Help playing harder difficulty levels

[GangsterOctopus]

I first started playing Civilization III about a year ago and I just recently got back into it. I have always played on Chieftain difficulty and I find I can usually beat the AIs without much trouble.

So I decided try playing on Regent (on a Pangaea map as the Persians) and I lost pretty fast. First of all the Arabs started a war with me for no reason, but I was able to hold them off and we signed a peace treaty. A little later on the Mayans tried to extort something from me, I forget what, but I refused. The Romans did the same thing, for gold, to similar results. I should mention that these civilizations are respectively the most powerful civilizations. Anyways before I know it the Mayan, Romans, Arabs, and Carthaginians are at war with me and none of the other civilizations want anything to do with me.

What I wanted to know if there was any way to get a peaceful victory without having to be bullied around by the more powerful civilizations.

 

[Obormot]

Welcome to CFC
First of all there is a way to become the most powerfull . My advise is: read the article in the war academy about settler factories if you haven't done that yet. Fast early expansion will help you to become stronger then the AI.
And the answer to the main question: yes, you can win peacefully, but if you don't buid a decent army it requires some luck. You should definitely give in to AI demands if you don't feel ready for a fight.

 

[Zeepsel]

Although I am by no means a great player, I can almost always get 'peaceful' victories on emperor. But I have yet to play a game in which I use no military at all.

The basic idea is expansion, which is the most important thing in the first couple of thousand years. If you use settler factories you can outrace the AI very well and you can win the game hands down... Expansion is key. Not letting the other civs be more powerful than you is pretty easy on regent, as long as you outexpand the AI. If you outexpand the AI and focus on technologies you can enter the middle ages way ahead of the AI's and thus have more powerful units to hold of the AI.

On higher levels(monarch and up) you might need to train some defensive tactics... Which is: don't build useless defenders! I never build defenders unless I need them pretty badly. Instead, build offensive units, the AI has more respect for a big offensive army. Offense is the best defense.

I rarely build military units other than a few warriors in the ancient age, but that totally depends on how close your neighbors are, if they are close, you should build some barracks in cities and build things like swordsmen and horsemen.

Getting out of despotism is pretty important as well. If you play conquests version of civilization, after pottery, try aiming for Alphabet, Writing, Code of Laws, Philosophy, Philosophy should give you a free tech and you will choose Republic of course. In the meanwhile, trade smart and get the other techs of the ancient age if they are available(usually trade things like code of laws and philosophy for things that you want). In vanilla civ I wasn't that good at the game... I usually ended up playing monarch and researching maximum until I could research republic, which always lasted for ages before I discovered it and traded for the rest of the techs, so I can't say much about the tech-race in vanilla...

So to summarize some things:
- Expand fast, using settler factories
- Don't build defenders
- Get out of despotism, preferably to Republic
- Trade your way up the tech tree while researching to a government
- Take a look at the war academy on this site! It served me pretty well!

Well, this is getting a bit long I hope there is some usefull information in it...

Edit: Obormot beat me to some of my story-telling

 

[IglooDame]

If the other civs are pretending you aren't there, make sure you haven't broken any agreements with them somehow; they get quite uppity about that and never forget it.

 

[GangsterOctopus]

Thanks for all the help.

I will definitely check out the war academy, any other recommendations besides the settler factory article?

 

[vmxa]

The main method of preventing demands is to not be "weak" compared to them as shown by the advisor. You do not have to have wars, but you do want to be strong.

It is also possible by making trades and treaties. This is not a sure thign, but at chief should work. If you are too weak, just give them what they ask for and things are fine. This is what you have to do at the top 2 or 3 levels in the early game.

 

[gmaharriet]

Thanks for all the help.

I will definitely check out the war academy, any other recommendations besides the settler factory article?

I'd definitely read Cracker's Opening Moves . It's rather long, but extremely helpful in making a good start.

 

[GangsterOctopus]

One more problem I ran into a few times is that my cities don’t grow past a population of 2. These cities are usually located in an area of plains or tundra.

Is there anyway to increase the population of these cities? I know workers or settlers can join the city to increase the population, but I’m looking to have the cities population on it own. Like maybe I need to make some improvements to the terrain.

One more thing, I usually automate my workers. Is this a good idea? Like is there a way to improve the terrain better then the automated way?

 

[Pentium]

If your city is on plains, irrigate them (if you have river nearby, of course). Then it will grow.

You can't irrigate tundra, so try to settle those tundra cities next to a coast, so you'll be able to build a harbor and get 2 food from coastal/sea tiles.

It also means that managing your workers is better then automating. The most obvius example of this are grasslands in Despotims. Irrigating them does nothing (because of the Despo penalty), but automated workers still do that. It's a waste of both workers and tiles.

 

[CommandoBob]

You may want to consider joining a Succession Game, where you and a team play a game together, rotating who actually plays the game. There are also occasional training games, where a more experienced player will "lead" a bunch of Chiefs, Regents and/or Warlords in how to play at the higher levels. This actually makes it easier, because of the discussion on why and why not decisions are made.

There is also a Succession Game of the Month, where several teams (at least eight on this last SGOTM) all start from the same map and are competing with each other. In these, the moderator would assign you to a team and they would be aware of your level of experience. That, too, would be a good place for learning.

Both of these have their own subforum here at CFC.

 

[knupp715]

Also remember, that if you want a strong nation you probably shouldn't build your cities far apart. When I first played Civilization I used to build my cities 5/6/7 tiles apart so that the culture wouldn't overlap. When I played on higher levels, I was crushed. In higher levels you should only build cities 3/4 tiles apart if you want to be stronger than the AI. You need to expand fast in the beginning so you have a lot of territory, making a stronger nation. Also, you should manage your workers. I usually manage workers until the industrial ages and then I will automate them. If you are not a warmonger (like me) than it is a little harder to play higher levels. The key is to build a moderate sized OFFENSIVE military. I usually never build defensive units in higher levels, unless I am in serious danger of losing a city. Other than that, you will just have to play Civ and you will catch on to new strategies and different more effective ways to play the game. Practice Makes Perfect!

 

[MarcoPolo]

One thing I learned about higher levels is diplomacy matters a lot. Even if you're getting your butt kicked you can often get someone to side with you. The last Monarch game I played I teamed up a lot to completely wipe out other civs. We basically just divided their territory between us evenly. Once that main threat was gone we went back to building until someone else became agressive. There was one instance where I started losing a lot of cities. Then all of sudden it was 4 civs against 1. The aggressive civ went down pretty quick. I got my cities back and then some.