Jumping from Monarch to Emperor

[Aegis]

I will be attempting to make the Difficulty jump from Monarch to Emperor sometime this weekend. Does anyone have any tips that could help smooth out the transition? Should I start on a small islands/continents map to start off? Or perhaps, Standard Pangea? I think I will try this with the Ottomans, as I am very strong with their traits and the Siphai will be excellent for conquest.

This is my usual start:

1) Immediately begin researching Pottery w/max research. Build 1 Warrior for Military Police and then another structure as a pre-build for a Granary when Pottery completes. I assume for Emperor Difficulty I will need two MP’s in addition to bumping up the lux slider a notch or two.

2) Begin cranking out settlers & accompanying military units while my capital re-gains the population necessary to pop out another settler. Begin researching towards Ironworking or The Wheel after Pottery (Depending on my Civ).

3) When settling a new city, my first build is either a) a warrior, or b) a worker depending on my need. I always have 1 worker per city.

4) Second build for a new city is going to be a granary. My expansion process is pretty much my capital spitting out settlers and military units while my new cities focus on growing in population. If new cities grow quickly enough to help out with expansion, they become settler factories, too.

5) Once I get Ironworking/The Wheel, I try for the Philosophy Jump for a free tech (usually Literature because I enjoy Scientific civs), but if the AI is competitive in tech, I go for the highest cost tech). I would try for the Jump to The Republic, but I don’t think I will be able to research Code of Laws and still beat the AI to Philosophy.

6) Now I head for Currency, for Marketplaces and begin building them as I push for The Republic. Once I have that researched, I flip Governments and push towards the Middle Ages ASAP.

7) From here, I beeline for Education for Universities and then to Banking, for banks. I hope to be able to trade for Invention and Engineering to give me a boost towards Military Tradition.

If I can get to this point while being competitive with the AI in the tech pace, I am confident that I will end up stomping them in the tech race over time and will be able to conquer their cities as normal. During this whole process, I try not to go to war unless the AI makes an outrageous demand of tribute, they attack me or if there is a needed luxury/resource within striking distance.

Any thoughts, questions or suggestions? Thanks in advance.

 

[Aabraxan]

First off, there's an article in the War Academy called "The Great Leap," and, IIRC, it's by Ision. Definitely a good read before making this jump.

For me, the hardest adjustment from Monarch to Emp was happiness. The AI build rate doesn't change that much from Monarch to Emp, but going from "third citizen born cranky" to "second citizen born cranky" is tough. Luxes get really, really important. I actually had more difficulty with agri civs than with non-agri civs for a while, just because the agris grew too fast for me.

I'd suggest starting on an archipelago or continents map. Using arch or continents will give you some control over the the tech pace, at least until galleys and probably until galleons. Having all of the AIs on one pangaea is going to speed up the tech pace, especially if you pull a couple of expansionist civs as rivals. Also, the AI is terrible with naval invasions, so having some of them on a different landmass keeps the ones "over there" from being able to hurt you, even if they do DOW. Oh, and getting the ones "over there" to DOW is a fine way to get some war happiness.

I'm not going to go into details on the rest of your questions, as many of the answers are so situation-dependent. How do you want to win? Conquest? Space Race? Culture? Who are your opponents? Will you hand-pick them or go random?

At any rate, good luck and keep us posted.

 

[Aegis]

I will try for Conquest and if that fails, Space Race. If I play Pangea, I think I'll disable barbarians and then choose my opponents so there are no Expansionist civs. An Expansionist w/o Goody Huts is pretty sad.

Thanks for the heads-up on Ision's article. I'll try to track that down.

 

[Jokeslayer]

Aren't you over-thinking this a little?

The main problem is happiness (like aabraxan said), so make sure you keep an eye on that. I usually don't worry too much about early research especially if it would hurt lux slider use. Expand first, research second.

For maps, civs etc., i'd just go with what you're used to or what you prefer.

 

[Aegis]

Aren't you over-thinking this a little?

That's part of the fun of Civ! =oD

I love the methodical planning and contemplating. Planning my strategy will almost be as much fun as playing the game.

The main problem is happiness (like aabraxan said), so make sure you keep an eye on that.

If I go the Pangea route, I believe I may use the Monarchy Gov so I can get the three MP's and additional unit support.

 

[Decebalus]

Yeah, happiness is biggest issue I think.

Not sure what your style of play is, but I'd pack those cities really tight and don't let them grow too big. The start is important until you get a few luxuries. Till then, luxury slider becomes important. It's why having many cities means a lot more money so you ca afford moving that luxury slider.

If you're lucky to see some luxury resource nearby right off the bat you're good and getting them should be your priority. If not, it'll be a long hard game!

 

[capnvonbaron]

I will be attempting to make the Difficulty jump from Monarch to Emperor sometime this weekend. Does anyone have any tips that could help smooth out the transition? Should I start on a small islands/continents map to start off? Or perhaps, Standard Pangea? I think I will try this with the Ottomans, as I am very strong with their traits and the Siphai will be excellent for conquest.

1) Immediately begin researching Pottery w/max research.
2) Begin researching towards Ironworking or The Wheel after Pottery (Depending on my Civ).

NO! NO NO NO!

Pottery is a waste of time since I GUARANTEE there will be another civ out there with pottery as a starting tech. Put the research slider at a minimum and start researching toward Republic IMMEDIATELY if that is the road you are going. When you meet the civ with pottery, either buy it with the saved gold or trade one of your starting techs to that civ for it; that civ will aquire your starting tech from someone else, or pop it from a goody hut anyways, so you are only benefiting yourself. Once you get some cities up, adjust the slider to increase research, but you are only going to shave off a few turns. That is fine, because it will be enough to get philo and republic first, though, almost certain.

Same with ironworking and the wheel... either those resources will be close, or they won't. You just need to focus on getting your core set up first, then you can send out a settler or army to claim the resource if it isn't close. My guess is that once you research them, it is many turns before you are ready to crank out swords or horsemen anyways, so go for something useful and TRADE OR BUY FIRST-TIER TECHS FROM THE AI!!! Trust me on this one, I know it seems illogical or uncomfortable, but its the way things work in this game!!

Also, since your UU is a cavalry, I HIGHLY suggest going straight for Military Tradition when you get to the middle ages. Aquire education from the AI and trigger your GA with siphai, then build unis and banks like crazy. I wrote something under my thread "a new low" that details that strategy a bit better.

 

[Aegis]

Yeah, happiness is biggest issue I think.

Not sure what your style of play is, but I'd pack those cities really tight and don't let them grow too big.

I use the CxxCxxC method of city placement, making exceptions for rivers, coast and luxuries/resources.

 

[Decebalus]

Yeah that's what I use too.

With the exception of the first ring which I do CxxxCxxxC since the capital and those ones usually become core cities in the later game.

With the CxxCxxC placement after that. And in patches of prime realestate I make sure the outer cities are well placed as if the middle wouldn't exist so that later in the game I can get rid of the middle one and allow the good ones to grow out.

But early on, pack'm tight!

 

[Aegis]

NO! NO NO NO!

Pottery is a waste of time since I GUARANTEE there will be another civ out there with pottery as a starting tech. Put the research slider at a minimum and start researching toward Republic IMMEDIATELY if that is the road you are going. When you meet the civ with pottery, either buy it with the saved gold or trade one of your starting techs to that civ for it;

Hmm, good idea.

Also, since your UU is a cavalry, I HIGHLY suggest going straight for Military Tradition when you get to the middle ages. Aquire education from the AI and trigger your GA with siphai, then build unis and banks like crazy. I wrote something under my thread "a new low" that details that strategy a bit better.

The Siphai-rush route is something I have done in the past to good effect. I will give that a shot in my second game, if my first does not work too well.

 

[TheOverseer714]

Aegis, I agree with Capvonbaron about the tech choices and trading for tech. You have an excellent chance to get the Republic slingshot if you go max research on the beeline to Code of Laws/Philosophy. Which one you research depends on the tech pace. If it's not too bad, go CoL first. My rule of thumb is Writing. If you get that first, the sling is likely. If you get beat to Writing, go for Philosophy and trade for CoL either before Philo come in or in the big picture trading. Avoid Pangaeas at first, the tech pace races too fast until you get the hang of it. Smart research, trading, and settler factories are key to winning at Emperor. Oh, and using the luxury slider is almost mandatory. Good luck!

 

[capnvonbaron]

Good tips on the sling, Overseer... I don't have much to add to that since I'm a vanilla man, myself

Regarding siphai rush... you don't need a horde of them, just attack something and win to spark the GA. THEN build a horde and go destroy something, or a lot of somethings, and backfill the techs either by buying, trading, or by putting a gun to their head

You would be surprised how well "pointy stick research" works on higher levels, even into the Modern Ages.

And yes, I agree continents. If you are on the alpha continent, meaning the one with the most civs, you will outpace the other continent, but not at a rate that you can't keep up. Once astronomy or at latest navigation/magnetism come around, meet the other continent and trade contacts around between the two for all the gold, techs, maps, and workers you can get. With any luck, you'll own your continent by that point anyways.

 

[Spoonwood]

You would be surprised how well "pointy stick research" works on higher levels, even into the Modern Ages.

Careful. We have a rather clear demonstration that "pointy stick research" won't work too well the higher up you go in a current HoF thread.

Aegis,

For a conquest game with the Ottos, I'd really recommend pangea. The tech pace *will* go faster, but I don't think that too much of a problem on Emperor if you shoot down the middle first (Alphabet-Writing-Code of Laws-Philosophy-The Republic), then to Literature and Currency, and then go Monotheism-Theology-Education-Banking in the middle ages. In fact, I'd think that's almost "textbook" for a game where you want to pick up the tech pace/keep up at higher levels. It sounds exactly like what I usually do for my fast tech pace games... although often I'll go for Chemistry or Physics instead of Banking... it depends. With a pangea map you'll more easily trade for more of the luxuries than with an archipelago map, so you won't have to manage happiness as much later on.

The only *signficiant* difference between Monarch and Emperor really comes as the happiness problem in my opinion. Other differences seem slight. Sure, the tech pace will move faster and they'll get units quicker. Techs will cost you a bit more, but if you beeline down the middle, then literature, then currency (or the other way around probably), then stick to the top part of the tree as you seem to in the middle ages, and keep an eye on what techs the other AIs have in general, you should do O.K. So, I think all differences between Monarch and Emperor for you (other than 1 less *content* citizen) come as slight. Now, in my opinion at least, the difference between Emperor and Demi-God, or between Deity and Sid... that's a different story.

You said you wanted a conquest game. I'd say to stick with that plan *no matter how things go*. If you have problems with the tech pace early on or start to trail in the middle ages, don't sweat it. Instead, I'd say to stick to your basic early builder, middle age/industrial conqueror plan, buy some tech and then use the strategies here: http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3/strategy/artillery_effective.php You probably won't need as many artilleries as suggested there either.

 

[CommandoBob]

I will be attempting to make the Difficulty jump from Monarch to Emperor sometime this weekend. Does anyone have any tips that could help smooth out the transition?

Not really tips, but data that may help you.

AI Costs
At Monarch, the AI pays 90% for techs, buildings, units and such. At Emperor, the AI pays only 80%.

If you have handled Monarch fairly well, Emperor shouldn't seem that difficult. You can still out produce the AIs, but not as quicky as at Monarch.

Happiness
Others have mentioned this before, but let me repeat it. At Monarch you get two content citizens per city; at Emperor you only get one.

Luxuries will be more important, and so will MPs. I've become slight phobic about get luxuries connected. With the Map Finder utility you can have the game generate starts for you with one luxury within sight of your inital game start.

AI Free Units
This may or may not be an issue. At Monarch, each AI gets 2 Defensive units and one Offensive units at the start of the game. At Emperor, each AI gets 4 Defensive units and 2 Offensive units, and also gets an extra settler/worker at start up. The .biq file doesn't specify whether settler or worker, but I think it is a second settler, though I can't tell you why I think that.

This could mean more AI-on-AI wars in the Ancient Age. If the Zulu or Maya are around (and close) this is not good news for you.

This also means that the AIs will be stronger than you and will be more likely to demand things from you.

Free Unit Support
Another facet of this is free unit support. At Monarch, the AI had some number (per government and city size) of free unit support. To that base number was added 4 units and then 1 more unit for each city the AI had. At Emperor, the AI gets 8 units added to that base number and then 2 more units for each city.

So, if Rome was a Despotic One City Civ at Monarch, it would not pay any unit upkeep until unit number 10 is built. In Despotism, each city supprts 4 units, regardless of city size plus 4 more because the level is Monarch and one more since Rome only has one city, all add to 9 units with free support.

Same situation at Emperor and Rome can now have 14 units and pay no support. Again, 4 units supported by Despotism, plus 8 more because the level is Emperor and then 2 more for the city of Rome: 4 + 8 + 2 = 14.

Summary
The article by Ision, Monarch to Emperor: The Great Leap , covers these things and more. What I gathered from what he said is that most people think that moving from Monarch to Emperor is just going up one step in difficulty, while really it is more like going up two steps.

If you're ready for it, it won't be a problem.

If you're not ready...

I think you will be ready.

 

[NickyH]

Going for Republic and revolt as soon as possible is very good advice. Don't worry about the early granary. I've come to think that it's much better to get your first settler out as soon as possible instead, and worry about the granary after that. Having two cities very early helps your growth more than the granary does.

I'm not sure I agree about going Monotheism-Theology-Education-Banking in the middle ages. You're Ottoman, and you can beeline for Military Tradition once you reach the middle ages to get your unique unit asap. If you take that path of research instead, you'll be able to trade the techs from the bottom part of the tech tree for the techs in the higher part of the tree. The AI might go for gunpowder early in the middle ages, but they never(?) choose to go for chemistry and metallurgy after that, so you'll be able to get a monopoly for those techs, and you'll find yourself in an excellent trading position.

Many good players consider the best choice of research to be the techs that the AI won't go for. (This also makes Literature and Currency good choices to go for in the ancient era once you have Republic. Literature seems to have quite low priority for the AI, and I believe they often choose Construction before they choose Currency.)

Regarding map settings and other things too make the transition from Monarch a little easier, I'd recommend that you start a few games until you get at decent starting location, with a river and a food bonus.

Good luck! I'm sure you'll "stand the test of time".

 

[Spoonwood]

At Emperor, each AI gets 4 Defensive units and 2 Offensive units, and also gets an extra settler/worker at start up.

They don't get an extra settler until Demi-God. Not sure about an extra worker. I didn't find a thread for the extra settler info., but find any Demi-God game played out to 3000 BC or past there and an Emperor one also. Retire the game and play the replay until about 3700 BC. At Demi-God you'll see a second city for each AI pop up at about 3800 or 3750 BC (which means a free settler as that's 4 or 5 turns the AI has had to move the settler to the second spot.. since the AIs settler at an overextended OCP city placement usually, that's just about right if the second settler moved from their capital location in 4000 BC). I doubt you'll see this at Emperor.

I think Emperor *would* make for much more of a jump if the AIs had an extra settler than they would at Monarch. I don't think that in *conquests* at least (Ision's article got written back when only Vanilla/PTW existed) Monarch to Emperor makes for too big of a leap... maybe something like 1.25 to 1.5 levels up.

 

[CommandoBob]

They don't get an extra settler until Demi-God. Not sure about an extra worker.

I was looking at the editor and using my memory. I recall hearing about extra settlers/workers, but I didn't take the time to track it down.

Here is what I was looking at:




I have no idea of what exactly is meant by Number of start unit type 1 or Number of start unit type 2, so I guessed at worker/settler.

 

[Ringo Kid]

Just started a game at Demi-God, which is a level or 2 higher than I normally play. I think I can survive, but dont expect to win. Wish me luck.

I choose the Byzantines on an islands map; which gives two advantages. The AI cant gang up on me, and I have an unbeatable Navy up through destroyers.

So that would be my tip , play the Byzantines , build a dozen Dromons and two dozen archers and whack whomever is closest with them; repeat as required.

And good luck to you.

 

[Aegis]

Ok, I started a game on Friday night. Large Continents as the Persians, playing with Mass Regicide option (7 king units). Victory Conditions are Domination, Elimination, Space Race & Diplomatic. My Settler spawned one space away from the ocean, so the first thing I did was move east onto the coast, which placed my city in reach of a Wheat to the NE and several hills nearby. Persepolis was founded next to a river on the southern coast of my continent. On my continent were the Egyptians (North of me), Japanese (West of me), Babylonians (North of Japan, west of Egypt) and Rome (North & parallel to Babylon & Egypt). The continent was shaped like a fat crescent moon, with the Romans at the top of the C and myself and the Egyptians at the bottom.

I couldn't trade for Pottery, so I'm glad I researched it. Before making a Granary in my capital, I built two Warriors this time to help with the unhappy citizens. I first encountered the Egyptians, who were not too far away from me in the north. Between our two civilizations was one Silks Luxury which was the NW, so the land-grab race was on. The Silks were about three city lengths away from my capital and a little further from the Egyptians. I plunked down two cities to the north and west of me, respectively before chasing after the resource, which I succeeded in courting. By this time I had met all of the civs on the continent and traded for Warrior Code, The Wheel and 1-2 other tecs. Horses were nearby, but Iron unfortunately, was up towards the Egyptians.

Knowing that I needed that Iron, I began churning out Archers as quickly as I could because war was going to be inevitable. My capital focused on Settlers while my 3-4 other cities focused on military. I had sent a settler up to that Iron, but Egypt beat me to it by one turn. Thus my flood of Archers began marching towards the Iron. I Declared War and took the city with 6-7 Archers, with another 10 Archers heading up to reinforce the city. At this point, I turned my focus back towards the expansion of settlers, ignoring the Egyptians.

During this entire time, I did not build a single granary or barracks in any of my cities, which is something I would do in Monarchy difficulty. Well, the barracks not so much, only in 1-2 military cities. I relied on my Regular Archers to keep the Egyptians at bay at the Iron resource until I was ready to go on the offensive. Egypt and I were both expanding at the same rate. I called up the Japanese and convinced them to DOW on Egypt. Letting Japan distract Egypt, my 20-30 Archers conquered three other Egyptian cities over the course of the next 10 turns or so. I’m actually surprised how well the Archers did. I usually do not begin war-mongering until I get Swords, at least.

One of the cities I captured had Incense in its borders, so things were looking up. Now I had Immortals and kicked off my Golden Age (in Monarchy) and began trying to wipe out the Egyptians, but it was proving to be difficult because the AI has so many friggin units. I wound up wiping them out completely by the time I researched Theology. It took a long time, considering I declared war shortly after Ironworking was discovered. I missed the Philosophy Slingshot (I’m sure the Byzantines on the other continent got that first), which is just as well since I was at war with Egypt and war with the Japanese to the west was looming in the distance. I used Philosophy to trade for a bunch of lower-tier tecs and researched Monarchy, which was the Government I switched to. The only wonder I pursued in the AA were The Hanging Gardens, which I built in my capital.

The beginning of the Middle Ages was spent wiping up the Egyptians and filling out my portion of the continent. I already had enough troops in the north to finish off the Egyptians, so I spent time pre-building for Sun Tzu’s Art of War, which I managed to complete.

As soon as the Egyptians were wiped out, I went into 6-turn anarchy (woo-hoo!) and switched to The Republic, since I had 3-4 different luxuries at this point. The Romans then declared war on me, but that was pointless since they had no way of getting to me other than by galley. They would have had to go down through Babylon in order to get to me and I convinced Babylon to declare war on the Romans so that wouldn’t happen. I have stayed at war with the Romans all the way up to the Industrial Ages just to keep the War Happiness going.

After switching to the Republic, I traded for Gunpowder and saw that the only source of Saltpeter nearby was next to one city west of Japan’s capital. -_- I built up a ton of combined-arms units and simultaneously attacked and took three of their border cities, two of which were cut off from the rest of their empire, which prevented me from fighting a war on two different fronts. I was fighting with Knights, Trebs, Pikes and Immortals vs. mostly Musketmen, archers and pikes. They do have Samurai, but most of them were nowhere near where I was attacking. If I didn’t have the Trebs, I would not have gone very far at all. I would have sustained far too many casualties to continue on to the next turn, which I used to take a fourth 11-population city, which was surrounded by my borders.

At this point, I have one city of theirs which is surrounded by Japanese borders. I stay alive for the next two turns and then began slowly pushing my way further into Japanese territory, headed towards Kyoto, their capital. I had to take two more cities before I could strike Kyoto, which eventually fell to my stack of doom. Another 3-4 turns and I had the city west of Kyoto, which has the Saltpeter. The War Weariness at this point is getting bad. I just managed to complete Universal Suffrage (yay for a Great Leader!), but it’s still bad enough for me to want to sue for peace. Thankfully, Rubber is in the part of land I stole from the Japanese and I have access to Coal, so I do not need to go to war over those. I will sue for peace now and hope that Oil is within my borders.

Total wonders built thus far:

Hanging Gardens
Sun Tzu’s
Knight’s Templar (this has really helped a lot)
JS Bach's
Newton’s University
Universal Suffrage
And I'm working on Smith's Trading co. atm.

I am at the point where I am trying to pre-build for the ToE slingshot in order to get the Hoover Dam. I am confident that I will get it. The other continent has the Byzantines, Greece, India and China. China is at the bottom of the totem pole, while Byzantine is the strongest civ there. They’re all at war with each other atm and several of them are at war with Rome, who everyone hates. The tech pace is indeed very fast. I entered the Industrial ages behind the curve, but I have caught up a bit since the AI have gone for Communism & Facism because they’re all at war with one another. Being Scientific was not much of an advantage, considering three other civs are also Scientific and they trade so easily with one another and they are stingy with me. I am the only Republic Civ. The Byzantines are a Democracy. The Japanese are still a Monarchy. Everyone else is either Communists or Fascists.

I am going to shoot for the Space Race victory condition. I would go for Domination, but I don't like attacking civs that have been very good trading partners or who have helped out a lot with military alliances. I will definitely take out the Romans, though, because they really ticked me off by declaring on me. And maybe Greece too, on the other continent who are Annoyed with me.

 

[Aegis]

TLDR version:

1) Didn't bother with Granaries or Barracks.
2) Missed the Philosophy Slingshot.
2) Went with Monarchy instead of Republic b/c of lack of Luxes and constant war.
3) Going to war for resources with Egypt & Japan successively.
4) Keeping pace with AI in tech in the Industrial Era.
5) Shooting for a space-race victory but will war-monger quite a bit on the way.

I am doing much better than I thought I would. Only having four other civs on my continent helped a lot. My only concern is if I should stick with the Republic or switch back to Monarchy or give Communism a try.