Just today, I decided I'd try a challenge, and fired up a new civ III game with diety difficulty. I just made myself a standard continent/70% world. I chose the babylonians, a scientific/religious civ, a good combination, and I started out on a fair sized continent, all by myself. This relieved a lot of the pressure of having enemy civs pushing my borders and stealing my land while I'm still trying to settle new cities, but it made it impossible to trade with them. So, since I was on deity, and with nobody to trade with, I figured that my only chance to ever be able to keep up with techs was to build the great library. Unfortunately, the only tech I got from a goodie hut was warrior code, and I needed to research pottery for my granaries, too so that I could settle my continent more quickly. However, even with science at 100% for all but the first tech, I still had 4 techs to research before I could build the library, and only a couple of turns after I started, the English Finished theirs, and every single ancient wonder had been built. On top of this, the english had found my continent and settled 3 cities in the area that I still hadn't gotten to, so I no longer had the continent to myself, and only 140 gold so nobody would sell a single tech to me. At this point, I quit the game to come here to ask what the hell I'm doing wrong. There must be a way that I can settle my Island before a culture half a world and an ocean away does, and be able to research and build a single wonder. Anyway, thanks for your help.
New to Diety
- Thread starter Bilko
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budweiser
King of the Beers
Well, in general with that kind of start, you need to do two things; maximise growth and science output. You need a granarie in your capital first, prebuild and even cut down trees to help if you can. After that, settle cities on any rivers first or in a position to work any bonus trade squares first. Dont be afraid to pack 2 or 3 or 4 cities on a single river to maximise the use of the river sqaures. After that, max out and research map making, then go for literacy, or maybe reverse the two - it depends. Great Library would be nice, but so would Great Lighthouse. You are going to need to find more land asap.
At some point barbs will start to pop up, try to have a defense force of a few units ready to search and destroy their villages - this will give you money for science and let you run a deficit science effort.
Pack your island with close cities and put them next to the coast to help preserve the most land. This should put you in good shape with a fighting chance when you manage to make contact.
At some point barbs will start to pop up, try to have a defense force of a few units ready to search and destroy their villages - this will give you money for science and let you run a deficit science effort.
Pack your island with close cities and put them next to the coast to help preserve the most land. This should put you in good shape with a fighting chance when you manage to make contact.
TerriaMachine
Accelerated Evolution
I'm not sure if this will work for Deity, but it worked great for me on Regent.... I played the Aztecs and was on a continent with India and Persia, whom I wiped out very quickly with a horde of Jags. I didn't build any settlers and instead let them build the settlers so I could move in. By the beginning of the Middle Ages I had the whole continent to myself and thought I was kicking some major ass, until I realized that I was researching Feudalism while England had just completed Adam Smith!! I was too preoccupied with domination that I forgot to keep up on my research. Knowing that I could never catch up conventionally I immediately set my research and happiness to zero and waited for one of the five other civs to come by on a galley. First came the Zulu and then came the English. I had amassed somewhere around 2000 gold by this point and traded furiously until I was soon completely caught up to--and even surpassed--the French and the Japanese. This method of gaining techs seemed to work so well that I continued the rest of my game researching nothing, trading for everything with gold and my stockpiles of luxuries, and eventually amassing a huge army of artillery, modern armor, and marines, thwarting all of the AI's attempts at a spaceship launch and eventually dominating the world. Like I said, not sure if this would work on higher levels, but it worked great for me...
Budweiser: My continent is fairly big, and I can easily fit as many cities on it as the other 3 civs have without having to pack them too tightly, so I'd rather leave some space in between them so that I can expand my borders more rapidly, and so they can be more productive late game when I'm finally able to launch an invasion.
I also had barbs set to sedentary, so unfortunately I won't get anything from them. I like this map a lot, it's a good, comfortable challenge, so I don't want to make a new one just so I can put barbarians on it.
What I really need to know is how to maximize my commerce output and pump out those settlers fast at the same time.
I also had barbs set to sedentary, so unfortunately I won't get anything from them. I like this map a lot, it's a good, comfortable challenge, so I don't want to make a new one just so I can put barbarians on it.
What I really need to know is how to maximize my commerce output and pump out those settlers fast at the same time.
budweiser
King of the Beers
Is there any way you can post a picture of the island?
I could tell you a few more things but I'd like to see the island too. Try a few close packed cities, make sure you have enough workers to connect your cities and cut down the travel time for new settlers to reach their destination. Try some early temples to expand your cultural borders and keep the other ai off of the island. Dont build too many milt units, connect any luxuries - even with a colony, and use the slider bar if you need to keep order.
I could tell you a few more things but I'd like to see the island too. Try a few close packed cities, make sure you have enough workers to connect your cities and cut down the travel time for new settlers to reach their destination. Try some early temples to expand your cultural borders and keep the other ai off of the island. Dont build too many milt units, connect any luxuries - even with a colony, and use the slider bar if you need to keep order.
What do I build when there are no buildings to build, but I don't have enough pop to build a settler? Military units just take up valuable money, and I don't need them.
I'd also be glad to post a picture, but I'd need someplace to host it, if you could suggest one
I'd also be glad to post a picture, but I'd need someplace to host it, if you could suggest one
Factor-X
Chieftain
When you dont have buildings or improvements to build you should start doing wealth, even if it only produces 1 gold... this helps out alot if youre running a deficit science research budget, keeps the impact on your economy to a low...
Bamspeedy
CheeseBob
deficit science research is largely ineffective on deity. It costs you ~60% more to research a tech than it does the AI, so you're not likely to 'cash-in' on techs you research, because the AI will beat you to them anyways. They not only can research faster than you, but they grow and build faster too. For a 400-shield wonder, the AI only needs 240 shields for it.
It is possible to beat the AI to some techs if you research the techs the AI tends to avoid, or if AI contacts are pretty limited. You need to make contact with as many AI as possible, and preferably before they have writing. This is because you can then trade techs between them before they all have contact with each other (and before they can demand contacts from you).
On higher levels, you sometimes have to accept the fact you won't always get any ancient wonders (most of the time). Some clever trading is needed on the high levels.
You can also get a ancient wonder with a pre-build, but even then you sometimes need to get the right map, so that the AI tech pace isn't so fast (so the wonder cascades end).
I bet in this case, since you were alone on a continent, all the AI were bunched up together, quickly trading techs with one another.
It is possible to beat the AI to some techs if you research the techs the AI tends to avoid, or if AI contacts are pretty limited. You need to make contact with as many AI as possible, and preferably before they have writing. This is because you can then trade techs between them before they all have contact with each other (and before they can demand contacts from you).
On higher levels, you sometimes have to accept the fact you won't always get any ancient wonders (most of the time). Some clever trading is needed on the high levels.
You can also get a ancient wonder with a pre-build, but even then you sometimes need to get the right map, so that the AI tech pace isn't so fast (so the wonder cascades end).
I bet in this case, since you were alone on a continent, all the AI were bunched up together, quickly trading techs with one another.
Grille
panel insect
It's sometimes a good move to not build TGL (difficult anyways) and make a raid on the TGL city somewhat later (when at least 2 known ais are about to finish the middle ages techs). Just avoid education: Then, you could even get those past-education techs.
it doesn't really matter in the medium run if you avoid education.. with TGL you will get education as soon as two other civs have it.. which can be fairly quick on higher levels..
it makes more sense to trade techs since other civs take much less time to research.. this way, you can store golds for armies at the same time..
Grille
panel insect
The Great Library is worthless for you when you know education, so you want to avoid that tech when planning a raid on TGL.
Well, I was referring to a similar scenario TerriaMachine described. He was researching Feudalism and another civ (England) just comleted Adam Smith's, showing a big gap in techs. Assuming there's at least another known ai civ that's at the same tech level with England, shutting down any own research (avoiding education, that is) and capturing TGL will give you all these techs. Basically, in this case, the benefits of TGL vanish in the turn after you gain education for free.
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