Every played a game with wonders build freakishly early?

[Sherlock]

The AI must be bee-lining like crazy to certain wonders because they're being built a hundred turns before I can even get to them.

I'm not talking about the infuriating 'I beat you to the wonder 3-4 turns before you finished it' deal.

Next game I play I'm going to keep a notepad handy and start writing down when this happens.

 

[Chabshaile]

What Diff are you talking? On prince I hardely ever lose a wonder by more then 4 or 5 turns unless I am way late to the party on working it.

 

[Uzael36]

At easier difficulties, you should be capable of beating the AI to just about any wonder. However, starting with King, the AI starts to get advantages, though it still is fairly easily to beat them to most early wonders up to Emperor, starting at Immortal, good fortune is needed to beat them to early wonders, as they just get too large of a start bonus to get to them.

It is possible they got the right early tech while exploring ancient ruins, and got a small lead, but if they are getting there a 100 turns before you, either they beelined towards a tech, and you avoided it for a long time, while going after others, or you simply are not teching fast enough due to improper build order.

 

[bhavv]

Well, not so much the AI doing it, but I did a fun little trick where I built barabodur (sp) to 1 turn from completion then swapped to great mosque of djenne, all while building hagia Sophia in another city, just because I had a GE saved and wanted to make sure I got them all, otherwise I'd reload and use the GE.

I finished great mosque and hagia Sophia on the same turn, following turn finished barabodur, and then rushed chichen itza, 4 wonders completed in 3 turns. Much fun.

 

[docbud]

I played a game (Prince level) the other night, and I could not get a single wonder (except for the Great Library). There was some runaway on another continent who apparently was gobbling them up.

Great Library gone was gone by turn 40. Temple of Artemis a few turns after that, etc. Chicken Itza not long after that.

I ended up just not trying to build any at all, as it was too frustrating.

I've never had a game like that before.

 

[Uzael36]

I played a game (Prince level) the other night, and I could not get a single wonder (except for the Great Library). There was some runaway on another continent who apparently was gobbling them up.

Great Library gone was gone by turn 40. Temple of Artemis a few turns after that, etc. Chicken Itza not long after that.

I ended up just not trying to build any at all, as it was too frustrating.

I've never had a game like that before.

That is rare on Prince, but the reality is that you are better off building your infrastructure first, before worrying about wonders. The 1st two wonders I'd consider, are hanging gardens and petra, but you should look at all the cities you've discovered to see if they are already building them 1st.

Sometimes a civ will get a free technology that gets them started on a wonder earlier, and sometimes they have lots of salt or other great land to build and grow rapidly. If that happens, you need to focus on getting your technology improving fast, until you get into the tech lead, at which point, most new techs you acquire, at least the ones that are the most advanced, will include wonders not yet built.

 

[Makavcio]

Majority of wonders is worthless. And even if they do provide some useful benefits, it's way more important to pursue other things. Notre Dame is the best example of that. Some religion and massive happiness bonus is a great incentive, however, a wise player won't be able to build this wonder because he concentrates on the upper half of tech tree and ND would be a huge detour. Usually when the prerequisite tech is attainable, AI has already been enjoying the wonder for quite a few turns.

Speaking about earlier wonders, AI makes use of its bonus techs that computer civs to immediately tap to resources around them. Together with free workers on the highest difficulties, they have nothing better to spend their hammers on than wonders when you still struggle with your the most basic infrastructure.

On king and below severe problems rarely occur. I don't really remember because my last game below emperor was on vanilla. If you fear that AI may start stealing all wonders, consult flavor chart that should be somewhere on the forum and compare it with civs in game. If there is a wonder-happy civ in your game and the civ has decent hammer base around its capital, consider conquering wonders instead of building them

 

[joncnunn]

You can make this happen reliably (AI building wonders freakishly fast) by playing on Deity on a Huge map.

But usually any move up one difficulty level from what you normally play at or a bigger map than normal will cause this.

 

[docbud]

That is rare on Prince, but the reality is that you are better off building your infrastructure first, before worrying about wonders. The 1st two wonders I'd consider, are hanging gardens and petra, but you should look at all the cities you've discovered to see if they are already building them 1st.

Sometimes a civ will get a free technology that gets them started on a wonder earlier, and sometimes they have lots of salt or other great land to build and grow rapidly. If that happens, you need to focus on getting your technology improving fast, until you get into the tech lead, at which point, most new techs you acquire, at least the ones that are the most advanced, will include wonders not yet built.

Actually--I was working on infrastructure and stuff. And I had to settle a few cities to avoid forward settling on me. I figured I'd lose a few wonders, and I rushed libraries and got the tech lead. But they were building stuff left and right. Every other turn a wonder was built. Sometimes I was getting three notifications in one turn.

 

[Uzael36]

Actually--I was working on infrastructure and stuff. And I had to settle a few cities to avoid forward settling on me. I figured I'd lose a few wonders, and I rushed libraries and got the tech lead. But they were building stuff left and right. Every other turn a wonder was built. Sometimes I was getting three notifications in one turn.

If you had the tech lead, they clearly were finishing wonders you've had for a while. That is to be expected. You just focus on wonders that are more advanced. If you have the tech lead, assuming they are the more advanced techs, and not early ones you neglected, you get first dibs on making the wonders.