Please help, don't know how to win time victories on noble

[Zapurdead]

Basically this is my problem:
Start game with intent to win through time victory
Expand quickly, become points leader
Run out of places to expand and start falling behind
Forced to declare war, or else I fall behind another AI (who is somehow able to get a huge ing empire without fighting wars)

I'm pretty sure there's some fundamental error I'm making here, because every game I play, the moment I declare war I know I'm essentially set to lose for the rest of the game, and it's always by a huge score margin that I lose (we're talking in the hundreds behind the first player by the modern era) Here is a replay. It's pretty short, because I surrender before even getting Education.

Some people are going to tell me that I should be not fighting war, or this and that, and I have to say I don't think it matters. The fact is one Civ seems to have a good starting position that lets him or her expand aggressively, and I have to fight wars for land to keep up. Once, I even expanded to a large portion of America and I was still behind the first civ by a significant amount (I can post that too if anyone wants but it's a long one).

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Basically this is my problem:
Start game with intent to win through time victory
Expand quickly, become points leader
Run out of places to expand and start falling behind
Forced to declare war, or else I fall behind another AI (who is somehow able to get a huge ing empire without fighting wars)

Time is the unloved runt child of the victory conditions; I'm not sure that collectively we know a lot about it. A good player needs to (a) not win earlier by accident, and (b) play whack-a-mole with the AI as each in turn approaches a victory.

However, there is clearly a problem in your game somewhere; the human player has an enormous advantage (the ability to think) over the AI. Thus, once the mechanics are understood, wars tend to be quite profitable.

1150 AD is a bit late for a first checkpoint, but we shall see what we find. I'll write up my initial thoughts in order of observation, rather than in order of priority....

1) You are on turn 175, and you haven't yet explored any of the continent that lies outside your boarders. This blindness means that you really don't know enough about the map to be able to react to your adversaries, or even make a plan for how to win.

It's an important to understand the lay of the land around you, so that (once you have claimed your fair share) you can correctly prioritize the AI's fair share of the goodies. This is usually done by signing open borders agreements with your neighbors very soon after writing, and training fast units (scouts, or chariots) to go look at their lands

2) You are at 1150 AD, and you haven't discovered Education yet. This suggests a very slow tech pace, which is confirmed by the fact that you are only producing 103 research a turn at break even.

A look at the demographics screen shows that your GNP is almost last (presumably, you are ahead of Shaka, and no one else). You aren't far behind the pace, but truthfully you shouldn't be behind the pace at all.

Demographics also shows that you are weak in production, and in food, and in soldiers. You are second in land, which suggests that you are badly developed.

3) A look at the statistics shows that you have trained 5 workers in 175 turns. That almost certainly means that the development of your land has been slow.

4) You've only got three great people to your credit -- an Artist (from Music?) and two Prophets (from the Oracle in the capital). That indicates that you haven't yet learned the great person mechanics, and how that fits into your planning.

5) Only five cities. You are clearly gimping yourself very badly in the opening. The 12 forests surrounding the capital suggest that you haven't yet learned that chopping down trees gives you hammers. Bronze working and chopping are an important element in ensuring that you get to claim more land than the AI does.

You've got three fish and a green cow that should each be feeding a city. You simply forgot to settle them. Likewise, there's a corn and a fish tile north of Carthage that ought to have been yours (but now they are claimed by cultural pressure from Greece.

You got your first settler only a little bit slow, but Utica looks like a pretty unhappy second city - it needs a lot of help to start contributing to your progress. Hard to be sure at this point, but you likely would have been better off going coastal.

Your remaining cities were definitely slow -- only three cities at turn 75? ouch. Not sure what you were doing then, but it wasn't playing to win.

6) Weak cities. Hadrumetum is just a mess -- it sort of looks like you wanted it to be a GP farm, but the land isn't really suitable. As it stands, it's a city with too much food. You would be much better off if those farms were maturing cottages.

Carthage is working 5 unimproved tiles! ouch ouch ouch. Three of those people working brown forests should instead be working green mines, and the others should probably be working cottages where those riverside forests stand.

7) While you are at war, your best city is busy sinking hammers into a world wonder, and another city is sinking hammers into a courthouse. Not a good choice when what you need are units units units.

War is supposed to be easy, but it's not going to be here because you have snowballed yourself so far behind -- failure to settle enough cities early has meant that you haven't had enough hammers since to build a good army.

Translated: all that time in the early game when you thought you were ahead, you were actually behind in the things that matter, and then you got caught flat footed as the AI caught up to you.



At Noble, until you can beat it regularly, I recommend aiming for the Rule of One: you should be first in GNP, first in Soldiers, first in Land, by 1AD. Once you are there, you can generally win any way you like.

 

[Zindaras]

I'll take a look at the savegame later but some general tips are:

-Build workers. I can't really stress how important that is. Settlers may start cities but its workers that actually build them. Aim to have about one worker per city. They may not have much use at the end of the game but they'll have earned their weight back in gold (and science and production and food) by then.
-I would advise you to try to split your cities into two types: commerce and production. Commerce cities will supply the science and wealth that you need to pay your maintenance costs and research important techs, while the production cities build the army that you will use to defend or attack at will. Try to make sure that each city has access to a solid source of food. Resources are best, but otherwise grasslands or plains will suffice, especially when close to a river. Each unit of population needs two food to feed. Count the amount of food in the city's BFC (Big Fat Cross: it's the tiles that the city can work). A good rule of thumb is that there should be just enough food in the city's BFC to feed enough people to work every single tile. If there is not enough food to do that, you'll have to build farms to make up the difference. Improve all the resources you have. For your commerce cities, a good plan is to just build cottages on every non-farm, non-resource, non-hill (build mines there) tile you have. Cottages take a long time to develop (which is why you need early workers to build early cottages) but they are really powerful once they mature. Commerce cities are best placed around rivers because river tiles yield extra commerce. For your production cities, try to place them in a place with a few hills and/or production resources. Build a couple of farms to provide food and then build mines.
-Do not build every building in every city. It's something I still want to do but it's just not efficient. Commerce cities should focus on building buildings that multiply science or gold (libraries/universities/observatories and markets/grocers/banks, respectively), while production cities should focus on production and military buildings (forge and barracks). Courthouses are good in basically every city. After you build the military buildings, just go all-out on units.
-Before you build a wonder, ask yourself this question: do I need this wonder to win? And with need I mean absolutely need, that you will automatically lose without it. Wonders are amazing and cool and I love them, but if you have problems at a difficulty level, they are a trap. You can choose: build a wonder...or build 10 units for the same cost, declare war, capture the wonder, and still have units to show for it. Clearly, the second is better.
-Build workers. Seriously. I know this rule and I still tend to wind up halfway through the game thinking to myself "I wish I had built more workers."
-Early expansion is key. Try starting off a game by building units, settlers and workers and ignoring buildings until you have 3-4 cities and 3-4 workers.
-The Rule of One is pretty nice: as long as you're ahead in everything, you can choose how you win the game, whether it's time, space race, or military conquest.

 

[iggymnrr]

My only time victory was on prince. Basically, success warmongering will do the trick. Get enough size to prevent an AI win. In the off chance the AI starts building spaceship parts, use spies to destroy their parts. Otherwise, run out the clock.

 

[BornInCantaloup]

Some people are going to tell me that I should be not fighting war, or this and that, and I have to say I don't think it matters.

Very wrong Don't feel bad about it: asking the right question is an admirable deed, indeed, when we deal with a game such as Civ4.
Some people will tell you that you need to recognize the situations where you will benefit from warring. Same people will then add that when you want to go to war, you need to set up to win the war.

I feel the need... the need for speed!

 

[Zx Zero Zx]

Don't try to win by time, because it is well a waste of time. It's not a reason victory condition. It is more of a cop out saying you couldn't win in time, but we will be nice to you because you are a little ahead of the AI in land + techs + pop + wonders, and such.

 

[Celebithil]

The best way to win by time, is to win by conquest and then refrain from pulling the trigger: That is, kill everybody, but let one civ have a single (preferably tundra) city, and surround that city (every tile in the BFC) with tanks. Then it is just a matter of not accidentally winning by culture (either really by culture, or by having border expansions triggering the domination victory. Did I mention you should start razing everything in sight around the time you hit 50% of land?) and pressing enter a few hundred times.

I mostly agree with Zx Zero Zx's comment, but would frame it a little differently. At some point the game just says "Well, this is taking too long, something must be wrong. Let's just declare someone (who seems to be ahead in a not completely superficial way) the winner and be done with it." Normally someone should have won a space or culture victory before the end date, unless domination or diplomatic victories come first (but computers typically don't dominate, and you can't really slowly grow your way to a diplo victory).

Thus to actually win time, you must prevent the AI from winning by culture/space, and the most reliable way to do that is to eliminate them. Of course you are not allowed to eliminate them all due to the pesky problem that that would trigger a win for you, so you have to keep a pet. Keeping the pet as small as possible keeps things as simple as possible.

Considering the above, purposefully trying to win by time is one of the harder ways to win, even though it might seem to be one of the simplest. If you can manage to thwart all AI plans until the end, you must be so powerful that you should be able to win by other means. I suggest you first try to win by space (if you're not that much of a warmonger), or in order to learn how to fight, aim to win by conquest/domination. Of course the tips others gave on how to improve your game will help with all victory conditions. Changing your focus from trying to be number 1 in score (not one of VoUs conditions in the rule of 1, though it is related to being first in land) to trying to build an army with which to crush the AI, and trying to develop your land to increase your production and commerce, should turn your game to a more advantageous direction.

 

[Zindaras]

I don't think the win condition really matters at this point. Clearly, it's going wrong before he gets into the position to win. First step is to get in that position. Once you're there, you can really choose how to win, whether it's by time or diplo or domination or conquest or space race.

 

[Zapurdead]

First off, I just want to say thanks to everyone who posted, all the advice here has been a huge help! The reason why I have been trying for a time victory is because while you can win a diplo or cultural victory on noble and possibly be "behind" in some sense, to win a time victory definitely is a macro challenge. Anyways, I have played a new game, and I will post a replay when I finish (for anyone who cares), but it's going very well. The main advice I have been following is:

• Scout scout scout out the continent early game to find resources
• Rush chop early to get quick workers and settlers
• Build more workers!
• Try to make better judgements on specialization

In the current game I'm playing, I actually have the opportunity to win by diplomatic victory through the Apostolic Palace, but I'm still going just for the sake of playing.

I just wanted to make one comment:

5) Only five cities. You are clearly gimping yourself very badly in the opening. The 12 forests surrounding the capital suggest that you haven't yet learned that chopping down trees gives you hammers. Bronze working and chopping are an important element in ensuring that you get to claim more land than the AI does.

One of the reasons why I was so behind is because I was obsessed with getting "perfect" cities. From reading guides, you often see those cities that are provided as examples of the "perfect" production or commerce city, and I got it in my head that settling anywhere else was a waste of time. Clearly, this was not the case.

 

[erajah]

Your main decision in civ is "will doing this pay off"? or "when will doing this pay off"? A small city that's working only a handful of useful tiles will pay it's initial cost (100 hammers/food) pretty quickly. Don't settle junk cities just for the purpose of settling cities. Try to have a worker there ASAP to start improving tiles. You've read guides on specializing cities so I assume you have the general idea of where to place cities. But the other reasons for settling cities would include choking off the AI, claiming off resources.

Civilization, like all strategy games is about snowballing. Small advantage in the beginning leads to huge advantage in the late game. That's why everyone on these forums talk about early game early game early game. A lot of games are decidedly won by the 1AD mark. The rest is just going through the motions.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

One of the reasons why I was so behind is because I was obsessed with getting "perfect" cities. From reading guides, you often see those cities that are provided as examples of the "perfect" production or commerce city, and I got it in my head that settling anywhere else was a waste of time. Clearly, this was not the case.

Yup

The usual guideline I offer in city planning (aka "dot mapping"): every city needs a food resource, every food resource needs a city.

It's not a perfect guideline, but I think it puts your attention in the right place and gets you asking the right sorts of questions.

Once you have an arrangement of good city sites, you can then evaluate what order to settle them in, and what the timing ought to be.

It's VERY common that you get two or three "perfect cities", and all of the other cities are compromises. This is a big part of exploiting city specialization -- the cities that aren't particularly anything get used to pitch in on the jobs that you don't have naturally "perfect" city to do.

And of course, the more capitals you capture, the more opportunities you have for perfect cities.

 

[Zapurdead]

So here is my replay (for those who are interest). I actually got a domination victory around 70 turns before time ran out, so I suppose whoever said that thing about time victories being hard unless you try is right (I'm sure a better player could have won quicker anyways). Unfortunately, it's not as exciting as I had hoped, I ended up stuck with 2 vassal states I couldn't get rid of.

Thanks everyone who gave me some advice here, and hopefully my victory was no fluke.

 

[Zindaras]

So here is my replay (for those who are interest). I actually got a domination victory around 70 turns before time ran out, so I suppose whoever said that thing about time victories being hard unless you try is right (I'm sure a better player could have won quicker anyways). Unfortunately, it's not as exciting as I had hoped, I ended up stuck with 2 vassal states I couldn't get rid of.

Thanks everyone who gave me some advice here, and hopefully my victory was no fluke.

My game actually tells me you've won conquest, not domination. The only opponents you have left are your vassals.

I'm actually pretty sure you won before this save. Probably at the end of the Gilgamesh war. Anyhow, that's not the point here. City placement is okay, though I feel like you've let a couple of good spots go to waste. I have a couple of screenshots in the spoiler, with the red spots being ones I think are good.

Spoiler :

This spot gets fish, clams and because Catherine is your vassal, it will also take her rice away from her. That's pretty good.



That's a good city. Probably shouldn't have razed it.



I think there's an argument to be made for either spot. 1W gets the stone and a lot less overlap, but I tend to put a large premium on riverside spots because of the ability to build a Levee and the fresh water that you get.



The eastern city is a really great spot. It's got 4 resources, 2 grass hills, riverside, coastal. You can do anything you want with that city. I'd love to have the western city be riverside as well, but going west reduces the overlap. I'd hate to agree with the AI, but that's a solid decision they made there.



The southwestern city gets a clam and can use it to work the marble. Farm the northern grassland and you can work the other plains hill as well while still growing, even without irrigation. The northeastern city is just pretty okay. It gets the fish, which is the best of the seafoods, and it gets a couple of grasslands and a plains.



The western city will always be a little food-scarce, but it gets 4 resources. The eastern city is riverside, coastal, and can use its food resource and the riverside farms you build there to work a lot of grassland mines. It's not perfect, but as far as production spots go, it's pretty darn good (you even get coal to boot).



Northern city gets clams, gems and lots of grassland, the southern city is riverside, coastal, gets a food resource and lots of grasslands, not bad. I just realise you can even move that southern city one west onto the plains, then fit in another city to get the eastern clams.



Crabs, grassland, that's solid enough.

Then, some general things:
-You raze a lot. Too much. You're only ever going to raze a city if you're going to resettle it somewhere else pretty soon afterwards (or if you're trying to fight a war of attrition and are afraid your opponent will retake the city quickly and don't want to sue for peace). You just kind of raze left and right. You even razed the Hindy Holy City, which is a very poor move. Not only will it ruin your diplomacy (you get a -2 penalty with everyone when you raze a Holy City), Hinduism was also the major religion in your game: that Shrine would've given you dozens of gold and would've been well worth the maintenance, regardless of where it was situated.
-Your National Wonders aren't well thought out. You put the National Epic in Carthage, even though there are about a dozen other cities at this point in the game with a higher Great Person Rate. The National Epic should go in your Great Person Farm, another type of city, where you basically just build a ton of farms and use all the food to feed specialists. The Heroic Epic is also in Carthage, but there's no West Point (Heroic Epic/West Point is a pretty good combination). The Oxford University is in Utica, but it's not your best science city (though it might've been when you built it, I'm not sure). You built Moai Statues in Novgorod even though it only has 4 water tiles to work. Aveiro, with its massive amount of water tiles, would be the best spot to build that (turning it into a pretty amazing city). You built Wall Street in Utica and incorporated Cereal Mills in Moscow. Wall Street in Utica is a good idea because it's the biggest shrine you'll be able to build (though the double shrine in Amsterdam, if you can build them, would also be pretty nice). But why then incorporate Cereal Mills in Moscow? You always want to incorporate your corporation into the city with Wall Street. No exceptions, really. You built the National Park in Coimbra, but there's no real point to that: it doesn't even have the Forest Preserves that would give it free specialists. Generally, I keep one city (or just space where I'll put a city later) which has a ton of forests in its BFC, then build the National Park there when I get Biology and fill it with Forest Preserves for the free specialists.
-Usually, when there's multiple continents, I want State Property to stop the extremely painful colonial maintenance. On the other hand, Cereal Mills is huge for you, allowing you to build workshops basically at will because every city will have the food it needs anyway. But State Property makes workshops really good, too...so I'm not sure what is better there. You can also consider making your American cities into a colony, though (press F1, then click the clenched fist). I checked and making the North American cities into a colony is a pretty good idea: it seriously increased my gpt. Liberating the South American and African colonies only cost me money, while the Australian colonies were pretty much break-even (in case of break-even, never do it). A nice side-effect of installing colonies is that if you really want to go for a time victory, getting colonies will lower your domination ratings.

Overall, though, you played this game pretty well. You were ahead in basically everything that matters (GNP, Production, Power) for pretty much the entire game. If you have the lead in all three of those categories, you're going to win.

 

[Zindaras]

In addition, considering the fact that you're Hannibal, coastal cities are extra good. Your Unique Building is a powered-up Harbor and your Financial trait makes every coastal and lake tile better. That's going to help your coastal cities pay for themselves pretty quickly.

And I'm personally a nuke-hater. They are a desperate measure for desperate times. Or, if you're so inclined, they are the perfect ending to the game, if you like watching your foes writhe in translucent agony.

 

[pigswill]

Just for the sake of it I played your first (1150ad) save to see if it coul be turned round...

Spoiler :

Bought peace with Shaka, costing me aesthetics. Moved southern army north, whipped and chopped suicidal cats, recaptured eastern city, survived three Salinist stacks before he coughed up drama for peace in 1500. Meanwhile went for lib/steel which I got c 1550ad. Then joined in the dogpile vs Shaka with Zara/Izy and Alex. Captured two Zulu cities before Shaka was annihilated. After steel I went for economics (picked up guilds and banking in trades) then astronomy. There's lots of land overseas waiting to be colonised. Couldn't be bothered to play further.

 

[Zindaras]

Just for the sake of it I played your first (1150ad) save to see if it coul be turned round...

Spoiler :

Bought peace with Shaka, costing me aesthetics. Moved southern army north, whipped and chopped suicidal cats, recaptured eastern city, survived three Salinist stacks before he coughed up drama for peace in 1500. Meanwhile went for lib/steel which I got c 1550ad. Then joined in the dogpile vs Shaka with Zara/Izy and Alex. Captured two Zulu cities before Shaka was annihilated. After steel I went for economics (picked up guilds and banking in trades) then astronomy. There's lots of land overseas waiting to be colonised. Couldn't be bothered to play further.

I feel these kind of things are very instructive. When defeat is inevitable, I always tend to go back and see if I can take another path that would allow me to win. This taught me the value of Spearmen/Pikemen and many diplomatic tricks. In my experience, there are no unwinnable games.

 

[Zapurdead]

I'm actually pretty sure you won before this save. Probably at the end of the Gilgamesh war. Anyhow, that's not the point here. City placement is okay, though I feel like you've let a couple of good spots go to waste. I have a couple of screenshots in the spoiler, with the red spots being ones I think are good.

-snip-

Yes, I think I actually did win a conquest victory after my war with Gilgo. First off, I just want to say thanks for taking the time to put all of this into screenshot form! I think some of those plots were cities previously, but I razed them and never resettled. Now that you've mentioned them though, I think I might go back and replay the game while settling those cities to see how much of an advantage it gives me (I imagine it will be quite big).

Then, some general things:
-You raze a lot. Too much. You're only ever going to raze a city if you're going to resettle it somewhere else pretty soon afterwards (or if you're trying to fight a war of attrition and are afraid your opponent will retake the city quickly and don't want to sue for peace). You just kind of raze left and right. You even razed the Hindy Holy City, which is a very poor move.

Yes, I was simply bored at that point and going through the rotations... I was very upset to find that somewhere along my march to the sea I razed a Holy City.

-Your National Wonders aren't well thought out. You put the National Epic in Carthage, even though there are about a dozen other cities at this point in the game with a higher Great Person Rate. ... The Heroic Epic is also in Carthage, but there's no West Point (Heroic Epic/West Point is a pretty good combination). The Oxford University is in Utica, but it's not your best science city (though it might've been when you built it, I'm not sure). You built Moai Statues in Novgorod even though it only has 4 water tiles to work. ... You built Wall Street in Utica and incorporated Cereal Mills in Moscow. ... You built the National Park in Coimbra, but there's no real point to that: it doesn't even have the Forest Preserves that would give it free specialists. Generally, I keep one city (or just space where I'll put a city later) which has a ton of forests in its BFC, then build the National Park there when I get Biology and fill it with Forest Preserves for the free specialists.

The ones I bolded I essentially built/didn't build at a point when it didn't really matter anymore. As for Oxford, I built it before I learned how to check city research through the domestic advisor, so who knows. I had so many cities I didn't want to look through all of them just to find those extra beakers. The tips about putting the corporation in Wall Street and the Forest Preserve are very useful though.

-Usually, when there's multiple continents, I want State Property to stop the extremely painful colonial maintenance. On the other hand, Cereal Mills is huge for you, allowing you to build workshops basically at will because every city will have the food it needs anyway.

As a personal choice, I just enjoy having a corporation and spreading it around (similarly with religion, I think it's some sort of sick pleasure, you can control a civ without controlling them), so I think I will stick with Free Market.

In addition, considering the fact that you're Hannibal, coastal cities are extra good. Your Unique Building is a powered-up Harbor and your Financial trait makes every coastal and lake tile better. That's going to help your coastal cities pay for themselves pretty quickly.

Very true. I will definitely keep that in mind, especially as I move up difficulties.

And I'm personally a nuke-hater. They are a desperate measure for desperate times. Or, if you're so inclined, they are the perfect ending to the game, if you like watching your foes writhe in translucent agony.

I used them because I didn't want to fight long battles. I guess I'm a genocidal maniac...
But apparently they speed up global warming, which I hate.

I will play another game soon on a higher difficulty, and I will also look at that replay when I have time. In conclusion though, seriously, thanks to everyone for the help!

 

[Zindaras]

Yes, I think I actually did win a conquest victory after my war with Gilgo. First off, I just want to say thanks for taking the time to put all of this into screenshot form! I think some of those plots were cities previously, but I razed them and never resettled. Now that you've mentioned them though, I think I might go back and replay the game while settling those cities to see how much of an advantage it gives me (I imagine it will be quite big).

You're welcome. A couple of them contain City Ruins, which imply that they were cities before. The only real reasons (as far as I can think of) to raze cities are horrible positioning (one off the coast is a crime against Civilization), too high maintenance, poor land or fear that you will lose the city to cultural pressure from others.

Yes, I was simply bored at that point and going through the rotations... I was very upset to find that somewhere along my march to the sea I razed a Holy City.

The snowball aspect of Civilization does make it boring sometimes, when victory is really a foregone conclusion. That's also the source of the whole 1AD rule. The start is where the game is won, irrespective of when it actually finishes.

The ones I bolded I essentially built/didn't build at a point when it didn't really matter anymore. As for Oxford, I built it before I learned how to check city research through the domestic advisor, so who knows. I had so many cities I didn't want to look through all of them just to find those extra beakers. The tips about putting the corporation in Wall Street and the Forest Preserve are very useful though.

I personally also tend to save my national wonders until really late, but I also try to plan a little bit ahead in the early game, trying to figure out where I'm going to build the National Park and Moai Statues, since these are very area-dependent national wonders (you want lots of water for the Statues and lots of forests for the Park). Heroic Epic/West Point go into my best production city (but usually not in my capital for some reason). National Epic goes into the city with the most wonders or the most specialists (if I'm not generating a lot of great people points (GPP) anywhere, then I may sometimes even wait and put it into the National Park city, though I'm sure that many others here will say that's a horrible strategy. Heroic Epic/West Point is an amazing combination of wonders and should always be built in the same city, in my opinion.

As a personal choice, I just enjoy having a corporation and spreading it around (similarly with religion, I think it's some sort of sick pleasure, you can control a civ without controlling them), so I think I will stick with Free Market.

The corporations are a fairly strong addition to the late game that was made in Beyond the Sword, so I'm not going to fault you for it. Just remember that colonial maintenance, especially when you move up in levels, becomes backbreaking. If you really want to keep using Free Market, consider liberating colonies with 4+ cities. I gained more than 100 gold per turn by liberating the North American cities in your save. As the amount of cities and the cities themselves grow, the maintenance only increases. Also remember that you can spread your corporations to your vassals, which may give them the benefits (though they will only get benefits from their own resources so they won't gain that much) but, more importantly, it will also give you even more gold from your headquarters, making you richer and richer.

I used them because I didn't want to fight long battles. I guess I'm a genocidal maniac...
But apparently they speed up global warming, which I hate.

I can't stand global warming either, though I've never understood the exact mechanics, which is part of the reasons I dislike nukes. But that's just an opinion I couldn't keep to myself. It's not actual criticism. Like I said, you had already won and how you want to end the game doesn't really matter. Nukes at least helped things along.

I will play another game soon on a higher difficulty, and I will also look at that replay when I have time. In conclusion though, seriously, thanks to everyone for the help!

Consider going to the Nobles Club, where there are games aimed specifically at players having trouble with the Noble level or trying to play more difficult games. They have a game going on right now. You can download the game and report your progress and ask questions in the thread, and you will probably get some answers.

 

[Robert FIN]

That domination victory sounds great. Just don't plan to win time victory. I'm playing on prince but I can tell you that prince AI will manage to win another type of victory before you survive to 2050 AD on score lead. So > Try domination or space race for example.

 

[ZeekLTK]

5) Only five cities. You are clearly gimping yourself very badly in the opening. The 12 forests surrounding the capital suggest that you haven't yet learned that chopping down trees gives you hammers. Bronze working and chopping are an important element in ensuring that you get to claim more land than the AI does.

This sounds like my problem. I hardly ever chop forests because I want to leave them to put lumbermills on later (I usually go for replaceable parts as quickly as possible, although yeah - it still takes a while).

Also, besides waiting for lumbermills, I think another reason is that I can never decide what NEEDS to be chopped. I will occasionally chop if I'm trying to rush a wonder, but if it's just some other random building then I always think "well... I'm not racing anyone for it, I can wait a few extra turns for it to finish without ruining a forest"... lol