Okay Paal, here goes:
Erikk's land. Notice that our first say 9x9 tiles are the same. The rest is a little different, but not that much.
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Now, these are my lands with Erikk's cities marked with Green Cirkels, the number indicates the order of founding.
In Blue, my order of founding.
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It is immediately clear that city 3, Napoli, is a great city for me, on a lux, on the sea and near fresh water. For Erikk the loaction lacks fresh water, whcih for his agri trait makes this site less attractive. There are more reasons but I'll get to that later. Please also note that every player has totaly different setlingplans (or none) and these are not good or bad per se.
My decision on founding city 2, Milano, was for the reasons:
-On the sea, I am commercial and thus can build a curragh from start! I need to explore.
-On the river: extra commerce, no need for aquaduct, more trade on tiles next to the river.
-Near a Bonusresourcem wheated Floodplain, +5 food and that means a 2 turn worker factory (or a very hard 4 turn-setler factory, since there is not enough production probably.)
We see that Erikk founded his second city one tile closer to the Capitol. This is by no means a bad move. Remember that he may not have scouted the lands there and the location at itslef is ok. However, mine is better (And I by no means want to sound arrogant! Kemal or Anarres would easily burn this placement strat!) because it has more tiles to work on, including a fishbonus and 2 grasslands. Normaly Dense city is ok, but since there is nothing behind Milano, the location I chose is great.
After selecting a second growth factory it is time for happiness. I will build a granary in both roma and Milano so I need luxes there. There are two nearby. I decide to found Napoli, as said before it has fresh water/sea/lux. It does not get any better then that. In some games I'd also go grany there but since I met agressive neighbours (babylon and Persia) as well this is pangaea I will build barax after a few warriors.
Erikk has build Lugdunum as city II. He chose the Wheated Floodplains over a lux at that time probably since with his agritrait he'd crank out nr's 4 and 5 soon too. It is an ok choice but I am happy I waited a while before founding there.
I founded Genoa because it is ON silks. so a second lux. It also has a cow and some nice hills and Mountains for production in the later game. Erikk also founded on the spot there. Not much to say about it realy.
Here we come at a different choice. I had scouted the Ivory up east and sent my 4th setler there. A setler from Milano founded Torino North of Rome. Nothing special abput it. On a river is nice again, and it will grow as well as I intend to use the Game for it. I beat persia and Babylon to the Ivory, while the Indians beat Erikk! The main reason for this is that even when Ravenna and Bologna are more productive cities I will get these anyway! There is zero chance the AI will settle there before the next setler is done in my core, while the Ivory spot with 3 ivory-tiles is very hot.
To rap the founding up, six, seven and eight were founded in two turns to make the core complete. The eight city has wines btw.
As a result my Lands are slightly bigger then Erikks. My cities just a bit further apart. Nothing that major but let it be 10%? Or 8%? I'd also like others to have their thought on this. Would you have founded differently? iF so, why? Remember I sent out my scouting warrior East, by chance.
As for how I know erikks founding order, check the list for the Celts in the civlopedia. now you know hwy I rename my cities!
