move to prince = failure

[Darkpriest667]

game speed normal left the barbarians on.. started with catherine...

 

[Darkpriest667]

got judaism was going for the great wall lost it...

 

[Darkpriest667]

after this point i had 5 cities my capital was the military pump... second city was supposed to be a money maker but having to go for monotheism killed me... so it ended up just being there.. and the 3rd city was a growth city... ended up being a research city.... the celts declared war.. i fended off their invasion but was unable to take any of their cities... apparently a 20 stack of swordsmen are worthless

by the time i quit everyone but the celts were 10 to 15 techs in front of me my 50 turn war had cost me the game.. im honestly thinking of giving up going to prince and continuing to play on noble until civ 5... im tired of getting my ass kicked after taking all the advice given on teh boards... I used to be really good at civ.. at civ2 i was just awesome but since civ 3 and now civ 4 i just seem to suck..

 

[oyzar]

Build workers, never work unimproved tiles, and you should be able to beat prince...

 

[Darkpriest667]

i was doing that.. I even stopped building a barracks as my first build went straight to warrior then worker... it didnt mean crap in the end game

 

[CornPlanter]

Well I myself moved to Prince like two months ago but I didn't notice any big difference from Noble. I'd say it's only slightly more difficult. And I don't even do much micro nor I specialize cities (apart from choosing two best commerce cities for Wall Street and Oxford).

If you are good at Noble I believe you could do pretty well on Prince too. Maybe you were unlucky this time. Don't give up and try again

 

[Bostock]

The screenshots suggest you could be doing it even more - a lot of unimproved tiles being worked are visible there.

If you go one level down, to the Strategy Articles section, you can find a lot of very good advice aimed at players of all levels of play, including Noble/Prince.

 

[Sleepless]

Looking at some of your early screenshots it might be an idea to change your tech path a bit. If your economy is tanking try going for much earlier pottery (cottages) writing (scientists). That way you can still expand and keep a reasonable tech rate.

Tech Trading. Higher difficulties Aesthetics is generally best for tech trading. Prince I would assume it is much better to go for Alpha and let the AI research IW, Math etc for you.

Let the AI go for the religions, forget building wonders unless you have the resource to speed them up (or nothing better to do).

A lot depends on the neighbours/maps so hard to say do A then B then C as the best way to go.

Good luck in your next game though.

 

[Bandobras Took]

Build workers, never work unimproved tiles, and you should be able to beat prince...

So long as you handle other aspects of the game such as city placement, tech choices, and warfare correctly . . .

@ OP: One thing I noticed is that you were going for Wonders with an opposing industrious leader on the map. Unless you're Industrious yourself, try to avoid building World Wonders when moving up in difficulty -- even if you do get them, they often represent a significant hammer investment that is better spent elsewhere (more Settlers, military, workers, etc.).

In much the same way, don't worry so much about founding religions unless there's a clear reason to. Catherine is creative, so her borders are going to pop anyway and she gets cheap libraries for running Scientists and keeping research afloat. It's usually more effective, both diplomatically and tech-wise, to let an AI found a religion and spread it to you while you research something to trade to them with.

 

[futurehermit]

having to go for monotheism

I can't remember the last time I've ever read someone on these forums say that.

Your starting position makes me drool all over my keyboard, especially with Cathy. If you still have the 4000BC save go back and try this:

-Opening build = worker. Improve both corns and 3-4 mines, preferably grassland. Opening tech order: ag-bw-ah-wheel-pottery.

-Grow to happy cap while building warriors. Once you hit happy cap while working max production (i.e., as many mines as possible after 2 corns) then chop out worker-settler-worker-worker-settler-worker-worker-settler-rinse-repeat until all good land is settled. First city should claim horses or copper and should be designated to spam axes or chariots for active barb defense.

-Subsequent cities should be designated commerce or production depending on what they are best suited for. If you can find a good gp farm site, go for it. Otherwise, put a library and 2 scientists in your capital for a GS for an academy once your other cities start to mature enough that they can continue the rex by producting workers and settlers.

-Once all the good land is gone, shift focus to teching through currency/col to consolidate your empire. Then tech through construction and go into full military production mode to expand your empire through your first target.

EDIT to add: With wine and all those nice commerce-looking cities hereditary rule is also going to be important for your economy, probably before currency/col in this case. Also, once you hit HR, growing your capital to max health cap will be really important in preparation for CS. Once your rex starts to slow down due to lack of space swapping your capital onto mostly-cottages mode will be in order, I'm thinking.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

i was doing that.. I even stopped building a barracks as my first build went straight to warrior then worker...

Well, when you have a picture of turn 36 that includes no improved tiles, your readers are going to conclude that you weren't doing that, but instead something else.

Your initial city is corn and trees - why are you not starting Worker + Agriculture or Bronze Working?

 

[Antilogic]

Well, when you have a picture of turn 36 that includes no improved tiles, your readers are going to conclude that you weren't doing that, but instead something else.

Your initial city is corn and trees - why are you not starting Worker + Agriculture or Bronze Working?

My thoughts exactly.

Also, one thing I noticed going up in difficulty is that the AI gets more units to explore, and they typically get more goody huts than you do. Plus, you don't get as many awesome benefits like free technologies, just chump change or worthless water maps. I don't know if they get extra units at Prince, but try turning those huts off and see if that helps.

 

[futurehermit]

Huts can still be good for the human. If you turn them off it negates one of the nice bonuses of civs that start with hunting/a scout.

 

[oyzar]

i was doing that.. I even stopped building a barracks as my first build went straight to warrior then worker... it didnt mean crap in the end game

You are a bad liar, though you are not even making sense. You grew your city to size 2 before building a worker. Why? You even built a settler before your first worker? How can you even think of building a barracks before a worker? Know how to improve your tiles(and what techs to get to do so), and you'll notice a shift in your game.. How is straight to warrior then worker the same as worker first thing?

You should have built a worker first thing and another before your first settler, in most cities you want a worker ready when there when the settler arrives(or busy roading to the site of the new city). Use 1.5 workers per city or so(though it depends on the land if you are working a lot of water tiles from fin + colossus you might need less but with loads of jungle you might want over 2 per city for example).

Oh yeah and make sure every city have enough food. A city without any food should have a very good reason for getting founded...

 

[FlyinJohnnyL]

i fended off their invasion but was unable to take any of their cities... apparently a 20 stack of swordsmen are worthless.

Cottages!!

Wait, that ain't right...lemme try again.

Catapults!!

 

[Antilogic]

Huts can still be good for the human. If you turn them off it negates one of the nice bonuses of civs that start with hunting/a scout.

I usually leave them on, I'm just throwing out an idea that may help. It also depends on map size--I play tighter, small maps, so there are not as many huts to go around.

 

[dualmaster]

The start looks awesome and plenty of great city sites. Start teching by going Agri>BW (look for copper to settle second city)>if no copper go AH(for horses), then pottery for cottages

Build worker first

You barely chopped any forest around your capital. Worker should improve corn, then chop and mine hills.

Do you have any cottages? One of your cities had a ton of farms on floodplains - these should be cottages so give you lots of to convert to or .

It looks like you are chasing wonders. Avoid expensive wonders that give little benefit - that city could be pumping military/settlers/workers/improvements instead.

A stack of swords won't do much against an entrenched defender in a city. You need catapults.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

20 swordmen with City Raider 3 should have been able to take a city. You must have waited until they got longbowmen.

First off, excellent map. I agree with posters that say your early tile improvements are a bit late, but you were roleplaying to pick up Judaism I assume. (It's not the best initial tech path when you need both bronzeworking and agriculture get your initial city improved. Plus, you don't have mysticism either so it's a pretty long detour... four techs!) If your available tiles and start techs line up, a religion beeline is not as dangerous a sidetrack, and can be quite fun.

I would have placed the cities a little differently. If it doesn't have one or two food tiles like wheat, corn, etc, it usually does not get built first unless I need the resource NOW. (I couldn't see a food tile other than 2 floodplains for your third city, and I couldn't tell if it is the copper/iron city so I won't judge, but if it doesn't at least have a cow, it needs to be moved.) City two is ideally copper city with food tiles, if copper doesn't pop near the capital.

For example your city # 2 was going to be money city (St. Petersberg), so you want to work cottages and you are planning to build no units there... but you need pottery before it will start to help you. I would have placed it third instead of second. It doesn't look close enough to the AI to help block the AI so it could have waited for pottery. I can't see the whole map, so I don't know if my money city would have gone here or further up river. Hey, who am I kidding, I like to make the closest AI's capital my money city, but I have to wait for catapults sometimes! lol (edit - based on the past few games, the AI likes to call my future money city Madrid. )

I see no failure here, just an opportunity to play more!

second edit - you wanted city two to be your money city with a shrine, didn't you? I can see that part of your strategy, but what was the great wall for? You don't get Great Priest points from that.

 

[Bandobras Took]

You are a bad liar, though you are not even making sense.

You have to admit, your first post didn't make a lot of sense either, but was pretty much vague and useless.

 

[Eat_Up_Martha]

Here goes another vague and useless first post...

I just recently made the jump the prince, but I did so in a pretty cheap manner. Try warrior-rushing your enemy's capitol early on. I know it isn't useful at all on higher difficulties, but it's extremely viable at prince.
My MO for warrior rushing was to work the highest production tile immediately, building warriors first and ignoring growth. Build about 3 or 4 warriors while scouting for nearby enemies. With any luck, you'll find a capitol that is not that far away. Make sure to wait until they hit pop 2 in the city (I found it usually happened at 3200-3400BC) and come in diagonally. By hitting from the corner, it takes only one turn in their territory to reach the capitol instead of two, so there's less chance they'll build/recall a warrior to defend. You should be able to take a city defended by two warriors, although it's usually only one. If they've got archers (which they shouldn't), just call it off, try and steal a worker if you can.
It's not always going to win the game, but it can give you enough of an edge to make it further into the round.

Don't give up, you learn more from losing than winning!