Tips for expansion and war on noble please!

[ironic_lettuce]

Hi guys

First off, thanks for helping me so much so far, and sorry for all these posts! But I assure you I am learning and it's all coming together!

I think the final piece in the jigsaw I need to learn about is expansion and war and I've written below what I feel I need to learn, so any hints would be great!!!

Expansion:
I have trouble knowing when to expand, and how much to expand! Are there any general tips on this? I know it depends on the type of victory I'm going for though. And what's the best way to combat the cost of expanding? I know that you cant expand too fast, because of the city upkeep etc - is cottage spamming the best way to overcome this? In conjunction with buildings such as markets, courthouses etc?

War:
This is still my biggest flaw unfortunately! I think one of the things I do is build far too many units, and end up losing lots of money in maintenance because of it, which stifles my expansion. But then, if I dont build these units, I'll fall behind the other civs! I cant get the balance!

When you go to war, how many units do you normally build? Again, I know it depends, but I do think I build too much! To take a city, I tend to bring lots catapults, bomard the city, suicide some cats, then use my other guys to mop up. I make sure I do it all in one turn as well - no promotions for the bad guys! I also try and take the whole civ in one go, but if I have to, make peace with them, then re-build my army and declare war on them again

Also, when I tech up and I'm able to build better units, am I as well disbanding the earlier units, if I dont have the money to upgrade them? (which I very rarely do!)

I've seen people on these forums say stuff like, 'once i've taken the whole continent'. I have NEVER taken a whole continent! Mainly because of the fact that if I was to take these cities, the maintenance would cripple me!!
One of the ways I've made money in this game is to found a religion and then build the shrine to it, but if I'm warmongering I dont bother with religions and then find it hard to make money Whats the best way to make money with no religions? is it cottages again?

Finally, how many workers should I be using? Is it one per city, or more?

Any hints at all on any of these subjects would be great!

I have read some of the articles in the War Academy but I think the advice you guys give me is much better

thanks again

EDIT: Also - how long do you guys normally take to finish a game? (in hours) I think one of the other problems I have is lack of patience at times! And, for some reason, if I lose a game or fall way behind, or something happens that means I know I wont win the game - I never go back to an earlier point and re-load, because I see that as cheating almost, which is daft considering I'm trying to learn! Think I need to start doing the reloading thing more and learning from my mistakes!

 

[King.Bahamot]

First off all, you know that you can expand when you are able to keep your science slider pretty high. I normaly go to war when slider is at 50% or more. Else I try to get it up there. To get you economy more stable you basicly build marketplaces where you have good commerance, courthouses where the upkeep is high. If you dont have enough commerence I would suggest cottages by your capitol. Try to work on goldmines, gems, silver and wine. Sometimes you have to set the city to work on them yourself.

About the units, kill of the old units like warriors if you dont have the money to upgrade them. They do nothing in defending, Besides making the enemy to have to atack an extra turn.

Normaly when I go to my first war, I explore the enemies cities, decide how many of their cities I want to capture or raze. Look at their defence, and tries to calculate how much units I need to capture what I am going for. The game Im playing atm on emperor, i decided to go in to capture 2 cities, one which had a good position, and one that was the capitol of a religion, and had a shrine. I did not have catapults, so I brought up an army of 10 axeman and 5 war chariots. Dont kill of a civilization at once. Milk out their technology. The war is to cripple them for a while.

Disband units that is not very experienced. Units with more then 10 xp is worth to keep. great general+barracks+vassalge+theocracy=10 xp. Also old units with city raiders promotion might be fun to keep. Since grenadiers does not get that upgrade.

Dont have time to write more. Hope it helps

 

[ironic_lettuce]

Thanks, that's helped

 

[King.Bahamot]

Reloading is ok if you dont intend to brag on how you finnished a game
A game useally takes more then 10 hours if Im playing serious. Sometimes up to 20 hours. I take this long when I try to figure out what I need to do to make the best moves. It's like chess, you think about every move that is possible, then tries to think what move will make me win. and what the opponent will do. This is what reloading can do you good when you are in a learning process, unless you have time to play 24/7

 

[JimT]

I'm the same with reloading, feel like I'm cheating myself. I agree it is a good training tool and I should learn. Problem is I don't have much time to play civ and don't want to waste it on a game I won't enjoy finishing.

On the point about continents, it depends on map size. I play smallish maps where you are likely to share a continent with one or two AI. You should be able to capture a continent this size but don't fill it with your cities. Just the useful bits (grassland, river basins and resource rich areas). If an AI settles the gaps more fool him. It will give you some cash when you raze his poorly defended and pointless outpost.

I tend not to wipe out a civ unless I want ALL his land. I think they are more useful left around unless they could be a dangerous ally to a future enemy.

 

[ironic_lettuce]

hehe definitely dont have 24/7 access!

I've started a game and I'm doing ok in it. I've taken over Montezuma's two biggest cities then got all his money and two techs in exchange for a peace treaty I'll wipe him out soon enough - I've taken his only source of iron

Catherine is on my continent as well, so once I've disposed of Monty, I'll build up my army again and wipe her out (slowly ) and hopefully, for the first time ever, have a whole continent to myself!!

 

[cabert]

about expansion, on noble you can expand a lot!
(iMaxNumCitiesMaintenance = 5At some point, when you have too many cities, every city will have 5 maintenance from "number of cities", meaning that a single cottage will pay for the city).
Of course, i don't mean to say you should build one cottage in every city. Build loads of cottages where the land is good, and none where other improvements are better.

Go for currency and/or for CoL soon, and you'll be fine.
I favour currency because you get 3 bonuses :
- one more trade route in every city without any cost (you need roads or rivers, though to connect your cities to others)
- you may sell things for money / sue for peace for money
- you can build markets for 25% bonus money.
Why is this better than courthouses and CoL? because courthouses don't pay unit support!
Still, in faraway cities, courthouses are really handy, and if you overexpanded a bit, switching to caste system and running merchants all around the place is good too... But switching out of slavery has a cost I don't like paying.

About war, a very common noob error is to build a gigantic army before going to war. You can declare war when you have enough troops to conquer something : 1 city or even 1 worker. Just be sure to build reinforcements and you should be fine.

I never had to delete a unit (my heroes!). If you have obsolete "leftovers", use them as garison in your core cities.
colateral damaging units should never be deleted IMHO. Just throw them on the biggest stack and have them die for a good reason.
If you care about WW, you can even launch a war against a big guy, let him enter your territory with his biggest stack and suicide all your old units on him = they just died for a cause, and you had no penalty for this . Of course you need fresh troops to finish off the stack and then counterattack.

About workers, you know you don't have enough when your cities work unimproved tiles.
My rule of thumb is one / city (which doesn't mean you affect a worker to a city! team work is much better).

about play duration, it really depends on many things (map size and game speed for instance!) but my usual game is 10 to 20 hours. Which is never straight.
And reloading is not a sin, when you're not into a competitive game (succession games, although not competitive ban it too).
Try a game in 2/3/4 different ways. You'll see different moves in action. It's the fastest way to learn IMHO.
But you need to replay "large chunks" of games, like 4000 BC to 1000 BC, or 1000 BC to 1000 AD. It's not about shuffling the RNG, it's about testing other strategies.

 

[automator]

Expansion is the toughest to learn. If you don't expand enough, all the good land is taken by the bad guys. If you expand too fast, you risk no science or a general strike. Usually on Noble (I'm on the Noble/Prince cusp now), I'll hit three-five cities before a first war. By this time, I'm usually at or just about to discover CoL or Currency (or both). Each of these helps take away the sting of your next expansion. Then expand until it is beginning to hurt your economic growth.

Don't build to much. Think about your goal from the war. If you just want to grab and take a single (hopefully stragetic) city, build for that. Have 4-8 cats, a few swords, an axe or two and a couple archers. Take the city and fortify. In early game, that's enough of a force per city you want. Don't build a SOD that has your entire army and march about; it's very slow. Instead, divide into conquoring units and start grabbing land. The AI isn't very good about retaliation. If you take a city of theirs, they'll tend to try and take back that city, rather than going into your empire and messing about.

Upgrades? I'll upgrade as necessary. If war is declared, I like to be able to upgrade those usless Archers on my border cities. Only upgrade an attacker if it's of reasonable level. I use what my best city can produce as a judge. If I've got pentagon, west point, and I'm running vassalage and theocracy, that means I'm not upgrading those units who only have two promotions. Basically, if I could replace those units with a quick build, I'll not upgrade. Also, only upgrade if you're going to use the unit. No point in upgrading your axe to a grenadier if you're just going to let him sit until he's obsolete and you need to think about if you're going to upgrade again.

Workers -- I do one per city early in the game, then stop unless I notice that I'm working unimproved tiles. remember though, it's nice to have a ton of workers once you get railroads to quickly build a RR network!

I do recommend the War Academy articles. They're a little "thick" when you're first starting to playing, but they give good strategy and help you think of the big picture. Lurk in the forums to pick up on the jargon, then kick back with some WA and soak it up.

 

[cabert]

Don't build to much. Think about your goal from the war. If you just want to grab and take a single (hopefully stragetic) city, build for that. Have 4-8 cats, a few swords, an axe or two and a couple archers. Take the city and fortify. In early game, that's enough of a force per city you want. Don't build a SOD that has your entire army and march about; it's very slow.

IMHO 12 units for 1 city is already a stack of doom.
I go to war with 4 axemen
If you wait for cats to attack, it's true you better build at least 4.
Because with 4 catapults, you can bombarb defenses down in 2 turns, and have 1 unit to sacrifice for collateral damage.

 

[King.Bahamot]

IMHO 12 units for 1 city is already a stack of doom.
I go to war with 4 axemen
If you wait for cats to attack, it's true you better build at least 4.
Because with 4 catapults, you can bombarb defenses down in 2 turns, and have 1 unit to sacrifice for collateral damage.

I really needed that much, I had to cripple him by that time. I lost like 8 of those 12 in that war But still gained my 2 cities I was aiming for. If I had catapults I probly would have sent less

 

[ironic_lettuce]

IMHO 12 units for 1 city is already a stack of doom.
I go to war with 4 axemen
If you wait for cats to attack, it's true you better build at least 4.
Because with 4 catapults, you can bombarb defenses down in 2 turns, and have 1 unit to sacrifice for collateral damage.

4 axemen!??!?!

Right, I'm definitely building too many units!!! I would never dream of going to war with only 4 axemen! I'd get creamed!

 

[cabert]

I really needed that much, I had to cripple him by that time. I lost like 8 of those 12 in that war But still gained my 2 cities I was aiming for. If I had catapults I probly would have sent less

8 losses for 2 cities is a lot, but still acceptable in some way.
Ididn't mean to pick on you. Just pointing to a very common mistake.
You don't need an overwhelming army to gain land in a war.
You capture city after city, defend against the counter attack with your entire stack, healing units included and bring reinforcements along the way.

You don't have to face the entire army of the AI in one big fight, so you don't need to have 2 units for every AI unit.

 

[ironic_lettuce]

Thanks for the tips guys, I'm definitely getting there, I can feel it!

One of the things I've started doing that's really helped is to stop letting my cities grow on their own, as it were. Every couple of turns I'll check my cities and make sure they're growing how I want them to etc instead of just letting the computer choose.

Also, is it best to group workers together and get them building improvements that way? Completely improve one city, then move on to the next?

 

[King.Bahamot]

8 losses for 2 cities is a lot, but still acceptable in some way.
Ididn't mean to pick on you. Just pointing to a very common mistake.
You don't need an overwhelming army to gain land in a war.
You capture city after city, defend against the counter attack with your entire stack, healing units included and bring reinforcements along the way.

You don't have to face the entire army of the AI in one big fight, so you don't need to have 2 units for every AI unit.

Thats what I normally do. But I had a reason for my misstake I wouldnt send 4 axeman, I would have sent 5 In that war I wanted to finish it quick. Since my economy is down very low. If you have time you can take a look on my first emperor game and give advice.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/103038/King_Bahamot_AD-0425.CivWarlordsSaveThis link

 

[cabert]

Thats what I normally do. But I had a reason for my misstake I wouldnt send 4 axeman, I would have sent 5 In that war I wanted to finish it quick. Since my economy is down very low. If you have time you can take a look on my first emperor game and give advice.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/103038/King_Bahamot_AD-0425.CivWarlordsSaveThis link

If i could open a save, i could be playing, and then I wouldn't be posting

4 axemen is enough on monarch, it may be a little short on emperor

 

[ironic_lettuce]

If i could open a save, i could be playing, and then I wouldn't be posting

4 axemen is enough on monarch, it may be a little short on emperor

lol, I play on noble, so I'm guessing 4 is more than enough!

 

[cabert]

lol, I play on noble, so I'm guessing 4 is more than enough!

usually, yes
I didn't want to say it's a rule. It's just my way of playing.
But if you attack a frontier city, without culture, not on a hill, defended by 2 archers, you don't need more than 4 axemen. You then heal the survivors (1, 2 or 3, depending on your luck) in the city, while reinforcements are coming for the next city.
And it doesn't cost you more (in fact it costs you less) than building up a massive army and storming through many cities at once.

 

[ironic_lettuce]

usually, yes
I didn't want to say it's a rule. It's just my way of playing.
But if you attack a frontier city, without culture, not on a hill, defended by 2 archers, you don't need more than 4 axemen. You then heal the survivors (1, 2 or 3, depending on your luck) in the city, while reinforcements are coming for the next city.
And it doesn't cost you more (in fact it costs you less) than building up a massive army and storming through many cities at once.

Ah I see, I was never sure how to play it - have a huge army and march to victory, or have fewer guys, then let them heal, and move on.

 

[cabert]

Ah I see, I was never sure how to play it - have a huge army and march to victory, or have fewer guys, then let them heal, and move on.

pros and cons for a massive army vs a reinforcement strategy :

pros :
- you won't be backstabbed
- you have a better element of surprise
- the first fights will really tell how you're doing

cons :
- you start later = you win later
- in this time, your opponent can build reinforcements
- you pay upkeep for useless units (units are only good when you use them!)

It's not a clearcut thing as you see.
But I feel the urge to use every opportunity (that fits in the long term goals). So allowing the opponent to fortify in this city I want in my empire is always a bad move.
If i can attack the settler before he builds the city I gain a worker. Not quite as good as a city but easier to defend
Same thing, if I can grab a worker. (warning : in warlords, the worker cannot move in the turn where you capture him!)

 

[ironic_lettuce]

thanks

I was just reading an article about how to pillage etc. Do people ever declare war on another civ with the express purpose of pillaging and destroying their improvements and no other purpose?

seems like a good way to get an advantage