Emperor Game (COMPLETED)

[Wrathful]

Hey guys, first post here. I've been reading this forum for several months now, so I figure it's time for me to emerge from the shadows and really start to improve my skills. I've read that the best way to learn is to post a game and play slowly with advice, so that's what I'm going to do here.

Here are the settings...

• Pangaea
  
• Standard Size (6 AIs)
  
• Emperor Difficulty
• Standard climate, sea level, etc.
• No Tribal Villages
• No Random Events
• Normal Speed

Our randomly-selected leader is...

Spoiler Leader :

A good leader. Philosophical is a great trait, although I need more experience to be able to leverage it well. Starting techs are good, unique unit is good for guaranteed barbarian defense, protective and totem pole aren't very good, though. At least they have some synergy. Overall, I like him. Not too weak, but not overpowered.

And here's the start...

Spoiler Start :

I have not made any moves yet. Here are my initial thoughts:

• Move warrior SW, if there's nothing special revealed then settle 1S for the plains hill. This costs a turn, but I will be able to build a worker in 12 turns instead of 15.
  
• Set research to Animal Husbandry. Worker will improve pigs then sheep? Or should I research something else? I suppose I can wait until T5 to make a choice.

The save is attached. I will wait for advice before playing further. After getting advice, I'll play until first tech is researched/ worker is built, then wait for more advice. Does this sound like a good plan?

PS: I hope the images work properly. I had some trouble getting them uploaded.

 

[Pedro78]

Hey welcome!

Move warrior SW, if there's nothing special revealed then settle 1S for the plains hill. This costs a turn, but I will be able to build a worker in 12 turns instead of 15.

Yup that's what I would do aswell

What difficulty are you usually playing on? When posting a forum game and waiting for advice it's recommended to play 1-2 difficulties level above usual (IMM max though).

Anyways, the best piece of advice I can give you right now is be patient. There will always be people to comment on your game and teach you things, the biggest problem with this kind of forum game is that usually OP just drops the game after a few turnsets
But if you can keep this going until T150 I guarantee you that fairly soon you'll have no trouble beating IMM

 

[Wrathful]

What difficulty are you usually playing on? When posting a forum game and waiting for advice it's recommended to play 1-2 difficulties level above usual (IMM max though).

Hey, thanks for the feedback! I have beaten Emperor before, but that was some time ago. Recently, whenever I try to play a new game I play sloppily or get bored after awhile. So I decided to play a forum game in the hopes that it would help me stay interested. I don't think I'm quite ready for Immortal yet, but if this game goes well I'll probably try it next.

 

[lymond]

Welcome to the Light!

Nice start. PH the right move. Straight to AH and probably BW afterwards. Worker first, ofc. Always nice to see you have a good city option in view with fish later. I might go settler at size 2 after a couple of warriors..or size 3.

Improve pork and kebab and then chop for settler/worker2.

I'd play til your worker pops and post again, so we can see more of the land and discuss settling options.

Warrior should scout about 10 tile radius around cap, and then plant for spawnbust.

 

[Wrathful]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I've played until the first worker is finished.

Spoiler To T13 :

Settling 1S reveals this...

Not a bad spot. Lots of forests to chop.

Production set to worker. I will set research to AH on T5 unless the warrior finds something amazing.

On T5 I meet this guy...

Good guy to have as a neighbor. His scout came from the south, so I know his general location.

The following turn I make another discovery...

That's two good neighbors so far...I put my espionage points on Mansa.

T13: AH and worker done. No horses sighted yet. Worker goes to pasture pigs. Research set to Mining > BW. Here's the world as Native America knows it:

For my second city, I believe the wheat/stone spot is best? How much are a priority are the east pig and northern seafood spots? It seems like I should focus on blocking off land for now and backfill those spots later.

I will wait for advice before playing further. Next turnset will probably go until first settler is produced, unless that's too fast.

 

[Fippy]

Really nice land, hmm both spots would be good 2nd cities.
Seafood city needs no road for trade route, and wheat would be a stronger early tile.
With AH - mining - bw it seems unlikely that you can have a road ready, so i might favor fish spot and make sure i chop there fast for a boat

For east pigs more scouting would be great, i would give the river cities priority for now but those are also great 4th-6th city possibilities visible already (floodplains too).
Blocking land mostly depends on if you like playing peaceful, further away cities can also slow down research until stuff like construction.

 

[Gumbolt]

The stone/wheat looks average unless you want to chop out mids? Could be a blocker city? As a helper city for cottages it would be covering only one grassland. Need to explore south of wheat.

The flood plains to the east look good for cottages. Need to explore that after you dip down to look below for wheat site.
Fish/crabs/pigs could be interesting but needs border pop. Maybe better on the plains and chopping for the workboat.

What to do with that capital. 6 possible grassland all covered in forest. So BW is very useful here. 2 possible hills. Cottage seems best?

Need more info to really decide on next city spot. A 2nd warrior after worker can help explore. Growth will be painful here with no early 3 food tile. Check food yields. Guessing pigs is higher.

The wastelands at top of map suggest you are far north here.

 

[Wrathful]

Growth will be painful here with no early 3 food tile. Check food yields. Guessing pigs is higher.

Unfortunately, the pig is on a hill, so it only yields 2 food. The sheep yields 2 food as well in addition to 1 commerce because it's riverside.


I played a few more turns. Haven't settled any new cities yet.

Spoiler To T21 :

Warrior explores the wheat spot. Then on T15, we spot the founder of Buddhism...

No warmongers yet...

On T17 we find Mansa's borders.

Mansa is close to our flood plains spot. Should we try to take it from him?
Second warrior moves NE to explore pigs spot and fogbust.

On T21 we discover horses.

Here is the land as a whole:

So, where should the first settler go? Northern fish for instant trade route? Wheat/stone? Flood plains?

 

[Fippy]

Hmm in that case, settling 1w of horsies looks best..both for war (HAs) or peaceful
Destroys 1 floodplains, but gets pigs later for a very strong city.
And it's not actually that far away, so yup trying that makes a lot of sense.
Maybe size 2 settler would be the fastest way, with 14t still for bw. Special cases can certainly justify such early settlers.

 

[lymond]

Do a bit more scouting to the W/NW of Cahokia.

I like wheat/stone myself (mids/hangin' nice option here). But if you can get horse/pigs spot that would keep Mansa's grubby hands off that spot. (Since that is viewable now for the thread, I'll say I played some turns and settled just E at some point for the pigs. Mansa settled the horse spot and got a dern Holy City there..ha)/

Oh..erm..and GLH is actually viable - very- for this game. Kinda strange Pangaea map but you are not seeing everything yet. (I settled 15 or more cities peacefully)

 

[Wrathful]

Okay, played a little further.

Spoiler To T30 :

Went for the flood plains spot based on advice. Decided to build the settler at size 2 as suggested because BW was 14 turns away. It will actually get built in 10 turns (not 12) because of the sheep pasture.

T24 greets us with another peaceful fellow:

Looks like a lion got stuck here, kind of funny when that happens.

Okay, settler is one turn from completion. This is usually the time when I have trouble, so I'm going to pause here.

I built the mine because my worker didn't have anything else to do. So, how should I proceed from here? Should I send the worker with the settler and build a new one at my capital? Farm a FP at the new city?
Tech should be set to Wheel > Pottery after BW is finished? Or something else perhaps? When should I revolt to slavery? Lots of questions here.

Next turnset will be short, maybe only a few turns. These early turns are crucial, and I don't want to make any mistakes.

 

[Fippy]

Was thinking about size 2 settler for a minute or two more, and yup it's a perfect reaction to those starting tiles imo.
Gumbo already noted it's slow growth before pigs are improved (no 3f tile), and then would still be only 5f at size 2 until sheep are done.
In return we have ph city tile and pigs are 6 yield for settlers.
Nice that you used it, i would too no matter what difficulty with so many good city spots around

With bw not ready just yet, i would send the worker with your settler yep.
I think a good move would be improving horsies and starting with a worker build in your new city, acceptable with a 5 yield tile.

Slavery switch usually good when a settler still moves, so the new city can skip anarchy.
Wheel and pottery certainly looks best

 

[Wrathful]

Was thinking about size 2 settler for a minute or two more, and yup it's a perfect reaction to those starting tiles imo.
Gumbo already noted it's slow growth before pigs are improved (no 3f tile), and then would still be only 5f at size 2 until sheep are done.
In return we have ph city tile and pigs are 6 yield for settlers.
Nice that you used it, i would too no matter what difficulty with so many good city spots around

With bw not ready just yet, i would send the worker with your settler yep.
I think a good move would be improving horsies and starting with a worker build in your new city, acceptable with a 5 yield tile.

Slavery switch usually good when a settler still moves, so the new city can skip anarchy.
Wheel and pottery certainly looks best

Hey, thanks for the help. Really appreciate it.

Alright, played on a bit further.

Spoiler To T36 :

So the settler got completed on T31, let's hope we beat greedy Mansa to the flood plains spot.

BW finished T34, found copper too.

Revolt to slavery. Research set to Wheel > Pottery.

On T35, Poverty Point is settled. Production set to worker. Little bit of a delay with a lion, could probably have avoided that and settled one turn earlier. Oh well.


Lots of seafood here, many spots to settle.

So, here's how it looks on T36:

Here's my basic plan going forward. Worker will finish horse pasture, then return to capital to chop second settler. I think I will whip that at size 4. Wheat spot for city 3?
Worker produced in Poverty Point can build roads, then cottage or something. Here's my road plan:

This will connect all the cities, right? The river saves a road (2 worker turns). Of course, I have to settle the wheat city for it to work.

 

[Pedro78]

Your roading plan is correct. City #3 spot seems good, but I don't really like that second city. I would have settled it 1S. You won't get those pigs for quite a while and FPs are enough food IMO. I'd much rather have 1 more FP+1 forest in the first ring, especially on EMP where the AI will take ages to spread you religion. Building a monument early is also suboptimal. 1N3E of Cahokia is a good 4th city spot. Nice write-ups btw, playing short and detailed turnsets is the right way to learn the game

 

[Gumbolt]

Pends what his plan is here. He has horse and attacking Mansa with HA could be an option.

1S gets the flood plains and forest albeit so would a border pop. Mansa will grab that forest from a border pop on turn 50?

Lots of options with all the sea food. Settling on that other horse with a border pop gives 3 sea foods. Painful before that.
Could settle south of crabs and try for double fish. Crabs could share copper/pigs.

Chariot rush is out here. Mansa's Skirmishers are too strong. HA looks good but would require some decent chops. Whipping on a food poor map hurts.How fast without a commerce resource? Cottages?

You need a plan for happiness here. Either monarchy, mids or calendar. So far you have no basic happiness resources such as gold, ivory or silver. There is some logic to a delayed attack on Mansa? Try for Oracle first? This will at least allow wine and HR civic?

What is the best strategy here?

 

[Pedro78]

Why attack early? You have enough land, decent commerce, a lot of food and a PHI leader. To me that's a "lib game". I wouldn't attack Mansa before Construction - HA rush on Skirmishers would be really painful (not sure about unit spam on EMP though). Happiness usually isn't an issue on a Pangaea, just trade for happy res and wait for the AI to get Monarchy in most cases. Again, not sure how optimal this is considering the tech pace on Emperor.

 

[lymond]

Plus, Mids is a must build here...build it right in stone city. I settled that first actually, and got about 400g from GW.

 

[Gumbolt]

Mansa is not a unit spammer. From memory he is one of the lowest unit spammers just has a uber strong UU. Still beatable with HA. I agree early war here does not seem ideal. Hopefully religion will spread from indians?

The flood plain city was still nice to grab as a blocker. Wheat/stone next for mids. Will take a long while to set up the stone. Still need the hammers to build it too. GE dilution on GP pool would not be good. So idealy stone city should build it.

 

[Wrathful]

To be honest I'm not yet sure what to do in the future here. Attacking Mansa with horse archers could work. But his skirmishers make that tough. Plus, he's a great trading partner. However, I could certainly trade with the other guys. When would a good attack date for horse archers be? 1000 BC?

Oracle: Well, it's three techs away. I do need Mysticism for a border pop. I could use whip overflow and chops to get it done quick. But I'm worried that these guys might get it quickly themselves. Justinian or Gandhi, for example. Both of them went the religious path. However, Stonehenge has not been built yet, and this is Emperor difficulty.

Pyramids does sound like a good idea. Representation would help with happiness, plus we're Philosophical so we're going to run specialists anyway. I can probably still get failgold from TGW too. It hasn't been built yet. So I think I'm going to try for the Mids.

I played a few turns more, until city 3 was settled.

Spoiler To T44 :

Here come the barbarian hordes...

They won't enter my borders for awhile, I think (anyone know the exact date)? I can use Dog Soldiers if I have to.

T38: Horse pasture done, this worker will head back to capital to chop settler.

On T39 a warrior scouting near Poverty Point makes an interesting discovery:

Keeping the gold would be hard, should I bother trying to settle this?

There's even more!

What do you think? Should I go for the gold?
Capital reached size 4 this turn by the way, started working on settler. Will 2-pop whip it.

T42: Met Bismarck.

Barb archer could cause problems. He killed one of Justinian's scouts and might get a promotion.

Wheel done, will choose next research in 2 turns. (I will run the slider at 0% to collect money).

T44: Settler whipped. 50 overflow produced. Where should I put it? Settler? Worker? I believe the worker:city ratio is 1.5:1. So in that case worker would be best? Research set to masonry.

I'll stop here and wait for more advice before continuing.

Save attached for those interested.

 

[dutchfire]

Bit hard to say from the screenshots, but it seems that the land to the west is mostly safe. That gives you a lot of room for cities. Wheat+stone, fish+crab, 3W of the capital (fish) and 3E or 3E1N of the capital all look reasonable.
Another worker would be good, still quite a lot going on: mining the copper, improving your new city and improving the floodplains in the east, chopping in the capital.