I'm in the habit of building Stonehenge EVERY game

I'm thinking I'm pretty alone in doing so, however I can't bypass getting a religion as it bugs me how much I'll miss out if I don't get one.

Furthermore the Great Engineer point allows me to snag Sistine Chapel in every game (immortal level) I've played.

I'm thinking of changing my strategy to liven things up a bit, so can anyone convinence me to do so by pointing out all that I'm missing by always focusing on an early wonder?

You could be using those hammers on settlers

You could build a few Units and conquer someone's Wonders, plus an experienced military!

Astennu said:

I'm thinking I'm pretty alone in doing so, however I can't bypass getting a religion as it bugs me how much I'll miss out if I don't get one.

Furthermore the Great Engineer point allows me to snag Sistine Chapel in every game (immortal level) I've played.

I'm thinking of changing my strategy to liven things up a bit, so can anyone convinence me to do so by pointing out all that I'm missing by always focusing on an early wonder?

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You literally just took the words out of my mouth and put em in a post. You are not alone. I LOVE stonehenge since it guarantees a pantheon and with some shrines a religion.

Also it allows for a turn 140 wonder so yeah sistine chapel works out nicely most of the time. It two wonders and a religion in one!

Try changing your focus from Stonehenge to TerraCotta army and then blitz someone with it.

What do you do when you don't get it? Do you build a shrine before building it to make sure you'll at least get a pantheon?

I've gotten to the point where I rarely bother with many early wonders, too easy to get beat and be set back. The Oracle has been the one I go for most. Probably because I beeline the tech most of the time anyway and the free sopol and scientist point are so nice. For some reason the AI do not build it very often so I rarely need to worry about getting beat to it.

Astennu said:

I'm thinking I'm pretty alone in doing so, however I can't bypass getting a religion as it bugs me how much I'll miss out if I don't get one.

Furthermore the Great Engineer point allows me to snag Sistine Chapel in every game (immortal level) I've played.

I'm thinking of changing my strategy to liven things up a bit, so can anyone convinence me to do so by pointing out all that I'm missing by always focusing on an early wonder?

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No, sir, I cannot.

Make no apologies for your wonder whoring ways! I myself am addicted to the sweet, sweet nectar of the Great Library and the Mausoleum. If I don't get those two back to back--well, then, God must not have wanted me to play that game through to its conclusion.

I say you just keeping building that ring of obelisks, my friend.

If you still want to play the religion game, Ethiopia and the Maya are nice while not needing a wonder

Thanks for the replies.

I manage to build it first 99.9% of the times I try. Taking tradition and chopping forests helps ensures this.

Building units and taking it from someone else isn't likely in my games, as I tend to play 10-12 player large/huge maps and its likely built on the other side of the world.

As for settlers, I often rush buy my first settler after accruing enough gold, however with so many AIs I AM often beat to good spots by a neighbour. However I guess I can just conquer those cities anyway. Missing out on a Wonder from the start can't be reversed so easily.

I don't like building settlers too early in my capital anyway. The production is so low that it takes 15+ turns to build (I play at Epic speed) and i hate missing out on pop growth during that time.

When I use to play on Emperor I use to rush build both Stonehenge and Temple of Artemis for massive growth and religion as well as quick archers for defense. The super quick Engineer allowed me to build Macchu Picchu for massive gold too.

I once managed to build both on Immortal with Siam and absolutely dominated.

As for the above poster, Great Library and Mausoleum on Immortal would be a near impossible feat .

I think I should start a game as Maya, go wide and build Pyramids and forgo any early wonders. I've been wanting to veer from a tradition start in any case.

Basically, I rush for GL every game, and usually get it (King), but after that dont build any wonders until Renaissance, unless I have an OP prodcution city.

Astennu said:

As for the above poster, Great Library and Mausoleum on Immortal would be a near impossible feat .

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I've done it on Deity. Twice.

It takes a PHENOMENAL amount of luck. The first time I got both pottery and writing from ruins, and I still had to chop down every tree within sight (and revert to older save games to finesse the production turn by turn) to do it.

The second time wasn't as hard, but it still took about two dozen tries. I used the Shoshone to get what I wanted out of ruins. Still not easy.

Astennu said:

I'm thinking I'm pretty alone in doing so, however I can't bypass getting a religion as it bugs me how much I'll miss out if I don't get one.

Furthermore the Great Engineer point allows me to snag Sistine Chapel in every game (immortal level) I've played.

I'm thinking of changing my strategy to liven things up a bit, so can anyone convinence me to do so by pointing out all that I'm missing by always focusing on an early wonder?

Click to expand...

I also do this a fair bit if I want a religion, especially if you're the Arabs or Byzantines, but I am now diversifying my tactics towards early settler. In some cases, the benefits of stonehenge are dependent on your neighbours: if they have their own religion then you'll have trouble spreading your own religion and of course, the further your religion spreads, the more effective it is. Also, if there is a religious NW nearby, grab that instead of stonehenge. I did that in my immortal Poland game even though it still wasn't really worth it later on because my neighbours also got their own religions.

I've also had about 3 games where stonehenge was taken early and before Great Library on emperor-immortal difficulty.

shrine does the same thing with the right pantheon;
if your dirt does not allow a faith-based pantheon, a measly 5 fpt from the wonder will get you pagodas VERY slowly anyway.

And, you could be beaten to the wonder.
And, sometimes the more realistic wonder to aim for (on deity) if you want religion is Hagia Sophia (this one is easy to see if it's doable or not since you keep tabs on who has entered medieval and with your luck they will go for the other two theology wonders instead, just get an embassy and try to spot the wonder; leaving you this one provided your tech is not delayed)

Religion from free prophet +divine inspiration belief is better than Stonehenge by a LOT; the free temple also helps in building grand temple later on;
and the early great engineer delays your first great scientist anyway.

Religion on deity is not as much for the founder bonus (you will not be able to keep up with the piety AIs anyway, and even if you could, using the faith to buy great people would give you an easier win no matter what win condition), as it is for the faith generation and for giving your holy city (which is hard to convert using passive pressure alone anyway, but watch out for enemy prophets) nice bonuses like +15% growth or +15% production as well as keeping your original pantheon (which is usually chosen based on the terrain of your holy city anyway)

Aiming for Hagia Sophia is not really a good idea on higher difficulties unless you are in the tech lead early on. You could do it if you get a GE at the time you start building it.

sendos said:

Aiming for Hagia Sophia is not really a good idea on higher difficulties unless you are in the tech lead early on. You could do it if you get a GE at the time you start building it.

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it's easier than Stonehenge (many times gone on t40 or so)... mainly because the tech itself has 3 wonders to it; AIs who reach that tech by FAR prefer Borobudur if they have a religion, speaking from my own experience on standard deity anyway, or Great Mosque if they went piety. Deity Pacal will prioritize this wonder last among the three virtually every time.

Of course, I'm assuming at this point you have reached tech parity with around half the civs... (no point building it if you are the last to reach medieval unless you are sure they all went for the bottom of the tech tree)

And there is no way you can get a GE (unless you are Maya/ finish liberty) by the time you reach theology (no idiot would go for workshops before theology)

kb27787 said:

AIs who reach that tech by FAR prefer Borobudur if they have a religion, speaking from my own experience on standard deity anyway, or Great Mosque if they went piety. Deity Pacal will prioritize this wonder last among the three virtually every time.

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Hagia seems to only go early when built by AI that haven't founded yet - it's immediately followed by "religion founded" or later you see the pointless holy site.

Astennu said:

I think I should start a game as Maya, go wide and build Pyramids and forgo any early wonders. I've been wanting to veer from a tradition start in any case.

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I just finished a wide Maya game, liberty and pyramids to help overcome a very heavy jungle with lots of gems. Obviously it was a great start religion-wise, with wide faith and settling half the cities on gems. But it was a really mediocre region with no rivers. 2 extra science per city and Interfaith Dialogue really disguise pitiful growth, haha. I hard-built Machu Picchu but was still broke the whole time due to low pop. I used the long count GE on Borobudur.

if the henge also comes with +1+ culture, i will get it.

Just +5 faith is meh, since i can get the great library which adds +3 science and 1 culture and 1 tech

Stonehenge and Pyramids are also my go-to ancient era wonders. The GE points are just so nice, and GL is more hit than miss anyway, whereas these I will get almost every time (well, Stonehenge at least most of the times). Temple Of Artemis is very rare for me, AI seems to love that one.

Stonehenge and Pyramids gets you a great engineer to nab Notre Dame. You just need to hold off on the liberty finisher until after the engineer is popped.