TSG 59 Opening Actions

Welcome to the TSG59 Opening Actions thread. This thread is used to discuss the game once you've started playing through your first 100 turns. There are no posting restrictions as such (apart from normal decency), although we encourage players to use the spoiler tags for screenshots. Here you can post questions related to the game and share your achievements/anger/frustration/victories while you play. Please remember that we are running a family friendly site, so express anger or frustration with this in mind.

STOP - Please do not continue reading this thread until you have completed at least 80 to 100 turns in your game.

Please use this thread to discuss your goals for the game and your opening moves through the first 100 turns. We are going to try something new and limit your game description in this thread to the first 100 turns. Anything after that should be posted in the After Action thread once you have completed your game.

- How did the terrain affect your early decisions?
- What were your initial priorities?
- What tech path did you follow and why?
- Were there any early wars and who started them?
- What Social Policies did you choose and why?

settled on silver
scout > worker > warrior
bloody swedes snatched 2 huts from me, huts give the game def a luck factor
went AH > Mining > Pottery > Calendar
bought tile with cattle
T28 >> Religion, Oral tradition, faith through quarries gone, now 60 turns later was a good thing, oral tradition is strong here.
T38 build Rotterdam southeast on flood plains and bought 2nd cotton tile
English met, they hate me (T39), T 80 they are still hostile …. I did nothing to them besides my scout running around in their region, weird
Bloody Swedes pump out settlers as mad, took 2 of my noted spots away, strategically I should declare war and kill him, but he is a trustworthy friend for the moment and pays good money for everything from horses to lux. I am at a loss what to do with him as England hostile and Ethiopia offering around 180 per lux and nothing for horses, i need my trading partner too badly to kill him.
Settled 3rd town to the west
Build Pyramids & Hanging Gardens, Rotterdam got Petra

Build NC, bought 2 settlers, settled one near Gibraltar and one in the Tundra to the North. 5 Cities now, Ethopia of all things Dow'ed me T85, England followed a turn later, Swedes massing an army on my border but still friendly, i see the back stab coming
Religion spreads well, allied 2 religious CS through rather easy quests, HS lined up to enhance in a few turns.

Beides the strategic situation with the Swedes being too close for comfort this is a rather easy games. I am trying out a few (sub optimal) things like the pyramids, pushing NC a bit further back than usual etc.

Next focus will be edu/navigation, climate on the island gets hostile.

Completed tradition and opened liberty (for the lack of a better choice)

Hieschen said:

T38 build Rotterdam southeast on flood plains and bought 2nd cotton tile
English met, they hate me (T39), T 80 they are still hostile …. I did nothing to them besides my scout running around in their region, weird

Bloody Swedes pump out settlers as mad, took 2 of my noted spots away, strategically I should declare war and kill him, but he is a trustworthy friend for the moment and pays good money for everything from horses to lux. I am at a loss what to do with him as England hostile and Ethiopia offering around 180 per lux and nothing for horses, i need my trading partner too badly to kill him.

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I'm in the same boat. Ethiopia and English have been broke for the first 100 turns and Sweden is the only one who wants to buy my stuff. But wow are they ever close.

I was late buying settlers as I tried a different strategy this game since it was Prince. I never go for GL but gave it a shot and then went right for NC before expanding. As a result both Sweden and I were sending settlers to the same spot to the SE of Amsterdam. Likely same spot you settled. My archer beat Sweden to the spot and I fortified my archer there. Swedens settler stopped and turned back and they settled south on the coast. Sweden still paying well for my lux but now he covets my land War may be coming, which wouldn't be too bad as Stockholm would make a good puppet. I purchased a few tiles in his direction to ensure I had them but also to push his buttons a little. He hasn't said "boo" to me yet about my aggressive settling which I'm surprised. Our borders are now touching.

I also neglected my army a bit and I should pump out a few more units so I can properly take Stockholm if he DoWs me. I'm definitely out of my comfort zone playing this way.

I'm at turn 101 and so far I have:

GL, NC, Oracle and Chichen Itza in Amsterdam.

I did take Stone Circles which helped me get my religion going but maybe wasn't the best choice? (Tithe and Divine Inspiration (+2 faith per wonder). This is all new to me as I don't usually build many wonders but with Prince I'll give it a try. I'm sort of regretting it now but that is what I get for playing late into the night. I'll use the faith for sending missionaries/prophets overseas to try to get my religion going over there. I'm going to need a lot of $ for this map and Amsterdam is going to be hurting for gold I think. Need more river spots.

I guess this is a continents map and I thought maybe at first it was islands or something and it surprised me when I met Sweden on like turn 3? I usually like keeping Sweden as a trading/friendly partner but they are right up in my grill. They also had crazy border growth (or do they actually buy titles?) as they gobbled up the extra cotton I was trying to get when I sent my settler over.

I'm currently at 3 cities (3rd one up by the gems on the coast to start sending units overseas). About to send 1 more settler to the river WSW of Amsterdam.

Full tradition so far and opened Patronage and about to get another policy I believe. More in patronage? Open Commerce? Not a lot of gold in Amsterdam though

I'm only a few turns away from Education but other than Amsterdam my cities aren't ready for Uni's quite yet.

I'm not sure what it is with this map but I'm not very comfortable with my start and not sure why. I'm first in score (doesn't really mean much) and first in literacy but maybe it is the lack of early wars throwing me off? I'm usually in panic mode fending off multiple DoWs so maybe that is what I'm missing. 100 turns of peace so far.... strange with Sweden so close.

Oh Sweden did offer me a DoF before I stole his spot for settling. I accepted and hope he breaks it. Maybe if he breaks it and DoWs me I can get friendly with Lizzy or Ethiopia. But Lizzy hates me every map so I doubt that will happen lol.

Need to see the other continent. I need trading partners. I also need more Lux. I'm starting to covet Sweden's lands I need more gold...

Hi,

1st post and 1st gotm i'll submit. i wanna say thanks to gotm player and staff, gotm and after actions review are great for learning and improved my gameplay.

- How did the terrain affect your early decisions?

The good spot east and sweden next door made me hard build a settler as fast as possible.
But map type and polder , change my usual tech and sp plan.

- What were your initial priorities?

Scouting! i wanna know what map type i'm playing, mainly to know if i need a coastal city and astronomy priority

- What tech path did you follow and why?

Mining, Pottery (find archery in ruins) Calendar, Writing, Masonry, (Philo with GL free tech), beeline Guild, Construction, Theology, Education, Metal Coasting.

I wanna beeline Education and renaissance as fast as possible to get university and rationalism opening but when i found my Rotterdam spot, i decide to go for Guild for petra and polder. then i go for construction, delaying edu a bit more hoping annex Stockholm and PetRotterdam will pay off later in game

- Were there any early wars and who started them?

Since turn 20ish i was on a "should i stay or should i go" mood over stockholm, around turn 80 i decide to go and tech construction to upgrade to comp bow, and ... Sweden dow me turn 85 ... I was unprepared (2 units doing a cs barb quest) and Utrecht was captured with a bit of luck T88...

I follow my plan and go for Stockholm and get it t98. 3 turn later Gustav give me back Utrecht and gold for peace treaty.

1st time i loose a city to an AI, good things i learn that when you get it back, monument and aqueduct from tradition sp are destroyed and u can't puppet a city you found ... Utrecht was crappy because i "emergency found city" when i saw a Sweden Settler coming at my priority spot (1 tile south east for observatory and citrus in first circle) and now it is even more crappy...

- What Social Policies did you choose and why? Did you save any policies, why?

Tradition Opener, Legalism Aristocracy, Landed Elite, Monarchy, Oligarchy/Tradition Finisher => Patronage Opener, Aesthetics, Philantropy

After scouting a bit, i found 1 obvious spot and 2 other one with unique lux. perfect for my usual 2 city NC +2 city tradition opening. I go Aristocraty before landed elite because of prince difficulty, i want to build GL.
Usually, i play diplo victory like science victory, rushing renaissance to open rationalism as fast as possible, and come back after for patronage tree. but i ve only find 7 Cs and if i remember correctly aesthetics work on non encountered CS (I think but i'm not sure)

i haven't save policies. can we ?

I 've play till t125, because of map and difficulty i've made some choice and i hope they will pay off later. i'm 20 turn from renaissance era and rationalism opener.
I've build GL T53, NC T66, Oracle T101 in Amsterdam; Petra T89 and Hagia Sophia T117 in Rotterdam.

oh nonetheless i hate ethiopian!
My religion is desert folklore/tithe/pagodas/religious community/itinerant preacher. Ethiopian get enhance and pick religious text the same turn i enhance my religion.

Kigur said:

1st post and 1st gotm i'll submit. i wanna say thanks to gotm player and staff, gotm and after actions review are great for learning and improved my gameplay.

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Welcome to CivFanatics and GOTM.

Glad you joined us and best of luck in your learning.

Kigur said:

Hi,

1st post and 1st gotm i'll submit. i wanna say thanks to gotm player and staff, gotm and after actions review are great for learning and improved my gameplay.

Click to expand...

Welcome! I'm glad we are helping you out in your Civ play!

- What Social Policies did you choose and why? Did you save any policies, why?

i haven't save policies. can we ?

Click to expand...

Haha, no, that is a remnant from a cut and paste from previous GotM's that did have Policy Saving enabled. My mistake, thanks for catching it. I have now edited the OP to reflect that.

HR

Stupid Swedes were too close.
Stupid Ethiopia is spreading too much religion.
Stupid English hate me and their spies coup my CS.

200 turns in and I am still sitting here with 4 cities. Will I ever learn to expand more?

I got an Admiral out around 350AD IIRC so I have met the others. They are annoying too.

My basic plan is to buy all the CS of which I am doing well if I can keep up the cash flow. Science and even culture is pitiful so I lament my 4 cities.

Full tradition, 2 in Commerce, finishing patronage.

I took Tithe so i might have to kill Ethiopia if I want to make any use of it.

settled on silver.

cap BO: scout - scout - worker/granary (maybe I bought one of them) - GL - NC - HG - etc.
2nd city SE of cap, on desert sheep hill: granary - lib bought (for NC) - petra - etc
3rd city SE of the continent, near 2f 5g NW: granary - lib bought - etc

cap position was not good (no river, not enough resource, etc) and 2nd city postition was too tempting - I bought settler around t25 and built 2nd city, petra and 4 polder city asap. 3rd city went up pretty late. I considered 2 cities, but I needed a coastal city. I decided to go with 3 cities and annex other caps later.

took Sweden cap and 2nd city before t100 and ethi next. annexed ethi cap later.

happiness was a big problem. I stayed at unhappy for couple of turns when I conquered new cities. I had to spend money on happy CS and didn't have money to rush buy any univ when I got education. Poor play.

Hit renaisance with acoustics, around t110. Opened rat at the same turn. Used oracle later to get secularism.

religion: stone quarries (yes, some AI took desert forklore before me) - tithe - 15% prod - pagoda - 30% further spread.

Got england cap around t145, and not sure I should conquer the other continent or not.

Gotta love prince.. Turn 33 I open trade with Gustavus and he mentions my powerful military... Which consists of 1 spearman.. A scout.. And a worker... lol

I first moved my warrior East. Decided to move my settler to the silver. Then I moved my warrior east some more and saw a mountain, river and flood-plain. So I took 3 turns to move my settler next to the mountain. So far it seems I'm the only one that did this. I figured with the floodplains and Petra this city is going to be awesome. The disadvantage was being crowded out by Stockholm and a Lhassa. I built two scouts and a shrine but still ended up having desert folklore taken the turn I was going to found a pantheon. Grrr. Took Messengers of God instead. With a neighbor so close by I decided to build a settler fast. and settle it way West, on the river just below cotton. Bought another settler (a little too early) to settle among all the goodies on the coast South of the second city. This surrounded Sweden who started to send out settlers. So I bought a bunch of archers, upgraded them to CB and took Stockholm as my fourth city.

In my capital, after the settler, I built the GL, NC, HG, Petra and Chitzen Itza. On Prince you can build any wonder you like I think. Had to buy a library in a my second city to be able to build a NC and wait settling the 3rd until it was finished.

After I took out Sweden, Haile and Liz DoW at the same time a few turns later. That ended up giving me a puppet from Haile before both settled for peace. The peace deals gave me another puppet from Haile and some gold from Liz. Liz and Haile were dirt poor anyway, so I don't think I miss much in terms of trading partners. Time to cross the pond and meet the rest, hopefully with untold riches in their coffers. It also looks like I'm on the verge of a CS chain reaction, so I'm expecting a nice number of allies soon.

I was a bit surprised that Stockholm didn't get a Monument when I annexed it at some point. I thought Legalism would give it a Monument as it's my 4th city. I also must have done something wrong with the timing, as I didn't have any good wonders to build in my capital for a while and ended up building a few minor buildings like a circus and a temple. And at the same time I didn't have money to buy a university because I had spent it all on buying archers and upgrading them, so I ended up building a university as well. I did manage to buy an observatory.

And t108 ratio iirc, with five cities. T 146 sci theory.



I did not like my start location either, but decided to bite the bullet and settle silver. Considered building NC in petra city but stuck with cap. After NC settled 3, 4th cities quickly, and then 5th a bit later. All but one settlers rushed. Only had cash for 2 unis. Built one slowly and bought two more i think.

Only enough cash for three public schools, then one few turns later. Not sure if I'll have enough for 5th. In meantime puppeted Stockholm around t 135 and now working on Ethiopia, will raze one and take cap. I might not have enough happiness to annex anything but will get them just in case. Cash for labs will be an issue but will deal with that later.



I DOWed Sweden twice early to steal Workers and stop him going for petra spot, then finally to take cap, but without gpt abuse, same with Ethiopia. Did a lot of CS quests so have few allies, had to pay few of them to keep happy and growth.

Took stone circles, tithe, 15prod, divine inspiration and IP. Used two missionaries to spread on my continent, and sent a prophet to the other one. It might be too late as there are two religions there already, one enhanced. I keep wondering if pagodas or asceticism would have been better, I could have expanded and conquered faster with one of those, as it is I keep waiting for late cities to build coloseums and have to build happy wonders. I thought I will get lots of faith for extra GS this way.

Got beat to two wonders only: pyramids and HG, that last one hurt as it was on same turn it finished
Will add few screens later.

I've ran into some trouble it seems. Hopefully the game isn't corrupt and I can go back to a previous autosave. The tile yields/graphics got all messed up around turn 165 (maybe?). A bunch of them went blank and toggling it on and off wouldn't fix it.

I saved the game and reloaded which I thought fixed it. Tile yields showed up again and on my way I went. A few turns later maybe 167? 170? I noticed the yields/graphics seemed to be in the wrong spot. A science academy I had planted was showing up a few tiles over on an unimproved forest??? I took a screen shot which I hope to post tonight. I shutdown the game and restarted my computer and decided to go to bed. Maybe it was a good omen as it was quite late into the morning anyways so I got some sleep.

I'm hoping with a comp restart and/or a reload it will fix things. Anyone else ever run into this problem?

I am at turn ~100.

I also settled on the silver and founded my second city at the petra location. Settled 2 more cities after i built NC. One is at the coast next to the food and gold natural wonder. The other one is at the south coast west of stockholm. I made Stockholm med puppet some turns ago and will do some more conquering as soon as my happiness is more stable.

I got education at turn 94 and is currently researching towards astronomy.

Had some bad luck with wonders, started to build hanging gardens right after NC, but it was stolen by someone on the other continent 3 turns before completion. Then I started to build the pyramid instead, but it was built by England on the same turn... The loss of hanging gardens will probably hurt a lot, It is not very common to be beaten to key wonders at this difficulty... Hopefully no one will get in the way of my oracle-astronomy timing, but you never know.

Vintage Port said:

I've ran into some trouble it seems. Hopefully the game isn't corrupt and I can go back to a previous autosave. The tile yields/graphics got all messed up around turn 165 (maybe?). A bunch of them went blank and toggling it on and off wouldn't fix it.

Click to expand...

i had the same problem in my game.. some of the tile yields were like one tile off.. my academy was showing itself in the lake.. the mountain was showing the marble's yields.. etc etc

Novalia said:

i had the same problem in my game.. some of the tile yields were like one tile off.. my academy was showing itself in the lake.. the mountain was showing the marble's yields.. etc etc

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Did it fix itself? What about restarting the comp and Civ 5?

It is impossible for city management to play that way as I have no idea which tiles the yields are supposed to be for. I guess I could just set it to default but that would drive me nuts.

I'm going to fire it up when I get home and see what happens. Might have to go back 3-5 turns and hope for the best. Frustrating.

I've never had this happen before.

I only noticed it outside the city screen.. I got v lazy and didn't micro the city tiles most of the game.
They really need a redraw screen function like an F5 refresh or something. This wasn't the first time.

Gustavus has got to go. He's broke as a joke, he's too close for comfort, and I'm about to compound (bow) his miseries.

- How did the terrain affect your early decisions?

I figured I would have to go large b/c no sea access, poor resources around the capital, decent resources elsewhere, etc.


- What were your initial priorities?

My initial priorities were to scout, meet CS and AI, get some ruins (got 4 of them), and then build two settlers quick, so as to beat Gustavus to the good spots.


- What tech path did you follow and why?

I'm sticking close to the bottom. Big empires need workers so I'm going pyramids, and I'll want compound bows to destroy Gustavus, plus I need Petra in my second city, and I need Machu Piccu to give me gold from trade routes in my wide empire.


- Were there any early wars and who started them?

None yet, but I'm about to start one.


- What Social Policies did you choose and why?

I went with Liberty. I'm going wide with this one; five of my own cities, and hopefully Stockholm.

Vintage Port said:

Did it fix itself? What about restarting the comp and Civ 5?

It is impossible for city management to play that way as I have no idea which tiles the yields are supposed to be for. I guess I could just set it to default but that would drive me nuts.

I'm going to fire it up when I get home and see what happens. Might have to go back 3-5 turns and hope for the best. Frustrating.

I've never had this happen before.

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try the check game cache integrity option in steam. rightclick on civ5 in games library, properties, local files -> verify integrity. if it doesnt work, check this: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=11947347#post11947347

workaround that did it for me was turning off the hex yield display (next to minimap), exiting the game and restarting civ5.

Settled on the silver and used my scout and warrior to meet England, Ethiopia and Sweden. Surprisingly from what I've read here, I was able to get some decent money in trades. Not full price, but something at least. I bought 1 settler and built another. Put one city on the desert hill to the SE and built Petra there. The other 1 I put on a hill/river to the SW. Not a lot of luxes there, but a nice spot nonetheless. I thought for sure Sweden would become hostile because of how close we were and how I was expanding, but I never got an angry message from him. Around turn 80, he did backstab me though. Too bad for him, I was already building an archer army for an inevitable war. I killed his army, upgraded to CBs and took Stockholm. Somehow, it was his only city and in a pretty nice spot too. I'm saving my pennies for a courthouse so I can annex it. Meanwhile, I had built the Great Library in my cap. That and Petra are my only two wonders. I took the pantheon for +4 faith for natural wonders (the other good ones were gone) and bought the Grand Mesa tile, which is now pretty sweet (+4 faith/+2 prod/+3 gold). I still don't have a religion though. Around turn 95, I still had a decent army of 4 CBs, 2 warriors and a GG, so I marched over to Ethiopia. He had 3 cities, and I easily took his western most one. I puppeted it, even though it was small, because it was on a river and had 2 spices. Now I'm going to march on his capital, but it might not be as much of a cakewalk. It's in the middle of hills/jungle/forest/river. I should get a religion fairly soon I think and my national college completes soon, which isn't great on this difficultly level. My plan is to just wipe out the continent and explore to find the rest of the civs. Probably not gonna bother fighting them unless they have nice caps on the water. I'll take them down with Frigates. I went tradition, but plan to put a bunch into patronage to help with CS allies. Figure I should be able to dominate my continent and coast to victory once I get to the UN.

pkf said:

try the check game cache integrity option in steam. rightclick on civ5 in games library, properties, local files -> verify integrity. if it doesnt work, check this: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=11947347#post11947347

workaround that did it for me was turning off the hex yield display (next to minimap), exiting the game and restarting civ5.

Click to expand...

Perfect this worked! Hallelujah

Turned off the yields and closed the game. On restarting up Civ everything looks good.