How legit are huge map settings and marathon mode?

[Lord_Herobrine]

I prefer Huge Marathon. The game flies by too quickly otherwise. I mean, the world is not so small where you only have like three cities maximum, but its on a more relative scale to earth. And about marathon: "Rome was not built in a day," so it shouldn't be a really quick game. With Marathon you can fully immerse yourself in the game, allowing for much more in-depth micromanagement.

 

[PolishNoble]

I definitely wouldn't say Huge maps are the "easy" way to go. I just started playing Noble difficulty (BTS), and I was coming off a cultural victory in 1913 with Byzantine, being compared to Augustus Caesar. Map size was Normal, playing the Balanced map, Marathon speed. This morning, I fired up a game on Noble playing as Elizabeth, on a Huge Archipelago map, Epic speed. My bright spot was Sid's Sushi Co. in a ton of cities, but otherwise I was stuck on a small island to start, the AI expanded WAY faster than me, and by 1900 I was in 4th out of about 13 leaders and Montezuma and Ragnar decided to gang up on me. Any advice for Huge maps? (Note I usually go for Space Race/Cultural, will occasionally go for Domination/Conquest)

 

[Quibblesome]

Any advice for Huge maps?

As long as you're not isolated early aggression is usually a great idea because the civs that beeline religious techs end up so far away from defensive techs. If you're getting out an early force of units its not unusual to face up against a religious civ that hasn't even got bronze working yet. In the same vein a beeline to alphabet is good because it enables you to trade stuff like bronze working which you usually would never be able to trade in a normal game.

I'd usually go for domination myself even on a huge map. Space/Cultural takes too long . If you're looking for quick games then as long as there isn't an isolated civ then AP cheese is usually the quickest option.

 

[faipalgugus]

Well, i always play with an epic seed and big/huge maps with a ton of ai.

I tried two times a pangea with normal settings on emperor and i won very very easily. With a normal map, especially with a pangea, you can only focus on yours units and you can win by domination early. With a huge map, you can't rush them all and you have to balance your game a bit.

Balance is the key. Marathon with a normal map is a bit like cheating, but Marathon/huge or Small/quick is fine

 

[capnvonbaron]

Huge maps generally increase the AI tech-rate as well. With so many AI teching so many different things, and the increased chances that you have a Mansa or a Ghandi trading everything to everyone they meet, it can be really hard to keep up with.

Also, diplomacy is a slog. On a smaller map you may go space-race or culture without too much diplo finagling. On huge maps, you WILL eventually piss someone off, and they WILL DoW you at some point.