Never building scouts

[Civilmyzation]

sure, if you also start on a small island, there is really no point of an immediate scout

however, say you are Polynesia, I played a game on Arch, and because I could send my scout into the water, I was able to nab at the least 10 ruins before other civs could move. that is when a scout can be amazing. or a pangea type map, so much space that is often covered with some jungle. that extra movement is so helpful in comparison to running your warrior out there.

 

[Bino]

Simply put, the 5 turns it usually takes me to build a scout are paid back quite quickly for the reasons stated by others in this thread. While you find out your surroundings and where to settle your next city you get also some goodies here and there, i dont think anything is worth more than those 5 turns of scout building.

 

[George Orwell]

Also, if your warrior's out scouting your worker(s) often can't do anything but sit in the city waiting for barbs to die or move on.

 

[Aldor]

If you play as the Aztec or Inca, you might also skip a scout (or build a warrior instead), since they get the biggest benefit of a scout (fast movement) through their UU / UA. Also quite notable: both ignore difficult terrain. The Jaguar can move over hills as long as there's forest/jungle on it, and the Inca units can move through forests quickly as long as a hill's under it

 

[ivonbeton]

It's not always the best idea to build a scout first, but usually it is. Last game I managed to discover 3 extra ruins thanks to my scout. It only slows you down a bit but can give you a great start by discovering extra ruins/civs/CS's fast.

I also use my scout a lot to guard my first worker while my "army" is clearing out camps. They aren't strong enough to take barbarians head on, but they can make sure barbarians don't capture your worker while your city bombards them.

 

[ajok]

in bnw, if you want to be host in congress, you must met all civs (which means, you must have scout at least 1)

 

[docbud]

sure, if you also start on a small island, there is really no point of an immediate scout

however, say you are Polynesia, I played a game on Arch, and because I could send my scout into the water, I was able to nab at the least 10 ruins before other civs could move. that is when a scout can be amazing. or a pangea type map, so much space that is often covered with some jungle. that extra movement is so helpful in comparison to running your warrior out there.

When I play Polynesia, I build a moai warrior instead of a scout. I know I realize I lose movement, but I feel safer with a moai warrior instead. I do the same thing when I play as the Aztecs. I build a Jag instead of a scout.

 

[Arachnofiend]

Its actually not a bad idea to start with a monument first. If you think your warrior can find enough gold to be able to rush buy a scout, it might make sense too to not build a scout first. When you are playing multiplayer if you have the perfect terrain for a wonder, it might make sense to forego those extra 3-4 turns on building a scout (Quick) to focus on the early set-up for a wonder [So a granary/worker + monument]

Can't speak for multiplayer, but in singleplayer this set up is a bit too chancy for my tastes. The main reason I stopped going for the monument first is to make it easier to get into Acoustics right after finishing my final Tradition/Liberty policy so I can head straight into Rationalism rather than dumping a filler policy. Of course if the Oracle is still up I might go ahead and take Patronage and pop the Oracle for Aesthetics so as with everything it's all about the situation.

 

[Cicerosaurus]

Also, if you are playing as Spain, they get large gold bonus' if they are the first to find Natural Wonders.

Scouts can be very useful for finishing off barbarians and being the one to rush the barb camp when your archers have killed the brutes.

I would add that your playing style will also impact. If you value gold very highly in the early stages- which I do for buying settlers rather than building them- scouts can deliver so much from meeting Civs and goody huts. Plus, as has been mentioned, if they get a free upgrade to an archer it saves building a unit.

 

[atreas]

The benefits of the scout are indeed nice, but...

First of all, in Immortal+ it is getting quite unlikely to get first to many goody huts - that's a 0-1 for the scout.

Secondly, I think that the early scout isn't fitting with Liberty+rapid expansion (you certainly need the monuments much more). Thus, when playing that way, you usually HAVE to omit the scout. Of course, you should also check at what turn you meet other AIs (the closer the AIs, the less useful is the scout).

On the other side, nearby forests (i.e. Iroquis or Polynesia usually) make a scout mandatory. Most probably you will not get first to the huts, but maybe you can discover some Natural Wonder (and happiness = more expansion). Plus, of course Pangea is better for scouts than continents, etc.

I would say that you have to look at the strategy in whole, not in isolated pieces. I can't think of many Tradition games without a scout, and I can't think of many Liberty rapid expansion games (or early war games) with a scout. But certainly the scout can be hugely useful.

 

[Sir Betti]

I use a mod called, I think "Unlimited Barbarian XP". On larger land masses this makes scouts really interesting. The first promotion I choose is 15 xp rest, then 20xp rest then rest xp while moving. This lets me attack those barb camps much more easily. One promotion makes for 3 movement speed. There are also 2 promotions for more visibility. If your scout survives until max promotion he is easily as valuable as a warrior. Then as your empire grows, send him out into the boonies and park him on a hill. His area of view is quite large. If I play with 2 scouts I keep em together and as they level up, wreak havoc with roaming barbs.

I play goody huts off and raging barbs.

 

[Catan_Settler]

Well I suppose you could make the argument that a monument is better first, but the reality is... the benefits of an early scout can't be gotten later. If the AI gets all the huts, they're gone. This costs you-- tech, faith, culture, and/or gold, depending on the huts. Then there is the fact the first person to find either a city state OR a natural wonder, gets bonus gold, so if you're not the first, that gold is gone too. Whatever else you are delaying to build a scout, can be gotten later. The policies you get from building a monument for instance, well you'll still get them, but maybe 10 turns later or however long it takes to build that scout. If you miss out on all the bonuses from exploring though, you will never get them cause there's just no way to get those huts once they're gone, and no way to be the first to discover something when you're not. So the opportunity cost to NOT building that scout is huge, meanwhile the downside to holding off on the monument for 8-10 turns.. is pretty much nothing. Your policies are delayed a few turns, that's it.. you'll still get those policies.

Basically, unless it's an archipelago map or perhaps small continents, skipping the scout is a bad move that you can never compensate for. Now, can you win anyways? Sure, of course. Hell you can win doing all kinds of if you're not playing on Deity... but still, the best opening on almost all maps is a scout because it's your best bet for finding huts, City states, and natural wonders.

 

[Catan_Settler]

Secondly, I think that the early scout isn't fitting with Liberty+rapid expansion (you certainly need the monuments much more). Thus, when playing that way, you usually HAVE to omit the scout. Of course, you should also check at what turn you meet other AIs (the closer the AIs, the less useful is the scout).

I'd have to disagree with you there. Scouting is probably even MORE important if you're going wide since you have to make a plan for where even more cities are going to go, and also pick a pantheon belief appropriate to the terrain around them. Also, you tend to need more gold when going wide if you want to do things like get a national college up in a reasonable time, and so on. IE: buy settlers and/or libraries.

 

[civzombie]

I didn't see settler blocking mentioned in this thread. In single player, against the AI at immortal, I find scouts very useful for slowing down or disrupting the AI's second city build. (the scout can be used to make them move at close to one square per turn even without declaring war by using the terrain and the fact that civilians must go around military, which might be the difference between my settler getting to the spot first)

 

[DarthSheldonPhD]

I never play with ruins and consequently never make scouts. However, in the event that your starting location is production poor, it may be worthwhile to build a scout initially for, well, scouting, but also for barb defense. While numerically scout>warrior and certainly scout>spearman, the combination of bonuses vs. barbarians, help from city bombardments, and effective use of terrain modifiers enable a scout to fend off wave after wave of multiple barbs.

 

[atreas]

I'd have to disagree with you there. Scouting is probably even MORE important if you're going wide since you have to make a plan for where even more cities are going to go, and also pick a pantheon belief appropriate to the terrain around them. Also, you tend to need more gold when going wide if you want to do things like get a national college up in a reasonable time, and so on. IE: buy settlers and/or libraries.

I think you didn't exactly get the meaning of my phrase: wide via wars, not wide via building cities yourself. Maybe it is a flaw of mine, but in standard map size I never feel the need (or have the ability) to initially build more than 4 cities myself - I usually get another 5-6 through puppets quite early, and there is simply no way that I have found to overcome happiness problems after that point. And in this scenario the scout is almost pointless IMO.