*Note: I plan on editing this post when I have time*
Hey all. there are a lot of challenge games going on to help spur discussion on optimizing game play. One thing that i've always wanted out of these games is what's going on in the heads of the people playing. Often times a player will tell you what he did, but not why. the closest I've seen to a player giving the most insight as to why they do what they do is in Unconquered Sun's Justinians University: Defeating the Deities threadhttp://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=242211. What I would like to provide for players trying to move up to emperor or monarch is a detailed account of why higher level players actually do the things that they do. What I also hope from this is a constructive critique of my game play and strategy
. alright so lets get on with the game.
The settings
The Civ:
So we're going to be playing Sumeria. It's starting techs are wheel and agriculture. If we don't start off with a farmable resource, this means it won't hurt us a lot to go for AH for pigs (if it can't be farmed/mined). It also means that we'll be able to research Pot pretty quickly.
The initial strategy will be similar to axident's Immortal Dutch Domination strategy: REX/Spy Fusion, which is a great read btw http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=240749.however, supporting REXing with a non-financial civ will be a bit harder. we might fall behind techwise, but that's what the espionage is for. grabbing the land early will be very important. My initial thoughts are we need GW for the GSpy and Oracle to grab Alphabet very early. However, Confucianism and Metal Casting are both tempting as well. Confucianism not so much since we get Zigs with priesthood. I'll only get that if we can research alphabet cheaply and no other civ we encounter has founded a religion. MC is always useful to grab since it takes forever to tech and is good for trading, but because of espionage, i doubt we'll be doing much trading. Alright, lets see where our civilization will start off!
Well...I actually DIDNT want gold in the BFC, just because I wanted it to be more of a challenge. we're lucky that we got a corn, but besides the corn and the gold, there isnt much else. Thanks to the river below us, we'll be able to farm the grassland and the corn giving us a surplus of +4
. This means that we'll be able to work the gold and the plains hill at a population of 5. Not to bad, but there isnt a whole lot of growth potential until bureaucracy. We also seem to be on a branch of of a larger continent, but from my experience, I don't know if the branch will be to the N or S. So i send my warrior S to get a better look since it seems like the land mass will be to the S. I settle in place.
looks like i was wrong lol. I still move the warrior one more SE just to get a better image of the area (I could have let culture explore it for me, but I just wanted to make sure). I start my build with a worker to get the corn up and running as fast as possible and mining so I can get the gold up and running. It'll take 15 turns to complete the worker and 8 to finish mining. I should have the mine done while I'm about done with BW.
my borders pop and assimilate the hut and I get AH! great, this means that I'll be able to see any horses when i get my settler out as well as work any pigs/sheep/cows my warrior may find me. things are turning up MrFelony
I send my warrior North to expand, it looks like there is desert to my east so I presume we're in the "desert belt" that i've heard about. can someone direct me a link that talks about the geography of maps? I know that there are desert and jungle belts, I just want to be able to better understand what i am to expect on maps from where I'm placed. from the look of things, it's jungle to the north. That means expansion is going to be a hassle, I might have to prioritize IW (especially if i dont find horses or bronze).
The NE isn't looking so promising so I send my warrior NW/W. hopefully there will be something worthwhile in the jungle, or maybe it's not all jungle
. Also, I believe that Zara is going to be in the NE somewhere and De Gaule is somewhere on that island area to the east. I figure this because DG's scout is traveling NE and Zara's is going SW.
We'll I guess we can't expect everything to go so nicely. that -1 wont kill us, but it may just mean we'll have to unleash the vultures on his cities
.
As for Uruk, I had finished my worker and set him loose on the corn first because city growth is of the utmost importance. I then began to build a warrior to let my city grow. I finish the warrior i let it work one more turn on a 2nd warrior (i will need guards for my settlers/fogbusting) but plan on only working it one turn until i grow to size 3 and immediately switch to a settler. After BW, I begin chopping the forest on the plains hill. I dont mine it because I want to get my settler out as soon as possible so I'll be chopping for now. also a note, it takes the same amount of time to chop and then build as it does to just mine it (one more if you move on to do something else since you have to get back on the hill), so when you're building something that needs completing sooner as opposed to later, it's better to chop it first then build the mine (or move to another forest to chop). I also began researching masonry for the GW. and then this!
3 gems in the jungle
. I calculate how many turns it'll take me to get a settler there. along with the chop and moving him, it'll take about the same amount of turns as researching IW. So i switch research to IW, continue chopping my settler and then another good thing happens
this'll make a great spot to farm or cottage. (i may farm since I'm low on in this city and will probably use it for mostly production right now). my warrior continues north and makes another great discovery. there be copper up north, and it looks like a pretty great city site.
so it looks like i'm going to chop rush 2 settlers now instead of one. I'll then have to start pumping out some workers to make up for the fact that I'll have 1 worker to 3 cities, but as of right now I think it'll be more important to make sure i grab that city site before Zara who is very close (i can see his borders).
here is my dot map (i'm sorry it's bad, i dont have any photo editor on my main comp and had to use my laptops paint
).
The yellow city is my priority since zara threatens settling near there and red will be settled shorty after that. they have 3 overlaps, but I really dont think that's bad. the reason why I believe, IMO, that the yellow spot is better than 1 NE is because it'll be on the river which will mean +7
with a dike (i play dutch too much so i forget what it's normally called lol) and +25% defense for being on a hill. however, it means it loses possible intercontinental trade. If someone makes a good argument I would consider changing to a dif spot. as for the overlap, that wont matter for a long time. red city wont use the hill since it'll be a commerce city.
AS for the teal/pink city. I prefer the teal site for similar reasons, but also because I'm trading 1 desert, 2 plains, 1 plains hill and a water tile for 2 grassland tiles, 1 grassland hill and 1 plains hill (potentially 2). but i do lose intercontinental trade again here. What this means is that the GLighthouse will be less important for my civilization. What I need to do is explore more to the west to see what's along the coast. I'll probably end up throwing a city or two there for seafood resources/trade.
Here are tech/build orders
Mining ->AH (hut)->BW->masonry (5turns left)->IW(6turnsleft)->back to masonry->myst->polytheism->priesthood->oracle->IW
Worker->warrior->warrior (1 turn)->settler(chopped)->worker(going to be chopped)->GW->Settler->worker
as for the Oracle, I plan on building it in the bronze city, but i have to do some calculations to check the timing on everything. I also plan on chopping all/most of the forests in my cap for the GW and settlers
If anyone has any questions about anything i did, no matter how dumb sounding, just post or im me
WOW that was very long
I'll probably be more concise in future updates or go back and edit this, but for now i need to get to bed
Hey all. there are a lot of challenge games going on to help spur discussion on optimizing game play. One thing that i've always wanted out of these games is what's going on in the heads of the people playing. Often times a player will tell you what he did, but not why. the closest I've seen to a player giving the most insight as to why they do what they do is in Unconquered Sun's Justinians University: Defeating the Deities threadhttp://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=242211. What I would like to provide for players trying to move up to emperor or monarch is a detailed account of why higher level players actually do the things that they do. What I also hope from this is a constructive critique of my game play and strategy
. alright so lets get on with the game.The settings
Spoiler :
as I like to call the map, Biggie Smalls 
The Civ:
Spoiler :
So we're going to be playing Sumeria. It's starting techs are wheel and agriculture. If we don't start off with a farmable resource, this means it won't hurt us a lot to go for AH for pigs (if it can't be farmed/mined). It also means that we'll be able to research Pot pretty quickly.
The initial strategy will be similar to axident's Immortal Dutch Domination strategy: REX/Spy Fusion, which is a great read btw http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=240749.however, supporting REXing with a non-financial civ will be a bit harder. we might fall behind techwise, but that's what the espionage is for. grabbing the land early will be very important. My initial thoughts are we need GW for the GSpy and Oracle to grab Alphabet very early. However, Confucianism and Metal Casting are both tempting as well. Confucianism not so much since we get Zigs with priesthood. I'll only get that if we can research alphabet cheaply and no other civ we encounter has founded a religion. MC is always useful to grab since it takes forever to tech and is good for trading, but because of espionage, i doubt we'll be doing much trading. Alright, lets see where our civilization will start off!
Spoiler :
Well...I actually DIDNT want gold in the BFC, just because I wanted it to be more of a challenge. we're lucky that we got a corn, but besides the corn and the gold, there isnt much else. Thanks to the river below us, we'll be able to farm the grassland and the corn giving us a surplus of +4
. This means that we'll be able to work the gold and the plains hill at a population of 5. Not to bad, but there isnt a whole lot of growth potential until bureaucracy. We also seem to be on a branch of of a larger continent, but from my experience, I don't know if the branch will be to the N or S. So i send my warrior S to get a better look since it seems like the land mass will be to the S. I settle in place. Spoiler :
looks like i was wrong lol. I still move the warrior one more SE just to get a better image of the area (I could have let culture explore it for me, but I just wanted to make sure). I start my build with a worker to get the corn up and running as fast as possible and mining so I can get the gold up and running. It'll take 15 turns to complete the worker and 8 to finish mining. I should have the mine done while I'm about done with BW.
my borders pop and assimilate the hut and I get AH
! great, this means that I'll be able to see any horses when i get my settler out as well as work any pigs/sheep/cows my warrior may find me. things are turning up MrFelonySpoiler :
I send my warrior North to expand, it looks like there is desert to my east so I presume we're in the "desert belt" that i've heard about. can someone direct me a link that talks about the geography of maps? I know that there are desert and jungle belts, I just want to be able to better understand what i am to expect on maps from where I'm placed. from the look of things, it's jungle to the north. That means expansion is going to be a hassle, I might have to prioritize IW (especially if i dont find horses or bronze).
Spoiler :
The NE isn't looking so promising so I send my warrior NW/W. hopefully there will be something worthwhile in the jungle, or maybe it's not all jungle
. Also, I believe that Zara is going to be in the NE somewhere and De Gaule is somewhere on that island area to the east. I figure this because DG's scout is traveling NE and Zara's is going SW. Spoiler :
We'll I guess we can't expect everything to go so nicely. that -1 wont kill us, but it may just mean we'll have to unleash the vultures on his cities
. As for Uruk, I had finished my worker and set him loose on the corn first because city growth is of the utmost importance. I then began to build a warrior to let my city grow. I finish the warrior i let it work one more turn on a 2nd warrior (i will need guards for my settlers/fogbusting) but plan on only working it one turn until i grow to size 3 and immediately switch to a settler. After BW, I begin chopping the forest on the plains hill. I dont mine it because I want to get my settler out as soon as possible so I'll be chopping for now. also a note, it takes the same amount of time to chop and then build as it does to just mine it (one more if you move on to do something else since you have to get back on the hill), so when you're building something that needs completing sooner as opposed to later, it's better to chop it first then build the mine (or move to another forest to chop). I also began researching masonry for the GW. and then this!
Spoiler :
3 gems in the jungle
. I calculate how many turns it'll take me to get a settler there. along with the chop and moving him, it'll take about the same amount of turns as researching IW. So i switch research to IW, continue chopping my settler and then another good thing happensSpoiler :
this'll make a great spot to farm or cottage. (i may farm since I'm low on
in this city and will probably use it for mostly production right now). my warrior continues north and makes another great discovery. there be copper up north, and it looks like a pretty great city site. Spoiler :
so it looks like i'm going to chop rush 2 settlers now instead of one. I'll then have to start pumping out some workers to make up for the fact that I'll have 1 worker to 3 cities, but as of right now I think it'll be more important to make sure i grab that city site before Zara who is very close (i can see his borders).
here is my dot map (i'm sorry it's bad, i dont have any photo editor on my main comp and had to use my laptops paint
). Spoiler :
The yellow city is my priority since zara threatens settling near there and red will be settled shorty after that. they have 3 overlaps, but I really dont think that's bad. the reason why I believe, IMO, that the yellow spot is better than 1 NE is because it'll be on the river which will mean +7
with a dike (i play dutch too much so i forget what it's normally called lol) and +25% defense for being on a hill. however, it means it loses possible intercontinental trade. If someone makes a good argument I would consider changing to a dif spot. as for the overlap, that wont matter for a long time. red city wont use the hill since it'll be a commerce city. AS for the teal/pink city. I prefer the teal site for similar reasons, but also because I'm trading 1 desert, 2 plains, 1 plains hill and a water tile for 2 grassland tiles, 1 grassland hill and 1 plains hill (potentially 2). but i do lose intercontinental trade again here. What this means is that the GLighthouse will be less important for my civilization. What I need to do is explore more to the west to see what's along the coast. I'll probably end up throwing a city or two there for seafood resources/trade.
Here are tech/build orders
Mining ->AH (hut)->BW->masonry (5turns left)->IW(6turnsleft)->back to masonry->myst->polytheism->priesthood->oracle->IW
Worker->warrior->warrior (1 turn)->settler(chopped)->worker(going to be chopped)->GW->Settler->worker
as for the Oracle, I plan on building it in the bronze city, but i have to do some calculations to check the timing on everything. I also plan on chopping all/most of the forests in my cap for the GW and settlers
If anyone has any questions about anything i did, no matter how dumb sounding, just post or im me
WOW that was very long
I'll probably be more concise in future updates or go back and edit this, but for now i need to get to bed
