It all goes to pot when I reach the renaissance

[Djinn8]

I'm trying (and failing) to beat the game on Immortal.

My early game and through the middle ages is good. I keep up with the other AI tech wise, found 5-6 core cities, grow them all to populations of 8-10, maybe puppet a city or two or else just weed the garden by razing AI cities. All my cities have all the food producing buildings, science buildings and most have markets and/or production focused buildings. My road network is up and turning a profit. Religion is spreading happily. I've built NC and perhaps another wonder or two. All in all it's all coming along nice.

Then I reach the renaissance, I start lagging behind.

I hit a happiness wall and my cities stop growing. The hammer cost rises and production slows to a crawl. I start having to dedicate myself much more to paths on the tech tree. While I'm researching naval techs in order to intervine with the runaway who I've just met via caravel, I'm forced to neglect my military techs and now I'm facing muskets on my borders while I'm still turning out pikes. Alternativly I dominate my continent, but in doing so I never get that fleet up and running in time to stand a chance overseas, all the while putting myself into such crippling unhappiness that I never really recover and spend the rest of the game battling smilies.

I think that's the biggest problem. I get all the happiness I can get early on, either through luxuarys, trade, religion or policies and then struggle to find more so I can keep up in the race. The game becomes a case of scrounging for - it goes positive, a city grows a fraction - back to negitive and everything goes on standby - aquire a little more, yadda, yadda, yadda. While this start-stop gameplay is going on the AI just pulls away and I start to get left in the dust.

So I have three questions really.

How and when do you start building a strong navy? I find that it not something that grows naturally. Naval tech is pretty worthless in the early game, and all the good techs seem to come at once later on. Costal sites are generally pretty poor spots for production and everything naval is so hammer/gold intensive.

How do you deal with the happiness drought that comes about around this time of the game?

What do you do to maintain stability on your continent? Turtling up seems to just invite wave after wave of enemy troops with no end in sight. Wiping your enemies out brings peace, but also hatred and unhappiness. Liberating you allies from the local warmonger, or else just weed-wacking is resource intensive and can go on indefinatly. Is there another way?

 

[Novalia]

what religious beliefs are you taking.. seems your problem mostly stems from unhappiness.. maybe go ceremonial burial.. and the one where temples give +2 happiness.. pagodas.. i generally go a different way.. i'm not a huge conqueror so i focus more on generating wealth.. tithe.. lots of trading with AIs.. markets etc.. puppets with trading posts.. economics.. then when i hit the happiness deficit i'll buy off a mercantile CS or someone else that has a lux i dont.. i'm also generally in good standing with every CS because i follow their quests pretty regularly.. i pledge to protect them.. i dont do the bully ones i usually ignore those.. unless its my ally and i have a ton of influence already.. generating lots of faith and culture usually helps gain influence..

maybe your tech path needs to be a little more focused.. perhaps beeline into industrial so you can pick up order and get the happiness for all the cities you have.. get to public schools faster to slingshot your tech into the real naval units.. or maybe instead of always taking the left side of rationalism you'll need to divert to the right side for happiness.. or beeline to printing press to pick up theaters..

i dont generally play too much on continents because i find the whole naval part to be a huge investment for such a lackluster payoff.. you end up destroying them in a few turns and then their worthless.. i would try to war your continent back into the stone age so you wont ever have to watch your back again.. then you can focus on that badass naval empire..

on a continents map i would mostly always conquer it.. use the AI funds early for trading to buy settlers and composite bowman upgrade funds.. then either try to piss someone off into DOWing you or just do it yourself.. likely if there are 3-4 civs on your continent someone will be happy with you if you denounce one of them.. neighbors are always fighting.

 

[kirbdog]

You are probably already doing this if you're playing on Immortal, but I suggest to make sure that you are running science specialists in your universities and going through the left side of the Rationalism policy tree.

Also I'd suggest to bee-line public schools before getting techs like Navigation or Dynamite, in a typical game, because the number of turns from education to public schools isn't nearly as bad as the number of turns to research labs (making the bee-line to public schools small sacrifice). It will let you comfortably research navigation or dynamite or flight before going to plastics later, without falling behind on tech late-game.

To build a navy, the best idea is to spam or buy galleas with a coastal city. These will upgrade with gold to frigates. This is also the best way to get your caravel - build or buy the trireme, then upgrade. You are correct in thinking that hard-building a navy is a lot to ask from a coastal city, so building these early units and upgrading with gold will save a lot of hammers (and give you more frigates faster).

Happiness is, unfortunately, a very binary affair - either you are positive and growing or negative and not. And the more cities you settle, the harder it is to manage. You really need to do long-term planning, considering your victory goal and everything else, to make sure you avoid frequent dips into negative happiness. For a domination game you really want to abuse religion to the maximum - goddess of love, ceremonial burial, and pagodas being a good start. Keep an eye on things while settling like access to horses or ivory for the circus. Try to get city state alliances and luxury trades going if you have any friends. Don't hesitate to hit the raze button. And if you notice someone builds Notre Dame or Eiffel Tower, pay them a visit.

 

[Djinn8]

Here's a screen shot from a game I'm playing at the moment. I've gotten my happiness under control (middle of tradition, right side of honor, coluseums, circuses, walls and garrisons all round). Ceremonail burial for my religion. All food buildings in all cities. Still I seem to be growing far to slowly. As you can see Berlin is only size nine and its been on food focus for the whole game with barely any lapses into unhappiness. I have built universities in all but one city, and those that can work science specialist and still stay above 4+ food surplus are doing so.

Still I'm way behind everyone. I've been throwing units at Japan trying to stop him from overrunning the Dutch, but I'm fighting samurai and muskets with pike, sword and comp-bows. Thanks to my spies I've just managed to steal a bunch of techs from Rome and now I'm pushing for muskets of my own. Hopefully that will even the field with Japan and let me liberate Persia (to my north). Then its just a case of babysitting the Dutch and his wonderspamming ways - that or kill him myself for all his lovely wonders.

Not to say that taking on Japan would be easy - Great Wall + Hemeji Castle + Tradition + walls & castles in all cities.

Not really sure what to do about rome however. They've just built the Kremlin and I suspect the next few turns will see them enter the industrial age, while I'm as yet to enter the renaissiance. From the techs I can steal it seems he's focusing on the bottom end of the tech tree. But I suspect his empire so huge that that won't matter as every few turn I get an "another civ has lost its capital" message. Chances are I'll never catch up with him.

 

[Novalia]

you need more workers.. more farms.. more science..
less gunpowder =)

 

[The Pilgrim]

Religion and CS are two main sources of happiness. And by religion I mean terrain based pantheon, not shrines and temples. If your faith relies purely on these, you might be in trouble. I don't know what pantheon you picked, but if it's silver I see on the SS, religious idols should have been your choice. Or even Dance of the Aurora. Atm you religion isn't spread at all, so Ceremonial Burial gives you nothing.

You should have met the rest of the civs by now, which means beelining Astronomy right after Education. Science is way too low (cities are too small). Instead of hard building university in Frankfurt you'd better sell spare iron and horses and rush buy it. Why do you need harbor in Hamburg? Are there any sea resources hidden by worker menu?

The map is not great, but it's workable. I recommend paying close attention to early CS quests, especially as Germany. You can 'earn' an army and a bunch of CS allies by clearing barbs and camps. Maritime CS are invaluable.

 

[Djinn8]

Religion and CS are two main sources of happiness. And by religion I mean terrain based pantheon, not shrines and temples. If your faith relies purely on these, you might be in trouble. I don't know what pantheon you picked, but if it's silver I see on the SS, religious idols should have been your choice. Or even Dance of the Aurora. Atm you religion isn't spread at all, so Ceremonial Burial gives you nothing.

I was late to the religion party (last to found) My pantheon was Godess of Love. Other picks were cerimonial burial and pagodas - mostly as they were the only ones left. I wasn't really focusing on religon so much and taking Idols would only net me an extra 2 faith per turn for most of the game. There's no other religions on my continent though, so think I'll have the time to spread it.

You should have met the rest of the civs by now, which means beelining Astronomy right after Education. Science is way too low (cities are too small). Instead of hard building university in Frankfurt you'd better sell spare iron and horses and rush buy it. Why do you need harbor in Hamburg? Are there any sea resources hidden by worker menu?

Astonomy is only one tech away. It was my plan to take to the seas, but Japan started to get uppity and it seemed more prudent to tech to better units so I could give him a fight. When I've got gunpowder I should be able to switch back to naval techs, then the uni should be done and I'll be able to build Oxford and rush to Frigates. Hamburg has a couple of crabs + colossus - my main reason for building it was so I could build a Seaport later.

I agree that my cities are too small but I just can't seem to grow them fast enough. They are working farmed river tiles and have all the growth buildings. I WAS a little late to civil service however.

The map is not great, but it's workable. I recommend paying close attention to early CS quests, especially as Germany. You can 'earn' an army and a bunch of CS allies by clearing barbs and camps. Maritime CS are invaluable.

Sadly it's a continents+, so no city states till I scout the seas. The UA came in handy however in the start - 3 warriors + 2 archers, which I upgraded and used to bring down Persia without building a single unit. Japan jumped on the remains of the Persia while I was waiting for my happiness to increase though, giving them a biggesr boost than I would have liked.

 

[Keepitsimple]

Frankly that screenshot looks terrible. 94 science at turn 238?

Here is a simple recipe for success.

1. Build scout

2. Trade all your gold per turn for gold right before you steal your closest civ worker.

3. Trade all your gold per turn for gold to every civ you meet and declare war on them.

4. Buy workers/granary/archers. Do not buy a settler.

5. Sign peace treaties with everybody (the reason for not buying a settler is because some civs might then demand a city for peace).

6. Start expanding.

7. Settle directly on the lux (this is true like 70 % of the cases).

8. Kill closest neighbour with composites if his cities are not on hills. Otherwise just chill to crossbows. You dont need composites to defend on immortal. So if you think you cannot take enough cities. Just beeline universities. If you feel that you can take a lot of cities you should go composites -> NC -> Crossbowmen -> Universities.

9. The priority in the cities are granary/workers/archers. Libraries should rarely be built first.

 

[Matthew.]

Frankly that screenshot looks terrible. 94 science at turn 238?

Look at the date. It isn't standard speed. Nor are any exploits needed, especially on Immortal.

Not ideal, but not terrible.

Growth in satellite cities are OK, but Berlin should really be much higher. A strong capital is always needed.

Surprised you are going for Notre Dame. 17 turns is quite a gamble, especially that late in the game.

My own personal advice: Unless you know exactly what you are doing, you are better off focusing everything on science techs until public schools or even research labs. There is some wiggle room to deviate and take advantage of key military techs, but if you don't have the science game down well enough, you risk falling behind in tech.

Can't tell, but is that Japan's core cities to the left? You could have ignored long swords and muskets and instead went for naval, which would allow you to 1.) meet the rest of the Civs, 2.) meet some city-states, and 3.) take Japan's core cities through naval, where his samurai/muskets would have been useless.

 

[Maxym]

It all looks wrong somehow...

I know it's not standard speed but still 94 bpt is way too low. I see cb in almost every city, I assume u went for honor and are getting ur local happy and culture from garrisons. You must have XB now, and have 400+ gold, so build 4 scouts, upgrade those 4 cb and send them north to where Oda got some persian cities and take them. If you want William to stay alive let him lose one city and retake it itself, so u can upgrade units at the front. You should just tech for arty and wipe Oda out really, no point keeping him around.

With 6 cities and some puppets you have enough of a base to keep up in science. Build or rush all science buildings and staff them all. Save GS and spread your religion earlier. If all good enhancers IP, RT are gone then instead of emhancing get a missionary and spread it to 2 cities that will get a higher pressure in ur other cities or CS.

Ur cities seem to be quite far away and not in very good locations.

 

[sufficiency]

Here's a screen shot from a game I'm playing at the moment. I've gotten my happiness under control (middle of tradition, right side of honor, coluseums, circuses, walls and garrisons all round). Ceremonail burial for my religion. All food buildings in all cities. Still I seem to be growing far to slowly. As you can see Berlin is only size nine and its been on food focus for the whole game with barely any lapses into unhappiness. I have built universities in all but one city, and those that can work science specialist and still stay above 4+ food surplus are doing so.

Still I'm way behind everyone. I've been throwing units at Japan trying to stop him from overrunning the Dutch, but I'm fighting samurai and muskets with pike, sword and comp-bows. Thanks to my spies I've just managed to steal a bunch of techs from Rome and now I'm pushing for muskets of my own. Hopefully that will even the field with Japan and let me liberate Persia (to my north). Then its just a case of babysitting the Dutch and his wonderspamming ways - that or kill him myself for all his lovely wonders.

Not to say that taking on Japan would be easy - Great Wall + Hemeji Castle + Tradition + walls & castles in all cities.

Not really sure what to do about rome however. They've just built the Kremlin and I suspect the next few turns will see them enter the industrial age, while I'm as yet to enter the renaissiance. From the techs I can steal it seems he's focusing on the bottom end of the tech tree. But I suspect his empire so huge that that won't matter as every few turn I get an "another civ has lost its capital" message. Chances are I'll never catch up with him.

Is this played on Epic?

 

[kirbdog]

Is this played on Epic?

Yes, it's epic (judging from the year 930 AD on turn 238).

 

[Greasy Dave]

I've never played epic speed so I have a hard time comparing everything. That said, here's my two cents.

I've looked up a couple of recent Immortal continent games I've been playing and compared the position I was at for that date.

That bpt is poor - given that you beelined Education. I've been comparing it with my own games from that year and it's close to my bpt- but I've been beelining machinery and then going for Education. The benefit of beelining education is that you can then jump into the rennaissance with accoustics and start rationalism policies. So you should be in the rennaissance with rationalsim started by now and consequently get the bpt benefits.

You're SP's are all wrong.
You only took middle of tradition? You need to fill out the tradition completely and get the free aqueducts - growth boosters.
Then you go for left side of Rationalism. The first Policy of rationalism will boost your bpt instantly.
Like I said, after hitting education go for acoustics to get into the rennaissance and get into rationalism ASAP.
Forget honour - it's not good if you're still finding your way to beating the AI at immortal. Sitting those units in the city, just for the happiness bonus is a waste.

Like someone else mentioned - you need to build more workers and get those tiles improved.

You need a much bigger army. The UA of Germany is all about having a large standing army on the cheap - and using it to conquer - or not. Trying to go tall and puppet a couple of neighbouring cities - well, you're not taking advantage of what Germany gives you.

Is that silver to the South of Frankfurt? Why haven't you settled on it, or at least bought the tile and improved it?

Religion is a bit meh for this starting location. If I'd found the desert to the North where Frankfurt is early enough, I'd have settled my second city on it and built a couple fo shrines to see if I could have gotten desert folklore.

BAsically, bigger army, improve your tiles, sort out your policies.

I've attached a couple of screenies of immortal continent games I've been running with Elizabeth - standard speed, but taken around the same year - it's hard to compare but at least you can see a slightly different play style using a larger army. (Bare in mind I beelined machinery and then education for these games)

I'm not saying you have to conquer and be aggressive - but playing Germany to its strengths, a bit of conquest would certainly help you.

In the first shot, I've taken the continent. My bpt is only 125 ish, because I missed the policy rationalism jump - but I have all of tradition and the right side of liberty filled. Growth in my capital is reasonable -not great but reasonable (thanks to tradition). Ten turns later I've allied all the culture city states on the continent, and will shortly be geting the science boost. I lucked into the first pantheon, got folklore and the first religion, and for fun took ceremonial burial and pagodas Getting the first religion enabled me to spread it with a missionary quickly to the immediate neighbouring cities and then it just spread itself - happiness hasn't been a problem all game. I'm a little behind in the tech race but I'll soon be winning it. Honolulu which has the tech lead is now out of the game.

The second shot is from an earlier game which I tried all liberty. NOt as high pop in my own cities (no tradition growth boosts) but big bpt boosts from the conquered cities. Religion was meh. Japan and Persia founded their own and I haven't managed to spread it. In this game I just got the tech lead.

The final shot is from the same game, showing where my army is. Siam is about to die.

 

[OwlRaider]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned this yet, but you don't seem to have a clear strategy in mind. In general there are 2 main strategies: tall and wide. Going tall means getting to 3-4 cities(including your capital) than growing them as much as you can. Going wide means getting a lot of cities and cover more territory, at the expense of national wonders, diplomacy and to a lesser extent culture and science. 5-6 cities is a bit too much for a tall strategy though still workable, and not enough for a wide strategy. In order to choose which strategy to use you need to decide on the victory condition you're aiming for and the civilization you picked. Your above game shows a Germany game, Germany is only good for militaristic victories and even than is not ideal for them. Germany is a pretty weak civilization until you get to the modern era for them Panzers. For a militaristic victory with Germany you should be going wide and swallowing your continent ASAP, than build as minor a navy as you can afford and invade a nearby continent, swallow it than go at another, repeat until you win.

Since you seem to be a newer player, or at least new to high difficulty games, I'd strongly advise you to pick some more newbie friendly civilizations than Germany, as Germany is pretty weak and hard to utilize properly. Also militaristic victories are not the only option and are far from the easiest. You can go for some culture, science or even diplomacy games first on Immortal to get used to the difficulty, than go ahead and pick a warmongering nation and conquer the world. Some easy newbie friendly combinations are: Korea/Babylon for science victory, India for culture victory, Siam for diplomacy victory, etc. All of these combinations are best used with a tall strategy, so stick to 4 cities(the standard), preferably with the 4 city tradition opening that can be seen in these forums, than continue from there.

Remember, the key to any civilization game is to pick your victory condition before you start the game, have an alternative victory condition in order to adapt to game events(for example if you aim for a diplomacy victory yet have an AI Greece who is befriending all the city states, usually best to transition into a different victory condition). Have a plan on how to achieve your victory condition, going tall or wide, peaceful or warmongering, with or without puppets, etc. Again, have a backup plan to adapt according to in-game situations. Than execute your plan as efficiently as possible.

 

[Greasy Dave]

@ Owlraider. I agree and disagree.

I agree you need to decide which way to play, tall or wide before you start. And that it's necessary to choose a civ that suits that. But not necessarily the VC (unless you're shooting for culture). Playing wide, once you reach a certain size - or eliminated the main rivals, diplo, science or domination are all doable (especially on continents).

Personally, I don't think there's a right or wrong number of cities for either strategy - especially if he's trying to win immortal for the first time. I've had tall science victories at Deity with 6 cities and a couple of puppets (admittedly pre-pacth - I haven't been up there since November ). Though that's only my view and better players than me will agree with you on that, I'm sure.

 

[WarIsPeace]

Remember, the key to any civilization game is to pick your victory condition before you start the game, have an alternative victory condition in order to adapt to game events(for example if you aim for a diplomacy victory yet have an AI Greece who is befriending all the city states, usually best to transition into a different victory condition).

Surely this only applies if you know a lot about your start beforehand, correct? I play on shuffle settings. If I get a jungle start with, say, Korea on an island map, that screams for a science victory regardless of what I may have planned for myself before the game started. Other VCs can be made to work, but I find that when I pick my VC before I have investigated the map a little, I tend to struggle.

 

[Ninakoru]

I think the major error was the policy setup. I also go often with tradition + honor, but you have to take care of the order. I usually get tradition opener, honor opener, then full tradition. Honor opener pays for itself with the barbarian culture you'll get, and is a nice boost for germans who can abuse their barb traits.

The two free buildings are well timed, and the boost to happiness from monarchy is great. If you go full tradition your capital will grow much larger (+25% growth + 2 food).

I am agree you should try another civ. I find germans is a quite good civ, but you have to know how to get their best. Germany is a honor civ to me, this is the real issue: Honor is harder to handle on higher difficulties, to make it work you have to be warmongering and conquering from the very start, first with barbs, later neighbors. Heck, when you have finished it, you want to have constant war even if you are not prepared for more conquest at the time, for the sole purpose of killing units to get gold + improved exp, while harassing those neigbors.

I am agree to the advice of getting ocean access ASAP, also as people say, you should have a plan from the very begining. About the policies, forget about honor, get another civ and try the 4 tradition opener, is just great.

 

[The Pilgrim]

I was late to the religion party (last to found) My pantheon was Godess of Love. Other picks were cerimonial burial and pagodas - mostly as they were the only ones left. I wasn't really focusing on religon so much and taking Idols would only net me an extra 2 faith per turn for most of the game. There's no other religions on my continent though, so think I'll have the time to spread it.

That's why chasing after religion without natural bonus from either terrain or UB is usually a waste of effort. You maybe have time to spread it before the game ends, but the point is to benefit from it. And with one city having the religion there is no benefit at all. Small things but they add up. Hammers spent on shrines could have been used better.

Astonomy is only one tech away. It was my plan to take to the seas, but Japan started to get uppity and it seemed more prudent to tech to better units so I could give him a fight. When I've got gunpowder I should be able to switch back to naval techs, then the uni should be done and I'll be able to build Oxford and rush to Frigates. Hamburg has a couple of crabs + colossus - my main reason for building it was so I could build a Seaport later.

It's a matter of priority. On continents (and even more so on continents plus) exploration and Astronomy beeline is right at the top. Gunpowder is not needed, crossbows and ridiculously cheap LS will keep everyone in check.
As for Hamburg, investing so many hammers in order to have a couple of semi productive tiles in the second half of the game - it's just not a very good deal. Sea resources are the hardest to leverage and cities planned around them are usually weak. This is something to keep in mind.

I agree that my cities are too small but I just can't seem to grow them fast enough. They are working farmed river tiles and have all the growth buildings. I WAS a little late to civil service however.

Finishing Tradition and beelining CS would have helped. But overall it's pretty bad setup for Germany. In case like this you have to play the map. War is your best bet here. If you plan to replay the map, I'd consider going Liberty, cranking out a huge number of CB's and clearing the continent.