Need for Large City Games

[Paeanblack]

Um . . . I thought the whole point of Deity was that you had to follow the One True Path to victory, so that you can give contempt instead of advice on Strategy Forums.

I thought that if there exists any path to victory on Deity, we're supposed to just complain about how easy it is...

 

[Roxlimn]

It's not just me- none of the other people who have beaten the game on deity can do this either. No one else claims, like you do, that you can build huge cities in a reasonable time and construct all the buildings. So apparently you've figured out something that no one else has. I want you to give either some sort of proof, or a reasonable explanation of how this works.

The only thing I can think of is that maybe you're just not building any libraries at all? That's not "de-emphasizing research" that just ignoring it completely. Maybe, by doing that, you can slow down research enough to give your cities time to grow. What year do you typically research important techs like biology, steam power, and rocketry?

I don't build "huge" cities in a "reasonable time." I specified a particular size that I attain at a particular turn. I attain size 20 in my capital at about turn 260-280. I've mentioned this to you already. It is not that remarkable. There is nothing to figure out. You've already attained larger cities at the same turn.

It's not that I don't build libraries at all - I just don't build them everywhere, since I felt my tech rate was quite fast enough. I'm not sure when biology and steam power are researched. Maybe turn 320?

I build seaports too but they come quite late in the game. And by "Trade City" I guess you mean a city that mostly works trading posts? Such a city would have almost no production- less than 10 hammers. I'm happy if I can just build a market and a coloseum in that city before reaching the modern age.

If it's a big city with high production then you said you could build almost all buildings there as they were researched. In that case you dont' have to choose! You just build everything!

[/quote]

A Trade city is a city that mostly works trading posts. This does not mean that it does not have lumbermills or mines. Choosing tile improvements is a choice. Even at size 15, working 6 Plains Trade Post tiles and two Mines (and whatever other Trade Post tiles), such a city would already have 14 base hammers - 12 base if you're working 2 Lumbermills pre-Steam Power.

I do not recall saying that you could build "all buildings there as they were researched," and if I did, I recant that - I misspoke. You can't build everything everywhere, even with a big city with big production. Nor would you want to, what with the maintenance costs and everything.

I mean, did not I imply as much when I said that most cities were "complete" entering modern age, without having the techs to build any modern building? Did you interpret that to mean that every city would have every building you can possibly build?

You can build everything a military city needs in a timely fashion. You can build and purchase everything you need in hammer-poor cities.

 

[Bandobras Took]

On the subject of having affordable cities: Never keep more than one or two barracks

Unless you're a fan of the Heroic Epic.

 

[E66man]

Growing a city to size 28 or higher isn't really that difficult.

I think the OP's original challenge is to have a 'lot' of size 25+ cities, not just one or two. With the added challenge of higher difficulty levels.

I gave this a go myself last night on Emperor, Huge map, Continents as I haven't had too much trouble getting a half-dozen or more size 20+ cities on King or below. I tried a game as China and thanks to the Paper Maker and plenty of grasslands + river I had what should have been a great starting area for this. My starting Warrior got bumped up to a Pikeman thanks to a set of ruins so I did an early attack on Persia to my north to wipe them out since they were extremely close to me. After that I was ready for some concentrated peaceful building since everybody else was down to the south and east of me.

The two immediate neighbors were the Mongols, Japan, and Egypt. I decided to try and be nice and butter up the Mongols as much as I could since I didn't really want to war with them ever. I took this to the point of even joining them in a war against Japan so that I could stay on their good side. But of course, as soon as I had a common border with the Mongols our relationship immediately went under and he attacked me... and to keep friends with him I had even just agreed to his GPT demand shortly before. Aside from this war, Ramses and Elizabeth started sending me insults and eventually declared war on me too. At this stage there was still 4 tiles in between the borders between me and Egypt and I hadn't even found Elizabeth's homeland. I found out later she had to march through both Roman and Egyptian territory to get to me, so I don't understand why she wanted me dead. I'm only guessing that somehow the AIs were persuading each other to go to war with me.

So by the time 100AD rolls around, I'm entering a phase where I am always at war with one or more AI players, and they almost never want me to make peace with them. In the case of the Mongols, I couldn't even get a peace offer until I had taken something like 6 cities from them. Since I didn't even know where Elizabeth's homeland was I had to bribe her into peace by giving her one of the Mongols' cities and tons of my spare luxuries. Ramses *never* made peace with me, even though he didn't seem too interested in actually prosecuting the war. Once in a while a couple of Knights and a Swordsmen would wander by to my closest city to them and I would have to deal with that, then nothing for 10 - 15 turns. Honestly in situations like that where no blows are exchanged for so long I don't know why you can't get the AI to agree to a white peace. In the case of the Ramses AI, he wouldn't even open up the trade screen after I picked 'Negotiate Peace'.

By the time I had done with the wars vs the AI players that were actually serious about sending armies over to kill me, it was passed 1400AD so I gave up on the game. Having to beeline Chu-Ko-Nus so I could stay alive wrecked my chance at having Civil Service or Biology in a decent enough time frame. I gave up on finishing the game since I knew I wasn't going to be growing any super-cities here which was the main point to begin with. I also hadn't been having any fun for the last two hours as I realized that the wars were never going to stop, ever. Ramses also had Renaissance troops out and Himeji Castle out so I saw it was too late to make a dent in him.

So some questions for the folks contributing here-

For the ones who are casting a dim view to the 'warmongering' exhibited by others who have discussed their games in this thread, how exactly at higher difficulty levels can you pull off a game without having to find yourself eliminating one or more opponents? If you don't have your landmass to yourself (or well over 50% of it) what are the tricks to living peacefully? In my game the only reason I attacked Darius right off is that I *knew* he would be the first to attack me since he was the closest neighbor and nothing at all I did would make any difference. With the diplomacy setup in Civ V you're always going to be at war, it's just a question of when (and again to make it clear, I'm talking higher difficulties). So far my only peaceful games have been at the lower levels where I assume the AI is either programmed to be nicer or they are just afraid to attack me since I'm so far ahead of them.

For the builders, thanks to the Paper Maker I did have a decent cash flow going for a while in the early game. I'm not sure what the optimal way to spend it should have been. Once I was at war, I had to pretty much sink all the money I collected into unit upgrades and troops to stay alive. Before then, I was trying to prioritize RAs since I assumed that on Emperor level I wouldn't be able to keep up in the tech department without help. As a general strategy, do you think this is helpful, or maybe I am better off buying more buildings or saving for City State alliances?

I also noticed after a while that my cities hadn't expanded their borders out as much as I usually see, which meant that I wasn't filling in my map area as much as I think I ought to and giving the AI more room to plant their famous and war-provoking (because you are now to close to *them*) 1-ring cities. Are the culture costs for a city to claim a tile also increased? If so, maybe I would have been better off using my cash surplus to acquire more Temples since the Monuments were too ineffective at this level? Or, maybe it is more helpful to use Washington and/or Monarchy so that you can use your cash surplus to buy tiles instead of Temples. Or stick with France to help solve the early culture problem. I'd hate to give up China though since the Paper Maker is such an awesome building. Any thoughts?

 

[pi-r8]

So some questions for the folks contributing here-

For the ones who are casting a dim view to the 'warmongering' exhibited by others who have discussed their games in this thread, how exactly at higher difficulty levels can you pull off a game without having to find yourself eliminating one or more opponents? If you don't have your landmass to yourself (or well over 50% of it) what are the tricks to living peacefully? In my game the only reason I attacked Darius right off is that I *knew* he would be the first to attack me since he was the closest neighbor and nothing at all I did would make any difference. With the diplomacy setup in Civ V you're always going to be at war, it's just a question of when (and again to make it clear, I'm talking higher difficulties). So far my only peaceful games have been at the lower levels where I assume the AI is either programmed to be nicer or they are just afraid to attack me since I'm so far ahead of them.

It's mostly luck, to tell you the truth. As far as I can figure out there's no rhyme or reason for when the AIs declare war, they just roll a die every turn to decide whether they'll declare war on you or not. I managed to get through a whole game on emperor without a single DoW, despite the fact that I barely had any army at all.

Part of it is settling cities though. The more cities you have, the more angry the AIs get. It doesn't even matter if you settle the cities far away from their land, they'll still get angry.

On the plus side, defensive war is a lot easier than offensive war. If you just want to build your cities in peace, you can make a smaller army and just concentrate on defending your land. You can do that easily with just a few horseman/knights/catapults

I also noticed after a while that my cities hadn't expanded their borders out as much as I usually see, which meant that I wasn't filling in my map area as much as I think I ought to and giving the AI more room to plant their famous and war-provoking (because you are now to close to *them*) 1-ring cities. Are the culture costs for a city to claim a tile also increased? If so, maybe I would have been better off using my cash surplus to acquire more Temples since the Monuments were too ineffective at this level? Or, maybe it is more helpful to use Washington and/or Monarchy so that you can use your cash surplus to buy tiles instead of Temples. Or stick with France to help solve the early culture problem. I'd hate to give up China though since the Paper Maker is such an awesome building. Any thoughts?

I don't think the culture costs for tiles increase with difficulty, but I'm not sure. Temples are good but I wouldn't rely too much on them to claim tiles for you, unless you also build Angkor Wat in that city. The cities have an annoying habit of never choosing the tiles you want (hill tiles are the biggest problem here). I found Washington/monarchy to be very good for this, although China with the paper maker could work well to, since you'll have extra gold. You can also try settling your own 1-ring cities just to claim tiles and work trading posts.

 

[pi-r8]

I don't build "huge" cities in a "reasonable time." I specified a particular size that I attain at a particular turn. I attain size 20 in my capital at about turn 260-280. I've mentioned this to you already. It is not that remarkable. There is nothing to figure out. You've already attained larger cities at the same turn.

It's not that I don't build libraries at all - I just don't build them everywhere, since I felt my tech rate was quite fast enough. I'm not sure when biology and steam power are researched. Maybe turn 320?

OK I think I see what's going on now. Turn 320 is a lot later than what I've been doing. I can usually finish the game before then. So yeah, if you're waiting until turn 320 to enter the industrial age, it's no surprise that you're able to build all the early buildings that you want before then! I usually expect to finish the game within about 300 turns. The hard part is to still build all those buildings while getting biology by turn 200. Turn 200 isn't even all that fast, that's just what happens when you have 3 large cities running 3 scientists each.

You're not getting faster production, you're just getting slower research.

 

[Roxlimn]

pi-r8:

I'm probably getting both, since you were initially quite incredulous that I was getting modern units in 7 turns, when it's possible to get it down to 4.

As I mentioned before, it's not that I can't get faster research. I'm aware that the option exists, but I don't like it when I'm teching rocketry in the 1600s. It's totally anachronistic. The science rate could use a bunch of tweaking to slow it down for the larger empires.

 

[pi-r8]

pi-r8:

I'm probably getting both, since you were initially quite incredulous that I was getting modern units in 7 turns, when it's possible to get it down to 4.

As I mentioned before, it's not that I can't get faster research. I'm aware that the option exists, but I don't like it when I'm teching rocketry in the 1600s. It's totally anachronistic. The science rate could use a bunch of tweaking to slow it down for the larger empires.

Sure but that's after you've spent probably 400 turns developing your cities! 400 turns is just far too slow. I mean if that's what's fun for you, go ahead, but if I have the option of building modern era units from turn 250 then I'm going to do that. That's what people mean when they say research outpaces production in this game- there's so many ways to speed up research, and so few ways to speed up production (most of which require research anyway).

 

[Roxlimn]

pi-r8:

But then they say that the problem is production? So they want to be able to research how to build artillery in 300AD, and have the hammers to do so? Whatever for? For bigger epeen?

Clearly, the problem is that research is too fast. You should not have the option to build modern units from turn 250, because turn 250 is grossly anachronistic. If you want a faster game, set the speed to "Quick."

And no, 400 turns is beyond the turn estimates. I think you can hit Modern with okay production in the mid 300's.

From my perspective, you perceive 400 turns as too slow because you like rushing up science, and you've gotten used to too-quick science rates.

 

[pi-r8]

Well I think both are a problem. I think research is too fast and production is too slow. But this whole time you've been insisting that research and production are well balanced, and apparently the reason you think that is that you're not doing anything to speed up research at all. There's so many ways to speed up research in this game, and it's hard to ignore them.

 

[Roxlimn]

pi-r8:

That's an exaggeration. I do build Libraries and Universities - just not in every single city. I think that limiting the hammers does an effective job of forcing you to choose how to specialize each city. The problem in your games is that you choose to specialize every single city the same way - science. This predictably leads to blazing fast science without vertical growth, and is exacerbated by exchanging hammers for gold in both tile and building management.

The resulting Civ is massively advanced and highly skewed to have lots of gold and low hammers. I'm not seeing a problem there. Isn't that what you wanted?

As I mentioned, I think the problem is largely that large Civs tech too fast. If the max tech rate were cut in half, it would be more reasonable.


OR, we could say that large city strategy is too weak, and tweak the game so that it's just as powerful as an ICS strategy that launches space ships at turn 200. I mean, that's not ridiculously overpowered and totally unbalanced, is it? No. That's perfect!

 

[pi-r8]

What are you talking about? I don't specialize every single city in science. I just run a few scientists. That's all you need to do to for fast tech.

In the game I posted in this thread, I built workshops, windmills, and factories as soon as possible, while working every possible mine and forest. I also ran a few scientists. What else could I have done to increase production? I could have fired the scientists and slowed down research, yes, but that wouldn't boost my production at all. I guess I could have made one an engineers early on instead of a scientist for a pitiful +2 hammers, but that's still just a marginal increase.

And the more cities you get, the worse the problem becomes. In this game I kept up production reasonably well because I only had 3 cities. Every single city you build speeds up research, no matter what it does.

I think the economy of this game needs to be heavily reworked. Unfortunately if they allowed higher production or slower research, you'll end up with units clogging the map due to 1UPT so they can't really do that either. So I don't even know what they can do.

 

[Roxlimn]

pi-r8:

Running only scientists in a city that's got Libraries IS putting a focus on science. I mean, isn't that what running specialists do?

You could have put those Scientists to work on Production tiles, or more food to grow the cities larger. Putting the citizen on scientist means that for that city, you are focusing on Science.

Some really favorable city sites can have everything, of course, but in general, you have to choose, and you choose science every time. That's why your tech rate is high.

And the more cities you get, the worse the problem becomes. In this game I kept up production reasonably well because I only had 3 cities. Every single city you build speeds up research, no matter what it does.

Additional cities also produce more gold. With more cities, the tech rate goes up, but it also means that you can buy Factories instead of building them with hammers.

I think the economy of this game needs to be heavily reworked. Unfortunately if they allowed higher production or slower research, you'll end up with units clogging the map due to 1UPT so they can't really do that either. So I don't even know what they can do.

Try this. Never build a library. Never assign a scientist. If the governor does it for you, manually remove the scientist. Don't get wonders that give you Great Scientist points.

Now you're slowed your research. Alright, now try clogging up the map with units. Thirty should do it well enough. Let me know if it's super-easy. No ICS, now!

 

[pi-r8]

Alright whatever. Enjoy your 400 turn zero scientist games. I just find it incredibly simplistic compared to civ 4.

 

[Roxlimn]

I'm serious about that experiment. Since you appear to be interested, I was hoping that you would undertake the comparison. I don't have the patience to play through an entire ICS game. It's not a very exciting experience.

You assert that if research rates were lowered, then 1UPT would become a problem. I suggested a means for you to test your hypothesis. Were you just exaggerating? Did you not truly think that it would be a problem and were simply making a rhetorical statement?

 

[Martin Alvito]

You could focus on something other than Science, but why? Whatever your desired win condition is, lots of Science is either strictly necessary or more helpful than anything else you could be producing.

If you enjoy playing in a different way, that's fine, but you should keep in mind that a strategy forum for a new game is going to be full of players looking to share information towards the common goal of discovering the optimal way to play the game.

As for the Civ 4-Civ 5 comparisons, Soren Johnson came right out in the introduction to the manual and indicated that his goal was to maximize the number of interesting choices the player had to make. This version of Civ doesn't do that.

EDIT: It should be obvious to you that making Science harder to get will make 1UPT a problem on high levels of difficulty. Right now, you can outtech the AI and run a small force of units for defense. Remove that advantage, and the player will have to build many more units in order to stay alive, soaking up the Hammers you intended to free by gimping Science. The AI builds mass quantities of units and will deploy them along all possible fronts given sufficient time; it follows that you would need enough units to slaughter any potential invasion force, and that's a lot of units.

There's no need to run an experiment to verify basic economics. We already know it's true, and have ample empirical evidence across alternate domains to prove it. This is the beauty of theory - it saves us time running experiments.

If you reduce the cost of later buildings to the point that constructing them is worthwhile/people can do so before a win condition is achieved, people will build them. The reason that they are useless right now is that they don't provide sufficient return on investment. It's too easy to shred through the end of the tech tree with Great Scientists and Research Agreements to achieve your win condition and start a new game, and a lot of players only find the segment of the game where the outcome is still in doubt interesting. The mop-up once you have a winning game is just tedious, which is why there is a norm to resign in chess even though doing so is never in favor of the player abandoning the game.

Alternately, you can make it much harder to burn through the end of the tech tree. Capping GS research by number of turns elapsed would help. This feature was in Civ 4 at launch; why is it not in Civ 5?

 

[Roxlimn]

Martin Alvito:

Arguably, Civ 4 didn't, either. At the highest difficulty levels of the game, much of the things that made the game interesting at lower difficulty levels was simply impossible to do.

You could focus on something other than Science, but why? Whatever your desired win condition is, lots of Science is either strictly necessary or more helpful than anything else you could be producing.

If you enjoy playing in a different way, that's fine, but you should keep in mind that a strategy forum for a new game is going to be full of players looking to share information towards the common goal of discovering the optimal way to play the game.

You should keep in mind that this thread is focused around the very explicitly stated goal of having large cities with lots of buildings and Wonders. Says right so in the OP.

Lots of Science won't help me have 10 size 20 cities if it wins me the game before I have a chance to get to that size.

If you can help us attain 10 size 20 cities at turn 200, we would be much obliged.

 

[Tveskaeg2]

My favorite way to get big cities fast is by employing a satelite system.

I am not sure it is the best or most effecient but I like having some sort of relation with my cities and I can´t have that with 100% ICS.

Where terrain permits, the city sites I choose, will get upto six satelite cities. Each in a 3 tile distance from center city (the star) and 3 tiles from eachother.
This gives the star-city quick access to all its tiles (except the 6 city-tiles) and the satelites will be using specialists and the sides turning away from the star(s).
This is very good for the economy and defense. Keep those borders closed too. Just make sure area has got roads, then plant all 7 in one turn and you got a ball of power.

The stars build order will depend on my plans for it. The satelites generally start with colosseums.
Once the site has matured I start looking at the "back-sides" of the satelites to see if two of them can be re-used for the next site.
With some practice this can be timed just as 6 colosseums are done in another star-system.

This will lock you into specific policy choices and you wont get many. I am happy if I get 8. 4 is a must.
Also specific wonders: Machu Pichu, Forbidden Palace and Stat of Lib. Maybe Sydney if it drags out.

I have not tested it on anything smaller than huge(Continents, Pangaea) emperor but the limit to size seems to be the end of the game. 30 is easy. Atleast with Monty.

 

[Martin Alvito]

Arguably, Civ 4 didn't, either. At the highest difficulty levels of the game, much of the things that made the game interesting at lower difficulty levels was simply impossible to do.

I completely disagree. Deity in vanilla was a monster after they nerfed the choprush. You had to carefully consider every decision you made (with the possible exception of tech path) in order to win on a standard map. Anything less than maximum efficiency prior to 0 AD was probably going to get you killed.

If you can help us attain 10 size 20 cities at turn 200, we would be much obliged.

Two possible plans:

1) Play Rome. Build 10 cities. Build Workshops, Colosseums, Libraries, Universities, Markets, Theaters, Banks, Hospitals, Med Labs and Stadiums in every city, rush buying the building in the capital each time as tech unlocks it. Run Rationalism, Secularism and Freedom. Always fill the Workshop with an Engineer, and fill the Libraries and Unis with Scientists in each city as they become available. Take the Scientists out whenever you're ready to pop boom after a wave of Happy buildings, and work Food tiles. Take every Research Agreement you can starting around turn 90 until you can see that you will have Biology, Steam Power and Railroad in 30 turns.

Best guess is that you want to burn the GE on Taj to cycle buildings faster.

2) Play India. This will let you get away without Stadiums and the rush buys, but now buildings are going to be an issue. Workshops are more debatable now, Banks aren't happening (which isn't the end of the world since maintenance is more manageable) and you may run out of time before Med Labs go up.

I can't see any other ways to do it. Either way, you absolutely, positively must get Biology early to grow to 20 in time.

Please notice that this is a Science-centric strategy, which tends to confirm my earlier point.

 

[Roxlimn]

I completely disagree. Deity in vanilla was a monster after they nerfed the choprush. You had to carefully consider every decision you made (with the possible exception of tech path) in order to win on a standard map. Anything less than maximum efficiency prior to 0 AD was probably going to get you killed.

This is a significant derail so I won't reply to this after this one. The level of difficulty is not an indication that the game design is good. One could easily make Civ V impossible to win at any particular level chosen and specify only one way to win at those levels. That doesn't make the game design good.

I consider the Civ game weakest at the highest difficulty levels because at those settings, precisely because it could only be won one way. And that's the last I'll about that here.