Where am I going wrong?

[K9Mur]

Let´s say I´m the British. Here is what I commonly do.

Focus first 5 moves on food to get to 3 population.

Put 1 on food and 2 on science and study bronze working.

Put 2 on production, 1 on food and build archers to take barb villages, gold and scout out future cities.

After producing 4 or 6 archers focus on science and food and study alphabet.

Hopefully I get the 100 gold and the free settlers. Once I have alphabet rush a library in London. Study writing and then code of laws and then focus on building settlers and cities.

I´ve done this and I´ll get 5 or 6 cities build but then I´m under pressure from the rest of the civs and I end up having to build military units and do other things besides building more settlers and cities.

Please critique me and-or direct me to a thread where I can better understand why I´m coming up short.

Incidentally, I´m winning most of the wars but I´m not dominating the other civs on deity like you veterans do.

Thanks in advance!

[BigStank]

Try goin 2 forrests for the first 5 turns to crank out 2 warriors to explore and take down huts. Then grow to 3 pop, then work on getting out settlers by either using 2 forrests 1 grass(if you didn't get your 100g) and producing a settler in 5 turns. Or if those warriors did get 100gold then do 2 grass 1 forrest and rush the settler after 2 turns. A library costs the same as 2 settlers but 1 city with a library will do less tech than 3 cities(8 vs 12 if were talking 2 pop cities). Your first tech with the English should be Bronze Working so you can build those super archers and one of those starting settlers should be placed by a dye resource(where it could be good to get a library in the future, but not at the start of the game generally). If you expand faster than the computer (which you will if you rush settlers, the ai doesn't rush settlers as far as I know) then you'll have a higher tech and production potential as the game progresses. If you look in the strategy section and find Morte's Strategy Archive there's dozens of civ specific strategies and other guides but for the most part they start along these lines.

[ScottieX]

Im not a Veteran - but I think you don't seem to be being very agressive.

Warriors are good enough for scouting - if you are going to have the computer on the back foot you won't have that much use for defense. And 4-6 sounds like quite a few archers.

Why not go for horseriding and instead be blitzing them with you horse armies in the same timeframe?

I like rushing libraries (before bronze working) but I think that is because I am usually playing econ victory OCC, without that it probably isn't that high a priority since you would be building settlers whenever you get the chance.

[Zefelius]

Im not a Veteran - but I think you don't seem to be being very agressive.

Warriors are good enough for scouting - if you are going to have the computer on the back foot you won't have that much use for defense. And 4-6 sounds like quite a few archers.

Why not go for horseriding and instead be blitzing them with you horse armies in the same timeframe?

I like rushing libraries (before bronze working) but I think that is because I am usually playing econ victory OCC, without that it probably isn't that high a priority since you would be building settlers whenever you get the chance.

I've seen people go with the british horserush, but it doesn't seem to me like their strongest suit. They have Monarchy from turn one, so it really shouldn't take long at all to get to Feud. Just make a beeline toward it without rushing libraries, because -- believe it or not -- libraries will slow you down (as BigStank pointed out they're less efficient than settler spamming). With just four or five cities, at least a couple of which have dye, you'll often be able to get your knight armies out by around 500 BC, and definitely before the end of the BCs. And of course a GS makes this happen even sooner, at around 1000 BC. On Deity (which was on your header), this should do some damage if you keep pushing them out and then maybe supplement them with cruisers if the rush slows down.

[elthrasher]

People like bullet points. I'm repeating some of what others have said.

• You must send at least 1-2 warriors (usually 2) at the start. Just growing without having any notion of your surroundings means you are missing out on gold and whatever else the map offers. Sometimes you can get a walk-in on an enemy cap or at least choke them off early with a warrior. The AI is usually pretty slow to pick up barbs and stuff. You should be fast and gold-starve them. Also, if you start playing online, this kind of strat where you have 0 gold and no units until 2700 BC will get you dead almost every time.
  
• You are getting Bronze Working way too early. You don't need to start on it in 3500 BC. The AI won't attack (aside from taking empty cities or unescorted settlers) until the early ADs usually.
  
• The library in London is pretty useless. If you are going to rush a library (and most of the time you shouldn't with the English), it should be in a city that has one or preferably two dye tiles to work. But you shouldn't rush a library in most games, unless you have very little space to work with. Settlers are almost always a better choice.
  
• You should try to have more than two cities before Code of Laws. Try to get a city on every dye tile nearby. If you get enough out, you could really just skip CoL, at least for the moment, and go straight for knights.

So I would amend the strategy to something like this:

• Settle, put both workers on trees, send out warriors to get gold, explore and choke off the enemy.
  
• Rush additional warriors as needed. If you find yourself in the middle of the map, the 20 or 40 gold for an extra warrior or two will pay off big time against the AI.
  
• Now grow your cap to 3. If you have 100 gold around this time, work 2 grass and 1 forest for 2 turns, then rush the settler (you'll grow back to 2 in one turn) or if you don't have 100 gold, then go 2 forest, 1 grass for 5 turns to get your settler.
  
• By now you should have 3 cities. Try to settle on fish and dye. Now you can get Bronze very quickly with a couple dye cities while working on more settlers in London.
  
• After having Bronze, switch your cities to gold if you want to do extra expansion. Getting 5 beakers into Pottery isn't very useful. See the backfilling strat in the strategy section for more info here.
  
• If you want fast knights, start on a Barracks somewhere (maybe London) or rush it if you have a lot of gold. You only need Horseback Riding and Feudalism. If you get no other techs, you can get knights in ancient and rush them for 50 gold. Just make sure your beaker count is at 20 or below when you finish Feudalism or you'll backfill stuff to push you to medieval.
  
• If you'd rather play a longer, more balanced game, you should expand until you can do like 21+ beakers, then get CoL fast and expand more. Once you have 24 techs and a cruiser fleet, you can kill the heck out of everyone or play for some other victory condition, if you prefer.

[Aheadatime]

Read thrashers post. Lots of great stuff in there. Seems like you need to work on your opening strat a little bit before venturing into MP. 2 forest thing should help you out.

[Grayson]

Let´s say I´m the British. Here is what I commonly do.

Focus first 5 moves on food to get to 3 population.

Put 1 on food and 2 on science and study bronze working.

Put 2 on production, 1 on food and build archers to take barb villages, gold and scout out future cities.

so you're not getting an archer till 2700BC? You grow to 3, tech BW, then produce an archer??

If you produce early units, you'll find that you'll be getting your 100 gold a lot faster. Like, 10-15 turns faster.

[K9Mur]

Thank you to all and especially to elthrasher!