Dwarven_Megalomaniac
Chieftain
Ok... I must admit that after playing Civ3 a few times, the gaming issues that I'm sure everyone is familiar with, generally made me feel like not playing. But I'm thinking of giving it a second chance....
So there are some things I REALLY need advice on.
Now when I started, I decided to play chieftan since I just wanted a feel for the game and ... ok... after a rough day at work, sometimes I just want to STOMP.
So in Civ 1 & 2, on chieftan I could tech VERY easily. It seems to me that I MUST be missing something in Civ3. I couldn't even get all the modern techs by the time the endgame date came around (2100) and I'm sure I was in 2000 before I even got flight. This is even with science at 70% to 80% as often as I possibly could, and going to Democracy ASAP.
I'm I missing something fundamental here? Can anyone get high level technology early on in the game?
Do I just have to have a ridiculous amount of cities? I usually play archipegalo (makes strategic resources much more interesting) and once I fill my island, and maybe one or two smaller neighbours I have a pretty decent amount of cities.
Also... has anyone been overcome by purely ridiculous amounts of enemy AI naval units? I was playing against Aztecs (on Chieftan) and had just declared war (bastards kept trespassing through my land and building cities on the ONE square my culture didn't cover). Anyway... once I declared war they tore apart my 6 battleships, 6 destroyers, and 2 aircraft carriers in about two rounds, plus pounded my coastal cities pretty hard and took out a LOT of terrain improvement.
What did they use? Galleons. Wood and cannons. But they must have had over a hundred. Anyone seen anything like that?
Ok, this leads into my next question. Do you guys try and match the AI's propensity to build new cities? Do you build them anywhere for the sake of building them? Or do you put more planning into city location. I'm usually ahead by a few cities until the late part of the early game and then the AI seems to go crazy planting cities anywhere it can. I'd like to try a different map than archipegalo ... but I'm worried that this will only feed the AI's insatiable hunger for more cities.
So there are some things I REALLY need advice on.
Now when I started, I decided to play chieftan since I just wanted a feel for the game and ... ok... after a rough day at work, sometimes I just want to STOMP.

So in Civ 1 & 2, on chieftan I could tech VERY easily. It seems to me that I MUST be missing something in Civ3. I couldn't even get all the modern techs by the time the endgame date came around (2100) and I'm sure I was in 2000 before I even got flight. This is even with science at 70% to 80% as often as I possibly could, and going to Democracy ASAP.
I'm I missing something fundamental here? Can anyone get high level technology early on in the game?
Do I just have to have a ridiculous amount of cities? I usually play archipegalo (makes strategic resources much more interesting) and once I fill my island, and maybe one or two smaller neighbours I have a pretty decent amount of cities.
Also... has anyone been overcome by purely ridiculous amounts of enemy AI naval units? I was playing against Aztecs (on Chieftan) and had just declared war (bastards kept trespassing through my land and building cities on the ONE square my culture didn't cover). Anyway... once I declared war they tore apart my 6 battleships, 6 destroyers, and 2 aircraft carriers in about two rounds, plus pounded my coastal cities pretty hard and took out a LOT of terrain improvement.
What did they use? Galleons. Wood and cannons. But they must have had over a hundred. Anyone seen anything like that?
Ok, this leads into my next question. Do you guys try and match the AI's propensity to build new cities? Do you build them anywhere for the sake of building them? Or do you put more planning into city location. I'm usually ahead by a few cities until the late part of the early game and then the AI seems to go crazy planting cities anywhere it can. I'd like to try a different map than archipegalo ... but I'm worried that this will only feed the AI's insatiable hunger for more cities.