Where do I go wrong, or am I just terrible?

[Gliese 581]

Try building no wonders at all next game, that should help a bit. Try to get one or two cities that only build barracks/forges and such that help in production of units, ignore economy in these cities and just build units, all game.

 

[Maxit]

If I ever do start training armies, I find that by the time I've got enough to mount a decent attack, the other civs have either teched a troop to counter it

Since you can get a tech lead, give a high priority to techs that unlock military power (IW for iron/swords, etc.) Specialize cities according to the map (good articles here and here). Follow the good advice given above, build the units, then stomp. Rinse & repeat.

CIV is a military game

It sure is if you want to conquer/dominate! It seems most players prefer that type of game, but if you are a "builder-type" you might want to try for a culture win. Here is a good article.

 

[6K Man]

It sounds like you get caught up in being a perfectionist and then let the AIs catch up while you focus too much on your cities.

As has been noted, you should try to have a goal in all your games, and a lot of those goals will be military. Conquer such-and-such a city. Take out Montezuma. Capture the Pyramids. And so on.

You also will want to consider specializing in both a macro and single-city sense. For example, if you are Financial and plan on running an economy based on cottages, Pyramids are less crucial than if you run a specialist-based economy. If you have an archipeligo map, you may want to shoot for the Great Lighthouse ahead of other wonders.

City wise - and again, as has been noted - try to focus your cities on a particular task so you can avoid the need to put every building in each one of them. I look at cities in the following way:

City site with some food and lots of hills/production resources: This will be a city that builds either wonders or units. It needs a granary, forge, barracks (and stable/drydock as the case may be), and any other buildings that provide hammer or military bonuses. It should not have any other buildings unless they are required to keep it happy or healthy. Otherwise, build units here. Ideally you'll want 2 or more cities like this, and one of them should always be building units.

City site with lots of food and not much else: This could be a Great Person "farm". Build or whip a granary and whatever improvements (Library typically, later a Market) that allow you to run specialists. Improve the food tiles and not much else. Add National Epic here, perhaps.

City site with lots of grassland, some food, commerce-related resources: This site sounds ideal for cottages. Build a granary, and as many commerce-related improvements (library, university, market, bank, maybe an Academy and later Oxford and/or Wall Street) as you can. This site doesn't need any production related buildings here at all, unless you have nothing better to build. Ideally it shouldn't spend much time building units, if at all, because it will do this slowly and other cities are better at it.

 

[DiamondPirate]

Ok, so I took the advice on board (Well, everything before my last post yesterday anyway) and started a game at home last night.

Cheiftan/Standard/Med&Small
Playing as Monty (I really like the Spi trait and Agg is a good trait to have if I'm gonna be warring).

I started with quite a few rivered grasslands, with some hills (some grass, some plains), few dotted plains about. There was pigs in the cross, it was coastal and the shape looked like it was probably island or smallish snakey continent.

I soon discovered Ghandi, who founded Hindu and Jew, and spread Hindu to my capital and my second city (Which was forced to be on Tundra... no ice though fortunately. Quite a few hills, some copper, sheep in the cross. Gold just outside, and its a close to Delhi, so it will make a good launch base. Not Coastal, although close to it.

For techs, I straight bee-lined to bronze working because capital was surrounded by forest, so nothing would get built without it. That kinda then led to continue into iron working, because well, duh. Jaguar!!!!!!!

I've now wiped India off the map. Had two cities, and I took advanged by claiming Delhi for my own, then peaced for some reli techs. I then traded (totally in his favour) for the rest of the techs he had before hitting war again, and sacking his remaining city (was a horrible location that inpeded on both Delhi and my second city.

Its been alot of fun. I've taken lots on board... infact, my problem now is that I think I've got too carried away training units. Losing too much money! I've just met the HRE bloke... unfortunately it seems he met Ghandi. And hated him. Becase I'm now his worst enemy for trading with his worst. And the only other person I met was Ghandi. You'd think he'd love me for wiping the peaceful fool of the earth!!!!

I've hit optics.... but theres been hardly any wonders built. I'm now B-ling to guilds to get money buildings, Delhi is sooo a great person farm (3 sea food + cows.). I'm also founding my 5th city, but that will it for this part of the lane, I'm now going to focus on getting my research back to 100, and then take down the Holy Roman Empire. Have plenty of cats and jags... just need to get the transports sorted to take them over land. Already have a spy on his way to scout for me.

Its definately a much more absorbing game when you war. Its also making me micro manage alot more where I am generally actually doing something each turn, so I look at the cities more, and in turn tweak more.

 

[Dhaulagiri]

Someone on this forum had advice on this that I read a long time ago and used to get over this same problem.

Pick one city early that has hills. Build troops in that city non stop the whole game. Other cities can do libraries, banks etc and help with troops if need be. This city is nothing but troop making.

The military city will have no research or commerce. If you need to build a forge or courthouse, have another city cover for it during those turns.

If you keep disciplined your army will be surprisingly strong. You'll find other civs will be much less inclined to start trouble with you even if they have a different religeon, with a few exceptions. You'll also find opportunities will arise when someone asks you to join a war, and you will actually have the army to do so and take a few cities that you hadn't planned on.

Try this strategy, its simple and it works.

 

[vanatteveldt]

@DiamondPirate

Congrats on the fun warmongering!

Remember, it ain't simcity!

 

[jknox]

hmmm I consider myself a noob too, but I only seem to win by Domination. XD
When it starts getting into the 18th 19th century AD I feel like the game should of ended or something, so I just beat the hell out of people with my army.

I usually end up with a lot of cities, I'm very territorial, so when I think a civ. is building a little too close to home, I rampage the city and keep it, but then I always over build my army so I'm like eh? might as well annihilate them and end up with tons of cities. XD

 

[Rubberjello]

First of all, I question the need to label his initial tactics as "wrong". They are only "wrong" if he absolutely wants to break out of his perfectionist mode and take his game to the next level. I'm thinking he may not want to discard this equally fun way of playing CIV totally.

I personally play in two modes.

At lower levels, a fun, wonder-building, utopian civ mode which usually results in a late game domination win if I wish it, otherwise a space win. This is just plain relaxing, and doesn't require a micromanaging every turn and enables fast play. Personally, I've never had a problem building a huge modern army if I've made massive infrastructure investments in my cities through the ages. I'm not sure what is going on there. I get a lot of satisfaction building the perfect civ.

At higher levels, a much more serious, micromanaged, very few wonders, intense city specialization, challenging mode. This mode has it's own "fun" in very tight wins, scary wars, and many near misses. This is not as nearly relaxing, but you get a great feeling of satisfaction at the end.

If you force some people (or force yourself) to play outside their relaxation (and personality) zones all the time, they may just get turned off of the game as they play higher levels.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

I agree. Everyone should find their enjoyment zone.

It is satisfying getting your first win on Emperor and thinking about Immortal though... Just one more turn

 

[the343danny]

What you did reminds of what I did at first. I played settler and chieften, and was always afraid of losing so i didnt move up. I also was a perfectionist and built every building before making units, so my army was pathetic.

I'd often reload when I lost a unit and when I found out about the WB, I just cheated myself to win all my games easily. Any enemy army striking where I didnt have defenses just got deleted, and if the enemy garrisoned too much for my army, I'd delete them.

My army was patheticly weak. Very small in number because I always built buildings first. I also hated losing units, and id reload even when I just lost 1 unit. Because I hated losing units, I thought collateral damage from siege was stupid as attacking w/ them will kill them. I just brought a few to bombard.

Games always went long, with no challenges besides EXTREMELY slow conquering due to my pathetic army and cheating habits, it got boring. After reading the forums a bit, I decided to put away my stupid habits. Now, my army ussually not last, and win noble games without cheating, and bring plenty of siege. I didnt neglect my army by building too many buildings.

Also, before, all of my cities had to have no conflicts with tiles workable to other cities. My cities needed all 20 tiles for itself. I got over that now, and I make much better use of my land. My cities are still just as great with only 15 tiles available due to specialists.

 

[Capellan]

One way to train yourself to build military is to play some games with only Domination and Conquest enabled as victories. That way, you have to war to win, and it will help you get into the habit of churning out units.

 

[yanner39]

Ok, so I took the advice on board (Well, everything before my last post yesterday anyway) and started a game at home last night.

Cheiftan/Standard/Med&Small
Playing as Monty (I really like the Spi trait and Agg is a good trait to have if I'm gonna be warring).

I started with quite a few rivered grasslands, with some hills (some grass, some plains), few dotted plains about. There was pigs in the cross, it was coastal and the shape looked like it was probably island or smallish snakey continent.

I soon discovered Ghandi, who founded Hindu and Jew, and spread Hindu to my capital and my second city (Which was forced to be on Tundra... no ice though fortunately. Quite a few hills, some copper, sheep in the cross. Gold just outside, and its a close to Delhi, so it will make a good launch base. Not Coastal, although close to it.

For techs, I straight bee-lined to bronze working because capital was surrounded by forest, so nothing would get built without it. That kinda then led to continue into iron working, because well, duh. Jaguar!!!!!!!

I've now wiped India off the map. Had two cities, and I took advanged by claiming Delhi for my own, then peaced for some reli techs. I then traded (totally in his favour) for the rest of the techs he had before hitting war again, and sacking his remaining city (was a horrible location that inpeded on both Delhi and my second city.

Its been alot of fun. I've taken lots on board... infact, my problem now is that I think I've got too carried away training units. Losing too much money! I've just met the HRE bloke... unfortunately it seems he met Ghandi. And hated him. Becase I'm now his worst enemy for trading with his worst. And the only other person I met was Ghandi. You'd think he'd love me for wiping the peaceful fool of the earth!!!!

I've hit optics.... but theres been hardly any wonders built. I'm now B-ling to guilds to get money buildings, Delhi is sooo a great person farm (3 sea food + cows.). I'm also founding my 5th city, but that will it for this part of the lane, I'm now going to focus on getting my research back to 100, and then take down the Holy Roman Empire. Have plenty of cats and jags... just need to get the transports sorted to take them over land. Already have a spy on his way to scout for me.

Its definately a much more absorbing game when you war. Its also making me micro manage alot more where I am generally actually doing something each turn, so I look at the cities more, and in turn tweak more.

Hey DiamondPirate,

We're pretty in the same boat. Thanks for starting this thread. It's been very helpful to me as well.

 

[GreatNinja]

Welcome to the Forums DiamondPirate.

I love how you always welcome the noobs such as myself

 

[yanner39]

What you did reminds of what I did at first. I played settler and chieften, and was always afraid of losing so i didnt move up. I also was a perfectionist and built every building before making units, so my army was pathetic.

I'd often reload when I lost a unit and when I found out about the WB, I just cheated myself to win all my games easily. Any enemy army striking where I didnt have defenses just got deleted, and if the enemy garrisoned too much for my army, I'd delete them.

My army was patheticly weak. Very small in number because I always built buildings first. I also hated losing units, and id reload even when I just lost 1 unit. Because I hated losing units, I thought collateral damage from siege was stupid as attacking w/ them will kill them. I just brought a few to bombard.

Games always went long, with no challenges besides EXTREMELY slow conquering due to my pathetic army and cheating habits, it got boring. After reading the forums a bit, I decided to put away my stupid habits. Now, my army ussually not last, and win noble games without cheating, and bring plenty of siege. I didnt neglect my army by building too many buildings.

Also, before, all of my cities had to have no conflicts with tiles workable to other cities. My cities needed all 20 tiles for itself. I got over that now, and I make much better use of my land. My cities are still just as great with only 15 tiles available due to specialists.

So late in the game, is this what I should be focusing on?

I'm fairly late in my current game, playing an easier level. I've conquered 2 civs so I have about 8 or nine cities. I've just been producing buildings in all my cities because I don't plan on trying to conquer another civ.

I guess I'm at a point where nothing is really happening. I'm going to the motions until the game ends (I have roughly 43 turns left). All my cities are healthy and happy by a large margin and I am leading the other Civs by a large margin in points. I'm at a point where I want to stop and start over.

Is this a situation where I need to decide earlier in the game what victory condition I want to follow? Should I expect later in my game to be attacked and therefore need to always build my military? Maybe the level I am playing is too easy?

 

[DiamondPirate]

Ok, so I've played a few games now, and I'm definately getting better. My main issue now is just getting my cities in the right places, and finding areas to found them early enough. Timing is another issue... I need to balance early expansion and warring... obviously you need to found a certain amount of cities yourself.

I do have once slight issue I've noticed. The AI seems spawn units on declarition of war? Cos their troops always seem to double in number whenever I march in. Or do they just generally whip troops on declare?

The other problem I'm finding is post war economic depressions which seem difficult to get out, but thats likely just down to me readusting how I run the econ now I've got different city types.

Games are certainly more tense now. My only other problem is that I always seem to end up on a continent with one dominant religion so its very hard to get a war without everyone jumping in.

 

[Joshua368]

Ok, so I've played a few games now, and I'm definately getting better. My main issue now is just getting my cities in the right places, and finding areas to found them early enough. Timing is another issue... I need to balance early expansion and warring... obviously you need to found a certain amount of cities yourself.

No need to carefully ballace these... expansion and warring are the same thing. You can certainly postpone founding your fourth or fifth city, as long as you plan on quickly capturing those cities from an AI. So it's okay if you put those settlers away for a little bit, expanding with axemen works just fine.

I do have once slight issue I've noticed. The AI seems spawn units on declarition of war? Cos their troops always seem to double in number whenever I march in. Or do they just generally whip troops on declare?

Yep, they'll whip like crazy to save their skins, as well as move reinforcements in from the back of their empire. You got to prepare for this. Also it's why pillaging any metal should be done as quickly as possible.

The other problem I'm finding is post war economic depressions which seem difficult to get out, but thats likely just down to me readusting how I run the econ now I've got different city types

All the post-war slump is are a bunch of newly "acquired" cities costing you maitenance without really being able to help yet. Once they mature, got their cottages and basic infrastructure, your economy should be back on its feet. Courthouses are pretty vital once you start getting over six or seven cities.

The good thing is that once those cities get working to support your empire, you'll be stronger than ever.