Sid games C3C: how to improve our skills

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by vmxa1
What sort of numbers did you encounter?

More than I cared to count. With 26 trebuchets, I was still having several units per turn attack that I didn't have trebuchets to help with for at least four or five turns. And that's not counting the units I killed or injured offensively in my turn (bombarding with trebuchets and following up with MedInfs and knights if I had sufficiently wounded targets), or the Impis that played escort but didn't attack.

[Aeson]

I've played up till 980 AD, pretty much turning the corner on the Zulu campaign. My second AI still hasn't made it to Theology though, and I am on about turn 20 of a 50 turn research pace for Metallurgy. Egypt has just entered the Industrial Era. Japan is flourishing on their new island. Arabia just recently discovered... Writing!

In the Zulu war it quickly became apparent that the AI love to do two things with their free 'defensive' units. Pillage any tiles in the player's territory that it can reach, and garrison cities which are threatened by Armies. I had sent out 2 of my Swiss Merc Armies to pillage the Zulu Iron, and everything else they could. They've been pillaging 2 tiles each every turn, or close to it, and most of the Zulu cities in the S are disconnected from each other now.

The Zulu still have at least 200 Impi running around, and I've been using their tendancies against them. The SM Armies down S keep pulling the stack(s) that way to defend 'threatened' cities, while the main portion of my troops strike N, positioning forces to cut off cities from reinforcement before moving in for the kill. This has worked wonders as I've been able to avoid the vast majority of Zulu defenders while razing 5 of their cities so far. I think I will try to trap their main stack up N before finishing off the last city up there, boxing them in with Armies, so I can avoid fighting them entirely during the conquest.

The Zulu had been kind enough to research Chivalry for me, and so I had upgraded 50+ Knights and shipped them across. I could have basically cleared the N by now, but have been waiting for my Trebs to keep up so losses are minimized.

Leaders have been very scarce for a while (drought coincided with building the Heroic epic..go figure), and it was my 5th turn with Knights (~100 Elite victories) before I was able to build a Knight Army. The Pentagon is up, but I will be able to finish off the Zulu with the 3 unit Armies I have now, so will keep the rest empty and won't add any units to my current Armies. I have 1 3x Knight, 3 3x Swiss Merc, and 4 3x Med Inf Armies. Unit support costs were getting a bit high, so I had cities build Cathedrals instead of units for a while. Now I'm back to building Knights and Trebs most everywhere.

Getting the cash for the Knight upgrades was the main reason why I choose a 50 turn Metallurgy. Another factor was being able to rush Walls, Barracks, Harbors, Settlers, and Temples (keeps the Impi running around pillaging more!) in my cities on the Zulu continent. Also I am going to end up stealing some techs, if only to get Egypt to declare war on me when the time comes, and so need a lot of cash.

Egypt is getting scary. I'm still 3 techs away from being able to reach them, and it seems they must be at the 4 turn tech limit the way they are advancing with no help at all. I have no idea how they avoided the too many units pitfall that all the other AI seem to have fallen into. The other AI are all idiots, far behind in tech even compared to what you'd expect in an Emperor game. I know Egypt isn't bleeding them dry either, as they still don't have contacts even though Egypt has circumnavigated the globe around the N pole.

Egypt will certainly have rails by the time I can land, which may be a major problem. I guess I'll have to land some explorers first and do some pillaging. Will be interesting to see if they will attack Armies with superior units or if they still will avoid attacking in the open. I plan on landing at the bottleneck with an Army, and seeing if they will try to kill it or not while I take out the former Japanese lands.

For now Egypt is supplying me with 3 luxuries at least, and that allows me to run a 10% lux rate.

[nbarclay]

As best I can trace the secrets of Egypt's power are:

- The Pyramids, an early GA, and a larger core area gave them a decisive advantage over Japan in securing sole control of a relatively large land mass. I suspect that Egypt also had better land in general, including a cattle tile by their capital.
- Fighting Japan helped keep their unit count from being a drain on their economy.
- As Egypt's technology advanced, they kept learning how to build new buildings and wonders that diverted some production away from building excess units. Also, Egypt learned how to build more expensive units, which helps keep the unit count down compared with larger numbers of cheaper units.

From what I've seen (mostly on lower levels), the trap that sometimes kills isolated AIs is that when they don't have anything better to build, they build gobs of cheap units. Paying for those units destroys their research capacity, so they have a hard time learning how to build anything other than gobs of cheap units. In this game, Egypt seems to have been the only civ that was able to stay essentially out out of that trap.

[nbarclay]

I hadn't really thought about it, but under the odd conditions of this particular game, the tactics used in fighting the Zulus can have a major impact on the research picture. With my approach of using bombardment and offensive units to destroy Zulu forces as quickly as the Zulus send them (or as close to it as I can manage), I probably have them below their free support threshold by now, or at least not significantly above it. Couple that with the fact that I haven't been engaging in economic warfare against them, and they are probably researching more quickly now than they were before the war in spite of the cities I've captured or razed.

In contrast, a defensive strategy that generally lets the Impis roam free and absorbs attacks against Swiss Mercs would not reduce the Zulu unit count nearly as much, and as cities are razed, the need to support the same free-roaming Impis with fewer cities could make matters worse. Pillaging tiles would only add to the Zulus' financial difficulties.

Normally, playing havoc with a victim's economy is a good thing. But with the Zulus the best assistant for getting techs from the Great Library, it can actually hurt competativeness relative to Egypt. In this game, if the Zulus are destroyed or rendered impotent before they research Education, the situation gets messy. Catching the most advanced other civ up with the Zulus in tech could help, but could also risk creating another threat that would have to be dealt with after Egypt.

[Aeson]

The Hittites (along with the Egyptians of course) were responsible for getting me all but Chivalry. The Zulu are most likely working towards Invention now (they went for Engineering after Chivalry), then will go to Gunpowder. AI's tend to go that way when at war. Hittites have Invention and Gunpowder, missing Chivalry. The Mongols are tied with the Zulu for 3rd place in the tech race.

You're right that they speed up research once you kill off their units though. I don't think the Zulu had had an advance in the 20 turns leading up to the war, and have 2 so far during it. Just it isn't going to help me as they were so far back to begin with.

In any case, I think this game is over at Astronomy if I can get a few more Leaders for empty Armies, Magnetism otherwise. Egypt will have a nice technological advantage, but the way the AI deals with Armies and bombardment dooms it. Once Egypt is out of the way, the other civs are all insignificant.

[nbarclay]

Aeson, are you paying attention to the culture situation in your game? In mine, Egypt is up to 53,563 culture compared with my 14,681. That puts a time limit on how quickly Egypt has to be either conquered or extensively pruned, and the later pruning starts, the more extensive it will have to be. [Edit: This was a crosspost, not a direct response to Aeson's post.]

[Aeson]

Aye, very similar numbers in my game. 53281 to 16465. Culture is the reason I didn't try to keep pace technologically, stay peaceful, and try for a Space win. I am gaining on the Egyptians in per turn Culture now, closing in on half at this point. With the Zulu lands for a bunch and finishing off cultural improvements (getting those Universities especially), I think I can get to 80k+ before the Egyptians hit 160k, but not sure.

I plan on ICS through the Zulu lands for unit support, army support, and mass Temple/Library builds.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Aeson

I plan on ICS through the Zulu lands for unit support, army support, and mass Temple/Library builds.

Mass temple/library builds? At the rate Egypt is growing in culture, the game would be practically over by the time cities on the Zulu continent can build temples without rushing them, and rushing temples/libraries on the kind fo scale needed to make much difference would take massive amounts of gold away from research and/or unit upgrades.

On the other hand, I'd thought about building extra temporary cities on the Zulu continent so I could get extra armies myself, and the unit support aspect (which I hadn't thought of) makes the idea even more attractive (albeit not by a huge amount). Then, when and assuming I switch to Communism, I can shift to a mode with fewer, larger cities.

[nbarclay]

Here's my culture as of AD 990. Very similar to yours indeed.

My Hittites are roughly even with yours in tech; mine have Chivalry but lack Gunpowder, the reverse of yours. My Mongols and Arabs just fought a war that I'm sure brought both their unit counts down, and my Mongols are now ahead of my Hittites with Gunpowder. My Arabs - ironically, the losers of the war - are even farther ahead with Theology, while my Celts still need Currency to get out of the ancient era. My Zulus are still ahead of the other AIs except for Egypt, though.

[nbarclay]

I'm up to 1050 AD and just captured Zimbabwe. That gives me control of both the wonders the Zulus built, since I captured Sun Tsu's shortly before. The Zulu counterattack seems to have finally completely fizzled; I've just been seeing a few new units per turn for the last few turns, which is consistent with Sid-level new production. Impi sightings are extremely rare.

With the Zulu forces depleted, I've regarded it as sufficiently safe to start building camps and am thus far up to five of them (in addition to my permanent cities). I'm bumping my head against an army limit that's currently 13; I have a leader cooling his heels until I have enough cities for a fourteenth. I'm also using three separate offensive bombardment stacks, which, coupled with cavalry, should keep the rest of the war reasonably short. The Zulus now have Music Theory (I suspect purchased from Egypt), so I could get peace in exchange for a worthless tech if I wanted to, but why would I want to?

Nathan

[Aeson]

It's pretty easy to rush an island full of Temples/Libraries. Much cheaper than doing 66% of the map full of Marketplaces/Aquaducts/Hospitals around this same time in the standard milked game type. Limiting factor will be getting the remaining techs I need (up to Astronomy at least), finishing off the Zulu, and placing the cities more than anything else.

I think I have it all timed pretty well, where the Zulu will be extinct about the time I can get to the Egyptians, with the upgrades done and cities placed. Then all my cash can just go to culture to give my armies the time to deal with the Egyptians. Probably not necessary, but I have no idea how long it will take fighting Riflemen or perhaps even Infantry with Cav/SM/Cannon.

Without the culture bomb on my part, it could end up a military 'victory' that would come after Egypt hits 160k. Which obviously is to be avoided at all costs.

[nbarclay]

I'd missed the fact that it's 160,000 culture instead of 100,000 in this game; that's a change in C3C that I hadn't noticed before (and very much a change for the better). That makes a big difference in the risk of losing by culture, and in how quickly a loss by culture could happen.

I'm at 1090 AD and my conquest of Zulu territory is proceeding nicely. With the Zulu reserves depleted, the invasion isn't feeling all that different from what I'm used to on lower difficulty levels. I'm up to fifteen armies (all but two unpopulated because I'm trying to generate elites and leaders), and I just rushed the Military Academy toward the center of the Zulu continent. It's useless for building armies now, but I'm getting all the armies I can support with leaders and it will be a nice place under Communism with the SPHQ located there. I'm up to something in the neighborhood of eighteen cities on the Zulu continent, ten of them camps built purely to boost army and unit support.

I recently sold Chemistry to the Arabs for 45 gold per turn and a little over 50 up front. I'm not entirely thrilled at doing so, but I still have a two-tech branch lead on them to trade if they get Astronomy and I'd just as soon not have them line Egypt's pockets. Speaking of Egypt, they're in Fascism now, so I hate to think how many troops they'll be able to support by the time I land.

[Aeson]

Didn't get much time to play. So only a few turns to report.

Now that I have enough Knights over, I started killing Impi and trying to generate Leaders with them. I set up a trap in the N, luring in a stack of ~200 Impi with an empty city (Amsterdam 2). Screwed up by not sitting a unit on the Jungle, and that's where they all went.

No matter, my stack of Trebs next to the Jungle were pinging down about 30 of them a turn. They were boxed in, but could get out of my territory to heal by moving onto a free Grassland tile. Then my Knights would kill the 3 hp Impi the next turn while my Trebs would ping down another 30 or so.

Now there are about 20 Impi left, and I've taken away their retreat by building a city.

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The Egyptians made contact with the Hittites finally, so I declared war on the Hittites, and signed Egypt up as an ally. No real purpose other than to try and keep Egypt on my side as much as possible, and to divert some Egyptian units, as they had captured a Zulu city with their Cavalry.

I gifted Monotheism (and techs up to it in the case of the Japanese, Celts, and Arabs) to the AI who didn't have it yet. Declared war on the Arabs, and traded Chivalry to the Mongols for an alliance. Also gifted Chemistry to the Mongols, to make sure their next tech would be one I didn't have. They should lose a few units, grab a few more cities, and spark their GA, so hopefully I get to Education by the time the Zulu are finished.

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I've stopped razing Zulu cities, as I have enough units to keep them from flipping, and enough cash to quickly get them down to size 1 by building Settlers and starving them.

[nbarclay]

I'm up to 1190 AD now. The Zulus are down to two cities: their northernmost city and their southernmost city. I just traded Metallurgy to Arabia for Astronomy. So everything's almost ready for me to invade Egypt except for one tiny complication: Egypt just declared war on me!

The turn before I traded for Astronomy, an Egyptian settler escorted by three cavalry landed on the Zulu continent right next to where I had a settler ready to found a city. (I really should have captured the Zulu city I'd just finished attacking instead of razing it, but I had different ideas from Shaka about where I wanted my cities.) I built my city, put one of my 4x Swiss Merc armies in it, and made sure everything else in Egypt's attack range had at least four units in it. Two of the three Egyptian cavalry attacked a nearby captured Zulu city, while the third stayed behind in an absurdly futile effort to protect their settler. (Yes, it's absurdly futile to try to defend a settler when there are several cavalry and a dozen or more cannons in the area. ) Egypt won a battle offensively against a Swiss Merc, but now their cavs are dead and I have two Egyptian slaves. In shield cost, that's almost a ten to one kill ratio in my favor, which I can live with.

Somewhat oddly, Egypt has been showing up as not having Saltpeter the last few turns. That means Egypt won't have as many frigates and privateers to send at me (although I know they do have at least some frigates), and it could be especially nice if it means fewer cavs and more knights when I invade Egypt.

Another interesting thing happened a few turns ago: I actually sold a tech to Egypt! One of the AIs researched Printing Press, and Egypt had never gotten around to researching it. I traded Chemistry to the Hittites for it and then sold it to Egypt for a little over 1100 gold and a world map (which finally let me see what the rest of Egypt's land mass looks like). I was both pleased and a little surprised to find that Egypt hadn't started work on a rail networkyet.

I'm thinking I'll probably ride out this war with Egypt, make peace, and then violate the peace treaty a few turns later with a landing in Egypt. That way I won't have to worry as much about having frigates attack my caravels as I try to land. In the meantime, I wonder whether Cleo is stupid enough to keep throwing settlers and units away if I raze the northernmost Zulu city and leave the land vacant for a while. (Well, vacant other than a couple dozen cannons and some cavalry. )

[nbarclay]

Here's a screenshot.