The case for Expansionist civs.

HalfLotus · November 20, 2001, 21:41

Expansionist is not popular, and is generally regarded as the weakest trait. I had a great experience with the English recently.
The scout found 4 huts. 3 with techs that I traded to other civs and stayed ahead in tech. And one with a settler. The settler came on my fourth or fifth turn, and was a huge boost ahead of the AI. I was playing Monarch where staying ahead is tough unless you do an early military rush.
I still prefer Religious and Militaristic, but the gains (esp. techs from huts) from expansionist were great.
I got tired of waiting until industrial and modern ages to have a good lead on the AI and press the offensive. I enjoyed being ahead in the early stages where it is almost impossible to build settlers faster than AI. This was the first game where I was in command from the get go. It was fun.
This is hardly a quantitative analysis. Just a case for the early game funness of expansionist. I dont know how often settlers come out of huts for expansionist. Does anyone?

Lawrence of Arabia · November 20, 2001, 22:02

The expansionists scout does away withe the need to build 2 warriors

dexters · November 20, 2001, 22:08

It also guarantees all goodie huts give you something good.

they tend to be useless in small maps however.

jack_frost · November 21, 2001, 03:25

From my experiances expansionist is actually really good.

Aside from finding the best expansion spots (which is real important), and goodie huts (which give you a good boost). You also gain the ability to compete with the computer in making contact with other civs. If you do it well, you can position yourself as the most advanced tribe really early. You can also withhold contact between rival civs for sometimes a long time if your in a central spot and expand quickly.

But I really like the english due to expansionist/pottery/alphabet. Which lets you get granaries really early, and possitions you to be the first republic. The comination with this, and the above is great. PLUS you get your golden age RIGHT at the start of industrial which is one of the ideal times. Too bad you get a ship special unit - sometimes I have to start a war randomly to hit my golden age (its hard to find a boat to kill sometimes).

vmxa1 · November 21, 2001, 03:46

I still say that the huts you find with the scouts you would have gotten with a warrior. Maybe one less, big deal. Even with the scout you could go in a direction that is not the one where the AI is so you are not competing for huts in that case. Huts that are near you settlements can be made to give value without EXPAND trait. I send someone to the hut and if it is bad, I just reload and leave it alone. Eventually I build or expand to include it in a city and it always seems to give up good stuff. So far it has happen in every game.

jack_frost · November 21, 2001, 04:11

huts are better for expansionist. Increases chances of goodies and not barbarians.

I've never hit a barbarian as expansionist, its very rare that its empty, and I've gotten more then one settler in a single game as expansionist.

Show me results like that as non-expansionist on emperor (hut quality is biased by difficulty), and maybe I'd agree.

And simply, you can grab huts the computer would have gotten.

Badtz Maru · November 21, 2001, 04:41

I'd say that about 2/3 of the time playing Expansionist I will get one settler from a hut. More than once I have gotten two. Even one settler in the early game can be a huge advantage, and two will make sure that you are in the lead for the rest of the game if you don't do anything stupid, especially when you consider that you will also have a tech lead from the techs you get from huts. I always play on Huge maps, though. I doubt Expansionist would be worth much on smaller ones.

The fact that you never get hostile barbarians from a hut with Expansionist doesn't really mean that much to me, as I've never got them anyway. I suspect that getting hit by barbarians early on would often lead to a reload anyway. The money you get early on from huts is very nice too. People seem to think money isn't worth much in the game, but I think they don't play around much with their domestic adviser screen. Having a nice reserve of gold gives you lots more options - not only can you hurry improvements, you can buy techs from the AI (on Regent you can often get Ancient Era techs for well under 100 gold), you can buy luxuries or strategic resources, convince hostile civilizations to leave you alone, you can go into the red for several turns to increase research or to keep from having to make entertainers to keep your people happy - getting extra money early on can make the beginning phase much easier.

fbitt1 · November 21, 2001, 07:33

I almost never get tech from goodie huts with non-expansionist civs. I've built cities that included a hut in its radius with a non-expansionist civ, and out popped barbs.

On large and huge maps, Pangea, expansionist Civs get a great early start:
- Extra tech:
Can be used to get an early start on Wonders (for culture scores that increase over time.
Sold to the AI for gold
Traded for tech
- Early exposure of the map. Early contact, valuable world maps, selling contact between civs
- Extra warriors -- extra protection in frontier cities, fodder, etc.

I've found Literacy, Monarchy and Republic in huts, plus I get piles of money early.

With the right circumstances, that early lead can be maintained throughout the game. Your early, superior culture allows you to absorb cities culturally faster, block out the AI from expansion, keep them from resources, etc.

I think they are way under rated here. Allows for a larger variety of non-warmongering strategies.

player1 · November 21, 2001, 12:05

I like playing Exp./Religious combo on higher diff. levels.
It allows me to expand fast, increase culture and quell unhappiness.

Plus, Mounted Warriors ar VERY powerfull special unit.

egovalor · November 23, 2001, 00:24

Quote:

Originally posted by jack_frost
From my experiances expansionist is actually really good.

Aside from finding the best expansion spots (which is real important), and goodie huts (which give you a good boost). You also gain the ability to compete with the computer in making contact with other civs. If you do it well, you can position yourself as the most advanced tribe really early. You can also withhold contact between rival civs for sometimes a long time if your in a central spot and expand quickly.

But I really like the english due to expansionist/pottery/alphabet. Which lets you get granaries really early, and possitions you to be the first republic. The comination with this, and the above is great. PLUS you get your golden age RIGHT at the start of industrial which is one of the ideal times. Too bad you get a ship special unit - sometimes I have to start a war randomly to hit my golden age (its hard to find a boat to kill sometimes).

Here's a possibilty...I've found that if you stack ANY naval unit with a pirate ship (privateer), when the pirate gets attacked the other naval unit actually defends it (you still don't go to war, although I think you might suffer a reputation loss. The romans suddenly went from gracious to annoyed with me after throwing at least 20 ironclads uselessly against a "pirate greek battleship. heh.) Question: You think a "pirate" man-o-war that successful defends itself might send you into golden age? hmm. Try it sometime, I never play english.

War4ever · November 23, 2001, 00:47

are you sure about more than one nomad per turn...i play standard maps and have never seen more than one nomad and never seen a nomad that didn't come out of the first hut.....!!!!!!

perhaps on larger maps this is the case......

the scout unit doesn't do anything a jaguar couldn't do......early huts are ok but if your on the warpath you will get your techs from the ai when you sue for peace...

militaristic religious is the way to go.....and play as the japanese....their golden age will come later than the aztec one which will come when the jaguar wins in combat as opposed to the samurai which comes around knights and when your well into a representative govt

the one turn of anarchy makes such a difference when your trying to conduct a war or go from war to peacetime......

as for religious....hehe that speaks for itself.... early war and early culture make a deadly combo

vmxa1 · November 23, 2001, 01:43

Barbs coming out of huts is great for a hoplite, instant vet or elite. I had it had twice and both regulars went vet and then elite. I do not need any extra from the huts anyway as you will get ahead sooner or later.

War4ever · November 23, 2001, 01:59

exactly my point....barbs from huts are almost a blessing unless its the first hut and it overuns your capital without a defender..even then you only lose gold......

i find the scout useless....now that i rock at the game..... it was nice to have when i couldn't keep up to the ai....but now i just over run them so...... i would rather have militaristic and religious traits.....

dexters · November 23, 2001, 03:08

Expansionsit civs as stated allows you to scout locations, and get goodie huts, which I believe gives you 100% non barbarian goodness.

I got 5 techs and 1000 gold on a large map as I simple sent my scout moving into new territories even as my Civ grew. People forget that it's not just the very beginning. If you're on a large map, you can go on for a good 100 turns exploring and finding resources.

I've used the strategy to effectively "camp" out at a resouce and deny the AI from ever using it. My scout also helped me discover potential threats early. In my current game, I found the Aztecs above me. With water cutting off expasion south, Aztecs would cut off my expansion north and I'd be stuck controlling a small peice of land. It was really the early discovery of the Aztecs that allowed me to move quickly to establish cities northward and westward and stake my claim on a larger peice of the pie.

The warrior alternative is feasable, but not optimal. It takes several turns to produce the warrior, and once it is produced it has only one movement point, compared to the scout's 2. Warriors can be effective a little later on even for expansionsit civs to protect resources found by the scout. If you're playing advanced difficulty levels on one of the larger maps, by the time your warrior finds an enemy Civ, it is usually too late, strategically, to change the course of your expansion to cut off any potential threats in the rival Civ's expansion. And even if you did try to change course, it takes an additional 5 to 10 turns to get the settlers where you want them to be, and while that is going on, the AI is expanding like map, and more than likely, moving close to you and taking sweet spots.

Nothing is worse than not being able to get your first 10 or so cities off to a good start. If you lack the territory to build them because you are getting boxed off, or the AI is taking all the good locations, you'll find yourself struggling to compete later on.

Part of the trade off in this game is that obviously you can't win every land grab,so you will certainly have to to let the AI build where you might not like it, but know you will come with an army later on and take it by force. But it is also important to keep in mind you won't be able to field that army if the AI expansion cuts you off from strategic locations, resources and the like. Thescouts give a great early warning for any player as to the appropriate strategic moves to maximize ones opportunities in the very early game. And like I said, you might find 3 iron mines up north, and you may want to rush settles up there to claim them, a discovery you might not have made untit later for a non expansion civ and you'd be stuck trading for it, or worse yet, the rival civ will send his swords man to cut down your Civ and you're finished.

vmxa1 · November 23, 2001, 04:59

All you say it correct, but as I said, I get most of the huts with just warrior or hoplite or whatever my unit is. I send them all over until I can go no farther and I seldom see the AI get many huts. I even find them very close to them. I get tech 8 out 10 times. The 9th will be gold and the 10th is barbs (not all in one game except on Huge). How much better do I need to do? The only time I had expansion I was on an Island (small one), real useful there huh?

War4ever · November 23, 2001, 05:51

depending on your civs strengths the hut results will vary....

i play religious militaristic civs now....well the japanese .... i get alot of barbs which upgrade my units..... a few sciences and some gold.... once in awhile i get a nomad and occasionally i get deserted or maps....

on a standard map there aren't enough tiles to justify an expansion civ other than the fact that they have a higher chance of getting a nomad..but any civ can get one and on a standard map, a nomad ruins my game as i am guarranteed victory

with scouts exploring , if you stumble upoin barbs your toast.... warrior aren't as fast but i still find techs right beside other civs all the time and i tend to find most of the huts i figure....

unless playing on a large map......a expansionistic civ is a waste IMO

MarshalN · November 23, 2001, 11:47

I think the key is how big of a map do you play. I just played a game on huge with English (first try) and I got at least 10 techs from huts, plus a settler I got on the first hut I hit which really jump started my civ. I found the Germans early as well and nipped them in the bud so they're only surviving because I'm letting them

If you play on a standard or smaller map, I suspect the scout is quite useless because there's nowhere to go. On a huge map, however, you can go REALLY far before hitting a wall. It just depends on the circumstances.

vmxa1 · November 23, 2001, 13:49

It depends on more than map size. I played a huge and did not have scouts and got so many techs, I lost track. I only ran into one empty hut, by then I did not care. At a very high level (deity) it may slow you down some, but I did not see any big push from the AI to get huts. I had 5 hoplites and one warrior out so far that one I sent back took 30 turns. I had to abandon as I never got Horse/Iron/saltpetter so I could not build any worthwhile units. I could not trade as the civs.

player1 · November 23, 2001, 17:52

It is not important how much techs you get, it is improtant how quickly you get them (you get those much quickiler with Exp.)
If you get them quick enough, you can trade them for other techs & money. If not, then nothing.

There is one pattern I saw with Expansionistic
Every time I play game I get one free city (of settler) early.
Still, never got two of them (regardless of taking more then 15 huts).

Without Exp. trait, I never got a free settler.

War4ever · November 23, 2001, 18:17

militaristic civs get settlers too...i used to think that only expansion civs got them but that is not the case...still havnt' had one past my first hut in any game......

player1 · November 23, 2001, 18:23

Maybe that's some kind of "design cheat":
-You can get settlers from huts only once (if at all) , but easier with Expansionist

Probably to prevent "lucky games"

MarshalN · November 23, 2001, 20:03

I think the speed of when you get the techs make a difference. You can build better units/buildings earlier, you can do a lot of stuff with early tech advantage, like trading (although on a huge map you won't have as many chances to trade). Now that I see the whole map, I know that I got a lot of huts that were right around my neighbours. If I didn't use expansionist, I probably would never have gotten them.

barefootbadass · November 24, 2001, 01:43

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Huts that are near you settlements can be made to give value without EXPAND trait. I send someone to the hut and if it is bad, I just reload and leave it alone. Eventually I build or expand to include it in a city and it always seems to give up good stuff. So far it has happen in every game.

Huts near you also benefit expansionist civs, the point is that they tend to get more huts. Also, please don't use reloads for something bad happening to demonstrate that not getting bad stuff from huts as expansionist civs is not really an advantage. You can do it if you want but AFAIK your whole game is 'tainted' from that point on.

Badtz Maru · November 27, 2001, 02:44

I take back what I said about Expansionist probably not being any good on smaller maps.

I recently played a Tiny map game, edited to allow 16 civilizations. I encountered all the other expansionist civs right away, and at the very beginning of the game, before I had researched my first tech, they all had 4 or 5 techs I didn't have. In this tiny little cutthroat world, the Zulus were a major player early on, and still an important factor later on in the game due to their tech lead.

Beau · November 27, 2001, 12:39

Ok I always play XL maps. But it has been my experience that cpu's with the expansionist trait ALWAYS do the best. The one cpu that almost always seems to be in my games is Russia. Exp/Scient and they are always in first or second. There expansionist and science traits allows them to research faster and expand faster which seems to result in them growing almost twice as fast as the other civs for the entire ancient erra they are ahead of everyone and most of the middle as well. I'm in the industrial age now and there still in first and there empire is huge like the chinese the only difference is there cities aren't all 1.2.3.4.5 there 7,8,9,10,11,12. Thats the difference between an expansion and a regular civ. There is something about exp civs we are missing its value is deceptive IMO.

vmxa1 · November 27, 2001, 13:11

I think that when people suggest that expansion trait is the weaker one, they are only refering to their play, not AI. It may be that the players are not using it to it best advantage, but it does seem to be of lesser value.

MarshalN · November 27, 2001, 13:13

I think expansionist give you a possible early lead -- in getting an extra settler, in getting a few more early techs, and in getting early contacts (that you can trade) and a bigger map (that you can trade too).

Down the road when you hit industrial age, expansionist is useless. So you have to utilize it as much as you can early on, or it's just a waste.

HalfLotus · November 27, 2001, 14:17

I agree with Marshal. After I got to industrial, i missed the the benefits of commercial/industrious/etc. It was tough to keep up at that point.
I'm not saying expansionist is the most powerful, just that it can make for a fun early game. Though with early military rushes being very effective, this early lead can be quite powerful.