Seeking advice on Medieval Era

noontide

Warlord
Joined
Dec 17, 2007
Messages
267
Hi guys,

So far I've logged in 1200+ hours on the game and I feel I finally start to get a hang on early stage of the game on Immortal difficulty. I can usually set up 5-6 cities before running out of space while manage not fall behind in city growth. Finally learned how to alternate between population growth and settler/worker output so as not to work on unimproved land. I feel the next stages of the game I need to improve on are (i) better understanding and handling of diplomacy and (ii) research sequence during the Medieval Era.

The game I'm playing right now (saves attached here) is a rare case of everything just humming along. I did have to reload a few times to optimize the building and/or research sequence but I managed to achieve most of my goals. I have a natural tendency to go tall than wide but on Immortal I learned to resist my urge to spam wonders. Pyramid is pretty much the only thing I would attempt if the situation allows it. And maybe Great Lighthouse if I'm playing a sea orientated civ. This game however, I decided to try fto ocus on Great Persons due to England's Philosophy trait. Had a great start location and was able to block off a good chunk of land by quickly setting up a city chain. Grabbed stonehenge (I play without New Random Seed but after a few restarts managed to get it), and use the first Prophet to start a golden age, during which i completed the Pyramid and Great Lighthouse. I almost never build the Colossus but decided to go for it here and got it too. The Pyramid incredibaly gave me two Great Engineers with which I nabbed both Parthenon and Great Library. Also built Hanging Garden because my capital had healthy problem and I wanted to keep popping Great Engineers. The downside of all this was I back filled the land I blocked off very late. Since in this game no one is fighting, I'm just barely hanging on in term of research progress. It's actually a bit disheartening to think with ALL these lucky breaks I'm still not far out in tech progression. Mali has only 5 cities but is already shooting for Liberalism and I'm not sure I can catch up to him. I usually have an easier time if there are aggressive civs who bully Techies and leave me along. I tend to have problem catching up when everyone is teching like crazy on Immortal.

At 520AD I cannot decide which route to take. I just rolled another Great Engineer, I'm thinking to either pop Sankore University to further boost research or grab Apostolic Palace. Is Apostolic Palace useful in diplomacy in general? The resolutions all seem underwhelming, especially in peace time. I'm leaning towards Sankore University. But do you guys usually build monastary for research purpose? I read it on this forum that never build aqueduct and market because they are way too expensive for their benefit, and that's generally the rule I follow. When I run out of useful thing to build I just build gold.

Also as a general question how do you handle Medieval Era? I often shoot for Liberalism for the free tech but how important is improving infrastructure with Machinary or Metal Casting etc.? I know Currency is important but how about Guild? I often run into healthy problems.
 

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..., I'm just barely hanging on in term of research progress. It's actually a bit disheartening to think with ALL these lucky breaks I'm still not far out in tech progression.
Haven't looked at the save, just commenting on your summary.
If you're wondering about your slow tech progress, you might rethink your GP strategy here. Great Scientists are called Scientists for a reason.
If I read correctly, you've had one prophet and 3 engineers so far, and already ran one golden age. A comparison would be helpful with an approach concentrating on getting Great Scientists instead. Instead of the 400 and 350 hammers the Engineers for building Parth and GLib were spent on, GS can fetch 1500 beakers each on the way to Liberalism.
Another way to speed up your tech would be to consider failgold instead of completing all those wonders you got.
Btw, whenever I get an Engineer from the Pyramids, first thing I check is, if a Machinery bulb (followed up by Engineering) would be useful on the map.
 
Haven't looked at the save, just commenting on your summary.
If you're wondering about your slow tech progress, you might rethink your GP strategy here. Great Scientists are called Scientists for a reason.
If I read correctly, you've had one prophet and 3 engineers so far, and already ran one golden age. A comparison would be helpful with an approach concentrating on getting Great Scientists instead. Instead of the 400 and 350 hammers the Engineers for building Parth and GLib were spent on, GS can fetch 1500 beakers each on the way to Liberalism.
Another way to speed up your tech would be to consider failgold instead of completing all those wonders you got.
Btw, whenever I get an Engineer from the Pyramids, first thing I check is, if a Machinery bulb (followed up by Engineering) would be useful on the map.
Well, in my capital I built the Stonehenge and the Pyramid, and later on the Hanging Garden so as to increase the chance of rolling a Great Engineer, I run scientist specialists via library in another city to roll Great Scientist but the progress is much slower than the Capital due to limited great person points.
 
Well, in my capital I built the Stonehenge and the Pyramid, and later on the Hanging Garden so as to increase the chance of rolling a Great Engineer, I run scientist specialists via library in another city to roll Great Scientist but the progress is much slower than the Capital due to limited great person points.
And this is why GP, GA and even GE-points are often referred as :gp:-pollution. This is also why many wonders are not that great. I haven't checked the save yet, but your game is probably deteriorating because you focused on wonders and therefore spawned weak type of :gp: instead of expanding normally and generating strong type of :gp: (GS, GM). Running a golden age very early sounds like a bad idea, too.
 
Commenting on your overall questions, a problem could be the lack of focus. Generally, I try to assess rather early in the game a) how the situation is and b) how I want to get in a winning position. If in the mid-ADs you still are unsure about your tech path, wonders to build etc., this is a pointer that you're making very short-term decisions instead of a greater strategy.

There are no hard and fast rules for this, but some hints - upon getting a good view of surrounding lands and AIs - are:
- is there a lot of good land to grab? Then: Few to no wonders, focus on production.
- are you blocked in? Then: Think about early war (Horse Archers, Axes, Catapults)
- is the land commerce-poor? Then: Think about early Wonders (Oracle, Great Lighthouse, Pyramids)

etc. Then if you want an early rush, focus everything on that; same with early Wonders etc.

As to your specific question on the Medieval era - it depends a lot on your overall focus. I could have gone for an early war, in which case I really need Currency and Code of Laws fast to avoid paying to much upkeep, so Medieval era is recovery time (whipping Courthouses, laying down cottages etc.). I could aim for a war starting in the Medieval era (with Trebs), so I focus on getting to Engineering as fast as possible. Or I could go for Liberalism (for, say, Military Tradition), in which case I want to bypass the Medieval era fast via Code of Laws - Civil Service - Paper to get there. All of these can be winning strategies on the right map.

I'll play out your save from the start for a bit, and see where it gets me within the next days!
 
Checked the save. I'd focus on correcting the biggest mistakes.
  • Some of your cities are over size 6 and no granary. This should NEVER happen after you have pottery. Whip immediately at size 4 or chop asap.
  • You are working a ton of unimproved tiles. When this is about to happen, put 1T into a worker in a city working mediocre/weak tiles, whip next turn. Problem solved. You have a lot to improve here so under 1 worker/city is not enough. Some of your workers are doing very unnecessary things like chopping jungle.
  • Your capital area is unimproved. You should've cottaged those green river tiles some 40T ago. You are running an engineer instead of growing.
  • You are not selling resources.
  • You are building too many buildings (barracks, monasteries, temples).
  • You have a non-capital academy.
For your actual questions, maybe you are too late asking them. Georgjorge is spot on on focus. You haven't played with a plan so far and correcting things is harder than playing it right earlier.
 
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