Nobles' Club 310: Gandhi of India

[redstar]

I have some questions about the way the modern game is played. I've not seen anyone specialise cities? I would generally have science cities but would try and have a couple of production cities where there were hills etc. In my game above I had a production city but because of too many plains it only grew to size 5. I guess that may answer the question?

The modern game at high levels seems to be about rapid expansion to a good core of cities. Then get a Library and Granary in those. Expand a second wave as much as possible. Keep good diplomacy. Tech and trade, to prepare for war. Then I'm guessing you use all the cities to draft/whip an army and start to conquer the world?

Do you really not get many buildings past Library? The builder in me feels unsatisfied but I can see how expensive buildings get past that.

Do you micromanage cities or let the game manage worked tiles? I find it does a pretty good job but doesn't always do what you want and can change it's mind when a city gets near the happy cap etc.

Finally, how do you deal with Barbs with only Warriors? You have to be really careful as if you meet an Archer and your Warrior is on anything other than a Forrested Hill then it's generally good bye to the Warrior! Do you take risks? Replace lost Warriors?

 

[konata_LS]

From T156 to T224:

Spoiler :

Settings:

I was confused about what to build and research after Astro. Also didn't know which AI I should attack first. So I watched some semi-iso LP videos to find inspiration. Decided to attack Charlie first, as his land was nice and close. No need of ships or State property to attack him. Plus he only had 7 cities.

Lib Chemistry. Maybe lib Steel would have been better, but the AIs caught up quite fast after they made peace. Hanni and Hatty were already researching education. So I just made the safe choice and lib Chemistry.

On T188, bad news: Shaka capitulated to Cathy

Cathy and Shaka DoW Hatty in 1370AD. Sold Gunpowder to Hatty for 400 because I didn't want Hatty capitulate to Cathy. They probably made peace through AP (AP is Hindu). Fortunately Hatty didn't lose a single city during that war.

According to "Know your enemy", AI Gandhi's code includes:

Base attitude towards human player: +2
Builds units: 0/10
Can plot war at Pleased: Nope ​

But when a human chooses to play as Gandhi, the human's code includes:

Base attitude towards AIs: -100 ​

Builds units: 100/10
Can plot war at Friendly: always ​

​

Who cares about PRO. Who cares about all these CG3 longbows in hill cities. Soon my numberless cannons shall destroy you all

A full health CR1 cannon lost to a wounded knight in the city. How could it be possible

AI's city placement was terrible. If Charlie hadn't built Mids here, I would have razed this city as it killed a fish:

I guess that Copper was randomly discovered by Charlie..? as in the ancient era, Charlie didn't have metal before he got IW. With Copper, Iron, double resources, and 2 settled GGenerals, Aachen will be my HE city

Charlie disappeared on T224

PRO longbows were nasty. Rampage of knights and maces was annoying as well.

Have 15 cities now. Thanks to the experience from high level players' LP videos, this time I didn't go on strike or fall behind too much after the war . Several AIs have MT, so I probably need Rifles for the naval invasion. Also have to start building galleons. But before Rifling, I want to get State property asap, because the maintenance of 15 cities is already high.

A troublesome religious lovefest began in the big continent: Hanni was initially Jewish but converted to Hindu several turns ago, which made him under the same religion of Cathy & Shaka. As a result, they became friendly towards each other and may sign a defensive pact . The good side is, Hanni and Cathy have similar number of cities, so the peace vassal is unlikely to happen between them.

 

[chinemol]

@redstar in the higher difficulties the game goes quite fast, so you won't have time left for those buildings to pay up the invested hammers. maybe in a no tech trading game. you can automate the worked tiles after say medieval age. otherwise try to step down the difficulty. sure you get vices, but the game is more enjoyable as it allows you to build more, trade less and not focus on every detail

@konata_LS

Spoiler :

get communism before going overseas and get those cannons some nice action. watch out for catherine

 

[redstar]

@redstar in the higher difficulties the game goes quite fast, so you won't have time left for those buildings to pay up the invested hammers. maybe in a no tech trading game. you can automate the worked tiles after say medieval age. otherwise try to step down the difficulty. sure you get vices, but the game is more enjoyable as it allows you to build more, trade less and not focus on every detail

Interesting, thanks! I see why people talk about what level the game is balanced. The AI has to cheat to compete with the player but that means the player has to do optimal strategies to win.

 

[Izuul]

Some later buildings occasionally make sense in certain cities or situations. If you have a really strong Bureaucracy capital you may want a university or observatory, or even a market, bank, or grocer. If you capture a strong holy site that is making a lot of GPT, you frequently want those gold multiplying buildings there. Courthouses can make sense for an ORG leader if you have a lot of cities and are bleeding gold.

I'm going to ramble for a minute now...

In general it's very, very difficult to win on the higher difficulties without doing significant warring. In very special cases you can win via culture without going to war and capturing cities, but even something like diplomacy (via UN) generally requires warring - sometimes even extensive warring. Researching deep in the tech tree without falling way behind the AI requires a lot more land and cities than you are going to be able to settle on your own. So now that you start every game of Civ 4 with the assumption that you will need to go war you have to decide two main things at some point.

1) When to start the first war - I'm not really going to get into this one right now, but it's something you will learn and get better at with more experience

2) Can you win the game with the same units you use in the first war and, if not, how far will you have to tech to do so?

The second question plays a big part in how many buildings you are going to build. If you plan to start your first war with cuirassiers, you may be able to win the game with just those units, and that is something that's possible to do quite often on Immortal and below. So if you think you can tech to Military Tradition (worst case Rifling for cavs) and then just win the game, it doesn't make sense to build many buildings past granaries, libraries, barracks, and maybe some stables. On the other hand, if you are playing against Deity AI and think you may need to go deep into the tech tree to win the game, building some more buildings could absolutely make sense.

It's also easier to make those decisions with experience because you will get a feel for the pace of the game and the overall situation.

 

[sampsa]

I've not seen anyone specialise cities?

In general, I don't specialize cities in the early game. I don't have a thing like "production city" really. If you need for units, you'll find ways. Chops, whips, overflow. Every city with and a granary is a settler/worker pump (optimally always whipped!). I guess a city focused on fail gold or wonders is a thing, but I wouldn't stagnate growth for that usually, if it's possible to grow. Build mines only if you can't do anything better. -farm is often a thing only after the first golden age, meaning GLib+NE type of stuff. During the 1st golden age every city with strong is a -farm.

In another words, there is no static city specialization. Specialization is very dynamic and usually the whole empire is doing one thing at a time.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Some later buildings occasionally make sense in certain cities or situations. If you have a really strong Bureaucracy capital you may want a university or observatory, or even a market, bank, or grocer. If you capture a strong holy site that is making a lot of GPT, you frequently want those gold multiplying buildings there. Courthouses can make sense for an ORG leader if you have a lot of cities and are bleeding gold.

I'm going to ramble for a minute now...

In general it's very, very difficult to win on the higher difficulties without doing significant warring. In very special cases you can win via culture without going to war and capturing cities, but even something like diplomacy (via UN) generally requires warring - sometimes even extensive warring. Researching deep in the tech tree without falling way behind the AI requires a lot more land and cities than you are going to be able to settle on your own. So now that you start every game of Civ 4 with the assumption that you will need to go war you have to decide two main things at some point.

1) When to start the first war - I'm not really going to get into this one right now, but it's something you will learn and get better at with more experience

2) Can you win the game with the same units you use in the first war and, if not, how far will you have to tech to do so?

The second question plays a big part in how many buildings you are going to build. If you plan to start your first war with cuirassiers, you may be able to win the game with just those units, and that is something that's possible to do quite often on Immortal and below. So if you think you can tech to Military Tradition (worst case Rifling for cavs) and then just win the game, it doesn't make sense to build many buildings past granaries, libraries, barracks, and maybe some stables. On the other hand, if you are playing against Deity AI and think you may need to go deep into the tech tree to win the game, building some more buildings could absolutely make sense.

It's also easier to make those decisions with experience because you will get a feel for the pace of the game and the overall situation.

When you elite players go for the cuirassier rush, do you typically not use siege to take advantage of the movement bonus?

 

[redstar]

When you elite players go for the cuirassier rush, do you typically not use siege to take advantage of the movement bonus?

In Henrik's video he explains that the Cuirassier is much more powerful than Medieval units like the Longbowman. Even with Culture Defense or Walls your Cuirassier have a resonable chance to win, 20% or so. It's not much but when you add the base Withdraw Chance 15% and and another 10% from Flanking I they have a decent chance to survive. If they don't survive the defender will be weakened and a second Cuirassier can finish them off.

So you'll need at least twice as many Cuirassier as defenders in the City, some with Flanking I and some with Combat I. You use the movement speed to keep the attack moving fast so the enemy can't build up the defences.

You can use the same principle at the start with Chariots. Before Culture Defense Chariots have a resonable chance to beat an Archer in a City.

 

[drewisfat]

When you elite players go for the cuirassier rush, do you typically not use siege to take advantage of the movement bonus?

Correct, it generally doesn't make sense to use 1 and 2 movers together. Cuirassiers and Horse Archers are the "best" horse units because of their timing. Cuirassiers are the first gunpowder horse (ignores walls/castles), and HAs are early enough that hopefully you can attack before the enemy has walls/culture. Knights are the worst horse unit because they arrive at peak medieval defenses and they're in a bad spot on the tech tree to rush. Cavalry are ok, mostly as a continuation of cuirassiers rather than their own push. Chariots, a couple can be built in the initial build-up to HAs and serve as mop-up and a medic. The unique two-movers (impi and musketeers) can be used in conjunction with HAs and Cuirs respectively. Pre-gunpowder spies can be used in conjunction with 2-movers to quickly city revolt cities, or when on a budget, to destroy walls.

 

[AspiringScholar]

What a clean, quality and informative video. Thanks for the reference!

I remember like 14 years ago the chariot rush used to be popular here, so I wouldn't have guessed that you would only mention them wrt HA upgrades. That was back when BtS was new though, and the game was still being learned I suppose. At Monarch, I most often strongly considered going straight for BW if I discover horses with AH and then whip/chopping 10 or so as soon as possible, provided that the prospective target isn't farther away than about 7-9 tiles and isn't protective. I wouldn't personally deign to bother with an opener rush against protective archers right off the bat. I never "graduated" from monarch but the chariot rush consistently worked pretty well for me at that level. I guess at deity it's just not feasible?

EDIT: And too bad regarding the knight... It has a high hammer cost and requires 2 strategic resources. It seems like it should ideally be a little more effective, given its iconic status for its era of warfare.

 

[drewisfat]

Can always play with Justinian. The cataphract is a significant enough bonus to make the unit very strong. I've also had pure espionage economy games, where Knight rushes were ok because the major weaknesses were accounted for (I wasn't bulbing / rushing lib, so I could just steal my way through guilds, and I had plenty of points for full city revolts). And ultimately you can make anything work, it's just a matter of what's most efficient or how luck dependent it is. A pure chariot rush could work very well against an AI that's right next to you, isn't protective/creative, and you have BFC horses. It could also just fail spectacularly to like a single spearman. However, a War Chariot rush is about the strongest attack in the game.

 

[Izuul]

War Chariots and Immortals can both be very strong for super early rushes. The general idea with both of them is to get them ASAP and go try to prevent the AI from connecting metal.

Plain chariots might work on Emperor and below, but it's very difficult to do anything successful with them above that. Chariots have really poor odds against fortified archers.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Cool, good to know regarding the chariots. The difficulty curve of RI has been so steep that this conversation makes me want to try a vanilla game on Immortal to see how I fare. Probably won't win but might be surprised to see a play improvement. I won a duel deity game once more than a decade ago but I don't really count that as taking me above monarch.

 

[konata_LS]

Emperor from T225 to T263

Spoiler :

It seems, for a noob like me, jumping into actions without much planning would only lead to a series of wrong decisions. So I watched some LP videos about semi-isolation then played the game more slowly than I often do with Pangaea-ish games.

After State property and Rifles, hesitated for a while about the war target, as both Hatty and Lincoln were weak. Hatty was far while Lincoln was close. Both Hanni and Cathy already got RP but they were all Annoyed towards Hatty, which decided me to attack Hatty first. Even Cathy/Hanni were at peace with Hatty at the moment, it was only a matter of time for them to plot wars against an annoyed neighbour. Once Hanni or Cathy DoW Hatty again, she would have no hope to defend against Carthaginian Cavs or Russian Cossacks. I need to vassal Hatty before she capitulated to Cathy or Hannibal.

Hatty beeline Electricity-Radio but still used War chariots + catapults . As I said, she had no way to defend against Cathy/Hanni.

Even a push-over Hatty had 2 GGenerals settled in her capital, from her previous wars against Hanni and Cathy

Making Hatty become my vassal is better than letting her capitulate to someone else.

Doing something unusual to avoid losing the game to AP: I spread Buddhism to Lincoln who had no religion. Cathy built Hindu AP; Shaka, Cathy, Hatty, and Hanni were all AP members. Charlie spread Buddhism throughout my continent, so no auto-spread of Hindu to me. But once the war against Hatty started, I would inevitably capture Hindu cities and become AP member as well. In this case, if Hinduism randomly spreads to Lincoln, that'll immediately activate religious victory conditions and I would probably lose the game. To avoid a loss due to AP, I had to prevent Lincoln from becoming an AP member. Usually I don't spread religions to the AIs, but some extra of building missionaries are better than losing the game.

Hatty built much less units than Charlie did.

Unlike some AIs such Willem or Pacal who ignore Rifling, Hannibal got both early Rifling and MS :

To make things worse, Hanni has been plotting for a while

Hanni is Friendly with Cathy, Cautious towards me, Annoyed towards Lincoln and my vassal Hatty, so his target can be anyone other than Cathy. I think before making further decisions, I need to scout Hanni's land and stack. If Hanni's target is me, that may be indeed dangerous, as Hanni will bribe Cathy (she's friendly towards Hanni) & her vassal Shaka to attack me . I don't think Hatty will help me much during the war, as Hatty is among the AIs who prefer building Broadway to building Rifles even during war-time . I mean - me defending against Hanni's invasion is definitely doable, but surviving three AIs' (Hanni, Shaka, Cathy) joint attack would be ...

 

[konata_LS]

From T263 to T311

Spoiler :

Finally got enough time to finish this game

Hannibal demanded Electricity to me on T270 and I said yes (thanks for demanding that, I badly needed the 10 turns peace treaty because my reinforcement was still on boat). Next turn he DoW Lincoln

But Hanni invaded Lincoln with only...1 Galleon

Given that my reinforcement just passed through Lincoln's land, I sent my reinforcement to attack Lincoln. He capitulated after only losing 2 cities, as he beeline Physics and ignored Gunpowder

Cathy was plotting for a while.

She had a big stack near Hatty's border, so her target was definitely Hatty and me.

But before the war vs Cathy, I needed to get Hanni to pleased and beg 1 from Hanni so that Hanni wouldn't be bribed into the war against me for 10 turns. I said yes to all Hanni's demands, and even traded my Oil to Hanni for "our trade relations have been fair and forthright" bonus:

Built a bigger stack, begged 1 from Hanni. Then DoW Cathy and her vassal Shaka:

We have enough on our hands right now

Wiped out Cathy's stack. Next turn the war weariness was soaring in all my cities, combined with emancipation anger. Indian UB became really nice under such circumstance, as I only needed to run 20% instead of 30% or 40%. Cathy capitulated soon after she lost her capital and some core cities:

Shaka capitulated the same turn:

As I mentioned above, Hanni's land had no Oil. So Hanni wouldn't be able to build any tanks once I attacked him

Hanni captured a barb city Chinook, but it had no oil neither

A weird thing in my game was Hanni beeline Mass media while skipping AL . He probably turned off research and was trying to win culture. Some Carthaginian cities were guarded by SAM inf. with sword and axe

Tanks against rifles. Hanni quickly gave up. As shown in the screenshot below, Hanni was actually quite advanced and had several techs ahead. He just skipped AL and Industrialism, two important military techs.

Next turn, conquest

Built some tanks, also upgraded cannons to arty. Sieges were really nice for intercontinental warfare, as attacking with enough sieges usually led to small losses.

Marines were good protection against AIs' arty.

The events at the end of the game showed Shaka DoW Cathy in 25BC; they were busy killing each other for more than a thousand years.

Hannibal marched across a continent to attack Hatty in 600AD

Some thoughts about the map:

Spoiler :

Among recent semi-iso NC games, I feel this map is slightly harder than NC 289. I'm not saying Gandhi is not as good as WvO - both are strong leaders. What makes this map more challenging is the opponents on the other continents. In NC 289 we don't have FIN AIs, and Toku is famous for his slow tech pace and troublemaking (he often DoW an AI and the war slows down them both). By contrast, in this map we have a strong opponent AI Hannibal who can peacefully expand to 10+ cities. Shaka is a poor techer, but he have some fellow low-peaceweight AIs as trading partners.

Semi-isolation is not suggested for people who are moving to a new difficulty. OTOH, this NC offers interesting learning opportunities for people who want to practise semi-isolation at a level they're used to, thought the learning process may come with some frustration.
With a SPI leader, this map also provides decent challenges in terms of diplomacy, for example switch out of a heathen religion to trade with some zealots then switch back, or adopt free market for 5 turns to make Hannibal happy and beg. This map may give people surprising discoveries: the big continent is very far from my own, even with circumnavigation bonus, my fleet needs at least 5 turns to reach the front. AIs' destroyers were also annoying and sunk several of my ships. I got Flight from my vassal Hatty, built some airports and used "Airlift" function - something I never did in Pangaea-ish games. Airlift moves a unit to the front on the same turn; it's much faster than ships and free from AIs' naval attack.

Experienced Deity players such as sampsa or Izuul definitely know how to handle the semi-isolation. But for new players who are not used to semi-isolation, copying the tech path or build order in Pangaea games to semi-isolation would probably lead to doubtful results. There are some useful references I've found:

• SGOTM 11, leader is Gandhi, also semi-isolation + double corn forests start. There are many valuable discussions in each team's thread. SGOTM11 only accepted UN or culture victories, which make things more interesting
• Lain's video LP Deity 2, leader is Peter (a PHI leader like Gandhi), semi-isolation
• Henrik's video Deity 51, leader is Suleiman (a PHI leader like Gandhi), semi-isolation

Many of my mistakes in the early game would have been avoided if I had watched/read these three games. For example if I had read some discussions in SGOTM11 before starting NC310, I would probably have finished both Mids and GLH instead of hoping for failgold. If I re-watched Lain's Peter game and Henrik's Sully videos before rushing into the first 100 turns, I would have built more cottages and less roads.

Thanks for the map . NC games give great practise to new players and help them play better. Though at the moment I need to focus on real life and probably won't have much time to play civ 4, at least before Christmas.

Satan's voice : "just one more turn" until 5 a.m. and fall asleep at work next day !
: Gaming is good in moderation. Don't lose your job or fail your exam due to excessive gaming