Starting position woes.

[Woobyluv]

Why is it so difficult for the random map generator to give a decent starting position on single player that has a river, hill with forest, and stone nearby?

 

[LuckyAC]

Doesn't sound very interesting if all the starts are the same. The game is easy enough, it's good there's at least there's some adaptation and variety.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Is it? What kind of map are you picking.

There might be a bad start about 1/4 of the time but there's a restart option.

 

[agonistes]

Why do you like stone? I prefer jungle hill bananas and spices myself.

Had a start over the weekend with 3 jungle hill bananas, 2 jungle hill chocolate, and 2 jungle chocolate. And 1 plain forest hill.

Too bad it didn't have dairy.

It was a scarce resource setting too. But maybe that only applies to strategics?

 

[Archon_Wing]

The only starts I resent are usually starts with little to no civs/city-states on the landmass, and so barbs are everywhere which isn't that bad unless they are horse archer barbs which suck, and coastal starts where you are easily blocked in. It is kinda crap to have the smaller landmass on a continents map with sometimes 1-2 (or even none) city states and you know someone on the other continent is running away.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Maybe the palace should give an additional housing bonus that can't stack with fresh water.

 

[Esperr]

I don't think I have ever not gotten a freshwater start TBH. At least not that I can remember anyway, I figure it was built into the algorithm.

 

[stinkubus]

Coastal starts will frequently lack freshwater, but I can't ever recall getting one without that was in-land. There are really very few bad starts in this game, imo, and the only real question is just how strong your start is.

 

[The Highwayman]

I've been seeing non freshwater coastal starts pretty frequently of late since getting back into the game after the summer patch. A couple of civs in particular, Rome and Arabia, do not have a starting bias by the coast to the best of my knowledge. Thankfully a move or two inland often reveals a perfectly fine spot by a river. If not, that restart option that took months of development is a click away...

 

[stinkubus]

Rome is great for coastal starts and they can pull off harbor spam almost as fast as the Brits.

 

[Victoria]

It's a question of what you call bad I guess. You do not need stone but no production is a killer. Grassland starts, bleugh

 

[craney1987]

I'll never reroll. Bad starts are very few and far between

 

[Karpius]

"Bad" starts are simply a greater challenge, not a game breaker.

 

[iammaxhailme]

 

[Karpius]

Okay, I stand corrected. *THAT* is a game breaker! You can't do anything until research allows you to cross water .
Unless I'm missing something?
Thoughts anyone?

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Okay, I stand corrected. *THAT* is a game breaker! You can't do anything until research allows you to cross water .
Unless I'm missing something?
Thoughts anyone?

Well, not that it helps but you could probably build an encampment district on the other side of the mountains.

 

[LFRANK]

Wow! I've seen valleys completely surrounded by mountains generated in the game but never a starting position that bad. Best of luck if you continue the game to see where it goes.

 

[agonistes]

Okay, I stand corrected. *THAT* is a game breaker! You can't do anything until research allows you to cross water .
Unless I'm missing something?
Thoughts anyone?

Its not that bad. Hills, sheep, plenty of water resources, fresh water... what is beyond the mountains?

As someone mentioned, you can put an encampment on the other side of the mountains. And only a navy is attacking your city for awhile.

 

[Karpius]

But.....how does one get to the other side of the mountains without crossing water? It will be some time before that can even happen.

On the flip side, I would be curious to see how the AI plays it. How long would it be before the AI even discovers that location?

It might be near impossible to achieve any of the victory conditions from that start, but it would be interesting to see how long one could survive and how strong one might be by the end of a game.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

But.....how does one get to the other side of the mountains without crossing water? It will be some time before that can even happen.

On the flip side, I would be curious to see how the AI plays it. How long would it be before the AI even discovers that location?

It might be near impossible to achieve any of the victory conditions from that start, but it would be interesting to see how long one could survive and how strong one might be by the end of a game.

You can buy a tile and make an encampment on the other side of the mountain tile, and your units you build should spawn from there. Still, could take a while. I think I'd go for "God of the Sea" pantheon and go from there.