When Spain gets two NWs to itself early game

[El Caballerion]

Hey Spaniard fanatics,

I was wondering if we could post our experiences when playing Spain on maps when you can easily settle your first and second city next to close-by NWs. To be more organized, paste the two wonders at top, like so:
----

EL DORADO and MT. SINAI

For instance, in the Marathon/Immortal game I'm currently playing, I was able to nab the 1000 gold bonus from EL DORADO, and settled my capital next to it. With the extra money, I rushed a shrine (giving me the ever so Spanish-Centric 'One With Nature Pantheon') and eventually bought a settler, settling about 12 tiles away next to MT. SINAI (which, with the pantheon belief, will produce 24 faith instantly).

I'm only entering the medieval age, but am noticing that I am nabbing up SPs easily because of EL DORADO, and will spread of my own religion unchecked due to my faith-buff. Unfortunately, I'm not getting any food or production bonuses, so I'll be prone to wars (I didn't take the Holy Warriors belief), so while I'm in a good position, I'm still going to struggle in some key ways.

Have you guys experienced any other instances of Spanish synergy when your first and second (third too) cities are founded next to close by NWs?

 

[Silverman6083]

LV, El Dorado, KSM
Holy Hell. This Game. Capital had KSM +12 hammers not bad at all. Discovered El Dorado & rush bought the settler & shrine when LAKE VICTORIA was withing working distance & of a city also with ELD. That city, was freaking ginormous & the culture & tourism it produced late game was unholy.

 

[El Caballerion]

LV, El Dorado, KSM
Holy Hell. This Game. Capital had KSM +12 hammers not bad at all. Discovered El Dorado & rush bought the settler & shrine when LAKE VICTORIA was withing working distance & of a city also with ELD. That city, was freaking ginormous & the culture & tourism it produced late game was unholy.

Silverman... that makes me salivate. What were your game settings!? Do you have the same game? If it's Immortal and Marathon, can I get that save game?

 

[Matthew.]

Does both GBR tiles count as two?

 

[triheptyl]

In G&K the Petra bonus would apply to Natural Wonders in the desert. I found the Grand Mesa (I think? the one that is 3 prod and 2 gold) in the desert. Usually I find this NW fairly useless, giving less output then a mined luxury, but that isn't the case with Spain. Not only that, it was one of the most perfect Petra spots I've ever seen, with many river hills and sheep, marble (making this city a wonder spammer), and coastal with multiple sea resources. After all was said and done, the Grand Mesa was worth 8 faith (One with Nature), 7 production, 5 gold, and 1 food (Petra bonus wasn't double on on the NW, sadly). I think that may have been the best city I ever had, I mean even without the NW, it was in such a good spot that Petra alone made it broken.

Add onto that fact I found Cerro de Potesi early on too, third city had a 20 gold tile. Unfortunately it wasn't the best location in the world for a city, but still, 20 gpt in the early game? Unstoppable. I don't think I even produced any military units, just bought them all and conquered my continent before the Medieval Era was over, which is big for me because I don't even usually start thinking about military conquest until the Industrial Era.

When I conquered my neighbours, I got 2 more NWs, Rock of Gibraltar and Barringer Crater if memory serves me right. Imagine the luck, 4 NWs on one continent with 3 people, in a standard sized game.

 

[mikeville]

I'd definitely be interested in people posting game start save files. I personally play on Epic speed, prefer King or Immortal difficulty.

 

[Scott Jegg]

Played Spain quite a bit and never had the opportnity to get a NW in the capital... well, not without reloading a save once I had found one within 4 or 5 moves, but I wouldn't play that way.

Had a few games where I got Sinai and uluru in my 2nd and third cities. The one with nature pantheon makes this absolutely ridiculous for faith generation

 

[Atinuviel]

I wish I had the save where I got a 108 turn Sacred Site victory. I had Uluru close enough that I settled my capital on the 3rd turn. Mt. Sinai was about 10 tiles away, which became my second city. About 10 tiles further from that was Mt. Kailash.

Lets just say that the AI Civs didn't know what hit them. (Except for delicious Zoroastrianism, which I always choose for my religion)

 

[cpm4001]

In a TSL map: Well, you start practically right next to the Rock of Gibraltar, which immediately gives you a bonus 500 Gold and, once worked, starts granting you 10 Gold and 4 Food per turn. In this specific game, I got to the Medieval Era and started spamming Conquistadors, ultimately settling next to Uluru, the GBR, Krakatoa (yes, it's workable on a TSL map!), Sri Pada, and Mt. Sinai. And I tell you, with the One With Nature Pantheon, that's a lot of FPT.
In a non-TSL map: Spawning in North America on a (vanilla) Earth map, discovering the NWs in North America, and buying a ton of settlers. Fun!
In a non-TSL non-Earth map: What?! You can't expect me to have a neat Spanish/Natural Wonder experience on every map type!

 

[johnny_rudeboy]

How do you get TSL? I think I have all the maps but I have never seen any map or map options that would indicate that civ´s start at their original location. Would be fun to try.

 

[Silverman6083]

How do you get TSL? I think I have all the maps but I have never seen any map or map options that would indicate that civ´s start at their original location. Would be fun to try.

You have to download a map from the Steam Workshop. Very fun, highly worthwhile

 

[Storminator]

There was a "can you build all the world wonders?" thread a while back. It got me thinking - "can I settle all the natural wonders?" So I picked Spain, set the difficulty down, and either settled or conquered all the natural wonders but one.

That one was on an island between city states, so even after conquering the city states I couldn't reach it. It would have been in the 4th ring on one of them, but I would have had to play forever to get the culture to spread to there.

PS

 

[Hpuk]

Sad thing is, when I get a natural wonder as spain on my first or second city, I have to restart because it's so OP (unless the wonder is Gran Mesa or Barringer Crater). I really hate the Spanish UA.

 

[El Caballerion]

Sad thing is, when I get a natural wonder as spain on my first or second city, I have to restart because it's so OP (unless the wonder is Gran Mesa or Barringer Crater). I really hate the Spanish UA.

Honestly, I play in Immortal/Marathon, and even when I do have instances where I settle next to two good NWs, I still find myself lagging behind in terms of tech and overall production capacity. Damn cheating AI...

 

[tat501]

Happened to me in a multiplayer game once - got Uluru and El Dorado - built 2 cities on them in about 4 turns, founded a religion in about 10 turns.

Everyone quit.

 

[ggmoyang]

GBR and Uluru, if you count GBR as one...

If you count GBR as two, my answer is still GBR.

 

[mlund]

The Lake Victoria vs. King Solomon's Mine inspired me to try another game with Spain and go for broke. I didn't get a Natural Wonder at my capital, but I did discover the Rock of Gibraltar and El Dorado by turn 10. It was a total blow-out. I was using the beta test build so I decided to see just how nasty army-in-a-can could be.

Gibraltar discovery money made a settler to settle said wonder. Skilldorado paid for it's own settler and then some. It was kind of a mess as far as nearby food went, though. It had a lot of jungle I couldn't clear and then some riverside tiles in the 2nd and 3rd ring and my happiness was going to become an issue, so I just left the city at 1 pop producing 10 culture for a while. I pushed out a pantheon quickly and took One With Nature to go from 1 Faith Per Turn to 17. Then I founded a religion and took Holy Warriors.

I took Liberty to get the Pyramids and a 4th "Free" city and then the steam-roller started to take shape. I managed to have a Warrior, Archer, Spearman, Catapult, Composite Bow, Swordsman, and Pikeman all in place for the completion of a Terracota Army. After upgrading the obsolete units I'd kept for cloning, I wiped out Morocco. I managed to score the Oracle and push into the Mercenary Armies policy while completing Physics.

At that point it was all over. I bought a wave of Landsknecht in my capital in a single turn (to maximize Barracks bonus) and then used Holy Warriors to buy a Treb each turn for 3 turns, more than replacing my losses from the first war. Even the Great Wall couldn't help Austria blunt my offensive.

Sending along a Missionary helped too. Annexing a single city at the front lines becomes much more attractive when you can suddenly dump more Landsknecht and Siege engines into the front lines via Holy Warriors and Mercenary Armies.

So, yeah, it wasn't one of those "initially settle on a wonder" starts, but it was still hideously gross.

- Marty Lund

 

[SirWinston]

Spain is imbalanced imho. If you discover 2 NW first (lol) ... stand up, run down the street and high-five everybody. If you don't get first find gold and can not settle a Wonder (for any reason) you feel stupid

imho the gold amount should be adjusted. Something like first find 300 and 200 later. And i think El Dorado (1000 Gold for FF + 10 Culture), The Fountain of Youth (20 Happiness) reaaally need some changes

 

[Matthew.]

I like it that way. I mean we have 43 Civs in the game, we can afford to have one act as the cheat-mode version.

 

[Hpuk]

You still get +2 (where other civs get +1) happiness and +100 gold from every NW as Spain. However, every situation where you can take proper advantage of their UA, is completely broken. Finding a NW first or settling almost any NW as Spain is basically cheating. Especially all the G&K and BNW natural wonders.