NC CXIII: Washington of America

The Nobles' Club series started out as a way for Noble-level (and below) players to improve their game. Most of the original participants now play at much higher levels, so this has become a way for advanced players to help others learn to play better. You can play your own game at any level and with any mod, but it would be nice to comment on the games of other players and give them advice.

Our next leader is Washington of America, whom we last played in NC LXV; we last played the Americans under Lincoln in NC CII. The Americans start with Agriculture and Fishing.

• Traits: Leader is Charismatic and Expansive. CHA means +1 (+1 more with a monument), which lets your cities expand faster sooner. It also reduces the XP for promotions by 25%, meaning your units improve faster. EXP means +2 , allowing bigger cities sooner if you can find happiness resources. It also gives faster granaries, harbours, and workers. The +25% bonus for producing workers only applies to , not , so you need to be working 4 to get the 5th.
• The UB: The Mall, a Supermarket with +20% and +1 with Hit Musicals, Singles, and Movies.
  
  
  
  
• The UU: The Navy Seal, a Marine with Amphibious and 1-2 first strikes.
  
  

And the start:

Finally, a cut and paste of our standard doctrine:

There are no hard and fast rules here: fun and learning are our primary goals, but we do suggest that you update your progress at various points in the game, using the Spoiler feature of the boards. You can post as often as you like; here's one suggestion:

• 4000 BC (starting thoughts, no spoiler required for that discussion)
• 1000 BC or so (how you decided to progress up the early tech/build paths, which AIs you have met, where you're thinking of putting cities, etc)
• 500 AD or so (after establishing some cities and a possible plan of action)
• 1200 AD or so (mid-game, Lib race, wars or peace, or whichever happened or didn't, met other
• continent if applicable, etc)
• 1600 AD (or when you have decided on a course of action and a specific victory condition)
• End of game (Victory!!! or defeat, no shame in losing, especially if you tried a higher level. Learning is what we focus on, not fastest win or biggest empire)

This is just a guideline. If you're trying to improve your game, then posting more frequent updates, in as much detail as you can manage, is the best way to get suggestions from other players. If you come to what seems like a major decision and you want some advice, post an update, regardless of what game-year it is.

We also welcome players to ask for specific game advice, as we have a number of stronger players who lurk and help out with solid tips, and of course, we help each other. Replies to specific questions should also be in spoilers, with a simple "@" in front of the person the answer is directed towards.

Special Thanks go to Bleys and TMIT, who really made this series a great one, r_rolo1, mapmaker extraordinaire, for his maps in the early days of the series, and all of you for playing.

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The WB-saves are attached (zipped; they are bigger than standard saves). To play, simply download and unzip it into your BTS/Saves/WorldBuilder folder. Start the game, and load your favorite MOD (if you use one, if not, check out the BUG MOD), select "Play Scenario", and look for "NC 113 Washington Noble" (or Monarch, etc., for higher levels). You can play with your favorite MOD at the Level and Speed of your choice. From Quick-Warlord to Marathon-Deity, all are welcome! We stuck with the name "Nobles Club" because it has a cool ring to it.

Reserved.

turn the thingies on please

if I had'nt seen tundra and plains to the south, i would definetely settle 2S and hope for more and better food... knowing the land isn't green, I would probably SiP

Nice production capital there as we SIP. With Washington's Char/Exp characteristics we should be able to have this be a very solid capital indeed as we should be able to work a few mines even as we are whipping.

I just won my 2nd game on Prince (out of like 10) so I'm thinking I'll try out Prince with George and see how it goes.

The floodplains/stone to the north look pretty sexy as well. I don't have the game in front of me, are there any stone-centric wonders that would make sense for Washington? Obviously Great Wall but not sure if it makes sense to try for that.

Observation: in at least the Monarch No Huts save, the save name is "dalamb."

@Nez: Washington gets +1 in every city with Stonehenge, so that might be a good idea. On the other hand, this start wants a lot of different techs in addition to everything required to build the Henge with the stone (AH is an expensive tech that you'll need to work the best tiles, and Masonry, Wheel, Mining, and Mysticism are all needed to get the site going in time for the Henge).

Pyramids are always nice, of course.

ah see! I missd the corn! much better start now than I thought before... he bubbles are kinda important

Im gonna try this on deity

It feels weird playing with a leader whose UU/UB is so late in the game. It seems most have 2, if not at least 1 of them in the early game that we can try to strategize around but with Wash you really have little strategy around them.

I like a good cottaged Bureau capitol when possible. Could settle 1S and get at least 7 riverside tiles, or SIP for a good hammer city and possibly move the capitol later. I think I'm leaning towards the latter atm since there appears to be a few potential sites for moving the cap.

send in the marines!

about worker:
in recent SoM pacal game, the bonus 25% for production of worker seem to have had no effect....

any way around this? I mean very early game, later it doesn't matter.


also this leader remidns me of pacal - in mz current SoM game I didn't use holkan too, I did use the +2happy UB, but washing gets +1 by itself and +1 from monument

and has charismatic which is much fun for military!

Will start this game later today... hmm... noble or monarch? We shall see...

Nez477 said:

It feels weird playing with a leader whose UU/UB is so late in the game. It seems most have 2, if not at least 1 of them in the early game that we can try to strategize around but with Wash you really have little strategy around them.

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Charismatic Monuments feel a little like a bonus UB. And fortunately Chm-Ex is a really cool pair of traits in the early game, especially if you can't get an ancient luxury. No one likes whip cycles on a 4-happy city. Cheap workers synergize with the bigger cities until you stop building them, at which point you start to care about the healthy bonus too.

Nicol.Bolas said:

in recent SoM pacal game, the bonus 25% for production of worker seem to have had no effect....

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The production multiplier only applies to raw hammers, not the bonus hammers you get from food when building workers. It'll probably have an effect if you settle on a 2-hammer tile or you're able to work a 3-hammer tile. (In this case, both seem possible.)

I'll probably start the map on Emperor later today.

stone trap or rex?
and what to do with stone anyway (apart from castle economy)

i know henge seems the way, but if instead of sttlers you buuild stonehenge, that you have no cities to take advantage of it...

i know in some high difficulty games, GW can help vs barbarians..... I did this in one emperor gotm , mostly ppl did it there

Hello Civ Fans of all ranks and hierarchies! I'm brand spanking new to the site. I've decided to join the Noble's Club and improve my game. Currently I win most games on Noble, but when I tried a couple games on Prince I got creamed, the AI is just too fast! I realized that some of my newbie strategies just don't cut it for higher levels, and that I need to learn some new ones. This is what prompted me to come here in the first place. I'll start Washington on Noble first to warm up, try and incorporate some of the advice I've read. Looking forward to many good games!

I do have one question. I'm sure the answer is somewhere in the Bullpen, which is very informative, but at the moment I'm not sure where to look for it, please bear with me; what is the difference between choosing a "difficulty level" in the Scenario menu, and choosing a difficulty level in the Difficulty menu? What happens if I choose a different difficulty level from the Scenario's? Thank you.

Starting thoughts and more: I settled 1S. I'm playing no huts, pretty much blind, not much scouting ahead. I'm pretty comfortable on Noble so I should be okay. For some reason I got the feeling the map was conducive to a nice, well sized empire, but what do I know. I'll try to look for city sites and tech with the philosophy of "Flexibility" in mind. But a new kind of flexibility, active, not the usual newbie, passive one.

Nicol.Bolas said:

stone trap or rex?
and what to do with stone anyway (apart from castle economy)

i know henge seems the way, but if instead of sttlers you buuild stonehenge, that you have no cities to take advantage of it...

i know in some high difficulty games, GW can help vs barbarians..... I did this in one emperor gotm , mostly ppl did it there

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That stone is too far away to be of any use for SH or GW.

Izuul said:

That stone is too far away to be of any use for SH or GW.

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Exactly what I was thinking. I still might shoot for SH, just with no stone. I'll probably give this a go in a bit, settle 1S.

Edit: I'm assuming were not isolated, and with the CHA trait some early warfare might be in order.

Hahaha, I like this guy.

Nicol.Bolas said:

send in the marines!

about worker:
in recent SoM pacal game, the bonus 25% for production of worker seem to have had no effect....

any way around this? I mean very early game, later it doesn't matter.

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First, that 25% bonus only applies to actual hammers, not the production from food surplus.

Also, due to rounding, you need to have at least 4 base hammers before the 25% bonus kicks in. That's not always possible when building the first worker out of a size 1 capitol, but it is possible here since you can settle on the PH for a 2 hammer city tile and/or work the 3H FPH 1W. If you SIP and work the FPH you will be able to produce a 10T worker. That's very significant. You could also settle 1S and get a 12T worker, which is still good.

Nicol.Bolas said:

stone trap or rex?
and what to do with stone anyway (apart from castle economy)

i know henge seems the way, but if instead of sttlers you buuild stonehenge, that you have no cities to take advantage of it...

i know in some high difficulty games, GW can help vs barbarians..... I did this in one emperor gotm , mostly ppl did it there

Click to expand...

Castle economy? That's the first thing that comes to mind with stone nearby, instead of say....the Pyramids?

Izuul said:

I like a good cottaged Bureau capitol when possible. Could settle 1S and get at least 7 riverside tiles, or SIP for a good hammer city and possibly move the capitol later. I think I'm leaning towards the latter atm since there appears to be a few potential sites for moving the cap.

Click to expand...

SIP still allows you a good number of riverside grass cottages, and all those hammers get multiplied by bureau as well. Makes for a strong mixed commerce/hammer bureau cap, which is fine with me. Allows you to build the multipliers that much faster.

I'm playing this on monarch for fun, with huts and events on.
My goal is to peacefully expand to 20 citys(LOOOOL)

But HC doesn't trade with me in 350 BC ??? Is this the curse of beeing semi isolated or maybe some kind of bug???
He is at pleased because i got his religion, but he says to things like iron working and such that he doesn't want to trade it away just yet, i mean in 350 BC