Need some basic assistance

[Llathos]

Ok. I played Civ II for a long time...loved it. Was never the Civ master that some people become, but I was ok. I think I got up to Prince difficulty or so before getting obliterated at higher levels.

Anyway, on to this game. I have probably started somewhere close to 20 or 30 games in Civ III. How many have I finished? One.

Every other time I start, I can't seem to find a good place to start up my civilization. Maybe I'm being too picky, but I don't like trying to start my civ with 25% desert, 25% jungle, 25% mountains, 25% plains.

Even when I do get a somewhat favorable startup position (wheat, cow, good terrain, etc), I find myself 9 times out of 10 getting into trouble early on. I'll build up to about 4-5 cities in decent locations (good terrain, resources, etc), but by this time the AI civs have often started spewing settlers to fill every nook and cranny of my civ. Little spaces I leave behind, they plop down on. Even crappy areas that are just desert or tundra, they'll throw down a city.

Another problem is that I've had multiple AI civs (not in a MPP) declare war on me early on in the game for no apparent reason. I tried to appeal to the English who loved me at the time to help, but I couldn't find any such option in the deal window. Usually there is the "Military" options or something in the list along with technologies or maps, but there was nothing. So I had to try to fend off an attack from Germans and Indians with nothing but a few spearmen as defense in my cities. Perhaps it's a symptom of my not-quite-aggressive-enough playing...but do you guys find yourself hitting Next Turn repeatedly from around 2000BC - 500 BC ? I usually in this time frame have expanded as much as I can (cities have a very low pop size and cannot build more settlers, or don't see many good areas immediately nearby since distance under despotism is a corruption magnet) and am trying to build pyramids or temples or additional workers to connect cities, etc.

I have this feeling that I'm doing something wrong.....in all difficulties past Chieftan, I find it very difficult to keep up with science leaders, and building a military to dominate aggressive civilizations like the Germans at the same time is quite difficult.

I've read through the basic tips posts, etc....but I don't see any golden nuggets that would help me in my situation.

Any specific advice? What am I doing wrong?? :-(

 

[Yeti]

You can't even tell what a good starting position is early in the game because you can't see far and you don't know what hidden resources are there. I say always plop down and create a city either on your starting square or one step from it.

Build contiguous cities if you can - near enough that your borders will overlap soon, and build temples as soon as you can to expand and connect those borders.

Block off bottlenecks if you can - fortify a military unit there or create a city.

Create more cities quickly. Create your first few settlers, granary, and temple with the whip under despotism.

If you start very near another culture I find you really want to go on a very early offensive (take a city just after he founds it, force build a spearman for defense asap). One more city for you and one less city for him that early in the game makes a big difference.

 

[mdletend]

For military alliance you need an embassy with the other civ (need writing) to build embassy you double click on the capital star. Once you have nationalism then you can sign mutual protection pacts and trade embargo.

Also you might want to build your first city where you started unless you see a resource very near. I personally think the first few round you dont get production and gold are critical for sucessfull game

 

[GreenLantern]

I have found getting a good start to be fairly easy in most cases. This is what I have done.

1) Pick the nearest good starting position. What I am looking for is: coast, plains/grassland, fresh water, cattle. Best is a coast city with mixed plains/grassland and cattle.
2) Build a warrior while your explorer is off and running.
3) Build a grainry.
4) Build a settler.
5) Send him out to the next good site. This should be within about 7 squares, but I personally don't like to make them adjoining.
6) Original city builds a third settler, then turns to more interesting things like a wonder.
7) Second city builds a grainry, then turns into a settler generator.
8) Find horses and/or iron as soon as possible.
9) Build city or colony there, then a trade network of roads to it.
10) Find the nearest civs.
11) Once you have horsemen and/or swordsmen, declare war and take out their capital and intermediate cities.
12) Negotiate peace, then play to your style...

I find in most cases I can get off and running in 15 - 30 minutes.
It is usually pretty obvious if there is no good starting terrain or you fall behind right away. When that happens, I usually move on to a new game and hope for at least a reasonable starting position.

Good luck...

 

[Mr. Socks]

I agree that the most important thing is laying down your 1st city right away, or 1 step away. Move your worker (+ scout, if you have 1) before your settler to help make your decision. Don't worry too much about the terrain your settler is on, because you'll notice that civ 3 gives a pretty nice minimum output to your city square regardless (I think it's 2 food / 1 prod / 2 com -- and in despotism you can't get much more than that anyway). Of course, the surrounding terrain is important, but my highest-scoring game so far had what looked like a terrible starting position -- a long, skinny peninsula with lots of mountains.
The computer's building cities in the gaps between yours can be a problem, but make sure you're taking measures to prevent it:
1) Build temples as soon as possible. Don't build units first; bring your defence in from other cities.
2) don't trade world maps or territory maps, to anyone, at least until you've expanded as far as you can.
3) look for chokepoints, watch for settlers moving towards you -- they can be blockaded without violence with a group of 3 units in a line or L-shape.
4) if boats are out, put any spare units on those tiny bits of coast that your borders don't yet cover.

I believe you need an embassy to get the military options in the diplomacy menus.