Victory on Monarch (help)

[Woobi]

Hello everyone!!!

I have decided to come back from my Civ IV hibernation, and I recently bought Warlods. I have always had trouble winning on Monarch, I can do it about 30 - 40 percent of the time, which frankly, isn't good enough...

My play style is saddly a builder, which I know I have to get rid of if I want to move up the difficulties. This is where my questions come...

I know a lot of peacefull players have trouble at levels Monarch and above, because at these levels it requires a lot more war and a lot less building, so if anyone has any tips or help I would greatly apreaciate it.



Also, I included my most recent game. I am Catherine. Early game I went to war with Hannibal and took him down signifigantly, I was doing fairly well untill...

Untill I started to get into huge economic trouble. I was dominating military wise, plenty of axes, but I was down to 10% science, and I couldn't get Hannibal to give me any techs. I feel far, far behind in the race and it took a lot to get back to the point I am at.

So my questions are, what could I have done differently, what should I do next, is this game lost, if not how do I win it???

Thanks once again!!!

 

[entrada_sinful]

I haven't got much experience in Monarch, so everything here is basically moral support. Definately keep trying, just because you can't keep a budget doesn't mean all is lost. And make sure you checked all of your units, you may have uneeded money suckers hibernating somewhere, also try to attain as many resources as possible. Keep your economy building and once you have a sufficient fund and few but powerful units is when you should strike. Better to wait another 200 years building than starting a war you're going to eventually lose because of unsufficient resources to fuel your war.

I don't know if that was just a jumble of words or if it will actually help but thats all I got.

 

[Sisiutil]

I unfortunately don't have Warlords yet so I can't look at your save. However...

I've never really gotten over my builder addiction. All I've done is added a warmongering addiction over top of it. Even when I play as Rome, which just begs for warmongering and empire-building with that great UU, I still restrain my warrior long enough to build a bit first. What I'm doing is setting the groundwork for the rest of the game; if I don't, I find myself in a similar crunch to yours.

To wit (and keep in mind I'm talking about vanilla Civ IV here), I try to build 3 to 5 cities to snag some essential land and resources right off the bat. I'm not just talking about copper and iron; I also am looking to founding my military city and at least one commerce city which will probably become my science city. But the specialization comes later; I just want to grab a few good spots at first and start building units.

I also try to build a couple of early wonders: usually Stonehenge and the Oracle, preferably in the same city. I usually use the Oracle to get Code of Laws, mainly for the courthouses. And I don't research Masonry at first, so that I can use the wonder-produced Great Prophet to pop Civil Service. Meanwhile, my workers get busy with cottages around the capital as the troops head off to the front.

As a result of all this groundwork, I usually have several hamlets or even villages around the capital by the time I can implement bureaucracy, which I'm able to do fairly early. I also run slavery for much of the game; if a city I've taken is starving and/or has a lot of unhappy citizens, I whip a courthouse. By the time my early wars are done, I'm in pretty good shape economically. I follow this up by making Currency a priority tech.

This basic early strategy saw me through Prince and is working reasonably well so far on Monarch.

 

[cabert]

I cannot open the save right now (if I could I would be playing )
but here is some piece of advice.

general thoughts :
warlords and vanilla may look alike but they're different. Don't let the similarity get you into trouble. Warmongering will be different in warlords (obviously, GG is a big thing, don't sue for peace before having one!).



to recover economically you need :
- income
- cost reduction.

Where can you get money?
1) Easiest way is pillaging and capturing/razing cities since you have an army.
2) Second easiest is to sue for peace at a high price (no techs? so what? just take the money).
3) Third is to conquer a shrine for a dominant religion (doing it yourself is good too, but it takes time).
4) Commerce = cottages and trade routes. No answer here but a check-list:
-Do you have all the roads towards "friendly" (meaning open borders) neighbours? Do you have "friendly" neighbours at all?
- Do you know currency?
- Do you have enough cottages?
- Do you have population to work those cottages?
- Do you have happiness to grow to the size allowing you to grow those cottages?
4) building wealth or science. In vanilla this is a moot point, but in warlords it's doable. You just need the right tech to do so. every hammer will become either a gold coin or a beaker.
5) running merchants specialists.
It may feel very little at first, but a settled great merchant may save you for the rest of the game (food and money, what else do you need ? a lady maybe, but you already are catherine)
6) selling resources (selling a double cow for 3gpt isn't game changing but 3 is better than 0)
7) missing wonders (a bit late, but you could start early wonders in every city. You gain money for missing them)
8) others i forgot? You could build markets in your high commerce cities to improve your gold output. You could sell techs. You could settle a great prophet. ...

Cost killing :
What is costing you money?
1) cities : maybe raze the next cities you capture? More cities = more maintenance in every cities (not only in the last one). Build courthouses in high cost cities.
2) Civics : quit caste sytem if you don't use specialists. Slavery is cheaper. Org rel is not cheap...
3) Units : you pay for more units AND you pay for units outside your territory.
Healing inside your borders is not only faster, it's also cheaper.

 

[TM Moot]

Sorry Woobi, can't open as at work..!!

I've just upped to Monarch and after a few embarrassing failures I'm getting the hang of it now. I would suggest the following:

1) Build cottages instead of farms (esp. if on floodplains). This goes against my CivIII heritage (max pop) but is essential.

2) Don't allow cities to get too big too early. When the pop is heading towards being unhealthy or unhappy stop any further pop growth until...

3) Only build city improvements when necessary to let your pop grow (i.e. granary/aqueduct)

4) Fog bust to reduce barbs if not surrounded by other Civs

5) Be willing to change religion if surrounded by Civs with other shared religion

6) Open boarders linked by roads to increase trade

7) Don't build anything (Wonder/city improvement/unti) that you don't need, instead get the city chugging out research so you can keep your income high

8) Aim for 5-6 cities first off, until you can afford a second expansion later in the game (if poss)

 

[Twiglet]

Like cabert I'm at work and can't open your save - but I have some generic comments.

On vanilla I play at Monarch. If I choose an easy leader (Caesar, Catherine etc) on a Pangaea map (random climate/sealevel, normal speed) I can win most of the time (say 70-80%). I prefer to let the game choose me a leader and a map though - I just specify normal size and speed, Monarch difficulty. When it does I win about half the time. I don't win more because I'm weak at micromanagement - basically I get bored of it and can't be bothered to sit and calculate everything to the nth degree - I even automate my workers late on sometimes - and I don't specialise my cities effectively enough (I'm never quite sure how to balance the specialists-vs-tileworking in the early game when it makes a huge difference to the outcome). Reading the ALC threads gives a real insight into the depth to which other players consider their first ten moves. Me, I tend to just go right ahead and do whatever occurs

I'm also a builder at heart but Monarch pretty much forces you to have an early war - axes for a few cities or at the latest axes-plus-cats to take down nearest/biggest rival (at least to the point where they won't trouble you the rest of the game).

However, I just bought Warlords and have had five starts at Noble (thought I'd try out some of the new stuff at an easier level), random everything. I've only won twice and one of those was really a fluke. The Great Wall is a great wonder but it means you can't use a GP to pop CS, for example (because you need masonry so the GP popping path is different). Vassals makes bribing other civs into war a whole new ballgame. If you are looking to hold your biggest rival up, you can simply end up giving them more vassals (which, while it doesn't always help them, does make it much harder to go after them militarily late on as you're then attacking three or four civs all at once).

The short version is, they made some fairly significant changes. The new traits are cool, I haven't yet worked out how to leverage them to their fullest advantage (I'd have thought Imp, with its cheap settlers, might have lent itself to a REX strategy and lovely building. Fell flat on my face when I tried it though). Short version is, as the name of the expansion pack suggests it's more about warring than anything else. I think the pack makes domination/conquest wins more interesting/achievable in different ways - but diplo and cultural wins much harder to achieve. Of course I'm still a noob (and not especially good at vanilla...) so take my thoughts with a pinch of salt. Barbs are also more pressing so you need more military units earlier on (esp if you don't go for great wall) just to take care of the swordsmen and axes that will arrive at your doors.

In terms of low science a real factor is military unit cost - but you gotta have those units. You need to develop the land you took and give it time to right itself. The last game I won I was way behind and on 10% science for a bit - but then plastered my continent with cottages and universities etc and ended up launching the ship before 1900, very rare for me (but this was only Noble).

Not sure if I've helped or just waffled a lot

 

[podraza]

I think I have builder addiction too. My problem is that I see each new building as an investment towards future gains, and thus I think they should be first priority, with units second. I always think to myself, "I'll build the (building) first, THEN I'll build a unit" But of course, there is a never-ending supply of (building) and so next thing you know you have no army and are getting killed.

Of course, the unit is the better investment towards future gains, I am learning. And yet, I can't shake the bias towards buildings.

The solution, I have found, is the specialized military production city. I have one of these to start and usually add a 2nd and 3rd as my civ expands. The units only city gets no buildings other than forge/barracks, etc. This allows my other cities to build nothing but those buildings I want so much to build anyway. This lets me get my builder fix and still have a strong army.

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

woobi, I win on monarch about 50% of the time and most of my wins are dependent on which civ I picked

One of the things that works for me is to build the GW to avoid having to worry about barbs. The CS slinger works, but I got bored with the same thing every time and I got tired of getting killed early in GOTM.

A second is to constantly remind myself that if a conquered city don't have a really good wonder or a shrine there's no reason to keep it.

A third principle is to not get too attached to that City Raider 3 axeman; he's not gonna live long enough to upgrade.

I'm trying some wonderless games to see what happens if I don't build any.

I usually don't build more than 4 native core cities. Then again, I'm an idiot.

Micromanage early, do it with regard to your goals.

Cherrypicking undefended workers and scouts really early also works well.

 

[Jet]

Previously, hard for me to tell. Earlier cottages? Not settling St Pete on a poor food site? You seem to have gotten only one or two great people; more of those would have helped. If you weren't close to a L5 unit it might have been better to use your one GG on a Medic III for Heroic Epic and West Point. Build choices seem a little strange, grocer before granary?

Now, well, how about National Epic in Carthage and adding scientists there; cottage over everything else; and build fewer buildings and more units (now - longbows and trebs, soon - cossacks) and then try to take on Toku, at least to get the shrine in Kyoto. You could get the 4 cities to your south, and the colony to your North, and settle 2 more in your home territory. For me the distraction of the war would make it hard to catch up to Mansa in score, but who knows.

 

[Woobi]

So is cottage spamming better to do that trying to grow your cities to size 20 for specialization???

And the grocer's are because I needed more money...

 

[Meatbuster]

Now, well, how about National Epic in Carthage and adding scientists there; cottage over everything else...

What he said. You don't need many GP farms, really. It is probably counterproductive to build many huge cities in favor of a few big cities and a handful of small ones. After a while, towns will beat scientists, even under Representation.

 

[Jet]

So is cottage spamming better to do that trying to grow your cities to size 20 for specialization???

And the grocer's are because I needed more money...

Yeah, usually it's most efficient to make sure each city has at least 1 good food resource and then cottage (at minimum) most flat grassland tiles (except for irrigation, and in a few special cities like the Heroic Epic, Ironworks, maybe National Epic cities). While you're at it, cottage some river plains too.

I don't think I understand what you mean by "size 20 for specialization". Size is good, but if you mean specialization in the sense of "this city has food and hills so it's going to build military units, this city has grassland so it's going to work cottages, etc", you basically can do that no matter what size the cities are.

My point about buildings was that the first buildings in a city should usually be granary, culture building if needed, forge. Second tier (depends) barracks, library, lighthouse, courthouse. In my opinion grocers should usually be low priority except in special cases (shrine city, need health).