New Player, your advice needed plz

[NagaSaki]

Hey all,
I just got Civ3 gold pack with all 3 games.
I've been reading this site since i got the game and have found loadz of helpfull hints, tips and strategies (Sg's have been very fun and helpfull to read).
The problem is that i have won 2 games on warlord so decided to move onto regent, where i'm having a few problems.
Firstly i cant keep my populace happy even though i use the lux slider. How far should i move the slider>? If it goes above 40% is that bad ?
Beacuse i have to keep the happy slider so high i cant keep researching AND keep in profit.
Secondly i cant get enough gold, i always get the message saying my treasury is dangerously low .
My current game i am the greeks playing on 70% continents. I own half the continent and share it with the byzant's (who only have 2 cities left after i rampaged ) and the French who own the other half of my continent. i have used some suicide galley's (another great tactic i got from this site) to get to the other continent where i found 3 other civs.
The problem is the 2 civs on my island are both relatively broke and way behind me in techs. Where as i am equal or 1 tech behind the rest of the civs on the other continent. this mean i cannot broker techs.
Any help and tips are very welcome, especially about my technique and MM.
I've uploaded my current save (hopefully i got it to work)

 

[beckbro2]

I am a new player as well and don't take what I say for gold but speaking of gold literally. I was having a problem with gold and getting dangerously low as well. I started producing much more workers and keeping 2-3 sometimes for joining each city and moving others out working on improvements. This has helped a ton and I dont have any problems with gold anymore. At least not in the same manner lol. Again take this as a note from another new player, I just know it worked for me. Good Luck I haven't had much luck with winning anything on here either.

 

[denyd]

Workers are part of the answer as each road segment generates more gold. Some of the other parts are:

1. Luxuries, either owned or traded for, will keep your people happy
2. Marketplaces, multiply the effect of luxuries
3. What government are you in? Republic is the best early choice unless you plan on long wars, then monarchy is better. Get out of despotism ASAP.
4. Military size, if you're in Republic MP (military police) are of no value. Those garrison troops not in a coastal or border city are costing you gold. You probably don't need more than 2 defenders (whatever is the current best) per city.
5. Every city doesn't need every improvement. If you have 2 or 3 luxuries, with a market in the city, you won't need a temple until it's over size 6.

Once you get near the end of the middle ages you'll find you'll be able to sell to the AI for gold per turn (gpt). Normally before that they use most of their gold for research and unit support. Having the AI support your research is one of the keys to keeping any optimum reseach rate.

These are just some of the things you can think about.

If case you haven't seen this thread yet, it has excellent discussions on all of the finer points of the game. The moderators changed throughout the game and many of the lurkers were some of today's top players. I think you'll find many very helpful hints (if you can weather the 100+ pages)

LINK TO THE THREAD

 

[Willem]

Hey all,
I just got Civ3 gold pack with all 3 games.
I've been reading this site since i got the game and have found loadz of helpfull hints, tips and strategies (Sg's have been very fun and helpfull to read).
The problem is that i have won 2 games on warlord so decided to move onto regent, where i'm having a few problems.
Firstly i cant keep my populace happy even though i use the lux slider. How far should i move the slider>? If it goes above 40% is that bad ?
Beacuse i have to keep the happy slider so high i cant keep researching AND keep in profit.
Secondly i cant get enough gold, i always get the message saying my treasury is dangerously low .
My current game i am the greeks playing on 70% continents. I own half the continent and share it with the byzant's (who only have 2 cities left after i rampaged ) and the French who own the other half of my continent. i have used some suicide galley's (another great tactic i got from this site) to get to the other continent where i found 3 other civs.
The problem is the 2 civs on my island are both relatively broke and way behind me in techs. Where as i am equal or 1 tech behind the rest of the civs on the other continent. this mean i cannot broker techs.
Any help and tips are very welcome, especially about my technique and MM.
I've uploaded my current save (hopefully i got it to work)

I'm making a guess that you have Republic as your government. If so, it costs you 2 gold to maintain your units, and War Weariness is probably making your people unhappy. To find out why their unhappy, just click on one of them, the unhappy ones, and it will give you their reasons.

And yes, 40% Luxury is to high, I usually have it set at 10-20% myself. I only go to 30-40% if I'm experiencing WW and don't want to end a war just yet. Are you building happiness buildings, like Temple, Coloseum etc? Do you have all the Luxuries available connected to your network? Do you have enough Workers building roads to bring in money to your cities?

 

[Whomp]

Something to consider on the lux slider. It impacts the WHOLE nation. Sometimes it simply takes making a few citizens specialists especially in those hopelessly corrupt conquered cities.

"Oppress this Mr. Byzantinian taxman!.
All the sudden you've gone from 40% to 10-20%.

 

[Moonsinger]

Hey all,
The problem is that i have won 2 games on warlord so decided to move onto regent, where i'm having a few problems.
Firstly i cant keep my populace happy even though i use the lux slider. How far should i move the slider>? If it goes above 40% is that bad ?
Beacuse i have to keep the happy slider so high i cant keep researching AND keep in profit.
Secondly i cant get enough gold, i always get the message saying my treasury is dangerously low .

You can easily solve that slider problem if you use your Deity level's skills. Don't laugh! Moonsinger must be out of her mind right? Here you are trying to win your first Regent game and I tell you to apply your Deity skill. What Deity skill? You haven't won Monarch or Emperor level yet...so what deity skill am I talking about? Anyway, at the Regent level and up, I usually assume that I'm playing on the toughest level where the AIs are all too powerful and there is no way I can get ahead of them on research. Therefore, I set my search rate to ZERO (and doing my research with only 1 scientist). By setting your research to zero, you have only gold and happiness to worry about. By hooking up all your luxuries and trading luxuries with other civs, you should be able to keep your people happy while saving a lot of money too. Also, try to keep your units at the free quota. Focus on exploration and trade and trade like crazy for everything, especially technology. Let the AIs to do research for you. Also, save enough money to get ready for major trading opportunity at the discovery of important techs.

My current game i am the greeks playing on 70% continents. I own half the continent and share it with the byzant's (who only have 2 cities left after i rampaged ) and the French who own the other half of my continent. i have used some suicide galley's (another great tactic i got from this site) to get to the other continent where i found 3 other civs.
The problem is the 2 civs on my island are both relatively broke and way behind me in techs. Where as i am equal or 1 tech behind the rest of the civs on the other continent. this mean i cannot broker techs.

Don't worry! Your worldmap and communication are very valuable commodity. Just keep an eye on them and save your gold. When someone discovers Printing Press or Navigation, you will make your move to catch up on techs at no time. In the mean time, if you are more powerful than the local civs, I recommend building up your army to consolidate your home continent.

 

[nullspace]

I looked at your save. The main problem is too many city improvements and not enough population. Some of your core cities like Thermopylae and Delphi are losing more money to maintenance costs than they're producing. That's no good. You need to get irrigation to those cities and get citizens working the irrigated squares so that they can grow. More population = more money.

I don't know why you think you have happiness problems. I set your luxury rate to 10%, and almost all cities are fine. With that, you only need 3 entertainers in your entire empire, and they're all in mostly corrupt cities.

You're also doing fine with tech. You can buy chemistry from Germany for education and 28 gpt. Then you'll be tied for the lead in tech. You said no one on your continent had anything to trade, but France will give you dyes for any of your obsolete techs. That's essentially free. On the other hand, they don't have chivalry, and your military advisor rates you as strong compared to them, so now might be the time to attack. They're a republic with quite a lot of land, so they will only get stronger.

Speaking of government, you're a Monarchy, but with all those city improvements, you'd be much better off as a republic. Monarchy is only worth it if you are fighting continuously. Republic has more base trade, so improvements like libraries (which multiply base trade) help a republic more than governments that don't have the trade bonus. I think you should either fight France or change to republic (though you are close to democracy, so you could do that soon).

Your land seems to be well improved, so I'll spare you the stereotypical advice about building more workers, but you do need to change some mines in your core to irrigation. You also need to improve your conquered lands, and build roads towards France if you want to fight them. So actually, more workers would be good.

Also, your cities in your core are spaced too far apart. In particular, there is a cow three spaces from your capital that is not in the radius of any city. You could have built a city that is on a river and on the coast and has that cow and another cow in its radius. It would bave been a perfect settler factory, and it should have been the second city in your empire. It's PAINFUL to see that opportunity wasted.

Despite that, you're in a fine position to win this game. Your military is strang compared to everyone but China (it's average compared to them), you're current in tech, you have more land than anyone, but you're a bit behind China in population. Once you grow your core (and build the forbidden palace in Adrianople as soon as the courthouse finishes) you'll be in good shape.

 

[NagaSaki]

Wow thankseveryone for the quick replies.
All the tips are very helpfull. I'm gonna have to try the extremely slow tech research idea even though i still have to get my head around the idea of being able to be one of the tech leaders with no research!

Thanks for very specific feeback Nullspace , I'm glad an experienced player took the time to look at my lowly regent save . About the government change, i've been told and read everywhere that monarchy is better for war, is this only for long term wars? Could i survive a war with France if i was a republic (as it would be a fairly long-term) or would it be better to stay in monarchy till after the war with france?

One final point, what should i build instead of all the imporvements ? (temple, library etc.) Rather build military units and go attack?
Sorry about all the newb questions and thanks again to everyone for all your great tips .
Denyd that link is very helpfull although as you said it could take me a while to get through

 

[Tomoyo]

Yes. Units to go attack. Units units units. You can never have enough of them.

 

[denyd]

One more little link to convince you on buying and trading for tech. A game I was involved with (late game replacement player). Playing as England at Emperor level. We can never have any research (no scientists and slider always at 0%). We won via a spaceship victory.

The Link

 

[IbnSina]

About the government change, i've been told and read everywhere that monarchy is better for war, is this only for long term wars? Could i survive a war with France if i was a republic (as it would be a fairly long-term) or would it be better to stay in monarchy till after the war with france?

One final point, what should i build instead of all the imporvements ? (temple, library etc.) Rather build military units and go attack?
Sorry about all the newb questions and thanks again to everyone for all your great tips .
Denyd that link is very helpfull although as you said it could take me a while to get through

Yes, Monarchy is for Always War. You can fight long wars in Republic, and still maintain a good tech pace etc.. Just make sure you have marketplaces in every decent town, and acquire luxuries by any means necessary.

As for what to build, see Tomoyo's post

@Moonsinger: I've seen your dialog with Dianthus et al. in the Utilities forum, and at least two posts over here today. Does this mean you've reinstalled civ on your computer? Great news!

 

[Moonsinger]

@Moonsinger: I've seen your dialog with Dianthus et al. in the Utilities forum, and at least two posts over here today. Does this mean you've reinstalled civ on your computer?

Yes, I have re-installed the latest version of Civ3, PTW, and C3C so that I can test MapFinder. I'm not sure if I have time to play any more Civ.

 

[Willem]

Wow thankseveryone About the government change, i've been told and read everywhere that monarchy is better for war, is this only for long term wars? Could i survive a war with France if i was a republic (as it would be a fairly long-term) or would it be better to stay in monarchy till after the war with france?

Although you can last a long time, it's not a good idea to start a war with Republic. That makes War Weariness much worse than if another civ declares war on you.

One final point, what should i build instead of all the imporvements ? (temple, library etc.) Rather build military units and go attack?

Keep in mind the state of your city before you build an improvement. For instance, the Library increases test tubes by 50% so if you only have one being produced, it's not worth building. Except in border cities where you're trying to increase your culture. And don't build Coloseums or Cathedrals in some dinky town with only 4 or 5 citizens, they really don't need the happiness those buildings produce. Unless, again, it's a border town, but in that case you're after culture.

 

[supaguruzebidy]

A good way to lower war weariness is to provoke the other side to attack you. One good way to do this is to wait until you have espionage then try to put a spy into their capital. If you succceed then just do different spy missions until your spy is caught. Keep planting spies in the capital until they declare war on you. With your opponent attacking you, you get lower WW. As well if you do it at the start of your turn you also get the opportunity for the first strike.

 

[Sam3891]

Are you
> Building enough settlers
> Having too many units
> Are you doing deals with other nations

Personally by the first 15 turns I would have at least 3 cities. If you build about 5 cities at once you will have a big income but if you don't you will lose valueble gold. Also are you getting workers to build roads and mines?