I don't run either a CE or SE but I'm about to get my first Emperor win. I've read a lot about both, well, at least tonight I actually read the SE primer, and I'm aware of the cottage spamming verbiage.

But I reluctantly build Cottages, maybe 1 or 2 per city if I can't irrigate it, or just bcz I feel obligated to do what everybody else does.

I only use specialists when I can't grow anymore due to unhappiness or unhealthiness.

And I rarely make wonders.

I do seem to often be behind, but I make rapid late game surges that somehow clutch victory from the flames.

Diplomacy and tech trading are powerful things.

I just make huge cities with massive production.

I guess I run an RE economy, which could stand for either religious economy or resource economy. Or maybe I could call it DE or TE for Diplomatic economy or Trade economy or Terrain Economy.

For war, I've learned to do a lot with little in mostly defensive wars where I let the AI exhaust itself emptying its cities. I don't counter-attack until they are empty and I can just wander in with little opposition.

Of course, in my game, I turned off space race, and used a huge archipelago map to limit ease of movement. Archipelago is a double-edged sword though. Higher maintenance for distance and colonies. Less easy to expand. Less defensible bcz an AI can land their troops anywhere.

Actually, I really don't know how I am winning my game, bcz my economy thrives on trading and religion, and later in building Sushi's. But I've had the misfortune of being resource poor (at least for extra resources to trade), and not having my own religion. And I was 8 turns shy of getting my GM to set-up Sushi's. But somehow, I've overcome every obstacle.

It's been a very diplomatic game.

My style seems to work somehow, though.

Each step-up for me has started with a couple of initial losses, but then I figure it out and it gets easy. I expect my next emperor game to be quite easy.

But I feel weird, bcz I don't seem to play the game the "right" way...or at least not the standard ways.

Perhaps I'm just lucky or deluded, ha? :lol:

There a lots of variables involved in how difficult a game is.

A good start can IMO be worth one or two difficulty levels (just look at the three goldmines thread).

Settings. I mean you actually say that you choose the settings so that you make things easier for you. Try your tactic on more varied settings - maybe they'll work and maybe not.

Actually, I just prefer the feel of archipelago maps, and since I've won most of my games the space-race route, I get bored of the race and want variety. But yeah, the space-race route seems so difficult.

My most amazing game was on an inland-sea map. 250 barbarians swarmed me over the early course of the game.

I think I just adapt well to the changing situations in a game. I can recognize that I'm losing, and then find a creative way to win.

Actually, I just prefer the feel of archipelago maps, and since I've won most of my games the space-race route, I get bored of the race and want variety. But yeah, the space-race route seems so difficult.

I think I just adapt well to the changing situations in a game. I can recognize that I'm losing, and then find a creative way to win.

Sure, I prefer certain types of maps too. I also have preferences for certain leaders and traits. But I find it important to play differents maps and leaders just to get a feeling for them.

There are some ways too win a game at high difficulty that are incredibly map-dependent. It's just good to know what works where.

Mind posting a save? I always enjoy looking at them.

Sure. It's only a matter of time before victory now. I just secured a foothold on Dutch soil, and halted the war to build up some more units and to allow WW to cease. Holland, at one time was the greatest nation, but they lost their oil source, and I took advantage of that opportunity. But wow, I never possessed such a deep respect for guided missiles until the Dutch hit me with hundreds of them. I targeted the Dutch for three reasons. 1) They don't have oil 2) They have the Sushi that I need to grow ridiculously large 3) I need their landmass.

I'm trying for a score victory, the only type of victory I haven't won yet. Not trying to dominate or diplomacy or space, just want score.

I actually had the highest score for awhile, but then I gave away too much land to my friends and allies, and then Brennus/Sury caught up in techs too.

This is my first game with Permanent Alliances enabled. I was awfully worried when Brennus and Sury allied, they became so powerful, but I was able to convince my former opponent, the HRE to become my ally. I vassalized France after a 3000 year war, and created the Arabian colony to the south.

Gilgamesh hates my guts, but he's never attacked me, and so I just keep extorting him for money and resources. He's scared for some reason.

The Carthaginians seemed rather frightening for awhile too, but I teamed up with Brennus/Sury to defeat him in a war.

I'm like you, I let the PC randomly pick my civ. Except for this game I decided to be Persia since I haven't played them before and I've heard they're great.

Curious to see what you think.

I also opened WB for the first time, bcz I decided I didn't want to play with PA's enabled, but I couldn't seem to figure out how to change it. After Brennus and Sury PA'd, I was worried the game would degenerate into just a bunch of fighting, but it's actually made the game more interesting. And it's sorta fun to actually have my own ally for a change. France/HRE and myself make a deadly team.

Also, every civ in the world has all the techs now (or soon will, bcz I'll give them to them just for fun), so I have the advantage in that regard. When their is tech parity, the AI doesn't have a chance. Size doesn't matter either, I can defeat a civ 3 times my size.

But I'm in no hurry to win, I'm simply biding my time, building and building and building until the time is right.

Ah, I also turned off culture victory, since on an archi map, that's too easy. I won my first archi map game bcz I amassed over 100 fish resources and was getting over 1,000 culture per turn per city. Like I said, I want a score victory challege without having to worry about other distractions.

My cities are smaller this game than I'm used to though.

Hmm. seems to be too big. Just under 2mb.

Well, here's an earlier save, maybe a turn or two before I captured Umma on the Dutch continent, and made peace to regroup and solidify my position. Currently, I've airlifted a dozen additional units into the city to augment the original dozen.

I find airlifting to be one of the most powerful aspects of the game. If you have an airport in the destination city, you can airlift multiple units in per turn.

Wait, here it is!

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/39018/QuickSave.CivBeyondSwordSave

Here's the quicksave

You know what I would want what you have here? Trade Economy is good, but I would actually call it a Sea Economy.

Your commerce comes from all that sea cities - that way in many of your cities 50% of your commerce comes from the trade routes and much of the rest from workes sea tiles.

:)

Hey thanks for looking man. I appreciate your interaction.

Yes. I suppose that's why I call it a Terrain economy. I grow my cities very large, very quickly in order utilize the natural terrain about it. In this particular game, it's the sea.

I remarked on the power of the sea to another poster who asked about his game. http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=264519

In many of my other games, I found splotches of land with like 6 or 7 of the "calendar" resources, which would act in similar fashion to the "sea economy" in this game. I suppose I rely on the terrain for my economy.

But, if I guess correctly, I think my cities grow large, much more quickly than the other economy styles (because I almost exclusively irrigate and mine). In almost every game, even though I have less cities, I tend to have the largest overall population; at the same time, my production is the highest too.

In every stage of the game, I out-produce all of the other AI's (even with my production handicap). My production is lower in this game because my terrain doesn't suit it, but I routinely have most of my cities producing between 150 and 200 hammers per turn (with powered factories, OR, and sometimes a little help from CreateCon; I never get Mining). In this game, I was annoyed bcz my ally was permitted first chance to build all of the late game wonders, even though I could build them significantly faster). Happily, he left the internet alone, so I completed it!

Maybe you hit on something there. Sea Economy.

Look at my comments about that other guys game, and the calculations I did concerning his "sea power".

Think about it. A science specialist creates 3 beakers, and a single sea square generates 3 commerce (for a financial ruler). Really, those 3 beakers are simply a specialized form of 3 commerce, which makes the sea equal to a specialist.

Whenever I can, I try to build giant sea-side cities. A size twenty sea-side city (which is commonplace for me), with 10 sea squares generates 30 commerce in sea tiles alone (plus other terrain and trade-routes), that's the equivalent of 10 vanilla science specialists (in a non-representative government).

I'm going to have to investigate this idea some more.

I think the reason I've been winning is because my immense city size that draws it's trade from the terrain compensates for the lack of specialists and cottages. I do tend to pick my terrain carefully, and like the other strategies I allow a handful of select cities to drive my economy, but unlike the other strategies, my cities tend to be balanced between economy and production (they do both). That is to say, they can all produce, and they all add a great deal to my commerce; some may be stronger in certain areas than others, but for the most part strongly they assist both. Instead of having production only cities and commerce only cities, I have balanced cities that are larger and more productive.

In most games, my economy doesn't really begin until the discovery of calendar (when I can begin to really harness the terrain for both the internal city commerce and for trade to the AI's). For the early part of the game, I beeline religions and ride them.

After I captured Paris, which was cottage heavy (the AI seems to employ the CE), I started calculating whether to build Wall Street and Oxford in my giant capital of Persepolis (which had long been over size 20, and thus had a few specialists just from the size, and an academy and a GS) or in the CE city of Paris. Paris was a size 12, and because of the lack of food (bcz of the cottages), was maxed out at that size. I was able to determine that my capital, with only 2 cottages was by far the better choice.

Sea Economy. Indeed. Terrain Economy. Harnessing the power of the land. Hmmm. It's not that I don't use specialists or cottages at all, I guess I take a more balanced approach that emphasizes the terrain and simply use the specialists and cottages to augment what I already have.

I think I remember reading something about the standard 2 extra food per turn to grow a city. To mean that seemed remarkably crazy. A city will take forever to grow at that rate. I tend to have anywhere from 8-10 food extra, so my cities grow remarkably fast and large.

Thanks Ammar. Thanks for letting me sit here and pontificate a little while to myself. I needed to talk to myself a bit and figure some things out.

I feel better now.

Even if no one else is listening. :)

I know I'm talking to myself here, but I have some more thoughts that I need to say to myself.

Whenever you take a worker off the ocean to put him inside as a specialist, you are not gaining any difference in raw commerce. The comparisons are that the specialist may produce GP points, but the trade-off is the loss of food that causes the growth that could be used in another sea-square. While that SE person is waiting for the birth of there GP, I've already grown a few times, which in turn enhances the size of the trade route. By growing so quickly and dramatically, I'm able to compensate the SE specialists by sheer size and using the natural terrain.

And as to CE, I grow faster than cottages do, and I'm free from the ravages of pillaging.

I know, I know. You're thinking that this would only work with a financial leader on a water heavy map. But I just won my first marathon-monarch game as Portugal on a Inland-sea map where I didnt have a coastal city until 1500 AD (hence, I only had 3 lousy late-game fillers with access to water). Additionally, Portugal has two traits that do not in any way fit my style of play.

But in that game, my core cities were giant cities built along rivers or calendar resources.

Sheer size CAN out-produce simple SE and CE.

Truly, a more balanced approach that uses a little of each can simply work better.

In my present game, my GNP in the demographics is listed at 6000, while the next civ is at 4700. And there are 5 other civs with comparable size as mine.

how quickly do you expand? How many cities do you end up with at say 0 A.D, 1000 AD and end game? You mentioned that you don't go ou to fight until you've had the fight picked with you. I found that when I did this, I ended up with out the ability to go out afterwards and would be severely set back in production and economics. What terrains do you have and what are you building on them?

I ask, because I don't really care for the cottage system either and am looking for alternatives. But, without following strategy suggestions from other threads, I have yet to get a win on Noble, which is pretty low.

...........

It sounds like you're running what people would call a trade economy. Common wonders to enhance it are ToA, GLH and Colossus

I tend to concentrate on mines and farms early on, let my cities reach their happy cap, then run specialists.
Later on when I have Caste System, Guilds and Machinery I start replacing some of the farms and mines with workshops, water and wind mills and concentrate my specialists in fewer cities
1 thing I do have in common ith you is liking the economic help of a well-spread religion. A couple of wonders really go well with this - AP, UoS, SM.
Between them thats increased hammers, science and gold.

AQ, seems we have the same style of play :)

I like watermills and workshops too, however I tend to ignroe windmills bcz I prefer the opportunity to pop a resource (which I hope to use with a corp). And by the time windmills come around, my city is already very large and the tiny bit of food it gives is inconsequential, and my economy is usually booming enough that I'm not desparate for the trade.

Needsleep. Those are tough questions to answer. Every game seems different. I seem to employ a different strategy each game. I'd like to say that I start every game with a comprehensive strategy that I impose upon the game, however, it seems that each game dictates to me the strategy that I must find and adapt. Truly, this game is never same each time.

Hell, I've replayed certain starts and had entirely different outcomes.

In my current emperor game (huge terran map), I was only able to found 5 early cities and found myself surrounded and hemmed in. Each of the AI's possessed two or three times my number. Fortunately, one of my cities rested on a rich flood plain, and I possessed 2 ocean-side cities (good commerce). Somehow, despite my lack of size, I kept up in techs, and for the most part avoided the wars, watching the AI's slide armies back and forth across my lands in their pursuit of one another. But gosh, I sure took a lot of diplo hits by ignoring the constant requests.

I did possess a weak neighbor target to destroy, but lost the opp when it vassalized itself to my neighbor friend. Fortunately, much later a distant AI captured one of these neighboring cities and so I opportunistically declared war and gobbled the city. I also returned an opportunistic favor to Issy when she was involved in a losing war :lol: Earlier, while we were friends, she DoW'd on me. It availed her nothing, but it infuriated me. Hence, I did the same to her (on friendly terms) later.

The almost game-breaking moment for me, however, was while I was preparing for the discovery of Astronomy. I beelined to it, and while waiting I built numerous galleys (to be upgraded) and outfitted them with a worker-settler-longbowman colony starter. Unfortunately, I found out that my ocean side cities weren't actually on an ocean, but rather alongside a giant inland lake. :mad:

I was compelled then to colonize (7 cities) the frozen ice to the north that no one wanted rather than the lush plains of the new world. It cost me a fortune in maintenance.

Fortunately, the nearby Indians moved their entire army north to take them from me, leaving their nearby and developed southern cities open for me to take!

Serendipity.

I'm quite surprised, it's now the midgame, and I'm current in techs. So, that should project into an eventual win. If I'm even in techs during the midgame, then it's over bcz I explode late.