Regent-Monarch Leap

[Ansar]

I heard I should jump from Regent to Monarch, given I've done every victory except Diplo.

But...

On Monarch level, the AI gets 2 free defensive land units and 1 offensive land unit.

That scares me.

And I saw deity, it scares me how you experts do it.

So do the AI start with 2 Spearman and 1 Warrior?

 

[Pentium]

That depends on their starting techs. They get 2 best defensive units (Spearmen if SCI, else warriors) and 1 best offensive unit (Archer if MIL, else warrior).

Germany starts best being both scientific and militaristic and getting 2 spearmen and an archer.

But I think free units are the smallest problem, unless you're going for Tiny conquest. A unit or two won't make a difference on the whole game.

 

[Ansar]

Do the AI build larger military?

 

[madviking]

Or you're playing archi, the AI would use them as ecorts,

Anyway, i beat Monarch in 4 tries

Its not too hard...

 

[Own]

Yeah, the biggest differences are cost factor, free units, and trade rate (if it stayed the same, tech pace would be just as fast on cheiftan as on sid).

 

[madviking]

Not really, i manage to capture 4 cities with just knights and muskets once.
The built speed is only 90% for the AI

 

[Dreadnought]

I found the 'jump' rather easy, actually. And if you think thats bad, you should see how many units the AI gets with Sid...

 

[Invisible Rhino]

I really enjoy Monarch level. I won't switch up unless it becomes easy for me.

 

[Tomoyo]

Think of it this way - the two defensive units will serve as defense and the one offensive will serve as a scout. Nothing dangerous. You should be concentrating on overcoming the build rate bonus they, if anything.

 

[Ansar]

I guess 10% can go a long way then.

 

[Tomoyo]

Well, the 10% production gets them more stuff like libraries, which multiplies with your 10% science penalty, it all multiplies one way or another, so the end result is that they have more than a 10% advantage over you.

 

[GoodGame]

The main changes at Monarch is to learn to focus

1. on an explosive early growth stage (to about 5-10 towns) using pottery towns,

2.use your workers efficiently (micro-management balancing benefit vs. time taken)---e.g. develop tiles in the most efficient and growth-curve useful manner---not develop every single tile around the capital before moving on,

3. Minimize unhappiness disruption, and 'entertainer's. Focus on a collection of luxuries,

4. Picking thru the tech tree in the most efficient manner, based on your civ's traits and economic possibilities (dependant upon map position).


Assuming a free worker and warrior, a good start queue is research pottery, worker, granary (cutting down trees if possible), warrior, settler. Perhaps throw in some kind of scout, but repeat warrior-settler cycles until you got a good foothold. Then develop a game strategy.

And mainly only develop tiles your city actually uses.


A couple of free units is meaningless unless they start right next to you. Just play a strong defense using the terrain to your advantage at worst.

I heard I should jump from Regent to Monarch, given I've done every victory except Diplo.

But...

That scares me.

And I saw deity, it scares me how you experts do it.

So do the AI start with 2 Spearman and 1 Warrior?

 

[DBear]

Monarch to Emperor is the big jump. Free units are no biggie. The AI starting with an extra settler, now that makes a difference.

 

[CivBound]

I have been having a very difficult time moving up from Regent to Monarch. What gets me is technology. The AI always seems to way ahead, almost every wonder, and then eventually overwhelms me in war. To make things, I feel like I am up against a cartel that set ridiculous prices in the infrequent events it is willing to trade and sell technology. Any tips on speeding up technology advances without going broke?

 

[vmxa]

CivBound, the main thing I would expect to find is the empire is not being improved quickly. I mean that players that get by on Regent or lower with doing lots of happy things.

They build temples right away in every city. The build any new structure they learn the tech for right away in nearly every town.

They do not epxand as fast as they need to do and they do not have enough workers to keep tiles improved as soon as they have pop working the tile.

Then the little things slow them down. The go ahead and work mountains ealry or hills that may or may not even have a resource, while the BG tile is not mined, maybe even without a road.

They space towns too far apart. Then they are slow to make troops and when they do they want to make lots of spears and pikes.

Next you tend to find they are researching less than optimal techs and are in fact researching the same techs the AI is researching. If they beat teh AI to it (not often), they do not get monopoly prices for it.

Contacts are often not prioritized, but this is not eveyones problem, but it is common.

Now are some issues that I feel are frequently abused. That is too quick to make MPP and RoP's with civs. Not selecting your partners well, when they do make a deal.

All of these things are meant for players with a decent or better start. I mean if you get a real bad start, then even Monarch can be a struggle.

 

[madviking]

Civbound- Thats why you should play archi on your first game. build a boat and sail to everyone and build GLB and crank research down to 0% because the AI *should* research faster than you and use the money for the happy slider.

Byzantines are good because the sci make more sciguys and more techs, and seafaring is used to meet everyone. Dromons with bombing makes a whole new ship. Destroying coastal supplies of iron, and horses gives you the upper hand.
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I think Monarch to Emperor *should* be easy because the only differance is faster research/building and a little more units. Using the GLB and boats you *should* be up on everything.

 

[TheBB]

You don't have to go zero science on monarch - it's still not a (big) problem to outresearch the AI in the end.

 

[Tman65]

I'm in the midst of my first Monarch game as the Iroquois and I've found timing to be really important. I mean that w/the Mounted Warrior, I don't necessarily want the tech pace to be too fast so that I can maintain my advantage longer. I haven't found it too bad, the AI is noticably more agressive than I've encountered before...even on standard. Attention to detail is beginning to be the words of the day though (as already mentioned). Anyway, the challenge is why you play, right?!

 

[NintendoNut]

I think the main difference between Regent and Monarch is the cost for building stuff for the AIs. They can build everything much quicker than they could on regent.

The jump to Monarch wasn't that tough for me. From Monarch to Emperor was very hard. (For me)

 

[Ansar]

Monarch is soo easy. The only thing that bothers me is that AI now actually put up a fight in defensive against me, glad there is artillery and bombers.