newbie having some trouble getting started...

[WinMar]

Well, i just played my first game of Civilization III, i must admit that im quite new to the civ-series (played my first Civ 2 game 1 month ago) and Civ 2 is going quite well but i got problems with Civ 3, my cities always get corrupted before i can build a temple and my researching is going to slow! Ill usually go like this:

Town - Warrior - Settler - Town - Warrior - Settler until im satisfied and then i build about 2 workers, building some mines and roads. Granary in some cities and Temples in some... but im really kinda stuck... any good tips for a starter?

Im sure there been 1000 of these threads.. please delete this if its not appropriate...

 

[Shillen]

Cracker's Civ3 Opening Plays Site. Read it. Study it. Memorize it.

 

[nihil8r]

try playing a commercial or religous civ at first. the commercial civs have less corruption and religous civs let you build temples and such faster.

 

[zagnut]

Yes, try nihil8r's suggestion. Also, play on a small map and choose opponents who are not militaristic. The militaristic civs have more of a tendancy to attack you. You want to be in a position to attack them.

Shillen is absolutely right about Cracker's treatise. However, it might be a little overwhelming for a new player. Just be patient. Play a lot of different, small games and you will start to see some trends and learn some tactics.

You shouldn't be suffering from corruption in your capital. It is virtually corruption-proof. There is no one formula for starting or winning. However, that being said, here is advice from Moonsinger, one of the best players:

"1. Start your first city at 4000BC and tell it to build 2 warriors. If you don't have Pottery, research it now and set your science slider to 100%. You will discover Pottery within about 15 turns.

2. After building the first 2 warriors, set it to build a great wonder, barracks, temple, or whatever, that takes the longest time to build. Note: we just want to store the shields at this point. Once we discover Pottery, we will immediately switch it to build a granary. In the mean time, road and irrigate the food bonus tiles within the city. After the granary is built, set the city to continuously produce settlers. That's it. We now have a settler production structure in place.

3. Find a good spot to build your second city (make sure it gets good shield production and not too far from your capital) and immediately build a barracks. After the barracks is done, set this cities to continuously produce military units. That's it. We now have a war production structure in place.

4. Depend on your playing style, do what you will with the rest of your cities. "

She is suggesting that you build a city that can produce settlers fast so that you can go out and settle as much territory as possible in the early game. That is what the AI is doing and you have to match them.

If you want, upload a game and I will take a look at it and give you some advice. Go to the bottom of any page and click on the Upload Button. Then put a link on this page to the uploaded game.

 

[Babbler]

Originally posted by Shillen
Cracker's Civ3 Opening Plays Site. Read it. Study it. Memorize it.

Realy, I could not understand what cracker was talking about!!! It descends into number crunching and self-made techobabble fast than a science textbook. Not have anything agiest cracker or any of his adhearents of civ3 methodolgy. It just does not make any seance to me. Still check if you want.

Anyway, also look at the vairous Civ3 War Academy artitles and forum posts for some more understandable tips and ticks here at Civfantics.

Remember that there is multipy ways of playing game. Try play on different settings with different civs with diferent optitions. That why so many love the game, because of infintie gameplay styles and possiblities.

Any finaly, just go play the game. Like anything in life pracite make perfect. Go and try out even if it seem it is impossible to win often I find that doing thing different, you pull and overtake the ai rivals

Hope you win,

 

[Sirp]

I have to say, I don't think there are any decent tutorials which teach a new player how to win. Besides having some points I disagree with, cracker's tutorial does involve complex terminology and number-crunching which is not going to be easy for a new player to understand.

Moonsinger's advice is pretty sound, albeit brief. It'd be great if someone were to write a more comprehensive tutorial for beginners.

-Sirp.

 

[TedJackson]

As another newbie I've found looking at the GOTM (Game of the Month), especially the QSC (Quick Start Challenge) timelines extremey helpful.

Reading how more experienced players tackle the opening moves should also help you to understand what Cracker is gettiing at.

Working out (with pen & paper if necessary) what those early squares are really worth can make a huge difference to how your game plays out.


regards

Ted

 

[Renata]

Just one point based on something you mentioned. You said your build order was something like town warrior settler town warrior setter etc. That's the same thing I did when I started civ 3 and it's straight out of civ 2. Civ 2 made producing multiple units from the same town awkward at best due to city-specific upkeep costs. In Civ 3 the cost is spread over the whole civ so there's no drawback to dedicating one city purely to unit production for extended periods of time.

Another difference between civ 3 and civ 2 is the greater corruption in civ 3. Early cities built under despotism before you have enough workers to attach them with roads can be quite corrupt. Generally your first 2 or three, built on the best available nearby land close to the capital, are ok, but cities after that don't tend to produce much early.

Add those two factors together, and building a settler from each new city as you found it becomes a very inefficient way to expand. Instead, try building multiple settlers from a single city at a time, preferably the one with the most best combined food/shields potential (often your capital; otherwise usually your second city). Your other cities can supply the units and infrastructure (and the occasional settler), and you'll expand much faster that way.

This works best if your settler city is well developed with irrigated bonus food and lots of mines, which is pretty much what Cracker's article gets at.

Renata

 

[WinMar]

thanks for all the great advices, i guess i imported most of what I've learned in Civ 2 to Civ 3 and clearly thats not the right way to go. I will study the tutorial by cracker later, because frankly, its kinda hard to understand but still it sounds like its crucial to learn.

I will start a game now and go with a comercial civilization and please continue with the advice if you want, i've also looked through a couple of threads for beginners and so on and i hope i will play a better game this time.

EDIT : i got one more question, what does "OCC game" means?, just wondering.. heh

 

[col]

It means One City Challenge.

You play the whole game with just one city - and win. And yes its been done all the way up to and including deity.

 

[Ralph-x]

Civ 2 -> 3 takes some time, bit after a couple of games I found out how things have changed, and would say its mostly for the good.

Like most have said here, not settlers require 2 pop to build, letting a city grow to 5/6 pop and building a granary then churing out settlers gets you places alot faster because it can keep the population up better. Also positioning of citys is IMHO more important. Look for bonues within the first 9 tiles because you wont be able to use the others till you get a temple.

I read Crackers turtorial and get very lost, its more for people who know how to play the game but want to do so better.

 

[H00se Neckts]

This seems like a good place to ask.

I've seen a lot of things on sci rate and research. What is the most ideal point in the game to stop buying techs and start researching them yourself?

 

[Shillen]

I really struggled with my first few games of CivIII. I had never even played civ2 before, only CTP and civI a long time ago. I lost several chieftain games and finally managed to beat one with an ucky histograph win. After that I discovered Cracker's opening plays site and it just totally changed everything for me. Right after reading that I was able to beat warlord easily, then went to regent and that was easy too. I don't know, I didn't find it that complex at all and it was just what I needed.

 

[Renata]

Well the tutorial does get into a lot of arkana about things like whether a wheat-on-grassland is a more or less powerful tile than a cow-on-plains and whether or not that's still true post-despotism etc etc. The tables and such may be a little more detail than most want to get into. But I agree it's fairly easy to abstract three or four useful concepts out of that will help your game a lot.

@ hoose - Not an easy question. Probably depends a lot on what sort of victory you want, as well as what level you're playing at (more self-research needed at lower levels). But it's possible to go to either extreme at most levels (i.e. never buy a tech or never self-research), and still win.

Renata

 

[H00se Neckts]

Thanks Renata. That helps a little bit more... cuz I've looked at Cracker's tips, and they're all pretty much common sense tips, and stuff you can find in the book.

Can someone help me out though? In my current game, regent level, (ive started on regent since first game, not the kind of person to start small. Should I ?) i started getting really behind in the middle ages tech around things like feudalism, invention, banking, and stuff like that. I feel like I'm taking to long of a time to switch from "buying techs" to "researching techs." By this point in the game it's either not cost effective to keep buying techs, and when I try to get my sci rate up to 90-100% I always start losing heeps of money every turn. Any hints?

 

[zagnut]

On Regent level, by the middle of the middle ages you should be about equal with the AI in the tech race. YOu don't have to be researching at 90%-100% to be there. Try to balance the science/luxury sliders so that you have a positive cash flow and relatively happy/content people. First move all the sliders to zero. Then move up the luxury slider until you have most of your population in balance. By that I mean that you don't have more unhappy people than happy people. Some cities are always a problem, and with them you might have to choose an entertainer to keep from going into unrest. Don't let that trouble you.

Once your pop is stabilized, you should have some positive cash flow left. Use it up by increasing your science slider until you are just in the positive cash flow range. I would guess that you might now show 20% luxuries and 60% science. That should allow you to research a new tech in about 10 turns.

Of course, I am guessing here, not having seen your game. But if you are not somewhat close to what I am proposing then you probably have not developed your infrastructure enough. By this I mean you do not have enough workers who are developing the most powerful squares around your cities. It is important early on to develop the most powerful squares because they continue to pump out their resources turn after turn. Why develop a square that only gives you one shield when right next to it is an undeveloped square that could have given you 2 shields every turn from the beginning of the game? These are the kinds of decisions that you make early on that help you keep up by the time you reach the Middle Ages.

Hope this helps you get going. If you want, upload a copy of your game and we will take a look at it. Use the Upload button in the bottom right corner of the page. Once your file is uploaded, right click on it and copy a shortcut that you can post in this thread.

 

[H00se Neckts]

This should be my game, I uploaded the file. me n0ob.

I'm confused, I uploaded zip + sav. changed name like 4 times, nothing works. I put the link http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads3/filename.(sav/zip).

Now I try to edit the message and I can't add attachments.

Does this work: ?

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads3/Hoose game 50bc.sav

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I found this one.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads3/h00se_-_russian_50bc.zip

Is it correct?

Remember, the file server is case specific. Spaces in the file name aren't good, either. And yes, your best bet is to ZIP the file first. --Padma