Starting Position

Hmm, yes it looks like a commerce is showing on that Eastern tile, despite the river terminates (unnaturally). I guess there are going to be a lot more bizzare issues depending how much tampering went on.

To be honest, I don't trust it. I wouldn't be that surprised to find the engine es and thinks we are not due an extra loaf there when the time comes.

obsolete said:

I’m just not sure on which tech to go for right here, to be honest my first opinion is to go for our Religion NOW. Then we don’t have to worry about it later. I would not even bother wasting time on growing up our pop, but chop out workers, and a settler and get our second city up asap. Our warrior now needs to find our next city spot. Unfortunately it will have to be a bit aways from our capital, since we got totally screwed by useless un-workable water tiles. This really hurts on our starting trees to chop, and we have to chop many for both our capital and our GE Farm city.

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Is it really critical to found a religion immediately? There's only one other civ in the game (Pacal/Maya) that starts with Mysticism. If they beat us, we can always go for Judaism. I just thinking getting some sort of defenses up are critical in case our neighbor is Ragnar and they have copper in their BFC. Our holy city won't do us any good if its being marauded by Vikings

I really think we should go Agri->BW. That will open up a lot of worker actions (farm, mine, chop) while we pursue our more long-term goals.

babybluepants said:

It's already irrigated actually.
I see your point. Tried a test run and it hurts that we can't farm any of the grass pre-CS. Growth problems at size 4-5 due to working gems. Still, I wouldn't complain about this start in any other game. I don't expect any of the teams have 2 6f tiles either.

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We could farm our dye early on. Its riverside, and will chip in a little extra commerce. We may have another riverside dye in the fog.

There's only one other civ in the game (Pacal/Maya) that starts with Mysticism.

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I am curious where the other leaders are posted in this game?

obsolete said:

I am curious where the other leaders are posted in this game?

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It is in the Game Settings thread in the public forum.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=359235

Leaders
Mavericks: Gandhi
AMAZON: Cyrus
Sirius: Willem van Oranje
CDZ: Ragnar
Merlot: Pacal II
Quatronia: Hannibal

Also, I'm warming up to the early religion idea after reading the Sandkaasten (spelling?) thread...

Maybe go Agri->Med/Poly->BW

Since we will only be working a single tile and not chopping until BW, we don't need a 2nd worker right away and can start our settler sooner.

Worker->Settler->???

I'd definitely like to have copper revealed before we settle city #2 though.

The Mike said:

It is in the Game Settings thread in the public forum.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=359235

Leaders
Mavericks: Gandhi
AMAZON: Cyrus
Sirius: Willem van Oranje
CDZ: Ragnar
Merlot: Pacal II
Quatronia: Hannibal

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the only surprise here is cyrus, rest was obvious (eli, ragnar, dari, pacal, willy, hanni are usually choosen)how predictable... ...only good that hostile civic switches hasent been banned

So no other Spiritual civs at all, 4 Financial civs, and no other philosophical civs.

Cyrus is the most interesting choice, as obsolete has said in the war room thread - definitely the most warlike of the other civs. Two warring traits (both IMP and CHA are kind of half and half, but tend towards war) and Immortals (one of the most dangerous UUs in MP, simply because it's a two-mover) make this faction by far the most dangerous.

The good thing about a chariot/horse archer rush is that it's easy to stop if we know when and where it's coming. All you need is half a dozen spears, and you can pretty much trade 1:1 with the attacker's units. With shorter lines of supply and home-field advantage, that usually adds up to victory.

Willem is a fairly typical leader - just an economic powerhouse really, with two massive traits.

Ragnar's a bit more dangerous, but I have a feeling he's been chosen more for his traits than his UU. Aggressive is a bit weak in MP, as the only units that benefit are one-movers.

Pacal will be quite dangerous simply because of the speed with which he can get Holkans out. The fact that they're resourceless means they can be pumped immediately upon discovery of BW. The good news? They're absolutely pwned by axes.

Hannibal's another 'stock' strong economic leader with a 2-move UU. These are a bit more dangerous than Immortals, but come slightly later.

No other phil leaders = Oracle/Pyramid gambit is more likely to fly. The fastest way I've done it is

City 1: -> worker -> settler -> warrior -> oracle
City2: -> worker -> building (pop rush at last moment-> forge

We'll need a 2nd city with many trees and at least 1 food booster.

I have not done this while taking a religion first (only with BW first to help chop the settler)... can we do with a starting religion? Is it safer to pick up monotheism directly after the gambit?

Mono is such a waste of beakers, I'd rather avoid this at all costs. It's especially silly when we are using GE's to rush wonders and can switch into slavery free of charge.

Obs, you think we can get a religion and still nail the oracle? That was the discussion to which I was responding. Agreed on Monotheism, though I do like the civic it gives.

Obs, you think we can get a religion and still nail the oracle?

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Of course. We HAVE to get Med or Poly regardless on our way to Oracle. And BOTH come with a religion. So it only makes sense to get these while they still have a rel available.

The problem is it's a 50/50 gamble depending on what Pacal goes for. If we ASSUME she (ok it's a guy) goes for religion first, then we could possibly fall back to going Aggriculture first, and THEN Meditation. If we find out that's what Pacal was after, we can then switch to Poly. It would be very ambitious of any other team to early go for Myst and then one of these religions. I am sure they are aware that two other civs out there already start with Myst.

I think the race for Oracle will basically be between us and Pacal. And we have the FastWorkers. Now, if HC or Ramesses II were around, I'd be a little worried here.

I agree with obsolete completely. I doubt we'll lose the gambit now, and I would be surprised if we don't manage to nail a religion on the way there.

I'm not sure if anyone pointed it out yet, but with those water tiles, there is quite a weighted chance toward an archipelago map.

I suppose it is getting too ambitious to also want to go for TGLH. Though, no one went after Industrious for some bizzare reason. If someone had taken HC for example, they could have had quite a bit of leverage here. People often avoid chasing wonders altogether just because the THREAT of an industrious leader being on the map.

obsolete said:

I'm not sure if anyone pointed it out yet, but with those water tiles, there is quite a weighted chance toward an archipelago map.

I suppose it is getting too ambitious to also want to go for TGLH. Though, no one went after Industrious for some bizzare reason. If someone had taken HC for example, they could have had quite a bit of leverage here. People often avoid chasing wonders altogether just because the THREAT of an industrious leader being on the map.

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I think there is a good chance it will be archipelago map, since all teams voted on that option one way or another, and I think second choice overall was global highlands.

One question only for you Obsolete: How do you think to fit all that in with Pyramids gambit?

P.S. On sandkasten test I can't get pyramids before T73 although a lot will be determined by the surrounding area in real game right?

The surrounding area in the real game could speed up things by up to 4 turns possibly. A lot depends on the trees, which is the bested advantage of our UU.

What we could do right before the first GE pops, is whip a forge in the capital, and then run a GE there to get close to a 20% shot for our second. I was originally thinking on using him (if we get lucky) for the Library, but perhaps.. just perhaps we could research fishing --> sailing just before hand, so we could rush that lighthouse if indeed we are on archipelago.

We still may want to skip this though if there is no marble resource to capture.

We also have to wonder, will other civs refuse to trade with us because of TGLH? We may be able to still get traderouts due to the prisoner's dillema. We also could cut them deals and offer bonuses for those routes.

A lot depends on trees and flatland, too. If trees are on hills, then our fast worker's extra movement point is no good there.

I wouldn't want to whip a forge in the capital and run an engineer there, though. I think it would probably be best if we were able to claim some more land by building settlers/workers in the capital, since with all the forge and Oracle stuff we will be behind in expansion. That, and we will not be ensured of a great engineer.

Yes, other civs will be wary of opening borders with us, which is why we have to work on diplomacy to ensure that we get allies who sign open borders. Of course, this is all contigent on us getting a Great Lighthouse.

There is more to whipping the forge in the capital than just gambling on a second GE.

Even if you ignore the tremendous amount of hammers that GE could save us…

* We need a forge eventually in our capital.
* It will give us immediately 25% production.
* We get an extra happy immediately just from the Gems boosting alone (more whipping).

Is it starting to look better now?

No?

The running engineer gives us another +2h at least, and 3b with rep. of course, modified by the forge itself. If we lose the roll for the GE, at least it will have sped up our first Priest, which is another +2h settled with forge bonus, AND 5 gold to jack up the slider, AND 3b with rep.

Anyhow, I guess we can do some sand-box testing on this if it worries you

Nothing to add really.

I suggest we go agriculture first and go for a religion after that.

Agriculture -> Poly/Med -> BWing.

-- Luckily BWing isn't that critical 'cause none of our resources are forest covered, yet.

Definitely worker first.

Move warrior NW.

I would agree with the above.