Issues from the Regent Difficulty (Using the Sid-Level Strategy)

[maxcavsm]

Just started playing this game while I'm winning money playing online Texas Hold'em. It's a lovely combo that will never have me 1) playing regular online games again and 2) may never have to get a real job again. Fallen head over heels for turn based gameplay; it's a great distraction while waiting on good hands to play. Can't wait for Civ IV.

Anyway, a few threads down, there's a builder strategy for the Sid level that I decided to try out for the lesser Regent level. I've managed to stave off a majority of the crap from the 16 other rampaging computer players, but I've noticed a few things:

1) They never have ANY money. Ever. I can't sell my tech to anyone for GPT ever. I put 1 gpt in there, and my advisor gets his unhappy fact out, saying they'll never go for it. I end up selling my tech for 10-20 gold. While that's not bad across 10 civs, it's not really the whomping gold that the strat provides. I'm sure they're not making as much as they would be on Sid-level, but everyone always has 0-20 gold.

2) Diplomacy. Forget it. My army of Cavalry blazing across the Japanese landscape, and even after taking his capital, Tokugawa is still not surrendering. That goes for most of the civs. I end up having to take a few towns, and then pleading with THEM for a peace agreement, usually losing something in the process!

3) After the peace is in place, I can't extort anything worth a crap. They laugh at me when I ask for ANYTHING other than MAYBE a few gold coins. I'm in the industrial age and I'm asking for Music Theory, and getting laughed at. And asking for cities? Hah.

4) I think that I'm leading the tech race with my Sumerians, as I'm rarely asking anyone for any tech above mine anymore (thank GOD). How much tech are you supposed to gift out, and how much are you supposed to keep? My neighbors, the Mayans, are high ranking on the leaderboard, so I'm not sure if handing them anything outside of a territory map or a luxury trade or two is a good idea (other than keeping them happy). Yet I keep getting the one sided trade panel from them, asking for a generous donation of Industrialization.

5) Speaking of my pain-in-the-ass neighbors, having granted ROPs for almost everyone, I've got 20-30 enemy units rampaging across my territory going to war with each other (AI set to most agressive). If I decide to go to war with my Mayan neighbors, and they have a ROP/Alliance with other nations against another civilization, will they're units they have in my territory (including allies), become hostile? Or does that need a Mutual Agression Pact (or whatever its called)? Being a builder culture, I don't want to cause 3-4 civs to come after me all at once, but the Mayans could certainly use a Cavalry charge at their capital to get them off of the extortion kick.

6) Never having had an instruction book, can someone give me the idea behind the embassy and espionage? Is it worth doing? Why can't I see anything going on in the capital city one turns after my embassy is established? "Investigate city?"

I'm sure that I'll have more questions, as I've never been past the Industrial age; usually I'm either getting beaten badly or have such a commanding lead over everyone, that I want to start again. A big part of this game seems to be the fun of Ancient Age land rush and establishment, but I think I'm going to take this one to the bitter end here. I'm only about the middle of the leaderboard (not sure how that's possible, but there you go) so I'm far from total victory.

Any help anyone could give would be appreciated. Thx.

[vmxa1]

Re: Issues from the Regent Difficulty (Using the Sid-Level Strategy)

If they have been on a war footing they are spending all they have for support and research. Only the top dog is going to have money and probably no tmuch either.

Yes they often are slow to talk peace.

Demands are hard to accomplish after the early part of the game.
You have a bad rep so they will not want gpt deals.

Techs that offer units/wonders or governments are highly regarded and not traded easily.

Cities are only given as part of peace.

[vmxa1]

Re: Issues from the Regent Difficulty (Using the Sid-Level Strategy)

Originally posted by maxcavsm

4) I think that I'm leading the tech race with my Sumerians, as I'm rarely asking anyone for any tech above mine anymore (thank GOD). How much tech are you supposed to gift out, and how much are you supposed to keep? My neighbors, the Mayans, are high ranking on the leaderboard, so I'm not sure if handing them anything outside of a territory map or a luxury trade or two is a good idea (other than keeping them happy). Yet I keep getting the one sided trade panel from them, asking for a generous donation of Industrialization.

5) Speaking of my pain-in-the-ass neighbors, having granted ROPs for almost everyone, I've got 20-30 enemy units rampaging across my territory going to war with each other (AI set to most agressive). If I decide to go to war with my Mayan neighbors, and they have a ROP/Alliance with other nations against another civilization, will they're units they have in my territory (including allies), become hostile? Or does that need a Mutual Agression Pact (or whatever its called)? Being a builder culture, I don't want to cause 3-4 civs to come after me all at once, but the Mayans could certainly use a Cavalry charge at their capital to get them off of the extortion kick.

4- well no rules on what or when to gift anyone. I would only gift techs to someone that was way out of it normally. YOu may want to gift them ino the next age if scientific to see if they get a free tech that you can trade for.

Maps are almost sanrosac. I would only give them out if I had no open area and they had probably seen most of it anyway. Later when all the land is known to someone, I may give a map.

5- I am not a fan of RoP. I just rarely give them. If I was in your spot I would cancel them as soon as I could (20 turns). They will often feel an empty city is an invitation, especially if you are not rated as strong to them.

Understand you may be strong, but not rated strong. The do not grasp the idea that fast movers or armies beat slow movers.

If you have 3 civ with RoP's to you and units in your land and declare on one, the others will take no action. Well they will be forced to devlare war, if they have an MPP with that civ and you kill one of the civs units outside of your land, for sure if it is that civs land (not sure about neutral land).

If you are in that spot, try to force them to attack one of your units after you get an MPP with the third party. This will trigger thier MPP with you.

If you go at their capitol with calvs and they already have rifle or better, it could get rough. The defense will make calvs a tough sled. If they have infantry do not do it without massive bombarments.

[vmxa1]

Re: Issues from the Regent Difficulty (Using the Sid-Level Strategy)

Originally posted by maxcavsm

6) Never having had an instruction book, can someone give me the idea behind the embassy and espionage? Is it worth doing? Why can't I see anything going on in the capital city one turns after my embassy is established? "Investigate city?"

Embassies are required to do a number of things, such as be notified if they take some actions. To better relations, to use diplomats to steal techs.

Espionage is used for spy missions. Steal tech, plans, invtigate cities and propaganda and so on. A spy allows you to know what the military is composed of, but not where it is dispositioned.

You have to have Intel Agency build and then plant a spy.

You get a peek at the capitol one the turn you create the embassy, but never again without a spy. Sometimes I will hold off on making an embassy until I wan a peek at the wonder progress.

Investigate city cost gold andneeds a spy. It gives you the same look as you got from the embassy. Very useful for a city you are planning to invade.

[maxcavsm]

Good info guys. Thx a bunch. Guess I have to try again and work on my ratings with my neighbors to accomplish better diplomacy, because it sure as hell isn't happening right now.

[Egbert]

The AI has far less money at Regent level than at Sid.

You just can't get those mind boggling gpt deals from the AI at the lower levels.

BTW If you make demands they have to be very scared of you before they will give you anything good. You need to be very strong to demand Music Theory with its wonder to be built.

[maxcavsm]

Okay, moving right along, new questions.

1) Catherine the Great's empire wasn't doing so hot. I left her alone for awhile, thinking she was out of the fight. Then one turn as a joke, I decide to see if I can sell some tech to her. Turns out she's sitting on 10K gold and willing to trade me 700 gpt for flight? Meanwhile, the rest of the world can't put together 100 gold at any one time. This influx of cash was what really put me over the top, but I'm just curious...where in the hell did she get it from?

2)The Manhattan Project. Good idea or bad idea? I can't see having the tech around, as then everyone can research nukes, and my hostile neighbors would be sending nukes my way (I assume). I don't need to give them any help, so I've been holding off on it as long as possible.

3)The Mayans. They had an astounding lead over me (by about 700 points), so over the last two days, I built up my tanks and mech armies and stomped him into the ground. Yet, even standing on the burning remains of Chicken Itza and having decimated his army and holdings to a half of what he had before (and that's saying a lot), he STILL wouldn't give in to my demands for a surrender. What in the hell do I have to do to these people to force THEM to concede defeat and give me something for my troubles??

I've got this game under control now, as I'll probably be doing the Space Shuttle. I just can't beat the Mayans without razing and burning every piece of ground they occupy with the score they have right now, and despite having the UN built, the remaining survivors HATE me because I won't gift them maps...oh, and Industrialization...if you could just throw that in too....

[vmxa1]

" Originally posted by maxcavsm

1) Catherine the Great's empire wasn't doing so hot. I left her alone for awhile, thinking she was out of the fight. Then one turn as a joke, I decide to see if I can sell some tech to her. Turns out she's sitting on 10K gold and willing to trade me 700 gpt for flight? Meanwhile, the rest of the world can't put together 100 gold at any one time. This influx of cash was what really put me over the top, but I'm just curious...where in the hell did she get it from?"

Well if they are not fighting each other then one AI can trade and get teh others gold. This allows them to keep being first to a tech and selling it around.

You want to prevent that by either keeping them at war or being the one to sell them stuff.

I am not sure about the amounts, though. I would guess it is a function of the map size.

"2)The Manhattan Project. Good idea or bad idea?"

Does not matter really. Someone will build it and the lid is off. Either get the game over before ICBM's are available or cut off their uranium.

At Regent is quite possible to play conquest and the AI still not get ICBM's.

"3)The Mayans. They had an astounding lead over me (by about 700 points), so over the last two days, I built up my tanks and mech armies and stomped him into the ground. Yet, even standing on the burning remains of Chicken Itza and having decimated his army and holdings to a half of what he had before (and that's saying a lot), he STILL wouldn't give in to my demands for a surrender. What in the hell do I have to do to these people to force THEM to concede defeat and give me something for my troubles??"

If they have nothing to give, then you can get nothing. IOW if they have little cash, no techs and only cities, forget it. They will give up towns, but rarely cities.

"I've got this game under control now, as I'll probably be doing the Space Shuttle. I just can't beat the Mayans without razing and burning every piece of ground they occupy with the score they have right now, and despite having the UN built, the remaining survivors HATE me because I won't gift them maps...oh, and Industrialization...if you could just throw that in too.... "

Scores are the product of an accumulation of each turn. This means even if the die there score will not go down and as long as they are alive it will grow some.

To gain on them you must slow their per turn points and increase yours. 700 is a lot to make up, but if they are down to 50 per turn and you are getting 150, it won't take long.

Adding land and pop is the main way to up your score quickly.

I would expect it is possible to get some to vote for you, IF the other nomination has been at war and better if they are still at war. They will either abstain or vote for you. Gift them maps.cash and techs just before the vote and see what happens.

[diablovision]

"Cities are only given as part of peace."

This is one thing that I have been frustrated about for a while now. Historically, the colonization and expansion of the US has been brought about primarily through land purchases. It was relatively common in colonial days for European powers to trade control over different colonies for money, strategic alliances, etc. I wish the game had more of this.

I was able to extort a city from the Aztecs a few turns after the war. I just demanded it and they caved in! In peacetime. I was more than 2x their size and had recently beat the hell out of them in a war, reducing them to just four cities at that time.

[vmxa1]

It was possible to get cities before patches in vanilla, but it was quickly seen as too exploitive.