ALC Game 13: Mali/Mansa Musa

[Obsydian]

Here is my opinion: Move your settler SE on top of the gems. Settle on the gems and work any commerce tiles soon as you can and have a crack at getting polytheism first. I believe that you have a good chance at discovering Polytheism first because the game speed is on epic and you will have a bonus of at least 3 commerce per turn from worked tiles. You may even get lucky and find a hut granting fishing technology and work another 3 commerce from the lake. If you miss Hinduism, then get Judaism instead.

The short term gain of founding a religion (and the immediate gain of having an extra hammer in your city tile) may outweight the long term benefit of having a mine on top of the gems. You also get an extra forest to chop by not settling where you are or 1S.

On a side note: Moving SE on top of the hill will reveal a wider section of the surrounding area – allowing you an opportunity to make a more informed decision of where to place your starting city in case you see something better. The surrounding deciduous trees show that you not near the polar caps so there would still be room place a city to the North and South of your capital. The tile 2SW of your settler appears to be a jungle tile, so you are a north of the equator. I would move south anyway to grab more land towards the centre of the continent you are on.

 

[Melon Head]

Checking for seafood sounds good. I would also like to mention how much i like the pre-first-turn discussions, too. They give the game a bit more depth, and actually I've learned a lot about founding other cities just from these discussions, becacuse that's really where a lot of information about location preferences comes out.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

You might recall that posting the start grew out of the first ALC, when I instead started by posting the first few turns and everyone wondered why the heck I didn't found the capital on a very convenient plains hill. To prevent such oversights, I started posting the start.

I do recall that, in fact. I was rather hoping that your tactics had improved somewhat after 12 ALC's of practice. Tossing out the opening position, I definitely approve of. It's not clear to me if the opening screen shot should be part of the pregame show, or only when the game starts (there are disadvantages either way).

Also, the patches since then have eliminated much of the exhibited by the AI city location routines.

But I took this passage -

So now the usual discussion ensues: where to move the Warrior

to be deliberately soliciting a discussion at this level of micromanagement. Fine, if that's what you want; if it was intended as a sardonic comment to discourage that sort of micro-optimization commentary... well, I think you missed the mark.

 

[vormuir]

I don't have a problem with talking about where to move the Warrior. Nor with Sisiutl being sardonic about it (if he was).

Everybody seems to enjoy these opening position discussions a lot, so I think he's on the right track.


Waldo

 

[Rancid Sushi]

Nice start. Even a noob like me would settle in place (I hate losing a turn anyway). I like moving scouts/warriors onto hills when I can to reveal more territory, so warrior should go 1 NW. Your city would also get a defense bonus for being on a hill, right?

PS: I have a feeling that one of those hills will reveal bronze or iron later.

 

[Sabertooth]

Settle in place, start a worker. Tech Hunting-Agriculture-Archery-AH-Pottery. Then decide if you want to try for an early religion first, or go for BW.

After your worker build a scout, then a skirmisher.

You have a brilliant starting position.

 

[cabert]

how many times did you regenerate for such a start???

settling in place gives you an option on poly and monotheism. A far away option, but not null. I may try it in a shadow game, but it's not failsafe enough to be tried here.
You want to show the power of mint, so I would go
- agri, hunting, AH, archery, BW, pottery
- worker, scout, settler, skirmisher, skirmisher, worker, settler

It's not the rex strat I proposed, because you have so much good tiles, it would be a shame to waste it by whipping too early.
And it's giving up on the oracle for a while too. Just research MC.

 

[Killroyan]

I can't imagine for the love of god why you would want to settle on the gems. With a mine this will be a 1f/2h/8 commerce tile. Nothing can beat that at start. I would give up 1 forest chop for that any day. If you go worker first to get that mine online you will be the tech leader in no time. This spot is perfect for anything. Enough food for cottage heaven. Enough hills for good production. The only problem I see is that you are propably just a little of the coast so checking for sea food with your warrior is a must if you ask me.

I agree with Caberts build and tech path.

 

[LostCrumb]

Two questions to you guys out there:

Can we assume, that Sisutil starts at a jungle strip, because there is rice an gems? This would mean lots of space for cottages, when the jungle has been cut down

I have the feeling, that most of the calendar ressources are located at the jungle and desert strip. Is that true? If the answer to both questions is yes, calender should move up in priority.

LC

 

[dragomaster]

this is a greate start, the gems will get you the cash for judaism. start with hunting then AH > BW > Mystesism > Polyteism > judaism (forgot the name on the tech) > archery. you are near the jungle IW shold maybe be reserched before pottery.

When the gems is mined the reserch will expload, making AH not that expensive. i whod improve the gems first that minimize the risk of a jungle growing there. as soon AH is reseched improve the pigs and start with settler.

Inprowing order. mine Gems > mine the hill 1 north of gems > pasture pigs.

the mine 1N of gems gives you the same amount of hammers as rice do when building a settler, I see no need for agri early on when you want the UU. I don't think there is bronz near, iron or ivory shold be around though.

if you ar aming for a slingshoot i realy like the Ide of theology slingshoot, mybe something to think about.

 

[patagonia]

Settle in place.

Seriously, the only thing that could possibly harm this starting position is if the jungle starts to encroach on the tiles it looks like the map generator has cleared for your capital before you can get improvements up.

 

[carl corey]

Yeap, settle in place. I'm not sure about Hunting first anymore. It does lead to Scouts, AH and Archery, but wouldn't it be better to go with Agriculture to get AH? And given the two food sources already visible you definitely want to whip early, so Bronze Working is also right up there. Agri-BW-AH or Agri-AH-BW seems like a better way to go. Your worker can farm the wheat then mine the gems and road them both until you get AH.

Too bad about early Skirmishers, but I don't see the point in researching those two techs with the given land. Seems like a real waste of time unless something else shows up for future cities.

 

[Immaculate]

If you really want a mint, but can afford to wait ~25 turns (not sure exactly on the math here) after getting the oracle, you could do this:

• found a city or two
• build oracle in one city
• take Code of laws
• switch to caste-system (you are spiritual after all)
• research pottery and bronze working but not maths
• a city with large food surplus (northern city with pigs?) runs two merchants for ~25 turns (i think this is right- can someone confirm/refute?).
• use the merchant to lightbulb metal-casting.
• go back to slavery,etc.

This way you still get metal-casting early and don't have to pay beakers for it, but you are also in a better position to REX which is something you said you wanted to do because you will have access to courthouses.
Also, if you do this you will have confucianism (as well as Hinduism/Judaism which you might or might not have either way) to help you build temples/run more priests if you want help getting to theology and divine right that way.
The last benefit is running science at 100% for a little while longer while the merchants pay the upkeep costs for 2-4 cities.

Thats just an idea i am throwing out there. This is a powerful opening that is useful not only for philosophical leaders. Don't let the financial trait prevent you from farming Great people in the early part of the game where they make the biggest difference. Later a merchant (and even a scientist) can't research a whole tech, its best to get them early when they can give you a lead in a particular line of research and when they can make that much more of a difference to your game.

 

[dragomaster]

I just read the previos posts and I agree in moving the warrior 1 NE but he most find gold or gems to justify moving the capitol. Riverside gems is sutch a greate resurcse and not taking advatage off it from start is crazy.

Besides it looks like you will get atleast six riverside cottages posibly eight if you count gems as one.

 

[Gwil]

Keep in mind you could end up having to research iron working, it seems there is a probability of hitting coast to the north and jungle to the immediate south. Either way that seems a moot point for now - settle in place, take the warrior 1NW to identify possible sites for city #2 (production specialist)

 

[Eggolas]

So very nice of a start for Uncle Manny!

Settle in place or if you're really curious, move warrior SE first to reveal more tiles. My preference is not to look a gift horsey . . . .

The rice gives you 3F and the mined grassland hill/gems gives 1F, so the opening sequence of Agriculture - AH should be pretty well set. If no horses show, then perhaps a detour to Hunting/Archery may be in order or BW once the gems come on line to reduce research time.

Production from hills, an extra 7 food from two improved resources (with CS), gems for research, money and happiness and perhaps 5 river tiles for cottages should result in a very nice first city.

 

[KMadCandy]

The short term gain of founding a religion (and the immediate gain of having an extra hammer in your city tile) may outweight the long term benefit of having a mine on top of the gems.

howdy, welcome to CFC! and now here i'm gonna disagree with your first post, how mean huh? i disagree about the short term vs long term benefit of the mined gems... but the real reason i wanted to reply is that you only get the extra hammer for your city tile if you settle on a plains hill. this is a grassland hill so we'd not be getting an extra hammer.

 

[Galileo44]

Add me to the settle in place gang. All you are going to find in the south is jungle. This is excellent for a financial civ around 1AD when the jungle is gone. Wait for the AI to settle threre and clear the land for you, then take it. Or, beeline to IW after the Oracle and start some serious chopping.

PS. Can you imagine how long it would take your first couple cities in the jungle area to get up and running if it still had Civ3 jungle clearing times. 24 turns for one tile! Ugh. You might have the equator clear by 1500AD.

 

[KMadCandy]

Seriously, the only thing that could possibly harm this starting position is if the jungle starts to encroach on the tiles it looks like the map generator has cleared for your capital before you can get improvements up.

*giggle*. that is one thing i don't think anybody thought of in the pregame thread regarding starting with the wheel. jungle is less likely to grow over a tile if you have a road on it, and you can start making roads right away

 

[Fierabras]

If you decide to settle in place, settle first, then move the warrior. After settling you might want to re-route the warrior if a goody hut appears outside the BFC.