ALC Game 22: Arabs/Saladin

Pre-Game Thread

Starting Position (this post, below)
Round 1: 4000 BC to 2625 BC (55 turns)
Round 2: 2625 BC to 1500 BC (45 turns)
Round 3: 1500 BC to 380 BC (48 turns)

The idea of the All Leaders Challenge is that I'm going to play a game with each of the Civ IV leaders. With the help of all the posters who participate, I will attempt to make the most of the leader's unique characteristics: traits, starting techs, unit, and building. Aside from the leader, the other game settings are (mostly) kept constant for the sake of comparison. I will post the saved game files, screenshots, and status reports here as the game progresses. Everyone then has a chance to chime in with their strategy ideas, or voice their frustration (or glee) when I make a mistake.

Everyone is invited to offer opinions and advice, and to make your own attempt at playing the same game. But if you do play a "shadow game", I kindly request that you refrain from posting spoilers--i.e. any facts or even hints about the map, opponents, and so on--before I'm there myself. I'm trying to play the game as authentically as possible.

In this ALC game, I'll be playing as Saladin, leader of the Arabs. I'm playing the game using the Beyond the Sword expansion pack, its latest patch (3.13), and Bhruic's unofficial patches as well. The difficulty level is Emperor, the map is Hemispheres (more details below), and the speed is Epic.

Here is a more detailed look at the initial game settings.



r_rolo1 was generous enough to generate this start since my old computer died recently and I'm still awaiting delivery of my new one. martin026 recommended the Hemispheres map with islands; r_rolo1 suggested the further refinement of 2 continents. I kept the Choose Religions setting for flavour, but after some recent experiments with other custom settings, I've decided to leave them at their defaults for this game.

Here is the starting position:



r_rolo1 gave me three starts to choose from and I selected this one. It seemed well-balanced, offering a good amount of potential while not featuring an overpowering element like gold or gems. As I indicated in the pre-game thread, I want something of a challenge on what I expect to be the last ALC played on Emperor.

So I have 4 flood plains visible in the fat cross along with a couple of plains hills and some forests. The only visible resource is the riverside plains cows. There's a fresh water bonus to offset some of the unhealthiness of the flood plain tiles (along with the cows, of course); since Saladin is not Expansive, the flood plains may make health a bit of an issue for the capital eventually.

The many riverside tiles suggest this will be an excellent capital to cottage in anticipation of the Bureaucracy boost. Food will be a little bit of a challenge in the short run if nothing else shows up in the fog, but not excessively so; I might have to irrigate one or two flood plains until later in the game in order to work the mines on those plains hills.

At the moment, moving the Settler nearby doesn't make much sense to me, since doing so would involve losing a flood plain or a forest. And as many of you have maintained in the past, founding a city on a sub-par tile like plains or desert is usually a good idea. The only other relatively attractive spot is that riverside plains hill 2N of the Settler, but that would be a gamble--there are a lot of unrevealed tiles up that way. Based on the terrain, there could be a lot of desert nearby. While that may be appropriate when playing as the Arabs, as Prince Feisal told Lawrence, "No Arab loves the desert." And neither do Civ players.

Nevertheless, there is the possibility that moving the Warrior will reveal something attractive that's worth moving towards. The obvious spot to move the Warrior, to me, is that grassland hill 1NW. That would reveal quite a bit of surrounding terrain before you make your final recommendations and I make my final decision. I could also move him 1SE, but that won't reveal nearly as much terrain, and 1NW would reveal some of what we'd get by moving to the plains hill to the north.

Thoughts?

If you want I may move the warrior/settler in about 9 h or 4 pages of discussion

I'm for settling in place... FP + Cow +forests + plains hill = good city

Good luck with the show!

Right now there is nothing that would suggest not to settle in place. The spot looks just fine.

I would move the Warrior up the Hill to NW - should reveal the most tiles.

I am curious how many pages of "Settle" discussion we will have this time

I agree on the warrior going NW to the grassland hill. I addition to potentially revealing alot of terrain, the river heads out west as well. You might reveal enough resources over the first few turns to the west for a quick second city to be an option.

Settling in place seems like the call to me. With so much river and access to plains hills, you'll be able to really customize your micro in the early game as far as worked tiles. Of course, that may require farming one or two floods plains early, as you've said.

Move the Warrior 1-NW just to see what's up. But assuming a move won't net you anything super special just settle in place for sure. It's on a river, at least 4 floodplains in the Fat-x, plenty of rivered grass, a cow, and plains hills. Looks like there's about 16-workable tiles are on river (17 if u include the city tile), very nice extra commerce for Bureaucracy even if you farm it up.

I'm going with the majority here, Warrior NW and settle in place.

BARBEERIAN said:

Move the Warrior 1-NW just to see what's up. But assuming a move won't net you anything super special just settle in place for sure. It's on a river, at least 4 floodplains in the Fat-x, plenty of rivered grass, a cow, and plains hills. Looks like there's about 16-workable tiles are on river (17 if u include the city tile), very nice extra commerce for Bureaucracy even if you farm it up.

Click to expand...

Agreed. Late game, this city is going to be a production monster with a levee. Of the 3 tiles that won't get that bonus, two look likely to be grassland and the third is a plains hill.

It's probably more important to decide what to research and build first given the starting location, than where to move warrior/settler. Worker first is only worthwhile if you're going to pick mining as your initial tech, otherwise you'll end up wasting a bunch of turns. The alternative is to build a warrior while researching agriculture to unlock AH and pottery. It may be worth farming one of the FP to boost growth early on, but you can get good commerce and production at size 6 working 3FP cottages, the cows and 2 plains hill mines so it'd be good to leave space for those.

1) Move the Warrior 1NW. This will reveal the surrounding area.
2) If something good (Gold? Gems?) is spotted, move the Settler to take advantage of that. If not, I say settle in place. Good spot for a GP Farm or late-game production area.

long time lurker, first time poster...
thought i would try my hand at posting some discussion.

looking through the fog i sorta see somewhat of mostly grassland unrevealed so with cows and a couple farms capital is nice.

for warrior movement, NW is nice cuz east has a couple good tiles for city, a FP and forested plain hill, so revealing it first/early will make discussion about it sooner, although lots of discussion

so i'm going with consensus.

dosent look like this is 9 page worthy.

Settle in place. After getting the cows hooked up + any other specials (in fog) + irrigating 1-2 floodplains (if needed), I'd probably focus on commerce here to fund expansion. Sending the warrior either 1NW or 1SE seem like solid moves.

i wote for moving the warrior to the cows so no animals eat them. i whold be a shame to lose 3 3 to a stinking grizly.

no seriusly settle in place an let the game going. this is a gr8 start. and wy not move the warrior to the grasland hill 1 NW seams like i no brainer to me

i've been reading some of these and they are a great help....im glad i get to see the game unfold from the start this time.

but yeah, move the warrior 1 NW, and barring any major discoveries, settle in place

I'd go with your gut and move the warrior NW. Probably settle in place, I'm pretty sure the warrior wont reveal anything too exciting.

I'd move 1 NW to reveal what's further up that river.

Best thing to do would be to move the warrior on the hill like you mentioned recently, and settle in place.

Hopefully you have a research plan. Good luck! Maybe I'll play this game....

So much consensus?.... This was supposed to be a ALC

@DMOC

S man can't move anything, remember? He's civved out for some days....

OTOH I already moved the warrior for both the suggested directions so far ( NW and SE ... I can do that, because i already checked the map in WB )) and have screenies.... just waiting for the owner's orders

I refer you to my post on page 29 of the previous ALC thread.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=262239&page=29

although I made a typo, it should have been 1NW not 1NE.

Warrior 1NW.

Possibly settle 1NW.

While my skill does not nearly equal the others, I'm also in favor of going to Pottery early. Cottaged Floodplains are nice for research even if you're not Financial.

All this assuming you settle in place.