Trapped on an unhappy island

[bovinespy]

What do you guys do when you're stuck on an island with no luxury resources? My most recent game as Portugal (BtS, of course), it seemed like I had a good set-up. Plenty of food and hammers at the capital (3 clams, wheat, 4 hills, 1 plains iron eventually), and enough room to spread out and put down 3 more cities pretty quickly, all with good food and hammers. Eventually, there's enough room to put up 6 cities. I've got Roosevelt walled off to my south on the tundra, and no other neighbors. Pretty quickly, all my cities cap out at 4 population (I'm playing Prince level). The big problem? No happiness resources. The only one on the whole sub-continent was dye, but that obviously doesn't do me any good for a LONG time. I built cottages where I could, built coliseums as soon as I could, and also prioritized Monarchy, but I ended up abandoning the game in frustration around 1290AD, still researching Code of Laws (!).

I'm not a very good player, but I win more times than not when I've got a decent continental start with some neighbors around. The thing is, if this was a crap tundra or desert start, I would've bailed in 4000 BC. But this game seemed to have promise. Like I said, plenty of food, hammers, and (after cottaging floodplains) commerce. Yet I still fell WAY behind. What do you guys do in this kind of a situation?

(Playing BtS, Big/Small, Large, Epic, Low Sea Level, 12 civs)

 

[Cam_H]

An earlier Hereditary Rule might have been your best bet here.

I'm not sure why you still hadn't got to Code of Laws by 1290AD in light of a medium-sized empire with Cottages.

Maybe post the game, or better yet; the 1290AD game and an earlier save if you have one?

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Oracle sling to Monarch (you need Priesthood and Writing) then HR for unlimited happiness.

Or prioritize drama and run an SE pumping lots of happiness through the culture slider.

Either way you should be much further along than this. In 1290 AD you should be researching techs in the renaissance era - even with an isolated start (since you should have discovered the AI before 1000AD).

Personally I would probably try and kill Roosevelt so you get a true isolated start (1 opponent is isolated anyway as they won't trade with you). Then you can expand as your economy dictates. I probably wouldn't have more than three cities before I had Monarchy.

 

[Haika]

I'd agree with the above who call for prioritizing HR. What can help if you are planning to heavily abuse HR is to either skip hunting or to not hook up strategic metals. Happiness at 15 hammers a warrior is quite a bargain!

Also, here's a shameless plug of my current game, which is also an isolated start in BtS. Although it's not far along, maybe it will be helpful to you as it progresses.

 

[jerVL/kg]

Recently I had an isolated start w/ very few happy resources...until I popped gold & silver from 2 mines, problem solved!

But if you're not that lucky...

Go religion-crazy! State religion gives you +1 happy, each temple gives another +1 happy (whether it's your state religion or not), a cathedral (hindu mandir, jewish synagogue, etc.) gives +2 happy if it's your state religion. If you can score 2-3 religions you'll be set for a long time; you can also benefit from Free Religion later.

Build the Pyramids, run Representation. No Pyramids? Then go Hereditary Rule & build lots of cheap units.

You have dye? Then make Calendar/Drama a priority. Also Construction -- colussems give +1 happy, but I rarely get that desperate.

Notre Dame gives a +1 happy boost on your home continent.

If all else fails, beeline Astronomy & trade for the happy resources you lack.

But all you really need is Hereditary Rule...happiness is easy to come by, even on isolated starts. I find that health is far more limiting when isolated.

 

[Tzu Iop]

I'd agree with the above who call for prioritizing HR. What can help if you are planning to heavily abuse HR is to either skip hunting or to not hook up strategic metals. Happiness at 15 hammers a warrior is quite a bargain!

Or have small city which is not connected to your tradenetwork somewhere with a bit food surplus and whip regluarly two warriors since one pop point provides 30 , one warrior is needed to counter the from the whip the other is free for use.

 

[bovinespy]

An earlier Hereditary Rule might have been your best bet here.

I'm not sure why you still hadn't got to Code of Laws by 1290AD in light of a medium-sized empire with Cottages.

Maybe post the game, or better yet; the 1290AD game and an earlier save if you have one?

Yeah, that's why I specifically mentioned CoL because it never takes me that long to get it. My research was all over the place. I had to go for IW, because I had no Bronze, I had to go Monarchy for the HR, I had to go Construction for the Coliseums, and then Currency for the commerce, and Calendar for the dye.

I wanted to stomp Roosevelt early, but like I said, I had no bronze (or horses), and by the time I hooked up my iron and cranked out the axes and cats, he already had longbowmen (!).

Oracle would have been great in my position, but I'm not industrious and playing on Prince, so I figured I had no realistic shot at it (or pretty much any other wonder, as I had no marble or stone). Because of isolation, I had no religions spread to me, either.

I think, in the end, the biggest mistake was going to 5 cities so quickly. I probably should've stopped at 3 in the early going, and cottaged up (I did do some cottages, but not nearly enough for my dire circumstances). Anyway, I guess it was a learning experience. I'll hopefully remember what not to do next time in the situation. Thanks to you and everyone else who offered input.

 

[Ruler]

I had one game not too long time a ago what reminded me something what I was already been forgotten from me that how good Representation from Pyramid and beeline to Code of Laws for Caste System for extra scientist really is. All you need 3 cities, start with 2 scientist after Caste System run as many you can and once you get Great Scientist build Academy it keeps you going all way to Astronomy of course this is situationable and also what I did I delayed the finding of other cities as long I could. I don't know though if this works in Warlords but it did damn well in BtS on Monarch.

 

[Dan Quale]

I'm playing an immortal game, at the moment with no happy resources, no starting millitary resources,and all religions founded on other continents, and to top it off starting right next to ghengis knan. The guy is ridiculous now, I still cant eliminate him with superior weapons, one thousand years later.(finally after wasting 20 archers I'm back into the game), hereditary rule is your best friend, You can grow your cities to unimaginable size, alllowing further expansion, greater millitary support limits, and amazing tech rates. Happiness resources only come into play in the late game as far as I'm concerned, health resources, are far more common and important in all but the earliest phases of time. Sure Gold is great, but you can get by without it.

 

[vicawoo]

Oracle on prince is very doable. Just whip an almost completed building for initial overflow, and chop. I can do it on monarch with a normal build, although it delays my axe rush a lot.

Once you had hereditary rule, I don't see why you wasted time on any more happiness resources. You know it's +1 per unit for as many units as you want, right? Construction was a waste if you're not getting catapults (I might get it if I'm going to switch to pacifism so I can disband some units). Calendar before drama I'd say is wasteful. With only one neighbor, currency and even alphabet are suspect. And evidently you're getting early mathematics, which I think is a little wasteful in that situation.
And I'd be worried about specialist economy if I can't trade, and don't have civil service to get enough farms.

 

[axident]

In a recent Monarch/Fractal/Standard/Normal speed game, I wound up as Incan on a half-desert, half-jungle island with a forested patch around my capital. Ugly start, huh? I found some rock sort of nearby and settled it ASAP. Also chopped like crazy. Stonehenge. Great Wall. Good, now I don't have to worry about building military stuff for a while and just build build build.. expand like CRAZY especially if you have access to CoL.

Then I realized that I had ONE happy resource on my island: sugar (requires calendar). Luckily I went for Pyramids and got it, so Representation gave +3 happy to my problem child cities. The other had to suck it up. I don't like canceling Stonehenge too early but I calendar'd and that worked ok.

Later on I finally got caravels around the same time as everyone else, and I did some trading. Got Spiral Minaret + Uni of Sank combo going, along with Wall St, and TWO holy shrines in the same city (I founded CoL via Oracle slingshot and later got Divine Right, one of the few times I bothered going for it, but I knew the wealth from the shrine and Spiral would matter lots in an isolated start).

Random events gave me spice and silver eventually, too.

Eventually won extremely easily via space race. My island was still defended by one quecha (warrior... sp?) per city, but completely surrounded by a giant navy.

Moral of the story: Pyramids will save your butt if you are on a lonely happy-less island, long enough for religious buildings and random events to help out. Then you meet other people and trade.

 

[oyzar]

at princde you can get pretty much any wonder you want as industrious or not...