Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[History_Guy]

My guess is that the game works just fine and you are interpreting something wrong. But for any precise diagnosis more information is needed. The best way is usually to upload a savegame immediatly before the situation occurs.

I think you're right, because my capital produces exactly 100 shields and tanks in 1 turn. However, in another city with say 6 corruption and produces 105 shields the tank takes 2 turns. I'm assuming now that the total production does not include corruption into the calculation.

 

[Takhisis]

Why does the game not register the correct amount of shields per turn? For example, it should not take 2 turns to build a tank that cost 100 shields if the city is producing say 105 shields. Any suggestions?

Only the blue shields count towards production. It does get awkward to count them at such scales, yes.

 

[vesperbot]

Well, I'd like an advice on what to do with these. 1.sav is when I ended playing while half eradicating Persia, when I've said the game ran out from me, 2.sav is the current condition, I'm about to start attacking Aztecs, and wonder where to start. The problem is threefold: I need to eliminate their spaceship-building potential, for that I need to strike at their Aluminium which is at their east; I need to eliminate their army-building potential striking either Oil or Aluminium, and Oil is at their west; and I need to eliminate their UN turnkey so that they won't cheat me out of the game by diplo win, for that I either need to wreck Tenochtitlan at the dead center or break their long-term alliance with MPP and baiting. I've brought some army of about 40 tanks and 20 arties up north, covered by a set of jet fighters on a carrier, but I'm unaware whether Aztecs have Modern Armor (I think no, as trading for Eco/Synth is not displayed in diplo screen), but they certainly do have tanks and MI, as well as fihters, bombers and missiles - maybe nukes too, Manhattan was built but not too long ago. Any particular advice?

 

[justanick]

I need to eliminate their UN turnkey so that they won't cheat me out of the game by diplo win,
[...]
Any particular advice?

How about a general one:

0. Have embassies with everyone.
1. Declare war against your war target.
2. For the duration of all negotiations increase available gtp by setting the sliders for research and entertainment to zero.
3. Cycle through all other nations to find out which one will accept a military alliance against your war target for the least gtp. Make that deal, possibly in a slightly altered way.
4. Cycle through the remaining nations in the same manner and make military alliances till every one is at war against your war target and commited to remain at war through a military alliance.
5. Wage war and possibly stay defensive for while if that suits you.
6. If anyone breaks the alliance against your war target forgive their betrayal and renew that alliance immediatly.
7. Whenever a military alliance has lasted 20 turn renew it as well.
8. Never make peace with your war target. Fight till your war target exists no more.

If you had applied this general advise long ago, your war target could not have become as powerful as it seems to have become. Preemptive annihilation works.

 

[Samson]

Do "Heroic Epic" type wonders stack? For example, in the middle ages scenario, if you build both the Norse Sage and the Holy Roman Empire what is your chance of getting a leader from combat?

 

[justanick]

I suspect having more than one will not help. If you have the Great Lighthouse and Mangellan you still get only +1 naval movement, not +2 as one might expect.

 

[Takhisis]

In the case of naval movement it's because there's an individual tag set in the editor for +1 naval movement and another for +2 movement, so as long as you have at least one with either tag that particular bonus will be checked but will not stack.

 

[vesperbot]

I wonder what can and what cannot the AI do based on difficulty level. I have just encounered that the AI cannot nuke you until you have nuked THEM. This last game with runaway Aztecs I have fought them with conventional weapons only, but with three-front war with Zulu and Egypt I decided to use a tactical nuke vs Egyptian Grand Fleet of no less than 6 battleships. 5 died, but the very next interturn I got 6 ICBMs on my head with 3 of them hitting a single coastal city that wasn't producing anything serious (weird huh?). Boy I was enraged. Thankfully they didn't touch my city that was building SS Engine so I won two turns after with SS...
Also Monarch AI cannot declare a diplomatic win even if they have the UN. Interesting huh?

 

[Takhisis]

Also Monarch AI cannot declare a diplomatic win even if they have the UN.

Are you really sure about that?

 

[tjs282]

I have just encounered that the AI cannot nuke you until you have nuked THEM.

AI-Civs will not (usually) initiate a first strike against a non-aggressive rival, including the human.

This is hardcoded: even if a unit has an AI-strategy other than 'Tactical Nuke' or 'ICBM' in the Editor, giving it the 'Nuclear Weapon' flag, will make the AI generally reluctant to ever use that unit in combat.

However, I have seen it happen more than once (at both Monarch and Emp) that an Ai-Civ which is losing a high-tech war (and possibly also a space-race) will drop nukes if its situation is getting desperate (e.g. your stack of Modern Armour + Armies is getting dangerously close to its core/ capital, and you are still refusing to talk to it).

And at that point, the gloves are off. Once any player (human or AI) has dropped The Bomb, they will become a global pariah, and hence a legitimate target for any other nuclear-beweaponed AI-Civ.

Also Monarch AI cannot declare a diplomatic win even if they have the UN.

Pretty sure this is not true. But having the UN alone is not sufficient, they have to win >50% of the votes to win the election.

So if there is an even number of Civs left, say 4 Civs, the winner has to obtain 3 positive votes: 2 votes + 1 abstention would not be enough to beat the rival (who will vote for themselves).

If the UN-holding AI-Civ 'knows' it will not win, it will simply refuse to hold an election (as should the human, if they can't bribe their way to victory: see @justanick's post above!)

 

[Lanzelot]

Also Monarch AI cannot declare a diplomatic win even if they have the UN. Interesting huh?

The AI can try for Diplomatic victory on every difficulty level, but it won't start an election, if it sees that it can't win. (Meaning less than 50% of the AIs are polite or gracious with the AI that has the UN.)

Edit: crosspost with tjs282...

 

[vesperbot]

Are you really sure about that?

Well, in my game the Aztecs held the UN for about 30 turns, at one time they had half of the world allied vs me and China (and it was them, Germany, England, France, Egypt and Zululand on their side!) but they had never called for an election. Vanilla 1.29f. I say this big alliance should be enough to vote Aztecs in, but the election wasn't even started. My assumption is that they just select "no" when asked for an election regardless of global politics. However I was not sure if there would be a rival should the election commence, as I wasn't likely into either 25% territory or 25% population - vanilla has no such stats available to display. So, I am "sure" that they can't but not "really sure".

Once any player (human or AI) has dropped The Bomb, they will become a global pariah, and hence a legitimate target for any other nuclear-beweaponed AI-Civ.

Hmmm, does this include a "second" civ to nuke someone? And frankly I'd differ between nukes dropped on armies only (those that didn't harm civilians or cities) and those dropped on cities, but with this approach the Civ3 devs did not make such difference for AIs.

Also, how often does the UN ask for an election? Once per 10 turns or say 20? I held it for not enough to differ between these, as I only had to say no once about 5 turns after conquering Tenochtitlan in that game, then it flew.

 

[tjs282]

Also, how often does the UN ask for an election?

Every 11th turn after the build-completes.

My assumption is that they just select "no" when asked for an election regardless of global politics.

This is definitely false.

Over the past couple of weeks I have been playing the Sengoku Conquest again (at Emperor), and I've lost it 3 times in succession (once as the Hojo, twice as the Date) because someone else built War Council (=UN-equivalent Wonder) and then later on, called an election while they had multiple Alliances in place.

Right now, I'm on a 4th run as the Imagawa, and doing much better (it really helps having a decent source of freshwater nearby -- unlike the Date -- and also Iron + Horses, unlike the Hojo) -- because this time I managed to (pre)build WC myself, and have since selected "No" every time the game asked if I wanted an election.

 

[vesperbot]

I have been playing the Sengoku Conquest again (at Emperor), and I've lost it 3 times in succession (once as the Hojo, twice as the Date) because someone else built War Council (=UN-equivalent Wonder)

Hmm, could it be that there is some attitude difference between vanilla and conquests that's in place here? I was playing vanilla standard epic game, and I'm really baffled about AI attitude in there. Say, no actual injury between me and Egypt, but they are always furious at me, war or peace. Really, haven't been touching their cities even once, only navies were clashing somehow, and it was mostly them bombarding my coast, then me bombarding their battleships (no lethal bombardment in vanilla, mind you).

 

[tjs282]

Say, no actual injury between me and Egypt, but they are always furious at me, war or peace.

I'd have to check the AI-attitude article to be 100%, but I'm fairly sure that if a Civ (including the human's) is running away and likely to win, the losing AI-Civs will become Annoyed to Furious with them, regardless.

And even if you didn't do anything to Cleo, your actions against other AI-Civs throughout the game may also count against you: for example, every foreign city that you raze not only (strongly, negatively) affects the attitude of that city's owner, but will also give a (smaller, but still permanent) attitude decrement with all the other AI-Civs.

 

[r16]

even if already fully explained , ı have been nuked once and lost elections multiple times on Monarch . As ı make it a priority of sorts to get the UN to prevent elections ı can't say much about the frequency of elections but ı have also felt the AI will refuse if it's me who's going to win . And ı have been rather reluctant to enter into basic trade deals , especially overseas because things will happen , the guy gets into war , gets blockaded , becomes my fault .

 

[vesperbot]

every foreign city that you raze not only (strongly, negatively) affects the attitude of that city's owner, but will also give a (smaller, but still permanent) attitude decrement with all the other AI-Civs

Yup, I'm aware of this - the article I've read that in said +1 attitude "bonus" per city razed. I have abandoned one city in that game, it was at 1 pop but most likely that pop had Japanese nationality - there was a set of events with that city, I conquered that city from Japanese, then tried to settler-abandon it but apparently vanilla does not allow to finish a settler if the city would get down to 0 pop - which I'd like to do exactly. I've added a worker there (of my nat), then finished the settler then abandoned the city from main window, not checking the nationality of the remaining citizen. But -1 is just toooo small amount to add to -10 required. Also we had the same govt at the time - Communism as we were warring different enemies. And I'm not remembering me having a MA with the only civ that was playing "my" side of the global war vs anyone at all, but AI side was all but inter-allied vs different nations including the targeted AI and French who got DoW'd by German when they had no one to war with, and subsequently obliterated.

 

[tjs282]

apparently vanilla does not allow to finish a settler if the city would get down to 0 pop - which I'd like to do exactly

Conquests allows towns to be Settler-abandoned at Pop1 (except if Agricultural and non-Despotic*) — can't remember if Vanilla does (been a while since I last played Vanilla/PTW).

However, in order for a city to be Settler-abandoned (in Conquests), it must be producing net-zero (or negative) FPT*. So you need to either put that town's last citizen on a Mountain (or Volcano in Conquests), or turn him/her into a Specialist. If there is even +1 FPT net, the Settler will not be completed until the town reaches Pop3.

(You can often see this 'problem' in AI-towns, especially at Emp and higher levels, during the early game: where a Pop2 town quickly accumulates the 24 -- or fewer -- shields needed for a Settler-build, but then sits there wasting SPT for multiple turns, until it's grown large enough to finish the Settler)

But yeah, Settler-abandoning any foreign town at Pop1 (apparently) also counts as razing it, so you get the attitude-hit for it. Adding a native Worker (or growing the town to Pop2) before Settler-abandoning makes the town 50% yours, so you don't get the hit.

Spoiler * :

Under any government other than Despotism, Agri-Civ towns (or freshwater towns under Despotism) will all harvest 3 FPT from the town-tile itself, so can only obtain zero/negative net FPT at Pop2.

 

[vesperbot]

in order for a city to be Settler-abondoned (in Conquests), it must be producing net-zero food

I wonder do entertainers count here, say I make one citizen an entertainer, the other work a forest... will this config allow me to settler-abandon a size 2 city in vanilla? This needs some testing, hum. Thanks anyway.

 

[tjs282]

I wonder do entertainers count here, say I make one citizen an entertainer, the other work a forest... will this config allow me to settler-abandon a size 2 city in vanilla? This needs some testing, hum. Thanks anyway.

This configuration would produce net -1 FPT (2 FPT harvested from the town, 1 FPT from the Forest; 2 citizens eat 4 FPT), so it should be possible.

Even in Vanilla, though, a Scientist or Taxman would be a preferable Specialist over a Clown, if possible (i.e. without the working citizen becoming unhappy and rioting).