Prince Shadow Game

[OldDude]

Hello again Civ4 experts! It's been a while since I've posted on the board. Due to life I got away from the game for a spell but have played some at Prince level. When I first posted on the board I was on Warlord and with the boards help I was able to move to Prince.

The problem is, I'm struggling at this level. I'm probably winning only about 25% of the time. I know it's me and I may have regressed to old, bad habits so I thought it would be useful (to me anyway!) to ask for a Shadow Game.

There are a couple of things that I see happen nearly every game I play that are aggravating. These are:

• The AIs that are on my borders are always the strongest
• The AIs that are on my border always steal tiles via culture no matter how much culture I'm pouring into a border city, even though that AI may be way lower than me in the point standings
• The AIs will usually be behind me in tech early on, but eventually most of them zoom by me to where it's nearly impossible to catch up - how?
• Monty always attacks, even if we're the same religion and he's in a Pleased state
• I still don't understand how the AI can out-tech AND out-produce military units AND build wonders AND out-culture me
• My success or failure is GREATLY tied to the kind of start I get

I need help!

OK, now that my whining is over, here we go with the Shadow Game start:

Pangaea map, no huts or events, normal settings.

Spoiler The Start - Mansa Musa :

Wow, this is not a great start. No food in the first square. It looks like there is coast directly east of my warrior. For my settler, I really want the FP he's standing on for a cottage and there's a PH 1W of him so I'm thinking of moving him there to settle. At least one move there would expose a few more tiles.

I'm thinking of moving my warrior 1NW to see if there is any seafood up there.

Thoughts?

 

[Olafeson]

Same idea here, moving warri 1 NW to check for seafood would be nice. Looks to me there might be another food resource 1N 2W of your starting location.
Since there are no resources in BFC there must be smth as i said 1N 2 W and probably also on the plains hill 1S 2E of your starting location.

Really tricky start. Also the tile 1 N of your settler could be maybe smth like copper or iron or horses. I think best play here would be to settle 1 N of starting location. Farm the floodplain ( not cottage it) and ssecure the sheep, if you move 1 E onto the plains hill, you lose the sheep and you gamble for food that might not be there.

Still there is a high chance that there might be some AH food resource 1N 2 W of your starting location, but it would be a gamble. I would settle 1 N and farm the floodplain.
If there is fish up to the north you cans till grab it by sttling on the fur.

Tech path would be smth like :

Agri - BW - AH - Pottery

farm FP, mine the hill 1S 2E of starting location and build a settler at size 3

 

[krikav]

• The AIs that are on my borders are always the strongest
  
  Could be that you are not taking your fair share of land, that makes the AI closest too you get a land advantage.
  
  
• The AIs that are on my border always steal tiles via culture no matter how much culture I'm pouring into a border city, even though that AI may be way lower than me in the point standings*
  
  The AIs do all sorts of stupid things, running the culture slider is one thing. They can also run artists when there is no utility for them, and they build basically every single building.
  Going head to head in a culture battle with the AI is seldom a good idea.
  War is an excellent way to ease culture pressure.
  
  
• The AIs will usually be behind me in tech early on, but eventually most of them zoom by me to where it's nearly impossible to catch up - how?
  
  On higher difficultires, the AIs get more bonuses for each era, no sure if theis is true on prince however...
  But they almost always spam a ton of cottages. We stay in the game by bulbing, techtrading and getting more land than the AI, getting vassals to tech for us etc.
  Also, it's no shame in being behind in tech, it doesn't help pacall if he has physics when I knock on his door with cannons+rifles and he is lacking rifling himself.
  
  
• Monty always attacks, even if we're the same religion and he's in a Pleased state
  
  Yeah, he tends to do that. He is not the worst backstabber though.
  Consult: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-illustrated-1-know-your-enemy.478563/
  to see which AIs can plot at pleased, don't trust them, and try to keep them preoccupied (bribing them against each other etc).
  
  
• I still don't understand how the AI can out-tech AND out-produce military units AND build wonders AND out-culture me
  
  If you ignore wonders, culture and most tech and only focus on military, they shouldn't have a chance to keep pace with you at prince. Either you are getting a land disadvantage early on, and that snowballs. OR you are spreading yourself too thin, trying to ackomplish to many conflicting goals.
  
  
• My success or failure is GREATLY tied to the kind of start I get
  
  Nothing weird about that.
  It's the same for all of us.

 

[krikav]

The start is certainly making my head hurt.
I think I would tackle it like this:

T0: I would do first warrior NW, and then it depends on what warrior sees, but after that probably settler 1E, that being a possible site to settle depending on what is revealed 1S 2E.
T1: Warrior SW and reevaluate. Depending on information then one can either settle where the settler stands, or move to the unforested plains or move 2W to the PH.

 

[lymond]

Hello again Civ4 experts! It's been a while since I've posted on the board. Due to life I got away from the game for a spell but have played some at Prince level. When I first posted on the board I was on Warlord and with the boards help I was able to move to Prince.

Hey OD! Good to see you back to Civving.

The problem is, I'm struggling at this level. I'm probably winning only about 25% of the time. I know it's me and I may have regressed to old, bad habits so I thought it would be useful (to me anyway!) to ask for a Shadow Game.

Entirely possible you have regressed some. I recall you showing some promise on this level months ago, but learning civ and mastering the basics takes time and practice. Let's get this fixed!

The AIs that are on my borders are always the strongest

Not sure the point here, but it is irrelevant to anything of import.

The AIs that are on my border always steal tiles via culture no matter how much culture I'm pouring into a border city, even though that AI may be way lower than me in the point standings

First, point standings are irrelevant. Second, you are worried about very unimportant things here with culture stuff and borders. I recall you falling to this same ill logic when you first started here before. We need to turn your attention to the important stuff..not culture wars

The AIs will usually be behind me in tech early on, but eventually most of them zoom by me to where it's nearly impossible to catch up - how?

AIs naturally get stronger as the game progresses, even on this level. But again, this goes back to things you need to do. For perspective, if you improve your play at this level you should expect to absolutely blow the AIs away in tech, by a very huge margin.

In the bigger scheme of things, AIs actually tech very slow on Prince level.

Monty always attacks, even if we're the same religion and he's in a Pleased state

Always expect a Monty, Shaka, Rags, Nappy, etc. to consider attacking you. It is simply the way those guys are programmed. It's fine to improve diplo, but one should very much consider protecting against them or killing them early. Another option is the bribe them into wars on others.

I still don't understand how the AI can out-tech AND out-produce military units AND build wonders AND out-culture me

Again, you should technically blow the AIs away on this level. It simply boils down on mastering basic mechanics. You still have some way to go here to not only refresh what you learned previously, but expand greatly on that as well.

My success or failure is GREATLY tied to the kind of start I get

There are more difficult starts than others, but this is very very far from the real issue here.

I need help!

You do! We are here to help!

Wow, this is not a great start. No food in the first square. It looks like there is coast directly east of my warrior. For my settler, I really want the FP he's standing on for a cottage and there's a PH 1W of him so I'm thinking of moving him there to settle. At least one move there would expose a few more tiles.

This is not a promising looking start, primarily as there are no resources visible in the BFC. Just forests. Ofc, forests are a good thing too.

I'm thinking of moving my warrior 1NW to see if there is any seafood up there.

Warrior is indeed not well positioned for identifying immediate BFC tiles, and I think 1NW is the best move here as you say, simply to see if there are ocean critters to exploit. So yes, that would be the first move.

Then, you must remember our discussions of fog gazing. You currently don't see any food resources visible if SIP. (and yes, I'd prefer not settling the FP so it can be cottaged or it might have to be food). There is a plains sheep to the NE which is not a strong food resource, but it is something to consider if seafood appears.

So fog gazing, we see 3 tiles unforested. There is one 2E1S and another 2W1S. Both of them are hills, which means less likely they are food. Another one is 1N2W and I think it is more likely that is food. I mean there's gotta be at least one food resources, so that is where I think it is.

So, I think move warrior 1NW as you mention. If seafood right there, then I would settle 2N in hopes of that food there, plus you'd at least have the sheep as well. And the FP.

Select/de-select tech for the first 5 turns..select tech on the 5th turn. First tech is dependent on what hidden food resource appears. If you just have seafood and sheep, I'm inclined to go BW first here then fishing. Much faster approach since you can chop WB and worker can still do chopping. So in this case, BW>Fish>AH

If an AG resource appears for you, I would go AG>BW.>Fishing and likely ignore AH unless significant pasture food presents itself elsewhere (even if no copper ). Probably go POT> Writing directly instead.

 

[lymond]

I stopped by the thread a bit later as a particular point stuck out to me that I wanted to expand on further:

I want to impress on you that this whole idea or perspective you have that "my success or failure is greatly tied to the kind of start I get" is really something you need to rid yourself of entirely. While there are some extremely rare almost impossible starts - very unlikely on Pangaea though - most certainly no start is going to be so bad to prevent success on Prince level. (And anyway, as long as you have decent food you are golden. If not, like you only have a plains cow or something of the like, then just reroll the game) It's how you are playing this game and the decisions you make that directly impact your success or failure.

So to point, you seem to put way too much emphasis on things you cannot control as opposed to things you can control. That perspective is actually counter-intuitive to the process of learning. So put your brain on rinse cycle, and then open yourself to learning new things the right way.

 

[ArchGhost]

Spoiler :

The AIs that are on my border always steal tiles via culture no matter how much culture I'm pouring into a border city, even though that AI may be way lower than me in the point standings

The best way I find to deal with this kind of stuff is to try not to get into that situation as much as possible with an AI...they tend to win it and it's not really worth it to fight them back culturally.

A way you can try to do this is to make sure you have the leg up:
-settle the most important tiles you want to keep first ring
-keep the city center "back behind" out of the same ring of culture as the border tiles; this way if the AI start to pressure the first ring tiles the city center itself still isn't in real danger of flipping yet.
-pop borders at 10/10 culture ASAP. This is easy to do in Caste or later with Music, earlier you might need a monument. If you are at 10/10, you're pumping 22 culture into every first ring plot with just a single +1 culture source; the AI will have to get a whole cultural level above you to beat that pressure if they are a ring further out from the tile than you, or else build a LOT of culture stuff (wonders mostly upset this) as the difference between ring pressures is +20 per deviation.
-you can whip a library to reach 100/100 timely enough for added safety; Libraries aren't bad buildings in the right spots either.

That's just how you might go about it if you want to fight back. Generally I wouldn't really settle cities on the enemy's 3rd ring if it can be helped (I know, THEY will push up against YOU though) but if it still happens, plan your cities with mind to still be able to share internal tiles, or run specialists if they do.

The AIs will usually be behind me in tech early on, but eventually most of them zoom by me to where it's nearly impossible to catch up - how?

On Prince, the AIs do eventually get a small era-based bonus to research speed that compounds the later the game goes (its the first level with this handicap for them). You should be able to still overcome this easy enough; I still regularly out-tech the Immortal AIs and good players can do the same to Deity -- see Lain's latest Gilgamesh game as an example.

You will have to focus more on fundamentals of researching things yourself though, as the AIs are not as good trade partners on Prince.

I still don't understand how the AI can out-tech AND out-produce military units AND build wonders AND out-culture me

Just to pep-talk a little: you're gonna have to get used to it as an idea. The AI doesn't play fair in regards to things like economy, costs, or even trading/diplomacy. It only gets worse moving up further.

Instead, try to understand it's okay to concede a bit to the AI. Can't get every spot. Can't win every tech race. They snipe wonders sometimes even when you have an excellent shot (and incidentally, stunt themselves on lower difficulties doing it). It happens, my friend.

However, the AI cannot focus as clearly as you can toward a goal, nor can it consolidate means to an end outcome so all-in like a human player. Especially abusing the power of the whip, bulbs and/or trades, and using its rather stupid unit AI against it, you can dominate the AI, most easily by usually concentrating a strong enough gut-punch to take one of them out, then assimilate their land, power up and do it all over again.

So what becomes more apparent is the importance of realizing what you can do without, what you can let the AI do, and what things you instead have to focus on, like getting enough land, more efficient development, quickly reaching a tech plateau, whipping out a useful army to go stomping.

Civ is a game of trade-offs; what good are the Mids to a guy like Gandhi if you just take them from him with 500hammers of units instead of the wonder? Willem may be blazing through the tech tree, but if you're rolling on him with Mace+Treb and he's still at Longbows, he might as well be dead. And so on. War isn't always the answer, btw, but it's dang strong!

Wow, this is not a great start. No food in the first square. It looks like there is coast directly east of my warrior. For my settler, I really want the FP he's standing on for a cottage and there's a PH 1W of him so I'm thinking of moving him there to settle. At least one move there would expose a few more tiles.

I'm thinking of moving my warrior 1NW to see if there is any seafood up there.

Thoughts?

I agree with the warrior 1NW. I'm fond of also moving off the floodplain, as that's at least another 4f tile to be used. The question is which direction, obviously.

It's also worth noting that the sheep you see is NOT in your SiP cross....so you have to have at least one food tile in the BFC you can't see yet. It could easily be just south in the fog, or maybe a pig on one of the grass hills you can see uncovered.

This would lead me to believe that if you don't have a Deer or Cow etc, in the plains to the NW, or a seafood just off the coast, moving 1S would still be workable. Open with a fast BW after teching food, and off to the races with chops.

But knowing what the warrior can find out is kind of critical there. If there's a seafood there, definitely go for the sharing of that with the Sheep by moving North instead. better to use the food you know you have than guessing.

You can always save any potential food down south/SE/SW for city 2, so the conservative approach of just going 1N for the sheep + FP is fine too and probably the better choice as you know you can still incorporate the sheep no matter what instead of gambling, like mentioned

 

[lymond]

You will have to focus more on fundamentals of researching things yourself though, as the AIs are not as good trade partners on Prince.

I'd like to expand on this point by @ArchGhost for clarification. The AIs are not good trade partners on Prince specifically because they tech so slowly. You may trade for this tech or that now and then, but for perspective, if I play prince now (like I just played early BCs of your game here OD) I traded for IW at some point after I teched Alpha, but at that point I was so far ahead of the AI in tech I was pretty much just trading techs for straight up gold or flat gifting them techs. Also, I got pretty much all the dinky religious techs, sailing, and other dinky things in peace deals from my early wars. Wars can be a great way to get a techs through peace deals, and those techs don't count against Trade Caps (WFTYABTA)

If I happen to be playing a Prince game or other lower level game like a GOTM, and I happen to be going for Space, I will often prop up certain AIs with tons of tech gifts to increase the overall tech pace so that I can have the tech stuff for me.

Point is, again, once you start really getting this stuff down, you will annihilate Prince level.

 

[krikav]

@lymond "Wars can be a great way to get a techs through peace deals, and those techs don't count against Trade Caps (WFTYABTA)"
Really? Are you and others sure of this? I have been playing like it does for as long as I can remember. Turning down alot of lesser techs in preacedeals just to keep away from WFTYABTA.
This would be gamechanging for me!

 

[OldDude]

Thank you everybody for your great input! I'd like to respond to each post individually but I only have a few minutes right now.

So I moved my warrior 1NW and found crab just off the coast. That made my settling decision to move my settler 2N to get the crab and sheep. After settling, wheat was exposed, right where a few of you thought there would be food (nice!). This makes it a bit better start. I'm 5 turns in now so I'm stopping for further input.

Short term plans

• Build Worker
• Teching AG
• Tech BW next
• Tech Fishing after
• Warrior scouting surrounding area

Spoiler After 5 Turns :

 

[krikav]

Your plan looks perfecly viable imho!


That 3 commerce crab is really nice. I would want to get that up and running.
From T1 I think I would have tried fishing -> BW, building worker at pop2 and possibly whip it if it lines up ok with BW.
From this t5, I'm thinking perhaps farming the wheat and then mining that PH while teching Agri->Fishing->BW.

Possible second city spot NW or 2N1W of wheat, as that location would be insta-connected and the extra hammer is nice, warrior should have hugged coast there for a little while longer.
But more likely, you should claim land further south and backfill later.

 

[lymond]

Ag>BW>Fish better, krikav, to get choppin”

 

[OldDude]

Thank you again for your feedback! Considering in the start there aren't too many decisions to make I went through the next 30 turns, noting highlights:

T6 - Met Shaka
T9 - Buddhism founded
T10 - AG in, teching BW
T16 - Worker in, building Warrior. Worker set to build farm on Wheat
T22 - Farm built, 1 turn away from BW. Set worker to build mine on PH as Warrior 4 turns away. After BW, tech Fishing and chop out a WB.
T25 - Met Catherine as she came up from the SW. Shaka to my east.
T26 - Warrior in, 2 turns away from Fishing. Build Warrior until Fishing is in then switch to WB.
T28 - Fishing in, switching build to WB. Worker starts chopping. We're at pop 3 now so after WB, build first settler. Teching Pottery.
T29 - Met Hammurabi as he came up from the SW.
T31 - WB out, building Settler. Worker chopping.
T32 - Found Gilgamesh to my south. It looks like I could get boxed in if I don't play this right.
T35 - Pottery in. Next options in my mind are AH or Writing. Considering I have no Copper anywhere in visible land I think I should go AH first and hopefully find horses. Soon I'm going to need something better than Warriors to fend off Barbarians.

Stopping here for feedback on my progress and further thoughts. I've noted a couple of potential new city spots. My tendency is to go outward to claim land before AIs can get it and then backfill later, so that is why I'm thinking the "First City?" spot might be first. It's on a PH with a couple of FPs and plenty of riverside tiles. Plus it claims it before Shaka, assuming I can get my settler out first.

Looking forward to all of your thoughts and feedback! Thanks!

Spoiler Turn 35 :

Spoiler [USER=139622]@lymond[/USER] :

Hey Lymond, I was so disgusted with that Superbowl. It took me a couple of weeks to get over it, LOL.

 

[krikav]

This is a mistake (and it's possibly my fault)...
"T22 - Farm built, 1 turn away from BW. Set worker to build mine on PH as Warrior 4 turns away. After BW, tech Fishing and chop out a WB."
You should have gone into a forest and started chopping.
The only reason I mentioned mining a PH is for the early burst in hammers to get a workboat out in a "delay bw" -techpath.
Now with BW, you should not have mined that, but started chopping right away instead, possibly squeezing in farming of that floodplain.

 

[krikav]

City should not be far west to be able to grab whale, much better is 1E of that marked position, on that plains hill, that way you "kill" an otherwise worthless tile, you save the grassland tile, and you open up the possibility to share both crab and wheat.
You are also 1 tile closer to capital, possibly saving a tiny bit on maintenence.
I think I would settle this city first, even though it violates the principle of settling toward the AI.

How many turns until capital borderpop again?
I would consider hunting before AH, that makes AH abit cheaper and you will need hunting to get that happines from the fur.

Not many really hot city locations imho, one city should probably be close to the southern cow, that can also share the capitals floodplain.
The one you placed on the PH close to two floodplains I would probably place 1N, since that enables it to share the sheep, and will eventually get the deer. It has freshwater and working that lake isn't all that bad either.

 

[lymond]

I agree that AH would be best next tech here, and it opens some other possibilities if horses appear. Then Writing>Alpha (then maybe HBR)

(edit: I look back at my game. I went Writing after AH, and then HUNT>Archery>HBR, but I went hunt>archery first as Shaka went fish mode so thought I might need Skirms first. But HBR after Writing is fine if things are okay...then hunt>archery>alpha. I also got some techs from Gilgs..maybe Hunt but can't remember. I was teching pretty fast)

(edit: nvm..I see I got Sailing from Gilgs..so I teched hunt myself. you have deer anyway. You could go Hunt>HBR>Archery)

I'm forgetting my playthrough at the moment, but I don't recall needing to build a mine. Seems I could start chopping as soon as BW was in.

Whales spot is very minor and maybe something you backfill much later.

Two spot stand out to me. 1E of clams was the first city I settled, with chopped WB from Tim to net clams immediately. Then 1W of deer that can share sheep. Those are two immediate ones I would settled, With chopping you should have no problems getting these spots.

PH spot you point out is good. I settled that 3rd. 4th was 1NW of cows.

I had no problems getting all these spots. Granted I stole 2 workers from Gilgs and choked him, so prevented him from settling N. (so no hammers went into more workers) (oh..I will post my game to late BCS at some point so you can see/compare my progress)

Anyway, no reason you can't get at least 5 good cities, and possibly start conquering at some point. AIs settling patter my differ in my game than yours, especially Shaka, but key here is the AI settles very slowly on Prince. You are going to settle things much faster than you are normally used to.

If you are not going to worker steal from Giggles, you should move warrior NW on grasshill 2E of clams to spawnbust.

Spoiler Brady needs to retire :

Yep, disappointing SB indeed. I was certainly pulling for the Rams. Future is very bright though for that team...I believe they just got even stronger in free agency.

 

[OldDude]

This is a mistake (and it's possibly my fault)...
"T22 - Farm built, 1 turn away from BW. Set worker to build mine on PH as Warrior 4 turns away. After BW, tech Fishing and chop out a WB."
You should have gone into a forest and started chopping.
The only reason I mentioned mining a PH is for the early burst in hammers to get a workboat out in a "delay bw" -techpath.
Now with BW, you should not have mined that, but started chopping right away instead, possibly squeezing in farming of that floodplain.

@krikav, thanks much for your thoughts. I had a save at turn 17 so to try it out I went back to it and once the farm was done I did not build the mine. I went straight to chopping, as suggested. I think the reason I didn't do it first was I didn't want the hammers to go into a warrior as I was waiting for Fishing to come in. At any rate, doing it this way netted my first settler at turn 37, but no WB yet.

So then I went back and continued my game from T35 to see what kind of difference there was. I had the settler out at T39 and I had a WB. So, maybe I didn't maximize very well, skipping the mine? It seems like by T40 it worked out about the same. Please don't take this as a challenge, I'm just trying to understand where I could have done better.

Thanks again!

 

[OldDude]

@krikav, @lymond - thanks very much!!

I played 5 more turns so I'm at T40. I've got a settler on his way to the first spot marked on the screen shot. Just went into a worker build and I'm chopping him out.

So after the worker is out, should I let my cap grow to pop 4 before going settler again? I've adopted slavery.

3 turns from AH.

Thoughts for the next few turns:

• After worker is out, let capital grow to pop 4
• Farm FP or cottage? I have no commerce to speak of yet so is it a good idea to get at least one cottage going now?
• Tech Writing > Hunt next
• After pop 4, build another settler > worker

@lymond - obviously stealing workers starts a war. What turn did you do this and what did your military look like at that point? How did Giggles react?

Holding here for now.

Spoiler T40 :

 

[lymond]

I attacked Gigs very early. My first warrior basically explored up to his border and sniped his worker. How did he react? ha..I gather he was not very pleased with me. Worker stealing is a "thing" in this game. I walked around his entire BFC (he only had a warrior for a long time). I did a little trick as well for another worker. I stayed in forest 2tiles south and east of his cap, 2E of his food resource which was surrounded by forests. (I kept checking for a road on the forest just S of cap as AIs love to make roads before improving anything, so I knew the new worker was improving rice. So I stepped above the worker and caught him the next turn as he tried to return to safety, but the forest slowed his movement.

I don't always do it this way but since i was going for alpha, i just choked him and made peace for a tech or two later. (you can't always get away with stuff like this on higher levels but Prince is funtimes)

Point on the PH mine is that you simply will not and should not mine that tile. Non-special mines are very low priority. You kinda have to adjust your thinking on this..I know...took me a long time to get away from mines. (Now if because of starting techs or whatever, you have nothing at all to do then sure build a mine.) As soon as you can start choppin' you start choppin'.

Think more like this in terms of worker priority - specials(food, strats, commerce but def food) > choppin > only key roads > cottages > more choppin > maybe a mine

Yep, don't chop into warrior. If Fish not in, you can put chop into settler, then back to warrior, start chopping another forest, start WB as soon as Fish is in. Put chop into WB. Possibly whip WB into settler, but such that you want to immediately be working wheat and crab. That is, once wheat and crabs are improved, you don't whip off those tiles.

No way to full know the sequence of events in your games or how many turns you truly would have save, but keep in mind that every turn counts. And the 5 turns you spent on the PH mine were completely wasted turns...totally

I settled clam city first simply as it was so easy to get an improved food resource for nothing, but technically the deer spot is probably best first. Plays more to the overlap/tile sharing logic and close proximity. And on higher level you'd probably simply have to get that first.

I think getting to pop 4 for next settler is good, but chopping new worker is fine right now. (again, i had 2 free workers myself. Note: I'm in the late BCs right now with 13 or 14 cities..Giggles is long dead and Hammy ain't long for this world.ha)


edit: Also, I want to add, as a little bit of a refresher/reinforcement, that FOOD is KING in this game. This game is about growth and turning that growth into production. Food=Production. Growth plays into other things as well. But the point is drive home why mines are less valued. PH and GH mines are food deficit tiles..they slow growth..thus, slowing the production from whipping.

Now consider this, a PH mine is worth 4H. A whipped citizen is 30H. It takes 8 turns for a PH mine to give 30 hammers (at deficit food..well no food at all from that tile). A 2pop whip gives 60H almost instantly. A 3pop whip gives 90 hammers.

 

[OldDude]

I attacked Gigs very early. My first warrior basically explored up to his border and sniped his worker. How did he react? ha..I gather he was not very pleased with me. Worker stealing is a "thing" in this game. I walked around his entire BFC (he only had a warrior for a long time). I did a little trick as well for another worker. I stayed in forest 2tiles south and east of his cap, 2E of his food resource which was surrounded by forests. (I kept checking for a road on the forest just S of cap as AIs love to make roads before improving anything, so I knew the new worker was improving rice. So I stepped above the worker and caught him the next turn as he tried to return to safety, but the forest slowed his movement.

I don't always do it this way but since i was going for alpha, i just choked him and made peace for a tech or two later. (you can't always get away with stuff like this on higher levels but Prince is funtimes)

Point on the PH mine is that you simply will not and should not mine that tile. Non-special mines are very low priority. You kinda have to adjust your thinking on this..I know...took me a long time to get away from mines. (Now if because of starting techs or whatever, you have nothing at all to do then sure build a mine.) As soon as you can start choppin' you start choppin'.

Think more like this in terms of worker priority - specials(food, strats, commerce but def food) > choppin > only key roads > cottages > more choppin > maybe a mine

Yep, don't chop into warrior. If Fish not in, you can put chop into settler, then back to warrior, start chopping another forest, start WB as soon as Fish is in. Put chop into WB. Possibly whip WB into settler, but such that you want to immediately be working wheat and crab. That is, once wheat and crabs are improved, you don't whip off those tiles.

No way to full know the sequence of events in your games or how many turns you truly would have save, but keep in mind that every turn counts. And the 5 turns you spent on the PH mine were completely wasted turns...totally

I settled clam city first simply as it was so easy to get an improved food resource for nothing, but technically the deer spot is probably best first. Plays more to the overlap/tile sharing logic and close proximity. And on higher level you'd probably simply have to get that first.

I think getting to pop 4 for next settler is good, but chopping new worker is fine right now. (again, i had 2 free workers myself. Note: I'm in the late BCs right now with 13 or 14 cities..Giggles is long dead and Hammy ain't long for this world.ha)


edit: Also, I want to add, as a little bit of a refresher/reinforcement, that FOOD is KING in this game. This game is about growth and turning that growth into production. Food=Production. Growth plays into other things as well. But the point is drive home why mines are less valued. PH and GH mines are food deficit tiles..they slow growth..thus, slowing the production from whipping.

Now consider this, a PH mine is worth 4H. A whipped citizen is 30H. It takes 8 turns for a PH mine to give 30 hammers (at deficit food..well no food at all from that tile). A 2pop whip gives 60H almost instantly. A 3pop whip gives 90 hammers.

Thanks for the refresher on the FOOD IS KING. Also, for some reason I didn't even think about changing my build to a settler to get the chop hammers and then switch back to warrior. It's these little nuances that need to get hammered into my head. Your explanation on the diff between a mine and chopping is very clear. I know that we covered that in the past but I think this is one of those points where I kind of regressed and fell back into bad habits.

I'm going to play a few more turns and report back.

Thanks @lymond and @krikav!!

Spoiler Brady :

Yes, Brady needs to retire. I'm so tired of that team winning all of the time. I think I would have preferred to lose to any other team besides the Pats. And I agree that the Rams are going to be the team to beat in the NFC West again in 2019.

Spoiler Unbelievable :

As soon as I hit End Turn to get to T41, Shaka settles right between the two spots I have marked. I'm going to go back to my T17 save and redo this, sans mine as @krikav suggested. I want to see how it turns out differently.