Harv
Emperor
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2008
- Messages
- 1,945
Hi all! I enjoyed the game many years ago, but never actually played a game from start to finish, most likely due to a perfectionist streak. I have been playing again the past few weeks.
Similarly to Civilization and Earth maps, I have enjoyed playing Colonization on the Americas map and more specifically the North America start. Here is a map I have been playing on repeatedly over the past couple of weeks:
The North America start location 37,14:
The first thing I always do is open up the Game menu options and hit End of Turn. I have no idea why it is presented as an option when it is absolutely essential. Then save game so I can easily find it.
Here is the situation in Europe:
We are playing as England on the original Americas map at Viceroy difficulty. I understand that the Dutch have stronger starting units and a better domestic economy to work with. The French have stronger starting units and better Native relations (and economy) to work with. The Spanish have a stronger starting soldier and a bonus fighting these Natives. However, we are playing as England, which as well as I understand history, is recently recovering from a civil war and in no shape to be funding adventures in a new world.
England gets a bonus to generating colonists through crosses, so I will try to leverage this. With some pre-knowledge of the Americas map, there are three squares that I know of we can land on two of them and start right away generating Crosses and Bells. This is pretty close to what is today Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island, and possible Maine, depending on how you are interpreting the map.
@Gumbolt - I remember you from Civ4 and you were always asking me what my plan was. Does this resemble what you mean by a plan?
General Plan:
So I plan to sail to this part and see what is there, then drop the two colonists to found two colonies, then return to Europe in time to pick up a colonist in 1496. It takes two turns to get to the New World and sail into one of the two ports we will have, one turn to sail a sea lane, and two more turns to return to Europe. So our cycle is 5 years and we will be in Europe.
Cross Plan:
With the docks empty and with two colonies, we will be generating 20 Crosses per 5-year mission. With no extra units purchases, the costs are as follows:
1496 - 10 Crosses, 4 Units (Pickup 100 Tools and become a Pioneer)
1501 - 11 Crosses, 5 Units (Buy 50 Horses and become a Scout)
1506 - 13 Crosses, 6 Units (Buy 100 Tools and become a Pioneer)
1511 - 14 Crosses, 7 Units (Buy 50 Horses and become a Scout)
1516 - 15 Crosses, 8 Units (Increase a Colony to 2)
1521 - 17 Crosses, 9 Units
1526 - 18 Crosses, 10 Units
1531 - 19 Crosses, 11 Units
1536 requires 21 Crosses, which is over the limit and we will need a third Colony by then in order to maintain this regular pattern of sailing into Europe to find a Colonist waiting at the docks for us. This third colony will not be located three tiles from a sea lane, so we will need a Wagon Train to reach it. The Wagon Train also counts as a Unit, so based on this, we will need our third Colony by 1526.
If we find an opportunity to buy an extra Colonist (such as a Carpenter) then we will need this third Colony by 1521.
So by 1521, we will try to have:
3 Colonies
11 Units (1 Caravel, 1 Wagon Train, 9 Colonists)
Economic Plan:
This part of the map generates Furs. The market bid price for Furs is 3 gp. A colonist on a forest tile, as shown in the default town setup, generates 3 Furs for 9 gp. The market bid price for Coats is 9 gp, so we can generate 3 Coats from 3 Furs for 18 gpt.
We will do this in 2 Colonies to generate enough cash to buy what I think we need in the near (1521) future.
100 gp - 50 Horses in 1501 (162 gp income)
200 gp - 100 Tools in 1506 (270 gp income)
100 gp - 50 Horses in 1511 (162 gp income)
200 gp - 100 Tools in either 1516 or 1521 (135 gp income + 36 gp from Furs)
220 gp - Extra Colonist in 1516 or 1521 (135 gp income)
52 gp - Buy 4/40 Hammers for Wagon Train
If I balanced this budget correctly, I have 28 gp left over after all these transactions, so there is nothing left over to transfer any colonist to build Bells. I will add this to my list of Mistakes.
Interesting to note in inspecting the market prices is the ask price of Sugar is 7 gp and the bid price of Rum is 14 gp. Similarly, the ask price for Tobacco is 4 gp and the bid price for Cigars is 11 gp. With some investment, it might be possible to make a 7 gp profit.
Build Plan:
An alternative to the Fur Trade is to build stuff, such as that Wagon Train we said we needed by around 1521, which is when we will need that third Colony. Hammers can be bought to finish a project for 13 gp, so we can say the Wagon Train (40 Hammers) costs 520 gp. However, this is what I will call the Hammer Economy and will try my best to distinguish it from the Cash Economy.
A Colonist can spend one turn chopping 6 Lumber and two turns building 3 Hammers, for a net production of 2 Hammers or 26 gpt. This is, of course, higher than what we earn in the Cash Economy producing Coats and it appears to be a direct result of the fact that Coats are valued at 9 gp and Hammers are valued at 13 gp.
We can also blame Mercantalism for this.
This value of labor improves to 28.36 when we add a Road to a Forest tile and producing 8 lumber instead of 6. It will go down as we add more Colonists and require Food to support. It will go up again as we add more improvements. Specialists will earn more, of course.
When we clear one of our Colonies, we will add 20 Lumber. When we plow, we will be able to support a population of 2.
The earliest reasonable time I can think of to build a Wagon Train is:
1505 - Produce 2 x 8 Lumber
1507 - Produce 5 x 3 Hammers
1512 - 20 Lumber + 15/40 Hammers + 1 Lumber
1519 - 36/40 Hammers - Buy for 52 gp
This is later than the proposed dates for the third Colony.
Pioneer Plan:
1498 - Pioneer 1 arrives (1/3 probability of Criminal Pioneer)
1503 - Road connecting colonies
1508(+1) - Road (allow 1 turn to switch to Criminal Scouts)
1510(+1) - Colony 3 built
1513(+1) - Road (depending on location of Resources)
1515(+1) - Alternate Colony 3 built
1506 - Pioneer 2 arrives (Is this Colonization or a space game)
1512 - Colony square cleared +20 Lumber
1518 - Colony square plowed, Population 2
Bell Plan:
It looks like I did not make a plan for adding Bells. For 18 gpt, I can transfer a Colonist to the Town Hall to produce 3 Bells. The budget above did not leave any room for this, only 28 gp.
We can get some of this back if we want to:
220 gp from the bought Colonist we have no plan for.
200 gp from the Tools we said we would need in 1516 or 1521
The current plan gets us a Founding Father in 1522 with a surplus of 1, assuming the third Colony does not get built for some reason. Spending 18 gp as above will advance us to 1520 with no surplus. Another 36 gp will advance us 3 more years. So we might manipulate the year we get our first Founding Father by delaying one of the projects mentioned above.
Founding Father Plan:
I count 960 combinations of Founding Fathers in the first round. I will set up priorities as follows:
240 - Thomas Jefferson - 25% probability - Political
He gets priority in my books over everything, because some of these Founding Fathers appear to be game winners and worth deck searching strategies to obtain.
144 - Hernando de Soto - 20% probability - Exploration
With so many Lost City Rumors, and a few Seasoned Scouts, this is the difference between getting Nothing and hitting the Fountain of Youth several times. However, I am giving the edge to Jefferson, because I worked out the deck digging strategy to be cheaper this way and I do not plan to leverage de Soto until a later point in the game where it is "safer" to start digging for treasure and upsetting the local population.
192 - Hernando Cortez - 33% probability - Military
More Treasure. Free transport. Saves deck digging to pick him up later.
I currently have him behind de Soto because:
a) He appears to me as slightly less of a game winner.
b) He becomes a game winner several turns later than de Soto.
c) I plan to explore before attacking.
d) The 33% probability gives a good chance of appearing again.
96 - William Brewster - 25% probability - Religion
If I am planning to hit the Fountain of Youth several times, then this will mean fewer Criminals and a much less expensive education plan.
The rest go to the Exploration Adviser.
96 - Magellan
If I get him, then the 5 turn cycle becomes a four turn cycle? I have to check.
96 - La Salle
We are cycling the Exploration deck.
96 - Coronado
As above, we are cycling the deck.
It looks like in this list, I have decided to ignore the Trade Advisor and I am missing a couple of other great picks that might show up, both named Peter.
Missing Plans:
Get Rich Quick Plan - Obviously this is too slow a start. Hopefully the RNG provides us with something quicker.
Posting and editing in thoughts.
Mistakes:
So my mistakes so far that I am aware of, without playing so much as a single turn are:
1. Rolling the Original Americas map
2. Rolling the English
3. Overthinking
(I did the exact same thing many years ago in the Original Civilization and learned how to play completely wrong! However, I am also giving detailed information about how I think!)
4. Starting with 2 Colonies already, why no investment in Bells?
I uploaded a save file for whoever might be interested.
Similarly to Civilization and Earth maps, I have enjoyed playing Colonization on the Americas map and more specifically the North America start. Here is a map I have been playing on repeatedly over the past couple of weeks:
Spoiler :
The North America start location 37,14:
The first thing I always do is open up the Game menu options and hit End of Turn. I have no idea why it is presented as an option when it is absolutely essential. Then save game so I can easily find it.
Here is the situation in Europe:
We are playing as England on the original Americas map at Viceroy difficulty. I understand that the Dutch have stronger starting units and a better domestic economy to work with. The French have stronger starting units and better Native relations (and economy) to work with. The Spanish have a stronger starting soldier and a bonus fighting these Natives. However, we are playing as England, which as well as I understand history, is recently recovering from a civil war and in no shape to be funding adventures in a new world.
England gets a bonus to generating colonists through crosses, so I will try to leverage this. With some pre-knowledge of the Americas map, there are three squares that I know of we can land on two of them and start right away generating Crosses and Bells. This is pretty close to what is today Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island, and possible Maine, depending on how you are interpreting the map.
@Gumbolt - I remember you from Civ4 and you were always asking me what my plan was. Does this resemble what you mean by a plan?
General Plan:
So I plan to sail to this part and see what is there, then drop the two colonists to found two colonies, then return to Europe in time to pick up a colonist in 1496. It takes two turns to get to the New World and sail into one of the two ports we will have, one turn to sail a sea lane, and two more turns to return to Europe. So our cycle is 5 years and we will be in Europe.
Cross Plan:
With the docks empty and with two colonies, we will be generating 20 Crosses per 5-year mission. With no extra units purchases, the costs are as follows:
1496 - 10 Crosses, 4 Units (Pickup 100 Tools and become a Pioneer)
1501 - 11 Crosses, 5 Units (Buy 50 Horses and become a Scout)
1506 - 13 Crosses, 6 Units (Buy 100 Tools and become a Pioneer)
1511 - 14 Crosses, 7 Units (Buy 50 Horses and become a Scout)
1516 - 15 Crosses, 8 Units (Increase a Colony to 2)
1521 - 17 Crosses, 9 Units
1526 - 18 Crosses, 10 Units
1531 - 19 Crosses, 11 Units
1536 requires 21 Crosses, which is over the limit and we will need a third Colony by then in order to maintain this regular pattern of sailing into Europe to find a Colonist waiting at the docks for us. This third colony will not be located three tiles from a sea lane, so we will need a Wagon Train to reach it. The Wagon Train also counts as a Unit, so based on this, we will need our third Colony by 1526.
If we find an opportunity to buy an extra Colonist (such as a Carpenter) then we will need this third Colony by 1521.
So by 1521, we will try to have:
3 Colonies
11 Units (1 Caravel, 1 Wagon Train, 9 Colonists)
Economic Plan:
This part of the map generates Furs. The market bid price for Furs is 3 gp. A colonist on a forest tile, as shown in the default town setup, generates 3 Furs for 9 gp. The market bid price for Coats is 9 gp, so we can generate 3 Coats from 3 Furs for 18 gpt.
We will do this in 2 Colonies to generate enough cash to buy what I think we need in the near (1521) future.
100 gp - 50 Horses in 1501 (162 gp income)
200 gp - 100 Tools in 1506 (270 gp income)
100 gp - 50 Horses in 1511 (162 gp income)
200 gp - 100 Tools in either 1516 or 1521 (135 gp income + 36 gp from Furs)
220 gp - Extra Colonist in 1516 or 1521 (135 gp income)
52 gp - Buy 4/40 Hammers for Wagon Train
If I balanced this budget correctly, I have 28 gp left over after all these transactions, so there is nothing left over to transfer any colonist to build Bells. I will add this to my list of Mistakes.
Interesting to note in inspecting the market prices is the ask price of Sugar is 7 gp and the bid price of Rum is 14 gp. Similarly, the ask price for Tobacco is 4 gp and the bid price for Cigars is 11 gp. With some investment, it might be possible to make a 7 gp profit.
Build Plan:
An alternative to the Fur Trade is to build stuff, such as that Wagon Train we said we needed by around 1521, which is when we will need that third Colony. Hammers can be bought to finish a project for 13 gp, so we can say the Wagon Train (40 Hammers) costs 520 gp. However, this is what I will call the Hammer Economy and will try my best to distinguish it from the Cash Economy.
A Colonist can spend one turn chopping 6 Lumber and two turns building 3 Hammers, for a net production of 2 Hammers or 26 gpt. This is, of course, higher than what we earn in the Cash Economy producing Coats and it appears to be a direct result of the fact that Coats are valued at 9 gp and Hammers are valued at 13 gp.
We can also blame Mercantalism for this.
This value of labor improves to 28.36 when we add a Road to a Forest tile and producing 8 lumber instead of 6. It will go down as we add more Colonists and require Food to support. It will go up again as we add more improvements. Specialists will earn more, of course.
When we clear one of our Colonies, we will add 20 Lumber. When we plow, we will be able to support a population of 2.
The earliest reasonable time I can think of to build a Wagon Train is:
1505 - Produce 2 x 8 Lumber
1507 - Produce 5 x 3 Hammers
1512 - 20 Lumber + 15/40 Hammers + 1 Lumber
1519 - 36/40 Hammers - Buy for 52 gp
This is later than the proposed dates for the third Colony.
Pioneer Plan:
1498 - Pioneer 1 arrives (1/3 probability of Criminal Pioneer)
1503 - Road connecting colonies
1508(+1) - Road (allow 1 turn to switch to Criminal Scouts)
1510(+1) - Colony 3 built
1513(+1) - Road (depending on location of Resources)
1515(+1) - Alternate Colony 3 built
1506 - Pioneer 2 arrives (Is this Colonization or a space game)
1512 - Colony square cleared +20 Lumber
1518 - Colony square plowed, Population 2
Bell Plan:
It looks like I did not make a plan for adding Bells. For 18 gpt, I can transfer a Colonist to the Town Hall to produce 3 Bells. The budget above did not leave any room for this, only 28 gp.
We can get some of this back if we want to:
220 gp from the bought Colonist we have no plan for.
200 gp from the Tools we said we would need in 1516 or 1521
The current plan gets us a Founding Father in 1522 with a surplus of 1, assuming the third Colony does not get built for some reason. Spending 18 gp as above will advance us to 1520 with no surplus. Another 36 gp will advance us 3 more years. So we might manipulate the year we get our first Founding Father by delaying one of the projects mentioned above.
Founding Father Plan:
I count 960 combinations of Founding Fathers in the first round. I will set up priorities as follows:
240 - Thomas Jefferson - 25% probability - Political
He gets priority in my books over everything, because some of these Founding Fathers appear to be game winners and worth deck searching strategies to obtain.
144 - Hernando de Soto - 20% probability - Exploration
With so many Lost City Rumors, and a few Seasoned Scouts, this is the difference between getting Nothing and hitting the Fountain of Youth several times. However, I am giving the edge to Jefferson, because I worked out the deck digging strategy to be cheaper this way and I do not plan to leverage de Soto until a later point in the game where it is "safer" to start digging for treasure and upsetting the local population.
192 - Hernando Cortez - 33% probability - Military
More Treasure. Free transport. Saves deck digging to pick him up later.
I currently have him behind de Soto because:
a) He appears to me as slightly less of a game winner.
b) He becomes a game winner several turns later than de Soto.
c) I plan to explore before attacking.
d) The 33% probability gives a good chance of appearing again.
96 - William Brewster - 25% probability - Religion
If I am planning to hit the Fountain of Youth several times, then this will mean fewer Criminals and a much less expensive education plan.
The rest go to the Exploration Adviser.
96 - Magellan
If I get him, then the 5 turn cycle becomes a four turn cycle? I have to check.
96 - La Salle
We are cycling the Exploration deck.
96 - Coronado
As above, we are cycling the deck.
It looks like in this list, I have decided to ignore the Trade Advisor and I am missing a couple of other great picks that might show up, both named Peter.
Missing Plans:
Get Rich Quick Plan - Obviously this is too slow a start. Hopefully the RNG provides us with something quicker.
Posting and editing in thoughts.
Mistakes:
So my mistakes so far that I am aware of, without playing so much as a single turn are:
1. Rolling the Original Americas map
2. Rolling the English
3. Overthinking
(I did the exact same thing many years ago in the Original Civilization and learned how to play completely wrong! However, I am also giving detailed information about how I think!)
4. Starting with 2 Colonies already, why no investment in Bells?
I uploaded a save file for whoever might be interested.
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