Can anybody do anyting from this start?

[NihilZero]

Random leader, standard fractal, immortal and normal speed with some quirky settings as I was in a quirky mood: choose religions, permanent alliances (I've still naver had one one of those), and those annoying huts and events are all on.

I got what seems to be to be about the worst start I've ever seen.

Spoiler :

Don't be fooled by the inocuous screenshot, it's a lot worse than it looks.

I know some of you love a challenge, so I'd be most interested to see what you guys can get from this.

Here's how I did:

Spoiler :

After moving my warrior, I settled on the hill for some corn. Took one look at the barren, empty wasteland surrounding my capital, and concluded that there was only one option - rush one of my (very) near neighbours. Discovered horse, but my crappy capital was production poor, yet I started to make chariots. By now Augustus had of course built the GW, so my land was laid waste by a massive concerted barb assault. I repelled the swine with my chariots after losing most of my improvements around Beijing.

By now I had two cities (I settled a very bad one near the gold for want of something better to do while waiting for horse to come online) while both my rivals had six apiece. I had about four chariots. It was 1400 BC or so. I gave up.

Oh, and I never found any huts either. Why did I bother turning them on?

Good luck. Please let me know how you got on, I expect to see some victories!

I hope the save works, I have BUG or something like that...

 

[TheMeInTeam]

With PA I can say for 100% certain it's winnable already, but I'll play it to see if we can win WITHOUT leaning on that.

 

[NihilZero]

PA?

I'm sure it's winnable, but just not for me (or maybe if I didn't give up so easily when things get ugly ).

edit - oh yeah, permanent alliance. I really have to get one of those sometime.

 

[vicawoo]

Brown coastal = great lighthouse

 

[Grashopa]

Spoiler :

SIP, Hunting - AH warrior first. This would have been more diabolical with the warrior starting on the other side of the settler. Found Shaka and choked.

This was annoying to see since I thought I had elephants locked up.

Got 4 workers off Shaka, didn't even put a turn into a worker myself. HBR will nab me Shakas capital... I probably should have allowed his settler to go out, but I chased it down when the archers fled back into the city I can't imagine having much of a problem at this point.

 

[NihilZero]

@ Grashopa:

Spoiler :

Looks good, Shaka is in trouble. Are you concerned about Augustus taking over the rest of the continent, though? He expanded pretty fast in my game.

Still, if you get Shaka's capital you will at least have one decent city, which is pretty good on this map.

Choking is something I need to try, this seems like an ideal scenario for it.

 

[Durak]

@grashopa

Spoiler :

Why sip? Moving on to the hill for the corn seems better no? Or moving 1E to get the fish?

 

[Grashopa]

durak

Spoiler :

The only thing I noticed was 1E for the fish, but I wanted to trust the map generator balancing my start and just didn't feel like a double workboat start.

Nihil

Spoiler :

I don't really see much of the map, so I'm assuming I'm good with the double capital. I'd have attacked the other AI as well if I knew he was so close and obviously with IMP hes a monster settling my ivory that early. I expect I would attack him for the ivory city.. Perhaps I'll have to play it out some more.

 

[DreamworK]

which china man are you?

 

[NihilZero]

Chairman Mao.

 

[obsolete]

I got what seems to be to be about the worst start I've ever seen.

You must have been the luckiest player on earth so far, but discovered you are way out of your league right now. Don't even get me started on this being a bad spot, I am locked in a tuff deity game with Kossin & Shy on a bugged map where the PoS generator failed to give us any food resources in our BFC. But we are sticking it out despite the AIs have all the goodies they could want in THEIRS.

BTW, there is a good reason why Perm Alliance is not turned on by default. Don't ever turn that crap on again.

 

[NihilZero]

Vintage Obsolete post.

Have you looked at the surrounding terrain, btw? It's bad. You can't tell much by just looking at the screenshot.

 

[obsolete]

To be honest, no I haven't looked at the sourrounding terrain. But I've won games with nothing but settling on ice patches with settings a lot harder than what you have here, and so have many others, so I can't see how there should be a problem.

Now... I suppose you are going to try and goad me into it...

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You must have been the luckiest player on earth so far, but discovered you are way out of your league right now. Don't even get me started on this being a bad spot, I am locked in a tuff deity game with Kossin & Shy on a bugged map where the PoS generator failed to give us any food resources in our BFC. But we are sticking it out despite the AIs have all the goodies they could want in THEIRS.

BTW, there is a good reason why Perm Alliance is not turned on by default. Don't ever turn that crap on again.

I used to think this wasn't possible.

Then I got put in a pitboss game where my BFC was visible, and had 0 food resources and 0 tiles that could be irrigated...and was on a peninsula with forest/hills blocking. I actually uploaded that screen shot it was so bad.

The worst start EVER, however, was one posted long ago by another player. The guy saw no reason to avoid settling in place and did so. After his borders revealed the surrounding land, he discovered that 1) his capitol was not coastal and 2) settling a 2nd city was not possible, because the rest of the land on the continent was blocked by a peak, and there were no sites available on his side of the peak.

Basically, it was a forced OCC without most national wonders or any means to attack anybody before fascism/flight...totally unplayable on any high-ish difficulty.

 

[lsgag]

@NihilZero

I played the map and its lots of brownland and not a great capital, but i gave it a try.

Spoiler :

Since I moved the settler 1 north, since i was worried to lose the fish i didnt get horses in my BFC, so i didn't opt for a rush.

I researched fishing, hunting, ah, bronze, writing (i think in that order). I settled my second city on the hill, for extra defence in case shake or Caesar would attack immediately grabbing the gold for science. 3rd city it build one of the coast for blocking purpose, but i should have settled it 1 north. Fortunately August didn't like my lands and i couldn't agree more with him.

my 4th and fith city where gift cities to the zulu and ceasar and it worked they attacked each other.

After aestatics which i traded around for alpha, ironworking, and some backfilling i went for TGL and then to music to build these wonders so i keep the zula and ceasar of my back. Then i went for meditation and drama to bulb philo and use the artist to change to pacificm for 2 precious GS and to switch to bureacratie.

Right now i am in doubt what to do the land is really crap. I have a lead to liberalism though i dont know how big, because i didnt meat everyone. But it seems i have at least 2 techs on everyone. My plan was to pick Scietific method after researching optics and astronomy and bulbing printingpress but of course i am blessed with an GA instead of a GS, but with the next one i can bulb printingpress partially. And then going for communism while focucising on production try to hit august and shaka with cavelery, but i really have no clue, how to win this game.

Any ideas? The save is 1 turn from lib, i didnt borther to build uni's since i hardly make science but I will after completing, the religious buildings since im building the UoS.

Science, Diplo, Land,

Spoiler :

 

[NihilZero]

@ Obsolete - no, I'm not trying to goad you, I'm sure you would win the map quite easily as you are an acomplished player. I just thought it was a bad map so I'm curious to see how other people might approach it. I'm a pretty bad player and I have a lot to learn.

@ lsgag

Spoiler :

Nicely played, I think you've done about as much as you posibly could with what you have available. The land is commerce poor, food poor, and resource poor - and that's just the parts of it that aren't desert or tundra.

I pinned my hopes on a rush to get some decent land but a large scale barb attack slowed me down and my capital was very production poor. As for how to win from where you are, I'm not sure. Your position doesn't look particularly strong for war or space. That leaves diplo or culture. You have very little commerce but you did nab the Sistine, so you might be able to eke out a slow culture win with Sistine caste artists and the awesome power of the pavillion!

 

[lsgag]

@Nihilzero i probably should go indeed for culture, but i decided otherwise though.

Spoiler :

First i went with my scientic method plan, i got a Great Scientist and when i had enough research in astronomy i made with saladin for printing press which left my GS to bulb Astronomy. Took SM from lib and started on communism.


Made some trades with hanibal and saladin after i got communism and teched rifling while trigging a GA. Switching to serfdom to make some quick improvements. After completing the kremlin it was draft and whipe time. I love wiping with the kremlin.

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Then i declared war on Ceaser because he was the closer to rifling then shaka. Shaka and Ceasar are also in war and i did something stupid. I wanted shake to crush his defences and eliminate his own stack and ceasars stack. After this turn Ceasar capitulated (see screenshot) and my army was set back to my gift city cian.

Spoiler :

healed 1 turn and then redeclared, but im again at a position i dont know how to end this game. I guess i first whipe ceasar of the island and then eliminate shake. I dont know how i can vassel him if he has ceasar as a vassel and with me remove ceasar from the island i think he wont break free. I will play tomorrow i guess.

My troops

Spoiler :

Ceasar Mainland cities

Spoiler :

 

[NihilZero]

@ lsgag

Spoiler :

Impressive! I didn't think you had the production base to conquer anybody, but it seems that the draft plus Kremlin whipping can give you enough units to kill somebody with significantly better land. Taking out Shaka might be tough as he loves to spam units, but if it can be done you should have enough land to win however you please.

 

[r_rolo1]

The map isn't so bad at all... And I got far worse luck than anyone in here:

Spoiler :

both Shaka and AC expanded towards me ... in fact, Shaka even settled a city 1 SE of the horses near the cap and founded a religion there before i could pull my first settler out. I was when I seen that : no not shaka being a city spammer, but founding a religion soon

Anyway, this is definitely doable. I'm even provoking Shaka in warring me pre contruction ... nothing like seeing one of this moron AI that spam units suiciding them without bombing the city vs pro archers .

 

[Grashopa]

rolo - put up some screens, I think the problem people have is not seeing the commerce and the production in the land. And yeah PRO is great right? GGs do make a game easy.