Help on current game

[strijder20]

Hello,

I started my first game on Emperor as Alexander. I wanted to do a non-military victory - as basically all my victories so far are domination.

I'm now at 25 BC and have no clue what to do.

I am playing on Emperor, Normal, Tiny, Fractal.

I'd like to attach a screenshot, but as they seem to be automatically 'tga' files, I can't upload it here. There is one in the .rar file attached, though.

I've got 5 cities, four with a library. My capital has the Hagia Sophia, the Great Library and the Porcelain Tower. It's 14 turns away from the Notre Dame.

Askia is directly to the north, I don't know where the others (Augustus, Hiawatha, Bismarck, Mr. Incognito) are - but as AC already declared on Askia, he is probably near him.

I should probably finish the ND - as I have severe happiness problems. I own 5 cotton resources, 2 gems and two marble. Should I sell them for other luxes or for gold?

I've finished Liberty and opened Patronage. I've teched straight towards Education and also have Astro. What should I tech?

Should I continue down the Patronage line and meet some other City-states (have only met two Cultural ones so far) or should I open Rationalism and tech those things instead?

Is cultural or science the better way to win this game?

What wonders should I go for? (aside from ND)

Do I have enough cities/land to win, or should I conquer Askia/settle more cities?

Thanks in advance,

Strijder20

 

[DevilHell]

If you haven't traded those spare cottons that's a mistake, having them just lying there
If you have "sever" as you say, happiness problems you should trade them for another luxes, if not sell them for gold

Why did you open Patronage??

5 cities by the BC, How many turns is that?? However, I think that for early expansion, is better to go Piety to control happiness

The best way to go I think would be Science, because a Cultural victory has to be something more planned, and also you already have the PT and Rationalism unlocked so what the hell, finish ND and go Rationalism

 

[strijder20]

If you haven't traded those spare cottons that's a mistake, having them just lying there

Yup, I already traded them away. I also traded OBs away.

If you have "sever" as you say, happiness problems you should trade them for another luxes, if not sell them for gold

Sever? I typed 'severe', which is an English world, IIRC. Yes, selling off Cotton for lump sums of gold was probably a mistake, should have taken the .

Why did you open Patronage??

Feel free to slap me in the face.

5 cities by the BC, How many turns is that?? However, I think that for early expansion, is better to go Piety to control happiness

0 AD is 115 turns. I wanted to get Rationalism though, so Piety was locked.
I thought that amount of cities was fairly reasonable. Apparently I'm wrong.

The best way to go I think would be Science, because a Cultural victory has to be something more planned, and also you already have the PT and Rationalism unlocked so what the hell, finish ND and go Rationalism

Thanks for the advice.

 

[DevilHell]

I thought that amount of cities was fairly reasonable. Apparently I'm wrong.

Nope, not wrong, 5 cities is good, and define that you must go Science victory, but a better choice would have been Commerce, not Patronage
Also I would like to say that Rationalism, even going for a science victory, is not necessary, Piety helps well with unhappiness
But I guess suffering a few turns from unhappiness is not that bad, after the ND everythin's gonna be well, but always take in count to trade lux - lux when you want to expand

 

[Light Cleric]

I'll take a look at this when I get home. At a glance, though, if you don't plan to expand beyond 5 cities, I don't really think there's a point to Piety; you can manage the happiness just fine once you get Notre Dame up, especially if you're ally a CS or two down the road and get their luxuries.I'll have to take a look at the exact details of the game to give more advice. I do agree that science is probably the way to go, as you've probably missed out on important cultural wonders(like the Oracle) and that's not a good strategy to just suddenly decide to shift into mid-game.

Also for screenshots, I've found it's easier to take them via Steam's in-game screenshot thing.

 

[The Pilgrim]

Yes, hitting F12 in-game will save the screenshot into Steam directory as .jpg, although I've noticed some weird behavior lately. Random reloading of the last save. Really bizarre, but maybe it was my fault and I just messed with hotkeys.

Anyways, 5 cities are good for this stage of the game and I agree that science will be the easiest non-domination victory here.

Few points:
- you need more workers. 2 workers for 5 cities are not enough.
- building a road to size 2 city is not profitable. Even considering Meritocracy bonus. Wait for cities to grow.
- same with universities. They are super important but size 2 city cannot afford specialists. Thus all universities will cost maintenance and bring nothing in return until cities grow.
- there is no excuse for poor exploring. What is your scout doing there? Send him north. Buy OB from Askia if that's what it takes. On fractal you should also build a boat.


I don't think selling luxes for gold is a mistake. Ally cultural CS with it. Unless AI civs have luxes your cities demand. Then it's worth trading. Every tiny bit of growth helps. Especially if you want to set up universities quickly.

 

[Light Cleric]

I looked at the game and a few things really stuck out at me:

-It's turn 114 and there's only 29 bpt and no NC, that seems extremely unusual to me
-I don't really care for that city in the southeast near the tundra, but maybe that's just me.
-As Pilgrim said, exploring could be much better.
-Where did your Great Engineer from Liberty go?

I tried to ally some city-states, but the cultural ones in this one are really bad for you. One has cotton(which you have), another I found has Gems(which you have), and another has Pearls which it looks like it will never improve to give to you. I don't particularly care for the map itself either but maybe that's just me lol. The one thing you have going for you is solid gold income, so take advantage of that and pick up city states.

 

[SeptimusOctopus]

Yes, hitting F12 in-game will save the screenshot into Steam directory as .jpg, although I've noticed some weird behavior lately. Random reloading of the last save. Really bizarre, but maybe it was my fault and I just messed with hotkeys.

That's not really your fault. Civ5 defaults F12 to quickload if I remember correctly. Most games don't use F12, so Steam has that set up as the screenshot key by default. Civ however uses quite a few F# keys to open various windows.

It's just a case of two programs operating with different assumptions. It causes a problem if you don't re-map one of them. I think I put steam's screenshot key to "print screen" since that made a lot of sense for me. They might not use that by default because some laptops don't have a print screen button.

 

[The Pilgrim]

That's not really your fault. Civ5 defaults F12 to quickload if I remember correctly. Most games don't use F12, so Steam has that set up as the screenshot key by default. Civ however uses quite a few F# keys to open various windows.

It's just a case of two programs operating with different assumptions. It causes a problem if you don't re-map one of them. I think I put steam's screenshot key to "print screen" since that made a lot of sense for me. They might not use that by default because some laptops don't have a print screen button.

Thank you very much! Good to know.
It was weird though, sometimes it worked correctly, sometimes it didn't. I will re-map it the same way. Converting from .tga requires quite an effort. Still will have to resize them. Oh well...

 

[strijder20]

I decided to play further (it's 1800 AD now, teching Rocketry and having 5 GSs at bay).

-It's turn 114 and there's only 29 bpt and no NC, that seems extremely unusual to me

I indeed built the NC too late, it was already 500 AD or so.

-I don't really care for that city in the southeast near the tundra, but maybe that's just me.

It has 4 fishes, thought that was enough to justify it. The culture expansion does not like fishes apparently, though

-As Pilgrim said, exploring could be much better.

I teched to Astro (for some renaissance tech - don't know what exactly it is a prerequisite for, or is Astro a renaissance tech on itself?) and built a caravel. I should not have let that scout there, though. If you want to know why I did: it's because I was being a paranoiac and though Askia would warrior-rush me. Not that scouts help much in that case

-Where did your Great Engineer from Liberty go?

Took a GS, bulbed Edu, finished HS, took Engineer, rush-built Porcelain Tower.

I tried to ally some city-states, but the cultural ones in this one are really bad for you. One has cotton(which you have), another I found has Gems(which you have), and another has Pearls which it looks like it will never improve to give to you. I don't particularly care for the map itself either but maybe that's just me lol. The one thing you have going for you is solid gold income, so take advantage of that and pick up city states.

I picked up two : the two to my north (cultural). They indeed had no luxes I had, but because of those extra duplicate luxes I could sell off all my own luxes.

Thanks for all the help and learning me how to take proper screenshots!

 

[chazzycat]

its ok to delay NC if you are expanding a lot, but if all your new cities get their growth stunted due to happiness then its not a good plan. If your cities can keep growing, then the combined effect will quickly catch you up with the NC output. to do that you need to settle near luxes, and highly prioritize circuses/coliseums.

4 fish is enough to justify a city IMO, that will be very nice later in the game. but if thats the straw that broke your happiness camels back, well maybe you could have waited a bit.

Not sure why people are saying patronage is bad. Patronage is awesome for Greece, soon enough you will own every single CS...start with the ones that offer a new luxury. better scouting may have landed you some of those luxuries earlier. but yeah keep exploring as much as possible to meet all the CS.

if you can, acquire a few puppets at some point. That really helps keep up the gold income.

 

[Light Cleric]

Indeed, Greece can give one gift to a CS with patronage and be set forever I really should play them more often.

I probably overlooked a couple of the fish, that does justify the city a bit more, though I still would have waited until I had NC done before settling it.

I usually take a GE with Liberty if I'm not playing a domination game(usually take a GS then to bulb Steel/Machinery), but a free bulb is never a bad thing, I think that's all just personal preference. However, I think you could have afforded to research Education without bulbing it and built NC in the meantime; the AI is actually quite far behind you in tech so you weren't in any real danger of losing Notre Dame or the like.

I played on a bit more too and you should be able to win this pretty easily by science or diplo, whichever you choose. You didn't play horribly at all, just some places you could improve your game.