When do you get Metal Casting?

[AutomatedTeller]

How is it possible to get curaissers FASTER than knights? I'm not a deity player, but this seems... odd.

I mean (taking the values for techs in the war academy, which arent' the deity ones, but they should scale), you need monarchy, fuedalism, machinery and metal casting to get guilds, which is 3150 beakers.

to just get gunpowder, you need code of laws, civil service, paper, education, which is 4750 beakers, or masonry, polytheism, monotheism, theology, paper, education, which is 440 beakers, to say nothing of aesthetics, literature, music, philosophy and nationalism to get mil trad, which is another 5700 beakers.

I mean, mil trad and nationalism ALONE are more than all the techs that lead to guilds.

I mean - obviously if you beeline curaissers, you'll get 'em before knights. But that doesn't mean you couldn't get the knights faster.

So... what am I missing? Like i said, I'm no deity player.

 

[Deckhand]

How is it possible to get curaissers FASTER than knights? I'm not a deity player, but this seems... odd.
...
I mean - obviously if you beeline curaissers, you'll get 'em before knights. But that doesn't mean you couldn't get the knights faster.

So... what am I missing? Like i said, I'm no deity player.

Many players beeline liberalism and take a tech from it along the curaisser path. Ignoring the guild path as the AIs will take it and you can trade for those techs.

edit: it isn't possible to get curaissers faster than knights; but it is common to get them sooner

On topic, excluding the obvious benefits of slingshots, production boosts, trade baits etc., in my today's game I had a situation where it was beneficial to go Metal casting after writing and Iron working, because the civs I was competing against (and wanted to trade with) were likely to go Alphabet, Calendar, CoL and Currency. Which they did, and I merrily traded Metal casting around for all the mentioned techs.

Bibor, how did you know "civs I was competing against (and wanted to trade with) were likely to go Alphabet, Calendar, CoL and Currency."?

 

[Framesticker]

Usually, I either 1) Trade it with the Oracle Civilization (that, along with CoL, seem to be the most popular technologies for that wonder) or 2) self-tech it if going up the Machinery/Printing Press line. I like taking PP from Lib if I'm relying on lots and lots of cottages (which''ve had time to mature) and usually PP can give a 50-100BPT increase.

 

[vranasm]

Usually, I either 1) Trade it with the Oracle Civilization (that, along with CoL, seem to be the most popular technologies for that wonder) or 2) self-tech it if going up the Machinery/Printing Press line. I like taking PP from Lib if I'm relying on lots and lots of cottages (which''ve had time to mature) and usually PP can give a 50-100BPT increase.

I find one big obstacle for trading MC and that is its pricey. For its position in tree it's really, really pricey and at the time trades start you dont have almost nothing to offer. Except for the rare situation where you eventually had Alpha+Aest on that particular AI, since usually they get on their own everything for the MC...

Actually I usually dont bother with MC, except for the situations where the land seems better to workshop, then I strongly consider getting it in some way.

 

[Bibor]

Bibor, how did you know "civs I was competing against (and wanted to trade with) were likely to go Alphabet, Calendar, CoL and Currency."?

Hannibal and Shaka were in question. Neither hannibal or shaka are industrous, they have no gold, silver or gems, no marble, no ivory and no stone. Thus most of the early wonders are no-no for them (Shaka built the Pyramids tho!). Neither are religious, half of hannibal's land was jungle, shaka has 4 hills in his territory (he's very weak). I just presumed shaka will go for stuff that helps his poor financial situation (and he did go for Pyramids/Representation), while Hannibal will focus on teching (he has no hated enemies on the continent). All or most of their cities were coastal. I was pleasantly surprised myself that I was right.

 

[Casi]

Your posts are probably going to get removed, but I'll just say this. Casi, you're not a deity player. Please stop lying about it. I visit these forums often because these are not World of Warcraft forums

Another guy who thinks he knows other players.
I play Everquest in a hardcore raidguild, trust me i know how to use and think about strats.
Civ4 is cake compared to it, and i played it from 1 to 4, starting maybe 15 years ago on the very first PCs. And i can beat Deity, prolly with less tricks and without thinking for a month or 2 like most of you pricks, so go fy

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[Casi]

Here's an update for my numberless fans on this board.
Cathy vs Capac, Toku vs. Hatshi (round 2). Good for me.
Capac is the clear point leader atm, but iam not doing bad.
Me: 896 ; The glorious Tokugawa, beloved and feared hero of the board: 549

We managed to get metal casting, sadly Cathy got it one round before us.
Still been able to trade it to Hashi for Mathematics + minor stuff, and to Capac for Calendar.
This was a big deal, as we used our great engineer to grab the MoM, the best wonder available atm as we didn't have a golden age yet, so our future shines a bit brighter now.

Spoiler :

http://eqfantasys.de/1.CivBeyondSwordSave

 

[vicawoo]

Another guy who thinks he knows other players.
I play Everquest in a hardcore raidguild, trust me i know how to use and think about strats.
Civ4 is cake compared to it, and i played it from 1 to 4, starting maybe 15 years ago on the very first PCs. And i can beat Deity, prolly with less tricks and without thinking for a month or 2 like most of you pricks, so go fy

Given the adversarial content, there's no way of commenting on this without making it any worse.

---

So let's bite the bullet and make it worse! Is Casi a secret civilization prodigy? Or is he *gasp* an unscrupulous liar and cheater? Should we all quit playing civilization and start everquest accounts in an attempt to learn by osmosis? Who knows?

We take a visit to the mason dixon detective agency to uncover the truth...

Spoiler A few screenshots from his saves :

Yes indeed in settings it says deity. It's a small pangea map, aggressive AI, no tech brokering, there might have been something else.

Mystery 1:barbarian archers
Most interestingly, he has conquered 3 barbarian cities, you can tell by their names and their barb culture. Fair enough. He has killed 12 barbarian archers. Each barb city starts with 4 archers if I recall, on deity, so without outside AI help, that means he didn't engage any other archers. He's registered 1 warrior kill.

How many chariots has he used? Build 14, 7 have died. This is curious, since a combat 1 chariot gets inferior odds to a fortified archer in a city. So in theory, he should have lost >12 archers (in practice, you'd probably lose at least 1.5x) Moreover, the eastern barb city is on a hill. Of course, he gets promotions ... but even combat 2 chariots still get worse than 50% odds. With pure chariots, I'd expect he would need more like 20 chariots ... although he may have poached cities off the AI. Except for the hill city.

Explanations: not deity? poaching off AI? Or more likely, save/reload abuse.

Mystery 2: it's the economy, stupid
So the tech rates have the right beaker values, AI have their prerequisites. He's currently teching pottery. But he'll run out of gold before he hits writing. And if you check the screenshot, while he's generating a modest surplus, one of the barb cities has yet to come out of revolt.
And when it does... check the last screenshot. 2gpt at 0% gold. Of course you could switch to sea tiles, and work the 2 riverside tiles he has. And delete some units.
And once he has writing, he has pyramids!

But... at turn 80, he'll be only halfway to writing, with 2 bpt. And the later save, he has teched metal casting, mathematics, and calendar (traded for mathematics?) In 26 turns? But with low micro, haphazard worker use, no general infrastructure, and the capital building another settler, I'd be surprised if he gets writing in 15 turns, unless he skipped pottery, let alone a library.

Explanations: super hidden micromanagement skills. And hopefully a road to get some foreign trade routes, since he lacks sailing.

In a slightly more serious aside, here's the classic deity choosing cuirassiers over cataphracts game, with explanations why the following page.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=242211&page=3

Moderator Action: Flaming - warned.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

 

[Casi]

Given the adversarial content, there's no way of commenting on this without making it any worse.

---

So let's bite the bullet and make it worse! Is Casi a secret civilization prodigy? Or is he *gasp* an unscrupulous liar and cheater? Should we all quit playing civilization and start everquest accounts in an attempt to learn by osmosis? Who knows?

We take a visit to the mason dixon detective agency to uncover the truth...

Spoiler A few screenshots from his saves :

Yes indeed in settings it says deity. It's a small pangea map, aggressive AI, no tech brokering, there might have been something else.

Mystery 1:barbarian archers
Most interestingly, he has conquered 3 barbarian cities, you can tell by their names and their barb culture. Fair enough. He has killed 12 barbarian archers. Each barb city starts with 4 archers if I recall, on deity, so without outside AI help, that means he didn't engage any other archers. He's registered 1 warrior kill.

How many chariots has he used? Build 14, 7 have died. This is curious, since a combat 1 chariot gets inferior odds to a fortified archer in a city. So in theory, he should have lost >12 archers (in practice, you'd probably lose at least 1.5x) Moreover, the eastern barb city is on a hill. Of course, he gets promotions ... but even combat 2 chariots still get worse than 50% odds. With pure chariots, I'd expect he would need more like 20 chariots ... although he may have poached cities off the AI. Except for the hill city.

Explanations: not deity? poaching off AI? Or more likely, save/reload abuse.

Mystery 2: it's the economy, stupid
So the tech rates have the right beaker values, AI have their prerequisites. He's currently teching pottery. But he'll run out of gold before he hits writing. And if you check the screenshot, while he's generating a modest surplus, one of the barb cities has yet to come out of revolt.
And when it does... check the last screenshot. 2gpt at 0% gold. Of course you could switch to sea tiles, and work the 2 riverside tiles he has. And delete some units.
And once he has writing, he has pyramids!

But... at turn 80, he'll be only halfway to writing, with 2 bpt. And the later save, he has teched metal casting, mathematics, and calendar (traded for mathematics?) In 26 turns? But with low micro, haphazard worker use, no general infrastructure, and the capital building another settler, I'd be surprised if he gets writing in 15 turns, unless he skipped pottery, let alone a library.

Explanations: super hidden micromanagement skills. And hopefully a road to get some foreign trade routes, since he lacks sailing.

In a slightly more serious aside, here's the classic deity choosing cuirassiers over cataphracts game, with explanations why the following page.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=242211&page=3

or more likely, yourself haha.
I WROTE i teched metal casting, and traded it for maths and calendar from hatshi/capac.
And about the barb cities, i brought enuf chariots to make sure ill take them even if not gettig lucky.
Yes, that's aroudn 8 stationed right at the hill city.

As i said, go fukk yourself you underling. I didnt abuse anything, i dont have to, i raid in one of the best guilds in EQ, a classic game not your WoW . I dont get a damn boner when beating CIV, a damn comp AI. I just manage to, sometimes.

SHOW ME HOW YOU PLAY THIS BETTER.
Then open your mouth again, underling.
you for saying i might cheat, seriously you. This is a single player game, its not worth cheating you dumb fukk

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[Casi]

And what the hell do you mean with stupid worker using?
Lol opening his mouth, but i bet he gets beaten so badly on this map, he woud feel butt raped for 3 days.
For the record, i got enough libraries and scientiests going after pottery to put this game up to a maybe 50% winning chance. And that has to be enough, this board full of wankers isn't worth the time.
Iam seriously disappointed about how things work here, a guy puts up with a game that needs a hell lot of thinking, as Deity always does, and all you do is calling me a cheater.
You are a sad person, the day i cheat in a single player game i'll go hang myself. Like you shoud, maybe.

 

[vicawoo]

Great stuff, keep it coming.

So how many chariots did you use to take the city on the hill, Anasazi? 10? 14? And how many barbarian archers did you kill in the open?

And I remember playing Everquest, not exactly a game I would brag about skillwise. It's better to brag about being good at a real man's game, like starcraft or one of the good FPS games. Being a good raider means more about logging ridiculous hours (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barriers_to_entry, whereas non-MMORPG's/RPG's you begin every game at an even foot as everyone else), and every expansion practically doubles the required time in the rat race trying to hit max level.

Please have another delightful response by tonight, so I can have something fun to read after dinner.

 

[Casi]

Great stuff, keep it coming.

So how many chariots did you use to take the city on the hill, Anasazi? 10? 14? And how many barbarian archers did you kill in the open?

And I remember playing Everquest, not exactly a game I would brag about skillwise. It's better to brag about being good at a real man's game, like starcraft or one of the good FPS games. Being a good raider means more about logging ridiculous hours (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barriers_to_entry, whereas non-MMORPG's/RPG's you begin every game at an even foot as everyone else), and every expansion practically doubles the required time in the rat race trying to hit max level.

Please have another delightful response by tonight, so I can have something fun to read after dinner.

I don't know? Do you remember how many units you used to take city xxx?
I remember getting lucky to kill 1 with full health, unexpected, but it's forbidden on this board to get some luck in a Deity game? lol, and once i damaged the others, the odds went up ofc, so heck...maybe i lost 4 on the hill city?

What does it matter? I didn't cheat, and i didn't reload. Take my word for it, lol the word on an internet board...does it even matter?
I produced chariots almost every turn, that was all this city has been good for...hammers...so i went for it. You have to take chances in a Deity game without the sweet little tricks you all prolly use, you know?

And about Everquest, yea sure...Starcraft...you obviously never raided endgame content, so you don't know how much attention it requires from every single person in the raid, to beat new stuff where you have no strat yet and learn by wiping.

Good that it's an entertaining read for ya, i have more respect for an ex-EQ player than i have for a monkey that tells me i cheat in CIV4, a game that i only play vs. the comp.
So enjoy it, hey do you have a stick up your A$$? Didn't think so, you sound like more fun than the other clowns.

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[Nick Carpathia]

Hahaha. What the hell, ladies, take your slapfight outside.

 

[Gwynnja]

Hahaha. What the hell, ladies, take your slapfight outside.

haha, no way dude this is awesome. I can't wait to see the deity knights domination.

 

[Ichabod]

People, chill out.

What's the problem about someone beating deity? It's very hard, but not impossible. Of course that there are players that can maximize the chances of winning in a map, but that doesn't mean that not so good palyers can win once in a while. Heck, I'm playing deity only in the last weeks and I managed to get pretty close to a win and I'm not a good player.

The few things I know I learned at these forums and I'd like to learn more, so why trying to dismiss Casi strategies? Let him show us. Of course, the bad language should be avoided (I'm surprised to see no moderator actions).

on-topic:

I can't remember the last time I teched metal casting. Since I started trying to beat deity, I'm not confident to get off the normal path of going aesthetics and trading fot IW, Alpha, mathematics... It's rare to me to get IW by myself (only if I have gems in jungle), so MC is very rare.

But it could be a good idea, the AI doesn't go MC that often and the ones that do don't want to trade it due to colossus. Maybe I'll try it next time. I could tech it after Aesthetics if the AI haven't done it yet and trade it for currency/calendar. The bad thing about trading for currency is that you aren't sure when you're going to get it and you could end up spending a lot of time without the +1 TR. Not being industrious (I play with Hatty only) hurts a little too.

That's one of my problems, I'm not a sufficient daring player to go away from my normal strategies, wich, of course, don't work all the time.

 

[Moroktonos]

And one more for 8. 106 / 8 aprox = 13. Yikes!

Edit: Sessions, that is. Sorry if I was being cryptic.

 

[Casi]

I used the bad language coz they called me cheater, not deity-worthy etc...
it's just so tempting on the net, i know i shouldn't, but where i come from calling someone a cheater/liar is worse than a fukk or 2...
and as you say, they seem to be uncapable of accepting there can be different strategies, aside from what they think is the ultimative one.

 

[vicawoo]

haha, no way dude this is awesome. I can't wait to see the deity knights domination.

Uh oh, he's starting to simmer down, someone poke him again! Where's TMIT when you need him to go on an angry counter-rant?

This is all from a single thread, there's more out there.

Enough pretend fairy la la land

I'm not holding anyone's crappy land line 56k modem phone.

Wrong. Only your immediate border city the AI is threatening has to be on a hill.

The second part of the quoted argument is stupid. Let me show you why by asking a similarly stupid question back.

I can either point out that you didn't actually read what I said, or I can simply point out why you're wrong, or both. Both I guess.

Casi, if you're reading this, pretend I said all applicable quotes to you. The stuff about being wrong, not reading what other people said, and your arguments being stupid. I'm not sure what the arguments were, but I'm sure it's true.

 

[ori]

Moderator Action: @all: If you cannot post in a civil(ized) manner, don't post. You are welcome to discuss other poster's posts - without resorting to flames or trolling.
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[Ramesses-Rules]

This is not worth the time, reading through answers that could as well have been writte by a bunch of lawyers. Except by some ppl, but you know who you are, so don't take me offensive.
Disappointing to see that Civ seems to be played mostly by ppl with a stick up their A$$, or maybe the game changed you that much alrdy? I know what an impact this addiction can cause, maybe you need help.

P.S. FU for even mentioning the world editor, i don't even know how to launch it coz i dun care.

Moderator Action: stop the flames.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

You are good player and can contribute some good information to the forum, but I hope you can tone down the rhetoric before you get kicked off the forum. Just stay calm and reply with logical arguments and evidence. The rest will take care of itself. Peace.