Prince of the World #1: Frederick

Hello everybody, there becomes a time in every lurkers life where he must step forth and become a fully functioning cog in the community. Today for me, is that day. I have been blessed by his royal highness himself (Neal) to proceed with what I will admit is somewhat of an exact replica of the King of the World series. Still the world is definitely big enough for the two of us, so let us commence with (suggested by Neal himself):




Frederick! Yes the game that never quite ended in the King of the World series, is back to be re-run and hopefully, history will be changed for the better (I hope).

Here is where we start:



With the ever friendly Catherine to our East and the Wonder machine Louis to our West. We could be part of a Franco - Russian sandwich, and whilst being pinned who knows what Julius will do to us down there! So now I shall open up the forum and hopefully someone will reply with suggestions. Bear in mind I am no where near as experienced as most of you probably are so some of the simplest advice will probably help.

P.s. I will obviously gauge how people respond to this, if its a hit I'll create a "play room" to keep track of all the games etc. Think of this as the beta stage at the moment though, like Saints Row is to GTA. It's never going to be quite as good as KOTW, however its so good(GTA), the "rip game" is still pretty good (Saints Row).

Hey, I don't have much advices but have fun with your game, i'll be reading

A King of the World clone at my play level? What's not to like?!

Where to settle... so many options, none of them optimal. One south is probably best, but then Neal already did that. Onto the coast perhaps?

I'm thinking you should move 1 NE. That will get you the horses and Scandinavian pigs while keeping the bronze and wheat. You should probably crush France early, as their culture will be HUGE. Also, try to cut of Julius's eastern exit from Italy and expand into Scandinavia before Russia.

I always prefer to settle 1NW on this map as Freddy... it leaves more room for 3 other great commerce/production sites.

Thanks for the responses guys, I'm certainly leaning towards a different starting position (than Neal's) just to change it up a bit. The coast would be good, I'm still not sure at the moment. I will play the first round tomorrow (should be up for about 9pm British Summertime).

Settle 1 SE. Research BW, chop out a couple of axes and rush Louis, Julius and Isabella. Iirc, none of those three have copper, and only Louis and Isabella have horses.

I've extensively tested out Frederick's position, and have concluded that, by far, the best spot to settle for the capital is on the copper assuming you want to wipe out Europe as fast as possible.

where you settle doesnt really matter too much. Warrior rush on Rome, kill france with axes after he completes the pyramids, then spain, after that the games pretty much over

On regular maps, are you Prince level or Noble level? Because Earth 18 tends to play as if the difficulty level was one lower. IE, I'm a prince level player on a random map, but on Earth maps I can easily win on Monarch, and I'm in the process of playing my first Emperor game ever.

BakingTheArt said:

On regular maps, are you Prince level or Noble level? Because Earth 18 tends to play as if the difficulty level was one lower. IE, I'm a prince level player on a random map, but on Earth maps I can easily win on Monarch, and I'm in the process of playing my first Emperor game ever.

Click to expand...

If you're not playing with Mansa Musa...

If your playing as Mansa, playing a good four or five difficulty levels below your norm is pretty accurate.

As Germany, build anywhere with the copper in your BFC. Tech to Bronze Working. Build axemen. Conquer Europe. Go to Greece/Italy first, to make sure they don't get that copper square. Rest of Europe shouldn't be too tough.

BakingTheArt said:

If your playing as Mansa, a good four or five difficulty levels below the norm is pretty accurate.

Click to expand...

You've obviously never played an Earth map with Mansa Musa...

I know, it's im-freakin'-possible. Which is why I said play below your normal level.

I'm a noble normal player so Prince seemed like a good place to start, I'm liking the sound of settling on the copper. Taking Europe quickly seems to be the general consensus, I'll be doing the round in a few hours time. Wish me luck, and thank you for the all the replies.

1 NW is a good site, as is 1 NE, as is settling on the copper, all for different reasons.

1 NW is probably the best city site with a lot of food without taking too much from Paris (which you should plan on making yours), on the copper as DMOC said, is probably the best for killing all of Europe quickly (settle and immediately research Bronze Working?) and 1 NE is probably the best compromise of them all and has the side benefit of checking Russian expansion while you stomp Europe into submission.

I'd take out JC first, giving Louis a chance to build a few wonders. I'm sure he'll then give them to you, if you axe nicely.

Speaking as a relative newbie, I'd love to see some European dotmaps for this map. There are so many good sites that it's hard for me to find an optimal configuration, and hard to specialize them.

A nice problem to have, to be sure, but I'm curious to see how others solve it.

Rushing Europe is, in my opinion, kind of cheaty, but it is a lot of fun, a great confidence booster and the ridiculous position of strength it affords you is a fantastic vantage point from which to learn the rest of the map. I just wouldn't do it more than once If that's the plan, then yeah, land on top of the Copper, beeline Bronze, and send Axemen out to drive your enemies before you (and hear the lamentations of Izzie and Liz).

If you're planning on playing a more even-handed game, I gotta say I like 1NE. Trade Routes are a disproportionately important part of your economy on this map, so being coastal makes a big difference. Scandinavia is pretty much yours, but don't slack about it, since Russia and even England will be glad to fill in if you don't beat them there. And starting east rather than west spares Berlin from Paris' tedious Culture wall.