Gauntlet 2: Step by step ICS style!

[tommynt]

if trading lux for money to declare war after is no exploit - whats an exploit then?

its the most obvious exploit of all those weired things you can do in civ5

 

[pagh80]

if trading lux for money to declare war after is no exploit - whats an exploit then?

its the most obvious exploit of all those weired things you can do in civ5

Some think using horsemen is a exploit. Some think trading cities is an exploit. Some think snatching a CS worker in the beginning is an exploit.
What is an exploit and what isnt, is really in the eye of the beholder.
Im using the AI stupidity like you are using it during war to lure the AI into open terrain.

 

[Chuvi]

I also tried this strategy for the Beta 2. I realized at the end of the game that I should have built universities in all my cities sooner.

Also, most of my cities ran only specialists, so building monuments for the cultural expansion didn't really serve much purpose. After starting the expansion, there was no hope in ever buying another social policy, so the additional culture from monuments didn't really help there either.

 

[bhavv]

I really dont want to try this with washington for the HoF game, but Augustus Ceasar would seem a lot better to get buildings built quicker and going for an ICS strategy.

 

[BLubmuz]

if trading lux for money to declare war after is no exploit - whats an exploit then?

its the most obvious exploit of all those weired things you can do in civ5

It's just the same as in CIV vanilla and warlords. I always used it.
Only BtS forced you to peace after a demand.
But even with BtS if you sell a tech for gold to an AI you're goin' to wipe you can start your war the same turn. The only difference in Civ 5 is that you can trade gold from the beginning and not only after currency.

 

[Xicivilian]

I dont really have the patience to micro to that extend. I did micro abit to keep below -10 happiness and to get the science i wanted. But i didnt check every city each turn. Not by a long shot.

So do you leave your focus on default and do you just turn on and off scientist in the library (at the start)? Or do you select all the tiles by yourself? Of do you use one of the emphasize options?


Btw a whole different question. A cattle on a grassland next to a river should produce 2 food (from grassland) + 1 food from cattle + 1 gold from river. So what will the pasture do, since you already got the food bonus. I can't find it somewhere, but I think it adds a hammer. Is this correct?

 

[pagh80]

So do you leave your focus on default and do you just turn on and off scientist in the library (at the start)? Or do you select all the tiles by yourself? Of do you use one of the emphasize options?

I always emphasise production in my cities so they will build stuff faster and i always turn off specialists so if i want any i have to assign them myself, when i need them.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Btw a whole different question. A cattle on a grassland next to a river should produce 2 food (from grassland) + 1 food from cattle + 1 gold from river. So what will the pasture do, since you already got the food bonus. I can't find it somewhere, but I think it adds a hammer. Is this correct?

Yes, all a Cow Pasture does is add 1 Hpt.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[davide08]

Hey great thread and i am very impressed with your empire. I have never done a ICS game before so i can be considered a noob when it comes to this, is there a "learner thread" to ICS like what are the basic concepts. Your thread is very nice but i got lost with the concepts, for instance, what size are your cities? how far apart are they? my playing style is usually totally opposite with few large cities so its taking a while for me to wrap me head around this. nice thread and thanks for the help

 

[Sumorex]

What were your tactics for attacking with only three warriors? It is something I'm having a devil of a time accomplishing with any regularity in my own games.

 

[pagh80]

What were your tactics for attacking with only three warriors? It is something I'm having a devil of a time accomplishing with any regularity in my own games.

Short answer is that its risky. If you lose one its all over and you will lose alot of turns waiting for reinforcements.

But 3 warriors is enough if you can attack with all of them the same turn. This way you will be able to take the city in just 2 turns. If your opponent have more than 1 warrior to defend the city you probally cant take it.
So basically if i cant attack with all 3 the same turn i have to get 4 before i attack.
btw save your promotions, cause in the beginning instant heals will be extremely useful.
In my game i took warshaw and 2 of my 3 warriors got a upgrade. That helped alot when i attacked china cause, i could just use my instant heals when needed.

Hey great thread and i am very impressed with your empire. I have never done a ICS game before so i can be considered a noob when it comes to this, is there a "learner thread" to ICS like what are the basic concepts. Your thread is very nice but i got lost with the concepts, for instance, what size are your cities? how far apart are they? my playing style is usually totally opposite with few large cities so its taking a while for me to wrap me head around this. nice thread and thanks for the help

Well first of all i would go and read this and this thread. It gives alot of useful information.
Keep in mind im no expert in ICS and there are other players that are better then me at it. Anyway here is a few pointers i found useful to use during the game.

Placement:
Place your cities as close as possible, thats the first rule of ICS. The more cities you can squeeze in the better. It actually took quite some planning to figure out how to make best use of my land for this.

Expansion:
Here it differs. I waited to expand until i had the policies i wanted, but there is another approach(more popular) where you begin to expand by making a settler as soon as your capital reach size 2. That the approach that people call REX ICS.

City management.
Each new city that i found starts to make a colloseum. As soon as that city grows to size 2 it begins to make a settler. After the settler is done it continues on the colloseum, then library then university and finally just research.
Now you cant follow this stricktly thats very important to remember.
If your happiness is -9 or better its fine, but make sure you NEVER reach -10 or worse cause then your production in all cities stop.(almost)
If your happiness is really good, like above 0 then make more settlers in your cities, instead of whatever they are producing. There is no point in keeping your happiness above 0. All that will happen is that your cities will grow faster and eat it all.
You also earn alot of gold and when you can afford it buy libraries... or colloseums if you really need them, or military units if needed. What ever you feel like is best for your cities.
What i also did was to keep my cities from working bad tiles/unimproved tiles. Its much better to just keep them as specialsts or unemployed. Activating the freedom tree will give you ½ happiness for each specialist/unemployed, which over time gives a HUUUGE happiness bonus.
As for city size: Well id say get to size 2 fast so they can build settlers, and then let them grow as slowly as possible, but if you cant found new cities and your happiness is far from -10 just grow them bigger.
I feel that a city with library and a colloseum can easily grow to size 6. More than that is not recommended imo(except for your spaceship production cities/wonderbuilding cities and so on ofc)

Improvements:
Well personally i prefer to build mines at my cities. I find it more useful that the cities can finish libraries/colloseums faster than working trade posts. Furthermore in my game i had a crapload of unemployed to keep my happiness above -10 so not too many tiles was worked.

 

[Sumorex]

Short answer is that its risky. If you lose one its all over and you will lose alot of turns waiting for reinforcements.

But 3 warriors is enough if you can attack with all of them the same turn. This way you will be able to take the city in just 2 turns. If your opponent have more than 1 warrior to defend the city you probally cant take it.
So basically if i cant attack with all 3 the same turn i have to get 4 before i attack.
btw save your promotions, cause in the beginning instant heals will be extremely useful.
In my game i took warshaw and 2 of my 3 warriors got a upgrade. That helped alot when i attacked china cause, i could just use my instant heals when needed.

Thanks for the reply. Just wanted to see if there was something I was missing, but looks like I'm doing everything you list.... it's just risky.

 

[pagh80]

Also, most of my cities ran only specialists, so building monuments for the cultural expansion didn't really serve much purpose. After starting the expansion, there was no hope in ever buying another social policy, so the additional culture from monuments didn't really help there either.

I know its a old game but i had to reply to this:
I think you are 100% correct. I also belive that monuments are simply not worth building because you(should) expand as fast as you do in a ICS game. I see alot of people building monuments in their ICS games, and i feel its a waste of time. I have a feeling they find it usefull because they expand too slowly and therefore ending up with enough culture to buy new policies. If you really expand as fast and as efficient as possible, you will never be able to get enough culture to buy another policy, simply because of all the new cities you will make continuously through the game.

Save all your excess gold for libraries and colloseums in your new cities.Its really worth it.

 

[Methos]

I assume you start off with cultural improvements to get up to Meritocracy (sp?) for the and then start the ICS. I haven't tried an ICS game yet, but that appears to be the logical choice, or do you all immediately start ICS and ignore the policies?

 

[pagh80]

I assume you start off with cultural improvements to get up to Meritocracy (sp?) for the and then start the ICS. I haven't tried an ICS game yet, but that appears to be the logical choice, or do you all immediately start ICS and ignore the policies?

I didnt make any cultural buildings, but i did ally a cultured CS to get the culture needed.(and building The Oracle ofc.)
My initial approach was to stick to 1 city and as many puppets as i could get(only 2 for me, because of the maptype).
Once i reached acoustics i got the following SPs:
Liberty, Citizenship, Meritocrazy, Freedom, Rationalism and Secularism.

Id say unlocking the freedom tree is the most important SP to get. Far more important than meritocrazy, because it gives you a great way to control your happiness and it will over time give you a huge happiness boost. Remember that only two unemployed citizens per city will be equal to the bonus meritocrazy offers.

While waiting until i had enough culture i also prebuild several settlers to kickstart my delayed ICS.
Going with this approach you wont be able to get enough culture to buy another SP so you have to pick the ones you want to use before you start colonizing.

I hope this helps abit.

I haven't tried an ICS game yet, but that appears to be the logical choice, or do you all immediately start ICS and ignore the policies?

Reading about various ICS games in the forum my impression is that they just start colonizing from the beginning.
On lower difficulties like king and emp i have found my delayed ICS approach just as useful though, but i cant say what is most efficient.