Help me ascend to Monarch or higher

[DrCron]

At this point I'm not sure if I should switch to Caste System or keep Slavery

Early game slavery is better (unless you are on a golden age and want to get an extra GP). Much later you'll want caste system combined with state property with a lot of workshops on the land. But not now.

I suppose I shouldn't convert to Confucianism either, but rather wait for Buddhism to spread

Correct. And yes, spreading Conf. to Carthage would be great because Isabella will hate Hannibal immediately (she cares A LOT about religion).

 

[lymond]

So you did get CoL from Oracle? great!

Hopefully you are starting to see the advantage of the helper city there and the ability to tag team cottages and keep the working while London whips, and runs scientists later.

Caste really only benefits you when you have the growth to utilize the specialists. Great time is in a golden age. Otherwise, this early you want slavery slavery slavery. Note: Spiritual trait is a very nice trait to take advantage of brief civic changes for various purpose. Sometimes with early Caste I may switch into for 5 turns for border pops, or speed up a GS or GM early if I have the food to do so.

I really like yellow city now as it has a lot going for it. Technically, it is just as good or better a bureau cap than London, but otherwise will be a great secondary commerce city that will really boost your game once you get it up and running, which should not be hard.

How are you whipping your settlers? Try to do 4>2 or 6>3 whips. For one, it is faster, and you can really turn you whips into great OF hammers. You can add a chop to speed it along further, but note the invested hammers and base hammers of the city. 3 pop whip (6>3) is at or before 39/100 hammers. 2pop whip (4>2) is >40 and =<69 hammers invested. Each whipped citizen is 30H so a 2 pop whip is 60H and 3pop is 90h. I usually put the OF into a new worker or a wonder.

I would 2 pop whip the current settler and the look to grow to size 6 now that you have gold and the start 3 popping them. After the next one start putting OF into a Library and add a chop or two, then run your scientists.

After wheat city, look for one of the copper spots and settle asap and get copper online.

Nott does not need warrior right now..get them out your borders to bust. Wheat warrior can move south a bit to bust more area and scout a tad further (there is copper just S of the cows. Not bad spot.

Corn/copper can probably just be settled coastal..not seafood, but allows for lighthouse for lake. Cow city can eventually fill in between.

Free missionaries are great for scouting...send him toward Hanny and get more scouting done (meet more peeps), then gauge if you want to infect him or someone else. When you start entering fog do 1 move per turn to avoid stepping into barbs. Try to reveal as much coast as you can to open foreign trade routes later with Sailing (sometimes a workboat makes a good coastal scout too)

you do need to do a better job of getting warriors out busting the area. cities don't need mp for some time early one while cities are small and whipping. You are going to have a lot of problem with barbs in the not so distant future.

Adopting a religion or not is basically about gauging the state of diplomacy. there are at least 2 AIs. You might choose a peaceful approach early and just let Iz control the religion, which she tends to do. Or great division between the two. Sometimes AIs ask you adopt there religion. It can be a nice diplo boost to do so, and you can also switch back to No State or something else later. (very easy if Spiritual..another nice benefit of that great trait). Some great Religion civics you can take advantage of later as well.

However, early on best to let the religions shake out before make a choice, and make sure you meet everyone as there might be other religions around. Choose your enemies and your friends, or sometimes just ignore religion and stay on good terms with everyone. It's up to you and your goals (In my case, I stole everything from Izzy anyway...10+ workers, holy city, holy shrine, land, paella, sangria, tapas)

 

[Arcanior]

Next update: 575 BC. My next Settler is in place to found the corn-copper city. I have had some problems with barbarians; they've founded a city to the southeast (see screenshot below). I'm now building two chariots to deal with that.

After Alphabet I started backfilling technologies; Isabella gave me Animal Husbandry and Monotheism for Writing and Monotheism for Bronze Working, Hunting and The Wheel. Hannibal gave me Hunting and Sailing for Polytheism and something I don't remember. I definitely did not trade Alphabet itself away, as I don't want to start them trading between themselves just yet. Although maybe I should trade Iron Working for it with Hannibal...

My own research path is Mathematics, and I'm 7 turns away from Civil Service. My Library is coming along between Settlers in London, while the other cities have mainly been working on Granaries and Warriors for damage control and spawn-busting. I've lost two Warriors, I think, to barbarian Archers, and I've had to rebuild Nottingham's gold mine once. Hastings has been founded next to the wheat.

I also got a Great Prophet from my Oracle points in London. I could build the Kong Miao in York with it, get a Golden Age, or save it for bulbing Theology later on (I'd have to research Meditation first).

What do you think?

P.S. Also met Shaka's scout, but haven't found his territory yet.

P.P.S. Don't worry, I know that I should found the copper city 1E of the Warrior and Settler's current location. The Warrior was still in that place for spawnbusting.

Spoiler Screenshot :

 

[Qactus]

Just a quick comment on that last screenshot: Note that London is not working one of its cottage tiles, while Nottingham is working unimproved floodplains. From Nottingham's city screen you can claim another cottaged tile. London should then switch to the idle cottage automatically. These adjustments have to be made quite often when cities grow, but it's very important. Right now, it costs you not only 3 Cpt but also the lost progress on cottage development.

 

[Arcanior]

Wow, well spotted, Qactus, thanks!

I have to admit, this is the first time I'm working with these kinds of "helper" cities, or even tracking cottage progress. In the past (playing on Prince) I usually just cottaged a tile and left it alone for pretty much forever... This playstyle is much more versatile and powerful, but it does require more micromanagement.

 

[Pangaea]

That is certainly correct. And once you get more familiar with the micromanagement, you'll (hopefully) learn to love it, or at least understand how important and powerful it can be.

Kind of in that vain, I think it was a mistake to settle the NW gold where you did. 1N, where it was originally intended, is better, because you get the corn in inner ring, and can thus work corn + gold very early on, and still grow. You couldn't even improve the cow for a good while, so I don't know why you founded it there. Marble can be claimed later. It isn't important that early. It becomes more important when you unlock Aesthetics and Literature.

Soon you'll get Civil Service, which is very strong with a well-cottaged capital. It also means you can chain irrigate. If you're not familiar with that, it means you can put several farms next to each other, from a water source (river, lake, oasis), and towards an un-irrigated corn/wheat/rice plot. That gives you +1 on that plot, because it becomes irrigated. The wheat next to the river SE is already irrigated btw, but by using chain irrigation you can irrigate the corn further NW. Unfortunately you need to expand borders first, because corn wasn't in first ring (Or has that happened now?)

Cites that aren't located on hills also chain irrigate btw, so the city you're about to found in the east will automatically irrigate the corn there (from the lake), once you get Civil Service.