Help a lad find his way on Noble

[Ronojoy1917]

After playing Civ4 on and off for a year or so I've decided to get serious about and I think the way to do that is by doing one of these shadow games. I've grown quite comfortable on Warlord and I guess I want to push myself a little. I'm here basically just to improve my game some.

My greatest weaknesses are improving my land in a timely fashion and working specialists, so those are the areas I would like the most help on, as well as finishing wars quickly.

I'm playing a pretty standard Continents map as Mao Zedong. I'll stop after every 30 turns or so, hoping you veterans out there can learn me some new things about this game.

Well the starting postion is attached, and I gotta say I don't like it very much. It's too plainsy. I'm thinking that as I already have agriculture my first tech should be animal husbandry to get those cows and I should start building a worker right away.

 

[GGracchus]

For noble, just build 1.5 workers per city. You'll get your land improved in no time, no need for something like serfdom/hagia sophia. Specialists aren't necessary on noble, if your city is about to reach the happy cap, run specialists to stagnate. The important thing is to have a clear plan of what to do(domination, space, AP cheese, diplo, culture) and use the techpath/leader to achieve that. If you just got on noble, you probably want a better leader than Mao(i.e HC, Willem, most people Fin, etc.). I would try to just use that and get a nice start, preferably gold+food. Look at the Noble's Club series for potential games that you can play. For this start, AH while building a worker, and hope there's better land elsewhere.

 

[Ronojoy1917]

Well by turn 30 I've got a lot to think about. There is some really gorgeous land nearby, but it's right next to my neighbour Kublai Khan. (Kind of funny that China and Mongolia are neighbors). Initially I was thinking of sending my first settler to this spot on the coast where it could both clams and cows, with the idea being that so much food would make it easier to pump out that next settler. Now though, there is some breathtaking riverland for the taking in a spot that seems like it would block and completely choke my neighbor Kublai. I'm really tempted to settle that way, but I'm not sure if I should. After all, he might be on the point of establishing a second city as well, and if he beats me to that spot it would be pretty bad. Also it's pretty close to his capital and somewhat far from mine, seven tiles.

I stopped at this spot because I'm really not sure what to do. Should I settle for the city close to my capital, with good food? Seems like the safer option. Or I could try to grab this land and trap my neighbor. Perhaps a gamble but it looks like it might be worthwhile. Thoughts? Any and all advice will be very appreciated.

 

[coanda]

What did you ever do to deserve that sort of starting capital location? That's truly terrible terrain you got given by the random-number generator. Hopefully that empty spot in your capital BFC is copper.

That said... the rest of this start isn't bad.

If you can get it in time, I'd say definitely take the site you marked "i like" first. Two reasons. First, it's a good site. I'd actually consider moving the Palace there - it'd make an excellent Bureaucracy capital, as opposed to the junk you're dealing with now. Second, it blocks off Genghis. That site cuts him off from ALL northward expansion. Plant your third city somewhere to the SE of your capital and you could probably box him in to just a couple of cities on mediocre terrain while the rest of the continent is left open to you to fill.

After that, maybe consider an Oracle -> Machinery slingshot to use Cho-ko-nus to secure your continent. Genghis is not a friendly neighbor, so it's kill him now or be attacked by him later. Then it's just a matter of filling in your continent. You might pillage your own copper (or at least the road hooking it up) so you can keep building warriors for garrisons and barb-busting. Leftover cho-ko-nus should be strong enough to kill any barbs you do face.

 

[Ghpstage]

A few points on your capital management.

1. Theres no need to road floodplains to your capital, the turns wsted building those roads would be almost enough to farm the floodplains, which is the task your worker should have done!
2. I think it was a bit too early for a settler personally. Its often best to grow to work your strong tiles by building warriors before building a settler, in this case that means the cow and both floodplains.
3. No need for a barracks yet. Build a worker instead, you will need one as you've got chopping and improving to do very shortly.

Now your city sites

1. Your chosen local sites aren't bad. Be sure to send your current worker with your settler.
2. Its much too early to decide where any jungle cities will go, you haven't explored enough. For example '4th?' appears to be one off the coast and may well spoil some seafood, neither of which is good!
3. Jungle cities also require Iron Working and a lot of workers, don't rush into settling them.
4. Make sure you uncover the fog where your settlers will move in to, the last thing you want is for them to be eaten by wolves, lions or bears!

Not a huge deal, but,
I'd say theres no need for Wheel so early, the only thing it has accomplished is wasting and worker turns . No need for Fishing either, but i'm pretty certain you got that in a hut.

 

[Ronojoy1917]

Only thirty turns in and I already found myself doing some things I can't find any solid reasoning for...

I was going for Wheel because I thought, 'hey I should road those cows to my capital', which was unnecessary of course, but its nice to have things roaded. Now with the floodplain, I had set my worker to farming it and was under the impression that the farm was done when I told him to road it to the capital, :=/ not sure how I got that idea.

well this is embarrassing, I actually did research fishing, but it was because I thought my second city was going to ahve clams. Poor logic, I know, but that was my train of thought.

Looking back at my tech choices I think I went something like

Animal Husbandry-> The Wheel -> Fishing -> Bronze Working (currently researching)

I definitely felt like I was doing something wrong with the whole Wheel business, but I just like having roads. What might have been a better tech path?

 

[AutomatedTeller]

Probably AH->BW->wheel would have been better... but it's not a big issue, unless you were planning on axe rushing someone.

 

[vranasm]

shadow to 100 AD

moved war 1 NE, decided on settling 2N on PH.

AH->BW->TW->pot->writing->myst->med->ph

tgw, mids, oracle->CoL

rest you can read in event log (time of cities etc)

Spoiler :

275 BC declared war on genghis since he had red fist anyway

got peace now


ignore the construction, given the situation it was a mistake... i don't need it

dominant position...

 

[GGracchus]

I would have teched AH-BW off the bat, then pottery to help for that crap capital.

 

[Ronojoy1917]

Here is my tech path for this session:

BW--Poterry--Writing--Hunting--Archery--Alphabet--Metal Casting--Machinery

I traded Writing for Mysticism and Alphabet for Iron Working with Gandhi, who I found in the north.

This tech path isn't really usual for me as I never research archery. It's just, being protective, and having an archer UU I decided it would make sense. Followed by Writing to help with border pops and research. Now what I found is that there was quite a gap between finishing researching Writing and the actual building of libraries because I was also building granaries in all my cities. Thoughts? Looking back it seems that trying to get to Machinery quickly may not have been the best idea as I'm suffering unhapiness everywhere. Then again, it should allow me to knock out a civ shortly with relative ease and as I consolidate the conquest I can expect to have researched Monarchy and have wine hooked up. Should I have researched Monarchy and the religious techs earlier?

As I spread out to four cities I realized hapiness was going to be a problem quickly and really the only happy resource I had was Wine so Monarchy, but I saw that I would have to rese4archall the religious techs to get there and thought whether alpha might be a better investment. I thought I could shoot for Machinery to get Chu ko nu's as soon as possible, hoping to get those other techs from Gandhi. Unfortunately Gandhi is turning out to be a lot stingier than I thought he would be, not even trading Meditation for anything. Meanwhile my four cities are all quite unhappy, which I'm trying to resolve by whipping gratuitously.

Genghis, meanwhile has expanded to four cities in his little corner of the world, and unfortunately this means that he has taken the Cow tile away from Shanghai, my second city. This was kind of annoying because the main weakness of that city is its production. So I whipped chopped a library and built a monument, hoping to flip the tile, or if not, I'm going to invade anyway with Chu ko nu's. I'm wondering if I should wait till catapaults and I'm thinking not. With maybe 12 or so chu ko nus, 6 axemen, and a few spears to deal with keshiks, I think I could easily roll over the Mongol empire.

 

[Ghpstage]

Open Borders with Genghis, this will get you valuable foreign trade routes and allow you to explore his land to assess what threat he poses. Right now it seems likely he has no strat resources and it appears his capital is on flatland, I suspect his next city will grab the Iron south of his capital.

You should really have more cities by this point, and don't allow your workers to sleep when theres so much weork to do. Theres Irons to improve, forests to chop, riverside tiles to cottage, future sites to road to and improve and more.

This tech path isn't really usual for me as I never research archery. It's just, being protective, and having an archer UU I decided it would make sense. Followed by Writing to help with border pops and research.

Someone posted on these forums quite recently 'that which can wait, must wait', and this is very true here.
For the Archer UU, researching Archery before Machinery is pointless, and Pro doesn't make it better when you already have units to defend yourself with.
Writing is a major economic tech, not something for border pops . Open Borders brings in trade and boosts diplo a little and Libraries help science and let you get GPP generation started in a big way with scientists.
The culture is only good for border pops if you don't need those pops early. If you do need pops, then use a Monument instead.

Thoughts? Looking back it seems that trying to get to Machinery quickly may not have been the best idea as I'm suffering unhapiness everywhere. Then again, it should allow me to knock out a civ shortly with relative ease and as I consolidate the conquest I can expect to have researched Monarchy and have wine hooked up. Should I have researched Monarchy and the religious techs earlier?

Yes Monarchy long before Machinery.
The total cost of Myst, Med, Priesthood and Monarchy is only slightly more than Metal Casting, which you researched and is achieving next to nothing for you
Hereditary Rule would have been a big boost with the garrisons you have.

I probably wouldn't have gone down to Machinery for the UU, MC and Machinery are both extremely expensive and it would have been easier to take down Genghis earlier with Axes or Swords. UUs aren't something you have to use, and you don't want to chase them at the cost of everything else, and personally I don't think Cho-ku-nus will be much good on noble, but now you've started you might as well finish.

BW--Poterry--Writing--Hunting--Archery--Alphabet--Metal Casting--Machinery

I would instead have gone
BW -> Pottery -> Writing -> *Myst -> Med -> Priest -> Monarchy, possibly using Oracle to get Monarchy.
*Myst would be moved around depending on the need for border pops.

I might be being a bit overly picky on some things, none of what you've done so far is crippling. Far worse has been done on Noble in games that have led to wins!

 

[Ronojoy1917]

I didn't really like the idea of opening borders with Genghis when I've got him locked in so well. I mean, what if he sends a settler through my territory, I know I can cancel the deal, but it might just slip in unnoticed and when the deal gets canceled, he might be teleported somewhere he can settle.

Yeah at the start of the game I was looking everywhere for good city sites but suddenly after getting four out there I seem to get into some sort of complacency. Not sure why.

Hmm I guess looking at the actual beakers would be a good idea.

I do usually do an early rush in most of my games, but I wanted to try something a little different. With this game I saw an opportunity to halt a neighbor's growth without going to war that would allow me to peacefully expand through till the early medieval age.

Frankly I'm getting a little tired of warring as it gets too much in the way of building and I want a more peaceful kind of game. Having Gandhi as a neighbor might help in that regard.

One thing I felt I must really be quite behind on cottaging. If you've looked at the save, could anyone tell me whether I've laid out enough cottages for turn 100?

 

[coanda]

The AI won't send settlers through your territory. Don't worry about it.

 

[lymond]

The AI won't send settlers through your territory. Don't worry about it.

unless they do so by sea

 

[Ghpstage]

I do usually do an early rush in most of my games, but I wanted to try something a little different. With this game I saw an opportunity to halt a neighbor's growth without going to war that would allow me to peacefully expand through till the early medieval age.

Frankly I'm getting a little tired of warring as it gets too much in the way of building and I want a more peaceful kind of game. Having Gandhi as a neighbor might help in that regard.

The way I see this map is that you can either wipe Genghis out quickly, or if your feeling daring, block him in and expand while largely ignoring him. If you block then he won't really have enough cities to build an army, and it doesn't appear he has any resources until he gets Iron.
If you choose to ignore him you have to build up some units to kill anything he may decide to throw at you, but while running Hereditary Rule you will be building up troops anyway.

Heres my effort so far, to 650BC.

Tech path
AH -> BW -> Wheel -> Pottery -> Writing -> Myst -> Med -> Priest -> Alpha -> Monarchy(Orcale) -> Currency -> Maths -> CoL (will be finished in 1 turn) -> Civil Service next. I picked up Hunting, Sailing and Fishing in trades along the way.

6 cities so far, with more on the way, haven't bothered killing Genghis i'm relying on my production city to get enough Axes out to defend myself, but right now I don't feel pressured.

Spoiler :

One thing I felt I must really be quite behind on cottaging. If you've looked at the save, could anyone tell me whether I've laid out enough cottages for turn 100?

The number you have is being strangled by a very low population, but the ones you do have are well developed for this point.

 

[vranasm]

1838 SS

32 cities final count. Actually my best space race score wise (not quickiest)

autosave at the victory turn.

 

[coanda]

The way I see this map is that you can either wipe Genghis out quickly, or if your feeling daring, block him in and expand while largely ignoring him.

Playing as China, you get a third option. Block him in, then scout him with Open Borders. If he has no horses and you can get Iron, then he'll be defenseless if you can get cho-ko-nus before he gets Feudalism. I'd think that's the safest way to handle it - you don't run the risk of an AI backstab like you would if you just blocked him in, nor do you run the risk of a run of bad luck making you simply fail in your attack and lose the game. Worst-case (if he proves unusually strong or you can't find iron) you just fall back on the "block in and expand" option without much lost.

And he's already got almost all the techs for it - all he's missing is Iron Working. I'd say grab IW and hope for iron.

 

[barbertje]

Here is my tech path for this session:

BW--Poterry--Writing--Hunting--Archery--Alphabet--Metal Casting--Machinery

I traded Writing for Mysticism and Alphabet for Iron Working with Gandhi, who I found in the north.

This tech path isn't really usual for me as I never research archery. It's just, being protective, and having an archer UU I decided it would make sense. Followed by Writing to help with border pops and research. Now what I found is that there was quite a gap between finishing researching Writing and the actual building of libraries because I was also building granaries in all my cities. Thoughts? Looking back it seems that trying to get to Machinery quickly may not have been the best idea as I'm suffering unhapiness everywhere. Then again, it should allow me to knock out a civ shortly with relative ease and as I consolidate the conquest I can expect to have researched Monarchy and have wine hooked up. Should I have researched Monarchy and the religious techs earlier?

After you tech meditation+priesthood you can trade for monarchy with Gandhi. It will be OK to give metal casting, since Genghis and Gandhi hate each other, and it won't do Genghis any good in time anyway.
Genghis has no horses, no elephants and is 4 techs away from feudalism. A chunoku attack can't fail. You can pad the numbers with some axemen, wich you can start making now, since the collateral from the chunoku's will weaken the defenders.

You have 2 sleeping workers in Shanghai, and don't need a monument there.

 

[Ghpstage]

Playing as China, you get a third option. Block him in, then scout him with Open Borders. If he has no horses and you can get Iron, then he'll be defenseless if you can get cho-ko-nus before he gets Feudalism. I'd think that's the safest way to handle it - you don't run the risk of an AI backstab like you would if you just blocked him in, nor do you run the risk of a run of bad luck making you simply fail in your attack and lose the game. Worst-case (if he proves unusually strong or you can't find iron) you just fall back on the "block in and expand" option without much lost.

And he's already got almost all the techs for it - all he's missing is Iron Working. I'd say grab IW and hope for iron.

With half decent preperation a rush shouldn't fail here. Early scouting will show the capital is on flatland, probably lacks resources, and we already know Genghis won't likely found a religion and he is not protective.
If you wait for OB we can confirm the resource thing and go in with swords or late axes....
Either of these options is much safer than deliberately chasing extremely expensive techs and giving Genghis a chance to get the nearby iron and build walls, to get a unit that will probably underperform on noble.

If you go for expansion then keeping a military large enough to stop a noble AIs stack is not difficult, especially considering he lacks good land and doesn't have metal till IW!

Obviously now that the OP has IW, 2 sources of iron and has nearly finished machinery then theres little point in changing directions, but I really don''t think its the best path to have taken.

 

[Ronojoy1917]

School got in the way so I'll be posting an update as soon as the weekend. Looking forward to inspecting that save of yours, Ghpstage. How did you get so many techs so quickly? Some of them are cheap but some like Maths and Currency are kind of expensive.