Goddess of the Hunt or Dance of the Aurora

[mrwho]

So I've just started my first emporer game and after a lot of rerolls (was looking for a good desert start because I never play those) I saw this start.

My question is whether to go for Goddess of the Hunt (+1 food from camps) for Dance of the Aurora (+1 faith from tundra without forest). Both seem like very powerful options. Obvious faith with Arabia synergises very well but such a strong initial growth with 7 +4 food tiles is also a really strong start as well. Which one should I go for?

 

[Chiatroll]

I'd go goddess of the hunt with those 6 camps right next to you. That would be one heck of an early boon.

obviously strategies vary though. What victory condition are you going from and do you plan to go into piety?

 

[TheMarshmallowBear]

Start Bias : Desert.

"Harun" - So.. where is this "desert" to speak off.... doesn't feel sandy around here...

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Depends on if you Really want a good religion or a strong capital.

 

[MarshalN]

Clearly he turned off start bias. I like to do that too, makes games more interesting

I would go with hunt. With hunt you have a chance of using this in other cities. Also, you'll be working the deer tiles. You would normally not work barren tundra, because they produce almost nothing. So hunt all the way.

 

[mrwho]

I actually hadn't disabled start bias. There is some desert (and snow) near my capital though.

Before I posted this thread I had gone with Dance (very unsure if it was the right decision) but I think I'll restart and go with Goddess instead. I went with Dance because I thought that strong of a religion start would go really well with Arabia but given that I've now decided to go for a science victory Goddess seems to be the way forward. All that early faith going though feels ... wrong.

Surprisingly enough by turn 65 on my initial game Emperor The Great Library STILL hadn't gone but I'll pretend I don't know that because I assumed I'd never get it on emperor the first time round and I don't want to cheat.

 

[Bagi]

Start Bias : Desert.

"Harun" - So.. where is this "desert" to speak off.... doesn't feel sandy around here...

Doesn't the start bias only apply most of the time, but leave some chance for a random start?

 

[MarshalN]

Early faith is nice, but I tend to go for the pantheon that will get me the most goodies. You're not likely to settle another city near a lot of tundra, I'd imagine.

 

[de_baser]

Get Goddess, Go tradition, get food trade routes running in there and watch your population multiply like bunnies in heat.

 

[Roxlimn]

Hm. I would go for Goddess in this position because the site doesn't otherwise have enough food to function right. Five of the key riverside food tiles are Deer, and they're Tundra so you're -1 food anyway. There are no other food tiles available. Definitely Goddess here.

With Goddess early and Granary, it's a reasonable start, albeit without luxuries. Could be a production powerhouse in Classical and Medieval with Tradition and HG.

 

[FeiLing]

Start Bias : Desert.

"Harun" - So.. where is this "desert" to speak off.... doesn't feel sandy around here...

Looks like Arborea to me, so there might be no desert at all on the map. Or if there is a little spot, maybe Morocco got it? or he has turned it off.

 

[Matthew.]

Definitely goddess of the hunt. One of my favorite pantheons, especially with a start like this.

 

[Arachnofiend]

Yeah, Goddess of the Hunt is definitely the go-to pantheon in this situation. Those deer are going to be one food better than Petra/Desert/River/Hills. You'll have quite the capital running. Just make sure you get faith through other means so you don't get snuffed out by another religion; with that much production you could probably nab Stonehenge, or Hagia Sophia if you beeline it.

 

[joncnunn]

I am counting 4 tiles of Aurora that you would want to work. (Not counting tiles that would require degrading by choping forest.) [3 deer already in Tundra that already contain no forest plus a Tundra Hill]

This is the bare minimum for me to pick a faith pantheon. But I'm not seeing a luxury resource at all Which would actually make it an instant reroll.

I'm surprised about the Tundra start with Arabia; this wouldn't be an earth map would it? Normally I would expect a Desert Faith start with Arabia given their starting bias (which gets turned off by the earth map)

 

[Princeofnigeria]

Start Bias : Desert.

"Harun" - So.. where is this "desert" to speak off.... doesn't feel sandy around here...

Well... LEGALLY a desert i just a very dry place due to lack of rainfall, so a tundra very well CAN be a desert, as it can lack water and can simply be a rocky wasteland of stone and permafrost (not water).

 

[Kwami]

A start bias isn't a guarantee. The script tries to honor them, but it's really just a best effort kind of thing. If the map scripts can't fulfill a start bias, then that civ just gets placed somewhere else.

 

[Vidszhite]

So I've just started my first emporer game and after a lot of rerolls (was looking for a good desert start because I never play those) I saw this start.

My question is whether to go for Goddess of the Hunt (+1 food from camps) for Dance of the Aurora (+1 faith from tundra without forest). Both seem like very powerful options. Obvious faith with Arabia synergises very well but such a strong initial growth with 7 +4 food tiles is also a really strong start as well. Which one should I go for?

Holy crap!! I've never even seen that many deer in one spot before! Get Goddess of the Hunt, that'll be worth an entire Hanging Gardens of food right there.

 

[Vidszhite]

I am counting 4 tiles of Aurora that you would want to work. (Not counting tiles that would require degrading by choping forest.) [3 deer already in Tundra that already contain no forest plus a Tundra Hill]

This is the bare minimum for me to pick a faith pantheon. But I'm not seeing a luxury resource at all!? Which would actually make it an instant reroll.

I'm surprised about the Tundra start with Arabia; this wouldn't be an earth map would it? Normally I would expect a Desert Faith start with Arabia given their starting bias (which gets turned off by the earth map)

It might just be that the luxes are beyond the fog, which would make them more annoying to reach, but this looks like a fantastic Tall start. The game never starts you in a place where there aren't at least 2 luxes near your capital, so take a look around and see.

 

[Scott Jegg]

I had a start like this, but I moved one tile to get 6 deer, 5 of which were in forest. That was an ungodly powerful start for growth and production.

Definitely go for the +1 food pantheon. You'll grow fast and have good enough hammers to reach and probably hard build all the religious wonders yourself if you want a strong religion.

 

[mrwho]

If anyone's interested I got my first ever emperor win. 1959 with a science victory. Could had won a culture or diplomatic earlier if I had wanted to but I hadn't won a science for a while.