I found Madrid on the spot. Madrid begins by building a workboat. I set research to polytheism.
As you can see, our people are going to be SO drunk
(EDIT: oops- i mean spiced up?). I pop a hut and get a scout. I pop a hut with the scout and get a map. We are directly on the equator.
Madrid founds Hinduism!
Research is set to agriculture. Both the capital and the most obvious secondly position for a city could use agriculture. Once the workboat is complete, I set production to a warrior. This is timed to coincide with growth to size three. The scout pops a hut (originally located by the warrior) and finds hunting! We complete research of agriculture and I set research to the wheel. I struggled with this choice a little bit. I am considering two decisions. Will we go for the oracle? How can we leverage our traits the best?
One way we could proceed is to research priesthood and grab a free technology by building the oracle. This will also allow for use of temples as well. For us, temples are half price. This is a valid path. I think other players may choose this path however, so I am going to attempt to choose an alternate path and make best use of our other trait, the expansionist trait. I will research pottery, not for cottages, but for the half-priced granary. Later, with the development of slavery, we will make excellent use of these.
As we scout more and more of the territory, we meet Genghis Khan who lies to our east.
Somewhere in the fog people are talking about Nirvana. Buddhism is founded!
We pop another hut and receive 33gold. And later, another one, for 37gold.
Pottery completes and before progressing towards writing, I detour to sailing. I have just learnt that we are on a island to ourselves (at least we can see the Khan and latter trade with him); did I set it to snaky or sneaky continents? It would be nice to get a galley, mount the scout on it and set it off to find other civilizations. Sailing is also on the way towards the great lighthouse which would be a nice wonder on this map and which, in conjunction with expansionists other bonus building (the harbour) has a synergistic effect. I am envisioning a vast empire of large cities, the health provided by seafood and harbours, the happiness by monarchy (seeing as how we have wines
EDIT: yeah, spices right...
), forges (we have gold), and temples (Hindu and Jew?), all bringing in 150% of 4 trade routes (with currency) before the ADs. Am I being too optimistic?
We lose the scout to a barbarian warrior. Not much a hill is going to do to prevent that outcome.
EDIT: Additional turns:
In 2240BC, a new warrior is built, a city is founded, and the corn required to feed it are farmed.
Barcelona is founded and while growing, it builds a galley. That was one of three places that would have made potential founding options. I choose that location because I think we need hammers and those hills will provide lots of hills, especially when we can put some mines on them, and the food can all come from a single tile. I think you will get excellent early and midgame production out of this city. Since we dont really have any neighbours to rush, we should expand a bit and get some tile control/infrastructure up. And to expand quickly you need hammers.
I order up another settler in the capital in the hopes of finding a way back for the scouting warrior. Ive seen archers and I think we need metals or archery sooner rather then later. Pottery, in retrospect, could have been avoided while mining and bronze working came in. I think I teched slowly, I didnt work tiles for anything other then production so far.
Hmmm
I maybe should have picked mining up earlier
my worker has nothing to do but build a road for a few turns.
While running from an archer, Bob runs directly into a warrior. Will he prove victorious, even with the newly acquired single star promotion? He survives this encounter but is now being chased by 2 barbarian archers and only has 0.5/2life. Oh no! Will Bob get back to
civilization safely?
Oops I got so caught up in getting Bob to safety some years may have slipped by. Its now 1920bc. Like I said
preoccupied with bobs fate.
So here are our cities in 1920BC:
A view of our lands (sneaky continents indeedJ):
The Demographics:
The good news, is that Bob got away to fight again another day. Way to go bob, only a bit more to be a medic then you get to play with the real soldiers (I said play, not fight Bob).
Barcelona is built for hammers. Note that if Hinduism goes there and we adopt the religion, we will be able to grow to size 4. I count 1,2,3 sources of hammers and the farm. Midgame, with calendar we will have a four food square and that can pay the food bill on some watermillls. I decided to build on the sea as opposed to inland where there would be more hammers to allow the option to either build, or benefit from the great lighthouse here.
Madrid can grow to size five (could adopt Hinduism)(possibly six soon enough depending on placement of current settler in production) and is almost finished a settler. It could build an escort for it (in case Bob doesnt ever return) and the lighthouse and greatlighthouse. A worker would be nice as well.
Techs:
I was sort of playing towards grabbing the great lighthouse, but still require masonry. Research path I was thinking towards masonry after bronze working, finish this last settler and put out the lighthouse and the great lighthouse. I really hope we have copper. After masonry, instead of getting writing and alphabet as I was originally planning, was to make a play at Judaism. With organized religion, the lighthouse would be faster. Use chops and slavery as we develop organized religions to make it worthwhile. I was thinking Barcelona would handle archers (or axemen)(or warriors- also a valid option- just need a few more) to cover barbarians while we expand. With a granary and that corn, you could move very quickly. A worker will soon be required. The galley might want a scout aboard to assist in scouting. We might get an off-shore hut. One option that might still be available if you made it a priority is to get both the oracle and the great lighthouse. This would require an inland city near the marble with the settler being built. I think this is a long shot, but actually doable if you make a priority at this point.
Here is the save.
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