Which is your favorite starting resource?

[DarkSchneider]

Which resource are you most happy to see near your starting location? Generally do you like to see one that will boost food or resources?

 

[Innawerkz]

Me?

An Elephant on a Grassland.

+1 Happy Face with an early tech, a guaranteed answer to virtually all units in the Ancient and early Medieval stage of the game and a handsome production bonus that's able to support it's own population.

I definitely like it when The Tusks are coupled with the appearance of a nice food resource, such as Wheat, Rice or Fish!

 

[Crimso]

I like gold. I usually lack luxury resources, and I almost always play as Financial leaders. Wheat, corn and rice are great too.

 

[Toshiro126]

Stone is a good one. Especially if you have a lot of trees around to chop down. Between those two things, I have a good shot at getting the pyramids.

 

[biratets]

Stone -50% production cost for Stonehenge and The Pyramids if I remember correctly.

Enough said.

 

[petey]

I have to agree with Stone. There's some powerful early Wonders that it makes affordable.

 

[Bismarck II]

I say wheat then you can make another worker ASAP and get the stone while your other makes a road to your next city's location for the settler that will come after the worker ect ect... Pretty much I am a "boomer" so I need my capital to get as much food as possiable.

 

[Mordraken]

And I'm for Marble, also for the wonders (Oracle). Other resources come with the 2nd city, but Marble at the first city almost gurantees me to the Oracle before anyone else.

 

[Aldor]

I'm happy if my city has some cows...makes for a great tile once developed

 

[Zombie69]

Depends on the quantity.

In 1 copy : stone.
In 2 or more copies : fish.

With fish, you can build work boats while still growing and get a huge food boost.

Special mentions go to gold, for the extra science, and cow on a grassland, for great food AND production!

 

[Mooncusser]

I'm a Stone fan. I love Stonehenge early on - it's great for being aggressive in sealing off borders before opponents encroach too much. Plus, the faster I get Stonhenge completed, the faster my main city can get back to worker/settler/archer production.

 

[spa]

I voted other. I love to find myself with a few flood plain squares near my starting city because flood plains means cottages that still provide one extra food. As for the actual resources on the list, I like to see some sea resources nearby because I can go get them without slowing my city's growth.

 

[rgbender62]

You guys are real pacifist types. Any red blooded war monger type will tell you the resource you must have first is horses. Get horses before your neighbors and you will have chariots. There is a reason they were the worlds first terror weapon. With chariots you have mobility and striking power and can knock out 1 and possibly two of your neighbors. This gets you their cities and pile of gold to ride out the financial crisis that comes from early over expansion. Plus you can upgrade all those chariots to horse archers when you get the horse riding tech. Stone and Marble are great but HORSES are essential. Besides with horses you can always conquer cities that control the stone and marble you need.

Gold will not get you good warriors but good warriors can always get you gold.

 

[Artanis]

Of the resources you can see at the start, I like Gems. You can put a Mine on Gems, getting Hammers, Commerce, and an extra out of them. They can also sometimes show up on flat land, and a flat land mine...well...the HUGE total F/P/C (10? 11? something like that) speaks for itself .

What I REALLY like about Gems, however, is what they say about everything else around them. I've only ever seen Gems on Grassland, and Grassland means I won't have much trouble feeding my Cottages and Mines, so seeing Gems means I'm in good shape

 

[IrishBornKiller]

I like to see Stone. Not only does it give you the bonuses to build the Pyramids/Stonehenge/Hanging Gardens but it seems to be very rare. Marble always seems plentiful. I can expand later into luxury or food resources but I am much more unlikely to see stone laying about.

 

[Glinka]

Stone -50% production cost for Stonehenge and The Pyramids if I remember correctly.

Enough said.

Agreed. Definitely the best way to get a jump on the AI. Unfortunately, unless you're playing on very low levels, you probably won't get this near your first city.

 

[Reprisal]

Of the choices states: stone, though I could settle for cows fairly easily. In addition to the food and health benefits, there is a hammer bonus with cows, which plays well with the ideas put forth by Jared Diamond in Guns, Germs and Steel, a favourite book of mine to be sure...

Of those not listed, horses are always nice as well since they give a production bonus too. Chariots, War Chariots and Immortals make for especially good settler escorts and barbarian fighters, and Immortals even make for a good rush unit if one is warring early.

The Mongols benefit a lot from horses, obviously. Though, I only mention that because I won my first domination victory with Genghis Khan (renamed Mongke Khan) yesterday... .

 

[warpstorm]

Reprisal, Horses are no longer starting resources.

 

[Abegweit]

Lotsa food and lotsa forests. A hill or three is good too. I didn't vote because there are several good resources for food. Plus forests and hills weren't even on the list.

Of course I always like to find stone and copper but they don't have to be in my first city. The capital needs to grow and chop. Chop. Chop. Chop.

 

[Shadzy19]

Gems on grassland.