Sid games C3C: how to improve our skills

[Krill]

And how did you REX so fast? I can do something similar with the Maya, but with the industrious trait, the workers slow down how fast I can set up a pump.

[nbarclay]

In my report of my early game, I provided a lot of detail about my opening moves that set up my REX. If you want to, you can try following the same pattern and see what it lets you do. The main keys were four early settler/worker pumps and no units other than setters and workers for a very, very long time.

In C3C, you don't get barbs from huts if the hut pops in the process of founding a city. I took advantage of that with some huts, and left other huts alone, so I had little trouble with needing to kill barbs. My lack of military cost me a bit of trouble when my capital expanded the second time, but by then, I was far enough along that it wasn't a big deal.

[Krill]

Your reports were excellent in detail, It's just that when I follow what you have written, I MMM (Mis-Micro-Manage). I can see the first two settlr pumps, and the two worker pumps, So it is just be playing Silly Buggers with myself, I think.

Bravo, though. Hope you beat The Almighty Sid

[vmxa1]

TT I would be surprise if they were over taxed as the free support is huge.

Extra free support 24
Bonus for each city 8

Plus the production bonus, I would think that is not an issue. Any change they were killed? Moved back under fog?

[ToeTruck]

That much! Wow; I didn't realize the support bonuses were that high. The Zulu have several dozen cities so they would have to have a whole ton of units...but since they don't have any Iron and have not yet discovered Invention, all their units are really, really cheap. So maybe...

I'll look for a save that illustrates this phenomenom. I have seen it three times now. The Zulu land an Impi on my continent (which has no fog) and then the units disappear by my turn to play.

In a similar (but explainable case), two units landed - I killed one and the other retreated to a Mountain from where it might have jumped onto a ship the next turn.

I'll keep a look out. Thanks.

- TT

[ErikM]

It could be that max # of units limit was exceeded.
On Sid, AIs that are left to their own devices would easily have 200-400 units per civ by Middle Ages. On a large map, probably more. It does not take too many civ to get dangerously close to the limit.

[Aeson]

Originally posted by nbarclay
If anyone wants to suggest any ideas on the matter, I'd love to hear them. You should be able to see where I've jumped my palace to on one of the screenshots. Also, discussion of whether I might have been better off with some other palace location once the FP is factored in would be useful for future consideration.

I'm of the opinion you should build the FP towards the edge of your Palace core, towards the majority of your cities, ASAP (1.15b and later). The main thing is to get the OCN boost from it as soon as possible.

The Palace and FP both reduce distance corruption, but only the Palace figures into OCN numbering of cities. What this means is that you will have a low OCN core around the Palace, and then can reduce distance corruption with the FP in a decent area that isn't too low OCN, but further away from the Palace. Because the OCN on Sid is so low, as long as your FP is centered in a decent area you're going to be reducing distance corruption as well as can be expected for the cities which are going to 'count'.

I don't think you shoot for 2 cores anymore. Replace the dumbbell with more of an egg shape... and make sure not to be building too many cities 'outside' the egg on the Palace side that will be stealing ocn's from cities closer to the FP than the 'outside' is from the Palace.

I've played this game out to 10BC, and my FP (1 of your Arnhem) has been giving me +20-40 commerce and production since 330BC. It's also kept me from ever having to bump over 40% luxury rate except for one turn early on (no Lighthouse, so no luxury trades yet either). I really wish I had prebuilt for it, could have had it up at least 12 turns sooner, but wasn't thinking ahead.

I'm not sure there's a good move for the palace given my FP placement. Maybe if I had built the FP a little more NW, eventually a move of the Palace down near your Delft would have payed off.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by ErikM
It could be that max # of units limit was exceeded.
On Sid, AIs that are left to their own devices would easily have 200-400 units per civ by Middle Ages. On a large map, probably more. It does not take too many civ to get dangerously close to the limit.

Probably not the case. The new limit is 8192 IIRC. This will not be reached that early with only about 12 civs in the game. That could be an issue later though.

[vmxa1]

Anyway I don't think that would lead to unit being disband, only not completed. TT would not be able to make units either if the max had been reached.

[Aeson]

In my game the Zulu have 19 cities... so 176 free units... It's pretty easy for a Sid AI to double or even triple that number of units. I would guess that it is support costs that are causing the units to poof. On these types of settings the AI often will cannibalize their economy with insane numbers of units.

It's part of the reason why Bamspeedy's "beyond Sid" game barely made it to the Industrial Era, even though he was pushing the 2050 AD limit.

[lmtoops]

The disappearing Impi happened to me with a Zulu archer. The first time a played the game, a Zulu archer landed and the nearest city was not protected, so I was toast. Amazingly, just like TT, the archer disappeared. I figured he could not support the archer, but that was only a guess. So this was not just a TT dream.

[lmtoops]

As for super REXing, like nbarclay, it is not that difficult. One my first game, I did a very poor job of REXing. I worried too much about protecting my cities. When I saw nbarclay's pictures, I decided to try again.

The second game, I build 4 settler pumps and kept my citizens happy by making them work. I did not micro-manage that much, but I still did much much better.

In most games, so many settler pumps may not be available. None the less, I will be using this in my latest PBEM game.

[Aeson]

I saw the spoiler for sedentary barbs before starting, so I decided to go for a no military (or close to it) REX. Moved the Settler 1. First build was a Worker, then Granary. After that Settlers and Workers. First city was 77, Granary and then Workers until it had enough terrain improvements and borders expanded (through building coastal cities) to start on Settlers. Same deal with the 3rd, 4th, and 5th cities founded to the E along the river.

Using 5 Worker/Settler pumps, along with 10 turn Workers from every corrupt city, I was able to REX the entire continent very quickly, and probably didn't even need the blockade to beat the Zulu to any of the city sites. The blockade did allow me to Settle 3 Island cities though.

I got a bit carried away with expansion and forgot to set up the Great Library prebuild as soon as I should. Ended up finishing the GL in 775BC (Maastricht), which really shouldn't ever work. No Alphabet civs and little contact between the AI helps out a lot. FP was built in Groningen in 330BC.

Sent out about 10 Curraghs exploring early. Lost 2 of my first 3 to misclicks before even scouting out the starting continent. Found the Zulu early and 3 curraghs were able to just barely block off the crossing. 1 Zulu Galley made it to the first island, but turned back when I blocked off his 3rd move option, and the next turn the blockade was in place.

Then the suicide Curraghs/Galleys. Seafaring sure is nice, and I was able to meet all of the civs with only losing 3 more Curraghs to the sea. Even got a Settler across to the middle island, though the Hittites had built the Lighthouse and were settling it like mad.

I decided to try to 'relocate' the Japanese to that island, and gifted them the city I founded there. Then I declared war on them, and signed Egypt up in a Military Alliance. I made a pretty dumb mistake here, using Literature to make the deal, and linking in 43gpt from Egypt. Should have first made the MA by offering gpt to Egypt, then got it back in a seperate deal for Literature. As it was, Egypt made peace with Japan in about 10 turns, having taken 1 little city, and I only got about half the cash from them I should have. My attempts to relocate the Japanese have thus far failed completely, but I think it's still a good idea eventually. I don't want to see the Hittites get any bigger, and Egypt can't look much tougher even with the Japanese lands.

I've just been coasting along at 40% Lux, 60% tax, building up my empire. Have just made it into the Middle Ages, Egypt is about 3 techs ahead (they just started Sistene and have Feudalism), but I will be getting the Republic next turn. Not sure if I want to be a Republic for most of the game, Monarchy tends to be better on Sid, but will switch to it at least for a while if I don't get Monarchy before my Anarchy is up. Getting sick of Despotism and have 5106g saved up so I can rush some badly needed Courthouses in fringe areas.

Now my goal is to settle the newly discovered island(s) to the far W, and I am setting up a SOS (stack of sinking) Galleys to try to get as many Settlers over there as I can. The Hittites can safely reach the island(s), but probably will take a while to do so. AI's tend to miss those narrow sea lanes. Other plan is to build up an invasion force (Spears, Horses, Cats, and upgrade) to hit the Zulu with once all the Marketplaces and Courthouses are finished.

Catching up to everyone but the Egyptians in culture, will be passing Japan, Celts, and Arabia in per turn culture soon. Still far behind in overall culture though. First in population with 24%, and close in territory at 13%. As for demographics, I'm second to Egypt in all the important categories. They just triggered their GA. Better now than later I suppose.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Aeson
In my game the Zulu have 19 cities... so 176 free units... It's pretty easy for a Sid AI to double or even triple that number of units. I would guess that it is support costs that are causing the units to poof. On these types of settings the AI often will cannibalize their economy with insane numbers of units.

Not sure how you come up with 176, but I am dubious. Here is a snap from one Sid gane where I attacked Germany with 7 cities. In the end I kiledl about 800 units on that little island. It is all posted on C3C Sid thread.

"Still you have to be amazed at the number of units they can muster. I killed at least 30-40 to get the city.
They countered with 46 and then I killed 26 more on my turn.
They had 126 in sight after that. so that is over 200.

They attacked and I killed 64 more, losing only 8. I figured that puts it at about 170 or so dead for them.
They attack and I kill 33 with no loss. It never got past the three armies.

Next turn more of the same 39-0. They now have 132 in front of me. About 240 dead and 132 in view. I am only talking about the the ones near me. Who knows what else they have.

Aztec landed a few units. Funny, I bet they have 300-600, but sent a handful.

How they could even build that many, even with the big discount and all the free unit support. I see only 4 cities and maybe they have 4 more I have not seen.

If they even sent the whole 132, I would probably be toast."


AFAIK they get 24 extra free support for each city and 8 bonus support. So that would be over 600 for 19 cities. Then they would have to pay maint and they get a huge production boost and could probably pay for another large group.

Anyway all I can tell you is I have dropped down on a number of AI cities at Sid and had to beat 60 or more units in that city and counter attacked by at least another hundred more the next turn.

[nbarclay]

I'm up to 260 AD, in Republic now. I've decided to go for something that may or may not be a bit crazy: Leonardo's Workshop. With Egypt so far ahead of the Zulus (and everyone else behind them), the only way a wonder cascade has much chance of getting in the way is if Egypt picked a really horrible place to build Sun Tsu's. (They've already finished Sistine.) And with no one having Engineering yet, a prebuild should give me a huge head start.

The down side is that I could end up with a major loss of gold researching things myself that I could have gotten from the Great Library. On the other hand, Egypt already went for Education and beyond without getting Engineering first, and if the Zulus would follow suit, I could be stuck researching the bottom of the tech tree myself and not have Leo's either.

I'm currently leaning in the direction of doing a massive cavalry upgrade (assuming I can get Leo's), allying with either the Arabs or the Mongols against the other, and letting the AIs wear each other down for a while before I start doing serious fighting myself. (I just hope I don't have too hard a time getting saltpeter.) If all goes well, I could then backstab the other civ once the alliance is over and gain control of that continent without the pain that is involved in invading a healthy AI. If anyone has any thoughts regarding that idea, either pro or con, I'd be interested to hear them.

Nathan