Need some advice.

[civver_764]

I've been playing a game on Warlord difficulty w/ Julius Caesar. My goal is to get a domination win, but it's already in the 500s and I've barely got over 12%. I did take out Portugal and kept two of their cities(which surprisingly, helped my economy a lot more than it hurt it). Right now I've got 7 cities, one is a recently captured Thebes that is still in revolt. I was gonna try and finish off Egypt with my Praets but by the time they got healed Rammy would've had a lot more units. So I called off the war.

My main concern, however, is how slowly I'm teching. At first I thought it was because the marathon speed makes everything tech slower, but I'm never still in the classical era by this point in the game. I can't use any of the Medieval units yet(although the Praets are still pretty good). I think the problem is that my cities won't grow enough to work enough commerce tiles. The happiness cap is still around 6 or so since I've been too busy with war to tech/build happiness stuff and there's no real way of getting any happiness resources(all are in pretty horsehockey locations). I did get calendar but I haven't got enough workers to start working them as I've been too busy pumping out military.

I am new to this whole warmongering thing, btw. This is the first time I've seriously tried for a domination win(I usually go for Space or Time).

So, yeah, any advice to improve this game would be greatly appreciated. I'll include the saves(I don't have a 4000 BC one, so I'll just post the earliest I do have). Latest patch needed.

 

[batavier]

why do you have all those archers in Rome and Cumae? I think 1 archer and one axe or praetorian for each city is enough as anti barb force.

You captured the great lighthouse and Tokugawa will open borders with you. (gasp!)

Your really need more workers. The moment you get calender, you need at least 2 workers ready on a silk. Once you have more workers, settle more cities near happyness resources (and food of course)

 

[Jedi_Otis]

I looked over the save for a few minutes and a few things stood out.

You're building wealth in half your cities. You don't need wealth. Your science slider is at 100% and your're only losing 4gpt and you've got 552 in the bank. Build workers, buildings and SETTLERS!!!

You could build a monastary in Rome, then build missionaries and spread the religion to all your cities. Religion= Build temples for more. Settle a city south of Lisbon to work the Oasis,sheep,wine and gold, and another near the silver and beavers.

The easiest way to increase your happy caps would be to research Monarchy for Hereditary Rule civic instead of Civil Service. With all the troops you have lying around, happiness won't be a problem.

After that, if you're hell-bent on merciless destruction, I would suggest Construction for Catapults.

And for Gods sake get open borders with Toku for some trade routes. He's actually pleased with you!!!

You may never see that again in your life.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

I am new to this whole warmongering thing, btw. This is the first time I've seriously tried for a domination win(I usually go for Space or Time).

So, yeah, any advice to improve this game would be greatly appreciated. I'll include the saves(I don't have a 4000 BC one, so I'll just post the earliest I do have). Latest patch needed.

HEREDITARY RULE

The hereditary rule civic turns obsolete war units into portable happy. The classical gambit is to deliver most of them to your best city (I would normally say capital, but... umm... Rome sucks in your game).

Other comments: Civil Service is probably an unwise choice here. The big benefit is the Bureaucracy civic, but when your capital sucks that's not so important, is it?

Also, I think you city placement needs some work (Antium should probably be one tile to the west, for example).

As a rule, having your capital building wealth is an error - small cities build wealth so that the big cities can construct multipliers to take advange of their huge through put. Here, it may be ok, because (all together now) Rome sucks....

 

[civver_764]

why do you have all those archers in Rome and Cumae? I think 1 archer and one axe or praetorian for each city is enough as anti barb force.

I didn't know what to build so I just built more units =/.

You captured the great lighthouse and Tokugawa will open borders with you. (gasp!)

That literally just became available a few turns ago, and I've been forgetting to open borders.

Your really need more workers. The moment you get calender, you need at least 2 workers ready on a silk. Once you have more workers, settle more cities near happyness resources (and food of course)

I don't really see any more spots to put a city. Could someone do a dotmap or something if it isn't too much trouble?

You're building wealth in half your cities. You don't need wealth. Your science slider is at 100% and your're only losing 4gpt and you've got 552 in the bank. Build workers, buildings and SETTLERS!!!

I don't really have many buildings available to build, and I've built the ones I think need to be built(I'll recheck the save). Workers I can see the reason for, but settlers? Once again I don't see where else to put a city.

You could build a monastary in Rome, then build missionaries and spread the religion to all your cities. Religion= Build temples for more. Settle a city south of Lisbon to work the Oasis,sheep,wine and gold, and another near the silver and beavers.

The oasis and sheep would provide some food, but other than that it doesn't seem like it would grow too much with all that desert. And is it really worth putting a city in the Tundra just to get two resources? Seems like a waste. I'll get to building some more settlers.

Yeah I forgot about HR. I'll switch techs immediately.

As a rule, having your capital building wealth is an error - small cities build wealth so that the big cities can construct multipliers to take advange of their huge through put. Here, it may be ok, because (all together now) Rome sucks....

What else should I be building?

 

[Ghpstage]

You have a ton of resources in you territory that no city can work, massive expansion is required!
There are at least another 10 sites you want to settle. I would settle some of the small islands, even some of the 1 tile ones, mostly due to having the GLH.

I slapped a few tages onto your save to show where I would settle in this game. Bear in mind that these are sites I would pick, I have no idea what other people would think

I numbered the sites I feel have most priority, primarily due to resources. The rest I wouldnt be comfortable giving priorities on. The site tagged with City? is one i'm not 100% sure about yet, but would probably settle due to owning the GLH.

City 2 will want a lighthouse early on as it will make the freshwater lake tiles provide 3, farm the grass forest next to it and you will have the food needed to work the Iron, both furs and Wine.

The gambit tag is a site I would go for early. Settling the city on the turn of the save would give at least an extra 17 instantly.
2 from working coast, 1 from city tile, 8 from its own trade routes, 5 cities will gain 1 by trading with it . Building more cities on the main continent will increase its value while building more on islands will reduce it, being Organised and the city having fish in the inner ring will make getting a courthouse and lighthouse up with the whip quite easy.

First Open borders with Tokugawa, build lots of workers and settlers, grab resources. Make sure you use the whip to get courthouses in place quickly and the expansion shouldn't hurt too much. Your going to need a lot of workers!


There are even more sites I would go for, but I think you can find them later

**Edit ignore the ice island tag in the far South of Rome!

 

[civver_764]

Thanks a billion for that. I'll check it out. Question: By the time I'm done building all of this, will it be too late to still pursue a domination win? Or will I have to go with a peaceful victory?

 

[Ghpstage]

You will have plenty of time for a Domination win, in fact if you don't expand a lot soon you can't win by domination fullstop! Being on marathon speed winning with war later on isn't going to be much of an issue anyway.
It doesn't even take a long time to get a decent empire built up, i'm trying it now and in 825AD I have 15 cities settled, most developed enough to contribute nicely nearly doubling your land area to 20% with still loads of unsettled land