Sid games C3C: how to improve our skills

[vmxa1]

The AI will not attack armies in the field if they are at full or nearly full health.

Once you take or build a city they will come and not care about armies. This is where you have to sweat.

I figured you may have wanted the infantry, but I would have prefered to have the factories first. You could use any unit for defense with th elimited numbers of units you would have to defend against. Just make more of them.

A 50% boost in shields is not to be ignored.

[Drachen]

I've taken my Viking game and played it out for awhile with the intention of taking out France in the modern age so as to test the effects of bombers etc at Sid. Trouble is she's got tactical nukes and I'm not familiar with how the AI uses them. My beachhead is one square from Paris so I’m guessing she won’t use them there but I could use some advice as to using feints etc to draw nuke attacks and deplete her arsenal. Any advice would be appreciated.

It looks to be an interesting battle. I’m the only one with modern amour and am just starting to build a fleet of stealth bombers to take out her rails and infrastructure as my opening move but she has about 900 mechanized infantry and an extensive air force as well. My beachhead will be a metropolis with civil defense built on grassland at battles opening. I’m betting she won’t attack as I have about twenty armies and a boatload of other units defending.

Wish me luck

[vmxa1]

I have only limited exposure to nukes at any level. The last time I faced them was at Sid, but they were not used.

I had them and nuke subs as deterent and in case they were to start building the last part.

They cannot move the one type (ICBM?), so use a spy to see where they are located. If they are all in one or two cities, try to take them down.

The other form (tactical?) can be moved.

[vmxa1]

The air part, I would say get as many AA units as you can and a SAM. Have fighters as well. Send AA units with your stack. Locate cities that house lots of planes and attack it.

When you are dealing with large numbers of troops the air power is not so big of a concern, except for any city you are using.

I mean having 30 bombers hit your stack is not as important when your stack is 300 or more. It is when you are dealing with tens or scores, that bombers are more painful.

They are also painful on beachead cities that are just starting as they can bust you barracks and temple.

[Drachen]

Originally posted by vmxa1
I have only limited exposure to nukes at any level. The last time I faced them was at Sid, but they were not used.
I had them and nuke subs as deterent and in case they were to start building the last part.
They cannot move the one type (ICBM?), so use a spy to see where they are located. If they are all in one or two cities, try to take them down.
The other form (tactical?) can be moved.

Yeah…I’ve no experience with nukes to speak of since I’m usually so far ahead at lower levels that it’s a non-issue. My plan was to win this game via diplomacy, which I did, and after restarting it in 1806 without saying yes to the UN vote I’m facing an opponent that’s much stronger than I usually face. A perfect test for advanced invasions actually. France is in Democracy and so I think I’ll make her declare. I just signed a MMP with number three and as soon as war breaks out I’ll bring the pipsqueaks on board as a distraction and possible resource denial. My initial turn will probably be a pain as I’ve enough units in my beachhead that you can’t get to the wake all command. Civ IV really has to address the troop interface problem. Well…I’ve got 10 stealth bombers, a dozen more due very quickly, and 80 artillery to cut the roads into my beachhead and I think it’s time to rock and roll.

[homeyg]

Hi! I was flipping though some of the pages of this thread and the Emperor level one and I'm still having trouble understanding what these two threads are all about. If someone could fill me in, that would be great. Thanks in advance!

[vmxa1]

Drachen I think they at least need to move the zoom to city and wake to the top. It can be a pain in these types of games.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by homeyg
Hi! I was flipping though some of the pages of this thread and the Emperor level one and I'm still having trouble understanding what these two threads are all about. If someone could fill me in, that would be great. Thanks in advance!

Hello, mainly it is a place for people to exchange ideas and experiences at Sid. A few of us had taken the plunge and were struggling. We all finally managed to find a few ways to win. but still bat around different tactics.

Some of the emperor threads are sort of the same thing, but for that level. One or two were intend to be road maps to one players style at that level.

So in short, people often put up their game and ask for input. Some will start their own thread.

At least that is my perspective.

[Drachen]

Here is a brief overview of the modern age invasion of France at Sid level. Preparations began in 1806 and the war started in 1918. A brief early war ended when I founded my beachhead town, Hammer, 1 square from Paris and made Joan pay me for peace. I ferried units into Hammer and disbanded older armies and units to rush barracks, walls, library, harbor, aqueduct, civil defense, airport, and hospital. After the airport was built I was able quickly reinforce Hammer from all over my empire and drop workers to first improve tiles and then join the city creating a metropolis for the added defensive bonus. I was unable to get Joan to declare on me and so I declared on her and quickly developed a worldwide coalition excepting the tiny unaligned Arab nation who demanded 4 techs, 4 luxuries, 4000 gold and 900 GPT for the support their pikes would provide. I declined.

I opened up by destroying all access roads which would allow units outside of Paris to counter attack on the first turn. Joan rushed in massive ground reinforcements which were mostly mechanized infantry (MI), dropped from 845 to 807 MI, lost two tanks, launched no nukes, and did not attack my well defended airspace with her 17 bombers. I lost no units and this is how it looked when 1920 dawned…

[Drachen]

Joan had 9 points of attack and all of them had massive numbers of mostly modern units. Some of the stacks were too large to allow me to scroll through the entire screen and so no accurate account of her force is easy to discern. She apparently drafted a number of citizens and switched to Fascism. From 1918 to 1922 her TOW count jumped from 33 to 280 so I assume that’s the units that were created and that may be due to resource denial as I was bombing her strategic resources with my stealth bombers. I decided not to attack her on my turn hoping to take advantage of the defensive bonuses when she attacked and hoping that she would attack with more units if they were healthy. None of the stacks were small enough for me to redline and eliminate anyway. In her attack Joan dropped from 807 to 632 MI, 59 to 12 tanks, 17 to 14 bombers, used 3 cruise missiles, and used no nukes. I did not lose any units in the attack with the bulk of my defense being provided by 15 armies being, 2 MA, 5MI, 4 Tank, 3 Infantry, and 1 Cavalry. Most of these were redlined and a few of my many MI units were involved after that.

By 1936 Joan’s MI count was in the 500’s with significant losses in other areas as well. These losses were mostly due to my redlining and eliminating smaller stacks milling around Hammer since Joan quit attacking after the debacle of 1920. My overall troop numbers were increasing. In the end I was reduced to surrounding Paris with armies to prevent reinforcement and attempting to wear her down with MA and armies. This was time consuming and costly but seemed to be my only option since 100 bombardments per turn were failing to present a Parisian defender at less than full health after the barrage. The game ended abruptly as Paris reached 20,000 culture. This seemed like a good time to end the experiment since I had already won the game in 1806 and the questions I had about modern invasions at Sid were pretty well answered. My conclusion is that the only thing scary about a modern age war at Sid is the C3C troop interface. At war’s start I had a few hundred units in Hammer to try to assure victory and as a result I could not scroll down to the “wake all” button. This made the experience excruciatingly slow and cumbersome and I often attacked with MI rather than MA because I couldn’t scroll down far enough to wake an MA. (Please fix this in Civ IV!) Invasions of advanced AIs at Sid are slow going but doable and I’m pretty sure that at some point I would have depleted Joan’s ability to resist and France would have collapsed very quickly after that. In future games I’ll follow whichever path to victory seems easiest and not worry about an adverse outcome from an invasion.

[vmxa1]

I forget the number, but it is around 121 or 141. After that you can't scroll down.

I am surprsied that France had so small an army and failed to attack in force. Some times the top civ has many hndreds fewer units than the #2 or #3.

I remember China had about 800-900, while #3 (US) had more than 1200.

What are the numbers in your stacks? Did they contain armies?
Did they not bombard at all? How was the make up of AA units? How many in each stack? Was it just the number of fighters in Hammer that held them in check?

[Drachen]

Originally posted by vmxa1
I forget the number, but it is around 121 or 141. After that you can't scroll down.

I am surprsied that France had so small an army and failed to attack in force. Some times the top civ has many hndreds fewer units than the #2 or #3.

I remember China had about 800-900, while #3 (US) had more than 1200.

What are the numbers in your stacks? Did they contain armies?
Did they not bombard at all? How was the make up of AA units? How many in each stack? Was it just the number of fighters in Hammer that held them in check?

You’re right Vmxa1. France had a lot more units than I mentioned but I thought musketeers, rifles, and the like weren’t worth reporting. It may not be clear from the picture but those 8 stacks are all French. My entire defense of Hammer is fortified inside the city. This included a handful of SAMs and perhaps 10 regular jets set to control the sky to deter air strikes. The stack of ships just outside the city has 7 carriers with defending jets as well. The bulk of my tactical nukes were in subs in that stack also and I was worried that a French nuclear strike could take them out but since little info was available on AI nuke use I gambled that Joan wouldn’t nuke so close to Paris. As far as bombardment goes, I had the game settings set to not show unit moves or animate battles so the only thing I can point to is the low level of French bomber losses means there wasn’t much of an air attack. I couldn’t see any French arty employed but the game passes by pretty quick with those settings so I’m just not sure if she used an arty barrage but I tend to doubt it. As far as the AI not attacking with much I kind of think losing a couple of hundred units in an attack is not insignificant. It seems to me that the AI has some method of deciding when it has had enough and stops attacking. I even tried exposing a stack of about a hundred MI with no army cover but Joan wouldn’t take the bait. It’s a drag really as that means you need to go on the offensive with its concomitant increases in losses.

[vmxa1]

Sorry I got confused and was thinking the pink were yours, dah.

If they had used nukes and then sent all they could on the first turn, they could have made you suffer. But that is not how they work. Especilly from where they sat, they were going to win in a few turns.

I can't remember the AI using arties on offense, only defense.

[Drachen]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Sorry I got confused and was thinking the pink were yours, dah.

If they had used nukes and then sent all they could on the first turn, they could have made you suffer. But that is not how they work. Especilly from where they sat, they were going to win in a few turns.

I can't remember the AI using arties on offense, only defense.

I don't know if the approaching cultural win caused them sit back a bit or not but I tend to doubt it. The response pattern was very similar to that of the Aztecs earlier in the game. As far as the nukes and all out attack go lets face it...if the AI ever learns how to fight then Civ is gonna get a lot tougher.

[Mountain Sage]

Wow Drachen!
You took time to build your defences.
How come that Hammer did not flip as you could add only 1 building each turn? How quick did you ferry in your troops?
I know by experience that often troops alone are not enough to prevent a flip.