Alone on a continent

[MyOtherName]

I just fired up a Monarch game in vanilla Civ4 on the default map settings (in particular, continents), and found myself with Hatsheput.

After a little bit of exploring, it became clear I was alone on an island. The kicker was that my island was the size of half a continent!

I wasn't isolated; Isabella also had half a continent to herself, and there was only a one-tile-wide straight between our islands, and we made contact before I even had a worker. She nabbed hinduism, so we had a religon.

It turns out that our two half-continents put together was a little smaller than the other continent, and the tiles were so-so; neither great nor terrible.



It's been a while since I've played Civ4 -- I vaguely remember playing island starts by quickly expanding to all of the prime spots on my island and then trying to quickly research economic techs and then beeline to optics. But this is the first time I've had such a large island to myself! My intuition tells me that the same plan should work: expand to fill out the island and then beeline for optics. But rushing to 10 cities is a lot for a non-expansive leader, and even then I didn't have my entire island filled!

Well, the short story is that my science slider dropped to 20%, then slowly (but steadily) worked its way back up as cottages matured and cities grew. I caught up to Isabella and then started swiftly surpassing her. But the other continent found me just after I researched optics, and unsurprisingly I found myself pretty far behind. Even though I had the #2 GNP, I never managed to catch up. (And, somehow, Ghandi's GNP was significantly higher than mine)


So, my first question is whether or not this is even a sound strategy to try! The usual advice is to found only a few cities, get your economy into full swing, then found more cities; does this advice still apply to this particular situation?


My second problem is with the general tech and development strategy; I've never done especially well on island starts. My inclination is (after getting the basic development techs) to beeline to currency, literature, monarchy, and finally optics. I didn't try for any wonders, because my early production was devoted entirely to expanding ASAP and whipping economic buildings in most cities.

Is this a generally sound approach? (meaning I need to work on my execution) Or is my tech choice drastically flawed? Should I try hard to get certain wonders? Is a cottage economy the way to go, or should I try learning a specialist economy? I didn't get a great person farm early; was that a big mistake?

 

[shyuhe]

see the LHC series. Those games are all about dealing with isolated starts. Generally speaking, it's not good to REX out the entire island. Enemy civs can't settle until astronomy (except Joao) so take your time filling out the island and take care to not dent your research. I'd try to stay around the 50-60% range as a rule (post currency/col) and go for liberalism to hopefully slingshot astronomy.

 

[pawelo]

Following what shyuhe's said before, here is a gold mine of how to deal with isolated starts :

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=250960

This thread has links to all already played Lonely Hearts Club games - Vanilla, Warlords & BTS, and we are trying to synthetise some important points for an upcoming Strategy Article.

Good luck with your next starts and hopefully we can see you trying one of LHC games !

 

[r_rolo1]

Mr pawelo, we haven't done any LHC in vanilla ( yet ) .....

@MyOtherName

Your instinct wasn't necessarily wrong... one of the options when playing isolated is to build the GW ( for anti barb protection ) and then build waorkers/settlers as a mad man and fill the island..... It is a viable strat ( InvisibleStalke done it in LHC 4 Warlords ( IIRC ) and it worked well. But requires a lot of cold blood and you'll be weak militarily for a big while ( and I've saw too much of AI ploting against me since they reached me with the first caravel ( seeing my sorry excuse for a army ( I tend to keep a low military when playing in isolation ) )and to DoW only when they reach Astro... ), making it a very derailable strat . The proposed strat by shyuhe is far more safe, and in normal conditions works very well.

 

[MyOtherName]

I've mulled it over a bit, and I think I see a couple mistakes.

(1) I went mathematics / currency after getting writing.

I think heading for monarchy would have been the superior choice; extra cottages / coast tiles in every city is surely more benefit than an extra trade route in every city!

(2) I built too many libraries early.

Knowing that my science slider is going to drop, it's silly to whip libraries that will have no effect! I should have focused on maximizing my raw commerce.

(3) I didn't use specialists.

I had a couple high food cities. A couple scientist specialists, and the eventual great scientists, could have helped a lot.

(4) I habitually went for space victory.

The thought never crossed my mind to try for a diplomatic victory. I had the equivalent of a whole continent in my back pocket (I had something like +18 modifier with Isabella). Of course, I know very little about how to play for those, so it would have been yet another uphill struggle for me this game.



In my mind, I just can't see why a stop expanding -- build economy -- restart expanding strategy could work better; maybe I'm not fully grasping the benefit of the economic techs?

Monarchy -- bigger cities = more cottages, coast tiles, and specialists. This is worth several GPT per city. I definitely want this.

Currency -- an extra trade route; only about 1.5 gold per city? Markets are very expensive and only give another 1 GPT in most cities, maybe 2 in the most lucrative cities.

Code of Laws -- courthouses are very expensive, and are only worth 1 or 2 GPT in most cities.

Civil service -- Bureaucracy is nice, but it's a long way off


I realize now that Monarchy is a much bigger deal than I had realized... but as long as I'm at 10 cities or less, each new city starts turning a profit in a couple dozen turns... I'm having trouble difficulty seeing just how the other techs would make such a dramatic improvement that I should cease expanding to get them early.

 

[MyOtherName]

I started again, and went with roughly the same idea... but did it much better this time. In 1 AD I have:

9 cities
Monarchy
Literature
Mathematics
4 turns left on currency
2 turns left on great library. (waiting for chops)


The big difference was that each decision was made in terms of "how does this help me?"; e.g. estimating the medium-term worth of building a city versus building a library or growing a city. This is much better than "I gotta expand" thought I had the first time.


I decided I wanted to roll over Isabella this time, and a dozen or two war chariots weren't going to be sufficient (admittedly, it was a long time before she built a non-archer unit...) and I went for civil service then machinery, and then aimed for liberalism. This was silly; I didn't realize just how close military tradition seems from liberalism.

Oh, and I had 1 turn left on liberalism this time when someone else got it. So it was even more silly.


I felt like I plateaued around 1 AD -- I didn't really do much expanding after that point (there was still room on my halfcontinent), and if I was planning on rolling over Isabella, I needed to earmark another production city or two and start churning out the chariots much earlier.


I think I'm going to play this start a few more times, and probably with a few different strategies -- I think it's really helping me focus on the purely domestic aspect of the game; how to do early expansion, development, and research effectively.

 

[Gooblah]

Isolated starts are a bugger for sure.

I've had a few, but most were really me on a large island connected to a larger continent with a few AIs on em. But once, as Rome, I was on a tiny (real tiny, room for only 6 cities) island. Washington was on there too! I conquered him, and guess what I found? On the edge of his territory, the western end of our "island", there was a 3 by 2 tile mountain range! That's right! 2 Civs squeezed onto a TINY peninsula. The rest of the Civs were on the other side, horribly advanced (most had Cats while I had Praets, and Taoism was already founded). I settled a city there, but it flipped due to Spanish cultural pressure, and then Isabella DoW on me. I lost.

 

[bestbrian]

REX doesn't seem like a bad idea, but use the isolation to your advantage and go for the culture win. Without the need for a large military, crank out specialists and wonders and snatch every religion you can get your hands on. Trade for military techs when you make contact with other civs. Think it could work?

 

[Quechua]

In my mind, I just can't see why a stop expanding -- build economy -- restart expanding strategy could work better; maybe I'm not fully grasping the benefit of the economic techs?

Because if you first slow your research by expanding too quickly, it takes longer to get the economic techs that allow you to support a larger empire.

I think some people are missing that you aren't quite isolated, and Isabella can take your land if you're not careful. But as long as you get to the strait first, and close borders if you see a settler in a galley, you can expand at your own pace. You probably want to maintain open borders for the most part for the trade routes and so she'll spread her religion to you. I don't think it's really necessary to go all out and attack Isabella early. She's not really your threat, the civs on the other continent are.

 

[MyOtherName]

Because if you first slow your research by expanding too quickly, it takes longer to get the economic techs that allow you to support a larger empire.

Ooh, I think maybe I see.

I'd been looking at it like this if I have 6 cities, I can choose between
(1) Spending 1000 gold researching math --> currency to net +9 GPT
(2) Spending 100 hammers and 50 gold to build a city -> net +4 GPT

(50 gold is a rough estimate of the deficit I lose to the city as it grows, both +GPT numbers are rough estimates)

So if I focus on the immediate benefit, building the city seems obviously better -- delaying my seventh city for something like 40 turns is a lot worse than delaying currency for something like 10 turns.


But there's a difference I hadn't noticed -- when I'm building cities, I don't have the option of blitzing up to, say, 12 or 16 cities because that delays currency too much. But after I've gotten to a key tech (say currency or civil service), I can blitz to 16 with impunity, since the next significant economic tech is still a ways away.

In summary, what I didn't see is that I'm really looking at this tradeoff:
(1) Get large empire early, techs late, very large empire very late
(2) Get medium empire early, techs medium, very large empire late

I don't think it's really necessary to go all out and attack Isabella early. She's not really your threat, the civs on the other continent are.

Oh she's certainly not a threat. I've never had a civ admire me so! And she doesn't build much of a military at all this game. Most of the times I've played the beginning, she never even thinks of settling my island until very late (though she did quite early in one of the playthroughs, which is why I didn't restart expansion in my last attempt)

I was thinking more along the lines of "If one half-continent is good, then surely two half-continents are better!" and she's already done me the favor of settling and improving the land... at the very least, I can take Madrid for the hinduism holy city and so that its cultural border isn't preventing me from settling the last 2 city sites on my half continent.

I also don't warmonger much; is a war with Isabella entirely infeasible? Is any sort of military victory condition infeasible with such a start?

 

[martin026]

Is Hatty spiritual in vanilla? If so, courthouses are good with COL, but you can switch to Caste and run extra scientists while you rex to help keep the beakers flowing in. It also helps to run an artist in the new city to pop the borders faster than waiting for the monument.

Even if you run scientists at the expense of growth, it will usually help to expand past the normal early game limit of 4 or so cities. Your slider will drop, but it won't matter as much.

 

[MyOtherName]

Yes, Hatsheput is spiritual / creative in vanilla Civ4.

Last time I had a wealth of land to myself (not isolated, but I could block off a fairly large peninsula) I was Julias Caesar. That made things so much easier. *sigh*

 

[jray]

Because if you first slow your research by expanding too quickly, it takes longer to get the economic techs that allow you to support a larger empire.

I think some people are missing that you aren't quite isolated, and Isabella can take your land if you're not careful. But as long as you get to the strait first, and close borders if you see a settler in a galley, you can expand at your own pace. You probably want to maintain open borders for the most part for the trade routes and so she'll spread her religion to you. I don't think it's really necessary to go all out and attack Isabella early. She's not really your threat, the civs on the other continent are.

I agree. But keep in mind that in BTS you can no longer see the contents of boats, so you should close your borders simply if you see a Galley. Also, open borders doesn't affect trade routes (except maybe it makes them slightly more valuable... maybe someone else can confirm or deny). Unless Izzy founds another religion soon, all of your cities will probably get her Buddhism anyway. Open borders slightly increases the probability of natural religion spread but isn't required.

And yeah, it would be really silly to defeat Izzy early. She'll be a valuable trading partner. Beef up your espionage a bit so you can always see what she's researching, and continue parallel research paths. It's like doubling your research!

 

[MyOtherName]

I agree. But keep in mind that in BTS you can no longer see the contents of boats, so you should close your borders simply if you see a Galley.

But keep in mind the original poster is talking about a vanilla game.

It turns out that the geography makes this irrelevant; the southern end of my halfcontinent is covered in jungle, so there's no way I can reasonably settle it to block her out of the whole continent.

Also, open borders doesn't affect trade routes (except maybe it makes them slightly more valuable... maybe someone else can confirm or deny).

In vanilla, at least, you have to have open borders to get foreign trade routes.

Unless Izzy founds another religion soon, all of your cities will probably get her Buddhism anyway. Open borders slightly increases the probability of natural religion spread but isn't required.

The various times I've played this start so far, Isabella always founds hinduism and that spreads to me. (with varying degrees of rapidity) She occasionally founds another religion and that occasionally spreads to me too.

And yeah, it would be really silly to defeat Izzy early. She'll be a valuable trading partner.

Except she doesn't trade with me for a very long time. (I gather that's because I'm the only civ she knows)