Kill Civ or stop Manhattan?

Leowind

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A situation has arisen in my current game that would be interesting to discuss here. It is late in the game, I have conquered all the world except the Vikings and the Sioux (this is GOTM4, for anybody who is familiar). I last conquered the Egyptians on the Southern end of a large continent containing the Vikings in the center and the Sioux to the North. I have a slight tech lead over both. I have conquered several Viking cities, effectively splitting their empire in two. On one side is their capital and 3 or 4 well-developed cities. On the other side, across a small isthmus, lie the newer (ie smaller) Viking cities, and the road to the Sioux nation. Original plan was to take Viking capital, mop up the other cities on that side, then head North. Problem is, the Sioux just started Manhattan. My fleet is not sufficient to get a spy over there to sabatoge it, so my choice is to continue with my original plan and get ready for the rain of nuclear missles (the Sioux are within missle range over a narrow sea of much of my empire), or dig in against the remainder of the Vikings and head North immediately in the hopes of stopping Manhattan. What would you do?
 
I would try to push for them (try with your army and still try to get spies over there). Also you might try and get another civ to attack them too. You just need enough to scare them away from the wonder. Giving them a tech that allows a different wonder is also an option, they might change wonders.

But in the event that all that does nothing, be prepared for the storm of missles. Hopefully you have the tech needed to build SDI's (I'm at work right now, so I don't have all the info in front of me). If not, lie, cheat and steal to get it as soon as possible. Build a nuke sponge area and that should have it where they use up all their missles.

As long as every city you have that is in range of his missles has an SDI, you are covered. But that can be very expensive, so a nuke sponge can usuaully help.

To do this you need to build a city in between two or three of your main cities. Preferably the ones closest to his cities. The goal of the new city is to make sure the city radius overlaps the other cities you have already built. Put an SDI in the new city and that will cover the original cities as well (An SDI covers the city and it's radius).

Now, the computer always knows which cities you have SDI's in and won't send missles in there. The cities that are covered by the new cities SDI don't have their own SDI, so the computer thinks they are open targets. It will send in dozens of missles into those cities just to have them shot down by the new cities SDI coverage.

Covering your cities this way is cheaper and quicker than putting an SDI in every city and it uses up their missles too. <IMG SRC="http://forums.civfanatics.com/ubb/smile.gif" border=0>

Hope that helps!

On Edit: If the other comps are close to being able to build the Manhattan Proj., then it might be best to just cover your cities and continue your conquest, as you won't be able to take them all on at once to stop it from being built.

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I always wanted to be a professional procrastinator, but I just never got around to it.

[This message has been edited by Duke of Marlbrough (edited July 13, 2001).]
 
I too am playing GOTM 4, though it's been on hold since the beginning of July because when I have a free moment, I play a few moves of GOTM 6. My order of conquest was the same, and for posterity's sake, I left a single Sioux and Viking city when the dust settled.

Is more than one Sioux city building the Manhattan Project? If only one is, drop everything, spend whatever is necessary, and get a few spies over there. Bring two engineers and the best veteran defenders you can find. Put them ashore, and use the engineers to build a fort on the best defensible roaded terrain you can find. Move the pile around, find the Manhattan Project city, and spy on it each turn. As it nears completion, sabotage it. It may take two spies (sometimes 3, if they are not veteran) to get it, since non-vets are often captured when you target a specific improvement.

Since you now occupy the land across the channel (to the west of the core Sioux empire), incrementally rush build a transport there. Divert any nearby engineers and good defenders to it, too. Rush build, or just buy (210 gold), at least 2 spies, and get 2 or 3 more under construction for replacements in several turns.

Unless lots of Sioux and/or Viking cities are building the Manhattan Project, you can stop it forever, as long as you keep your spies on station!

It is riskier if you are not good at coordinating and controlling a large and complex plan, but there is another solution, too.

In phase one, you still need to delay the Manhattan Project a few years. Determine the number of Sioux cities you need to conquer. Build spies... triple the number of Sioux cities. I suggest at least 50. Get them into place on the Sioux mainland, along with some high-mobility units like mech inf, tanks, or even engineers.

Phase two... the execution phase (LOL!). Let them build the Manhattan Project. If you're already in Communism building vet spies, great. If you're in Democracy, declare a revolution and use your spies to nuke every Sioux city. Move your pre-positioned pieces into place (poised to enter all their undefended cities). Make absolutely sure you have all cities accounted for, then simple capture all the Sioux cities and exterminate the Sioux. All the Partisans will dissappear, too. Bring over all your engineers and clean up the pollution ASAP.

I once did this to a huge huge Celt empire, and had 305 squares of pollution to clean up. It took two turns after the nuking to control the pollution (the attack turn, plus 2 more). Fortuantely, my control number was about 27 due to the Solar Plants I had been able to construct, but your pollution target number will be 9 because it seems you are not to Environmentalism yet (since you don't even have SDIs built).

Hopefully, the Viking do not have Rocketry, or else they'll have nukes too. If the do, make peace, wipe out the Sioux, recover for a few turns, and release your now-veteran spies on the Vikings, LOL!
 
Well Leo, first I'd nuke the Zulus....

Seriously though, you need to bust up that project. I hope you have an Embassy, as it will let you know which city is working on manhatten. Or could you prepare for a quick elimination of the Sioux by stockpiling shields and cash then nuking the crap out of them once it's completed? Ally with them to stall the attack. Punish the Vikes later, I presume you're stronger?

Interesting situation
 

posted July 14, 2001 01:12 AM by HIEROPHANT:

long time ago i destroyed the Mahattan project wonder but it was very strange because the nukes can still be made even if the Mahattan gets destroyed after being built does anyone know why.

Once the Genie is out of the bottle, you can't put it back in. When the Manhattan Project (MP) is complete, the knowledge of nukes will never dissappear, even if you actaully kill the city with the MP.
 


posted July 14, 2001 01:59 AM
Well Leo, first I'd nuke the Zulus....

When in doubt, in any game, lob a gratuitious nuke on the Russians or Chinese. They can always use a good nuking!
 
Originally posted by HIEROPHANT:
long time ago i destroyed the Mahattan project wonder but it was very strange because the nukes can still be made even if the Mahattan gets destroyed after being built does anyone know why.

Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam,
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Wonderful Spam, Delicious spam ...


 
Got in a couple turns last night. Decided to push for the Sioux, captured one more Viking city standing between me and the Sioux, but haven't yet seen any railroads or even roads linking the Sioux and Vikings-very strange. Then I get the message, Manhattan almost complete! I know what city is building it, but I don't know exactly where the city is, and couldn't get to it in time if I did.
As I've been thinking about it, I'm toying with an interesting strategy. I need to double-check, but I don't think either the Sioux or Vikings have laser (SDI), so they will be open to nukes once they build Manhattan. A couple nukes aimed at each of their capitols as soon as Man. is built may just turn Man. back around on them. We'll see. The problem might be I'm close to global warming, and a few nukes flying around would likely push it over the edge. I've never been through global warming before, so that would be interesting. I *think* it would actually hurt them worse than me, as many of my more important cities are not on the coast. Vikings have Rocketry, so yes they'll be able to build Nukes too. I'm builidng SDI's in all my vulnerable cities; just hope I have the cash to finish them all and build a couple nukes. I'll come back and let you know how it goes.

P.S. Duke, the sponge idea is good. I'll have to see if that is feasible.

[This message has been edited by Leowind (edited July 16, 2001).]
 

I'm builidng SDI's in all my vulnerable cities; just hope I have the cash to finish them all and build a couple nukes.

If you have SDIs, then no worries! Conquer at your leisure. If you insist on nuking, spies might be cheaper, if you have vet spies. The good news is that the AI engineers will knock themselves out to clean up the pollution in their area .

BTW, Solar plants, though expensive, will nullify half a pollution in the global warming computation.
 

I *think* it would actually hurt them worse than me, as many of my more important cities are not on the coast.

It will not just hurt coastlines. Plains turn into deserts, for instance. Several weeks ago, I forced some global warming in a test case, because I'd never seen it in a gme before. It really is a pain, I would think, to clean up all the less productive terrain that results from global warming. Far better to use the engineers to clean it up ahead of time, since pollution takes 2 turns to clean, and transformations start at 10 turns .
 
I really messed-up awhile back and let global warming happen...BIG mistake it happened about 4 times and the entire planet was messedup it was hopeless.
 
All that beautiful farmland turned to swamp, causing mass starvation.... Avoid it at all costs! It happens worldwide, not just around polluted areas or coasts.

I've been in that situation, BTW, where someone starts building Manhattan (usually when I've been way ahead, and some minor AI power wants to make a name for himself ). I usually then start building it myself for the points, start building units like stealths in some cities, then when Manhattan is built (by me, so I get the points and not them) I switch all those accumulated shields for stealths into nukes, so I have them the very next turn. Oh, and if I can, cities within their range will already have SDIs at completion time.

BTW, the most nukes I ever dropped in a game (unless I was fooling around or something) was two--I've experienced global warming in a game before and trust me, it ain't fun. But drop one nuke on an enemy civ's city, especially a big juicy one, and they'll show proper respect....



[This message has been edited by allan (edited August 07, 2001).]
 

Cunobelin Of Hippo wrote:
Seriously though, you need to bust up that project. I hope you have an Embassy, as it will let you know which city is working on manhatten.

I agree; first, trash that Manhattan project. Move boatloads of spies towards the "offending" city and do what you have to. The other way may not give you enough time before they finish.



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