Needing more Strategic Resources

[vmxa]

"Illuminous"

"Should I be forgeting about wonders after building a certain number of them and switch to producing military units instead?."

I do not avocate "forgetting" about wonders, just make them when it puts no strain on you or you feel it is very important. When you have a small empire, getting more land is the goal.

Where you are at the start, no value to troops. They would just sit around, till you get some techs. At least Map Making. If you have landing parties, then you can try to fish for a leader.

If I can see land that can be reached safely by galleys, then I would gear up. It has to be safely as I do not want to risk loaded boats at sea.

"How soon should I be on the offensive, do I build up a large force then attack, or do I continually send out men to their deaths like the AI?"

It is rarely a good idea to do anything the AI does, hence the advocating of no gov. No automation. War is a case by case basis. In the main I do not mass, just get enough to do the task.

The sooner I get the land, the better. I get stronger, they get weaker.


"I'm affraid of installing CivAssist II. People have reported bugs with it, and I don't want to muck up my CivIII Complete installation and have to reinstall it again."

I doubt CA is the cause, many have issues with .net. In any event it is a great tool and worth a shot. If not go for Mapstat. It is quite good.

 

[undertoad]

I appreciate all the tips, hopefully it will make me a better player.

Should I be forgeting about wonders after building a certain number of them and switch to producing military units instead?.

How soon should I be on the offensive, do I build up a large force then attack, or do I continually send out men to their deaths like the AI?.

I'm affraid of installing CivAssist II. People have reported bugs with it, and I don't want to muck up my CivIII Complete installation and have to reinstall it again.

The trouble with Wonders is that they're so tempting. Every so often you discover a new tech, and get the chance to build a Wonder. "This will give me the edge over the AI!", I think...
Often this isn't the case. Very early on, I find it much more important to have my strongest cities (the only ones which would have a chance to build a Wonder) producing units (inc. Settlers or Workers). This is why I hardly ever get Pyramids - one of the earliest Wonders - even though it is a fantastic Wonder for expansion.

On the offensive: against a newly-built AI city on the edge of their empire (typical for the first ones you'll see), you can get lucky with just a single unit. But the RNG (random-number generator) is a cruel goddess... Against better-established cities, connected by road (or even worse, rail), bear in mind that you're fighting not just the
city itself but the entire empire behind it that's sending it units. Artillery of some sort is a great advantage, as is cutting off the supply lines to the city.

Re CivAssistII: I've had no problems with it, but it doesn't surprise me some people have given the variety of Windows setups out there. I haven't read anywhere about it having any effect on the CivIII installation itself (correct me if I'm wrong) - it really shouldn't and I think doesn't have any impact on the game installation itself. Talking from a programmers' POV, and with some guesswork, I think the worst that could happen is that the specific .SAV file CAII is using might get corrupted if it crashes.

Give it a go - if it doesn't work, you can just uninstall it. It's been crucial to my game.

 

[CKS]

I doubt CA is the cause, many have issues with .net. In any event it is a great tool and worth a shot. If not go for Mapstat. It is quite good.

I haven't gotten CAII working on my new computer, but it doesn't mess up your Civ installation.

Mapstat doesn't tell you exactly what CAII does, but it will tell you about upcoming riots and a whole bunch of other stuff. I use it all the time. However, it isn't really called Mapstat, but CRpMapstat. You want to look for the CRp Suite of utilities in the utilities forum. Mapstat is the name of another, much less useful utility, and this can be kind of confusing if you run across it first.

 

[vmxa]

I ran a little of your 4000bc. This was done with no attempt to micromanage, just straight forward:

4000BC: drop settler in place, set research 100 on Alpha and start a warrior. Hut gives CB.
3500BC: hut gives Pottery.
3300BC: it looks like an island as we see water on west and it goes down north and south the few tiles we can see now. We see borders and Incense, so we can get to land soon.
3200BC: met Hittites and trade Mason for Alpha and 10 gold. Start on Write at 10%. Switch to worker, so I can chop a granary.
3150BC: see Ivory.
2310BC: start settler in 5. Have granary and temple up with a bunch of chops. Got a settler from a hut and now have 2 towns.
2110BC: settler out and start another. See all of island now.
1650BC: boat mets Shaka and traded Alpha for WC and 10 gold.
1500BC: I actually saw America earlier, but did not realize it, so contact now.
1375BC: Trade Hittites Writing for Myst+Wheel +30.
Trade Writing to Zulu for IW and 30. America is broke. Down HBR, start on Philo 90%. 7 towns and settler out.
5 workers and 3 in the queue. Made Embassy will all, before the trades.
I should have cheated and looked at the map as I sent one boat up a dead end, between the Hittites and America, oh well.

Does this look like about what you did? Not sure how close it is to the dot map I made. It is not unusual for changes to be made.

 

[vmxa]

You can see two of the three workers I have out making roads for futre towns. The new workers are to get improvements done. Pyramids is a place holder, in case I land Philo. I take MM and switch to Lighthouse.

Need to get galleys to see, if I can find and grab some land. Fall back is to learn or trade for Math and go for SoZ. That may turn out to be better as AC's would let you start beating on someone.

More contacts would be good as Philo is a great trade tech.

 

[Illuminous]

I can't seem to build enough settler's and military units (spearmen) at the same time. I have to prioritize and send them to grab land near the zulu and the far west island. My own island is lagging behind in city's, I have to defend the island when civs send out settlers to camp. I'm using tight placement for everything except for tundra, which I use infinite city sprawl as suggested.

I got lucky using 100% science and spawned a scientific leader, so I was able to rush the Great Lighthouse in 800BC. I have the Colossus also. I have a mere five city's built on my main island.

I normally start by building three or four warriors sending all but one to scout, and keep them scouting so that barbarians don't spawn, killing my workers. I then build a spearmen and switch to settler, then Colossus. Once that's done I switch to Pyramids until I get a new tech like Map Making then switch to The Great Lighthouse.

I send the spearmen to the north city where I sent the settler and build a worker and two boats to scout - then a granary. I try to stay as close to 100% science, adjusting as needed so as not to go broke with the poor unit support of Despotism.

I see you have wheat irrigated, shouldn't it be mined instead?. In despotism, anything with three food is -1. Also, shouldn't there only be two squares between each city?, you have wider placement.

Does CAII install into it's own directory within the CivIII Complete or Conquests directory?. It's tempting for knowing when your able to trade with the AI alone-I might just try it. Are there any gui/graphical glitches?.

 

[Illuminous]

What mod are you using VMXA?, my Persian units are green. Your GUI is different from mine also.

 

[vmxa]

I have the Metallic Interface. I use a 31 color palette as I play a lot of games with 31 civs.

 

[vmxa]

"Illuminous"
"I normally start by building three or four warriors sending all but one to scout, and keep them scouting so that barbarians don't spawn, killing my workers. I then build a spearmen and switch to settler, then Colossus. Once that's done I switch to Pyramids until I get a new tech like Map Making then switch to The Great Lighthouse."

How do barbs kill your workers? I mean it is not like they are going to be able to wander into town. I guess you have few towns, so that is possible. Barbs could only access the outskirts of my empire and "they will get dealt with real quick" (stolen from Snoop Dogg) .

You are taking out a lot of production going that route. I would not bother with Colossus, let the AI have it. I want to get land and contacts.

"I send the spearmen to the north city where I sent the settler and build a worker and two boats to scout - then a granary. I try to stay as close to 100% science, adjusting as needed so as not to go broke with the poor unit support of Despotism."

No reason to even have any spears on that island. Who is going to attack you?

"I see you have wheat irrigated, shouldn't it be mined instead?. In despotism, anything with three food is -1. Also, shouldn't there only be two squares between each city?, you have wider placement."

No, you have a -1 food penalty, but it gets more than 3 food. Well mine or irrigate if a fucntion of what you need, here I want the extra food more. A few have an extra tile to let them be on a river. A fair trade as those are the core towns. You could pack them in tighter and the rest are. I let the land dictate palcement as much as I can. This is not AW where CXXC is important, more than a free aqua.

"Does CAII install into it's own directory within the CivIII Complete or Conquests directory?. It's tempting for knowing when your able to trade with the AI alone-I might just try it. Are there any gui/graphical glitches?"

It will install in its own folder, not part of Civ.

 

[Illuminous]

You are taking out a lot of production going that route. I would not bother with Colossus, let the AI have it. I want to get land and contacts.

Land elsewhere or on the main island?.

No reason to even have any spears on that island. Who is going to attack you?

Their there for extra protection, but I guess warriors are good enough - and cheaper too.

No, you have a -1 food penalty, but it gets more than 3 food.

My mistake.

It will install in its own folder, not part of Civ.

Good to know, thanks.

 

[Aabraxan]

I haven't looked at your save, but I've been looking over this thread. If you're just doing a basic (non-AW) game and you're on an island, there's really no reason to have defenders in every city. The AI is horrible at naval invasions, and the Vikings are the only ones capable of amphibious attacks before Marines.

As for where to grab land, if you're on an island, clearing the island goes a long, long way to providing military security, because the AI is so bad at invasions. I would make clearing my island a priority, almost regardless of my victory condition.

I see that they've been mentioned, and I'll also suggest that you get CivAssist II or MapStat sooner rather than later. They're unbelievably helpful.

 

[vmxa]

"Quote:
You are taking out a lot of production going that route. I would not bother with Colossus, let the AI have it. I want to get land and contacts. UnQuote "

"Land elsewhere or on the main island?."

I took it that any talk about the Colossus would be on your start land as it would be well underway if you wait to you get to another land or at least I would think that woudl be the case.
Plus you will have limited productivity and small town size for a time, given them even more time to beat you to the Colossus.

As to getting more land I mean elsewhere. It is a given that the island is mine. I need to explore as you saw boats were out, so I can tell where I should go as well as get contacts. I was able to get a number of techs from those early contacts. Even more would be in the cards with Philo. It would either be a monoply tech or close to it. Even though I helped them with Alpha and Writing. As more towns are laid down and workers improve tiles, the tech pace would pick up for you.

I took advantage of the fact that I am alone and it is Regent. I really do not need MP's, so I can only build a few warriors for now. No support cost. Later get up a rax and make some better units.

If things fell out nicely, you would get some landing parties and get a little war and work on getting a leader. Get the SoZ and make an AC army and then go punish someone.

 

[Illuminous]

Here's the new save, I didn't bother building the Colossus this time. I used the shields for improvements and settlers. I ended up getting another scientific leader and was able to rush The Hanging Gardens. I now own The Great Lighthouse, The Statue of Zeus, The Hanging Gardens and Knights Templar. I'm currently working on Smith's Trading Company.

I've got alot more city's built this time around. I think it's almost time to war with America.

 

[vmxa]

As long as you are working on it and do not need to be doing something else. Wonders can't be instead of settlers/workers. The earlier the wonder the more likely it is that is going to slow you down.

Typically they are started in one of the first three towns, which should be the best towns and now it cannot contribute settlers/worklers/troops. By the time you are out of the AA, then probably you do not need settlers as much and can get them from other places.

When Colossus needs to be started, you have only a few towns, so taking one out of production for a long time hurts.

 

[vmxa]

I only looked at three towns:

Altin Tepe why have 2 pop making nothing? As I mentioned earlier, drop to 1 pop and have it a scientist or taxman. Scientist, if research, tax if not. Take all those tundra towns and put the pop as scientist, except the size 4. Make those taxmen.

When they starve down to one, leave the one a scientist. If you want to pop workers out, then use one town for that. The fish town would be the one.

Herat sell colosseum and wall and never build colosseums. Put the pop on the mountain as scientist. Take the tile near Merv and take the pop off it. First irrigate the mined grass (not the BG).

Now you will be at a stable size 9 and have 3 scientist. Merv can use the tile to grow and put up a harbor in Merv. Ok that is a 4th town.

Seidon, sell wall. Irrigate to get growing, maybe make a harbor.

This is why you do not use the Gov to run thigns. I would go over all towns to fix them, if it was me. Again all these little things slowed you down form jump street.

 

[Illuminous]

I'm not good at managing city's, I don't completely understand specialists.

Colosseums keep the citizens happy and increase culture, why ditch them?. That improves my score, no?.

I can revert to an older save and fixed what I screwed up.

I don't need Smith's Trading Company and banks, correct?.

Walls cost nothing to maintain, why sell them?.

Am I at least doing a little better?. How does the city placing look to you?.

 

[Illuminous]

Regarding CivAssistII, do I need to open the utility prior to launching the game?.
I downloaded it but I wan't to know before I install it. If I need to launch it prior to playing, then that means that I can play CivIII without it if I want.

 

[undertoad]

I'm not good at managing city's, I don't completely understand specialists.

Colosseums keep the citizens happy and increase culture, why ditch them?. That improves my score, no?.

I can revert to an older save and fixed what I screwed up.

I don't need Smith's Trading Company and banks, correct?.

Walls cost nothing to maintain, why sell them?.

Am I at least doing a little better?. How does the city placing look to you?.

I took a quick look at the save, and yep, I'd say you're building too many buildings. Libraries/Mkts are very useful (you have a slight tech lead, thanks to Libraries no doubt). But Banks do absolutely nothing for your happiness, and Courthouses are really only good as an occasional investment, for a super-productive city that is so far away that the Courthouse will have an effect.

a) Banks: Look at the "coins" you're getting from a city, in the 3-line display at the bottom (coins, beakers, happy faces). If you're not getting at least 6 coins with a Marketplace, it's not worth building a Bank. This is because a Bank (like a Mkt) adds on 50% coins - but it's 100+50+50, so a city that's making 4 Coins will make 6 with a Mkt (4+2, where 2 is 50% of 4), and will make 8 coins with a Bank (you have to have a Mkt to build a Bank) so it's 4+2+another 2, which is 50% of the original 4, not 50% of the 6 including Market. In this example city, your bank costs you 1/turn to run, and makes you an extra 2/turn. So this is the absolute rock-bottom case: an extra 1/turn (2-1) isn't worth the time it takes to build a Bank.
A Bank has no other effect at all - on happiness or corruption.

b) Courthouses: look at the "red" wasted shields in the city production display, and the red "corrupted" coins in the coins/beakers/happys display. A courthouse will cut this wastage in half, and cost you 1/turn to run (but take you a lot of effort to build). If you're only losing 5 shields and say 5 coins, the Courthouse will only claw back 2 of each for you (5*50%, rounded down). Not worth it.

c) Walls: I think vmxa may be saying "sell them" because once a city is >size 6, a Wall has no effect whatsoever.

d) Specialists: Entertainers, Scientists, Taxmen. (Other more exotic types come later). Basically these are citizens who are not working a square, but doing something else. An Entertainer diverts more of the city funds into "happy faces", so making unhappy people content, or content people happy - end-result, no civil disorder. A Scientist diverts city funds into "beakers" - more research. A Taxman diverts city funds into "coins" - more tax. Of course, you can only make a Specialist by not working one of the city squares - this means less shields, food and trade. Note that the extra Science and Tax produced by Scientists and Taxmen doesn't get multipled up by Libraries, Universities, Marketplaces or Banks - it's no good building a Bank in a city that's making only a few coins, and then hoping the Bank will really kick in if you make two citz into Taxmen.
An odd effect with specialists is that you can often solve civil disorder by making someone an Entertainer - so far, so normal - but: if you turn the Entertainer into a Scientist or Taxman, the citizens don't get more miserable, and order remains! Try it in an unhappy city, it's odd but it works.

I'd recommend Marketplaces, and importing more luxuries, to keep people happy. Marketplaces multiply up the effects of Luxuries, but only if you have at least 3 Luxuries.
With a Marketplace:
1 lux - 1 happy face
2 lux - 2 happy faces
3 lux - 4 happy faces
4 lux - 6 happy faces!

They work so well that I never build Temples or Colosseums anymore, except on rare occasions. Have a look at my earlier save over on the "Regent->Monarch" thread - I'm keeping large cities happy with nothing but luxuries, Marketplaces, and a 10% luxury rate. This is better than building Temples or Colosseums, as you only have to build one building, and it's a building that gives you 50% more coins as well!

How to get Luxuries? (I was lucky in my starting placement, and expanded very quickly to grab all I could). Well, here's what CivAssist says:



You could get Furs and either Incense or Silks, by trading two of your excess Ivory. I'm remembering now, there's no way I'd have known this prior to using CivAssist.

 

[undertoad]

Regarding CivAssistII, do I need to open the utility prior to launching the game?.
I downloaded it but I wan't to know before I install it. If I need to launch it prior to playing, then that means that I can play CivIII without it if I want.

Either. It has no connection to CivIII the game itself. It's just a clever bit of code that monitors the save folder for new files, and reads the save file. So it's always only accurate up to the start of this turn - it's not "reading" the actual state of the game, but just the last autosave. This is why it's risk-free as far as the game installation is concerned. But it means if you e.g. buy a tech from someone mid-turn, CivAssist won't show it as something you have to trade (the trick is to do an explicit save, and then CivAssist updates with better information!)

If you start it before starting CivIII, it should detect when you load a game and show info from that load. Or you can start it once in-game, up to you. Occasionally it loses track of what game you're playing (meaning, what file is your last save) - just use the File option to point it at the last Autosave.

 

[vmxa]

You could get Furs and either Incense or Silks, by trading two of your excess Ivory. I'm remembering now, there's no way I'd have known this prior to using CivAssist.

You should be able to go to the trade advisor and open new trade and see that the have lux available. It just a pain to go around to everyone, especially in > 8 civ game.