First Emperor Game

[yanner39]

I started my first EMP game this morning as Willem (I figure FIN and not have to worry about perfect city placement would help). Fractal map, Standard size/speed. I spawned beside Boudica and it looks like I'm in semi-isolation. I have a warrior scouting and I will have a work boat built in my Cap after the next settler.

My initial tech was Mining-BW-TW-AH-SAIL-POT-WRI. I will now tech towards Monarchy since I have 1 resource, which is the gold. With the way things are shaping up, it looks like I will be boxed in with 5 cities. My initial thought was to put my settlers on galleys and go north but on Emperor, the distance costs will probably kill me.

So I'm looking for advice. I have 4 workers (one more on the way) and 3 cities. A swords/cats war against Boudica is never a good idea because of the Duns and GWs. I have a Settler on the way and was thinking of sending him North to claim the pig site north of the Celts. This could then give me safe passage to expand northward. My current dotmap includes a city south by the deer and crab and right beside it west to claim the fish.

I'm probably too late for the Oracle and my indecision probably cost me a few other wonders (like the Gr LH). I lack stone or Marble so Wonder-hoaring is probably not in the cards. Maybe get an early MC for The Colossus?

Another concern is dealing with Boudica. She won't DOW at Pleased but she hasn't founded a religion yet so getting her to Please could be tough. I just opened borders with her so I am sending a scout to see if she has metal. If not, the game plan will change. If we're in semi-isolation, then this will be a slow teching game.

Attached is a save. If you play, any images in spoilers please. Advice as usually.

Thanks!

 

[vranasm]

doesn't look like catastrophe.

the semi-isolation is mostly unwelcome. Very tough situation especially with Boudi which has militaristic thoughts.

I think I would forget a bit wonders (Oracle is too late) and for others you don't have resources.
Don't get boxed in... I would try to expand around the northern coast into the northern land.

It's questionable the direction with techs you should go.

you first cities seem to have some cottagable land (btw Hague should work on the cottage instead of horses right now). A little bit worrying amount of improments done around.

As I already said, very tough, should be challenging to play out.
Have you 4000BC save? I would maybe try it. Have not so long ago some game as Napoleon semi-isolation with HC which turned to be pretty tough too (you basically can own your continent eventually, but get behind if the other continent is lovefest)

 

[Amao]

4000BC save? In semi, rush your neighbor with all costs normally is a better choice. A dead neighbor or a capitulated one is better than a friendly one.

 

[lymond]

Kinda bizarre situation. I find it hard to believe that the map would roll Boudi that close on that type of land mass. Almost has to be another civ up there somewhere, but I guess you woulda run into them by now. She almost has you block in and then could grow into a monster.

You have a decent number of workers, but I'd like to see more improvements up. Really leverage more cottages on that land and get those cheap libraries up. Not sold on the Hague placement but it will do I guess. You will need to have one city building axe to keep your power up until Boudi gets to pleased if she ever does. I would always expect her to DOW at some point as getting her to pleased will take some time. You won't get a fist either in semi.

You could beeline construction, but you will need to hurry as Boudi will go for it too.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

4000BC save? In semi, rush your neighbor with all costs normally is a better choice. A dead neighbor or a capitulated one is better than a friendly one.

A neighbor that is actually at friendly will give you techs and foreign trade routes however, and generally develops nice land that can be taken with less attrition later. This decision is not so obvious.

 

[vicawoo]

The AI will trade monarchy since it does not give unlock units, buildings, or wonders.

To get an AI to friendly, learn the art of gifting useless cities (often you still need a religion or one of the nice AI).

Gallics aren't so scary if the cities aren't on hills, though mass shock axes aren't very nice.

 

[yanner39]

Attached is the 4,000BC save.

Thanks for the comments.

@vranasm

I really tried this game to chose my techs wisely this game. For example, I delayed AH because my starting techs gave me the food I needed early and could delay improving the pigs until I had mining and BW online. The reason I chose the Monarchy beeline was because I had limited happy resources.

@lymond

I do now if it's complete semi-isolation yet. I have a workboat in the queue in the cap and will use for exploration. Perhaps I should have built it sooner to explore.

Also, the Hague was built there because I didn't want to settle it on a Floodplain. The peak tile would have been the ideal spot IMO. Where would you have settled it?

I settled the copper city for the exactly the reason you mentioned - unit pump.

@vicawoo

Yeah, I never think of the gifting city trick. I may do that, say on the western side of the landmass where she would have settled a city anyways.

I need to scout more her land to see where her cities are placed.

 

[yanner39]

So I played a bit more until 275BC. I have Boudica at Pleased so she can't plot war against me. Now it's a little bit of a land grab. I'm not teching Code of Laws since the only cities I'll be settling are in the northern part on our land mass.

Again, my scouting revealed that I am semi-isolated and based on the coastal/sea tiles, I can't reach another landmass with a Galley of course I maybe wrong.

I completely ignored wonders to get more land (plus I didn't have stone or marble).

I teched Alphabet mostly to build Research. Boudica's not trading with me.


After Code of Laws, should I tech compass and optics to try and find other trading partners?

I don't usually play isolated starts so this is a hell of way to play my first Emperor game.

I did make a dotmap in my save.

 

[Gwaja]

This is gonna be very tough. Because you are semi isolated, Boudica probably won't trade any techs with you unless you get her up to Friendly, which is going to be a challenge, considering that her favorite civic is a really late one. You might want to consider settling a junk city and gifting it to her. You will also probably have to put up with her begging for techs at some point.

You have Bronze Working, but no Iron Working, so you can't see any iron. Boudica does not have any copper, but she does have iron somewhere. There is a mine 2W of Tolossa that is on a flatland plains tile, which is definitely a source of iron for Boudica. If that happens to be her only source of metal at this point, perhaps you might want to think about amassing horse archers and taking her out, preferably Tolossa to cut off her source of metal.

In my opinion, your tech pace will be slow due to lack of tech trades, and it is probably not worth it trying to get Boudica to Friendly, which may never happen. It seems much better, in my opinion, to take away her source of metal, and then take her out as soon as possible.

Elephants are out of the question, but catapults/swords/axes may work, considering that only one of her cities is on a hill, and that hill city is only a weakling size 1 city right now.

It seems you have chopped off almost all of the available forests in your heartland, so it may be difficult to amass large number of troops... but your cities seem to be in locations with decent food production, so whipping out units may work.

Another option is to make Optics your priority. This means getting Iron Working, Compass, Metal Casting, and Machinery. Now you could put off Code of Laws for now and research Iron Working and Aesthetics, so that your next Great Scientist will bulb Compass for you, but I don't know how much that would help. Self researching Metal Casting and Machinery at this point will be quite expensive and long.

But since I am just as new to Emperor as you are, take my words with a grain of salt. Good luck!

 

[yanner39]

@Gwaja

I appreciate the input.

-----

So I played until 1190AD.

I followed vicawoo's advice and gifted Boudica with a bad city (Leiden ), which essentially went well with other bad cities she settled (no food )...She was now friendly so trades were made.

I was actually a little happy with my self since in my first Emperor game, I won the lib race. I built the Parthenon, and National Epic in my Cap. I think this is one of the games where I've been able to generated quite a number of Great People. I got music first so burned my artist for a Golden Age. I've settled 2 Scientists in my cap because I could bulb anything I liked (possibly mistakes).

I am currently building the HE in Utrecth and will try and go for a Cuirassier war against Boudica. I'm teching toward gunpowder right now.

Anyways, any advice or things I should have done better would be appreciated.