Old World from Soren Johnson

[devoncop]

Hi Gus.

The two easiest nations for beginners are apparently Rome and Babylon (strong armies and strong economy respectively) though this was written before the Hittites arrived and not sure where they are ranked. Needless to say I am therefore going to ignore this advice and will have a crack at the Egyptians. :)

Will be playing on "The Good" difficulty which guarantees no declarations of war against me for at least 40 turns and in the advanced set up options am reducing the AI starting development from "fledgling" to "none" so the AI only starts with one city and not two so its a level playing field. You are right there are about 7 difficulty levels and "The Good"  is one of the easier ones but from what I have heard that will be plenty for the first game !

As for maps I considered playing a historical map, maybe the Mediterranean or the Eastern med but have decided on a random medium map for a first go.

Let me know which civ and options you go for.

[Gusington]

Heh I'm definitely ignoring the advice as well - Persia calls. I never play anything on difficulty higher than 'Normal' as AIs usually punch me right in the face...so I'm thinking of taking my first real game on either the 3rd or 4th difficulty tier. I also like using historically accurate maps. I like the Old World feature of offering the opportunity to change the name of geographic features that the player is first to discover too.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Dial the difficulty down to "The Just" or lower for your first few attempts at the game.  The AI is generally quite good at slapping you silly.

[Gusington]

Is 'The Just' the 2nd/3rd level out of the 7? I am not afraid to take that advice, just to get a grip.

[devoncop]

The Just is the level above "The Good" that I am attempting.

If you hover over each of the drop down levels it tells you the implications of each.

[Gusington]

Gotcha - hoping I can overrun the world with an army of Persian immortals in my first proper game.

[devoncop]

Gotcha - hoping I can overrun the world with an army of Persian immortals in my first proper game.

I can see my ungrateful brat of a step son is going to be a literal right royal pain in the ass and I have Greeks to the SW and Persians to the East so far....I have little faith my Egyptian levies will hold v the Immortals if Darius kicks off.

The 1st Rangers (big bonuses attacking from trees )....have the honour of being conmanded by a very competent drunk with more tree fighting bonuses...so we shall lurk menacingly.

[Gusington]

'a very competent drunk' - I like it

[Tripoli]

'a very competent drunk' - I like it

Ulysses S. Grant is in the game?  ;)

[Gusington]

 ;D

[devoncop]

'a very competent drunk' - I like it

Ulysses S. Grant is in the game?  ;)

One of his distant Egyptian relations.... ;)

So now 42 turns in and Egypt has something of a crisis underway with a 13 year old King ruling with no heir ...His father was killed in a duel with a Thracian warlord whose camp the Egytians had just overrun, shortly after taking the throne and his eldest sister , who wasof course particularly capable came to an early end at the hands of the plague :pullhair:

In score terms my Egyptians hold the narrowest of leads over the Romans,Greeks and Persians but it all depends on the 13 year old sticking around.

Fantastic game.

[bobarossa]

Just finished Tutorial 3 and my brain hurts!  So much stuff going on.  This is nothing like Civ and I'm glad.

[Gusington]

^Me too! Going in to the final tutorial now.

[Gusington]

Ok, in the final phases of the last tutorial and my scout keeps getting discovered by the Romans - anyone have any suggestions?

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Be sneakier?