Why is Prince to Monarch such a huge jump

[BigDaddyOttawa]

I've been playing Civ since the original came out and consider myself a moderately good player. In Civ 3, I could at least SURVIVE until the end of the game on deity level

Anyways, here is a screen shot of a typical game I can play on Prince. I always go with Random leaders so I'm never focusing on specific traits.

I usually score over 20,000 points in the hall of fame, routinely completely dominate on the power chart and always have the tech lead. I can play a CE, an SE or a hybrid depending on the situation. In most of my games, my in game score can be anywhere from 25 to 50% higher than the next guy on the totem pole (this specific game was almost double!).

So how come on Monarch level, I suck! I am always dead last in score, usually on the low end of the power chart and running middle of the pack in techs?

I just started yet another Monarch game as the Romans. I am still on the bottom of the score card, although I handed the English their butts early and am giving the Chinese a hard time even though they are a fair way up on the power chart compared to me. I'm middle of the road tech wise (I can trade every 3rd tech I get to the AI since I deliberately try to stay away from their tech paths) and I typically pull down a new tech between 5 and 10 turns up to the industrial era.

Is it my early game? Am I not aggressive enough on Monarch? I'll early rush if I can but I don't go out of my way to do it unless there are resources I know I'll need later. I guess by default I'm more of a builder player, at the higher levels do you essentially HAVE to be a warmonger?

I could post my Roman save game (mid Renaissance) if you guys would think it could help gain some insights.

 

[Zanttu]

Is it my early game? Am I not aggressive enough on Monarch? I'll early rush if I can but I don't go out of my way to do it unless there are resources I know I'll need later. I guess by default I'm more of a builder player, at the higher levels do you essentially HAVE to be a warmonger?

I could post my Roman save game (mid Renaissance) if you guys would think it could help gain some insights.

No, you don't have to be a warmonger to defeat monarch. You don't have to be a warmonger to defeat any level, although in higher levels it may make your game easier. But at monarch it should be quite easy to dominate the game without warring a lot.

Posting a save or at least showing some screenies could definitely help. Because ATM I have no idea what you are doing "wrong", I can only guess. Some possible problems:

1. Not enough workers early - your cities shouldn't be working any unimproved tiles

2. City specialization - if all of your cities have the same land improvements, same buildings and you have no GP farm, this is your problem

3. Not expanding enough - Land is power. Or actually, Population is power. More population translates to more tiles worked/more specialists, which means higher research and production.

It may also be that your problem isn't any of these. That's why I suggest you to post a save or show some screenies.

 

[Xurr]

3. Not expanding enough - Land is power. Or actually, Population is power. More population translates to more tiles worked/more specialists, which means higher

This is where the "warmongering" comes in, in monarch and higher games. You need to at least take out 2-3 of your neighbors to get enough land to overcome all the advantages the ai gets.

 

[SnowlyWhite]

basically, the ai starts with 1 worker and has archery right from the start; which can mean alot. That'd be the main diff. from prince. Otherwise, obviously, it has some better bonuses, but those are rather linear.

 

[Unconquered Sun]

Chop forests outside city crosses.

 

[BigDaddyOttawa]

No, you don't have to be a warmonger to defeat monarch. You don't have to be a warmonger to defeat any level, although in higher levels it may make your game easier. But at monarch it should be quite easy to dominate the game without warring a lot.

Posting a save or at least showing some screenies could definitely help. Because ATM I have no idea what you are doing "wrong", I can only guess. Some possible problems:

1. Not enough workers early - your cities shouldn't be working any unimproved tiles

2. City specialization - if all of your cities have the same land improvements, same buildings and you have no GP farm, this is your problem

3. Not expanding enough - Land is power. Or actually, Population is power. More population translates to more tiles worked/more specialists, which means higher research and production.

It may also be that your problem isn't any of these. That's why I suggest you to post a save or show some screenies.

1. Not an issue. I never work unworked tiles.

2. Always. If I am running SE, its science cities and production cities. My super science city produces GP every 10 turns or so

3. I think that may be it. With the Romans, I've started a second game after posting. I've been SUPER aggressive with my Praetorians and nailed the US early and am hitting the Mongols now. This game, I'm at the top of the score board but not necessarily at the top of the tech tree.

 

[BigDaddyOttawa]

Chop forests outside city crosses.

I'm lost on the value of that strategy

 

[Validator]

basically, the ai starts with 1 worker and has archery right from the start; which can mean alot. That'd be the main diff. from prince. Otherwise, obviously, it has some better bonuses, but those are rather linear.

I don't think the AI gets a free worker at Monarch anymore. They did in Warlords but I think it was removed in BtS due to the improved AI.

The free Archer plus the free Archery tech does help the AI build up an early power advantage on the human player though.

 

[qwertz]

Score is irrelevant, on higher levels you WILL be last in score for the most part of the game and only cathch up somewhere in the industrial era. You also can't keep up in techs all the time on higher levels and you will fall behind and have to do a lot of tech-traiding to catch up.
However the most important thing land and you should have as much of it as possible. This can be done either by REXing towards the AIs and backfilling later or yust capturing the enemy land.

 

[Archbob]

Pick the Philo-Financial leader, get the Great Library, switch the caste system and stock your main city with like 5 scientists. Be sure to have the academy. This works pretty well for research.

 

[Zanttu]

This is where the "warmongering" comes in, in monarch and higher games. You need to at least take out 2-3 of your neighbors to get enough land to overcome all the advantages the ai gets.

This is not true. By settling your first 3-4 cities aggressively enough, on most maps you can block yourself enough land for 8-10 cities, which is surely enough for winning any game. This is what you HAVE to do at levels like Immortal-Deity. That's because at Immortal/Deity you can't just rush 2-3 neighbors (assuming you're not playing Incas) without crippling your own economy.

 

[Zanttu]

3. I think that may be it. With the Romans, I've started a second game after posting. I've been SUPER aggressive with my Praetorians and nailed the US early and am hitting the Mongols now. This game, I'm at the top of the score board but not necessarily at the top of the tech tree.

At the early game, tech situation/ your teching speed doesn't matter so much. What matters is how much land you're able to secure. If you have biggest land area by 1AD, you have already won the game. However, it isn't always possible to conquer/REx so much land in so short time, that's what makes the game challenging.

 

[Archbob]

At the early game, tech situation/ your teching speed doesn't matter so much. What matters is how much land you're able to secure. If you have biggest land area by 1AD, you have already won the game. However, it isn't always possible to conquer/REx so much land in so short time, that's what makes the game challenging.

It generally isn't possible to do this unless your playing pangea or continents.
I play Arch and islands most of the time and you can't really just conquer your opponents.

 

[Unconquered Sun]

I'm lost on the value of that strategy

Well, that's my advice based on the thumbnail. I see six forests outside city fat crosses that aren't chopped: why? They still give production when chopped. And they are right next to your capital, so you could've chopped them in early/midgame for an extra wonder.

 

[Zanttu]

It generally isn't possible to do this unless your playing pangea or continents.
I play Arch and islands most of the time and you can't really just conquer your opponents.

I know this isn't usually possible, at least on the higher levels. But if you COULD do it, you WOULD be sure winner by 1AD. How often does that happen when you're playing Immortal? Let me tell you, not so often. But my point was that Land Really is Power. Bigger empire -> bigger research power in the future. At the early game your economy shape isn't so important, you should always think about your potential in the future.

 

[pigswill]

It would appear from the posts above that the issue is about acquiring land, not about killing the AI. If you can rex peacefully then you can get more territory (more cities, more beakers and hammers) without the tedium of fighting lots of wars. That should be possible even on an archipelago/island map unless you get hemmed in early (which is when you do need to fight a war or two).

Re chopping forests outside BFC. The point of this is you get free hammers (not many, but they're free) without affecting your cities at all.

 

[BigDaddyOttawa]

Well... I'm guessing its just my land grab strategies. Attached is the second Monarch game I started. It is 1200AD and I have a pretty decent landmass percentage and taking Turfan and turning it into a production center, I should be able to get some major stacks while I protect my back end of my empire through natural bottlenecks.

So, then here is the question:

Reading through the ALC's, the concensus I've always read was to keep your first few cities fairly close together to keep the maintenance from being cripling. As well... are you guys building a ton of monuments to get your cultural borders up super early, or at the higher levels is Stonehedge almost a must if you aren't a Creative leader?

Thanks for the Phil-Fin leader tip, I've done the English on a SE economy but I think it didn't help because my total number of cities was still too low by the time I hit 1AD.

qwertz: Thanks for that... I always felt that by late renaissance/early industrial if I was still at the bottom of the pack score wise that it was a fruitless endeavour.

It still doesn't change the fact, though, the huge disparity I personally find between Prince and Monarch. Why is it the same strategies I employed at Prince level net me a tech lead and a score lead, and yet on Monarch (prior to me adjusting my REXing) having the lowest score and trading like made to stay current with techs. Again, is Archery and a Worker really going to create that much of a power shift?

 

[TriPp]

Noble- Research x1.00 /AI cost x 1.00

Prince- Research x1.10 /AI cost x 0.95

Monarch- Research x 1.15 /AI cost x x 0.90

Maybe its the 25% cost difference in research as opposed to 15% cost difference? Just thinkin out loud...

 

[BalbanesBeoulve]

I personally didn't find a big jump in between prince and monarch. But I did need to make adjustments.

One of my main changes was that in Monarch I needed a tech plan, which was beelining liberalism, getting nationalism free, while backtrading to fill in the banking line and beelining rifles.

once I got rifles I couldn't build a huge stack of city raider II macemen and then lower my research slider to upgrade them to rifles. I couldn't afford to get behind in tech by doing that, and it takes too long. So instead now I switch to nationalism and draft them instead.

I also discovered the power of the great library, which I never used to build on prince.

What victory conditions do you go for? A 20,000 point victory on prince really isn't that great for domination, but is decent for a peaceful space race or diplo victory.

 

[Archbob]

Prince to Monarch wasn't that hard. Monarch to Emperor I'm finding impossible.