How do you typically open the game?

[Victoria]

Slingers are such a no brainier as you need 3 for a crucial eureka. They are also need for archery eureka and the barb death eurekas. You cannot sensibly put off buying at least 3.
The other choices you have

Warrior
Slinger
Monument
Scout
Settler
Worker
... granary

It really just depends on situation, especially terrain

 

[WackenOpenAir]

I have already had 1 GOTM where people died if they did not open with units.
Then i have had many GOTM where a scout would get home allerted if i had not start with a slinger.
Now a scout allerting a camp may not be lethal, but dealing with them delays you so much that it totally ruins your game anyways.

 

[Victoria]

that it totally ruins your game anyways.

Slows and increases challenges. Totally ruin?, perhaps sometimes if you were going for an early archer rush. You need backup tactics. My game this morning on deity I had 3 cities at turn 80 but still won although I did have to use the sea a bit to do so. That was down to a barb camp that seemed to spawn horsemen forever.

 

[comatosedragon]

Wow -- Assuming you guys don't play as Rome exclusively -- when do you get a monument in there? I almost always open scout, scout, slinger, monumnet. Slinger may take priority given landscape, but monument is always 3rd or 4th build.
[immortal]

 

[historix69]

I think an early monument in Civ 6 is less important since you get 0.3 culture per population, so a pop 7 city generates 2.1 culture by itself. You can buy monuments also for a fix price of 250 Gold.
When doing Eurekas, you need less culture to unlock civics, too.

 

[WackenOpenAir]

If i felt i could build it without getting into barb trouble i would probably do it often.
You complete it around turn 10-12. It now doubles your culture output. Would you normally expect craftmanship at 25 with boost or early 30s without, the monument halves that time, saving you 5 - 10 turns. If you are building units after the monument, that already pays for much of the cost of the monument. Not all, so you would still delay your first (and all subsequent) conquest by 2-3 turns, so its still a tradeoff, but thats good, its a choise.

 

[Victoria]

You start with 1.7 culture and if you do not get any from another source it is a long slog
Each pop only gives 0.3 so when you eventually are at 7 pop you have equalled a monument.
A monument is quite a subtle build. On lower levels it contends with scout for first out.
On higher it's a hard call, you will get monuments from other players but those that do not scumsave on deity know archer rushes just do not often work out how you want to unless you are on flat ground, that's the real key to an early archer rush.
If I am in a little safe zone I will often build it quite fast because I want the double navy or 50% mounted build cards and that's why monuments are underrated.... Military tradition it a great route for passive agressive play.

 

[The Highwayman]

On Immortal/Deity it's a tough sell to build a monument really early in my capital. I feel the need to defend and take control of land for future expansion. The spawn system in this game contributes to this: Huge map with the number of Civs reduced from 12 to 8, and I'm still boxed in most of the time. 5-6 military units with a builder mixed in if there are close neighbors is the norm.

If it's a rare game where I have breathing room at the start, I may go Warrior + Slinger for the barb clearing Eurekas followed by a builder. I'm a big fan of an early Settler ASAP followed by the Trader while the Settler is en route to the city location before a monument in the capital. A monument is typically the first build order in my first expand though, unless I need some more military units. I also repair monuments first in captured cities.

 

[MrE]

Monument is a tough call. On the one hand it halves your civics research early, on the other, the civics research goes so fast you miss half the eurekas that are typically easy to get. So is it paying for itself early? Maybe not.

I have begun purchasing monuments as soon as I can. Meaning, no early DOW (mine or on me) I buy a monument instead of a unit.

All the talk on scouts is interesting. I was going to start a thread called 'all my scouts are war heroes (and suck at scouting)'. It seems no matter my intentions the barb action is typically such that the scouts get called into play for defense/offense. I've just started making more slingers instead and use them to slowly push out and scout a bit. And when it comes to scouting - a horseman is better imo.

The way in which scouts are constantly roped into warlike activity reinforces the fact that early units are crucial - unless of course the map gives you a sweet defensive spot.

The map determines the build order.

 

[Chibisuke]

I have made monument my very first build on several deity games recently. It's totally doable. I can even do that and declare an early war in many instances.

The only time it would be really bad is if you did it and had two aggressive neighbors DoW on you within the first 30-40 turns. Certainly possible but I have been making it work with careful tactics.

 

[Victoria]

Deity games are weird, you will have 2-3 in a row where you are a long way from a civ and barbs are meat not threat.

Then the next 3 are right in the middle of a bunch of civs and anything but slingers and you are dead.

Deity is just tough, winnable but tough amd you are forced to violent. I feel myself dropping a notch or two for a while where I can appreciate the finer mechanics and relax and enjoy the scenery a bit more.

I agree monuments are doable but a risk at that level. They do pay off though, even if it's to get you to military tradition earlier.

 

[Loco1234]

Slinger > Slinger > Warrior > Settler, continue with settlers until I run out of good spots or need to build more archers.

Double slingers helps with archery and also home defense. I buy a builder at first opportunity,

I only recently started playing on Emperor, mind you, but so far this is what I've found works best for me.

 

[Victoria]

Slinger > Slinger > Warrior > Settler, continue with settlers until I run out of good spots or need to build more archers.

Double slingers helps with archery and also home defense. I buy a builder at first opportunity,

At some stage you need a third archer for the Machinery eureka which should be on your priority list if ten after Apprenticeship. I often buy that builder too, that or a slinger

 

[Sprenk]

The fact that there is so much disagreement in this thread--or so much awareness that the answer is "it depends"--tells me that the developers have done a great job of balancing.

 

[Victoria]

Yes, and it's not like there is a huge choice.

 

[Tabarnak]

Scout or warrior then settler(multiplayer). Buy worker if possible to focus on units and early monument for early empire timing(when 2nd city finishes worker).

 

[WackenOpenAir]

The fact that there is so much disagreement in this thread--or so much awareness that the answer is "it depends"--tells me that the developers have done a great job of balancing.

Well, the disagreements i think are mostly between people that choose to not try to win as fast as possible or a high as possible level. Those that do i think arent so flexible in their openings.

 

[TurboJ]

On emperor and lower, you have a lot of freedom in this respect and there the discussion is valid. On immortal/deity you need to be super lucky to survive without a strong army very early. It is possible to open with a monument on deity, but as it is a suicide 85% of the time, slingers are the way to go. But thinking about it, there isn't any real reason you shouldn't do a deity opener even on emperor IMHO.

 

[Victoria]

I practically always open on deity with slingers, however not always. Yes even on lower domination is the fastest way to victory. I am just not convinced all slingers is always the best option. For a start on lower levels you have less targets.

IF you had the breathing space at high level there is still the question of IF building 10 slingers is better than building a monument or a builder or a scout first IMO. But it would be nice to properly look at the benefits and be correctly shot down.

As Victoria I can end up with 2 sides of coast near tundra and think I am a lot safer and normally that is the case.

Opening a scout is hard to correctly quantify, it can be a gamble but does have advantages but let's just look at a monument

What benefits does 3.7 culture instead of 1.7! Culture give us?

It can get us to Autocracy twice as fast which is +4 combat
It can get is to Military tradition twice as fast whic is +2 per friendly adjacent unit on defence and +2 per flanking unit on attack as well as the 50% cavalry build card.
It can get us to craftsmanship faster with agoge and if you buy in a builder it's not such a difference in speed but still benefit.
You get a trade route possibility earlier, a 50% settler card earlier but these are not so strong.

I have no idea mathematically as I have not been bothered working it out and it's hard to put a value on agoge military tradition and Oligarchy. What I do know is I race to them much faster.

 

[TurboJ]

Sure, an early monument is tempting - we all know how difficult it is to reliably build culture early on. My point is just that I would never gamble building the monument before I have that one slinger sitting in the city. Even the one slinger with the option of getting the starting warrior quickly back home if someone attacks is often the difference between life and death, especially as getting attacked will help upgrading that slinger into an archer more quickly.

My deity opener (non-domination) is usually
1. slinger x2
2. scout
3. builder
4. monument
5. settler

while #4 and #5 depend whether somebody is trying to kill me off at that moment in time ...and I might do the monument before builder if tech or terrain dictates.

My reasoning with the early builder is that it will help accelerate everything, including culture. The monument will be up later but it will take less turns to do. I get more population faster and I get my first army out very quickly if I need it (and the eureka for improving 3 tiles is just as much of an early culture boost as a monument). One situation where I would consider a monument very first is if I'm safely isolated and have a 4-food tile and a 3-production tile available at spawn.