Improving on Monarch

[Zoomerang]

I know many of you guys have already blazed past monarch but looking at my game, how would you improve it?

Any criticisms / stuff I can do better next time

uh the save file says prince but it should be monarch :x

[MrCynical]

OK, your first major problem is you've overexpanded, partly due to warfare by the looks of it. Your science rate is down to 20% and you're still losing money hand over fist. Even at 0% you'll be bankrupt in under 20 turns unless you can boost your income. If your science rate has fallen to 60 or 70%, stop expanding, whether by settlers or warfare, and focus on improving your existing cities. Only expand when you can afford it, and still maintain a high research percentage. Extra cities may well be costing you more in maintenance than they're worth. Another indication of this is that you are top in land area, but well down the list in population. Population is more important than land area.

Your second major problem is a direct result of the first; you are massively behind on tech. Without Alphabet you can't even trade to catch up, and you're not going to be able to spend anything on science if you're going to avoid bankruptcy. This game will be extremely difficult to win from this position.

Thirdly you have no wonders or holy cities, presumably due to the poor research rate. Running with confucianism as a state religion isn't doing much for you, and is damaging your relations with most of your neighbours. Unless you are really desperate for the happiness boost, which you don't seem to be, then you'd be better off with Judaism, or no state religion at all.

A couple of minor points: You'd have been better off burning Chicago and refounding it one tile further north, as being one tile from the coast is a major disadvantage for a city. You don't seem to have enough workers or cottages, which is also hindering the rate you can afford to expand at.

[Zoomerang]

Hm, I wasn't sure which cities to keep or raze. I knew that an early war against the US could be profitable - and for awhile it seemed like it was. Then I guess I just kept attacking, mainly due to the incredibly weak troops that the US had. Possibly 1-2 archers vs a horde of immortals.

Also, with my research even at a much lower % it seems like I can research techs at a relatively rapid rate... if only I wasn't losing so much money...

In respect to wonders, I was under the impression from other threads on this forum, that they aren't crucial to winning. I opted for 10 Immortals instead of the Pyramids probably.

Unfortunately, I can't raze the crappy cities, which isn't so dandy.

if I had consolidated my existing cities you think I would be in much better shape?

thx for the comment ^_^

[Kenji]

ok, back the save to u, used all the cottages and gold income spots , 20% -7 gold per turn now.

dont care the overexpand thing...we still have some advantage : big emperor land mass. focus on How to use them well. lets see....all production cities... no gold mines, no cottages city...this is what make u stay at 20% research rate and neg income.

time to get some cottages spam, overall...best location u got for cottages spam is Atlanta, 7 grassland which 3 of them on river, have a gem spot used, have a silk in big cross, spam all your cottages there. and build all the + gold rate buildings such as Market,Bank.

defend abit, since u only got Immortal , cant beat Longbowman defenders anyways.

i agree that Confucianism isnt good for long term, but at least atm u got French to defend the north line of your cities...so now u only need to focus to defend West/Coast and East (dont think US can get back tho)



should be fun to continue...let me try it abit heh

[Zoomerang]

Thx, G-luck,

Let me know what comes out of it, I'll try it myself

^_^

[Kenji]

hm....dont seems to be able to catch up space racer...still 10+ tech behind even with 400+ research at 1800 AD..pretty low i know, cant flip the coin =/

[MrCynical]

You really can't fall that far behind at this difficulty level and expect to recover. The AI can research faster than you to start with, and the amount of land you've gained isn't that overwhelming. Once you're behind the AI gets first grab at all the wonders, religions and free techs, and you don't have a lot of chance in a war when your military is out of date compared to theirs (which it will be very soon after the first save).

It's a fair point that wonders aren't always the best way to go, but I generally like one or two for the great people, without needing to bother with specialists. I wouldn't recommend the Pyramids without stone, but I'd still go for Stonehenge or the Oracle, since they're dirt cheap.

@Kenji: What research percentage is that at? I generally reckon I need to be at around 1000+ research at Monarch to have a chance at space race.

[Kenji]

back up to 80%, but not helping much, =p
the war with others isnt the issue , main issue for me is lack of good land to spam cottages....and no Great Person to play with...w/o any wonders too. =)