Calabim Starting Position - Gold vs Hammers

[pragmatic_labs]

In the starting position I've attached, would I be better off moving one east to get the extra commerce/ocean squares or to stay put and getting the extra hammers from hills?

I'm Flauros (Financial) playing on Prince, Erebus map.

Also, in general is it better to aim for production (hammers) or commerce (gold) starting positions in FFH? Or does it depend on leader/situation?

 

[Emptiness]

In the starting position I've attached, would I be better off moving one east to get the extra commerce/ocean squares or to stay put and getting the extra hammers from hills?

Stay where you are. In FfH2, unless you are Lanun: Water Tiles < Land Tiles < Riverside Tiles < Water Resource Tiles < Land Resource Tiles < Riverside Resource Tiles

The three shown on those Coast tiles is attractive, but in practice it is hard to access successfully in FfH2. You must research Fishing before you can use them, and then must research Sailing and build a Lighthouse before they can support themselves. Other than the Clams tile, working any of those coastal tiles will hurt your growth and expansion much more than the Commerce will help your research. Unless you are planing to follow the Octopus Overlords religion, researching Fishing in the early game to allow you to work one tile (the Clams) is probably not worthwhile.

I would suggest researching Farming > Calendar > Animal Husbandry as your first three techs. This will give you 6 decent tiles to support growth and settler production. Where you go after that will depend on whether you plan to adopt God King (to leverage the potential of your starting location) or the more natural Aristocracy (the bonus from Aristocracy farms is too attractive to pass up as a Financial leader). You have no mineral resources (shown) to benefit from mines, so Mining would probably not be a priority tech and so you won't be producing enough to make God King worth passing up on Aristograrian Farms. I would suggest Ancient Chants > Education > Code of Laws as your next three techs.

Also, in general is it better to aim for production (hammers) or commerce (gold) starting positions in FFH? Or does it depend on leader/situation?

It depends mostly on your leader, and somewhat on your situation, but it's a question of vs. rather than vs. . You want to have as much as possible, without sacrificing your growth or settler production. Growth means food, and food resources are usually the first to be utilized in order to kickstart growth. What happens next depends on what civics you plan to use.

Your leader's traits usually determine what civics you use. For example, Financial begs for Aristocracy whereas Expansive (encourages use of to produce settlers) and Spiritual (push to found a religion first mean researching Mysticism early anyway) fit in nicely with God King. Early aggression also favors , so Aggressive leaders may be inclined to use God King to further increase military unit production.

Your situation is also important. If you plan to adopt God King then become quite valuable in your capital (allowing you to produce early settlers in a timely fashion with instead of ). Lots of hills and/or mineral resource tiles benefit from God King, and so if you will be using that anyway you may want to place your capital to maximize your output. With Aristocracy it's all about the farms. Lots of flat Grassland and Flood Plains tiles begs for Aristocracy, because those tiles can also benefit most from Agrarianism (the natural companion civic to Aristocracy). Flat Plains tiles can be used for Cottages or Workshops, but too many of them and there may not be much benefit to using Aristocracy.

 

[DaveGold]

Move one space west and get more land around your city, plus two extra forests that will give you some city health.

Food is pretty easy to get in the early game so get that fast. For production you generally need mining and this can give you a dilemma. Either you get it too soon and your research grinds to a halt without commerce and buildings, or you get it too late and you can't chop forests or build up production. In the start you've linked up I'd certainly look at agriculture and calendar first of all, giving you a lot of food and some commerce from the resource. From there you can make some choices on crafting/mining, animal husbandry, festivals for markets, fishing, god king etc.

 

[pragmatic_labs]

Thanks. Good Info.

 

[Sanityfaerie]

I know I'm a bit late to the party, but I'd say that the first thing to consider is what speed you're playing on. If you're playing on one of the slower speeds, in particular, the first thing you should do is walk your starting settler (with his boosted vision) over to the tower to the west (just south of the mountain). That'll let you see a lot further in very short order, which might reveal a significantly better spot. If you're going for a fast enough game type that you don't want to do any prebuild scouting, however, I would certainly stay where you are rather than moving one west. Consider BFCs. They have a fair amount in common, but the changes....

Current position gets (effectively)
- ocean access to city
- 2 coastal tiles
- 1 river flat grassland tile (uncovered by city movement)
- 1 hill plains tile
- 1 river grasslands incense tile
- 1 hill plains forest tile

1W gets (effectively)
- 1 river flat plains tile (uncovered by city movement)
- 1 river hill plains tile
- 4 unknown tiles

in both cases, the city tile has a river. Neither city square is a plains hill, and neither city square has a special resource, so the city square resource outputs of both are identical Neither city square is a hill at all, so neither is getting the defensive benefit. The unknown tiles are quite likely (though not certain) to be better than the coastal tiles, and will probably be about equivalent to a hill plains tile or so. the hill plains forest tile and the freshwater hill tile are about the same. This is where civ choices kick in.

Let us assume for the moment that you're going aristograrian. You've got a classic aristograrian leader, with a solid aristograrian starting spot. This changes things.
- First, under aristograrian, you'll be putting farms on all of the (non-cow) freshwater plains and grassland spots. Under this setup, though, the grassland spots will be producing one more food than the plains spots, and otherwise identical.
- Second, you're going to be researching Calendar pretty quick regardless, since it significantly boosts your food income. Losing out on the one calendar resource you can see is going to cost you a fair bit in early commerce, and a nontrivial amount in overall commerce. It's also a happiness resource that won't have to wait for your second border pop.
- Third, you're going to have clams in your BFC regardless. Eventually, you're going to want to research fishing. (Note that "eventually" is likely sometime after you have aristocracy, unless for some reason you want to religion-race for OO - and OO is a particularly bad choice for Calabim. The religious units can't get vamped at any point along their development (first undead, then demon), and the Tower of Complacency turns off much of the benefit of the UB courthouse. Still, eventually). Still, you're going to want to research fishing, once you've built your tech-engine to the point that it's fairly trivial. Once you do, having access to the sea will let you build workboats, to get more out of the square (including a health resource), build a lighthouse (with Sailing) to get more out of all of your ocean squares (which at that point become at least unembarassing) and build a harbor, to get an additional health boost out of the clams, and more out of any other sea resources you may get. You'll also be able to build ships and trade along the coast, if either of these appeal to you. If you don't have your first city as a port, you'll almost certainly eventually have *a* city as a port, at which point you can build the workboats, but you'll never get the lighthouse for the extra food production or the harbor for the bonus health.

Note that technically, if the lanun aren't in the game and you have a nice healthy tech lead, and you are a coastal city, you may be able to build the Heron Throne. Lighthouse+heron throne+flauros makes the sea tiles worth 2 food, 1 hammer, 3 commerce each, which isn't bad at all. On the other hand, if you can afford to build the Heron Throne to buff three squares, only one of which is particularly good, then you're probably winning already anyway.

 

[Azhral]

Just having a financial leader means Coast Tiles are 3f 3c with a lighthouse. Don't write them off, considering Aristogracy is a good idea as Flauros and your Farmed Tiles will be producing very similar to that but a bit better.

 

[Emptiness]

Coast tiles are 1 /2 .
A Lighthouse will increase that to 2 /2 .
Financial will increase that to 2 /3 .
In order to get 3 /3 you have to be Financial and playing the Lanun - in other words Hannah the Irin.

 

[Azhral]

Ah, coast tiles have +1 commerce, not food.

Well, nevermind then. I still like them

 

[Angel-Julia]

I only really prioratise non-resource coast when playing Lanun. otherwise they are a waste, and only come into play in the late game when i have a lighthouse, and my cities are 20+, so they work all tiles in their BFC.

However as stated; Hannah the Irin loves coasts! with the coves built, and the whip, you get plenty of growth, commerce, and production from the whip. settlers are built INCREADIBLY fast with this food production, making settler spamming easy, no worries with economics with all those financial-coast tiles. also half-priced money changer to stack with this commerce, making a money powerhouse that makes the Khazad jelous.

hmm.... that gives me an idea for for team games; Lanun and Khazad as a team. Lanun as the money makers, all buildings for money (market, money changer etc, slider at 0%. then they give 2000gpt to Khazad, who have 100% research rate, and only libraries etc built(no need for cash as Lanun is financing everything), and use the money for half-priced unit upgrades(units gifted back to Lanun). Khazad will have phenominal production and mega-sized happy cities with the overflowing vaults. Lanun player takes all costal cities while Kahzad takes all inland cities. talk about a phenominal team!!!!

 

[Emptiness]

(units gifted back to Lanun)

You'll have to mod in unit gifting if you plan to do that.

 

[Breunor]

Late inthe game, I like the coastal cities becuase of the tremendous trade bonuses. For those of you playing on Pangaea, lakes, inland sea, or Erebus, this benefit is small; but on continents, small islands, archipelago, those coastal cities are worth a lot. Get the great lighthouse and all of your coastal cities are money machines. On continents, a nice strategy is to fight to clear your continent and get the huge moeny form trade from others (often requires astronomy).

Best wishes,

Breunor