Foundation and Empire

[Don Promillo]

Is there a general rule of thumb when you would attack your neighbour? (aside the fact that MM's skirmishers would probably kick our asses in the current scenario...)

- No more room to settle?
- Has access to critical ressources?
- will grow faster / more culture than you?
- as soon as we will have iron and cats?
- ...?

 

[Nick Carpathia]

It should be noted that of all the demonumbers, crop yield is the most important. Food is a better indicator of both population and population growth. Each population point contributes production, commerce, and/or even more food, and the more you have, the faster you will accumulate hammers and beakers. The fact you have thrice the next competitor pretty much means you'll roll this game (but I guess that was the point). Still, everyone, aim for food.

 

[vanatteveldt]

Related question on demo outside the context of the current thread: do you use those demo numbers as a guide/goal on higher levels too? I pley emp/imm and I rarely look at those numbers... should I?

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Is there a general rule of thumb when you would attack your neighbour? (aside the fact that MM's skirmishers would probably kick our asses in the current scenario...)

- No more room to settle?

I'm advocating that one. I think, speaking broadly, you have three general choices

a) On a wide open map like this one, where we're looking at being able to settle 15-20 cities, we're not going to put ourselves on war footing early.

b) On a more normal map, "wait" for construction and catapults

c) On a cramped map, think rush. Cramped usually means your capital can see the enemy capital, but can also mean you are squeezed in by complete junk tiles, or pinned against the jungle.

 

[RJM]

Is there a general rule of thumb when you would attack your neighbour? (aside the fact that MM's skirmishers would probably kick our asses in the current scenario...)

- No more room to settle?
- Has access to critical ressources?
- will grow faster / more culture than you?
- as soon as we will have iron and cats?
- ...?

On this map, at this level, you can win a space race victory without ever attacking anyone. I assume a culture win without attacking is reasonably easy as well, although I haven't tried.

 

[ben-jammin]

I'm not sure what people are supposed to learn on a map with that much good land and so much time to settle it?

At most that you always want to settle towards your opponents and back-fill what you've blocked off? Except you settled your second city where nobody was going to take that land for a couple thousand years, and at this difficulty the ai expands slowly.

The problem with trying to teach suc ha specific thing (expanding and settling) on a map that could hardly be better for just that is that valuable lessons for higher difficulties arent going to be incorporated. there are really no difficult decisions here for city placement with so many high yield tiles. There is little need to balance expansion with defenders, there is little worry about crashing your economy on this difficulty. I'm afraid a map like this teaches a noble player to expand in a way that doesnt work even on emperor. nothing to learn here about the value of overlapping, trade routes, worker management, diplomacy. You are essentially given a ton of great sites and the time to settle them all.

This would teach noble players to be more competitive moving up to higher levels if it were more crowded, if the land was poorer, if you had aggressive neighbours, etc.

 

[ecuwins]

This would teach noble players to be more competitive moving up to higher levels if it were more crowded, if the land was poorer, if you had aggressive neighbours, etc.

The purpose of this guide is to teach new players how not to loose at noble. I think what you are suggesting should be reserved for the next lesson.

One has to learn to crawl before they can walk.

 

[ben-jammin]

Right i understand that, but teaching people to expand on a map with room for a dozen plus easy cities on a difficulty level that doesnt really make you compensate financially or militarily to make it work might even hinder players when they move up to prince and then emperor. It's like giving a kid training wheels to learn how to ride a bike. Im afraid what people will learn here is how NOT to move up in difficulty.

 

[PeterWolf]

Right i understand that, but teaching people to expand on a map with room for a dozen plus easy cities on a difficulty level that doesnt really make you compensate financially or militarily to make it work might even hinder players when they move up to prince and then emperor. It's like giving a kid training wheels to learn how to ride a bike. Im afraid what people will learn here is how NOT to move up in difficulty.

VoU is talking about a basic approach here. You can't learn any basic stuff by going straight into the complications and exceptions like you're suggesting. Also, since it's basic stuff, you don't have to worry "would this work on Emperor", because your goal, right now, is to beat Noble, not Emperor.

 

[ben-jammin]

I thought the goal was to win on noble and then move up?

I understand teaching how crucial it is to expand and get your cities up. I don't see this map teaching efficient expansion strategies because you're not punished for not being efficient. As demonstrated by the OP settling in place before moving the warrior (and telling people to SIP because you start with limited information, with your warrior able to move onto a hill overlooking unseen flatland?) settling two of his first four cities into a corner of the continent away from the AI, settling the first city far off when there was a good (and faster growing) location closer in the same direction), no thought (as far as i can see? correct me if im wrong..OP mentions opening borders but only as a "low cost method of scouting"?) given to trade networks. You can make just about every mistake in the book and still be in a winning position after 200 turns on this map. People are going to tell me i'm being overly critical of a noble difficulty thread but these things are so called "basics" of expansion just like fogbusting and tech path.

edit: ill do a quick first 100 turns or so with a basic outline of what i did differently, because despite all the info the OP is providing i feel like some 'basics' are being neglected.

 

[PeterWolf]

I thought the goal was to win on noble and then move up?

Yes. And then win on Prince. And then move up.

You can make just about every mistake in the book and still be in a winning position after 200 turns on this map.

Or in pretty much any Noble game for that matter. The AI is not a great techer, and the fact it has the same start as the human player is what allows the player to make lots of mistakes and still win. You just need one thing the AI doesn't have - a plan.

On higher levels you need a plan and better micro because the AI starts with the advantage. Once you compensate for that advantage though, you can once again start making mistakes and it won't matter an inch if you have a plan, because the AI can't plan.

That's why Vou's leaving the optimal micro out of the question, because it doesn't matter on Noble as long as you don't play like an AI, with no planning.

 

[ben-jammin]

First turn you dont want to immediately settle in place if you have a first move for your warrior that can give you important information. A warrior move to the southwest will reveal a lot, being a hill overlooking flat tiles. It reveals that there are grassland pigs (super strong food tile) that can be had without giving up...anything, really. Rather than settling in place i settle on the plains hill SW, gives me the pigs as well as an extra hammer production on the city tile. That means the first worker is out in 12 turns instead of the normal 15.

Tech path is animal husbandry (best food tile is pigs, best overall tile is plains cow)
mining (plenty of unforested hills, riverside even better)
wheel (preparation for connecting first cities)
bronze working (whip second settler)
pottery (plenty of riverside and even some floodplains, earlier you get your cottages in the more you get out of them)
mysticism (not higher priority than pottery with all the early city sites with strong surrounding tiles)
writing
alphabet
currency
code of laws (with so much space for so many cities, courthouses will fuel further expansion)
math -> calendar because there are fully five luxury resources for us here, really doesnt matter if you do this or code of laws first
After that it doesnt really matter.

Cities were settled New York -> Boston -> Philadelphia -> Atlanta, then leisurely backfilled. New York and Boston were able to share both the corn and the cows which comes in very handy because a) the corn is already improved for the second city and b) the capital is so food rich with the pigs (which later get used by chicago for a growth spurt) that it will be growing too fast anyway. Overlap is your friend, think about it not just for resources but for cottage placement, a cottage that can be shared is a cottage that rarely gets left unworked.

Played fast and loose, not enough workers, lost a lot of worker turns, lost a worker to barbs, lost a lot of turns of unhappiness, forgot to whip, forgot about one city entirely for a good 20 turns, didnt trade for any techs except sailing and meditation, didnt use any better civics other than slavery. I think that simulates a noble player fairly well. The only wonder I built was Stonehenge.

I see the OP advised someone who asked about it specifically not to build Stonehenge in general. Sorry but on a map where you're going to be settling a dozen cities, id be attempting stonehenge as soon as id scouted (with a non creative leader of course) on any difficulty below immortal. Stonehenge is 120 hammers. A monument is 30. More than the hammers you save innumerable turns.

As you can see there are 3-4 good spots yet to settle, mansa has been left out of all the sweet goodies (in fact he didnt even try to expand south once cities 3 and 4 were settled), economy is strong, everything is connected except the last city settled. Happy cap is 8 or 9 in cities without religion with another luxury resource soon to be hooked up.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Tech path is animal husbandry (best food tile is pigs, best overall tile is plains cow)
mining (plenty of unforested hills, riverside even better)
wheel (preparation for connecting first cities)
bronze working (whip second settler)
pottery (plenty of riverside and even some floodplains, earlier you get your cottages in the more you get out of them)
mysticism (not higher priority than pottery with all the early city sites with strong surrounding tiles)
writing
alphabet
currency
code of laws (with so much space for so many cities, courthouses will fuel further expansion)
math -> calendar because there are fully five luxury resources for us here, really doesnt matter if you do this or code of laws first
After that it doesnt really matter.

Yeah, you're pretty much demonstrating here that you've missed the point.

Roundly, I would put it this way - you are focusing on the right answers, whereas I'm trying to put something together for people who can't yet ask the right questions.

I'm not striving for best play so much as a framework for coherent play. I believe that can be achieved by simplifying the game - emphasizing the handful of ideas that are most important, simplifying the ideas that aren't so important yet.

And the touchstone I use is this - if a particular answer is reasonable on most maps (call it 80%), then the question isn't sufficiently interesting to investigate at this point.

Where do I settle initially? What do I build first? I'm trying to come up with 7 plus or minus two things to learn at first, do you really think those belong at the top of the list?


On the other hand, maybe you did understand all that, and are just trying to demonstrate that this won't work. I've got no problem with that - I've been trying to find a good approach to helping people beat Noble for a while, it won't surprise me if this isn't the right answer either.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Not a lot changing on the map. Code of Laws has come in, and as it happened we discovered a religion with it. Happy accident, especially as neither Mali nor England have discovered a religion of their own.

First, a look at the scoreboard - how am I doing?

Not quite there yet - I didn't quite produce enough military. I'm not actually sure how much of that reflects the fact that I didn't build a barracks anywhere, and how much is just lack of units. I'm quite safe, as I'm much stronger than Mali or England, but not yet as strong as I want to be.

Here's a quick look, via the Domestic Advisor

You see a lot of units, because I'm trying to catch up in that last number, and to rotate to safety my remaining sentry warriors.

The GNP number is also lower than I would like, but the plan has that well covered - courthouses now (hooray for Organized), and Calendar next; as Ben-jammin pointed out, there's a lot of happy on the map.

Everybody point at me and laugh, because I don't have enough workers!

But I post mainly to show the buildings, as (a) I wasn't joking, there aren't very many, and (b) this is about the stage of the game where I would expect that to change in my older cities

 

[ben-jammin]

Yeah, you're pretty much demonstrating here that you've missed the point.

No I get it, the point was to provide a map so easy that even people who normally cant beat noble can win, even making all the same mistakes. What I don't get is how you think this is going to help those people get better.

Where do I settle initially? What do I build first? I'm trying to come up with 7 plus or minus two things to learn at first, do you really think those belong at the top of the list?

absolutely I do. Build a worker first. What happened to

if a particular answer is reasonable on most maps (call it 80%)

? Worker first is the best thing to do at least 95% of the time, it doesnt get simpler or more helpful than that. Likewise there is nothing complicated about moving your first unit to see if settling in place is actually ideal. You already spent plenty of time going over scouting strategy step-by-step but for some reason neglected the first step and your reasoning is "its too complicated for these people." Likewise settling your first city far away when theres a good spot in the same direction much closer goes against a basic premise that works at every difficulty level. Then settling subsequent cities in the opposite direction away from the AI is just confusing. Block and backfill is simple, so is distance = expensive.

Absolutely nothing I did in my quick example was at all complicated or involved any advanced strategy that these people wont understand. None of it involves more than the most basic understanding of the game.

I know you're trying to help but the "they dont need to know that" IMO is a poor approach even if -- and i mean no offense here -- all the advice you did decided to give was solid.

 

[ahcos]

@ben-jamin:

Honestly, you're complitcating. I've done beginner guides for other games, and the main problem remains that you won't be able to cover all the strategy - you'll have to focus on certain problems, you'll have to select. That's what i think VoU does very well in his approach. Lay down your plan - the way the individual player executes it isn't that important. Simplify.

You can start with all the deep strategy right off the bat, but personally i'm confident that it's more reasonable to take each step slowly. You'll learn more that way than by just rushing through it all.

 

[Kaosprophet]

No I get it, the point was to provide a map so easy that even people who normally cant beat noble can win, even making all the same mistakes. What I don't get is how you think this is going to help those people get better.

The point actually has nothing to do with the map. That it's being demonstrated on a particularly easy map was simply luck - bad luck, if the ease of the map winds up overshadowing the actual point.

Likewise there is nothing complicated about moving your first unit to see if settling in place is actually ideal.

I think you've forgotten what it is to struggle with Noble. I still remember plenty of games where I moved my unit to see if SIP was 'ideal' and moved off in error because I didn't understand the information. By the time I did understand it well enough for it to make a *positive* difference to my game, I was also feeling ready to move up to Monarch.

Feel free to laugh at the apparent noobishness of that, but that's the audience VoU is aiming at.

 

[ecuwins]

OP, you're doing fine. I applaud your effort. I just recently made my way through Noble by reading all of the War Academy articles, more than once. Making copious use of the search function whenever a question came to mind. Posting detailed reports of my current games. Blah, blah, blah... I have to say, what's missing around here is a guide exactly like what you are envisioning.

All that said, if I may, my 2

I'd say "basic" lessons for a Noble player could be broken down into two phases. Expansion and post-expansion. Post-expansion is broken down further into Peacemonger vs Warmonger.

Expansion
1) How to pick city-sites.
2) What resources to improve and in which order. This ties back into #1, as choosing city sites is more often than not dependent on what resources are around you. The exception being blocking.
3) Which techs should one choose and why? This ties back into #2.
4) When to block and why.
4b) This AI is close. Should I rush? *If yes, then skip down to "Warmonger".*
5) When to stop expansion and why.

Peacemonger
1) How much defense does one need?
2) Tech to space race, learn the tech tree, buildings, and improvements.
3) Learn about trading resources.

Warmonger
1) What techs are important if planning for war?
2) When should one start building troops and why?
3) What troops should one build and why?
4) Why are siege units so awesome?
5) When should one stop building units?

That said, everything is dependant on the map. So...it is necessary to look at a handful of varying scenarios while exploring the same("basic") lessons. Once those lessons are mastered, one can move onto "intermediate" lessons. Breaking lessons apart and focusing on just one piece at a time is very helpful when one is being bombarded with eleventybillion pieces of information all at once.

I remember back when I was learning CivIII, I'd pick one article from the War Academy and just focus on the lesson at hand. Once I had that lesson down pat, I'd pick another article, rinse, repeat. Were some aspects of my play neglected during those games? Well, of course. The point is that once enough of these individual lessons are learned, things start to click and one begins to incorporate all of these lessons together. At this point, the player can begin working on "intermediate" strategies.

 

[Tortfeasor]

I think I'm not exactly the target audience since I have an 85-90% win on Noble and I'm dipping my feet into Prince. But I've found in trying to move up that I really need a mastery of the Noble basics so I'm finding this rather useful.

In my experience at least it was easy to get a winning path to Liberalism and once I had a victory plan in place it was easy enough to put it into action. But provided you don't go for an early domination I'm eager to see how you'll tackle post-Liberalism Renaissance until you hit the Modern Age. As a decent Noble player I find this is where my plans and focus go off the rails. Getting Universities and Banks for the Natl. Wonders puts a big hurt on my economy and I find myself working the tech tree more vertically than horizontally to compensate.

I'm not at all expecting your game to revolve around my question but as someone maybe possibly vaguely kinda sorta resembling the target audience I'm waiting to see how to properly tackle something like this.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

In my experience at least it was easy to get a winning path to Liberalism and once I had a victory plan in place it was easy enough to put it into action. But provided you don't go for an early domination I'm eager to see how you'll tackle post-Liberalism Renaissance until you hit the Modern Age.

I wasn't actually intending to take it that far - from my point of view, the game is cold at this point. Not surprising, given the map.

Also, I start to run out of simplicity at this point. Which is to say that the win from here is pretty straight forward - fill continent, raise happy cap, burn through the tech tree, launch being the easiest - but (a) it's not clear to me that it sufficiently resembles other winning positions to be sufficiently general and (b) it gets really hard to pare away the "unnecessary" mid game elements.

On the other hand, if the plan "land" is right, meaning that its simple enough to use as a starting point, then it really should be possible to carry through to "all the land you can reach". In other words, it really shouldn't matter whether you peacefully expand to the whole continent, or conquer it - the plans beyond that point should be reasonably similar.

There are some topics that I want to cover, like catapults, that probably don't fit into the windows I've been limiting myself to, so I need to work that out as well.