Arrrggggg!

[Tokyo Sexwale]

Actually, lately I've been turning off tech trading (custom game option) and been finding the late game much more enjoyable. The AI is ridiculous with its demands for techs later on.

It means you have to research everything, though. But it's better than constantly checking every turn whether all 7 other Civs have a new tech they're willing to trade. I find that irritating, tbh.

[OPD]

Originally posted by Jxands
Thanks for the great suggestions! I'll look at it again to understand you better.

Besides being behind in population I also noticed I was behind in Trade and MNF Goods, I can see I need to make better deals in Trade, but what constitutes Mnf Goods and how do I improve those?

Thanks again!

I had a look at your save.

You may be ahead in GNP but the AI is likely running alot of specialists which don't show up in that calculations and will give them the edge in science.

You should have switched to Universal Sufferage as soon as you could have, this would have given you a production bonus in all your cities and allowed you to build the infrastructure improvements.

Your capital has no bonus food resources, I've never had a start without at least one bonus food.... You have some nice mined hills but you're not using them. Get rid of the towns and build irrigation there, get Biology next and you'll get +1 food from each farm, you should then be able to use the hills and lumber mills for some serious production. 70 turns for the Apollo Program in a city with 6 hills and 5 lumber mills is not good, get a factory and maybe even a coal plant before the Apollo Program.

Build factories in all cities as soon as you can, you've had the tech for a while now but haven't built any. Also build the Ironworks as soon as you can in your highest production city, with a factory and coal plant there too, that city should be able to build Apollo and other wonders/spaceship parts real fast.

You're not trading enough resources, you have the stuff to trade but are not trading it and you're cities really need bonus food resources.
Contact the Aztecs, gift him Liberalism and Assembly line then give him cow, rice, ivory and wine for fur, sheep, deer and corn. This might upset other nations if he's at war with them, but it's not as if anyone else is giving you anything good.
Do some more trading, try and get resources, but money and maps are good too, as you're behind in techs trade away any techs you can.

You need to look at each city in turn and maximise it's output, increasing it's population so it works all avaliable tiles.

Also it would be better to specialize your cities more, some cities as big commerce centres a couple of big production centres. Commerce cities can still build stuff with the +1 production from US. You're building Oxford Uni in a size 6 city with low science output, that should be built in a big commerce centre so that the +100% will have a much bigger effect. Decide what you're going to do with each city before you build it then develop the terrain accordingly.

You've probably got too many lumber mills too, choping a few of those forests would have sped up your early expansion. Dehli for example is working 4 lumber mills, if they were towns instead (with US) you'd loose 1 hammer and gain 7 commerce, at 90% science with Academy, Lib, Uni and Obs that's a big boost to your science.

Other than that, your nations although great, isn't the biggest around, there are others with more output in a better position to win the space race.

[Hauptman]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


You can't put cottages on hills.

Yes sir, you can.

[Jxands]

Wow! Great tips! Thanks guys.

and I'm about to admit what a noob I am....it JUST dawned on me last night that gold=research (right?). I've been putting most of my focus on hammers.

another question...what do you all mean with "vertical" vs "horizontal" growth?

[PaganPaulwhisky]

Hmmm, I find that the easiest way to deal with this situation is to simply declare war on the advanced rival. You dont even have to fight much or have top notch troops. You can wreck anyones economy/research by pillaging all their cottages and improvements. That will knock those large sizes down to a more reasonable size. You must build units and go on the offensive or the comp will leave you in the dust especially on higher difficulty levels.

I had this same problem in my last monarch game. Frederick and several others all of a sudden rocketed 4-5 techs ahead of me and were close to rocketry. I had redcoats and cannons versus infantry and artillary, but I had alot of them! I declared war, razed 2 size 15 cities and then proceeded to pillaging. Repeat on one more rival and the AI trading capacity will be reduced dramatically. After this the I built the spaceship and out teched everyone with ease. Compared to a human player, the AI is miserable at maintaining research and spaceship construction during warfare.

[Tebriel]

Spies to destroy production/sabotage resources are also useful!