Any new tactics for the new patch?

[Captain Crunch]

Hi everyone its my first post here. I have played all the civilization games. I usually play warlords at monarch level with epic setting.
The AI in the new warlords patch is the most annoying ever. But after all its a computer program. I remeber the previous games there very several weaknesses one could exploit and some strategies pretty much worked all the time.
I am starting this thread to see if there are strategies out there that seem to work well with this new patch.

1 thing that has been working for me is basically has been

GO TO WAR as early as you can take out your nearest opponent.
Before this patch came out my strategy used to be more peaceful. Build more wonders, try to advance in tech etc and then go to war.

Basically if early in the game if you can take over about 1.5 times or 2 times the land area of the the average opponents land area when the early land grab is finished you have very high chance to dominate and win later.

I can elaborate later but lets see what you guys have to say.

 

[FuRRie]

Well, not many game-play changes have occured, so the main strategies still work.
I do notice the AI has improved quite a lot.
They even dogpiled me on Noble (I managed to overcome it but still, 4 AI's isn't too easy to handle, even on Noble.

 

[Captain Crunch]

I agree about that. I mean dont you hate a scenario like the following.

Your civ is living peacfully your tech is ahead of your neighbours. They are happy with you. They share the same reiligion. Out of a sudden somebody gets pissed off at you and sends 10 units at your weakest defended city.
This used to be somewhat easier to manage before a couple of reasons.
1. The AI would attack your heavily fortified city but fail in turn letting your units gain experience. So in effect even if your targetted city was weak you could move in Archery units etc from other cities to beef it up.
2. The choice of attacking units would not be the best at times.

But now i have noticed if you city defenders are strong the AI never attacks you even if it has ten units. What it does is ruin all your country side plus its starts moving deeper in your territiry to attack another weaker city. Plus for some reason it never break its stcak like it used to before. So if you trying to to take out its units with units that have an advantage over them its not going to work. eg if you wanto use your pikeman to take out the knight you find a crossbowman protecting it.

My solution is dont let that stack ever build up and enter your borders. Keep your neighbours weak!!!!

 

[binhthuy71]

Captain Crunch nailed it. And the AI is definitely smarter about warmaking. I noticed that it was distinctly more able - even when it had to land units across the water. In a recent game, Monty (natch!) declared war with a landing of eight Cavalry in an uninhabited region of my home continent. They immediately spread out and began pillaging everything in sight. They were a real pain to chase down and kill while doing enough damage to require several turns to repair.
To make things even more interesting, Toku declared war within a couple of turns.
I reduced Monty to Vassalage and Toku now has two cities but in the meantime Mansa Musa is about to take a Space Race victory because I was too busy fighting to attend to research.
So, for me, the game became harder post patch.

 

[Captain Crunch]

I used to like Louis and Ramses before the patch. Both of them get it easier to make wonders. I thought i would like Louis more with the library boost. But the warmogering AI wouldnt let my Loius mature to a culture pumping machine. Regarding Ramses it is still playable with its war chariot but still there should be less emphasis on building and somewhat more on producing troops. Producing wonders and temples wont cut it as well.

2 of the best playble leaders after the patch in my opinion are
1. Cyrus
2. Julius Ceaser

The computer AI focuses more on attack but i have noticed that it is slightly easier to attack than defend. The AI after the patch is producing more mobile and attacking troops therefore is leaving a relatively weaker defence.
With both these guys you can capture cities early and keep your economy going at a decent rate.
Cyrus is amazingly good and easy at getting an early war started.
its really easy when you have wheel and a horse pops up in your neighborhood. Just pump out some immortals and attack the guy nearest to you. pretty soon you will have a great general.
With julius there is nothing sweeter than a having a couple of general praetorians early on.

Some other simple tips
1. Always use a great general on a swordsman or praetorian and get CR3. I dont know if someone has mentioned this before or not but longterm benefits are amazing. You can upgrade em to rifle/ infantry for free plus they retain the CR3 promotion which you cannot get with a regular gunpowder unit. A CR3 rifle or infantry and couple it with gunpowder promotion is brutish in capturing cities even if they are protected by gunpowder units
2. Early on if you have a choice try to attack a weaker civ first. eg if 1 civ has longbowman dont attack em but if one has just archers finish em off. You can also use the weaker civ as a jump to attack the stronger one. YOu can sacrifice its population to make troops plus make it your vassal.
3. Dont over expand. Like i mentioned before i think twice the area of the mean opponents area is enough. After the warmongering focus on development.

ps its more fun capturing wonders than building them

 

[Blake]

Compass.

It has recieved a serious boost in power. For a start it's one of the least valued techs for the AI, mainly because it's on a relatively barren tech branch, the AI's are all off chasing religions and wonders which are not to be found on the path to Astronomy.
You're almost guaranteed to get Compass first and be able to trade it around for high-powered techs like Alphabet, Theology, Code of Laws etc.

What's more, the harbor has been "Buffed". You know those giant cities the AI likes building now? Giant cities mean giant harbor trade routes! You can easily get 7c traderoutes early in the game.

Something else to consider is not researching Alphabet and letting the AI research it. They don't make it super priority but they'll certainly research it earlier, often by 1AD. Alphabet is no longer a key trading tech, other tech branches may provide more useful trade fodder. It largely depends on whether you want the Great Library or not, an AI who gets Alphabet is probably chasing the GL so you have to be fast.

 

[ABigCivFan]

I now build more culture, it is much easier to defend your cities when you have a larger cultural border.

I always build the best available mounted units to DEFEND. They can reinforce a weak area much faster and they generally have the HIGHEST attack strength so they can deal with any AI stacks.

I nomally have Military instructors in multiple cities so I could build specialized forces. With good battle field intelligence, I know when to throw in Shock, formation, pinch, flanking(soften up city defenders) and medic calvaries. You can build a powerful mixed battle group with mounted units alone. I make sure that i always have more elite troops than the AIs and this is easy to achieve with a Imp+Cha civ + the right civics.

If a neighboring AI gets strong(check the military score periotically), when you see its large stacks in its cities, the invasion is imminent. It is hard to defend all your cities, so I locate my city(ies) closest to this AI, and deliberately leave them lightly defended so i have a good chance to direct the AI to attack these cities. I could then mass my offensive forces nearby. After the AI take my bordering cities, I could march in my elite troops and slaughter his forces. I take advantage of my road infrastructure so I could concentrate my attack with impunity. From my experience, i could wipe out AI's attack forces within 3-6 turns using this "bait and trap" strategy. From that point, i take back my cities and go on offense. My losses are minimum and my troops gain tons of experience.

As for creating warlords, I would mostly attach them to mounted cause they can keep up with my largest forces(mounted in general). I give all 20 xp to a single unit to max out flanking I&II, leadership, tactics then combats to max his survialbility(60-90% withdral chance) and really use him in battle(+90% prob wining). I think 3 medic promotions is a waste on a warlord given their rarity. I always have enough medic II units doing the job. Question: How much does Medic III warlord heal/turn? 15% or 25% (10%+15%). Is it cummulative to Medic I & II bonus?

I alway try to have a good production coastal city. It helps a lot when you can pomp out some naval units quickly to deter AI landing. Always need a couple of latest naval units around in peach time too.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

Taking out your nearest opponent was a good strategy before the patch, heck even before the expansion. The AI just seems to be a bit more aggressive in denying you peaceful expansion opportunities. (I play Emperor/normal speed by the way.)

I don't know if it is the patch or not, but they seem to be expanding faster than before, but running into cashflow problems more often. I admit that I do more razing of towns and other improvements when I attack (emperor gives me serious money issues and razing enemy hamlets and resources helps alot with my cashflow), but even the far continent seemed to tech slower in my first couple games with the new patch (both playing continents).

Maybe they are getting good to the point of running into overexpansion problems that a human player faces. Maybe it's just an illusion, since the maps are so variable and the AI has all the built in cost advantages to help avoid overexpansion death.

 

[ABigCivFan]

I don't know if it is the patch or not, but they seem to be expanding faster than before, but running into cashflow problems more often.

I think having good production is so crucial now in early phase. (I am playing Deity/Large Pangee/Normal speed setting). It helps with early war, then helps even more after you drop to 0% research and have to rely on converting hammers to beakers for a while. Only good thing is you are always researching something everyone else already have so "cheaper" for you.

The AIs are so tough now even after you take out 3 out of his 5 cities, he would NOT give you a single tech for peace!

The war loot should help you for a while. Good production cities can quickly switch between war/research mode.

The cash flow problem should go away after you get Currency, COL, Calender when all your early land grab start to pay off big time. Suck up to the most powerful neighbor(trading, gifting, converting to his religion) Switch to Organized religion, build Forge, Markets, courthouse everywhere, hoop up all the luxouries/resources, and an empire is in the making.

 

[maxbjr]

Taking out your nearest neighbor (or neighbors) is key to later success now. Wipe them out early before they get too powerful to elimenate easily. I also have a few groups of fast response units around my empire now, in case AI civs or barbs show up. I also build more ships to protect my coastline now, I didn't have to worry about that until the 1700's before.

 

[jray]

I also build more ships to protect my coastline now, I didn't have to worry about that until the 1700's before.

Just wait until Firaxis fixes Barbarian Galleys (and Spearmen). Then you won't be able to succeed with a Chariot-only military anymore against the barbs .

 

[Captain Crunch]

I remember the original civ game. Those pesky barbarians would come out of nowhere in their triremes and land in the middle of your civ. Atleast we dont have to worry about that in the new warlords game.

Regarding which type of unit you should attack the leader to. I still think its the sowrdsman but in the end it depends on what you are seeking to do and which level you are playing at. Its relatively easy to produce a lot of culture laden city and be defensive when you are playing nobel. In that kind of strategy attaching leader to a horse unit is ok. I gues your goal woould be to effectively eliminate a maurading army.

It starts becoming a whole different ballgame when you play monarch and beyond. you need to be more proactive. Try to get a look at your opponents city in the beginning part of the game. at monarch. It gets a free worker plus the city grows at a very good rate. The AI can outspawn you easily. Although in the patch i have noticed The AI sometimes grows to a size 6 before spreading.
My point is in order to win you need to cut them down to your size before they grow so big they can turn you into rubble.

I will give you an example with the latest game i am playing with Julius. I am playing fractal. I had Kublai Khan, Ghandi, China(the guy that looks like kublai khan not mao), Mehmet and Shaka born on the same continent. During the initial part i could only spawn 2 cities. The only good thing i could do was to discover buddhism. I tried building wonders(i have acces to marble) but couldnt do it Ghandi, Brennus and some unknown civ at that time built most of them.
Now Buddhism is the only religion in that continent polyteism and monotheism got discovered by someone else. So everyone is budhist and friendly towards me.
I wanto ask you guys in order to win what would you guys do from now on. Remember you are Julius Ceaser only good things you have done so far is to discover budhism and find 3 cities. all the other wonders till the pyramids have been built by some other civ. I will tell you guys what i did later.

 

[ShaLouZa]

Well you're Rome, so it all comes down to one thing : do you have iron or not ?

 

[quizibuk]

I would say the biggest change for me is the lack of the CS slingshot, I now find myself almost happy about it, it forced me into going for a construction slingshot instead. If you have ivory or are Korea thats all you need.

 

[Captain Crunch]

I rushed to discover iron, putting other techs on back burner i couldnt get it i had bronze though. Iron popped up in a weak china city next to my capital. That was a do or die situation for me. Luckily china didnt have bronze didnt have horse at that time and hadnt gotten around to use its iron. So it immediatley went to war and captured its city with iron and went no further. China could only mount a weak offence in retaliation. The reason i didnt go further is that it would have just wasted my troops other cities were better defended china was protective so all the archers had city defence and drill to start off with and i still had just axemen.. So i made peace after a stalemate.

Now i had iron i turned my attention to build an army of preatorians. when i just had 3 i turned my attention to see who to attack now. China by now was better defended so i didnt wanto risk attaking it again. The weakest to attack was kublai khan. He had discovered horse but no iron and no bronze...ideal. So imade 1 spearman to counteract its chariot. Smaller cities fell i scrificed their population to build more prateorians. Even the capital wasnt hard to take. He had discovered horseriding by than but only could dish out 1 or 2 keshlik. His destiny was sealed. In the end i owned all his cities i had an army of praetorians plus i had 2 generals. In addition i had access to horse so i can build some chariots.

Now looking at the ranking Ghandi was the furthest he had built 3 wonders in his capital already. But he still hadnt discovered feudlism. Now icouldve waited trying to recover but if i wouldve waited it wouldve been too late. So imoved my whole army to the other side and attacked him and went straight for the capital. In the end i was left with all but 1 city of his city. I went ahead and pillaged the surroundings. the reason i didnt capture it was he had discovered feudilism by then. I had 3 general praetorians by then but again there were other fish in the sea. I turned my attention back to china and just creamed it.

Now i felt comfortable although i was back in tech i still hadnt discovered feudilsim i was ahead in points. I had the biggest area plus i had the biggest army. During my last fight with china i had focused into building wonders for my capital and the mongol capital which i had captured. Both had good amount of hammers. I was able to build some. So in the end i was ahead in wonders as well. Now at that time expansion was catching upto my economy so now i turned to consolidation. Build courthouses and forums let cities grow
and enjoy the fruit of great people. After a while my tech level caught up to the rest of the folks plus my ranking was easily 300-400 points more than the rest and gunpowder was just discovered then. The other people on my continent were just helpless. Ghandi was reduced to a noncompetition. Mehmet and Shaka had much weaker armies. I had 6 general praetorians at that time. i have noticed just the fact that you have a powerful army deters toher opponents from picking a fight with you. Some of them just started fighting amongst themselves lol

During the years of peace churchill, Toguwaka, Montezumu, Feredrick and some other civ came to visit my continent all of them were lagging behind. Brennus was the next best rank.

so after years of peace when i got rifleman i was planning to attack Brennus. He just didnt have some wonders but he was ahead in tech (One of the history compilations told me that. But he was weak. His land area was 1/4th the size. He had some good defenders but they wont be match for 5 city raiders rifleman.

But alas before i could start an attack shaka attacked my My culture was staring to convert 2 of his cities. He did some damage but my retaliation was swift. BY then i had Infantry. Oh man there is nothing better than a general infantry with CR3 strenght 2 and gunpowder trying a capture a city its like taking a candy from a baby.

So to cut long story short nearing the end i captured nearly my whole continent leaving mehmet and ghandi to 2 puny cities. My ranking point are twice more than the next best civ. Its going to be another augustus ceaser for me......time to sleep