Sucking after the patch

[Watiggi]

How low did your research slider get before moving into builder mode?

 

[obsolete]

Damn, I tried to pull it off again. Declared war on cyrius twice, and got a -6 rating. That's ok, but I had assumed it would disapear after all the insane techs and trades I gave him FREE after that until the end of the game. Nope... rating still stayed at -6. Lesson learned. Maybe it's the new patch, or I'm too used to civ III where after each age the ratings sort of fall through. At least the religious status changes at a whim. Anyhow, next time I declare war on a person twice, I think i'll go ahead and kill him anyhow. You'll never repair the damage and he will never vote for you after that, no matter how nice you are and how bad the other AI's are to him.

Then to top it off, after I gave mansu EVERYTHING and tried to applease him all game too, he still refused to vote for me too. O_o

 

[Willowmound]

How low did your research slider get before moving into builder mode?

Most of the time 60%-70%, never below 50% -- except for a handful of turns when I needed money to make Bersekers out of my old city raider Axemen.

It's the AI's demands in tech-trading that really makes things difficult. Some trades I simply refuse. As when they want several expensive techs in exchange for one. Sometimes it's just ridiculous, and I won't do it. Some leaders are worse than others.

 

[Lance of Llanwy]

I generally am not afraid to go down to 40%, but at that time I become very squeamish about going any lower UNLESS I see large, immediate benefit from continuing whatever war I'm prosecuting, I call it a day and start the recovery...

 

[illram]

I've gone as low as 0% and running only scientists. Granted it's only temporary, but it's possible as long as it's an investment in a robust future economy. (I.e. it's usually because I'm killing everyone on my continent and have rapidly over expanded myself).

Building research/gold also helps. The slider often gives you a false sense of security or panic.

 

[Watiggi]

Most of the time 60%-70%, never below 50% -- except for a handful of turns when I needed money to make Bersekers out of my old city raider Axemen.

I quite often go down to 20-0%. Alot of the games I play I hover around 20% most of the early game and it starts to pick up at around Cannon (and after a few holy shrines) as I start to get more income comming in. It then settles at around 40-60%. I dunno, more cities with lower tech percentage vs a higher tech percentage but a slower expansion rate? I prefer the former although it can get hair raising when you are at 10%, -20 gold per turn and you start a war with your neighbour inorder to expand further. It works though! If you stick at it and develop what you conquer. Maturing the cottages takes a while as does developing the shrines, but for a conqueror, getting Isabella's shrine mid game is like an oasis in a desert

It's the AI's demands in tech-trading that really makes things difficult. Some trades I simply refuse. As when they want several expensive techs in exchange for one. Sometimes it's just ridiculous, and I won't do it. Some leaders are worse than others.

That annoys me too. I wont agree with most of the trades either. I tend to play the game with this idea of not expecting much from the AI's. I tend to focus on building my economy and being totally self sufficient when it comes to research. I have found the AI to be rather eager to trade resources for gold per turn though, even to the point where you can keep cancelling them after 10 turns and raise the costs as they get more gold per turn to trade - can build a nice income that way to support an expanding empire. On that note, with a big empire, I generally have quite a lot of resources for trade too.

When you're interested in doing so, try to play a game where you continue to expand. Take over a neighbour. Consolidated it by building the cities and developing the land and continue expansion to infinity. There is a point where the slider just balances out and a huge, fast expanding empire (that is being developed as well ) supports itself while teching very fast - at about 40% I think - and with a big empire, I can catch up rather quickly. I think this has to do with the pace at which cottages grow, vs the cost of civic/city maintanence. But in the begining, I usually end up deficit spending at around 20-30% (clinging to the percentage rate with -20 to -40 gold per turn) and then conquer as a means of putting gold into the treasury by pillaging and capturing cities.

My GOTM3 (I think it was - the one with Tokugawa (my first Monarch game whereas I usually play Noble)), I just expanded with the idea that expansion would save my butt. It did! I was fighting Elizabeth's Musketmen and Granaiders with Samurai and Catapults, but by the time I finished her and Gandhi, I had caught up in tech and was (if I can recall), one turn away from Artillery. I think at some point in the game I was clinging to a 20% research slider while deficit spending and I just gritted my teeth and kept on expanding. For a Noble player, that was a big thing for me to do on Monarch. Mind you, I had nothing to loose anyway and I ended up with just under 80K for a dommination win

... I learned a lot about expansion in that game and the illusion that a low research slider, deficit spending and going to war in such a state is not nessecerily a bad thing.

edit: noticed your thread name has been changed Man this new posting system is cool!

 

[Willowmound]

I noticed the change too. Other threads as well. Someone has been cleaning house, it looks like.

What you describe sounds absolutely terrifying. But I'll give it a try. Do you play Large maps?

My current game has enterd its final 100 turns. If I win, it will be by a hair -- and a Time Victory. Korea has two spaceship parts left to build. All I can do is try and stop them from being completed. I've been lucky to get a Permanent Alliance with the English (otherwise I would have had no chance at all), and lucky that another pair of civs are fighting the Koreans as well. Still, they are holding their own, and I'm not sure I can get sufficent forces together to take out the city my spy just found where the second to last spaceship part will be finished in 13 turns.

This would have been very different pre-patch. The AI actually builds the UN now, and the friggin' peacenicks voted for a ban on nukes about six turns after I finished the Manhattan Project. If it weren't for that, Korea would have been a heap of unhealthily glowing rubble by now...

 

[obsolete]

Permanent aliance is nothing but a cheat. This is why it is only avail under the custom game menu. It's nice to build just one city (original capital), then get your perm alliance but it doesn't really feel like a true win. Because it isnt.

 

[HardCoder]

Permanent aliance is nothing but a cheat. This is why it is only avail under the custom game menu. It's nice to build just one city (original capital), then get your perm alliance but it doesn't really feel like a true win. Because it isnt.

Remember it's just a game dude.

 

[Willowmound]

Permanent aliance is nothing but a cheat. This is why it is only avail under the custom game menu. It's nice to build just one city (original capital), then get your perm alliance but it doesn't really feel like a true win. Because it isnt.

It's not a cheat so long as the AI uses it. Which it does. The playing field is, as they say, perfectly level.

 

[Watiggi]

Never used it before. I'm usually never above cautious with my AI 'friends' and so never get the chance. I find that you have to go way to far to befriend them. May aswell just eradicate them when the time is right for you. Mind you, there seems to be changes to the patch with regards to this. They seem to make more demands or something and get annoyed with you more quickly.

 

[eric_]

Yeah, I was cleaning up on Noble pre-patch, but am just starting to get the hang of it post-patch. I think I'm just about ready to move back up to Prince.

The AI is definitely "smarter" now. It's "decisions" are much more intuitive and it "knows" how to wage a nasty pillaging campaign when it doesn't have the power to take cities.

 

[Watiggi]

You do know that Blake has also made additional adjustments to the AI since 2.08? Some of the adjustments have to do with proper mixed stacking of units (including medics) and attacking cities properly. I haven't had a chance to play it yet, but the differences may have an impact to the game aswell.

 

[eric_]

So I think I've seen this mentioned before, but couldn't find a thread or anything...

Anyone find trebuchets to be kind of overpowered? They regularly beat my well-promoted longbows and macemen in a walled city.

 

[Willowmound]

The trick is to take your trebuchets to their cities...

 

[shmily_dana]

I had just started to play Noble pre-patch. After the patch I dropped back to Warlord. I find that I need a better home guard when I launch an invasion. The AI will sends a much bigger stack into my territory. Also, I need a bigger fleet, or the AI will try to land transports deep in my territory. It did that before, but it seems like it does that a bit better. In my last game, I did not have any coal. This was the first time I had ever missed that resource. The only two sources, were deep in enemy territory, so I don't feel like I did not expand enough. I was able to trade for some from the other continent. I don't remember exactly, but I think it was for another resource. I expected to be charged 200/turn or something silly.

I did note that all the AI players had 20+ population cities. I'm going to have to work on my growth.

btw : I took my continent, mostly to eliminate the AI tech leader. I probably could have taken enough of the other continent for a domination victory, but I went for the space race.

 

[Watiggi]

I just did a Jaguar rush last night on Noble and it worked fine. I gave up about half way through when I underestimated a heavily defended city and lost my entire army of Jags (about 20 of them) when I accidentally had the stack attack option set. Arghh! Mind you, with the Jag UB and effectively being able to pop rush every 5 turns without penalty (and only a 7 turn unhappiness penalty if I do pop rush within 5 turns), I built my Jag force back really quickly (which is what I love about the Jags). I was way behind in tech, but I didn't need it: I had much more cities and a force capable of taking down my rivals.

 

[Charles 22]

I've been extremely reluctant to admit this, not least to myself: after the patch, I can't seem not to suck.

I play Prince. Or at least I used to. Now I can't manage it anymore. After the patch I'm consistently at the bottom of the pile, score-wise, tech-wise, military-wise... I just suck.

I used to be very comfortable on Prince. I have beaten Monarch. Now, though, I'm fearing I will have to revert to Noble. Noble! I haven't played that level since my very first few games of civ4.

I don't get it. What exactly is it the AI does now that it didn't do before? Better city placement? But I usually follow the blue-circle suggestion anyway. How can I all of a sudden suck this much?

I'd really like some advice here. I do not want to revert to Noble.

I regularly play noble, and have the very same problem. It's made far worse than you realize by the fact that the AI seems to be free of war weariness concerns. I enjoy a long war, but you could have that with the old system anyway. Now if you slaughter over a hundred of their units in your land, they won't come looking for peace, and if you offer peace to them they will give you a token 50 gold so it seems. I used to profit quite a bit out of civs attacking me and having to pay reparations, and now that strategy is completely out the window. I think it's dumb to take the aspect of a civ benefitting from being defensive very successfully in war and not reaping any decent benefit.

 

[HardCoder]

I regularly play noble, and have the very same problem. It's made far worse than you realize by the fact that the AI seems to be free of war weariness concerns. I enjoy a long war, but you could have that with the old system anyway. ...

I don't think it's a problem with the AI's apparent lack of war weariness as much as that weariness after the patch seems to really clobber the human player. For all I know, it clobbers some of the AIs too, but there are a half dozen of them, and only one of me.

A game called "Warlords" should IMO be a little more lenient in allowing long wars with stable war economies, especially in the Classical and earlier periods where wars went on for generations and to some extent centuries. Since the 1800s war will send a country back in time quickly, so severe weariness is more appropriate from the standpoint of realism.

 

[eric_]

when I accidentally had the stack attack option set.

I think it's OK to load an auto-save if your mistake was simply a settings error (or something equally benign). I just make sure I do everything exactly the same as I did the first time through, other than the one silly mistake.

If I stack-attacked on purpose and lost everything, well, that was just a tactical blunder that doesn't deserve a reload.

I think it's dumb to take the aspect of a civ benefitting from being defensive very successfully in war and not reaping any decent benefit.

On what level? I have gotten some fantastic payouts on Noble and Prince. You just have to a) decimate their army, b) take a city with overwhelming force, and c) make it clear that you can take one or more additional cities with similarly overwhelming force.

I think what you're noticing is either a result of playing on a higher level than me, or possibly the fact that the AI just makes better decisions, so it isn't as easily overwhelmed.