What the hell am I doing wrong??

[Solo4114]

So, I "rerolled" and started over again with the same 4000BC start.

This time I made liberal use of the whip, and WHOA did that help! I've always been worried about lingering happiness issues, but hook up a gold and a wine, maybe whip out a temple or two in a city, and you're all set.

However, once again I ran into issues with building up my military and barbarian incursions. I think I may even try restarting AGAIN and this time use the same city locations, but focus a LOT more heavily on military.

I haven't tried the espionage approach, either. I've never had much luck stealing techs...but that's also been at lower levels where I didn't really NEED to steal techs. So maybe things will go a little better this time. I did notice that Freddie stole Mathematics from me (sneaky little bastard...) so maybe in the next go-around I'll turn the tables on him.

I think with a better early game, I'll be in much better shape to get to the mid-game and start invading other continents. That is one problem with the map, though -- given the distance between continents, I THINK it will require a MASSIVE invasion force and a LONG campaign to knock out even one of my opponents. After that, maybe I'll try espionage + religion/diplomacy to turn things more to my favor.

I did notice that another civ built the Apostolic Palace, which sucks because it was for a religion that hadn't even made it to my shores yet. Oh well. Maybe I'll just go take the damn thing.

 

[oyzar]

The problems with barbs is not because you build too little military but because you have no cluse where to put it and how to use it. Put heavy hammer military units in your capital do you no good for example...

 

[Solo4114]

Actually I understand the concept of fog busting and protecting my borders. That's not a problem. The problem is in not building the military soon enough with heavy-hitters capable of acting as effective border patrol soon enough. By the time the AI is sending barbarian swordsmen, my warriors aren't cutting it, even with promotions. My archers can hold off a single swordsman, but if there's more than one, or a swordsman plus a warrior, I've got problems.

 

[Gumbolt]

Ermmm swordsmen???? They dont arrive till much later.

The reason most go for bronze working is that this fres up axemen and copper. Settling a copper resource early is important. Same for horses resources.

You are needing lots of fogbusters as your by a lot of barren wasteland.

My first 3-4 cities are either food cities and a copper/horse city. My copper is nearly always hooked up by 2500bc. The Ai will only have archers till 1500bc or something.

Axemen will generally take out swords/archers.

Best way to avoid the need for fogbusters is: 1. build the great wall. (chopping helps with 3-4 workers)
2. Rex heavily giving the Ai few places to spawn.

Perhaps you could post the starting save and your second attempt so people can coomment.

For a good start build a worker, worker and a settler and tech mining bronze working. You will have 2 cities by 2800. Animals dont enter your borders anyway. I often leave my capital undefended early on. When the babrb warriors appear I work on this.

 

[Skallagrimson]

REX is a built-in fogbust.

"Barbarians are a blessing, for they indicate there is more open land to grab!"

50% slider? No way. Take it down to 30 at the highest, and if you see a surplus climbing back up fairly quickly (due to cottages, etc.), get ready to blast out at least 1 more, if not 2+. Some recommend going down to 0, but I fall into Strike too often that way. 30 is safe for me.

 

[Solo4114]

Yeah, the 2nd time around (I'll post the game later tonight, I think), I definitely REXed more. My 2nd city went over to the southeast with the clams and gold. 3rd city was my copper city, but I don't recall how fast I got the copper up. Again, my big problem was in not building military units fast enough this time around.

BUT, I also have a built-in map disadvantage. If you look southwards, there is a LARGE expanse of pretty much useless land, most of which is snow. Apparently barbarians don't worry about snow, though, and are happy to spawn in barren tundra/snowy conditions. This means I need fogbusters to the south, and sufficient numbers of fogbusters to hit barb invasions AND withstand repeated incursions. Not quite SOD levels, but I'm wondering if I need at least three units per area, one of which is a medic (not a big deal, since Boudica is Agg).

 

[Skallagrimson]

Just fogbust with leftover warriors. If the barbs own them, no big whoop. You get no WW hit for it, and basically any obsolete unit can go and take their place in fogbusting duty.

The job of KILLING barbs can be more specialized to axemen, at least 1 per 2 frontier cities (facing the barbarian land). When you hear the marching boots, zoom in on where they spawned and put the nearest axeman on the march.

Another really good thing barbarian-killing is for is to train units up to 10XP prior to sending them into battle against the AI. So in a way, a few fogged regions are a military resource, training grounds.

 

[Solo4114]

Yeah, I kind of did that anyway although I did it closer to home. It worked until the swordsmen showed up and I hadn't had time to properly upgrade everyone.

I did do the training rotation, though -- once someone was up to the max XP point for barbarians, I'd rotate 'em out in favor of a less experienced unit. Then I'd just hope I'd get enough cash to upgrade them.

 

[Skallagrimson]

Not everyone has to be upgraded. CRIII axes I like to upgrade to macemen simply because that frees up some build queues to LBs, trebs, and other units of that era, but if cash is low I won't consider killing the economy further just to save 5 XP (going from 5 to 10) on the battlefield.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

Ok, so, "expand more, dummy" seems to be a common theme. Trouble is, when I've done that in the past I've crippled my economy and tech. I don't mind dropping my tech slider down to 0% to build up gold for an upcoming unit upgrade, but I do mind dropping it below, say, 70% early in the game.

Crippled your economy and tech? 70% with three cities should be about equal to 30% science with seven cities (more or less). That is because by the time you get seven cities, you should be past Writing and Alphabet, close to acquiring Currency, even after researching other techs you need to get to that point. Unfortunately, that science rate is misleading. That is only the conversion rate to , not your total science output. It's the number of beakers next to the slider that is important, since that takes into account ALL your sources of research, and their multipliers.

What is important is how many beakers are you putting toward science, after maintenance costs. As you build more cities, you should make sure you have the growth techs in place as the new cities are built (or captured).

Early techs so you can afford a bigger empire:
Pottery, Writing, Alphabet, Currency - currency can help push the number of cities you can afford over ten from the trade routes (instant +1 or +2 bonus in every city you own) and marketplaces, Metal Casting, and finally Code of Laws.

Once those techs are all in place (and workers have improved the enough land tiles in all those cities, and the buildings were whipped or otherwise built), you should not have too many restrictions on empire size. Squeeze them in to your tech order as you expand, and you won't have much problem growing.

And why are you upgrading units so often if a unit production city is constantly making fresh modern units (one every turn or two) to spread around? You must have built a cottage there by mistake...

My $0.02,
SR

edit 2 - I missed Monarchy! With Hereditary Rule, your happy cap is limited only by how fast your production cities can churn out units for a police force! You can help save a stressed economy by raising all your cities to pop 8-12 ASAP.

 

[Solo4114]

So, I went back at it last night, this time from in the late BCs (85 BC?) and did more fog-busting. That helped a ton. Far fewer barbs this time.

I trucked along, building up gradually, but by the time I was ready to go to war, we're already in the middle ages and I'm working on engineering. I think next time I'm going to worry less about capturing cities and focus more on razing them and rebuilding later. That or I'll do a few staged wars (grab one or two cities, sue for peace, settle down, grab another two, sue for peace, etc.)

Another REALLY weird thing was that by the time I was ready to declare on Freddie....I couldn't. WTH? It said "Cannot declare war!" Well why the hell not?!

 

[Stolen Rutters]

Another REALLY weird thing was that by the time I was ready to declare on Freddie....I couldn't. WTH? It said "Cannot declare war!" Well why the hell not?!

If you "make an unreasonable demand" for money or tech and they give in, you get 10 turns of peace. I think this may be it.

 

[Solo4114]

Ah, dammit. That's what happened. I demanded a tech, got it, and then planned on saying "Thank you very much. Now SUBMIT OR DIE!!!" Guess I'll try that again and just take it using espionage.

What's gonna suck, though, is fighting a war of annihilation (which is why I'm going to try for a staged approach). I won't be able to knock him out quickly. He has way too many cities at this point (easily 7 or 8) and there are quite a few in locations I don't want. Plus, Feudalism has popped for him, so he'll likely vassal himself to someone else (or to me).

I think basically that I waited too long to attack. I need to build up the military sooner, build a smaller stack of doom, and just hit him with Gallic warriors rather than wait for a truly unstoppable force that can steamroll him in one go.

 

[oyzar]

Chopping / whipping a force of units substantial enough to take him out shouldn't be very hard... Did you read sisiutils guide i linked to? As you get better at the game, everything gets easier(of course you only get better if you try to improve), also attacking the AI in a timely fashion.

Staggered war as you call it is seldom a good aproach in this game(unless you need to extort techs), but i suppose it could work while you learn how to wage war...

 

[Supr49er]

Welcome to the Forums The Madness.

 

[Solo4114]

I've read sisutil's guide in the past, but it wouldn't hurt to do it again. I need to get a good sense for stack composition and stack size, as well as figure out how many stacks I actually need.

For taking out Freddie, I'll need at least two, probably 3 stacks.

At the moment, he has a far southwestern city (on the ice, no less) that's literally on top of the only iron in his area. He's also got copper hooked up close by. I sent a spy to take out the mine, but obviously I can't kill the iron source. So I sent an out-of-date stack to his border there. I'm within 3 squares of the city. Once I declare, he'll lose his ability to replace lost units. His best unit will be horse archers. After that, I should be able to take him out. He's pretty spread out and probably won't be able to fight off walled longbowmen garrisoned in cities (or crossbowmen, which I also have).

 

[Stolen Rutters]

Ah, dammit. That's what happened. I demanded a tech, got it, and then planned on saying "Thank you very much. Now SUBMIT OR DIE!!!" Guess I'll try that again and just take it using espionage.

I keep forgetting that myself. I demanded a tech myself just yesterday, but forgot about the ten turn wait before I could attack again! Doh!

What's gonna suck, though, is fighting a war of annihilation (which is why I'm going to try for a staged approach). I won't be able to knock him out quickly. He has way too many cities at this point (easily 7 or 8) and there are quite a few in locations I don't want. Plus, Feudalism has popped for him, so he'll likely vassal himself to someone else (or to me).

I think basically that I waited too long to attack. I need to build up the military sooner, build a smaller stack of doom, and just hit him with Gallic warriors rather than wait for a truly unstoppable force that can steamroll him in one go.

Don't forget for larger wars, you have to keep feeding soldiers up to the front line as you go, since that first stack will be depleted and resting by the third or fourth city. Your main production city is probably building a unit every turn or two by then, so you won't have to wait too long if you focus a second and third city to unit production.

At the moment, he has a far southwestern city (on the ice, no less) that's literally on top of the only iron in his area. He's also got copper hooked up close by. I sent a spy to take out the mine, but obviously I can't kill the iron source. So I sent an out-of-date stack to his border there. I'm within 3 squares of the city. Once I declare, he'll lose his ability to replace lost units. His best unit will be horse archers. After that, I should be able to take him out. He's pretty spread out and probably won't be able to fight off walled longbowmen garrisoned in cities (or crossbowmen, which I also have).

That's a good idea, remove his access to copper and iron! edit - But why can't you kill the iron? No catapults? Or you think he'll just rebuild the city?

 

[Solo4114]

I mean I can't send a SPY in to kill his iron (and keep killing it) before invading. I have to take that city out. It's literally built ON the iron resource, so as long as that city stands, he has a source of iron. I could cut his roads, I suppose, but it's on the coast so that wouldn't get me very far -- he's got other coastal cities, so I'm not actually killing the trade route. I don't want the city (it's worthless, really -- more like a glorified fort/mine combo), I just don't want HIM to have the city.

I'm lucky in that, at the moment, my capital (which is my unit city, too) popped copper AND iron right in its fat cross. Don't ask me how THAT happened, but it means major unit spam (plus I have heroic epic in there). I'm cranking out crossbowmen at 1 every 3 turns and my population is still growing. I've got another secondary unit city (my first copper city), which has several regular mines around it and decent enough food.

I've got Chichen Itza too, this game, and the Temple of Zeus, so he'll be hurting once I start knocking out his units and he can't replace them with iron-based units or even copper based ones (unless he pops copper on a mine -- but I intend to send pillaging parties out to handle that).

So, basically, if I roll back to a turn or two before I demanded a tech and just cancel my deals with him, we should be in business. I'll need to keep pumping out units, though.

 

[Gooblah]

I mean I can't send a SPY in to kill his iron (and keep killing it) before invading. I have to take that city out. It's literally built ON the iron resource, so as long as that city stands, he has a source of iron. I could cut his roads, I suppose, but it's on the coast so that wouldn't get me very far -- he's got other coastal cities, so I'm not actually killing the trade route. I don't want the city (it's worthless, really -- more like a glorified fort/mine combo), I just don't want HIM to have the city.

I'm lucky in that, at the moment, my capital (which is my unit city, too) popped copper AND iron right in its fat cross. Don't ask me how THAT happened, but it means major unit spam (plus I have heroic epic in there). I'm cranking out crossbowmen at 1 every 3 turns and my population is still growing. I've got another secondary unit city (my first copper city), which has several regular mines around it and decent enough food.

I've got Chichen Itza too, this game, and the Temple of Zeus, so he'll be hurting once I start knocking out his units and he can't replace them with iron-based units or even copper based ones (unless he pops copper on a mine -- but I intend to send pillaging parties out to handle that).

So, basically, if I roll back to a turn or two before I demanded a tech and just cancel my deals with him, we should be in business. I'll need to keep pumping out units, though.

I think you're fine even if he has Iron. Just build some Shock Axes and/or Crossbowmen to ward off Axemen and Swordsmen.

 

[Solo4114]

Too late. He made it up to macemen, so I HAD to take the city out. He was on par with me in terms of tech and had way more cities than I did. He also had them in crappy locations, but still. I ended up taking about four of his cities and then the civs from the other continents got in touch with me. They were INSANELY ahead of me. I canned that game because, with a 500-600 point differential between myself and the leader, there was no way I'd catch up even if I took every single one of Freddie's cities. Besides, he'd just vassal himself to one of the other guys or to me and I'd never really knock him out.

Basically, I waited too long to take him on. Moreover, that game really was NOT what I'm used to. Usually I play on Terra style maps (if not an actual earth map itself). This means I usually have contact with more civs and more trade with them. This time around everyone was on their own little continent or with one other opponent.


I did learn some valuable things, though -- I'm definitely a fan of the whip now. And I intend to REX a LOT more and with an eye towards specialization rather than "Ooh! Strategic resource. Let's grab that."