just bought the whole collection

[MiguelCairo]

first main campaign play through with or without the DLCs?

[ValhallasAshes]

It's up to you. Personally, I think the game does a good enough job of easing you into the experience without being heavy handed. And for the most part, it doesn't force you start and complete DLC if you don't want to. So I would play with all of the DLC's enabled.

[Smokerbait]

Depends on who your opponent are, I guess. If you aren't used to the game, the Medium and Hard level AI opponents can expand long before you are ready, and you'll find that all the islands are taken before you have a change to get there.

In the campaign, I believe it is scripted that you get at least one island in the New World, no matter what the AI do. I think all bets are off for Cape Trelawney (Sunken Treasures DLC) and Embesa (Land of Lions DLC).

Easy AI will not expand to new regions before you do, so you can take your time while learning the game.

But depends on what you like and what kind of challenge you are up for.

[freelancer909]

The main campaign is a learning stint. I would have all DLC off. After completing it you are going to say gee I could have done better, So you will probably just move on. When you know the game. Have short cutted your keys and can build an island and move to the new world in about 1 hour start using DLC. I know 1 hour to the new world seems hard but with practice it is doable. Then You wont start over all the time. So then DLC is important. Sunken Treasures for example. You want to be there first and blast anyone entering. Control it Own it and forget the rest of those losers. And they all are useless They just clog up space and delay your shipping ports. Just Blast them every time. Pirates too. I sink all thier ships for goodies.

[ValhallasAshes]

You don't need to blitz to the New World within an hour. That is a ridiculous assertion to make. If you're really worried about AI's beating you there, then just use tier one AIs and they can't colonize new regions until you discover them. And within the first hour of any game, there isn't even any DLC that would significantly impact you within the first hour anyway, so I don't know what point you're trying to make about the early game and DLC. On top of that, with tier one AI's, all of them will ask you for permission before they expand to a new island, which you can refuse. And they will actually respect your denial for the most part until you finally start expanding. They'll eventually defy you, but for the most part, they respect your decision. So you can even control them to a certain extent even if you do take your time.

And if you were really really ultra paranoid about the tier 1 AI expanding too early, then just don't leave the starting region until you kill them. It is exceedingly easy to kill off tier 1 AIs in the early game. Hell I did it in my first game because I all of a sudden hit a nice boon on my eco and said screw it, build some warships and clear the AI's before I expand further. I just went round killing all of them off one by one. Then I killed the pirates. Then parked a few ships in the pirate bay so if the pirates came back, they would get killed immediately. IT's REALLY NOT HARD! I didn't even leave the starting area until about 4 or 5 hours into my first game and I had AI's on. Probably much longer because I tend to expand slowly and methodically.

Why some people feel to compulsion to scare the crap out of newcomers by overblowing the difficulty of the game, I'll never understand. You're not helping with that kind of scaremongering and undue pressure.

For the record:

Even with all DLC's enabled, they are all only unlocked once you achieve certain milestones in any one game. They are not all unlocked at the very beginning. Most of them will not unlock until you reach certain population types and counts like workers, engineers, Investors etc. Some will not unlock until you discover them via expeditions. But they all unlock at different points of the game dependent on certain triggers that you will hit naturally through normal gameplay.

If you don't want AI's to expand out of control before you can learn the game, then set your game up with tier 1 AI's only.

If you'd rather avoid AI's altogether, you can in fact completely disable all "expanding" AI's (known as "Characters") in the game creation screen and just leave the "non-expanding" neutral AI's (known as "Factions") enabled in the "Custom" game setup options. You are not actually forced to start with AI's or even pirates if you don't want to and prefer a more casual game.

Bottom line, other than the AI difficulties which you can choose at the beginning of the game, the game itself will never "push" you more than you want to be. And the game does a good job of expanding in a natural way without putting any undue pressure on you. It will take you time to learn all the mechanics, how they work and how they can be manipulated to push you to ever greater heights, but the game will always give you all the time you need or want to learn those mechanics on your own schedule.

Yes there are some people who act like there's so much content it's overwhelming. What they don't tell you is you have all the time in the world to figure it out how you see fit. There is no pressure to learn all of it. There isn't even pressure to use all of it. Just play around at your own pace and you'll find your own footing and what you like.

And in case it helps you to understand how easily this game eases you in, I've never played any of the main campaign. I've had this game since release and to this day I haven't played a single campaign mission. I play in sandbox mode. Speaking of which, I still need to get round to playing the missions, but you get my point. There was no need to put pressure on a newcomer by telling them they need to learn keyboard shortcuts, blitz to the New World in an hour and other such nonsense. The game is nowhere near that unforgiving.

[Father President]

Most people say there is no difference with the dlc's on or off. I have them on and I just started as well.

[Edwardlloyd]

leave them on they are fun. just dont start with normal difficulty because beryl just takes everything. set up one star AI and thats it.

[MythTrip]

Say goodbye to your wife and family for the next three months...this is one captivating city builder/trader/explorer with the slickest building interface Ive ever seen.

[Sandor]

Main thing is learning not to overbuild and go broke. Take advantage of overpriced trade routes to npc's each area has atleast one i think. I did everything wrong still having fun :P Many good tip videos on YouTube.

[CyFiver]

Originally posted by ValhallasAshes:

You don't need to blitz to the New World within an hour.

As a brand new player, this persons response is spot on. I have only done the Campaign and the first level, which I am still farting around on. I was cruising along doing quests and then a few hours in I got some random message that someone had colonized an island.

Here I was thinking... "Oh, there probably isn't many! Better figure out how to make more docks places!" and low and behold there was an (optional) quest to explain. I did it. Within the next 30-35 minutes I had four ships [Turns out there's like 12+ islands still ROFL]. Three were colonizing new islands to steal them [figured first level they would probably not take them back] and the fourth was running 50 Potato's to the Prison and then looping to the Chinese Lady checking for fresh resource spawns being sold. That round trip was perfect timing for 50 more Potato's for me to be ready to ship.

Once I had all the islands colonized with a dock I then grabbed a fifth ship and put three of them at my three competitors vendor docks and would just buy soap and sell it to the prison in conjunction with making it on my main island and selling those in two 50 stacks.

I'm like 12hrs in with about 9-10 being sitting hours. $200,000 money with a positive income.

This game is super casual at least at the start and I have ALL DLC enabled. The only DLC unlock I received so far was the Farmer one where you make enough of something you get the "Grain Silo" for the Pigs? Or just the "Grain Silo" which I still don't know what exactly it does? Guessing stores extra food for the pigs in case of loss of grain?

I still have to also figure out more about Diplomacy, also how to make AI pay ME for trade deals and things like Combat//Pirates.

Anywho, great game. Great tutorial material. Was worth the $71 Canadian on sale for the entire bundle.

[pemmons1]

I'm willing to spend many hours on a game and in my current play-through the only NPC is Ms. Jorgensen, who is a sweetheart and actually helpful. But the lack of competition has probably made me too greedy with claiming islands. I have most of them in the Old world, the New world, and Cape T. and they have taken up so many influence points that I can't build enough ships to even develop them effectively, let alone venture into Enbesa. I will need to get well into the investor level on Crown Falls first. It's fun in a way to wait patiently for that opportunity, but the point is that the choices you make don't eliminate challenges so much as change them.

[freelancer909]

Hey Vallallas Every one has different play styles. Just cause you didnt like my reply gives you no right to bash me. So stop trashing people you disagree with. Im not scaring anyone. I just like blasting every known ship because the game has no action other then sinking ships. I also like to see the AI complain about things. I dont play low tier AI. Who does. All they do is take up space. They advance at a snails pace and ruin your map.

[freelancer909]

I didnt tell anyone to blitz to the new world. This a DLC question regarding the main campaign. That you by your own admission have never played. I could care less how anyone plays the game with DLC on or off. Im just saying we all start over on the main campaign because it is the first thing anyone plays. As far as short cutting keys why does that get your goat. My gosh man lighten up.