First Come First Serve Run

[Lykus Cerebros]

I was thinking of doing a Norse Run in the Americas to get some achievements.

I would be starting in the New World as a Western Norse Nation and try to get the entirety of both continents before going bacjmk into Europe to get the Odin achievement.

That means I got 200 points to spend and have to start somewhere in the Americas. Since I would like to get this done within one run I have some questions.

1. Whats the best place to set up my capital?
Since I probably want to expand as quickly as possible even before getting expansion ideas I was thinking Mexico on a gold mine. That would allow access to all the gold in the world and targets for conquest.
The other possibility would be American east coast for better trading, but much poorer lands.

2. Ideas and Ambitions
I was thinking of tolerance of heathens and unrest reduction to lessen my rebellion issues. Then settle increase and maybe a colonist at some point.

Anything I have missed in these two questions or some other tips would be very much welcome.

 

[MachopPower69]

The best place could be closer to Texas or California than the East Coast. One of the reasons is because there is plenty of space to grow and is less crowded and you give yourself 100-150 years to colonise the areas near you before the colonisers arrive.

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

The best place could be closer to Texas or California than the East Coast. One of the reasons is because there is plenty of space to grow and is less crowded and you give yourself 100-150 years to colonise the areas near you before the colonisers arrive.

Yeah realized how dumb the idea was to start on the east coast as opposed to near the Caribbean. Will check the point cost of a gold mine as opposed to just next to it.

 

[bokorthedust]

I did First come, first serve, For Odin, Ideas Guy and Humble origins in one swoop, but that meant using only 50 points in the nation designer. I ended up starting in Miami, with an old 0-1-0 old as hell ruler with 3 negative traits, a 0-0-0 consort with 2 negative traits, and the most generic lowest level pretty useless ideas. Even though it was a pretty slow start, I had tremendous fun in the early game.

Because you are western tech with better technological start, you don't have any valid rivals until the natives start blobbing out a bit. IRC I went exploration ideas first to uncover the Caribbean, and started colonizing there, but I grabbed a province in Louisiana too so I can start gobbling up the natives. Eventually they've reformed off of me and I could start rivalling them, which meant a couple show strength wars to catch up in my early abysmal MP generation. Because you all are in the Pagan religious group you can build diplomacy with them, so you can play them off against each other, which makes dealing with their federations easier as an OPM.

The hardest part was when Spain and Portugal showed up in the Caribbean and started to declare war for my provinces directly. They had naval superiority but transported in their technologically superior armies piecemeal, so I just about could kill their stacks with my weaker army. After 2-3 bloody wars they started forming CN-s which you can gobble up without getting them involved, so your power base grows quickly.

I started colonizing up the coast and Greenland so that I can get colonial range to get into Europe, Scotland also started colonizing the East Coast, so when their first colony finished I fabricated a claim and also took one of their islands, gaining a foothold in Europe. I released Norway from Orkney and reconquested his cores in Scandinavia, gaining a foothold there too. From there on it was mostly eating the Iberian CNs for the First come, first serve achievement, and also expanding and converting in Northern Europe and the British Isles to progress with For Odin. It was a long game, finished it around the 1700s, but I had lots of fun with it, if you don't mind a much harder start you could try doing those 4 achievements like I did.

 

[MachopPower69]

Yeah realized how dumb the idea was to start on the east coast as opposed to near the Caribbean. Will check the point cost of a gold mine as opposed to just next to it.

Gold isn't the only good resource, there is gems as well which has a high base price.

 

[necro84]

What about starting in area with high chance of cotton for cheaper development and trading bonus to get +20 Global settler increase?

 

[RobbieAB]

Gold isn't the only good resource, there is gems as well which has a high base price.

I am not sure I would put my capital in a gems state, due to the State House benefit on a gems province.

What about starting in area with high chance of cotton for cheaper development and trading bonus to get +20 Global settler increase?

This seems a much smarter option! If you are going to be colonising a lot, that +20 bonus is huge.

 

[MachopPower69]

I am not sure I would put my capital in a gems state, due to the State House benefit on a gems province.


This seems a much smarter option! If you are going to be colonising a lot, that +20 bonus is huge.

You do know you can move your capital, right?

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

Gold isn't the only good resource, there is gems as well which has a high base price.

Is there a way to see which resources you will get when setting up in uncolonized provinces?

 

[bokorthedust]

Is there a way to see which resources you will get when setting up in uncolonized provinces?

You can see each possible good's chance when sending a colonist to a province, but outside of that I don't know any ways, and even then it's a dice roll between the possible goods. I presume you mean to find out what good you'll start with if you create your custom nation in a given province, but that's impossible to determine. All you can try is to play around in non-ironman to see the chance of each possible good in your desired starting province and then hope for a good roll or do multiple starts until you end up with the one you want.

 

[necro84]

Before colonizing there isn't. Game shows trade goods: unknown

 

[RobbieAB]

You do know you can move your capital, right?

As an argument, that appears to invalidate the entire discussion of picking a start province for the trade good…

If we are seriously micro-optimising at this level, why sign-up for the mana cost of moving a capital against getting it right.