Can anyone win this game?

[Hjor]

This is my friend's game. He was playing a regent game as portugal and it looks pretty dismal. I'm a Monarch->Emperor player and I'm trying to win it, but it's not looking so good. I think I'm going to lose to Space Race. I am wondering if anyone else would like to try to make a comeback. I don't think its unwinnable.

Here's the situation:
1)we (portugal) are in the industrial age, in democracy. strongest AI civs are in the modern age
2)we are in 2nd place score-wise
3)we are at war with a lot of people
4)we have poor infrastructure (not many marketplaces/etc), therefore we are poor.

During the first turn you might want to un-automate all the workers and take off city governors (annoying!!!)

I'm attaching the original save that he passed on to me. Can you win? Tell me how you did it if you can Good luck!

This is for Conquests (most recent patch)

 

[vmxa]

Well those automated workers are good at getting captured that is for sure and little else.

1345AD and still lot of tiles not even having roads another by product of automation.

Too many units for Demo and with all these wars, you will be getting WW issues real soon.

Top shields city is only 14, that is about what I would expect in an AA city, not late IA.

The good news is you have American near and they are at war with you and a lot of others as well. They have to be making a contribution to your empire.

Probably I would look at dumping Combustion and go to RP. You need those infantry and faster workers. Go through all cities to unload junk units, structures such as colloseums should never be built at this level (maybe any level).

Get units to the front and upgrade some. Reassigning pop and get some cannons.

Consider a switch to Monarchy and maybe even mob. Then act as if it was an alwyas war game. You need high kill ratios and that means top defenders, bombardment units and kill zones. You will be facing better units for a long time as you cannot do much damage without getting some armies.

How did they get to 1345Ad and have no army at all. Even a peacenik should have 1 or 2 by now.

 

[CoolioVonHoolio]

yea. demo is a terrible gov for this situation
and WOW your far behind in techs. i dont think it is possible to come back. the only thing i could think of is try to make peace with everyone, switch your gov to communism or fasism and start pumping out cavalry. but you dont have those govs. im sorry to say, but your SKEWWED!

 

[madviking]

Some stuff i can think of...

1. I'll start making workers to make mines/irre.
2. Irregate all plains, grass, FP and Desert, mine all mounts, hills, tundra
3. Chop all forest
4. Start a revolution into Facism/ Coni
5. Pump out Tanks/Cavalry
6. Make Infantry to gaurd borders
7. Work on infrastructure (Factories <- biggie)

 

[skisphereo]

What's wrong with colloseums?

 

[Renata]

Combination of shield cost and upkeep cost is too high to justify the minimal reward in happiness and culture.

Renata

 

[vmxa]

I forgot to look, but someone said this was an AP game, so that changes many things. I have only played a partial game ith AP on and do not really have a great feel for the whole thing.

It will distort nearly everything that you know.

 

[killercane]

Talk about argh. I got to within 40 tiles of domination and the Inca launched in 1585. If the Inca hadnt of gotten in my way and taken a few (normally useless) Indian tundra cities or I had taken the American island in the middle it would have been done. I replanted a second spy too late (1570) to sabotage production or muster enough force to burn their capital. Pretty fun though. AP was a bit disconcerting to play with, and I think it helped the AI a bit more than me.

Attacking the Inca with American help would have been better; their army mainly consisted of 150 mech infantry, about a third of which were trapped behind enemy (my) lines. CA2 told me that I wouldnt have to attack them if I took out America and filled in unclaimed tiles to domination. Oh well. Still pretty winnable I think if someone were to take the time.

Trading in those frigates and defenders that I disbanded for an equivalent number of artillery to start with would have been a big difference maker as well. Democracy really wasnt that bad overall to play with.

 

[Hjor]

Thanks for the help guys. I'll send my friend a link to this thread. If anyone else wants to give it a shot, I'd still like to see this game carried to a victory

 

[Evil Tyrant]

I bribed the Americans to sign a peace treaty, and extorted/traded Communism out of the Maya and switched govts. I then whipped and drafted as many riflemen as possible, while researching replaceable parts. Once I got that I upgraded my riflemen and whipped lots of artillery and went to war with America. I've taken two cities and am preparing for a new offensive.

PS: The moral of the story is avoid democracy like the plague!

 

[Coffeedragon]

"Immediately set Research to Communism, Comrade!

Shoot the governors! You can do that even before Communism!

What are those Warriors and Spearmen doing in our beautiful cities? Are you mad? Disband and arrest them immediately! Minimum time for Loitering is 20 years Forced Labor!"

Communism will get the situation under control in no time flat.

 

[sabo]

Combination of shield cost and upkeep cost is too high to justify the minimal reward in happiness and culture.

Renata

That is true but in the modern age when I have alot of $$ I don't mind colesiums, because by then my cities are pretty big and I need all the happiness I can get, especially if I'm depraved of luxeries and happiness wonders.

Hjor: you probably should build embassies or intellegent HQ if you can and start stealing techs. Stay away from immediate steals though and go for "careful" or better. And try to steal techs one or two other civs don't have and then trade for their techs

 

[jgoodguy]

That is true but in the modern age when I have alot of $$ I don't mind colesiums, because by then my cities are pretty big and I need all the happiness I can get, especially if I'm depraved of luxeries and happiness wonders.

Hjor: you probably should build embassies or intellegent HQ if you can and start stealing techs. Stay away from immediate steals though and go for "careful" or better. And try to steal techs one or two other civs don't have and then trade for their techs

I try to have enough gold so that I can buy outright. Most of the time, its been cheaper to buy than steal for me.

City improvements have to ba balanced costs against benefit. If an improvement means that 1,2 or 3 citizens are working would be entertaining or rioting that has value. Is that value greater than the cost of the building.

I can build, or I can conquer or buy to get luxuries for happienss, or I can use treasury for happiness. All of which has to be decided.

I do not think there is a cookie cutter logic for city improvements other than looking at the situation and making a decision. Worst is to let the governors decide automatically.

 

[sabo]

Worst is to let the governors decide automatically.

Or let the computer (AI) do anything automaically, workers come to mind also..

 

[vmxa]

I try to have enough gold so that I can buy outright. Most of the time, its been cheaper to buy than steal for me.

If you are buying techs you are feeding them. That is allowing them to spend the same on research and have more for improvements and troops. This hurts you.

Stealing may cost more, but the money spent does not help the AI.

Buying techs helps leep the tech rate high. That is usually not a good thing, if you are already behind in tech. It tends to be a very bad thing as you move up the levels.

The reason is that if you play sid for example they get a cost factor of 4. So they pay a lot less for structures, units and wonders and hence can make them faster than you.

In order to build a given wonder before the AI on sid you have to have a head start (prebuild) or more than twice the shield production than the city they are using.

That coupled with them getting the tech before you, leads to you not getting many wonders.

 

[Coffeedragon]

Stealing may cost more, but the money spent does not help the AI.

Excellent argument, Comrade!

I take it from another post that we have only ~50 turns before they launch. It may really be too late to save the situation, but I´ll give it a try.

We will never get Domination in time, and capturing the far away capital of an atomic power is too messy for my taste, so there is only one strategy that might work.

Who is the first to guess what I am talking about?

 

[Sullla]

The cost of stealing techs is one of the broken aspects of Civ3. As you go up in difficulty level, the cost to research techs increases, the cost to buy those techs increases - but the cost to steal them remains the same. This is a programming ERROR on the part of Firaxis, but you may as well take advantage of it because by now it's not going to be fixed.

 

[Tomoyo]

We will never get Domination in time, and capturing the far away capital of an atomic power is too messy for my taste, so there is only one strategy that might work.

Who is the first to guess what I am talking about?

Sabotage production? Resource denial? ROP rape?

 

[rysingsun]

The cost of stealing techs is one of the broken aspects of Civ3. As you go up in difficulty level, the cost to research techs increases, the cost to buy those techs increases - but the cost to steal them remains the same.

ohhh ... well no wonder then

for so long ive been advocating stealing and it's always seemed like such a controversy here, although i found it to be extremely cost effective. i couldnt understand why others disagreed.

ive been playing deity for ages. now i understand.

 

[vmxa]

The cost for stealing does go up.

Steal Technology 10 dist*level + base * techs*techrate/100

So it is plain to see that the cost to steal will go up as more techs are known and hence available to steal. The variable techs is the number of techs known. The techrate is the cost factor.