Build Scout First on Diety?

[Zyrica]

The trade is pretty simple:

10 extra culture or 10 turns of extra scouting. (Depending on starting hammers.)

The 10 extra culture will result in an earlier opner and the extra scouting could earn good ruin yields.

I prefer 10 extra culture since this syncs up the honor opening for my initial barbarian clearing archers and also aligns the extra xp policy for my first archer push.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

i think the scout is worth a bit more than just the ruins you might get. i still go scout-scout even when i disable ruins. meeting as many CSs first and all the AIs first for WC has a greater value to me, assuming standard pangea type maps. and when the 2nd scout is done i immediately build either shrine or granary as the timing is generally 10 turns, enough for pottery to finish, my usual opening tech. i'll prioritize a monument if im not planning on a free one from Tradition but they still arent built til after 2 scouts. i just really value knowing the map too. i might see more and/or better city spots, a less tangible benefit that isnt directly measured with a stat.

 

[wayneb64]

I can't help myself from wanting to get that monument and even a shrine up ASAP. They always take priority to scouts as I just don't trust my luck with ruins. I have played mostly Emperor so maybe I need to change to survive at higher levels. Going to try Immortal this weekend.

 

[BruinBound]

Let's not forget that scouts are also helpful when it comes to stealing workers. Trying to get two from an AI and another from a city state with just a single warrior can take longer or you may miss the chances entirely. Even if completely successful, you still probably haven't scouted much of the map and missed meeting more CSs and other civs.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

I can't help myself from wanting to get that monument and even a shrine up ASAP. They always take priority to scouts as I just don't trust my luck with ruins. I have played mostly Emperor so maybe I need to change to survive at higher levels. Going to try Immortal this weekend.

i do play with No Ruins ticked on occasion. it can change openings that relied on finding the culture ruin. scout-mon-scout is very reasonable as monument speeds up getting first SP, to maybe t17 instead of 25. but i still prefer scout-scout there unless im maya or ethiopia.

 

[wayneb64]

i do play with No Ruins ticked on occasion. it can change openings that relied on finding the culture ruin. scout-mon-scout is very reasonable as monument speeds up getting first SP, to maybe t17 instead of 25. but i still prefer scout-scout there unless im maya or ethiopia.

How do you not get beat to first pick of Pantheon beliefs?

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

How do you not get beat to first pick of Pantheon beliefs?

i get beat to the first pick all the time. me building shrines quickly has nothing to do with that, really. some AI will always get there first (Spain, Maya, Ethi, Celts, etc.) and i usually play immo/deity where pantheons go quickly. the only thing i dislike is having 1 or 2 really good faith options that are taken but this is common at immo/deity. but usually the terrain dictates my pantheon needs. if i find one faith CS first (8f) and im likely to not get a pantheon without a shrine then i'll probably go with scout-scout-shrine, but only if my religion could be decent. if i dont care what my good pantheons are (dirt doesnt give me one of the good faith producers) or dont really care to focus on religion (or playing emperor and under where religion is easy to get) then i'll delay the shrine til i want it.

some games have little need for an early/immediate shrine. find two early faith CSs and that 12f/16f got you a free pantheon that will now fund your religion (deserts, +4f from NW, etc). You'll build shrines later for the building path to Grand Temple, etc but sometimes you can delay them for more priority units/bldgs. i have a hard time not starting scout-scout every game, but i can respond when the starts give me some good luck by seeing i dont always need an early shrine. it isnt so much a 'rule' as a default until circumstances show me better options.

 

[stormtrooper412]

Well the only sure way to get a first pantheon pick is to have 2 religious CSs around, it's happened in DCL6 and DCL24

 

[wayneb64]

With Emperor quick scouting was not critical, but it sounds like I need to change that if I am moving up to Immortal. Does that mean you re-roll a lot on Immortal if your scout(s) come up empty?

 

[BlackWizard]

With Emperor quick scouting was not critical, but it sounds like I need to change that if I am moving up to Immortal. Does that mean you re-roll a lot on Immortal if your scout(s) come up empty?

No. You just learn to play without religion.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

No. You just learn to play without religion.

agreed. you also learn to play with someone else's religion. they can often provide nice bonuses, sometimes better than what you had to choose had you gone the extra mile to found, and even a nice choice of bonuses with multiple religions in your empire. and a side convenience is not really worrying about prophets/missionaries swarming your lands, something that happens often at immo/deity.

 

[stormtrooper412]

Getting someone else's religion is a gamble obviously, but sometimes you'll settle on desert, and then receive a religion that has DF and Pagodas

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

Getting someone else's religion is a gamble obviously, but sometimes you'll settle on desert, and then receive a religion that has DF and Pagodas

yeah, you'll certainly get one but you cant be sure what you'll get. but you can try and persuade it by sizing up your neighbors and picking friends. i once bought a couple pagodas from another religion only to realize they also took sacred sites and i was getting the tourism too. didnt really impact my game but it would be really interesting to see if you could win CV with someone else's SS, haha.

 

[Zyrica]

I rest my case, I've done some testing and it seams I've been doing it wrong all the time. Imo the first thing to build is a scout in nearly all cases.

For my personal honor, archer rush it only differs in 3-4 turns before I get the extra xp. Just the extra gold from finding city states first compensates that. The scout consistently provides more benefits then the extra turns of culture unless really unlucky.

Spoiler :

I started loads of games and did scout -> monument or monument -> scout openers and compared them on turn 50.

These are my testing results:
1/10 monument first provides better result
2/10 they provides the same result
7/10 scout first got better results, in some cases MUCH better.

My conclusion the gamble isn't really about it being better or not as I initially thought. It's rather about how much better it will be to build scout first.

 

[ToborajniN]

I go scout first 10/10. Maybe even scout + scout more often than scout + monument. Meeting CS's, AI's and popping ruins are just way too important early on imo.

The more stuff I can find, the better. And ofc, I like the science bonus from AI's..

 

[CraigMak]

Scouts since you could possibly get culture from a ruin anyways. Plus you want to meet those CS FIRST to get more money and possibly 8 faith. Meeting civs will impact your science later and the scouts can be used to defend against barbs after scouting.

 

[Memoryjar]

scout - scout - scout/shrine.

Scout is the best choice for Deity, find ruins, faith CS and grab workers from AI (graal is its extra settler one).

With some practice a scout (4/5 turns) is 2 workers (14-15 turns per workers). And workers are the key of a game.