I just finished my second Prince Augustus caeser rating victory on Prince level. Conquest victory/marathon/standard pangea...95,000+ points in year 1609. Granted I played as Augustus as well this game and it was sort of easy. With so many civs on a standard map they had little room for expansion. I REX'ed to three cities as soon as possible to grab what little space was available. Then I got double lucky. Copper in a fat cross, and the Incas founded two religions in their capital which neighbored one of my cities. So I axe rushed him and took HIS three cities. My other neighbors were Egypt and India. Ramsess built Henge so I DoW'ed him after Ironworking LOL, love prats. Spread my 2 religions to Thebes and built/whipped the temples to max out GP points to build shrines in Cuzco. Hindu and Judaism were the dominant religions on the map and I had both shrines. So cash flow was great. I had THREE capyal city start locations so I had three awesome city sites. The rest of the game was just slowly attacking one nonhindi civ after another. The best part was the AI were warring with each other like crazy so it didn't end up as a boring space race.

Now I think I should try Monarch, i don't wanna....I'm skeered...they are meanies....I think I will hide some more on Prince level.

Same here, I have 2 Prince wins now and thinking about the move to Monarch. I've never played as Rome though! I go for random leaders since I haven't even played all the Civs yet. Maybe you should try a game without being the Romans and see how you fare then? I would also like to get a cultural and maybe a few other types of wins under my belt before moving up.

I think all the AI gets extra on Monarch is even better bonuses to Research, Maintenance and Upgrade Cost, plus a free worker (which I guess you can just steal anyway). I think they tend to build bigger stacks in their cities too.

Monarch isn't so bad, it's Emperor that keeps kicking my butt.

Plus I don't think that winning conquest as Rome counts towards moving up a level. If you can win as a random leader and win all the different ways, then you're ready to move up.

Orion is right, Monarch IMHO is the best difficulty level for most good players. You can still win games without obsessive micromanagement and luck, but its also challenging and much more difficult to just mow over your rivals.

Personally on Prince and below I too often was an age ahead and didn't think it was too fun to always be taking my cavalry over to enemy land and only seeing longbowman and axeman. Monarch is much harder to get very far ahead, so winning militarily depends on tactics and researching certain techs much quicker. Also the Specialist economy is much better at Monarch than Prince because of the better trading opportunities.

I really like Monarch. On Emperor the AI advantages get a bit out of hand for my taste. I find that to even keep up on Emperor I need to use crazy gambits and take really aggressive chances. So Monarch is just right. I've tried emperor 3 times and don't plan on ever trying it again. But I also refuse to play Prince.

I normally play Prince with normal speed and rarely get a whole age ahead tech-wise. I have cavalry for a bit sure, but then rifles start appearing. I tried an epic game and that was alot easier I think. Do you think that is correct in general?

I normally play Prince with normal speed and rarely get a whole age ahead tech-wise. I have cavalry for a bit sure, but then rifles start appearing. I tried an epic game and that was alot easier I think. Do you think that is correct in general?

Here's what I'm saying, even on regular speed: When I made an effort on Prince to get to Liberalism first, and then popped Nationalism and beeline to MT, I would have a LONG TIME where my Cavalry could mow over the AI with only a few catapults to soften up the cultural defense. I'm talking 30 turns before they get rifles. 30 turns of war is a very long time. Sometimes the AI wouldn't even have Maceman, and they'd never have Knights (even though the AI loves going for Guilds early)

I didn't like that part so much, because frankly I don't like anything that is so dominant it would be STUPID to pursue anything else. And to me the Liberalism to Cavalry route was too effective. I found myself doing it every game.

Well on Monarch it isn't that simple. You usually have to have an early axerush on your nearest neighbor, worry about relations with your neighbors and secure a few good trading partners, and even then you are only a few techs ahead of the AI. So your cavalry may only come 10 turns ahead of rifles.

My point is that Monarch is difficult enough that you can't just depend on Cavalry (or Praetorians for that matter since we were talking about Rome) to dominate your continent, which you can do IMHO on Prince. In my current game I did a horrible job expanding early and my cavalry came when the AI had knights and TONS of longbowman and pikes. I managed to carve out some more land, but now I've got to decide whether to start another war and try and finish them off with trebuchets BEFORE they get rifling (which could happen anytime) or should I try and go for rifles myself and use my redcoats.

Again that is me, and I'm sure there are plenty of people on this board that don't find Monarch challenging enough. But I only like games that are REALLY competitive that I actually have a chance to lose and Monarch fits the bill.

You will do fine on monarch, all you need to add is siege to your army, and their larger number of units will be countered like nothing, monarch isnt that much harder than prince, in fact its very similar, a bigger jump lies in the next difficulties, but if you are winning with ease monarch will be a natural transition.

I'll probably give Monarch a try then. Maybe the next WOTM or GMinor will push me in that direction.

EDIT: I already have enough catapults! They rule.

to the op, playing rome is not as challenging as playing the other civs.
Try a few other leaders for a change.

I'm struggling with Monarch level as well - I'd say 40% percent wins and 60% losses right now. You'll need to play tighter and with better control over what your cities are producing, which tiles are being worked etc. compared to Prince level.

There's a lot of leaders I haven't tried out on Prince yet though. Tried Catherine the other day on Monarch (1. time I've played her at all) and loved it - I lost though but learned a great deal from the experience. My promoted cossacks were no match for Churchill's protective redcoats (I suspected that beforehand ofcourse, but it was fun anyway to try it out):)

I've just becomed experienced enough to win on Prince (great personal victory...!) but I think I'll need to customise my tactics some more before I move on. Haven't really tried a specialist economy yet, and I used Isabella for a diplomatic victory (which is perhabs the easiest way of winning). So I'll propably play around on Prince a little more, until I start adopting those hardcore tactics :)

At the OP:

I would try Monarch. My last prince game was with Augustus with +/- 75000 ... and I tried it. Not so hard as you are thinking, not so easy as you would like... :D

You will do fine on monarch, all you need to add is siege to your army, and their larger number of units will be countered like nothing, monarch isnt that much harder than prince, in fact its very similar, a bigger jump lies in the next difficulties, but if you are winning with ease monarch will be a natural transition.

I agree Mr. Quale that there is a much bigger jump from Monarch to Emperor, but Prince to Monarch isn't that small a difference. The AI tech advantages are bigger and they create larger stacks in their cities which makes taking cities much harder.

I had a try earlier on, Cyrus was the random leader. I had horses near my second city and settled a thrid for copper.

But barbarian archers were everywhere... razed my copper city. So I wrote that one off. I'll have to take more aggressive barbarians into the equation I think. Didn't hook up the horses because I was waiting for a border pop. I made 3 workers early on I suppose I should have made some more warriors.

I have a couple Prince wins, but more losses. I want to be able to win consistently at Prince before moving up.

One thing about Monarch I noticed is that you better be ready to go to war early if Brennus, Ragnar, Monty, Tokagawa, or other aggressive civs are around. My latest game, playing as Korea Brennus rushed me with GALLIC WARRIORS! around 1250 BC. Defensive trait was actually helpful, giving me some highly promoted archers before I start churning out enough of my own axes.

CivCorpse: before moving to monarch maybe try a couple of games on prince with different settings e.g. any non-roman civ on continents and see how you get on.

I've been a monarch player since the game came out. The only thing is I lose almost everytime. But I havent played in over a year. Since I am bored with my MMOs, I am back to Warlords now and I have learned a couple of things.

First, play your starting techs, then play the map. If you build a worker first, then he should know how to do 2 or 3 different tasks like farming, mining roads or else you wont get good use out of him. Develop your food, then production, last is towns, but dont wait too long before you build those or your ability to research tech will suffer. If your city is size 3 or 4 then it should have a mine, a farm and a town being worked for balance. Then get a library and use pop 5 for a scientist.

Second, you need one decent weapon in your arsenal before about 2600 BC because thats when the barbs really start coming out. AH is good because you can do two things when you get that tech, you can improve animal food tiles and also it reveals horses which are one of the weapons you are aiming at.

If you cant get horses, try for either copper or archery before the barbs come out.

The other thing is send out some units outside your borders to light up the surrounding tiles. Put them on a hill and set them to watching. Barbs only spawn in the shadows, if a bunch of land is lit up, they cant spawn near you. This will cut down on barbs dramatically.

Good luck. YMMV.

So is the Prince to Monarch jump as big as the Noble to Prince jump?

I struggled forever with making the latter. I'm finally able to win consistently at Prince. A diplo, a few space and a few domination wins, and two near wins for culture (I'll eventually shoot for a conquest win).

Second, you need one decent weapon in your arsenal before about 2600 BC because thats when the barbs really start coming out.

So does that mean that barbs start entering your territory that early? Damn. I'm used to the barbs roaming the wilderness and not entering my borders until around 600 BC.

So does that mean that barbs start entering your territory that early? Damn. I'm used to the barbs roaming the wilderness and not entering my borders until around 600 BC.

No, Barbs won't enter your territory that early. I'd say it's around 1700 BC when they'll start attacking. Maybe slightly later, I could be confusing that with the Emperor games I'm trying to play.

Anyway, it's certainly before 600 BC.

One thing about Monarch I noticed is that you better be ready to go to war early if Brennus, Ragnar, Monty, Tokagawa, or other aggressive civs are around.
If you share their religion they won't trouble you. An exception is Montezuma,
if he's not Friendly you can't trust him.

Before moving up a level, I suggest to play a huge map with raging barbs, so an axe rush isn't an option anymore.

I can beat Prince level in my sleep, using any random Civ, or leader. I have yet to beat Monarch level. I think the main problem is that I'm used to being ages ahead of AI on Prince level, and get quickly discouraged when I see AI ahead of me on Monarch. One of these days I'll try to actually to play a Monarch game through to completion...

to the op, playing rome is not as challenging as playing the other civs.
Try a few other leaders for a change.

I only played rome the last game. The game before I was assigned asoka and achieved a 59,000 point diplomatic win in the year 1622. All games are on standard maps at marathon speed. I wish someone besides augustus had the cre/org trait combo. Prats really do imbalance the game, but as I am not much of a warmonger I think the traits are more important. If I had been more blood thirsty I probably could have finished off most of my rivals long before I did.

I can beat Prince level in my sleep, using any random Civ, or leader. I have yet to beat Monarch level. I think the main problem is that I'm used to being ages ahead of AI on Prince level, and get quickly discouraged when I see AI ahead of me on Monarch. One of these days I'll try to actually to play a Monarch game through to completion...

Another even more important thing when playing Monarch compared to Prince, is diplomacy and tech-trading. Beware who you ally ourself with and who you alienate. In a good game you decide which wars you will fight and when - in a not-so-good game, your opponents make that decision for you. ;)

I only played rome the last game. The game before I was assigned asoka and achieved a 59,000 point diplomatic win in the year 1622. All games are on standard maps at marathon speed. I wish someone besides augustus had the cre/org trait combo. Prats really do imbalance the game, but as I am not much of a warmonger I think the traits are more important. If I had been more blood thirsty I probably could have finished off most of my rivals long before I did.

so maybe you're ready for monarch ;).
My personnal experience was :
- noble has always been easy, never lost at this level. I played it for a few games, just to get the feeling for the new game mechanics.
- prince was hard at first. lost many games, before looking for better advice here on the forum. After checking hendrickszon's GotM 2 spoiler, prince got suddenly very easy :lol:. Never lost a prince game after that. I still played a dozen or so of those games, with various leaders and maps, because I lacked confidence to go up.
- when it was obvious I wouldn't lose a prince game, I tried monarch. I started with a cultural game, those I'm most comfortable with. I had to replay the same game a few times, but I made it. So you could say I lost 3/4 monarch games, before getting accustomed to the level. I didn't lose any monarch game on vanilla after that. But when warlords came out, I won "easily" (afterwards, I realized it was closer than I thought) my first monarch game, then lost a bunch of games where I tried some exotic moves. Now, I'm pretty comfortable (90% odds I win any monarch game I start) at this level.
- I tried a few emperor games, won some (cultural game or domination playing rome :lol:), lost some (well, not really. I gave up on a few where I had a few unlucky starts, like constantly (!) losing with egyptian war chariots against zulu chariots). I think I'm at this level now, if I try hard enough.

The main thing about monarch is that you can't be quite as lazy as you can on Prince. But, hey! It's only a game! Try Monarch level. It's not like you really die if you lose. Sometimes losing a good game on Monarch can be more fun than winning easily on Prince. The extra tension adds drama, and if you lose, who cares? You can always try again.