I've never played a Civilization game, and so far I am not very impressed with Civ3. I've played plenty of strategy games, but I have yet to win this game even on the easy level. My latest attempt seemed to be going very well... for a while. I was into the modern era finally, and the only other opponent (the Indians) still had warriors and spearmen... I figured I was pretty far ahead since he had not built a wonder or anything. He finally built some Galleys about the time I discovered Frigates. His ships from one city had no where to go except into my area. When I told him to leave, he refused. So, figuring I was technologically superior enough, I declared war and sank his Galley with two of my own. His forces immediately began moving toward the only city I had close to his border. Imagine my complete surprise when my Knight (complete with a bloody Musket no less) was wiped out by a Warrior... one Warrior... that's it... he wasn't even Veteran OR Elite, but my Knight was a Veteran. He then proceeded to waltz through 3 of my cities (defended by Musketmen and Cannons) with nothing but warriors and spearmen. What good is technology in this game if it gives you no advantage? It seems like no matter what you do in this game, the computer opponents are kept on a level playing field with you... doesn't make for a fun game in my mind, particularly on what is supposed to be the Easy level. So... any long time Civ players out there that can tell me what I am doing wrong? As it is now, I'm ready to shelve this game and go back to playing something else... is far too frustrating.
Completely Confused!
- Thread starter Davin
- Start date
war is a serious thing, so don't declare war until your units are massed and at the border. When your units are not attacking try to have a least one in the stack fortified. It seems that this helps. Take advantage of your tech superiority. You didnt say what kind of civ you are playing, but it also is very important to have as many elite units as possible. Try to make sore that the first time you attack a stack or city you do it with a powerful unit.Knights are good units to attack with as they will retreat when possible. I really try to never build concript(2hp) units if possible.
For defense, making walls and a couple of catapult should help keep you safe.
Keep reading these posts there is a lot of good info out.
Good Luck.
For defense, making walls and a couple of catapult should help keep you safe.
Keep reading these posts there is a lot of good info out.
Good Luck.
I was playing the Iroquois... I like having Scouts at the beginning. The fight I described was between a Veteran Knight (my unit) and a normal Indian Warrior, no "stacks" were involved yet. Let me reiterate this... I didn't even HIT him... he simply walked up and killed me without taking a single hit. So a 1/1/1 Warrior defeated a 4/3/2 (I think those are right) Knight without any trouble. This isn't a matter of lucky rolls. The cities he took had walls... I also had the Great Wall wonder, but not sure if that helps. All three cities were 8+ population... none of them were my capitol, but it would have been next. His capitol had a population of 8. All his other cities (there might have been 1 or 2 I could not see) were at 6 or less. I believe I had 10 cities in all... two on other continents than the starting one. This was on a Tiny map. My army was much smaller than his (my interior cities were only defended by one unit each)... which is another thing I do not understand. How did he build such a massive army in such a time frame and STILL support expansion that was nearly equal to my own. I was struggling to stay in positive income with 40% research... mostly due to all the nice advanced city improvements I guess... and somehow he could support 20-30 unit army on an empire of half the size? In all other strategy games, I take the "tech route"... I research like mad while trying to expand and concentrate on using fewer, superior military units to make gradual inroads against enemies. Not only does this not seem to be possible in Civ3, it completely backfired.
Dillo
Barbarian Armadillo
Welcome to my biggest gripe about this game. People say. "You can live with this because it only rarely happens" well I say BS to that it happens to me in every game.
KnightOwl
Chieftain
And the fact that they made the AI way to good on the earlier levels. An idiot should be able to win on very easiest level (as it is in Civ I,II and Alpha Centuari). Sure the difficulty is great for those of us who have been playing these kinds of games for awhile and want a challange.. but your average newbie just wants to kick some ass..
Well I did finally win a game. But it was still more grueling than fun. I won by Culture after the game ended in 2050. There was still a lot of weirdness going on... I had Infantry (guys with machine guns) getting beaten by spear wielding Elephant riders. It wasn't until I could build tanks and battle ships that I finally felt safe. Bombing, whether it is by catapult or plane seems completely useless... it NEVER kills anything... just weakens them. Nice for softening up things I guess, but hardly worth the cost to build them. There were things I could not build, because I had no Iron... this is another weird thing. It was a Tiny map, with two continents... I was on one, the Indian was on another. I had a single source of Iron that "ran out" fairly quickly. The Indian had at least 4 on his continent that were still there at the end of the game. I also had 1 source of Saltpeter, 1 source of Rubber, 1 source of Oil and 1 source of Uranium. None of those ran out thankfully, but that seems awfully strange. So, I had no Iron, but I could still build Battleships and Jets... very weird. This game makes no sense at times. The most humorous moment was seeing one of my battleships (which was bombing a coastal city to try and take out the harbor) get hit by a Catapult. It was just one hit, but that would make for a rather silly scenario. "Sir, they seem to be throwing large stones at us." "Keep firing the mains Seargent!" Oh well, enough "work"... back to something fun.
It's sad to see new people turned away from this great genre. I haven't played enough to make my own conclusions about whether CivIII is an improvement from its predecessors or not, but if this is a typical newbie experience, shame on the people behind this game. The Civ games are supposed to be work, yes, but they should still be fun. I recommend getting Civ 2 or even the original to play before giving up on this whole genre, though, if it's not too late...
Proteus
King
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2001
- Messages
- 714
I (and I think several other people also) have countered the Spearman vs. Tank-Problem by just increasing the Number of Hitpoints. This way a lost Battleturn has not so much impact to the outcome of the battle than with less Hitpoints (If a Regular Tank loses a Turn with Standard-HP he already has lost 1/3 of all his Hitpoints, but if you multiply the Hitpoints per Experience-Level by 3, he has lost just 1/9 of his HP). A Spearman can still give your Tank a nice beating, if you have bad Luck, but Outcomes like one unfortified Spearman in plain Terrain defeats 3 Tank-Units aren´t such likely to occur.
I've modified the hit points rather then than attack and defence values as from what i've read that smoothes out the weird randomness but it still means conscript infantry get beaten up by archers and such like occasionally.
I've given up taking the tech route as it seems impossible to keep up in the early ages. I just accept that the AI is going to build most of the ancient wonders. But i am getting better at the game slowly but it seems to favour an aggresive approach.
I've given up taking the tech route as it seems impossible to keep up in the early ages. I just accept that the AI is going to build most of the ancient wonders. But i am getting better at the game slowly but it seems to favour an aggresive approach.
walbers
Chieftain
rather than taking these units at face value why don't you use your imagination and make some assumptions for these "weird" results. they've happened to me as well, ever since the very first civilization game. it's not realistic to assume that organized armies of bowmen would survive into the 20th century. I prefer to assume that the ancient units i'm fighting against with infantry and tanks aren't really Hoplites, they're more like lightly armed guerrilla armies from third world type countries. they just happen to be represented by archers and spearmen because that's the best the game can do at the moment.
let's not forget that in the late 1800's an army armed only with short spears and clubs soundly defeated the world's best military at Isandahlwana. And in the 20th century, American's were getting their heads handed to them by the Viet Cong. There are plenty of other parallels to be drawn from history. So if you just use your imagination a bit it's not at all unreasonable to get beat by the perceived lesser unit. rgds, will
let's not forget that in the late 1800's an army armed only with short spears and clubs soundly defeated the world's best military at Isandahlwana. And in the 20th century, American's were getting their heads handed to them by the Viet Cong. There are plenty of other parallels to be drawn from history. So if you just use your imagination a bit it's not at all unreasonable to get beat by the perceived lesser unit. rgds, will
I agree there is precedent but i have to accept what i can see in the game - in this case attack, defence values and hit points. If the only information available to me is that my unit has say, six attack and four hit points and the defender has two defence and three hit points i expect to win most times. Isandahlwana may have been a good example of a "weird" result in game terms but i don't expect the game to hide extra random factors from me (such as the british running out of ammunition). Its just the sheer numbr of times that i seem to lose to inferior units that really winds me up. In a grand strategic game like Civ i don't think there should be so much randomness.
I'm with you Davin -
I was a very decent Civ II player who could easily master a game, but I've found such ridiculous balancing between Civs in III that I've given up many games in frustration. I don't have a lot of time to continuously play - which would allow me to develop successful strategies - but I've encountered the exact same problem you describe where enemy warriors on flat plain areas constantly defeat my elite swordsmen, horsemen and spearmen. I've lost every single war I've fought, and had enemy warriors swarm over my cities, each defended behind a wall with two spearmen, and lost each one - in Chieften! I love challenges but I also like at least a little realistic chance. In Civ II developing technologically superior units was a winning strategy, but in Civ III enemy warriors can wipe out just about anything you throw at them, and take your cities afterwards.
The "avoid wars until 1700" option is not available, at least for me. Every single game I've played so far has plopped all - all! - the enemy Civs right next to me, whether on a large map or small, whether there are two Civs or 16. I am attacked and invaded constantly in the early centuries, and so far I lose every war. I posted a "Help!" thread in the strategy forum and several people gave me some good advice which has helped me survive much longer in the game, but eventually I still end up in some major war, which means I lose.
I just downloaded the new patch and I'll see if any of the changes helps, but I must admit I am not enjoying Civ III very much. back in '96 when I first got Civ II I just played and played until I developed some winning strategies, but it became clear early on what worked and what didn't. Granted, again I don't have as much time now to spend with the game, but it's just not as much fun for me as Civ II was. Clearly others are succeeding so I'll have to buckle down and keep trying...
I was a very decent Civ II player who could easily master a game, but I've found such ridiculous balancing between Civs in III that I've given up many games in frustration. I don't have a lot of time to continuously play - which would allow me to develop successful strategies - but I've encountered the exact same problem you describe where enemy warriors on flat plain areas constantly defeat my elite swordsmen, horsemen and spearmen. I've lost every single war I've fought, and had enemy warriors swarm over my cities, each defended behind a wall with two spearmen, and lost each one - in Chieften! I love challenges but I also like at least a little realistic chance. In Civ II developing technologically superior units was a winning strategy, but in Civ III enemy warriors can wipe out just about anything you throw at them, and take your cities afterwards.
The "avoid wars until 1700" option is not available, at least for me. Every single game I've played so far has plopped all - all! - the enemy Civs right next to me, whether on a large map or small, whether there are two Civs or 16. I am attacked and invaded constantly in the early centuries, and so far I lose every war. I posted a "Help!" thread in the strategy forum and several people gave me some good advice which has helped me survive much longer in the game, but eventually I still end up in some major war, which means I lose.
I just downloaded the new patch and I'll see if any of the changes helps, but I must admit I am not enjoying Civ III very much. back in '96 when I first got Civ II I just played and played until I developed some winning strategies, but it became clear early on what worked and what didn't. Granted, again I don't have as much time now to spend with the game, but it's just not as much fun for me as Civ II was. Clearly others are succeeding so I'll have to buckle down and keep trying...
scavenger
Warlord
I am confused about why they made Chieftan so hard, they have so many difficulty levels, they can afford to make one super easy!
The combat system is Civ 1 was amazingly basic, no hit points, you either won, or you lost, that was it, Civ 2 was by far the best combat system, prehaps once in 40000 fights would a truly superior unit loose to a truly inferior one.
The combat system is Civ 1 was amazingly basic, no hit points, you either won, or you lost, that was it, Civ 2 was by far the best combat system, prehaps once in 40000 fights would a truly superior unit loose to a truly inferior one.
Easy difficulty should be very easy. This is the difficulty level where a new player should go to win. But not only that, Easy is where people go to build units they didn't in the last game, to try things they didn't in the last game, and to try a different race than the the last game. But if you keep losing on the Easy level, you do not get to explore all those neat options, unless you have far more patience than me that is.
I usually do not have trouble staying ahead in technology... in fact, in most of the games I have played so far, I have built all of the ancient wonders. The key to this, for me, was those Scout units that allowed me to quickly explore whatever continent I started on and snatch up all those Villages that give you free tech. I still expand very slowly compared to the AI. If I watch the movies at the end of a game, it is pretty obvious to see how the AI works. Every time I build a city, he would follow up with two or three of his own. They AI also apparently don't pay the same costs to maintain an empire as the player. To watch an AI expand in that movie, you have to wonder... "how the hell did he build that many Settlers"... or "how is he not losing 75% of his income to corruption"... etc.
I work for a company that makes racing games. We get complaints on occassion for keeping the AI on a level playing field too. If you get too far ahead, the AI will start racing harder, if you fall too far behind, they will slow down, etc. This is done because the designers feel that racing by yourself (by being too far in front or too far behind) is boring. I wish I could say the same thing applied to Civ3, but it doesn't... it just makes the game unenjoyable and stressful.
I usually do not have trouble staying ahead in technology... in fact, in most of the games I have played so far, I have built all of the ancient wonders. The key to this, for me, was those Scout units that allowed me to quickly explore whatever continent I started on and snatch up all those Villages that give you free tech. I still expand very slowly compared to the AI. If I watch the movies at the end of a game, it is pretty obvious to see how the AI works. Every time I build a city, he would follow up with two or three of his own. They AI also apparently don't pay the same costs to maintain an empire as the player. To watch an AI expand in that movie, you have to wonder... "how the hell did he build that many Settlers"... or "how is he not losing 75% of his income to corruption"... etc.
I work for a company that makes racing games. We get complaints on occassion for keeping the AI on a level playing field too. If you get too far ahead, the AI will start racing harder, if you fall too far behind, they will slow down, etc. This is done because the designers feel that racing by yourself (by being too far in front or too far behind) is boring. I wish I could say the same thing applied to Civ3, but it doesn't... it just makes the game unenjoyable and stressful.
I've always wondered how people don't see that enemy units are what they are. People keep stating the view that maybe the spearmen had gotten guns to kill your tank; THIS IS NOT POSSIBLE. Spearmen only use spears. Spearmen are CALLED spearmen BECAUSE they use spears. If the spearmen had gotten guns, they would be infantry. Buying weapons off of the black market is NOT simulated. You should NOT assume that spearmen use guns, because they don't.
Proteus
King
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2001
- Messages
- 714
Originally posted by Peer
@Proteus (and anyone other who´s able to alter the Unit settings):
Could you post a brief step-by-step manual how to set the hp to the 3x value?
Please note that I haven´t yet changed anything at the settings, so to this I´m a newbie
I´ve made it into a new Thread:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11726
Jezner
Warlord
Davin - in my experience - air power is supreme. At first, one bomber can't do much. But think about twenty bombers. And with the ability to knock out city improvs, it doesn't take much imagination to know what will happen if you destroy an aqueduct or hospital in 15+ city (mass death = yummy)
Here's what I did to the Germans.
a) rebased my fleet of bombers to my friendly city.
b) Bombed all the infrastructure surrounding their capital - no roads = no resources (thankfully, they didn't have a harbor)
b) waited a few turns
c) bombed their supporting cities so all their units had something like one health.
d) took their cities with no casualities.
e) approached their capital.
f) at this point, all they had were arches and such. Yes. I bombed them back to the stoneage.
g) surrounded them - they asked for peace. I agreed (Decided to have a pet civ)
In previous Civ games I never pillaged because I would have to spend the time rebuilding the infrastructure. Now, I go nuts.
Hope this turns you on to the power of the plane.
