Do you lose?

[Dis]

warrior defense. You'd think with enough of them, they could hold out against axeman. I'm not sure if it's worth it (in hammers) to build multiple warriors over archers. And they can't get the city defense promotion.

[Blaupanzer]

Yes, fairly regularly. Don't always retire to the HOF, but if I am running behind, and can't turn it with a desperate ploy, I tend to either quit or retire. Hate the way the AI always catches up on me with tech during mid-game, especially the ones that are far enough away that I can't reach out and swat them. A tech lead of two or more by an AI that can't be easily crushed in the late game is guaranteed to lead to a loss. Have to stay aggressive to keep AI under control, means no way the UN is to my benefit. So many ways to lose, based on the AI combinations (war/culture/tech/finances -- each AI taking a different path, so the one I neglect reaches out to bite me). If I start to run away at one level, say Noble, time to move up to Prince. Play on marathon, so it is easy to fool myself into thinking I'm still in it when actually my time has passed. I am learning all the time and loving it.

[rah]

Yep, lose all the time. The key is recognizing it early so you don't waste too much time. There was one that it was obvious that I was going to lose on an AI spaceship, but I was having so much fun, I got the mod code from CFC to turn that victory condition off so I could finish the game and win. Cheezy but I was having a blast, and that's what it's all about.

[Blaupanzer]

NOW you've let the cat out of the bag! Mod code??? I recall you asking about this a while ago.

[LDiCesare]

6-8 cities captured, plus the two I built = total economic meltdown

That's usually what happens to me when I try to play Rome and Praetorians. I don't get why people love this unit so much. Everytime I play the Romans, I try yo kill everybody nearby with Praets, and I usually succeed. Of course, a few hundred years later, while I've managed to get up to a magnificent 30% research, a ship with big weird-looking sails on it lands out of nowhere, and some kind of barbarian pretending to be civilised shows up with 10 more techs than I. Go figure.
In my current game, I watched the replay after winning and realised I had built 3 cities when some of my neighbours (ai's) had built 8. This one was the first to get vanquished.

[Jaybe]

Vel & LDiCesare, the talk of all you strategy "purists" make me laugh!
Balance is the way (even with Praets).

[rah]

Originally posted by Blaupanzer
NOW you've let the cat out of the bag! Mod code??? I recall you asking about this a while ago.

http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=157007

[Adagio]

I have lost a couple of times, but most of the time I just quit if Im way too far back to even have a chance of winning. In my current game it looks like Ill lose, but I still have a small chance of winning, but its going to be very tough, as the Celts has lots of vassals (including my only neighbors, the Aztecs and the Malinese... just great, I kicked their ass, and now they ask the Celts for protection )

[rah]

Yes, vassalage is a fine line to walk. You would rather eliminate them but at some point its sometimes better to take their capitulation rather than them going to someone bigger.

[TheArsenal]

speaking of the devil ...

...as of last night I am losing to Mansa by a fair number of points but in second place (14 Civs still alive) by a fair number of points. The good news is two fold, one the Spaceship Victory is turned off, and two, he is the Empire right on my border so I can reduce his lead through well implemented aggression if needed. On the Huge Continent map I am playing, if either of these weren’t true, I would most likely lose. Although now less likely, it is still possible that I could.

[MasterDave]

I play mostly multiplayer. These days I am by no means certain, but I think that I win those games about 60% of the time, and when I lose a lobby game it is when some d3wD finds copper right away and hits me with four axemen in 2000 bc, or I get into some anceint era war with some suicidal guy and both of us quickly fall behind in score and techs. (Admittedly, a lot of these early wars are my own fault, because I just cannot resist an undefended human controlled worker or city).

I do lose single player games sometimes too, almost always at Emperor level and about a third of the time on Monarch (and yes, games where I quit early are considered losses in this case). I have had a couple of games where the AI launched a spaceship a turn or three before my own ship launched or my last city went legendary.

I do not like turning off victory conditions in single player. It sort of feels like cheating to favor a certain play style. Also, taking away the space race really exposes the AI's weaknesses in modern warfare.

[Virdrago]

Yeah, I keep all victory conditions on, since I've never seen the AI go for anything other than Space Race or Diplomacy - I'd love to see an AI with Cultural victory; my top three cultural cities tend to be higher than the next best civ's top one.

[Virdrago]

Sorry, didn't mean to post two threads. Sarxis, you started the post - what about you?

[Sarxis]

I'm not playing cIV right now, but have been playing the Ages of Man mod for Call to Power 2.

I did lose one of the games of vanilla cIV, but that was mostly because of a VERY bad start position. Impossibly bad.. actually.

But I never tried the game on a hard setting (stuck with noble or Prince). Haven't picked up Warlords because I am just not feeling convinced of its value. I didn't care very much for the way cIV turned out... too scaled back. Too streamlined.

[TheArsenal]

Actually, I routinely change game conditions. As often as not I'll play with random personalities and I'll play raging barbs one game in a few. I also play with the Spaceship Victory off about a third to half of the time. The only thing, for me, less satisfying than winning by blasting off is losing that way. My only concern is I doubt the AI can look at the fact the victory condition is off and decide, "hey, looks like I have to approach this one a little differently."