Routine Vent at the Usual Suspects

Buttercup

King
Joined
Oct 20, 2011
Messages
915
I got bored of tweaking my usual starting settings and decided to have a go at the most traditional set-up possible:

Standard Size
Full Random Civ competitors
Pangea
Middle settings for everything else
Regent

I thought I'd have a go at the Mongols because I don't think I've ever played as them before.

Aaaaand, wouldn't you know it, I start slap-bang in the middle of everyone, 2 Civs below me and two above, all of which have more Settler friendly start locations than me. The luxuries near me are the ones on Jungles and Mountains. I get Disease from Floodplains at size 2. My Scouts are adept at discovering 25 Gold or Maps Of The Region. My second city has to be so near a rival capital (That's where the Cows are) that I have to start by building a Temple in my second city. Two turns before the Temple is complete a pair of Warriors from the Civ above me appear. They stroll into an empty city like they 'knew' it was going to be empty...

Oh... give me strength... I'm just too old for this crap.

So I went back to (almost) my usual settings:

Huge Size
Full Random Civ competitors
Archipelago
extreme settings for everything else except Normal AI and Roaming Barbs
Regent
Playing as the English

Aaaand... I start on a teeny weeny island with no fresh water and 75% Desert/Plains, no luxuries, no Iron and right above me (within Coastal Waters travel distance) is a gigantic continent with 2 Civs on it that has both Freshwater and Cows aplenty etc. Oh well, I thought, I've had it worse. I proceed to squeeze 9 towns into the space of 3 or 4 cities.

They both agreed to destroy me somewhere just after Horseback Riding. Oh, the joys of cancelling Science, general Production and a conversion to Republic while I pump Horses to bump off the odd landing Swordsman, Spearman, Warrior or Archer, then pumping Galleys to block off their flow of irritants and provide a means to counter attack.

Ah well, cunning plan number 4276 it is. Negotiated peace with one and then got them to agree to turn the tables on the original aggressor. Gave it a few turns and landed my army on the nearest beach and proceeded to easily take 2 very useful beachhead towns. Now... if I can just grab the Capital (the next city on from the taken towns) it's just a matter of time before I clean up the entire island.

I place my 13 Horses and 2 Spearmen outside their Capital in readiness. Hoorah! No attackers, they're all off killing the other Civ. Next turn I lay siege. The Spearmen are dropping like flies, it's all too easy! But... alas... for every Spearman I kill there appears to be another fully healthy fresh one standing in it's place. They keep dying, but I have to keep attacking. On and on. Until I'm spent. He survived. Now what do I do? I'm already at my limit of units. Oh well, I thought. I'll take the Capital later, at the next technology change.

Turns out that his Capital is one of the best in the game, has the Pyramids, Leonardos and etc etc. So Saltpeter comes along and I get 18 Cavalry and 3 Musketman outside the Capital. Just 2 turns previously the guy completes Shakespear's and goes to size 13. They fall like dominoes to his unlimited Musketmen. And I'm stumped. To add further misery, the border between my beachhead town and the Capital is set up so that my Cavalry can't reach his Capital in one turn, but, as soon as he gets Cavalry, my Beachhead is one Cavalry turn from his Capital. Hills etc...

It's predictable. My crappy towns have too low a Production output to build modern Units with any kind of pace, my income doesn't even equal one quarter of a bought Unit, even at 10% research. As soon as he gets Cavalry I'll lose my Beachhead towns. He was superior to the other Civ on the island and it only benefits him to get those two fighting each other.

I have 2 choices. Either hold out for a Diplomatic Win or just click end-turn until 2050. Well, nope, can't be bothered, especially as it all hinged on the Horse stage anyway way back in BC.

I stuck around for some noseyness and by 1500 I had the world mapped and, yup, nothing near me, even with the Great Lighthouse advantage, I wasn't finding a close 2nd Island to boost my town number tally with (like many of the other Civs got). I was on one of the filler islands.

Just another day in the life of wasted time playing Civ 3. Looks like I'll be spamming start locations again for the next game, nothing like those Cows near Rivers to assist with the 'luck' factor ;)
 
All good reasons why you generate a map in the editor and then choose your starting location.
 
One of the things I like most about civ3 is gradually exploring the map and removing all the black. Its one of the reasons I like Archipelago so much, that great sense of early naval exploration. If I knew the map beforehand that would be too much of a spoiler for me.
 
One of the things I like most about civ3 is gradually exploring the map and removing all the black. Its one of the reasons I like Archipelago so much, that great sense of early naval exploration. If I knew the map beforehand that would be too much of a spoiler for me.

I never remember the map well enough not to be surprised, and I play either archipelago or continents maps. I have been experimenting with wide and narrow ones of up to 360 by 180 in size. Those are always quite interesting.
 
"They stroll into an empty city like they 'knew' it was going to be empty..."

That is because they do know it was empty. They know what is on all tiles at all times. They just do not know how to path to a location that they have not scouted or gotten a map for. That is why they plant towns in a location that look crazy, they know it has oil or whatever coming, when they get the tech to see it.
 
Yes indeed, that's another one of those stark differences between an AI and a human player. If the human player wants to know what's in a city then they have to pay to investigate the city, where as the AI just knows. It would have been a huge tactical and strategical advantage for me to know exactly how many Spearmen were in the Capital before I committed my troops. I guess, like they say, the AI needs all the cheats it can get, otherwise it would indeed be too easy.

A question I'd like to know for future reference:

Can you investigate a city when you're at war with its whole Civ prior to Espionage?

I ask this because I clicked on the Star of the Capital, but because I was at war it wouldn't let me access the necessary screen. It's all very well investigating a city while at peace, but a few turns later, while at war, it could have a completely different set-up of troops. It seems logical to me that the most important time you need this function is while at war, and that you would mostly be interested in paying a metaphorical spy for this info while at war. If it's not possible during war then this makes no sense at all really, from a game mechanic perspective.



Looking back at the latter game, I think there were 2 things I could have done better to get the Capital at the Horse stage.

1. Make a save-game before I started moving towards the Capital so that I could just reload if it failed.

2. Concentrated on all the other towns around the island and left the Capital for much later, perhaps even having farmed an army from the surrounding towns.

Number 1 was just general bad planning, probably because I wasn't giving the game 100% investment and treating it more like a time-killer.

Number 2, however, I was deliberating with at the time. The problem was that it would have meant splitting my forces right round a large oddly shaped island and would have left me open in so many places I could hardly expect to hold anything I took, either from re-invasion or Culture pressure from both the other civs. It might have worked, it might not, but without the save-point I never got the chance to experiment. I know the game offers you free save-point returns, but by the time I decided it would be worth going back to try it was after the Cavalry stage, way down the line - I kind of decided on waiting for Cavalry instead of probably the better option.

That investigate city option though... that would have made an awful lot of difference...
 
Everybody can win with a handcrafted map with 2 cows and 3 luxes in the first ring... It's the games like these that I usually remember for a long time (especially if I manage to edge out a win against all odds... ;))

BTW, if you are trying to take the first AI capital with Cavalry, then you know that something has gone wrong: it means you have been playing half of the game with just your tiny island, while all that time the AI had an entire continent. Impossible to catch up at such a late stage. If you find yourself starting on a small island, you need to play a different strategy from what you are used to: beeline to Map Making, build half a dozen galleys and then attack with whatever you have at that time, be it horsemen, swordsmen or just archers. (Sometimes you will even be able to find a good spot of land that is still uninhabited. Then you can just send a settler and a few units over.) Once you have secured/conquered a nice stretch of land with food, rivers and resources, you disband your old capital and you are back in business. On Regent you should still be able to catch up whatever small lead the AI has on you.
 
*snip* It's all very well investigating a city while at peace, but a few turns later, while at war, it could have a completely different set-up of troops
(I was recently surprised to learn that) this is unlikely.
Spoiler :
I was told (and have now seen it for myself in-game), that if a unit has only the 'Defence' AI-strategy (e.g. Spears, Pikes, and I think also Muskets), the AI will tend to keep them fortified in the city that originally built them, unless it 'needs' a defender to shield a vulnerable (D=0) unit in transit, such as a Settler. And it generally won't bring 'defenders' forwards to reinforce a city under attack, either -- rather it will whip/ buy/ conscript a new defender(s) in that city (which is why there tends to be no improvements in a late-game city, if you take it after a prolonged siege).

In contrast, AI-units that have only the 'Attack' strategy (e.g. Archers, Horses) will frequently be moved around between AI-cities. They'll be sent into the field in large numbers following a DoW -- whether to attack your units or assault your cities -- but if they get badly injured (yellow or red), they will then retreat towards their nearest city to heal, which will not necessarily be the city that originally built them.

If an AI-unit has both 'Attack' and 'Defence' strategies checked (e.g. Rifles and Infs), it gets a little more complicated. As I understand it, when the AI builds those units, it flags them permanently for one purpose or the other, presumably according to its build priorities (e.g. if it has 'Build defensive units -- often', more of those dual-use units will get flagged as defenders than attackers, and vice versa). And it will then use those units for the designated purpose forever afterwards -- which is why sometimes you'll see (what we would think of as) 'defenders' leaving an AI-city while it's still under attack.

Another idea I'm still getting my head round, is not worrying too much about AI-units in the field on their turf. Ideally you want to decoy all of the dual-use attackers out of your target-city to make it easier to take (e.g. leave a Worker where they can see it, but can't reach it) -- but don't fight them until after you've taken the city. If you attack them unsuccessfully before the city is yours, then when those injured units retreat to heal, they will effectively end up reinforcing the nearest AI-city(s) (most likely your target), making it/them more difficult to capture.
TL: DR
What you see in the 'Investigate city' screen 1-2T before a war starts, is most likely what you'll face when you begin your attack (give or take a a newly-built defender or a healing attacker). So if you know which cities you want to take, and also which order you would prefer to assault them, investigate them just before you DoW and note down the total defence strength (bearing in mind D-bonuses... ;) ). That way, you'll have a better idea what you'll need to bring to the party.
2. Concentrated on all the other towns around the island and left the Capital for much later, perhaps even having farmed an army from the surrounding towns
I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that, in general, if you can be reasonably sure that your stack won't be attacked on the IBT (e.g. by stationing it on a Hill/Mountain tile, preferably under cover of an Army with a decent D-value), it may actually be better to take their Cap as soon as you have sufficient strength to do so -- not necessarily with the intention of holding it continuously for the next 10-20T, but as a means of permanently weakening that AICiv. Since the original AICap will almost always be the largest, best-defended, and strongest Culture-generator of the AICiv's cities, taking it should seriously reduce that AICiv's ability to fight you -- especially if you can then immediately press your advantage and make inroads against its remaining cities, and/or you now control some useful continent-spanning GWonders (e.g. ToA, SunTzu). (Admittedly, that second point is less relevant on Large+ Arch-maps)

The problem with taking the cap before mopping up the rest is that you have to deal with Palace-boosted (+50%?) defenders more than once, because of the automatic Palace-jump to the next-b(igg)est AICity. OTOH, because of the way the AI garrisons (see above) the new Cap probably won't have nearly as many troops to take advantage of that bonus as the old Cap did, so capturing it shouldn't be such a slog. And if (when!) the original Cap flips back, it will get only a few defenders at most, which will have only the normal town/city def-bonus, so it should be (much) easier to capture the second time around.

I made the mistake of leaving the enemy Cap alone in my current game (Emp, Small mapsize, Restless Barbs, Random everything else)...
Spoiler :
I got assigned as the Koreans on a 5bn yr, 60% Archi-map (although it looks more like 60% Continents: 3/5 AICivs started on my landmass, and the other 2 were sharing the other major landmass), and I rolled what turned out to be a pretty poor starting position, all things considered -- which I then aggravated with some poor early decisions. I'd been (forced into) playing a fairly defensive/ cowardly trading-game up to the mid-Middle Ages, but by this point I was getting seriously constricted (and was nearly half an Age behind on tech), and really needed to make/ take some expansion room, or get left in the dust. The Russians were my nearest neighbours, and we'd already had a few scraps (stalemated), but now I needed to squash them for good -- which would also secure me an Iron and some Luxes.

I had mostly not had Iron during the first part of the game, and then lost my one source (due to Russian border expansion) soon after I'd got it hooked, so my military still consisted mainly of Warriors, Spears and LBMs (upgraded from Archers), a small stack of Horses, and some Cats. The few Swords and Pikes I'd managed to build before losing 'my' Iron were stationed in my frontline cities, but Cathy already had Muskets in hers (and a couple of Cossacks showed up as well, after I DoW'd) -- although she was buying Salt and Horses. So before I DoW'd I had to buy some Iron (from Gandhi I think): I upgraded a couple of Horses and Warriors, and Spears in the frontline cities, and set every available town to building Iron-units before the deal ended. My first target was the Russian city which had grabbed the Iron with its border-pop, then I mopped up the rest of their Tundra-trash and sent my troops against their western Grassland-towns.

Considering what I was facing, I was surprisingly lucky, but I had also paid well to bribe the Aztecs and Sumerians (both on my continent), and the Indians, into the war, forcing the Russians to fight on 3 fronts, and ensuring that Cathy's Horse- and Salt-deals stayed broken. I'd won a 3-Knight-Army (A=4+(4*3/6)=6) by the time I reached Moscow, but it was now at Pop14 (it had Shakes, plus 4 other GWonders), and the Russians had got to the Industrial and acquired Nationalism, so it had a fortified vRifle on top (effective D=6+6(100+50+25+10%)=17!). I didn't fancy those odds, so I bypassed it to go after the 4-5 smaller eastern Russian cities first. I took two of them (one got autorazed), but while I was healing/regrouping, disaster struck... the Sumerians RoPed and DoW'd me out of the blue (even though I was paying them lots of GPT for various things).

On the first IBT their Cavs took the Russian city I'd just captured (garrisoned by a 2/5 eKnight), and killed my Army (at 2/14 HP after taking the second city), and half my Knights. The remaining Knights took down 2-3 Cavs on the next turn, but were lost on the next IBT. I'd now lost all my best attackers, my Russian campaign had stalled, and the Summies were huge, so as soon as my MAs expired I signed peace with Cathy (extorting MilTrad and Magnets, which saved me), garrisoned my city west of Moscow (which was luckily on a chokepoint) with fortified Pikes and a Musket (had to buy Saltpeter as well), and fought off the incoming Cavs, Crusaders, Rifles and LBMs using Maces, LBMs, Knights (then Cavs), and a small stack of Hwachas.

By the time I'd fought Gil to a standstill and was in a position to go after Moscow again (>20T later), it had at least half a dozen v+rInfs and some vRambos defending. By that point I had a lot more Cavs, a couple of Cav-Armies (thanks Gil!), and also Infs and Arty, but it still took another 10-20T to damage/decoy all the defenders sufficiently for me to risk my much weaker attackers (in hindsight, I should have upgraded my Hwachas before I started, but I was overly reluctant to give up the lethal-bombard).
If I'd tried to take Moscow when I first reached it, I might not have got so badly hammered by the Summies -- and I would also have beaten the Indians to Hoovers, because I would have been able to start (pre)building it much sooner.
 
I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that, in general, if you can be reasonably sure that your stack won't be attacked on the IBT (e.g. by stationing it on a Hill/Mountain tile, preferably under cover of an Army with a decent D-value), it may actually be better to take their Cap as soon as you have sufficient strength to do so -- not necessarily with the intention of holding it continuously for the next 10-20T, but as a means of permanently weakening that AICiv.

I doubt that taking the capital first is sound advice. There might be few cases where this is the case, but in general taking the capital will require much more effort compared to only slightly more gain. The surrounding cities will likely have a similar economic output, but are less defended. So you can take more cities per used unit on your part and furthermore you can usualy attack them earlier instead of having to slowly move to the capital first.

The more the empire of the AI collapses the less luxuries remain for it, thus its remaining cities are threatened to starve. After they have starved it will be easier to take and keep those cities. So withholding the attack on the capital and other core cities till to the end can be rather convenient. But that should not be put to extremes either. Giving AI the opportunity to build much more units you have to kill is usually not desired, unless you want to farm great military leaders. So maybe it is in fact desired. :crazyeye:

The problem with taking the cap before mopping up the rest is that you have to deal with Palace-boosted (+50%?) defenders more than once, because of the automatic Palace-jump to the next-b(igg)est AICity.

The capital is displayed one city category larger, so towns are displayed as cities and cities as metropolises. Usually larger city category means +50% defence, but to me it is not clear that the different display of the capital has any real effect.
 
I'll add some screenies of the game for visual aid's reference, but I'll put them in spoilers so as to not drain anyone browsing on a mobile or on slower systems.

You'll have to imagine back to BC by studying the town names as I only have the quitting state in save (the turn before I attempted the Cavalry attempt which I didn't save but played out a few variables).

My delightful starting island:

Spoiler :
The stack under the Cavalry in the top town is my stack of Caravels, not more Cavalry



This was my easy beachhead which at least eventually gave me an easy luxury, but I was hoping would provide easy access to the Capital:

Spoiler :
These three towns were the only towns I wanted at that stage, I felt if I could take these quickly it would be enough to form a base from which to gradually take the entire island



This is the grand spoils of my naval advantage of Seafaring + Lighthouse + Magellan's (later):

Spoiler :
It had the all important Iron chunk and was easily defendable, but, alas, required Navigation to be of use due to it's distance and only really serves a purpose for late game Iron use.



This was the wider continent above me, for your analytical pleasure. As you can see, there's no real easy way in other than the way I went and the Capital really was the most obviously appealing option. There were other pickings, but they would have been quickly flopped by Indian Culture boundries combined with Incan re-flip pressure. Plus the real combat was taking place in the central area.

Spoiler :
I was hoping India would take Tiwanaku and Vilnus, but, instead, the Incans took Calcutta and Bengal.

 
I'll add some screenies of the game for visual aid's reference, but I'll put them in spoilers so as to not drain anyone browsing on a mobile or on slower systems.

In most cases the pictures are loaded first and spoilered second. Thus the spoilers are not really helping.
 
The starting island is actually pretty strong for a Regent game. (Cow, wheat, two oasis, and horses!) There should be no problem setting up a new Palace in Cuzco before 1000BC. (Or perhaps there is even better territory on the lower left hand continent (light green) or the upper right hand continent (blue)?)
 
The starting island is actually pretty strong for a Regent game. (Cow, wheat, two oasis, and horses!) There should be no problem setting up a new Palace in Cuzco before 1000BC. (Or perhaps there is even better territory on the lower left hand continent (light green) or the upper right hand continent (blue)?)

I agree with everything you said except the part I've quoted :king:
 
Don't be daft. You know what the map looks like, you know where everything is, you have a singular objective in mind.

When I played it I started by not even knowing where I was nor what kind of objective I'd be playing for. For me it was just a timekiller, I wasn't even beelining Republic, I beelined Map Making in the hope of finding nearby islands to Settle them first. I prefer peaceful wins.

It was only after being disappointed by my lacklustre results from naval exploration and after being declared by the two above Civs that I even converted to a war footing.

You'd be starting with some forum invented challenge, like it's some HoF challenge rather than a naturally evolving scenario.

What I had issue with regards your post:

"The starting island is actually pretty strong for a Regent game."

By what degree of relativity? In comparison to a 3 square island of pure desert, no It's pretty awesome. By comparison to Cows near a river alongside a Luxury and equally good surrounding land, then, no, it's pretty darn crappy. Compared to the worst? Yes, it's preferable. Compared to the best, it's crappy. Just flipping the relativity bat at me to feed your ego and diminish mine is pretty lame.

There should be no problem setting up a new Palace in Cuzco before 1000BC.

If you actually had that agenda from the get-go, yes. And what do you mean by 'no problem'? More relativist crap, right? No problem compared to getting a Conquest win by 10 AD on Sid, yes. No problem in comparison to getting a conquest win by 2050 on Chieftan, no. You'd have 'no problem' completing something that you set out solely to do? Well, whoopy do. Let me run it again and I bet you $10,000 even I could take Cuzco by 1000BC.

(Or perhaps there is even better territory on the lower left hand continent (light green) or the upper right hand continent (blue)?)

Which you'd have no idea that they even existed in early BC? You don't even know how many ships I lost on suicide missions do you...

But somehow you're now able to get to Map Making, Horseback Riding while spamming Settlers, Units and Ships enough to take out another Civ and settle every other island on the map that you don't even know exists? So much free production that you can waste +1 ship and +1 Settler every turn until you get lucky? Wow, what a marvelous genius you are...

But, generally speaking, without all the micro-analysis, you just come across as preposterously 'know-it-all', like a 12 year old taking the controller because I've fallen in the Lava on a new Mario screen. Yes mate, your dad's got a bigger car, a better job, a better house and yes, you ate a hundred packets in a day once *glitter falls from the sky* [you probably won't get this joke (and will probably think I'm being literal instead of metaphorical) btw].

You really think this is a thread requesting 'help'? If so, it's you that needs help. It's a vent thread. Which means there's a vast amount of topics that get spewed, mostly small things, which are only prescient because they have accumulated into a large ball of general frustration. Attempting to 'solve' one small part of that ball via the nonsense-logic of pre-understanding the map would be akin to someone re-running the Titanic's course to prove you don't have to sink if you follow the Titanic's route, only worse, because in this thread there's more stuff on display than one single iceburg, there's a whole flotilla of them.

Vent over... ;)
 
Lanzelot, please stop confusing the forum with quality advice and that strange notion that the game could also be about becoming a better player. :huh: you can only do that by already being a better player, which somehow in a way i cannot describe makes everything you say obviously invalid. :crazyeye:
t_x
 
Buttercup, with all due respect, I really think you have Lanzelot all wrong. As I have sworn never to flame here at CivIII, that's all I will say. Let's return to normal programming.
 
Top Bottom