6otM 20 Opening Actions Report

[Knowtalent]

Welcome to the 6otM 20 Opening Actions thread.
STOP - Please do not continue reading this thread until you have completed at least 80 to 100 turns in your game.
This thread is used to discuss the game once you've started playing through your first 100 turns. Apart from normal decency, the only posting restrictions are to please not post videos until the deadline is finished and 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.
Please use this thread to discuss your goals for the game and your opening moves through the first 100 turns. Anything after that should be posted in the After Actions thread once you have completed your game.
- Where did you settle your city?
- What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
- What was your build order?
- How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
- How did you place your districts?
- Did you emphasize expansion? How many cities have you built/captured in the first 100 turns?
- How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
- What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
- Were your neighbors peaceful?
- How were the Barbarians?
- Any surprises?
Please use spoiler tags for any surprise details you'd like kept hidden. Thanks.

 

[Vlad Dracula]

Where did you settle your city?
I went SE one tile.
What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
I rushed for Knights.To conquer.
What was your build order?
Two slingers,builder,two more slingers.
How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
I built an encampment as soon as I was able.None really after the first encampment.
How did you place your districts?
I placed them where I could get the best bonuses.
How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Gold at first for econ then production.Build time for military.
What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
All of the ones on the starting continent.Three or so.I forgot which lol.
Were your neighbors peaceful?
Nope Harald and Ghandi declared.
How were the Barbarians?
Not too bad.
Any surprises?
Gandhi declaring on me.

 

[Greenlami]

Where did you settle your city?
One tile south east, so I didn't have to lose one rainforest.
What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
Mining to imrpove tiles near my capital, then campus an after that straight to typography, since I planned to build lumbermills to help with production.
What was your build order?
Slinger, scout, settler.
How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
I built very sonn a campus, and did that in every city I founded until I unlocked theatre district, then built some of them to balance the points
How did you place your districts?
Where I could get the best bonuses, also triyng to think ahead where I would put the next ones.
How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Gold and production (still have the settlers' one), also culture by Meritocracy asap.
What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
Didn'd do very much scouting since there would be no treasure huts, but managed to discover 4 in the first 80 turns. Kumasi first, then Buenos Aires, and Zanzibar. Yerevan not useful for Kongo, pity.
Were your neighbors peaceful?
Very much so. Harald is always angry but he's at war with my bff Gandhi so no problem, I also didin't settle near him.
How were the Barbarians?
Some showed up, but they created few problems.
Any surprises?
I'm enjoying playing as Kongo, quite different approach but their production boost towards districts and 50% towards GP is a godsed gifth for this kind of victory.

 

[Slacky86]

Where did you settle your city?
One tile SE

What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
Started with mining, after that wherever the eureka's took me

What was your build order?
Scout, Slinger, Warrior

How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritise?
Campus, Theatre, Commercial

How did you place your districts?
Wherever bonuses presented themselves

How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Gold and settler production

What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
Became suzerain of Kumasi and Zanzibar fairly quickly for the good culture and lux boost, conquered Yerevan

Were your neighbours peaceful?
Yep, no issues at all

How were the Barbarians?
No issues

Any surprises?
First time with Kongo, very strong in science and culture. Surprised at how peaceful my neighbours were.

 

[Katakanja]

Okay, so I ended up deciding to settle in place, which, given the proximity of Kumasi and Yerevan, was probably the right choice in hindsight. I immediately started prepping an army to go on the offensive, the plan is to conquer every city I can in the long run to drive up my score as high as possible, so the bottom of the tech tree took priority especially since groups of N'gao M'beba are pretty good at sieging cities with their ranged defense boost. To further this aim, an encampment was my first district, followed by a campus to speed things along.

Sent settlers north and south of my capital - south to get a coastal city and north to secure some iron (I initially forgot that Kongo's unique doesn't need iron ) and met my neighbours in the process. Everyone was friendly and amenable to peace, but sadly Kongo wants to take over the world, so that couldn't last Peter was my first target as he built Stonehenge and then very kindly sent a settler towards my army, so it seemed like a good time to declare war. He was easily eliminated and I used the free settler to claim the desert area north of his capital - if I have the time and no one else gets it I will build Petra there (I think playing as Nubia has made me want to build desert cities in all my games now )

The next target is Gandh, and in the screenshot below my invasion of India is in progress offscreen to the left. I'm also preparing to expand with settlers into the northern part of the continent - Harald doesn't seem to be expanding, so it will be easy to surround him and then conquer Nidaros at my leisure.

The number of nearby city-states has caught me a bit off guard. I'm not sure whether I will invade and seize them, or keep them around for bonuses until near the endgame. Probably some combination of the two.

All in all, everything is proceeding smoothly

Spoiler :

 

[Lily_Lancer]

It says wonders are 5, which means they are equivalent to a new city, and great people are 3, which means they are equivalent to a district. Given the relative effort of building a wonder versus building a settler, it would be wiser just to conquer any AI built wonders than spending time constructing them yourself, at least until the map has filled up and its harder to find spots for new cities.

Late game settlers cost as much as a Spaceport even with +50% policy. On the other hand, purchasing them will cost you more than 10,000 Gold each. So wonders are actually cheaper...

Moderator Action: Moved to Opening Action thread as we are headed into spoiler territory.

 

[Katakanja]

Late game settlers cost as much as a Spaceport even with +50% policy. On the other hand, purchasing them will cost you more than 10,000 Gold each. So wonders are actually cheaper...

That's why I said wait until the map has filled up

It would be best to keep expanding until about turn 200 through settling/conquest and then spend the last 50 turns on whatever wonders you can get.

So I presume relics won't give you any points whatsoever...?

Great works don't appear to, so I doubt relics will either.

Moderator Action: Moved to Opening Action thread as we are headed into spoiler territory.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

- Where did you settle your city?
1W
- What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
I hurried Mvenba first, but soon I realized that they do not count for scores so are useless, also it consumes precious forests... Then I went for Monarchy and walls +150%.

- What was your build order?
Builder, Warrior, Warrior, to take down Yerevan early.

- How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
I didn't build early districts until maybe T50. Of course we shall prioritize Campus.

- How did you place your districts?
I don't care about adjacant.

- Did you emphasize expansion? How many cities have you built/captured in the first 100 turns?
Not many. My settler cost is 410 so I guess I only built about 12 and captured about 4.

- How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Walls+100% with Monarchy to make overflow for Mvenbas. Also, settler+50% and builder+2 are must-places.

- What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
I captured Yerevan but try to suzerain all other CSs.

- Were your neighbors peaceful?
Not sure since I take them down early.

- How were the Barbarians?
I try to light up possible places to avoid them before kill+50% gold policy.

- Any surprises?
Mvenbas do not count for points! Also, they do not provide hammers!
Kongo is the weakest Civ in game so I achieved slower development speed even if I have goddess of harvest in this game. I'm only at <100 Science and Culture at T100.

 

[Everad]

I settled 1N/2W when I ran into Yerevan, which luckily left me with one tile between my capital and Kumasi for my second city along the river. At this point I decided the city states had to go, and focused on an archer rush. For techs & civics I stayed in the ancient era as long as possible, then researched classical to one point from completion as I really wanted to avoid war monger penalties.

Gandhi moved a settler in front of my scout, so I took it, then took his capital and that was the start of the 87 year long continent wars. Peter was friendly and we became good friends and like a good boy stayed in his little corner of the world, until I took Yervan and Kumasi, then I sent my army down there around turn 60 and took him out. Harald was also friendly, but after dealing with Peter, I had to take him out too, his capital fell quickly, but moving my troops to his second city was a nightmare and missed my deadline of turn 100 to "purify" the continent, and took until turn 107 due to Buenos Aries expanding borders and me having to move my troops south and then north to finish Harald off. By this time I had 12 cities, half captured/ half built by me. For districts my priority was science, commercial and cultural.

Overall no real surprises, except for the massive continent to colonize, barbs were mellow except for this one camp north of St Pertersburg in the sandy wastes that caused me a lot of grief. My screenshot is from turn 107, hope that is ok, I lost track of time trying to finish off Harald.

Spoiler :

 

[Eyswein]

- Where did you settle your city? Settle in Place

- What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
Initially Mining (close mines), AH, Pottery, Writing (quick Campuses), BW, Archery (get out the military), 3 later Currency (Commerce Districts) and now out to 24 techs to include Machinery and Cartography (ocean roaming)
Initially to Political Philosophy and then Drama & Poetry (Theater Districts), then headed to Exploration (though I hate the loss of Urban Planning) and now to 19 civics and want to get to the double worker bonus for better development ASAP

- What was your build order?
Capital - Scout, Settler, Builder, Slinger x8, Warrior x3, Settler x2, Campus
2d City to N – Builder (buy), Trader (buy), Monument, Builder, Slinger x2, Warrior x2, Builder (buy), Settler, Campus
3-5th City on coast – 2 for harbors, 1 for galleys

- How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
2 Campuses by Turn 60; 2 Harbors by about Turn 90; Commerce priority otherwise (6 so far), then Theaters (3 so far); 1 Entertainment for Colosseum; still working on 1 Encampment and 2 Industrial

- How did you place your districts?
Looked for synergies when possible; for example, my Colosseum is within range of 6 cities

- Did you emphasize expansion? How many cities have you built/captured in the first 100 turns?
Total of 16 cities (10 built, 3 captured settlers, 2 captured city states, 1 captured AI city); 6 additional AI cities on the continent to be captured soon

- How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Started Discipline/Urban; Agoge for slingers/warriors, Conscription(no maint archers)/Colonization (get them settlers); Maritime (for galleys); Professional Army as needed - by turn 100 I had upgraded 2 galleys, all 10 archers, and all 6 warriors to the next level; now have Serfdom and mostly gold saving/producing cards

- What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
Met 10 so far and received notice another unmet one was eliminated (annoyingly saw Stockholm as an AI city around turn 90); captured 2 CSs; Suzerain of 6 so far (1 of the 6 is Valletta that I got via quests, but plan to capture)

- Were your neighbors peaceful?
Yes, but I started 4 wars and they just denounce me; I haven’t eliminated anyone yet; I still have one AI to meet and ideally plan to wait until I’ve finished the next 3 AI wars and 1-2 CS wars (if they don’t meet me first)

- How were the Barbarians?
Initially had quite a few near the capital, but no significant issues yet except for annoying barbarian ships making me retreat (hate 1 galley meeting 2 quadriremes at a choke point); used military to reduce space they could spawn

- Any surprises? Not really, but…
1) I was hoping the AI would build more settlers and place the ones I didn't capture better
2) I wish I’d taken out the initial continent earlier so I could be friendly and trade better with the other AI before I conquer them also, getting ready to start 3+ Renaissance Era wars and eliminate all on my land mass, which will make everyone else I’ve met hate me
3) My strategy is/was a wide (get lots of initial cities), then tall (working on getting them developed), then wide again strategy (plan to then settler spam again) – not sure what is optimal strategy; wondering if just placing districts, not completing them, and never stopping the settler spam would have been better
4) Score of 294 so far: Civics 38, Empire 201, Great People 6, Technology 48, Wonders 5

 

[Zeppa]

Turn 96. Settled in place, have 6 cities. b-lined to UU swordsman. Currently have 110 victory points, All cities building research districts then commercial districts.

 

[antimony]

Turn 104

Where did you settle your city?
1 tile West for extra mines.

What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
Mining - BW first. My strategy was to rush Ngao Mbeba to go with an early general. Then beelined writing and currency to get districts down early.

What was your build order?
Scout, builder, settler, slinger, then builders with 30% card to chop first district.

How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
Encampment first in capital, campus first elsewhere, then commercial hub.

How did you place your districts?
Mostly as soon as possible, bought a few tiles for +2/+3 campuses, but tried to save gold for unit upgrades.

Did you emphasize expansion? How many cities have you built/captured in the first 100 turns?
4 settlers built, 3 settlers stolen (two from Norway and one from Gandhi), 5 cities captured (3 enemy capitals + Kumasi and Yerevan). Yes, none of the 3 AIs on my continent was able to settle a second city, they couldn't get their settlers past my troops or the barbarians.

How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Waited for Agoge to build a few slingers and warriors, after that moved to Colonization. I got Mercenaries and upgraded to a knight/crossbow army around turn 100.

What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
I think I met all of them on the starting continent. My plan is to suzerain Buenos Aires, Zanzibar and M-Daro which help the most for city growth and happiness, and conquer the rest.

Were your neighbors peaceful?
Yes. I declared on Norway to get a settler, and on India later since they had denounced me and were closer than Russia.

How were the Barbarians?
Not too bad, but they were really hard on the AI, apparently.

Any surprises?
- I was really hoping to get Buenos Aires and Zanzibar for the amenities, and they were right there!
- Like I mentioned above, that 0/3 AI managed to settle a second city.
- Also, a possible bug. When I conquered St. Petersburg, they had a pillaged Lavra. Usually holy sites disappear, but this one stayed there. Kongo can't repair it, so it just takes up the district slot.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Yerevan not useful for Kongo, pity.

In a normal game they're great for giving all your Apostles Martyr which Kongo is well placed to make use of.

Peter was my first target as he built Stonehenge and then very kindly sent a settler towards my army, so it seemed like a good time to declare war.

Exactly the same thing happened in my game!

 

[Greenlami]

In a normal game they're great for giving all your Apostles Martyr which Kongo is well placed to make use of.

Yes, would help immensely in a cultural victory.

 

[Katakanja]

Exactly the same thing happened in my game!

Good guy Peter is clearly always willing to help out a friend in need

 

[Uberfrog]

Turn 101

- Where did you settle your city?
As seems popular, one tile SE.

- What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
Mining and Masonry to get the gems online, Bronze Working to get an early Encampment for General, then through to Ngao Mbeba.

- What was your build order?
Monument first, then a couple of Slingers to deal with the pesky barbarians, then a Builder to improve luxuries.

- How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
Encampment down as soon as BW was researched to get those General Points. Got a Theatre District in capital and second city to get some GWAM points going, after that my usual Commercial Hubs for trade routes.

- How did you place your districts?
No particularly stunning adjacency bonuses, so just wherever was convenient. See screenshot.

- Did you emphasize expansion? How many cities have you built/captured in the first 100 turns?
Pretty rapid Score Victory, so yes! On five cities at Turn 100, having just captured Saint Petersburg (soon to be Mbanza Saint Peter ). Took Kumasi just before declaring on Russia. Built one Settler (to grab the coast at Mbanza Mbata), the other cities are Settlers I captured from Kumasi (who presumably stole it off Peter, who foolishly declared war on the city state just before I did), and Peter. I have an extra one I captured who I plan to settle towards the floodplain desert in the east.

- How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Autocracy because I knew I'd be doing some conquering. Agoge to get my early army, Conscription so it's cheaper. May switch to Republic now to crank some GP points.

- What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
Found Kumasi first, pretty prime real estate so I nabbed it. Yerevan and Zanzibar I probably won't bother capturing, especially Zanzibar since its suzerain bonus is nice.

- Were your neighbors peaceful?
Yes, but I wasn't . Peter did declare on Kumasi but seemed to succumb to their Archers.

- How were the Barbarians?
Surprisingly annoying. The camp down south produced a Scout early so I diverted my starting Warrior and rushed some Slingers to deal with it. Then a surprise Horseman and Horse Archer army came from the east and pillaged my Wheat, so I built a Spearman to deal with them.

- Any surprises?
I've inherited a Holy Site from Peter, which I mercifully didn't pillage!

Spoiler Screenshot at start of Turn 101 of the glorious Kongo Empire :

 

[Half Nelson]

Kongo turn 110. I have 12 cities, 3 settled and 9 conquered (2 from Russia, 5 from India, Kumasi and Yerevan).
I settled 1S of the starting place to free up more rainforest and built slinger x2, builder, warrior, settler, slinger x2, encampment then spearman (due to barb horses and probability of Indian varu).
City 2 was founded on the S coast river mouth. I took pasture culture as pantheon. I settled a third city N to secure iron and horses.
The plan was to spam settlers at this point but both Russia and India forward settled my capital so I reverted to building military (sword UU then war chariots) and attacked Russia. They were soon conquered and my army (now including a GG) headed N to Kumasi (just too close to my capital) then W to India. I initially captured the Indian CS ally (Yerevan) then, with crossbow and knight upgrades, I conquered India with few difficulties after my spearmen cleared the paths of varu.
My army is now heading N to deal with Norway and the settler spam is finally underway. I have just completed the colosseum in capital to ease future amenity concerns and my first mbanza are under construction.

 

[100games100days]

Disclaimer: Only picked the game up a week or 2 ago. Even though I have 50+ hours in the game already, still learning a LOT.

At turn 107...

Where did you settle your city?
In place

What did you research and which policies did you choose and why?
I went straight for Political Philosophy for governments and managing policies to get the most out of settler and builder boost civics.
I focused on boosts to get to the UU then started spamming them out of my high production producing cities.

What was your build order?
Slinger, slinger, builder I believe. Was chasing a scout around early and found a barb camp or 2 hence the early 2nd slinger and thought it would help with some tech boosts later.
My build order for all new cities is basically builder then monument. Not sure how ideal this is.

How soon did you build a District? Which ones did you prioritize?
I got a bit slack with district planning and plotting them down when they're available to save on hammers. I'm used to playing tall all the time in civ 5 so there's a lot more micromanaging in this game.
The first district I got was a campus in the capital. I misread the inspiration boost for Recorded History and thought it was 2 encampments not campuses that needed to be built.

How did you place your districts?
Campus in capital next to the mountain and 2 jungle tiles for +2 science.
Have a campus in my city north of capital near Norway that has 2 horses and one in the south near Russia. Both are 2 tiles away from city and towards Norway and Russia capitals.
Placed a harbour in my coastal cities near India, one of those cities will have a commerce hub as well.
Placed a culture district in the capital and was going to build it but Russia's religion hadn't spread yet and I'm keen to try out Kogan's Apostle feature where you get a free one if your city has a majority religion.

Did you emphasize expansion? How many cities have you built/captured in the first 100 turns?
Once I cleared barbs and my capital was on 3/4 pop I started pumping out some settlers.

How did you play your governance cards, priorities?
Builder/Settler and Military bonuses. Didn't bother with faith.

What City-States did you meet and which ones did you cultivate to your side?
Met a few very early. I'm suzerain of the one that gives 2 unique amenities and the commerce one. Ghandi is suzerain of the very close faith city state. My plan is to eventually capture all city states that suzerain bonus is of no use to me. Keeping any that give housing or amenity bonuses.

Were your neighbors peaceful?
Yeah, surprisingly. I should have been mean rather than nice from the start to get the war going without penalties. But since i'm ally with the city state that gives 2 unique luxes I'm in very good shape.

How were the Barbarians?
Barbs were dealt with early with India, Russia and mountains creating a safe barb-free zone border around my cities.

Any surprises?
City states were really close. Not sure what the AI are doing, I'm starting to take out Norway and they haven't put up much of a fight. Should be able to take out the continent with relative ease I feel if I keep spamming my UU with crossbows and some knights.

Plan going forward
Utilise all the unique things about Kongo - Apostles, the new neighbourhood district etc. Mainly for fun since I've never played Kongo before. Also take over the continent, focus on building as many cities as I can, getting wonders etc for that big score!
Kongo's neighbourhood district along with the unique city state luxes should help build a pretty massive empire.

Questions (for anyone nice enough to answer )
1) To get the free Apostle for creating the Unique Kongo building or culture district do you need to have a majority religion (e.g. 5/8 population on that religion) or can you have as little as 1 population for it to appear?

2) If I kill Russia who has formed a religion and it's starting to spread to my cities - does that religion die completely? I'll eventually want to kill off Russia but I'm keen to give this free Apostle trait of Kongo's a go. So if it does kill off their religion I want to keep Russia alive.

3) Follow up question. Let's say one of my cities how has majority religion (e.g. 5/8 pop following that religion) AND I kill Russia - will that city still follow that religion?

 

[Uberfrog]

Questions (for anyone nice enough to answer )
1) To get the free Apostle for creating the Unique Kongo building or culture district do you need to have a majority religion (e.g. 5/8 population on that religion) or can you have as little as 1 population for it to appear?

2) If I kill Russia who has formed a religion and it's starting to spread to my cities - does that religion die completely? I'll eventually want to kill off Russia but I'm keen to give this free Apostle trait of Kongo's a go. So if it does kill off their religion I want to keep Russia alive.

3) Follow up question. Let's say one of my cities how has majority religion (e.g. 5/8 pop following that religion) AND I kill Russia - will that city still follow that religion?

1) To get the Apostle, that religion will need to be the majority religion in that city.

2) The religion does not die, it will remain in your cities and be spreadable via your own Apostles. It is effectively removed from the game in terms of Religious Victory however (not that that is relevant in this GotM).

3) Yes.