Emperor more difficult than Immortal

[lumpcalhoon]

I'm comfortably can beat immortal most of the time thanks in a large part to this site. Big thanks to lymond and fippy! Reading old Posts. I recently tried to go down a level and it was hard the ai doesn't trade and techs slow! Anyone else experience this lol

 

[lymond]

Nah..Emperor is definitely easier. It may be an adjunct result of loosening up your gameplay a bit due to moving down difficulty. Also, although Emperor is easier, you can still roll tougher starts and have less cooperative neighbors. I play IMM and Deity usually, but with like HOF and GOTM I sometimes play an Emperor game now and then. I tend to be more aggressive early on which helps. Go for early Alpha and declare lots of wars and get free techs in peace.

 

[lumpcalhoon]

That's where I was screwing up I was going for aesthetics and no one had alpha playing hemispheres. It was just so strange. And slow paced lol

 

[Amao]

Well, if you play even lower levels, forget about tech trading. Tech whatever you need yourself!

It's not like you're doing some attack plan or rexxing. You still need, say, like 50 turns to get 3 cities, or 100 turns before you rushing out with cats/axes/etc. They are likely the same. But, I guess you just need to optimize your tech path to the level, or maybe rush out a few turns earlier coz AIs don't have as much defenders. btw, what techs you can get out of beating up an AI is decreasing as you going lower on levels.

 

[lumpcalhoon]

You are absolutely right I just forgot how slow they were. I was actually pretty slow on my first attack because I was teching the wrong things. It honestly felt harder after being used to a faster tech rate on a pangea. Ha rush was really late. Then when the other continent was met I actually kinda backward from all the warring.

 

[Amao]

You are absolutely right I just forgot how slow they were. I was actually pretty slow on my first attack because I was teching the wrong things. It honestly felt harder after being used to a faster tech rate on a pangea. Ha rush was really late. Then when the other continent was met I actually kinda backward from all the warring.

Hammer wins the war. So, just sail a bigger stack to the other side of the earth.

 

[lumpcalhoon]

And that should be a mantra in this game food in the first ring and hammer wins the war

 

[Bibor]

Yeah, I play emperor, but I think it's time to step up a level. I learned good deity micro from posts and videos, so I do really well till like T150 and then I get lost in random wonders, buildings and tech strategies instead of just building enough galleons and cavalry.
With a decent start and good leader I outpace the AI at around Feudalism and then it's just an OCD therapy till Fusion (I prefer space races with an odd domination/conquest)

 

[lumpcalhoon]

I did the same thing to move up a level. a lot of reading posts From the deity players on here and watching lain videos. Lymonds early game walk throughs with different players really helped me learn the whip in the early game. And not over building. My micro is still lazy lol but it's getting better

 

[Gavagay]

When you play with tech trading on, all kind of craziness can happen, including Immortal feeling easy. Tech trading is basically a cheat mode, stupid, broken mechanics which creates commerce ex nihilo and allows playing without economy.
My advice is to play without tech trading for much more balanced and competitive experience.

 

[rah]

I usually play with it off but when I do I feel it disables quite a few aspects of the game. It's harder to get other AIs to friendly. It's harder to bribe AIs to attack other AI's. For me it leads to not ending wars since I can't get a tech for the peace treaty, I'll just finish them off while I'm at it.
I too think it's kind of broken but it touches quite a few other aspects of the game.

 

[lumpcalhoon]

I suspect rah is probably right but maybe i'll roll a map and give it try. The mechanic does seem a little schewed. Maybe they should've limited how much you can trade the same tech or be in a certain era before getting it from another civ just for game balance...just a thought

 

[lymond]

I suspect rah is probably right but maybe i'll roll a map and give it try. The mechanic does seem a little schewed. Maybe they should've limited how much you can trade the same tech or be in a certain era before getting it from another civ just for game balance...just a thought

First, I quite disagree with previously expressed thoughts on tech trading. It's a default mechanic of the game and plays very well with diplomatic aspects. The option is pretty much about personal preference or making the game more challenging, if one chooses. I really don't find it relevant to the topic anyway.

As rah mentioned, tech trading on allows for many more aspects of the game to be realized, probably more than he may even realize himself. Also, I look at it this way. Tech trading off - AIs don't trade with human, but they don't trade with each other. Conversely, with it off AIs trade with human and other AIs. There's more balance to the mechanic than what opinions state - (although the balance decreases with decrease in difficulty). However, it opens up good strategies and gameplay tactics if one knows how to tech trade optimally. That includes knowing how to tech optimally.

As for limits, lump, AI leaders have trade caps - with the exception of Mansa - so depending on the leader (trade caps limits vary by leader) the human can hit a wall on being able to trade stuff as they will "fear you are becoming to advanced". Furthermore AIs tend to not trade certain techs like Wonder techs or certain military techs (think Construction) for quite some time, even if you have good relations. Also, there is an option called "No Tech Brokering" which prevents trading techs around that you acquired in trade previously - probably the happy medium to the issue.

IMO no tech trading is far too limiting with respect to other mechanics in the game. Not being able to acquire techs in peace deals or offer them to get out of a war is not logical. Or simply to trade older techs for gold..in other words - sell or barter your empire's knowledge. Certainly an historic basis for that transaction.

With that said, there is certainly merit in playing with it off if looking for more of a challenge. I find Deity plenty challenging anyway, but the option is there all the same. I think it far from a stupid mechanic in this game though.

Lastly, there are situations like iso/semi-iso that would be nigh impossible without it ..same goes for the AI.

 

[Gavagay]

It's harder to get other AIs to friendly. It's harder to bribe AIs to attack other AI's. For me it leads to not ending wars since I can't get a tech for the peace treaty, I'll just finish them off while I'm at it.

In other words, the game becomes less about manipulating AIs which is my point.

 

[Gavagay]

However, it opens up good strategies and gameplay tactics if one knows how to tech trade optimally. That includes knowing how to tech optimally.

My position is that "go for Aesthetics, trade it for all other classical techs" is not a "good strategy and gameplay tactics". This is nothing more than an exploit of an inconsistency in AI programming which is coded to de-prioritize Aesthetics when doing research but to take it at full value in trades. And the ability to create commerce from nothing which tech trades imply is immersion breaking. But this is just my opinion, of course, everyone plays this game in his own way.

 

[sampsa]

My position is that "go for Aesthetics, trade it for all other classical techs" is not a "good strategy and gameplay tactics". This is nothing more than an exploit of an inconsistency in AI programming which is coded to de-prioritize Aesthetics when doing research but to take it at full value in trades.

Well, I almost never go aesth unless marble, even if it's a good trade chip, because there are many other good trade chips (say compass, CoL, even MC). So I wouldn't blame it on "AI doesn't prioritize aesth". Maybe the tech trade mechanic does indeed favor human player too much, but then it's just poor design. There are several ways to make the game harder and choosing a higher difficulty level is the most obvious one. I would definitely say that going for a "trade chip"-tech to trade it around IS a good strategy, nothing less, nothing more.

 

[Fish Man]

My position is that "go for Aesthetics, trade it for all other classical techs" is not a "good strategy and gameplay tactics". This is nothing more than an exploit of an inconsistency in AI programming which is coded to de-prioritize Aesthetics when doing research but to take it at full value in trades. And the ability to create commerce from nothing which tech trades imply is immersion breaking. But this is just my opinion, of course, everyone plays this game in his own way.

I feel like it's somewhat unfair to define exploit as "taking advantage of something the AI doesn't do." Otherwise almost everything that makes this game fun would be "immersion breaking." For example - safety begs. If anything it's even MORE unrealistic for a crazy psychopath like Shaka to stop planning to kill you if you ask nicely from them $10, and yet having that option is not only an anti-frustration feature but an important part of manipulating diplo. And let's not talk about slavery, the only reason 90% of deity games are even winnable. Does it make sense to use FMAB-esque human transmutation to magically turn a person into 30 hammers? Not really. Do the AI use it in any sensible way to their advantage? No, except panic-whipping defenders and occasionally wonders just to spite the human player. Does it make the game more fun and even playable in the first place? You bet. Past a certain point I feel total realism has to be sacrificed a bit for balance and enjoyment, and tech trading is one of these things. And it's not even unrealistic - sharing knowledge is a legitimate part of progress, and like @sampsa said there's plenty of trade bait that's much more useful than aesth (AZ's videos are not exactly the pinnacle of deity strategy these days).

 

[Fippy]

Single player is almost never balanced, and for most players joy comes from finding ways to win against AIs with bonuses (or just better positions overall).
Civ4 solved this much better than most games, even today everybody here can still lose a very tuff deity game if things go wrong

Tech trading really can go both ways, imagine a scenario where Mansa and 2 other friendly AIs like Gandhi or Lizzy sit on 1 continent (unreachable until Optics).
With trading off, it would be much much easier to catch up with them later.
Or when you have a really strong military tech for yourself, AIs will be slower with reaching counter units.
Ofc nobody will deny that tech trading can also make some games easier, but i cannot agree with those who claim it's always so.

On Aesth, it's not really true that AIs are coded to rarely tech it.
They can and sometimes will, or if they are Indian leaders i.e. they will do so often.
It's just that techs like IW have such high priority at this point, which also makes sense cos..
well without IW many early rushes like HAs would become easier, now they would rely on copper only.

 

[Bibor]

Played a game last night with Inca, beautiful map, semi-isolation with further culture contact across ocean. Perfect island with a neighbor that has the perfect BFC for infinite worker steal (forest highway to its only source of food). I think I stole like 10 workers or some such, got 2 woodsman III guys... you get the picture. Oh and perfect bureau capital location with 3 (!) prime production sites very close nearby.

By turn 50 I realised I have this game in the bag, but then what? It's emperor, by the time I broke isolation (and I was in no way in a hurry, since there's no need), I was teching everything in 3-5 turns and I had the choice of either go space or go galleon naval across the globe. Well I played two games, one with space, one with conquest. Both were pretty boring. There's nobody to trade with, and I was either self-teching everything (not worth giving up printing press for drama, really) going with Cav against longbows and knights at best. In the space version, by the time *one* AI had something to trade, it was computers for democracy...

Perhaps I should go for a culture or UN version, but that's more for philo leaders.

 

[sampsa]

@Bibor you should play a harder difficulty level.