Rhino #1 - Roosevelt

[Rhino]

Hello all,

I've been reading these boards for a very long time and decided it was probably time to become a part of them. I've been reading XOTM's, succession games, and strategy articles on here mostly. Started playing during the CivIII days and have been doing so off and on ever since.

I like math, therefore I hate english. I read slow, my spelling sucks and my grammar is worse. Please bear with me. (Yes, I had to google grammar to make sure I spelled it right and also checked if it was bear or bare as I didn't think you'd appreciate me asking you all to get naked with me.)

My goal here is the same as most others that are posting noble level games and thats to improve my gameplay and hopefully that of others who read this thread. I myself have benefited greatly from reading other peoples games and thought it would be fun to give it a try myself (yeah, googled benefitted too, *benefited*.)

The Settings
Continents
Small (5 other civs)
Standard Speed
No Events / No Huts

The Leader

Spoiler :

(yes, this shot is from another start as I forgot to take a screenshot, please ignore the mini map. lol)

The Start

Spoiler :

I'd like to talk about the warrior's move first and then once I do that will post another screenshot and then talk about where to settle and my early goals. I think a lot of players at my level ignore how important the start is and even more so where you settle your first city.

I hate losing a turn to settle on a forested tile and hate even more losing a forest that could be chopped. This appears to be unavoidable if I move the settler anywhere south as I'm not going to settle on the the wet corn obviously and I really don't wanna give up the PH('s) to my north. Another reason I hate moving the settler.....

"You have a source of horses near Washington"
"GREAT!!!" *middle mouse button*
"#%$!@ I dropped my #%$!@ city right on #%$!@ top of them!!!"

I'm leaning towards #1 here, but would love to get others thoughts here.

1. NW to the PH, reveals NE/NE, N/NE, N/NW, NW/NW, W/NW, W/W, and W/SW of the settler's current location. This is the area I'm most curious about. I would be surprised to find another food resourse and I'd love for it to be cows.
2. NW, W, or SW. I'd like to know if I have a rogue elephant here, or if its part of a heard. However I don't want to take the corn out of my immediate boarders and really would like to avoid losing turn 1 to movement.
3. SW. Will reveal a forest I can see in the fog and 1 river side grassland tile. IMO, #1 and #2 would be more beneficial info.

Couple things for people in my same shoes at the moment. I've found a lot of useful information in the strategy articles and on these boards. Just becareful as things that work at higher levels aren't always the best for lower levels (ie, depending on the AI to research something in a timely manner and then trading them for it. lol) couple other places I've found great stuff is youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Chris67132 - very informative and a good insight on what types of things you should be thinking about when playing. Also when to plan and how to execute your plan.
http://www.youtube.com/user/TheMelnTeam - same as above
http://www.youtube.com/user/tks2103 - I don't think this guy is making videos anymore but his comments on what you should prioritize seems very spot on to me.

The Save

 

[GGracchus]

My vote is warrior 1SW. To the north are two forested tiles and the PH, and ideally you want to discover what your cap's BFC consists of with the first warrior move, and to determine whether or not to move. You also might want to change your name in game from Anderson to Rhino or something: I set my default as GGracchus. Don't worry about your grammar too much, it should be fine. I didn't think grassland ivory was possible.

 

[Rhino]

Sure, but wouldn't 1NW reveal 5 BFC tiles and 1SW would only reveal 2?

 

[GGracchus]

True, I forgot about the west. 1NW is probably better after reconsidering that. Probably best to SIP, opening with maybe hunting?

 

[michmbk]

I'd say move the warrior NW or SW - don't think either move is "wrong". My guess is that settling 1NE is looking pretty good from here, so I'd probably move the warrior NW to see what that reveals. Settling 1NE looks like it gives you a strong bureau capital, with flexibility to either cottage or be a power production city with farms & the PHs.

Roosevelt is IND, so 1NE could churn out a bunch of wonders with farms & mines.

 

[Rhino]

Yeah, NE for settler looks good, worried about feeding 3 PH's. I'm really hoping for a cow or maybe more elephants as this will give me 16 at size 6 which will be 20 after my forge is up. I'd love axes every 2 turns. lol

 

[Keilah]

Don't open with hunting, farm the Elephants for 3f1h1c instead of camping them for 2f2h2c.

 

[Keilah]

Hello all,

http://www.youtube.com/user/tks2103 - I don't think this guy is making videos anymore but his comments on what you should prioritize seems very spot on to me.

Went here, clicked on the 100 turn walkthrough (Sitting Bull), and facepalmed when he settled in place instead of spending a turn moving onto the spices to get +1 food in the cap. Spice so bad!!!! +1 food in a low-food cap so good!!!

EDIT: fixed the link, had the wrong one last time.

 

[Rhino]

Yeah, I noticed that too in the video. I like his thought process, but he made some mistakes.

I'm guessing you meant the tks2103 link, think you got the wrong link in your quote there.

 

[Rhino]

Went ahead and moved the warrior.

Spoiler :

Not exactly what I wanted to see, but I can't exactly complain about it. I'm guessing that with all the grasslands and now seeing those 2 calendar resources that jungle is near by. I honestly don't mind jungle though, some of my best cities have come out of it. One of my downfalls though is that I look at everything long term.

I'm thinking SIP is best now. By doing so, I'll still have a great bureaucracy capital. Settling 1NE still looks nice too. If I settled 1NE though, I'd be trading the 2 calendar resourses for a non-riverside PH and I'd be losing a riverside grassland (not a huge deal for the grass land.) I'd also be trading 6 known tiles for 5 unknowns (really 4, as I can see a riverside grassland hill in the fog, which would balance as I would be losing the same thing by moving.)

Techwise, I leaning towards....

1. Mining
2. The Wheel
3. Hunting

This will let my first worker....

1. Farm corn, road it (connecting me to the river which will be needed for the elephants.)
2. Mine the GLH, road it (gives me a road network towards the south.)
3. Camp the elephants, no road here
4. Mine and road the 2 PH's to my north.

 

[Rhino]

Just wanted to add, it kinda sucks that those 2 resourses came up. I'm guessing that probably means I don't have a strategic resourse in my capital. Don't think I'll uncover anything in the south either. Thoughts?

 

[Keilah]

I'd probably take 1NE, I prefer production capital > science capital. Up to your style tho.

If you do settle 1NE, you can consider mining -> masonry -> Great Wall for barb defense, then you're free to spam cottages or take a run at the Oracle, or do whatever really.

 

[Keilah]

Oh and don't waste worker turns roading early on, it's not like you'll need the health but you definitely do need food and hammers. You can skip roads entirely on most tiles and come back later to road others. I really think your strongest opening, especially if you go 1NE, is to delay hunting and just farm the elephants. You can get one turn of farm on the phants while you move to the corn, meaning zero wasted worker turns, a nice bonus. And you'll need all the food you can get with those plains hills. You can go back and camp the elephants when you need the Ivory.

 

[lymond]

resource bubbles are your friend

 

[Ecori]

I would SiP -> Hunting -> Mining then based on what the map reveals BW/AH/Wheel+Pottery+Archery. Very strong Science capital with all those riverside tiles.

 

[michmbk]

Don't think you can go wrong with 1NE or SIP - both have their merits. Since the two new resources are both a little later, you can always claim those with a second city anyway. Either way, there's clearly some good cottage land around there. I probably would wait a bit on hunting - I'd probably start mining-AH or mining-BW to see if i can find a military resource while scouting around. Then figure out what's next after you've scouted. You won't need the happiness from the elephants for a bit, and I'm more inclined to get wheel/pottery done and start laying down cottages.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Techwise, I leaning towards....

1. Mining
2. The Wheel
3. Hunting

This will let my first worker....

1. Farm corn, road it (connecting me to the river which will be needed for the elephants.)
2. Mine the GLH, road it (gives me a road network towards the south.)
3. Camp the elephants, no road here
4. Mine and road the 2 PH's to my north.

First, I like that you are planning ahead. As a rule, I find that investing in specific worker micro isn't an important priority at this level, but you are relating your techs to what you want to do, which is an important step.

That said, I think you are making an error here, in that you are scripting for "efficiency" first, rather than thinking about your current goal, and planning around it.

Improving the irrigated corn means that you are going to have a very fast growth rate available to you starting about 5 turns after the worker spawns. You'll grow to size 2 two turns after the farm is finished, and you'll be growing again in 4 turns or so unless you start throwing food away. Each worker turn of constructing a road is an extra turn delaying the next improved tile, which means an extra hammer/food lost.

You don't need the roads yet, so postpone them.

Wanting to have improved tiles available as quickly as possible, I'd expect to go Corn Ivory GreenHill (on the principle of food first), or Corn Ivory BrownRiverHill BrownHill. That's about 20 worker turns there, so you have LOTS of time before you need the wheel.

 

[Rhino]

Thanks for all the responses.

So, i see what you guys are saying and the roads can wait. What do you think about a second worker before the first settler? Let him road towards the second city site or is it best (in general) to let the first settler slug it out with out roads. I know its very dependant on how close our neighbors are.

Hopefully get at this tonight and post something once I get a couple starting techs in and have enough uncovered to talk about 2nd settler and how fast he needs to come out.

 

[Keilah]

settler before 2nd worker is best in 99% of starts, including yours. I'd only go 2 workers before settler if I had either a boatload of forests + fast Bronze Working, or a lot of floodplains + rush to pottery for cottage spam.

If you can, settle on the river connecting to the Capital, close enough that you have unbroken borders, and that'll give you a roadless trade route.

 

[Rhino]

Well, some interesting stuff came up, I think this is going to be a fun start for me.

Being that I started this game and wanted to make use of the Industrious trait, more for its cheap forges than its cheap wonders. Yes, wonders are awesome, but overbuilt by many (imo anyways.) Given that, I'm on the same page with Keilah now and decide to settle 1NE of my starting spot.

Spoiler :

Either spot would have be great, but the spot I've taken does offer more production.

I set the research for Mining and then straight into Bronze Working. I find myself going this route 90% of the time, but its hard to put off a tech that gives you 2 ways to hurry production (chop or whip) and reveals a very important resource. I haven't switched to Slavery yet, but probably will do so after the first settler gets chopped out, so down the line the 2nd can get whipped out.

When the first border pop comes, I about crap my pants. We have another source of elephants down south and a source of gems that isn't jungled over. The dyes we saw in our west came in a pair, and there is a third source of elephants to our north.

3320BC comes around and a couple things happen. First off, Bronze Working finishes and thanks to our initial move 1NE, we have bronze in our capital's BFC goodjob: Keilah)...

Spoiler :

We also meet our first neighbor who is towards our south, extremely close and ofcourse, somebody I can't stand being next too....

Spoiler :

I played a couple more turns after that to uncover some more fog in the south so we could get a good idea of the land between us and Sury.

The North

Spoiler :

The South

Spoiler :

City Placement
I imagine the clear move is to grab our land in the south before Sury does. On Noble, the AI's first settler comes out around turn 50 IIRC, and I'm not sure if I can get 2 out before that. I'd really like to do option 1 below, but any advice would be greatly appreciated. Option 2 would be my choice if only 1 city seems possible, but like I said, I really like option 1 better.

Option #1
Would settle Red, then Orange.

Spoiler :

Option #2

Spoiler :

As far as techs go, I really would like to get Metal Casting early. I have a few turns into The Wheel and Pottery is qued up right behind it, but after that is where I'm torn. What I would love to do is...

1. Tech Metal Castings next, which shouldn't hurt too bad being that I have the gems and I can lay down some riverside cottages in my 2nd and 3rd city.
2. (optional) Use the forge to get a great engineer started
3. Oracle Theology for a religon and if it works out right, use the engineer to hurry The Hagia Sophia.

....however, I know thats a big order, and I'm not certain its possible. After that would probably go Alphabet if nobody has it up for trade, otherwise Aesthetics then Literature as I plan on having a level 4 unit compliments of Sury. But I think I'm getting a little to far ahead now.