TSG71 Opening Actions

Welcome to the TSG71 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 settings 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?
- Did you notice any gameplay changes due to the patch?

moving warrior to one of the north hills was the best decision I made for this game. When I saw fish+pearl tiles, I was like... okay I move my settler here, forget about one wheat.

tech: optics beeline - writing - mining - calendar - masonry - pop philo with GL - iron working (colossus!) - math - currency - theology - education (t108) - compass - pop astro with oxford

cap BO: monument (yes, I assumed islands map) - scout (to get worker from CS or Zulu) - granary - shrine - trirme - work boat - lighthouse (not the wonder) - GL(t59) - NC(t66) - cargo ship - colossus (t79) - HG (t87) - market - writer's guild - HS/oracle (delayed HS to get natural pop, t104) - bought univ at t108 - oxford - finish oracle

stole Zulu worker around t25 and he offered his liberty settler around t30 too. Those two workers are all I needed.

religion: god of the sea - tithe - religious community - 30% more spread - +2 faith per world wonder

I entered renaissance with astro (oxford) and opened rationalism right after full tradition. and planned to use oracle next turn to get secularism. And I got market early and worked that slot so that I could double pop GM and GS. And......you can see the screenshot. I have no idea why I only got GS.

I ragequit at that point - I had one more ragequit moment before, but I didn't, and second time I could not stand it. The first one happened when I waited long turns to make sure that CS would get granary, and when I got it at t70 it had only one building - monument(free). I had to use all my cash to buy granary there (planned to buy cargo ship...) I mean, I know that this is prince AI, but what the heck were you doing for 70 turns.....

My game is patched and I just hit the Auto-Annex bug on turn 178 when I took the Zulu capital. I will try reloading the auto-save and replay the turn the same way, after hitting all the F-keys to see if I can take the capital without hitting this bug. If that doesn't clear up the bug I'll be quitting this GotM, because it would be completely unfair to have a 2nd that I can control the production.

Here's a screenshot showing the bugged city. To prove that I can actually control the production, I queued up Notre Dame.


Yes, I'll be submitting a bug report with both the auto-save and a save right after I took the city along with this screenshot.
Edit: Here's a link to the bug report.http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=512083

Edit2: Luckily, on replaying the turn after going thru all the F-keys to open and close each window, followed by manually opening the windows and using the F-key to close them, I was able to capture the Zulu capital and got the pop-up so I could choose to puppet it properly.

I rage-quit in my mind when I saw who our neighbor was. I hope we don't have him every other game.

budweiser said:

I rage-quit in my mind when I saw who our neighbor was...

Click to expand...

My priority at first was to wonderhog, until I saw Shaka. Then killing him before Impis became priority #1. I like starting near a warmonger though, because it spices things up.

I went liberty in the last Venice game and ended up spawning too many great merchants. I went tradition this game to see what difference it would make.

I think it will make a lot of difference. I went Scout-Monument-Worker-Great Library (Optics)-Great Lighthouse-National College-Stonehenge-Archer-work boat(x3), Hanging Gardens-Archer(x4). Someone else built Oracle on T105. Not sure it was a great idea to hard build the work boats.

I DoW'd Shaka a couple of turns after I met him, mostly because I wanted to get a scout past Ulundi. Then I stayed in perma war with him, taking his workers and such.

I finally took Ulundi about T100. I also got Antwerp with a MoV. Not sure I will take another city state. Both cities had granaries, so I am sending two cargo ships to Venice. The should be booming now.

I struggled to fill the trade routes because I was building so many wonders. I also need to explore more, to see if there's another city state worth buying. Science is not great because of the early war, but I plan to mix Rationalism and Commerce. It should be a decent finish.

@glory7: I havent done the simultaneous GPs in a while but if i recall correctly mine failed when they weren't exactly the same, like +7 for GS and +4 for GE taking the GE points to 100 and the GS points to 102 would get me only the GS because it went over more. This also happened when fractional points came into play. It showed me 100/100 on two GPs but one of them was actually 100.25/100 from a Garden bonus. I'm not sure if it still acts this way or if the new patch has affected it. Also this was pre-BNW so I'm not sure how relevant this example is anyway.

@Monthar: Thanks for so thoroughly addressing that bug. After all this time I'm surprised they haven't soundly fixed it, particularly with something like Venice. I'll check the bug thread every so often to see if anything was addressed specific to Venice. If you get a response, an update would be appreciated. I'm glad you got it to work eventually.

Simultaneous popping of Great Scientist / Great Engineer / Great Merchant is not possible in BNW.

First off, kudos to the team for another great game. This is not going at all as I expected. This one looks designed to separate the pacifists from the war mongers from the realists.

Based upon a few practice games, I decided to go Great Library (GL)/National College (NC) followed by Optics. This seemed very doable, even with throwing the Great Lighthouse into the mix, possibly even Hanging Gardens. And then I started the real game.......


Current Metrics (Turn 100)

Venice plus two CS (Antwerp and Zurich). Best fed Civ in the world! +40 science, -6 gold (ouch), no trade routes (currently building my first Cargo Ship), +3 smileys, +17 culture, +4 faith, score 258.


- How did the terrain and map settings affect your early decisions?
Having Pearls pushed me to Sailing earlier but that was no major problem - I like getting the luxury tech done early anyway. The Zulu choke point was the major issue. This pushed me off my planned GL/NC path into a beeline to Optics so that my units could get around.

- What were your initial priorities?
My initial priorities were exploration to find the City States (CS) and to follow the GL/NC path but that quickly changed to beeline optics and to then try to catch up in exploration. Given the nature of the map it didn't seem like I suffered from the late start but I sure didn't know that in the early turns.

- What tech path did you follow and why?
Beelined Optics to get embark mode and, of course, a Merchant of Venice (MoV) which I used to buy Antwerp. After that I went a Writing/Calendar/Philosophy path to try to recover a GL/NC. (Almost did it too - lost the GL by one turn !) I then switched over to an Education path, prioritizing techs as I thought most useful (e.g., Math for Hanging Gardens.) At turn 100 I'm researching Theology.

- Were there any early wars and who started them?
None so far. I'm second guessing myself big time, though, over whether I should have rushed Shaka as soon as I found myself boxed in. My natural game play is peaceful and I expected a Venice game to have a peaceful strategy so it wasn't until turn 28 that I started thinking that maybe, just maybe, I should have take Shaka out.

- What Social Policies did you choose and why?
I've followed a hybrid Liberty/Tradition path; Liberty for Collective Rule and the free MoV (used to purchase Zurich), Tradition for the "small empire" boosts.

- Did you notice any gameplay changes due to the patch?
None, other than my knee jerk decision to go God-King as my pantheon. I had planned on Fertility Rites but God-King was calling my name!


Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

Maybe I should have rushed Shaka early when I had a little edge. Would have required diverting to Archery, though, and I was dead set on Optics.


Lessons Learned, or, Don't Keep Doing the Same Dumb Things

1. Remember that units must be in home territory to get the embark capability; they can't be watching Shaka and then have to move all the way back home
2. Plan out the MoV routes so they don't have to back track when they run into enemy terriroty
3. Hey, marble gives a 15% boost to ancient and classical wonders! Maybe I should have connected it earlier...

Jerusalem is the pick of the CS's in the early game. I parked my MoV nearby and waited until he worked his second fish tile. Then at pop 6 I picked them up then bought a lighthouse. Snagging Antwerp next. I also failed at double popping the GS/MoV. Bummer. Shaka is so weak on prince he isn't even worth peeking at. Good for early workers tho. Gathering Military CS gifts and will wreck him soon enough. Unfortunately all the gifted units spawn at Jerusalem. :/

It is my first game as Venice I figured with prince I can learn as I go along.

I scouted to the north too, saw all the fish but decided to move on choke hill thinking there might be something there. I think glory's move was better, the extra wheat and horse and outside salt dont make up for all those fish and pearls.

Went: monument/worker/granny/shrine I think. Put a trireme in the water early when I saw my path cut off by Shaka. For the longest time I could not find anyone. Built GL, NC, SH, HG, colossus, oracle, CI. sent optics MoV scouting, thinking I will get Singapore or Yeravan since they are hostile. But I didn't see another porcelain and didnt want to get stuck with that as my WLTKD quest and Yerevan seemed too far, not sure how many tiles early cargo covers. So I sent my Marco Polo back home and took Antwerp. All that wondering paid off as they had granny already.

I went with fertility rites as pantheon, I thought about tears but decided to build SH for faith generation and go food nuts. Took swords into plows and religious community later.

Bought. Two Great G. To go after Shaka, had to buy one more to take cap at 20, he walled up as soon as I started shooting. Later I will get two other coastal expos and that will be it for mister warmonger.

DoF with Morocco and Portugal. From my routes he has some cash for me, Maria is dirt poor even with her UA. So a bit slow start but I am hoping huge cap will pay off later.

I was afraid to gamble on almost finishing Oracle to sling into secularism, and since I am not patched went for consulates before ratio, prolly a bad idea.

I hear the bards in the courtyard below singing the praises of Venice, the center of World Wonders and Maritime riches...


I settled on a hill to the north, allowing for 2 extra fish, 2 extra pearls and a sheep

With no barbs, I built Monument first, scout, shrine, granary, worker, GLib, cargo ship, wb, GLight, Oracle, currently building HG, (then NC and NE)

Didn't build any boats yet, been using my scout and warrior to explore

Focused on getting a Patheon early, so I could grab the "God of the Sea" ?? (the one that adds hammers to workboats). Will also work on spreading a religion, ideally Shaka will have my religion.

Filled out Tradition, working on Patronage, then go to Rationalism, making stops along the way for anything that will get me more money, or buy units/buildings cheaper.

Popped two techs from ruins: Sailing (was a perfect pop, as I just finished researching on the same turn, and could immediately start Optics) and Bronze working

I've never played Venice before, so I don't know if/when to use GMV to puppet a CS. I had the GMV walk to Antwerp, back to Capital, back to Antwerp, and then sail around exploring... just too chicken to "bite the bullet" and puppet the CS. Guess I'm gonna have to do it at some point. [[not sure if waiting so long is bad thing?]]

I'm nervous about Shaka, but will try to use my Venician cunning to make him my friend ... I'm not going to build an army for a while ... this might be my undoing.

For now, just trying to meet everyone, and find all the CS's. Get the Venician land maxed out, and do the same with Antwerp (when I get the nerve up to puppet them). This will be my little kingdom of commerce !!

No idea what will come next, high level strategy is to tech as fast as possible to get the World Congress founded. [[Not sure if it's a good idea to puppet more cities?]] Hopefully Shaka will stay away.... I am hoping I can have him focus on someone else (Morocco), it may all depend on whether I can get him to follow my religion.

Holy cats, it sure took a long while on Prince for the CSs to not stink. My MoV were fast floating fogbusters for the most part for a real long time. Who wants to eat a bunch of unhappy for a city with no infrastructure? Playing Venice I generally prefer to perma-puppet Militaristic CSs, because they are usually swarming with strong units, but on Prince even ol' Shaka didn't make a dude until like Turn 80. The only CS I nabbed early was Sofia, as it was close to just about everyone's cap and made a good spot to send Cargo Ships from.

I GLed into Iron Working and built Colossus ASAP, so I never had any gold problems. I did however have science problems, making me wonder if I should have just done the Philosophy slingshot. You can buy all the science buildings but you can't make your puppets staff the specialist spots so beakers were hard to come by clear out past Turn 200. I took two of Shaka's cities by turn 100 with Great Galleas and a Trireme.

God of the Sea paid off big. I was aggressively spreading at the beginning so I should have taken the beakers/missionary but instead I took the +Culture one. It was pretty good for initially helping through the social policies but Morocco really fought me on conversion. Wonder faith also rocked plus I took production bonus and fast spread.

Opened Tradition then filled Liberty. Scout-Monument-Shrine-Granary then Wonders, Work Boats and Cargo Ships. I did put together a little fleet to sail the world and add cities to the Venetian Trade Federation. Colossus and early DoFs with Byzantium, Japan and Portugal had me swimming in money so I'm not really sure what was hammered and what was bought. Had a pretty good string of Work Boat-Pearls-Sell-Buy Work Boat-Pearls-Sell-Buy Work Boat that put my early food, gold and production into triple happy.

I came close to ragequitting this game a few times because I didn't always get the option to raze some of my conquests, silly little sloppily placed 3 pop happiness vacuums. I eventually just decided this was an achievement game and not one for the record books. My Deity practice game with Venice will probably have a better finish time.

Plans: I've never played Venice, so I'm curious how the dynamic works. I have seen a couple comments about not annexing cities too soon because you want them to have a Granary. Since this is a DV, I think the strategy is to get Printing Press ASAP. I've read the threads regarding DV timing, and I think that is the key. I'll be using the GL strategy to open Philosophy and start the NC quickly.

- How did the terrain and map settings affect your early decisions?

No Barbarians was kind of a breath of fresh air. The island map is going to be a challenge for me, I usually don't play water maps, so my instincts are to build roads, etc.

- What were your initial priorities?

Once I saw I was on the same island with the Zulu it was to keep him bottled up, in the end I was able to take him out early, I think that will help later.

- What tech path did you follow and why?

GL to Philosophy, I'm doing my normal rush to Education, but with departures for Optics and IW (for Colossus).

- Were there any early wars and who started them?

Yep, I DOWed the Zulu and never accepted peace. He died on turn 71.

- What Social Policies did you choose and why?

I started up the Liberty tree for the free MoV. Going that way allowed me to get 3 puppets (I used archers from purchased CSs to take out Zulu). Now I'm trying to get Consulates before finishing Liberty because happiness is an issue (I've grown pretty large).

- Did you notice any gameplay changes due to the patch?

Nothing yet.

0 - Moved warrior to north hill and saw all the sea resources, settling to NW
1 - Found Venice, start Pottery and Scout
6 - Start Monument (planning to take Liberty)
10 - Met Zulus (really? Do I need to plan an early war to take them out?)
11 - start Writing
12 - Sailing from ruin, start Granary
15 - War so I can get past Zulu
16 - Open Liberty
21 - Start Shrine
24 - Republic
25 - Start Archery
27 - Start GL
31 - Start Calendar
35 - Stole worker from Zulu
39 - Collective Rule (and MoV), sending it to Antwerp
41 - Pantheon, took God of the Sea, starting Optics
43 - Took Zulu settler, waiting to annex Antwerp until they develop the gems since I don't have mining yet
48 - Finished GL, starting some workboats before NC
52 - Optics, starting Mining
53 - Start NC
55 - Annex Antwerp, start Masonry
58 - Zulu are surrounded, they can't get any Settlers out
59 - Annex Zurich
60 - Start Animal Husbandry
62 - Start Drama and Poetry, Citizenship
69 - NC done, building workboats
71 - Ulundi taken (thank you Zurich archers) and Zulu is eliminated, I can breathe easier
73 - Start Theology
76 - Start Lighthouse, buy a Trireme, stopped Theology research, forgot I need Colossus, beeline to Iron working
82 - Start a Cargoship
85 - Open Patronage, switch to Colossus, back to Theology research
86 - Faith ruin
91 - Theology done, beeline Education
93 - Starting Hagia Sophia
99 - Found Cult of Bacon (Tithe and Swords to Plowshares)

Second post, first GOTM.

First, I have to say that I usually play on Emperor. So I was expecting that everything comes down to timing the DV. As I've already played further (I'm very close to finishing), I know now, that I still have much to learn, even on Prince....

Although I'm a long way behind t100, I wanted to answer the questions anyway.

Hammer Rabbi said:

- How did the terrain and map settings affect your early decisions?

Click to expand...

I didn't build the usual Scout because of the water-based map but went scouting with the Warrior and went for Sailing research-wise.

- What were your initial priorities?

Click to expand...

Finding a CS for expansion, scout the water. I was not very sure if I should get a religion, but since I was able to get 'God of the Seas' as a pantheon and was able to build the Hagia Sophia due to the difficulty setting, I founded a growth-based religion.
Another early priority was the great lighthouse for the water map. I almost forgot to build the Colossus for the two additional trade routes, but I had some luck - the AI was to slow.
Another priority were food trade routes and building a garden to make use of my religion.

- What tech path did you follow and why?

Click to expand...

I beelined Optics for that Great Merchant to annex Antwerp. After that my tech priorities were determined by my usual strategy for going tall: Mathematics (for the Hanging Gardens) and philosophy (for the Oracle).

- Were there any early wars and who started them?

Click to expand...

No wars so far as I remember. I should have killed the Zulu early, but Shaka behaved himself and adopted my religion. And I didn't have the time to build the neccessary ships for fighting him.

- What Social Policies did you choose and why?

Click to expand...

I got down the Tradition tree before going over to Patronage. That was probably a mistake, since Venice lends itself to a wider approach, I think. And Patronage was at that stage not really necessary...

- Did you notice any gameplay changes due to the patch?

Click to expand...

The Landsknecht caught my attention later in the game for being a unit tied to a social policy. But I didn't build him or chose the SP. Otherwise, no.

the Landsknecht come in handy later in the game.. you can buy multiples and move them in the same turn from a single city.. so if someone is about to religion bomb you and you dont wanna waste a bunch of faith on an inquisitor they're a pretty good alternative... just park 3 or 4 around the city.

s8g said:

Second post, first GOTM.

Click to expand...

Welcome to CivFanatics and GOTM.

Keep up the good work.

Retiring for the evening, t99. Second BNW game I play, first as Venice. Seeing its on Prince, I decided I'd shoot for a bunch of early wonders. Also I decided to bum out of religion, I'll take whatever comes whenever it does.

- How did the terrain and map settings affect your early decisions?
No barbs, so monument first(allowing for free Amphitheater instead, later). Archipelago so I didn't bother with scout. On second thought I should have bought the trireme before archer.

- What were your initial priorities?
Great Library -> Colossus -> Hanging Gardens -> National College

- What tech path did you follow and why?
Writing -> Bronze Working/Iron Working(GL pop) -> Mathemathics -> Philosophy. Heading towards Education now via Metal Casting.

- Were there any early wars and who started them?
Nope, peaceful as ever, reading what others have written maybe I should have/should be worried about Shaka, but he has caused me little concern so far.

- What Social Policies did you choose and why?
Tradition is my tradition for tall.

- Did you notice any gameplay changes due to the patch?
Just got BNW, so I've only played the new patch.

Also I got to bully a CS for cash, nice! Met Shaka, Oda, Maria and Gajah so far, Venice is size 12.

I did a bit of a error though, cost me about 7 turns. Hard building the Aqueducts to have them finish a turn before selecting Oligarchy and finishing tradition for the free Aqueduct. Could have got another cargo ship instead.
Ohwell, the game goes on.

Turn 50


Turn 50

Ribannah said:

Simultaneous popping of Great Scientist / Great Engineer / Great Merchant is not possible in BNW.

Click to expand...

oh, didn;t know this.. thanks for letting me know.

so I continued playing from the autosave file. As I cannot get CS with UU and I don't want to get GM instead of GS, I will capture other caps to boost spt. Morocco with Petra and other wonders is the first target and Byz (CI and parthenon), Jap (GLighthouse and others) are next targets.

Should be fairly easy... it's prince and it's water map - 5-6 frigates can dominate the world. Went navigation early to build seaport (15% bonus for navy is good and it provides raw 8h 8g.. OP) and beelined for PP. Expect to hit PP around t140 and ironworks+heroic epic will be done by then - after that I will get enough navy to destroy the world. That double pop failure totally changed my game plan.

Since the Fall Patch has derailed my intention of recording a Domination LP, I decided to do this GOTM as my first LP. From my practice games, I learned that I suck at playing and talking at the same time, so this is an excellent way to get some practice at LP'ing, and record something that will still be valuable to players trying to step up.

Opening BO: scout, monument, shrine, granary, GL, NC, HG, Oracle, etc
Tech Path: Pottery, sailing (should not have bothered with sailing this early), calendar, (bulb Phylo with GL), archery, >> mathematics, >> CS (picking up masonry on the way), Education (getting optics on the way)

Policies: Full tradition is the only policy tree for Venice. Opened Patronage, and will head down to scholasticism.

religion: God of the Sea Pantheon.

I settled the north western corner to get 5 fish and 3 pearls in my 3 ring

Shaka closed the south to me, so I hovered his borders and stole settlers and workers til ~T100. When morocco found his way over and I made peace to avoid the diplo hit for taking him out. Deleted all but 2 workers.

Waited til T90ish to get optics to give time for the CS to get a granary (still no freaking granary! )

Moderator Action: I removed the link to your Let's Play video from this thread because anyone going there can access the whole game, thus it creates spoilers for other players who may be at Turn 100 and haven't played further yet. You have the link in the After Action thread and that is fine. Please do not post anything that may spoil the later game for others in the Opening Action thread. Thanks.