end, so the most Greece built was a thruster and several casings, which allowed me to run away with a SS win in 2018. My score wasn't too great, I got an "Ivan the Terrible" rate, I guess the score would be higher if I won earlier and got a domination win. Attached are a couple of saves from the game if you are interested in looking over.

http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/3590/victory0cw.jpg

I would put cities right were your two units are. Research fishing, explore withwork boats. Get sailing and cross those mountains. I don't think it's all that bad. At least you've got a nice defensible position.

I won a Civ 2 deity game once when my starting location was on the pole and I had to walk the settler about twenty tiles to find even a couple of workable tiles.

I then put every effort into getting the Lighthouse and, curiously enough, after that the game became really quite easy.

But I suspect that in Civ 2 when the player deferred founding his or her first city the programme did something to cramp the A1 civs. Because there is a well known strategy (on huge maps) where you don't found a capital city at all. You then mainly get units from huts and you can acquire so many that you just steamroller each A1 civ as you find them. The point being that when I tried that once or twice (it is only good for novelty value) I had the distinct impression that the A1 civs had developed surprisingly slowly.

I doubt it is the same in Civ IV.

Although in the long run it might cripple city size, starting with overlapping city radii is not a bad thing, since it takes so long for cities to reach their potential. So I would lean that way for the additional 2 starting cities.

This is a tough start IMHO because there's no fresh water from which to irrigate. Berlin has enough food regardless, I think -- but in the long run, cottage-spamming here would be great, esp. since the island is almost untouchable to raiders.

This IS a lot like the Incan start in Earth 1000AD, except you start on even footing tech-wise, which the Incans do not! I have yet to beat that scenario, but this looks survivable (as the OP already has described)

I won a Civ 2 deity game once when my starting location was on the pole and I had to walk the settler about twenty tiles to find even a couple of workable tiles.

I then put every effort into getting the Lighthouse and, curiously enough, after that the game became really quite easy.

But I suspect that in Civ 2 when the player deferred founding his or her first city the programme did something to cramp the A1 civs. Because there is a well known strategy (on huge maps) where you don't found a capital city at all. You then mainly get units from huts and you can acquire so many that you just steamroller each A1 civ as you find them. The point being that when I tried that once or twice (it is only good for novelty value) I had the distinct impression that the A1 civs had developed surprisingly slowly.

I doubt it is the same in Civ IV.

I can remember all the way back in Civ I, I hadn't bothered building a city just mucked around on my continent with my settler popping huts. Around 1200 AD the biggest empire had their capital taken and it was civil war and I became the rebel half of the Zulu Empire, well cool :D