RBP1 Succession Game - Celtic Light Infantry (PtW)

[Griselda]

Not because I'm quibbling about your comments, but because I'm curious. First of all, when trying to negotiate a peace treaty with the AI, do they consider the strength of your civ or just how you're doing in the war?

I'd actually like to take the war thing step by step so that I can figure this out, if you don't mind, Charis. All of these things happen on the half-turn after the date, of course.

1050 BC- Carthage declares war.

When I get the game in 1000 BC, I am planning to check every turn until they'll talk, and try to get out of the war. I'm hoping the distance means that I won't see any actual fighting.

950 BC- Arabs (NOT Spain) demand tribute. In hindsight, I suppose with one war ongoing, I should have caved. But, since I didn't cave, and there are now two semi-distant AI against us, should I assume that a mass of alliances vs. us is imminent unless I buy the others first? I was thinking that I didn't want to commit to 20 turns of war if I could talk my way out of them without fighting. In any case, 4 turns later the Ottomans sign on, and Spain is the last to declare vs us, in 825 BC.

-Griselda

 

[Ozymandous]

Carbon:

I hit the "upload file" link, browsed to the save on my home PC and then hit the "Upload" button on the bottom of the window. I will admit I didn't read the whole post on how to use the system but I thought it would be self-evident. I browsed out to both folders that uploads are supposed to go to and never saw my save, this iw while trying to upload while logged in also if that makes a difference.

Charis:

Don't forget that workers can now make "outposts" that clear out the fog. If we have any of these (foreign I'd assume) that we want to spare until we can later settle an area, we may want to try to push some of the fog back to keep barbs from hampering us all the time.

BTW, the spot East of the capital was mentioned way back when as a good spot, glad to know you agree.

The barb's East of Alesia that I saw were from a cmap roughly 4 squares SE of that city. I don't know if their camp now will be in the same spot, but might be a good place to check.

Griselda:

Charis or someone else may have a more concrete answer on war, but from my experience Civ strength has little if anything to do with a Civ agreeing to peace with you, while how much pain you deal to them seems to be the greatest factor of when they will talk. Civ strength seems to be the best deterant to them declaring war, but even that's not guarented.

If you haven't killed any of a Civ's units, pillaged their lands or caputred their cities and aren't over-whelming in Civ power compared to them don't expect them to want to give you peace for free...

On Alliances... Bringing other AI civ's into an alliance depends on a few factors. For me, if I am on an island or far enough away from another civ I don't really care if they declare, since you can generally have enough troops made and deployed before they reach you. If an enemy AI civ is right next door for example, or you're all relatively close on the same land mass, forming an alliance, just to keep the heat on them and not you, is generally a good thing.

For example, one game I was on the top of a longish continent. The civ in the middle declared war on me, so I made an alliance with the civ on the botom to help fight. Now the civ in the middle was caught from both directions and eventually destroyed.

As Charis mentioned, if you could have brought one of the other "far away" civ's into against it's neighbor that would have more than likely caused them to fight each other, instead of them streaming troops down to us, and slowed them both down in growth.

In any event, not criticizing, since I am far from a good player myself, just try not to mess up too bad.

All:

Sorry about the lack of report, I'll do better next time.

 

[Charis]

@Gris...

> First of all, when trying to negotiate a peace treaty with the AI,
> do they consider the strength of your civ or just how you're
> doing in the war?

As Ozy mentions the biggest factor is pain. If they've been doing the dishing, not only won't they make it hard for peace, but their demands will increase. If you've been pillaging them, beating their units, giving more than you get, their price starts to drop. Take a city and they're more than likely ready. Take *3* cities and they coming begging to YOU to stop. I can't remember any case where they wouldn't agree to free peace or give a handsome tribute, after you "take 3". In limited wars of agression vs tougher bigger civs, it's often a goal to take 3 cities in 10 turns then have peace.

There is a given time period

> When I get the game in 1000 BC, I am planning to check every
> turn until they'll talk, and try to get out of the war. I'm hoping
> the distance means that I won't see any actual fighting.

Don't bother checking for the first 10 turns. There is an automatic minimum time during which they won't even consider your envoy, even if getting very badly beaten. Think of 10 turns as minimum war duration.

> I was thinking that I didn't want to commit to 20 turns of war if
> I could talk my way out of them without fighting.

If they declared on you and want a price for peace, they will certainly not give up before 20 turns if you give them no pain. So a fear of making an alliance taking you 20 turns at war is not realistic, you WILL be in it for 20 years with a distant civ that you do nothing to.

> In hindsight, I suppose with one war ongoing, I should have caved.

Nope, you did the right thing at that point. (Before that point, allying with Arabs vs Ottomans was good, but once the Arabs came demanding, telling them to shove off was good)

The reason is because they're so distant they will NEVER be
able to mount any attack whatsoever. The situation where caving would have been called for would be if such a civ were on your 'other border'. Lets say the Mongols lived East of Salamanca and had been quiet the whole time. The last thing you want is a two front war, and caving to prevent that is worthwhile. But...
In that case even better would be to ally with those Mongols to be sure that you have a friend, not an enemy, on your rear flank.

> But, since I didn't cave, and there are now two semi-distant AI
> against us, should I assume that a mass of alliances vs. us is
> imminent unless I buy the others first?

On any higher diff lvl, the AI can be quite fond of dogpiling on the human, because alliances are rather cheap for their benefit. If you get a situation where you see two alliances form against you, by all means do expect the worst dogpile. That means seek an alliance if it will help (often it's too late by then, that last one to join the party is usually the one you should have gotten as an ally!), or make it highly unattractive for other folks to join the dogpile. For example, I put Korea in a position that was either very awkward if they were considering war, or very gracious if they were peaceable folks. If they were the Mongols I would have done the same thing, and they may have dogpiled, but I would be up two techs and saved a huge pile of gold by them reneg'ing.

One other tip in the dogpile situation - these alliances are frail. If you can get one civ to come to peace before 20 yrs is up, you blacken their rep, which is a good thing - they're less likely to be trusted as an ally partner later, and might get on the receiving end of a dogpile. If there were more than 3 Spanish cities left and we cared about their rep, we would make peace and tarnish them.

(BTW Gris, the comment on an alliance was meant as "great job, really just one thing I would have done different" than as anything invective )

@Ozymandous

On browsing for new uploads at CF, keep in mind their system is case specific. So if you upload RBP1-xxxx, you'll never see it in the lowercase section near files like rbp1-yyyy.

> Don't forget that workers can now make "outposts" that clear
> out the fog. If we have any of these (foreign I'd assume) that
> we want to spare until we can later settle an area, we may

Ah! Outposts! I'm not at all used to the other 'new inventions' of PtW, good point. I don't think I would spare a worker just yet given our major needs for improvements and roads, but with the several captures we got and the smart planning by other players, we might end up with one or two to spare. Also keep in mind that if an outpost ever falls under enemy culture border, it goes poof.

As for the barbs hammering, maybe I got lucky, but being able to train three swords to elite and lose none was a positive thing, made even sweeter by the 25 gold. But with workers lose and/or no swords in the foggy areas, it could get ugly. Also, I don't think I faced a "massive uprising" - then I would have wished I made an outpost.

> BTW, the spot East of the capital was mentioned way back
> when as a good spot, glad to know you agree.

Hehe I thought that point was made before, but didn't look

> The barb's East of Alesia that I saw were from a cmap roughly
> 4 squares SE of that city. I don't know if their camp now will be
> in the same spot, but might be a good place to check.

If we can spare a spear or sword, we could surely use one on sentry duty with a mountain view somewhere back there - to keep us up to date on barb activity, to keep a massive uprising from not occuring *right* next to our city, and to see if any AI sneaks back there and settles.

> For me, if I am on an island or far enough away from another
> civ I don't really care if they declare, since you can generally
> have enough troops made and deployed before they reach you

Very true, this and other factors play in as well. For example, if you're going for a diplomatic win, and someone declares on you, ally with everyone you possibly can. You do NOT want to have 2-3 civs, or worse, a dogpile, of furious AI's, rather you went them all gracious with memories of "ah yes, my close friend and ally from way back in the war of Persian agression..."

> As Charis mentioned, if you could have brought one of the
> other "far away" civ's into against it's neighbor that would have
> more than likely caused them to fight each other, instead of
> them streaming troops down to us, and slowed them both
> down in growth.

Exactly, the benefit of two civs who live right next to each other, of equal strength, beating each other senseless, simply cannot be overestimated. It's like we went in and pillaged both, and slew a dozen units or more, all with no effort on our part.
That's why even if you don't "need" an ally to save your rear, it's often a good thing. There's also the chance that your ally will make peace before 20, and blacken his own rep

One parting general comment... If I wasn't impressed with the Gallic sword before, I am now. Virtually every one promoted, and either zero or one losses, with well over a dozen casualties inflicted on the enemy, three cities captured and one about to fall. These guys just rock! "Working" the terrain, who attacks and who defends, and the fact that they're seeing a lot of 2.1.1 style opponents, means they have a big advantage. The 'retreat' ability with high speed alone saved us 4 of them - that's 200 shields!! Unlike plain swords, where a long push forward means moderate attrition, the Gallics see instead a brief pause every half-dozen turns or so, as a group of them stop and heal - then on again with the fight. If that can be timed so that their healing time is time well spent on quelling rebellion, so much the better.

Charis

 

[Arathorn]

You won't see any massive barbarian uprisings for quite a while. It's been established (at some point, I don't know when) that a "massive barbarian uprising" (where the definition of massive depends on the barb setting) occurs when the second civilization reachs a new era (middle, industrial, modern). At that point, every single existing barbarian camp has a "massive" uprising at the same time.

BTW, looks like barring some major , the game is won. Congrats.

Arathorn

 

[Rowain deWolf]

Yup Arathorn is right. Considering your land mass I guess there won't be many AI's left to reach Industrial.

And the Gallic Swords are as powerfull as expected/feared.

Congrats to you.
Rowain

 

[T-hawk]

Hey, I had missed that this thread was here, somehow. But I'll be lurking, and commenting, now

Commenting on a few game mechanics:

It's not even clear if the AI will discount fully a partially researched tech. In the old days, if you were 90% done researching a tech you could buy it from anyone at basically 10% the price. I don't think that's the case anymore - although I don't know if it's a reduced discount, almost no discount, or only certain techs

I'll assume the "old days" are 1.21 and "current" being 1.29 (I haven't gotten PTW but it doesn't sound like this changed). There still is a discount, and it's the same proportion; the difference is in how tech devaluation changed. In the old days, tech would devalue linearly: it'd cost 1/7 of the base amount for the last of 7 civs to discover it. Starting with 1.29, tech devalues on the order of something like 2/3 of an increment per civ (if that made sense); the last civ of seven gets a discount of (2/3)*6 / 7, or 4/7; therefore paying 3/7, 42% of standard cost.

Also, the multiplier for buying instead of researching tech changed from 0.5 to 0.75. These changes together mask the discount for already having partially researched a tech, but it's still there. (Also, your comments about minimum research progress being 32 beakers, not 32/40 = 80% done, are right on.) And there may be multipliers introduced for buying certain techs like the governmental ones, Nationalism, and Space Flight. I'm not totally sure that these exist, though; they're not in the editor.

...

Whipping the capital's temple way back when: I wouldn't have done it, because it ran afoul of the hidden cost of whipping: because whipping fills the box, the shields produced that turn go to waste. That whip actually only got 13 or 14 shields; not enough in my book. Whipping is significantly more useful at outposts (especially flood-plains cities) that are only pulling a couple shields per turn, or if you can whip-switch (rush, say, a barracks by whipping a settler to 30 shields, then let the city build the remaining 10 shields by itself in two turns.)

Coastal? I wonder what implications a fresh-water-only coast has? Harbor-yes? Colossus-no? Commercial dock-?? Trading route-no?

Harbor - no; coastal wonders - no; commercial dock - I'd guess no based on offshore platforms (which also don't affect lake squares). Dunno whether the game calculates water trading routes across fresh water, but it'd be pretty rare for two cities on the same lake to not have a road.

1550 I then use 29 of our 34g in the treasury to establish an embassy in Spain. Well, can't argue that rat's hole is worse than extortion, but that's the second time we're lining the pockets of our upcoming foe.

Cash you pay for an embassy doesn't go to the receiving civ. In fact, if you're in a situation where you want to divest yourself of cash, embassies are a great way of using it.

Just nitpicking, and I'll be eagerly following along with you guys as well

 

[Carbon_Copy]

I was going to suggest outposts earlier, myself. According to the manual, an outpost on mountains has LOS of 4 tiles. If we put one on the mountain furthest to the east of Alesia, when combined with Salamanca there should be far fewer places for barb camps to pop up in the east. It should even push the black fog back a bit. I suggest that if we do it we use one of our foreign workers, of course. What I don't know is if outposts are pillageable, since it would still have to contend with any existing barbs roaming around in there.

Also, looking at the various screens made by different people make this SG a showcase for all the different tilesets. I'm using the European tile set, looks like Charis is using some version of Sn00py's, and I think Ozy mentioned that he was using the watercolor tileset on the RBCiv forum. It's too bad that the Winter tileset makes it so difficult to distinguish between normal and bonus grassland, or I'd be using that one instead of Euro.

 

[Griselda]

Originally posted by Charis (BTW Gris, the comment on an alliance was meant as "great job, really just one thing I would have done different" than as anything invective )

I know, and I appreciate the feedback! I want to learn a little bit more about how all of this works, so please don't hesitate to post suggestions.

Arathorn (about the uprisings)- That makes perfect sense! That's why there was an unannounced uprising near Entremont at the same time there was one near Alesia, considering the AI's beelined to the middle ages. Definitely good information!

-Griselda

 

[Zed-F]

CC: I would expect that outposts, radar towers, and airfields work exactly as resource colonies do: that is, they are attacked and destroyed by hostile forces the same way, and forces that do not wish to be hostile must avoid them. I don't have a game but it sounds like they have been implemented as an extension of resource colonies (e.g. requiring the permanent sacrifice of a worker, etc.)

As for the use of a native versus a foreign worker, that depends on whether you are short on available worker-turns or short on cash. Since you are expanding your empire right now, I'd say you probably need the worker turns more than the cash, so using a foreign worker is probably the right call.

 

[Mystery13]

Just taking in my usual update on your thread and I see talk about making alliances. I've completed two PTW games now and in both games this occurred: withing 5 turns of making the alliances that Charis has suggested, my partner has turned around and allied against me! I had not seen this in pre-PTW so I'm assuming it's a new "feature." Bottom line, if most AI-civs are against you, you may find that your new alliances don't hold.

 

[Charis]

Just a note in case anyone missed it on the RB forum, Marshall "got it" and should be able to play it tomorrow.

Arathorn - AH! That's where the massive uprising come from!?
Does that also mean no new barb camps form, or will those camps continue on if there remains fog?

> BTW, looks like barring some major , the game is won. Congrats
Hehe, while I don't challenge the assessment, that's about the earliest count-your-chickens comment I've heard in a long time


Rowain...
> And the Gallic Swords are as powerfull as expected/feared.
Now, that thought certainly does come to mind, but let me counter that (or at least take a preemptive stance against their being called uber)
1. Spain is WEAK, with no horses or iron. Any civ that had military ambition could have taken them just as easily as Celts. In fact, an archer or horsemen rush by civs who start with the right techs, or a Jaggie rush, would have been even quicker.
2. We had iron, and got it online early. Persia or Rome would have done just as well (Conversely, Spain failed to hook up the iron that was right there in their core)
3. The folks here did an outstanding job in the opening. They had a plan, expanded well, worked the food well, made the barracks, and executed. Everyone here seemed to micromange very well too, wasting almost no shields on their turns
4. Our GA helped fuel the extra shields needed to crank out the
Gallic swords we have
5. Our GA is now over, and it was 'used up' in despotism. If the Turks or Arabs get their act together they might say "The Ancient Era was yours, but we own the Middle Ages!"
6. The terrain, mostly open, and the fact that we got to pick our battles, made most of the 2 speed advantage.
7. Promotions, omg, is the level increased in PtW, or have mil civs always been *this* good at promoting, or did I see a very lucky streak? Perhaps good luck in combo with two things - barbarian fights where you're almost a shoe-in to win due to the bonus, and also the ability to retreat, and you don't lose promoted units as often



@ T-hawk
> Commenting on a few game mechanics:
> It's not even clear if the AI will discount fully a partially
> researched tech....
> There still is a discount, and it's the same proportion; the
> difference is in how tech devaluation changed. In the old days,
> tech would devalue linearly: it'd cost 1/7 of the base amount
> for the last of 7 civs to discover it. Starting with 1.29, tech
> devalues on the order of something like 2/3 of an increment per
> civ (if that made sense); the last civ of seven gets a discount of
> (2/3)*6 / 7, or 4/7; therefore paying 3/7, 42% of standard cost.

Ah! Thanks, I was trying to find that info and could not!
Hey, it might just fit that the 2/3 discount would apply to 'partial research' as well. A tech where you are 1 beaker from finished would still see you paying 33% of the full unresearched price. The turn before you might pay 36% of the price. Whereas in the old days you would see the price drop to near zero on the last turn, now you would see a much smaller price drop each turn.

> Also, the multiplier for buying instead of researching tech
> changed from 0.5 to 0.75. These changes together mask the
> discount for already having partially researched a tech, but it's
> still there.

Ah! More good info!

> And there may be multipliers introduced for buying certain techs
> like the governmental ones, Nationalism, and Space Flight. I'm
> not totally sure that these exist, though; they're not in editor.

It seems pretty definite there is a premium - if you compare the "Tech costs" in the editor, I've seen (pretty sure) a significantly higher price charged by the AI for a gov tech compared to a normal tech of the same beaker cost.
It wouldn't have to be in the editor if the new cost was
coded as:
if TechAllowsNewGovt() = true or TechAllowsDraft() = true then
Call JackUpCost;
endif

You would do this rather than just increase the tech cost itself so that there were no barrier to researching it yourself, it just makes the AI want to hold certain techs close to its chest. (Which is a VERY smart thing!) I don't know which if any other techs get a premium, but if *I* were coding it, I would add:
if TechShowsNewStrategicResource() then JackUpPrice;
That is, wheel, iron, gunpowder, replaceable parts, etc.
Basically, this cleanly implements some of the logic a human would use.

> Whipping the capital's temple way back when: I wouldn't have
> done it, because it ran afoul of the hidden cost of whipping:
> because whipping fills the box, the shields produced that turn
> go to waste. That whip actually only got 13 or 14 shields; not
> enough in my book. Whipping is significantly more useful at
> outposts (especially flood-plains cities) that are only pulling a
> couple shields per turn, or if you can whip-switch (rush, say, a
> barracks by whipping a settler to 30 shields, then let the city
> build the remaining 10 shields by itself in two turns.)
I agree, and you give some good points to support it. In this particular situation, I don't think it hurt us too bad.

One thing I've been doing for a while now, to reduce that 'hidden 1 turn cost' to a whip, is to try to see if there is something you can build that takes one turn less, whip it (whether cash or population), then switch to what you really want to get.
For example, you have 3 turns left to finish an infantry you want NOW. Checking the number of shields needed vs your production, you might see that swapping to a Frigate, whipping/rushbuying it, then switching to infantry, lets you complete it in "1 turn" just as if you whipped it directly, at a reduced cost. I view this as strategic micromanagement, and extra bonus to be squoze out by those careful enough to do it, and not an exploit. It's similar to the Whip-Wait-Whip in 1.17 - an 80 shield improvement could be whipped cheapest by - needing 79, switching to something smaller needing 39, whipping at a loss of one worker, switching back to original improvement, now needing 40, wait one turn, then whip again.

@Carbon_Copy

> Also, looking at the various screens made by different people
> make this SG a showcase for all the different tilesets. I'm using
> the European tile set, looks like Charis is using some version of
> Sn00py's, and I think Ozy mentioned that he was using the
> watercolor tileset on the RBCiv forum.

Hehe, I look forward to a watercolor map post - I've been thinking about trying that one out. I use a Snoopy's as you guessed, with the addition of "straight railroads", "letters with the resources". The similarity of jungle and forest was what drove me to use a mod in the first place, but now the more visible resources is something I couldn't go without now

Zed - good comment on the worker, foreign vs domestic. An outpost on our mountain behind Alesia sounds like a winner

@Mystery - thanks for chiming in, wow I'm surprised you got backstabbed THAT badly! I've not seen that yet in PtW, and never saw it in classic Civ. Ouch! Be sure you make such deals in gpt, not cash, eh? In this game, I've been pleased to see Koreas gracious status and non-involvement in the war.

Good luck to Marshall, if you can read this forum yet!
Charis

 

[Arathorn]

Camps continue to form in fog, regardless of era, civs remaining, etc. The continue to crank out their little piddly token occasional unit every so often in any era. The "massive uprisings" occur when a 2nd civ enters a new era and all existing camps go nuts. This is rarely seen outside of the middle age entrance, but I've read seemingly-reliable reports that it happens every age.

As for the "congrats", I've gotten tired of reading doom and gloom predictions from SG teams sitting pretty. Of course, were a human playing Arabia or the Ottomans, you might be right about them swinging a GA advantage into crushing you, but this is the AI we're talking about.... That doesn't mean, of course, that it won't be fun, but it does mean that y'all can probably afford to experiment a little bit (just avoid the wacky stuff) with PTW and we can all learn from it!

Militaristic civs have always had impressive promotion rates, especially from regular to vet. You appeared to have been somewhat lucky, too, but it's not far out of the line of expectation.

Partial whipping and then letting finish on its own is also a very powerful strat with cash-buys. If your city is making 20 shields/turn and you need a cavalry ASAP, it makes MUCH more sense to change to a musketman (cost 60 shields) and rush that, then change back to cavalry (80 shields) and let the city complete the 20 shields on its own -- saving you 80 gold. I've used this a fair bit with medieval infantry and ansar warriors in my PTW experiment game.

Looking forward to the rest of this game and the RBD PTW game starting soon!
Arathorn

 

[T-hawk]

It seems pretty definite there is a premium - if you compare the "Tech costs" in the editor, I've seen (pretty sure) a significantly higher price charged by the AI for a gov tech compared to a normal tech of the same beaker cost.
It wouldn't have to be in the editor if the new cost was
coded as:
if TechAllowsNewGovt() = true or TechAllowsDraft() = true

Yeah, that'd be the logical way to do it, and if the jacked-up costs do exist that has to be how it's done.

One other thing I forgot to mention - there's now an extra multiplier of 2 for buying a tech if ONLY ONE civ has the tech already. If it cost 2000 beakers for the Kazakhistans to research Radio, and they were the only one with it, the first civ to buy it from them would actually pay 2000*0.75*2 = 3000 cash. This has been dubbed the "Monopoly Swine" effect, and is a key component of maintaining a tech lead in the game now (keep selling your tech - especially intermediate useless ones like Atomic Theory - at grossly inflated prices, more than it cost you to research.)

Arathorn - I've seen uprisings happen for the industrial age, and presumably they do for the modern age as well. One other thing about barb camps - they do not form on a continent with no civilization-settled cities; that worked in our favor in LOTR4 on the intermediate Russian islands. (It might be fun to take the LOTR4 final save, research the last couple medieval techs, and watch all the camps on the huge eastern continent go nuts...)

 

[Zed-F]

Yep, Charis, the game's not over, but it's over, if you take my meaning. You'd have to pull out some REALLY wacky weed to lose from this position -- how long it takes may depend on a few factors, but a complete collapse (which is what it would take to lose) looks nigh-impossible, especially with your cadre of elite CWs to hold the line while you consolidate. The land you've got is ample to guarantee victory even without pressing the attack on the Carthaginians, and we all know how inept the AI is at actually attacking a competent human defender.

In fact, I am starting to think that all the new worker improvements in PTW are going to make life far easier for the player than for the AI. The AI doesn't know jack about how to amass and apply force, or how to effectively use battlefield intelligence, whereas the human player does. The only impact these will have will be to make the mop up phase last a bit longer and to allow the human to recover from desperate situations ala RBE2 a bit more easily (as if we needed the help! )

 

[Rowain deWolf]

Originally posted by Charis
Rowain...
3. The folks here did an outstanding job in the opening. They had a plan, expanded well, worked the food well, made the barracks, and executed. Everyone here seemed to micromange very well too, wasting almost no shields on their turns

Thats absolutly true and my comment was not meant to deny this. As a matter of fact you must play on a very high skill-level to kick AI-butt that hard as you did.

So if anyone feels offended by my comment I apologize.

But:

Originally posted by Charis
One parting general comment... If I wasn't impressed with the Gallic sword before, I am now. Virtually every one promoted, and either zero or one losses, with well over a dozen casualties inflicted on the enemy, three cities captured and one about to fall. These guys just rock! "Working" the terrain, who attacks and who defends, and the fact that they're seeing a lot of 2.1.1 style opponents, means they have a big advantage. The 'retreat' ability with high speed alone saved us 4 of them - that's 200 shields!! Unlike plain swords, where a long push forward means moderate attrition, the Gallics see instead a brief pause every half-dozen turns or so, as a group of them stop and heal - then on again with the fight.

You yourself described their powers.

Additionaly the retreat-ability does not only save the shields it also denies the defender a victory which means less promotions for him.


Rowain

 

[Ozymandous]

Originally posted by Zed-F
In fact, I am starting to think that all the new worker improvements in PTW are going to make life far easier for the player than for the AI. The AI doesn't know jack about how to amass and apply force, or how to effectively use battlefield intelligence, whereas the human player does. The only impact these will have will be to make the mop up phase last a bit longer and to allow the human to recover from desperate situations ala RBE2 a bit more easily (as if we needed the help! )

Ah, I wouldn't agree with this totally. I don't know what Soren did with the AI, but you haven't seen a "oh crap this may hurt" situation like the late game in PTW until you try to invade a AI with Radar Towers every two tiles interspersed in between their cities. They sprinkle those things around *everywhere*! Not complaining as they make the game a bit more of a challenge if you're unprepared, just that the AI does use at least some of the new abilities pretty well.

 

[Zed-F]

Ozy, my point is that in the scenario you describe, you are on the offensive, and if you are on the offensive in the late Industrial Age, odds are you are already winning the game. Just about any human-led civ capable of going on the offensive in the late Industrial Age is also capable of hunkering down for a space race victory, for instance; even if that civ is not the biggest, it is likely to be the most well-developed infrastructure-wise, as the human player knows a lot more about how to formulate intelligent build orders than the AI does. A human player also knows about things like sending cavs (or conquistadors -- the ultimate pillager) in to knock out undefended radar towers behind the lines before the main tank rush on the cities begins, or using rails to ship up workers and build his own radar towers before a major battle, and can generally make a plan to deal with or work around radar towers and the other new improvements far more effectively than the AI will be able to do against the human player.

So, trying to invade another AI in the late Industrial Age may be more painful, but at that point, you're in mop-up mode anyway; the game is yours, it's just a matter of which way you win, and how long it takes to beat the AI into submission. But, for the human player confronting an RBE2-like situation (regardless of the difficulty level), radar towers may turn a desperate defensive struggle into much less of a contest. This might allow him to focus attention elsewhere than military buildup and maybe pull a rabbit out of a hat to win the game.

 

[ToddMarshall]

Well, it simply refuses to send me the pass for my other nick...... Anyway, I'm finally home, finally have ptw, finally have a working comp again with civ3 and ptw installed. Im working on patches now. Then i'll load up and play my turn sometime today. Thanks to everyone for being patient with me.

 

[ToddMarshall]

OK, thanks to a family crisis I'm just NOW getting to it. I should have the turn posted within the next few hours.

 

[ToddMarshall]

OK here we go. I apologize for the lack of detal in this report after the first 5 turns, but my life has been a living hell the last 2 days and I just want to do right now is crawl under a rock and sleep for the first time in almost 3 days.

[0] I move the gallic from Toledo twards the front lines. I move the scout warrior from the south mountina to the north one, hoping carthage will leave him alone. Interturn a barb horsie moves next to our Alesia workers

[1] I take out the barb horsie with the sword which was thoughtfully put in Alesia for just that purpose. I decide to move one of the Galics next to Leptis Minor to see what the heck is defending it. Turns out to be a regular numidian....... ok, we ARE taking that city because we ARE going to want the FP in Santiago I'm sure and thats a first ring city for it. Besides that, it has a spice in it's inner ring, which SHOULD make 5 lux in our territory soon. I send many Galics that way to prepare for the assult.

Not so lucky with Santiago. It has an eliete spear . The 3 gallics in the neighborhood move next door so we can take it next round.

[2] The first Gallic attacks Santiago and his victory produces a Great Leader...... OMG a leader?!
*blink* I literally spilled my drink. You have NO idea how rare leaders are in my games. I've never, ever had a leader this early even in an allways war game. The next Galic splatters a regular spear, and Santiago is ours! I'm REALLY tempted to just use the leader to rush the FP right there, as it seems the IDEAL location, but Charis seemed to think a Galic army was the way to go, so I figure I'll send him over over to Seville to do just that.

In a surprise, the capital jumps to Samalanca.

I dial up Izzy and figure I'll take peace for all 4 techs or both other cities and 3 techs..... WELL She WONT give up Murcia for anything. The best she'll do is Valencia, Currency, Construction, and Horseback... not even Map Making instead of horseback.... SO no deal. I'm gona auto-raze that city she won't give us and we can just replace it with one of our own.

[3] A Numidian reinforcement appears outside Leptis within striking range of an eliete Gallic. I figure nows the best chance, so I attack...... and whack him without a scratch

[4] The battle for Leptis Magna begins The first vet Gallic drops to 1hp, does NO damage, but retreats. The next vet Gallic does 2 hits to the Numidian, then dies . The 3rd Gallic, an Eliete wins with 1hp left. The 4th Gallic (an eliete) takes out a regular numidian 3-2 and Leptis Magna is ours Hanibal still wont take straiight up peace at this point (unfortunately as all but one of our gallics over there is out of commission for several turns) aparently because he has another numidian on the other side of the city waiting to counter attack

Interturn the Arabs start Hanging Gardens

[5] The annoying city Spain refuses to give us is auto-razed. NOW Izzy will give us Valencia, Map Making, Currency, Construction, and 67 gold for peace (not horseback though). We take what we can get.

I check with Hanibal to see if he will donate horseback riding for peace to get us out of the dark ages and we are "close to a deal" Well, I have one vet Gallic I can sick on that last Numidian so, what the heck? The RNG likes us still. Now Hanibal WILL give us Horseback Riding and 20 gold for peace. We accept. Welcome to the Middle Ages boys.

Now I notice something... Korea has droped to cautious... DOH! No wonder they were Gracious! They are at war with Spain and Carthage! I'm now left wishing I'd known. It probably would have been worth it to wait a few turns, heal up the galics, and try to take another city or 2 from Carthage and really put the screws to them. Sigh. Sorry about that move guys.

BTW - Spain is now sending 3 units from Samalanca through our territory in the direction of Korea. I decided to let them go. Two of them are spears and pose little if any threat, so why not let them go away from the city we want to take soon?

I dial up the Ottomons, and they will give us WM and 20 gold for peace now. Might as well. War with somone that far away right now seems pointless. Besides, a few orange swords just showed up spoted by our northern warrior.

The Arabs will now accept a flat peace treaty, so I take that too.

Ironically, our leader has just now arrived at his intended army making spot, and now I decide we don't want an army since we are at peace...... SO, he heads right back over to Santiago to make that FP afterall X_X.

Now I check the diplo screen and everyone now has the Republic, everyone except Spain now has Monotheisim, and everyone except Korea and Spain now have Monarchy.

Maybe this is a weedy move that will get me tar'd and feathered but I decided we couldn't afford to wait 31 more turns for The Republic. I just feel really strongly that 30 more turns in despotisim would hold us back more than getting a productive government now would cost us up front. So I bought it from the Ottomons for the best price available which was 465gold and 7gpt. I decided to revolt immediately, figuring we would make up for the lost shields/income in the 4 turns of GA we had left.

General Stuff from the last turns:

I switched most of the large cities over to markets to help maximize our income, AND, with the idea that we will get a 3rd and maybe 4th lux on line soon to get bonus happiness working for us. I moved one of the workers onto the mountian to hook up that gems - not sure if this is good or bad. I know it will take a long time, but it should be worth it. If the next player disagrees with this, by all means do something else with him.

I have workers trying to road up that spice from Leptis Magna to the core cities. I definately feel like this should be done.

There is also a question of the Ivory over by that Razed Spanish city. I have a settler almost there to replace that city with one of ours, however if we re settle that exact spot, though it looks to be the best one to me, the ivory won't immediately be within our boarders. We could either settle for a less than ideal spot and get it now, use one of our foreign workers to colonize it and get it fast that way, or bite the bullet and do without it for a while. Personally I'd like to see us get it sooner rather than later since we now have hapiness issues being in Republic, but that won't be my call.

I started a coleseum in Entremont since its in the worst happiness shape.

Alesia completed an Aqueduct since it is really our only core city not on fresh water.

The eastern shore cities were left on courthouses.

We now have the FP in Santiago, so the several cities in its ring should all be good producers once they grow. One of the new cities we took from Spain is whiped and can't sustain a single content citizen, so its runing a scientist at the moment working on Engeneering. The new cities are all working on a temple at the moment for boarder purposes.

I hope my play didn't suck too bad. Sorry if it did. I'm just not thinking very clearly at the moment. Maybe I should have just steped aside and let the rest of you handle it with my current state of mind. Everyone waited on me, so I would have felt bad if I hadn't taken my turn, or if I'd put it off any longer. But now that I finished it, I wonder how bad I messed up.

I tried to figure out how to upload the save file and the pics, but I just cant get it. Maybe it will all make sense in the aftenoon when I get up and can see and think straight