Atomic Era - The End

[CaptainPatch]

Perhaps it's just because we were dealing with different maps. For me, things were not particularly cooperative. I was sandwiched between two CSs, but the first Caravan gained from Animal Husbandry could only reach one of them. That meant a second Caravan would have been a waste of time. The first Gt Merchant of Venice isn't gained until Optics is complete -- which puts you in the Classical Era. Usually in ALL of my other games, by the time I enter the Classical Era I've got 2-3 cities up and running. Here, I couldn't even get that 2nd city until Classical. Meanwhile, construction is carried entirely by Venice, all by itself. What do you want, Culture, Religion, Military, or Production enhancement? To get to Optics quickly, you're skipping Mining, Archery, The Wheel, Masonry, Calendar, etc. JUST TO BE ABLE TO HAVE A 2ND CITY. The first building that _starts_ to give you a Gt Merchant point-generating Specialist is the Marketplace. You can't get that until you've researched Animal Husbandry (which you already did to get 2 Caravans), Archery, The Wheel, Mathematics, and Currency. But by then, you very probably expended one or two Gt Prophets to get your Religion up and running -- which just drove the price of a Gt Merchant up to 600. [This is why I'm approaching the Renaissance and I haven't even generated a Gt Merchant on my own as of yet.] _Despite_ having built the Marketplace ASAP.

There are several Wonders available that help with generating Gt Merchant points, but it boils down to: What do you have your ONE city building? Wonders -- which someone else might/will probably beat you to the Finish Line -- or useful buildings and units that produce more money or Production or Science beakers?

I focused on building up Production and income as much as possible. Aside from a Library, there really wasn't much to improve Science beaker generation. So aside from that one free Gt Merchant of Venice -- which also helped to drive up the price of a Gt Merchant, so it wasn't entirely "free" -- I've only gotten that ONE other city. Which, btw, wasn't as useful as I thought it would be. I can _purchase_ buildings and units for the puppet city, but I can't do basic things like select just what should be built now, place population on tiles where they best support my strategy, select what the manpower focus should be (it's permanently set on gold generation, ignoring the benefits of greater productivity), etc. Further, it takes a puppet twice as long to build anything than it does Venice, and the city expands at half the speed. An incidental pain in the butt was that when my units investigated an Ancient Ruin, if the outcome was an increase in population in "the nearest city you own", practically all of those landed in the puppet -- which wasn't all that big, therefore having limited space to put population to work. I ended up with 4 citizens in the "overflow".

Despite all that, coming out of the Medieval Era, I'm about to take the lead in ALL categories, because of all of my CS Alliances. With several tech advances I got more Caravan range and more Cargo Ships reaching more distant CSs. So, even though the way Venice expands is by buying CSs, NOT being able to buy them has not been the long-term hindrance one might expect.

 

[Redaxe]

Then you are playing Venice wrong. Obviously when playing Venice, you should focus on Great Merchants and navy. That means beeline Great Lighthouse, get Mausoleum of Halicanassus, get markets and put specialists in merchant slots. Liberty is your friend because you will get a free MoV to get a very early puppet, and puppets are great for merchant specialists since they have force gold focus = more merchants = more puppets. Optics will give you another MoV and those Galeasses are not too bad either. Commerce is also your friend for increased Merchant production and buying GM with faith after Industrial.

Interesting, I haven't played Venice but I always assumed Tradition would be the best opener as you get a significant boost to your capital city. Does filling out the liberty tree give you a 2nd free Merchant of Venice from finishing the policy tree?

 

[mclericp]

I would like to start saying that I LOVE Civilization 5. This is not a complain, just asking for information from those with larger experience than me.

Ok, here is the thing: I never lost a game if I got to the Atomic Era. Last game I played Babylon (First time!)/Emperor/Standard/Small Continents with 1 extra Civ was pretty rad up until Modern Era, where I got the top place from Lizzy for the first time. After that, the game just became dull; I eclipsed every other Civ in Technology, had almost every City-State as an ally, had the most wonders/policies/happiness.

When it came to the Victory, I had all City-States as allies, Lizzy was gone, 2 Civs Guarded and every other 'Afraid', every Spaceship part built, 3 Capitals (mine included), 47 Delegations + Dido and Pachacuti's unconditional support (39 needed to win) and won by Culture. People are just too nice with each other, when pressing F4, every thing on the Global Politics details was GREEN! Nobody denouncing, no wars, just happiness and friendly talk every where you look! I had to bribe people into fighting, but just 10 turns later they make peace. ALWAYS.
I already had researched FIVE Future Techs, and most of them were still entering Atomic Era, with only Dido left behind in the Renaissance.

I'm wondering, do this still happen in higher difficulties? This was just my third game in Emperor and it just feels boringly easy. My first Emperor was awesome as I struggled to build the first Wonders I wanted and was even nearly wiped out by two neighboring civs, and went so-so up until the end. The second one was just boring, but I believe it was because three Civs were wiped at Medieval thanks to Shaka and Attila's unseemly alliance.

Just now I started a game with Babylon again, 15 Civs, Huge map, Small Continents (I loved this map setting!) on Emperor again. I don't want to play Deity because they start with too many Techs and I would never be able to build the Wonders I like.

TL;DR: The games becomes too easy/boring near the end. Not enough fights, not enough challenge as well. Any solution?

Try emperor on Yet another earth map mod it is a whole different story
I(rome) am fighting against USA china siam korea morroco carthage and England. Already crushed India egypt and babylon but stupid India fired a nuclear warhead into Thebes(my largest city) causing me to rage.

 

[direblade99]

Interesting, I haven't played Venice but I always assumed Tradition would be the best opener as you get a significant boost to your capital city. Does filling out the liberty tree give you a 2nd free Merchant of Venice from finishing the policy tree?

Tradition is by far more optimal, but you could always go down liberty as well after because of reduced policy costs of only one city. Problem with that is you miss out on either commerce which venice loves, exploration which also suits venice somewhat or even part of rationalism because you will be getting it late.

 

[kaspergm]

Interesting, I haven't played Venice but I always assumed Tradition would be the best opener as you get a significant boost to your capital city. Does filling out the liberty tree give you a 2nd free Merchant of Venice from finishing the policy tree?

Yes, you can choose another MoV in the end of the tree (although personally I would still go for the Engineer to grab a nice wonder).

Dunno about Tradition and Venice, Tradition is good, but I somehow feel it's less urgently needed when playing Venice. With only one major city, those free buildings are less needed, the gold and happiness bonus is also less urgently needed because gold is pretty abundant (to say the least) as Venice. The free food from Tradition is nice, but on the other hand Liberty gives you free production, so that sort of evens out. It might depend on the level you play, but for me, Liberty worked perfectly fine.

 

[lindsay40k]

Filling out Liberty could get a MoV, but the food for a tall Venice is not the only thing Enrico loves about Tradition - if you're playing a difficulty where it's possible, building HG in your only 'proper' city can be pretty important if there's no fresh water. Venice is rich, and Tradition amplifies that advantage very nicely - great synergy with the Commerce the gold-heavy rush-buying Venetian economy adores.

 

[GhostSalsa]

There are several Wonders available that help with generating Gt Merchant points, but it boils down to: What do you have your ONE city building? Wonders -- which someone else might/will probably beat you to the Finish Line -- or useful buildings and units that produce more money or Production or Science beakers?

Ok this thread is derailed to Venice discussion haha.

Who needs buildings? Early food cargo ships to capital are better than early buildings. Tech for optics, then mining, then tech for currency. Don't worry about writing. Having triple population on turn 100 is more science than third-population x .5 extra beakers x 50% national library.

Cargo ships are better than buildings.

(Yes that depends on starting layout. I'll admit I re-roll Venice of there aren't nearby coastal CS's. But I'm pretty picky about all my coastal starts these days... nearby spots for expansion/cargo routes or it's not worth lack of a river.)

Also I say go Tradition for HG. MoV's are your cities, HG reduces pop-up time and it's on the currency line, invaluable.

In my last Venice game I don't remember when I got second city, probly t90ish, but after then with the Commerce left side policy you pop your next 6 or so MoVs really fast.

 

[Ninakoru]

Last game I played Babylon (First time!)/Emperor/Standard/Small Continents

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Just now I started a game with Babylon again

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Playing some civs makes things much easier, Babylon is no doubt one of those civs.It's like lowering one difficulty level. Same goes for Arabia, Korea, Poland for example.

If you win in everything to all AIs at that moment, maybe you should move to Immortal with Babylon, or play Emperor again with a less OP civ. It's a usual moment in BNW you can often say it's over, but If you clearly outpace everyone is an indicator you should play a higher difficulty.

 

[kaspergm]

Filling out Liberty could get a MoV, but the food for a tall Venice is not the only thing Enrico loves about Tradition - if you're playing a difficulty where it's possible, building HG in your only 'proper' city can be pretty important if there's no fresh water. Venice is rich, and Tradition amplifies that advantage very nicely - great synergy with the Commerce the gold-heavy rush-buying Venetian economy adores.

Going into Liberty WILL get you a MoV, because you get a free MoV instead of the Settler other civs get with collective rule. On top of that, you will ALSO get the free GP at the end of the tree (which you can pick as another MoV or can choose to get a GP to rush a wonder).

Of course, mixing trees is perfectly viable, you can spend one policy to open Tradition if you really want the HG, if you do this early, the culture in capital from Tradition opener will make it almost cost neutral until around the time you'll finish your first tree anyway - or you can go only left side of Liberty and max out Tradition, although this seems significantly less desirable than the other combination.

HG are nice, but with double trade routes and ability to buy in puppets, you only need to allocate one trade route to give the same food. Of course, if you don't get a fresh water start, the free Garden is very worthwhile.