Start Bias Observations

[smallfish]

Current games I've played lead me to make the following observations-

1) Whenever England starts close to Babylon, she will always eventually be outclassed and thus outdominated by the (cyborg)zombie hordes of Nebuchadnezzar II.

2) Pachacuti loves to build the Great Wall. Loves. And he is one of those hidden warmonger types that everyone should be wary of whenever they start close to him.

3) In any given game, Monty has a 50/50 chance of becoming a runaway even into the Industrial era against dominant types like France. But he never seems to do well whenever he starts close to Babylon.

4) America's start bias will put him next to Germany, and one shouldn't be surprised to see "Boston" in Bismarck's city list during first contact.

5) Oda Nobunaga is like Monty - loves sending his Samurais and support units to far flung and unlikely places in hopes of catching a capital or two offguard. Only problem is that he needs to bring more advanced units, or in much larger quantities.

6) Why did Polynesia spam a city next to me when his nearest is 20 tiles away, and he is at war with a crumbling Roman Empire next to me?

[strijder20]

4) America's start bias will put him next to Germany, and one shouldn't be surprised to see "Boston" in Bismarck's city list during first contact.

I'm not surprised to see American names in any civilizations city list...
I remember one noticable game where Washington started in a bunch of hills, built the GW, and got completely mauled by Darius...

[TheKingOfBigOz]

Originally Posted by smallfish

Current games I've played lead me to make the following observations-

1) Whenever England starts close to Babylon, she will always eventually be outclassed and thus outdominated by the (cyborg)zombie hordes of Nebuchadnezzar II.

2) Pachacuti loves to build the Great Wall. Loves. And he is one of those hidden warmonger types that everyone should be wary of whenever they start close to him.

3) In any given game, Monty has a 50/50 chance of becoming a runaway even into the Industrial era against dominant types like France. But he never seems to do well whenever he starts close to Babylon.

4) America's start bias will put him next to Germany, and one shouldn't be surprised to see "Boston" in Bismarck's city list during first contact.

5) Oda Nobunaga is like Monty - loves sending his Samurais and support units to far flung and unlikely places in hopes of catching a capital or two offguard. Only problem is that he needs to bring more advanced units, or in much larger quantities.

6) Why did Polynesia spam a city next to me when his nearest is 20 tiles away, and he is at war with a crumbling Roman Empire next to me?

If a Civ built a city RIGHT by your borders prepare for war, that means they will eventually go into war with you, they want you, badly.

[smallfish]

Originally Posted by TheKingOfBigOz

If a Civ built a city RIGHT by your borders prepare for war, that means they will eventually go into war with you, they want you, badly.

The thing is, its a lone city out in the middle of nowhere. And I have a Defense Pact with him, while he is gobbling up my old nemesis the Romans and possibly now that they share mutual borders with Siam, going to war with Siam.

And I'm more worried about Siam, who has these city-states in his pockets.

[TheKingOfBigOz]

Kammy is undoubtely plotting against you, well.. did he establish the city while Texoco was under Monty's control? or after?

[IcyFrozen]

Originally Posted by smallfish

Current games I've played lead me to make the following observations-

1) Whenever England starts close to Babylon, she will always eventually be outclassed and thus outdominated by the (cyborg)zombie hordes of Nebuchadnezzar II.

The Babylonian Archer is OP, atleast only in concept. From my experience Babylon seems to over-produce their archers too, resulting in them having a vastly superior military in the early game. The best bet is to befriend them till the medival era then wipe them out when their archers become obsolete. Unfortunately they sometimes conquer a few other nations (or atleast gain some extra cities), giving them a decent size advantage later on.

Originally Posted by smallfish

2) Pachacuti loves to build the Great Wall. Loves. And he is one of those hidden warmonger types that everyone should be wary of whenever they start close to him.

Pachacuti is definitely a warmonger. He always seems to be at war with someone and is one of several civs that seems to abandon all outstanding diplomacy and randomly declare war.

Originally Posted by smallfish

3) In any given game, Monty has a 50/50 chance of becoming a runaway even into the Industrial era against dominant types like France. But he never seems to do well whenever he starts close to Babylon.

Monty is similar to Pachacuti, almost always at war and highly erratic.

Originally Posted by smallfish

4) America's start bias will put him next to Germany, and one shouldn't be surprised to see "Boston" in Bismarck's city list during first contact.

5) Oda Nobunaga is like Monty - loves sending his Samurais and support units to far flung and unlikely places in hopes of catching a capital or two offguard. Only problem is that he needs to bring more advanced units, or in much larger quantities.

America, to me, is always weak early game, which make sense since America doesnt appear on the world stage till a much late era. They dont get any uniques (which seem to define a nations key age) till much later. In my games it always seems to be atleast partially devoured by Germany, Spain or Japan.

Japan tends to launch stupid invasions throughout the game in my experience. The one thing i like about Japan is he doesnt issue nuisance wars in which neither side actually sees the other and a summary peace is made after 10 turns, he actually sends out troops even in the early game on the off chance he might do some damage or capture something. He may not succeed but any war with Japan is likely to actually see combat.

Originally Posted by smallfish

6) Why did Polynesia spam a city next to me when his nearest is 20 tiles away, and he is at war with a crumbling Roman Empire next to me?

Polynesia seems to expand too far to me, their cities seem to be wider spread then the AI average, usually pushing the boundaries of other states much earlier then usual. The distance between their cities is probally why they get promptly beat down in the mid game (too distant to easily defend). I expect their strategy was written hoping for islands which would favor their more distant policy.

[smallfish]

Originally Posted by TheKingOfBigOz

Kammy is undoubtely plotting against you, well.. did he establish the city while Texoco was under Monty's control? or after?

Right after I vanquished the last Mech Jaguars of Acolmiztli. Like I said, it was how I got to meet him, and it was just a lonely settler walking out to my part of the world and then instantly settling on that river lux area.

He most certainly is, this game has devolved into Domination nuke fest and the ones who are trying cultural have either adequate pointy sticks (not-met-yet-North Korean France with 4 ICBMs and an atomic bomb) or have never been able to do well whenever they start off next to their Game Nemesis (England, who in addition to getting nuked by Incans, got nuked and taken by Babylon too).

[TheKingOfBigOz]

Ok, so you counquered Texoco as he was establishing that city? Then he was planning an attack against Montezuma (which is very likely, kammy has no tolerance for warmongers). Had Texoco remained in Monty's possession I guarantee Kammy would've attacked him at some point.

[strijder20]

planning an attack against Montezuma (which is very likely, kammy has no tolerance for warmongers)

This is so ironic.

[TheKingOfBigOz]

Originally Posted by strijder20

This is so ironic.

I've rarely ever seen Kammy being a gigantic erratic warmonger in my games, he's very loyal and easy to befriend.

[budweiser]

Every time I start next to Monty, he will rush me. But, once his forces are dead he makes peace. Sometimes he is very afraid for a time after that. But usually afterwards we are BFFs.

[smallfish]

Originally Posted by TheKingOfBigOz

I've rarely ever seen Kammy being a gigantic erratic warmonger in my games, he's very loyal and easy to befriend.

NO.

In this game, just like me and Monty, Kammy took the path of Autocracy. Worse, he has 4 base uraniums in his lands. I spotted "believe your winning the game similar to them and dun liek" also showed up in his traits, so...

More likely in this game, Kammy had no tolerance for anyone who isn't trying to be a stepping stone to his grand ascent to world domination.

[blackcatatonic]

Elizabeth is always outclassed, regardless of who she starts near, in my experience.

Often she doesn't get beyond building one or two cities. In my current game she actually made it to 3... and then York and Nottingham were taken by the Ottomans

[budweiser]

Originally Posted by blackcatatonic

Elizabeth is always outclassed, regardless of who she starts near, in my experience.

Often she doesn't get beyond building one or two cities. In my current game she actually made it to 3... and then York and Nottingham were taken by the Ottomans

Interesting because I just played a few games as Liz and that's how I approached it; OCC until Longbows and then a rampage.

[Gucumatz]

Polynesia always starts in a clustered area and never isolated. Somehow their start bias seems messed up.

[TheKingOfBigOz]

Originally Posted by budweiser

Interesting because I just played a few games as Liz and that's how I approached it; OCC until Longbows and then a rampage.

There's a diffrence between how you play and how AI plays. Liz, as AI, will usualyl end up being overpowered.

[prince_caspian]

My observations kinda corroborate with yours and I'd add in a few more:

1) Korea's capital tends to start near flat land, but a few tiles beyond you'll find lots and lots of mountain. Useful for turtling or observatories

2) AI Cathy naturally has lots and lots of iron and horse, but humans? - most of the time a pittance 2-iron and 2-horse. So it's back to the wargame drawing board again.

[duxup]

Originally Posted by blackcatatonic

Elizabeth is always outclassed, regardless of who she starts near, in my experience.

Often she doesn't get beyond building one or two cities. In my current game she actually made it to 3... and then York and Nottingham were taken by the Ottomans

I see her get a reasonable number of cities out pretty often, never dominate but still put together an alright group of cities 5 to 6 cities fairly often... until she is inevitably devoured by some neighbor.

She is pretty week. I hardly pay attention to her. She's nothing like the dangerous Civs. Often I see her and fairly weak Spain go at it for a while until someone finally virtually wipes one or both of them out.