Anyone have a different strategy in mind, faced with this ridiculous start? Prince difficulty btw.

http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z22/fnurt/Civ4ScreenShot0058.jpg

depends on difficulty. At prince or under warrior rush seems good..

Well, I don´t like to rush things, it may be that you end up isolated if you rush him and that´s never good. It looks to be some fairly good lands around you. And three crab in BFC will get you a good food bost to settle across sea fast.

Fishing would be first on the techlist to be able to scout the area. (and work the crab) next target, BW to be able to whip or chop settlers, next sailing to get them on location.

As you got that choke point Paris will be easy to defend vs the egyptian warchariots. no problem there.

Archery seems advisable here...

There are 2 more good food resources north of paris making excellent area for another city. being coastal cities will be a good trade boost too.

You cant rush what you dont see. I would of gone BW route and masonry for the marble after you have your workboats. You look pretty safe from barbs tucked away there.

Your first two cities anyway should grow quickly.

Build a galley and go East & west

Rush or you will regret it! Actually, you may want to play it both ways! Save and rush then reload and try it without rushing.

I recently warrior rushed Germany and then ax rushed Inca. Ended up stranded on a large island and as soon as I found the other players I was last in techs and power! Still won a space race though.

I recently warrior rushed Germany and then ax rushed Inca. Ended up stranded on a large island and as soon as I found the other players I was last in techs and power! Still won a space race though.

My point exactly, the rush may be you way to go sometimes, but if you don´t know if there are any other civs oute there to trade techs with you ought to wait.

That is my way to do it anyway. I really would lika to see whats on that eastern landmas, that seems to be a really beutyfull spot. with, fish, sheep and wheat.

At prince difficulty and with that starting location wonderspam would be a good choice too. 3 food resources means your miners will never go hungry. ;)

Definitely rush, although I'd suggest using archers, not warriors. With warriors, you're fighting strength 2 vs 3 (+25% city, +25% fortify) at the cost of 15 each. My estimate would be around 20% odds to win a battle. Archers cost 25 hammers, but you'd be on even odds.

While teching archery, I'd build a workboat or two, depending on how many hammers you can get in the meantime. Then you'll have plenty of food to grow and fuel working those four 1f2h tiles, soon being able to produce an archer every 3 turns.

I'm not sure how much Prince AIs prioritize archery, but since you're facing Hatty, you can expect her to go for an early religion first, she also doesn't start with hunting and is generally a peaceful opponent. Imo, waiting for archers should be safe.

Immediately build 3 more warriors while working the forest hill.
Rush Hattie with all 4 warriors.

At prince level and below a warrior rush is entirely viable. Chances are the enemy city will be gaurded by one lone warrior for the duration it takes you to build 3 warriors. For each warrior defending a city you need 2 to take him down. 1st suicides, 2nd mops up. So before building anything else build 2-3 warriors in addition to the 1 you already have and go at him. you certainly lose at least 1 warrior but you will gain a new city. Effectively you gain a settler for the price of a warrior.

In addition the defeated civ won't have any other cities at this stage so he will be eliminated with all the benefits that entails; no negative diplo, no counterattacks and room to expand unhampered by the civ you eliminated. + a few GGP to get you started.

do you have the save?

I appreciate all the suggestions for other ways to play it, I was legitimately curious if there were viable alternatives. I have a couple questions for those who believe a warrior rush wasn't the optimal strategy:

1. Is it really an option to wait for a unit better than warriors? My thinking was that if the enemy gets archers, I'm totally screwed, as archer vs. archer is a bigger mismatch than warrior vs. warrior. Obviously I can't count on having copper any time soon with this map. So I was in a big hurry to get a rush going before the opponent could get an archer up.

2. Is it so bad if wiping out Egypt leaves me in isolation? I understand the importance of tech trading, but I might get choked for city sites very quickly if I have to compete with another civ right on top of me. Two anemic civs trading with one another may still be pretty anemic at the end of the day. (Will the AI even trade techs with me if they don't know of any other civs besides us?)

I really appreciate all the input. I find these island maps involve a lot of interesting choices.

Well for me isolation is always a no no, not just cause you don´t get to trade techs. (noyou will not be able to trade techs if it´s just you and Hattie inthe known world so to speak, thats right) Buta also casue the game gets boring on your own....

Nahh on the other hand that site looks good, I think you will get good land over seas and thats not to bad.
I do think you should wipe hattie out quite early though. Not with a rush but mayby, with cats and swords, or when you established some trade realtions with some other civs.

If you don´t get any metals however this game will probably be lost, and the rush would be tha way to go. thats the beuty of this game. You never know what the dice rolls.

At prince and below, warrior rushing is always the optimal strategy.

But I wouldn't recommend it in every game, because you need more skills than warrior rushing before you jump to monarch.

At prince and below, warrior rushing is always the optimal strategy.

But I wouldn't recommend it in every game, because you need more skills than warrior rushing before you jump to monarch.

I try to rush situationally, based upon how cramped my borders feel in the early part of the game. I figure there's no point in trying to rush someone if they're so far away that you won't be able to consolidate their land with yours anyhow.

I enjoy playing with random map scripts (random everything, really) as it forces you to try out different strategies instead of playing a one size fits all strategy. If I rush Egypt, am I going to be in isolation for hundreds of turns or will I be meeting a bunch of other civs before too long? With a random map type, it's impossible to know.

HC anyone ? :D

The story has a happy ending, although I'm not totally convinced it was the best game plan since it pretty much came down to a 50/50 chance. Thebes was a holy city too.

http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z22/fnurt/Civ4ScreenShot0059.jpg

There's also a funny postscript...

http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z22/fnurt/Civ4ScreenShot0060.jpg

That's right, Paris was FOUNDED ON the copper. I guess I was pretty assured of wiping Egypt out, but of course I had no way of knowing! By the way, with all that seafood, things got real good really quickly.

I thought this was an archipelago map but it actually wasn't. The world turned out to consist of 4 civs sharing the 4 quadrants of a big continent on the other side of the globe... Hannibal having a medium-sized continent all to himself not far away from me... and France and Egypt having to share the same ridiculously small island. Heh!

At prince and below, warrior rushing is always the optimal strategy.

But I wouldn't recommend it in every game, because you need more skills than warrior rushing before you jump to monarch.

It depends on how close the closest AI is, and with copper in bfc, single axe rushing can often be better(backed up by the starting warrior).

So I guess you moved your settler before founding? You should really have settled 1 NE, trade a wheat and sheep for a crabs, although there is now a very nice spot on the second island with both resources and the spare fish just below thebes' BFC...

So I guess you moved your settler before founding? You should really have settled 1 NE, trade a wheat and sheep for a crabs, although there is now a very nice spot on the second island with both resources and the spare fish just below thebes' BFC...

I guess I must have, now that you mention it. I didn't want my capital to have two resources on another landmass, it seemed it would be a pain to work them. I did manage to settle Orleans on that island to the east and work the wheat...

Wow! Two civs starting on that little scrap of land. You have an interesting map there!

ohh that was a small island. I really think you made the right choice to rush. You got such a great island to go from there now. And I think this will prove to be a good game,