Trading crossroads

[TruePurple]

Deity level with max number of AI components. Something I've been struggling to win for awhile. I usually can keep up with techs sorta at first. But when AI has contact with all other AI it trades me to the dust. It also expands into my area at warp speed.

Its difficult. AI seems to be able to produce twice the towns as me. Or it simply starts out with alot of settlers(don't recall what the bonuses on deity area) And it starts out and can generate alot of troops fast where I'm just struggling to make settlers.

Spoiler My nation :

I produced two curraghs (which I sent in opposite directions to circle the continent) and a number of warriors which explored and attempted to take a couple barb camps but were defeated each time (even being vet from bad barb hut pops) As well as a hopolite for defense (rushed it in with a well timed forest chop I think)

I'm going to rush the temple at the bottom there with 1 pop cost. Recently did a 1 pop rush of settler in food rich but not so rich in shields sparta. Probably will switch to library build in Corinth(scientific) or perhaps settler. I know I shouldn't build buildings like this when still expanding. But I can't afford to take on germany still expanding either. Even if those towns buit units I can't afford to take on germany yet. But I don't want those cities to flip. Plus spains huge expansion leaving many gaps in its nation has me worried. Its really going to have the market on resources. Can't afford to take on em both!

But I don't want to have those towns flip either. BTW thermapylae was built to trade its extra resource. Germany demanded it from me the moment A road was completed to capital which I gave into, but at least germany got happy with me quick (and being a gpt type trade the happiness with me should last awhile) Hopefully I can trade it after the 20 turns end.

Heres the practical area I have to expand into.

Spoiler area to expand into :

Heres the spaces spain left in its expansion that I could expand into but it will be tough.

Spoiler Tough area to expand into left by spain :

Not to mention I'll be bumping shoulders with alot of other nations cities at once and be badly spread out.

Anyways I circled the glob and my curraghs met on the other side on that island being claimed by portigues. First one attempted a ocean crossing and failed. But I saw the domain of another nation so I risked the other one. It got close enough to get one contact, but then sunk in its sea.(strangely that AI nation was already liking me, where deity level nations usually start off annoyed)

Spoiler the difficult long journey to get the other contacts :

I recently got litteracy. Everyone else is illiterate (if you need any more proof of AI stupidity. Not that being illiterate makes you stupid, but I'm just trying to be funny ) My overseas contact has different tech then the nations on my continent. I could unique tech trade hopefully up to par.

BUT.. having the contact of only 1 nation over seas I don't want to trade techs between the still isolated AI. If I trade with that one nation it'll virtually give it away to everyone else there. Which means AI leaves me in the dust faster and gets closer to the point where it can contact the others. I want more contacts.

BTW how long before AI will cross that bit of ocean? Do I have until astronomy?(I think the ship from astronomy can cross two ocean squares without risk of sinking, which is what AI waits for, a no sink risk journey?)

Anyways, should I trade techs among the continents? Or just on my continent? How can I tell when nation on my content has reached the point where it can cross and trade?(when your behind in tech you can't tell how far the AI has researched)

Should I wait to trade with over seas nation? Should I trade for map making even though law is cheaper and more unique/tradable? (AI is still building map makings GW) Should I change my caps settler build to galley?(same shield, it will be completed in one turn) Should I make a harbor to then make a vetern galley? Don't veteran galleys have less chance of sinking? But is the reduced sinking risk (if it does reduce it) enough to be worth it?

But then I'll slow down my growth and I only have a small window to try to claim more land. But then claiming that land might risk might risk war leaving me at the bottom of a dogpile rather then another nation (and reducing trade opportunities as well) I sure wish AI would get warish soon with one another.

I can't really claim any land west without going to war, so I need to circle the continent again to get to that island to try another crossing. Should I send a galley east instead even though I don't know of any decent crossing points there?

Such tough choices! Heres the save.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/59003/Overseas_trading.SAV

 

[TruePurple]

Any ideas anyone?

 

[RFHolloway]

Deity is way beyond me (DG is s struggle), but my instinct would be to trade if you can get most of the techs you are down with that one tech. That would be if you could trade lit at home and abroad at monopoly prices then it would be worth it.

you can't afford to wait too long as they will research it eventually and then you will get very little if anything for it.

If you could trade for a tech that would be a monopoly for the home continent, that would be good. What are the trade options? e.g. from Civ assist.

I would still build the settler - you have contact with the other continent, the tech pace is about to skyrocket, you need the space. Veteran doesn't make it any less likely to sink IIRC (or not enough to make the harbour worth it) - 2 reg galleys would be better than 1 vet, by miles.

Any nation with the GL and Galleys will cross the passage (3 move from sea to sea) but they will be the only ones.

 

[Kool Keith]

Diety is also beyond my skills.

But I would say to definitely trade to anyone and everyone and get what you can get.

 

[Othniel]

Some tips for getting that first Deity win (and that'll hopefully help with your current situation!)

1. Start in a better location! Obviously that would mean starting over, so if you want to continue with this save, keep reading. Just for the record though, especially for the first Deity win and even after, having a strong starting location is vital and not at all cheating, IMHO. I don't mean keep rolling starts until you have 6 cows in your starting radius, but having fresh water for the capital is a must, IMO. Also, try to be an Agri civ. The food bonus will help a lot to compete.

2. Ok, if you continue with this save, trade Lit around on your starting continent, trying to get as many two-fers, etc. as possible. You very well may be able to leverage tech-parity from just one monopoly tech.

3. Get contact with the other landmass! Getting all contacts is simply critical at Deity, this point cannot be overstated. This means for you getting ASAP 2-3 more galleys (or more) searching the seas for other civs. More reg galleys is superior to fewer vets.

3A. Corollary to 3: The AI's indeed cannot cross between the landmasses until either the civ with the GLH does it or someone gets to Astronomy. Once you cross the gap, then it's a judgement call on trading Lit right away or not. Typically, the AI will research Lit very late unless they pop it from a hut, so you are probably safe to wait to trade until you have all contacts. But please don't hunt me down if you wait and then can't trade it...

3B. Second corollary: Sometimes grabbing the GLib is both good and necessary to keep tech pace. You have to use a Palace pre-build from nearly the beginning of the game to do this, and of course that's a little late for this game.

4. Don't build libs or temples at all in your situation. The shields are much better invested in horses/archers/swords--whatever you can build--even if you are under pressure of flip.

5. Follow up to #4: I know Germany (or whoever that is directly south of you) seems a beast, but you're going to have to either kill them, the sooner the better, even if you feel overmatched. Try to MA Spain and anyone else in against Germany and start a dogpile. Fight deliberately and try to pick of any Germany cities you can. Even if you make extremely slow progress, each city razed is one step closer to your dominance. A slugfest is absolutely common at Deity.

6. Considering #5, concentrate all your cities on barracks, units, and workers. Forget mass settlers at this point. Also, forget culture and, more or less, the tech pace and expand through the iron fist. (Of course, grab the galleys first so that you can maximize the trade value for Literature).

7. Build catapults like mad. Artillery will be your lifesaver.

These are some of the things that have helped me beat Deity. Of course, they are just opinions, so feel free to follow them or ignore them as you see fit.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

Deity is tough.

The AI gets an extra settler plus a couple of workers plus a bunch of military - so they can defend their city and find you and beat up barbs and go to war with each other.

Plus, while it takes your city 20 food to grow... it takes their cities 12.

So, yes - they are probably growing faster than you!

I would start making trades, if you can - in particular, trading for iron working (Immortals!!) Immortals really are the key to the game for you right now - yes, they create a despotic GA, which sucks, but they eat through spears and swords.... and an army of Immortals is the biggest bad-ass on the continent...

Once someone gets the lighthouse, they will be able to make that crossing... though they may not try.

Veteran galleys do not have a reduced chance of sinking. Sinking is sinking.

I might build a barracks, then military.

You might want to build a granary in your food rich city, though you don't have many shields there.

I would go to CoL, not Map Making. You won't be able build the lighthouse, anyway, and CoL is necessary to get to Republic, which is really useful for you if you want to best use being scientific.

 

[Kool Keith]

That is Spartan green, not Persian green.

 

[shinsei]

I just loaded the save data,and this situation is absolutely impossible with my current skill(still struggling in emperor).

To Othniel:how can you tell if AI is not reasearching literature?and what they are currenly researching?

PS:what are those red entries thats under the cities which shows something like percentage(from the screenshots,it looks kinda of messed up,just curious,since i never had used any utility yet)

 

[Chamnix]

I can't access the save from here, but some quick comments:

1. Forget the culture in Thermopylae and Corinth. The enemy city in that area has already had a cultural expansion - you will never catch up to it in culture, so those tiles are lost until you capture/raze that city.

2. I would forget settlers for the time being - you are going to have to fight your way out of this. Pump out workers from towns like Delphi, Sparta, and Corinth. Improve the tiles by Knossos and Pharsolos and add the workers to get them to size 6 ASAP. Athens, Pharsolos and Knossos should be changed to military factories.

3. Use your monopoly tech to start fomenting war. I'm having a hard time seeing your pictures, but it looks like a good bet would be to declare on the purple civ. Pay Germany for an alliance against them using gpt (and/or your extra luxury if that deal will expire soon). Then sell Germany Literature for as much gpt as you can get back and whatever techs you can get. Trade Literature to everyone else on the continent as well.

4. Once Germany breaks your alliance (or the 20 turns elapse), go expand via their towns.

You picked a very difficult start for a deity game. In future attempts, I would suggest you place your cities a little closer together.

 

[Othniel]

To Othniel:how can you tell if AI is not reasearching literature?and what they are currenly researching?

You can't know for sure. There are AI research tendencies that let us know what the is AI more likely researching. These tendencies are based on statistical probabilities and I think there is an article on it in the War Academy.

Regarding Lit, it's the same as above. One additional thing, though, is if the AI has advanced to the Middle Ages without researching Lit (it's an optional tech), then I have noticed that very likely the AI won't research Lit for a long time, if at all.

Again, these are just tendencies, so it's always a guessing game.

 

[shinsei]

Its sucks that if one of the AI has,it spreads to everyone

 

[Ansar]

Delphi, Thermopylae, and Corinth are at huge flip risk.

 

[Induktio]

Recently I've played Emperor and have been thinking about moving up a difficulty level or two. I could maybe take some savegame and play it as a challenge, but quite frankly, the above strategic situation seems a little 'shaky' to say the least.

Some pointers:
City layout is spread out and difficult to defend when, inevitably, Germany dows us etc. I would've placed cities in a CxxC pattern usually.

A non-agri civ starting next to desert hurts bumps up difficulty too. Luckily there's both horses and iron on the area, so no need to trade for them.

Probably Germany needs to be knocked out asap to gain enough room for expansion, but we have practically no military. Spain and Portugal would be useful to get to fight Germany so if they raze each other's cities, we gain more room for expansion. Berlin contains the Pyramids so acquiring it would be very useful. But then the AI's have such a huge culture lead that we would have to raze&replace almost every city we conquer.

 

[TruePurple]

Thank you very much for your help people. Though with my frusterations over technical problems with civassist2 and the editor I might not play much for awhile, Im not sure. Anyways..

Is it feasible/possible to get a 200k culture win at deity?

If I had placed my cities closer I'd simply have less territory.

If I switch to just producing military now and attacked germany without war among AI I'd be dead at the bottom of a dog pile.

If I had switched to producing military some turns ago to attack germany, I'd have half as many towns to produce military.. then be dead at the bottom of a dog pile.(its still pretty early in game, many of those towns are recent expansions)

If I attacked germany at all I'd be out of my only resource trading partner, meanwhile spain (light blue to the north) who already has the most tiles on my continent would grow huge and crush me (assuming I wasn't dead at the bottom of a dog pile)

@AutomatedTeller
My UU is hopolite (1/3 defender instead of spearman)
The map making would be to get galley (which can cross easier, only one turn out at ocean plus arrive there 50% sooner) to get contacts. Not to build lighthouse.

3A. Corollary to 3: The AI's indeed cannot cross between the landmasses until either the civ with the GLH does it or someone gets to Astronomy

Yes but how can I know when AI has reached astronomy? They wouldn't necessarily immediately make contact after such would they?

Is it worth it to slow down tech development of the other sides nations by not trading since I only have one trading partner who can easily give to everyone else? Till I get more contacts that is (which might take awhile, especially if I don't trade for map making)

Or is it more important to trade tech at every opportunity? Even if that means they get astronomy for trading with each other that much faster?

3. Use your monopoly tech to start fomenting war

No tech is even remotely close enough for MA against anyone. Well of the one or so countries I have embassy with (I think germany) Can't afford another embassy. Purple is purtiguse. Their presence there is token. The bulk of them is on the other side of germany (germany is sandwitched between us) Portiguse is small (well for AI anyways) Its spain I worry about long term even though it hasnt expanded up against me. Portiguse being there means more likely for AI to start war with one another anyways (as much as they hug one another I expect war to break out on its own between germany and portiguse soon enough)

@shinsei
There is a trick to see what AI is researching if they are aren't too far ahead of you. AI gives credit for tech researched (by you or AI) Offer to sell a tech to AI, if next turn AI lowers its offering price, its most likely researching it.

 

[Chamnix]

Is it feasible/possible to get a 200k culture win at deity?

Not sure if you mean 20K or 100K, but yes, either is possible. However, both generally involve beating the crap out of the AI first, then building culture.

If I had placed my cities closer I'd simply have less territory.

Maybe, maybe not. Placing your cities closer together has a couple significant advantages. First, the cities get founded sooner, so that everything coming from that city is built earlier. Secondly, it gives you more overlapping tiles. This means that multiple cities can share powerful tiles as needed (whether they are powerful because of resources or because they are the ones your workers have had time to improve).

As it is, you have many cities working unimproved tiles. By giving them the ability to work improved tiles sooner, you may have been able to build an extra city or two to keep the same territory but have more cities.

Of course, this is all still without actually downloading the save, so I can't say for sure in your case, but as a general rule, I would recommend closer city placement than you are using.

If I switch to just producing military now and attacked germany without war among AI I'd be dead at the bottom of a dog pile.

Haven't looked at the save, but I'm sure you're right.

No tech is even remotely close enough for MA against anyone.

Not meaning to be rude, but have you actually tried this? You cannot sign an MA against someone if neither of you is at war with the third party - your advisor will always say "They would never accept this deal". You have to take a chance and declare war on Portugal yourself first, then try to sign Germany into the Alliance. If Literature is truly a monopoly tech, and Germany is not already researching it (use the trick you just mentioned to shinsei to find out), then I can't believe it would not be sufficient.

Purple is purtiguse. Their presence there is token. The bulk of them is on the other side of germany (germany is sandwitched between us)

That's what makes them perfect. You will be in no real danger and should not do any more fighting than absolutely necessary during the war with Portugal. Your goal is simply to get German troops moving in that direction and dying so you can attack Germany later.

Portiguse being there means more likely for AI to start war with one another anyways (as much as they hug one another I expect war to break out on its own between germany and portiguse soon enough)

Well, it seems just as likely that Germany or Spain could attack you instead. I'd take matters into my own hands rather than hoping the AI did what I wanted them to do.

Hope this helped .

 

[Induktio]

If I had placed my cities closer I'd simply have less territory.

I was mainly referring to Thermopylae which is so thoroughly sandwiched by AI culture that it's almost dead meat.

Of course you can't always know where some sneaky AI settler will place a town, but generally I would only found towns which I can adequotely connect to the empire and defend. Imho, plopping towns in a roughly circle based pattern minimizes the border line thus making it easier to defend. Founding cities all along the east coast in this case tends to do opposite.

If I switch to just producing military now and attacked germany without war among AI I'd be dead at the bottom of a dog pile.

If I had switched to producing military some turns ago to attack germany, I'd have half as many towns to produce military.. then be dead at the bottom of a dog pile.(its still pretty early in game, many of those towns are recent expansions)

If I attacked germany at all I'd be out of my only resource trading partner, meanwhile spain (light blue to the north) who already has the most tiles on my continent would grow huge and crush me (assuming I wasn't dead at the bottom of a dog pile)

Yes, it's quite early in the game and going for a farmer's gambit is almost a must. If they attacked that early we'd be dead anyways.

I would probably need the 4000 BC save to have any chance at this challenge...

Yes but how can I know when AI has reached astronomy? They wouldn't necessarily immediately make contact after such would they?

Astronomy contained the Copernicus' Observatory wonder, right? The AI's will almost immediately start to build any wonder they can get the required techs for. F7 or F8 opens the wonder list which can tell you that.

Is it worth it to slow down tech development of the other sides nations by not trading since I only have one trading partner who can easily give to everyone else? Till I get more contacts that is (which might take awhile, especially if I don't trade for map making)

I seriously doubt 'withholding' techs is going to help anything unless you already have a significant lead over anyone. The AI's have so high research/trade bonuses that they'll research everything anyway.

 

[TruePurple]

I already told you why Thermopylae is there and its a very good reason(told people several times even)

I place cities where I can, germany was already settling against me when I sent my first settler to the wheat area. I suppose I could have quickly sent a settler to that desert... maybe. But it would be a token useless city only there to claim territory.

Astronomy contained the Copernicus' Observatory wonder, right? The AI's will almost immediately start to build any wonder they can get the required techs for. F7 or F8 opens the wonder list which can tell you that.

Hey, that is a good idea. I don't remember, do you see wonder builds for nations you haven't met yet?

I would probably need the 4000 BC save to have any chance at this challenge...

Heh, you think you can do better with start then me? Be my guest. I'd be curious to see it.
I think you just load the save, maybe wait a turn then choose play last world. It won't be exactly the same but it will be close. I don't seem to have the 4000BC autosave any more (I could give you the oldest save I do have though if you want)

 

[gmaharriet]

Heh, you think you can do better with start then me? Be my guest. I'd be curious to see it.
I think you just load the save, maybe wait a turn then choose play last world. It won't be exactly the same but it will be close. I don't seem to have the 4000BC autosave any more (I could give you the oldest save I do have though if you want)

You can get the exact settings with either Seedbeast or CivAssist2. I used CA2 and came up with:

Civ - Greece
Difficulty - Deity
VC's - Dom, Space, Diplo, Conquest, Culture
Random Seed - Yes
Respawn AI - Yes
Culture Flip - Yes
SGL's - Yes
Seed number - 4356746
Std Continents, 70% water, Arid, Temperate, 4 billion, restless barbs, normal aggression
Opponents: Spain, Germany, Portugal, Maya, China, Zulu, Mongol

If you start with "New Game" and use those settings with the opponent civs in the exact same order, you should get an absolutely duplicate starting map at 4000 BC.

 

[TruePurple]

Similar, not absolute duplicate. The terrain can be slightly different and resources can often be in different space locations though still in the same general area. Maybe AI making a few different political choices and such. Not sure if other differences. Close enough anyways though.

Thanks for the info harriet.

 

[Induktio]

You can get the exact settings with either Seedbeast or CivAssist2. I used CA2 and came up with:

Civ - Greece
Difficulty - Deity
VC's - Dom, Space, Diplo, Conquest, Culture
Random Seed - Yes
Respawn AI - Yes
Culture Flip - Yes
SGL's - Yes
Seed number - 4356746
Std Continents, 70% water, Arid, Temperate, 4 billion, restless barbs, normal aggression
Opponents: Spain, Germany, Portugal, Maya, China, Zulu, Mongol

If you start with "New Game" and use those settings with the opponent civs in the exact same order, you should get an absolutely duplicate starting map at 4000 BC.

Choosing "Play Last World" brought a different world, but the above worked - at least I can't seem to notice anything different.

Anyone interested if I play this as a practise game (though outcome is certainly not guaranteeed)? People usually post the stories in the "Stories & Tales" forum, right?