Using +2 naval movement on pangaea. yuris125 of England

[yuris125]

T2

Ancient ruins gave me +1 pop, one of the stronger results. So I'm the score leader now

Here is the city of Boeing after growth



Note that gold yield on the tile NW-W from the city. There's a river there! This is very important, and I will explain why after work

[yuris125]

I keep promising a post about city buildings, but other matters keep popping up. Since I noticed the river near my capital, it's a good opportunity to talk about tiles, tile improvements, and why you can live without Workers for a while

Here are Civ5 terrain types and their basic yields (ignoring special tiles for now):

Grassland, flood plains, jungle - 2/0/0
Plains, forest - 1/1/0
Tundra - 1/0/0
Snow, desert - no yield
Hill - 0/2/0. It is important to note that the game makes a difference between hill terrain types, but it's only visual. Any hill, be it grassland, desert, or tundra, has a yield of 2 hammers

Tiles adjacent to a river get an extra yield of 1 gold

Tile improvements are:
Farm - +1 food, can be built on any tile (including hills)
Mine - +1 hammer, can be built on hills
Lumber mill - +1 hammer, can be built on forests
Trading post - +1 gold, can be built on any tile

These bonuses can be improved with later technologies, but in the early game, they're really not that strong. Extra food and extra production is nice, but improving yield of standard tiles by just 1 is not good enough to build a Worker over a Monument (faster social policies and border expansion), Scout or Warrior. The first Worker is normally used to improve special tiles, but you need to get required techs first. So a Worker built before anything else wouldn't have much to do

Most of the techs which improve yield of tile improvements come into play late. Civil Service, which gives an extra +1 food to riverside farms, is the only exception. It's a Medieval era tech, one of Education pre-reqs, so it's usually among the first 10 techs to be researched. When farms give +2 food rather than +1, they become much more important. Riverside hills can be farmed to become 2/2/1 tiles, and it's usually a legitimate choice whether you want to farm or mine a river hill. Grasslands and flood plains can become 4/0/1 tiles and support city growth, citizens working mines, or specialists. The number of tiles adjacent to a river often makes a difference between an average city and a great one

There also are buildings which require the city to be built next to a river, but they aren't great, and Boeing doesn't qualify as "next to a river" anyway, so it's not important in this case

[Commodore]

I really appreciate the informative style here Yuri, as I know less than nothing about CiV. How is Sirian Doctrine here? Even on a Pangaea there seems like a lot of coasts to pillage and despoil.

[yuris125]

Thanks Commodore Sirian's doctrine works perfectly. Cities in Civ5 have their own hit points (increased with each era, with defensive buildings like Walls, and I think with extra pop as well). To take a city, you need to fully remove its hit points. There can be 2 units inside the city (1 garrison and 1 passing by), but I don't think they add to hit points, they just can attack from the city tile, and cannot be attacked because any attack is against the city

The last city hit point has to be taken with a melee unit. However, before you get to the last hit point, you can make ranged attacks. In a land war, this is usually done with siege units, which have bonus against cities. But ships work just as well; if you bring 3 Frigates/Ships of the Line to a city, you can get it down very quickly - especially if you do it when your opponent is still in the medieval era. Also you don't need to build Galleys/Galleons in Civ5: once you discover the required tech (Optics for coastal tiles, Astronomy for ocean), every unit in your territory gets the Embarkation promotion, and can enter water tiles and sail to its destination. And I believe they can attack from the embarked state; the usual amphibious penalty applies, but attacking a city which was bombarded down works just fine. Ships also can bombard units outside of cities, so they can be used as defensive units

So yeah, I definitely expect naval warfare to play its part, even on pangaea

[yuris125]

T4



Here is the first city state. I will officially meet it next turn (it's not enough to see the border, you need to be next to it or a city state's unit). I expect to get 30g for it (on contact, city states give 30g if you're the first civ to meet them, 15g otherwise). Then I'm very likely to stick around and steal a Worker or two. Civ5 gives quite a few possibilities to get Workers for free

I marked two possible locations for the second city. Magenta dot seems to be stronger, unless I find another luxury in the fog in the east

Also, since we started to talk about capturing cities, the number next to the shield icon in the city label shows how many hit points it has when undamaged. In the ancient era, cities have the strength of 6, 9 in the capital because the Palace provides +3 defence. For comparison, Warrior has strength 6, Spearman strength 7, Archer strength 6 ranged attack. It is possible to take a city with 3 Warriors, or 2 Warriors and an Archer, if your opponent doesn't have defensive units and only relies on the strength of the city

[kalin]

With England's unique units being so awesome, strategy outline is clear: research the techs required for UUs, build an army, kill the neighbours. How am I going to get there, and which obstacles there are to overcome?

Don't forget that +2 naval movement applies to embarked units. Also, I found the longbow a bit lacking in practice because you can't shoot over forest/hills etc.

The Oracle is a decent wonder as well, but with social policies it's more tricky: they all cost the same, and become more expensive with every new social policy taken. This means that the later you can build the Oracle, the more valuable it is. I might go for it, because I need that GS point, but I won't prioritise it

The Oracle doesn't change the cost of social policies, so it doesn't really matter when you get it.

Kalin

[Bobchillingworth]

Also, I found the longbow a bit lacking in practice because you can't shoot over forest/hills etc.

Haha! It's totally cool for LB to shoot over three grassland tiles, which surely must represent at least several miles of terrain, but hills would just totally shatter the illusion of reality we've got going here

[yuris125]

I found the longbow a bit lacking in practice because you can't shoot over forest/hills etc.

Against AI, who attacks with a disorganised pile of units a human player would never be able to support, they might be lacking. Against an intelligent opponent, the range advantage is huge. Or so people say

The Oracle doesn't change the cost of social policies, so it doesn't really matter when you get it.

Hmmm, you made me doubt. I need to think about it, you very well can be right

Haha! It's totally cool for LB to shoot over three grassland tiles, which surely must represent at least several miles of terrain, but hills would just totally shatter the illusion of reality we've got going here

Game rules don't have to be logical

[kalin]

Against AI, who attacks with a disorganised pile of units a human player would never be able to support, they might be lacking. Against an intelligent opponent, the range advantage is huge. Or so people say

Actually, I meant that they are lacking against a human, not against the AI. That is because a human would position troops in such a way that they are not exposed to longbows... In principle you could use their range to slowly advance a line of troops, but you inevitably run into rough terrain that longbows cannot shoot over. It came to me as a surprise too as I thought they'd be more effective. This is just my limited experience...

Game rules don't have to be logical

Exactly... civ4 stuff is not particularly realistic either if you think about it, but it's a very good game.

Kalin

[yuris125]

Well, we'll see. Between the release and Seven's idea of this game, I played two games of Civ5 I think So it's not like I'm a huge expert. I think at the very least Longbows will give me extra options, and increase the change of opponents' mistakes