Asking for your advice – Shadow game on Emperor

[lymond]

Trying to understand the logic of whipping the worker. That was not good. The 24H OF helps speed up the worker. No need to whip it. And I'm hoping you did not whip on the 1st turn of the build, even though you should not have regardless. Depending on growth, I might put 1turn into worker to take the OF, and then grow a pop before finishing.

Mine was unnecessary - wasted worker turns (and it could be cottaged instead). Should be chopping around Gondar. Either Granary or settler. You can grow on Granary and put chops into settler. Get those 3 spots settled asap. And horse city can be settled soon as well on tundra hill. Another helper city. Two FPs for Aksum it can help work, with its own two FPs to farm for food, or you could just cottage them too.

You are still fine, but you could replay the set. Keep in mind that you can always stop and report at any point you question something.

Unfortunately, you may have to tech archery. Although you could go ahead and settle the horses next. It would not be my preference in city order, but you will need an advance unit sooner than later.

 

[Fish Man]

I would actually suggest a city on the long tundra tile NE of the wheat, then another for the fish. Two reasons:

Fish + wheat is way too much food for a single city. Especially without mids or an early luxury you're gonna be stuck at a whopping +8 food surplus or more with just 4 citizens max. Better to share and get, at the very least, 2 libraries running 4 scientists instead of 1 running 2.

Also, settling closer to the river allows working a decent amount more cottages. If you settle on the PH you'll be potentially killing 3 riverside cottage tiles, 2 of them juicy FPs. I mean, you could found a city later to claim them, but that'd be a crappy city without much food. And...

Spoiler :

I played a bit ahead, there's 2 fish north and west of the horse. You really don't wanna kill those.

Also I overran my continent with just knights. Mansa peacevassaled to me - it's not that hard to do once you know how: you just gotta be a landtarget (so your borders touch 8 of his land tiles and you have at least 3 cities on the continent his capital is on), be at least 1.5x as strong, be cautious or better, and not be too strong (I think once you have over ~20% below dom limit he stops giving that option, to prevent from just handing you a dom win).

 

[NightOnEarth]

I am again very grateful for your advices and for taking the time to help me improving my gameplay. According to the motto "learning by doing" I followed lymond's advice and replayed from turn 32 to turn 51, trying to improve. Let's see if it worked.
Lymond taught me something I haven't practised before. I think it is called queuing. I only noticed by now that after a forest has been chopped or whipped, you could alter the build order in the city. Something like building a warrior (and growing the city population during this build), but the chop is received by a settler by putting him to the top of the queue. This is really something that I have to apply regularly, I believe.

I'd like to comment to a couple of your remarks to my previous message just to explain my thinking.

Your scout location leaves a hole for barbarians to spawn in the north, which would be very inconvenient. Was there a reason you moved him off the hill?

An barb archer appeared next to the horses. I think my scout had no chance against him, even fortified on a hill with guerilla1. So my scout retreated to lure the archer next to the forested hill 1N of the wheat, where my warrior was heading. Probably I could have avoided this situation by better/earlier fogbusting.

Mine was unnecessary - wasted worker turns (and it could be cottaged instead)

I now understand that chopping is more effective. I built the mine to have a 4F/H tile +1 commerce for Gondar. At that moment pottery was not yet available.

So where I am this time at turn 51?
- Pottery researched, Writing is next (9-10 turns)
- Aksum just 4>2 whipped a settler, 36H overflow already available for a granary, which will improve the health and will therefore allow to chop the last two forests.
- Gondar size 2 next turn and rapidly growing on a warrior. Next in the queue is a settler (47H).
- The surrounding of the horse is fogbusted in time. 2 Fishes were uncovered. Thank you, lymond and Undefeatable, for pointing me in this direction.
- Three workers will now build cottages around Aksum. First the ones that could also be worked by Gondar.
- Trade route established between my two cities.

Spoiler Turn 51 :

My current empire



The South

For me, the most important decision at the moment is the sequence of settlements and the spots where to settle. I find coanda's thorough analysis very helpful. I believe that my warrior's discovery in the north may alter the decisions.

Spoiler The North-horses :

I have encircled three spots, where I would settle with respect to the new circumstances. I also could imagine to shift the red circle 1E to have access to the horses from this city, too. IMHO the sequence should be
1. horse city (yellow circle or red, if shifted 1E)
2. pig city south of Aksum
3. expanion to the east? Coanda suggested that spot between wine and gold, that looks very tempting itself and could serve as a bridge for further expansion to the east or south-east.
Alternatively the red/yellow circled spot, whichever wasn't build
Blue circle city has low priority, I think.

Technology:
There is a second thing I have learnt from your recent messages: the importance of trade routes between the cities even in the early stages. This is great advice for me, coanda! My current goal is writing-alphabet-currency (maybe archery in between, if necessary)

Military:
I understand and agree to coanda's analysis. I am protected from nearly three sides, only the east and the south-east is open, but the other civs seem to be far away. Therefore currently the only threat are the barbs. This makes horses/chariots a high priority, IMHO. OTOH my fogbusting seems to be efficient. With the worker in progress from Gondar I can probably shield my entire empire.

I hope my evaluation is valid. Let's see how the game will progress.

 

[lymond]

I don't fully agree with U's thoughts on fish city. I don't really think a city can have too much food really. That growth is utilized for production and later specialists...early on happiness issues can be tempered by building settlers or workers. With that said, in certain cases you may lack in overall food in your starting area, with food being the key factor generally in settling cities. So you might indeed try to split up food specials as best you can in that case. This in not that case and I see no reason not to settle fish city on the plains hill. , I don't like the coastal wheat spot at all. There are two FPs that are unused between fish city and Aksum, and a city could be placed just E of those FPs eventually.

(Note: I played a bit of this start up to settled about 8 or 9 cities and did not really have issues with barbs at all...just using judicious spawnbusting...a little surprising once the map is revealed more)

So, in my game, I stuck to the pattern of settling the nearby cities - in order wheat/pigs, fish/wheat, southern pig, and then horse/ fish...later oasis/gold.

One issue with horse/fish is distance - lot of work just for horses. Technically, as mentioned above, you could just settle 2S1E of the horses now, and then back settle the fishes later. That city just needs one road to be connected and can help grow cottages - as well as having 2 FPs of its own for food. (I would have done that in my game if I was thinking straight)

And I should broach a topic that I think you may have some familiarity with but I should make clear. A major factor in this game that impacts economy is city distance maintenance. Settling in closer proximity to the cap keeps city maintenance lower. All these cities mentioned, are within 3 tiles of cap and overlap it. There's a few benefits in that but one of the main ones is reducing costs - others being tiles sharing, cottage growing and actually worker management. Ofc, sometimes you just need to grab a certain resource early that is farther away, but ideally you settle in such a patter if the land permits. And this is almost an ideal setup you have here with very good cities in such close proximity to the cap. It does not always work out this well.

A couple of other things to think about. Should all workers be working cottages now? yes, it is good to get a cottage growing or two so that either Aksum can work one or the nearby cities. But you still need to think about chopping or other needs that workers do that may be important in setting up the empire. Like you have a settler about to pop which I assume is for fish city. If you had a road in place to the plains hill the trade route is instant upon settling (note: if settling on that turn and just completing road on adjacent tile ..finish the road first otherwise the trade route is not instant on the same turn)

Also, while it is good to see the 3 workers, I would be more inclined to have the 2nd settler before the 3rd worker. You 4>2 whip of settler could be factoring into a new worker, or the 3rd worker you chopped somewhere should have been a settler instead. I just don't know the order of things in your game. But 2 worker is fine for two cities if you are managing them appropriately, so after the 2nd worker, the next settler would be my priority, not the 3rd worker..and so forth.

Lastly, I don't like the placement of the warrior way down in the SW. The warrior to the E on that forest PH is in a good position. But all that warrior way S is doing is busting coast mainly when there is a gap of land to the N that is a barb factory. 1NE of that spot would be better. Same with that Warrior way up N in the ice. He is busting a lot of coast. Barb galleys are not your concern for quite some time. If that warrior was on the Tundra hill S of the Peak he'd be busting all land tiles to the W near horses..and two more land tiles to the E.

With Gondar expansion of borders it is time to move that scout a bit E. Right now, technically the scout is only busting 1 tiles, although being on that hill gives a good view, but at least 1 tile over would do much more. Keep track of your busters compared to your expansion and coordinate accordingly. This is how barb issues are reduced or sometimes eliminated.

 

[coanda]

Horse-double-fish city is a really nice city... eventually. I have a couple small concerns about settling it immediately. Lymond already mentioned distance, which is one. Another is that you'd need to research Fishing to make it decent, and it has no good way of hurrying out the first work boat - no forest to chop, no land food resource to grow and whip. When you settle it you'll need to build a work boat (~10 turns), build a second work boat (~5 turns, probably use a whip in there), a library (~10 turns, plus a 2-pop whip), then grow a bit in size to work a pair of scientists. It's really not contributing anything until a good 25 turns after you settle it. After that point, yes, it becomes a very good city. But maybe that's something you'd prefer for a 4th or 5th city, instead of a 3rd city. In its favor you can get horses quickly from it, but you also could settle a city somewhere south of the horses, grab them just a couple turns more slowly thanks to Creative border expansion, and have that city be a positive factor earlier. Or if you were feeling comfortable with the barbs you could take the horse/fish spot with a fourth or fifth city, when you weren't as worried about slowing your initial expansion boom.

The spot you considered earlier (and I was favorable to at the time), 3N1W of the capital, is still an option. I hadn't actually even thought about Lymond's alternative suggestion (3N1E of the capital). But that's another good location. 3N1W is the short-term greedy option. That'll let you start working that wheat a little earlier than another settling pattern would, and the city will be a good fast contributor. For a third city, I'd be strongly tempted by that. On the flip side, it pushes the western plains-hill city site off the plains-hill, kills a floodplains tile, doesn't add a forest to chop, and doesn't have as many floodplains and hills tiles to grow onto eventually as 3N1E. Pros and cons.

Regarding the wine/gold spot to the southeast. Don't be afraid to skip straight past that site and settle further out around the floodplains if that seems feasible (will depend on the terrain around there and how the barbarian + AI situation is going). Oasis + desert-gold isn't exactly a powerhouse combination. It'll feed itself and give you gold (and that +1 happiness could become a nice boost soon), but it doesn't really contribute much beyond that at least until Monarchy. You certainly would prefer to take that land, and those resources, yourself rather than need to go to war with an AI over them. But as long as barbarians are under control and you can afford the distance maintenance (which Gold resource will allow), you don't necessarily need to have your borders connected with every new city.

 

[Fippy]

I think gold city is somewhat underrated in previous comments
For learning purposes let's assume there would be no floodplains area below, and where to settle would depend on your ambition (if included).
So with just gold and Oasis, 1N of Oasis seems okay.

Why underrated, well this city needs only 1 worker (2 roads from sw of Gondar), and then gold with ~8t time cos it's growing on Oasis first.
When all set, it's very powerful for your economy. Not only gold commerce, but every other city now has +1 happy cap.
Not that important, but with CRE it's also taking away some fogbust needs in that area.

Maybe i would settle south pigs with your finished settler next, best single tile and 2 floodplains can also easily be spared by other cities.
Workers also close for quick setting up.
Afterwards gold, then those other nice food & floodplain spots.

 

[lymond]

Yep, I kinda mentioned the gold spot casually in discussing my playthrough, as I was so focused on driving home the logic of settling a compact empire that I did not pay attention to it early. However, the gold spot is indeed strong, and sooner rather than later. Anytime one sees gold in a reasonable distance from the cap it should be an early priority, primarily for that early commerce boost. Ofc, the extra happy is welcome too.

For me, it was not so much underrating the gold, as me being myopic in my advice.

 

[NightOnEarth]

Again, what great analyses from you. I enjoy reading your comments (and learning from them) even more then playing the current game (a bit ). Of course, my current gameplay still leaves much to be desired, but my perspective/strategy has got more depth. And I have to tell you, that my son was really amazed, when I told him that several of you experienced players pick up my savegames and take their time to play through them yourselves.

This time I played from t51 to t67. Progress and events briefly:
- two new cities founded (pig city south of Aksum t53, Gold/Wine/Oasis city t62)
- four workers; two of them improving gold city (Addis Abeba), two preparing next settlements and improving core empire
- fogbusting adjusted (thank you for drawing my attention to this, lymond. I should know it myself, but I had botched this up because I was too focussed on city build and workers)
- scout discovered the Khmer way south
- Writing reasearched, open borders with Suryavarman II and Süleyman I. Alphabet being next.
- Süleyman has chariots and two cities, Suryavarman II has axes and three cities. Research of Surya is visible for me since turn 48 (masonry, sailing, iron working - as predicted by coanda)

I stopped here for a couple of reasons. First I had to understand how cheap libraries combine with whipping/chopping. Second, I stumbled upon my cities happiness cap and misplayed growth/build on a couple of occasions. I think I will replay the sequence and try to improve on this. Beside this I have some general questions.

Spoiler My game at t67 :

My empire
the north
the south

How to overcome the happiness cap/unhappy citizen problem:
I noticed that at city size three I get a -1 because my pop demands protection. Thus at size four I get one unhappy citizen. I only see three possibilities to tackle this problem until my gold is connected (7t?)
1) Build a warrior that stays in the city. But there are already too many weak warriors around, and this would be only a solution until size 5.
2) Low food mode. This is hard, because I need these cottages to grow. Currently one worker is going to build a mine for this possibility.
3) Being ready two whip a build as soon as size four is reached. Best would be a two pop whip. Libraries come to my mind with a low production mode before.

Diplo/spying: How to approach this?
I lack experience here. I got an open border agreement with both rivals. I hope to improve my relations to them by this. When alphabet is available the tech I want to trade in the most is fishing. Is this reasonable? How important is the myticism branch? What to trade and what not?
None of us three has founded a religion (buddhism, hinduism, judaism), so this is not a diplo issue. Is there a strategy for my diplo affairs?
I am really astonished that no WW has been built up to now. Oracle seems still to be possible.
As already stated, Surya has axes (copper) and Süley has chariots (horses). But both are far away and trading routes to them are out of question at least until sailing.
I include the demographic screen. But how to read it? I'm leading in food (potential to grow) and land (#cities), but mediocre in commerce (cottages need to grow and gold not yet connected) and population (how is this possible?), and finally trailing in military (efficient fogbusting, no military needed at the moment, fits to my former gameplay ) and production/hammer (I produce mainly by whipping, then chopping). Currently there are no foreign trade routes at all. Interesting!

Spoiler Demographic screen at t67 :

City placement
The previous (great) discussion mainly circled around this topic. I was amazed how many details should be considered and I am happy that there is no single truth (boring) but pros and cons for a decision. In fact it took me a long time (and a lot of re-reading your messages) before I made my decision. Fish city third was your common suggestion. Because my fogbusting situation was good after adjustments I went for the gold city next as proposed by Fippy. I wanted to grab more land towards the east, and new settlers are already in the queue. But the spot of gold-city gave me a headache. Coanda proposed 1W of the oasis with access to a farmable grass tile next to the oasis and 2 gold, Fippy preferred to settle 1N of the oasis - nearer to my empire and access to 1 gold. I decided to follow coanda's proposal because of more forest to chop and because of another grassland tile 2W of Addis Abeba (and because I'm greedy here).
Currently my research rate is 70% and further expansion will decrease it considerably. So next should be horse city at the spot lymond suggested and coanda concurred. Coanda's reasoning convinced me not to opt for double-fish city. Number six is intended to be fish/wheat city on the PH west of Aksum (if fishing is available).

Granaries
If I understand correcty, I could 4>2 whip a library in Aksum after putting a few hammers into it and recover pop fast afterwards. But it should be not too fast because of the 10t -1 , no? I believe it's time for my first two scientists.
So, are granaries high priority, or libraries? What do you think?

 

[Fippy]

Happy problems are sorted via Pyras (too expensive without stone or IND usually),
Monarchy + warriors or resi trades with AIs.

1 warrior sitting in most cities is good
They are cheap, and an extra tile or scientist can be worked.
Ofc very slow growing cities will need none for now, and in some cases never.

In your game, Monarchy seems like the obvious pick.
You might know already, but AIs always trade Mona (coded this way, they always trade Alpha and a couple other techs as well, no matter how many other AIs know them).
Not sure how it works on Emp usually, on Deity where i play you would never tech Mona yourself cos AIs like doing so (for you), and something else as trade chip works better.
Others will know better if you should self-tech Mona here.

Granaries are considered the #1 most important building,
but they are not auto
Before getting a better happy cap, creative libraries can surely be better builds.
No use in getting granaries (at all cost, slow building okay) if you have nothing to whip and re-grow for,
while libraries will let you run scientists for gp points, and help reaching Mona quicker.
Food weak cities will probably still want a granary first, especially for later..but are there food weak cities besides gold here?

You mentioned 70% research rate, it's best to not look much at that slider.
Collecting gold at 0% until you have some libraries will give you a 25% research bonus.
Meanwhile it's pretty unimportant if you are at 30, 60 or 80%.
Collecting gold until libraries is very common, sometimes you want an important tech before and checking when you can start on that can pay off
(not unusual that we see peoples who collect 300g or so while they only need 150 ~~), but overall i would encourage getting used to 0% or 100% for most of the game.

 

[lymond]

I don't think where you settled gold is much of an issue either way. Net effect is pretty much the same. (I had settled one N of oasis myself probably just thinking about the wines which really are not that much to think about, but in a food poor city it is something..conversely, you spared a green farm-able tile). There is logic in having more forest to chop. The big question here is why are you not chopping gold city? Library? Granary? This city's main focus right now is growing from oasis to completed gold tile for the commerce boost, which it will work continuously and indefinitely. The grass farm is low priority over chopping a cheap library (to boost that commerce) here and the granary. In the short term, farming that tile is wasted worker turns...city ain't gonna work it for quite a long time.

Diplo/Spying - For spying, I'd keep it simple at this point. Focus EP on EP screen toward one target AI by changing weight to 1. Generally that target, for me, is a good teching AI. You do this to see what they are teching which helps facilitate trades later among other things like judging tech pace. I think you have done this with Sury, he's decent. Most FIN leaders are good targets (Rags probably being an exception), and IMP leaders are always strong (Justy, Joao, Cathy), but if Mansa is on the map he is always a given. Not only is he generally the best techer in the game, but he is the friendliest of traders. You want to know what he is doing...his tech decisions can majorly impact yours. Mansa on a map where most AIs are going to meet each other reasonably early means ...generally..that a game going to have faster overall tech place. Mansa is the only AI that trades indiscriminately - with AI or human.

As for Diplo, it can get complex, but there are some rather simple things to keep in mind. Open Borders is a given. It will build up to +2 relations over time. But note Worst Enemies as you might have to navigate around this. Some AIs are notoriously disliked, but even more complex is Peaceweights. AIs have different Peace Weights. Think of the Montys, Rags, Nappys, Shakas, and then think of the Gandhi's, Mansa's, Darius's. These groups always dislike the others. Warmongers vs. peaceniks. So sometimes you have to choose a side as best suits your game, or simply to keep those that are neighbors happy. And depending on the mix, one type of group may far outweigh the other. An, ofc, religion can be a major factor especially among those leaders more zealous in nature. Very hard to get on Izzy's good side unless you share her religion..and well, whether you choose to get on her good side depends entirely on your goals, or what benefits you most. It's a decision you sometimes have to make. So to point, I generally open borders with everyone unless doing so with a particular AI would be more problematic, or even dangerous. It may not be worth it to maintain that relationship while other AI are requesting or demanding you cease it. On the other hand, oftentimes I just don't care as I feel confident in my position and rather would have the foreign trade routes, resource/gold trades and tech trades. (Keep track of WEs as well, as they can change) I'd also note that some leaders have basically neutral peaceweights like Justy, Zara and Joao....interestingly those 3 are pretty effective AIs too. Wang, DeGaulle, and Brennus some to have a lot of diplo issues (with most AIs), and then there is..um..Toku.

edit: Major point that I'm not sure I made clear above, is that you should start to really get to know the leaders in the game. You have some experience with the game and the leaders. You know Shaka wants to kill you, and Gandhi wants to be your friend. But I mean really get to know them. They are all coded differently. Things like Gandhi will never plot at Pleased. Mansa is a huge peacnik and does not like to fight wars, but..hey..he can and will plot war at Pleased. Cathy is the only AI in the game that can be bribed into war at Friendly. Boudi loves to fight, but she never will with you if she is Pleased with you. Not sure if you are familiar with this strat article, but it helps a lot:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-illustrated-1-know-your-enemy.478563/

Other things that help. Religion, of course. Choose a religious bloc or even ignore religion for the time being. Religion can have nice benefits like the civics, especially OR and Pacifism, but sometimes it can be best to just not adopt one until things sort themselves out and you feel comfortable joining one. Try though not to be odd man out though religion wise. Ha...I've seen new players come on here so keen on founding and adopting their early religion and then asking why everyone else is attacking them. Trade resources as soon as you can. Generally, you are not going to trade single happy resources, but single health resources? Sure, if I"m healthy enough. And if your leader is EXP you have a lot more leeway here on giving up single health resources for a while just to get that trade modifier building, which takes time to reach +1 and then +2. And once Currency is in (important tech), always look to trade extra resources for GPT...very important. That is gold for you as well as the trade bonus over time. Fair trade bonus up to +4 comes as you trade techs to AIs especially when more in their favor, which is really not that hard to do if you are tracking things closely, especially when Currency is in. Definitely trade old junk techs for chunks of gold. Good for you for teching, but good for relations. But even relatively newer tech can be traded or gifted if otherwise not giving up some advantage, especially on higher levels. The good meticulous players around here check that trade screen every turn, and pull up diplo screens to gauge tech trades to see whether AIs are close to a particular tech. Idea here is that if they are going to finish it anyway, then get some gold for it or even just gift it. You'll not only keep the Fair Trade bonus up, but eventually hit a new diplo modifier called "You share your technology with us" (Each AI has a different cap on # of tech from, I think, 7 to like 20 but the bonus has no limit as far as I know other than total techs in the game divided by said cap). Not a major bonus as it does take a while to hit for many AIs, but it IS there. Shared war is another thing, ofc, and like religion, how it grows with another AI seems directly related to the type of leader.

And lastly, I'd like to add more to My's comments about the slider above. Yep, this is actually a pretty big thing for newer players to understand. Definitely, do not get caught up with slider percentage. Once you settle your first city, you are going to hit deficit research. So for some time simply get used to the 0% or 100% slider guideline. Run 0% until you have just enough gold to finish the next tech, then boom 100%. Rinse/repeat. For one, you are funding your expansion. But also, need to explain that there is a rounding issue with beakers/gold the is remedied by running at min/max. This will get remedied later once you have more multipliers in place, as well as being able to get access to chunks of gold. We can try to point this out to you later, but you can see this pretty clearly in your game. Move slider to 0% and note beakers vs. gpt. Now try 10% and check beakers vs gpt. It does not add up does it. That will change, but probably not until you have your first academy and running a few scientists around.

One other thing, you do know that your scout can be used as a spawnbuster, right? After initial scouting for city spots he should be a buster for some time, at least until everything is secure.

ha ha..that is great about your son..is he old enough play yet?

edit: ha..still glancing back up at your post and looking at things, so thoughts still pop up after I post something.

One thing to be think about is Aksum and what it should be doing vs. what other cities are doing. Aksum is your cap, and very good cottage bureau cap at that. It is still early so you are still in expansion mode. But once you settle a couple of strong cities..namely the food cities, those cities can start taking the brunt of expansion needs, i.e., settlers, workers, or even units as need.

Point is that once those cities are set up, Aksum should focus on getting that first Library, which honestly with a Creative leader should already be built with some well timed settler whips and chops. Then, get that city working 2 scientists asap for that academy in Aksum which will definitely payoff huge in a nice city like this and go bonkers later with Bureaucracy. So early, once library is in, Aksum will focus less on those cottages and more on getting that first GS. That is what this nice helper cities do for you. They keep that those cottages growing during this time...not that Aksum can't work some too, ofc...just depends on the happy cap coming out of the previous whipping, but it will get there. Other good food cities can run scientists as well once things stabilize expansion wise)

Likewise, I'd really like to see those two other nearby cities by now. Gondar should have no forests. Can Lali grow to 4 and whip that settler?

And I saw some comments about happy cap. Yes, you generally avoid running unhappies for long. You pay for each citizen. However, an unhappy citizen is still a citizen and still worth 30H, so don't be afraid to grow into unhappy temporarily to whip something, although in that case it should be a 2popper or 3 popper.

Although I'd at least chop a Lib in gold city, as well as get it to size 2 for the gold tile, technically that city is good for a settler there simply from chopping forests. Don't they say "chop forests, ask questions later"

another edit..cause that is what I do: Be careful trading for cheap techs like Myst, Fishing or cheap religious techs. You have trade caps with AIs - all different - that cause one to hit "WFYABTA"..we fear you are becoming too advanced. Those techs you will probably tech in one turn soon or very quickly so don't bother trading for those. You want to always be able to make important trades later, so don't add to that cap with cheap techs. (You probably do want to tech Fishing soon for that city...later Sailing is something I don't mind trade for..especially for trade routes)

 

[coanda]

Seeing the Khmer borders would reshuffle my own mental priorities. That floodplains/gold spot between you is going to be taken real fast. Odds are good that they are looking at it already; if you jump on it right away, you might be able to steal it first. If you decide to try that, you want two settlers very quickly - one to get that area, another to get you horses.

I'd just be satisfied with a low happiness cap once that gold is hooked up until you've got a few more settlers and maybe a worker or two out (not sure, haven't opened up the save this time to see how you're doing on improvements). After that point, getting one warrior garrisons is worthwhile for the happiness. A bit longer-term, you're going to be looking for Monarchy. The wine is an obvious plus, but Hereditary Rule is the more important part. +1 happiness per garrisoned unit; you can put 3, 4, 5-warrior garrisons in a city if need be. But you'll want to get Currency first, and if possible trade for Monarchy (or at least trade for the prerequisite techs so you don't waste time with Mysticism and Priesthood).

Hard to say what to should think about trading with the AIs when we don't even know what techs they have and will trade yet.

Diplomatically, it helps to know the personalities of your neighbors. https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-illustrated-1-know-your-enemy.478563/ is a pretty good reference page on leaders for when you're getting started, but what will really help is just playing a lot of games - you get a feel for AI personalities over time. Suryavarman is a warmonger. He'll start planning wars fairly often (~2% chance per turn), gets a decently large army, and is willing to plan wars even against neighbors he is "Pleased" with. He's also one of the strongest AIs in the game, at least in my experience - he usually expands well, tends to strike a fairly good balance between his military and economy, and doesn't have any really crazy extremes to his behavior. With no religious spread in your direction (and it looking distinctly possible you three might be isolated on a continent with no religion at all), I would assume that war with Suryavarman is probably a question of when, not if. You'll probably be attacking him at some point if he doesn't attack you first. Suleiman is a friendlier AI. He doesn't plan war against "Pleased" civs and doesn't declare war as often overall. There's a lot of tricks you can use to help manage AI relations, and it shouldn't be too hard to get him to Pleased then eventually Friendly. If you want to crush him, he'll be there when you're ready. If you prefer a peacefully ally, you can have that too.

I would focus more on beakers per turn rather than slider percent. Settling new cities will push down your slider percent... but that doesn't always mean they are slowing your research. Any city that can work a couple scientists will be increasing your research rate. Any city that can work a high-commerce tile (like a Gold mine) will be increasing your research rate. After Currency, basically any city will increase your research rate - worst case, they can just run trade routes and build wealth to pay for themselves and then some. There's absolutely nothing wrong with having your slider at 30%, 20%, even 0%, as long as you are still making good progress technologically and you aren't in danger of literally going bankrupt.

 

[NightOnEarth]

Gosh! These were hard days for me playing my game and outside the game. I'm quite frustrated. Here's the story. After eagerly reading your elaborate tips and comments (again thank you all for taking the time to teach me so many things) I was prepared to advance during the next turns. First I replayed my previous session (turn 52 to 67) a bit differently to improve my micromanagement. This seemed to be successful.

Spoiler turn 67 - 2nd try :

Then I tried to utilise pop 4>2 whipping with cheap libraries to bring out a settler soon. I was aware of coanda's warning about Survey competing for the floodplains/gold spot. My scout entered the Khmer's borders and – lo and behold! - a settler popped up in his capital at turn 72. In spite of all my efforts I lost the race for this spot by a large margin at turn 77. Disillusioned I called it a day.

Two days later I decided to reload my game at turn 67 and I made experiments to accelerate the build of my settler. Two workers chopped two forests at the moment when I whipped a library, but the overflow was not enough. My settler was ready not earlier than turn 76. But in the meanwhile barbs founded a city at the floodplains/gold spot, because my scout abandonned his fogbusting spot to explore the Khmer empire (lymond has warned me). Survey's settler turned north to settle close to the sheep.

All in all I have the choice if the barbs or the Khmer will be my neighbors. With respect to my currently weak military I would prefer the Barbs. Survey has four archers and two axes, and I just connected my horses, so chariots are not yet available. In addition, Survey has elephants and is researching mathematics with construction probably next.
If I eventually succeed in conquering the barb's city, would it be a reasonable idea to settle on the gold?

Spoiler turn 77 the south - 1st and 2nd try :

Perhaps I was too fixated for settling the floodplains/gold spot, perhaps my expectations were too high, but I now have the impression that I misplayed this part of the game. Your review is welcome.

Were am I currently? Five cities and my settler heading for my last helper city, five workers and the sixth coming soon, gold and horses recently connected to my trading network, three libraries just whipped and running but no GS yet (cities have to re-grow), a chunk of gold to burn with these libs now in place (as advised by Fippy), a nice surprise in the NE with two possible spots to settle, alphabet still several turns away and a misplaced fogbuster in the E who just recovered from an enemy's blow.

Lymond, you wrote an essay last time, a lot of food for thought, highly appreciated by me. There is still a forest around Gondar (for Yeha's health bonus), but I slowly internalise the importance of chopping. Addis Abeba is going to be defoliated soon. But I wonder if I should farm the grassland N of the oasis in between for further growth.

In the meanwhile Stonehenge was built elsewhere, Süleyman founded his third city and Survey his forth.

Spoiler turn 77: my empire - 1st and 2nd try :

(is the zoom-factor of my screenshots ok or should I increase it?)
I saved my game one turn before, because I'm pretty unsure if I should settle the western helper city, to compete with Survey for the sheep or to head NE. Perhaps I should correct my decission, although co-working the floodplains around my capital and small distance to it make me feel ok.to settle the fish/wheat city.

Spoiler Next cities? :

Only now I seem to understand the mechanics of whipping cheap libraries. When I 2-pop whipped the library in Aksum, +54H overflow were displayed, but my worker received only 35H. Similar in Gondar, +42H overflow were displayed, but my setller received only 25H. Of course my cities don't get the full amount. I think the access hammers are halfed and F/H of that turn are added.

ha ha..that is great about your son..is he old enough play yet?

Nice that you ask. My son is a student currently, and he played a game with me some years ago when he gifted me the CIV IV box. Since then he abstains from CIV IV, but he likes to have a look at my games now and then and to get reported of my progress.

 

[lymond]

IMO I would not have been concerned about the gold/fp spot at all. It's nice, but a bit far away and very close to Sury. He would have settled there if not for the barb city which pushed him to settle up near that sheep (which I got in my game in the very spot you marked.

I don't like the NE spot near the deer, I think on the desert hill where your warrior stands is fine or 1SE of the deer. I forget what is in the fog there.

Fish/wheat is really the city I'd like to see you settle sooner than later.

Not sure on the OF numbers..those number seem very high to me.

For gold/oasis city, again the point was that the city is going to work oasis and grow on gold..the most important thing. This will slow its growth for a while which is fine because you settled this city for the early gold boost to economy. Therefore further farming is not a priority over things like chopping or improvements elsewhere. Sure, you will eventually farm there but later.

I'd get a chariot or two out soon. You can send one E a bit to see what is there and have fun with roaming barbs..maybe meet some AIs you have not met.

Once Alpha is in you can look to trade for IW and maybe Maths, which you might have to tech yourself, but if not then move on to Currency.

Sury is not that dangerous but there is always a possibility. Trade resources with him if you can and if you pick up Montheism in near future .maybe via trade, he likes the OR civic.

 

[coanda]

Don't stress about missing FP/Gold. It was still open on the last turnset, Sury had borders on it, I thought it might be possible to grab the spot first and was worth trying (you'd be making the settlers and expanding anyways, worst case it just costs a couple turns of settler movement). Turns out it wasn't possible, but you can do fine without it. Not enough time to make any more extensive comments at the moment.

 

[NightOnEarth]

Thank you for your encouraging words and for bringing me back to the right track. I moved forward 17 turns to turn 94. What happened?

t79 Debra founded (wheat/fish city W of Aksum); horse finally connected to my trading network
t80 The Oracle (unknown civ)
t82 Alphabet researched; traded Agri for fishing and AH for Archery with Surya
t83 Confucianism founded elsewhere
t84 My scouting scout met Mansa Musa's (!) representative. Traded Alpha for IW and Mysticism. Mansa was the guy who founded Confucianism last turn
t87 Next settler heading to choke point N of Angkor Wat.
t89 Scout spotted Mansa's missionary heading west
t90 Adulis founded; Surya switched to Construction (19t) after Math has been researched. Beware of Ballista Elephants.
t93 GP born elsewhere
t94 Currency researched; Mansa has swordsmen; Traded Alpha for Meditation/Polytheism/Sailing/5Gold with Süley; traded Currency for CoL with Mansa

I decided to stop here because some decisions have to be made and because it's a good point to receive your review.

Spoiler t94 - My Empire :

The West
The East

My Empire:

Five cities have granaries, four have libraries. FP around Aksum are cottaged and worked, Aksum and Gondar are running two GS. All food recources are built and connected to my trading network (except one road for a pig), as well as iron and horse.
Nearly all forests are chopped, leaving a lot of plains. Mining hills and working grassland is next as well as building roads for short routes between the cities. But how should I work plains afterwards, if doing so at all.

My main cities house an archer or a warrior for +1 happiness. Currently I seem to have no other means to increase the happiness cap.

Cheap courthouses are availabe now and easy to whip. They would probably give me the possibility to spy Surya and Mansa simultaneously. Lymond, you underlined the importance to observe Mansa as a leading tech trader. But what should be the priority for my builds? Military (axes, some pikes as counter for the elephants, some more chariots to counter axes of the enemy?)

I'm currently building another settler and have plans for two more (2S of the SE deer, as proposed by lymond, 1NW or 2NW or 2N of the SE deer (iron vs. fresh water; coastal vs co-working one more FP) and finally fish city N of Aksum, in that sequence. Is this resonable?

Currently I have the feeling that the early expansion phase is drawing to a close. Whipping is still important, but to a lesser degree, right? OTOH, some more cheap buildings beside libs and courthouses are waiting.

My rivals:

Spoiler t94 - Suryavarman II and Mansa Musa :

The Khmer
The Mali

Surya is going straight to construction. Understandable with elephants in his empire. He is surrounded by two barb cities W and E and will probably try to conquer them for further expansion.
He has five cities. His military is slightly superior to mine. Several archers, three axes, a spear. He laid siege to barb city Chinook (defended by two archers), but nothing happened up to now.

Mansa is far east. I mentioned his first missionary. I met the guy again close to the Khmer border. His land doesn't look promising: a mix of tundra, plains and grassland. Furs, crabs, cow, iron. Mansa has four cities.

I haven't yet located Süleyman. All I know is that he has four cities and chariots (horses).

For learing purposes, this game is a role model. I can expand and develop nearly without pressure. Other civs are far away, and deserts are seperating the civs even more.

Techs and Trading:

Spoiler t94 - The Tech trading screen :

I'm tempted to research Math next as prerequisite for CS and as trading tech, but perhaps I should keep an eye on monarchy (increase happines cap, wine). What would you advise? Should I research horseback riding in between? I've not yet seen other horses than mine.
My tech rate is quite good, I think. I'm alternatively leading or in second place according to the demographic screen. Because of the vaste amount of FP, this should be no surprise.

Sailing is now available, but I have no foreign trading routes. The entire coastline to other civs must be visible for this, no? It must not be interrupted e.g. by barbs, I believe.

Military
Is it already time to arm? Perhaps I should try to conquer Chinook before Surya will do so. Otherwise I could plan more defensively with pikes and chariots. Are horseback archers of higher priority?

Minor question on chopping:
What decides which city receives the hammers, when both are equidistant? I chopped a forest meant for Addis Abeba, but Lalibela gained the hammers.

Thank you for reading my long message. As before I'm looking forward to reading your comments and reviews.

 

[rah]

If they're equidistant, go into the city you want the hammers to go to and move a citizen to the forest to be chopped, That will claim the hammers for that city, you can move the citizen off then. As long as the other city doesn't claim that square through growth or gov before the forest is chopped, the city you selected will get them. You can verify by hovering.

 

[lymond]

If the forest exists in a shared BFC tile then as rah mentioned, the city that "owns" the tile gets the chop. You can see that in the city as the tile is bright in that city. Otherwise click the tile to the city you want to own the tile. If the forest is outside either cities' BFC, and the tile is equidistant, then I think it is the older city that gets the chop. (Don't know for certain how it is coded, but from my experience it seems to be the case)

You may have overlooked my soliloquy on Tech trading, but I advise not trading for things like fishing and archery. Again, the issue is about hitting trade caps with the AIs. You want to be able to trade for important techs. Trading for techs that by now you can tech in one or two turns goes adds to the ticker on those aggregate caps. You will hit a point where they won't trade most techs for some time. Archery particular is a tech you do not need at all (I've gone whole games without it), so definitely don't waste a trade on that. IW good, ofc, but if you have a monopoly on Alpha you may want to guage things across the board before liberally teching it around.

Currency good, but if you can't trade for Maths I would probably tech it first as it is on the path to Currency (all techs linked to a higher tech gives bonus to that tech - in this case Alpha and Maths) Maths is a pretty important gateway tech and boosts forest chops. On this level I would tech it. On higher levels it is pretty easy to trade for.

Sailing is good, but not sure if I would have traded Alpha for it yet, especially since you got those other cheap religious techs...again, adding to trade caps. I can't see you situation at the time or if there was something else you could have trade for Sailing, but I may have held out longer for more gold instead of those other techs.

I'm going to take a look at the save this time, but based on your date the timing seem a little slow. Not bad per se, but could be better. The important thing though is that you are learning a lot with this exercise. You have a fairly solid empire to work from for this game.

 

[lymond]

Ok..looked at the save and have a few pointers:

1) ha..I feel like you missed a whole post of mine. Ofc, I can be quite verbose so I don't expect everything I say to sink in at once. There is a lot to absorb. Still, Adulis is a very poor decision. Absolute no reason to settle that city. Only thing it does is make you a more likely target. And you are not going to overtake that sheep anytime soon against another Creative leader, so the city has gained you little. Deer/fp city or deer/fish(and now iron) would have been better. On some maps like Pangaea on higher levels, borders are going to join at some point, but I generally would not like to aggressively forward settle an AI if I don't have to.

2) Trade Myst to Sury for 20g right now. Always look to trade these old techs for as much gold as you can get for them. They're gonna get them soon anyway. I wrote up a big blurb on this in a earlier post, that you may want to reread. Especially the part about gauging if AIs are teching something via the diplo screen, made much easier after Currency as gold is factored into this equation. You know Sury is teching Construction, but this is a way to see what other AIs you don't have the EP visi on to assess what they are teching or close to finishing.

3) Go to Weight 2 on Mansa or even full EP on him for a while to get visi. He's more important to see anyway.

4) Ok..big problem here is that you don't have foreign trade routes. Two ways are via road or sea via Sailing. Foreign trade routes are something you want asap if you can, but depending on proximity you don't always want to use turns to road a long ways, and Sury has not been particularly close..and..ugh..desert takes a far longer time to road. Sailing probably would have been quicker here, but a big problem is first you have to unfog the coast and second that barb city is blocking coastal routes from the S. Now I, as probably you should have, teched Fishing much earlier..but then I setled fish/wheat far earlier (actually my second city). One method on maps like this is to get out a quick scout work boat to clear coastal fog. Like if you had done that early to the N you'd not only have met Mansa much earlier but would have foreign trade routes now. (also you can't even trade resources yet)

5) Mine okay for Lali, but you have a forest to chop there for faster settler. You can use the forest for the Lighthouse though (1 Maths chop = 1t LH with Org). You want LH for that lake. Also, soon start thinking about running scientists in other cities. Lali is going to be one good place to do so. Cities work food and cottages where they exists, but scientists over things like mines, which you can grow on later. Gondar running scientists is excellent.

6) So I like for you to start grasping the mindset that mines (except strats) are far less important than food, chops and specialists...early on

7) Worker between Aksum and Gondor. Cottages on riverside grass would be my priority over a mine there. But note that if my cap has good growth and bureau potential - i.e., it can work it - I'm inclined to put a cottage on riverside grass hills in my bureau cap.

8) make sure you adjust Addis with the farm complete.

9) Gondar is going to get you first GS first, so in Aksum I might take that 3C FP from Yeha with one of its scientists for more growth since Aksum can grow a pop. Yeha will then take its other cottaged FP.

10) Move warrior from Addis to Yeha, which will need MP soon. Addis won't need it for a while, and actually I might start a settler in Addis right now..its border will pop again next turn, so the forest 2E of the worker will net 24H and the other forest in its BFC will give you 30H toward a new settler.

11) Really too bad you built some archers. Kinda of a waste really. First, as mentioned you should not have traded for Archery anyway, but I might avoid hooking up iron for a bit to get another warrior or two for MP purposes instead of Archers.

12) But now, some Swords would be good from somewhere soon to see about maybe nabbing that barb city (its actually not badly placed although I might have settled a city there on the gold )

So other than that you have 3 pretty darn good cities to settle (plus maybe barb city) which should IMO complete your early empire ..rest will come later with some sort of conquest

 

[NightOnEarth]

(I'm not sure if a reply to the forum is the appropriate way to respond. At least for the first part of my message. Would a personal message be preferable?)

Lymond, I'm very grateful for your patience and for all the time you are putting into reviewing my game. Your comments and guidelines improve and enhance my gameplay considerably. A compilation of it would be a nice contribution to the war academy or the like, I think.

Yes, you often are quite verbose, and I appreciate it very much. There are so many things to consider, often linked. As you assumed there's a lot to absorb, and although I understand your reasoning I forgot some advices during my gameplay. It's a steady learning process.

I'm able to grasp general concepts or strategies, but I lack in applying them properly. Several times you mentioned that I'm (a bit) slow developing my game, and I share this assessment. Often I'm missing an inner compass (does this term make sense in english?), that steers me along the stages of (micro)managment, sometimes I don't know how to set my priorities. I'm not complaining, because again, this is a learning process, I'm just stating a reason.

And this learning process is exactly the reason I replay a session after I receive the reviews of you, coanda, fippy and all the other civ-veteran.

Points about tech trading well taken. I will replay my last session and this time I will remember them and will heed your advice. The concept of "WFYABTA" is completely new to me and never happened before in my games. Usually my tech trading was stingy in my previous games.

Ok..looked at the save and have a few pointers:

1) ha..I feel like you missed a whole post of mine. Ofc, I can bee quite verbose so I don't expect everything I say to sink in at once. There is a lot to absorb. Still, Adulis is a very poor decision. Absolute no reason to settle that city. Only thing it does is make you a more likely target. And you are not going to overtake that sheep anytime soon against another Creative leader, so the city hasn't gain you much. Deer/fp city or deer/fish(and now iron) would have been better. On some maps like Pangae on higher levels, boarders are going to join at some point, but I would not like to aggressive forward settle on AI if you don't have to.

Yes, I understand. This is an old habbit of me if other civs are close. In the beginning I often experineced that I was too late to settle a target spot. Therefore I developed this "strategy" to head for choke points. Unappropriate this time with plenty of good land to settle elsewhere.

2) Trade Myst to Sury for 20g right now. Always look to trade these old techs for as much gold as you can get for them. They're gonna get them soon anyway. I wrote up a big blurb on this in a earlier post, that you may want to reread. Especially the part about gauging if AIs are teching something via the diplo screen, made much easier after Currency as gold is factored into this equation. You know Sury is teching Construction, but this is a way to see what other AIs you don't have the EP visi on to assess what they are teching or close to finishing.

Clever! I didn't know. I tried something in this direction by teasing Süleyman with IW. He wasn't interested at all, so I assumed he was researching it. Lo and behold! a few turns later he finished IW.

4) Ok..big problem here is that you don't have foreign trade routes. Two ways are via road or sea via Sailing. Foreign trade routes are something you want asap if you can, but depending on proximity you don't always want to use turns to road long was, and Sury has not been particular close..and..ugh..desert take a far longer time to road. Sailing probably would have been quicker here, but a big problem is first you have to fog the coast and second that barb city is blocking coastal routes from the S. Now I as probably you should have, teched Fishing much earlier..but then I setled fish/wheat far earlier (actually my second city). One method on maps like this is to get out a quick scout work boat to clear coastal fog. Like if you had done that early to the N you'd not only have met Mansa much earlier but would have foreign trade routes now. (also you can't even trader resources yet)

This game I was too busy to go this way (or too unorganised), but the scouting workboat is something I was doing all the times in my games. Often I sent out two workboats in two opposite directions (I was always going for Magellan, mostly fractal maps, never pangea). But it was only my last session when I understood the linkage of workboat exploration with clearing the coastal fog and making foreign trade routes available.

7) Worker between Aksum and Gondor. Cottages on riverside grass would be my priority over a mine there. But note that if my cap has good growth and bureau potential - i.e., it can work it - I'm inclined to put a cottage on riverside grass hills in my bureau cap.

Interesting. I believe I never built a cottage on a grass hill before. My thinking this time was to create hammer tiles for low food mode of my cities. I'm (or better, I was) a production junkie in my previos games, and I thought of +50% hammers in a bureau cap.

[... great micromanagement advices]

11) Really too bad you built some archers. Kinda of a waste really. First, as mentioned you should not have traded for Archery anyway, but I might avoid hooking up iron for a bit to get another warrior or two for MP purposes instead of Archers.

Another old habbit of mine. Perhaps I'm too cautious by going for archers, but these warriors are not for defense, but solely (at this stage) for increasing the happiness cap, right? Another idea was to go (perhaps) for horse archers with horses available, no copper and IW far away at that moment. I was not prepared to trade in IW two turns later.

12) But now, some Swords would be good from somewhere soon to see about maybe nabbing that barb city (its actually not badly placed although I might have settled a city there on the gold )

Yes, attack! I hope it's not too late. I wondered myself if settling on the gold would be a good idea.

 

[lymond]

(ack..goodness...the typos in my last post were horrendous..i usually edit but neglected...I did now)

Hey, it's all part of the process of learning this game. It does take time (and willingness) to nail down the micro or "second-nature" things. Just keep at it. Yes, "inner compass" is very much a thing in English. My inner compass guides me to do some very silly things . Do please note that some of my comments may come off a little critical, but actually just meant to give perspective. Sort of like giving you a benchmark for where you should be at a certain point in the game...generally..other factors can very much come into play as far as where one should be in game tech-wise and empire-wise like the map and how many AIs you know...and the particular leaders. Anyway, it's a very complex game that CAN be played casually, or one can pursue excelling at it. No one here expects one to do so overnight..ha. We've all been in your shoes. You are making great progress though. It's just about ironing out some of the bad habits and absorbing the new good habits.

As for settling patterns, certainly on some maps you are going to be bordering AIs sooner than later...like a Pangaea on higher levels. It's going to happen. But here you had far better settling options than Adulis. Main point here is that I would definitely avoid settling a rather distance and suspect city to border fight over a resource, unless..say..one is planning to subsequently attack that AI in the very near future anyway.

As a note, I tend to focus newer players toward early empire management over early warfare, unless an early rush is just so obvious or in some cases necessary. Fine tuning early empire management is the framework for success for the entire game, no matter the goal.

Honestly, most advanced players check tech trade options basically every turn. Once Currency is in, you can balance different trade scenarios with their gold or yours as well. Are they now asking for more additional gold or giving less additional gold. Really helps in making a decision to fire off trades. Also, I should point out that a tech's value can decrease over time as well as how many others know it. Also, monopoly techs are more valued. Some techs AIs simply will not trade for a while either based on the tech itself (think Construction), it they desire a wonder, how many others know the tech, and relationship status. A few techs like Monarchy ..no clue why...AIs trade freely even in semi-iso. Mansa, as mentioned, is the one AI that trades liberally regardless of status.

Sometimes foreign routes come naturally with little effort. Such as a close AI does much of the road work for you, or you get Sailing early. I probably would not think of building WBs for circum, but at least getting one out early is good on a map like Fractal. (keep in mind you pay maintenance on those boats too)

Bureau caps are a huge factor in most games..at least long games, unless one plans to just run the map early. I'd say it is the second or third most powerful civic behind Slavery. As you have seen we've been guiding you to tailor Aksum for cottages. It is a very fine Bureau cap. (Sometimes you just don't start with a good riverside or fp cap..Palace can be moved though). The hammer bonus is nice and can certainly apply ...caps will generally have some production tiles. But is the commerce bonus that is the emphasis. That is what is going to make your science skyrocket mid-game. And, again, to clarify, I only cottage riverside green hills in the cap..like the flat riverside tiles they have the 1C to start...and maybe not always. If FIN, most definitely.

And, to refresh, this is why we have mentioned the overlap/helper cities a lot. That is, they help keep those cottages growing early as Aksum does other things, so once you can adopt Bureau you have a lot of juicy commerce for Aksum to work.

Exactly, and note that your warrior busters will be MP at some point. Kind of joke mentioned here at times is that the warrior is the best unit in the game. Cheap unit/cheap happiness. I've actually had cases where I'm using Monarchy that I've built warriors to stack in my cap to grow it large..even trading away metals to do so temporarily.

Archery is often necessary on Deity, and sometimes IMM, but I tend to avoid that tech unless going for HA rush. HAs are sweet.

Not sure yet on worth of attacking Sury early here. Other AIs are certainly quite far away. We know Sury has metals, and well if he has ivory (we can't tell yet cause we can't trade yet), his UU will be annoying. WEs are HA killers anyway. I think focus on setting up a really nice empire is best here, and then maybe doing something with Curs or even the UU/trebs or cannon later.

Yep, even getting down 1 or 2 Swords and you might see Sury trying to slam chariots against hill archers. AIs can really do stupid stuff sometimes when it comes to taking barb cities, although they will eventually take it.

Yes, on the gold I like best. Desert gold has less value anyway, but you get to work all the fps down there. Very nice secondary commerce city. (if I took a city like that later game I would watermill/workshop it)