TSG65 Opening Actions

Welcome to the TSG65 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 and map 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?
- What Wonders did you build or miss out on?

Moving the warrior as I discussed in the announcement thread paid off in spades. When I saw the grassland river, 3rd salt and wheat, I knew I just had to settle on that tile. Sure it's flat, but it kept the cows in the 3rd ring, let me have all those wonderful desert hills for Petra, etc. So that's where I settled.

I tried going for the GL while teching towards Petra and had it timed to take Petra's tech as my free one instead of going the traditional philosophy bulb. However, Arabia beat me to it when I was close to finishing. Luckily my worker had 1 more turn left on his forest chop, so I switch to Temple of Artemis and got to dump the chop's production into it.

Once my production was around 40 and I was into Piety, I started using the shrine trick to help power through all the wonders I got. I was beat to Alahambra by a turn and latter found out Gandhi was the one that took it.

Alex DoW'd me a few times and Arabia did as well. I was able to finish the Great Wall during the first war, which made it a lot easier to whittle down Alex's troops to where he gave me a white peace finally. Luckily when Arabia DoW'd my borders were already hitting the 4th and 5th ring in spots, plus I had expanded it towards Alex to grab another source of horses with a citadel. After clearing Arabia's troops with my ranged units they offered a decent peace deal which I took. During these first wars I was constantly last in soldiers.

When the Arabs Dow'd again I caught some breaks with my spy. IIRC, I got swordsmen, crossbows, longswordsmen and trebuchets all from tech steals. Not all from the same civ though. Level 3 spies are great at stealing the earlier techs fairly quickly once moved to a new civ. This turned the tide against the Arabs, allowing me to capture two cities and dropping a citadel to expand my borders right to the edge of Mecca and stealing their wine, which game me a road all the way to there. At this point they offered me a city to my west for peace. I took it, didn't like that it had no resources, so sold it to Carthage.

After pushing Alex back for the 3rd time and getting a decent peace deal, I bought his open borders and started spreading my religion to him. He and the Arabs both founded religions, so he was a bit PO'd. So were the Arabs, because I did the same to them, except I did it to their holy city after the last peace was brokered.

Now for some screenshots.
In these I recently finished my 3rd war with the Arabs, this time, however, I had a couple of cannons thanks to stealing the tech from Russia. I took Mecca, got a peace deal for some cash leaving him just Medina on the tundra peninsula north of Mecca.

At this point the only things I can build until until Archaeology are troops, wealth or science. So I'm cranking out muskets and the occasional cannon. I'm still only 6th in military, but I have decent troops and a few murder-bows (longbowmen) from my CS ally.

Wonders Part 1

Wonders Part 2

Overview of my lands. Look at all my Moai Statues. Yes I built one on a salt, a cow and an iron to get maximum culture from them.

Look, most folks are buying my blue jeans and listening to my pop music. Oh, wait, that's BNW's line. I spammed missionaries as fast as I could generate the faith for a new one. All of Korea, Carthage and Iroquois are true believers in the Faded Blue Jeans.


Religion
Desert Folklore
World Church - The last I checked it was giving me around 60 culture per turn.
Cathedrals
Monasteries
Religious Texts

As you can see from the screenshots I'm 5 turns from Archaeology.

Polices so far
Tradition completed
Piety completed
Patronage, all but the great person gifts.
Liberty to the free worker, only because I wasn't quite to industrial and didn't want to finish patronage yet.
Freedom to the extra culture per world wonder. To time the opening of Freedom I had to stop working half my culture tiles to coincide with the completion of an RA that would finish Scientific Theory. since I only had 3 turns to go in ST when the RA finished I also got Astronomy completed and part of Navigation.

booo kooo

what is it about Dido's voice that does it for me?

Moderator Action: It may do it for you, but how do you know she is in the game unless you have opened the save and played it? Once you open the save, please do not post in the announcement thread because you may give away spoilers, as in what other civs are in the game. Moved this post from the Announcement thread.

And t39 GL, then HG, ToA, petra and very late 2 city NC around t70 or later. I really wanted those free gardens as I decided to settle in place thinking there is got to be some fish somewhere

Oh well, at least I got the wonder I wanted, did not use the shrine trick at all. What is the word on that? I completely neglected my army, even my initial warrior and scout were on different continents and since it's not BNW paid for it. Settled 3rd city north on river for some marble and salt and seeing Harun massing his troops built an archer and bought one. Got one more from CS and After many turns of this stand off I was tired of waiting, had my edu and finally teched construction to go and take Mecca when .... Alex DoWs me with a massive army and despite rushing a CB, and walls in my mt.Sinai city he is going to take it.

I had a half built MoD there and a nice infrastructure. So instead of fighting to last drop of blood I sold it to Harun, withdrew, upgraded to XB and took one of Alex's cities. Got a half gold peace from him and turned around to take Samoa back. It went fast, too fast as I was building ironworks and Oxford in cap and now had to rush both workshop and uni and spend all my cash. Huge setback, my free monument and aqueduct are gone

But got to soldier on, t170 Industrialization, with Oxford and next turn open Freedom. Cpt still low in mid 300s and very little room to plant but it should go fast soon.

Turn 125.
Moved settler to river on east. Great spot. Good growth and prod.
Build 2x scout, and sent off warrior too, got a some gold, culture and sailing + AH from ruins.
Game has been going very smoothly so far. Did writing to GL (turn 45), then build HG, Petra and almost done Teracotta.
Was first to pantheon, second to religion. DF, and chose world church and cathedral which is what I consider optimal for culture game.
Founded 2 more cities turn 50, one from liberty and one BO. Settled north along river and south at coast. South city isnt providing any lux I dont already have, so its been dragging me into borderline/low happiness for the last 40 turns.
At turn 100 greek came with 4 catas, alot of spear and archers, same did dido and Arab. Had about 8 archer at this point, 4 on north and 4 on south, did rush out 3 more, and started upgrading to CB, so greeks actually turned around, while Dido attacked on 115. By now her attackforce is almost wiped, and will upgrade all archers and get a poni to go take her cap.
A little scared to move far, cuz greeks and arabs still has alot of unit close to my borders. Really would have liked to take out arabs first, but this opportunity to destroy Dido without any diplo penalty is hard to give up.
Edit: Sent of 6 CB and a horse to take out Cartage, and while in position I get a dow from greece and arabs. Securing peace with Dido and rush units back, but northern city fell to arabs, and ragequit. Will not play this one through. But great map, thanks.

Play it out, I lost a city too and as far as I can tell it cost me maybe 6-8 turns, maybe a bit more, hard to account for all the what ifs. At least it made the game challenging and interesting and not just regular wonderwhorefest . Selling a city to another civ helps preserve the population and infrastructure. I think all buildings and pop stays if sold and not conquered. I just realized I should have taken Arab other cities first and threaten Mecca to get my city back in peace deal intact (where is that hammer whack icon ?) as it was I avoided extreme pop loss but not loss of infrastructure.

I am really enjoying this map I just wish I did not settle the coast, no room for GA plants already and I still got 1.5 trees to go.

I absolutely hate settling on the coast if there is no sea resource so I did actually move the settler to the river which was revealed by the warrior. Not sure if that was a good idea (missing on SOH in cap)^^

5 Ruin: 80g.
9 Ruin: Tech: Archery (the ruin next to the city was left for the Scout... on turn 3 however both Harun and Dido show up with a Scout on my borders and grab that probably all others too, great -.-
10 Bought the Dear tile. Also a barb left his camp to attack my Scout over a river... what?
11 Another attack while I was sitting on forest... I fortify (well now I can waste another turn to get +1 sight anyway) [guess what, he didn't attack but get back to his camp -.-].
17 SP: Opened Tradition
22 SP: Opened Liberty
23 Granary done, next Shrine.
29 Starting GL. Risky move, but what the heck (at least Dido and Harun didn't start it yet and Hiawhata is walking around witha settler so he probably neither).
31 SP: Citizenship (free Worker)
32 Scout died.
43 Utique was placed 4 tiles away from Honolulu. Worker bought from seeling Salt and Wine.
44 Faith ruin... the Shrine didn't work out well, four Pantheons were already founded and kept upping the faith requirement for mine. At least Desert Folklore was still available.
46 SP: Republic - also another ruin: 70g.
46 GL done (1 Forest was chopped for this, next: NC).
50 Masonry before Mathematics allows me to get the Sugar now and start HG just when NC is done.
58 Camp cleared for Valetta, Quebec and Yerevan (nice!).
64 SP: Collective Rule (free Settler)
65 Ruin: Maps (revealing more Ice!)
67 Samoa settled on the Marble to the north.
69 HG done (next Oracle).
75 Although not further away from my capital than Arabia and Carthage (who both found me on Turn 3!) finally Greece decides to say hello.
76 India met through Wayfinding Maori; too bad he discovered they're already building the Pyramids (was considering them too). They're also swimming in Truffles.
84 Oracle done --> SP: Representation.
84 SP: Meritocracy. Liberty finished --> free Great Engineer.
85 Petra done (GE). Harun finished Stonehedge (good boy).
85 Barb Camp cleaned and Worker returned to Kuala Lumpur. Their Dyes made me go from 2 to 6 Happiness. Perfect! (98 Influence).
92 Great Prophet --> Found Religion: Tithe & Cathedrals.
93 SP: Aristocracy (Wonder production bonus); Harun builds Great Lighthouse.
99 Terracotta Army done.
100 First Maoi in Construction. Paid 500g to renew alliance with Yerevan.
103 SP: Opened Piety. Bought University in Honolulu.
105 Chichen Itza done.
112 Great Mosque of Djenne done.
116 Cathedral bought. Scientist --> Academy. SP: Legalism. RA signed with India.
125 Acoustics --> free Opera Houses. Alhambra done. Hagia Sophia done (GPr used to spread rather than Enhance).
127 500g to Kuala Lumpur.
128 Great Temple done (also National Epic finished earler, forgot to note).
128 Backstabbed by Dido (it doesn't say backstabbed though, guess the DoF just ended right before). Building Wall now (2 turns).
[pretty tricky: She asked me to go to war against the Iroqois just a few turns earlier so I thought I was safe]).
128 SP: Monarchy (for the Happiness). Sold single copy of Salt to be able to buy a Comp Bow in the Capital.
129 Ruin: Scouting CB upgrades into xbow (he's as far away from home as possible though). Another Cathedral bought.
130 7 Pikes/Elephants, 4 Archer, 1 Catapult + GG in sight. That looks grim. Maybe Alhambra (free Castle) will be my lifesaver here...
What is this? 3 of her units have Drill + Medic promotion; how? She also has the 15% Honor bonus. AND now also 4 melee units from Alex on my borders too... oh wow, I'm gonna die lol -.-
Lets see... paid Alex 40 gpt (!) so he declares on Dido. Crazy .
131 Coolio! Instead of them fighting a bit whiel they're both on my borders Alex rather decides to retreat. Come on!!!
134 finally Alex helps a bit, preventing Dido from a full surround of Honolulu.
139 SP: Organized Religion; Didos attack failed. Got 4 CB, 1 Pike and 1 Maori, Dido has Walls and still quite some units though.
140 DoF with Hiawatha who has now 9 cities and pretty much filled up all the space down there.
142 Iron Working stolen from the Iroquois.
146 Great Prophet --> Religion enhanced (last at that): Religious Community + Reliquary (50 faith per gp).
146 Utique gone to Alex in a peace deal with Dido. Now my troops are standing there...
146 Declared War on Alex. Utique was mine and also I don't like to have to pay him 40 gpt for 16 more turns.
He does have the Great Wall though (and Harun who I initially wanted to attack myself first might jump in on me too soonish -.-)
Since Utique was just "captured" it wasn't able to shoot and there weren't any troops nearby either, so that was an easy take.
147 RA resolved and finished Architecture and put me 1 turn into Machinery which will be needed to go on capturing.
Next goal: Reach Navigation, then Oxford for Archaeology.

at t100 I've just completed Education, bought University.

settled on the river, got GL done at t45. went all Tradition to start. while finishing NC bought a settler and settled him north on the river by the salt two away from the Marble. settled a third city south between the Gems.

funny game diplomacy wise, everyone wants to be my friend. yeah, I haven't been abusing the AIs and CSs much, just stabbed Hiawatha once to get out of a deal and steal all his gold. but later he sued for peace and after that wanted to be my friend! maybe it's the new version? or maybe I've just got lots of gifted military units from allied and freindly military CS's? dunno, but I've stopped renewing my Friendships with the Carthagianians and the Arabs since I'll probably want to go steal their capitals soon. Alex may declare first on me though, he hasn't ever wanted to be my friend and he seems to be lurking near my borders with his Hoplites.

I missed the Hanging Gardens by 1 turn at turn 57. dumb. I coulda done several things to speed that up. but I did get Oracle, and Petra and will get CI at t105 probably. Also built Halicanassus in Somoa!

working on Acoustics now. haven't built any Moai yet, hmmm, maybe I should think about that.