Importing Resources and Cheating Computers

[Psychlone]

In a recent game, I bordered Germany, who had a very small peninsula of the continent. At one point they traded iron to me for a tech, and I was puzzled, because as near as I could tell, they had no iron even for their own use, let alone extra to trade to me.

Several turns down the road, I decided I was going to take Germany out, because they only had 4 cities. So I proceeded to go in and break their road networks to all cities, isolating them from resources. In their capitol they had a pikeman, and had a couple of swordsmen, so they had iron from somewhere...

Ah yes, one coastal city had a harbor, they must have been trading for it. So I took it, and of course, the harbor was destroyed in the conquest. As I was massing troops at their last city, the coastal port culture flipped, and the defensive troop they got was a pikeman! Now, at this point, I was going "what the hell?"

The square the city was built on did not have iron, and it had no harbor. In the couple of turns I had owned it, I did reconnect a road to it to plug it into my luxuries.

Now I had always been under the impression that a city could not receive luxuries or resources via a road if that road passed through enemy territory. I was also under the impression a harbor was needed to receive lux/resources by sea. I had Germany bottled up on this peninsula, no harbor, and the only road network ran through me.

So how the hell were the Germans getting iron? Any ideas? Am I mistaken in how trade routes function?

 

[SGX]

halberdier... ?

 

[Psychlone]

Pikeman, sorry. There I go getting all technical n stuff...

 

[SGX]

if you still have a save game, could you show a picture?

(apart from the fact I love seeing what other games look like... it'll help 'visualise')

 

[Psychlone]

Here are the last 4 of their 5 conquered cities. None of the cities has iron underneath it. Prior to my attack, my border was completely across the peninsula, just south of Berlin. They had no other cities. Frankfurt was the only city that had had a harbor, and as I mentioned, the harbor had been destroyed when the city was captured, so wasn't there when it flipped back to Germany, so where did they get the iron for the pikeman if they weren't cheating?

(The Chinese are such a funky color because the Americans are also in this game, BTW)

 

[Pggar]

Could you post the savegame so we can take a closer look?

 

[Psychlone]

Here is the saved game, it's the last autosave available, but after I defeated Germany, unfortunately. I played a few more turns before deciding to make a post about it, and never figured anyone would want to check out the game version itself.

Please be aware, this game is on a modified bic that allows all 16 civs on standard map, as well as having an APC unit that I made and have been testing out. Those are the only modifications. So install and use it as you would any other modified bic, if you choose to do so.

 

[zebomba]

I guess I know. They were already making the pikemen when they lost the iron. The human player can do it, too.

The AI cheats big time, but not in this fashion you're thinking of. If it was, it could get anything it wanted. People told me it's how the programming works.

 

[History_Buff]

As far as I know, yhe Germans could have been trading through your territory for the time when you are at peace. As long as there is no declaration of war, there is no eend to free trade. Emphasis in the sentence in the manual should be on the word enemy.

 

[Psychlone]

Well, right, but how did the city that flipped back to them (Frankfurt) get the iron to build a pikeman when it had no harbor, is what I want to know? When an unconnected city flips back to me, I'll get a spearman since the city is cut off from iron and saltpeter, or a rifleman if the city is cut off from oil and rubber...

 

[sebanaj]

no, there 's no cheating really...

yeah u can keep building it if you already started it

the AI gets advantage from Monarch level... the units cost them less shields i guess... also they start with more units in the beginning of the game

The user gets advantage in the two first levels...

Regent level is the best cause no one gets bonuses, it's all fair...

 

[Pggar]

Originally posted by Psychlone
Please be aware, this game is on a modified bic that allows all 16 civs on standard map, as well as having an APC unit that I made and have been testing out.

Could you check if, by any chance, iron was unchecked as needed for the pikeman. I am clueless :crazyeyes here. There's no good explanation for what has happened. We must be losing something.

 

[Psychlone]

I modified the bic myself, I never even looked at the pikeman, let alone modified it, iron is still required. I couldn't build them until I got iron. What I'm really wondering at this point, about the unconnected coastal city that flipped to Germans and got a pikeman is, does the computer need a harbor improvement to receive resources/luxuries from other civs? *shrug* It's really not important, I guess. If I ever see signs of this again, I'll be sure to make adequate saves and examine it closely. I wish I had thought at the time to see if the Germans displayed any active trades on the relations screen.

 

[Selous]

i think i might have a solution for ya Psychlone .... mebey the city was built on a iron resorce? ... i seen that done before ... and actually is quite a great idea!! ... dont have to worry about defending it either

 

[Gruntboy]

Originally posted by Psychlone
The square the city was built on did not have iron

 

[nklatt]

Pikemen don't require iron, swordsmen do.

Or am I smokin' crack?

 

[eyrei]

Pikemen do require iron. I think I saw this in one of my games with oil. I controlled most of the map, and all but 2 oil resources. My allies the Russians, had both of those. Now, shortly (less than 20 turns) after the Persians and Zulus got flight (I know when they got it because I sold it to them) they both had a few bombers. If I am not mistaken, you need oil to build bombers. I checked and double checked to see if I had missed some oil reserve, but I found none. The Russians could have been trading with one of them, but not two, and I know I was not trading it to them. It seemed they were sharing the resource somehow. Strange things do seem to happen in civ games when you are winning handily.

 

[SlightlyMadman]

The exact opposite happened to me last night, and puzzled me as well. I was at war with a nation that did have iron (as did I). One of their border cities flipped to me in the middle of the war, and I got a pikeman in it.

* I had no roads connecting to the city
* It was not a coastal city
* The only road going into it was connected only to an enemy city (it didn't go around, even, a straight 1-tile line from their city to the flipped city).

Since it was only connected to me through enemy territory, it did not have iron. I verified that I could not assign a pikeman as a production option. So, why did it have a pikeman when it flipped?

The only explanation I can think of is that it calculates the unit the city gets based on the resources that were available prior to the flip. In your case, YOU had iron, so THEY got a pikeman. In my case, THEY had iron, so I got a pikeman.

It even makes sense, kind of, since the poeple that overthrew their government built their militia using the weapons available to the overthrown government.

 

[Psychlone]

SlightlyMadman, that actually makes sense, I can buy that explanation.

 

[nklatt]

Originally posted by eyrei
Pikemen do require iron.

Do not! Neener neener neeeeeener! But really, they don't - you can build them when you have Bronze Working which, as you might know, is a prereq for Iron Working which is the tech you need to even *see* iron on the map.