Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[TheOverseer714]

What really sucks is severe WW, in my current game i'm spending 100% lux and still have severe unhappiness(lost 2 cities unexpectedly to an enemy). Fortunately, I have a nice bankroll. Hopefully I can kill that enemy soon.

[vmxa]

When you get to that point and need to even use specialist, it is time to get to peace real soon.

[aintnorock]

It seems that I've run out of my supply of coal and can no longer build railroads. What options do I have of finding coal, or moving my troops some other efficient method. Those railroads really worked nice.

[TheOverseer714]

Use clean map to find a new source, if it isnt claimed, build a city there. If it is claimed, trade for it, fight for it, or steal it, depending on where it is.

[timerover51]

Originally Posted by aintnorock

It seems that I've run out of my supply of coal and can no longer build railroads. What options do I have of finding coal, or moving my troops some other efficient method. Those railroads really worked nice.

When one supply of a strategic resource disappears, another one appears somewhere else as a replacement. By using the clean map, you can find it quicker, if it is an explored portion of the map, and then determine how best to acquire as supply. Clearly the best thing is to gain control of it for yourself if you can.

[EMan]

And this brings up a good point..........Try and keep 2 sources of coal, so when one runs out you'll still be able to railroad while hooking up a backup source!

[Snarkhunter]

And if you've dealt for coal & the last of the 20 turns is approaching, remember that whatever tiles your workers are doing they'll still finish even after the deal goes south. So if you don't want to renew or think the AI won't renew, you can always spread 'em out to cover vastly more tiles & maybe finish the job. Slow, to be sure, compared to stacking a 6-pack on a tile. But maybe faster than fighting a war or sending out a settlement party.

kk

[Aabraxan]

Originally Posted by EMan

And this brings up a good point..........Try and keep 2 sources of coal, so when one runs out you'll still be able to railroad while hooking up a backup source!

It's not always feasible, but when it is, I try to leave one source of iron & one of saltpeter unhooked. I had a run 5-6 consecutive games a while back in which my iron depleted within ~5 turns of getting it hooked up.

[splunge]

2 1/2 questions 1 1/2 quick, 1 more general:
Does making a peace agreement in exchange for techs/gold/cities/nothing and then within 20 turns attacking give you a trade rep hit? Is refusing to move after a final move or declare count as a declaration by you or the AI? ANy suggestions on goading them to declare?

I'm having a hard time keeping up techwise on Emporer. Most of the trades available early in AA seemed not worth it and now I'm being left in the dust by the AI. Any advice? I can post my save once I'm at home if anyone's interested.

[Padma]

Originally Posted by splunge

2 1/2 questions 1 1/2 quick, 1 more general:
Does making a peace agreement in exchange for techs/gold/cities/nothing and then within 20 turns attacking give you a trade rep hit? Is refusing to move after a final move or declare count as a declaration by you or the AI? ANy suggestions on goading them to declare?

I'm having a hard time keeping up techwise on Emporer. Most of the trades available early in AA seemed not worth it and now I'm being left in the dust by the AI. Any advice? I can post my save once I'm at home if anyone's interested.

I'll answer the one I can: If you are asked to move or declare, and you refuse to move, then YOU are the one making the declaration of war.

[Optional]

It's even worse: declaring at such a moment is seen as a breach of RoP (even if nothing is signed).

Answer to the first question: Signing peace after a conflict is always binding for 20 turns.

[splunge]

Thanks for the lightning fast replies, Padma and Optional.

Anyone want to offer tech trading tips for a bumpy move up to Emporer?

[TheOverseer714]

Research carefully, avoiding low value techs. My typical research for trade strategy is the Republic Slingshot path. Every tech along the way is valuable trade bait if you get there first.
Alphabet=>Writing=>Code of Laws=>Philosophy=>Republic is my path 90% of the time. If on a Pangaea, you might skip CoL and research Philosophy ASAP, taking Literature as a freebie. Literature is a high trade value tech rarely researched by the AI. After that, I usually research Currency, then if you are lucky you can use that to trade into the MA

[Lord Emsworth]

Originally Posted by splunge

ANy suggestions on goading them to declare?

Make demands. Repeatedly. At least, until the AI is furious. However this is not something that is corrigible, so once you made an AI furious do not count on their vote in a UN election.

What kind of demand this is does not really matter. I sometimes try my luck though and demand smallish things where I have a realistic chance of actually receiving something. So for instance I might demand 20 gold. If it is not successful I'll retry with a smaller sum. If it is successful, I'll still try again with a smaller sum.

And only after you made the AI furious, you ask to leave or declare.


ETA: If you are certain that the AI is going to declare war, you can, if you do not find this too exploitive, sign a whole lot of very favorable deal where you give gpt and receive up front goods. You can easily buy all the techs, maps, gold and end up paying nothing in return.

[Snarkhunter]

Originally Posted by TheOverseer714

Research carefully, avoiding low value techs. My typical research for trade strategy is the Republic Slingshot path. Every tech along the way is valuable trade bait if you get there first.
Alphabet=>Writing=>Code of Laws=>Philosophy=>Republic is my path 90% of the time. If on a Pangaea, you might skip CoL and research Philosophy ASAP, taking Literature as a freebie. Literature is a high trade value tech rarely researched by the AI. After that, I usually research Currency, then if you are lucky you can use that to trade into the MA

Sounds good, & it's what I did on Monarch, but I've found the AI's are really acting chintzy on Emperor & I can't seem to budge them loose from too much of anything. I can get through the AA ok, more or less, but I'm usually not first out of the box & tech trades become very difficult in MA, IA, or ModA. So I've found so far. It's a bit frustrating. Also, they seem to spread over all branches of the tech tree from MA on & it becomes hard to find a monopoly tech. . . .

kk

[Optional]

Getting them to fight to slow down the tech pace can help.

[TheOverseer714]

In the next age, the Middle Ages, choose your path and stick to it. There is the military branch, which is the lower branch. I almost always start with Feudalism, possibly trade that for Engineering and set off on Invention=>Gunpowder=>Chemistry=>Metallurgy=>Milit ary Tradition. You can trade those for the upper branch. I'd only do the upper branch if I had a cultural victory in mind, the military techs are too valuable to get last otherwise.

[Spoonwood]

The upper branch almost always leads to a faster tech pace. The AIs prefer techs like Feudalism, Invention, and Gunpowder. The military techs make sense if you want to bash the AIs, but if you want to win diplomatically, launch the spaceship, win by 20k or 100k without the ToA, the upper branch makes more sense.

[aintnorock]

One of my enemies is down to just 1 city, but I can't find it. How can I go about finding it on the map?

[EMan]

Did you try Shift-l? (Locate City).