Idiot mistakes 101

[patweb]

In my first game I decided the time had come for some war. So I attacked the nearest (small) city of my most annoying neighbour and capture it. However it didn't have any culture (or something) and it was destroyed. So I start building a settler to grab the spot nonetheless. However another civ had a settler roaming about with nowhere to found a city and settles it right on the old city ruins.

So much for the "gaining land by conquering" technique.

I try to sit a warrior on the cherry city spots.

 

[Breunor]

I try to sit a warrior on the cherry city spots.

Remember, if you aren't at war they can enter your square. Also, they can plop a city right next to it.

Breunor

 

[Breunor]

Second worst mistake: Playing diety level to see "what's all the hype"!

ROFL

Breunor

 

[Loyran]

Discovering Induism and then putting off the construction of Stonehenge for a while thinking the AI doesn't care about that wonder.
Latter on when you're about to complete it..."Stonehenge has been built in a far away land"...So you decide to try for the Oracle...."The Oracle has been built in a far away land"....OKAY...No Biggie, I can build the Parthenon...."The Parthenon has been built in a far away land"....THE PYRAMIDS! LET'S DO THE PYRAMIDS..."The $%^& Pyramids have been built in a far away land"....

Then you realise it's 500 AD and your capital is starving, unhappy and undefended....

 

[BCLG100]

barb standing outside my city, on what would be square 6 movement from my 2 units in the city, i highlight one finger slips and i press the 9 button.
am thinking 'oh C^£$, least ive still got my unit in the city to defend it' during the break the barb attacks and wins and goes into my city.
'oh C%^" least ive got my other unit to get back in' i try and yes you guessed it failed to get back into the city, took me 10 turns to get my city back, i was the japanese and yes that was kyoto

 

[Sunwolf]

Completing the technology that cancels the special Effects of a Wonder a couple of turns before completing the Wonder. Did that last night with the Collosus

 

[Polopapolo]

1. Making contact with a religion-less AI, getting open borders, sending a missionary unit, spreading Judaism BUT paying 680 gold for them to convert instead of just waiting one turn for them to do it on their own!

2. Realizing after a dozen games that railroad DOES improve mines and lumbermills!

3. Unnecessarily upgrading a 22/26 exp axeman to maceman in order defeat archers. Result: 10/26 exp maceman

4. Repeat step 3 four more times!!! I only realized it afterward...

 

[crunchyfrog3014]

While planning expansion, sending the unit intended for defending the city ahead because they move one where as the settler can move at two. This is perfectly safe because the settler will be moving through the center of my empire. After creating the settler I just click on the destination without seeing how the computer calculated the path. You guessed it the computer thought it would be best if the settler moved through the fog of war. Sadly he never made it two spaces outside my cultural borders. The archer was left looking at his watch wondering why the settler was so late.

 

[Znabel15]

No, I was like: "Hooray, we have 50 tiles of jungle, I don't care what my cities build, they will build it FAST!"

This has to be one of the best! Ever....

 

[Good Omens]

Discovering Induism and then putting off the construction of Stonehenge for a while thinking the AI doesn't care about that wonder.
Latter on when you're about to complete it..."Stonehenge has been built in a far away land"...So you decide to try for the Oracle...."The Oracle has been built in a far away land"....OKAY...No Biggie, I can build the Parthenon...."The Parthenon has been built in a far away land"....THE PYRAMIDS! LET'S DO THE PYRAMIDS..."The $%^& Pyramids have been built in a far away land"....

Then you realise it's 500 AD and your capital is starving, unhappy and undefended....

BUT...you did at least get lots of gold, right? You could probably finance lots of early research this way. Probably not a useful strategy in most cases, but you never know...

 

[DraconisRex]

My main mistakes:

1. Not spreading my missionaries (I usually take 2 or 3 religions. Sometimes 4.) and passing on all that gold...
2. Forgetting to change civics when I own the Pyramids.
3. Not thinking about AI invasions on primarily sea maps.
4. Never committing to allies and enemies with other civilizations and trying to please them all, pleasing noone.

 

[DraconisRex]

I usually don't have more than 1 Golden Age per game. So why do I always seem to forget I'm in GA period and have an irresistable urge to change civics during this time? I don't think the one or two turns of anarchy help the cause, somehow.

I've done that too many times for comfort. Once, I changed civics, then some war monger wanted me to change state religions and I didn't want to waste what was left of my GA in building units. Doh! Twice in one GA.

 

[Abegweit]

sending 12 jet fighters to scout an area insted of 1 because they where attached togheter by SHIFT.

I've pulled this stunt so often it hurts.

In the first GOTM, I had just taken Thessolinica, which was in the extreme east corner of the continent) and was closing in on Athens, their last city. The Greeks had two units fortified on their iron hill two tiles away right on the main road between the cities. Rather than try to take them out, I decided to go around them. I selected a unit, sent him to his destination -- and emptied the city

This particular time I got lucky. For two turns in a row, the Greeks never moved! Then I took Athens and the guys on the hill suicided.

 

[ranger999]

I went to war once with one size-15 city building Three Gorges Dam. I did nothing more than make minor adjustments to the global culture slider to control war weariness. When the war ended, I noticed that the city had starved due to unhappiness from war weariness & lack of people actually doing useful things (like growing food)...to a population of 4. I suppose I should I have paid more attention to the unhappy face icon next to the city name, but after having to micromanage in Civ 3 unhappiness, it seemed so easy to ignore it...

 

[Memphus]

Thinking that Mathmatics gives you Cats

And declaring war the turn before to pillage, knowing you can pump out 4 of them on the next turn with timed chops so they can start advancing....
only to find out you don't get Catapults with math

The double kicker ...doing it twice

 

[Meffy]

Thinking that Mathmatics gives you Cats

The tech advance that lets you make cat units is the can opener. :-}

My latest dumb blunder -- moving several transports out of an invasion fleet back toward the home port, only to realize I hadn't yet unloaded the fighting units from those transports. =>_<= DUH. Fortunately, the ones I had landed were sufficient to take the one "must-seize" enemy city.

 

[gmanne]

The tech advance that lets you make cat units is the can opener. :-}

... well, that is cleverer than anything else I'll read today

2 months of playing and I still forget 3 cavalry can move AND destroy a town-village-hamlet in one turn.
I still wake up at night hearing that awful screaming of the peasants...

 

[SamE]

Okay, so I'm playing on epic and need 15 culture to expand. I have a city that can get rice and sheep with expansion, but doesn't have anything otherwise. I have Stonehenge. Then I trade an AI for Calendar right when that city is at 14/15. So I try to get it a religion. Hinduism spreads from Spain, and I build a monastery and throw a missionary out there. Right before he gets there, I found Christianity and convert to it. D'oh! Isabella was really mad and declared war, to add insult to injury (but I was doing the insulting to myself).

 

[Bushface]

Promoting some Catapults to Barrage 2 and using them to batter down the defences of cities full of defenders, not causing any collateral damage at all. Only later did I learn, in this forum, that no siege units cause collateral damage whilst bombarding: it only happens if you use them like any other unit, for a direct attack. Next time, Flanking 2 for hit-and-run tactics: good for Subs, too, I'm told.
EDIT: see p.38 of the manual, first paragraph, last sentence. It's stated quite clearly there. Oh dear . . .

 

[Baurgja]

Funny thread

My contribution: often forgetting about oasis move penalty and losing a move with scouts ...