omnimirage
Chieftain
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2012
- Messages
- 37
I've discovered the wonderful mod called AdvCiv, it has made the game more fun than ever for me. I'm attempting to beat it on Diety, and it's proving immensely challenging. I used to beat Diety using Mansa Musa, doing a simple Skirmisher + Cottage rush but I found it doesn't work as well on AdvCiv largely due to Financial being nerfed to an incredible degree ( I dislike this change on the mod).
So I'm playing Egypt now. At first I was trying with Hatshepsut, I was able to conquer a lot of civilizations, cities and land with early War Chariot rushes. This was a losing strategy, as there's been gross changes to city maintenance in the mod that doesn't produce a cap on city maintenance costs, so basically, I would conquer a huge amount of land, and then I wouldn't be able to advance my technology and keep up with the race due to the majority of commerce going to city maintenance.
So now I've been trying as Ramesses II and it's been going better than my other attempts. My strategy is the following:
Research:
Mining > Masonry > Bronze Working > Hunting > Archery > Mysticism > Polytheism > Monotheism, trade when I can for Pottery, Writing and Animal Husbandry.
Build order:
1st city: Worker, Settler, Pyramids, Wall, Great Wall,
2nd city: Worker, Wall, Archer, Settler
There's been changes to Great Wall. It now provides an extra trade route in all cities, it also produces great merchant points rather than great spy. The Great Wall also requires the technology of Archery, and it requires two Walls to be built.
I've been researching Mysticism, Polytheism, Monotheism, because the AI has differing technology research priorities now and I found that I can take that research path and consistently trade them for Pottery, Writing and Animal Husbandry.
When my third settler is built, I send it out to wherever the best Horse resource location is present, to allow me to spam War Chariots.
I basically have been spending a good amount of time regenerating maps to find a good start that has stone, food, plenty of forests to chop and maybe a few extra bonuses. When I do this, I estimate about 40% of the time I'm able to complete both Pyramids and Great Wall in time. It seems to make a noticeable difference in success rate if I settle the capital on top of a Hill Stone Plains, rather than just a Stone Plains.
A reasonable amount of the time, I get screwed by either barbarians (which I can defend with by whipping an emergency warrior/archer) or an early rush attack by a neighboring civilization, they tend to rush with Archers and Chariots this early stage of the game. The AI is inclined to attack if my power is incredibly weak, so it's important that I get War Chariots built quickly to persuade invaders to not invade.
I then use the great person points to generate either a Great Engineer, or Great Merchant, to then bulb Metal Casting, which I can then use to trade for other technologies. It seems possible that I might even be able to build Parthenon if I have marble and trade for Aesthetics with Metal Casting.
At this point, I'm unsure how to proceed. Since I'm going for a Farm + Specialists Economy, Banking is appealing, upgrading veteran War Chariots to Knights is appealing as well, as is beelining to Gunpowder to keep up with the aggressive AIs. This is the strategy I've been implementing but I've never survived long enough to get to Gunpowder.
I seem to constantly get stuck in perpetual states of war. Usually, I either start going aggressive on a neighbour because they don't have access to metals/spearmen and so I rush War Chariots to conquer them, that or someone starts declaring war on me. Because a War Chariot costs 80 hammers, and Granaries cost 195, I often don't find I have the time to build Granaries. I'm constantly needing new military units. When I defeat one Civilization, it often doesn't take long at all before I'm brought into a second war, where it becomes clear that they're going to keep declaring war on me until I conquer them. If I do conquer them, by this time Free Religion might come into play or other factors, that might lead other Civilizations to invade, requiring me to build more military units. I'm often whipping my cities down to 1 pop in order to produce military units to win wars: if I know a conflict between myself and my neighbour will only end when one of us is conquered, and that they're spending their hammers building more military units, then I often reason it's a better usage of hammers to simply rush War Chariots and conquer their cities. If I do conquer a city, I tend to be able to use it's population to whip out more War Chariots, to enable myself to conquer the next city. All this becomes an issue though when I notice that I'm 400 turns in and yet some of my earliest foundation cities still haven't had time to build a Granary, let alone other infrastructure. Since I'm whipping often down to such low population, I often don't have the extra population available to be able to hire Specialists, since the first few population tends to go to food, when I get to 4 Population I often whip it back down again meaning I'm not benefiting from Represenation as much as I should. However, I often conquer cities with Great Generals and sometimes Great People in them, which all give an extra three science beakers which seems to help quite a lot.
I haven't just about ever had the time to build a Barracks, because simply more military units seems often better. I tend to rarely build Libraries, because they cost so much hammers and Obelisks cost much less and also provide culture and specialists.
Here's my current game:
https://postimg.cc/gallery/LP7T2Jc
I'm in a dicey situation. I have three cities but I'm crammed between India, Inca, Ethiopia and the warmonger Zulus are close by as well. The Barbarian city to the left is populated by a Spearmen, Axeman and two Archers. India to the right is spreading it's dominating religion, and Bombay is right up against my capital and is a Holy City with the Shrine developed for it. I've started to build Granaries, because I haven't connected the road up to building War Chariots yet and I figure if I don't start spamming them very soon, someone will invade me and it'll be game over.
One big thing I'm unsure about is, should I try to build a Library, to be able to create science specialists, to then attempt to bulb Machinery? With Metal Casting, I can likely trade it for Aesthetics, and Alphabet. If I then don't trade for Fishing, this will allow a Great Scientist to contribute a large amount of beakers towards Metal Casting, to then help me advance quicker with that beeline helping me to keep up with technology and giving me early techs to trade for other things. The only problem with the Library is, that it costs an absolutely huge amount of hammers. I can build one Library, or one Obelisk and 2.5 War Chariots for the same price. I want Specialists early, the city of Memphis has a high food output potential, I settled it on rice, and then there's 4 Flood Plains nearby. It's also squished between other civilizations and needs some culture to spread. If I build an Obelisk, I can get Specialists earlier and War Chariots, which will help me not get invaded and might me declare war and conquer a nearby neighbour, that Bombay holy city is appealing. But if I build the Obelisk, I won't have a great person point pool that is pure and instead of getting a great scientist to bulb Machinery, I'll get a Great Priest, who I probably can only settle, which is still decent with Representation but not amazing. But if I wait to build Library, I'm not sure how long it'll take to get there considering I only have three cities and only 3 Archers: I imagine I'll need to spam War Chariots to get out of this position.
Another thing is I got lucky with receiving the quest for building War Chariots. If I build 17 War Chariots, War Chariots will get Combat I promotion for free, and my state religion will also spread to 5 other of my cities for free too.
Any feedback on my position, thought process is appreciated. I'm finding it difficult to know how to balance military production, and infrastructure, and the development of Specialists.
So I'm playing Egypt now. At first I was trying with Hatshepsut, I was able to conquer a lot of civilizations, cities and land with early War Chariot rushes. This was a losing strategy, as there's been gross changes to city maintenance in the mod that doesn't produce a cap on city maintenance costs, so basically, I would conquer a huge amount of land, and then I wouldn't be able to advance my technology and keep up with the race due to the majority of commerce going to city maintenance.
So now I've been trying as Ramesses II and it's been going better than my other attempts. My strategy is the following:
Research:
Mining > Masonry > Bronze Working > Hunting > Archery > Mysticism > Polytheism > Monotheism, trade when I can for Pottery, Writing and Animal Husbandry.
Build order:
1st city: Worker, Settler, Pyramids, Wall, Great Wall,
2nd city: Worker, Wall, Archer, Settler
There's been changes to Great Wall. It now provides an extra trade route in all cities, it also produces great merchant points rather than great spy. The Great Wall also requires the technology of Archery, and it requires two Walls to be built.
I've been researching Mysticism, Polytheism, Monotheism, because the AI has differing technology research priorities now and I found that I can take that research path and consistently trade them for Pottery, Writing and Animal Husbandry.
When my third settler is built, I send it out to wherever the best Horse resource location is present, to allow me to spam War Chariots.
I basically have been spending a good amount of time regenerating maps to find a good start that has stone, food, plenty of forests to chop and maybe a few extra bonuses. When I do this, I estimate about 40% of the time I'm able to complete both Pyramids and Great Wall in time. It seems to make a noticeable difference in success rate if I settle the capital on top of a Hill Stone Plains, rather than just a Stone Plains.
A reasonable amount of the time, I get screwed by either barbarians (which I can defend with by whipping an emergency warrior/archer) or an early rush attack by a neighboring civilization, they tend to rush with Archers and Chariots this early stage of the game. The AI is inclined to attack if my power is incredibly weak, so it's important that I get War Chariots built quickly to persuade invaders to not invade.
I then use the great person points to generate either a Great Engineer, or Great Merchant, to then bulb Metal Casting, which I can then use to trade for other technologies. It seems possible that I might even be able to build Parthenon if I have marble and trade for Aesthetics with Metal Casting.
At this point, I'm unsure how to proceed. Since I'm going for a Farm + Specialists Economy, Banking is appealing, upgrading veteran War Chariots to Knights is appealing as well, as is beelining to Gunpowder to keep up with the aggressive AIs. This is the strategy I've been implementing but I've never survived long enough to get to Gunpowder.
I seem to constantly get stuck in perpetual states of war. Usually, I either start going aggressive on a neighbour because they don't have access to metals/spearmen and so I rush War Chariots to conquer them, that or someone starts declaring war on me. Because a War Chariot costs 80 hammers, and Granaries cost 195, I often don't find I have the time to build Granaries. I'm constantly needing new military units. When I defeat one Civilization, it often doesn't take long at all before I'm brought into a second war, where it becomes clear that they're going to keep declaring war on me until I conquer them. If I do conquer them, by this time Free Religion might come into play or other factors, that might lead other Civilizations to invade, requiring me to build more military units. I'm often whipping my cities down to 1 pop in order to produce military units to win wars: if I know a conflict between myself and my neighbour will only end when one of us is conquered, and that they're spending their hammers building more military units, then I often reason it's a better usage of hammers to simply rush War Chariots and conquer their cities. If I do conquer a city, I tend to be able to use it's population to whip out more War Chariots, to enable myself to conquer the next city. All this becomes an issue though when I notice that I'm 400 turns in and yet some of my earliest foundation cities still haven't had time to build a Granary, let alone other infrastructure. Since I'm whipping often down to such low population, I often don't have the extra population available to be able to hire Specialists, since the first few population tends to go to food, when I get to 4 Population I often whip it back down again meaning I'm not benefiting from Represenation as much as I should. However, I often conquer cities with Great Generals and sometimes Great People in them, which all give an extra three science beakers which seems to help quite a lot.
I haven't just about ever had the time to build a Barracks, because simply more military units seems often better. I tend to rarely build Libraries, because they cost so much hammers and Obelisks cost much less and also provide culture and specialists.
Here's my current game:
https://postimg.cc/gallery/LP7T2Jc
I'm in a dicey situation. I have three cities but I'm crammed between India, Inca, Ethiopia and the warmonger Zulus are close by as well. The Barbarian city to the left is populated by a Spearmen, Axeman and two Archers. India to the right is spreading it's dominating religion, and Bombay is right up against my capital and is a Holy City with the Shrine developed for it. I've started to build Granaries, because I haven't connected the road up to building War Chariots yet and I figure if I don't start spamming them very soon, someone will invade me and it'll be game over.
One big thing I'm unsure about is, should I try to build a Library, to be able to create science specialists, to then attempt to bulb Machinery? With Metal Casting, I can likely trade it for Aesthetics, and Alphabet. If I then don't trade for Fishing, this will allow a Great Scientist to contribute a large amount of beakers towards Metal Casting, to then help me advance quicker with that beeline helping me to keep up with technology and giving me early techs to trade for other things. The only problem with the Library is, that it costs an absolutely huge amount of hammers. I can build one Library, or one Obelisk and 2.5 War Chariots for the same price. I want Specialists early, the city of Memphis has a high food output potential, I settled it on rice, and then there's 4 Flood Plains nearby. It's also squished between other civilizations and needs some culture to spread. If I build an Obelisk, I can get Specialists earlier and War Chariots, which will help me not get invaded and might me declare war and conquer a nearby neighbour, that Bombay holy city is appealing. But if I build the Obelisk, I won't have a great person point pool that is pure and instead of getting a great scientist to bulb Machinery, I'll get a Great Priest, who I probably can only settle, which is still decent with Representation but not amazing. But if I wait to build Library, I'm not sure how long it'll take to get there considering I only have three cities and only 3 Archers: I imagine I'll need to spam War Chariots to get out of this position.
Another thing is I got lucky with receiving the quest for building War Chariots. If I build 17 War Chariots, War Chariots will get Combat I promotion for free, and my state religion will also spread to 5 other of my cities for free too.
Any feedback on my position, thought process is appreciated. I'm finding it difficult to know how to balance military production, and infrastructure, and the development of Specialists.