Any advice on how to improve this strategy?

Riemann

Chieftain
Joined
Nov 8, 2004
Messages
1
Location
Redmond
(side note: Ello all, I'm new here. And now for something completely the same:)

So I am wondering if anyone has suggestions for improving this basic build order. I ask because I find that, barring absolutely amazing luck in terms of natural resources and getting techs from barbarians, I am usually outpaced in nearly every respect by the computer by the early middle ages.

I really like the Sumerians. Agricultural seems like an awesome ability to me as it allows for the colonization of deserts even early on. Scientific seems like a generally good idea as I tend to emphasize technology and culture over military. Plus their unique unit is very useful in the early game (its a spearman for the cost of a warrior).

My build order usually looks like this:
1) First city
2) Warrior (start exploring)
3) Warrior (city defense)
4-6) Settler
7) Temple
8) Pyramids
9) Library
10) Courthouse
11) Marketplace

In the 3 cities created by settlers in steps 4-6 I build:
1) Warrior
2) Worker (each city has a worker dedicated to improving said city, once a city has every square improved that worker joins a pool that helps out in critial cities or national tasks like pollution cleanup or securing luxeries/resources)
*) If the city is right on a border and I can afford it I will hurry a temple and sometimes a library here to start accumulating culture
3) Settler
4) Settler (if food is not scarce, else goto 6)
5) Settler (if food is abundant, else goto 6)
6) Temple
7) Library
8) Wonder

I generally place my cities according the the following criteria (in terms of importance, most to least)
1) A good resource base (eg: sufficient food and production potential)
2) Does not overlap any squares of existing cities
3) Renders as few useful squares as possible "unusable" by future cities

In terms of wonders I tend to focus on those that do not go obsolete. I usually have a core of 3-4 cities that are founded early on and have a good resource base that crank these things out. I think my favorite wonders are the Pyramids and the one that doubles the effects of cathedrals.

In terms of research I generally go for masonry then straight to the one with libraries (usually pick up ceremonial burial from barbarians or trade).

So, any advice?
 
Problems:

1) Pyramids are a :nono:. Don't build wonders on high levels.
2) Courthouses are wasted in your capital.
3) You are building too many useless buildings.
4) Overlap is not evil.
5) Build tighter. You can only use 12 tiles per city for most of the game.
6) Don't have a rigid build order! Adapt to each situation separately!

Oh, and welcome to CFC! [party]

EDIT: Are you trading?
 
As I would expect, Tomoyo states it better than I would, but here are a few additions. If you want to be convinced about wonders, go read Ision's article about wonder addiction in the war academy (and read other stuff there too).

Building a temple where you have it is not very helpful. Military police, luxuries, or the lux slider are better ways to control happiness, and libraries usually are better for culture (especially since you're building libraries anyways). Temples may be better for culture for religious civilizations, and temples are helpful for cultural victories.

I usually like to have more than one warrior/scout exploring; I usually build about 3 and then not enough warriors for MP. Other than your explorers and maybe a couple of military police, all of your military units should be built in cities with barracks.

As Tomoyo said, a strict building order is not adaptable. For example, if a city can have a surplus of 5 food, it should be producing only settlers (unless it has plenty of excess shields) for a while. I think there's about 3 articles in the war academy that relate to settler factories to some degree.
 
Riemann, are you doing a lot of trading with the other Civs you meet? Trading is huge in this game -- which is another reason why you want more than a single warrior doing your exploring. If you can contact the other Civs before they contact each other, you are in a better position to buy and sell techs.

Giving up wonders is probably going to seem like a bad idea, but it basically took me from Chieftain to Monarch when I did it. I would give up the production queue, too, if you've been using it -- it gets you too far away from the turn to turn management of your cities.
 
granaries are nice but you don't need one in every city. and after you max out a cities population sell it. unless it is a worker/settler factory then you won't sell it untill you are done making settler/workers. most games I only have 1 or maybe 2 granaries in the early part of the game. some games I don't get a granary untill I have a hospital. if you have a hospitial you should have a granary.
 
welcome reimann
like was said - dont stick to a rigid plan like that.
make yourself 2-4 settler factories and expand.
use 1st ring cities for barracks and troop making (i prefer offensive troops, but im a warmonger at heart ;))
use atleast 3 warriors as scouts
trade as much as possible. get yourself some future allies, and make sure u identify your biggest threat.
outer ring cities - libraries and walls (onlly in choke points, etc) are nice
FORGET WONDERS - lets them build them and then take it away
NO temples. they are useless. go for markets + libraries
build a nice strong army - so they wont attack you too soon. use said army to take any missing things you want-need (such as that iron hill, that lux, or wonder cities).
and use the LUX BAR.
 
Most of the advice given so far looks good; I just want to point out a couple of *severe* problems with what you've been doing so far.

First -- settler-settler-settler in your capital after just 2 or 3 warriors? Unless you're on flood plains all the time, your capital will generally be able to accumulate 30 shields (the production cost of a settler) in fewer than the number of turns it takes to grow twice (the population cost of a settler). I'm guessing you're typically building your first settler at population size 3 or sometimes 4, but what happens after that? Ever have your city reading "settler due in 1, population size 2, growth in 5 turns"? I'm guessing you must, if you follow that rigid build order to the letter all the time. Don't ever build a settler in a city that won't reach at least size 3 by the time it completes -- that's just wasted turns waiting for the city to get big enough to produce it. The AI does that all the time, but you're smarter than the AI. Build a few more military units in between, or a quick barracks, or something. There's potentially a similar issue with your build order in your secondary cities -- in low-food, high-shield towns, that first worker might be built before you're at size 2, likewise wasting turns -- but it seems less likely to happen often than the problem with your capital.

Second, your capital doesn't need a courthouse, ever. It's the lowest-corruption city in your empire, and won't ever waste enough shields/commerce to require a courthouse (until maybe it's size 20-something, but by then the game is probably over).

Keep reading around here; to me, such issues indicate someone who is brand-new to thinking about the game, and who hasn't really noticed some of the game's fundamental mechanics yet. You're in the right place, though. :)

Cheers,
Renata
 
Also, specialize your cities early on.
High shields, little food? Get Barracks, and built units there.
Decent shields, high food? Granary, than Settlers.
High Commerce? Market or Library ASAP.
Low shields, high food? Workers.

Unless desperately needed, or unless you'd get Happiness problems, don't build Workers from your core cities.

And contacts rule. Nowhere in your list I read about Curraghs or Galleys...
 
Good advice, Doc, however you can't specialize high commerce cities until you can actually build those marketplaces and libraries.

At higher levels, building workers is a great way to combat happines problems. You almost can't get enough workers at the beginning.
 
Riemann, I have only recently started utilising this website but as well as the War Academy and Tips Forum have also found some of the stories very useful for picking up differing ways of playing - especially from those playing on the higher levels. Have a look, some of them will keep you entertained for hours!
 
Doc Tsiolkovski said:
Also, specialize your cities early on.
High shields, little food? Get Barracks, and built units there.
Decent shields, high food? Granary, than Settlers.
High Commerce? Market or Library ASAP.
Low shields, high food? Workers.

Well said, Doc! That's a great set of guidelines -- I think it will help me work out the snags and bad habits in my early game.
 
Another good resource is GK2 - the Training Day Experiment. It's a sucession game (each player takes 10 turns and hands the save onto the next player) designed to teach lower level players how to play well. OK, it's now a monster thread, but it applies the kind of strategies mentioned in the War Academy to an actual game, and you can play around with the saves and play the turns before comparing how you did on any given set of 10 turns with how whoever played those turns did.
 
...and be prepared with some snacks and a drink because that's gonna take you 7 hours mininum to read. ;)
 
Tomoyo said:
...and be prepared with some snacks and a drink because that's gonna take you 7 hours mininum to read. ;)

I've been holding out for Cliff Notes to summerize it. Or maybe a Reader's Digest condensed version?
 
Someone put them together already. I just can't find it.
 
There is a digested table of contents in the first four or five posts for GK2, on the first page of the thread. As well as some links to relevant articles in the War Academy and elsewhere.
 
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