Hey guys, need a little help with strategy...

[keyser11]

Ok here goes. I'm not new to the forums or cIV, but this is my first post. I was doing ok on cIV warlords winning prince and moving to monarch. Then I started playing beyond the sword and I'm having a bit of trouble on a noble game

I'll post a couple of saves to show my progress:

Save 1: The first is about 300BC I have three cities, the oracle in the capital and researching construction. I am on a continent with two other civs, Suleiman and Huayna Capac. They both have different religions so I was about to use spies to influence Suleiman's and go to war with HC since he was weaker.

Save 2: The second is around 400AD. Capital is now a Holy city with the Temple of Artemis as well. It is finishing production of the Pyramids. I figured this was a turning point in the game since I still only have three cities and both HC and Suleiman have cities on my borders. Should I have gone to war earlier than this or waited until I could influence Suleiman? I decided to wait since he would for sure start a religious war when I was into HC territory.

The final save is 1050AD. I switched Suleiman to my religion with spies, and have a stack of 3 horse archers/3cats/and 3axemen in the city closest to HC. He also has a sizeable stack close to my city, so I was going to wait until machinery finishes, destroy HC's stack and then attack. I don't know if it is too late but it looks like Suleiman 1017 to my 801 will probably get a bigger lead with the impending war.

Finally, I played until the early 1800s, just taking 5 of HC's cities and waiting to get the capital with reinforcements. A couple civs found me, and I am currently in third with 1456, HC a close 4th at 1427, and Joao II with 1615. Suleiman is flying by with 2120, and I fear it is too late to win. I would appreciate any and all advice from anyone playing on this level or higher.

Am I building an army too late? waiting too long for macemen? or just building too few cities and too many wonders. At 1800Ad my capital is producing 50+gpp a turn because of the original wonders as well as the hanging gardens, the sistine chapel, great library, and national epic. My other cities also have stonehenge and the shwedagon paya. Thanks in advance and sorry for the huge post.

 

[kurtkage]

Welcome to the posting side of things! As you can see I've been mostly a lurker as well.

I've looked at your saves and here are some observations. Disclaimer for me, I am a prince player and by no means as good as some of our local fanatics

I strongly recommend that you read some strategy articles as they will provide more help and insight than a single thread like this will. Also look at games in the strategy forums, there are lots of walkthroughs, succession games, open games etc that you can read multiple opinions on issues from different people. An example would be the ALC series.

Look at the War Academy


Some specifics on your saves..

Overall I think you need to try and plan more around your start, looking towards the Future. Look at your Leader / Civ / traits. Starting position. Starting Techs. Then as time goes on, neighbors, settling, city specialization, conquering, victory condition even. Have a plan. Have goals.

1) Tile improvements!! You are working unimproved tiles for too long. Improve your cities faster and more completly than you are! Your capital is working unimproved tiles in late AD, that is no good. Which improvements you build all depends...

2) Citizens Working Tiles!! Your population is working some crappy tiles. You have cottages that have not been worked up to a village in 1810ad, you spent the worker turns building that cottage and never used it, and now it will take alot of turns to make it to a town that is actually productive. There are some good threads in the War Academy regarding planning for improvements, counting the food needed to work all tiles and how many farms will be needed to do so. But it all depends on what you are doing with the city, your economy, your victory.

3) Buildings: Ask yourself Why you are building what you are building in a city. You have a market in the hague, that city is only making 4 base commerce, and you are building a library. The 4 base commerce that the city makes will not add up to much even after it's gone through the buildings. This can be attributed back to your tile improvements/working though too. You want to build something For a Reason that is going towards your plan or goal.

4)City specialization: It does not appear that you really specialize cities. This is an in depth topic, you should prolly search for / look in academy.

5) Military: I'm sure you've noticed that in BTS the AI stacks are a bit larger. Your military seems a bit weak, beware the stack of doom

oki, hope I helped a little.

Peace

 

[keyser11]

Thanks for the advice man. I've been looking over the ALC games and deity/immortal challenge games since vanilla, but never knew about the war academy. Just read up on some of that stuff and I definitely think city management is my main problem. I tried to finish the game I was playing but The Ottomans were too far ahead and winning the space race. Thanks again for the help...time to try again

 

[Belisar]

Save 2: The second is around 400AD. Capital is now a Holy city with the Temple of Artemis as well. It is finishing production of the Pyramids. I figured this was a turning point in the game since I still only have three cities and both HC and Suleiman have cities on my borders.

I had no time looking at your save so you may have a couple of other problems as well (like kurtkage mentioned) but this may be the biggest:
EXPANSION.
It doesn't matter if you expand peacefully (if you have the land available) or by military, just expand. For learning purpose, try a game without a single early wonder, focus on workers, settlers, infra and military.

Land leads to cities, cities lead to power, power leads to winning the game.

 

[futurehermit]

Way too few cities. Focus more on expansion. Capital should get mix of cottages and mines to help pay for expansion. First city should be production ideally to start defending your empire. Next one should be gpfarm ideally to get scientists for academy in capital and philosophy lightbulb. Then commerce cities to help fund expansion. Prioritize currency/col to help pay for expansion. Don't stop producing military in your production city. Don't stop expanding. When the land runs out use all the military you have produced (don't delay construction) to continue your expansion via military conquest.

Or, in sum, see my signature.