Welcome to your C_IV SGOTM 1 Team Thread. Please use it for all internal team communication, turn logs and discussions. Subscribe to it to receive notifications, and do not visit the other team threads for this game until you have finished. Please also subscribe to the Maintenance Thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=170295) for this game, where teams and staff may post non-spoiler information of general interest. I hope you enjoy the game.

This game will be played in Civ4, patched to v1.61.

This first SGOTM will not feature any advanced variant.. the winner simply will be the team that wins the game at the earliest game date with either domination or a diplomatic victory. All victory conditions are still enabled though, with exception of Space Race, so you have to avoid getting another type of victory (and of course prevent the AIs from winning).

Individual start files for all teams will be available on the SGOTM Progress and Results Page (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm_submission_list.php) at midnight, server local time, at the start of May 12.

Here's the start position.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/civ4games/images/SGOTM01_start.jpg

Map Parameters
Playable Civ - Hapshepsut of Egypt
World size - Standard
Difficulty - Monarch
Landform - Mystery
Game Speed - Epic

Permanent Alliances are turned on (can form permanent alliances after either communism or fascism is researched)
Space race is disabled.
Egypt is locked into war with Huayna Capac of the Incas.
Egypt is locked into peace with an unknown civilization.

The map is hand built, and therefore may not have a standard configuration.

Please visit the following links to ensure that you are adequately prepared:
Civ4 SGOTM reference thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=168439)

Notes:

A. ONLY Civilization4 v1.61 is supported for this SGOTM. All teams will compete for a single award - the Gold Laurels.

B. All teams must play the sponsored variant - victory will be awarded for the fastest victory by either domination or diplomacy.

C. All saved game files uploaded to the server are parsed through software that extracts and archives data about your save, including reload count for each turn set.

Good luck to your team, and remember rule #1: Enjoy your game :D

Signing in.

Edit: Just curious which victory type everyone prefers. Myself, I could go either. One thing though, in my diplo HoF attempts I've found the fastest way to win a diplo game is by controlling all the votes through population. In other words, I destroy all other civs except for one, in his OCC, and than win diplomatically by population control. When you have over 90% of the population you win just by voting for yourself. Not sure on the exact percentage needed to win. Need to look that up.

Checkin' in.

Unfortunately I will not be able to say a lot on strategy from experience, as I bought Civ4 just two weeks ago. I'll post a lot anyway, please just keep in mind that this is mostly first impressions. Sofar my experience is one too easy space win on Prince, and several Monarch starts as Egypt, just to get a feel for what I can expect.

I have not played on Epic speed yet, will try to do that soon to see the difference with normal. I find normal speed to be rather epic already, to be honest.

What is the difference between the victory conditions? Diplo requires a tech, but less warring than domination I guess. 90% of world pop sounds too much, but I don't know the figures. Our Creative trait pushes out borders quickly, that helps with domination. The Spiritual trait seems largely useless - but maybe I'm biased against temples.

Some other issues we may want to discuss:

Start location. I would move SW: one extra shield in the city center, more varied terrain, cow in range, and fewer floodplains (better health). Health remains a problem and we'll want the cow improved asap.
Research: straight for Alphabet worked well in my test starts, and I could trade Writing for most of the techs from the first age, and hold back Alphabet for a long time to keep playing the broker. We already have two of the prereq techs, we need the horsies tech soon anyway for our chariots, and for that cow of course. With all those floodplains I think a small detour to Pottery for cottages before going for Writing will pay off.
I think the alternative choices are weaker: the best would be to try for bronze first, but then we'll probably be too late in getting to alphabet to really profit from the tech trades. Besides, we don't really have a lot of forests to chop it seems, and hopefully we do not need an early army of axemen.
Early military. The War Chariot doesn't seem well suited for city attack, but is an excellent and cheap field unit, for scouting, settler escort, offense and offensive defense (mainly vs barbs). Its main drawback is that we need to have horses nearby, but if so then this is by far our best option IMO. Btw, I find the AI's to be perfectly peaceful early on (on normal aggression): they'll run massive armies around your undefended capital and not even think of attacking. Funny.
Build order. Worker first? Warriors first for scouting?
Our traits. How can we use them?
Do we want to try for a religion, for specific wonders, etc? My civ3 experience says to ignore it, but maybe that's not wise...
Capac. Is probably not too close, or those Quecha's (attack 2 IIRC) would be a real pain. So possibly we can ignore him for now.
Forced peace with one civ. Don't know what to think of this. If that civ gets too big, we'll have to fight by proxy. I don't know how to do that. If it doesn't get too big, then does this matter?

Signing in for now. Glad to be part of an established team. :)

I've limited Civ4 experience still, winning a few Noble level games. I just uploaded a loss however in GOTM-6. Screwed around thinking I could win by ss, while I could have attempted a diplo victory. Lost by ss.

I'll read over initial comments, but my main weakness right now is focus - tech options for victory goal.

I imagine we'll want to decide bfore play begins as to which victory option we want: domination or diplomacy. Each require set approach I'd imagine.

I did notice my name was first in AlanH's listing on the sign-up thread. I hope that doesn't mean I go first. Not a problem w/ good advice. ;) But, if we can swap the lineup a bit, no worries here.

Looking forward to my first SGOTM in the Civ series. I've played several GOTMs in Civ3, et al and a number of SGs.

Reporting for duty! :salute: :whipped:

@dojoboy: Welcome to Team Smurkz! [party]
Even if you're new to the team you're obviously a long-timer at CF, and I'm sure you'll make a great addition to the team. :)

I'm happy to keep playing team captain if that's what the team wants. I'm in even worse a situation than zyxy though, I still don't have the game. I've been meaning to get it for quite some time, but never got around to it. I will get it as soon as I get the opportunity. As a consequence though, I shouldn't play first, both because I don't have the game and because I've never played it. :crazyeye:

From what I've heard whispered, military VCs are a lot harder to achieve than in III. I'm also a builder at heart, and since this is my first CIV game ever I wouldn't mind going the diplomacy route. Count that as my vote.

I'll be sure to read up on some of the existing info and join the discussion - game or not! :D

I did notice my name was first in AlanH's listing on the sign-up thread. I hope that doesn't mean I go first.
Someone had to be first in the list. dojoboy comes before the others, alphabetically ;) Your team should make all decisions affecting performance. I just have to get you to the starting line, fire the gun, and watch the rest with great interest.

I'm happy to keep playing team captain if that's what the team wants.

I have no problem with you being team captain, in fact I was hoping for it. You did an excellent job in the last two SGOTM's so I was hoping you'd be team captain this one too. You may not have any [civ4] experience, but you do have great abilities as a leader.

Been looking forward to this game.

Checking in.
Thank you for having me on the team. I'm really looking forward to it.

Niklas is the leader of Team Smurkz, I don't see any reason to change that just because a roman numeral has changed.

I don't think lack of experience will be a problem here for those that haven't played much IV, it will be easy to overcome with the great analytical skills you guys have shown over on the Civ III side.

While my wife pre-ordered the game and gave it to me as a surprise the day after it was released I wasn't able to play until after my wallet recovered from Christmas and I could afford to upgrade my computer (late January). At first I was a little disappointed, but I've grown to really like it a lot. I haven't played any single player III for while.

I'm still not that great of a player, I've been playing at Prince and am ready to move up a notch. Sometimes all of the options become overwhelming and I stray from my plan. I have learned a few things:

1) No building is bad - Maintenance isn't tied to buildings, just # of cities & distance. We're free to build anything we wish to spend the shields on. If we're having happiness issues, there's nothing to keep us from building a temple if we have the shields to do so.

2) City specialization is a good way to go - I was a tough sell on this one. I thought that being flexible would get better results. But I found that you really take some muscle away from National Wonders by putting them in middle of the road cities. Putting the Heroic Epic and West Point in your Military city gives you powerful units really fast. Building the Ironworks in a city geared toward producing hammers pays much higher dividends than putting it in a diverse city. Building farms to support specialists in one city yields better results than spreading GP points too thin throughout your empire.

Coastal citys are very powerful - They're almost always great commerce cities. Harbors, and the additional 50% trade route yield that they provide are a big boost to commerce. Working coastal tiles provides more gold than working a river tile. And having seafood within the city radius is a big food boost. Plus, if you mange to get the Colossus (+2 g in all water tiles), or the Great Lighthouse (+2 trade routes in all coastal cities) you can really make a lot of cash, and keep the research slider at a higher rate.

It's important to have a plan - My biggest fault. We're going to need a plan and stick to it. Everybody needs to be on board because there are so many options, and it's very easy to stray. These plans can be broken down into separate research plans, city settlement plans, military plans, GP plan, etc. Of course the hardest part is making them all come together in our master plan.

Chopping is powerful - While they nerfed it in the 1.61 patch, it's still a big boost. 20 shields is a lot, and can really reduce the build time of Settlers and Workers. Cities stop growing, and the computer switches around the worked tiles during these builds so I like to aid these builds with a chop. Sometimes a chop can be the difference between getting a Wonder or not. Of course this has to be mitigated vs. the health benefits of having forests around.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head, as I think of more (or the conversation strikes a cord) I'll put them out there. Like I said, I'm not a great player, but keeping these things in mind have made for progress in my games.

Regarding this specific game.

I think the most powerful city site visible is 1s (red x) of the Warrior. It is a powerhouse commerce spot, is coastal, has the health benefit of the river, can get some hammers from the cows and the plains/forest to the South. and grow like a weed. I would consider moving the Settler there. The other option (and the one I favor at the moment is to move the Settler 1N+1NW to put the capital in a position to chop freely with all of the woods around it. This would save the commerce spot to be settled down the road.
(Another note: ICS is dead, and overlap is something I try to avoid. The best way to grow your empire without going broke is to expand your cultural borders)

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/SGOTM10Start.jpg

I think early research could hinge on where we decide to settle. I like the mining -> BW route to be able to chop the first Settler. This would go well with settling the blue x. I also like knowing where the copper is (if any) to aid in planning city sites. At Monarch, I don't think we'd have much chance at founding an early religion, so I'd avoid that part of the tech tree until religion has spread to us, and we need temples or monastaries.

I've had much earlier wins by domination than by diplomacy. And when I do win by diplomacy, it's by having 1 or 2 friends, and taking cities from those that don't like me. Basically controlling a large portion of the voting %. I think you need 2/3 of the vote for a diplomatic victory and # of votes per civ is weighted by population. It takes me a long time to research to mass media, although I usually go for diplomatic if a) I'm still playing when mass media comes in, and b) I have a chance for a diplomatic win.

I'm not opposed to going for a diplomatic victory though. I think it would be fun to try for one from the start, and see how fast it can be done.

What is the difference between the victory conditions? Diplo requires a tech, but less warring than domination I guess.

A diplomatic victory is a lot harder than it was in civ3. You really have to pay attention to your relations with each civ and their relations with each other. It’s very easy to screw up your relations with civ A by trading with their worst enemy. The hard part is figuring out who their worst enemy is.

Egypt is locked into war with Huayna Capac of the Incas.
Egypt is locked into peace with an unknown civilization.

WW really sucks in civ4 IMO. Hopefully HC is fairly close (I doubt it since it’s a custom map) so we can destroy him early.

I’m curious who we are locked into peace with, as we ought to really work on our relations with them. I’ve never played with a locked peace with only one civ, so I’m unsure how it affects our relations.

Permanent alliances our turned on and can be very nice if used. Please note that having a permanent alliance with someone means their population and land area is included when calculating the % required for a domination victory. In fact permanent alliances our the only way for you to win a OCC domination or OCC cultural victory. Here’s an article that may be helpful:

Permanent Alliance Guide (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=3853417#post3853417) by WastingTime

The Spiritual trait seems largely useless - but maybe I'm biased against temples.

I’m not big on the Spiritual trait either, though I do really like the no anarchy. Can be very helpful as it allows quick civic and religion switches.

Build order. Worker first? Warriors first for scouting?

I’ve gotten to the point my first build is always a Worker. I usually try and line it up so Pottery is learned just before my Worker finishes. Early cottages are a definite advantage in this game.

Do we want to try for a religion, for specific wonders, etc? My civ3 experience says to ignore it, but maybe that's not wise...

A religion is nice only if you pursue it. What I mean is if we actively attempt to spread our religion through missionaries. If we are going for a domination victory than I would say instead to just let someone else create the religion and we just capture the Holy City.

Wonders are definitely different than in Civ3. I typically only build them in relation to how the city is specialized. Oh yeah, city specialization is very big in civ4.

Rather than me attempt to explain anything (as I’ll probably mess it up), I’ve listed a few articles you all might find interesting.

Technology Research Explained…. (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=146163) by Requies
Unit Maintainence Explained (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141475) by Roland Johansen
Technologies (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=140952) by DaveMcW

There’s several other good articles that I either can’t remember or have forgotten about. Hope this helps someone.

CommandoBob, sort of, I guess, lurking in?

Glad you're part of Team Smurkz, dojoboy! And if you want to see what these guys can do, check out SGOTM 8 (Team Durkz) and SGOTM 9 (Team Smurkz).

Sadly, like Niklas, I do not have a copy of the game. I also do not a PC that can run the game, until my son gets home from college later this week. He likes CIV and had a full copy of the game on his machine but deleted it. (And I could not justify, even to myself, getting C3C and CIV in the same month!)

Have fun!

Glad you're part of Team Smurkz, dojoboy! And if you want to see what these guys can do, check out SGOTM 8 (Team Durkz) and SGOTM 9 (Team Smurkz).


Thanks much CB! I will read ya'lls expoits over the next couple days.

I came here to check out the start again, but my school's firewall is blocking the image - wierd. No problems at home.

I appreciate your frustration with not being able to play the game. My mac is not going to be able to power Civ4, so I'm relegated to carrying my laptop home daily. Well, that is what their meant for, eh.

About this game: Which victory condition is most difficult you think, domination or diplomacy? If the consensus is domination, then we may be looking at a map with high water, reducing the area to dominated. Would this level the field against thos going for diplomacy? I'm inclined to believe that the map is designed to make domination difficulties equal to those inherent difficulties for diplomatic wins. Now, we are locked into war w/ the Incas, which doesn't help diplomacy if they smooge the other civs.

I believe I'm hedging toward a diplomatic win. Being locked into war w/ the Incans is going to force us to keep our rivals happy. There is also the possibility to hunt down the Incans ASAP and eradicate them, thus ending the state of war. I'm sure they're not going to be parked right next door however.

Methos makes a good point regarding population control in an earlier post. Removing the Incans will definitely rid ourselves of a population that will never vote for us.

How much time is lost when trying for a religion versus opting for growth and military techs? Is it critical. Is the religion critical? I personally don't think so. We can later convert to a smaller civ's religion (one not in the running), edging toward gaining their votes. In fact, we should be decidedly undecided on a religion, just like those Moors in Spain - converting to keep their heads. Is there a penalty for switching religions?

I like McLMan's thoughts on city placement, but one concern. Is it possible to lose our settler while moving unescorted?

One thing I'm looking forward to is how you guys specialize cities. Honestly in my Civ4 games, I rarely change citizens into any specialist type. :dojoboy ducks:

If we are locked into war w/ the Incans and locked into peace w/ a mystery civ, then is our mystery friend also locked into war with the Incans? If so, I don't know how I feel about possibilities of their location to one another

More later...

Nice to see you lurking, CB! And welcome everyone!

Well, I think domination goes better with my playstyle: whenever those AI come with their outrageous demands, I get the strong urge to dial up my cavalry commander and tell him about our new training grounds :). But I am happy to try for diplo, and learn to manipulate the AI into liking me.
I would guess that even then some warring will be needed. We probably have to take out Capac, and we cannot be friends with everyone. However, for a diplo win, we need a careful selection of friends and foes, depending on their mutual relations: a friend of my friend is my friend, and such.

@Niklas: you're right, warfare is harder, especially early on. First, most units have special features that make them more effective against certain others. When you attack a stack of units, the best defender is chosen depending on which unit attacks. That puts the attacker obviously at a disadvantage. On top of that, some of the early units are especially strong in city defense.
Another problem is maintenance. Corruption and building maintenance are gone now, and instead there is city maintenance. One component is due to distance to capital (or FP), the other is due to number of cities. The ugly part is that the second component goes up in every city when you acquire a new one, which means that new cities can be a drain on the economy. Later in the game you obtain means to do something about this (courts, and money making improvements), but it definitely limits expansion speed.

@Dojoboy, McLMan & Methos: thanks for the comments and the links. Very interesting, especially that micromanagement still helps to deal with overflows. Well, if it is true, then it's really unfortunate, and a display of rather bad programming IMO :sad:.

Concerning a religion: we don't stand a chance for the first ones anyway. Perhaps we can try to get one of the later three (Confucianism, Taoism, Islam). But if we want to be friends with someone, it might be good to try and adopt their religion. The AI seem to like it if you have fallen for their heathen religion instead of for one of your own ;).

On starting location: I am not too excited about McLMan's dotmap and would still like to move SW. So I have shamelessly stolen his map and added my pref so that we can compare. The pink and blue crosses are McLMan's spots, the green circle is mine:
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/zyxy/Smurkz4_1_BC4000dotmap.jpg

Early game: wherever we settle, we will have 5 happy faces IIRC, and that will limit our city size until we get some luxes or other advanced stuff. There is no way AFAIK to resolve unhappiness in the early stage of the game, so it is better to avoid it.

Floodplains locations have serious disease problems, and every sick guy eats one more food (don't ask me the rationale of that one, but this is the way it is.) Each of the three spots starts on fresh water, so gets 4 healthy faces, with +0.5 for each forest in the city radius, and -0.4 for each fp, -0.25 for each jungle. So the blue cross scores best (ignoring the 10 tiles we cannot see): 3 forests and 3 fp makes for +0 or +1 healthy guy, for 4 or 5 total (I am not sure how rounding works). Green circle does pretty well too: 2 or 3 forests, and 6 fp makes for -1 health and a total of 3, and if we improve and connect the cow then we get back to 4 total. Pink cross is troublesome: 10 fp and perhaps one forest makes for -4 health for a total of 0, or the grand total of 1 with the cow. Of course these numbers will all go up as we gain more food sources, but that will take some time.

Now let's see how much each city can produce at size 5, assuming settler or worker production (most costly builds early on).
[For Niklas: during worker or settler production the city does not grow. Surplus food is translated into shield at a 1:1 rate. Settlers/workers only cost shields, no pop. FP's are like in civ3, a herded cow is 3 food, 3 shield.]
The blue cross can work 2 irrigated fp's and 3 forests for 10 spt (3 from city center), losing nothing to health problems probably. Of course there may be better tiles in the fog, but we cannot know that now. The green circle can work the herded cow and 4 irrigated fp's for 15 spt (4 from city center), where 1 spt loss due to illness has been accounted for. The pink cross can work the herded cow and 4 irrigated fp's for 11 spt (3 from city center), with 4 spt sickness loss accounted for.

Long term: what can these cities be used for, and how do they fit in?
Blue cross: hardest to say because we can see only half the tiles. Based on that half, it is a not-too-good, not-too-bad city. No fancy tiles, but nothing really bad either. Less river tiles than the other two probably. It seems more central than the others which is good for a capital. The tiles to its east are probably wasted, and there seems to be mountain or tundra to its west.
Green circle: The most versatile of the three IMO. Has both high food and high shields tiles - this looks like a production powerhouse. Gets an extra shield in the city center. Its main problem are that tiles to its east are possibly wasted, although settling E or SE of the warrior would be ok-ish, with only 2-3 tiles overlap.
Pink cross: high food, low shields. This would be a good specialist farm, but I am not sure we want our capital in this role. The least centralized of the three probably, and low production means that building improvements will be a problem, in particular this town will not have a lot of time to construct units. Although it's coastal, it may not be a good naval base.

All in all, I like green best, followed by blue (but that's a bit of a gamble, and possibly gives us a very slow start). Pink is a troublesome spot I think.
Btw, a forest chop gives 20 shields only (or less if the forest is further away.) Each of these towns can generate that many shields early on in about 1.5 - 2 turns. So I think chops are not that great.

Though I like the pink dot, I do not like it as our capitol or first city. The pink dot will make an excellent GP farm. Build the Globe Theatre and National Epic there with everything irrigated, and we've got GP's coming out the wahzoo.

I probably like zyxy's green dot the most, as I really like settling on a plains hill. The only thing I worry is that we don't know what half the tiles are. Plus the capitol's city radius would overlap the future GP farm.

Welcome CB! I'm glad you're here. Just because you don't have [civ4] doesn't mean you can't participate in our discussions. You're still Team Smurkz! :thumbsup:

Btw, a forest chop gives 20 shields only (or less if the forest is further away.)

A forest adjacent to the city provides 30 shields, plus remember that once Mathematics has been researched we earn +50% shields from forest chops. The next tile over is when it drops to 20 shields.

IMO forests aren't worth it as much as improved land is. It isn't until Replaceable Parts before you can build a lumbermill, and that's just too long to wait to use it until its full potentional. I only don't chop if I don't need that tile or can't improve it. BTW, I typically use chops to rush wonders that I want, or a settler if really needed.

Edit: To keep from creating a triple post...

One thing I'm looking forward to is how you guys specialize cities. Honestly in my Civ4 games, I rarely change citizens into any specialist type. :dojoboy ducks:


By specializing cities I personally don't mean through specialists, but instead by builds and terrain. A city located between two rivers with lots of grass tiles, floodplains, etc. can have cottages built throughout. Than build a library, great library, uni, observatory, oxfords university, and a lab and you've got a great science city. Swap those builds with a market, bank, and grocer and you've got a gold city. Do you see what I mean? It's not the specialist, but the builds and the terrain around it.

Take a city with a couple good food resources and lots of hills and you've got a major production city. Build a library here would be wasteful, but building a forge, heroic epic, pentagon, factory, etc. and you've got a production/military city. The pick dot would make an excellent GP farm as I've mentioned earlier.

Sorry for the long edit. I tend to take too long explaining things. Civ4 definitely requires city specialization.

All in all, I like green best, followed by blue (but that's a bit of a gamble, and possibly gives us a very slow start). Pink is a troublesome spot I think.

I agree that green is the best site if we're looking at one city. But the thing that troubles me the most about it is the overlap we'd end up with in order to take advantage of the tiles to it's East. Also, I wouldn't go with farms in the fp's at red x, but cottages. Turn it into a commerce city. It is also quite possibly "behind the lines" and can be built much later on as a backfill city after expansion toward our rivals.

By specializing cities I personally don't mean through specialists, but instead by builds and terrain. A city located between two rivers with lots of grass tiles, floodplains, etc. can have cottages built throughout. Than build a library, great library, uni, observatory, oxfords university, and a lab and you've got a great science city. Swap those builds with a market, bank, and grocer and you've got a gold city. Do you see what I mean? It's not the specialist, but the builds and the terrain around it.

Take a city with a couple good food resources and lots of hills and you've got a major production city. Build a library here would be wasteful, but building a forge, heroic epic, pentagon, factory, etc. and you've got a production/military city. The pick dot would make an excellent GP farm as I've mentioned earlier.


Ah, I understand now. To what percentage of city MM does converting citizens to specialist take in any given game?

A forest adjacent to the city provides 30 shields, plus remember that once Mathematics has been researched we earn +50% shields from forest chops. The next tile over is when it drops to 20 shields.

IMO forests aren't worth it as much as improved land is. It isn't until Replaceable Parts before you can build a lumbermill, and that's just too long to wait to use it until its full potentional. I only don't chop if I don't need that tile or can't improve it. BTW, I typically use chops to rush wonders that I want, or a settler if really needed.

You are correct about the 30 shields, I was still talking about normal game speed. At Epic speed, shield/food/gold requirements for buildings/units, growth, and techs are all multiplied by 1.5 it seems, and so are worker turns. Oddly enough, culture rate is not. Obviously, movement rate is also the same.

I agree that forests are not valuable terrain, except early on when they provide some healthy points, and it is decent terrain before improvements. So the main question IMO is how soon we want to chop, and the urgency of bronze working. Well, I guess we could start researching animal husbandry first, and then take it from there, depending on the land and resources we find around us.


Sorry for the long edit. I tend to take too long explaining things. Civ4 definitely requires city specialization.

You are explaining it very well, thank you! And your posts are shorter than mine... :rolleyes:

Hi , Marc Aurel checking in.

Having just threaded with Niklas, McLMan and zyxy in Civ3 SGOTM 10, it’s fun to play the first CIV GOTM in parallel. BTW, a special hello to CommandoBob! Great to know you are lurking to be sure Smurkz keeps together. And another special hearty welcome to dojoboy - the new Smurkz on the block.

What can I say to the situation?

The start

The trait.
My general start is to acquire as much land and with that resources as possible. These resources are even more important in CIV than in Civ3. However you can much easier trade them as long as you have something to trade with. As everybody knows already – building up much cities early cripples your research capabilities by huge city maintenance. And conquering cities even makes this factor worse. So I am not interested early on in cities that don’t give me a special thing I need for civilisation growth. The way I try to claim a huge part of the land is to block other civs out early. Our special creative ability is very useful for this by earl pushing our borders to distance 2 from city center. If we do not sign any “open borders” treaty we will keep also galleys out of our “to be settled territory” in the future, since they cannot navigate on the oceans. If we block the shore and the shallow water tiles the enemy ships are banned. For that strategy we need an early good knowledge of the landmass to find a suitable blocking line. Normally that takes 2 – 3 cities, what is exactly the number we can build without huge impact on city maintenance costs.

The capital.

I concur to zyxys comment on our need for the cow early on for health purposes. We have too much floodplain tiles around and will suffer heavy unhealthy malus. Additionally cows give very good resources. Like zyxy I think SW is best to start at. We are in range of the woods for chopping and have 6 floodplains in reach, what is definitely enough. OTOH we would have to look for a possible blocking line in the west (north/south), since the east features the shoreline.

Military

Zyxy is right. AI’s are peaceful early on, besides Huana Caipac in this game. So we need to know where he is. If he is not close, what I suspect we need our military only for the barbs. That will be a problem if we go for settling a blocking line somewhere else. OTOH these barbs then build the cities for us and we only need to conquer their cities when we can afford them. That stat has often worked in my games. Only thing is, one has to keep an eye on a strong enough military. But since this is for free in the early stages and sizes that is no problem and chariots are a good choice.

Build order.

I normally play worker first. Since we have agri from the start, we can fast irrigate one floodplain making a (4fd /1 gold) tile after getting (3 fd 3 hammers / 1 gold) tile with the cow, that’s should be best, but we should calculate this in detail later on. After that a warrior is obvious IMHO.

Research
Since we are at the shore of the same river than the cow we wouldn’t have needed the wheel early on, but we have it as a start tech. Since we also have agriculture we should head for animal husbandry asap .- Once because of working the effective cow - twice because of finding the horses early on. After that alphabet at least is a choice that can handle every way the game goes somehow by trading for the required tech when possible. One word to the prince players – getting the techs you want by trade becomes more difficult on higher levels (monarch emperor …) Depending on your power ranking, the AI’s are less willing to trade their techs with you, even if they would benefit from the trade. Religion is no way in this scenario IMHO. The reason is simple – if you don’t have mysticism from the start you normally are too late either for Buddhism or Hinduism. Only in case no civ with that starting techs is around, but I don’t believe that’s the case. That normally also rules out Judaism. If one of the later religions becomes available, we already might have had a chance to conquer one of the holy cities. We will see later on.

@ Niklas : No better captain than you I can imagine – thank you for accepting this role!

I will have you all know that I really appreciate the analyses and comments you are providing :worship:. I feel that I've learnt a lot about this game just by reading this thread. And thanks for the links Methos, I'll be sure to read them and any others I can find. :)

Since I don't have that much to add to the discussion myself, I'm going to try to take the role of discussion leader. I will try to summarize where we stand on various issues, and what things that are left open and needs more thought and discussion. I think it will teach me something by having to formulate these summaries, and I'm sure that if I miss something or get something wrong you'll all jump on me :hammer:. At least I hope so :)

I'll go read the articles now, and come back to write a summary of the early game discussion.

@dojoboy: As you may have gathered by the comments, Team Smurkz is also playing in Civ3 SGOTM 10. CommandoBob is part of the Civ3 crew, and it's nice to see him lurking on this side as well. Feel free to drop by our team thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=170005) for that game and say hi! :)

I think it's time to start thinking about the roster. Niklas, what do you think would be a good sequence of us starting the game?
what will be our capital this time? Smurkzpolis, Smurkphis, PI-Smurkzes, ...?

Right, a roster! Since I have no indications of preferences (except my own), I'll use the sign-in order of this thread. That gives us the following roster:

Methos
zyxy
dojoboy
McLMan
Marc Aurel
Niklas
I put myself last to give me the most time to learn before playing (and to go get it in the first place). If you have any wishes let me know and I'll accomodate them, as long as there are no contradictions. :)

Regarding the first town, what about Thebez? (After all there are only so many ways to incorporate the word Smurkz... not that I think we're near the limit, no way :D) Other town names could be Alekzandria, Memphiz, Lukzor... But I'll leave the final decision to the starting player.

I'll leave the starting sequence to those with more experience. I don't have any tools for CIV, and I don't know the tile yields, build costs etc. well enough to think I could possibly do it by hand. I might write up a spread sheet once I've learnt the basics though, could come in handy for the next game. :)

I’d like to suggest my first move. I was thinking about moving the settler SW onto the plains hill and than saving and stopping, and posting a screenshot of what the settler sees. This way we can all take a look at some of those fogged out tiles before making our final decision on where to settle. Is this okay with everyone? It will cause us to lose one turn.

Would it be wiser to instead move S, SW to the grass hill? It could open up more tiles.

Thebez sounds good to me. Keeps it with the Egyptian style, but adding a little Smurkz twist.

Hi , Marc Aurel checking in.
And another special hearty welcome to dojoboy - the new Smurkz on the block.

Thanks Marc Aurel. I must say, even being a vet here at CFC, I'm somewhat intimidated by the breadth of knowledge and skill you gentlemen display. Math is not my strong point. I tend to play fast, which hurts me in regards to missing "things" that provide exponential advantages

So I am not interested early on in cities that don’t give me a special thing I need for civilisation growth. The way I try to claim a huge part of the land is to block other civs out early. Our special creative ability is very useful for this by earl pushing our borders to distance 2 from city center. If we do not sign any “open borders” treaty we will keep also galleys out of our “to be settled territory” in the future, since they cannot navigate on the oceans. If we block the shore and the shallow water tiles the enemy ships are banned.

Interesting point referring blocking the shoreline, never thought of blocking the infamous galley/settler through denying open borders. By land sure, but not by sea.

What is the teams feeling about civics, which will not be an issue for some time into the game? But, does Smurkz find a specific setting more powerful over the long haul, or that adjusting per the situation to be more important. I've not enough experience w/ Civ4 yet to determine how important the limited anarchy turns in Civ4 are, in comparison to 6-9 turns of anarchy in C3C. Right now, I find the shortcomings of 1 turn anarchy in Civ4 to minimal.

I’d like to suggest my first move. I was thinking about moving the settler SW onto the plains hill and than saving and stopping, and posting a screenshot of what the settler sees. This way we can all take a look at some of those fogged out tiles before making our final decision on where to settle. Is this okay with everyone? It will cause us to lose one turn.


Very good idea, Methos! Go on with it!


Would it be wiser to instead move S, SW to the grass hill? It could open up more tiles.

I don't think so. The plain gives us an additional hammer. The center tile alway has at least two food. So settling a grass hill gives no additional ressource. The center stays at 2fd/1hammer/1gold. Settling on the plains hill directly SW from the start gives 2fd/2hammers/1gold and that is an early boost.
I have played some test games, in which I have tested some build sequences and starting locations. Regrettably I don’t have such a comfortable spread sheet like Niklas for Civ3. I am currently working on it, but that will take some time. I’ve played them to 2290 BC, when I had finished 2 workers and one settler in the first variant and compared that result with other variants. It has turned out, that zyxys green circle is by far the best location. That is mainly because of the second hammer on the city center tile. That saves us 5 turns per worker (18 compared to 23 turns) and so on also for the settler. However I figured out the settler should come Second and be sent to the place where the warrior already waits for him to protect him after reconnaissance for the second city.

I should remark here, that I have a strong tendency to prefer gold resources or gems to be in the vicinity of our second city, since they give a huge commerce bonus early on, boosting science , if they are available.

On science it has turned out, that the only two forests, we can chop for sure (60 hammers, 20 each forest *1.5 for epic speed) would not justify postponing animal husbandry. We would lose 28 turns working the cow, what would mean 84 hammers by a loss of 3 hammers per turn (hpt) working the floodplain instead. Since we build only workers and a settler in this time this plain reduces the losses by not working the cow to 2 hpt.

But after that the mining – BW route is quite effective, since we get to BW short before the settler and can support the 2. worker by chopping and hopefully there are some more forests at distance two from the capital and the second city somewhere in the west might also feature some forests in the surroundings. If anybody also calculates the start for comparison, what I would appreciate here are my stats from 2290BC:

Points: 120
2cities at size 2
2workers
1warrior
Improved: 3 plains, 1 cow, 1mined hill

Nice work MA! I'll try to run some tests tomorrow to compare. Do you know how many turns it is to 2290BC?

@Methos: I like your idea. I guess it's clear that I would move to the hill SW...

It's 57 turns to 2290BC - close to the end of dojoboys turnset as long as we play 20 turns each for the first time and later on 10 turns each, as we did in team Bede in SGOTM9. Personnally I think that's a good idea, since during the first turns not much happens but later on 10 turns consume an evening if you are on your guard and doublecheck everything and later on write a summary of them in the thread including some screenies. What do you think about the length of the turnsets?

Ah, I forgot - the saves are ready!

@dojoboy: Hi - please don’t feel intimidated, it’s just an automatism for many people when they play in teams. IT’s another quality of competition that makes the fun. Everybody tries to participate with some good ideas in the team success. So automatically they start to do some math and optimisations. And in CIV there is quite a lot to do in this matter – enough room for you to find your special idea.

@dojoboy: That's what's so fun about these SGOTM's - for a solo game you seldom have time to stop and think about actual numbers, though you may have some intuitive idea about "good" and "bad" numbers. In this game we're doing 10 turns at a time, sometimes even less if something important comes up, so we have plenty of time to analyze and find optimal solutions.

@MA: Nice analysis! :) I agree that we should go with the 20 turns followed by 10 from Civ3 SGOTMs, if it doesn't work out we can change it later on.

Alright, I'll try to summarize what our thoughts are, for my own sake as much as for the discussion.

Early moves
zyxy, Methos and Marc Aurel all seem to think that settling the Green Dot, i.e. 1SW of the starting location, is the best start. Everyone thinks that the coastal area would make a good commerce town, or GP farm, but in any case a useful location to settle. McLMan points out that settling Green Dot will lead to a 2-3 tile overlap, something we would like to avoid, and suggests Blue Dot north of the lake as a better location for the capitol.

I feel that I miss some finer points here. I can see why ICS is dead since maintenance is based on number of towns. Still, 2-3 tiles of overlap doesn't seem very crippling, in particular if that overlap is not felt until the later stages of the game. But that might just be my Civ3 mindset not fully grasping the implications. So, here's a set of newbie questions:
How fast do you think we can grow to the size where the overlap is getting felt, citizen-wise?
Are there any other implications of an overlap that I am not aware of, i.e. other than the obvious citizen assignments and maxing out at a lower size?
As a related questions, are there any CIV equivalents to Civ3 aqueducts and hospitals, i.e. buildings that limit the size of a town?
While I'm at it, how fast do cultural border expansion happen? Or is it still tied to culture? We are creative and thus get +2 culture per town, is that +2 culture per turn?

Research
There seems to be no doubt that we should go for Animal Husbandry right away. We need it to make proper use of the cow, to find out where the horses are, and it will lead further towards Writing and Alphabet that we can probably use to trade for whatever else we need.
Marc suggests a going for Mining and BW after AH in order to get access to mines and forest chops. I would think it would be better to be able to trade for these techs, but I'm not sure how viable that would be. I understand that we need Alphabet for tech trading, so if we want to trade then we should head straight for that. This seems a bit long to me to go without mines and chops, but again I don't feel I can fully assess the implications.
zyxy also suggests going for Pottery for cottages. This would surely be beneficial, and would also slightly increase our research yields towards Writing, having two of the three optionals.

To summarize, AH right away is not in question. It has a base cost of 60 according to this (http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/info/techs/) page, how is that modified by speed, map size and difficulty? Will we get AH in 20 turns, or can we postpone the decision on the next tech until the next turnset?

@dojoboy: That's what's so fun about these SGOTM's - for a solo game you seldom have time to stop and think about actual numbers, though you may have some intuitive idea about "good" and "bad" numbers. In this game we're doing 10 turns at a time, sometimes even less if something important comes up, so we have plenty of time to analyze and find optimal solutions.

I shall have my thinking cap on. ;)

Early moves
Still, 2-3 tiles of overlap doesn't seem very crippling, in particular if that overlap is not felt until the later stages of the game. But that might just be my Civ3 mindset not fully grasping the implications. So, here's a set of newbie questions:[list=1]
Are there any other implications of an overlap that I am not aware of, i.e. other than the obvious citizen assignments and maxing out at a lower size?

The advantage here would be turning citizens into specialists, as a result of the overlap. Perhaps that could focus city in question toward a specific role. But, what do we want produced from these two cities? Will the overlap prevent it?

Research
There seems to be no doubt that we should go for Animal Husbandry right away. We need it to make proper use of the cow, to find out where the horses are, and it will lead further towards Writing and Alphabet that we can probably use to trade for whatever else we need. Marc suggests a going for Mining and BW after AH in order to get access to mines and forest chops. I would think it would be better to be able to trade for these techs, but I'm not sure how viable that would be. I understand that we need Alphabet for tech trading, so if we want to trade then we should head straight for that.

I personally don't find the Civ4 AI agreeable to trading techs very often. And, never having played above Noble yet, how likely will we have techs to trade? I've also never met a civ who would outright sell me a tech either.

Early moves[/b]
zyxy also suggests going for Pottery for cottages. This would surely be beneficial, and would also slightly increase our research yields towards Writing, having two of the three optionals.


I think he means also the health benefit of granaries, since the floodplains give a lot of illness amongst our people and making full use of the effective plains would be a good idea. The quest on the cottages is something to discuss after scouting the surroundings. If we can get some gold, silver and gems, working these is much more effective (5-7 gold per tile) in the critical early stage after city 4. But in our case the floodies around make granaries very useful.

The alphabet really comes too late for chopping. The great advantage of the chopping is in the early phase. These are ressources you only can get once. Later on they loose their effectiveness on the overall game. But getting your first two settlers and 3 workers by that, has been an unbeatable strategy up to version 1.52! The masters called it CET (chop every tree). The effect was getting 30hammers in 4 turns. Since the settler is 60, that is one chop and couple of turns working your center and second tile and you have a settler. That has been cut down a little by the programmers in version 1.61, cause it was too powerful. But still it is effective, even if you now must calculate the effect in detail. What I wanted to point out is, that we get our #1 settler and an additional worker by chopping as usual, but the loss of the cow for that would be too much. But after that the normal start out strategy works.
There is a number of cities you can have without maintenance penalty and this number we need to get asap. After that our growth is limited and we can do the other things. The number is generally 4, but sometimes 5 and seldom 6, if we have i.e. gold ressources, which would each pay the maintenance for one city. (-7)
@Niklas: to your questions:

-4: yes our advantage in the game is fast expanding culture borders. your idea of 2cpt is correct. We need no stonehange and obelisks for that.

-3: No, however your growth is limited. But it is by unhappiness - luxuries and buildings help! and illness - health ressources - all foods inclusive cows and granaries help.

- 1&2 the general problem of overlapping is that you have for a long time (after your initial 4 towns) much room but cannot settle due to the maintenance issue. You see the carrot and can't get it! That is torture!!! So every overlapping tile is simply one thing - a terrible waste!!!!!

As a related questions, are there any CIV equivalents to Civ3 aqueducts and hospitals, i.e. buildings that limit the size of a town?


No, the only thing that limits city size is food, happiness, and health. There are buildings that increase the limits of both happiness and health, but not food. Temples grant a +1 :) per temple, while markets grant a +1 :) per several specific resources. Aqueducts grant +2 :health: and grocers grant +1 :health: per specific resources. Also resources themselves grant bonus health or happiness points.

While I'm at it, how fast do cultural border expansion happen? Or is it still tied to culture? We are creative and thus get +2 culture per town, is that +2 culture per turn?

The bonus from our creative trait is for each city each turn. In other words, every city we have earns +2 :culture: per turn. I’m not sure what is required for each cultural expansion. I typically play Marathon speed, and not Epic. Taking a guess, I’d say at 15, 150, 1500, 7500, and 75000. That’s a guess, so please someone correct me if I’m wrong.

zyxy also suggests going for Pottery for cottages. This would surely be beneficial, and would also slightly increase our research yields towards Writing, having two of the three optionals.

I typically head for Potter very early, as the earlier you can build cottages the quicker they grow. Remember that cottages grow as they are being worked, thereby producing extra commerce. A cottage produces one :commerce: each turn, a hamlet earns two :commerce: , etc., etc.. So the earlier we can get those cottages up the quicker they become towns. Bee lining for Writing by way of Pottery might be a good idea, especially since we have all those floodplain tiles. Floodplain cottages are very sweet.

All factors (I believe) are modified by 1.5 in cost due to epic speed. Culture acquired is not, but the amount of culture needed for expansion is.

Well, as I suggested (and no one opposed it), I started the game up and moved the settler one SW. Rather than upload it I've attached it, so I apologize for the small pic. Anyways...

126433

As you can see not a whole lot opened up, but it does look promising. This will definitely be a nice city site. I just wish we could see what's to the west of those hills. It also looks like the tile W of the cow is a grass hill. I definitely agree with zyxy's suggestion of this site.

Edit: Okay, this is what our city will look like using our current view.

CC: 2f, 2h
Cow: 3f, 3h, 1c
Flood Plains (x6) [cottages]: 3f, commerce varies
Grass Hill [mined]: 1f, 3h
Plains Hill [mined]: 4h
Grass, fresh water [chopped]: 2f, 1c
Grass (x3) [chopped]: 2f
Fresh Water Lake: 2f, 2c
Plains: 1f, 1h

If we keep the forests than we gain three hammers and lose one coin.

Using the above tiles (all forests chopped) would give us [at size 15] +5 f, 13h, and a varied amount of commerce. With the forests we’d have an additional 3 hammers. Also note I counted the plains tile as unimproved, as I differ on how I improve it compared to what I need.

Also note that the above is based off what we can see. I’m guessing there’s a grass hill west of the cow, and a plains hill northwest-west of the settler. West-west of the settler looks like a plains forest tile, and south of that looks like jungle. South-southwest of the settler is possibly a grass tile.

FYI, Animal Husbandry costs 223 beakers and Pottery cost 178 beakers.

Sorry for the jumbled write-up. I'm off to bed.

Allright, the game is on!

There seem to be at least 4 forests in range of this location, maybe 5. Good for health or chops early on, in fact 4 forests allows a healthy city up to the happiness limit of 5 citizens.
Question: occasionaly I have had new forests grow near my capital in my test game. How is this triggered? Only on unimproved tiles? Only next to existing forests?

Btw, if we desperately want to avoid overlap then we could mobve the settler one more tile SW. It's a bit of a shot in the dark though, and it moves us away from the river, so I think I am not in favor.


How fast do you think we can grow to the size where the overlap is getting felt, citizen-wise?
Are there any other implications of an overlap that I am not aware of, i.e. other than the obvious citizen assignments and maxing out at a lower size?
As a related questions, are there any CIV equivalents to Civ3 aqueducts and hospitals, i.e. buildings that limit the size of a town?
While I'm at it, how fast do cultural border expansion happen? Or is it still tied to culture? We are creative and thus get +2 culture per town, is that +2 culture per turn?

Although you've already had some answers, here's my two cents:
1. not so fast I think. Also, if we settle the capital where we are now, then a town E of the warrior still has access to 6 unshared FP's, supporting 12 citizens if farmed, with another one fed from the CC. That's 7 specialists, quite a lot by my standards. You need buildings before you can hire specialists: for example, a lib gives the ability to hire 1 (or 2?) scientist.

2. You cannot abandon cities. And Tile allocation is terribly implemented with overlaps, you cannot easily see which tiles are worked by another city.

3. As said, townsizes are limited by healthyness and happiness. Various buildings, wonders and resources change these variables.

4. +2 cpt for palace, +2 cpt per town. First expansion at 15.


There seems to be no doubt that we should go for Animal Husbandry right away. We need it to make proper use of the cow, to find out where the horses are, and it will lead further towards Writing and Alphabet that we can probably use to trade for whatever else we need.
Marc suggests a going for Mining and BW after AH in order to get access to mines and forest chops. I would think it would be better to be able to trade for these techs, but I'm not sure how viable that would be. I understand that we need Alphabet for tech trading, so if we want to trade then we should head straight for that. This seems a bit long to me to go without mines and chops, but again I don't feel I can fully assess the implications.
zyxy also suggests going for Pottery for cottages. This would surely be beneficial, and would also slightly increase our research yields towards Writing, having two of the three optionals.


Animal husbandry costs 223 beakers and takes 18 turns to research (at 10 beakers per turn - you get some bonus apparently). Writing is slightly more expensive, while Alphabet is from the next age and costs a lot more at 600-700 I think. If we go AH -> Writing -> Alpha we are looking at 80-90 turns I guess. This may be too much, although I personally like it (the Civ3 person in me, no doubt). If we go for techs that are immediately useful, then mining, pottery and bronze working are all good choices. If we get coastal acces then fishing -> sailing might be useful, for work boats and trade routes.

The big advantage of beelining for alpha is that it makes it easier to be the tech king. The real problem is that every delay makes it less likely that you will get it in time - ideally you want to get alpha before the AI's all have writing, so that you can trade with writing and hold back alpha. It is quite surprising how long the AI's will grant you a monopoly on tech trading. I have been able to pull this off quite consistently on monarch level, but only if I go straight AH -> Writing -> Alpha. Even pottery causes a too long delay, despite the shorter research time of writing and the help of the occasional cottage.

I think all in all I am happy with any good research plan. I certainly don't feel I have nailed the optimal one. I think it very much depends on the start, and it looks like our current start will allow lots of directions. On higher levels than monarch the alpha gambit probably won't work so well. MA makes a good case for chops, maybe that's the way to go. In any case, we can start on AH, and explore with that warrior to learn more about our surroundings.

Just an add to my analysis. I've checked some more options and found something that is equal to what I've posted before. If we start (at the same location 1SW):

-building 2 warriors and letting Thebez grow to size 3 before the worker#1
-build worker and go exploring and switch to settler
-work the cow and go to the forest
-have one interturn screwing thumbs before we get BW after AH and mining
-chop the settler and send him to location#2
-start the 2. worker and chop him with the second forest

We are in 2290:
capitol : size 3
2. town : size 1
1 worker
3 warriors
worked one tile (the cow)

But we have already pottery! and have started on writing! giving us 126 points then.
Compared to my scenario A, we lack one worker (2 turns by chop ahead) and have the bigger capitol and the 1 point smaller second city and have two tiles less worked. In scenario A Thebez would grow in 5 turns. The rest is a bit depending on where the second city really is located. I am not able to judge what is better at the moment, but the scenario A is 3 turns back in research.

Letting the capitol grow to size 2 and start with the worker is weaker to both scenarios. I 've to finish the spread sheet. This is too much work calculating each scenario by hand.

Animal husbandry costs 223 beakers and takes 18 turns to research (at 10 beakers per turn - you get some bonus apparently).

Is 10 beakers / turn a fixed number? If not, what specifically changes this?

Is 10 beakers / turn a fixed number? If not, what specifically changes this?

Starting off the city center gives one commerce and the palace gives eight commerce, plus one commerce from a worked tile, getting us a total of ten commerce a turn. Since our slider is at 100% research than that ten commerce becomes ten beakers a turn. Let's say our citizen works the fresh water lake, which is two commerce. Than we would get one commerce from the city center, eight commerce from the palace, and two commerce from working the lake. For a total of eleven commerce. At 100% that eleven commerce would become twelve beakers.

Edit: Whoops, fixed an error.

Commerce is gained from tiles worked, and is used to figure out beakers, culture, and gold per turn. Commerce is what is taken into account when figuring our % slider. Please note that there is a big difference between commerce and gold. Gold is affected by buildings (such as a bank), but commerce is not. In fact I believe the only known thing that affects commerce is the Buearacracy civic.

Is 10 beakers / turn a fixed number? If not, what specifically changes this?

It is : 100% research consuming commerce of
8 c : permanetly only by the capitol
1 c for the center tile
1 c for working one of the flood plains which get the commerce since it is at a river.

Since all the tiles we will work early on are on that river, we will have 12 beakers, when the capital would be size 3 without any cottages so far.

@MA: very impressive starts!

Here's my attempt. This is calculated rather than simulated, so I hope I've understood the mechanics correctly.
I am settling on the SW hill (where we are now), and counting the settling turn as turn 1. On research I just assume AH first, after that it's free (i.e., I don't need any other techs, in particular, there's no chopping.)
Build order: worker (finishes on IT after turn 18), warrior (turn 29), settler (45), two more warriors (49,53).
Tile order: first citizen to fp, second to fp until cow is improved, then to cow, all following citizens to fp.
Worker actions: on turn 57 the worker has irrigated 4 fp's and herded the cow (no roads), in the order: fp, cow, fp (x3).
Capital status: we have 20 shields in the box, capital will grow to size 4 on the interturn. We have 592 gold collected (but need to subtract about 180 for AH).


@dojoboy: you get 8 gold from the palace, 1 from the city center, and 1 from the first tile you work. If you start building a worker, then the city will not grow, so the gold output does not change. (by coincidence the worker build also takes 18 turns :) .) This shows btw that it takes quite a while before you can double the economy - the palace is really a big boost early on.

EDIT: wow, crosspost-fest :D.

@zyxy: Yeah you got it! That is correct AFAIK.

one remark coming from strat about the warriors: I would take the 1 warrior out of your sequence. Why? I only use them for scouting but not for MP early on. The animals and barbs do not cross your borders. The same do the other AI's as long as you have peace and no open borders. So MP is no issue. Because of that I do not build a warrior before the second settler, cause the warrior I have from the start goes a little exploring. He has around 30 turns to do so. Has he found a good place he tries to cover the road the first settler has to go there and the second city can be founded. It is as safe as the capital now and my warrior moves on to city location 3 and the second settler is doing like the first. So far - so good! (Bad translation from German) The real problem that comes know is that at least location #3 is somewhere far away, since I now try to do the blocking, so depending on the map I may be in need of the warriors now to cover a large enemy rich distance through the wilderness to reach with the settler the next location. So don't take this too serious, but I start building only workers and settlers, warriors only if I want to grow the city, what might be the case this time.
In any case this hurry for cities ends as I said before after city 4,5, or 6 depending on our commerce for maintenance then. The chopping can significantly speed up this early city race. When we calcute the start until city 4, that should be clearly demonstrated - but we don't know about the other locations now, so we can't do so. The only thing we must decide now is whether we:

let grow the capital a bit:

warrior, warrior, worker, settler...?
or go straight on with the peaceful guys:
worker, settler, worker, settler,...?

What do you think?

I typically play Marathon speed, and not Epic. Taking a guess, I’d say at 15, 150, 1500, 7500, and 75000. That’s a guess, so please someone correct me if I’m wrong.

I play almost exclusively at Epic. You are 100% correct with your guesses.

I typically head for Potter very early, as the earlier you can build cottages the quicker they grow. Remember that cottages grow as they are being worked, thereby producing extra commerce. A cottage produces one each turn, a hamlet earns two , etc., etc.. So the earlier we can get those cottages up the quicker they become towns. Bee lining for Writing by way of Pottery might be a good idea, especially since we have all those floodplain tiles. Floodplain cottages are very sweet.

This is one comment I truly hope doesn't get lost in this discussion. Especially in the early game. Irrigating floodplains gets you to your health/happiness limits quicker but that's about it. And when you're forced to stagnate your commerce is also stalled at 1g per floodplain worked. A cottage instantly turns a floodplain tile into 2 commerce, and it will take 15 turns before it turns into a Hamlet and produce 3 commerce. Irrigating for GP farms is nice but it should be secondary to commerce IMO. Pottery is also very helpful because it allows you to build a granary. Granaries provide an extra health in the city, but more importantly allow faster growth. They work the same as Civ III granaries in this aspect. A site with lots of floodplains has the potential to carry several towns once you begin taking cities off of the hands of your rivals.

Irrigating for GP farms is nice but it should be secondary to commerce IMO.

I really like cities with a lot of floodplain tiles, as they can be specialized into so many different types of cities [science/wealth/GP]. As McLMan mentioned, they make great commerce/science cities. Here lately I've been playing a lot of culture games, hence my immediate notice of possible GP farms! ;)

What is everyone's preference on the warrior? Any preferred direction to explore?

What's everyone's opinions on our builds and tech research? Several great options have been brought up lately.

Unless we're still unsure of how to proceed, I'll probably play either Saturday night or sometime Sunday.

Edit: Wow! Looking at the progress page there are several teams that are already in the 2000 BC's!! VQ is already at 2500 BC! That's odd, look at Xteam. They already have a score of 40 at 3970 BC. Must have popped a hut or something. Everyone else is similar on the score table.

Okay, I understand now. Look at the score graph and than the culture graph and you'll see how Xteam is doing it. They used their settler to explore, or atleast haven't settled yet. I'm still curious how you can have a score of 40 without having a city founded. Must have popped a hut or something. Interesting.

one remark coming from strat about the warriors: I would take the 1 warrior out of your sequence. Why? I only use them for scouting but not for MP early on. The animals and barbs do not cross your borders. The same do the other AI's as long as you have peace and no open borders. So MP is no issue. Because of that I do not build a warrior before the second settler, cause the warrior I have from the start goes a little exploring.

What then allows barbs to cross borders? Is it the moment "open borders" are agreed upon with another civ?

What then allows barbs to cross borders? Is it the moment "open borders" are agreed upon with another civ?

Barbs can cross borders whenever they want. Animals cannot cross borders. Since typically all you get is animals in the earliest part of the game its okay to leave the city undefended. But just make sure we have some defense there when the barb warriors show up.

I'm not sure when the barbs appear.

What is everyone's preference on the warrior? Any preferred direction to explore?

I think the warrior should explore counter clockwise around the city site to see the lay of the land. Make a half circle then head West.

What's everyone's opinions on our builds and tech research? Several great options have been brought up lately.

I think we should start with another warrior for more exploration, then start a rax until the city grows to size 2 and switch to worker. Start the 1st settler a few turns before BW is researched & help it out with a chop at the end.
For research I think Animal Husbandry -> Pottery (maybe) -> Mining -> Bronze Working -> Pottery (maybe)

I have calculated several scneario's to about turn 70. Scenario's starting with worker, scenario's starting with warrior+growth, scenario's witha focus on early settler, focus on early growth, etc. In each case, settling on green circle, research AH, no other research assumed. General picture:

- By turn (approx) 70 every scenario has two settlers, one worker and a varying number of warriors (between2 and 6). Scenarios that focus strongly on early settler, like "warrior-worker-settler-..." and "worker-settler-warrior-..." have grown the capital to size 4 and generated some 730 gold in 70 turns. Other scenarios like "worker-warrior-settler" or "warrior-worker-warrior-settler" have grown to size 5 and generated around 800 gold.
- The second settler appears around turn 65 in each scenario. The first as early as turn 39 ("worker-settler") or as late as turn 54 ("warrior-worker-warrior-settler"). Scenarios "warrior-worker-settler" and "worker-warrior-settler" are the compromise scenarios and both get the first settler at turn 45.
- As a general rule, a "delayed worker" (i.e., start with one or two warriors) or "early settler" scenario delays growth and hence production later on. But of course the early warriors or settler also have advantages.
- The main advantage of an early warrior would be hut popping IMO. Although huts are pretty benign, I'm not sure if this is worth it. Early contacts are not that necessary, there's nothing to trade anyway.

My conclusion is that it is best to start with a worker - the early warrior is not worth it. Both the worker and AH come in in turn 18, perhaps Methos can pause at this point and we can decide where to go from there. Based on the info we have now I would favor warrior - settler after that, this seems to have the best midrange advantage as the warrior would allow us to grow the capital to size 2. It will delay the settler by 6 turns.

Btw, irrigated fp's are not just useful for growth, but also for settler production. And we can always change some to cottages later.

I agree that scouting the immediate surroundings of our HQ is best.

EDIT:

Unless we're still unsure of how to proceed, I'll probably play either Saturday night or sometime Sunday.

How do you want to proceed?

Great work zyxy!

Early contacts are not that necessary, there's nothing to trade anyway.

In case you didn’t know, knowing AI’s does affect the cost of techs being researched. For every AI we know who already knows that tech we gain a bonus in our beakers researched. The cost of the tech is the same, we just gain a bonus.

How do you want to proceed?

My preference has always been worker first, and head straight for Pottery. IMO getting Pottery first and getting those cottages built will speed our research up a lot, especially if we get them early. Pottery should finish prior to the Worker, and than we can start AH. Once the worker is finished he immediately begins putting up cottages to get them to start growing. We should be able to get at least one cottage up, possibly two, before we can improved the cow.

After both Pottery and AH I’d probably agree with heading for BW.

IMO getting the cow improved first isn’t worth it. It grants food equal to a fp as well as three hammers. This early in the game IMO production isn’t nearly as important as research is. Getting our commerce up quickly first is more beneficial than getting production up.

Deciding to test my suggestion, using this map:

126584

Please note, the below is not my turn set, but notes from my test game.

Turn 2, 3970 BC: Settled on the plains hill. Started a worker (due in 18) and began research on Pottery (due in 14).

3850 BC: Borders expand.

3550 BC: Pottery learned, and research begun on AH (due in 17).

3430 BC: Worker is complete, a Warrior is started. The worker moves to a fp and starts on a cottage (due in 8). AH is due in 13.

3220 BC: Cottage is finished. AH due in 6.

3190 BC: Worker moves to another fp and begins a cottage.

3100 BC: Warrior complete, start on another warrior. AH due in 2 and cottage due in 5. Residing cottage will become a hamlet in 11.

3040 BC: AH learned, start on Mining (due in 8).

2980 BC: Second cottage complete.

2950 BC: Worker moves to cow.

2920 BC: Worker begins a pasture (due in 6). Thebes will grow to size 3 in 4.

2830 BC: Warrior complete, start on a barracks.

2800 BC: Mining learned, start on BW (due in 15).

2770 BC: First cottage grows into a hamlet, and the pasture is complete.

2740 BC: Worker begins work on a road to connect the cow.

2530 BC: Second cottage becomes a hamlet. Cow is now connected and worker moves to the grass forest with fresh water. BW due in 5.

2500 BC: Switch production to a settler, complete in 14. Start road on forested grass (due in 3). BW due in 4. I should have invested a few turns into a fp cottage instead, but wasn’t thinking.

2380 BC: BW learned, start on Writing (due in 11). Worker begins chopping.

2260 BC: Chop complete, settler due in 3.

2170 BC: Settler complete.

2050 BC: Writing learned.

Here’s Thebes at 2050 BC:

126583

Not to for sure about all the warriors I built, so that could easily be changed. Changing to a worker would have adjusted things too as well. I’ve also attached my map if you all would like to mess with it.

Edit: It won't upload, so I need to create a 4000 BC save real quick. Okay, added a 4000 BC save. Only problem is it plays like an actual game unfortunately. Meaning you'll win a conquest victory shortly. My test game had all victory conditions turned off and me as the only civ. Hopefully you modders can adjust the 4000 BC save I've provided. My apologies.

Great work, Methos:goodjob:

For comparison: Here is my favorite at 2050BC.

126590

You have beaten me by 10 turns to Writing! :goodjob:
However, I have my 2. city already at size 3 (with a smaller capital) But the value of this we cannot really judge before we know the surroundings.

Since we agree on the worker first, I think you should start with that worker and go lifting the fog with the warrior and come back for discussion after that with a screeny.

Have you done an analysis, what would be the outcome in your approach with the cottages, if you start with AH and go to pottery second?

In case you didn’t know, knowing AI’s does affect the cost of techs being researched. For every AI we know who already knows that tech we gain a bonus in our beakers researched. The cost of the tech is the same, we just gain a bonus.

Thanks for the info! So: we cannot trade techs, we cannot see what techs the AI has, but still our research cost for these techs decreases :confused: :crazyeye:.

--- :king: -------- :king: --------- :king: ----

Now we still need to decide what to research first. There seem to be two approaches: pottery first, for increasing the gold supply, or AH first, for the cow and a strategy focussed on growth/production. The first will maintain fast research but postpone settlers, the second builds quick settlers.

If we first research AH, and use the worker to first irrigate an FP and then improve the cow, then this gives enough time to research Pottery. If we first research Pottery, and use the worker to build two cottages, then this gives enough time to research AH (I think).
So: does it matter much?

I should also mention that my calculations are off. FP's are apparently more difficult to irrigate than grassland, contrary to what I thought, and so my computations on worker turns are wrong. The effect is not enormous I think, but it means the turn numbers may be slightly off.

FWIW with my limited knowledge and experience, I'm inclined towards Methos' alternative with Pottery first. I've always been a fan of (and good at) Civ3 research games, and the quick commerce increase from cottages is alluring. It's not only the fact that they are built that much earlier, but also that they grow to give even more commerce that much earlier.
I'm assuming that the forests in range will help us with health issues until we can get the cows hooked up. Also what Methos says makes sense, about research being more important than production in the early game, since we cannot trade for techs until Alphabet.

Consider this my (inexperienced) vote for Pottery first. :)

If we first research AH, and use the worker to first irrigate an FP and then improve the cow, then this gives enough time to research Pottery. If we first research Pottery, and use the worker to build two cottages, then this gives enough time to research AH (I think).
So: does it matter much?

Cottages grow as they are worked from cottage/hamlet/village/town. I believe I'm missing one. Anyway, each state takes a certain amount of turns until it grows. When it grows it than earns an additional commerce each turn. Getting cottages up early causing the city to be able to research faster earlier.

Comparing my test game with MA's he has two cities at size 3 and I have two (one at size 4 and a settler). I also am ahead of him on Writing by ten turns. In a few more turns my two hamlets will expand to the next level thereby increasing my commerce by two more (without having to grow any population points), thereby also increasing research.

Having a second city also helps though, and I agree we need one out quick. In my test game I should have switched to a settler earlier, maybe just after size 3.

So what is our research path. I can't continue on without knowing everyone's vote. Zyxy is nuetral, Niklas is Pottery, MA is AH, and I'm unsure on either dojoboy or McLMan.

Unless anyone objects, I'll follow MA's suggestion of exploring counter-clockwise with the warrior. Worker first appears as agreed upon, so research is the only question.

Hm, that is not such a big issue, Methos IMHO. You are in charge of starting us out. I only wanted to give you something to think about. Nothing more. You have argued your case and you are aware of my input. So if you feel to go with pottery, That's ok with me. And the captain has supported you.
What hurts me more is loosing the free weekend I had without being able to discuss the more important decisions between 2000BC and 500BC. The next week and the weekend ahead I am very busy in my profession and my participation in the discussion will diminish to a very limited time. So from my point, please just start out with pottery and show us the surroundings.

For research I think Animal Husbandry -> Pottery (maybe) -> Mining -> Bronze Working -> Pottery (maybe)

Since I originally said this, I'm leaning more torward Pottery in the 2nd spot. Knowing where the copper is could help with expansion decisions, or lack of copper could influence research decisions.

So what is our research path. I can't continue on without knowing everyone's vote. Zyxy is nuetral, Niklas is Pottery, MA is AH, and I'm unsure on either dojoboy or McLMan.

Methos, I favor Pottery followed by Animal Husbandry. I'll check back later today. It's Mother's Day, and I've got a day full of activity for a beautiful woman and our 2 sons. :)

You have argued your case and you are aware of my input.

After rereading my posts I realize I am pushing my opinion way too hard. I apologize to everyone for that.

What hurts me more is loosing the free weekend I had without being able to discuss the more important decisions between 2000BC and 500BC.

Again my apologies. Since this is a SGOTM I hate to push ahead without having everything nailed down. Plus Team Smurkz has always discussed at length. I'll play my 20 now.

Turn 0, 4000 BC: Move the Settler SW on the plains hill.

Turn 1, 3970 BC: Thebez founded, begins work on a Worker (due in 14). Research on Pottery begun (due in 18). Here’s our immediate surroundings:

126690

Turn 4, 3880 BC:
IBT: Cultural borders expand.

Turn 5, 3850 BC: It appears we have located the northern tip of our landmass.

Turn 7, 3790 BC:
IBT: Lions appear near the eastern coast.

Turn 13, 3610 BC: Our warrior moves within sight of some lions in the far west.
IBT: The lions move adjacent to our Warrior.

Turn 14, 3580 BC: I move the warrior across the river onto the hill, but still adjacent to the lion. This will give us +25% defense from the hill, and +25% defense from having to attack us across a river. With any luck we survive.
IBT: :woohoo: We survive the lion attack with 1.4 health remaining!
Pottery>Animal Husbandry (due in 17)

Turn 15, 3550 BC: The Warrior is resting for now.

Turn 18, 3460 BC: Our Warrior is fully healed so continues exploring.
IBT: Thebez- Worker>Warrior

Turn 19, 3430 BC: Our worker moves to one of the floodplains and starts on a cottage (due in 8).
IBT: One of Catherine’s scouts appears from the southwest.

Notes:
The Warrior will be finished in ten turns.
The cottage will be complete in 7.
Animal Husbandry (68/223) will be finished in 12 turns.
There are lions east of Thebez.
Catherine’s scout is in the southwest.

Within Thebez’s radius is a Cow, Rice, and Stone.

Here’s a global view of our surrounding lands:

126691

Roster:
Methos- Just Played
zyxy- Up
dojoboy- On Deck
McLMan
Marc Aurel
Niklas

Here’s the 3400 BC save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Smurkz_SG001_BC3400_01.Civ4SavedGame).

Great start Methos. I'll browse the save.

Edit: Okay, I just made a quick peek at the save. A couple things:

(1) What do you guys think about laying down our second city near the isthmus to creat a "by-land" choke point? The settler should use an escort for that distance.

(2) Research after AH. Did we ever settle on a VC? Regardless, should we grab a terrain improvement tech next? Perhaps Hunting or Mining. Also, I like to grab Metal Casting when possible for the production boost provided by forges.

Ya, great start Methos!
I absolutely concur that waiting, analysing and discussuing and finding a team solution is best. I know what I'm talking about, I suffered heavily from team Bede in SGOTM9 running along the game as fast as the wind. I only wanted to point out, that sometimes (after discussion) you have to move on with just a majority of the team to keep the momentum of the game process but I am very content with the result. And I always appreciate someone having a totally different idea, I wasn't able to think of. In this case it seems you have been terribly right with your yield for early cottages, since there are no gold, silver or gem ressources around. Strange, that we have the lot of 5 cows around Thebez.
But the important thing I want to remark in the situation is the topography. It seems that we have a good chance to block the Russians off at the isthmus in the SW. So we would not need to care for the Northern lands, if we do not have a brilliant idea on how to use them early on. I would scout to the SW to find the best blocking line. However not much is won by that, since we seem to lack many ressources on our very small half island landmass. OTOH we first need to be sure that SE of Thebez is no land bridge.
After that I would like to first use the settler blocking the other AI's in the SW. I see at least one position for another city in the North. We should make this a coastal one and get the fish, since we have so few food ressources in reach.

EDIT: Blocking is somewhat questionable cause of the mountain ridge in the east (Is that correct?) That is blocked for land units but galleys can move around. We would need two towns to block that - that's quite a lot. Hmmm - should we go for early sea exploring with a galley to determine what's lying beyond ourselves?

The stone - with the stone in our direct reach - the question of early wonders arise.
Stonehenge ? After blocking we would have possibly time for such thing.
Contra: we would have no benefit from the obelisks (some more culture, but we do not go for a culture victory)
Pro: we get a Great Prophet. If we found one of the midterm religions we have it's Great building right there giving us a lot of gold, if we send missionaries around

Alright, good opening!

(EDIT: crossposted with MA.)

It seems we picked a good location for the capital, with cow, chow and rocks. Unfortunately with an unirrigated farm on the rice, but still the city has plenty of food to support miners, and cottages on the fp's was the correct decision it seems.

There are at least 3 decent sites for cities it seems: at the cow-and-river in the west, on the coast south of that, and east on the fp's. But I agree with dojoboy that blocking the choke as a priority may be a good idea. It depends a bit on how far away Russia is, I guess - perhaps we will need to block even further. Also we need to make sure that there is a single choke.

Btw, that's a strange mountain range to the east. I wonder if Capac is on the other side of it.

Are we playing ten turns each from here, or still 20? In the first case I have little to plan, so I can play quickly. Research project will take another 11 turns, city grows in 10 and makes warrior in 10, the worker can do another cottage after this one, and the warrior first explores the tiles inmediately east of it, and then passes through the choke.

For slightly longer term, we need to decide what to research next. Mining?
The second warrior can explore SE a bit - it seems lands end, but better make sure. Should Thebez start a settler after the warrior? Or do we want to grow to size 3 first?

After rereading my posts I realize I am pushing my opinion way too hard. I apologize to everyone for that.

Please don't. It did not come across as "pushing" to me, and conflicting opinions can only help. Cottages are probably the most powerful improvement on flatlands, and research speed seems to be the bottleneck of this game.

Unfortunately with an unirrigated farm on the rice,

I’ve never quit understood the difference between being connected through irrigation, and self-irrigated. What difference is it game-wise? Is it affected differently later in the game by something?

Are we playing ten turns each from here, or still 20?

We’re each playing 20 turns the first round, and than ten turns each after that.

Did we ever settle on a VC?

I believe the consensus was a Diplomatic victory.

Research after AH.

I believe Mining, Bronze Working, and Writing are next in line. Granted, this is subject to change as we learn more of our surroundings.

Hmmm - should we go for early sea exploring with a galley to determine what's lying beyond ourselves?

More than likely our next city will be coastal, so I agree Sailing should probably be moved into the lineup. I suggest we wait on it though until its benefits are needed. Plus by waiting the turns required to research the tech will be less as others will know it. We may need it prior to having Alphabet.

Btw, that's a strange mountain range to the east. I wonder if Capac is on the other side of it.

I think you’re right. Remember that G/COTM where the ‘Great Wall’ was put up? Every mountain had a pre-stationed spearmen or something. I believe we played as the Mongols in that game. HC is probably just on the other side.

I like your all’s choke point idea. If we can close Cathy off we can grab a fair chunk of land for ourselves.

Something to the Victory Condition:
I think we should decide that later. Before 500 BC we cannot judge, if we get away without much fighting. If we have to fight OTOH we probably will build up a town throwing units out very fast. Then it might be just effective to push on to domination. So let's see later on. I don't want to hurt any relation in the early game (so far I can see now), since Huayna is probably enough for an enemy at the moment.

I had the same thought than Methos and zyxy about this strange mountain chain. I believe Huayna is on the other side. Knocking him out early will solve that problem and we can more likely chose the diplomatic route.

The stone - with the stone in our direct reach - the question of early wonders arise.
Stonehenge ? After blocking we would have possibly time for such thing.
Contra: we would have no benefit from the obelisks (some more culture, but we do not go for a culture victory)
Pro: we get a Great Prophet. If we found one of the midterm religions we have it's Great building right there giving us a lot of gold, if we send missionaries around

Clever idea! We might get Taoism or Confucianism, and will likely be able to get Islam - ignored by the AI it seems.

Another option: do you think we could pull off the Pyramids? Looks like a very powerful wonder to me, as it gives access to all government types, but I have never tried it. For example, representation would be a useful early govt type, and Universal Suffrage seems very strong once our cottage industry is mature.

I’ve never quit understood the difference between being connected through irrigation, and self-irrigated. What difference is it game-wise? Is it affected differently later in the game by something?

The difference is 1 food. If you build a farm on the rice tile now, it counts as an unirrigated farm. Once we get the Civil Service tech, we can make an irrigation chain from one of the rivers. The effect is similar to when you make a chain and then break the chain by destroying one of the farms: the unconnected ones now lose 1 food.


We’re each playing 20 turns the first round, and than ten turns each after that.

OK, I'll play twenty then. If needed, I'll pause after ten for input. Plan atm is for a settler after the warrior.


I believe Mining, Bronze Working, and Writing are next in line. Granted, this is subject to change as we learn more of our surroundings.


I believe that too. Will start on mining after AH comes in.


I think you’re right. Remember that G/COTM where the ‘Great Wall’ was put up? Every mountain had a pre-stationed spearmen or something. I believe we played as the Mongols in that game. HC is probably just on the other side.


Or it is a ruse. I remember a Vanilla GOTM as Rome which featured a mountain range from northpole to southpole, the "spine of the world". Very nice game, they translated lots of stuff into Latin :).

Turn 0, 3400BC: all perfect.

Turn 1, 3370BC: our warrior finds sugar south of Thebez (lux; available with calendar tech). He sees that the russian borders are very close across the water. There's more sugar near Russia.

Turn 2, 3340BC: zzz.

Turn 3, 3310BC: zzz.

Turn 4, 3280BC: Scared citizens report 2 groups of lions east of Thebez.

Turn 5, 3250BC: zzz.

Turn 6, 3220BC: zzz.

Turn 7, 3190BC: Our cottage is done, 14 turns unitl it grows to hamlet. The worker moves south to build another.

Turn 8, 3160BC: zzz.

Turn 9, 3130BC: We find clam (health resource) on the western shore.

Turn 10, 3100BC: Thebez has grown to size 2 and completed the warrior. I'll start a settler as we desperately need to get that choke. Buddhism has been founded in an unknown land. Our new warrior heads southeast. Our first warrior spots gems.

Turn 11, 3070BC: zzz.

Turn 12, 3040BC:
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/zyxy/smurkz4_1_BC3040_AH.jpg
"Blessed shall be the fruit of thy cattle, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep."
Fine, fine, how about some horses? We start researching Mining. There are horses up north, and near Russia. We find more clam, this time on the eastern shores. Our western warrior arrives at the russian border, and sees lots of sugar, and more gems. Cathy has been mining a bit. This is probably Moscow as the city is a fat cross:
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/zyxy/Smurkz4_1_BC3040_Russia.jpg

Turn 13, 3010BC: Our warrior confirms that the southeastern lands end very quickly.

Turn 14, 2980BC: A panther is spotted southwest of Thebes! Panic in the streets :eek:.

Turn 15, 2950BC: Second cottage is done, the worker moves south again to herd the cow. Our russian explorer finds rice near Russia, and it seems the land ends near Moscow.

Turn 16, 2920BC: This is mean:
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/zyxy/Smurkz4_1_BC2920_RussianBlock.jpg
There may be a landbridge to the lands further southwest, but we cannot pass. It looks like a war with Russia will be forced upon us.

There is no time for our second warrior to go north and confirm lands end there, and be back in time for the settler, so he'll bust fog and find that panther southwest of Thebez.

Turn 17, 2890BC: Our russian explorer heads back to our lands to help escorting the settler.

Turn 18, 2860BC: Apparently the Russian scout has killed a lion east of Thebez. We spot the panther again.

Turn 19, 2830BC: We can now "move a mountain", that is, we have learned the secrets of Mining. Research is set to Bronze Working. The border of Thebez expands, and the Russian border does likewise. Fortunately we can still get past. We spot a lion West of Thebez.

Turn 20, 2800BC: Hinduism is founded somewhere. Our warrior is threatened by a lion and a panther. Although the defense of a hill is lower than that of a forest, I move the warrior to a hil so that only the lion can attack next turn. Our cow now has a pasture, and one citizen moves from cottage to cow for a 5 turn speed-up on the settler.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/zyxy/Smurkz4_1_BC2800_overview_south.jpg

Sorry for landing the next player in trouble with those animals. Let's hope it goes ok. Whether we can get the settler out in time will be a matter of luck really.

Here's a tentative dotmap (of course this may need changes once we see copper); blue dot is priority I think:

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/zyxy/Smurkz4_1_BC2800_overview.jpg

The save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Smurkz_SG001_BC2800_01.Civ4SavedGame)

Sorry for landing the next player in trouble with those animals. Let's hope it goes ok. Whether we can get the settler out in time will be a matter of luck really.

No problem, we ought to be able to survive this.

Here's a tentative dotmap (of course this may need changes once we see copper); blue dot is priority I think:


I'll move on the blue-dot.

I'll load the save and report back w/ thought and questions before playing.

We've got ten turns to building the settler. Any chance chopping would move this along sooner?

Noticed no roads were built. Simply avoiding unnecessary production turns here?

There are 12 turns to BW. Do we want to queue up for Sailing next, or go with Hunting -> Archery (thinking barbs will be coming by soon). FYI, I've never played on epic.

Build orders after settler:

(1) worker, warrior, settler
(2) warrior, worker, settler

Not a great deal at risk, it seems, so I'll look for some feedback over the next 1 to 1.5 hrs. before playing my 20-turn set. And, if anything important comes up, I'll pause and report back w/ screenies.

Are there any rules against posting a save during turns for team feedback? I assume not, but just checking.

I like the blue dot. Even there though, it will be under cultural pressure from Moscow, esp with Cathy being creative and all.

We won't research BW in time to help the Settler with a chop. I'd consider letting Thebez grow to 3, then going for another worker (aided by a chop), followed by a Settler (another chop).

We really should consider Sailing, it will be the only way to get the new town in the trade network without building one heck of a road through hostile, unsettled territory.

Another thing to consider with BW on the horizon - Slavery. I NEVER used to adopt slavery until I had another civic that I really wanted and piggy-backed it. I just never thought the one turn of anarchy was worth it. I'm not too fond of whipping in Civ III & it carried over here. However, in a current SG I have seen the error of my ways. It is quite powerful, especially in the early game where it also helps a great deal in controlling health/happiness issues besides getting buildings/units quicker. I'm not saying switch as soon as BW comes in, but when we see a need for the whip, we shouldn't hesitate.

Not a great deal at risk, it seems, so I'll look for some feedback over the next 1 to 1.5 hrs. before playing my 20-turn set.

IMO I'd wait at least 24 hours if possible. We have players scattered throughout the world so some of them are asleep right now. Niklas is from Sweden, Marc Aurel is from Germany, and even though zyxy has already played, note he's from the UK. With this being a competition game I'd suggest waiting at least 24 hours if you're able to. We've waited longer before in previous games.

IMO I'd wait at least 24 hours if possible. We have players scattered throughout the world so some of them are asleep right now. Niklas is from Sweden, Marc Aurel is from Germany, and even though zyxy has already played, note he's from the UK. With this being a competition game I'd suggest waiting at least 24 hours if you're able to. We've waited longer before in previous games.

I'll gladly wait. I was just sitting here thinking I wouldn't be able to play through tonight.

Normally next I would research Writing for the libraries, but I’m not so sure right now. The settler will complete in ten turns (BW will have seven left) and it’ll take him five turns to reach blue dot (BW will have two turns left). Fishing will take seven turns to research and Writing will take fifteen turns, so we need to discuss what will be the first build for blue dot city as well as Thebez. Fishing allows us to work water tiles and build fishing boats, so going for it next may be the best thing. Libraries (Writing) grants a +25% research rate, so is very helpful too.

If both warriors move 1NW we won’t need an escort. Remember that both barbs and animals spawn only in the fog. By posting on a hill we can push back the fog more, thereby giving the barbs less tiles to spawn from. A tactic we’ve used before in SG’s is posting units on hills to push all the fog back, thereby removing barbs out totally on our landmass. I don’t believe that would be wise here, as it’d take too many turns.

I’m thinking after the settler completes we probably want to grow to size three before building another worker or settler. This would allow our second cottage to get worked. Remember that the only way for cottages to grow is to be worked. If they’re not worked, they don’t grow.

I just never thought the one turn of anarchy was worth it.

Remember we’re Spiritual, therefore don’t suffer anarchy. We still have to wait five turns between each civic switch.

Noticed no roads were built. Simply avoiding unnecessary production turns here?

Yes. Building roads is a civ3 habit that I am trying to unlearn, at least for the early stage of the game. Later on, I do like to have a road on every tile :).

There are 12 turns to BW. Do we want to queue up for Sailing next, or go with Hunting -> Archery (thinking barbs will be coming by soon). FYI, I've never played on epic.

In part it depends on whether we have copper. If we do, then military wise we are all set. If not, then Iron Working becomes more relevant, but probably it can still wait, as we have horses already.
That being said, I am in doubt between Sailing and Writing. Writing is nice because of the libraries - they combine nicely with the cottages to speed up research. Also, we will soon need something to build while growing towns, and we cannot keep building warriors all the time. OTOH, we do not need the ability to sign open borders yet, so I think Writing can wait, and we should at least do Fishing first.

I would like to avoid hunting -> archery. It's a useless dead end. Instead of archers, we can try to get horses online. Question for the experienced among you on the trade network: can you connect roads to rivers? For example, suppose we settle red dot and want to connect horses to Thebez. Is it enough to road the tile E-NE of Thebez to connect the two rivers, the horse tile and the tile south of it, and pasture the horses?

I like the build order: finish the settler - warrior (and grow Thebez to size 3) - worker - settler. The last two can be aided with a chop, in fact the worker can mine and road the tile south of Thebez, and irrigate the rice tile in 18 turns if I compute correctly. Once we road the rice we get a health bonus, but first we need to chop to speed up the worker. Then both workers can chop 2-3 forests total to help the settler.
EDIT: or, if we want to get the rice online, we can road the cow tile (just to use up some worker turns), then road the hill tile south of Thebez, followed by farm and road on the rice, also for 18 turns total.

Are there any rules against posting a save during turns for team feedback? I assume not, but just checking.
No, in fact, if you check back with questions partway during your turn, posting a save is very helpful. Please post as attachment, not as upload.

Yes, the dotmap looks perfect – and the blue dot has definitely priority. After that I would think the red dot in the north is important for resources – we need those horses! And 3rd the pink dot in the south for bottling Russia up safely.

On research :

My approach is simply – looking for what the ressources need. I am playing in favour of asap getting larger cities and I want to get health and happiness up asap. So what is in reach?
With red and blue dot settled, we have two sea food resources that could bring the health up – that would make fishing mandatory IMHO.
I agree with zyxy that archery at the moment is a dead end. We should get the horses and the chariots.
The problem we have is more the missing early luxuries. We can get only one - the gems S of blue dot. But they are as often in a jungle. To remove this we need iron working. Later on there is the sugar, but that is still far ahead. With rice and cow we have two foods already. For growing we therefore would more urgently need happiness.
(For the fp towns we still need the fishes with same priority)
Heredity rule therefore seems very effective, cause we get one happy face by each unit in town and if we can get this fast by the pyramids – would be great! (Including the GP growth initiation) So masonry is also on my list for techs to be researched fast. The Alphabet however is not on my list for very urgent techs, because we now can see that there will be on the midterm run only one partner to deal with. To get to know the others, I think we need the galley to sail eastward. I assume as said before Capac in the east, so we don’t need to worry his borders, however we need to fear his navy. Getting along his shore before he can attack us on the sea has a great value IMHO. So that’s it from my point:

-Fishing (health)
-Masonry (I want the pyramids and maybe stonehenge also)
-Iron working (I want that gems!)
-Sailing (I want to meet the others on our continent, if there are any besides Capac and Cathrine)
Writing would help with the lib in the capital. The other cities have not enough commerce yet for libs (they only give 25%) and since we agree on settling blue dot first, the cottages around the green dot city won’t be available so fast.

Question for the experienced among you on the trade network: can you connect roads to rivers?

Yes. A road does not need to be connected from the resource to the city. Merely connect the resource to a river with a road, and than make sure the city is connected to the river.

Okay, all but Niklas has chimed in. He may be out picking up the game. ;)

Preturn overview: (unlikely all will take place during my turn-set)

Research - begin Fishing after obtaining BW

Settlement #2 - blue dot (place warriors on high ground to prevent barb-spawn)

Build queue - Warrior, Worker, Settler
* Chop for worker
* Chop for settler using both workers

Work cottage tiles and road rice/cows.

I'll likely play and post by this evening or have an update posted for feedback.

The Alphabet however is not on my list for very urgent techs, because we now can see that there will be on the midterm run only one partner to deal with.

I agree, Alphabet isn’t vital at the moment, especially if we are the only one Cathy knows. If she only knows us she won’t be willing to trade, or if she does it’ll be expensive.

Build queue - Warrior, Worker, Settler
* Chop for worker
* Chop for settler using both workers

Make sure Thebez is at size three before starting the Worker. Cottages only grow when worked, so they’re useless sitting idle.

Unless I’m mistaken, I believe there is 17 turns left on BW, not twelve. Currently it’ll take seven turns to research Fishing, so dojoboy won’t complete Fishing.

We might want to have our worker follow the settler over and corral that cow. This will help speed up blue dot. I’m guessing start a warrior when blue dot is settled?

Sounds like you got a good plan dojoboy!

We might want to have our worker follow the settler over and corral that cow. This will help speed up blue dot. I’m guessing start a warrior when blue dot is settled?

Good idea. Thebez shouldn't grow at a rate that one worker couldn't keep up with. How soon should we connect the second city? Unless others object, I think a warrior is a good first build for the second city.

What about naming the new settlement? I noticed Thebe(z) was a team tradition. Does the same go for all cities, in some manner?

@dojoboy: good plan! Although one of the cottages will stop growing, I would work the cow now that we are making a settler. Then switch back to cottage when building the warrior.

If we manage to settle blue dot, I would build warrior -> workboat, probably followed by worker. That will allow the city to grow a bit first. I don't remember what fishing clams does, but probably either lots of food or lots of gold. Both are good.
The first two workers will be needed near Thebez for a while I think - for chopping, and, in case we want a wonder, preparing mines/quarry.

I think you can choose a name for the new city. We'll all get a chance to found a city hopefully.

Good luck with the barbs! And let's hope Cathy doesn't beat us to that spot.

Yes zyxy, I support working the cow now. The reason is simple. On Monarch the AI already has a valuable advantage at the start and is often terribly fast on throwing out settlers. Since the blue dot is closer to Moscow than to the capital of Smurgypt Catherine has a lot of advantages in this competition. It might be a close race we are having with Catherine. I will not be content before this important race is won.

(Edit: I've seen the mistake by myself; it's also 5 turns from Moscow to blue-dot; so let's hope)

Your plan, dojoboy, -warrior -worker -settler sounds good.
Keep Methos advice for letting Thebez first grow to 3 after the settler- warrior. The invested food shall not be wasted. I often forget this when playing sloppy. If necessary fit the start of the barracks in, switch to worker after size 3 is reached and continue the barracks later on.
For the name - find your own - but somehow work something from "Smurkz" in.