Some newbie questions

[dancingk8]

I've gotten to the point where I'm able to defeat the AI fairly easily on Prince mode, but there are a few things I was wondering about that I think might help as I move on to higher difficulty settings.

-What determines when you can/can't found a religion? Generally, when I play a game, I actually disable the ability for someone to win via religious victory because I find the process of converting cities to your religion to be kind of boring and I'd rather not have to focus too much energy on it. I do, however, appreciate the benefits of converting at least my own cities to a religion so I get the various gold/production bonuses that come along with that. The only time I'm consistently able to found a religion is when I manage to be the first to build Stonehenge. If I miss out on that, then usually all the Great Prophets are taken by other civilizations before I can grab one so I'm stuck without a religion for the rest of the game. This happens sometimes even when I build a holy site right away. Any other tips here?

-I don't really understand the concept of combining troops into a corps. Once I've unlocked machine guns/rocket artillery I basically have zero issues defeating whatever city I want, but I'm wondering if it would be even easier if I could figure out the corps system. Do you know what the benefits are, what kinds of troops are good to combine, and if this is a useful feature to seek out earlier in the game?

-This one might be kinda a long shot to ask lol. I usually tend to go for a culture or science victory, but I thought I'd try out a domination victory at some point. My main complaint with this is the hugeeee amount of time it takes to move the necessary troops to where you want to fight if you want to go after any civ that's not immediately bordering you. It almost doesn't feel worth it to waste 25 turns moving your troops somewhere when you can probably unlock more advanced units in that amount of time and then not be able to upgrade them because they're away from friendly territory. Really the only time I can be bothered to take someone over who's on a different continent is after I've unlocked nuclear weapons and can bomb them from a distance. Is there any way to address this problem/things you've found helpful so I can start conquering more civs during the mid game?

-What is the point of having planes at all?? I feel like they're basically useless haha but I must be missing something. I hate how you can only use them to bomb very particular areas that are within a certain distance from the airport. And then it almost seems random which tiles are shaded indicating you can attack there. I would have thought the whole point of using planes is that they can fly long distances. What determines where they can attack? Do I need to like move them somehow if I want to attack somewhere that's not immediately bordering one of my cities?

 

[Victoria]

You need to get a holy site or two quite early and even push projects to get a great prophet amd most people just do not bother.

It allows stacking of 3 units. That +10 and +17 do not seem like much but the way the combat system works they are as powerful as 3 in the square and the maintenance cost is less. You get the feature mid game in the civics tree. All units can combine nicely, I sometimes leave flanking / scouting units not and also often do not have enough to combine. Also you have a single unit with 3 levels of promotion, add 2 newbie units and they in effect get the promotion.

Moving troops is a pain however sometimes there is a natural lull while you need some new tech or just war weariness... But yes, they still have to move. It is one of the reasons I like Naval Dom. You can have 2 armies, also knights with a siege tower for example... Get faster troops. Infantry are a pain, mobile troops mid game are great with support troops.

Landing strips?

 

[Mr. Shadows]

As to founding a religion, it's worth it to understand because it's the same way you earn other great people. Each type of great person (prophets in this case) are earned with great people points. Great prophet points come from the project Holy Site Prayers (this is the best way) shrines and a policy that only Greece and Poland can use because you need a wild card slot. You can check your progress on the great person screen. You can also buy great people for gold or faith from that screen, although that isn't practical in the early game.

 

[hongyu20]

For a domination victory , try to biuld Heavy Chariots and and rush to Stirrups for Knights , battering rams and siege towers are also very useful , or if you want , you could always try Sumeria to just crush the AI in the Ancient era .

 

[ShinigamiKenji]

Victoria pretty much nailed all questions. I'd only like to complement some of them:

1. If you really, really want a religion, it's easier using some civs. Arabia (duh), Russia and Japan are among the stronger candidates. Greece and Poland can use the +2 Great Prophet points policy as soon as you research Mysticism. Aztecs can rush Holy Sites with captured Builders.
Stonehenge is almost impossible to get on Emperor and above, since the AI shoots for it very fast (usually it gets built before turn 35). Get a couple of Slingers for defence, and shoot for the Holy Site. You can try to squeeze in a Builder or Settler, but it gets harder the more you delay it.
Conquering neighboring religious civs is also an option. Less players means more chances for a religion, and those also come with Holy Sites. It also takes ther focus away from religion.

2. Corps and Fleets are unlocked at Nationalism (Industrial Era), while Armies and Armadas at Mobilization (Modern Era). Don't underestimate the strength increase: A Knight Corps can almost go toe-to-toe with a Cavalry unit, and a Cavalry Army has only 1 strength less than a Tank unit.
Sometimes you don't want to merge them due to Zone of Control, though, and you can't divide them into separate units too.
You can train Corps and Armies in cities with an Encampment and a MIlitary Academy, and Fleets and Armadas in cities with a Harbor and a Seaport. Do note, however, that they take more time (less than 3 separate units), but I find it better to train those 3 units in separate cities and then join them together, which takes less time (but uses up 3 cities).

3. Domination in Continent maps get better if you build Great Lighthouse and shoot for Steam Power early. They greatly boost movement at sea.
For conquest on land, you generally want mounted units, and maybe the odd Siege Tower or Artillery unit.
A Great General/Great Admiral also boosts movement (and if you got more than one, they stack). You only need to keep an eye if your units didn't get more advanced than your general, though.
For your problem with outdated units, you can try to shoot ahead in science and bring more advanced units than your enemy. Then they'll still be able to get one city and you can upgrade them there.

4. They have a maximum range (which is quite small compared to Stealth Bombers from Civ V).
For land conquests, Victoria already suggested using Military Engineers to build Landing Strips (which can hold up to 3 aircraft in neutral, flat territory). I'd advise using Carriers too. Even on Pangea, they can reach quite far inland.

 

[Futumch]

I also didn't get the point of corps for the first couple of games. I realised later on that it has great benefits: a stronger "unit", more space for support units (freeing up one hex for something else to use) and of course the promotions as mentioned by Victoria.

Just on the idea of aircraft, if your empire at the late stage of the game is quite large, or even spread across a couple of continents, then Airports are a fantastic way to deploy units across vast distances. Knock that twelve-turn epic voyage down to a couple of turns.
Actually isn't there an achievement for air-dropping a rank 3 Slinger? Flight Slingulator or something like that.

 

[shaglio]

Since nobody else has mentioned it, I'll point out that your 2nd and 3rd bullet points are semi-related. Yes, it's a tedious slog to maneuver your troops across the map to attack. But if you combine them into Corps/Armies, then it becomes easier since there are less units to move and, therefore, less congestion on the map.

 

[Victoria]

And then of course you can use the Logistics card to give +1 movement

 

[hongyu20]

For a Domination Victory , or for any victory in fact , you could always start a trade route to the city you want to invade , the trader builds a road and so your units move faster , your trader will come back to its origin city when you declare war .

 

[Victoria]

yep, I have found it is one of the many things you need to plan ahead of time... Today I sent a trade route to Tomyris then attacked her and sent 2 trade route to China while I was doing so... and then to Kongo... Maybe the developers will code in an new AI civ screen

"you sent me a trade route, do you think I am stupid?"

• Say yes to declare war
• Say no to appease their worries and get a friendly bonus as there are not enough.
  
• Ignore the AI and watch them needlessly spend their time building up troops

 

[shaglio]

And then of course you can use the Logistics card to give +1 movement

Well, yes, but only in "friendly" territory. Does that include neutral territory, or only within your own borders (and possibly CS Suzerain borders and/or Ally borders)?

 

[Victoria]

Only your own but everything helps

 

[madeirabhoy]

I've gotten to the point where I'm able to defeat the AI fairly easily on Prince mode, but there are a few things I was wondering about that I think might help as I move on to higher difficulty settings.

-What determines when you can/can't found a religion? Generally, when I play a game, I actually disable the ability for someone to win via religious victory because I find the process of converting cities to your religion to be kind of boring and I'd rather not have to focus too much energy on it. I do, however, appreciate the benefits of converting at least my own cities to a religion so I get the various gold/production bonuses that come along with that. The only time I'm consistently able to found a religion is when I manage to be the first to build Stonehenge. If I miss out on that, then usually all the Great Prophets are taken by other civilizations before I can grab one so I'm stuck without a religion for the rest of the game. This happens sometimes even when I build a holy site right away. Any other tips here?

-I don't really understand the concept of combining troops into a corps. Once I've unlocked machine guns/rocket artillery I basically have zero issues defeating whatever city I want, but I'm wondering if it would be even easier if I could figure out the corps system. Do you know what the benefits are, what kinds of troops are good to combine, and if this is a useful feature to seek out earlier in the game?

-This one might be kinda a long shot to ask lol. I usually tend to go for a culture or science victory, but I thought I'd try out a domination victory at some point. My main complaint with this is the hugeeee amount of time it takes to move the necessary troops to where you want to fight if you want to go after any civ that's not immediately bordering you. It almost doesn't feel worth it to waste 25 turns moving your troops somewhere when you can probably unlock more advanced units in that amount of time and then not be able to upgrade them because they're away from friendly territory. Really the only time I can be bothered to take someone over who's on a different continent is after I've unlocked nuclear weapons and can bomb them from a distance. Is there any way to address this problem/things you've found helpful so I can start conquering more civs during the mid game?

-What is the point of having planes at all?? I feel like they're basically useless haha but I must be missing something. I hate how you can only use them to bomb very particular areas that are within a certain distance from the airport. And then it almost seems random which tiles are shaded indicating you can attack there. I would have thought the whole point of using planes is that they can fly long distances. What determines where they can attack? Do I need to like move them somehow if I want to attack somewhere that's not immediately bordering one of my cities?

agree with a lot of your points and questions there.

im not convinced that corps etc make logical sense, but its such a pain moving troops that i do it out of laziness.
i posted on a separate thread about the amount of time that moving troops takes and its bonkers no matter whether you are looking at the years of game time or in terms of enjoyment. tanks should move about 5 times further than they do. I'm about to win a domination victory that wasnt in any doubt but its taken me so long to get there because of troop movements. i have a few dozen tanks and it took me soooo long to move them over to another continent with two nations on it. yes i could have used airdrops if id managed to jump through all the hoops to get the airports, plus had a city over there to start with, but because i didnt it took decades of game time to move the tanks over. now having concentrated on china in the south, its taking me over a decade to drive the tanks to the north of the island to take spain.


firstly they should bring back troop carrying ships and make them move far faster, secondly tanks and modern units should zip up and down irrespective of roads.



and as for planes.....wooo i finally managed to use one, but its such a waste of time. bring back carriers so at least i can zip a carrier round the globe carrying them rather than the daft rebasing.

 

[Victoria]

...there are carriers

 

[ShakaKhan]

It almost doesn't feel worth it to waste 25 turns moving your troops somewhere when you can probably unlock more advanced units in that amount of time and then not be able to upgrade them because they're away from friendly territory.

Note that if you play on a slower game pace, your units maintain the same amount of movement points but it takes longer to progress technologically and culturally, so the units, in a way, move "faster" in comparison to how quickly they become obsolete. Though this is somewhat self-defeating, because everything takes longer and the campaign will probably feel equally if not more tedious to you.