And then sometimes you're just screwed

Monarch, Epic, Fractal, random leader: drew Saladin.

Weakish start -- Wheat and Wine, on a river but only one flood plain tile. Oh well, there should be horses or copper later...

Warrior explores. Three turns later, a neighbor! It's Monty! Hi, Monty! Damn, his capital is only... ten tiles, from mine. We're pretty close neighbors.

I found Hinduism. Go me! I get one goody hut before Monty's Scout snags them all.

I'm at the northern tip of a long skinny continent. Monty is south of me. Hmmm... better research Bronze Working.

Monty gets BW about ten turns before I do. On the turn that I get it, I see that he's founded his second city. Sure enough: it's right next to the copper. The ONLY copper. And what's more, it cuts me off from further expansion; I have room for maybe three cities on the northern part of the continent -- four if I really like tundra -- while Monty has a vast continent to expand into. Not that this will keep him busy long...

I stare hard at the screen. Remember my capital, with a Wheat, a Wine, and one flood plain? Well, Monty's capital has... two Crabs offshore, two Elephants, a Wine and two flood plains.

I suppose a better player would have played on. Maybe Monty would have picked up Hinduism and become my best friend. Of course, with just three cities it would still be hard to get much traction... anyway, I did something I rarely do, and pulled the plug. I like a challenge, but sometimes you're just screwed.

Anyone else been in one of these starts? Is there a way to handle it?

Waldo

Don't found a religion? With Saladin or any civ that starts with mysticism and a crappy tech (hunting in particular) I usually won't go for a religion (which is a gamble anyways). Worker techs are too important.

Imagine how the game could have been different if Monty had founded the religion and you had researched BW first and had founded the copper city...

Maybe. But if you follow that rule, it means there are only about five civs that can found a religion!

Anyway: I don't think it would have made much difference. Sal doesn't start with Agriculture, so even the best case scenario -- build Worker, then build Settler -- would be painfully slow. At Monarch, Monty's free Worker meant he could camp the two Elephants right away (he starts with Hunting). That plus two flood plains in his BFC = I couldn't possibly beat him to a Settler.

-- Wait, maybe I could have beat him if I built the Warrior, then the Settler? But then I'd have the Settler before Bronze Working and wouldn't know where to settle.

Waldo

I find it very difficult to persuade myself to go for an early religion even when I start with Mysticism. I just can't bear to wait so long to develop my capital.

Exception is starting with agriculture too and having flood plain or a grain to improve. Or starting with fishing and having workboats to build. I guess with Saladin, you could get lucky enough to have a couple deer tiles to develop.

I am sure there might have been things you could have done to win... But as it is a game which - for the most part - is intended to be played for fun, it's pretty obvious what to do with this start: just trash it

One note thou - on Monarch the AI does not get a free worker. I think this was the case in one of the previous version. As of BTS the AI does not get a free Worker before Immortal.

I find Monty will usually found a religion if you let him, then you can just rip the holy city from his cold, dead hands.

vormuir said:

Maybe. But if you follow that rule, it means there are only about five civs that can found a religion!

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Yes, exactly.

Admittedly, Saladin has terrible starting techs worker-wise. But if you went mining-bronze to start with while building warrior-worker-worker (chopped)-settler (chopped) you probably would've beaten him to it.

Of course hindsight is 20-20

xanadux said:

I guess with Saladin, you could get lucky enough to have a couple deer tiles to develop.

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Doesn't Sal start with myst and the wheel? He seems to be good for going for one of the later religions. Or taking one from someone else.

I think you should have at least researched IW. 3 cities is enough to take someone like Monty if you hurry it up. If you didn't have Iron then to hell with it!

Post the save. I'll beat it. First try. Like this: *pow*

Ah, crap, yeah Saladin has myst and the wheel. Thanks for the correction there. The Wheel is pretty good and is on the way to pottery also good. But I still wouldn't recommend an early religion with him. Tech whatever you need for food and/or tech to BW asap. Pottery before or after BW depending on the circumstances. If you meet Monty/Shaka BW is a priority above pretty much anything else imo.

Sometimes things just do not work out. I would have gone after hinduism providing I started with at least one commerce producing tile. I would have teched a food/worker tech (fishing or agriculture), then hunting/archery. I likely would have faired as well as you did, however, it is possible you could have gotten iron and still fought it out.

i would have played major defensive with archers galore and prayed for horses nearby. if horses are out of the question, beeline iron working while playing as defensive as possible. the AI is rarely good enough to launch a strong offensive to do any damage as long as you have a good bit of archers (say 10 in your border city with monty). Iron is almost surely in your capital bfc and you can go offensive once that is hooked up. REX and stay defensive until iron is ready to roll.

Do not forget the power of the archer rush, enough archers can in fact kill defending archers, then after you have the metal, your remaining archers make great garisons, until the axemen start flowing out.

Perhaps you could have held to see if there were horses about? With the wheel on board already, you could have tried to chariot rush - great for taking out whatever copper-built axes he might have had. Iron, too, if you found no horses - but that's probably too late for helping much.

I liked the archer theory as well...

Well I planned to go on a wonder collecting game with gandhi. Ended up on a long and slim piece "extention" of a continent. No hills, water everywhere, no stone, no marble, no copper & no iron. (I did have horses though).
Only way out was blocked by toku, who loves to get open borders. /sarcasm

Not really "unwinnable" but I resigned the game anyways. I didnt feel like playing all no production coastal cities when I wanted to play a wonder spam game.

So you're not alone, resigning a game!

Dan Quale said:

Do not forget the power of the archer rush, enough archers can in fact kill defending archers, then after you have the metal, your remaining archers make great garisons, until the axemen start flowing out.

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It would be hard if he has axes built already, but yes, an archer rush could have been tried here. Especially if it's just one border city that you need to take to get the metal.

I think you should have at least researched IW. 3 cities is enough to take someone like Monty if you hurry it up. If you didn't have Iron then to hell with it!

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I'm not a huge fan of using swordsmen where axemen would do. But I played a game recently where I had a bunch of swordsmen before rivals had bronze working, because I researched to bronzeworking as soon as I had a food tech researched, and then immediately went for ironworking (since copper was nowhere to be seen). Swordsmen are very powerful when every single unit the enemy has is still an archer, and they don't even have many of those.

Unless I misunderstood something, that wasn't necessarily an advice to use swordsmen; axemen work with Iron if there's no copper available.

This is a game I would have tried out; after all it's good to see that Monty got a good start (decent prize at the end if we can pull it off!) and if it doesn't work it will at least be mercifully quick.

Post the savegame from 4000BC. I think going early religion is a mistake. REX-ing then killing Monty is a way to go. Maybe Chariot rush if horses nearby.