...middle ages..

soujourner

Chieftain
Joined
Jul 6, 2007
Messages
47
During this phase, it seems that I am consistantly in a position of trying to overcome high unit prices; while also waging territorial expansion warfare against a weak opponent.

Any ideas regarding this topic?

Let me also express my sincerest appreciation for those who contributed to opening gambit. Hopefully, everyone will gain as much from this topic as did following that thread.
 
Could you give us and example or a save to illustrate this phenomenon? I am not seeing weak opponents, but the rest sound reasonable to me. You face continuously more expensive units as you progress through the ages.
 
He Probably means the Shield Cost.

I might be wrong, but seems to me like having too less workers, if you have enough workers which develop the land quickly, your production will rise with time.
 
If you are playing on a difficulty below emperour, then I can understand why you are facing weak opponents, but then why would that be a problem? Units rise in prices as the game goes on, but that is mainly because your cities are aslo suppost to grow in size and produce more shields. The number of turns nesessary to build units should not drasticly increase, because your cities should have grown.
 
I think he maybe talking about how these units are a lot more expensive but he doesn't have the productions bonuses associated with the industrial age to off set this. The huge bonus given by factories and railroads seems to drastically reduce unit production cost. These means that early game and late game units seem a lot cheaper and easier to produce then middle game units.
 
These means that early game and late game units seem a lot cheaper and easier to produce then middle game units.

Not just seems:

A horseman or swordsman is 30 shields, whereas a knight - with double the attack power of a horse - is 70. Cavalry, with 3x the attack power, is a relatively cheaper 80 shields; then tanks, with 8x the attack power are relatively even cheaper at 100 shields.

Even just thinking of individual units, you are likely producing one attack unit every 3-4 turns in the height of the AA. But knights are available very soon after the AA, so the 2.3x cost factor is a major hit to your production rate. You are lucky to be able to produce knights in 5 turns if you get Chivalry early, at least in my experience. But by the time you get Motorized Transport, if your towns aren't at least 3x as productive as they were in the AA, you are doing something wrong. So, you are back to producing one attack unit every 3 turns or so (frequently, 2 turns in some places).

So it is more than a perception, and it applies even with vigorous empire development, although having enough workers does help a lot.
 
I try to counterbalance this by changing governments to monarchy as quickly as possible. While there, engage in an expansionist war against a weak neighbor. Then to a republic, but alas the high unit costs soon rival corruption and it seems like my game bogs down.
 
I would avoid changing government twice, unless perhaps you are playing a religious civ. Even as a religious civ, it usually isn't necessary to change twice. Just make for Republic, and change when you get there. Avoid self-researching the religious arm of the tech tree. The AI will do that for you. You can begin your first expansionist war before you even get to Republic in many games.

Republic does give War Weariness, but you avoid that by being tactically smart and diplomatically aware. Avoid letting AI units attack you. Instead, attack them first. You don't get WW points for attacking and winning. Of course, sometimes, you can't avoid being attacked, so in that case, make sure your defense is good enough to win. You build WW points for dying in combat, so don't lose units. Most crucial, of course, is don't lose cities. One fallen town is equivalent to roughly ten lost units for WW. As for the diplomatic part, when WW does kick in, make peace. Be sure to extract soemthing of value. WW is on a per-civ basis, so if you want to, you can attack Civ 2 for the 20 turns that peace is in effect with Civ 1. At that point, WW versus Civ 1 is reset, so you can go back to beating up on Civ 1. This is known as Oscillating War, and it is a very effective way to win territory and keep up in tech as a Republic.

In the high middle ages, I sometimes find that, as you say, my war machine bogs down. That's OK. Set the research slider on high and spend a few turns building units. I like to beeline for cavalry on the tech tree, and spend some time building knights. When I get to cavalry, I cash upgrade, and my war machine is once again able to shift into high gear.
 
Anax, thanks for that post. I achieved more knowledge because of it.
 
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