What would you do here?

[Gwynnja]

Random Leader, Asoka starts with mining and mysticism. (Other settings- Fractal, standard size, normal speed, monarch.) In my BFC I have 7 FP for cottaging, a marble, a gold, and a plains cow.
Should I start by:
A. researching wheel -> pottery for cottages
B. researching AG -> AH for the cow
C. researching BW for whipping and chopping
D. research masonry to improve my marble and try for CoL from oracle for cheap courts
E. none of the above

 

[budweiser]

E. Use the extra commerce tiles to go for Poly.

 

[vranasm]

you should go for the AH first. Farming at least 1 FP.

Since you have so low food whipping is at least very unwise.

Everything else would depend a bit on the surrounding land. The gold in BFC solves early commerce, so there is no pressure for cottages.
But I see you have 2 problems there food and production.

That another resouce outside of BFC, that's wine? Monarchy would be good, so Oracle path is worth considering. I am not sure you need connected marble for Oracle (on Monarch anyway)

 

[Gwynnja]

you should go for the AH first. Farming at least 1 FP.

Since you have so low food whipping is at least very unwise.

Everything else would depend a bit on the surrounding land. The gold in BFC solves early commerce, so there is no pressure for cottages.
But I see you have 2 problems there food and production.

That another resouce outside of BFC, that's wine? Monarchy would be good, so Oracle path is worth considering. I am not sure you need connected marble for Oracle (on Monarch anyway)

I don't have any 5 tiles, but I'm not low on food. Working two FP cottages and the plains cow will allow me to work the gold and continue to grow slowly but tech quickly for a HA rush or early bureau beeline.

 

[budweiser]

Can you post the 4000BC save?

 

[vranasm]

Can you post the 4000BC save?

the same line of thinking I would say...

@gwynnja

well that's how i define low food... slow growth... i had once plains cow+grass cow start (arguably better since grass cow is 4+2) and it was a pain.

 

[Gwynnja]

Can you post the 4000BC save?

No. I have the turn one save though, after settling.

 

[budweiser]

No. I have the turn one save though, after settling.

Good enough, but if you havent generated anothr map yet, then you should have it in your singles/autosave folder.

 

[Gwynnja]

Good enough, but if you havent generated anothr map yet, then you should have it in your singles/autosave folder.

Yeah, I should have thought of that, but I wanted a little discussion before I play this out so I started a new game. Oops

 

[dirtyparrot]

I would probably have gone Ag>Hunting>AH. Your capital is food poor (so no point in building cottages there) and with there's only 1 spot in your BFC that you could pop a strategic resource. So farm the FP's (a pain to improve), mine the gold early to speed up your research. You are probably going to need archery, which is why I would take the detour to Hunting and get the discount for AH. I wouldn't whip in your cap because it's not exactly food rich.

 

[budweiser]

Yeah, I should have thought of that, but I wanted a little discussion before I play this out so I started a new game. Oops

I was gonna try for polytheism, but that 1 turn may make all the difference.

 

[shyuhe]

Like vra says, agri--AH and farm at least one FP. Probably two.

If you're going to build the oracle, you probably won't have the worker turns to hook up the marble in time.

 

[Gumbolt]

You have the fast worker and quite a bit of forest to chop. With BW you have slavery/whipping options. Bronze working is never a bad idea. You appear to have lots of gold resources nearby for +1 happiness. BW and fast workers normally allow an easy rush through chopping.

You should have no trouble getting the Oracle either without marble. Lots of nice flood plains for either cottages or to help food.

Main issue for me is finding production. So ag/ah would help here.

If you take COl with Oracle you have an easy religion to spread.

Overall starting location looks quite strong.

 

[Gwynnja]

You have the fast worker and quite a bit of forest to chop. With BW you have slavery/whipping options. Bronze working is never a bad idea. You appear to have lots of gold resources nearby for +1 happiness. BW and fast workers normally allow an easy rush through chopping.

You should have no trouble getting the Oracle either without marble. Lots of nice flood plains for either cottages or to help food.

Main issue for me is finding production. So ag/ah would help here.

If you take COl with Oracle you have an easy religion to spread.

Overall starting location looks quite strong.

With the cows, marble, plains gold, and two grass hills, there's production. I just have a mental block when it comes to flood plains where I almost have to cottage them. I'm going to go ahead and play 25-30 turns and see where I'm at, starting with AG->AH.

 

[Gwynnja]

And @ Budweiser: I thought that the turn 0 commerce gets carried over to turn 1? When I fire up the save, there are no beakers invested in any techs?

 

[Gwynnja]

Researched AG-> AH-> BW, and popped hunting from a hut. Not much in the way of strategic resources, and I have a neighbor that I can never seem to please in Willem. If I can protect myself, I have Ivory, Furs, and Wine nearby for keeping my cottages happy, and pigs, fish, deer, wheat, corn, clams, and rice to combat the floodplains unhealth. Right now, I'm mostly concerned about my lack of strategic resources. I don't want to go up the priesthood line before I can protect my empire. With the gold mine online, I can research archery in 4 turns to keep out barbs and spawnbust. Assuming I tech archery I'd settle city 2 3S1W of delhi in the clam/rice/gold/FP spot for added commerce, scientists, and help growing capital cottages. Which brins me to my next point. I need pottery and I'd rather have early cottages than a sure fire oracle sling, so for now my tech path looks something like this: Archery -> Wheel -> Pottery -> Poly -> Priesthood -> Writing -> Aesthetics -> Literature. Thoughts? I won't play again until late this evening.

 

[vranasm]

those FPs south with rice and gold is great spot...
where is your neighbor? east or west? that fish+pig+gold site could be great for some early GS if you make there library soonish.

that corn+horses spot is 11(12?) tiles away...with the abundance of gold around it could maybe work?

 

[Gwynnja]

I haven't found Amsterdam yet, but Willem's archer came from the west. That horse is too far away to be prioritized, especially with nothing better than warriors to spawn bust and protect my fast workers while they connect it. I think I'll research the wheel before archery and scout the fog to the east and west a little more while I build my first settler.

 

[budweiser]

Spoiler :

Turn 11 I won poly. I think this is a good map for relgion first.

I would go AG>BW next while aking a Fast Worker to get some hamers going. Plenty of food and comerce with FP and multiple gold here.

Spoiler :

T29 - BW is in. Hammy is close and he is Buddhist. We did not get any copper so I cant rush him right now.

 

[Paperbag_Hobo]

In a situation like this I would generally cottage all the flood plains as well - they still give +1 food do they not? Can someone explain to me why this would be a bad idea? Cottaged flood plains + bureaucracy seems like a great idea for a commerce rich capital, but everyone seems to agree on farming at least a couple of them.