Sid games C3C: how to improve our skills

[nbarclay]

Aeson, I really wish you'd include dates (at least approximate ones) in your reports. The reports are nice, but it's hard to get a feel for a game without knowing when things are happening.

[nbarclay]

In Egypt's turn in 1395, I discovered a complication: they now have infantry. With Egypt's forces significant'y reduced, I've decided to embark on what I call Operation Razer's Edge, the destruction of all Egyptian cities on the Japanese subcontinent and very possibly beyond. Toward that end, I've broken off all but fifteen of my cannons from my main stack. Depending on how the attack Kyoto goes, I can think about splitting the cannon stack in half (there would still be close to forty in each smaller stack), or I can keep the force concentrated.

By the way, I adopted a naming convention of greek letters for my temporary camp cities on the Zulu continent - and unless I missed a letter or two, I built so many I ran out of letters! And that's just the camps, not including the permanent cities. Scientists, mostly in the Zulu cities but some elsewhere, could have researched Theory of Gravity or Magnetism at about a 25-turn pace with the science slider at zero; as it is, I'm pushing ahead with those techs myself in the hope of extorting industrial techs from Egypt eventually. (Although I didn't think things through all the way when I prioritized Magnetism over ToG, so I've slowed things down a bit until my caravels carrying some additional cannons reach Egypt; when the Great Lighthouse expires, my transport ships won't be able to move as quickly.)

I've decided to see if I can take Egypt without resorting to taking advantage of armies' ability to pillage with impunity. I don't mind taking some advantage of AI stupidity (and I'll certainly take full advantage of their reluctance to go after attack forces with armies in them), but I'll get more satisfaction out of the victory if I engage in something at least halfway resembling a fair fight.

Here's a picture of the Zulu continent with its camps and its wall of units.

[vmxa1]

I don't have it in front of me, but there is an auto bombardment key. The units will bombard the selected tile each turn.

[nbarclay]

So much for that idea. There were somewhere in the neighborhood of ten infantry in Kyoto, at least. I'll have to wear down Egypt's forces - if I can - before I can go on the offensive.

[vmxa1]

What are they doing research wise? After they come out of anarchy (short for AI in Sid), do they have a long way to go to modern age? They have to at least do all their own research.

Things get very ugly now with island maps. You have to move massive numbers and invade. Having infantry will be a big problem. The AI is at least willing to attack with them at times.

Can you pillage all the tiles with a few stacks and armies? Trying to get them to draw down the cites reserves and pop?

[lmtoops]

I've never been able to figure out the Auto-Bombard feature. I select the tile, point at the target, and I bombard the tile. The next turn, there is no auto-bombard....Beats Me

[Aeson]

Sorry for no dates, but I post details from memory most of the time and don't pay much attention to date in general in my games. My timeline is pretty close to yours in this game (to be expected given the nature of the starting continent), just technologically a bit slower.

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The pillaging from Armies isn't a big deal IMO. That the AI won't target a full health Army in the field is the problem, and would allow you to do the pillaging with regular units in complete safety anyways. It also makes for no risk bombardment stacks and not having to fight your way to the next target.

Egypt could have killed off my landing very easily I think, first turn. But since they won't target Armies the game is basically over. That's the real problem with Armies. To try to play without them on Sid would make the game close to impossible to win*. But, if you can survive until you have them, even on Sid, you have won**. You can limit how much of Army's capabilities you want to use, but it's in the hand of the player how close they want the victory to be.

*Standard victory conditions enabled, on maps where strong Sid AI can develop.
**In any 1 vs 1 scenario. You can still lose due to time and multiple opponents of course.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by vmxa1
What are they doing research wise? After they come out of anarchy (short for AI in Sid), do they have a long way to go to modern age? They have to at least do all their own research.

My guess is that they aren't much if any beyond Industrialization and Replaceable Parts, but it's hard to be sure. The real problem is that unless I break down and do massive pillaging with armies, the difference between infantry and riflemen is probably going to mean I'll need a lot more cannons - even beyond the hundred or so I already have - before I can mount an effective offensive. (Or else wait for Egypt to wear itself down to where they don't leave so many units in each city.) That's going to take some time, during which Egypt will keep progressing - and while they'll be slowed down by Fascism, unit support costs won't get in their way at all. Worse, if they bother to land an infantry invasion force on my home continent, I have nothing there that can do a decent job against it and will likely - barring very good luck with my cavalry - have to make peace.

[nbarclay]

To me, what makes an exploit an exploit is that it takes advantage of things the game's designers never thought of and therefore never had an opportunity to deal with adequately. Several of the features originally included in Civ 3 had to be seriously toned down or eliminated because while they made sense when used the ways the designers expected them to be used, they could be taken advantage of in ways that provided rather absurd advantages. (One of the more memorable such exploits that I recall was the ability to renegotiate a peace treaty and get towns every twenty turns without firing a shot back in the original Civ 3.)

I do not veiw taking advantage of the power of bombardment units as an exploit because after four generations of previous Civ games (if you count the two CTP games, which Firaxis certainly should have tried to learn from), it's hard to see how Firaxis could possibly have missed the idea of players' building and using massive bombardment stacks. Firaxis had every opportunity to factor the possibility into their design decisions both regarding game balance and regarding AI tactics.

Similarly, Firaxis certainly put some thought into decisons regarding when AIs should attack approaching enemy units and when AIs should wait for the approaching units to attack them. Their decisions might not be the best, but it's hard to see how a competent game designer could include armies in a game and not factor in the possibility that they might be accompanying assault stacks - including stacks with bombardment units. If the AIs are not particularly smart in that regard, it is not because Firaxis lacked opportunity to make them smarter.

In contrast, the idea of using armies to devastate a civ's entire economy without ever attacking or being attacked is completely out in left field compared both with how wars are fought in the real world and (to the best of my knowledge and understanding) with how they are normally fought in Civ. My guess is that the reason why AIs are completely incompetent at dealing with the tactic is that it never occurred to Firaxis that players might use it. In which case, considering the tactic's power, it would fall squrely within my concept of what constitutes an exploit. (Of course using exploits and borderline exploits on Sid level is a lot more understandable than it is on lower levels. )

Nathan

[vmxa1]

I have no problem with you concept and I don't use that tactic, because I want to retain the improvement.

I will do it when it is the best/only way to accomplish my goals. I figure that since they had barbs pillage land, they surely are aware of the idea.

It is not that they don't expect pillaging, it is that they continue to determine that the army/stack is too strong to attack. This is where they break down on other fronts as well. You do not have to have an army to get the same result, it just speeds up the process.

If you have a large enough stack in relation to their units types, they will not attack them, even if they contain no army or bombardment units.

[sabrewolf]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Please ignore the following post, if you already know where and how to use the editor. This was for someone that asked

i see the alcohol 120% icon in the system tray

[ErikM]

Originally posted by nbarclay
In contrast, the idea of using armies to devastate a civ's entire economy without ever attacking or being attacked is completely out in left field compared both with how wars are fought in the real world and (to the best of my knowledge and understanding) with how they are normally fought in Civ. My guess is that the reason why AIs are completely incompetent at dealing with the tactic is that it never occurred to Firaxis that players might use it. In which case, considering the tactic's power, it would fall squrely within my concept of what constitutes an exploit. (Of course using exploits and borderline exploits on Sid level is a lot more understandable than it is on lower levels. )

Pillaging or not pillaging is entirely optional. With C3C resource model it is often enough to pillage a couple of resource squares to completely neuter an AI.

The big problem is that
(i) AI does not make armies - and I certainly remember AI armies in vanilla Civ, so this is a brand new screwup;
(ii) AI never attacks green armies in the field which basically makes you invulnerable once you have two or three of them and allows a human player to run circles around AI. This I think is an old problem but it is accenuated in C3C since armies are a much greater threat.

Just as Aeson pointed out, 10 armies or so essentially guarantee an eventual victory.

Wheteher it is an exploit or not - if we write off using armies as an exploit, what would be the "strategy" element of the game that is left? We all know what to research and what to build (or rather not build . There is only so much you can do with better terraforming and a lot of its benefits are eaten away by higher corruption,. So it is pointless to try to outproduce/outresearch a decent AI. So using armies intelligently is pretty much the only strategic option available to a human player.

Imo, if you eliminate each and every thing that a human player uses intelligently and AI does not then what is left is just a simulator, not a strategy game.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by sabrewolf


i see the alcohol 120% icon in the system tray

As they say in MM6 at the guild "won't leave home with out"

[Mountain Sage]

You know what? This time I outdid myself.
I loaded down the 1.22 patch and now I can't access to any of my files any more

Sometimes I wonder why I bought a computer.

Ah well, moving right along... to my next Sid game.

[Drachen]

Originally posted by Mountain Sage
You know what? This time I outdid myself.
I loaded down the 1.22 patch and now I can't access to any of my files any more

Sometimes I wonder why I bought a computer.

Ah well, moving right along... to my next Sid game.

You can uninstall the patch and play your saves if you feel like it, but please let us know what you think of 1.22 on Sid if you stick with it.