Bad starts?

[skeezix]

How often do you fire up a new game, and get a 'bad start' (really poor terrain around you so you'll either have to walk really far or suffer with very poor production for awhile), or end up surrounded by a half dozen enemies leaving a couple alone on their own continents to buikd up against you?

Do you slog through, or just restart until you're in a more neutral or favourable kick off?

I've just chain started a few games, and all of them have had me at what seems to be a disadvantage; though I've not played much of cV since release, I'm generally one to slog through.. make the best of it; maybe its not so bad as it appears...

... or are there genuinely bad positions to start in, best avoided?

jeff

 

[SouljahAtWar]

I restart about 99% of the time in that case. I just don't have the patience for bad starts.
Though, with the addition of religions, having a bad start usually got narrowed down by a bit. I actually do play desert and tundra starts, as long as I get the parthenon that connects to that terrain early. As for barbarians, I just find it fun to play Whack a Barb with.

 

[Smokeybear]

Life's too short to start in what is obviously a pointless losing location. At least in any difficulty that is consistently challenging and where you often lose even with a good start. On King, I could win with just about any crap start before the patch, but since- nope. Give me a decent starting spot, or show me the next map roll.

 

[skeezix]

I had a series of about 5 really poor map kickoffs, started me wondering if a recent patch deliverately did it (all desert or tundra starts, barring one where I had 4 AIs and a couple city states right beside me, with a chokepoint leaving me nothing to work with..)

But on the 6th start in a row, I've got an absolutely fabulous begin; freakishly good, in fact .. pay back for the recent bad luck run. (big meandering continent, divided into 1/3rd for me with a natural wall of mountains running across it .. only a little choke point 2 tiles wide to squeeze between the mountains. So easily defended, what seems to be good resources and working space... and 3 AIs and 2 city states sitting just outside the door. They have plenty to work with as well, but should be very interesting working with them..)

Feels weird to back down on a few starts in a row, not in my nature to give in; but as you say.. life is too short to spend it on an uphill battle.

 

[masterofroflnes]

i just work with what i got.If i truely hate my start then ill spend some turns moving my settler to a better spot.

 

[DavisonACT]

Life's too short to start in what is obviously a pointless losing location. At least in any difficulty that is consistently challenging and where you often lose even with a good start. On King, I could win with just about any crap start before the patch, but since- nope. Give me a decent starting spot, or show me the next map roll.

These are my feelings as well. I don't need an ideal start, just not diabolical.

 

[SouljahAtWar]

Some people find it fun and challenge to play a game like that. Others find it tedious and painful. I'm on both spectrum of the concept depending on my mood.

 

[smallfish]

Depending on mood...

1) its river with no hills

2) there's too many jungles and rough terrain (unless playing as Inka punapalapa, in which case full steam ahead)

3) no-river plains

4) no river at all


The biggest one, though, has got to be:

5) No luxury within six tiles of your starting location, but that's (probably) the game hating you for playing as Monty in a "Wet Boreal"

 

[terveurn]

Running one right now - great start for my capital (three elephants) OK placement for second city (near gold), third city the Celtic decides I am too close (yeah, I was going for a great spot grab)

Where the heck did she get all these troops.....

My settler was heading for the gold fields on the left (another great spot)

Might end-up going back to the auto saves and see if I can load-up the city with up-graded archers.

 

[dutchengineer]

I never play bad starts. I usually play Deity, because it's the only difficulty level that stays challenging for me for the full length of the game. However, in order to overcome the initial gap that you have due to Deity AI bonusses, I need a good start.

For me, the following things matter for giving a start a good or a bad label (+ positive factor, - negative factor):

• ++ River: more early gold + increased growth due to civil service bonus
• ++ Granary bonus food sources, i.e. wheat, deer, bananas: early growth is essential, and these tiles give you most early in the game
• ++ Hills: you absolutely need a few hills to get sufficient early production
• ++ Mining luxuries: for and cash after selling, available earliest in the game
• + Marble: increased wonder production (++ if settling on marble gives a good city location)
• + Other luxuries: for and cash after selling
• + City on hill: +1 production for free is very nice early in the game, additional city defense against early aggression of neighbours is a bonus.
• + City next to mountain: +50% science in your (usually by far for most of the game) biggest science city (capital) is a significant bonus
• + Terrain that gives good faith with right pantheon, i.e. desert (preferably in the form of flood plains and hills), tundra hills or deer tiles, 3+ stone/ marble tiles: to (reliably) get a religion on Deity, you either need to play a religious civ (Maya, Celts, Ethiopia), settle next to a faith natural wonder, or get a faith increasing pantheon.
• + If coastal, fishing boat resources: great tile yields (but slow to set up)
• +/- Jungle: University jungle trading posts give good tile yields, but they take a while (~100-120 turns on standard speed) to set up. Until then, they are not worth working. So some jungle tiles are good, but a start completely filled with jungle tiles is very bad, especially in production (-> restart for me)
• - Tiles that are hardly worth working / only worth working late game due to low tile yields: tundra forest, non-resource coastal tiles, non-irrigated plains and grassland
• -- Tiles that are never worth working due to low / no tile yield: flat desert, mountains, flat tundra, snow

 

[terveurn]

OK 80 turns later, the Celtic's are now trapped - captured Dublin and gave me Cardiff - both nothing cities - burned them both to the ground

Now I should be worried - she has one city and this always comes back and bites me.....

Going to isolate her (hopefully) - have a engineer waiting for Physics then have him build Notre Dame as soon as it become available.

Also have a bunch of settlers in production - going to build a city where Cardiff was....

 

[Crafty Bison]

@dutchengineer, also forests are important, even if going wide they seriously cut down (ha) the NC time.

@OP, Play bad starts, re-rolling takes a long time and encourages bad habits for if you want to start playing mp. If you find it too tough then move down a difficulty level, it'll be more fun and more rewarding. Bad starts can actually not impede you too much if you learn how to use them well.
As an example, I've just stepped down to immortal to do a load of GL starts, and see how many of them I achieve, from every starting position (I'd try to prioritise religion/growth/steal worker/CS beyond the necessary to the same extent I would in a normal game).
I was surprised to find that I was actually getting about 65-70% of them, even though I'd probably only go for it with about 20% of the starts normally (and would back out on all but 15% by half way). Moral - Bad starts not so bad. Will have to go back to deity to see what happens there - My guess is it'll be more dependant on opponents.

 

[Matthew.]

When I play culture games I tend to be more picky about starts. Mainly because I suck at CV's, so I need all the help I can get

My typical play of mass population, burning, pillaging, etc. etc., I am much less picky. Bad start is resolved as soon as I can muster a large enough army to take over all the good spots near by.

I always restart if I can't get 2 hammers. 7 turns on a scout and like 18 on a worker is too much.

 

[Socratatus]

I actually like bad starts. They`re interesting. I like the immediate problem of trying to survive.

 

[Adjuvant]

I actually like bad starts. They`re interesting. I like the immediate problem of trying to survive.

Yeh, this. To me, playing emperor with a really bad start is probably alot like the pleasure many others experience "always winning" in prince. I can improvise, adapt and overcome, and in so doing feel pretty good about the game.

Bad start in immortal starts to grind my gears and I find myself automatically resorting to gimmick "win tactics" I'd do in deity. Then, it becomes repetitively "the same game" over and over.

Bad start in deity is kinda stupid and you don't learn anything except how to get your ass kicked in new and different ways.

 

[Donaskme]

How often do you fire up a new game, and get a 'bad start'

Probably three out of four. Trying to get a start with Inca anywhere near a mountain can be a real laugh.

 

[skeezix]

To frame this .. I'm an essentially new player; I've played all the Civ games over the years, but only maybe 30-40 hours of cIV and only a couple hours of cV .. but trying to back into the game, in those bits of time here or there.

But there are different kinds of players .. some people like to dominate, withotu cheating themselves; they want an even start but set up in a way knowing theres a 80% chance they'll stomp the AIs. Others like me, prefer a struggle.. but I like a fair struggle; I'm new at cV, so no point in handicapping myself, but I want to have a struggle the whole time. With how much free time I get (small babies around I want it to be a struggle right off... not in a late game I'll never see. But struggle against AIs, in war.. not against a desert tile set

(Historically, the AIs have been terrible at navy, so using Arch or island maps is a huge handicap against them; I tend to pick Pangear or Great Plains or the like, so the AI is at its peak performance, and then have a long drawn out ground war against a half dozen AIs in a 'domination only' victory condition

...

Very interesting discussion guys, thank you (though some of the terms are lost on me .. "CV" is cultural victory I presume, but "GL start", etc, nope.

I think I need a cV refresher .. the tech tree and bonuses are fairly different.. no more race to pick up first religion as in cIV

 

[Browd]

"GL start" will usually refer to rushing the Great Library.

This thread should help you get a handle on CiV acronyms: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=442106

 

[Civking5]

After the latest patch, I find that if I have a bad start, there is Noway for me to catch up to the AIs and their aggressive city spamings ( immortal level games).

 

[joncnunn]

If the start qualifies as bad in my personal book, I always re-start.

You can avoid the surronded by enemies by avoiding the region maps, pangena, regular contentants. (And instead playing on maps like ring / donut / archepello / small contenants / large islands / tiny islands)

The no luxury at all problem is most likely to occur on the real region of the world maps.