A good start of game is good exploring .You should explore your surrounding quickly before any other civilization and than select best locations for your first four five cities these cities are going to be you key cities. Exploration is still very important now you have to explore your whole continent to occupy most of the land and strategic location and resources before  other's culture occupy it in this level you might not be able to occupy 100% of desired locations but if you explore earlier than others, chances are that you occupy more land.

Scouts and units Generally civ-gamers use their military units along with the scout which is fastest in exploring, Expansionist Civilizations can built scout and start with a scout. Use your all available units in as many directions as you can In the beginning of game their is no threat of foreign invasion since civilizations are far away from each other, but barbarians tribes can attack you so place military units in the cities close to these tribes or destroy them.

Trading territory maps and world maps with other civilizations is useful in this way you see all the terrain explored by others but they also see yours so your chances of taking advantages are equal to them. To avoid this you can trade maps by offering  gold, communications, and technologies in early game. As game advances you get more things to offer to buy their maps keeping your maps private. (See some advantages of keeping your maps private)

Scouts should be used in plain areas where they can move in two tiles and military units movement is one in all types of terrains. Units on Mountains and hills can see more tiles around. While exploring, Military units can also get maps of surroundings of a tribe plus technologies gold and warriors.

There are some other ways also to explore map before AI.

1 Save your game than move your troops in areas you want to explore keep moving them farther after 8 - 9 turns take a snap of game and reload the game, now move your troops again in others unexplored areas take a snap and repeat this if you need. Some times when you reload you still see some of your explored areas. Now study your snaps and locate best locations for your first 4 - 5 cities. Establish cities around your capital if possible. After establishing these cities you can again save your game and move all your troops in different directions.

2 Another way is to save your game and than buy territory and world map with all civilizations you know and than take shots of maps and reload the game. While trading maps give them whatever they want just make sure you have bought maps from all the civilizations you know  if you see some communications available have it at any cost and than buy maps of those new civilization and see if you can communicate to another civilization through  them. This method is easier and sometimes more effective you can try both ways at a time this may enable you to take snaps of map without darkness.

These methods can be used later at any stage with your different sea and land units. In early game you should focus your surrounding areas than try to get complete map of your continent and finally exploring complete world map.

Wonders of exploration

Lighthouse Building lighthouse of Alexandria in ancient ages is highly recommended. You need to know "Map Making" to start building lighthouse in any of your costal city. With this your galley can travel to sea safely with +1 movement, this simply means if you reach to some destination through galley in 6 turns now you can reach in 4 turns. Galley is good exploring units in ancient ages when they can travel to seas you get access to small empty islands and other contents, other civilization have to wait enter middle ages to research astronomy that will enable them to explore seas. This is very effective way of exploring the world; you can explore entire world before your rivals start traveling to seas.

Magellan's Voyage This wonder can be built after you master "Navigation" (navigation enables trade over ocean squares). It adds +1 movement to your ships. If you haven't built lighthouse, this  wonder can speed up your exploration.

Read also Economics

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