Noble to Prince - unbearable

[rah]

And no, I doubt I will join you at your settings. I can't imagine a more boring game (to much space for the AI to expand before it thinks about attacking) and I doubt my machine could handle it. When it gets smaller I may participate. 90% of my games are MP, the other 10% are for experimenting like with the GG strat I read about. So if I see a challenge that looks interesting but more importantly fun, I'll join. I already know how long my dick is and feel no need to compare it's length. (an MP game might be another matter though )

But I do look forward to seeing the comparisons with your game. I may learn something.

[wodan11]

trust me, if you go for early conquest you will most likely lose. i know thats my opinion but by the time you get to astronomy, AI's will have ALOT of cities and units, especially if you share your continent with an aggressive AI, but with the big maps you should easily be able to scout the army approaching before you lose dependent on how big the continent is. with 12 AI's and all having ample room w/ my settings for the first game the time itd take to try to wipe them all would lead to the huge tech lead for them and youd be going against infantry on your 3rd or 4th victim. killing the close AI's might be easier but that too is dependent on many factors. i foresee the quickest way to win would be the domination but that could take til the mid-late era at least if things play out the same way with my current game. im keeping the same size map (bout 2x that of huge) but adding two more civs since there was plenty of room leftover, not alot but enough. also this game will take a good time commitment for you guys, you dont have to play it night and day, but if you play 4 hours a day more or less on others, it'd still take a good week or two. its marathon and mapping the globe/making first contact does take some time. this map aint too big well not for me, going from one pole to the other with a 5 movement would take 20+ turns from end to end, bout the same east to west. but this is marathon so turns are tripled as is most everything else, just letting you know.

I was mainly talking about culture, diplomacy, and space. I know you usually "back in" to those victories but you should understand that most people don't do it that way.

im assuming whatever leader i pick will be the same for you right?

Yes. What you should provide is the 4000BC game save.

do you want game file from when i start cuz i need to do some remodeling of the map for changing deserts to plains and reducing how far ice/tundra go so as we have the same exact map, the only way i know how to do this is for you to have the same leader as i, unless im wrong then id need some info on that.

If you're going to be doing any terraforming please do it before you provide the game save. After that, I would suggest that World Builder be verboten to everyone.

for the AI yes

Even for the human.

im only going to do this if everybodys gonna play it through

Ok, then.

Brael, if you plan to stop at 1AD please tell Brandon you're going to play it through.
Then, later on you can "change your mind."

however long it takes is all right with me, just remember post at 1 A.D., 1000 A.D., and lets do 1500 A.D. and maybe if needed 1750 A.D. should your game go that far.

Sounds good!

After reading about the GG strat, it sounded like fun so I gave it a go this weekend.

After I got about 13 I figured it was time to go on the offensive.

It was a riot and I recommend that any bloodlust player give it a go.

I was never able to get a stack of 25 great generals though.

Glad you liked it!

If you play it a couple of times you'll surely be able to increase the number, and possibly minimize the number lost through combt. Also, obviously, playing on Marathon helps too.

I probably generated about 22 or 23 generals but I did lose about 6 or so before they became super units. One at 99.9 odds. The average experience points at the end was about 130 to 140. If anyone says they do this and never loses a general I'll say try not resetting. I could have done more but I won first.

Well, until your Warlords get a bunch of Combat and Drill promos, I'd be a little frugal with the low probability combats. Catapults are your friend.

The one big side benefit was the GG's cohort. Besides the 16 GG in by GSOD. (great stack of death) there were about 16 other units that had benefitted from cleaning up after the GGs so they themselves attained kick ass status. Nothing could stand up to them. Later when I went to war with the mayans and the etheopians all I did was locate their SOD, and moved my super stack as close as I could to in my boarder and would declare war. There SOD would enter my territory and my GSOD would vaporize it in 2 or 3 turns. QUALITY over QUANTITY every time.

It was Fun and I thank you for mentioning it.

My pleasure! Glad you enjoyed it.

At the Highest level, I have to cherry pick settings to win and get lucky. I guess that makes me not as good as some others that find the highest level easier.

I lose all the time too. But that's not my main goal so it doesn't bother me, and I pretty much play on Immortal and above, so that decreases my win rate also.

As I have varied success rates with different strates, either I'm better at some types of strategies or else some types of strategies are harder vs high level AIs, or more likely: both.

[rah]

Well, until your Warlords get a bunch of Combat and Drill promos, I'd be a little frugal with the low probability combats. Catapults are your friend.

What's the smallest percentage are you willing to attack with? If you wait for all 99.9ers you will run out of units to attack with and it will take longer to rack up the experience points. The ones I did lose were all in the +95%. If you wait for all 99.9 (which I did lose one on) you risk their siege units getting a shot at you. Until get enough drills, that can be dangerous. I did build a lot of cats but units were coming in almost every turn. And it's a bit silly to waste a cat on a single unit. I lost a couple at 98% and a few on 97%. So when you attack over a 100 times, the odds will catch up to you.

[Brael]

Tactics+Guerilla 3 turns a 90% into a 98%. I would think those are required promotions for any super unit.

You will lose stuff occasionally though. One thing to keep in mind though is you can have 80% withdrawl on normal units, you can get cavalry to 90% withdrawl (cavalry 30% withdrawl rate, flanking 2, tactics) though the other units in the mounted line other than gunships are 80% or less.

[rah]

But even at 98% you're going to loss 1 in 50 . As you said, **** happens. You have to risk some combats to get them to super status. If you're always at war you can't not use them. Granted once they got up there, I only lost 1 but you have to get them up there.

Next time, (and since it only took about 7 hours, I'm willing to give it another go) I'll choose different early promotions, since I probably front loaded the CR promos too early, but later in the game (once you're fighting gunpowder units) that's more difficult or you'll never get them. But of course maybe you don't need them as much as I thought. Something to consider.

[rah]

And I did do too many melee units early since it's rare in a game that I get to gun ships since tanks and mech infantry is as far as I usually get before winning. I detoured to gun ships this game but the units weren't as super. Next time I'll do more earlier mounted units to see if they survive a touch better with withdrawal promos. (Yes, I would expect them to )

[rah]

And I agree with those comments about the crossover metric. I never intended that it would be standard. I just posted it because because I wanted to hear examples so I could make some general judgments on different settings. Like usually it happens later in MP games vs SP games since there is the earlier threat of attacks. I was wondering what type of settings would alter it.

[Norselord]

This thread and the original poster are ridiculous.

If I understand correctly the OP uses these settings:
- Gigantic Map with continents (no early competition at all from the AI, no need to strategically REX)
- No espionage (eliminates a critical part of the challenge of the game...almost makes the game 20% easier)
- No tech trading/brokering (pretty much eliminates a huge facet of trading and of exploring to meet rival facets soon)

I think just about anyone can be a "pro" with those setting. In essence it means:
- don't worry about wars/diplo/trading until astronomy -- tech tech tech and casually expand.
- don't worry about the AI trading for techs amongst each other and building up strong diplomatic ties.
- don't worry about spies destroying resources, stealing techs, poisoning wells, etc.

Here is a challenge for the OP:
Instead of raising the difficulty level from noble to prince, or whatever, try slowly changing one of your starting settings to eventually get to:
* Map: Large, tectonics, 60% water
* Start with only tech trading turned off, tech brokering allowed; once you have gotten the hang of that, turn tech trading on.
* Enable Espionage

Bragging about being a "pro" with all the challenging factors turned off or setup in your favor is very cheezy, but mostly exposes you for the n00b you are.

[Brael]

And I did do too many melee units early since it's rare in a game that I get to gun ships since tanks and mech infantry is as far as I usually get before winning. I detoured to gun ships this game but the units weren't as super. Next time I'll do more earlier mounted units to see if they survive a touch better with withdrawal promos. (Yes, I would expect them to )

I think you would find them easier to build up to around level 10 or 15, but after that the normal units could do better. Fighting defensive wars like that, the fast units move 4 or 6 spaces so they can be all over your territory for exp but they can't get Guerilla 3 which is better than flanking 2 plus innate withdrawl (for all but cavalry). Remember, Guerilla is a 30% hills attack and 50% withdrawl, that's rather nice for a unit making attacks.

Actually, looking at the promotion list... I take it back. Guerilla is archery and gunpowder only. So you would really only be able to apply it to your melee units that you promote and their replacements.

[wodan11]

What's the smallest percentage are you willing to attack with? If you wait for all 99.9ers you will run out of units to attack with and it will take longer to rack up the experience points. The ones I did lose were all in the +95%. If you wait for all 99.9 (which I did lose one on) you risk their siege units getting a shot at you. Until get enough drills, that can be dangerous. I did build a lot of cats but units were coming in almost every turn. And it's a bit silly to waste a cat on a single unit. I lost a couple at 98% and a few on 97%. So when you attack over a 100 times, the odds will catch up to you.

Yes, true. However, it does sound as though you had a bit of poor luck. I don't recall losing that many Warlord units (6 out of 25 is a 25% casualty rate).

One thing perhaps you didn't do that I did routinely... you're correct that you end up with a handful of "groupie" units... skilled hangers on. It's the best of those guys that I would give a new Warlord to. So, your Warlord units should already be really skilled. Did you do that?

Next time, (and since it only took about 7 hours, I'm willing to give it another go) I'll choose different early promotions, since I probably front loaded the CR promos too early, but later in the game (once you're fighting gunpowder units) that's more difficult or you'll never get them. But of course maybe you don't need them as much as I thought. Something to consider.

Yeah, I wouldn't focus on CR until just before you tech Rifles because you won't be conquering many (if any) cities before then, and even then, you don't need ALL your warlords to have it. When you go a-conquering you just need the first couple of Warlords to have CRIII. Once you've cracked the nut of each city, any remaining defenders tend to be wussies.

And, if you are going for culture or space (instead of domination or conquest), you may not want any CR units at all.

And I did do too many melee units early since it's rare in a game that I get to gun ships since tanks and mech infantry is as far as I usually get before winning. I detoured to gun ships this game but the units weren't as super. Next time I'll do more earlier mounted units to see if they survive a touch better with withdrawal promos. (Yes, I would expect them to )

Oh, yes, I'd definitely spread out a bit. Some mounted units, some melee. Looking back I guess I didn't say that but I should have. I did say Genghis makes a good leader but that wasn't strong enough of a hint. It also may be a good idea to save a couple of GGs for when you get Tanks.

[Brael]

Oh, I did a GG game. I turned the difficulty down to emperor so I would have more room to play around with the strategy without being able to completely slack and managed to get myself the gw/pyramids, and researched for pacifism.

Anyways, I went with pacifism because I could run a much smaller army, then ran representation to do a SE (I rarely use it so I probably didn't do it that well), it made a really nice combo. It took how I thought of SE's to a new level with that combo. Enough that I'm actually rethinking Cyrus being the best leader to do the strategy. Suleiman looks to be an interesting one with philosophical and imperialistic, the unit isn't horrible either though a pre gunpowder or something melee upgrade to would be preferred.

[wodan11]

Cyrus is "best" only in terms of getting the most out of your Warlords. When you start thinking of Warlords as a viable and integral part of an overall game strategy, the dynamics change. i.e., as a means not an end.

[Brael]

Ya, I'm seeing that. Anyways I'm going to try a SE+pacifism+GG+phil combo. I'm thinking go for mining/masonry/bw first as Suleiman, build the pyramids, use the free engineer for the wall, get the army built, and then fight while researching towards philosophy to finish the combo off (and potentially pick up a religon to set up a great merchant city... I'm a big fan of NE+Wall Street holy cities)

If nothing else, that style is so different from my usual game that it holds some real appeal. All I can't figure out a plan for ahead of time is my legal and economic civics.

Two early wonders is a pretty tall order though, it seems reliant on stone to even have a shot.

[rah]

Oh, I did a GG game. I turned the difficulty down to emperor so I would have more room to play around with the strategy without being able to completely slack

Now my penis feels small.

[Krill]

What the hell is this crossover metric idea?