Watery Maps

[twilson1972]

One of the aspects i love about strategy games is naval warfare- the high movement rate of ships, coastal bombardment etc brings in a lot of potential for tactics in my mind.

Im english, and heavily into history and know full well the massive impact the royal navy had on the world...and like recreating the british empire (sad maybee, but it provides immersion)

But, the AI seems completely incapable of using its ships at all, marching land units in front of frigates etc.

To compound that, the AI seems utterly incapable of spreading its cities across watery maps. This seems a step backwards as at least the BTS AI would colonize islands.

It essentially means on a watery map - beeline frigates and win (not sure if its the same on deity?)

So the answer is play pangea i guess ...but i find them boring and unrealistic and to me it takes out a level of combat strategy

Why do people think the AI is so useless on watery maps?. Is it the 1UPT? i can remember big invasion fleets from the AI in BTS.

And what do people play (map wise) to not gimp the AI but still give themselves a naval flavored game? Continents? Small continents?.

Or is everyone here playing pangea???.

 

[beetle]

I like watery maps too, but I agree they are easier. So just go up a difficulty level? If I am playing small continents or archipelago then I hand-opponents so they all have some kind of naval UU/UA, and that seems to helps quite a bit. I have also tried some of the other watery maps like ring and donut and inland sea. None of those boosted the AI play in my experience.

I think people like Pangaea, Fractal, Continents because (1) they are harder while being reasonably comparable game-to-game with each other, and (2) well suited to random AI opponents. No, not everyone plays Pangaea 8 civs, standard size and pace, but that combo is the largest plurality. If you want to compare game experience, that combo is the default baseline.

 

[twilson1972]

I like watery maps too, but I agree they are easier. So just go up a difficulty level? If I am playing small continents or archipelago then I hand-opponents so they all have some kind of naval UU/UA, and that seems to helps quite a bit. I have also tried some of the other watery maps like ring and donut and inland sea. None of those boosted the AI play in my experience.

I think people like Pangaea, Fractal, Continents because (1) they are harder while being reasonably comparable game-to-game with each other, and (2) well suited to random AI opponents. No, not everyone plays Pangaea 8 civs, standard size and pace, but that combo is the largest plurality. If you want to compare game experience, that combo is the default baseline.

Cheers mate, its made my dominance on first imm game feel really hollow as the ai is just so incompetent with water- you wouldn't believe how many enemy knights/crossbows ive sunk while they were embarked

There was no attempt to destroy my navy first, no attempt to calculate whether my frigates can sail in range and blast them etc etc. Literally my enemy just sent land unit after land unit across the sea to give my navy free kills.

My wife was laughing at me last night for 'talking to my laptop' as i cursed AI stupidity.

Ill restart and handpick england etc as opponents and maybe go for continents plus.

I think there is something wrong with the AI for settling as well, when i went on the offense they had hardly expanded, areas with good food and lux were untouched...on imm id expected to struggle to grab enough land.

I guess on deity sheer unit bonus's will change that and ill get behind on tech bigtime?

It feels wierd putting the difficulty up to deity as i played BTS to death, but i only ever played immortal/( more often just emperor)...on immortal BTS water games the sheer size of the SOD could scupper me big time occasionally (vikings with 30 berserkers arriving at my capital still sticks in my memory )

Hate standard pace btw as game flies by, i always play epic- i guess that makes it easier too?

 

[Volcanon]

The AI doesn't do navy well. They also embark units right in front of you so you can use your frigate or whatever to kill them in one hit. I once sniped eight battleships on emperor with a single submarine and the AI simply just kept shuffling the battleships around without running away or finding the sub.

The AI tends not to protect its trade routes, too, so a well-placed ship can earn you 400 gold within a turn or two of a DOW.

The best part of naval combat is getting privateers and stealing ships. Those privateers keep that ability when you promote them, so you can steal endgame ships.

Also double attacking 4-range battleships that deal bonus damage to everything is awesome.

Exploration is obviously a social tree you want to get if you like boats. If you're always +1 faster than the other players' boats you can sink or steal the ones that flee.

 

[twilson1972]

The AI doesn't do navy well. They also embark units right in front of you so you can use your frigate or whatever to kill them in one hit. I once sniped eight battleships on emperor with a single submarine and the AI simply just kept shuffling the battleships around without running away or finding the sub.

The AI tends not to protect its trade routes, too, so a well-placed ship can earn you 400 gold within a turn or two of a DOW.

The best part of naval combat is getting privateers and stealing ships. Those privateers keep that ability when you promote them, so you can steal endgame ships.

Also double attacking 4-range battleships that deal bonus damage to everything is awesome.

Exploration is obviously a social tree you want to get if you like boats. If you're always +1 faster than the other players' boats you can sink or steal the ones that flee.

As the english naval speed is never an issue i dont try for TGL but i have speed anyway

I finally weaned myself off going for GL or TGL when i started playing king, even on king wonders would go at T45, so i dont even think about them on emp/immortal

But yes love exploration tree ...i just wish the AI would play water maps too...

 

[RuleroftheHex]

I'm not so sure that watery maps are easier than Pangaea. While watery maps don't need scouts, I find that it's hard to worker-steal since you need to get Optics fast and have a CS to steal from. Meanwhile, you have to build a trireme or two to scout for city spots. Also, watery maps suffer from reduced production and greater competition for certain wonders, like Colossus. All in all, watery maps end up being different rather than easier.

 

[dasaard200]

On water maps, Exploration is a must; even when not playing as England or other 'naval' civ. With enough land area for a few cities, I think that 'wide' becomes an operable scheme, using close islands to set up 'relatively secure' swaths of ocean to encyst CSs for trading TRs, Barbie free .

Yeah, going wide gets science & culture costs; more island cities = higher manpower caps = bigger navy; and when you get to Frigates en masse ...

To add spice to the Game, I like using the "Insane Raging Barbie+ Package": (Barb. Unlimited XP, Barb. Increased Spawn, Caravansary Trade Routes, and More Luxuries mods) ; with Raging Barbarians ON .

 

[beetle]

I'm not so sure that watery maps are easier than Pangaea... All in all, watery maps end up being different rather than easier.

The main thing that makes watery maps easier and not just different is that the AI are even worse at warfare. The things you mention are frustrations, but none of them add up to enough to give a strong advantage to the AI.

 

[RuleroftheHex]

On water maps, Exploration is a must; even when not playing as England or other 'naval' civ. With enough land area for a few cities, I think that 'wide' becomes an operable scheme, using close islands to set up 'relatively secure' swaths of ocean to encyst CSs for trading TRs, Barbie free .

Yeah, going wide gets science & culture costs; more island cities = higher manpower caps = bigger navy; and when you get to Frigates en masse ...

To add spice to the Game, I like using the "Insane Raging Barbie+ Package": (Barb. Unlimited XP, Barb. Increased Spawn, Caravansary Trade Routes, and More Luxuries mods) ; with Raging Barbarians ON .

I have never hit the manpower cap, and I play on Deity. You simply don't need a Carpet of Death to beat the AI. Moving to Exploration, I don't think it's a must. Maritime Infrastructure is the most useful of the policies, but the rest of Exploration is pretty awful. Instead, I would wait and go Rationalism, because it's more useful as a whole. Unless you're doing a Dido 100-something city Liberty game, Exploration simply isn't worth your time when compared to Commerce or Rationalism.
Also, in response to beetle, I'd say that the inability to worker steal isn't just an annoyance, it's an aspect that slows down your game. Likewise, lowered production means that the AI's production bonuses are more pronounced. These are more than annoyances. Also, on Pangaea, you can find more Ruins and explore faster, with a more streamlined tech path.

 

[Delnar_Ersike]

I'll chip in with a short thing I haven't seen mentioned yet: Great Generals are more useful on land maps than Great Admirals are on naval maps. The main reason for this is that both units have a movement speed of 2, but while most ranged land units also have a movement speed of 2, ranged naval units usually have a movement speed of at least 5 (ranged units being the workhorse of Civ5's combat system due to the way it's set up to favor ranged units). This means that in most cases, Great Generals can move with your armies, but Great Admirals will lag behind by several turns, so much so that by the time they catch up to your naval army fighting a battle somewhere, the outcome of the battle has already been decided (naval fights are also faster than land fights because there are no defensive terrain bonuses and units cannot heal passively).

 

[RuleroftheHex]

Delnar_Ersike brings up a good point. Great Great Generals not only are more useful, but their bulb ability is much stronger. Because naval battles involve a lot of focus fire, the AoE nature of the GA is overrated. Also, the only realistic way GAs would be worthwhile is with Navigation School, which is just... ew.