how to break the noble barrier?

[jake2007]

why am i only a below noble level player even when i follow all of the recommendations in the game. like i research the recommended stuff build the recommended stuff and place my cities where recommended. shouldnt i at least be able to beat noble.

what do i do wrong i dont understand it. this is frustrating. my best games are usually when i rush. but even after i rush and kill one or two opponents the others are still ahead on score.

 

[LiberiGlacialis]

I've been told to ignore the score and just gun for victory.

(unless, of course, your going to a Time victory...but what does this space-bound Warlord know? )

 

[xanadux]

Well there must be something you are missing. Perhaps if you described your games a little better, posting some screenshots, we could help. Do you just quit when you are behind in score, or do you keep playing? Score doesn't really mean all that much. You can have 5 great cities that by the industrial age will be able to easily destroy empires of over a dozen cities, and the empires you destroy may have double your score.

Score is strongly weighted by # and size of cities and land area controlled. A lot of land isn't necessary to win. Check out my Mansa CivIV 101 thread. Look at the turn 168 screenshot in round 6, which shows my score in second last place. Then look at the last screen shot in round 7. I'm quite a ways ahead of everyone, and the second place civ is going to be dead in a few turns. I was way ahead of the AI the whole game, but the score didn't show it.

 

[tycoonist]

as Xanadux says, posting an example of a game save (early or late) and we will try to provide some decent analysis

 

[jake2007]

ok here are a couple of my games

 

[seizer]

Well, the recommendations the computer gives you are usually (not always) wrong. In general, a good idea is to always do stuff that enhances your economy. That can mean a lot of different things, like founding cites, taking cities from the AI, building cottages, researching currency and so on. The trick is doing the things that help the economy the most in each situation. Then of course there are times when you should go for short-term benefits, and times when you should look for the long term, which one to chose might not be that easy.

Note that there are a lot of things that you can do that will not enhance your economy in any significant way, like building a bank when you are running 100% science. Avoid doing such things.

 

[Silence101]

It seems to me that the computer's recommendations don't seem to follow any particular strategy. You'll end up with a bland mess of cities that arn't specialized and an empire that doesn't accel at any one thing. I honestly don't like most of the computer's recommendations. Have a strategy or goal in mind, and follow that.

 

[jake2007]

how should i play if i want to be ahead on score and techs while having good defense?

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Don't worry about the score

Play for a space win if you are behind in the score late on, diplomatic works too.

If you are ahead in the score, you should be going for a domination win.

 

[jake2007]

ok. but do you know what i did wrong in those games though>?

 

[Silence101]

how should i play if i want to be ahead on score and techs while having good defense?

Focus on expansion.

With that said, a word of caution - a given city will initially present a liability to your economy... meaning that an undeveloped city with a small population will cost you more than it will produce. However, as a city grows and you develop the land and infrastructure, assuming it is well placed, it will return more than it costs. The key is balanced expansion over the long-term. Unless you're going for a Cultural or Diplomatic vitory, you should be looking for ways to expand for the course of the game. This doesn't mean that you're constantly at war or constantly building settlers, but that you're always preparing your economy, always preparing your military, always making the most of the cities and land that you do have through city specialization. If you want to stay ahead in score, you should always be looking down the road for ways to increase how much cities / land you control.

A Civ with 12 fully developed / specialized cities will way ahead of a Civ with 6 fully developed / specialized cities. Just don't try to swallow the whole cow at once - rapid expansion means expanding until it hurts, but beyond that, you will need to take some preparation time rebuilding your economy. Running an SE, especially in the early game, can help with economic troubles due to expansion - that will keep you competative with tech even when you're force to lower the research slider.

There will come a point where you will likely not be able to expand peacefully. War can be favorable because while you're expanding your territory, you're taking semi-developed cities away from your competition. It can often be a better play than peaceful expansion assuming you've prepared your military - something you should be doing anyway. Focus production cities on building military - generally, everything they do should be either to increase military strength or to increase production power (with buildings like forges, for example.)

 

[jake2007]

bump, anayone want to analyize my games =D ?

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

bump, anayone want to analyize my games =D ?

No. AD1800 is too deep into the game. Toss up some saves from 2000BC, and include your own analysis of the moves you have made, and you'll get a lot more interest.

It also helps to post screen shots.

 

[ho_chi_minh]

why am i only a below noble level player even when i follow all of the recommendations in the game. like i research the recommended stuff build the recommended stuff and place my cities where recommended.

Do yourself a favor and turn off recommendations and tips. All they do is distract you really.

It is correct that the score is not all that important, but on Noble you should be able to stay near the top for the entire game, no matter what strategy you pursue.

Have you seen the War Academy? Read the "introductury courses" and some intermediate guides to topics where you find you could do better, and make sure you understand them.

Ask yourself these questions:

1) Do you understand how city growth works? Are you optimizing your cities' growth?
2) Do you understand whipping and chopping? Do you use them to their fullest effect?
3) Do you understand city specialization and specialist employment? Do you use it effectively?
4) When you declare war, are you confident that it is the right time to do so? Do you have enough units to counter your enemy's units, to take cities and to defend them?

If you can answer all these four question with "Yes", you really should be able to beat Noble and maybe we should start looking at your early saves.

 

[vicawoo]

They had an AI is always right short game, and the computer was giving such boneheaded recommendations, the players were trying to weasel out by re-asking for recommendations until they could get what they wanted. They ended up getting conquered.

 

[Carabodes]

why am i only a below noble level player even when i follow all of the recommendations in the game. like i research the recommended stuff build the recommended stuff and place my cities where recommended. shouldnt i at least be able to beat noble.

what do i do wrong i dont understand it. this is frustrating. my best games are usually when i rush. but even after i rush and kill one or two opponents the others are still ahead on score.

What you do wrong is letting the game make descissions for you. The recommendations are seldom - if ever - right!
I tried it out in one game, just for fun (and it was no fun at all ). I did everything as recommended by the game, following either one of the two options given, both for teching and for building. As it turned out, by the time I had 6 cities, I had only 1 worker (it was only when I founded the 6th city that the game suggested that I needed a worker ), my economi was of course in ruins and my science-slider was down to 0. Needless to say. I never bothered to play any more of that game.

Turn off advisor pop-ups and tips!
Start analyzing your surroundings. Let the present resources and the landscape tell you what to start researching while also taking into account your leaders traits and starting techs.
Build only what you need at the moment, while also planning what you need in the future (as I suppose you'll always have a plan about which kind of victory you'd like to achieve).
For early builds, granaries are always important for growth, so make sure you tech early for what enables you to contruct granaries.
If you find yourself in the middle of a forest, tech for mining/bronzeworking early to be able to chop. These techs, as I'm sure you know, also enables stronger units for defense/offense, as well as determining where to settle next.
For a healthy economi, tech for pottery. If you have livestock, tech for animal husbandry.
And so on, all through the game , and never, ever, let the game decide what's best for you!
YOU'RE IN CHARGE HERE!

And remember to build enough workers (at least one per city) and defenders (don't look at the gamepoints, look at the powergraph - if you're in the top league there, the AI will probably - but not always, some of them are just too crazy - not attack you, which means you're in charge of when to do warfareing).

I know this was pretty basic, and maybe I'm speaking out of order, but having read the posts in the thread, I thought I recognized some of my own despair from early games. If I'm not helpful, then just overlook this post.

As for learning more, I suggest you read through Sisiutils ALC-games here http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=5320091
Through those games he has gone from prince to monarch to emporer, and through all three packs of Civ4. His games along with the comments from people at this forum has really taught me a lot. It takes a couple of weeks to read through them all, but it's definitely worth it.

Have fun!

 

[Sarek]

I had a look at your 1400 save above.

While Pacal is friendly, never be satisfied with happily building away. They just may backstab you.

I noticed you had some cities without any sort of garrison. That was where I started. I built up military and even assembled a bit of an offensive army. As you have virtually the top half of the map secure, domination looks like it would be easy.

I kept building units, but then made a bit of a bonehead move! I declared on Wash NOT realizing he was vassaled by Pacal...oops Oh well, that just moved things along faster. I took out a couple of Wash cities (kept one, razed two I think) at the same time being a bit defensive with Pacal. Then Wash broke free...so I made peace with him and turned full attention to the SE. Build units...stay ahead in research...steamroll! Keep the good cities and raze the rest.

I played through about 1850ad and am getting close to the victory limits for DOM.

Oh, and to speak to your initial point, by doing this you eventually do DROP his score and increase yours to the point where you take the lead (for good I would expect).

Fun game!

 

[jake2007]

Okay, thanks for the tips.

is it okay to leave your workers on automated?

 

[xanadux]

Automated is bad. They will do things in the wrong order, and often the wrong improvements. Hook up your resources (improve all food resources like corn and cows first), and then mines on hills, farms if needed to grow or work mines. Cottages (on riverside tiles first) if you are going to use them for commerce. More farms if you are going to get your science from specialists. Try to make sure your cities are always working improved tiles.

 

[jake2007]

why am i able to defeat one or two opponents with a rush but then i fall behind all of the others. shouldnt i be way ahead. for instance i played as alexander and rushed the incas with about 5 phalax and took their capital. then i later attacked with 10 and took all of their cities. but to my surpirsie i was behind on points AND behind on the power graph. what should i do?