WOTM-01 Pre-Game Discussion

[RobertTheBruce]

I don't find the Cothon to be useless... I'll grant you that it's not as impressive as some of the other buildings, but it's a harbor with an extra trade route attached... it all adds up.

Also, I have to wonder if the mods don't just scope this thread out and tweek the save to mess with us just before they put it up

The Cothon is pretty good if you are planning a diplomatic or space race victory.

Pre-astronomy, another trade route will be within your nation and one extra commerce per turn isn't that exciting. Post-astronomy, the trade route can be helpful if you don't have a huge empire. I'm not sure how much the arid conditions will affect city size and trade yield.

If you are planning domination or conquest and already control your continent then its weak but if you have less than a quarter of the cities in the world it can be very useful. It won't help cultural victories unless one of your 3 culture cities is coastal.

 

[ewokimpi]

Originally posted by RedBad
question: that strange delta of the river 1 E of the settler:
is that where the river ends, or starts or can it be somewhere in between?
And in case it's where the river ends: does there then has to be a lake or sea or can a river end like a wadi in the desert?

The braided area is where the river rises, that is, starts. Note that it occupies the corner of four tiles.

The end of a river is always in a sea, or one-tile lake. I've never seen one end otherwise.

 

[ewokimpi]

Originally posted by RobertTheBruce
Pre-astronomy, another trade route will be within your nation and one extra commerce per turn isn't that exciting. Post-astronomy, the trade route can be helpful if you don't have a huge empire.

In the test game I'm playing currently the cothons are worth an extra 11/gpt, spead over five coastal cities. This game is currently in the Carthage knows-Astronomy-and-no-one-else-even-knows-Optics-Ha-Ha-Ha stage.

The Noble AIs are such hopeless puppies...

 

[MrWhite]

This will be my first warlords game... bought the expansion just to be able to play.

So it will be a bit different then I am used to, but on these setting I'm certain I can at least manage to try and win.

After moving the warrior I will think hard. I would love to build the capital near the ocean, but will I search for it? I don't think so... if I don't see water with the warrior I will probably settle in place.
I will build lots of cottages on the floodplains, so first go for pottery, then BW, then maybe alphabet to trade all the early techs before going for a tech advance. This will only work if there are enough opponents on our island.

 

[KingdomBrunel]

After moving the warrior I will think hard. I would love to build the capital near the ocean, but will I search for it? I don't think so... if I don't see water with the warrior I will probably settle in place.

I think that's coast two spaces south of the settler isn't it?

I too will go for lots of cottages early; seems a good move with lots of food and a river.

 

[drkodos]

I think that's coast two spaces south of the settler isn't it?

Looks like coast 4N, 1E from the Settler as well (two tiles North of obscured forrest tile).

Unlike some, I will be moving the warrior North onto the Hill to see where the river goes, and then may decide to scout around with the settler for a turn before plopping down the city.

 

[Shillen]

I think that's coast two spaces south of the settler isn't it?

I don't think it is. It just looks like the gray splotches that are on plains hill tiles.

As for 4N, 1E I honestly don't see how you can see anything on that tile.

 

[drkodos]

As for 4N, 1E I honestly don't see how you can see anything on that tile.

Very large monitor, 2 million pixels.

If you look closely at the edge of that tile, you can see the hints of a little blue. Plus, knowing that the river runs into either a lake or an ocean, I suspect that water is due north of the starting position about 6 or seven tiles.

We shall see.

 

[lilnev]

Quick question: Will installing Warlords eliminate my ability to play vanilla, or will both be available to me?

thanks,
lilnev

 

[AlanH]

It installs a separate application and folder set, so all your existing vanilla facilities and saves are preserved.

 

[A'AbarachAmadan]

Like many others I'm trying to figure out where to move the warrior and settler. The only thing for sure is that the settler will end up on top of a plains/hill for the extra hammer from the start. While it just seems wrong to do this on the first warlords, I will be playing for a non-military victory since my last 5 games have been Conquest attempts.

 

[Jastrow]

Very large monitor, 2 million pixels.

If you look closely at the edge of that tile, you can see the hints of a little blue. Plus, knowing that the river runs into either a lake or an ocean, I suspect that water is due north of the starting position about 6 or seven tiles.

We shall see.

I tend to concure... On my work system, I can (during breaks, or course ) blow up the image to the point that I can see the individual pixels in the image file, and extract the colour. There are two blue pixels in that square. I am not saying this is proof, but I think it a strong indication, along with the rest of the logic above, that this is a water tile.

 

[phoulishwan]

I haven't played a GOTM since the first Civ 4 one, I got Warlords recently though and think I'll play this one, if I can fit it in to my otherwise WOW play time. I think I'll move the warrior 1E on top of that hill, to uncover the northeastern portion of fat cross if we settle in place, I think this may uncover coast 1S 2E of our settlers starting position. 2S of the settler has a small blue tinge and what looks to be a small white crest of a wave in the middle of the hills base, definately makes it look like it could be coast to me. Which means the tile 1E 2S between the two visible hills has potential to be coast as well, I think I'll move settler 1S to see, if this position is coastal, I might settle on that tile if it's not, I'll move onto the hill SE of starting position and decide what to do after seeing it's surroundings.

Lots of food in this spot, but my strategy will be highly dependant on whether or not I find a coastal position to start. If the start is coastal I'm going to aim for 2-3 cities max all hopefully coastal and go for a heavy science start, I'll probably try to grab The Great Lighthouse and then go for The Oracle to snag Metal Casing and go for The Colossus. If there's a sea based food resource I'll go for Bronzworking and pop rush a workboat as soon as I can otherwise I'll start on the road to Pottery and then go for Bronzeworking to enable Slavery. With this much food and so many hammers from nearby hills, pop rushing will help me push both Science and Production very nicely once I hit around 7-8 population, I should be able to support 8 population with a monument up so I'll look to keep my population around 7 and pop rush the 8th whenever I can.

 

[Déja]

The square 3S really does look awfully suspiciously like coast... I may have to revise my decision to settle in place and go SE with the settler. After playing a few test games, I'll probably go for BW first so that I can chop a worker-settler combination then go Pottery > AH (look for horses) and then see who I have for neighbors before deciding where to go from there. If I'm next to Juli, Toku or Monty, for example, I'll gun it for HBR, assuming there are horses nearby, otherwise go for IW and try to conquer the continent early on. If I'm next to Hapt or one of the other peaceful types, I may just try to settle as much of the continent as quickly as I can and devour them culturally. It also depends on my mood at the time

 

[phoulishwan]

Also if you look at the gridlines you can see a portion of the gridline tile marker is faded in color, I'm pretty sure this generally only happens when some water crosses the gridline, I've never studied it but in my experience without necessarily having looked for it, I believe that is the case.

 

[drkodos]

Also if you look at the gridlines you can see a portion of the gridline tile marker is faded in color, I'm pretty sure this generally only happens when some water crosses the gridline, I've never studied it but in my experience without necessarily having looked for it, I believe that is the case.

I agree that 3S tile is likely to be water. Map is standard Continents with High seas. That mean continents are rather small, so it would not be surprising to find ourselves isolated on a landmass with room for only two or three decent cities.

I am thinking Sailing may be an useful early tech and the faster one gets optics/astronomy, the quicker their game will be won.

 

[Déja]

In every test game I've played with these settings, I've been on a continent with only one other civ (though I had one where there was a second civ beyond an impassible mountain range, so hardly counting) while the rest of the civs shared the second larger continent. I don't know if it's co-incidence, but it's happened four out of the five games (the exception being the aforementioned mountains on an isthmus)

I agree that seaworthiness is important eventually, but I should think it more important to control the homelands, first.

 

[drkodos]

I agree that seaworthiness is important eventually, but I should think it more important to control the homelands, first.

No doubt. BW first for chopping and axemen (if we have some proximal copper) and that will take care of any roommates sharing Gilligan's Island with us.

 

[Tech Step]

I have only just got Warlords and the first civ I played was carthage. I deelined for horses and found that everyone had phalanx's or spearmen, which of course ruined my chances.

I still think that going for bronze working and axemen is still the safest way to go. If you can get a warlord happening quickly and split the points between a catapult and an axemenr you can usually get pretty far. (a catapult with 30% colateral and an axemen with 3 city attack promotions is a nice way to take down cities.....)

 

[Ozbenno]

In every test game I've played with these settings, I've been on a continent with only one other civ (though I had one where there was a second civ beyond an impassible mountain range, so hardly counting) while the rest of the civs shared the second larger continent. I don't know if it's co-incidence, but it's happened four out of the five games (the exception being the aforementioned mountains on an isthmus)

I actually had the opposite, on 3 of 4 test games I was on a starting continent with more than one other civ (up to 4 others).

My main issue playing with these settings was the severe lack of resources. In 3 of 4 games I had no copper anywhere near me and in 1 I had no iron or copper. Not many (non-sea) health resources in all games.