How do you typically open the game?

How do you typically open the game?

  • Military units to defend/immediately conquer a city state

    Votes: 20 17.2%
  • Units & an early builder to grab eurekas

    Votes: 35 30.2%
  • Units & an early settler to build a city

    Votes: 15 12.9%
  • Scouts & units/builder

    Votes: 39 33.6%
  • Other (Please specify in comments)

    Votes: 7 6.0%

  • Total voters
    116
  • Poll closed .
Well, all i can say about it is that if you dont like the straight up 6 slinger rush, i can understand and respect that.
If however you havent tried it and dont think it is optimal. Give it a try. (although you may fail on your first 2 or 3 archer rushes, you must pick the right target, choose a proper area for killing enemy units first, move carefully to never give your opponent the opportunity to attack your archer with multiple of his units and use your upgrades to heal your units.)

Compared to the build you giver here TurboJ, your first settler comes out at about the same time. So you lack a scout, builder and monument.
As soon as however you capture your first city, it probably has 3 improved tiles and a monument. And you still have your units to win more.
It really is grossly imbalanced imo and a mixed build like this cant really come close. Thats the whole problem, a mixed build with a bit of everything doesnt really give much of true significance.
If you could build that worker or monument as your very first build, at least you get something noteworthy. If you get it all around or after turn 20, meh. Definately not worth giving up your military opportunity.
 
Well, all i can say about it is that if you dont like the straight up 6 slinger rush, i can understand and respect that.
If however you havent tried it and dont think it is optimal. Give it a try. (although you may fail on your first 2 or 3 archer rushes, you must pick the right target, choose a proper area for killing enemy units first, move carefully to never give your opponent the opportunity to attack your archer with multiple of his units and use your upgrades to heal your units.)

Compared to the build you giver here TurboJ, your first settler comes out at about the same time. So you lack a scout, builder and monument.
As soon as however you capture your first city, it probably has 3 improved tiles and a monument. And you still have your units to win more.
It really is grossly imbalanced imo and a mixed build like this cant really come close. Thats the whole problem, a mixed build with a bit of everything doesnt really give much of true significance.
If you could build that worker or monument as your very first build, at least you get something noteworthy. If you get it all around or after turn 20, meh. Definately not worth giving up your military opportunity.

On domination-oriented games I go for 2 x warrior + 4x archers as soon as possible and start conquering. The build order on my last post is what I do when I'm not playing warlike. My "secret" to taking advantage of a surprise opportunity in that case is battering rams. If I'm not playing to make long-term war, I'm not paying the military upkeep neither. So if I need to take a city early on a more "peaceful" game, I just build one battering ram. And BTW, those rams make things much faster and more reliable in domination games as well.

Also, the reason for going with a builder and monument before military stuff is a principle that I don't build military units unless I can get a production discount for them. Furthermore, even in domination games, my first army is usually my last army so I make sure the training of it is efficient.
 
Hmm, my philosophy is that when i build units, i will have to get the maximum use out of them. So i never build units to take 1 city and have a more peaceful game as that would make that city rather expensive to capture.
Espescially if its an AI rather than a CS. Attacking the first city you have to first kill his standing army, after that is done, it seems weird to me to not take more cities, even when they have put up walls or you lost an archer causing you to need 1 or 2 more archers. Thats a price insignificant for the rewards.

I just use the reduce upkeep card to fix that aspect. I dont like disbanding units. The amount of units you have is also extremely important to reduce the chances of any AI attacking you.
As for the warriors and battering ram: While archers are a magnificent early game unit, another important reason for the archer rush is that you can build slingers instead, greatly reducing the time you need to build them. I usually build a second warrior after my archers just to feel more comfortable in battle. Having only 1 warrior means you have to keep it protected at all cost or you cant capture a city, while meanwhile you prefer to have it next to the city to stop it from healing. So ye i like having a second warrior there. Must admit i never really tried the battering ram.
 
Hmm, my philosophy is that when i build units, i will have to get the maximum use out of them. So i never build units to take 1 city and have a more peaceful game as that would make that city rather expensive to capture.
Espescially if its an AI rather than a CS. Attacking the first city you have to first kill his standing army, after that is done, it seems weird to me to not take more cities, even when they have put up walls or you lost an archer causing you to need 1 or 2 more archers. Thats a price insignificant for the rewards.

I just use the reduce upkeep card to fix that aspect. I dont like disbanding units. The amount of units you have is also extremely important to reduce the chances of any AI attacking you.
As for the warriors and battering ram: While archers are a magnificent early game unit, another important reason for the archer rush is that you can build slingers instead, greatly reducing the time you need to build them. I usually build a second warrior after my archers just to feel more comfortable in battle. Having only 1 warrior means you have to keep it protected at all cost or you cant capture a city, while meanwhile you prefer to have it next to the city to stop it from healing. So ye i like having a second warrior there. Must admit i never really tried the battering ram.

You could get a scout as a 2nd land unit. 3 MP can be usefull to just snipe a city without exposing the melee unit to bombardment. Especially when there's an archer in garrison.

As for the battering ram, it's usefull that early if you have a strong UU. Otherwise it s viable if you have iron and go for a swordsman rush. Past that point, the battering ram with any solid force (knights, musketsmen) is insanely strong if the opponent didnt reach civil service. Past infantry, it's a joke considering how strong it still is, even working with tanks lol
 
What do you do with your early gold @TurboJ ?
And everyone else for that matter

delegations, most typically buy the first builder, if i happen to get a free one from a goody hut or am awash in production, then maybe build the builder earlier and buy the first trader when opportunity shows itself. early rushes though and all those slingers need to be upgraded.
 
On gold, in the past i used to have the principle of "the earlier you use it the higher its value" so i would buy something like a worker with it. (when i was also doing mixed builds with workers, settlers etc)
I totally changed in that respect in civ6 because when you have cheap unit upgrading you get something like 1.25 production per gold while purchasing costs 4 gold per production.
Hence i use my first gold for upgrading archers, then i save until around turn 80-90 ish i get to use it for knights (with siege tower) or xbows at half upgrade price.
Of course sometimes you need to spend a little for buying a tile. During the first 100 turns, i will only purchase something in case of absolute emergency. (after you have all the commercial districts and trade routes you can wipe your ass with money if you like)
 
Yes early gold is important, I have started trading my luxes for 6 GPT but it's a tricky decision sometimes

i'll have to try that one. spawning next to the yellow city states is always nice for the 8-9+ gpt early game trade route
 
Well, an early worker is an excellent thing to buy, but imo upgrading 6 archers for 180 gold is simply a much better investment.
The next 200 gold are probably available only around turn 50ish or so. By that time im done building archers and already building builders and settlers anyway. And by that time im only 30-40 turns away from a mass unit upgrade where 200 gold = 2 knights.
 
The next 200 gold are probably available only around turn 50ish
6 GPT from an early lux is enough to upgrade your archers

I'm just saying if you can squeeze every ounce of gold out of the game early you can get a lot more done
 
Well the archer upgrade normally happens somewhere in the 20s. Cant really have much income from the luxes before that, usually not even the tech to connect them.
After that yes, it might be good to pay some more attention to that that i currently do.
 
What do you do with your early gold @TurboJ ?
And everyone else for that matter

If capital city has good, gold-producing tiles I buy my first builder. If not, I buy a builder in my second city the same turn it is founded. And of course the obvious slinger->archer upgrade. However, the best scenario I can think of is to be able to buy first one or two settlers. Loss of population is bad enough so loss of hammers at the same time I feel is best avoided. Monument and granary are also good options to buy with gold, whether it be first or second city; of course depending on if I have more GPT or production in any given start. I see people buying military units too, but in the early game I feel that's sub-optimal. In the early game, IMO, one should be buying either production (builders), population (settlers, granaries) or culture (monuments). I might occasionally buy an early scout though, if there is a good possibility for multiple goody-huts. Oh, and good tiles of course, easily worth a buy.
 
First slinger to get advancement on archers, then a settler to find an ocean location for a city to get sailing and navigation bonuses. Except for walls to get science advancement, I am almost always looking at getting the science bonuses. After that, a third city for iron if I didn't get it in my first two cities. Also, 4-5 warriors before I get iron working (if not Romans) to get quick, easy upgrade to swords. Then work toward crossbowmen and one or two catapults and begin assaulting other civs.
 
A question I have - somewhat related to the thread but somewhat tangential - is how many people build settlers, or how many settlers do you build, before getting the 50% discount card? I always feel like I should wait for the card, but that also feels really late to start expanding. I see many people in this thread listing settlers among their first builds, is it better to basically ignore that policy card and expand by building a few really early and stealing the rest?
 
A question I have - somewhat related to the thread but somewhat tangential - is how many people build settlers, or how many settlers do you build, before getting the 50% discount card? I always feel like I should wait for the card, but that also feels really late to start expanding. I see many people in this thread listing settlers among their first builds, is it better to basically ignore that policy card and expand by building a few really early and stealing the rest?

Yes. The policy is only efficient if you have much open space, for example because you choose fewer than the standard number of civs. Ususally however you
are building so few settlers that urban planning/+1 production every city is better, because you get it for everything.
 
The answer is "depends".
If you get a monument and a belief that pushes culture or an early natural wonder.... or are Gorgo you can get there earlier.
Certainly one settler and you ideally want a builder at some stage... getting at least 3 archers is a must even for peaceful so it's not like you are short of things to build so I go by the rule that unless I have something better to do I'll build a settler... and building a granary for example is not better
 
Yes early gold is important, I have started trading my luxes for 6 GPT but it's a tricky decision sometimes

@Victoria I find horses give the best return. I always trade these.

You can also trade 3gpt for 100 gold, which aside from diplo ramifications is a nice way to help rush buy a shrine, builder, or settler... or archer in a pinch.

What I haven't tested is whether you can then trade 100g for, say, 3gpt + 20g, or some such, and exploit the hell out of the ai until they can't afford an army and you've rush-bought yours.

With the river goddess pantheon, you don't need amenities for awhile, so I can get a nice gold income from my first few resources.
 
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