Hello,

I've bought BTW this week after playing a lot with Warlord on easy difficulties (Chieftain - Noble) and I realised that in BTW the AI are a lot more aggressive. I've been used to the AI in Warlord in the Warlord difficulty (confused yet lol?) and they are pretty easy to deal with.

Now in BTW I've played 3 games in the Warlord difficulty and wow I'm getting crushed by the AI. In my last game, I played a Standard Pangea map with 6 other civs in the Warlord difficulty and I after playing 100 turns, I saw that I was between the 2 better AI civ in the game scorewise and powerwise. I managed to only have 7 cities. When I check my map I'm pretty sure I have mor territory than anybody but maybe I'm lacking in cities. Only 7 and no more land to make another.

Shaka was on my left and I was racing to gunpower to be able to crush him in the next 100 turns or so with keeping my friendship up with my left civ while having the same religion helped a lot. It's the only CIV I let thm get the Open Borders.

Let's go back to Shaka. Resume of the deals he offered:

1) He wanted to get Open Border. I refused.
2) He wanted my Iron for my Corn. I refuse for obvious reasons.
3) He wanted me to give him Iron. I refuse again.
He declared war on me at around 425AD and in 6 turn I saw my city with 3longbowman, 2 archers, 1 axeman and 1 warrior getting crushed by a HUGE pile of Impi, Charriots, and other units. I didn't had time to move more units to this city before him and this city didn't had a wall but I don't think the wall would of get me any chance against his army. I had longbowman damn it I had the liberty of creating longbowman not so long ago so I couldn't had 10 of them in my city.

His deals was rediculous since he had nothing to give me that I didn't already have (techs, ressources, gold) so dealing with him was a losing proposition in the long run. I won't let him get Iron and be crushed even more with more powerful units. I couldn't go to war against him because I was focucing of going to war with him a little later with better units than him like grenadier and rifleman, being the most advanced tech guy on the map.

It's sick I feel like my so out of the curve in this game it's crazy. It's fun I like the challenge but I feel there is no option but to get what the AI deserve, specially Shaka who is tough overall. What should I have done different. Rushing the map early in the game to get more cities? Creating more units (I had 4-5 in every city). Should I had trusted my left friend and bringing more units on the right side of my empire because Shaka was getting angry at me? This feels to be pretty risky to me.

And I'm only at Warlord wow I don't want to imagine what it is in Emperor+.

:(

First, you are playing on warlord which means the AI is handicapped in terms of production and tech. You can easily out-tech them and out-produce them in units. You are focusing on diplomatic failures which is unlikely to be your problem. You are failing at a much more fundamental level. If you post a game, or even a couple screen-shots, you will get much more help but I can pretty much promise you have made some combination of the following errors:
1) not enough cities
2) not enough workers
3) trying to put every building in every city
4) not enough units

Shaka will pretty much always attack you eventually. He is just like that. I don't know who your "left friend" was but about half the Civs don't declare at pleased and none will at friendly.

Shaka is a bully. When you see him next to you in a game, get ready! He will almost always attack.

I would have had walls for sure on the cities that bordered him. Once I saw him, I would have chosen my city sites very carfully so that the treeian would have offered the most protection, on hills, behind rivers. Once those were up, I would have made sure I had enough mixed defenders to hold a city, archers and axes.

The other thing I would have done would be to build units in my other towns and march them over while these border cities tried to make cultural buildings like monestaries, libraries, temples and monuments and maybe even hired an artist. This would have boosted the defense by pushing out the cultural borders but is kind of advanced and I wouldn't do it unless I was sure I could make enough men elsewhere to hold the city.

Anyway, if you see Shaka, or Monty, or Alex, prepare to fight now with swords and bows, not later with guns.

1) not enough cities
2) not enough workers
3) trying to put every building in every city
4) not enough units

Shaka will pretty much always attack you eventually. He is just like that. I don't know who your "left friend" was but about half the Civs don't declare at pleased and none will at friendly.
1) On a Standard size Pangea with 7 other civs (default) how many should I have before being forced to fight? If I had rushed a little earlier I might have had 10 cities getting more will make my economy suffer by maintenance costs.

I was Suleiman during that game so being Imperialistic could help me gain land faster.
Should I get more land at the cost of getting my science rate lower for paying the maintenance costs?
Is it a long term EV+ (Expected Value Positive (Sorry for that poker term)) possibility?

2) I have 7 (one per city)

3) I consider myself guilty of this. But still in the early game (500 AD) the only building possible to be built in my game are walls, library, aqueduc, monument, barrack and religion temple if possible. I try to get library in all of them and barrack in specific cities and aqueduc when needed (probably whip instead?)

4) I had when war started around 25 units. 30% longbowmen, 50% archers, 20% melee (axeman, warrior)
I was building longbowmen like crazy right before war time. I guess I felt short timewise there.

My left friend was Willem Van Oranje. What you said about war possibilies will be very helpful because I could of bring more units on the right side before war. At least while the war possibility with Shaka was growing fast.

Shaka is a bully. When you see him next to you in a game, get ready! He will almost always attack.

I would have had walls for sure on the cities that bordered him. Once I saw him, I would have chosen my city sites very carfully so that the treeian would have offered the most protection, on hills, behind rivers. Once those were up, I would have made sure I had enough mixed defenders to hold a city, archers and axes.

The other thing I would have done would be to build units in my other towns and march them over while these border cities tried to make cultural buildings like monestaries, libraries, temples and monuments and maybe even hired an artist. This would have boosted the defense by pushing out the cultural borders but is kind of advanced and I wouldn't do it unless I was sure I could make enough men elsewhere to hold the city.

Anyway, if you see Shaka, or Monty, or Alex, prepare to fight now with swords and bows, not later with guns.
Thanks for the tips. I'll be more carefull next time.


I guess I have work to do. I appreciate the comments will serve me well.

For the curious 2 screen shots of my empire:
I was 2 turns short of placing a city at the Maaschisht city of my friend.

I think the big advantage that I didn't use is Shaka had only few squares he could go to enter my emipre. I could of centralize my forces to those points. Also, a little small question : when you're being attack, and you see few units going around your city for pillage, you let them of you rushed them before making huge damage? Going for them means the fight will be tougher so higher chance of being killed in the process. I guess when you have enough units this question is useless but I had the post it for my curiosity.

http://nsa07.casimages.com/img/2009/07/27/090727110419884148.jpg (http://www.casimages.com)

http://nsa08.casimages.com/img/2009/07/27/090727110446974732.jpg (http://www.casimages.com)

@kinghippo:

1) "When I am forced to fight" is not really a good measure of time since it could occur anytime or never. I would suggest 6-8 cities at 1AD as a general rule of thumb. Yes, expanding does affect your economy negatively due to maintenance costs but the long term payoff comes when the city is developed. Tbh, on warlord, the penalties are so low you can almost expand forever.

2) The rule of thumb is 1.5 per city, a good habit to learn early, though I'm sure 1 per city is enough on Warlord.

3) If these are the only buildings available in 500AD haven't you built them all?

4) 25 units w/longbows is more than enough to stop Shaka's Impi attack. Not sure how you managed to lose this one unless you had all your army spread around instead of focusing it where he was attacking.

EDIT: Just looked at your screenshot:
I don't see what the problem is. You will soon have knights, just build a stack of 15 or so and crush Shaka.

3) If these are the only buildings available in 500AD haven't you built them all?

4) 25 units w/longbows is more than enough to stop Shaka's Impi attack. Not sure how you managed to lose this one unless you had all your army spread around instead of focusing it where he was attacking.

EDIT: Just looked at your screenshot:
I don't see what the problem is. You will soon have knights, just build a stack of 15 or so and crush Shaka.
3) Without counting walls, mostly yes.
Edit : I forgot to say market in my list. I had I think 2 or 3.

4) It was all spread out in my empire. Longbowman was slowly coming because it was fairly new unit. Most of the my army was archers and my city didn't have lots of defensice potencial, specially the critical city (City 3 Top-Right) with 0. I had few axemen but it was minimal. City 3 had no chance against 10 units for power 4 and 5. And city 2 wasn't well defenced also.

Soon is right but it's still a big number of turns in my game situation. It will take at least 30 turns maybe more to have a good counter attack of knights prepared to fight back. I will lose few cities in the process by having not enough defence maybe more I don't have any knowledge of this miliraty (his power graph was WAY higher than mine haha). As I said earlier, I feel that I was pretty close of having the situation in control. My plan was to get those knight and kick some Shaka ass but I was not cautious enough in my planning. Shaka got me with my pants down.

^^Spreading out the army was a mistake. I can't see how many units Shaka has coming (try mousing over the tile in your screen shot). Does he have siege? Put the science slider to 0% and use the gold to upgrade archers to LBs.

^^Spreading out the army was a mistake. I can't see how many units Shaka has coming (try mousing over the tile in your screen shot). Does he have siege? Put the science slider to 0% and use the gold to upgrade archers to LBs.
I thought of this actually. The problem is by putting my science to 0% I'll get a 91 Gold profit. Upgrading to a longbowman is 125 Gold. It's not even one unit per turn. Seems too low to try this option. But maybe by upgrading the units in the ciritcal cities it might be a good option if I think about it more.

He didn't have siege because he didn't need to. My city was 0% in defence bonus.

His stack was:
6 axemen (10% strenght and 20% city attack)
2 chariot (10% strenght)
4 Impi (10% strenght level 2)

He had a smaller stack coming 3-4 turns after I saw the 1st stack.

^^can you beg some gold from your neighbors? Anybody who is pleased or better, ask them for about 170. Also, you can whip a LB in the threatened city. Why are you building a market? Also, send the units from city2, they will make it in time to defend.
Whip defenders everywhere, don't slowbuild them. CG1 LBs will crush axes.

^^can you beg some gold from your neighbors? Anybody who is pleased or better, ask them for about 170. Also, you can whip a LB in the threatened city. Why are you building a market? Also, send the units from city2, they will make it in time to defend.
Whip defenders everywhere, don't slowbuild them. CG1 LBs will crush axes.
Those screen shots are taken from an auto save. The market was scratch very quickly lol.

And my neighbor was goldless (30 ish) so it wasn't an option at this point.

BTW, what is CG1? (any link on this forum for abbreviations of the game available?)

What you should have done, of course, is to have expected the attack from Shaka. Leaders of his ilk (they're pretty easy to spot, basically those who were famous for fighting IRL - Julius Caesar, Genghis, Alexander) will always attack you.

The attack you describe (6 axes, 2 chariot, 4 impi) is very easily dealt with after only a very small amount of preparation. One thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is the use of catapults - attacking another stack with a catapult causes collateral damage to up to 6 other units in that stack, thereby severely weakening the stack. If you have a stack of your own with a couple of catapults, therefore, you can attack with the catapults first - they'll die, but that's the price you pay - and sit back as the rest of your stack completely decimates the opposition.

As far as building every building goes - if you run out of buildings to build, how about a couple of units to keep Shaka at bay? ;)

CG1 = City Garrison 1 BTW. :)

I think you've gotten some good advice on how to fix things from here. But, what you probably should have done from the beginning is realize that when Shaka is your next door neighbor, you are at war as soon as he introduces himself. Your next tech priority should be bronze working. No bronze available (your situation from the screenshot) for a good second city site? Tech Iron working. While researching bronze and iron, you should be building a settler to claim it and barracks. Get your metal hooked up ASAP, build a small stack of axes or swords, and go pay Shaka a visit. Don't wait for him to build up his army and attack you. GO KILL NOW. Do that and he'll be gone by 1000 B.C. Maybe by 1500 B.C. on Warlord.

I know you'd rather being building settlers and buildings to grow your territory and empire. There is time for that later and think of those lovely cities Shaka is building to "donate" to you.:D

On the plus, Shaka's a good teacher. Stay alert. Trust no one. Keep your UU handy.

Your game sounded fun. It's the difficult games I find interesting. I fourth or fifth the characteriztion of Shaka as someone who will always attack you, sooner rather than later. For me, if I find Shaka as a neighbor, I know it's going to be an Impi festival fairly soon. What can we say? Dude likes to attack.

CG1 = City Garrison I

Too late to reply. Sorry for that. :blush:

I think you should build more offensive units and siege weapons. The AI is always reluctant to attack with injured units, so once you attack his stack with your siege weapons, you can use your offensive units to mop up his forces.

I had a game where I had Shaka next to me, but rushed my other neighbor instead. This was because if I took out Shaka, I would be next to Julius Caesar, who was boxed in. I ended up losing the game. Not sure what I should have done. Rome had iron as well, so taking both Shaka and Rome would have been difficult.

Is it a good idea to restart the game from the stratch and apply those concepts in it or should I start a new game instead? I know my ennemies and some resources placement so is it a bad idea to practice on the same game setting and maybe have the thought of being better when I'm only because I know what's ahead?

BTW, I couldn't built siege because I didn't have the construction tech. I was rushing guild for the knights.

Also, are you using slavery? Your city populations are pretty high, you should try to rush some walls and catapults.

3) He wanted me to give him Iron. I refuse again.

kinghippo423,

I'm unfamiliar with Warlords, but I know on BTS you can cancel a deal 10 turns after you agree to it; including demands. With Shaka being the crazy guy he is, I probably would have accepted the Iron deal (unless it was my only iron and I NEEDED it right now) then cancelled it 10 turns later. If you can get Shaka to Friendly, he won't attack you with one very small exception.

I had a game where I had Shaka next to me, but rushed my other neighbor instead. This was because if I took out Shaka, I would be next to Julius Caesar, who was boxed in. I ended up losing the game. Not sure what I should have done. Rome had iron as well, so taking both Shaka and Rome would have been difficult.

Not that I can always pull off whatever strategy I like, but I probably would have attempted to make nice with Julius and use him to gang up on Shaka. If it was too early for that, I'd go ahead and rush Shaka first. The power rating from all of the units I built to beat down Shaka should keep Julius focused on other targets. Play nice with him until cats and maces can counter his prats and take him out. On lower levels, its not that hard to keep Julius off your back until the middle ages.

That's what I would try. Whether it would work, probably depends on a lot of factors.

Don't be afraid to overlap city crosses. The main thing a new city needs is a nice food tile (3-4 or more) so it can grow to size 3 or 4 quickly. Happy cap will keep them from getting size 16+ for a long time, anyway.. so don't worry about perfect end-game placement, think about what brings in the goods NOW!

You could have fit in more cities to use all that beautiful river-grassland. Most of your cities could have the forests around them clearcut and replaced with cottages, which helps ALOT getting granaries, libraries, workers, settlers, and the occasional wonder out =)

That said, you're way ahead of Shaka. Understand what countries are a threat to you and what aren't (you wouldn't need a bunch of defenders sitting over by Gandhi when Boudica is at Annoyed..)

Most AIs will have one big stack they've been building up for awhile. Deal with that and you're golden.

If you had all your hills mined you'd have double the production you do now when you needed it, but could use cottages the rest of of the time. You have fewer workers than it sounds like because you've only got a few big cities with LOTS of land.

Don't fret, you're doing just fine =)

I just wanted to make a follow up to my thread after my Warlord difficulty BTW game that I made after having difficulties with the AIs and wars in Noble. I tried to put all your tips into my game and I think I've done a pretty good job.

I played again Pangea on Standard size and everything on default (6 other civs) and I've managed to get a Domination Victory at 1715AD. I did crucial mistakes during my game that forced me to play a longer game. After some big cities capturing cities in my 1st war, I have at one time fell short in units and I lost captured cities. This forces me to regroup in my empire and wait to get enough troups to finish the war. I have the bad habit to capture every city I gain from war, it is good to do so but you need to be sure to keep it for good.

Secondly, I've learn a lot about healing troups in city before going more foward. I had the fear of if I heal every time my troops the enemy will have time to build more units and make it impossible to me to have the power to capture their cities. The reality is when you have better units and lots of them, healing everytime is almost a must. The cost of losing troups is way worst than waiting 3-4 turns to heal up. I've lost too much troups by being stuburn in my battles.

I when for:
swordmen, axemen, catapults for my 1st war.
knights knights knights for my 2nd war.
cavalries and riflemen for my 3rd and 4th war (in parallel)

Overall, I'm happy about my win and gave me confidence to attack Noble.
I feel I'll need more practine in tech trading because I feel I'm getting stolen everytime by the AI.
It's a price I'm willing to pay for avoiding unexpected wars.

Thanks everyone for the help. I'll keep reading and posting it's a gold mine of advice.

Don't be afraid to overlap city crosses. The main thing a new city needs is a nice food tile (3-4 or more) so it can grow to size 3 or 4 quickly. Happy cap will keep them from getting size 16+ for a long time, anyway.. so don't worry about perfect end-game placement, think about what brings in the goods NOW!

I've learned that too. I finished my game at 1715AD and I couldn't, even with lots of luxiries and building, keep my citizens happy after 14+. I was "forced" to whip them. I will try ti get my cities closer in the future. I had this habit too in CIV3 maybe it's because of that.


I just wanted to make a follow up to my thread after my Warlord difficulty BTW game that I made after having difficulties with the AIs and wars in Noble. I tried to put all your tips into my game and I think I've done a pretty good job.

I played again Pangea on Standard size and everything on default (6 other civs) and I've managed to get a Domination Victory at 1715AD. I did crucial mistakes during my game that forced me to play

Don't fret, you're doing just fine =)
For now I guess so. I just needed confidence and not give up if something goes outside my plan.



BTW, I had an opportunity to be a Master of a civilization (1st time ever) after my 1st war.
I kept only on of their city alive. I refused planning to attack him later and settle around him.
Few turns later, my friend got the rights of this civ, forcing me to let this civ live because I was friendly with them.
This was a mistake because the Mastered civ got to 7 cities at one point.

My 2 questions is :
1) Does Vassal stating a civ will count in my land and population for a domination victory?
2) Is it better to Vassal state a civ instead of eliminating it from the map?

Thanks again for the reactions and answers.

I just wanted to make a follow up to my thread after my Warlord difficulty BTW game that I made after having difficulties with the AIs and wars in Noble. I tried to put all your tips into my game and I think I've done a pretty good job.

I played again Pangea on Standard size and everything on default (6 other civs) and I've managed to get a Domination Victory at 1715AD. I did crucial mistakes during my game that forced me to play a longer game. After some big cities capturing cities in my 1st war, I have at one time fell short in units and I lost captured cities. This forces me to regroup in my empire and wait to get enough troups to finish the war. I have the bad habit to capture every city I gain from war, it is good to do so but you need to be sure to keep it for good.

Secondly, I've learn a lot about healing troups in city before going more foward. I had the fear of if I heal every time my troops the enemy will have time to build more units and make it impossible to me to have the power to capture their cities. The reality is when you have better units and lots of them, healing everytime is almost a must. The cost of losing troups is way worst than waiting 3-4 turns to heal up. I've lost too much troups by being stuburn in my battles.

I when for:
swordmen, axemen, catapults for my 1st war.
knights knights knights for my 2nd war.
cavalries and riflemen for my 3rd and 4th war (in parallel)

Overall, I'm happy about my win and gave me confidence to attack Noble.
I feel I'll need more practine in tech trading because I feel I'm getting stolen everytime by the AI.
It's a price I'm willing to pay for avoiding unexpected wars.

Thanks everyone for the help. I'll keep reading and posting it's a gold mine of advice.


I've learned that too. I finished my game at 1715AD and I couldn't, even with lots of luxiries and building, keep my citizens happy after 14+. I was "forced" to whip them. I will try ti get my cities closer in the future. I had this habit too in CIV3 maybe it's because of that.


I just wanted to make a follow up to my thread after my Warlord difficulty BTW game that I made after having difficulties with the AIs and wars in Noble. I tried to put all your tips into my game and I think I've done a pretty good job.

I played again Pangea on Standard size and everything on default (6 other civs) and I've managed to get a Domination Victory at 1715AD. I did crucial mistakes during my game that forced me to play


For now I guess so. I just needed confidence and not give up if something goes outside my plan.



BTW, I had an opportunity to be a Master of a civilization (1st time ever) after my 1st war.
I kept only on of their city alive. I refused planning to attack him later and settle around him.
Few turns later, my friend got the rights of this civ, forcing me to let this civ live because I was friendly with them.
This was a mistake because the Mastered civ got to 7 cities at one point.

My 2 questions is :
1) Does Vassal stating a civ will count in my land and population for a domination victory?
2) Is it better to Vassal state a civ instead of eliminating it from the map?

Thanks again for the reactions and answers.

Many players use their first or second great general to form a "medic" unit on a scout or explorer (low strength so it won't be chosen to defend and accidentally die).

The main (often only) threat to your Offensive Stack is siege, and vice versa. Being that cannons pwn units in cities and pwn large stacks of units, they're probably the most common unit to beeline to for warring. Sacrificing a few cannons can wreck a gigantic army and leave room for your units to massacre them.

I don't think vassals count for domination, but they do count for conquest and usually (always?) vote for you in the UN. An interesting strategy often seen here for a quick win is the diplomatic victory via conquest.

"Better" is situation dependent. The power and fickleness of the AI at Emperorish difficulty levels make the -1 diplomacy from each vassal extremely dangerous. I use vassaling frequently at Monarch due to the annoyance and pain of completely conquering a large empire, combined with the high maintenance. As you go up in difficulty levels you'll find a much bigger economic "crash" when the gold from pillaging runs out!

As you go up in skill (getting economy and the military down), diplomacy (getting at least a couple very important countries to LOVE you) and tech bartering (being able to get 1 advanced tech when your economy blows chunks compared to everyone else, then bringing yourself up to tech parity with it) become important.

I thought of this actually. The problem is by putting my science to 0% I'll get a 91 Gold profit. Upgrading to a longbowman is 125 Gold. It's not even one unit per turn. Seems too low to try this option. But maybe by upgrading the units in the ciritcal cities it might be a good option if I think about it more.


You already had 81 gold in the screenshot.

If you swith to 0% research / 100% gold and make 91 gold when you hit the button, then next turn you will have 172 gold. This is enough to upgrade one of the archers to longbow.

After the upgrade, you'd still have 172 - 125 = 47 gold.

The next turn you'd have 47 + 91 = 138. This is enough to upgrade the second archer to longbowman (with 13 left over, which is not enough to get a third upgrade of this type on the third turn).

Odds are fairly good that two longbowman would prevent the loss of the city. A loss of two turns of research to upgrade your two defenders is better than losing the city.