emperor help

weezer

Chieftain
Joined
Apr 21, 2003
Messages
22
Ever since I played Civ3, I usually play at Monarch. Now, I decided to play in a higher level. So, I tried Emperor. I was shocked by how fast the AIs expanded, fast they researched, how aggressive they were at the start. I decided to put my Science to 0. Since, they were so aggressive in the start, 5 of the civs made war to me. Luckily, I got a leader and made the GL. After the war ended, I tried to expand and make money. By the time, GL became obsolete, I had 1k+. Then, bought chemistry 1k. From there I was really left behind. By the time they got Navigation. Im still at Chemistry and cant buy cant techs. Hmm.. any strat/tips you can give me?
 
Hmm, sounds like something fundamental is going wrong.

It's not uncommon on Emperor to be behind for the whole of the Ancient Ages, and some of the Middle Ages, but by the start of the Industrial Age, you should be tech leader.

Are you meeting new contacts quickly and trading techs to keep up?
Which government are you in?
Are you aggressive or passive with other civs?
Do you have enough workers (1 per city), and are all tiles worked?
How many cities do you have?

In fact, post your save, it will help a lot.
 
It doesn't sound that bad actually. Most players do a lot worse on their first Emperor attempt. Strategies that work on Monarchy and below (and thus are used a lot) simply don't work on Emperor.

How did the first war start ? Was it a sneak attack or did you reject a demand ?

And yes, please upload a save; so people who can beat Emperor can analyse your game and give personalised advise.
 
Sorry, I can't upload it. I made a stupid mistake. I didn't backuped my game! My Civ3 freezes every now and then(see my post in tech support forum), and I decided to reinstall. When I deleted the directory, I didn't realize that the I didn't backup my game. So there. I'm gonna play again later.

-I have about 9 cities.
-The first war started when I saw this enemy unit near my capital. Then, the AI contacted me and traded with him, and giving gpt because of the trade. So I thought that the AI wouldnt attack me because I had a deal with him. The next turn, the war started. Then, he called an alliance against me, and his ally called an alliance against me,.. etc..
-Not all tiles are worked, but most of the tiles around the capital is already worked.
-I had about 6 workers.
 
If this happened before the republic tech came out then you could try buying all of your ancient age techs off of one or two civs that are the furthest away from your cities. For most of the ancient age, the AI's will have science set on full, so if you keep the cash flow out of your neighbors hands, when they wage an early war against you they shouldn't have embassies established with the other civs.

6 workers sounds like too few, but it just depends on your terrain and if you have an industrious civ. No matter what civ you have though, it's always best to keep pumping them out. If you find a good spot for a worker pump then build a grainery and keep 'em coming. If not, then try to squeeze them in after you plop a city and warrior.

For struggling in the early tech race, it's best to build a few exploring warriors to meet other civs immediately after settling. Sending three off in different directions for a pangea map is about the right amount. And after you meet other civs, start checking the forgeign advisor every turn to see what techs they have. You should be able to find some techs you can buy and resell to ai's that don't have them yet.

You mentioned that you turned science off. I usually set it to min. and go for math at 10% as soon as it's available. Most of the AI's will research iron working, or writing/map making (in fact, I think Carthage is the only one that pursues math, but havn't tested that fully yet). If you can get a monopoly on math, or any other tech for that matter, you can trade it around for almost any other tech you're missing as well as any gold the AI might have.

Question(s):

- What were the first few builds for your capital?
- What was your usual building que after you made a city?
- About how far appart were your cities (# of tiles)?
 
As you have seen at Emperor, the AI will dog pile you in a war. Civ A will buy in its friend(s). They will bring their friends and soon most of them are at war with you. Even if they cannot reach you this is a problem as it will be hard to get back to peace.

You also learned that having a deal where you pay them is not enough to prevent an attack. The best thing is to not be weak compared to them. Failing that, as soon as I see the attack, I demand them to leave and force the declaration. Now I can go out and start the dog pile on them. Get as many as you can, it is not important for them to actually help you, only that they not be in against you. Any work they do is a bonus.

Now you must have more workers. You want to be able to improve all worked tiles. If that is not done, get more workers. IOW look at the city view and if you see food/shields and no road, no mine or irrigation, you need workers.

Most of the games I see where players struggle to keep up, will have lots of citizens working unimproved tiles.

Zero research is fine, if you have the GL, but only if you have a long ways to go before Education. It sounds like you probably did not have that much leeway. So you would need to keep researching. You may be able to wait for a few free techs, but probably better to work on a tech that is not required.

Giving 1000 gold to a civ early in the middle ages, is never a good plan. In fact saving lots of cash is only useful, if you plan a mass upgrade. If not, then spend it on something. Infrastructure, if a builder, troops if a blitzer.
 
Another idea: play archipelago maps, at least to start. If 5 AIs do declare war on you, probably only a couple will be able to do anything about it.
 
Please also note that Ision has done an article; Monarch to Emperor: the Great Leap which may be interesting reading if you haven't spotted it. Most of the War Academy articles are of great value. The 'Individual Civ Reviews' are full of strategic suggestions about how to play to your chosen tribe's strengths.

I have found that simply reading some of the step-by-step threads, such as Sandman's 'The Chronicles of Khan' or zerksees' resurrection-type games such as 'Recovering from Last Place after Expansion Phase' to be of great value. There are a gazillion other commendable threads that show what can be achieved. :goodjob:

b.t.w. - Which version of Civ3 are you playing?
 
weezer said:
By the time, GL became obsolete, I had 1k+. Then, bought chemistry 1k. From there I was really left behind. By the time they got Navigation. Im still at Chemistry and cant buy cant techs. Hmm.. any strat/tips you can give me?

Buying like that worked in vanilla and PTW when techs were very cheap to buy if you were the last to get it. But they're more expensive in C3C, so you have to make that work to your advantage. Buy a tech when you can sell it to other civs. So, you must buy a tech that several civs don't know, and those civs that don't know it must have things to pay you with (gold, luxuries, or other techs). This way, you can get several techs at once, or make back the money you spent on the first tech. Opportunistic trading like this (sometimes called two-fer or n-fer trades) is one of the main skills you need to win the tougher difficulties. The games that Cam_H linked to should have good examples of this, or look at just about any session game.

As long as you're in the tech race and can do trades like that, the game is very winnable. Come-from-behind wins in the industrial age and modern age are pretty easy in this situation. But if you're so far behind the race that n-fer trades are not possible, consider stealing tech or researching (it's cheaper when in last place) to catch up.
 
I just started my first emperor game myself. You can click on the link in my signature to view it. So far i am off to a great start. I am playing archipelago and i noticed my one neighbor was alot more advanced then me. So i decided to make galleys and find as many neighbors as i could. Within 2 turns i gained all the world maps and about 5 techs and lots of gold. The first couple trades may cost you what you dont want to give them, but after that you will gain alot from the rest of the trades from the other civs. They will give you alot just for world maps and communications.
 
I just completed my first game on Emperor today. I think your highest priorities early in the game without a doubt should be:

1. Explore
2. Expand

Explore so you know where to settle productive new cities and get into contact with other civilizations ASAP. Like vxma said, you need a few warriors to do this, 2-3 is fine on a large map. I wouldn't recommend ever trading your world map early in the game, because even though the AI knows where everything is on the map right away, it only knows when it actually explores the map itself (or you show it to them). This will slow down their expansion.

Try to block-out other civs with your own cities, I try and expand outwards -> in, and if any civ tries to cross your border tell them to get out before they sneak through and settle somewhere in your desired land. It pays to be really attentive early in the game, scroll over the whole map at least once per turn to get an idea of where to expand to next and ensure no AI sneaks into your lands.

After you have a reasonable number of cities (maybe 8), you should probably really consider throwing in a few offensive units with your settlers and/or workers -- I generally don't bother much with defensive units since offensive units are rated on a ratio of 1.5 per defensive unit. The main goal here is to ensure that the AI doesn't get a large military lead over you. You can recover from being scientifically behind easily, but when an AI has a military lead it's harder to play catch up let alone sustain it. Runaway civs are tough to contain, so watch for them.

You should consider setting up embassies ASAP with most civs whenever you can afford it, and by this stage you should have a fair idea who to get alliances with -- countries that are doing reasonably OK. I wouldn't recommend getting MPP with backwards or small civs because at this level, the AI will pick on them fairly early and you will get dragged into a war early against someone who will most likely be much larger than you.

If you are dragged into a war, the SECOND you are attacked and it's your turn, get an alliance against the attacking country or a MPP and ROP with other civs at a minimum. The AI may get a few good shots in the first 3-4 turns of war, but once the other civs get involved and the AI is attacked from multiple sides, their war machine slows down significantly. I love watching an allied civ tear apart an attacking civ in your territory, it also gives you great relations with other civs (gracious) and makes it easier to trade techs and resources.

Later on when you get the Republic, steam power and nationalism; I always try to get to these ASAP. Republic is a good government no matter what mood you're in, WW is low, corruption isn't too bad and military upkeep is cheaper than Democracy (I'm fairly sure it is?). Steam power means you will only need to defend your border cities relatively well, so you won't need to keep units stationed everywhere. Nationalism means you can draft units from cities if you're under severe attack, this will help you significantly when you can pump out 5-10 defenders in a single turn to protect your empire. This also means you only need one reasonable sized attack force to pick off enemy troops that get too close to your borders.

Either way, I think keeping a lid on the runaway AI should always be a priority once your empire is well established and you can afford to build a strong mobile attack force. Once you get artillery, you should probably really consider going on an offensive since it gives you a bombard range of 2 tiles, attacking AI border cities becomes so much easier when you redline an entire city's defence.

Anyway, that's what I think :)
 
@ StavrosMelb: I would not advise holding off on getting offensive units until you have 8 cities on most emperor games. The first emperor game I played (and won), I was sneak attacked about 3 turns after I created my second city by 2 persian spearmen and 2 warriors.

If you explore and find no agressive AI civs near you, then it's fine to build cities with low military. But if you've got agressive civs near you, then I'd advise getting escorts for all your settlers. In that game I was sneaked by the persians, the warrior escort I sent with my settler and the exploring warrior I was able to get into the town were the only reason I wasn't killed off before 3000 bc in that game.
 
2000warrior said:
@ StavrosMelb: I would not advise holding off on getting offensive units until you have 8 cities on most emperor games. The first emperor game I played (and won), I was sneak attacked about 3 turns after I created my second city by 2 persian spearmen and 2 warriors.
yeah I know, its happened to me before, even on Chieftain :lol: you need to take a few risks early on in the game. building settlers and then waiting for an escort all the time can cost you ideal city locations, setting you back even longer, especially at a time when the AI already has a big advantage.

you are right though, 8 cities isn't ideal. what I should of said is while you're waiting a few turns inbetween creating settlers to replenish those citizens used up, these times are ideal for building attack units and when you're more comfortable city improvements (granary, barracks, temple). it's just perfecting the mix of settlers and offensive units inbetween stagnant periods of time.
 
I'm currently playing in PTW 1.27f.

Anyways, I started a new Emperor game. Im playing as the Koreans(the last game, I used the Greeks). I was able to have a good start(I think. ;) ). I think currently I have a big territory compared to the AIs. Then, I went to war with my neighbor, India. I got 3 cities from them. The cities I got was has luxuries near them(I have no luxuries!). Made peace with them after a while because I think I will not be able hold of their Elephants. I got myself a tech. Now, Im still at despotism. I have only I luxury at the moment, so I might go for Monarchy(for the police). What do you think? Republic or Monarchy?

EDIT: Oh, btw, Im playing with these settings:

Large, Pangaea, Warm Wet 3(?)/4 Billion
Barabs: Roaming
Rules: Default

Im gonna post a screenshot later. Thanks for the replies guys! :)
 
Screenshot:

The tiles aren't that worked. Haha. Oh well... should i make a Forbidden Palace?
 

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Where are your workers ?
You obviously haven't got enough of them, since your lands are so unimproved.
You need to revolt. I'd (nearly) always pick Republic over Monarchy (I learned the hard way).
There is still land available to your SW. Build settlers and claim those tiles.
Your cities look small. Have you got sufficient granaries?
Many of your cities are building units; but no cities seem to have barracks. It is better to create specialized unit-producing cities with barracks.
Irrigate plains, but mine grassland. I see a lot of grassland irrigation around your cap. That's not a winning strategy.
 
you've irrigated grass tiles around Seoul, which is a complete waste of time in Despotism, since there is a food penalty of -1.

EDIT: sorry Rik, didn't see you said that already

You should definitely be in another govt. by this time.

City placement is pretty good though, well done. :thumbsup:
 
yeah, I could learn a thing or 2 about city placement from you, weezer :)

move 2 defensive units from Hyangsan (I see 3 units there) to the border cities, on this map I highly doubt any naval assaults from the AI :lol: as your empire grows outwards, just move those defensive units from your old border cities to your new ones.

other than that, maybe change 1-2 cities to produce workers and a few more settlers while you still can (probably best to use Seoul), and the second you can, without a doubt change government, you want to make money and research, don't you? ;)
 
You have three irriagated grass tiles around Seoul. These do you no good in Despotism. One of them is shield grass too. All should have been mined.
 
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