Another "Play along" game.

[PeteJ]

It seems like everyone and their mother is doing one of these threads. And since I want to fit in and be cool, I am doing one as well.... Here are the settings:

Difficulty: Monarch
Civ: Random
Map Type: Continents
Map Size: Standard
Climate: Temperate
Starting Era: Ancient
Game Speed: Epic

Here is the civ they gave me:

And the Map:

 

[PeteJ]

Pretty good start... If I settle in place I get 7 floodplains, corn, 3 hills(2 grassland, 1 plains), and a couple of calendar resources. The only problem with settling in place is it leaves a clams resource and a floodplains tile practically unworkable in the future. Any ideas on where I should move my scout and where I should settle? We will figure that out before I decide on a plan for my game.

PS. Sorry about the large screenshots... I will fix that in future posts.

Edit: Forgot the save. Had to zip it because CivFanatics doesn't know what a .CivWarlordsSave file is yet(They should really fix that).

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads12/PeteJ_BC-4000.zip

 

[PeteJ]

ok nevermind then

 

[carl corey]

PeteJ, it's not necessarily about doing a "play along" game. People are trying to do something more than just "play" in those.

Sisiutil's ALCs try to deal most effectively with different leaders, a thing many of us might not be used to. ("He's creative? Meh, one more useless trait...")

aelf tried to show us what happens in a higher difficulty game, and as it turns out he ran into very rough conditions but managed to pull a beautiful win. His next game will try to go "full religious" in Warlords, as many people will use religion as part of their game, but few make it a priority.

Pete2006 saw aelf being in trouble on Emperor and decide he's going to show us his way of winnig. Now he's going for a no-world-wonders approach.

Some others have done this to learn how to deal with a difficulty from users that play at higher levels, and people are only too glad to help.

So try: a) to come up with something different, interesting for your game, or b) to play it at a difficulty level you're not used to.

And don't lose heart because of this. Sometimes threads get ignored, sometimes they don't. That's net-life.

 

[shivute]

PeteJ, it's not necessarily about doing a "play along" game. People are trying to do something more than just "play" in those.

Sisiutil's ALCs try to deal most effectively with different leaders, a thing many of us might not be used to. ("He's creative? Meh, one more useless trait...")

aelf tried to show us what happens in a higher difficulty game, and as it turns out he ran into very rough conditions but managed to pull a beautiful win. His next game will try to go "full religious" in Warlords, as many people will use religion as part of their game, but few make it a priority.

Pete2006 saw aelf being in trouble on Emperor and decide he's going to show us his way of winnig. Now he's going for a no-world-wonders approach.

Some others have done this to learn how to deal with a difficulty from users that play at higher levels, and people are only too glad to help.

So try: a) to come up with something different, interesting for your game, or b) to play it at a difficulty level you're not used to.

And don't lose heart because of this. Sometimes threads get ignored, sometimes they don't. That's net-life.

Agreed. If you are used to playing monarch level, then with this start almost guarantees a win. Means it isn't very interesting.
However to start you off, I would be loath to abandon the clam.
I would check by selecting the settler where the blue circle spots are. I would then probably move the scout NW and then NE to see what the terrain is like and would then make a judgement. With me that judgement would be either to move the settler NW and settle on the coast, move SW and settle on the square S of the scout, move NE and then S (losing a tree and settling on grassland compared to plain) or settle in place and have a single superb city rather than 2 very good ones.

 

[Killroyan]

I would scout with NW to see what there is. If the settler with moving 1 NW would get on a coastal tile and still have all the resources and floodplains then you can use the clams and several floodplain tiles for your second city. Some overlap is not even harmfull as Sisiutil already has proven in ALC7. It would be interesting if you could make a full dotmap empire. So not looking for the best places but just use every square inch to get cities going. Give it some flavour and try to emphasize on something like concnetrating on the berserker unit and the unique building. Islands would have been great with amphibious macemen. Show us how they work.

 

[voek]

I concur. Move your scout NW, we need to know if the settler should move to the coast to grab the clam or other resources or if it should settle.

I would also consider moving your settler to explore. (grab the hut for example to see NE) But first we need the information about the NW.

I am still a Vanilla player, so my advice might be useless later on. I like to follow these games to get a taste of Warlords.

Edit: hmm also an option might be to move your scout two tiles SE and settler 1 NW... anyone?

 

[shivute]

Bit of a gamble on potential lost turns if there is nothing to the NW by moving the settler, but it would give a better view of what is available.

A better option would be to move the scout 2 squares S to the hill to get a good view. if there is gold on the desert hill S of the visible one and more flood plains to the S, settling on the coast one square S of the scout would be a powerful position. It is more likely that the better coast position will be to the NW, however unless settling on a floodplain won't get the clam and a good 1st build of a workboat.

 

[Pete2006]

What's your culture plan?

 

[PeteJ]

PeteJ, it's not necessarily about doing a "play along" game. People are trying to do something more than just "play" in those.

Sisiutil's ALCs try to deal most effectively with different leaders, a thing many of us might not be used to. ("He's creative? Meh, one more useless trait...")

aelf tried to show us what happens in a higher difficulty game, and as it turns out he ran into very rough conditions but managed to pull a beautiful win. His next game will try to go "full religious" in Warlords, as many people will use religion as part of their game, but few make it a priority.

Pete2006 saw aelf being in trouble on Emperor and decide he's going to show us his way of winnig. Now he's going for a no-world-wonders approach.

Some others have done this to learn how to deal with a difficulty from users that play at higher levels, and people are only too glad to help.

So try: a) to come up with something different, interesting for your game, or b) to play it at a difficulty level you're not used to.

And don't lose heart because of this. Sometimes threads get ignored, sometimes they don't. That's net-life.

I see your point, maybe I should've started and Immortal game or something. Of course that might've also been suicide.

As for the plan, I was waiting on feedback before deciding on a plan.... The civ was random and Ragnar certainly wouldv'e been better on a naval map. Ragnar is Aggresive so I obviously want to crack some skulls in this game. Hopefully we have some enemies close by to do that.

No matter where I settle the capital, it will be focused on commerce because of the floodplains. So I'm thinking perhaps we can squeeze out a CS slingshot, followed by a beeline to Machinery and take over the continent with my berserkers. As for culture, I don't think I wanna waste my time with stonehenge unless I find stone nearby... in that case I will hook it up with with my second city and build it there. Otherwise I will have to rely on a quick confucianism and hopefully it will spread fast( it usually does).

I went ahead and moved the scout NW then NE.... Then I decided to settle on the coast after all since I already have fishing and so I wouldn't need a worker right away. The problem with this spot is the lack of production. I will have to rely on forest/plains for production until I get slavery. This also means I won't be able to build the oracle here I'll have to build it elsewhere. Here is a pic of the capital:

As far as reasearch, I am thinking Wheel=>Pottery=>Mining=>BW
Then perhaps Agriculture=>Myst=>Poly=>Priesthood=>Writing=>COL

And for the first build, I'm torn between Workboat=>Warrior or Warrior=>Workboat. I might want a warrior to steal a worker from someone but that also might not be possible. Any thoughts or suggestions?

Edit: Sorry I still need to work on resizing the images.

Edit2: By the way, I usually work 6 days a week, so I will try to get this game done in a timely fashion. Also I am starting school on August 28, so if this game is not done by then, you can expect progress to slow down a lot. But for the moment, my time is devoted to work and Civ(not necessarily in that order).

 

[PeteJ]

Due to my impatience and my eagerness to move on, I decided to play until 2470BC. I followed my instincts and started research with The Wheel followed by Pottery. I set the build to a Workboat and worked the grassland/forest/spices tile. I was planning on working the plains/forest/spices tile as soon as the border popped but I may have missed a turn or 2.

I sent my scout to the hut that was visible(on top of the corn) and it gave me another hut. So I sent one of the scouts east and the other one south. With these 2 scouts I managed to pop no less than 7 more huts. I feel like this should be cheating, but I don't really feel too bad about it. Out of those huts I received 3 maps, 24 gold, and 3 techs.... First Archery, then Sailing, then Mysticism. I also explored a very large part of the map, and no one is really anywhere near me. HC is pretty far south and I haven't met anyone else yet. Perhaps we are alone on this rock. That means I will need caravels ASAP to meet some other civs for trades. This also means that my Aggressive trait is practically wasted for the first part of the game.

After the workboat was out I put a few hammers into an Archer(Until I grew to size 2) and then pumped out a worker. After the worker, I finished the archer while growing to size 3 and used my worker to start cottaging those floodplains. On the same turn I finished the Archer, I finished BW and immediately switched to Slavery(To rush the settler). I will need another city ASAP because my capital won't be able to finish the Oracle in time for CS(Unless I beeline for it and start it right away while researching the other techs). Once I finished BW I set research for Agriculture(My second city will probably be using that corn for food). And I figure since I popped Mysticism out of one of the huts I have a little more leeway. I haven't put any money into Agriculture yet so I can still change it if you guys think I should.

Here are a couple of screenshots(I think I got the size down this time) Edit: So close

So right now the questions are:

• Where should I put the 2nd city? The obvious best spot is 5 East of the capital where it will pick up the corn, rice, cows, loads of grass, a decent amount of forest and 2 hills. But all of the food resources will need a border pop. Maybe I should put it somewhere next to the corn or next to the rice.... By the way, my Capital is at 100 culture so 25 more turns until the border pops again gaining the Corn.
• Once I set up my second city, what should I build? Should I rush a monument or a granary? Should I build another Worker?
• What Should I reasearch next? Should I research Writing first to set up a Library in the Capital and speed up reasearch? Or Poly/Meditation then Priesthood? Or should I stick with Agriculture then decide from there?

I apologize for not waiting for feedback before playing more. In the future I will certainly wait longer but I definitely wanted to get this game going.

 

[PeteJ]

It seems that I forgot to post the save....

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads12/PeteJ_BC-2470.zip

And it is worth mentioning that copper is nowhere near the capital. I guess it is a good thing that I popped Archery out of a hut.

 

[aelf]

Due to my impatience and my eagerness to move on, I decided to play until 2470BC.

You need to be patient for this kind of threads. If you aren't, people will not be able to help much and might lose interest trying to keep up with your pace. And quite a lot of commitment is needed. For a few weeks, I found myself spending all my Civ time just playing the Emperor Challenge and/or posting updates and replies on the thread. Also, given the other demands of life, I sometimes had to deliberately make time in my schedule to post replies or updates to keep the thread alive and going.

It ain't easy, friend

 

[PeteJ]

You need to be patient for this kind of threads. If you aren't, people will not be able to help much and might lose interest trying to keep up with your pace. And quite a lot of commitment is needed. For a few weeks, I found myself spending all my Civ time just playing the Emperor Challenge and/or posting updates and replies on the thread. Also, given the other demands of life, I sometimes had to deliberately make time in my schedule to post replies or updates to keep the thread alive and going.

It ain't easy, friend

Hence my apology at the end... I do plan on giving it more time in the future, but for this game the beginning seemed pretty clear cut to me. I am looking forward to other people's feedback on my game.

 

[yavoon]

hi .

 

[PeteJ]

To The First Page!!!!!!!

 

[PeteJ]

After careful consideration, I decided the best choice would be to research up to Priesthood first so that my next city would be able to start the Oracle right away.

After the worker finished cottaging the floodplains, I had him chop the grassland/forest/spice square. And once I was able to whip, I did. I decided to put the second city here:

This way, I could have the second city working one of the cottaged floodplain squares right away and I wouldn't need agriculture right away. After the settler was done, I pumped out an archer to deal with the barbarians. Then I whipped a granary and another couple of archers. My second city had 2 turns to kill before priesthood so I wasted a couple of hammers on a warrior, then started the Oracle. If I had done Meditation instead of Polytheism, I could've started it right away. This turned out to be a huge mistake as you will soon find out.

After Priesthood, I researched Writing. I decided that I would squeeze in Agriculture after Writing....another huge mistake. I figured I would farm the corn after my first chop. I ended up not farming the corn because at this point I realized that I didn't have much time and I needed to chop more forests right away. It was starting to get really close, but I thought I still had a chance so I kept going. Here is a shot from 1000BC:

Agonizing defeat.... Now what? I don't have any means of getting a Great Priest any time soon. If I had researched Meditation and skipped Agriculture, I probably would have had it. Also if I hadn't whipped in the Capital so much, I would've been working the commerce tiles for longer and I probably would've had a better chance. I guess it is time to shift gears. More specifically, I need to grab some of this land ASAP.

I met 2 other neighbors during this round... Ramses and Kublai Khan. I have open borders with everybody and I already have a trade route with Khan because of that giant river. So it looks like there will be more competition for land. It also means that Alphabet is now a very high priority. I will do another post in a minute with possible city locations....

 

[PeteJ]

Ok so here's what I came up with so far..... Here's the top half:

The black X's are the cities I already have, and the red are the cities that I want. The one on the right is a barbian city that I can capture rather than settle. It is in a good spot for a production site. Coppertown would also be a production city.

Here is the bottom half:

The Blue X's are the cities from the first screenshot, and the Red are cities that I want. The Southwest city could be put 1 square S or 1 SW to grab some cows that you can barely see at the bottom of the screenshot. This city would be tough to irrigate since there is a huge "hill wall".

Anyway, thats my plan for now. City placement is one of my weaknesses and this is the first dotmap I have ever planned out. Please give me some feedback, because I have never been any good at taking advantage of the land around me.(And my artwork sucks too)

 

[Jet]

Good dotmap. I can't tell exactly where you've discovered seafood/no seafood, and am especially wondering about the coast near rice/banana; as Ragnar you probably want to favor coastal cities. In the context of dotmapping I think a global view with resources would be helpful. The show detailed city info option might also be helpful in general.

I think right now I'd hurry to settle 1N of your cow red dot. It doesn't yield quite as good an overall dotmap as yours, but it's not bad, and expands towards your neighbors, and gives you axemen ASAP, and it's right on the river, which is nice. You must be on a pretty big continent, if you have 3 neighbors and have explored that far without seeing their borders. But I'd try to get at least that one city built in their direction.

Meanwhile (or after the settler) I'd build a barracks in City #2. Looks like a good production city.

Research AH next, I guess? And if someone beats you to Confucianism, maybe do that first before finishing CoL? At least with the wealth from the Oracle you can stay at 100% research for a while.

 

[Wodan]

Methinks no matter how you look at it, "one city in" along that river would have been a good spot to spot you capitol. Fair warning: I'm not one of the "settle where you start" camp.

Anyway, in this particular game, it would help you to move, settle, then settle along the south to establish your empire borders. You can then fill in to the north at your leisure.

Wodan