Dealing with isolation

[duckduckswan]

Hey there everyone! I'm a long, longtime lurker of this wonderful website, first time poster.

An issue that I've come across a few times and never quite found a satisfactory solution, is when you're isolated to your own island and so unable to communicate with other civ's until Optics is researched for caravels.

For instance, right now I'm playing a game as Pericles of the Greeks on a small, Fractal map. I spawned on an island with the Germans who didn't seem to be doing much of anything other than creating the Great Lighthouse. I didn't have any metals but they had copper, luckily horses spawned near my capital so I rushed to get Horseback Riding. Once I had a handful of Horse Archers I raised the Germans expansion city and took over their capital. About this time I had wandered around our little island and discovered we were all alone and surrounded by island. At this point I plunked down a few cities in places but had to drop the research slider down to 50%.

Now, I decided to bee-line to Optics so that I could travel the world and meet everyone for tech-trading, hopefully I'd still have something worthwhile once I met the others. Is there a better idea than this? I'm afraid I'll fall far behind everyone because I won't be able to broker for any techs, and there's hardly any reason to invest in a military other than what I have (no fog left for barbs to spawn).

So what do you guys do when you're locked away from everyone? Is the game moot at this point? I could post the save if anyone's interested, it's a Prince difficulty if that would affect anything. Thanks!

 

[Krixx]

I usually find that if I´m alone on a rather big Island you´ll have an empire that is so much better than the AIs that you will eventually catch up.

What you also can do is to neglect some of the older techs and trade them once you meet AIs.

Beelining Caravel is of course also important.

 

[Bhruic]

Conventional wisdom seems to skew towards cottaging the island as much as you can manage. The idea is that you shouldn't need nearly as much of a military as normal (basically, just anti-barb units), and you shouldn't have as much of need for stuff like military production cities. Therefore, you can (theoretically, anyway) aim all of your cities at science production.

My personal experience is that that works - to a point. You'll still be somewhat behind other Civs, but not to an unsurmountable degree. However, the AI is much better at naval invasions now, so you need to be sure that your military has caught up nicely by the time the AI is getting Astronomy going. Otherwise you'll get hammered by invasions and lose any advantage you've got going for you.

Bh

 

[Cam_H]

Refer to the 'Lonely Hearts' series for plenty of ideas (hopefully these links are right );

Lonely Hearts Club, Chapter III : Zara Yacob
Lonely Hearts Club, Warlords Edition, Chapter V: Brennus
Lonely Hearts Club, BTS Edition, Chapter II : Willem van Oranje
Lonely Hearts Club, BTS Edition, Chapter I : D. João II
Lonely Hearts 4b - Imperial Frederick
Lonely Hearts 4 - Roosevelt
Lonely Hearts 3: Elizabeth
Lonely Hearts 2: Shaka
Lonely Hearts Club: Huayna Capac

 

[r_rolo1]

First of all, welcome to the CFC posting community !

I usually find that if I´m alone on a rather big Island you´ll have an empire that is so much better than the AIs that you will eventually catch up.

What you also can do is to neglect some of the older techs and trade them once you meet AIs.

Beelining Caravel is of course also important.

I agree with the first and second paragraph, not with the third ( atleast not fully ). Isolated starts ( or 1 unlucky neighbour ones ) are all about teching until you reach Astro because you need to overcome the AI-AI tech trades and the foreign trade routes deficit ( from then are just more or less like normal games ) and the best tech path to maximize our teching abilities is the 3 Cs ( or four, dependind of what resources you have) : Currency, CoL, CS ( and Calendar ). Having Optics requires Machinery, a very expensive tech that does not add to your tech research.
Other thing that you should consider is that as sooner you meet the AI, sooner they have the chance of hating you and ploting your fall. Most likely you'll be of a diferent religion and ( possibly ) militarily weaker ( why build a army if there is no one to war with? ), making you a sweet target. In some of mine Lonely Hearts Club games ( open games in isolated starts ) I had AI that were with their hands full since they met me and that attacked as soon as they reached Astro.... Sometimes it is better to be in the shadows as long as you can and let the AI find you.
A third issue is that the Optics tech path drives you away from the Lib one....

Conventional wisdom seems to skew towards cottaging the island as much as you can manage. The idea is that you shouldn't need nearly as much of a military as normal (basically, just anti-barb units), and you shouldn't have as much of need for stuff like military production cities. Therefore, you can (theoretically, anyway) aim all of your cities at science production.

My personal experience is that that works - to a point. You'll still be somewhat behind other Civs, but not to an unsurmountable degree. However, the AI is much better at naval invasions now, so you need to be sure that your military has caught up nicely by the time the AI is getting Astronomy going. Otherwise you'll get hammered by invasions and lose any advantage you've got going for you.

Bh

This is one of the possible aproaches ( and one of the most consistent ). Others include prioritizing coastal cities and get the GLightHouse and the Collosus, ReXing and SE, some religious aproaches ( Henge + Oracle ( if you have the woods to chop them ), bulb to theo, AP , Optics path, careful religious spread, AP win ( this may requires CS for chain irrigation ) ).....

EDIT Cam_H, thanks for the links... I should had assembled them a long time ago

 

[TheStealthRhino]

Personally, when locked on an island by myself, I go for a cultural victory.

Getting 3 Legendary cities on an island isn't that hard, if you can found 9 cities total. 9 cities allows for 9 temples, and in turn, 3 cathedrals per city which produce +50%. Obviously, this requires you to be the founder of these religions, or you'll have to wait for caravels to come over to you, allowing you access to foreign religions. Convert, build a monestary, and some missionaries, and you're off and running.

Add to that Free Speech multiplier gained from Liberalism of +100%, Sistine Chapel for +2 per specialist, and some settled great artists for +14 and you can get upwards of 500 culture per turn by 1500AD.

Also, if a city falls behind in culture, a GA can be popped for +4000.

This strategy works for me on Noble/Prince on continents with standard settings.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

My favorite for an isolated start is diplomacy. Better than culture or any of the other wins.

Reason being that you avoid a lot of the negatives that close proximity to other AIs can bring. By the time you meet the AIs:

- You have no border penalties.
- You can see who hates who and decide who to trade with to avoid worst enemy penalties.
- You are close to liberalism and free religion to remove religion penalties.
- You never rushed anyone early so no declared war on friend penalties.
- You know who the probable opposition in the UN vote will be based on pop and since the land is all settled it probably wont change.
- You can pick who is likely to vote for you and work on making friends.

Once you have picked the AIs whose vote you want you trade techs, gift, never refuse their requests, open borders, trade resources. All these should get you at least +8 and often higher. By organizing wars between the AIs and joining in (and bribing your friends to join in) you can easily pick up the remaining points to friendly by mutual struggle points. Beeline mass media and win.

If things don't go to plan then beelining as far as radio and then heading into the space techs and laboratories gives a good backup strategy for a space race win.

All wins are possible from isolation (I've done all except time - even conquest is possible).

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Isolated starts are really tough stuff, from my experience:
- no early rushing the enemy's capital
- no capturing enemy wonders
- no pillaging enemy improvements for gold
- no vassals to do the dirty work for you

And a minor point:
- no trading techs

Seriously though, beelining to optics is the only way out. But don't worry too much about the "beeline" part though, because oracle slingshot to MC, forge, engineer and pop for machinery makes it a lot easier. Here's what I just did in my last isolated start:

- research writing, build library
- oracle, metal casting
- research code of laws yourself. You won't get confucianism
- get great prophet, set him to sleep
- get great scientist, pop philosophy with him
- get great engineer, pop for machinery
- research compass and optics
- pop great prophet for civil service OR build great wall and pop great prophet for Dai Miao, your choice.
- wait for scientists to pop paper and education.
- while waiting, try to trade for monarchy, drama or calendar in return for optics. The AI would have had MC, compass and machinery at this point
- (hopefully) win the liberalism race and get astronomy

Notes:
- specialist economy, please. I'm a cottage economist, but isolated starts are all about lightbulbing, and fast. ALL other nations are runaway AI's, essentially.
- If you only have 1 or 2 hapiness resources in the whole continent, put a stack of archers in each city. Units within cultural borders don't cost a lot to maintain, and size 10 cities are WAAAAY better than size 5 ones, even for the upkeep cost of the garrison troops. Since you're isolated, these garrison troops won't leave the city anyway.

 

[r_rolo1]

Isolated starts are really tough stuff, from my experience:
- no early rushing the enemy's capital
- no capturing enemy wonders
- no pillaging enemy improvements for gold
- no vassals to do the dirty work for you

And a minor point:
- no trading techs

Nice resume of the situation

Seriously though, beelining to optics is the only way out. But don't worry too much about the "beeline" part though, because oracle slingshot to MC, forge, engineer and pop for machinery makes it a lot easier. Here's what I just did in my last isolated start:

- research writing, build library
- oracle, metal casting
- research code of laws yourself. You won't get confucianism
- get great prophet, set him to sleep
- get great scientist, pop philosophy with him
- get great engineer, pop for machinery
- research compass and optics
- pop great prophet for civil service OR build great wall and pop great prophet for Dai Miao, your choice.
- wait for scientists to pop paper and education.
- while waiting, try to trade for monarchy, drama or calendar in return for optics. The AI would have had MC, compass and machinery at this point
- (hopefully) win the liberalism race and get astronomy

A way of doing things ( that works BTW , especially with a Philo leader ( who was your leader, BTW? )), but IMHO it is not the best way ( like I posted above ). I really prefer focusing in the path to Lib ( that grabs most of the economical key techs ) and backfill when contacted by the AI ( you don't need Optics to contact the outer world if the AI have it )

Notes:
- specialist economy, please. I'm a cottage economist, but isolated starts are all about lightbulbing, and fast. ALL other nations are runaway AI's, essentially.

I do not agree that SE is vital or even necessary for winning a isolated start. Isolation helps both CE and SE ( helps CE by giving you time to work your cottages, to not whip your citizens because of a emergency war and by having time to choose the best spots. t helps SE mostly because of the same reasons ( time to settle the best spots and not big need for the whip ), but a the main strength of a lightbulbing SE is negated by the simple fact that you are isolated ( can't trade techs until contact with the outer world ). My personal preference is a HR Beauro CE economy until contact ( with BtS sometimes it is better to postpone GP generation to the modern ages, to get the juicy corps )

- If you only have 1 or 2 hapiness resources in the whole continent, put a stack of archers in each city. Units within cultural borders don't cost a lot to maintain, and size 10 cities are WAAAAY better than size 5 ones, even for the upkeep cost of the garrison troops. Since you're isolated, these garrison troops won't leave the city anyway.

Signed under... In isolation you need big cites and HR is the more reliable way of getting the necessary ( Rep would be useful too, but early Rep relies in having a heavy pile of rocks )( BTW a random fact that I only discovered in my last isolated game: Gunships do not do MP work )

 

[xanadux]

It's really not that bad, and you have a lot of options. The main thing is you have to do all your own researching until optics, so the key is building a strong economy. That's the focus with an isolated start. Everything goes into economic development.

At least on Monarch and below, and even Emperor unless the other continent is a big happy religious tech trading family, straight forward economic building is fine. You don't even have to get optics early. You can just shoot for Liberalism if you want and let the AIs find you.

The way you build the economy depends on leader traits and land available. If you are industrious, have stone, or plenty of forests, consider the pyramids a strong option. Starting with representation and keeping it if you run a lot of specialists and have some happy resources, and switching to HR if necessary helps a great deal, and you don't have to bother with any of the techs up through monarchy.

Especially if philisophical (though phi is not necessary), producing a lot of great scientists and settling them in one city for oxford is very strong. Although you may be a little slower teching in the short run, and might be slightly behind the AI overall when you meet, getting Liberalism first should be rather easy, and over time the settled scientists under representation will produce massive beakers.

2 decent cottaged cities is usually sufficient, and even 1 when allowed to run high science slider with oxford supported by a merchant specialist city.

Colossus economy is an option as well. I've easily won the Lib race on emperor with almost no specialists and no cottages from an isolated start because there were enough coastal city locations.

Just look at the map, decide how you are going to get happy, and how you are going to get beakers, and build a monster economy. As long as you have enough decent land, an isolated start isn't so bad.