ALC Game 21: Zulus/Shaka

[Sjaramei]

This should turn out to be an interesting game, good choices.

Am I the only one who thinks that the scout/warrior should be moved before the first post ends? Getting feedback on where to settle is good, but having a discussion on where to move the scout? Unnecessary.

I agree with this. It's usually not worth discussing where to move the scout

 

[Daedal]

I agree with this. It's usually not worth discussing where to move the scout

One of the prime laws of the ALC: the fewer real points the peanut gallery can debate, the more they will debate those few points into the ground.

So... let's see that little fella move 2N.

 

[madscientist]

My guess is you have a resource in one of those riverside plains. You have 1 visable resource now, 1 floodplains, and perhaps something else. Too many clear terrain areas to be a forrest spammed capital that we see in BTS. Based on the map/forrest/fur you are in the sourthen area of a temperate climate meaning alot of tundra which could get in the capitals BFC if you move. Also looks like you have 2 snaking rivers that may or maynot connect, meaning good unpillagable city trade routes.

So my suggestions

1) Move scout NW to get a good view from the hill
2) Settle in place.
3) Build a worker.
4) Tech AH/archery/mining/BW but I know you will likely not listen about the archery.

I think it's a pretty good start for Shaka.

 

[LlamaCat]

I fired this one up and didn't realize the settings include no goodie huts. so I failed to notice science slider had quickly dropped to 50% since I had no cash in the bank. should be a fun challenge...

 

[Roxlimn]

I agree with settling in place. We don't know how far south this position is, and tundra may get into the BFC with the risk of a move. Going only by the hills, the Forests, the FPs and the Wheat, this is a pretty darned good start for Shaka. We already have a happy face resource in sight, and more of those for trading purposes are bound to be in the vicinity.

Having Forests is good for the early Worker production to take advantage of the Expansive bonus.

 

[mystyfly]

I'd move the settler 1N. This site seems not so productive. There are many plains (which I consider bad). 1E of the settlers current position seems to be copper/iron/horse, you wouldn't lose it by moving.

 

[oldsaxon]

I think he should move the Scout 1N, then post the screenshot (so we can decide whether to move it 1NW, 1N, or 1NE).

If he doesn't do that, though, I vote 1N1NE.

 

[manu-fan]

I think he should move the Scout 1N, then post the screenshot (so we can decide whether to move it 1NW, 1N, or 1NE).

If he doesn't do that, though, I vote 1N1NE.

Nice - let's not just debate where to move the scout, lets debate ever step of its movement

Cheers.

 

[Artichoker]

I think he should move the Scout 1N, then post the screenshot (so we can decide whether to move it 1NW, 1N, or 1NE).

If he doesn't do that, though, I vote 1N1NE.

1N1W should also be a possibility because of the Hill tile at 1NW.

If moving the Scout 1N reveals good squares at 2N and 1N1NW, then maybe go 1N1NE. Otherwise, go 1N1W.

 

[futurehermit]

My advice:

Settle in place

Worker-warrior-settler

Mining-BW-AH-wheel

Rush if you have close neighbour

If not, use your production-monster capital as a worker-settler pump and rex on the strength of your UB + courthouses then attack when the land runs out with classical/medieval troops.

EDIT: You may have to tweak the build here a bit if copper doesn't show up. Might be better to grow the capital a bit more while you wait to see if/where horses pop.

 

[Good Sauce]

I opened the WB because I know I can't shadow a game at this level and I just like to try to guess where things will go. I must share this little (non-spoiler) fact about the map. It has the longest river possible on a civ map. It empties into itself. Has anyone ever seen this before?
Infinite Rivers! Crazy!

 

[iamnleth]

My guess is you have a resource in one of those riverside plains. You have 1 visable resource now, 1 floodplains, and perhaps something else. Too many clear terrain areas to be a forrest spammed capital that we see in BTS. Based on the map/forrest/fur you are in the sourthen area of a temperate climate meaning alot of tundra which could get in the capitals BFC if you move. Also looks like you have 2 snaking rivers that may or maynot connect, meaning good unpillagable city trade routes.

So my suggestions

1) Move scout NW to get a good view from the hill
2) Settle in place.
3) Build a worker.
4) Tech AH/archery/mining/BW but I know you will likely not listen about the archery.

I think it's a pretty good start for Shaka.

Why would you go archery if you suspect there's a strategic resource in the capital's fat cross?

 

[madscientist]

Why would you go archery if you suspect there's a strategic resource in the capital's fat cross?

Agressive AI. Best early defense of a city is an archer. Also he would need archery anyway for Horse Archers which very nicely keep pace with impi.

 

[Sisiutil]

Move the scout. And soon, so that the first, limited knowledge part of the discussion about where to settle doesn't become unnecessarily long.

Are the options in the screen shot all you used, is this a game with tribal villages?

That's right, I forgot to mention that--it didn't fit in the screenshot, obviously.

Maybe you should toggle the yield display in addition to the resource info for these initial screenshots so that everyone can be sure what the terrain is.

Good idea. I'll do that from now on for the first couple of screenshots. I'll do it for the next post, after the scout moves.

This should turn out to be an interesting game, good choices.

Am I the only one who thinks that the scout/warrior should be moved before the first post ends? Getting feedback on where to settle is good, but having a discussion on where to move the scout? Unnecessary.

And if I did that, I'd get 10 pages of grumbling about how I moved the scout/warrior to the wrong tile. There's no pleasing some people.

Seriously, though, this sometimes-painful caution at the start dates back to the first ALC, when I was taken to task for posting the first few turns right off the bat and thereby missing the opportunity to settle on a plains hill (the advantages of which I was blissfully unaware). Ever since then, I've been determined to give the peanut gallery full opportunity to vent their collective spleen over the start.

Nice - let's not just debate where to move the scout, lets debate ever step of its movement

Who am I to stand in the way of an obviously-popular pastime?

I'll move the Scout and post the results tonight.

 

[Sisiutil]

I opened the WB because I know I can't shadow a game at this level and I just like to try to guess where things will go. I must share this little (non-spoiler) fact about the map. It has the longest river possible on a civ map. It empties into itself. Has anyone ever seen this before?
Infinite Rivers! Crazy!

Sounds like one of those M.C. Escher drawings.

 

[ejfree]

I opened the WB because I know I can't shadow a game at this level.
Infinite Rivers! Crazy!

You can easily shadow. Since you opened WB, save the file as SLC21 for instance, then open it as a Custom Scenario, choose that file and change the difficulty to your level.

 

[Pe Ell]

Scout 2N, settle in place unless there's something really gorgeous up there. Worker first while teching mining-BW. Next tech should probably be wheel and then AH. Depends on what we find though. AH and archery takes priority over wheel.

 

[Porphyrius]

Fairly non-standart settings it seems, hmmm...



Anyhow, we do naturally need to consider moving the scout very carefully (at least half a dozen pages ).

Previous posts suggest the fatal mistake of 2N or even N+NW.
Considering the start is mostly dominated by the riverside wheat and little else it makes perfect sense to reveal land close to it.
Thus, i suggest N+NE on the floodplains.

With luck we may even be able to reveal any hills N or NE of there.

 

[Winston Hughes]

It's a long time since I played one these maps, so I checked a few out in WB, to get an idea of what to expect here.

Some observations (spoilered for space):

Spoiler :

*Good Sauce's infinite river seems to be a common feature. Most of the maps I looked at had a single river running in a straight line across the top of the map. This then branched off and meandered its way down into the central, inter-sea region, where it met up with a long straight river across the middle of the map. A few tributaries then branched off from this into the southern regions.

I figure this is to allow trading between civs without having to wait half the game for road connections. It does mean, though, that we're likely to be dependent upon having OB with civs in the central region to maintain trade connections to those in the north.

*There's a hell of a lot of land - by my estimates, about as much as on a Large Continents map - and some starts are very isolated. If we do find ourselves stuck out on our own, then those Impis are going to spend their time killing barbs (and the GW will be a no-brainer). If, on the other hand, we start out with neighbours close by (and we kill them), then we're likely to face some incredibly massive rivals later on.

*Seafood is extremely rare (like one fish and one crab for the whole map). Other health resources are abundant, though, so shouldn't be too much of a problem.

*There is very little tundra - never more than 3 or 4 tiles deep at the poles, usually only 1 or 0. The fact this start has any at all means we're very close to the bottom of the map (close enough that the capital's fat cross will bump up against it sooner or later), so we'll almost certainly want to move the capital, perhaps even fairly early on.

*On most maps, the best land looks to be in the central region, where deserts are largely absent and rivers are abundant. There's a band of jungle here too, but it's patchy and very thin. Elsewhere, the land is pockmarked with many large patches of desert.

Just a few things to bear in mind...

Edit: I forgot to mention... Given that the land on this map isn't likely to be filled for a very long time (especially if we kill off a couple of civs early on), the space-grabbing potential of GA culture bombs shouldn't be ignored. If we drop them on cities settled (or captured from barbs) a long way from anyone's borders, a couple of these could secure a huge amount of land and a hell of a lot of resources.

 

[civ4legs]

I would be willing to bet that one of those non-forested tiles has a resource. I almost never move my settler, and in this case you have even more reason not to, since you can't see much of the terrain because your scout started so far away.

The chances of you getting a BETTER capital is less than your changes of getting a WORSE capital.