Berserks01 - Always War Cultural Challenge

Another idea I have been bouncing in my head for a couple days now.

Settings

Version: Warlord
Difficulty: Prince
Map: Pangea
Civ: Alexander of Greece
Speed: Normal
Victory: All enabled

The Variant

(1) Can only win by Cultural

The Roster
berserks01
frankcor
GreyFox
vra379971
Ozbenno
Swiss Pauli

I've rolled the start, and I like it.

Alexander? Cultural? Oh boy.

But meh, ok. I'm in.

Looks interesting. Alex was and interesting choice too.

Sign me up. I haven't had an a*s-whooping in an SG game in over a week now .

Great start. Now all we need is 2 more cities just like that one! Plus 6 other good cities in which to build temples. Piece of cake.

lurker's comment:

Lurking with interest.

Bede, you own one of the reserved spot if you're interested. If not, I will open it up to others.

lurker's comment:

@berserks, thanks for the reservation but I will lurk this one.

Thanks but I won't play this SG.

Unbelievably this was going to be the premise behind ROTQM4 (with a twist), but as you got in first berserks, count me in, if you'll have me of course.

reporting in.

Ok, we have enough to start. Maybe we can take another player later ... if we need another one that is.

Before I start, I'm planning on settling 1E. Does any one of you have a different idea?

I plan on going Poly -> archery -> bronze.

What do y'all think?

Looks good.

Has the scout moved? If not, move him E so we can see what is there, as I'd say settle in place!

Tech path seems right, founding religions is important as none will spread to us (3 would be good), so Poly is a good first off tech. I'd think about Bronze --> Animal Husbandry --> Archery --> Priesthood maybe.

Prince???? Oh my god. We are going to get our arse whipped ....

I suggest we forget abt the cultural part until we have captured some cities ... this will play like one of the earlier SG of soooo (i think, or is it kikint?) where they go for cultural win with the caveat that the 3 legendary cities must be built at 4000BC -- i.e. at least 2 captured capitol).. So we go ultra aggressive in the before-a-child-is-born era, and then think abt cultural only in the ADs.

Why do you want to go 1E? Settling on the spot is fine. Nice hill bonus (agreed we don't need hill bonus for capitol, but it at least eliminate one defensive spot where enemies can take siege of our city).

Before settling though, may consider using the scout to pop that hut first, might give better result .... but AFAIK, popping a hut without any city will not yield a tech ... so guess t doesn't really matter.

Going for poly first? hmmm, interesting choice, given we don't have mysticism ... I don't know. I agree we need to grab a religion for happiness in an AW game ... but it might be easier and better to grab it by capturing holy cities instead of teching. I would have go for Farming > Archery > Mining > BW, and start build warrior > worker > barracks.

EDIT: Replacing Farming with AH is fine too, it gives us the needed hammer boost via cows earlier.

--

Popping hut without founding city will not generate tech so found first (and thus pop hut).

If we don't have Mysticism, then Poly might not be such a great start, Animal Husbandry, Mining, Archery and Bronze Working would be better, we still should be able to get CoL first. I'd also consider Oracle as an option (wonders go very late in AW games).

Warrior worker barracks settler would be a good start.

Tech trading on or off? (Please say off).

That's a gold plains hill the settler is standing on. Moving 1E will give us 3 plains hills, 2 grass hills, 1 desert hill, and 1 gold mine. Settling in place gives us 4 plains hills and 2 grass hills. We still keep the 2 food resources in both cases.

I'll move the settler E and post a picture so we see what's there.

I don't think we have to worry too much that we need to skip out on Poly as our first tech ... hopefully

Hadn't thought about tech trading, totally forgot about it, so it's on .... dang, that might be a problem.

Alex is Philo, doesn't philo start with Mysticism?

It seems to me that the optimum opportunity would be to have 3 great-production (Heroic Epic-quality, you know what I mean?) cities for our 3 Legendary cities. They need to build every cultural improvement along with some wonders and then build tons of culture as soon as possible. That means we need 4 cities like that because we'll still need a Heroic Epic city. Taking those cities from our neighbors makes a lot of sense to me.

I'm concerned that we're facing an especially stiff challenge if we're unable to build monuments, libraries, temples and monestaries in our 3 Legendary Cities early enough. It's hard enough to get a culture win with the 1000-year doubling bonus. Building axemen won't get us the double bonus.

Having said all that, let smashy smashy commence!

We don't start with Mysticism, sorry that was my bad.

Here's the new screen with scout moved 1E.

Didn't see the gold in the first screenshot ... so I am ok with moving east. The blue circle, however, suggests that the hills in the WSW or plains in the WNW has one of the yet-to-be revealed resources. Moving 1E also means we are vulnerable only to 3 tiles (but all 3 tiles gives the enemy defensive bonus).

I wouldn't mind a reroll with tech-trading off though ...

I disagree with frank ... I still think we shouldn't think of culture in the BC era. Of-course we should go for wonders, but the primary purpose is not for culture.

Didn't notice the gold. Given that 1E does seem good.

Pyramids would be good here, as Universal Sufferage would allow you to buy all the cultural buildings with our conquest cash. Also, food rich cities can be whipped regularly for the same effect.