Won my first Monarch game!

[Creosote]

Pretty pleased with myself

Won my first Monarch game at first attempt. Been playing Civ 3 for about 2 weeks, going up the levels of difficulty.
Seemed a lot tougher going to Monarch than the previous levels of difficulty upgrades, if that makes sense, I mean Warlord to Regent was ok.

Only just made it though, Spaceship Launch in 1852, one of the other civs had 9 rocket plarts!

2nd smallest world size, everything else random. I don't think I could beat it yet on standard world size.

Anyway, excuse the crowing, and I would like to thank all the help I have had from the very helpful people here, else I would still be at Chieftain!

 

[Hyronymus]

I'm on a monarch game now, quite a fun one. It's 1590 and I'm researching Stealth, decimateded the Incans, conquered the Japanese, Portuguese and Indians and currently busy building my army of Modern Armours. I plan to attck the Spanish and remaining Incan cities at the same time, that's when marines come in handy .

 

[Smellincoffee]

I finished my first about a week ago...I've started quite a few, but none of them ever held my interest long enough. I wanted to stick with a game until 2050, but I was impatient and decided to instead trigger the wonder victory. However, the game had been won (realistically speaking) as early as the middle ages. The AI started to war and I took off.

- that was the turn I finished Longevity and won....as you can see, I obliterated all of the other civs. The only one I left was Spain, who was my ally throughout most of it. I kept her pacified with luxuries. Otherwise she'd hate me, because I razed probably a dozen size twelve cities.

 

[Dreadnought]

Congrats! But how will you do on the otehr levels?

 

[Total War]

Congrats!

I played several games on Rengent and one on Monarch, and so far I have ONLY won by Space Race. I'm playing another huge monarch game, and I turned off the Space Race victory so that I can win by doing something else this time (preferably by killing everyone else)

 

[El Dorko Grande]

Congratiulations! Winning a Monarch game after two weeks is quite impressive.

Are you going to try other types of victory too?

 

[Creosote]

Thanks.

I want to try out loads of stuff, difficulty levels, world sizes etc etc but one thing at a time

I've gone back to Regent for a while as I want to get more experience at developing in the early game which seems to be key at the higher levels, learning to do Settler factories and expanding fast, stuff like that.
I still dont understand half the game. I have never even made any sort of flying machine or naval vessel apart from a Transport and Galleon. There is so much I am blundering around at.

 

[tR1cKy]

Congratulations!
BTW, you gain more experience in staying at Monarch. It's the difficulty that make you think better about every aspect of the game, every possible move... Ah, you won by space race. Try a domination victory. Another step ahead in mastering the game.

 

[Admiral8Q]

Creosote, congrats after two weeks! You must have played Civ1 or 2 prior to 3, or just been playing straight for two weeks! Yes the game get's infinately more challenging past Monarch. Monarch is the most balanced skill level, however. Yes try domination only and it gets more tough.

 

[Creosote]

Creosote, congrats after two weeks! You must have played Civ1 or 2 prior to 3, or just been playing straight for two weeks! Yes the game get's infinately more challenging past Monarch. Monarch is the most balanced skill level, however. Yes try domination only and it gets more tough.

Yes, I used to play Civ 1 many years ago. Have to say I learnt more about good strategy for Civ 3 from this forum than any fading memory of Civ 1.

Strange, on Regent all I can get is Domination Victories, just finished a game a few mins ago with Dom win at 1450AD. No problemo

Oh, yes I have been playing straight for 2 weeks!

 

[vcaffari]

Ok, here is the deal. I have been playing since since summer 2004, i stopped playing for a few months, then i jumped back into it. I played a couple games on chieftan, became instantly disgusted, upped it to warlord, was incredibly bogus, then i stepped up to regent, and found regent to be very pleasing. Right away, i was doing well, winning all games but one. Then i decided, after a decisive victory as the mongols, that it was time to up the ante. So I played a game on monarch. I managed to stay alive, but my science in the ancient age was abominable, if i hadnt built the great library, i would be in a hell of a lot different predicament. Im playing conquests by the way. Ok so what I want to know is, if you dont have a fully developed beginning of the game strategy, how the hell can you even compete on monarch, Corruption is absurd, civil disorder requires too many units and burns out both your commerce, and production, and hence science. So basically, either you know something that I do not, or you are full of ****. Hopefully, if it is the former, you might want to drop a couple hints for monarch because im hitting a major wall here.

Thanks,

Peace

 

[Creosote]

Ok, here is the deal. I have been playing since since summer 2004, i stopped playing for a few months, then i jumped back into it. I played a couple games on chieftan, became instantly disgusted, upped it to warlord, was incredibly bogus, then i stepped up to regent, and found regent to be very pleasing. Right away, i was doing well, winning all games but one. Then i decided, after a decisive victory as the mongols, that it was time to up the ante. So I played a game on monarch. I managed to stay alive, but my science in the ancient age was abominable, if i hadnt built the great library, i would be in a hell of a lot different predicament. Im playing conquests by the way. Ok so what I want to know is, if you dont have a fully developed beginning of the game strategy, how the hell can you even compete on monarch, Corruption is absurd, civil disorder requires too many units and burns out both your commerce, and production, and hence science. So basically, either you know something that I do not, or you are full of ****. Hopefully, if it is the former, you might want to drop a couple hints for monarch because im hitting a major wall here.

Thanks,

Peace

I dont think I am full of ****

Basically I followed the tips in a thread somewhere on this forum on how to do well in the Regent level, which I did, then used those in Monarch. Also many years ago I did play Civ 1 to death, so while the memory is rusty I have had some experience at Civ games. Frankly, once I got the hang of it Warlord was easy, and I've just played another 3 or 4 games at Regent and finding that easy, so have just started my second Monarch game.

This is what I have been doing that has been successful for me:
Build Settler factory in capital.
Expand like crazy. Build a Worker first in every town, then Barracks, then offensive units which I put to a Rally Point next to nearest neighbour.
Don't build any improvements except for Barracks.
Work each town's terrain with a worker and add captured workers.
Churn out a very early attack force of whatever you can, unique units, or Horseman, Swordsman, whatever is the best unit you can make.
Assemble all those until I have around 12-18, this is pretty early in the game.
Attack nearest neighbour and attempt to obliterate them, not always possible as I dont have enough units, but I halt their expansion and can usually get some techs etc for peace.
I dont worry about science except to get to Literature asap to build Great Library in capital. This can get tricky as you want the capital for settlers but by then I usually just stop building settlers and concentrate on Great Library.
I try and find other neighbours during this time but must confess I tend to neglect sea exploration in favor of land area.I try and start building Forbidden Palace in a suitable town around 100AD, I add workers to the town to get the shields up to 4 after corruption wastage to build it a bit faster, but its still grindingly slow.
By approx 500AD I usually have 20-30 towns/cities and build a Temple in each and start developing them a bit with a marketplace. I dont usually build Granaries, rather try and capture Pyramids sometime.
I then try and explore more, consolidate my towns and try and make my core empire as good as possible.
By then I can build Knights and just build as massive army as I can and attack the next nearest neighbour, and upgrade Knights to Cavalry asap.

The Great Library is key to this, as I am neglecting Science and need to catch up. For example in the current Monarch game I lost out on Great Library so have been battling my way to the civ city that built it and have just captured it. Its 590AD, I have the Forbidden Palace half built, around 25 towns, and about 30 Horseman who are rampaging through my two neighbours. I am in slight trouble as I have only found 3 of the other Civs, two I am at War with, one is on another island somewhere, and gawd knows where the other 4 are!! I'll need to find them soon to get the techs from teh Great Library. I'm playing on Standard size map, Random opponents, docile Barbarians (they just irritate me). For this game I have switched cultural switch to off, to see what effect it really makes.

Anyway, sorry you think I am being a bull****ter! I've earnt my victories so far, and am getting reasonably good at the early game, but modern warfare is a complete mystery to me! Good luck.



Update: I just won my second Monarch game. Diplomatic Victory in 1645.