Surviving isolated starts.

[LightSpectra]

Since other civs love to pass techs around each other, they'll essentially be -- in a seven civs game -- six times more advanced than you are by the time you roll around to the other side of the world. How do you survive being so far behind?

 

[Gooblah]

Simple. Prioritze techs.
Currency
Essential for an Isolated economy.
Code of Laws
Courthouses are required.
Optics
Caravels are the first ocean-going ships. Use 5 to get the most civs met.

In Vanilla and Warlords, the AIs make Alphabet less of a priority due to the fact that its a (sort of) dead-end tech. Not entirely, but still. In BTS, they enable spies (or something, dunno), so the AI goes for it more. I suggest you grab Alphabet ASAP so techs can be traded as soon as you make contact.
Also, don't adopt a religion, and wait until all Civs are discovered vefore you start trading. You'll prevent the -4 "You have traded with our worst enemies!" demerit that way.

Lastly, remember to not neglect a military. In Sisutil's Mehmed II Warlords game, he had an isolated start and was conquered by an advanced Catherine. Don't be afraid to have more than 10 units per city, and 2 on important resources. And once you have Optics, grab Astronomy with Liberalism or something. IT enables resource trading across oceans and lets you build Galleons, which will let you man overseas assaults for greater land area.

 

[KMadCandy]

i hate them, it's so spooky not knowing how smart they are!

try a forum search for "Lonely" (but not the " ") in the title of the thread. r_rolo (i think he has numbers in his name too, but i'm too lazy to check atm) has been posting a set of saves at various difficulty levels. he pre-checks the map to be sure you're isolated. you can download the saves if you want, or just read the threads, but i think seeing the different perspectives and how folks handled it might be very useful!

 

[madscientist]

For isolated starts that I do not regenerate the map for (I actually do that with most isolated starts) I go for a cultural win. If the mood suits me I will beeline to optics and start trading. If you can keep barbarians at bay (great wall, or small continent) you can keep military to a minimum and ramp up infrastructure.

All that said, it really boils down to how much war is going on across the ocean. Watch for thsoe GG being born messages.

 

[eewallace]

I agree with madscientist. Alone on an island is fine for cultural, but is going to be a big problem for a tech-based win. (Unless, I suppose, EVERYONE is alone on islands...)

 

[r_rolo1]

Too lazy, miss candy?

Ok, let me give my 2 eurocents of knowledge:

Starting in isolation has his pros and cons... You had putted on the table a lot of the cons: AI trade with each other, have foreign routes.... But there are pros: Ai don't hate you as much as in a normal map ( they will dislike more their neighbours than you ), you have a certain margin of manouvering about the military until someone gots astro ( or Optics, if you have João in the game ) and you have a island all by yourself, letting you to choose the best spots unpressured by some land grabbing AI
You said that you have less tech power than the overseas civs.... that is a normal thing ( I'm used to have a 8 - 10 techs handicap at the time of first contact ), but remember that you don't really need all of the techs and that some are far more important than others. The key is to focus on the important stuff

Some things that you should do:
-Check that you're really isolated as soon as possible.
-Avoid early wonders ( this has some exceptions, depending of your game style, leader and civ: I like to try the GW or the Henge or the Oracle ( I doubt that you can gat them all ) and focus on settling good spots
-Focus on economical techs: CoL, Currency, CS, Calendar ( if you have the resources ) and Monarchy ( this one is not so clear, but having Hereditary rule allows you to have some really nice cities ( 8- 12 pop ) in the beggining of the AD era. More worked tiles = more everything )
-Unlike Gooblah, I do not advice you to pursue Optics: it requires Machinery and compass, 2 techs that won't help your economy much in isolation. IMHO those beakers are more well spent in Philo or in the Drama side of the tech tree. Let them find you....
-Focus on getting Education ( more and in path of Liberalism ) and Lib: this is a good tech to have in isolation, not only because of the free tech, but also because of the Free religion ( if you don't have the S. Paya ). AI like to stick to their religions and if you can pass somehow unnoticed, the better. But just in case get a sizable stack of cats and of the best units you can get,just in case....

I believe that the key of coping isolation is to be prepared for the inevitable day that you will contact the AI. Yo should focus on having a strong economical infrastructure ready in that moment, because if can do that, even with the heavy tech and military handicap you'll have, you'll be able to get parity with them in no time and skyrocket in front of them. After that any win type ( even cultural sushi powered one or space ( i like to pursue space in isolation: it requres a nice tech research plan and nerves of steel ) ) is easy.

 

[GeorgeF]

Tech is usually not a problem. I don't research Optics, let them research it and find you. Concentrate on commerce tiles and +beaker builds (Pyramids/Rep if you can do it, beeline to Education). Stick with warriors for military if you can. Use hammers on buildings/wonders.

When you do get contact, its usually with several all at once. Trade immediately! You likely have techs they don't have due to beelining, especially the civs that aren't so advanced. So trade with them, pretty fast you can get ahead of all civs in tech, then you can coast to space race victory quite handily. Don't forget to build lots of rifles when you get there, AIs usually can't get to you before you have rifles if they need astronomy.

I usually can always win Emperor if I'm isolated using these tactics, but I'm so bad at balancing military/commerce I always lose if I share a continent.

 

[Gooblah]

I find that my tech arena is better if I have Optics under my belt; finding them before they find you gives you both a military advantage and a trading advantage; they don't have Caravels, and they'll give anything for it!

Peaceful victories will be easiest-you can theoretically pull off Cultural or Space without meeting anyone, but it'll be (extremely) hard. Cultural is easier without the competition, but I think the AI in BTS now shoots for Space and Cultural, so you may have a problem there.

Lastly, isolated starts can be the most fun after you meet a few ene- I mean, players. Then the domination/conquest/space race/legends about cities begin!

 

[illram]

The GL and/or ToA can help out in isolation. Colossus as well, if you are settling alot of coastal cities. I know that may sound counterintuitive because there are no foreign trade routes, but the early boost to having that extra commerce skims a few turns off the early techs and makes new cities more affordable. What may seem like small increases (such as the +2 or +4 commerce per city you might get from a wonder like the GL) help in the beginning due to the low number of beakers needed for early techs. Astro is also very important, try getting it off of liberalism for the big boost in trade (although I did win one cultural game with Ethiopia were I delayed astro as long as possible, but the merits of that were debatable).

All in all isolation requires a good understanding of how to maximize your economy and build efficient cities rather than spam or go on a warmongering rampage; I find my isolation wins usually occur when I have a good core of about 9 or 10 cities all producing around 100 beakers, with one producing at least double that.

 

[xanadux]

BTS, emperor and below, assuming a decently sized island and no single religion love fest on the other continent, an isolated start means tech dominance with no military competition. Eventually getting a religion is good, but I like to wait for Taoism to allow for many religions for the overseas AIs to fight over.

 

[r_rolo1]

^^ Not always... check my spoiler of the current LHC game