Post Short Single Player Tips Here

[Meteor Man]

Not really cheating, but making it so that irrigation doesn't have to need a river, which is somewhat of an exploit.

 

[Aabraxan]

It's neither an exploit or a cheat. As vmxa pointed out, you spend worker turns moving the water from Point A to Point B. Those are turns that could be spent doing something else, so there's a not-insignificant cost associated with doing what you've described. Now, if you could do it just by hitting some magical "allowirrigationeverywhere" code, that'd be a different story.

As long as we're discussing irrigation: You can irrigate "through" a city, even if it's on a hill. So if you place a city on a hill, you effectively open a gateway from a river on one side to lands on the other side of the hill.

 

[EMan]

I like to get to Replaceable Parts as quickly as possible when going for a Histographical High Score (HOF).........You discover Electricity on the way, which allows you to irrigate tiles without fresh water in sight!

 

[anaxagoras]

It's neither an exploit or a cheat.

Sure is unrealistic, though. Just where is that water coming from?

You can irrigate "through" a city, even if it's on a hill.

At least you can explain this with Archimedes' screw. That was invented at least 300-400 BC, so I have no problem with the reality of it even very early in the game. Splitting entire aquifers is a little tougher to rationalize.

Of course, I still do both of these all the time, anyway. Warrior v. MA isn't very realistic, either, so what the heck.

 

[EMan]

Sure is unrealistic, though. Just where is that water coming from?...

Maybe it rains!

My Tip: Don't play Civ 3 like it is Real Life.......it's just a game!

 

[vmxa]

I agree with EMan, but remember Romans and even before them, nations used a form of ducts to carry water over miles to towns. It again, just took labor. Now later Electricity (in the game) allows you to water without an adjacent source.

The technique we are talking about does require adjacent water at some point.

 

[anaxagoras]

Maybe it rains!

Um, irrigation is what you do because it doesn't rain.

My Tip: Don't play Civ 3 like it is Real Life.......it's just a game!

Of course. Besides, I'd hate to think how slowly the game would play if it had to calculate water paths each time a worker finished an action.

 

[Tribute]

Still, this sort of thing is a good tip to point out. You can irrigate places that you normally couldn't by temporarily irrigating connecting tiles. It's useful to know (although many already do).

 

[NickyH]

Sure is unrealistic, though. Just where is that water coming from?

Well, you could certainly lead water from point a where there is a river, to point b through an aqueduct through a certain area, and still have a mine in the area where the water gets transported. So you could think of the irrigation that gets changed into a mine as building an aqueduct.

By the way, I think planting cities on hills to be able to lead water to places where it's needed, and that couldn't get irrigated otherwise, is a really important aspect of city placement. There's lots to be gained from it.

 

[Blackoak]

HELP!!
Can anyone tell me how to speed up the movement of my units and enemy units on the map so that I dont have to waste time watching them parade one step at a time???

 

[Aabraxan]

Sure. Hold down the shift key.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

Or turn off "Animate/show our/friendly/enemy moves" in the preferences wherever you see fit.

 

[Fiddlin Nero]

PTW

Cuise missles are great for sinking enemy ships off your coasts when you have no navy to protect the coast.

When the enemy battleship comes in to bombard your shores and cannot get far off the coast. 2 cruise missles will sink it.
Sometimes it will take 3.

It's alot cheaper to build missles than battle ships.

Sometimes you can lure an enemy battleship into missle range with an old caravel or ironcald.

Using Artillery to first knock the ships down to 1 hit point will reduce the need for multiple cruise missiles.

 

[DJ Bonebraker]

Using Artillery to first knock the ships down to 1 hit point will reduce the need for multiple cruise missiles.

...which also brings us to my Tip of the Year:

Even the WORST units, in terms of A/D stats, can pwn an army of top-notch units if they're backed with enough artillery (as in 5 times as much artillery as you have units)....

Learning this strategy saved my bacon when playing as the Girls in the Playground mod (Girl units are the absolute WEAKEST units of any of the factions), and allowed me to (thus far) take over a significant portion of Africa as the Boer Republics in Age of Imperialism (the Boers are considered to be one of the most difficult civs to play in that scenario).... I took three cities in two turns, without taking a single loss, because I used my massive stack of artillery to blast every defending unit down to 1 HP before I sent my troops in.

 

[Meteor Man]

This could also work (and it does) with bombers, but they are better because they can actually kill the unit instead of just hurting it.

 

[emlamotvisao]

It is the best to earn golds by "cheating" other civilizations:

- Arrange your troop next to one of your worst town;
- Make some workers to join the town to increase its value;
- Choose the furthest rival and negotiate piece;
- Give them the town and the most money you have (must pay them in turn), asking for their towns and technologies advances;
- Declare war on them and re-capture your town;
- Sell the towns you have just got from your enemy to your neighbors for golds and other technologies advance; even for towns if the town is close to your empire.

By doing it some times, you will have lots lots lots of golds. Choose the Monarchy as your government type. There are two advantages of this government type:

1. Your citizens are not fear of war;
2. You can built whatever you want (troops and city improvement) by paying golds. You have too many golds to rush any troops and city improvements without making your citizens unhappy;

When you reach to the Replacement Parts, find all the rubber sources and, by the same way, exchange the towns and city into your possess. After that, draft citizens to have Infantry (no one can have it, but you), use golds to rush culture improvements ASAP.

Now, no one can compare with you. You can beat anyone you want, especially when you can build tanks. If you really want, you can capture the whole world in just few turns.

Why rubber but not oil? Oil can be exhausted and discovered. Rubber is not. When you control all rubber sources, you control all the world.

 

[DJ Bonebraker]

This could also work (and it does) with bombers, but they are better because they can actually kill the unit instead of just hurting it.

Bombers only work when:

1. You're playing the epic game or a mod that has them and have reached the late industrial/modern age.

2. The mod or scenario that DOES have them has them flagged as "lethal land bombardment", which AoI, just to name one scenario, doesn't.

....and
3. Nobody's got SAM batteries or other AA defenses set up... Once you (or the AI) has SAM batteries in all cities (in the Epic game, I rush SAM batteries in all newly-captured cities).... Then your can just kiss your bomber fleet good-bye.

Artillery, OTOH, works in all mods, scenarios and eras of gameplay (unless you're the Amazons in the Warhammer mod... they don't get artillery of any kind).

Emlamotvisao: Ever since PTW and C3C came out, rubber isn't that critical anymore.... I've actually reversed my fortunes in one rubber-less game by using massive hordes of Guerrillas and Cavalry (or, since, IIRC, I was playing as the Ottomans, Sipahi).... Again, I repeat the Artillery Stack of Doom strategy....

 

[Meteor Man]

First of all, I didn't know that we were talking just about epic games
2. artillery has to move with your units making them vulnerable to capture
3. Whenever I use bombers I am usually far enough ahead that the other doesn't have any AA capabilities
4. artillery has to be right up on the front line, bombers don't
Lastly... I guess you're right. Artillery is a much more potent and dangerous way to decimate your foes' forces outright before an invasion.


I have a better idea though,
just nuke 'um.

 

[CEO Daedalus]

unless your against an underachiever civ, fighters before bombers.

 

[Bllasae]

Here's and exploit: Its called "Irrigation Cheating"

Say that there is a river next to a bunch of plains. Next to the plains is a sliver of grassland tiles, and on the other side of that are more plains. Say that you wanted to irrigate the plains on the other side of the grassland, but there are no rivers over there. So what do you do? 1. Irrigate the plains with the river; 2. irrigate a couple of grassland tiles to connect the first plains to the second; 3. irrigate the plains on the other side; 4. mine the grassland tiles that were irrigated. Now you can still keep irrigating the second plains tiles though the irrigation is not connected to the river! And yes the irrigation does give the bonus food.

This isn't cheating...Or an exploit.