Moving up to King with Askia

So after a monumentally dominant Morocco game on Prince level, I realized it was time to step it up again. Now, I'm not entirely clear on all of the benefits that the AI gets on King+, but I knew that starting techs were among them and that I wouldn't be able to swing for early wonders, etc, like I had before.

I like playing financial civs so I started up a continents+ game with Venice, and eventually just got frustrated with the general hyper-cubiness of it while playing on a new difficulty for me (Plus I was next to a very hostile Shaka, my puppeted CS was building non-sensical things like a caravansary despite the fact that it was the only thing on it's tiny three-hex island, and the barns were raging with little way to stop them, as the CSes I was courting were all out in the archipelagos and it was going to take forever to get anything over there that could amphibiously take out the encampments and so none of my sea trade routes were safe, etc.)

SO...

Long story slightly shorter, I'm trying to do this with Askia instead. I've never played a full game as Songhai and he seems interesting. I figure that if I can't guarantee the early wonders anyway I might as well blow them off and build up a army that can profit from the barb camps nobody else wants to deal with, and get a strong start that way.

So, what I'm looking for are:

1. Any general New-to-King-Level tips I should be aware of in terms of build orders, priorities, and strategies.

2. Any Songhai-specific tips I should know in order to maximize my potential. I'm not devoted to a Domination victory by any means, and in fact it seems like Askia could go a number of different ways with it, so what do y'all suggest?

Thanks

You can still wonder spam on King, in fact you can wonder spam even on Emperor even do the Great Library will be harder to get then unless a perfect salt, marble start. But King is pretty much similar to Prince just a little bit better AI.

johnny_rudeboy said:

You can still wonder spam on King, in fact you can wonder spam even on Emperor even do the Great Library will be harder to get then unless a perfect salt, marble start. But King is pretty much similar to Prince just a little bit better AI.

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No, it's the same AI on ALL difficulty levels, just with increased handicaps.

King bonuses:

1. AI starts with Pottery. (Can start its choice of a Shrine or Granary on turn 0, in addition is only one tech away from Great Library and so the expected turn time for an AI to complete it is greatly reduced.)

2. AI Per Era modifier of "-2" instead of 0.

3. Minor food & production bonuses.

That's it, but note the AI actually has tech, social policy, happiness, and barb bonuses at all difficulty levels.

If you really wanted to, by determining the order in which AI builds early wonders you could still build a lot on King, but it would be extremely poor preparation for Emperor.
Yup, low early hammer starts are also likely to be beat out to Great Library.

johnny_rudeboy said:

You can still wonder spam on King, in fact you can wonder spam even on Emperor even do the Great Library will be harder to get then unless a perfect salt, marble start. But King is pretty much similar to Prince just a little bit better AI.

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In my Emperor challenge game, I couldn't believe it when the GL was gone on turn 37!!

Fortunately I wasn't trying for it as with 3 pearls I was going quickly for sailing and the fishing boat pantheon.

I've played at least several dozen Emp games and prior to that game, I'd never seen the GL gone before turn 42.

Thanks for the tips so far!

2. AI Per Era modifier of "-2" instead of 0.

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I don't understand what exactly this means.

(After some more late-night frustration, I've moved onto Japan/Archipelago, which I know isn't a powerhouse or anything but I love the start I got and I've been interested in finally completing a game with them instead of just messing around.)

joncnunn said:

If you really wanted to, by determining the order in which AI builds early wonders you could still build a lot on King, but it would be extremely poor preparation for Emperor.
Yup, low early hammer starts are also likely to be beat out to Great Library.

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Definitely agree that wonder spamming on King is pretty easy. The Library and the Ancient Wonders are the only real questionable ones on King no doubt. I learned to just not even try long before trying Emperor. It help easy the want of trying to get it. Emperor is still pretty easy to spam classical and above wonders if you focus on it. A good production city could grab Hanging Gardens and immediately to Petra on Emperor it seems.

Navelgazer said:

I don't understand what exactly this means.

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That's a line in the Handicap.xml file and is that is the King value. It becomes more negative as the difficulty level goes up.
I don't know exactly what it does, but moding a number to make it even more negative appears to give the AI later game bonuses.