GAAAA!!!! Newbie Getting Thwacked!

[ironfang]

I just tried a game in Monarchy. I was the Romans. I believe the higher up in the game difficulty levels you go, the more you have to focus on your Civs specific ability.

In my case, Rome is war like and commercial. I built alot of roads and ALOT of military units (with barracks in my cities). I allowed the nearby Iriquois to build up nice cities with mines and temples... and then over ran them with military units. The only thing that REALLY sucked was that I had no iron and no one else would trade. Still, the onslaught of Vet. Archers and Warriors did enough for me to threaten my neighbors into paying with Technology and Money... so I could build a bigger military. hehehe.

Ironfang

 

[Nishdog]

Originally posted by Vrylakas
All help appreciated again. Clearly, it is not as easy to dominate a game in Civ III as it was in Civ II.

Question: I just can't keep up with the AI's expansion. I'm seriously undermining my cities by trying to constantly build settlers whenever they have a population of at least 3, and yet the AI still has a dozen more cities than I do. I send explorers out and beat the AI to many huts but usually only get $$$, a warrior or maps. We're talking Chieften level here. Am I missing something?

First of all, just to remind you, the contents of goody huts are no longer randomized each turn; it is what it is, so you can't do that save-and-load thing I KNOW WE ALL DID in Civ2 when we were faced with unexpected barbarians.
Second, I don't think you're missing anything unless I'm missing it too...i play chieftan as well, because I find it more fun and relaxing. I think one of the key things you will have to change in Civ3 if you're used to Civ2 strategies is that you don't need a hell of a lot of cities to be successful. If you've noticed after building several cities, additional cities will have rampant corruption to the point where all but 1 shield is lost.
The key is to choose good city locations with a few bonus resources (cattle, fish, game, whales, wheat, gold) WITHIN THE CITY RADIUS, along with luxury and strategic and luxury resources close enough for you to build roads to them, and even colonies if outside you're cultural borders. Plains and grasslands are good terrain to build cities on early in the game. Flood plains are okay too, but cause disease until you research Sanitation (Industrial-era advancement). Hills are great to have in your city radius for increasing production (iron or coal on the hill increases production further). Avoid building cities on or near deserts, and DO NOT build on tundra squares unless there's a tactical reason for doing so.
Depending on the map size you use, you can get a good 8 (small map)-32 (huge map) quality cities.

Keep in mind when you build cities that you cannot see all the special resources available on the map until you discover certain advances. Leave some potentially useful terrains on the map so future resources can appear near your cities.

As long as you're cranking out science, trade, food, and production in the few cities you have, who cares if the AI has more cities; you will have BETTER cities.

 

[stravaig]

Actually, the goody huts (mushroom patches) /are/ random.
Just save before you pop one. If you don't like the result, reload and then LEAVE IT ALONE that turn. Pop it the next turn and it'll be something else.
It might take you a few turns to get something good, but you can. The drawback to this is that it slows down your exploration.
Another possibile tactic that I heard of but haven't tried is actually /quitting/ the game. On re-launch, supposedly, the randomness is newly random.

- Stravaig