Can't beat Noble

[Schooly D]

Seriously, whenever I start a game on Noble, it goes pretty smoothly, but always, always, ALWAYS, some other nation just declares war on me for absolutely no reason. I say "yes," to all of their trade proposals, and do nothing to get them angry, yet one or two of them always end up declaring war on me early on in the game (before I can give them gifts that aren't cities). So then they go around pillaging all my improvements, destroying my resources, and capturing my cities, throwing my Civ-score to rock-bottom.

And if it's not them, it's those fscking Barbarians that come from nowhere and never stop attacking.

I seriously need help. What am I doing wrong?

 

[Zink]

i feel with u, i got the exact same problem, just cant beat AI on noble

all the guides make everything look sooo simple...

 

[DaemonDivinity]

Warlord to Noble is said by some to be the hardest jump.

It's easy to get pretty absorbed with your infrastructure and forget about defense, especially since at Warlord you can afford to build everything in every city and the hell with specialization. However, on Noble, defense is key. Two archers in every city should hold off early barbarians and a small aggressor, and a few chariots or something to take out the ones that just pillage but won't meet your defenders. Once you get Longbowmen, those work just fine until Riflemen.

Edit: By the time you get to Longbows, you really should put 4 in your border cities though. It's easy to push your culture out far enough to minimize barbs, but by the medieval period, the AI does not understand the concept of anything less then a grand army. Early on it can't field this many, but by then it will do it without any trouble.

 

[Beld]

Make sure you have enough military, really. Empires with a much larger army will pick on you if you can't atleast put up a good fight.

If you have border cities with 3 or so GOOD city defense units, with extra exp from barracks upgrade, then they tend to leave you alone a lot more at this difficulty.

If I'm playing carebear/isolationist/passifist strats, I still have atleast 2 or 3 units in border cities, and atleast 3 or so cavalry type units stationed in the middle of my empire to strike out and pillage an enemy if he attacks. This will help delay them until you can sue for peace or build up for a counter offensive.

edit: btw I love Schooly D, most recent thing I know he's done is the rap intro for Aqua Teen Hunger Force (number one in tha hood G')

 

[Trumbo]

What you do early on will affect your long-term play greatly, which is why so many people emphasize concentrating on early strategies, whether it be wood chop or religion or what-not. In other words, play to your strength in your starting position.

One key is to note your neighbors' tendencies (are they aggressive?) and to plan accordingly. In these cases the best defense is often a good offense. Depending on what you have nearby (copper or horses), shoot for the appropriate offensive upgrade (axemen or chariots) and wreak havoc on an aggressive civilization. What you lose in patiently building your infrastructure you can make up for by taking your opponent's cities.

It's also not a bad idea to befriend a civilization that gets an awesome early UU, like the Roman praetorian.

 

[Rhymes]

Seriously, whenever I start a game on Noble, it goes pretty smoothly, but always, always, ALWAYS, some other nation just declares war on me for absolutely no reason. I say "yes," to all of their trade proposals, and do nothing to get them angry, yet one or two of them always end up declaring war on me early on in the game (before I can give them gifts that aren't cities). So then they go around pillaging all my improvements, destroying my resources, and capturing my cities, throwing my Civ-score to rock-bottom.

And if it's not them, it's those fscking Barbarians that come from nowhere and never stop attacking.

I seriously need help. What am I doing wrong?

Build up some military god damn it.

You might suffer from the "wonder munger" problem, meaning that you have an obsession for creating wonders and put many other important issues asside, including military.

try having a city that focuses solely on units and war improvements.

 

[King Ash]

I'm no supergamer when it comes to civ. Noble is challenging enough for me at the moment. But I've beat it a few times with points scored and a domination victory.
Kinda depends on the map how easy it is. I find early expansion (read: disableing rivals) downright necessary even if you're gunning for non-combat victories. I can't win on the island maps as galleys are crap and you can't mount a succesful invasion force unless the other civ is really closeby.
Therefor I suggest just sticking with the continents map and hope you get some axemen/swordsmen before other civs start getting fresh with you. Once you loose the initative its very hard to regain your lead unless you spent the previous 5 centuries conquering your continent and have a huge population at your disposal.
Oh, and don't keep all cities after you've captured them. I have to really restrain myself from doing that as I enjoy adding cities to my empire. But most are located badly (the AI doesn't like harbours?) and the city maintenaince cost is skyhigh in the classical age. Meaning your bank account with hit through the floor supporting a large army and captured populations.
The game rewards pillaging (the AI loves to do just that) so don't be an empire builder be a guerillia warrior...
That's all I can think of right now.

 

[Tremo]

Anti-barbarian; Archers and Horse Archers.

Archers are perfect for early game city defense and horse archers are perfect for a speedy interception before they start demolishing your improvements.

Anti-early war;

Try to have the same religion as your closest neigbour(s). If they have a different religion and you can't convert, get an Open Border agreement and use missionaries. This eleviates a lot of pressure (not all though).

As for military measures;

• Put up the biggest defenses in your outer cities closest to potential enemies.
• Keep the Archers and equivalent in your cities for defense, but be sure to mix them up with a mounted and melee unit (mixed defense == superior defense).
• Have at least on of your cities be a military production center, ready to pump out units if need be.
• Keep a few units scattered across your border as an early warning system and buffer.

Note that these are just pointers. But one thing is for sure, you can no longer afford to neglect your military in Noble difficulty level. You are bound to lag a bit behind other nations as you build up your early-era army, but that is usually easily caught up with. Especially since now you should be able to repel and counter-attack pretty effectively in case someone decides to play the role of the neighbourhood bully.

Ow, and if someone attaks you, after you decimated their attack force, start pillaging their improvements ASAP. This pretty much kills them off as a threat as they'll no longer be able to produce anything within any forseeable timeframe.

 

[Marcus_Aurelius]

One thing you can do is play a custom game and turn off the barbarians. I suppose you don't get the genuine CIV experience that way, but it can make things a little easier. You can worry less about protecting your settlers and workers, but as has been stated, the opposing civs can smell an easy target and will attack if you don't set up strong defenses.

 

[Azragaul]

1st.I don't think it can be said enough build your armies even if its for defence. I shoot for at least 2 units per city (archers preferabily) and horse archers on most ciritcal resources plus a few more on non critical resources. A few galleys helps too it keeps those fishing improvements from getting pillaged. The AI's respect power. The more you can hurt them the less likely they are to attack.

2nd. those green and red faces pop up for a reason. I usually hold on a city improvement until it needs one until I have enough military to be a deterant.

3rd try going though a game without building more than 5 or 6 wonders total (if that many) pick the way you want to win from the start and focus on those types of wonders. Pick a way your going to win and work on that strat specifically. The first few times I won on noble I picked the way I was going to do it before I even built a city.

 

[circuitloss]

You MUST, MUST, have tons of defensive troops if you want to play a pacifist. Being a diplomatic pushover won't help you if the AI thinks you're weak.

Have a minumum of about 4 troops per city, with a quick response mobile force somewhere to hit anyone foolish enough to pillage you.

Only if you have good defense will other nations leave you alone, and remember, some leaders have a 100% modifier to declaring war (montezuma, genghis...) Watch out of those guys.

 

[Vizzini]

Genghis will declare if you even hint that you might be weak and absolutely hates his neighbors. If you share a border with him you simply cannot wait, as soon as you realize you're going to share a border just throw the switch on WARMONGER MODE, build up, and put that little peon down - you have to attack him because it isn't a matter of IF he's coming for you, only when.

There are other leaders like him (Second the mention of Aztecs are the same way) You can only put off going to war with them if you have an ocean or someone else in between. If they share your border... you're gonna fight.

 

[Trumbo]

Genghis will declare if you even hint that you might be weak and absolutely hates his neighbors. If you share a border with him you simply cannot wait, as soon as you realize you're going to share a border just throw the switch on WARMONGER MODE, build up, and put that little peon down - you have to attack him because it isn't a matter of IF he's coming for you, only when.

There are other leaders like him (Second the mention of Aztecs are the same way) You can only put off going to war with them if you have an ocean or someone else in between. If they share your border... you're gonna fight.

The Aztec leader is just plain crazy. In a recent noble game he crossed 6-10 turns of ocean with galleons, frigates, longbowmen and catapaults to attack my coastline settlements that were defended by destroyers, battleships, infantry and machine gunners. No matter how many of the little beggers I dispatched, he kept coming and wouldn't accept peace. Angry little fellow, that one.

 

[MyOtherName]

Gah, too many defensive troops can be a bad thing! I generally have far less than all of you suggest, and have few barb problems, and the only time I had someone declare war on me is when I was in the middle of a smallish continent with 5 civs on it.

(I played on noble at first, and have switched to monarch)

In the earliest game, I only really need one unit per city, and that's mainly for the happiness boost. I tend to be proactive regarding barbarians: I tend to have a unit or two hunting around my immediate area looking for experience points, so there's rarely anything left to head for my cities or workers.

I tend to have my cities build a barracks early on so when I do make units, they start with experience.

As for neighbor relations, I haven't seen any problems. I will even plop down a defenseless city next to them sometimes! (Of course, I will get an archer there fairly soon afterwards) Of course, I've been tending to do a minor land grab with swordsmen in my last few games, so the remnants of that are fine for defense.

In fact, the last game I played (monarch), after my land grab with swordsman / horsemen archer / catapault, I just kept the leftovers for defense. Most of my cities had 1 or 2 defenders (sometimes just an archer!), but the bulk of the leftovers were near my borders. I didn't build another military unit until riflemen. =) (And even then, only because I was feeling nervous seeing knights and stuff in my neighbor's lands -- I could probably have waited until machine guns or infantry)

 

[starlost]

the previous poster and many others have pointed this out. even if your passive you must build a military. i hate building military because there is always a wonder or building which will flex my cultural or research muscles i want to do a.s.a.p.. when i see a military unit sitting in a city i try not to think i could have had a settler or worker expanding my empire but instead maybe this lousy unit is stopping the a.i. from declaring war on me.
the warmongers have the same problem when they ponder if they should have reseached a few more techs or a wonder before pumping out the troops and declaring war only to find out the 3rd closest civ to you has waited untill you have spent your load to beat up on you and/or what you have softened up.

 

[DaemonDivinity]

Mao Zetung, who I was +6 with overall, opened hostilities on my last Prince game. His Knights ran head on into well fortified Longbowmen with good culture bonuses the first time. Counterattack took a city, then peace. Few dozen turns later at +5, he comes on again. He retook the city with his Knights and a *gasp* cannon. My Riflemen took point and recaptured it, then anbother city to boot. And then a third time, with his Riflemen facing off against my Modern Armor, Mechanized Infantry, and Jet Fighters. Jeez, the guy should take a damn hint.

He was true to chinese doctrine on numbers though. While I've seen most enemies come across with 3-1 or better numberical advantage, he had 6-1 superiority every time. Keeps it interesting I guess, just had to start all my Armor with the first 2 collateral ranks.

 

[Grogs]

the previous poster and many others have pointed this out. even if your passive you must build a military. i hate building military because there is always a wonder or building which will flex my cultural or research muscles i want to do a.s.a.p.. when i see a military unit sitting in a city i try not to think i could have had a settler or worker expanding my empire but instead maybe this lousy unit is stopping the a.i. from declaring war on me.
the warmongers have the same problem when they ponder if they should have reseached a few more techs or a wonder before pumping out the troops and declaring war only to find out the 3rd closest civ to you has waited untill you have spent your load to beat up on you and/or what you have softened up.

This is why specialization is so nice. Find an inland city with lots of hammers and not much in the line of commerce. Cities with lots of plains and a few hills and grasslands are great for this. Since the city has very little commerce you're not losing much skipping all the libraries/banks and such. Give it a barracks, a forge, and (once you've done a little fighting) the Heroic Epic. I had a great example in my last game that could churn out the most advanced unit available every 1-2 turns. With that type of unit production, you can focus most of your other cities on improvements/wonders and still be well defended.

 

[TLHeart]

I agree with the turning one city into a army factory...heroic epic, and west point make for a very strong military...add in pentagon in another city, and you are a modern era super power.

 

[Ryozo]

Id just like to say thank you to you all! I've gotten some great tips from this thread and im currently stuck on noble as well..

 

[raeldc]

I've beaten noble only once since I acquired CIV IV. i guess i was just lucky Im the only one who has aluminum so I'm the only one who has Modern Armor. America (Lincoln) had also been very friendly to me, he always go to war against those who attack me in exchange of my worldmap in which the most part of it came from his world map.

Maybe it's a matter of luck for a beginner like me.