Condensed tips for beginners?

[mystyfly]

Also, I have question regarding this. Let's say two cities do share a tile - is there a way for me to control which city is able to work that specific tile? It seems to me that the city that originally controlled the shared tile will stay in command of it, even if it's not being worked, while it would remain grayed out for the secondary city.

Click on the tile you want to change (from the city screen of the city that is supposed to work the tile.

About advantages:
Most significant advantage is that you really work your land. Let's assume you settle your cities in a way that creates no overlap at all. Until your cities are size 20, you never work all your tiles. However most of the game your city is size 5-15 (depending on mapscript, use of slavery, etc) and works probabely half of the tiles it can work. So you don't use your land efficently. Overlapping enables you to work more of the land you have.
Also, if you have a cottage city and you need/want a building in there, then you can work hills to get this building, while other cities develop the cottages. When the building is done, the cottage city can work towns and you get more science/gold (because you have probabely more % buildings in the science city).
Or you want to hurry a GS and you don't need a couple of nice tiles (gold, gems, cow, ...) that your neighbor city would greatly profit from. Then you can run as many specialists as you need and the tiles aren't "wasted" for those turns.
Another advantage is, that forests count for both cities (and every forest gives 0.5 health).

True, this requires lots of MM (=Micromanagement) but if you use it, you can improve your output (production and gold) by a significant rate.

 

[Ranchester]

Whats the best way to defend two attackers coming from opposite sides towards my lands? This was totally surprise that both my neighbors started war against me at the same time and now Im in trouble because both attackers are coming with huge stacks from different directions and I didnt have time to prepare for this. I moved allmost all my best units to defend the two nearest cities from the border but I keep losing units faster I can produce them in my most productive cities. How to proceed? If things continue like they do Im finished... Im playing at Noble difficulty for the first time and I lead the scoreboard.

 

[Sisiutil]

Whats the best way to defend two attackers coming from opposite sides towards my lands? This was totally surprise that both my neighbors started war against me at the same time and now Im in trouble because both attackers are coming with huge stacks from different directions and I didnt have time to prepare for this. I moved allmost all my best units to defend the two nearest cities from the border but I keep losing units faster I can produce them in my most productive cities. How to proceed? If things continue like they do Im finished... Im playing at Noble difficulty for the first time and I lead the scoreboard.

1. Pray.
2. See if you can get the neighbour(s) of one (or more) of your adversaries to go to war against them. This may draw units away from the attacking stacks for defense.
3. Switch civics: Universal Suffrage, Nationhood, and Slavery will all help you produce units quickly through buying, drafting, and whipping, respectively.
4. Sometimes the best units to produce in this type of emergency are siege weapons. Unleash them on the stack, even if they die in the process. Often the AI will pull its stack back to heal if all its units are damaged.
5. Keep checking to see if one of your attackers is willing to talk, and when they are, see what they want for peace. If you're really hard-pressed, agree to whatever they want. Then go away, lick your wounds, build up your military, and plot your revenge.
6. For the next game: you might be first in score, but if you have >1 civ attacking you, your power rating was probably very weak. Be sure to check the power graph on a regular basis, keep your military reasonably strong and up-to-date, and manage diplomacy with your immediate neighbours carefully.

 

[Gudinsdiv]

Since this is a "condensed" tips thread, I thought I'd ask the following question...

Top Three Tips (TTT) for:

1. City Placement
2. City Specialization
3. City Management
4. Technology
5. Religion
6. Civics
7. Diplomacy
8. Wonders
9. Great People
10. War

Pick one or pick'em all... it's all good!
Looking forward to the replies and insights.

1. First city where you are placed--I never argue, and once you atart looking around, you are wasting game time. Next few cities, DO NOT OVERLAP! COUNT YOUR TILES and place your next cities--three or four--in a circle surrounding your capital, WHILE making the most of the resources around you. Remember that your cultural capture of a resource is enough for you to harness it, and you want to have as many, and as much land, as possible, even if you don't effectively capitalize on all of it. When your cities grow, you will be fighting starvation on a regular basis by overlapping--or, by NOT overlapping, using those hitherto ignored tiles to boost production capacity.
2. Based on terrain and resources, but you can mine the hell out of an area to make a production city.
3. Watch your growth! I always scale back when the food production is over three or four--that's too much and you can use those citizens as specialists.
4. Try to get a religion founded as this is a real culture boost. Otherwise, strive for muscle--that is, go after the strongest units a tech gives you.
5. Try to get a religion founded, but when one spreads and you don't have your own, embrace it--building temples and monasteries is a plus to your cities.
6. I don't like Pacifism because of it's restrictions, I never change to Slavery, and I always avoid Mercantalism. Pacifism burdens your military, Slavery has no use that I can see, and Mercantilism takes your foreign trade away. The bottom five are the best, HOWEVER, if your civ is generating a lot of cash, use Pacifism for the GP boost.
7. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Allow open borders because to not allow it is an open insult. Be scrupulous with you tech trading. NEVER give a tech away. Always say no and then ask, "wHat will you give me for this?" They will usually empty their pockets.
8. When you can, you should, depending on the need.
9. Use a city specialist, I think, or for Great Artists, to expand your culture.
10. "Nobody ever said war was quick or easy." --GHW Bush

 

[Gudinsdiv]

Whats the best way to defend two attackers coming from opposite sides towards my lands? This was totally surprise that both my neighbors started war against me at the same time and now Im in trouble because both attackers are coming with huge stacks from different directions and I didnt have time to prepare for this. I moved allmost all my best units to defend the two nearest cities from the border but I keep losing units faster I can produce them in my most productive cities. How to proceed? If things continue like they do Im finished... Im playing at Noble difficulty for the first time and I lead the scoreboard.

The strategy of the central position: Throw ALL of your best units towards the WEAKER of the two attackers while having enough good defenders against attacker two to hold him off for a while. Reinforce as much as you can to hold him back while you hammer the initial attacker(weaker) into withdrawing. Now your best units have more experience and can be thrown against the second attacker, hopefully enough so to tip the balance in your favor.
I would also advise diversionary threats to the rear of advancing stacks, picked units that do best against whatever is in the stack. Holding a hill or forest with three or four pikemen is a threat to a stack of horse-archers and catapults on their way to a city. Even if they ignore you, you catch them between two fires and you also redirect some of those units away from attacking the city, weakening them, and limiting their effectiveness.

 

[Ranchester]

Ok, I managed to stop the attackers and now I'm in peace with them. Luckily I had Americans friendly toward me, so they brought lots of supporting units to defend me. Hannibal wanted peace after I managed to stop his attacks and I managed to sign peacetreaty with Celts aswell.
Now I'm planning counter attack, I just researched rifling so it's paypack time!!! I almost lost my iron and horses in the war but luckily they didn't get that far. Afterall I only lost one city and the vote is ongoing to get that city back. I also managed to get Zulus on my side (2. on the scoreboard).

 

[CCRunner]

DO NOT OVERLAP!

Not always the case. You may want to overlap a little to grow a cottage or to fit in an extra city or two.
A better statement is DO NOT OVERLAP TO MUCH

Slavery has no use that I can see

Slavery is the best production tool early in the game. Just be sure to not whip for one pop. Two pop whips are the best in most situations.

 

[Gudinsdiv]

IMO, after your first city, when land-grabbing is key, it's best to be sure you have as much covered as possible. It's not only a question of catching resources, but of allowing that initial fat-cross culture burst to dove-tail affectively with your capital without losing the territorial benefits thereof.
I agree with the idea "not too much" later in the game, but early in the game it is essential to empire-building to NOT overlap, but rather even overextend by a tile or two, knowing that subsequent expansion will embrace those spots.

I must admit, I've never employed the Slavery civic, mainly because the idea of sacrificing ones population to increase production with the resultant unhappiness doesn't make sense to me--but then that's my liberal side.

 

[johnccc]

Whats the best way to defend two attackers coming from opposite sides towards my lands? This was totally surprise that both my neighbors started war against me at the same time and now Im in trouble because both attackers are coming with huge stacks from different directions and I didnt have time to prepare for this. I moved allmost all my best units to defend the two nearest cities from the border but I keep losing units faster I can produce them in my most productive cities. How to proceed? If things continue like they do Im finished... Im playing at Noble difficulty for the first time and I lead the scoreboard.

Hi,

Divide and conquer here is the key as Gudinsdiv pointed out. I would also look to see if you can destroy roads/rail (even your own) to delay one side. This not only allows you to deal with one side first, the delay helps you whip more units to help in your defence.

John

 

[ozangumus]

Examining game play style of hardest(deity) AI, probably gives very good information about how we have to play. Especially about city-placement, tech-selection and building-order. It was true in Age Of Empires too, we were making cheat by opening map with "Marco Polo" code and following what AI does. This is true in nearly all strategy games.

 

[mystyfly]

Examining game play style of hardest(deity) AI, probably gives very good information about how we have to play. Especially about city-placement, tech-selection and building-order. It was true in Age Of Empires too, we were making cheat by opening map with "Marco Polo" code and following what AI does. This is true in nearly all strategy games.

I really don't think that you have a chance of beating any difficulty beyond noble by mirroring the AI. From noble on the AI gets bonuses the Human player doesn't. This is why those difficulties have to be beaten by superior strategy, planning and adapting.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Examining game play style of hardest(deity) AI, probably gives very good information about how we have to play. Especially about city-placement, tech-selection and building-order. It was true in Age Of Empires too, we were making cheat by opening map with "Marco Polo" code and following what AI does. This is true in nearly all strategy games.

I don't know any strategy games where mimicking the AI is a good idea. Excluding simple games like checkers, one usually picks up bad habits from AIs.

How do you mimick an AI that starts with two settlers anyway?

 

[MrCynical]

Examining game play style of hardest(deity) AI, probably gives very good information about how we have to play. Especially about city-placement, tech-selection and building-order. It was true in Age Of Empires too, we were making cheat by opening map with "Marco Polo" code and following what AI does. This is true in nearly all strategy games.

Doesn't work. The AI is equally dumb at all levels, and relies on bonuses/penalties to produce the spectrum of difficulty levels. Logically you therefore won't get past Noble by mirroring the AI, and it isn't that hard to do better than it.

 

[Sisiutil]

Examining game play style of hardest(deity) AI, probably gives very good information about how we have to play. Especially about city-placement, tech-selection and building-order. It was true in Age Of Empires too, we were making cheat by opening map with "Marco Polo" code and following what AI does. This is true in nearly all strategy games.

Granted, I haven't played at Deity level, but the AI doesn't get "smarter" at the higher levels, it just gets more bonuses. Therefore, it will still make the same mistakes it makes at the lower levels, and human players should be able to overcome it by using better tactics and strategies and taking advantage of the AI's mistakes. I currently play at Emperor level successfully by using strategies and tactics that are purposely different from those used by the AI.

Imitating the specific items you mention each has its own problems. We all know that the AI will choose some non-optimal and even dubious city placements (even with Blake's improvements it will still settle 1 tile from the coast, for example). If you duplicated the AI's tech path, you'll find yourself with no techs to trade; instead, you'll be constantly chasing the AI, which starts with a tech lead thanks to its bonuses and builds from there. Finally, build orders are situational. I've never seen the AI do an early rush, for example, so doing one of those yourself therefore requires very different build orders than the AI would pursue.

 

[spider1]

I guess everyone has their own style of play, but as I got into the higher difficulty settings, I find getting three cities up and running as quickly as possible to be most helpful.

Home City – churns out a warrior (the starting one explores) to defend the city, then a worker to start chopping. After that warrior, worker, settler for second city, then warrior, worker, settler for third city. I usually build a monument next then start churning out a lot of military units for several reasons, most obvious is either attacking your neighbors or defending yourself from them, and also after getting Monarchy as soon as possible, those military units give you happiness to help you grow your cities.

For the second and third cities I try to build buildings to generate culture/science/whatever it is they have the resources to do while beefing them up with military units generated by the home city allowing them to grow under Monarchy.

After that, I just play the game by ear because each game brings a different set of goals depending on your neighbors and the lay of the land. To get those cities up and running as soon as possible, I like playing the Portuguese because they can generate workers and settlers quickly, plus the added health bonus for being expansive.

The advantage of quick workers and settlers dissipates fairly quickly once you get into later stages of the game and land is scarce, but at the very beginning, getting those three cities up and running ASAP outweighs that disadvantage for me. That quick burst at the beginning is huge. Once the game gets going and I’ve secured a few resources, I can generate military units as fast as anyone else. Well, usually. LOL

 

[JTMacc99]

Rather than starting a thread which has probably already been done, but I couldn't find, I'll ask this here.

I finally decided to play a game at epic speed as opposed to normal speed. I started one or two previously, but I freaked out when it said Writing was going to take 17 turns to research and went back to normal speed.

I am finding Epic speed to be significantly easier. Maybe it is because most of my normal problems come from not paying attention. Maybe it is just because I drew a continents game where the Jungle dwelling Mongols separated me from Ghandi and Isabella (and a very early payment to Isabella to go to war with Khan crippled them both permanently.) Maybe I'm just getting better at this darn game.

Whatever the reason, I have found that my first game in epic is a cakewalk at my normal difficulty level. Is this normal for other people, or is just my style of play benefits greatly from the extra turns?

 

[PieceOfMind]

Many people tend to find the slower game speeds a little easier because basically you get to make more of the main advantage we enjoy over the AIs. That is unit tactics and war strategy. When it is closer to being an all out economy game, and it is closer to this on the faster speeds because you get fewer turns in each era to wage war before your units are obsoleted, the AI can make more direct use of its bonuses. After all, it does not receive any bonuses in combat (excluding some technical issues like barbarian combat etc.).

The extent to which you find the slower gamespeeds easier would depend largely on playstyle.

These days I tend to play Epic speed if I play a large map or greater, and I will play either Normal speed or Epic speed on a standard map (I rarely play anything smaller), for obvious reasons.

If you are finding the game significantly easier it may even be a combination of coincidence, better skills and the effect of gamespeed. I know personally that even with using similar settings in many games you sometimes get games that are far easier than others.

 

[JTMacc99]

I'll play one more game at epic to figure out if it is just this game. (To be fair, the fact that the Mongols settled a big band of cities in the jungle between me and my religious buddies was a dream situation. They barely improve land as it is, so my technologically advanced muskets and knights were just too much for the swords/longbows and 9 million Keshiks. The only downside was capturing a bunch of cities with NOTHING in them and barely anything improved around them.)

This seems to be where epic came into play. I was almost definitely more efficient in my pre-war REX period. I dropped in my new cities at a much better pace than I normally do. I also managed to specialize the early cities much better. I suddenly started to notice those little indicators on the map that tell me one of my cities is working an unimproved tile. I am not kidding about that. Normally I just pay attention when I remember to do it. This time, I got my workers running around to cities that needed the improvements immediately.

I also had much less trouble getting the Heroic Epic city identified and useful at an early date. First it made some crossbows (I was given a protective leader in this game) and then a stack of Knights that would see a lot of action and very few casualties.

I also find myself taking a much more sane approach to the city builds in general. Maybe it is just the fact that it is going to take 23 turns to build a Market that makes me actually click on the city to see if there is any commerce there to make it worthwhile. Same idea with the health buildings. Why on earth should I build an aqueduct in a city with +8 health?

Clicking on the city menu to see if I should actually build something also has had the effect of me noticing that I'm working a 3 food tile in a city that really can't handle rapid growth. In this game, I have run my speciallists better than normal.

 

[frankcor]

JTMacc99, you have gained the knowledge that careful city management and city specialization are the first steps to improved game-play. You should do well at any game-speed now.

 

[JTMacc99]

I'm in my second round of Epic, and even after isolating myself very early one (by killing off my only neighbor WAY before we could make any trades), I STILL ended up being the score leader when I found the rest of the world. I have no idea of exactly why, but something about this speed makes me play significantly better. It has to be the fact that I have more turns to notice I am being sloppy.

(I still can't bring myself to build a GP Farm, however. I see all that food and grassland, and I cottage the bejesus out of it and rake in the commerce. I REALLY need to stop doing that.)