Vel's Strategy Thread, Volume III

[couerdelion]

Schedules like city numbers/tech level can be a little misleading and might force you to adopt a strategy which is not ideally suited to your situation if you simply try to follow that schedule. Something like that number of cities – in my view 8 is a quite a lot and, at this stage in the game, will be expensive. More important is to achieve a consistent rate of growth over the game (beakers/gold, hammers, food)

For me the key thing about early settlers is to grab good sites/key resources to give more options in later games. After that city acquisition is by conquest and once you have the maximum cost from number of cities and State Property, you will tend to find that freely settling is likely to be one of your most profitable strategies particularly if you have the added bonuses from Wonders like Statue of Liberty (+Representation)/Spiral Minaret/University of Sankore and a Shrine in your Wall Street city.

[Addled Platypus]

Originally posted by Metaliturtle
nerf footballs are soft foam things that don't hurt when you get pelted in the face with them,

freeze them


gads....patch ...re-write....and its the holiday season

[Velociryx]

sorry for the delay folks...Candle'Bre has been in gallop mode the last couple weeks, and I've been struggling to keep all the plates spinning, as it were.

The new patch *does* change things....that's to be expected any time they change something at the root level (ie, tech paths, which are one of the prime drivers behind player-defined strategy), so I'll need to digest it before beginning this project again. I suspect though, that much of the material will still hold, and it'll be tweaks around the margins (ie., going for early Bureaucracy can still be a good play, and the Oracle can speed you along that path, although it probably can't be called a "slingshot" any more, since the sudden, radical shift in power is likely gone).

Anyway, I haven't forgotten...

-=Vel=-

[Metaliturtle]

Originally posted by Platypus Rex


freeze them

Make sure to soak them in water first!

[shimmin]

It might be useful to mention the early-game utility of keeping a small-to-medium city attack force around, not for waging war against other players, but for taking over barbarian cities. When the opportunity presents itself, it can be a less expensive means of expansion than settlers.

[Quillan]

That's an idea I use regularly, but it is situational sometimes. Barbarian cities only pop up off in the wilderness, and I've had a couple of games where the land mass I was on was pretty crowded, so there were none. If you start on the coast with a couple of AIs close by, there may be no barbarian cities within easy reach.

[shimmin]

I want to say that the section describing the "Slave-master" opening in detail is great, not just as describing a viable opening strategy, but as an "exercise" to help an at-heart builder like myself truly appreciate the value of pop-n-chop rushing and of early warmongering.

An interesting approach to a (section of a) strategy guide might a collection of such "exercises" to help illustrate the utility of certain approaches to certain situations, perhaps with saved games included for situations that tend to arise in the midgame.

[Steve Clark]

Vel, I see that the other thread ("thinking about writing...") is dead. I had just finished reading that and have a number of comments/suggestions. I have not read this thread so I'm wondering how best to respond to you.

Good to read your posts again.

[dacole]

Ok a question when do people start using specialists? I usually try to have 1 or two cities that I devote to specialists but I'm never sure when to start using them. In the past I have only started when I have 12 or 13 people in a city. I have decided this is wayyy to late. Of course what you would have to do is weigh the uses of working a tial against the uses of the specialist, with the addition of gpp especially if you can put them in a city with a good many other things specialists are INCREDIBLY powerful. I am thinking about putting 1 or 2 in my two great people cities when I get to a population of five. Early golden ages can be very useful. What do other people think?

[JackRudd]

Early Golden Ages? Golden Ages are for using specialists in the late-game, when you've got double-digit numbers of cities that can benefit from them. Early specialists are much better off either being settled (you'll be benefiting for hundreds of turns - it stacks up), used to rush a critical tech, or used on a special building (Shrine for prophets, Academy for scientists, or Wonder for engineers).

[couerdelion]

Early GPs are very important and you should be looking to appoint specialists well before year 0. Specifically, an early academy will boost science and settled GP can be extremely valuable. There is indeed one strategy that works on getting one city devoted, for a short period to turning out 3-4 GP for this purpose. You make a relatively early bee-line for Code of Laws to allow the use of Caste System and then get one food rich city to appoint lots of scientists. The first scientist then lightbulbs Philosophy and you switch to Pacificm for +100% GPP. After that, you will probably get yourself an academy and settle the remaining GS’s in the Academy city.

As mentioned early, don’t “waste” your early GPs on Golden Ages. GA’s are only valuable once you have around 20+ cities with strong production/commerce tiles.

[dacole]

Really interesting. I've never even considerd having 20+ cities... The AI goes into golden ages way more often than that but thanks for the help!

Next question is there ever a time when you can put your civilization on more than 1 contient? If so how? When I've tried to do this it usually ends very badly.

[couerdelion]

Originally posted by dacole
Really interesting. I've never even considerd having 20+ cities... The AI goes into golden ages way more often than that but thanks for the help!

Next question is there ever a time when you can put your civilization on more than 1 contient? If so how? When I've tried to do this it usually ends very badly.

The AI has this strange liking for golden ages. Basically, it is very stupid unless you get Blake's new improved AI. At the moment, I'd learn to play with the existing one

Getting to another continent requires a large military and naval build up. Usually, you’ll want a tech lead also otherwise your transport fleet risks being blown out of the water.

You will also need reasonably good diplomacy to pick on a weak, relatively isolated nation from which you can take a few cities. Then, with a base you can continue the expansion.

It’s almost impossible to do this without conquest (apart from settling the occasional large island that you might find)

Oh and on Terra maps there is a “free” continent for you to settle although this will have lots of barbarian cities which you have to take and which will require a decent military force to hold.

[dacole]

How much of blakes improved AI was included in the firaxis patch..? Prince is still giveing me a run for my money..

[Blake]

In 2.08 it manages it's economy better and that's pretty much it.

My full AI has a lot of new tricks, from being able to use Great Merchant cash bombs to being able to put together punishing stacks and even winning a cultural victory.

In short 2.08 just has a stronger economy, while my full AI actually knows new ways to kick your ass.