Need some help

[bewareofgnomes]

Hey there. I used to play Civ 3 all the time on all difficulty levels with relative ease. Anyways I quit for a good 3 years and just started back up with Civ4. I steamrolled the AI in my first to games but now I am having some trouble on the prince difficulty level.

A brief synopsis -

It's a terra map and I'm Bismark. I got off to a pretty good start and had a nice land grab with plenty of strong cities and little wasted space. But i quickly went bankrupt and had to turn down the research to 0% and still only make around 5 gold a turn.

With the other civs racing away in technology, i built a massive army of swordsmen and axeman and took all but 1 city from then tech/score leader Russia. However when I sued for peace she wouldn't give me anything worthwhile for peace, even though she was down to 1 city and not much of an army.

Now I have a huge outdated army, ZERO income, and not much hope. However I am number 1 in score, mfg goods, and crop yield. In summary, how do i catch up in the tech race and or how do i keep up and not get so far behind.


PS I will provide screens or saves if you would like. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[hotstuffjsn]

Previously playing Civ 3 myself have noticed that city building, or capturing has to be dome more slowly with regards to your economy(or else it will bankrupt you) It is possible to keep your research rate high and have a small war, but if you want your war to be shorter and more potent, you'll have to dedicate money to troop support costs, which can get a little expensive. You'll find markets and banks help keep the money high when you lower your research rate, which is fine because you'll compensate for it later when you build up your economy. Once you get a decent size force(check powergraph to make sure it's adequate compared to your opponent) and then declare war and march right in. Keep an eye on war weariness when needed and adjust accordingly. The gold you plunder will help you stay negative for awhile so you can keep up your research. From my experiences, it's ok to fall behind in tech while you war. You're securing more land, and higher populations which equal POWER. Once the war is over, if it's a major war you should start to build up your commerce cities to get the research rate back up, go after a few techs the AI doesn't have to trade a few. Once you feel you are back in a decent spot on the tech tree, find another opponent and give him your blade

ON a side note, it does help to have a few scientists allocated in a few cities if you have enough food to help your research rate a lot when warring. I always told myself I should not go to war and expect to stay in a tech lead, expect yourself to fall behind, as is realistic in life. Once you are done, rebuild and you will be more powerful then before!

 

[bewareofgnomes]

see that's what i was thinking, but the problem is how far back i am. I have pretty much every improvement in most cities (asides the new russian ones) and still have HUGE expenses. And no one will trade with me. I'm in 1000 AD and don't even have feudalism, though I am number 1 on the power chart by a good maragin.

 

[hotstuffjsn]

Keep in mind, being a leader on the Power chart is important as well. The AI's factor this hugely before waging are against you.

Also, once you hit Prince and higher difficulties the expenses for maintaining citites does increase dramatically. When your empire gets large, you will need to start building courthouses everywhere, they HELP immensely. Consider the Forbidden Palace as well if you need this in another 'core' part of your city.

Also consider how long you maintain a war. You will get a good idea but how hard your economy is suffering and the rate you fall back in techs. It's normal to be maybe a half dozen behind a leader like Persia who is intent on commerce, or Ghandi of the Indians for example. One word of advice though, it's better to wage a continous war then make cease fires and continue less then 10 turns later. Go at it hard, if you want to make peace do it and forget about it for a bit. That way your war weariness will be back to normal, otherwise it'll jump back up. I figure it this way, if I go to war and put myself so far behind of the other leaders, i'm not going to regain control in time to go after them and stay ahead in the game. So you'll have to decide when to stop the war and turn to somebody else for example.

Lastly, make sure you only build improvements you need. Libraries, markets in commerce towns, and in your production powerhouses, purely military or enhancing structures. Of course, if your cities dont have anything else to do it doesn't help to build other buildings. I've done pretty good lately with just two military citiets on a standard size map. Everything else is helping me keep my reasearch rate up in peactime, and money up in war time.

When trading, it seems the AI is more likely to give a better deal and trade more often with a higher opinion of you. Make sure you trade with those please or friendly of you first for the best deals. Consider giving in to their demands at times to raise the modifiers so they like you more. In the long run, these decicisions help you out.