Civ 5 - FPtD - Ehiopia - Update 3

We did a short turn set this time.  I wanted to be able to post this before I left the house, so a decent cutting off point seemed to be the settling of our second city.

Here are the highlights:

50     Finished Masonry, started Wheel.
50     Shrine suspended, settler started.
51     Shaka built the Great Library!  Yes Shaka!
55     Finished Wheel, started Mathematics.
59     Finished Settler, restarted Shrine.
59     Met Brazil - poor guy is close to two of Shaka's cities.
60     Finished Shrine, started Archer.
62     Great Prophet appears - adopted Tithe and Pagodas.
63     Friends with Bucharest - Culture quest.
63     Archer finished, Caravan started.
64     Founded Harar.

Our happiness has really taken a hit with the founding of  Harar.  We are now at -1 happiness.  Our second salt will be done in 3 turns.  I'm hoping to trade an excess for another luxury resource.  Our gold situation is adequate, but Tithe should really benefit us in the long run.  Pogodas will eventually help us with our happiness problem.  Here's where we stand right now:

Click to Enlarge

Here's Addis Abba:

Click to Enlarge

Here's Harar:

Click to Enlarge

And here are the two screenshots of the known world:

Click to Enlarge

Click to Enlarge

Well, where do we go now?  I teched toward Mathematics in case we wanted to make a run at the Hanging Gardens.  Brazil is also going tradition while the Zulus are going Liberty and England is going Piety (and she doesn't even have a pantheon yet).  I doubt we go that route, but I wanted to keep it open and it also kept Petra open as well although I doubt we go that way either.  What should I be teching?  Should I beeline Philosophy so I can build National College?  Construction for Composites and Coliseums?

What should I build with my first few builds in Harar?  What about my cap?  Another settler?  Library?  Units? Other?

How should we enhance our religion?  Should we be making an diplomatic overtures.  Should we avoid friendships with anyone?  No wars or denouncements of anyone yet.  What should we work on after finishing the tradition tree?  Piety?  Patronage?  Something else?

As usual, thanks for the help!

Civ 5 - FPtD - Ehiopia - Update 2

We left off with our little civilization needing to make a choice for Pantheon.  There were many good suggestions, but most people agreed that we should go with Desert Folklore even though it wasn't quite the desert location we had hoped.

On Turn 14, we finished our scout and started building a granary.  Our Spearman uncovered an ancient ruin and was paid in gold and we started the tradition tree with our first social policy.  On turn 19, we finished researching mining and started teching Calendar in hopes of some day constructing Stonehenge.  We also adopted Legalism and our Spearman found another ancient ruin that turn.  The remains of that civilization joined our empire allowing our fledgling empire to grow.

We met two other Civilizations on turn 20.  We met Shaka of the Zulu Empire and Elizabeth of England.  Well, things just might get interesting later.  Two turns later we met Bucharest and earned 15 gold.

Construction of our granary was completed on turn 25 and we started to build a Shrine.  Three turns later, after learning the secrets of Calendar, we suspended construction of the shrine so we could start to build Stonehenge.  Luckily, the very next turn, we adopted Aristocracy which will hopefully help us get Stonehenge built a bit quicker.  Our spearman also "borrowed" a worker from Bratislava on that turn.

On turn 31, our scout was given a crude map at the site of an ancient ruin.  We discovered where London was on this map.  The next turn we finished Animal Husbandry and started researching Archery which we completed five turns later at which point we teched writing.

Writing was researched on turn 43 at which point we started studying Masonry.  We also accepted an embassy with Shaka in hopes that he wasn't close to us and luckily England is between us and the Zulu.  Three turns later we adopted Landed Elite and our scout met the city state of Mombassa and grabbed us 15 more gold.

Finally, on turn 49, we finished construction on

Click to Enlarge

Next is a pic of our Capital:

Click to Enlarge

Here's a pic of our city screen:

Click to Enlarge

Finally, here are two pics of the known world:

Click to Enlarge

Click to Enlarge

So,where do we go from here?  Do we try to beeline toward Currency in hopes we can get Petra.  Is Petra even worth it for our capital?  Should we build a settler next?  Build a library?  Finish our shrine?  Shaka's on our continent.  When do we start building some units?  We'll have a religion before too much longer.  What should we choose as our founder and follower beliefs?  Where should we look at planting a second city?  I'm not seeing any real strong city locations.

Looking forward to your comments and suggestions!

Civ 5 - FPtD - Ehiopia - Update 1

OK, we followed the advice many of you had about moving our warrior down to the desert hill to the southeast.  We uncovered yet another salt and another cow in our city's future borders.  With that we decided to settle on the forest next to the river and the desert keeping our dream of a potential Petra alive.

After that, we sent our warrior scouting and started building a Stele.  We decided to research Pottery in hopes that we can get a quick granary.

Turn 3 we met Bratislava and collected our 30 gold.  On turn 9 we finished our Stele and started working on our scout.  On turn 10, our warrior found our first (only?) ancient ruins and gave him advanced weapons.  The next turn we finished our research on Pottery and started researching mining.  Finally, on turn 13, we achieved our Pantheon.

This is where we stopped.  Here are two screenshots of our current situation.  The first is of our capital and the second is of all the area we've explored so far.  I'd usually have explored more by now, but I usually start by building a scout.  Our scout will join us next turn, however, and will start to show us more of our immediate surroundings.

Click to enlarge

Click to Enlarge

The first question is what Pantheon do we take?  We don't have a ton of intel and our desert is smaller than perhaps we hoped.  Desert folklore will certainly still get us faith.  The tundra will get us faith if we want to go that route, but for most of it we'd have to wait until we got a second city settled.  Another option is +2 faith per quarry.  I see that as subpar, but perhaps someone might prefer that option.  Any other potential choices?

Next, was mining the right choice for our second tech?  I figured it would allow for the improving of salt tiles and allow us to cut down forests for improved production early if required.  If we should be teching something else right now, what should it be?  Should we switch right now?  What should be be prioritizing next for tech?

Next turn, we will choose our first social policy.  Should we start down the path of tradition?  If so, which policy should we pick first?  I'm assuming Aristocracy or Legalism.  I'd assume we'd take Legalism if we plan to build a settler prior to a wonder, otherwise, take Aristocracy.

Finally, what are we going to build in our capital?  I heard lots of calls for an early granary and that seems to make sense.  Other options are a worker, but I'm rather happy that Bratislava is so close.  I think they might just supply us with a worker.  A shrine?  I'm sure we'll want one at some point, but it seems that we'll get more bang from an early granary to me.

Oh yeah, what tiles should we be working in the capital?  Should I focus more on growth or production.  I'm assuming growth until we get our granary and then start to increase our production?  I think this could be one of our biggest areas of potential growth.

Well, as always, thanks everyone and keep those ideas coming!  We'll get our next round of turns done tomorrow.

Civ 5 - FPtD - Ethiopia - King

OK we had some great input at the civfanatics forum and have decided that for our first game, we are going to go with a random civ and the computer gave us Ethiopia!  We are playing on a standard sized continents map with standard turns.

Ethiopia will be an interesting challenge for us since we don't know exactly how to play as Haile.  What type of victory do we go for?  We usually have a plan from the start.  Now that plan doesn't always work out, but it seems to help us in our decision making.

Ethiopia's special ability, Spirit of Adwa, gives us a 20% bonus when fighting units from a Civ that has more cities than us.  Since puppets count for purposes of determining the Spirit of Adwa bonus, it doesn't seem like Haile's ability leads itself to domination.  I can certainly be used defensively in a tall culture/science/diplo empire.

Looking at the Unique Building, the Stele is a great replacement for the Monument.  It should ensure we get an early religion.  As long as Boudica isn't on our map, we have a great shot at getting the first pantheon which might enable us to get the first religion as well.

The Mehal Sefari, Ethiopia's unique unit, is very strong near the capital which again leads me to believe it's a defensive unit that when coupled with the Spirit of Adwa will give us ample protection in the industrial era.

My thought is to focus on getting an early religion that supports either a cultural or a scientific victory.  As for units, it will naturally depend on neighbors and map, but I'm assuming we want our units to play a more defensive role.  If I'm wrong, please set me straight!

Speaking of map, here's our start:

Click to Enlarge

River start with lots of salt.  Stone and wheat.  I assume we should move our warrior a bit to scout prior to settling.  Maybe to the desert tile east of the wheat?  Desert Folklore might be really strong for us.

Once we settle, what should be our first few techs?  What should we focus on building in Addis Ababa?  If we a culture ruin, what policies should we be looking towards?

What would you do and why?  Let us know in the comments below!

Our Quest in Civ V - Go From Prince to Deity

Hey fellow Civers!  This blog is a collaborative effort between me and my 13 year old son.  One of our favorite things to do is to hang out together and play some Civ.  We usually work together to make our decisions.

Prior to Brave New World, we could pretty consistently beat Prince and had moved up to King.  It was generally a coin flip in our King games.

Well, with the advent of BNW, we are having trouble getting back to our winning ways.  It seems we now can win on Prince about like we used to on King - which is really not good enough.

That's where this blog comes in.  We want to get to the point we consistently win not only on Prince.  No!  We also want to win consistently on King, Emperor, Immortal, and yes Deity.  Well, we'll settle for just winning sometimes on deity.

To do that we're going to need your help!  We need to refine our strategies as we take on tougher and tougher challenges and are asking you to help us become better Civers.  We're also hoping that in the process you will become a better player as well.

For us to succeed in our quest, we're going to need your participation.  We'll need your input in comments regarding what strategies we should employ in the coming turns.

Let's start with the comments from this very first post!  Introduce yourself and help us decide:  A. How will we determine when we move to the next level?  B. Which Civ will we play first?  C. What type of map will we play?  D. How many turns should we play between posts?

I'm for using standard turns and standard map sizes, but I'll listen to any other arguments.  As for map type, I've become a HUGE fan of Maddjinn on Youtube, and he recommends continents so naval civs are on an equal footing and it seems to make sense to me.  I'm not looking for exploits in order to win so I don't want maps custom tailored to my Civ for easy victories.  As for Civs, we usually do random and I'm fine with that, however as we continue it might bore you all if we end up playing as the same civ two or three times.

Thoughts, ideas?  Looking forward to posting our first screenshot of our starting area as soon as we hammer out all the details above.