Please advice me in this game

[andersw]

Hi.

I'm struggling on Prince (noble is mostly too easy for me).
This time I actually managed to do fairly well (this far atleast) w/o financial, industrious or organized leader (my fav traits).

My preferred tactics usually runs along the line, rush neighbour, build useful wonders wich I have recourses for and just generally pushing my borders by force.
I often have trouble with the diplo thing in this game.
I'm also not very good at knowing where/when to run specialists nor how many.

This time I wasn't able to rush any neighbours, I got col first but switched back to judaism fairly quick since I didn't want to be everyones peck.

Ragnar is the only one warring this far (against alliances that I've joined as well).

Since none of my neighbours are industrious I've been able to put up a considerable amount of wonders.
Actually this game is leaning more and more towards my old crappy playing tactics where I'd just build and build and ... well you get the point.

I think I should go after Catherine (you heretic), however if I expand my empire a lot more the economy will be seeing trouble .. or?

I play with bts 313 and bhrurics general bundle I also us random climate/sea hence the cold climate/low sea.

Edit: forgot to mention I'm playing as Lincoln.

regards
Anders

 

[Sisiutil]

It's admirable to get out of your comfort zone and play with traits you're not used to, but when you do that, give some thought as to how to best exploit those traits rather than just relying on old habits. If you're not careful, your strategy can actually be counter-productive to your chosen leader's strengths.

This game looks thus far like a good example of what I'm talking about. First off, Lincoln is Charismatic. That means his units earn promotions faster. There's only one way to do that: war. So by developing peacefully thus far, you've let one of your leader's traits effectively go to waste. Fortunately, it's not too late to correct that situation. But remember this in the future when playing as a Charismatic leader: war early and war often to optimize your use of that trait.

Why would you want to war on this map? Several reasons. Having 8 cities by 900 AD isn't bad, but 4 of them are in low-quality territory (in all that tundra, thanks to the "cold climate" map setting), and one of them (Frisco) is in a bad spot because of three other civilizations' cultural pressure. You also also have a strange mix of farms and cottages around your cities. This means your second trait, Philosophical, is also going to waste, because you don't have enough food-rich cities to run the extra specialists that will give you more Great People. Cottage one city (more on this below) and farm all the others to run specialists.

Catherine is definitely an attractive target (in more ways than one ). Look at all that lovely grassland and riverside terrain she has! And some very nice resources, too. I would have claimed that territory sooner rather than now, but as I said, it's not too late to get started. It looks as though many of your cities have decent production, so I'd produce nothing but military units for several turns. You may want to queue-build them and then switch to some XP-granting civics (Vassalage, Theocracy) before churning them out. Then go take out Russia the way America always wanted to.

As for the economic impact of war, never let this frighten you. Once the war is complete, you'll recover inside of 20-50 turns. Build Courthouses in all your new cities. Since you're Philosophical, run a specialist economy: improve most of your tiles with farms and run merchant specialists (build marketplaces and grocers and/or run Caste System). The extra income from the merchants will help you get back on track in no time. Also remember that 18 cities running the science slider at 50% will outdo 8 cities running it at 80%. (And if you run a SE, you can even run the slider down at 0% while still researching with adequate speed.)

Other points:

• When I run a SE, I usually like to cottage the capital should be cottaged to leverage the Bureaucracy civic. This capital doesn't really lend itself to that--it's more production-oriented, which you've used to fill it with wonders. Frankly, you don't have a good cottage city, something that I would have also used as impetus to go warring early. Now Yakutsk, with all that riverside grassland, would make a dandy cottage city. Take it first in the war, build its infrastructure, and move the capital there ASAP.
• You're researching Divine Right? For pity's sake, why? DR is a tech I almost always skip unless I'm Spiritual (for the Spiral Minaret to boost my cheap temples). Let the AI waste time researching it. Switch to Guilds so you can build Knights for your upcoming war.
• Go get Feudalism from Mansa or Charlemagne. You'll need Vassalage for the XPs and Longbows to defend the cities you capture.
• I'd trade just about every wonder you built for the Great Library. Seriously. Even though you don't have marble. You're Philosophical, so having two free scientists plus the GP points from the GL plays into that. It's probably too late now, though--Mansa has Literature and marble and he's probably almost got it finished. But the point here is that you need to address your wonder addiction, which will get you into serious trouble on the higher levels. Don't just build wonders for which you have the accelerating resource; go after wonders that will suit your overall strategy.

Now go build some units and give Catherine a sound spanking. You know she wants you to.

 

[andersw]

Thanks

This game looks thus far like a good example of what I'm talking about. First off, Lincoln is Charismatic. That means his units earn promotions faster. There's only one way to do that: war. So by developing peacefully thus far, you've let one of your leader's traits effectively go to waste. Fortunately, it's not too late to correct that situation. But remember this in the future when playing as a Charismatic leader: war early and war often to optimize your use of that trait.
This is the sort of advice I really need.

Why would you want to war on this map? Several reasons. Having 8 cities by 900 AD isn't bad, but 4 of them are in low-quality territory (in all that tundra, thanks to the "cold climate" map setting), and one of them (Frisco) is in a bad spot because of three other civilizations' cultural pressure.

I wanted to backfill my area, to get those strategic resources and also to be able to build military faster.

You also also have a strange mix of farms and cottages around your cities. This means your second trait, Philosophical, is also going to waste, because you don't have enough food-rich cities to run the extra specialists that will give you more Great People. Cottage one city (more on this below) and farm all the others to run specialists.

Yes, this is where I lack mostly, I don't specialize each city enough.
Should maybe try a noble game and really get in to specialists....

Catherine is definitely an attractive target (in more ways than one ). Look at all that lovely grassland and riverside terrain she has! And some very nice resources, too. I would have claimed that territory sooner rather than now, but as I said, it's not too late to get started.
It took me too long to grab strat resources otherwise I'd rushed her.

It looks as though many of your cities have decent production, so I'd produce nothing but military units for several turns. You may want to queue-build them and then switch to some XP-granting civics (Vassalage, Theocracy) before churning them out. Then go take out Russia the way America always wanted to.
How long does the build stay before you loose production when you queue up?

As for the economic impact of war, never let this frighten you. Once the war is complete, you'll recover inside of 20-50 turns. Build Courthouses in all your new cities. Since you're Philosophical, run a specialist economy: improve most of your tiles with farms and run merchant specialists (build marketplaces and grocers and/or run Caste System). The extra income from the merchants will help you get back on track in no time. Also remember that 18 cities running the science slider at 50% will outdo 8 cities running it at 80%. (And if you run a SE, you can even run the slider down at 0% while still researching with adequate speed.)
Right this was not a problem.

[*]When I run a SE, I usually like to cottage the capital should be cottaged to leverage the Bureaucracy civic. This capital doesn't really lend itself to that--it's more production-oriented, which you've used to fill it with wonders. Frankly, you don't have a good cottage city, something that I would have also used as impetus to go warring early. Now Yakutsk, with all that riverside grassland, would make a dandy cottage city. Take it first in the war, build its infrastructure, and move the capital there ASAP.
Right, I need to learn to move my capital.

[*]You're researching Divine Right? For pity's sake, why? DR is a tech I almost always skip unless I'm Spiritual (for the Spiral Minaret to boost my cheap temples). Let the AI waste time researching it. Switch to Guilds so you can build Knights for your upcoming war.
Spriraling minaret was for money, oh well maybe not a good choice ....

[*]Go get Feudalism from Mansa or Charlemagne. You'll need Vassalage for the XPs and Longbows to defend the cities you capture.
[*]I'd trade just about every wonder you built for the Great Library. Seriously. Even though you don't have marble. You're Philosophical, so having two free scientists plus the GP points from the GL plays into that. It's probably too late now, though--Mansa has Literature and marble and he's probably almost got it finished. But the point here is that you need to address your wonder addiction, which will get you into serious trouble on the higher levels. Don't just build wonders for which you have the accelerating resource; go after wonders that will suit your overall strategy.
Yeah, I should've built more units in my capital instead of those wonders.
Indeed Mansa did build the GL.

I did roll over Catherine and vassaled her and proceeded over and did the same with Ragnar.
I got to the point where I now could choose how to win, I want to try for spacerace rather than domination and the only real threat is a mansa cultural win. I managed to get steel from liberalism and got gspy from communism.
Of course I did build the statue of lib and kremlin

Oh and with railroads I managed to get 88 base production in my capital, haha.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

@ Sisiutil:

I know you're a much better and more experienced player than me, but I'm not sure I agree fundamentally on charismatic wanting to war immediately. Of the warmonger traits, charismatic is the only one that's got an economic boost in there, and it comes early! +2 (assuming you use monuments) is huge early on, and the extra citizens don't exactly hurt the philosophical Lincoln.

Now, he's in 990 AD, which means he should have probably fought by now though . IMO best time for charismatic is after they've grown their cottages a bit (with org/fin leaders) or after they've just leveraged the in general. This usually seems to come around the time of swords/pults at the earliest, and any time after that. Those are considerable early game though. I'd say until monarchy or the mids, charismatic has as much economic potential as financial! Why not take advantage of this in the BC's and work extra tiles?

I agree on everything else though. Get a money city, and otherwise run specialists (I'm actually just learning to do this myself with Phil. leaders. I don't usually play them as I don't know SE well, though I don't seem to have a hard time with the other traits because they're either brainless economic traits like fin. or org, or they help my ridiculous warmongering tendency).

I'd go cathy too. I also recommend vassalage, not only for the longbows and charismatic xp, but because you have quite a few AI's around you. This lends itself to snowballing capitulations. With each AI you take, your power rating goes up and more fear you. After a while, they capitulate after you take a city or two . This makes warring quite easy on the economy!

 

[Sisiutil]

@ Sisiutil:

I know you're a much better and more experienced player than me, but I'm not sure I agree fundamentally on charismatic wanting to war immediately. Of the warmonger traits, charismatic is the only one that's got an economic boost in there, and it comes early! +2 (assuming you use monuments) is huge early on, and the extra citizens don't exactly hurt the philosophical Lincoln.

Now, he's in 990 AD, which means he should have probably fought by now though . IMO best time for charismatic is after they've grown their cottages a bit (with org/fin leaders) or after they've just leveraged the in general. This usually seems to come around the time of swords/pults at the earliest, and any time after that. Those are considerable early game though. I'd say until monarchy or the mids, charismatic has as much economic potential as financial! Why not take advantage of this in the BC's and work extra tiles?

Good points. As with everything in this game, it depends on the map. If you have room to expand, by all means do so. As andersw said, he was grabbing resources in the early game, and there are several desirable ones on this map. But yes, he's overdue for his first war.

Charismatic can also build up XPs fast by taking on barbarians in the meantime. In fact, I would have been tempted to leave those northern areas in the fog to see if any barb cities appeared there. If they appeared in good locations, you save yourself a Settler or two; if they don't, well, you were going to build Settlers for those sites anyway. Either way, your units are getting valuable XPs.

 

[Quotey]

Spriraling minaret was for money, oh well maybe not a good choice ....

Looks fine to me, if it's for the Minaret. Never liked the wonder myself though. 7g for 3 cities? ehhhhhh. And I can find better things to build than Cathedrals and Temples.

 

[AndiD]

The way I learned to use specialists consciously was by going for a Hybrid Economy (see the article). Basically, you keep cottaging as usual except for an Oxford city (focus on science specialists, beaker enhancing buildings, GL, academy, later Oxford) and a Wall Street city (merchant specialists as soon as you can go Caste System, gold enhancing buildings, Wall Street, ideally shrine, settle the GMs) with the idea of paying for all your upkeep.

Advantages for the SE beginner: Micromanagement down to two cities you deliberately choose right from the beginning and decent rewards with a consistent, predictable stream of GMs and GSs, especially as a Phil leader.

 

[silverbullet]

Hi,
I took a look at your save, and you seem to be doing quite well.
You have 2 options here - invest in infrastructure development or go for war quickly. Cathrine doesn't have longbowmen yet, so trebuchet and macemen will eat her cities for breakfast. I would personally wait, because your current land has already put you in a tech lead and going to war may leave you behind, but that is more a matter of a style of play then a specific advice

With all these wonders you are definitely in a lead, I would spend a while developing current cities before switching to war mode.
A few comments regarding how I would do things:
1) You are philosophical and have the pyramids. You are not financial. Run mainly specialists.
2) Literature has a much higher priority than Divine right. The GL is still up for grabs and it is one of the best wonders for a philosophical leader with pyramids. Even if you miss it, national epic is important.
3) Boston should have mainly farms. NO cottages. and spread irrigation to the rice for additional +1 food. Boston should not build army. it's not a production site. It should run specialists or whip infrastructure (market).
4) New York:
- dont run cottages.
- Don't work plains. Farmed plains just suck. Until biology ignore them. treat them as desert. New York should farm over its 2 cottages, and get irrigration to the corn.
With 2 grassland farms, irrigation to corn and pigs you have 18 food for 4 tiles which is great. It will support a size 11 city.
The rest of the citizens should just work mine OR be specialists if you need a research boost (NY can run 7 specialists !!! with farming).
NY should be you unit builder and future Heroic epic city as you seem to be doing.
I would immediately build 4~5 workers in NY for the farming projects of NY and boston.
Also, you are currently in organized religion. You better build most of your army while in theocracy, but you may prefer to go to war now, since Cathy doesn't even have constrution she will get crushed like a bug.

5) Washington
This is the only place where cottages are somewhat ok, because you are running bureaucracy. However, being philosophical with the pyramids I would still run farms and specialists. You still get the bureaucracy's hammer production to your wonders, which is huge.
You specialized wahsington as you wonder city, which is good. Personally I would go for the apostolic palace instead of Notre Dam, because most of the world is jewish and you have good friends so a good chance to be leader. You could also pull an early religious victory after you get 1~2 vassals.

Market is a priority here. You make 46 gold here, and market would add 25% to that,but I would only do it if there are no wonders to build.

6) Atlanta - I would have placed it 1NE, settling 1 tile away from cost is rarely good. But now you can't change it, so work with what you have.
Cathrine has stolen your main food source and has pretty strong culture there. This city will not be great until after you conquer her, but you can still make the bets of it.
You are working 3 plain farms but not working the gold mine? You are working a citizen specialist when you could have been working a gold mine or run a scientist?
I suggest that you turn on citizen automation for that city. I don't see a need to micromanage every city in your empire, just the big main ones.
I would focus the city on food. Grassland farms, gold mine, specialists. Don't worry if the city doesn't grow. There is no reason to work plain farms just for the city to grow. Every population costs you maintenance and it's not worth it for the extra 1 hammer to grow.
I would work 3 grassland farms, gold mine and 2 scientist in that city. It will starve to population 6 and stay there, but will still bring you more income than it costs.

7) Seatle, philadelphia and Chicago - whip whip whip.
These are small cities that need quick infrastructure. You have 6 happy faces above the cap. Whip everything whenever population is high enough. Focus your small cities on food as much as possible. Work the tiles the will bring you the most food.
For small cities, whipping with organized religion gives you 37 hammers per pop, which is huge compared to conventional hammers. Food is much more efficient so use it whenever possible.

8) Los angeles - this is a garbage city designed to get furs. I would settle it 2W to make it coastal , so you can benefit from the great lighthouse. Don't spend too much time trying to develop it. It will stay garbage for the entire game.

9) San francisco - have your workers farm it. When the city is small it needs to grow fast with whipping.

In summary, this is what I would do now:
1) Build 4~5 more workers in NY. Convert NY and boston's cottages to farms, and make sure to spread irrigation to all food resources. Shift current workers to work on the big cities first.
2) Trade civil service with Mansa for philosophy (he wants some gold too, give him). Trade it to Charlie for feudalism. They both don't have theology, so I would take a shot at the apostolic palace.

3) Tech paper and education, and then liberalism until 1 before last turn. Make sure to check when other AI's can research liberalism. If they already have education and philosophy try to focus your espionage points on them. If you can see what they research , good, if not don't take the risk and tech liberalism for the free tech. On this level you should be able to get a good expensive free technology for it.
DON'T trade education to anyone.

4) Washington should try the apostolic palace while the workers convert your cottages into farms.

5) Once the apostolic palace is build (even if not by you) remember that every jewish temple and monastery gives +2 hammers to the city, so make it a priority in the small cities. +4 hammers in a small garbage city is a lot (whip if of course).

6) After the AP you choose a path - war now or war later.
War now: tech guilds, switch to theocracy and build an army of trebs, knights and maces.
War later: switch to pacifism and caste system. Run as many scientists as possible in Washington, and Boston and New York. You should get many great scientist. You could build an academy in Boston and settle some in Washington, or you could use them to bulb technologies, but it probably not very efficient at this level of play.
Peacefully tech to rifling and maybe also steel, and then switch to theocracy. Try to get a great merchant and send him to a mission to get cash for mass upgrade of macemen to rifles (make sure to get city raider 2 to macemen before upgrading, since it is not available to rifles).

In any case, you seem to be doing pretty well regardless and can probably win this game without my advices

EDIT: I noticed you have a Great Prophet that was born in New York. You could build the Confucian holy temple, but personally I would settle him in Washington to get faster wonders and cash (+2H +5 commerce +3 science).

 

[andersw]

So if I got you all right specialists run farms to get enough specialists?

Yes it did go very smooth, the computer didn't get enough room to rex wich made up for my slow start of warring.

I rolled catherine with trebs and got cannons around the time I were about to take out ragnar.
Cannons are just soooo great, I could've easily rolled over the rest but wanted to go for the rocket.

I actually never had any real diplo problems after this, Wang was a little grumpy but since he was furthest away ....

I got some new (for me that is) random events, a comet +5% spaceship parts and an electricity event +1 happy in ALL cities, I'll post them along with the victory down here

 

[silverbullet]

So if I got you all right specialists run farms to get enough specialists?

Yes. With the pyramids every scientist is 6 beakers. Every merchant is 3 gold +3 beakers. You need 2 grassland farms to run 1 scientist.
If you have 2 cottages on grassland instead, you get 2 commerce at the beginning and a bit more later. That's not worth it.

You are also philosophical so every specialist also gives you 6 GPP, and more under pacifism or during a golden age or in a city with national epic.

Also, when running slavery, farms in small towns are very important since whipping gives you infrastructure much faster than cottages.

In short, a philosophical leader with the pyramids, should almost never (never say never in civ) run a cottage in the first half of the game.

The game seems to have gone well. I think you are ready to go up a level.

 

[General_Ski]

First of all... Vassaling Catherine would have been the simpler apporach... That would have secured your flank. To do that. You needed to have created a defensive force. That would hold off her frontal stacks. While you could have sneaked in from the back via sea, with your invasion stack. Taken a couple of her cities, and the capital, on the turn capital falls she is ready to be vassalized. Once she is your vassal, you can turn your attention to others. Don't forget a defensive stack at the other side of the map. To prevent any of her allies doing much harm if they decide to join the war.

 

[General_Ski]

First of all... Vassaling Catherine would have been the simpler apporach... That would have secured your flank. To do that. You needed to have created a defensive force. That would hold off her frontal stacks. While you could have sneaked in from the back via sea, with your invasion stack. Taken a couple of her cities, and the capital, on the turn capital falls she is ready to be vassalized. Once she is your vassal, you can turn your attention to others. Don't forget a defensive stack at the other side of the map. To prevent any of her allies doing much harm if they decide to join the war.

But you pretty much did that, except the naval invasion part...