First two Ages at Bismarck.

[Elfje1989]

Hello,

I have started to play Civ V a few months ago and have been playing a game every now and then. Going slowly on my pace past all leaders on a challeging difficulty level.

I started with Alexander on Settler, just checking out the differenses between Civ IV & V. I played most crap but I won an easy cultural victory (as most city states were cultural and stayed allies without any real focus).
So time to get to Chieftain and conquer the world on Askia. Only killed Montezuma on my own continenent at first as he was too agressive to my taste and then surprised the other continent real early on. And won a smashing score close to 4000. Easy peasy.
Then it was Atilla on Warlord, despite a crappy start I managed to win the continent with mostly rams and a couple of spears/archers.
Then I found my challenge on Rome, needed a few retries until I figured out how to best build a solid Empire and crush China before Christ. As Bejing had the Great Library and other nice science boosts, my development skyrocketed and I won the space race, just bout 20 turns before anyone else could win.

So Prince was a nice level to continue on and it is now Bismarck's turn. His bonus makes me want to start a war ASAP. Sending barbarians to others and let them conquer in my name. I have tried a bit here and there and despite guides here and there telling me to not build my own army, focus on either expanding or building wonders.

I run into a few things that seems to make both tactics unlikely:

• Getting my first barb is tricky. I never get the first encampment without healing (unless I get spears or 20 culture from a ruin). And while healing the camp spawns 1, but more often even 2 more units. I have two choices here: run or try to beat the odds and if I fail to get a barb here, lose my first unit.
• By the time I have 5-6 units and should attack another civ as sugested, most already have 2-3 cities and more army then me (according to my millitary advisor).
• Getting wonders is great fun and as I start with a Great Library to boost my science and have a shrine before Writing is finished, so I get some faith early on. But I have not much to fall back on if my neighbours are much stronger then me.
• Expanding is tricky as I do not want to loose the settler I build by barbs coming just while my army is a little too far off. So I either keep them close and lose time getting to other encampments. Or I can lose the settler.
• Another thing with expanding is that I need to give more effort keeping the happines up, that is partly done by some policies in the honor tree, but not enough to get to a third city smiling. So I need a worker getting those special resources. The worker needs protection, as well as the imporved land. Next to that if I research Civil Service Asap (as adiviced in those guides) I have no worker techs, except Animal Husbandry, Hunting and the Wheel. With Marble/Pearls/Gems/Cotton etc. It is no help. And I don't want to reroll just to start next to truffles, ivory or fur or so.

The greatest problem with these little guides is that they do not give their game settings and version. But I will, before I ask your advice on how to best make advantage of Bismrack befriending barbarians.

I play Gods & Kings (with all DLC's from before february), I play a Prince level game on a standard size continents map with a standard game length.
I do not want to play another map type and size and game length for various reasons, nor alter the ammount of civ's and city states.

So again, I would be really glad on some adivice on how to use Bismarck to great advantage as early on as possible.

Thanks, in Advance.

 

[Unresolved]

I don't really play Bismarck, but I can give you some tips. Germany's UA(the barbarian half of it) is not very good on standard speed. Its uses increase as you slow down the pace of the game. I would not rely on it when playing standard speed. Use the unit maintenance reduction and their early UU as your main advantages. Also, whatever guide you read "build more wonders, less units" in is flat out wrong. It's actually quite the opposite as wonders take back-seat to units and buildings. Once you build units, you won't have settler or worker problems since you'll be able to defend yourself.

I'd recommend using Liberty and not Honor as it is much better as an opening tree. Particularly for domination-based games.

It also sounds like you're not using enough ranged units. I would go for an army composition of 6 ranged units and 2 melee units. Ranged units(in this current iteration of the game) are much better at fighting than melee units. Of course, this ratio will be different once you reach your UU, but you still want a focus on CB's and crossbows, not melee units.

 

[Elfje1989]

When I fought my few wars with rome, I fought cities with mostly ranged units, which later became more and more siege weapons. I only used melee to take out the extra army (witch I weakened with range first) and to take the city after their defences were down. Only used horses when to many melee died in the war, as they arive at the battle-field much faster. So I can keep presure on the enemy.

But in this game, as I focussed on getting my army from encampments, which mostly had melee units and a range here and there. So my army balance was kind of the other way around.

Yet a few questions linger:
When to start my first war? By which Era and by what other requirements (personal army size versus the enemie's, ammount of cities, land devolpment, production speed)?
Should I priotitize Civil Service, after I got the needed work techs or go finance/science based?

Next to that, I really hope to get a oppinion on Germany's UA at standard speed by someone who has played Bismarck a couple of times at Prince or better.

 

[nanomage]

...
When to start my first war? By which Era and by what other requirements (personal army size versus the enemie's, ammount of cities, land devolpment, production speed)?
Should I priotitize Civil Service, after I got the needed work techs or go finance/science based?

Next to that, I really hope to get a oppinion on Germany's UA at standard speed by someone who has played Bismarck a couple of times at Prince or better.

Start your war as soon as you can steal a worker or field 5-6 composite bowmen.
In case of CB's triggering war, that should be early Classical Era. You should most often beeline CS after construction, because it's +1 food per farm and it's on your way to Universities, and Landsknechts just make this way even better.
Don't make mistakes about German UA - their UA is to pay 75% for army maintenance. Barb converting thing is a minor-to nonexistant buff, never build your (standard-paced) game around that.
EDIT: You're definitely better off exploring with your warrior early game than trying to knock down barb camps before CS quest you to.

 

[Elfje1989]

Okay I tried a few things out but I was far from lucky.

I send my warrior to scout and grab a few ruins. Three spaces south of Berlin where mountains, which blocked my way to the south and north where mountains as well. So I went east, found two city states and a few ruins, one gave 20 culture but the others only barb location or gold.

Near Berlin where truffles in a forest and gold at the first city expand. So I researched mining, Animal Husbandry and then Hunting, followed by a focus on Construction as advised and then Civil Service.

I build a second warrior, with which I explored the north east a bit, next to the mountains. Followed by a Worker, another Warrior and a Settler. (Liberty gave me another settler and worker).

I build my second city and I had about ten turns left until I could build Compisite Bowmens, so I build a monuments in both cities and a wall in Berlin.

While I was sending my second settler with a warrior to a third city site, the Ottomans said Merhaba and build a city right west of Berlin, where I wanted my third to be put. As I finally arrived another suitable location, he build his fourth and declared war. Just as I had my first CB build.

It took a bit of turns before he arrived so I managed to buy four more CB's and build another. I repelled his first attack and managed to keep pressure on Ankara (which was in the west of Berlin). Thanks to the CB's, nice tip it played out to be. Although, all his cities where surounded by hills and forests, so I had to take two counter attacks, when moving my CB's in instead of zero, as I mostly plan it. (Later found out he had the Great Wall, no idea why, as the forests and hills already gave him the same advantage).

The new production in Berlin refreshed the fallen CB's near Ankara and the ones my other two cities produced pressed north with the exploration warior to siege his forth city. I capatured his fourth first and just when I took Ankara, the Japanese said Konishiwa and I though Crap! Not a warmonger, not now...

I contined to attack the Ottomans second city. When I had it almost done, the Japanese (which where friendly from the beginning and didn't check but find out why now), they took that city from the fog of war...

After about a few other centuries, entering the middle ages, as I finished CS and already build three Landknechten and send them to Ankara (as the east is filled now and only two city states are there next to me), Istanbul was mine, pff...

My Millitarty Advisor says that Japan is about the same strength as me, but I pointiest stick reports showed him having about 50 more points then me, us both being way above the rest of the world.

So now I'm troubled to continue. Should I stabilize or keep the pressure and kill him asap?
I expect Oda to bite if I get a little to weak, although he says we are friends. So I'm a bit worried. The war has made my people a little unhappy (I also used a great Engineer (which I got when finishing Liberty) to hammer Circus Maximus, still 2 unhappyness.). But my income is +30 and my own cities grow quickly. Berlin produces landsknechten in 1-2 turns and Hamburg in 4/5.
I have decided to go for Metal Casting and I already have a barracks in Berlin and am building one in Hamburg.
I'm thinking to upgrade my trained warriors. I have three and think one has had no level up, so I'll disband him.

Any tips?

Ps. I would have added my save if I knew where to find the file on my desktop.

 

[nanomage]

Okay I tried a few things out but I was far from lucky.

I send my warrior to scout and grab a few ruins. Three spaces south of Berlin where mountains, which blocked my way to the south and north where mountains as well. So I went east, found two city states and a few ruins, one gave 20 culture but the others only barb location or gold.

Near Berlin where truffles in a forest and gold at the first city expand. So I researched mining, Animal Husbandry and then Hunting, followed by a focus on Construction as advised and then Civil Service.

I build a second warrior, with which I explored the north east a bit, next to the mountains. Followed by a Worker, another Warrior and a Settler. (Liberty gave me another settler and worker).

I build my second city and I had about ten turns left until I could build Compisite Bowmens, so I build a monuments in both cities and a wall in Berlin.

While I was sending my second settler with a warrior to a third city site, the Ottomans said Merhaba and build a city right west of Berlin, where I wanted my third to be put. As I finally arrived another suitable location, he build his fourth and declared war. Just as I had my first CB build.

It took a bit of turns before he arrived so I managed to buy four more CB's and build another. I repelled his first attack and managed to keep pressure on Ankara (which was in the west of Berlin). Thanks to the CB's, nice tip it played out to be. Although, all his cities where surounded by hills and forests, so I had to take two counter attacks, when moving my CB's in instead of zero, as I mostly plan it. (Later found out he had the Great Wall, no idea why, as the forests and hills already gave him the same advantage).

The new production in Berlin refreshed the fallen CB's near Ankara and the ones my other two cities produced pressed north with the exploration warior to siege his forth city. I capatured his fourth first and just when I took Ankara, the Japanese said Konishiwa and I though Crap! Not a warmonger, not now...

I contined to attack the Ottomans second city. When I had it almost done, the Japanese (which where friendly from the beginning and didn't check but find out why now), they took that city from the fog of war...

After about a few other centuries, entering the middle ages, as I finished CS and already build three Landknechten and send them to Ankara (as the east is filled now and only two city states are there next to me), Istanbul was mine, pff...

My Millitarty Advisor says that Japan is about the same strength as me, but I pointiest stick reports showed him having about 50 more points then me, us both being way above the rest of the world.

So now I'm troubled to continue. Should I stabilize or keep the pressure and kill him asap?
I expect Oda to bite if I get a little to weak, although he says we are friends. So I'm a bit worried. The war has made my people a little unhappy (I also used a great Engineer (which I got when finishing Liberty) to hammer Circus Maximus, still 2 unhappyness.). But my income is +30 and my own cities grow quickly. Berlin produces landsknechten in 1-2 turns and Hamburg in 4/5.
I have decided to go for Metal Casting and I already have a barracks in Berlin and am building one in Hamburg.
I'm thinking to upgrade my trained warriors. I have three and think one has had no level up, so I'll disband him.

Any tips?

Ps. I would have added my save if I knew where to find the file on my desktop.

~/Documents/My Games/Sid Meyer's Civilization V/saves/single
You were late to build your military. Don't wait to research Construction to build CB's, buy/build archers and upgrade later. That you had enough gold hoarded to rush-buy 4 CB is a mismanagement too - you should have spent it on units/upgrades long before that

 

[Syailendra]

don't disband your warrior, lknecths upgrade path is lancer, which is useless. You'll need those warriors eventually. Your unit maintenance is lower anyway.
Your focus now is education tech, and build universities ASAP. Nobunaga will come to you at any time later, so prepare to war. After you get education you can focus to fertilizer, and then dynamite, in the mean time between fertilizer and dyna, build cannons, DON'T upgrade lknecth to lancers, they are expensive and useless (but upgrading 2 is ok if you don't have knights). When you have dyna, upgrade cannons to arties and declare war to nobunaga.

 

[Elfje1989]

Hmm, I didn't know that upgrading was always good. I always thought it was a waste to upgrade untrained units. At my last game before Germany, I builded new units and disbanded the old, as they had more XP. To begin with, then the others had already.
But then again, I didn't play war focussed. I only attacked those on my continent and only when they got anoying. Budica started building alot of wonders Rome was working on and the Swedish started attacking my city stat allies. With a superior army, I could not let that happen.

Back to Bismarck. I think that I will start a new game and try to get stronger earlier on, as it was not just bad luck, but mistakes as well.

Sya, your advise seems generally okay, not just to counter the Japanese. So I will go by the same order as I did now followed up by what you wrote.

Man, discussing a game is good. I learn more then I find out myself.

 

[nanomage]

Would be much better if you posted screenshots, but nonetheless I think this your game is far from lost. Being close 2nd in military power basically means you can steamroll the entire map #1 included, given the AI's total inability to use its units.

 

[OwlRaider]

The easiest tactic to use with Bismarck is to use the standard 4 city tradition opener, beeline to construction and get a solid number of composites up than beeline civil service which is on the way to education anyway and get some of your unique pikemen which build extremely quickly. If you can get some troops from barbs than great, if not no biggie. Just make sure to get your composite bowmen up early than get your unique pikemen once you have the tech for it, as soon as you have 2 unique pikemen attack your first neighbor, it should be a pretty easy kill. Than continue towards your second neighbor with the same army, which should have some nice experience now. Depending on the map and your neighbors you might be upgrading to crossbowmen in the middle of conquering your second neighbor, if not than upgrade to crossbowmen afterwards. When it's time to go after your 3rd neighbor your pikemen will start to be weak and lancers aren't very good units, so just milk your pikemen to the best of your ability and start switching them out in favor of knights/cavalry as those will later upgrade into your other unique unit, the Panzer. Continue conquering, upgrading your troops when you have the technology to do so and dominate the world.

 

[Elfje1989]

Okay, so I just played a stabalize and prepare game this weekend. As didn't have much time. I picked up the original game I posted about, where I fougth the Ottomans.

I added the current save. And I'd like some advice on how to go on.

Few things:
England just found me.
Most things are pretty fine conserning empire management, except finances. I'm losing at the moment. Didn't have enough money to make my last Longswordsman a musketman. And I'm close to hampering my science.

I have build a market in all my own cities. So I wonder, didn't I need so much units as I made, to crush the Japanese (the Millitary advisor still tells me not to mess with them) or should I have build more tradeposts and less farms/mines/lumbermills?

 

[JothHago]

Standard rule of thumb is to build TP on puppets and concentrate on growth improvements for your cities.

 

[Elfje1989]

Any rule of thumb on annexing cities? Until now I only annexed a city with a real high prodcution and if I needed the extra production city. I only did so though when I could buy the couthouse and I had enough happyness.

 

[JothHago]

depends.

If I'm gunning for a science Victory, I don't annex cities until I move down a few points in the rationalism tree or the order opener.

When i can sustain the cities, i annex all of them and get science buildings, concentrate on science until spaceship.

Unless the capital you just siege has great location, we're talking river tiles, hills, mountains, luxuries where you know growth is just going to explode, I keep them puppet until the end.

 

[Monthar]

Key points to remember with Bismark's UA, is you don't have to kill the barb when entering the camp to have a chance at a free unit. Just clearing the camp itself is enough. Whatever barb unit was last in the camp is the type you'll get. Barb camps will only spawn in areas that no-one can see, this includes the AI civs and CS's. Raging barbs setting just means more barbs will spawn from the camps, usually 2 at a time. It doesn't mean more camps and all you're really concerned with is the camps themselves.

The best way to get the units, is build a bunch of archers and kill off any barbs in and around the camp, then just walk any unit into the camp. If you want to get a lot of spearmen to upgrade to your UU, research bronze working then just keep killing the barbs at the camp with your archers until the camp spawns a spearman. Kill it then clear the camp. When farming the camps in this manner, put a unit on all 6 sides of the camp to prevent the AI from sneaking in and clearing it. Also, try to keep farming experience for your archers until they all have 2 promotions and a CS gives the quest to clear that camp. It's even better if you can get the quest from several CS's at once.

Don't rely on barb camps for your military, especially on the higher difficulty levels. Always build your own units and use the barb camps to supplement what you build. The main bonus of the UA is the lowered maintenance cost.

You can also try to ally with the Militaristic CS's to get more free units. The added benefit of this is they will give UU's of the civs not in your current game once you research the tech for that UU. Whatever UU they give, they tend to give units that are in the same upgrade path.

Also, ignore folks claiming the lancers suck, they don't. They have a higher movement rate than cavalry and a bonus vs. mounted units. Lancers upgrade to anti-tank and eventually to helicopters. Having a highly promoted lancer that has medic 1 & 2 makes it easy to keep the rest of your troops healed up. The only downside is once it's promoted to a helicopter it can't take cities anymore. The other benefit of the fast moving lancer, and more so the helicopter, is it can pillage a lot of tiles very quickly. This is handy for not only healing itself, but also to supplement your gold income and for clearing the farms out so once you puppet the city it doesn't grow very fast before your worker army can get in there and turn all the tiles into trading posts.