Get Out Of The Noble Rut

[Menes]

Patagonia, good advice there...I only built the roads due to panic researching BW...I should have gone for Pottery first...at the time of road building the Worker had nothing else to do, so I didn't see a problem building roads for a bit, but yes...should have done the Pasture before roading to it.

 

[petey]

I'd say settle to the south and west before the north. You want to cut off Ragnar and get the spots for yourself. Make sure you don't sign Open Borders with him so that he can't put anything up there. You're going to be attacking him pretty quickly and you don't want to have rogue units sitting on your backside that you have to deal with, especially since you have no mounted units to move quickly in defense.

Put one city to the west and one to the south and then chop a bunch of axes and take a city or two from him. There's no need to kill him yet, but just cripple him enough that you can expand some more without really worrying about him and then take the rest of his empire at your leisure.

 

[eric_]

Your capital will make for a decent commerce city once you get cottages up and research machinery and get windmills on the grassland hills. The windmills provide an extra food and an extra commerce, and between those and the food resources you'll be able to cottage a lot of the grassland tiles as well.

 

[drkodos]

8s 2e? That's awfully far from the capital, no?

I'd say 5w 1s for the coast, gold, and all that dye.

Or possibly 5s (so four tiles between cities), which will grab you bananas, ivory, sugar, and gems, but lots of peaks.

Yes. Land grab early, and then back fill in if need be. That spot will be taken by another AI long before the other potential sites will be.

At this level the maintainence costs are not that much higher to be that far away. Usually 1 gp per turn or even less, which can be easily replentished with those gems. The gold will fall into cultural boudaries as will the copper soon enough, but working those tiles directly also makes some sense.


Also, it is a river tile linking cities for trade and commerce. This will speed spread of religions and sharing resources without having to build as many roads.

Guaranteed that river/gem site will have Ragnar squatting on it soon but the other spot in the NE will remain vacant for a long time.

 

[eric_]

Good points, drkodos.

 

[eric_]

By the way, vicarious civving is awesome during a slow work day. Thanks Menes

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

The hut gave me gold which is not to be sniffed at. Mysticism is started (7 turns), as is a Worker (15 turns). I'm working the Corn tile for maximum Worker build time.

You played too quickly. It is often the case that settling your first city reveals a lot of tiles, and you should pause to take stock at that point. Important questions: what are the short term plan and long term destiny of this city? Does your initial plan need to be re-evaluated based on the tiles that have appeared? Can you extend that plan further into the future with more information?

In this case, there's a big old neon sign here that should have had you gazing into the crystal ball before you even selected your opening tech.

We immediately start Animal Husbandry (11 turns). In 3520BC, Buddhism is FIDAL. In 3400BC our Worker finishes and starts a Farm on the Corn. We start building a Warrior. I'm unsure how to best work the tiles here, so I leave it on the Corn for maximum growth, with a view to when growth happens, I can also work the Forested Plains Hill for 3 Hammers to speed up a Warrior.

Good call, bad call. Good that you recognize that you are emphasizing growth, not so much that you stunt it again. Two important realizations here - first, warriors just aren't all that; you don't want to be pouring a bunch of hammers into weak units. Better to invest the hammers later, when you can build better units. Second the growth tiles in this city also carry an extra commerce, so you'll be unlocking the better builds sooner.

Because of this, I also decide to build 2 Warriors and grow to size 3 before starting a Settler.

The decision to build 2 warriors was one you should have made a while back, so that you could consider Hunting as a replacement for Mysticism (which isn't doing you any good at this stage), and maybe replacing one of those warriors with a scout.

My view is that the two warriors are a little bit soft. The third one isn't going to do much for you, I think.

In 3280BC we get Animal Husbandry. The Worker starts roading to the Cows.

Soft. Improvements first, roads later.

We start Mining (6 turns), with a view to going to Bronze Working....

We start Bronze Working straight away (14 turns), although in hindsight, this may have been a mistake as now my Worker has nothing to do except build roads.

BW is a fine call, but you clearly didn't think it through. In this game, you bought mining but didn't use it right away, which suggests that you were treating it as a mere pre-requisite, without thinking about how to use it. This fits, I think, the earlier problem of not having thought through the short term plan for Thebes. Also note that building the road to the cows was additionally wasted, as now you have turns to burn on roading.

In 2920BC, I start building the Settler (9 turns) when Thebes grows to size 3. We're working the Corn, Cows and Forested Plains Hill.

Soft. The floodplains builds a settler just as effectively as the plains hill, and generates extra commerce. Also note that you could be improving the third tile with a farm or a mine, and getting a faster build that way.

The Settler is born, but I wait two extra turns so BW can come in to get a better idea of where the second city can go.

This probably means that you could afford to grow another size before starting the settler.

 

[drkodos]

@VoiceOfUnreason: Are you playing a shadow game? It would be interesting to see what alternatives you play.

I think your analysis has been very good, and hopefully not too threatening!

Kudod to Menes for subjecting (!?) himself to this so that many of us could also benefit. I would not be so relaxed about having my decision making called into question.

 

[LosBlack]

Kudod to Menes for subjecting (!?) himself to this so that many of us could also benefit.

is drkodos a chess player? giving Menes an "interesting move" comment..

VoU is at it again. good advice there. i also agree with everyone that says expand to the south. moving toward the other civs first is a great way to keep them from getting too greedy with the land and resources. you're north of the equator anyways..head south!

great starting location for Thebes. i would have mined a hill by now and put a farm on a flood plain. this early in the game, i usually run into times where i want to halt growth and maximize production, and a mine is great for that. since you have cows and corn (and tons of FP and river commerce), you don't need to worry about running low on food.

i also agree that stepping back and posting again after you reveal a lot of the surrounding area is a good idea. Sisiutil is really good about evaluating strategies this way. (check out his ALC posts if you haven't yet)

sure you made some mistakes (we all do), but you're still in a great position in this game. the only thing i wish you had done was explore more area to the southeast and southwest. losing 2 exploring warriors is tough. i usually don't see any barb huts on Prince.

 

[Rathelm]

I think getting Mysticism as early as you did was a waste. You don't really need obelisks until you are about to build a second city and I think Archery would have been a better research. Archers are much, much, better than warriors.

 

[LosBlack]

archers are much better than warriors, but i've only researched for them once in many Prince games. i always go stratight for Axes and Spears. good for defense, good for stacks.

but i do agree that getting an early tech without a real need for it should usually be avoided (unless it's a pre-requisite tech for something you absolutely must have.

 

[Menes]

Kudod to Menes for subjecting (!?) himself to this so that many of us could also benefit. I would not be so relaxed about having my decision making called into question.

The point of this thread was to have my decision making called into question. I'm kind of glad that VoiceOfUnreason has jumped aboard. After reading his comments on Sisiutils (sp?) ALC games, he seems very much "a spade is a spade" chap.

In other words, if you're complete crap he'll tell you. There's no point being molycoddled (sp?).

 

[Menes]

In this case, there's a big old neon sign here that should have had you gazing into the crystal ball before you even selected your opening tech.

Could you elaborate on this? The plan was to get a Worker>Warrior>Settler out as soon as possible, and they came out pretty fast, despite not improving/working optimal tiles due to my own bad gaming habits.

The decision to build 2 warriors was one you should have made a while back, so that you could consider Hunting as a replacement for Mysticism (which isn't doing you any good at this stage), and maybe replacing one of those warriors with a scout.

The only reason I built two was due to the speed at which I was growing. Growing to size three seemed a prudent move to get me a third Warrior. Hunting was suggested by cabert...I thought about it and rejected it in favour of an early Stonehenge build. As it is, the two built Warriors were killed, which is annoying.

Soft. Improvements first, roads later.

This is a habit I must get out of...I think the reason I build them as early as possible, is because I'm worried I won't have time to build them later.

BW is a fine call, but you clearly didn't think it through. In this game, you bought mining but didn't use it right away, which suggests that you were treating it as a mere pre-requisite, without thinking about how to use it. This fits, I think, the earlier problem of not having thought through the short term plan for Thebes. Also note that building the road to the cows was additionally wasted, as now you have turns to burn on roading.

Yup, good catch. I tend to improve tiles and leave them the entire game, and in my games, grassy hills usually get Windmills, so to me, putting a Mine there seems wrong. I need to get out of the mindset of improving a tile and leaving it forever...a Mine build would have been very good, especially as the Worker is sleeping at the moment, waiting for Pottery to build Cottages.

Soft. The floodplains builds a settler just as effectively as the plains hill, and generates extra commerce. Also note that you could be improving the third tile with a farm or a mine, and getting a faster build that way.

Again, good catch...I'd just finished the Warrior and forget about the extra commerce gain if I moved production from the plains hill to the floodplain.

 

[Menes]

I think getting Mysticism as early as you did was a waste. You don't really need obelisks until you are about to build a second city and I think Archery would have been a better research. Archers are much, much, better than warriors.

I see what you're saying, but I wanted to make sure I could build Stonehenge as soon as possible...as it is, Stonehenge will be finished not long after my second city is founded, so in that respect, the plan worked reasonably well.

 

[Menes]

Thanks for all critique of my first turnset. Next is to examine what should be done next, and some suggestions have been put forward that my second city site sucks.

You're right, it does. It has been pointed out that the Bronze will be in my cultural borders at the next border pop, and that'll be plenty enough for me to use it as opposed to putting a junk(ish) city up there. Just to clarify, I do need to road to this, right?

The city spot that is most appealing is the one towards Ragnar, taking in a tonne of Dye, Gold and will also be a coastal city. A third city will go south of Thebes, covering the silk and sugar (will need Iron Working as it's Jungle).

My question is, what to do about Ragnar. Once Bronze is up, should I whack out a load of Axemen and send them to beat him down? I don't want to wait for his UU (Berserker replacing Macemen)...and once this guy gets Galleys, he spreads fast, far and wide in my experience.

Will a few Axes be enough? Note that I need some defence for fog busting, defending the bronze and city defence, so should I just stick to axes, skipping Hunting and Archery for now?

Should I research Hunting just so I can build a Scout or two? I think not, they'll likely get killed fairly quickly...

Not having Horses is most annoying.

The current state of play is that I am building Stonehenge, researching Pottery, both will complete in less than 10 turns. I have one Warrior, an a Settler ready to found a city. If I settle near the Dye, IW becomes a priority...

Stealing Ragnar's religion is starting to seem like a plan...

EDIT: For some reason, my graphics card doesn't render gridlines in globe/world view very well, making dot-mapping a pain, but feel free to have a go...I'll make one tonight and it'd be nice to see how it compares to others.

 

[cabert]

Menes, I just lost half a page of post. I don't want to start again, but I think your main learning objective is to change your way of planning.

The crystal globe thing VoU mentionned is exactly pointing this :
you think about an issue, find an answer and won't look back.
That's bad planning.
Everytime you get new information, you should reevaluate your plan (large scale or small scale depending on what new information you get).
Maybe the initial plan is still the best, but maybe not.

Same thing for tile improvement : you should not mentally put an improvement on a tile, when this isn't doable now. A good plan is not carved in rock, you need to adapt better.

Same thing for roading before improving. It's generally a bad move, but sometimes it's good (tile not going to be worked before some time, units needing to move through the tile...). You should not have "automatic moves". You should evaluate your worker's actions.
All the more so when you only have one worker!

 

[Menes]

So basically I've got the ol' horse blinkers on?

Fair point.

Hey, I can do a dotmap at work! You can tell I'm busy...

One grabs the Dye, Gold and is coastal. Another grabs Bananas, Sugar, Gems and Elephants (in lieu of Horses!!!), the next is tentative since it has some fog of war still to uncover.

 

[cabert]

i did a dotmap (at work!) too, it's quite similar, but i think your gold city is too low on food.
Use the flood plains (and don't think about overlapping as a bad thing!)!

i didn't point your copper city, but i think it's worth building. Just not right now (you don't even know fishing ).

 

[pigswill]

I'm kinda surprised that no-one mentioned this before but looking at your starting screenshot Thebes should have gone 1 south to snag the gems (it also snags the bananas but you didn't know that at the time). You'd have had to wait 5 turns for the first border pop for corn and cows to be available but that's really trivial compared to long term city potential.

I also reckon you'd be ok going for clam/copper city next to make a start on axes while building stonehenge in the capital. Maybe think about early war to take out Ragnar. I'm not sure when he gets berserkers but take him out early enough and he won't be a major threat.

Edit: It would be worth diverting to fishing before pottery which is a cheap tech and should make pottery slightly quicker (as its a pre-req).

 

[cabert]

early war is good, but we don't even know where he is hiding!
a bit of exploration could be useful... (and then you remember you don't have a scout )