Prince and beyond, how to win the race?
- Thread starter DaemonDivinity
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DaemonDivinity
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 16, 2005
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Nitpicker. Well, true it isn't, but the III's combat system was just a bastardized version of CtPs. (Don't smack me mods that was in context!)
Anyways, went to strike at the Incans, but yeah, China started in. Fought a two front war rather well, but had to call it quits when the Germans got 8 parts up on me in the Space Race. I made peace, refocused my aims, and beat them to the last part by what couldn't have been more than a couple of turns. Talk about a race!
I think I'll play Prince again, see if I can run smoother. Need to work on my earlier warfare (and not gonna use the chariot rush cause it's getting patched). If so, then to Monarch.
Anyways, went to strike at the Incans, but yeah, China started in. Fought a two front war rather well, but had to call it quits when the Germans got 8 parts up on me in the Space Race. I made peace, refocused my aims, and beat them to the last part by what couldn't have been more than a couple of turns. Talk about a race!
I think I'll play Prince again, see if I can run smoother. Need to work on my earlier warfare (and not gonna use the chariot rush cause it's getting patched). If so, then to Monarch.
New to the forums (and to the game; I'd never played a Civ game before getting this one), but I just finished my first prince game. It doesn't look like culture is very popular, but it's all I've been playing (did the tutorial by space when I was just getting a feel for the game, then did one game at settler, warlord, noble, and now prince, all culture). I decided to try highlands, just standard size, and played French (Louis).
It ended in 1970 with me with the 6th place score (out of 7 total civs), having never been involved in a war. One other civ had 6 or 7 ship parts built, iirc, but that's all (another had just built apollo a couple turns before I won). A couple things that I found helpful: I threw out a couple of settlers early, but at that point I was playing the way I played on Noble, namely, paying no attention to military. Then barbarians started coming out of the woodwork and forced me to build some archers quickly (after trading for archery), which slowed my culture production down for a while. I pumped a few swordsmen out and started hunting down barbarian cities; they were a nice way to get some free cities, though, so I'm not complaining. I kept every city that I could.
Anyway, once I had the barbarians somewhat under control (they still came out to harass me every once in a while well past AD 1000, while I was still trying to track them all down with my slow swordsmen, but they were just an annoyance at that point), things went along pretty smoothly. I had to be a lot more attentive to details than I was in the lower difficulty settings, but it moved along in basically the same way: I focused on getting things set up at first (getting the important techs like drama and music (well, I like the free great artist), some culture-producing buildings like theaters and libraries, wonders if I can get them, and perhaps most importantly, keeping the three cities at basically even culture production), then once things were moving along well (this was very late, though; probably around 1200 or 1300, at least), I started phasing out research for culture, adding artist specialists when possible (caste system is nice for that). Liberalism is really nice eventually, but I don't rush for it immediately. This was the first time that I didn't manage to found a religion, but once one spread to me, I quickly pumped out a bunch of missionaries, built nine temples, and got a nice 50% bonus in my three culture-producing cities (and then another religion spread to me and I got to do it again, which was nice). I almost always trade with civs when they want to, and I almost always give them stuff when they ask for it--it's cheaper and less disruptive than getting involved in a war. I rarely cancel deals, though.
Of course, I didn't win the tech race. I wasn't in last place, but there were definitely people that were ahead of me, especially in the last couple hundred years, when I was in full culture-production mode and was taking 20+ turns to research stuff like chemistry and rifling. But it didn't really matter, because nobody was angry enough at me to want to fight (towards the end of the game, a war broke out, and people started asking me to join it, but I didn't and nobody felt like attacking me for it, I guess).
I'm sure I didn't do everything as efficiently as I could have; these games so far have been learning experiences. But it worked well enough, and hopefully it will give me enough to start with when I try monarch next time.
Well, I'm not sure how helpful any of that was. Just seemed like culture wasn't getting the attention it deserved, and it's been serving me pretty well so far. Of course, I have yet to ever build a more advanced unit than riflemen in the five games that I've played. Sometime I should probably try for a military victory just so that I can see what the units look like (actually, I did start a game on noble that I playing focused on military, but I got bored somewhere around 1000 or 1500; I don't recall exactly now).
It ended in 1970 with me with the 6th place score (out of 7 total civs), having never been involved in a war. One other civ had 6 or 7 ship parts built, iirc, but that's all (another had just built apollo a couple turns before I won). A couple things that I found helpful: I threw out a couple of settlers early, but at that point I was playing the way I played on Noble, namely, paying no attention to military. Then barbarians started coming out of the woodwork and forced me to build some archers quickly (after trading for archery), which slowed my culture production down for a while. I pumped a few swordsmen out and started hunting down barbarian cities; they were a nice way to get some free cities, though, so I'm not complaining. I kept every city that I could.
Anyway, once I had the barbarians somewhat under control (they still came out to harass me every once in a while well past AD 1000, while I was still trying to track them all down with my slow swordsmen, but they were just an annoyance at that point), things went along pretty smoothly. I had to be a lot more attentive to details than I was in the lower difficulty settings, but it moved along in basically the same way: I focused on getting things set up at first (getting the important techs like drama and music (well, I like the free great artist), some culture-producing buildings like theaters and libraries, wonders if I can get them, and perhaps most importantly, keeping the three cities at basically even culture production), then once things were moving along well (this was very late, though; probably around 1200 or 1300, at least), I started phasing out research for culture, adding artist specialists when possible (caste system is nice for that). Liberalism is really nice eventually, but I don't rush for it immediately. This was the first time that I didn't manage to found a religion, but once one spread to me, I quickly pumped out a bunch of missionaries, built nine temples, and got a nice 50% bonus in my three culture-producing cities (and then another religion spread to me and I got to do it again, which was nice). I almost always trade with civs when they want to, and I almost always give them stuff when they ask for it--it's cheaper and less disruptive than getting involved in a war. I rarely cancel deals, though.
Of course, I didn't win the tech race. I wasn't in last place, but there were definitely people that were ahead of me, especially in the last couple hundred years, when I was in full culture-production mode and was taking 20+ turns to research stuff like chemistry and rifling. But it didn't really matter, because nobody was angry enough at me to want to fight (towards the end of the game, a war broke out, and people started asking me to join it, but I didn't and nobody felt like attacking me for it, I guess).
I'm sure I didn't do everything as efficiently as I could have; these games so far have been learning experiences. But it worked well enough, and hopefully it will give me enough to start with when I try monarch next time.
Well, I'm not sure how helpful any of that was. Just seemed like culture wasn't getting the attention it deserved, and it's been serving me pretty well so far. Of course, I have yet to ever build a more advanced unit than riflemen in the five games that I've played. Sometime I should probably try for a military victory just so that I can see what the units look like (actually, I did start a game on noble that I playing focused on military, but I got bored somewhere around 1000 or 1500; I don't recall exactly now).
Well, I just finished off my second prince game (first prince win), and managed the win despite failing to accomplish pretty much everything that prevailing wisdom says you need to do in this game.
Playing as Qin Shi Huang (Chinese), large archipeligo map, default settings & victory conditions. I never fought a real war, I never founded a religion, I was behind in the tech race for most of the game, and I built a ton of wonders (what good is industrious if you don't take advantage of it?). I didn't have a clear plan at any point in the game. I still had cities defended by archers when I completed the space ship in 1974. I think the only demographics I was first in at the end of the game were manufacturing & population, and I just barely edged out the Romans in pop.
There was some luck involved--I started out on the Southern end of a decent-sized contintent, with the Egyptians as my only neighbor with a land border. The only other civ on the continent was the Americans, way up North. The Egyptians founded Hinduism and were nice enough to spread it down my way, at which point I eagerly converted...as did the Americans, later on, and the Japanese (on a smaller continent just to the SW of us) and the Germans (small continent SE). Between the shared religion, open borders, lots of trading, and enough open land that we didn't hit a real crunch til around 1200 AD, I was friendly with all 4 nations.
I built Stonehenge, the Oracle, the Parthenon, the Colossus, Chichen Itza, the Hanging Gardens, the Kremlin, and the Three Gorges Dam, along with all my national wonders save Ironworks, Heroic Epic, Red Cross, and West Point. All the World Wonders except Chichen Itza and the Kremlin were built in my capital.
The only non-barbarian combat that I fought in the entire game happened around 1000 AD, when the Inca declared war on me and trashed two fishing boats before I was able to sink his galleys and sue for peace.
I think I wound up with about 12 cities, although 2 were tiny little resource grabbers in the arctic regions.
Anyway, I had the points lead for most of the game and was hoping that the AI wouldn't catch up to force a space race, so I could just win on points. That didn't work...around 1850 the Romans and Egyptians both surged up towards me in points and left me in the dust technologically. At this point I had a 5-way defensive alliance going with my Hindu brethren, so I wasn't at all worried about the military aspect of the game. I dove straight into the tech race, trying to grab up techs that none of the AI had in the hopes of trading my way back to even...which worked for a while, until they decided that their techs were too valuable to trade away.
I really panicked when the Romans completed the Apollo Program around 1915 AD and I hadn't even researched rocketry yet. Crash research towards rocketry, with the needle sitting at 90% and half my cities producing research. I managed to start the AP one turn after Caesar pushed out his first SS Casing...oh, joy, 29 turns to completion with no trees left to chop for Beijing.
At this point, I figure that I have no shot at catching the AI's (the Egyptians, Americans, and Inca have all completed Apollo, too), so I try doing a half-assed switch to a culture win. Meaning, I leave the research up there at 90% until I've finished the table, but have my 2nd & 3rd cultural cities producing culture. Genius, right? <--- sarcasm
When I finally finish the Apollo Program (with all techs required for SS parts done & labs in all my decent-sized cities), Caesar has his casings & thrusters done, along with the engine. The Egyptians have the casings & thrusters done plus life support. The Americans & Inca are churning out casings, and the Germans just decided to jump on the bandwagon & beat my to Apollo by one turn. I drop research to zero, crank culture up to 90%, and have my 2nd & 3rd cultural cities still producing culture (Beijing is already good), while everything else builds space ship parts. By the time I've completed my first part, the Egyptians & Romans are both only 2 parts short and I'm still 12k & 18k culture points away, respectively.
I still have no idea how I managed to catch up (the Romans & Egyptians were both well into the future techs, and my manufacturing wasn't that much better than theirs), but somehow I did. I didn't even bother chopping, as I didn't think I stood a chance anyway, and with all my remaining forests producing 4 hammers/turn (raw) I didn't think the chop would really have been worth the effort. But, somehow I did manage to finish it up, with the Romans & Egyptians still 2 parts apiece away from the space ship. Ironically, I showed the leadership ability of Nero in beating Caesar.
Anyway, as far as what helped me to win:
-Luck. My neighbors all being friendly types & of the same religion helped a lot. I was also pretty fortunate with resources, as I wound up with all the strategic resources except aluminum within my borders, and a good mix of healthy/happy ones (plus gold, silver, and stone). The geography also worked out well, as the Egyptians were stuck in the jungle of the central continent, while I had mostly plains & only a small isthmus connecting me to Egyptian territory (which made for a perfect choke point).
-Well-paced expansion throughout the early/mid game. I think I managed to do my settling at pretty near the ideal pace, right when my economy had recovered from the last new city. In addition to my little corner of the continent, I managed to walk up though the Egyptian's territory to found two cities at the juncture where their territory was starting to butt up against the Americans (plus capture a Barbarian city there). I also managed to grab a couple of small islands (1 city each) off my coastline, plus the two arctic cities.
-Knowing the tech tree. When I fell behind, I knew what directions to go in order to catch up, or at least grab the necessary techs to stay in the end game. Building the internet towards the end also helped, as it gave me a total of 3 free techs.
-Great People. All the GPPs that I racked up from those wonders I built left me in a good supply of great people, and with a pretty good mix of the different types (although I never got a great merchant). With no religious shrine to fall back on, settling the great prophets & a few great artists kept my economy going in the middle ages.
-Micromanagement. My workers don't get automated until I'm out of useful things to build (and even then it's just automated trade network), and I've never been a fan of city governors. I took things a few steps further in this game, though, micromanaging tile placement of my citizens as I worked to keep my cities growing slowly in the early/mid game, and even assigning the specialists myself.
-Not wasting effort on producing a military that I didn't need in the end game. This is usually a weakness of mine, as I love to make lots of pretty mech inf & modern armor once I'm able to. But since nobody was going to invade me in this one, there was no point in building any more military, or even updating the units I did have (with the exception of 1 mech inf that came with a city I flipped, the most modern unit I had at the end of the game was a rifleman).
-In case you didn't get it before, luck.
Dunno if this was helpful at all, but it's what I've got so far.
Playing as Qin Shi Huang (Chinese), large archipeligo map, default settings & victory conditions. I never fought a real war, I never founded a religion, I was behind in the tech race for most of the game, and I built a ton of wonders (what good is industrious if you don't take advantage of it?). I didn't have a clear plan at any point in the game. I still had cities defended by archers when I completed the space ship in 1974. I think the only demographics I was first in at the end of the game were manufacturing & population, and I just barely edged out the Romans in pop.
There was some luck involved--I started out on the Southern end of a decent-sized contintent, with the Egyptians as my only neighbor with a land border. The only other civ on the continent was the Americans, way up North. The Egyptians founded Hinduism and were nice enough to spread it down my way, at which point I eagerly converted...as did the Americans, later on, and the Japanese (on a smaller continent just to the SW of us) and the Germans (small continent SE). Between the shared religion, open borders, lots of trading, and enough open land that we didn't hit a real crunch til around 1200 AD, I was friendly with all 4 nations.
I built Stonehenge, the Oracle, the Parthenon, the Colossus, Chichen Itza, the Hanging Gardens, the Kremlin, and the Three Gorges Dam, along with all my national wonders save Ironworks, Heroic Epic, Red Cross, and West Point. All the World Wonders except Chichen Itza and the Kremlin were built in my capital.
The only non-barbarian combat that I fought in the entire game happened around 1000 AD, when the Inca declared war on me and trashed two fishing boats before I was able to sink his galleys and sue for peace.
I think I wound up with about 12 cities, although 2 were tiny little resource grabbers in the arctic regions.
Anyway, I had the points lead for most of the game and was hoping that the AI wouldn't catch up to force a space race, so I could just win on points. That didn't work...around 1850 the Romans and Egyptians both surged up towards me in points and left me in the dust technologically. At this point I had a 5-way defensive alliance going with my Hindu brethren, so I wasn't at all worried about the military aspect of the game. I dove straight into the tech race, trying to grab up techs that none of the AI had in the hopes of trading my way back to even...which worked for a while, until they decided that their techs were too valuable to trade away.
I really panicked when the Romans completed the Apollo Program around 1915 AD and I hadn't even researched rocketry yet. Crash research towards rocketry, with the needle sitting at 90% and half my cities producing research. I managed to start the AP one turn after Caesar pushed out his first SS Casing...oh, joy, 29 turns to completion with no trees left to chop for Beijing.
At this point, I figure that I have no shot at catching the AI's (the Egyptians, Americans, and Inca have all completed Apollo, too), so I try doing a half-assed switch to a culture win. Meaning, I leave the research up there at 90% until I've finished the table, but have my 2nd & 3rd cultural cities producing culture. Genius, right? <--- sarcasm
When I finally finish the Apollo Program (with all techs required for SS parts done & labs in all my decent-sized cities), Caesar has his casings & thrusters done, along with the engine. The Egyptians have the casings & thrusters done plus life support. The Americans & Inca are churning out casings, and the Germans just decided to jump on the bandwagon & beat my to Apollo by one turn. I drop research to zero, crank culture up to 90%, and have my 2nd & 3rd cultural cities still producing culture (Beijing is already good), while everything else builds space ship parts. By the time I've completed my first part, the Egyptians & Romans are both only 2 parts short and I'm still 12k & 18k culture points away, respectively.
I still have no idea how I managed to catch up (the Romans & Egyptians were both well into the future techs, and my manufacturing wasn't that much better than theirs), but somehow I did. I didn't even bother chopping, as I didn't think I stood a chance anyway, and with all my remaining forests producing 4 hammers/turn (raw) I didn't think the chop would really have been worth the effort. But, somehow I did manage to finish it up, with the Romans & Egyptians still 2 parts apiece away from the space ship. Ironically, I showed the leadership ability of Nero in beating Caesar.
Anyway, as far as what helped me to win:
-Luck. My neighbors all being friendly types & of the same religion helped a lot. I was also pretty fortunate with resources, as I wound up with all the strategic resources except aluminum within my borders, and a good mix of healthy/happy ones (plus gold, silver, and stone). The geography also worked out well, as the Egyptians were stuck in the jungle of the central continent, while I had mostly plains & only a small isthmus connecting me to Egyptian territory (which made for a perfect choke point).
-Well-paced expansion throughout the early/mid game. I think I managed to do my settling at pretty near the ideal pace, right when my economy had recovered from the last new city. In addition to my little corner of the continent, I managed to walk up though the Egyptian's territory to found two cities at the juncture where their territory was starting to butt up against the Americans (plus capture a Barbarian city there). I also managed to grab a couple of small islands (1 city each) off my coastline, plus the two arctic cities.
-Knowing the tech tree. When I fell behind, I knew what directions to go in order to catch up, or at least grab the necessary techs to stay in the end game. Building the internet towards the end also helped, as it gave me a total of 3 free techs.
-Great People. All the GPPs that I racked up from those wonders I built left me in a good supply of great people, and with a pretty good mix of the different types (although I never got a great merchant). With no religious shrine to fall back on, settling the great prophets & a few great artists kept my economy going in the middle ages.
-Micromanagement. My workers don't get automated until I'm out of useful things to build (and even then it's just automated trade network), and I've never been a fan of city governors. I took things a few steps further in this game, though, micromanaging tile placement of my citizens as I worked to keep my cities growing slowly in the early/mid game, and even assigning the specialists myself.
-Not wasting effort on producing a military that I didn't need in the end game. This is usually a weakness of mine, as I love to make lots of pretty mech inf & modern armor once I'm able to. But since nobody was going to invade me in this one, there was no point in building any more military, or even updating the units I did have (with the exception of 1 mech inf that came with a city I flipped, the most modern unit I had at the end of the game was a rifleman).
-In case you didn't get it before, luck.
Dunno if this was helpful at all, but it's what I've got so far.
Good story Harv72b 
one thing you could try is instead of chopping, have your workers build workshop on the lumbermill (directly, no chopping). If you use the state property civic (which removes the food panelty of the workshop), a workshop is basically a lumbermill without the health benefit from the forest. By building a workshop without chopping, you still get to use the lumbermill during the build. when the workshop is done, the city square still gets the same production, and the ss part still gets the same boost from the chop.
Harv72b said:
one thing you could try is instead of chopping, have your workers build workshop on the lumbermill (directly, no chopping). If you use the state property civic (which removes the food panelty of the workshop), a workshop is basically a lumbermill without the health benefit from the forest. By building a workshop without chopping, you still get to use the lumbermill during the build. when the workshop is done, the city square still gets the same production, and the ss part still gets the same boost from the chop.
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