Vel's Strategy Thread

[Cort Haus]

Re: Upgrade Costs?

Originally posted by MVP
Don't know if it should go here, or on its own thread, but I've had so much fun keeping up with this one that I'll post it here.

It's a good point that you raise, but perhaps it's not a great move to have so many topics in one thread. Perhaps you could re-post it on another thread.

[TheZvi]

I've only been playing on Prince, but I'm finding that the computer tends to give you multiple resource tiles in your opening city and the result is that if you maximize the use of your good tiles your capitol will run smack into both your health and happiness limits. What that means is that I find you're generally left with two choices: You can 'sabotage' the city's production by using mines instead of your resource tiles, preventing growth, or you can produce workers/settlers instead.

The second option is by its nature far more efficient because it means you get to use all those 5-6 hammer/food tiles. This city will be far, far better at pumping out settlers and workers than everyone else and it's even better once it grows to its natural size limit. So what I keep wishing I'd done is: Start with a worker, and never build a worker/settler anywhere but the starting city until the midgame. Priming the pump and not having to build workes/settlers anywhere else means you end up with more and more useful additional cities, which are set to barracks/military units or wonders. In fact, I'm starting to wonder if the second city is worth doing second - letting yourself grow to use those tiles seems like it generates more surplus and it lets you be guarded properly to boot.

In essence, I'm asking if when you get your second and third cities is a good measure of speed at all. I need to try a few more openings to know if I'm on to something, because it's HARD to delay the second city. My civ instincts are yelling at me and they're loud.

[Lord Byte]

Re: Upgrade Costs?

Originally posted by MVP
...

Without any good evidence at this point, I'm leaning toward upgrading units when possible, but haven't yet tried the strategy of maxing gold for a few turns in a couple of cities to generate the gold necessary for a mass-upgrade.

Anybody else have any thoughts on the topic?

Well THE way to get a nice surplus of cash is sending a Great Merchant to a large AI city at the other side of the world Usually gives me between 3k-4k gold. The problem usually is that we tend to run our research as close to 100% as possible making it quite hard to have any cash on hand... Pillaging enemy cities also gives a nice boost. I only tend to mass upgrade units when I just received a large cash boost (someone beat me with a wonder, great merchant, or sacking a couple of enemy cities) or when I know that there may be enemy units coming in...

[Fried-Psitalon]

Hmmm. This thread is slowing down a bit. We need a new topic. :P

[Philotas]

[SIZE=1]
It requires three forests in a city area to get 1 health. That just seems like so many potential chops that you arent utilizing.

Forests should give .5 health if next to city, which I believe rounds up, so three forests should give 2 extra health.

I'm debating on doing an entire posts on nothing but health and all the factors that affect it.

[Jawa Jocky]

Re: Upgrade Costs?

Originally posted by MVP
Anybody else have any thoughts on the topic?

I need to go a step backward and ask, "How do you upgrade in the 1st place?"

[DrSpike]

Highlight the unit then look for the upgrade unit button on the action menu. Alt-U upgrades all of that type. You don't even need the unit to be in a town with a barracks any more.

You need to save lots of pennies though.

[Philotas]

Originally posted by Arrian
Vel,

Interesting exploitation of the AI's pillage tactics. I personally have *not* found that it's easy to get my border city's culture wide enough to encompass more than the "fat cross" on a consistent basis. Gimme a great artist and sure. Especially if my neighbor is creative.

Maybe I'm building up against the AI's culture a little bit deliberately, or I've run into more than my share of creative neighbors... I dunno. But typically the border culture war has been a draw for me.

-Arrian

My play style seems to naturally lean towards a high culture civilization and I've found big benefits from the culture "border" control during warfare. When on the offensive, sometimes the opponents cities are one move away and, even better, can be attacked from my own territory. And, with sneak attacks gone, a large culture border, with or without pillaging, can slow down an enemy's advance.

Also have found that more traditional "battle lines" are useful. Stacks of doom can be dangerous anyway, so I've starting spreading out units in more of a line formation. This helps to restrict the amount of pillaging. Although the AI will run "guerilla" attacks through other bordering countries.

[Jawa Jocky]

Originally posted by DrSpike
look for the upgrade unit button on the action menu.

Thanks! I was of course stuck in the past and searching fruitlessly within the "city view"

The ctrl+U shortcut is not on the "handy" keyboard layout that came with the game
And the in game help has been given a user interface that I'm still trying to figure out how to use.

[garetjaxusmc]

Newb on deck!

OK... I'm not very well versed in Civ 4, and as a matter of fact I'm out of practice on Civ in general, the last one I played having been Civ 3 when it first came out, and then not much afterwards.

Anyhow, I've tried these rapid expansions in terms of starting out in Civ 4 (I pick random civs), and I can't seem to get a good game started where I have a 2nd city going in a short amount of time.

I've tried the Settler first, and then I've tried the worker and the settler approach, but I feel like I've gotten an extremely stagnant start on both approaches. I feel that when I research bronze, by the time I finish researching it's too late to make much of a difference when I'm trying to chop that first settler out. Granted, it's excellent for any unit/building after that, but I'm thinking that my approach to the whole thing is wrong, or my timing is messed up.

-first step, I build city on the spot (or maybe wait a turn if I see an area that looks better)
-set production to settler or worker (most often a worker)
-set research tech tree to bronze.

Usually what happens to me at this point is that I end up building worker and still have a ways to go before bronze research is completed (research is at %100). Sometimes I've built a settler before the research was completed, at which point I'm about 40-50 turns into the game. I feel for some reason that I'm way behind at this point.

[InThane]

On upgrading: You do have to be within your own cultural boundaries to upgrade a unit, FYI. Also, if you do a "bulk upgrade" and you don't have enough money to upgrade all your units, it will upgrade some and not others.

It also doesn't ask you if you want to spend all that cash on the upgrade like it did before!

[piawak]

Re: garetjaxusmc

I'm not an expert by far but imo if you are going to try the worker/chop/settler idea you really need to be starting with a civilization that starts with mining. For the ones without mining you are right, your worker will be out for a long time before bronze working comes around. In those cases, as you're being random civs, I would only build a worker first if there is a reasource nearby that you have the technology for. There really isn't one good thing to do all the time, if I were playing a game with a random civ I would think something like this:

1. Are there a bunch of forests that are choppable?
2. If so, do I have mining?
3. If 1 and 2 are yes, start a worker and research bronzeworking.
4. Do I have mysticism?
5. If 4 is yes and I'm playing < prince (depends) research meditation/polytheism.
6. If no, is there a resource nearby that I have the tech for or can get easily?
7. If 6 is yes start worker and possibly research applicable tech or possibly another tech.

All of these are very malleable but I'm just trying to illustrate that you probably aren't going to get a good firm answer to "DO THIS AND CONQUER" but will need to think about what you can do and what you should do to reach your short and long term goals.

edit: spelling ftw

[Velociryx]

Thinking in Broad Strokes

In moving beyond the first several turns (settler, worker, warrior discussions), and coming to grips with the ancient era as a whole, it seems that there are essentially two approaches you can take:

* Play to the land

* Play to your starting techs/Abilities

Sometimes, these approaches go hand-in-hand (true of any civ that starts with a tech that gives a worker something to do!)

Both have their strengths, so it depends on what your overall plan is, and what you want to do.

Playing to the land is generally pretty easy, and it revolves around the following key techs:

Agriculture
Hunting
Animal Husbandry
Mining
The Wheel
Bronze Working
Fishing

With these techs in-hand, you can keep your workers busy for a VERY long time, and, it's typically a no-brainer to figure out what needs to be researched next.

If you've got crops, get Agriculture asap

If you've got critters, your natural inclination will rightly be toward Animal Husbandry/Hunting (or both, depending on WHAT animals are in your neighborhood).

A preponderance of precious metals tend to pull you toward Mining

and so forth.

NOTE - I would recommend AGAINST making "Fishing" a high-priority tech in the extreme early game unless you have at least 4+ "seafood specials" to work with....before then, you are probably better served spending those scarce beakers on the land (which probably has far more specials than this in any event). Once you get a good core established, then it's time to start making the sea pay dividends, but before then, unless you're running a very specific, food/commerce heavy & production lite strategy, you'll get farther by focusing on the landward fundamentals. Your mileage may vary.

So, playing to the land is an early-game no-brainer, but by no means is it the only option. Certain civs start at attractive points on the tech tree, and they can jump out the gate with a number of intriguing starts that will put them in a strong position.

Playing to your starting techs might look something like:

* Starting with Mysticism and making a play toward one of the early religions (get it founded, grab Organized Religion from that branch of the tech tree, and then, when you settle in to build your grainaries and barracks and other early infrastructure, you get a healthy discount).

* Starting with Mining (worker tech), might give you a compelling reason to jump out toward Iron-Working and Metal-Casting (well...once the patch comes out that makes the Forge do what it's supposed to do!)

* Financial Civs might want to go the seafarers route, and play to their burgeoning commerce, in which case, pottery, fishing and sailing become of keen priority

* Any civ that begins the game with a headstart on Alphabet can be in a strong diplomatic position, and a beeline FOR alphabet can be a very strong beginning (provided you're not stuck on the continent alone), as you can trade your 2nd and 3rd tier techs away for fistfuls of the techs you've been neglecting, and easily catch up, and this is quite doable, given the generous nature of the unmodified terrain tiles.

* Anyone interested in having a strong ancient-age military (warmonger or not) will want to make the dead-end portions of the tech tree a priority (Archery and Horseback Riding), because of the flexibility they give.

* An early rusher is gonna want "The Wheel" if he didn't start with it already, because that + horses gives you a highly survivable, very mobile, 4-strength unit to go a-hunting with.

* Set yourself up to go "GP Shopping", with an eye toward generating Great People (read below the notes on Wonders). To do this, you'll need to be focusing on techs that have Wonders attached to them, and/or open up civics choices that allow you to use specialists (think: Library!) Note that in this case, no one "Wonder" is key to your strategy. All you want are Wonders in general to springboard GP points, and in this particular instance, especially on higher levels, unless you're industrious, with stone, marble, and copper lying around, coupled with lots of forests to chop, it may be hard to get a significant number of them (because of the free techs and other benefits that the AI begins the game with), but you can still get enough from some points on the tree to jumpstart GP production.

And so forth.

So it certainly doesn't have to be about playing to the land in the Ancient Age. It can be if you want it to be, but it need not be so, and any of the starts mentioned above can be quite strong, depending on how you play them.

Wonders
Being that Wonders are "one-shot" deals, it would be unwise in the extreme to RELY ON the acquisition of a given wonder in particular as a cornerstone of your strategy. If that is the case, then you have a weak strategy, as it can be entirely undone if someone (ANYONE) beats you to your "key" Wonder.

Instead, view Wonders as enhancements to your general strategy, and count yourself fortunate if you snag one (or more) -- especially on higher levels of play!

Military Rules of Thumb
In general:

* Coastal Cities - 2 garrisons

* Cities "on the frontier" - 3 garrisons (note that this includes cities adjacent to "the wilds" as well as cities that butt up against the borders of another civ, no matter how friendly!)

* Cities in the safe interior - 1 garrison

* Your "Standing Army" - as big as your economy will allow (keep an eye on the f9 summary screen and note your position in army size, relative to the rest of the world...try not to fall to the weaker end of the spectrum...in the middle or higher is where you wanna be, in order to mount a credible defense, and obviously the nearer the top the better, if you plan to be "offensive"

More later....outta time and must get to work!

-=Vel=-

EDIT: Edited for clarity, based on continuing conversations.

[Arrian]

Military Rules of Thumb
In general:

* Coastal Cities - 2 garrisons

* Cities "on the frontier" - 3 garrisons (note that this includes cities adjacent to "the wilds" as well as cities that butt up against the borders of another civ, no matter how friendly!)

* Cities in the safe interior - 1 garrison

You playin' with aggressive AI or raging barbs, Vel?

Now I'll grant the coastal city thing, since I lost a coastal city the other day b/c I only had 1 axeman in it and the AI dropped off a War Elephant and a Sword. If you can get a mobile unit (horse archer) positioned between two coastal cities such that it can get to either one in one turn, though, I'd say go with that approach (1 garrison per city, plus the roamer).

If I can get away w/o troops in the interior, I do. If I need 'em for happiness, so be it. Everything else I've got goes to the border.

YMMV. If you're planning on fighting, clearly invest more in your army. If you're going the builder route (as I have been doing so far), maybe you don't have the time for lots of unit builds. It's true, of course, that you will put yourselve at greater risk of AI attack by having less of a military, but that's the tradeoff.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

A preponderance of metals tend to pull you toward Mining

Err, you cannot see the strategic metals until you have BW/IW. You can see stone & marble... which will pull you toward mining/masonry. Do you mean gold/silver?

-Arrian