The Unluckiest Lucky Start

[Aabraxan]

@darski -- Thank you. I'm glad that you enjoyed it.

@timerover -- I'm glad that you enjoyed it, too.

. . . . I had not considered the fact that corruption does not effect food production, nor specialist effects. I will need to keep that in mind.. . .

That's part of what makes specialist farms so powerful. In a sense, they circumvent the corruption model. The other thing to consider is that specialist output does not get put through the multiplier buildings, so there's no point in building a library or a bank in a specialist farm. A specialist farm putting out 12 bpt without a library will still put out 12 bpt, even with a library.

. . . . You also have much better luck with the AI in trading and peace agreements. I have yet to manage anything like that. Your style of play is also much different from mine, but overall, an account that was quite profitable to read.

I'm not sure which part you're referring to, but part of it was just luck. But I'll admit that I do monitor trade opportunities pretty frequently. Good luck with your diplomacy.

 

[timerover51]

Anything that circumvents the corruption model gets 10 cheers in my corner. The corruption model is my biggest irritation with the game. Having grown up and still presently living in the state of Illinois, near Chicago, Sid's view of corruption is incredibly naive, to say the least. Although in theory a democracy, and with respect to Chicago, I am using the term democracy EXTREMELY LOOSELY, corruption cannot be viewed as minimal or even nuisance. You want to do business with the state government or Chicago, you better be ready to pay. I had some friends exhibiting at the Gamefest in 1986 at McCormick Place, and had three different groups tell me the same story about the union workers there. When they went to get there materials, they were told that over and above the official charge, it was going to cost $100 cash per handler, and there were either 3 or 4, for the stuff to be moved. Otherwise, it went in the dumpster. In one case, a Chicago cop was standing nearby, and told my friends that it was a union issue and none of his business. The Booksellers show has pulled out because of issues like this. Corruption is endemic in any society, so I would love to see the whole idea killed.

 

[Aabraxan]

Well, I'm not a fan of corruption in RL, but I must admit that I think it makes C3C more interesting. Even though I'm a pretty heavy user of specialist farms, corruption adds a dimension to gameplay that's been absent in most of the strategy games I've played.

 

[CivRulesAll]

great game,followe it thru to the end in one day =D

 

[Spoonwood]

I think they made corruption in civ III the way they did, because of how corruption worked in civ II. In civ II, since corruption came as no problem whatsoever, and you could build settlers for 1 population point, ICS worked as the best city placement strategy hands down... no real question about that whatsoever. Corruption makes such a strategy less viable or less optimal.

"It's not pretty, but it's also not insurmountable. As for VC, I haven't decided, but Conquest, Space Race, Diplomatic and Cultural are all on. It's just been frustrating to have such a powerful-looking start, only to discover the truth of the matter."

Well, I guess this comes as an old game now, but I wouldn't have consider your lack of resources all that much of a problem early on. You had ivory... so you could concentrate on infrastructure and expansion early on. The jungle, I actually think looked great from the get-go. I say this even if I had wanted a military victory condition. I would have spammed settlers out to the jungle, with Carthage as a 4-turner, and I see a wheat there, so I'd make a second 6-turner or a worker pump. I would have settled as much jungle as possible and built *tons* of workers. In this one, I probably would have kept peace with the AIs until I really, really liked my worker crew at least, if not until the industrial ages. Maybe even build the GL and turn it off and *really* slow down the tech-pace on this one. Even though I haven't done it before from what I can remember, the next logical step seems a palace jump near the now *former* jungle from all those industrious workers clearing out. I'd have expected the former jungle to have some good coal, so then trade for iron in the industrial age and rail everything up. Trade for saltpeter for a bit if I wanted to whomp on the AIs, and then use all the cavalry armies I could get. Maybe I'd even have some cash stored away to buy some armies... the Great Library would have helped with this... I can't see it as a crutch here... its an army factory... think about it. If you lack early resources, I'd guess you can usually drop your warring plans for a while and play more builder for a while. Or just go builder the whole game. Or not and do what you did and win handily anyways.

 

[Aabraxan]

Even though I didn't wait until the Industrial to trade for iron, I did some of the things that you mentioned. I built a settler pump at Carthage (I think it was a 4-turner). I jumped the palace into the former jungle. When I first read your post, I actually thought that I had built the GLib in this game, but I looked over the thread and I guess I didn't.

As far as keeping peace with the AI until the Industrial Age, well, let's just say that I've never been very good at keeping the peace that long.

 

[Spoonwood]

As far as keeping peace with the AI until the Industrial Age, well, let's just say that I've never been very good at keeping the peace that long.

Well, that's something to always *consider* even if it's not really your style.