adjusting difficulty mid game

[Gailon]

first of all: BtS is amazing.

However, I really enjoy playing through the whole game to the modern era, developing my civilization along the way.

The trouble is that I usually win around macemen (lose around axemen, the AI builds so freakin many of em sometime).

I don't mean win as in conquer the entire planet. I just mean get far enough ahead that winning is just a tedious inevitability.

I'm currently playing a standard continents game on Prince difficulty. After a long war with the Aztexs, who started on my continent I emerged victorious. But now my development speed just seems too fast for the AI to be competitive. It is just a matter of time before my tanks steamroll through the AI's riflemen... bor-ing.

This tends to happen a lot to me in Civ. Once I start to win (or start to lose, but that's for a different thread) it becomes a snowball effect and I don't get to enjoy the late game play. If I increase the difficulty at the beginning I just tend to have the opposite effect, once I start to lose it just snowballs on me.

Sorry this is such a long post for such a simple question: can I change the difficulty mid game? Can I merge two civiliazation together (to similute one of them conquering the other)?

I guess I could just give all my technology to the 'chosen' AI players, but I would continue to outpace them in development and tech (cause I'm still building faster and researching faster).

Ideas? thanks

[Solver]

You can't change difficulty mid-game.

I would say, though, you're playing a difficulty level too low for your skill level. If you're sure you're going to win in the Middle Ages already, that's not the right difficulty. I believe that the "right" difficulty is when you struggle with winning and may need to overcome a losing situation to finally get a win.

[Gailon]

I guess

I should ask for advice on how to do that, then.

I played on Monarch difficulty in Vanilla Civ. When I tried my first BtS game on it though, I got absolutely destroyed. So I thought I'd try Prince.

My problem isn't so much that it's 'easy' I mean, I struggle to keep up early, and the wars through the middle ages are no cakewalk. It's that the game snowballs. If I'm losing then I'm losing worse every turn. If I'm winning then the margin just seems to increase every turn.

[Unimatrix11]

The effect you describe, i think, is inherent to this type of game. I noticed it playing Master of Orion II. At one point the game gets decided. It´s pretty much over then. I think BTS has a lot of layers though, which open up possibilites to add another twist to history, when everything seems lost in blant military / city numbers. So with creative thinking and a lot of foresight it should be possible to adept your strategy and achieve (if only limited) success in most situtations, even if they seem hopeless on first sight...

Also, dont celebrate too early. I, too, had games where i thought "well, its gonna be a cake-walk from now on... hardly worth playing it... well just one more turn ". But then the AIs would get themselves together, cooperate in technology, keeping me busy with little wars and seaborne invasion threats, so that the game would still take some effort to "bring it home". Right now in a MP game (tech-brockerage off) i had such a tech-lead as mensa (riflemen, when most other civs where still not having musketeers), that i thought thats it. But weather being inspired by my brother or by my tech lead, those AIs keep coming at me, one after the other, bogging me down - yes even once taking my (under-defended) capital (thank god they didnt raze it)...

What i want to say is: The AI is pretty good at catching up techwise once they made contact with each other and when confronted with a tech-leader.

[Solver]

To a degree, the snowball effect is an unfortunate inherent property of Civ games, though Civ4 fights it reasonably well.

The thing is, as a human, you're smart. So you should be able to counter the snowball effect when it's not in your favour. So when you're losing, there should later be a moment when you make some smart decisions and start getting back into it, culminating in catching up with the others.

And the key there is to ask for strategy advice, possibly with save files included, during difficult moments in the game or when you know you've screwed up to see how it could be done better.

[Gailon]

Thanks

so I guess the advice is to raise the difficulty and deal with the challenge of coming from behind as oppossed to finding a way for the AI to artificially catch up once I'm ahead.

As much as I fear the AI early axemen hoards on Monarch, I guess I'll just have to learn to deal.

[Solver]

The Prince-to-Monarch jump was very difficult in vanilla, it's somewhat easier in BtS.

To each their own, of course. Some people want to play in a way where they can be guaranteed to dominate the game, but it seems you're not one of them. Which is why, indeed, you'll probably better enjoy a level where you need to overcome significant difficulties.

[Shrapnel12]

I probably play at too low a level. I get frustrated too easily if I even start to lose. I was playing a game on Cheiftain which I knew would be an easy win. I was trying to win my first Cultural victory which is hard for me and why I played on so low a level. Anyway, I didn't pay much attention to other civs and concentrated on just getting culture points which due to some bad choices was coming very slow in my third city. Out of boredom, I decided to start a war with Isabella. I did some recon first and saw something that really surprised me. She was busy building her spaceship and there was a chance I might actually lose the game. I never finished the game however because BtS came out and I couldn't wait to get started with it.

Aside from an interesting story, my point is that perhaps you could let up on the AI a bit. Don't be so focused on your game, and maybe focus on stuff you'd like to do, instead of what's best to win the game. While you're having fun, you could let the AI catch up.

[Civilized 67]

Try moving to a higher difficulty level while using the BtS "tweaks" to make things more enjoyable. Those tweaks, even the small ones, can make a huge difference in how the game plays. As previously mentioned you can turn off tech brokering, make all Civs remain permanently at peace, make the AI generate new random numbers on reload, etc., etc...

[Kinjiru]

Couldn't you just use Advanced Starts to begin your game at a later stage?

[wodan11]

One other thing you could try (that others haven't suggested) is the Smartmap mod.

Smartmap gives you a zillion parameters you can tweak on map generation. For example, you can guarantee isolated separate continents, one to each player/AI. By doing this, you guarantee that you simply can't do an early rush. The side benefit is that you are guaranteed expansion room (and thus an early rush is not so useful as it is on other maps).

Just some ideas.

Wodan

[Blaupanzer]

Smartmap mod? What is this, and where can it be found? Thanks.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by Blaupanzer
Smartmap mod? What is this, and where can it be found? Thanks.

Don't know if it's here on Apolyton, but you can definitely get it here:
Smartmap

I've been using it with BtS without problem.

Wodan

[Blaupanzer]

Thanks.

[Gulelin]

Speaking of difficulty, does anyone know off the top of thier head what difficulty level puts you even with the AI as far as bonuses, etc?