Skipping techs

[RRRaskolnikov]

Except for mining. Rome without mining would be like a tiger without teeth! No mining, no ironworking; no ironworking, no Praetorians!

Rome does start with mining you want to tech BW -> IW -> sailing to connect the iron (need one resource riverside or coastal)...

Cheers

 

[Churchill's Hat]

Skipping mining would mean that the most powerful unit a civ would be able to build for the entire game would be longbows, and galleys for the navy. However I think you can build catapults so warfare wouldn't be too bad early on. The biggest handicap though would be not being able to improve forested terrain.

Actually, you could still build Grenadiers and Cuirassiers, although you would want to play on Pangaea. You could also build Muskets, Elephants, Trebs and Cats.

@troytheface:

Fact-- warriors can also pop techs

Fact-- horse archers, axemen or swordsmen can stop barbs in the field

Fact-- Swords in cities can easily stop HAs attacking, if only making them withdraw, especially with the anti-mounted promotion.

Fact-- Stating three facts with faulty logic and then one opinion doesn't make the opinion fact.

Fact-- While you're building scouts to try to get the few huts that haven't been gotten, you could be building for a Settler or Warrior/Chariot/Axe/Sword/HA rush.

 

[Turquoiside]

Well, it isn't really skipping, but I used to never research Hunting and Archery. I would always just beg an A.I. for them, because they usually give it at Pleased.

 

[RRRaskolnikov]

Actually, you could still build Grenadiers and Cuirassiers

I think you need engeenering for chemistry (and so machinery <- MC <- BW <- mining), so you would be limited to muskets

 

[shyuhe]

cuir's don't need engineering. You just need nationalism + music, neither of which come from the mining tree (interestingly enough).

 

[oyzar]

I activly avoid hunting in a lot of games and seriously though this thread would about how bad hunting is, and how it is often worth delaying machinery if you skip hunting not only for the potential lib bulb but also for the ability to build more and more warriors. There are some other techs that obsolete useful stuff(economics, rifling(with protective)) comes to mind, and of course there are all the wonders...

 

[RRRaskolnikov]

cuir's don't need engineering. You just need nationalism + music, neither of which come from the mining tree (interestingly enough).

Yeah, was thinking at the grenies... for cuirassiers, you need to start with either hunting or agriculture

 

[DaveMurray]

Actually, you could still build Grenadiers and Cuirassiers, although you would want to play on Pangaea. You could also build Muskets, Elephants, Trebs and Cats.

Oh yeah forgot you can get gunpowder through the education route which means Muskets and Cuirassiers. But still only cats as trebs and cannons require engineering and steel which have tech requirements in the bottom part of the tree.

 

[Airey]

Skipping mining would mean that the most powerful unit a civ would be able to build for the entire game would be longbows, and galleys for the navy. However I think you can build catapults so warfare wouldn't be too bad early on. The biggest handicap though would be not being able to improve forested terrain.

That's why no mining + no early victory conditions (ie AP) is going to be a fun game to play. Beeline to longbow and land grab all game long. Build def units and hopefully win peaceful way, until can out-tech AI and hold military advantage.

 

[UWHabs]

That's why no mining + no early victory conditions (ie AP) is going to be a fun game to play. Beeline to longbow and land grab all game long. Build def units and hopefully win peaceful way, until can out-tech AI and hold military advantage.

Taking someone like Sitting Bull could be good, to get protective super-powered longbows. Or Genghis or Kublai for Keshik rampaging.

 

[carl corey]

The first game is up here: CC Skipper I: Mineless Khan

 

[Gagonite]

Playing a game with the intention of skipping agriculture is not wise, what if you have lots of farm resources in your area? It's pretty much a given that at some point you'll need agriculture or animal husbandry, because farm / animal resources will exist in your area. The need for these depends on the map.

That being said, if I don't start with mysticism, I've played games where I don't research it for a long time, like until 1 AD. That seems to be the only one you could optionally skip. Maybe fishing too, if it's a pangaea map. But then again, calendar resources often abound, so fishing eventually becomes necessary.

I read an article in my Archaeology class that this professer guy did, and he said that humans becoming sedentary (and thus developing agriculture) was the worst thing that could have happened to humanity since it spawned the 'plagues' of the upper class and the nobility, which in turn came with corruption etc etc.

He said that if we stayed a nomadic people, everything that eventually came (like art, science, etc) would have come anyways.

'Supposedly', he's a well known and well recieved professer..

lol.. civ 4 proves him wrong!

Sure, you don't NEED agriculture to get far in this game, but without it, thats alot of stuff thats wasted.. so many farmable lands.. hunting resources are much rarer (Sept on that one aboreal map).. but you still become sedentary!

 

[carl corey]

That's a bold thing to say from your professor, considering that hunter-gatherer societies that have survived up to our times have not shown the same level of "sophistication" as those who "researched" agriculture.

 

[Elkad]

Agriculture led to pottery for grain storage, which led to the need for writing and math to keep track of which pots in the common granary belonged to which person and if there were enough to last the winter.

Irrigation and marking the borders of fields led to construction and geometry.

Study of the seasons to determine when to plant crops (more specifically, when the Nile would flood) led to accurate calendars and astronomy, which led to optics, etc.

Plowing is massively hard work. Until the invention of the horse collar (and oxen yoke, same thing), beasts of burden did about the same work for the amount of food they ate as men. Once they could, instead of a horse doing the work of 8 men and eating 8 times the food, it did the work of 20 men, still on 8 times the food. More planting done for less labor.

Grinding and cooking grains led to mills, driven by oxen, and later by water. Baking bread and firing pottery led to high-temperature ovens that could smelt bronze.

It goes on and on.

What did hunting lead to? Archery? Not much else.

 

[EmperorFool]

What did hunting lead to? Archery? Not much else.

Hunting lead to the invention of the snare.
A snare is a type of drum.
Drums are a critical component of the ear.
Ears, as you know, are used to listen to music.
And music is often written on sheets of paper.
Paper is used in printers.
Printers are people that produce newspapers.
Newspapers are a form of media.
So are floppy disks.
Rabbits have floppy ears.
They are commonly hunted.

And we're right back to Hunting.
That forms a circle.
Circles are often metaphors for God.
Clearly, Hunting leads to God.​

-- excerpt from Attacko's Complete Guide to Research Priority, outlining the importance of the Hunting beeline.

 

[Crusher1]

Been following the thread with some amusement because lately for fun I have been mixing it up by strictly limiting myself to 0% Slider and no cottages (both for the whole game!), and protective and or aggressive AI's on Emperor or Immortal.

 

[DaveMurray]

What did hunting lead to? Archery? Not much else.

Hunting and Archery led to better and more efficient ways to conduct war which has been the single most important activity that has shaped human history.

I highly doubt things like art and science would have come with humans being hunter- gathers. What agriculture did was allow for more free time to put our large brains to use. If we relied on killing things, we'd be constantly moving and tracking our next meal that there would be little time to dwell on the things that have so far improved our life.

 

[Killroyan]

A little of topic, but doesn't anybody wonder why you can always skip flight and still be able to build a space ship???? It would be far more logical to make it prerequisite to rocketry.

 

[EmperorFool]

A little of topic, but doesn't anybody wonder why you can always skip flight and still be able to build a space ship???? It would be far more logical to make it prerequisite to rocketry.

Especially since the fins on a typical rocket use aerodynamics for control even though they are not used to generate lift.

 

[dalamb]

If we relied on killing things, we'd be constantly moving and tracking our next meal that there would be little time to dwell on the things that have so far improved our life.

I have read that hunter-gatherers only need spend a few hours a day getting food. Agriculture supported much larger populations but required far more work.