Need AW Advice

[gmaharriet]

In another thread about moving up from Warlord to Regent, Own gave the following advice and there was some discussion:

Don't be afraid of war. Try an AW on warlord to let you know that war can be declared at any time and you don't have to be "completely ready."

I've been playing Warlord for about 6 months and, um, I'm afraid of war. I can manage workers and citizens, trade fairly well, meet other civs, get an occasional diplo victory, and keep a large standing military of offensive units to scare away the AI and/or defend myself, BUT I just can't bring myself to declare war on anyone who hasn't hurt me first. You'd think it was my own skin that might get hurt.

I don't think I can move up until I can learn just a bit of aggression, so Own's advice may be good for me as well, but how do you get started on AW? I'm using C3C and thought I'd try the Chinese (I like the industrious trait), but I don't know where to begin or logical builds to prepare for early wars, or a single thing about AW strategy. Do you declare upon meeting the first warrior you see? gather a tiny army first? What early techs are most helpful? Should I use my usual Warlord level or go back to Chieftain?

I started a game with the intention of warring, and then realized I was completely lost and quit. Any advice or a referral to a fairly low-level AW succession game would be appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Whomp]

When are we going to get you in a SG? You're due to join. You will learn very quickly how to use that pointy stick.

First, any Handy or Greebley AW game is worthwhile reading. As far as I'm concerned AW is AW. Technique will be the same with the difference being you'll be fighting less units at the lower levels.

Some key things I see having played in a defiant variant and now in SGOTM7.

Iron is a requirement.
GLib is huge.
Pillaging armies. You'll bankrupt them but cutting off their core. The AI is reluctant to attack armies unless they are in a city. Pillage, pillage, pillage.
City coverage. A foot soldier needsto be able to run and cover the next city. cxxc placement.
Putting cities on luxs (can't be pillaged), hills for defense and rivers so you don't need unnecessary builds.
Hurry to Monarchy.
I think Riders would be a good choice.

 

[commodified]

Hey gmaharriet,

I thought I'd refer you to my SG, which Own (and Merlin) are currently contributing to:

COM1 AW Monarch

It's Always War Monarch, but hopefully it will give you some ideas for Warlord. It's still in its early stages, but I've been playing a companion single-player game (different map) which has taught me a lot about how to use your military. Here are 5 basic tips.

1. CITY SPACING

Space your cities two tiles apart, like CxxC. Try as best you can to form a grid like this so that a unit can always be sent from one city to another (along a road) in one turn.

2. Build COMBINED ARMS. In the early game this will mean archers, spears and catapults. By themselves these units would be useless, but together they are deadly, and produce high kill ratios. For example, if you fortify a spearman on a mountain, road it, then put a couple cats and a couple archers on that tile, the following will happen--the AI won't dare to attack you there, since you'll be guarding at 4. It'll still move its units directly adjacent, however. You then pelt their units with catapults, doing them a little damage, and kill them off with archers. This simple strat produces Military Great Leaders quickly.

3. INFRASTRUCTURE

Try to have one worker for every city. This may seem counterintuitive, considering the tight spacing that AW demands, but it pays strong dividends. Infrastructure is your friend, especially roads, which give you great mobility during the initial stage of AW (defense).

4. DON'T TRADE UNITS

Simple but kind of subtle--don't attack the last unit in a stack if there are more enemy units which will then be able to attack your unit next turn. The exception is with horsemen. If you're like me, you're tempted to kill the last remaining archer in their (former) Stack of Doom with your elite archer, hoping to get a leader. But always remember that if they can subsequently attack that archer on their turn, then you are in essence just trading units. You do not want to trade units in AW! The goal of AW is to establish outrageous kill ratios even early in the game, with the combination of wits and catapults (10:1 should be easily attainable, so long as you have some hills/mountains/rivers near you).

5. TECH

The Wheel and Iron Working are high priorities so that iron and horses appear. Mathematics is also a very high priority, for catapults. After that Beeline to Monarchy.

P.S. Always War as a variant means you must declare war on every civ you meet on the first turn you meet them. In the standard version, you can first trade with them, but sometimes (as in my SG), no trading is allowed.

Hope that helps!

EDIT: You got to it first, Whomp! (OT: is your message box still full? I want to PM you!)

 

[gmaharriet]

When are we going to get you in a SG? You're due to join. You will learn very quickly how to use that pointy stick.

First, any Handy or Greebley AW game is worthwhile reading. As far as I'm concerned AW is AW. Technique will be the same with the difference being you'll be fighting less units at the lower levels.

Some key things I see having played in a defiant variant and now in SGOTM7.

Iron is a requirement.
GLib is a huge.
Pillaging armies. You'll bankrupt them but cutting off their core. The AI is reluctant to attack armies unless they are in a city. Pillage, pillage, pillage.
City coverage. A foot soldier needsto be able to run and cover the next city. cxxc placement.
Putting cities on luxs (can't be pillaged), hills for defense and rivers so you don't need unnecessary builds.
Hurry to Monarchy.
I think Riders would be a good choice.

Wow! Those are some great ideas if I can stay alive long enough and get a good start.

As for playing in an SG, I'm afraid of embarrassing myself or, worse, causing the team to lose. Also, I'm heading into my busiest time of year at work, July through September, and will have trouble finding any time to play. Maybe I can practice AW on my own when I get a few minutes and then join in around October. I've read several of them, though not an AW one, and they look like loads of fun.

Thank you so much for the suggestions. I've only had one MGL ever and the army I formed was immediately destroyed. I'll look forward to having more tries with those.

Edit: @Commodified More great ideas! I will check out your SG for sure. Heading over there now.

 

[commodified]

No problem. Feel free to lurk and ask any questions you like in my SG thread, gmaharriet.

 

[gmaharriet]

Thanks, commodified. I just finished reading through it to date. You guys are really surrounded by 3 civs with good UUs...looks dangerous. At least it's giving me some more ideas for initial builds and research and how the cxxc city placement looks in a real game, rather than just reading about it. I'll continue to follow your progress.

 

[Own]

cxxc is a perfect spacing cause it gives you lots of cities, each with enough tiles to make it to size 7 with decent shields, which means more units and more free unit support.

Unless you're militaristic, rax should wait. You'll be fighting enough that reg's will become vets pretty quickly.

On Warlord, the AI won't send that many units, so walls are unessasary, and you want to fight with elites as much as possible. Delay invasions by 1 or 2 turns to wait for an elite, let an invading unit deeper in you territory you could've killed before so an elite can kill. Leaders make armies, never small wonders (unless you have military academy in a very productive city or you have more than you can support).

As for playing in an SG, I'm afraid of embarrassing myself or, worse, causing the team to lose.

Don't feel that way! In my first SG, 2 of the 3 turnsets I played totally screwd up. There was a big attacking force ready to kill the Ottomans, I attacked with it too early, and the whole thing died. I'm over it now. Nobody expects you to be perfect in you're playing, if they did they'd have qualifications. They'll understand it's a learning experiance for you.

 

[Ginger_Ale]

I echo fully what commodified said. Another thing adding to this thread is to build walls on fringe cities. If you are militaristic, they are only 10 shields and cost nothing to maintain them, yet they give each defender a 50% boost. Catapults are also important - bombard enemy troops with them, as there is no way you can produce units at the same pace as 7 AIs. Limit your losses - walls and catapults on defense both (a) limit losses and (b) help you get elites (in Conquests, armies are superb!).

I suppose there could even be a training AW game for you, gmaharriet. Not only you would learn a lot, but a lot of others would too. I'm not sure there has ever been one. And don't be afraid in SGs - usually there's bound to be at least someone better than you that can clean up your mistake. No mistake is unfixable.

 

[Own]

Someone definately could clean your mistake up. When I destroyed the entire attack force that was supposed to kill the Ottomans, next turnset Bede captured 3 Ottoman cities. Someone should start an AW training game with Handy, Mark, and Arathorn as trainers.

 

[miller4242]

to gmaharriet, don't feel bad about being sheepish when it comes to being gunshy. I was the same way. There is nothing wrong with being a peaceful builder. However, I have found that when you are playing on regent and above, and you are going for a "peaceful" victory condition, you need to learn the value of a "strategic strike." I am referring to when you are missing a stragetic resource. I personally believe that you should do everything in your power to control (and not trade for) at least one of every strategic resources.

I see some Pros have given some excellent advice on how to stump on the AI. Another thing I could suggest is the thread on Arathorn's AW Sid game. I personally learned alot on warmongering that story.

Good luck with your game.

 

[Own]

Read some of Handy900 always war games in his SG history. Find one of his posts (i.e. Theodoras Sid Always War Excellent Adventure) then click his SG history and find some AW games of his.

If you do AW, do continents or pangaea, so Theodoras adventure and I came, I SAW won't help too much.

 

[Tomoyo]

I went digging and I found something I don''t remember writing...

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=99404

Anyhow, it's nowhere near complete.

I don't know if it has been mentioned, but don't skimp on city infrastructure either. Unless you are able to build enough military units at the time to push back the AI, only build enough to hold them off. This way, you'll be moving forward, and not jus waiting for something to happen.

I think I want to play in an AW game now though...

 

[vmxa]

I may have missed it, but be sure to get to Monarchy as soon as you can and stay there. Use those MP's. Husband those elites and try not to upgrade them, until they spawn a leader. Even old AA units can get in a kill later with bombardment.

Do not be tempted to fill cities with happy structures. As long as you get a market and 3 or 4 lux, a size 12 is managable at any level. Paying for construction and maint on a bunch of temples is wasteful.

Normally I would say to only build the GL and the ToE, but at Monarch and lower, you can add in a few more. Probably the Colossus for cash, if you find you have a good spot. The AI will not be able to cope with you if you are a solid player.

Build cats in towns with no barracks and troops in those that do. Look for defensive location for towns after the first bunch of core cities and if this is a pangea, you may want to hold off a bit before meeting the neighbors.

I like to go ahead and send out curraghs anyway and get all the civs in an uproar. This hurts their economy, but also causes me to face more units sooner.

One thing you may find and that is it can be very tedious to play AW all by yourself. If you do elect to build more wonders, be careful about triggering a GA. With China, I like to use the Rider to do it.

 

[Tomoyo]

Actually, don't automatically go to Monarchy. If you don't have enough cities, Despotism will give you better unit support. A change to Monarchy would hurt you. You might not survive the anarchy, either.

 

[vmxa]

Actually, don't automatically go to Monarchy. If you don't have enough cities, Despotism will give you better unit support. A change to Monarchy would hurt you. You might not survive the anarchy, either.

The use of the term actually implies that what follows is a contradiction to what preceeded it. When I said get to Monarch as soon as you can, that implies you are ready. If they don't understand when not to switch, they should wait before playing AW.

So of course you are not going to try to make the switch with 3 towns or something. The normative way would be to get to the GL and either get Monarchy on your own or wait for it to come free. By that time you have at least 8 cities or more or else a big struggle.

The longer you wait to switch the more turns of anarchy you are likely to get. I have gotten 5 days many times with an ultra early switch.

 

[gmaharriet]

I was all fired up last night after reading Commodified's SG, so I began an AW China game using a map I'd already saved earlier, so it's on small 70% Continents with 3 opponents. I was careful not to explore too much at first until I got my civ going, and much to my surprise, didn't see any other civ and thought I was alone until 1225 bc when the Vikings showed up.

I already have an SGL sitting in Beijing, and the jungle terrain is such that I don't think I can take cats on the offense. (They need roads don't they?) I'm going to try to post a screenie and .sav file. This is in C3C v1.22 at Warlord level.

It is sooooo tempting to just play on peacefully, telling myself "I'll attack at the right time" with everything going so nicely, but I know I won't learn as much that way. I would probably never even find the "right time". I'm such a wimp.

I could use some advice on what to do next.

Edited: It's Commodified's SG, rather than Own's. Geez, I've been talking to both of you about it and got mixed up. Sorry.

 

[Ginger_Ale]

I would have high-food cities build settlers (as you are doing) and high-shields cities build swords. You can most likely cripple the Vikings with your swords, and hopefully, earn a MGL for an army. The game looks like it is going well.

I agree right now catapults have no use because of the jungle, except on defense in fringe cities - but don't stop building them. They *will* become useful - and this proves your need for workers, even in AW games. Also, I would build some walls in the fringe cities near the Vikings of Tatung, Chengdu, and Hangchow.

 

[gmaharriet]

Thanks, GA. I'll try that.

Thank you also to the rest of you who've made suggestions. I've just read Tomoyo's thread, and will read the Handy SG recommended by Own. I appreciate the encouragement by Own and Miller and everyone else's comments if I haven't acknowledged you by name. It's going to take awhile to absorb all of this and read everything.

I'd love to do an SG, It's very kind of you to suggest it, but I think I mentioned soon beginning my busiest work season. I'm an accountant, and our fiscal year ends in about 3 weeks. I'll be lucky to even get here to read the posts until mid-September.

 

[miller4242]

to gmaharriet,

I would like to make a observation, just from your map. You need to get out and explore the rest of your world. Put some boats in the water and find the other civs. Also, you need to get an idea of what the Vikings have. Get an ROP with them, explore their land, and decide which cities you want take first. You need to know what you are up against and how much land and cities that they have. This info will help you plan your strategy. DO NOT COMMIT ROP RAPE.

Good luck with your game.

 

[gmaharriet]

Miller, that would seem like very sound advice for a normal game, but this was intended to be an "all war" game to kinda force myself into military confrontations and learn how to attack and defend. My understanding of AW games is you can't negotiate, trade, or make ROPs, but must declare upon meeting a new civ on the very first turn and no peace treaties are allowed.

That being said, every peaceful instinct in me wants to do it your way. Thanks for your suggestions.