Problems switching from Noble to Prince, advice needed...

[Cosmic_Fist]

Hi, I'm playing Warlords 2.08, and I'm having a hard time getting used to the improved AI. I usually win without problems on Noble, although I sometimes lose when playing a huge map. But when I try playing Prince, I can't seem to win.

I'm not a big warmonger, but I'm starting to get the feeling you haven't got a choice in Warlords. On one Prince game I played, everything was going great until someone declared war on me. I managed to kill all the units that enter my land and then I took one city. I gave that city back to the attacker in exchange for a peace treaty. The problem was that once the war was over, I had fallen too far behind, and I got beaten in the space race.

I'm sure there's lots of other things I'm doing wrong, but I'm not sure exactly what. I'm always reluctant of building too many units, because I always have so many buildings I need in my cities.

So what should I do? Should I give up my builder mentality and go all out war? I'm not sure how I would play such a game. If someone can give me some advice, or give me an example of a game they've played, that would be great!

Thanks!

 

[manu-fan]

I can only give Warmonger advice becuase that's the way I play.

I played quite a few games on Noble, and then switched to Prince.

I used the same strategies, and won a domination victory fairly comfortably on Prince, but it took longer than my Noble victores.

It was all about:

Getting 3 or 4 cities, then massing Axemen or Swordsmen and conquering a local rival. That usually gave me about 7 cities. Then, massing more Swordsmen and Catapults and taking over the next closet rival, ending up with 11 or so cities. Just repeating this until I won a domination victory. I was behind a little in tech, but Grenadiers and Cannons ruled the world (I went for Chemistry while the AIs were more advanced on non warmongering tech.

I think the key is to be the attacker. Once you take ONE city from a rival and kill some of their troops in the initial assault, they are then significantly weakened. I sometimes even pause wars with rivals for 10 turns to re-group and then kill them off.

I'm currently back on Noble trying to win as quickly as possible for fun.

Cheers.

 

[TG Empire]

I had/have the same problem. In my opinion ( no offense manu-fan ), warmongering is easier than not. But there is a difference between being a warmonger and having a military presence. You should always have a strong military unless you are running pacifism, in which case you need to either have a no-state religion or be spreading your religion like wild fire so as to increase your friends/decrease your enemies. AI wont attack you if you are stonger, unless you are making them mad.

The key to the upper difficulties is infrastructure and diplomacy. Remember that not every city needs every building, specialization is key. and just because you enjoy being buddhist doesn't mean it's a good idea to piss off a hindu Monty.

just my 2 cents.

 

[Cam_H]

I'm always reluctant of building too many units, because I always have so many buildings I need in my cities.

So what should I do? Should I give up my builder mentality and go all out war? I'm not sure how I would play such a game. If someone can give me some advice, or give me an example of a game they've played, that would be great!

There are plenty of things that might be causing you problems, but on the basis of what you've said, my guess is that you are;

• not specialising your cities (refer TG Empire who posted while I was typing! ) and

• not confident in warfare.

Specialisation

As you're going through your initial expansion phase, try to develop roles for your cities ... a hypothetical;

Moscow's a science centre because it starts with a Palace and good terrain with a mixed bunch of resources including plenty of available food, St. Petersburg a unit pump because you've put it in a spot with two Cows, a Marble, a few Forests and Hills, Rostov's a commerce centre because you've put it on a coast with Fish near some Gems on a winding river, Yaroslavl's another unit pump because its got Pigs as well as Copper and Stone, etc. ...

Moscow and Rostov therefore get Libraries and Granaries, while St. Petersburg and Yaroslavl get Barracks and Granaries. The workers around Moscow and Rostov build a combination of Farms and Cottages, and around St. Petersburg and Yaroslavl get Farms and Mines, although obviously you hook up your resources. You will need to produce Workers (one per city isn't a bad ratio, more is better) and use the whip to develop the empire quickly.

Once you start defining these cities' roles, you stop yourself from putting up every building in every city. In time it might prove to be beneficial to start redefining these roles, but for the short-term your empire has focus, and deficiencies in one area is being made up in another.

Attack

If about half of your cities are dedicated unit pumps, before you know it you'll be able to construct several nice big stacks / SODs ('stacks of doom') and go off belting an enemy.

I know that I over-compensate, but I will often form a SoD of ten units - eight Axes, a Spear, and an Archer, and unleash them on my chosen neighbour. You should be able to do some pretty severe damage with a SoD like that, and potentially wipe out the enemy.

There's a hidden trap though - the expansionary 'black hole' -

If you choose to keep the cities that you capture, they will typically cost you more in city maintenance to run than they're producing for your empire. The fact that your overall city count increases also puts further maintenance on the other cities in your empire. Be very mindful not to start running your empire into the ground financially, or else your science rate may be pushed down to a point where it will take you an obscene number of turns to bounce back to competitiveness. There are several ways around this, however acquiring Currency (extra , can trade for , can build Markets) and Code of Laws (Courthouses > Forbidden Palace, Caste System for Specialists) will help.

Later wars will employ Catapults, and these are of great value in not only bringing down city defenses, but also suiciding for collateral damage.

In Summary

As a Noble-level > Prince-level player, I hope that this blurb isn't setting out the bleeding obvious to you, but I've just tried to interpret from your post what could be going astray. As I said, there could be other reasons that things aren't working as they should - poor city placement, automated workers , lack of victory target in mind, poor judgement on trading opportunities, etc ...

If you think it may be of benefit, posting a game for others' views might be of help.

Best of luck!

 

[Cosmic_Fist]

Thanks a lot for all the great advice guys! I think my main problem is that I try to build every building in all my cities. I'm going to stop doing that and go for specialization. Any city not explicitly needing a building is going to build units. I'll definitely try the 10 unit stack of doom thing and see what happens.

I'm usually careful about not overextending by building too many cities, and economy is rarely a problem. But I'm thinking I might try overextending just a little bit, and then build up my commerce. I'm not sure if that's a good idea or not.

Right, I'll try a game later today and I'll tell you how it goes!

 

[Cam_H]

I'll definitely try the 10 unit stack of doom thing and see what happens.

As I say, I do tend to over-do this aspect of the game a bit ... waiting too long to build larger than necessary stacks can end up costing you valuable time and might actually be counter-productive as the enemy becomes stronger ... but I think at Noble/Prince you should be able to comfortably get away with it. Anyway - try a SoD of 10 with feeding of ongoing additional troops from behind and see how you go. Again - be prepared to raze rather than capture if you're concerned you're empire's getting too unwieldy from an economic perspective.

... and watch out for Barbarian activity too!

Right, I'll try a game later today and I'll tell you how it goes!

Best of luck, again!

 

[dragomaster]

Beside from Cam H explenation, one rule is to expand if you are 70+ in reserch slider. i often start to attack neighbours when i have that kind of science rate. I dont stop untill my slider show positive at 40 science. at that moment I've gaind alot of monney from capturing neighbours citys so science can be run at 60 or 70 for several turns. during that time I cottage spam, build economical buildings and whip couthouses in capured citys. after this is done I'm most often back on track running 60 or 70 in science. if not back on track it's still posible to make a tech deal to gain some monney.

 

[Cosmic_Fist]

Ok, I just played a game, and it went great! I made a stack of doom, built almost nothing but units, and I took over all but one of my opponents cities.

But just as I thought I was going to win everything, this happens:

What the hell am I going to do now? I don't have too many units defending my cities, and I have no idea what the German empire looks like. I was just hoping I could finish off the Mongols and work on getting my economy back up before starting the next war. I don't think I could have beaten the Mongols if I had not thrown everything I had at him.

The saved game is attached, feel free to check it out and give me some ideas. I'm thinking I should give up on this game and start a new one, but if anyone knows how I can survive this, please let me know!

 

[cabert]

^^don't panic. kublai bribed the german into the war, but he won't send any troops (at least not enough to take a city, a few pillagers probably)

You're not teching very fast IMHO. If you don't cottage spam soon, you lose.

 

[vormuir]

I play at Prince now, and I remember moving up from from Noble... yes, it's challenging!

War is now mandatory. This does not mean you will always be at war, and you can still win peaceful victories. At Prince it is possible to have just one or two wars and then spend the rest of the game peacefully building. But you really need an empire of 10-12 cities, and on a standard size map that means you have to go kill someone.

The Stack of Doom strategy is good for early warring, by the way, but once you have reached the medieval period you will need catapults. Cities with 20% defense are a nuisance, cities with 40% defense are a serious pain, cities with 60% will laugh at your silly stack. Cats can strip defense down to zero, so get them early.

Good luck!


Waldo

 

[dragomaster]

What the hell am I going to do now? I don't have too many units defending my cities, and I have no idea what the German empire looks like. I was just hoping I could finish off the Mongols and work on getting my economy back up before starting the next war. I don't think I could have beaten the Mongols if I had not thrown everything I had at him.

This is what ushaly happen: you start a war on neighbour A, the neghbour capitulate to civ B, civ B start a war against you, then civ B bribe Civ C in a war against you.

it's funny and this is where the challange starts. start to cottage spam. you ushaly have some workers at this point; your own plus the captured one so start cottage spam and whip corthouses in the citys who have the capacipacy to whip them i.e population 8+ (captured ones far away from capitol). after the whip the maintance will be lower and your score will go to bottom but later when they grow you will be the leader of the pack.

If you don't have the tech lead over many civs there is always the posibility to trade resorsec for monney, they love stone and marble. if you don't building wonders at the moment traid them. same if don't need health recorces like rice and outhers. and now is the time to choose friends. take a look on who likes whom. future war pals this shold be.

like vormuir, you don't need to war against everyone. if you are planing a pecefull building fest. just take the land so you will gain the advantage in monney and production later. cats is a must at this poin't, axes will son be svitched to maces and horse archers to knights. only make pece with gengis if you absolutly must. i think his capitol is a nice one. haven't looked at your save but that city will earn you imidiate cach, rased or captured.

 

[thecivdude]

a strong military quells your neighbors' desire to declare war usually, unless they are aggressive to start... but use religion, it's the difference maker in a domination victory on prince difficulty.

this is a long read, but me thinks it will help:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=5102956&postcount=23

 

[TG Empire]

Don't be afraid to run your research so that your GPT (gold per turn) is at a deficit. Unless you need to upgrade your units, spend that money on research!

 

[Rancid Sushi]

a strong military quells your neighbors' desire to declare war usually, unless they are aggressive to start... but use religion, it's the difference maker in a domination victory on prince difficulty.

this is a long read, but me thinks it will help:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=5102956&postcount=23

This thread has been a help to me as well. My Warlords Noble game was quite noobish until I got more aggressive and learned to use SE instead of CE. SE 4 Lyfe, baby.

 

[Cam_H]

Cosmic Fist,

You're in a reasonable enough position, but there are some problem areas still to address;

• Cottage cities
  
  , lack of 'Science Centre'
  

• Slavery: Use it or lose it! You have loads of war weariness and plenty of production to make up.

Kyoto is crying out for a Library and a Buddhist Monastery, and from there you can start running Specialist Scientists. This is not the city that I would have put the Military Instructor in, as it's not as well positioned as a unit pump as much as your commercial hub. Your cities are well developed, but I still don't quite see the specialisation that I was envisaging.

I played on your game to 1124AD.

I was uncertain whether to; (a.) sue for peace to make up a back-log of missing technologies, or (b.) finish Kublai off. I chose the latter, mainly to address "We yearn for our Motherland" unhappiness and ongoing diplomatic hassles. Tabriz was a hard 'nut to crack' with fortified units on a hill - I ended up using 10 units to take it out (where's the SoD? ), as Kublai added a fourth Archer as well as his Axe. It was important to sit on his Mines in the meantime. I chose to raze it, as this city was going to be gobbled up in Egyptian culture anyway.

As for Germany - Cabert was quite right in that Bismark seemed more interested in pillaging than taking out cities. On the opening turn I whipped a Spearman in Tokyo that took out one of the Horse Archers, and was to whip another not long afterwards. I produced some of my own Horse Archers from other cities, which dealt with a couple of Catapults that made their way towards the city. The war seemed to go on for quite a while, but eventually Bismark handed over 80 for peace.

Another thing: Grab that river-Plains spot near the middle of your empire for those three Gold tiles! Even if the city quickly stagnates growth - build and work those Gold mines!

The challenge now is to catch up scientifically. The AI has Feudalism and Construction. I'd be aiming for Construction and Machinery so you've got access to Catapults and Samurai, but also going for Liberalism. Try to get Judaism spread into your science centres for Monasteries, and as noted earlier, start shooting for some Great Scientists.

I hope this helps!

 

[Winston Hughes]

In addition to Cam_H's superb advice, I'd also suggest paying close attention to the possible diplomatic consequences of your moves, and taking measures to keep powerful civs from attacking you.

If they can be bribed to attack someone else, or someone else can be bribed to attack them, then it'll keep them off your back for a good while. If you can improve your relations with them by adopting their religion or favoured civic, agreeing to their demands, or by giving them good deals in trade, then that will decrease the chances of them coming after you in the longer term.

Most importantly, though, pay attention to the power graph. If your nextdoor neighbour is much more powerful than you, then there's always a chance that they'll decide to attack you at just the wrong moment. You have to take some risks, but try to avoid leaving the backdoor open. Expand in quick, decisive bursts, so that you don't find your troops tied up in lengthy campaigns at one end of your empire.

When you do end up fighting a war on two fronts, a wrecking policy is often the best approach. Instead of concentrating your forces to grab a city or two, separate your troops into smaller stacks and demolish the infrastructure around your enemies' core cities. Soon enough their troop production will dry up, and you can conclude the war on favourable terms, having concentrated your forces to take a few choice cities once the tide has turned in your favour.

 

[Cosmic_Fist]

Thanks to everyone who gave me advice, I don't know which part helped me the most, but now I am more confident playing at Prince level.

I gave up on the game mentioned above and tried a new one. I started on a small continent with only one other civ on it. I took the first city using only warriors, and then I got the capital with swordsmen after beelining to iron working. From now on, I'll try to always build Stonehenge and the Oracle, because that was a big help. I used the Oracle to get monarchy, and that got my cities nice and fat really early. After eliminating the other civ and claiming the continent for myself, winning the space race was a piece of cake.

Now I'm playing a second game, and although I know I could have done a lot better, I'm very satisfied with how things are going. My main problem was that no civs where close enough to do a early attack as I did in the last game, so I delayed my first war a lot. I started attacking when I got grenadiers. The first civ became my vassal, and I got lots of gold, resources, and techs. The next war was a bit worse, as half the civs declared war on me when I attacked. But I didn't flip out this time, I got one more vassal and peace with the others, which allowed me to eliminate my target. Now I'm not sure whether to go for space race or domination. I'm not sure if the continent is big enough.

If anyone's interested, I've attached my last save of the game I just mentioned. More advice would be great, as I have never been in such a position before.

Thanks!

 

[Cosmic_Fist]

Looks like I screwed up when taking vassal states... I was used to the vassal state getting independent pretty quickly. Now I realize it's not possible to cancel a vassal state deal. I tried to extort them by demanding resources and gold, but they just give everything to me. I think it's a bit too late to attack the other continent, so I'm going to go for the space race on this one. At least I learned my lesson concerning vassal states!

 

[dragomaster]

well u will win this one without problem. if someone build UN you will probably be the secretaty with you own votes, in that case no one will win diplomatic victory.

easyest reserch way as I see:
> Robotnic, build SS docking bay in Escatana, I see no good production city being able to build space elevator, you could posibly gamble if you use free greate engenerer from fusion in a decent city though, you choise.
> Fiber optics, build Cockpit in a middle of the pack production city
> Fusion, build SS engine in Cuzco

Reserch the outner space ships techs from there on and you will win

It is a city spot betwen uppsala, matchu pitchu and hamburg, alot of hills for production. this city could share rice and bananas with hamburg and uppsala for fast growth then working farms to suport it self. a little bit late to build now though, if build earlyer it could have build the space elevator fast for you.