Favorite place to start on Earth Map

Cedbird

Warlord
Joined
Dec 31, 2009
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What is your favorite starting location on Earth map . This is a hard one for me . But I would have to say Northern Africa / with access to the Middle East for strategic and economic reasons . I think most of my poweful games come from that area .
 
Europe / East Europe / Mediterranean, loads of possibilities, not so isolated as americas continent for example. A good balance of land and water, interesting situations.

Earth map is great fun, I love to play it with later era starts too, starting in medieval era makes for a really interesting game,
the empires' borders start to take form more sooner and the ancient civs lose their early units but more modern civs like America get nice edge.
 
What is your favorite starting location on Earth map . This is a hard one for me . But I would have to say Northern Africa / with access to the Middle East for strategic and economic reasons . I think most of my poweful games come from that area .

At least the last time I played it, with G&K, the new wonders didn't show up. If they now do I'll play it more often, but my past experience tells me the Americas are good (lots of space not much competition, esp in S America) and Africa, again because it's not as crowded.
 
I've only played an Earth map once, but I have to say, starting right in the southern tip of South America without any competitors on your continent is fantastic. Plenty of room to expand, and totally protected in the event of invasion.
 
Africa specifically central and south Africa and then invade barbaric Australia and colonise it super fun or at the very least Manchuria for North American colonization.
 
Along the Nile, or in Europe. For some reason, though, I always seem to get either South America or Siberia. Makes contacting AIs to sell luxes very difficult.
 
Mesopotamia is the best IMO. Desert folklore a strong possibility, two nice rivers, Persia usually uninhabited for expansion, same with Turkey, the Nile, and the Arabian penninsula. Doesn't take much navy to control access to your cities, and you can attack India very easily. While Europe and Russia battle it out, you grow and expand.

Another great spot is eastern North America, just make sure to own the seas.
 
My favorite place to start is on the coast of China (specifically as a coastal city). This allows for access to the Gobi desert, which gives a lot of valuable resources, Asia Minor, the Koreas, Eastern Russia, and access to Oceania, allowing for quite an impressive empire.

Since I tend to be a naval power, my empires in that region are thin inland and extensive on the various isles.

Africa and Arabia are also fabulous places to start as well
 
At least the last time I played it, with G&K, the new wonders didn't show up. If they now do I'll play it more often, but my past experience tells me the Americas are good (lots of space not much competition, esp in S America) and Africa, again because it's not as crowded.

I don 't like the Americas for that reason . I don 't like being alone :cry: . I like the competition and interaction of being on the main bodies of land . That is when I used to use 8 players . I always go 12 now . Fixes that issue . I will have to see what I think now !
 
I don't know about favorite, but I can answer my least favorite: Western tip of Alaska. I tried to salvage a crap start by rushing embark tech and crossing over to Siberia, but china was right on the other side. Managed to get another city up on western coast of North America, but by that time I was far behind in tech, so I just quit the game.
 
Along the Nile, or in Europe. For some reason, though, I always seem to get either South America or Siberia. Makes contacting AIs to sell luxes very difficult.

:lol: Siberia . Not so bad though . Not sure if you were being funny but it gave me a laugh .
I feel the same way . I like meeting the Ai to trade . BUT at the same time . If I could deal with all the quiet in North America ( when I used to play only 8 players ) then trading would not be such a big deal . Pair down your army , Wonder spam , and plan your growth wisely . Should be good .
 
Japan has kinda similar starting position as England. Isolated but with lots of islands around to expand to. The fact that these islands have also different lux makes the expansion more fun. Moreover, there is the natural wonder (Fuji) in the main island of Japan which can be helpful.
 
I don't know about favorite, but I can answer my least favorite: Western tip of Alaska. I tried to salvage a crap start by rushing embark tech and crossing over to Siberia, but china was right on the other side. Managed to get another city up on western coast of North America, but by that time I was far behind in tech, so I just quit the game.

I had a start there once . I LOVED IT !!! . I was like ole man at first . But being England helped . I had the same strategy . I expanded to Siberia . Put two nice cities there in smart locations . Met the Inca to my East and then there was conflict . But my strategy then was to go to my plan B . I had been scouting out what I could before ocean embarkment . So at the proper time when I could I could go and Island hunt until I got down to Austrailia . Then once I got strong enough I started attacking the Main land Inca and others . But a start like that if you get your management up will not stop you . Take your lemons and make lemonade !!!
 
Japan has kinda similar starting position as England. Isolated but with lots of islands around to expand to. The fact that these islands have also different lux makes the expansion more fun. Moreover, there is the natural wonder (Fuji) in the main island of Japan which can be helpful.

I agree . Have you actually ever started there before ?
 
Take your lemons and make lemonade !!!

Well the killer was it was a smaller map and the only luxury was salt near capital. On a larger map and an extra luxury resource or two near by, and I wouldn't have minded it at all. Earth maps are terrible unless played on large/huge.
 
I've never had good luck with Europe starts. There just isn't enough resources or luxuries in my games.

I've had some good games in the Americas but at the same time, I don't like the lack of interaction with other civs early in the game. It limits trade too much and the civs I do interact with frequently end up starting wars with me.

I've had good starts in Arabia and the Nile areas especially since G&K.
 
anywhere but Asia. i always started in Asia and it was boring to be in roughly the same place each time. i was always somewhere between India's delta or north China. ideally, south america and africa would be fun.
 
anywhere but Asia. i always started in Asia and it was boring to be in roughly the same place each time. i was always somewhere between India's delta or north China. ideally, south america and africa would be fun.

South America is interesting at first (usually tons of dye resources), until you realize that it's basically going to be lots of slogging through jungle and playing whack-a-barb until Astronomy. At that point, you have to hope that the rest of the world hasn't been getting along and signing research agreements willy-nilly, leaving you in a backwater. Also, city states always seem to take the best spots in South America.
 
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