Beginning strategy

[stixs]

What's everyone's beginning strategy, approx. the first 20 turns or so? I often find myself wasting the first five or ten turns building my first city and just sitting there waiting for my first unit to be built. After seeing that other cfcer's are conquering the world before they get to A.D. years I'd like to get faster. I'm primarily interested in conquest strategy but would like to hear tech/spaceship ideas too.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Build a city. Build a settler. Or, build two cities, build two settlers. Or, build a city, do once city size 1 settler trick, build two cities. Or, on deity plus three, build two cities, wait for them to grow to size two and out of disorder, build two settlers. You get the idea...

 

[Magic_gorter]

Fast growing is indeed the trick, but also trying to discover techs quickly. Finding a good balance between those two is the trick. Getting to Monarchy is for early conquest and for early landing the way to go......After a while trading will be the most important thing to get a lot of gold and a quick tech growth....

 

[Terrapin]

The top players here have this game down to a virtual science. But one thing which still seems to require "feel" is how long to spend looking around before settling your first city. Ideally, you will tip a couple of huts and get at least one NONE unit to explore and a few gold to help speed up building a unit in that first city. Of course, that means you have to find the huts and get the desired results and, as your question implies, you do not want to take very many turns to do this. That is why so many players use the save/load cheat to "fix" the hut outcomes.

Oh, and whales, whales, whales. Whales are by far the best special for a new city just starting out. Whales give you 2 each food, trade and shields and no other terrain type is as helpful. Of course, if you want to do the size 1 settler trick mentioned (your first city will not disband if you build a settler at size one), you will want silk, which gives one food and two each shields and trade, so your first settler will finish before your city grows.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

I usually settle my first city right away, unless I see a clear benefit to building very nearby (ie more river or access to the ocean). Your first city need not be ideal (unless you play occ), it just has to be serviceable for the early game. Every turn wasted in the early game will ripple throughout the rest of the game in terms of lost production, etc. As the game progresses, you can usually get a feel for which cities ought to be given more attention and which cities have served their main function of allowing exponential growth earlier in the game. If it becomes necessary, you can always move your capital, but wandering around for the first 20 turns will reduce your empire by half. Of course, exponential growth does not last forever, as circumstances (ie, lack of room, logistics of moving units dozens of spaces) will curtail it (or simply personal preference; after all, fun comes first).

I usually grow fast in order to gain techs fast, so there is little balance to be maintained. Jack the science rate up, and expand.

 

[Terrapin]

Well, Stixxs, I would listen to the cat.

 

[Rowan]

Fast growing is indeed the trick, but also trying to discover techs quickly. Finding a good balance between those two is the trick. Getting to Monarchy is for early conquest and for early landing the way to go......After a while trading will be the most important thing to get a lot of gold and a quick tech growth....

Good advice!

 

[Peaster]

Well, Stixxs, I would listen to the cat.

... and the Turtle and the Gorter and ...

The main thing is to make as many settlers and cities as possible before about 1500BC (then think about crucial WOWs, and boats, and maybe barracks/etc). Do NOT get distracted making defensive units, city improvements, long roads, or wonders. There are a few issues which are not 100% clear:

a) Whether to explore the blackness and pop huts (very early).
b) How hard to push for Monarchy.
c) Short Roads

My habit has been to favor growth over a) and b) but not c) (and all modesty aside, I've won lots of GOTMs this way). But I am not 100% sure about best play. I'll often go for huts on a large land mass [since you can expect lots of huts]. I'll push harder for monarchy [eg raise sci over taxes, etc] once I have 4-5 cities, or if I foresee happiness problems.

 

[BaconLad]

the 1st order of business is to save my starting location and explore for 15 turns or so to work out roughly where i will be building my 1st several cities. forward planning is crucial. if i can, and as early as possible i will build a city with good food/shield production purely to build settlers for expansion.
i try not to waste more than 3 turns to found my capital.
the best starting locations are WHALES and/or SILK, and grasslands. without any of these, your on the backfoot strate away.
once ive got my capital, i focus on production and get building a settler, after that, i focus on science and try to get monarchy as soon as possible.
i usually try to discover tech in this order (often start with alphabet/bronze working)
1,cerimonial burial
2,code of laws
3,monarchy
4,writing - build dips to explore/pop huts - i dont explore much untill this point
5,literacy
6,mysticism
7,philosophy
8,currency/masonary/maths dependent on what ive popped from huts
after this, its the needs of my civ that determine what i go for.
if i can i (with maths) take the science route university/theory of gravity/astronomy
if im lacking resources, i go for pottery and seafaring and build harbors in all my cities.
the 1st 7 techs are ALWAYS in the same order.
when i manage to pull this off, i oftan find myself miles ahead of the other tribes.