Best Initial Building Strategy for Early Game Effectiveness

[Bill Bisco]

Alright everyone, I'm very interested in what is the optimal starting building strategy for situations in which a civ begins.

My starting City on Turn 1 looked like this:

Spoiler :

I wanted to find out whether given this situation it was better to build 1 Worker and 3 Warriors or 3 Warriors and then 1 Worker.

I played til turn 26 to try to get a fair comparison. It turned out that the worker first turn had more worked tiles, while the warrior first turn ended up slightly higher in tech.


Turn 26 with Worker First Turn:

Spoiler :

Turn 26 with Warrior First Turn:

Spoiler :

Anyway, I'd like to test some more about the optimal early game building strategies. I'm also curious if Warrior Worker Warrior Warrior is superior to these 2 strats.

The Save is below. Please check (if you feel like it) if I played those beginning turns optimally.

Peace,
Bill

 

[Monkeyfinger]

In theory the worker first version is better if you don't get attacked, but because barbs can come so early in FfH worker first is too big a gamble for my tastes.

I'd be more interested in knowing which is better to build first: Second worker, or first settler?

Also I totally would have moved the settler 1E, but that's a bit of a derail.

 

[Senethro]

Imagine what worker first would look like if you went for an early Agrarianism.

When going worker first, you're advised to have your scout explore around your capital in a tight circle just in case he needs to help defend.

As long as you went Worker first, your capital should be developed enough that your only worker can do City#2 as well. But as soon as you have Mining, Education + Calendar you need to get back to 1.5 workers/city very quickly.

 

[Bill Bisco]

@Monkeyfinger: That's what I was trying to test, in nearly all my games I always build worker first, but I never really did any analysis. In this test, it turned out that worker first was slightly unoptimal.

About the Hill, I put it next to the sea since it's a continents game, but maybe that initial 1 extra hammer would make a big difference. I think I need to retest.

Edit: Added Turn 0 Save

 

[Tasunke]

here is turn 26 on a worker first basis, far better scouted, with farms and godking ready to pop out that settler like no tommorow, careening with a 3 warrior guard to the juicy center of that floodplains.


::ahem:: I built worker, 4 warriors, and working on a settler. I switched to godking on turn 25.

 

[Senethro]

What do you mean, worker first is unoptimal? Its your teching thats sub-optimal. You should have picked up Calendar and be using the farm bonus + Plains/forest/hills to push out a Settler who probably will be placed beside that handy river. I can't tell for sure, but two tiles SE of capital looks like a good spot - farm the wheat and farm the pigs and it'll grow quickly too, the capitals next culture ring will allow it to work the pigs without a monument.

The start is a little short of commerce so a few cottages on river tiles would be necessary to avoid tech stagnation, but the area looks like a great set up for some Aristo-farms.

 

[Tasunke]

I think he was meaning by raw score being suboptimal, but that's like saying the orcs were winning because they had the biggest army

 

[Tasunke]

Here is why I built the settler when I did, working on second settler too

 

[Tasunke]

here are some more locations along this path. turn 95, starting on the Great Library, less than 23 turns away, due to a quickly growing capital with godking and ancient forests, and guardian of nature.

 

[Bill Bisco]

Now here's something interesting. I redid the initial start with the settler settling in the hill instead of the forest next to the Ocean.

Here are the Results

Warrior First:

Spoiler :

Worker First:

Spoiler :

So Warrior first is ahead in tech by 1 turn, but Worker first is going to get a Settler Faster.

Amazing.

@Senethro: Why would I go for Calendar, when I could go Crafting+Mining+Runes of Kilmorph so that I can found a religion, get gold to support more cities and increase happiness so that cities can be bigger and more productive?

 

[Senethro]

Because Aristofarms are better.

Post your 100 and 150 turn save and I'll show you. Whats the difficulty level?

 

[Tasunke]

difficulty level is emperor

 

[Tasunke]

Amurites were low in power, baron and Kithra increased their power, and I got Iron for my Firebows on the way to beastmasters. Huge Firebow stacks will reign terror and fire upon my weak, pathetic AI opponents.

 

[Tasunke]

continuation of the Stomp, after razing 2 cities- turn 187 (10 turns after starting the stomp)

 

[Bill Bisco]

Alright at turn 47 to compare with Tasunke:

Spoiler :

2 Cities and 1 settler on its way.

Turn 100 Screenshot for Senethro:

Spoiler :

4 Cities, I've gotten Mathematics, and 5 turns til Great Library. If you're doing better by turn 100, I'm sure you'll be doing better by turn 150. So if you think Aristofarm is superior to what I accomplished here, I'd love to see it.