Starting locations have a big impact on how easy a game is

[SupremacyKing2]

Game 1 (Apollo): I landed near a lot of alien wild areas so expansion was slower. I expand in the only direction that seemed open and alien free but settled my 3rd city very close to Citadella. Brasilia declared permanent war on me with a massive military. The game was a challenge and I quit because victory seemed very unlikely.

Game 2 (also Apollo): I landed in an area with no alien nests nearby and no AI. I was able to expand freely about 6 cities until I got close to alien nests and other AI. I got 6 cities all pumping out international trade routes for a huge science boost. The game is much easier and victory is very likely.

Two examples of how the starting location really affects how "easy" a game feels, much more than difficulty level.

 

[Bezurn]

I agree as I have had similar experiences. Also some map scripts are easier than others. I find equilateral to be a challenge with the small portion of land available and very small islands you have to hop between on the top and bottom of the map.

 

[Udey1]

Yup. Starting locations certainly do have this effect.

 

[Xenotitan]

Yeah, I'd estimate starting conditions to be plus or minus a difficulty level or two.

I'd also say the map scripts like archipelago and equatorial give an advantage to the human player over the AI. Mostly coastal cities are a boost to trade routes which the human knows to exploit a lot better than the AI.

 

[Darvon]

You should post this discovery in the strategy section.

"Good starting positions make it easier to win"

 

[Esperr]

Have you tried the first appolo challenge in the strategy section, you have a bad faction, bad loadout, and you start the game in a box that you have to fight your way out of if you have any chance of winning.

Start position is everything. How many times in V did you look at the start and go "well, turn 260ish if I have no close neighbors".

 

[ilectrcbob]

how important is the terrain type? i mean does it make any difference?

 

[Xenotitan]

Terrain makes a difference, but not as much as how close the AI lands and how many nests are nearby. Obviously a miasma heavy start is bad, and a lot of forests are a pain to improve. Other than that the game seems to give the player decent starting locations most of the time.

 

[Creamy Goodness]

You should post this discovery in the strategy section.

"Good starting positions make it easier to win"

I agree. Also, I think that at this juncture we should also discuss the theory many of us have regarding water being wet.

 

[Roxlimn]

Terrain makes a difference, but not as much as how close the AI lands and how many nests are nearby. Obviously a miasma heavy start is bad, and a lot of forests are a pain to improve. Other than that the game seems to give the player decent starting locations most of the time.

One of the things I do is I always play a start to completion, win or lose, and I like trying all the start options. It's not impossible for me to start with Hutama on a land capital with Heavy Miasma all around. Hard for workers, nearly impossible to set up a trading network early game. It's worse when all the other capitals are also sealed away - can't even send a land route to them.

Early aliens isn't that bad. If there are enough Nests nearby, particularly if you're Brasilia, you can do Starship Troopers and take Might to farm the Aliens for science. I estimate it'll take maybe 3 or 4 Nests to really make that worthwhile, but if you get that and lots of Spawns, it's kind of okay. The weirdest thing about that is with that many Nests nearby, you eventually settle over them and then go for Harmony (because you have a crapton of Xenomass tiles).

 

[Gort]

Yeah, I'd say a good early decision to make is whether to go for the Might Virtues that let you farm aliens for Science.

If you absolutely cannot expand at all because of the nearby aliens, go straight to Might. If you can expand once but not twice comfortably, go to Prosperity for a free Colonist, then to Might. If you can expand three or more times, you can probably ignore Might and go straight Prosperity or enough Prosperity for a Colonist and then onto Industry.

Aliens aren't really a massive threat since if you ever come across vast numbers of them, they're really more of a renewable science resource than a threat thanks to the combination of ultrasonic fences and ranged units.

New players often have trouble with the aliens because they try to clear out aliens too early in the game, use too few units to do it, or don't take the Might Virtues that make clearing out aliens easy and worthwhile.

 

[aguliondew]

That happen to me one game too.

Spoiler :

4 nests with frenzy aliens on my borders. Eventually I had to quit that one since, the 2 most advance civ declared war on me for killing aliens. First time I made the aliens red without going for transcendence.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

I agree. Also, I think that at this juncture we should also discuss the theory many of us have regarding water being wet.

I realize my opening post may seem very obvious and silly. In the early days when BE was released, there were a bunch of "Apollo is too easy", and "I win without even trying" threads. The purpose of this post was to show that difficulty alone is not a fair indicator of true difficulty. Simply saying "Apollo is too easy" is misleading.

I also feel like the starting location is more influential in BE than in civ5. First, the aliens can be more of a problem in BE than barbarians are in civ5. In BE, you can stumble upon 2 nests just 2 hexes apart, swarming with aliens. I never encountered two barbarian camps that close together in a civ5 game, with that many barbarians roaming around. There is also miasma which can hinder trade routes until you get rid of it. civ5 does not have anything similar. The staggered start of AI civs in BE also adds another dimension to the early game which civ5 does not have.