How do you get a strong start?

[Doug Piranha]

Am I alone in going Worker first and researching Agriculture?

No, you're not. I don't understand why it's worth delaying the worker to grow to size 2, when all that 3rd tile will gain is one extra food or hammer beyond of the two food it takes to feed the extra citizen, and/or some commerce if you're lucky. On the other hand, building a worker means I can *really* grow while I'm building warriors.

I generally build my first settler when I have 6 warriors (3 for garrison of capital, 3 for escort of settler and garrison of new city), rather than wait for a particular population level.

 

[AngelGabriel]

Interesting thoughts here. I mostly play a large map with about 12 civs and if I were to follow those REX hints in this thread I would stick to 3-4 cities. How can you build 2-3 warriors, a worker and a settler fast enough to claim enough territory and thus have the option to settle more. Sometimes I'm spamming settler after settler and only get 6 cities running (without thinking too hard about economy). There're enough people here telling me it's way too few cities and I should stick to at least 8 cities in the beginning. So ... how can I do that?

 

[readercolin]

I tend to play on a bit emptier maps - Try global highlands, standard, with the standard number of civs and you'll see what I mean. I usually end up adding more civs to the map, but even then there is still plenty of space if you move fast enough. As for number of cities, on a crowded map and lower difficulty levels I can usually grab at least 4 before I go to wipe out an opponent - and I always tend to play with aggressive AI and raging barbarians which usually leads to trying to build worker first or just spamming settlers with lots of wasted production and quick ends to the game. Without aggressive AI and raging barbs, it becomes significantly easier, but, also less fun IMO.

-Colin

Edit - there is also the matter of placement of cities. If I just go and place a city near my capital, and then expect to expand more sometimes I wouldn't be able to. But if instead I place my cities to cut off my opponents, and block off a section of land that I can then backfill, it is significantly easier to rapidly expand AND have somewhere to expand to. If the enemy is a significant distance away however, it is generally better to just choose the best available spot - but in that case you aren't in as big of a hurry to settle as you WILL have somewhere to settle.