Early game after patch

Even if I'm not going for a neighbor immediately (which I always do if there's a neighbor), I'm having trouble seeing slinger-settler being viable because of barbarians. I almost always seem to have at least one camp within serious threat range by the time I could finish the settler, and maybe 25%-30% of the time I get a wave because a barbarian scout made it back to camp. Chasing scouts is pretty much impossible prior to horseback riding, the only reason waves don't happen more often is scouts often continue to explore instead of heading back to report.

 

I don't think you can really scout in time for slinger,builder or slinger,settler. Maybe if you're surrounded by mountains or water on one side completely. Also there's the problem that if you are teching as fast as possible to archery, if you don't build slingers before it completes you're stuck with waiting for archers in the production queue. Also, an earlier slinger will help you achieve the "kill a unit with a slinger" eureka.

I mean I know its boring going for such a conservative build, but there really aren't games where I feel I lost because I built second and third slingers too early, but there are plenty of games I lost because I didn't do that.

 

It's very risky to go slinger - builder on a standard continents map. But it is also very possible to have enough scouted by the time that the slinger is built that you can kinda know if it will be OK to start the builder or not. Mainly, if I have not met anyone or only met City-States, then it is probably OK. This obviously also means no barbarians yet. But even if a scout shows up or a hut pops nearby, just the starting warrior can be enough to deal with it so long as you don't let the scout report back about your city. Adding 1 slinger is plenty to deal with a curious scout. Get good at anticipating where that scout is going next and herd him back to his starting hut.

 

I wonder if any of you experienced the same issues, and I wonder how you guys approach the early game and whether your approach changed since the latest patch.[/QUOTE]

Yes yes and yes. I started my first game since patch about a week ago on Emperor Large map. I am a lifelong Emperor player.

And I got DOW from Phillip on turn 30 or 40 I believe or sooner. About 5 turns later everyone on the map.

Ghandi, Warrior chick Schtyia, and a couple other players.. Everyone I knew at time DOW me . .

I love it. Let the games begin! Now we have a game to play.

But I must say. They made a huge mistake. I am going to clobber than all.

Game over

 

In many cases you need to archer rush, have your units placed perfectly, not declare war if its possible to be involved in two conflicts simultaneously, micro perfectly, and perhaps even get lucky on top of all that just to survive. If you do, then you can start thinking about moving out and taking a few cities.
.[/QUOTE]

Exactly. I am back to my strategy since CIV4 . Emperor level player....

Build a nice army. When ready attack someone . Or just wait to be attacked and counter punch hard.

You get huge advantage if your army is ready to find weakness in an AI attacking another Civ or just weak. Or underestimating you and attacking

 

I usually go 2-3 slingers, and a builder before I get to 50% research on craftsmanship. Depending on how exploration goes I'll generally hard research foreign trade.

 

On Deity, I try to get in a settler as quickly as possible. Getting that second city up and running fast is crucial. Often I will do slinger slinger settler campus. Then I will often buy the third slinger.

Ideally, with the right exploration, you can steal a settler from an AI civ and have 3 cities by turn 40. Then get a second campus up and start cranking out more troops. You can start to snowball from there, though it's not nearly as easy as before.

My strategy is still similar but I can't be as aggressive with how long I continue wars as I was in the past. You have to be more surgical now. Get what you want and get the good peace deal. Then switch to a different target. This way you keep juicing up your war machine with new spoils from peace deals. It makes a huge difference.

Also, don't be afraid of aggressive AIs threatening you with troop positioning. Be ready with your defenses, and as soon as they expose a weakness, you attack. Don't worry too much about warmonger. I think it is still pretty meaningless as you don't get much benefit from making everyone happy. Usually the only way to have all AI be happy with you on Deity is by you losing. Even then, they will eventually backstab because you are weak. Don't allow them that chance.

 

I stopped playing this game for a long while. Deity play became boring and repetitive, it did not really matter what civ I was playing the strategy stayed the same. Now with map and UI mods I find I really am enjoying the game on emperor. My play has become varied and focus is more on leader differences.

 

I'm finding the "playing it the same way" problem to be largely true. I haven't yet tried all the leaders, but it's gotten repetitive enough that I'm thinking I'll shelve it when I've gone through all of them.

It's not perfectly true, of course. There are small details that change for most civs, and some civs have unique units that change at least part of the game. With Sumeria, for example, the early rush is War Carts, not archers. It's still an early rush to take out a neighbor or at least grab that city they forward-settled next to my capitol.

The map seems to inject more into my decision making than anything else, since the geography and resources affect a great deal.

 

Hadn't played for a couple week (i.e. since the patch) until tonight when I cranked up a Trajan game on Immortal, Continents, else standard. Found France and 2 CS early, eventually saw that England and Sumeria also nearby. Per the usual plan, I played slinger-slinger-slinger-settler-builder, boosting to archers and settling my first city on the way to Paris. My timing is about what it always has been in games at this level. But I get to Paris and the countryside is swarming with French archers and warriors, plus a few English troops. Is this bad luck, due to the patch, or possibly because Sumeria DOWed France already and Catherine has been boosting her military? Would I be better to back up my armies to my own territory and await the inevitable DOW?

By the way, one nice thing about playing as Rome is that you don't have to worry about early monuments in your build order. I'll have to rethink my build strategy if I ever start playing as someone else.

 

People who play the 3 slinger approach may be missing the fact that CS protect you from barbs as well. I will fairly often start near a CS and while a normal 3 slinger approach loves this and takes the CS out I use this barb cover as an excuse to go slinger, builder, monument or scout, builder, settler.
Maybe 1 time in 5 I cannot get the archery eureka because I never take out CS. One of my rules just to make life more challenging.

 

If you intend to start the game with a warmongering focus, there's a solid case for building an encampment as your first district followed with barracks. Especially on deity, the combat bonus from a great general makes life a lot easier. This strat though might be only viable with civs benefiting from early UUs. I used this approach with Alex and it worked like a charm. i just couldnt find a damn military CS to get the +2 for unit building in my encampment but i had a terrific starting terrain mostly made of grassland hills.

My early rush with both UU and the GG made taking almost 10 cities a walk in the park.

 

I am almost always building encampment now as my second district in my capital on deity. It is too useful, especially since you can't always count on getting 2 iron or 2 horse.

However, great general is not really my focus there. On deity, AI will spam encampment in every city and will usually have like 12 or more great general points by like turn 70 or 80. Theres not really a chance for you to catch them in most instances, unless you are a superior warmongering civ and are steamrolling.