What to do when you have no resources?

[UWHabs]

So, after not playing for a while, I just recently got back to wanting to play a new Civ game, so I decided to start a BtS game recently. After a bunch of games where I either decided after the fact I didn't like the leader I picked, or ended up in a bad location (how do I play on a long, northern peninsula, with a fairly decent size desert next to me, and the only person who my scout/warrior ran into was Shaka?), I started a new game as Charlemagne (Imperialist, Protective), standard size, continents, epic speed, since I thought his unit looked sort of neat to try, and I like the idea of a better courthouse.

So, as you can see below, I start in a fairly nice spot. 7 floodplains in my cross, and a cow, with a bunch of forests that I might be able to chop and still get good production. So I do a fairly normal start. Build a worker/scout/warrior (since my original scout died)/settler. In my travels, I meet Asoka right below me (his capital is actually right below my second city, since his culture has expanded right next to it). I meet a couple others (Wan Kon and someone else), but I haven't seen where either of them are set up.

So here comes the fun part. I decide, okay, Asoka next to me, sounds like someone who I might be able to axe/chariot-rush. With a bunch of floodplains/forested hills in my capital, I could get good production for the rush. However, when I finally research AH and Bronze working, to my absolute horror, there's nothing to be seen! Okay, slight lie, since there's one copper square in the tundra way up north, but really, it's not feasible to run a settler all the way up there and find some way to connect to my capital. The other fun thing is before that, when I got AH, no horses!

[Ah, this is getting to be a longer rant than I wanted...] Anyways, more exploring, and I basically get to the point below. I've explored almost my whole section, and realize that nobody is around my section (I originally thought Wan Kon was to the left of me, hence my urge for battle). So now, with no resources, here's where you come in. I wouldn't mind having some tips for how to develop this:


(sorry for a slightly bad map, but it was late last night when I got to this point, so I just quickly saved it and am now away from the game)

My main goal now is to probably build another settler in my capital, and go settle due West, either 1N of the cow, or on the sugar. This should cut off the lands from people encroaching on me, giving me probably the whole top section to backfill (since I was told that AI doesn't go behind your lines too much in BtS). (the other BFC I layed out was my choice for another city. Obvious location to grab the pig, fish, and a bunch of floodplains)

The main other thing is tips for what to do with my cities. My capital has 7 floodplains and a bunch forests and forested hills. I was debating at first making it a SE town, but looking around, I don't have too much production centres otherwise (since my only hills are deserts with gold), so I think I may switch it to a production centre (which will still be pumping out settler/worker/settler/worker early on?). Town to the right (pigs, fish, floodplains) looks like an ideal CE town.

One other concern is that town to the south will be terrible until I get a couple workers. It's got so much jungle that it's only +1 food per turn, so it's going to take me a while to grow to size 2 to whip the monument out to somewhat try to fight off Asoka. Once I get some workers to it, it'll be fine, but I may need to pop in a great artist there to not have Asoka gobble up all its good land.

My other worry is barbarians, which I haven't had come into my cities yet, but will soon. With stone in my next border pop (another ~14 turns), would it be an idea to slow down my settler production after maybe one more town, and try to run for the great wall? Or will I probably be too late to get it? I've already wasted some time researching archery (to at least build units stronger than a warrior), so I could just waste a few turns building/chopping/whipping a handful of archers to protect me instead, but then I have to build them, and still will have to deal with some ugly barbs coming at me.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

What difficulty is this? Monarch or below (I think so if barbs aren't in your territory yet, on emp they'd be coming around now, above that they'd be on you already), you can probably get the GW but it's at risk now depending on AIs. Alternatively, you can just tech archers which fogbust and own barbs used properly.

It's a bit to see complaints about this start. Gold nearby and a solid capitol (with both stone and marble nearby too)! Cottage the floodplains, settle rice/cow/gold for some strong commerce and , block/settle SW, get some , and backfill the continent.

You didn't say if you teched IW or not, so it's possible you have iron.

Also, for future reference, sailing allows access to trade over rivers outside culture borders. I wouldn't advise doing it JUST to axe rush a soft target like Asoka that can be blasted at any time, but if you really wanted copper all you'd need is a city up there, sailing, and a road into the river and you'd be able to start making axes in the capitol. That would be much more advisable if it was shaka below you and you feared a rush, but even then I might just use archers/walls and tech IW.

Anyway just expand peacefully and tech until you get an attack window, be it with swords, maces/trebs, cuirassers, or @ rifling.

 

[UWHabs]

It's monarch. Yeah, it's not so much complaining, I was more just looking for tips. Maybe it came out as desperate, but yeah, i plan to just expand out, then when I get a chance, I strike. I just thought it was an interesting start, with a fairly decent area with little strategic resources.

I haven't researched Iron working yet, so I'll be doing that soon to see if I have any iron around. It'd be great to see one on one of the grassland squares either for the city to the right, or the city below, but at this point, I really don't expect it. Hope I get it, since I always hate playing a game and not getting use of its unique unit. I'm debating now since I'll probably stay peaceful for a bit, whether it's better to go Iron Working, or to beeline for something like Code of Laws to get my powerful courthouses.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

IIRC iron is twice as common as either horse or copper, so you have a good shot at it .

I actually like sword rushes just as much as axe rushes (especially with a strong commerce start to hit IW fast), but you've not gone that route and that's fine...you can take your pick with the amount of cities you can get peacefully.

 

[Dirk1302]

Great start, place a blocking city near the rice/cow in the west.

 

[DaveMcW]

What to do when you have no resources?

Archers, then catapults.

 

[Kesshi]

Great start, place a blocking city near the rice/cow in the west.

UWHabs,

TheMeInTeam & Dirk1302 are right. You should be taking care of Asoka one way or another. By either teching for Iron and Sword Rushing him, or Settling it the southwest, somewhere in that black you haven't revealed yet! Speaking of, how can you claim there is no nearby resources when you have such a huge chunk of land undiscovered? You don't know this yet.

Also, I don't think your first city has any resources in it's BFC. You can tell this because you will never have "overlays" start (or grow) on top of Horses, Copper, or Iron. An overlay is a Forest, Floodplain, or Oasis. Because you have so much overlay in your capital's 20 (assuming you settled in place) you should have known you wouldn't have stratigic resources there from turn 1.

This is assuming that lone mine southeast of your main city started as a forest. If it didn't start forested, then you have a good chance that it'll be Iron.

 

[mirthadir]

Why bother killing him now?

If you aren't isolated togethor he should be willing to help you trade. If there are no resources for good offensive resources, he's a meatshield between you and other AIs. He may get you some nice wonders to take later. You have plenty of land to settle and get a rocking economy up to around liberalism without a problem.

Get a blocking city out in the west (rice/cows; cows/dye; or dye/whatever is in the black depending on how fast you can get it there and border pop). Cottage up. Backfill and work as much gold as possible. Get IW (I normally prefer trading for it and would do so with Wang and Asoka). Tech out and nab a few nice wonders (I'd be partial to Oracle, Mids, GL, HG, and Paya). Push out to rifling, military tradition, or steel and then draft my ass off to rampage southward (if you go Mil Trad drafting may not be as good as sticking by B).

 

[vicawoo]

You haven't prioritized a pasture at the southern city? It looks like it's at -3 food for jungles, so adding a road should make you break even. Don't bother growing it past 2 (only when you can get the stone up, otherwise just stay at 1 and whip whenever you can).

Settle on the sugar, settle on the desert hill with the two gold, if you didn't get a 2nd worker, I'd just go archers and skip the great wall.

You probably won't get a great artist in time to bomb asoka.

Fogbuster on the northmost gold, hill east of the 3 mountains should help.

 

[UWHabs]

I didn't have the pasture since I hadn't gotten a worker down there yet.

Basic update - found 2 sources of Iron, 1 SW by the Dyes, 1 E by the coast. There was a horse in the far NW. Managed to get the Great Wall (it was pretty quick to build with stone). Now, I still have a few more cities in the North to build (1 by the horses, 1 by the wine/wheat/furs/copper). Maybe can fit another few along the coast, but they're not priorities. Put one SW by the Dyes to block Ghandi, but they snuck one in on the coast due east of my bottom city to snag an iron that popped up there.

My problem so far has been that I've been basically running at about 30-40% science, since I got pottery relatively late and haven't gotten too many cottages. And my cities don't get too many hammers, so I've only build a couple libraries. Thus, I'm probably about 8 techs behind the others on the island, but hopefully as I get calendar to give me more luxuries, and start working the cottages, and be able to throw a few specialists, I'll be able to catch up. I could have considered rushing Asoka, who only has a few archers in each city, but Dehli and Bombay are both on hills, making it not worth it until later on (probably muskets or rifling).

The good news is once I fill in those 2 other cities, I'll be up to about 9 or 10 cities, and next most is about 5. The whole island is Buddist, so hopefully

 

[vicawoo]

IIRC iron is twice as common as either horse or copper, so you have a good shot at it .

I actually like sword rushes just as much as axe rushes (especially with a strong commerce start to hit IW fast), but you've not gone that route and that's fine...you can take your pick with the amount of cities you can get peacefully.

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<Type>BONUS_HORSE</Type>
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copper 128 iron 128 horses 256. From C:\Program Files\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Warlords\Assets\XML\Terrain\CIV4BonusInfos.xml
since bts lacks civ4bonusinfos terrain assets and uses the warlords one.

 

[Jerrymander]

Expand, turtle, and use your good commerce land to tech to Rifling.