Minitourney III - Spoilers

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Sounds like you had a good run, despite the initial bad luck with huts!

Definitely. I'm up to 1070 now and easily clicking along at four turns per tech, so I'm researching my fifth industrial tech while the leaders on the other continent don't even have Theory of Gravity or Magnetism yet! (They switched to democracies, except for Russia, whch I'm sure cost them some time.) Someone there did just research Free Artistry, which I had skipped over, but I was able to trade some spare iron to Germany for that plus forty gold per turn. (The fact that no one in the game, myself included, has Military Tradition yet probably has something to do with the fact that iron is still valuable.) So much for England's plans to steal the works of the great Chinese writer Shakespeare, given how quickly a city with a factory and railroads can work . Oh, and I did win the race for Leonardo's earlier.

The micromanagement is getting a LOT better now that my industrious workers have replaceable parts to help them work faster. That's one of my favorite things about Industrious: half as many workers to move around for any given job.

I'm also starting to think in terms of hitting America earlier with tanks, mech inf, or a combination thereof. America is smaller and lagging a couple techs behind compared with the leaders on the other continent, and they have two luxuries that they're foolish enough to sell to others instead of to me. I'm a bit annoyed at not having enough luxuries to keep all my subjects loving me, and annoying a superpower that's centuries ahead in technology is NOT a good idea .

Nathan

[nbarclay]

The Great Library only gives you techs that two other civs THAT YOU HAVE CONTACT WITH know. What happened is that as long as you only had contact with Japan and Egypt and were ahead of them in tech, the library was worthless. Then (I'm assuming) you made contact with other civs and got everything they both knew at the time you made contact. Interestingly, as in your case, the Library can provide techs beyond Education if you get them at the same time you get Education.

Nathan

[vulture]

Originally posted by nbarclay
The Great Library only gives you techs that two other civs THAT YOU HAVE CONTACT WITH know. What happened is that as long as you only had contact with Japan and Egypt and were ahead of them in tech, the library was worthless. Then (I'm assuming) you made contact with other civs and got everything they both knew at the time you made contact. Interestingly, as in your case, the Library can provide techs beyond Education if you get them at the same time you get Education.

Nathan

Ah, makes sense. I had wondered if it was something to do with contact. Chalk that up to a mistake by me then.

[jshelr]

Puttering along with a nice tech lead into the modern era, the evil Chinese leadership conceived of a plan to stall a little longer in order to discover the star wars defense while attempting to set a new record for number of MA and MI units. I wonder how the AI will react to the nightmare combination of nukes followed by massive invasion of the US and European civs by China. I will need to take a quick shower after this one.

[Velociryx]

Okay....it seems unanimous...the AI just didn't do much in the way of researching this game....why not?

Was it the particular combination of civs? Can't be attributed to starting postions...I've SEEN London, Moscow, Berlin, and Washington...I know those guys had good terrain at the start....then what?

What are the barbs set to? Felt like raging, the number of times I got WHACKED by them....if so, could that have some bearing on the AI's emphasis on research (more barbs = a greater need for military focus = less emphasis placed on research?)

Don't know...but if we can unlock the WHY behind the AI's research paralysis in this game, then we can find a way for the human player to reliably out-tech the AI on Monarch, and possibly beyond....

-=Vel=-

[jshelr]

Just throwing out ideas to be ruled out on Vel's question:

1. It's perfectly normal to out research the AI on Monarch after (about) the arrival of factories. In this game, China was probably the top GDP for all players after that point or sooner.

2. Speculating: Is it possible that the civs on the large continent all researched the same track and did not trade well? Maybe the mix of civs is important and, say, taking out England to get a "noneuropean civ" and adding in the Iriquois might lead to a very different result.

3. Do we know what wars were happening on the "other" continent in the industrial age? In my game, Bismark was eliminating Russia and, I think, had fought England.

4. On the home continent in my game it was constant fighting until the time we met the civs on the large continent. They were ahead on tech, but gave it away for lux and amazingly soon were behind. I got ToE with no problem even though I was several techs down when Bismark had Nationalism. I think all those mountains produced a poor economy.

5. Anyway, the better question is who we have to pay to get the results from goody huts that Vel gets. After a tech start like that, keeping up is, perhaps, not so hard to do.

[Velociryx]

Ahhh...what I failed to mention was the 2 barbarians I got from the huts, the three barb uprisings that pretty well demolished my treasury on two occassions, and the *numerous* settlers and workers killed by random barbs before I got the continent staked out firmly, but yes....the free techs and that settler on turn 6-7 was just about as fantabulous as you can get, and made dealing with the bad stuff a little easier to swallow...

Good observations, but I've noted that even for folks who DIDN'T attack right away, they still outclassed Egypt and Japan in research in the Ancient Age....that's odd to me...first time I've encountered that on Monarch....usually I struggle up til I get factories, as you say, but in this instance, I had the tech lead from the start (thanks to huts), and kept it (thanks to keeping my research pegged at 80-100%).

Could be as you say, poor tech tree runs and research coordination, but again, that's odd for the Euros, who are almost uncanny in their ability to do that very well (at least that's been my experience in all my previous games with them). This time around tho, they sucked.

Curiouser and curiouser....I think I may start up a few new Monarch games with different barb activity levels and note the difference (if any) that makes, and then combine civs in different ways to see what difference....

-=Vel=-

[nbarclay]

I routinely out-tech the AIs on Monarch well before the industrial age, and usually by the end of the ancient age. Some of the keys are:

- Good expansion, with plenty of tile improvements to make the cities wealthy and productive.
- Don't trust the governers to put city laborers the right place.
- Research the peaceful techs and trade for the military ones. More specificially, my current trend is to beeline for Literature and then for Republic (although lately, I've tended to grab Pottery first to set up a city or two to produce lots of settlers).
- Focus on buildings, not wars (assuming your starting position lets you). Once you get your economy built up and a good tech lead, wars are easy. In the meantime, every three archers or two swordsmen you build is a library you won't have. And saving up gold to upgrade warriors to swordsmen or chariots to horsemen is death to science! (Courthouses are also valuable in cities any significant distance from the capital.)
- Don't be afraid to ratchet up the entertainment slider a bit so the core cities can get big enough to build improvements reasonably quickly.
- Switch to Republic ASAP.
- Don't waste gold buying maps; at least not unless you really need the information. Instead, do stuff like trading your tech for someone else's, and then trade your tech to another AI for its map. (World map for territory map deals can also come in handy to reduce how much you don't know, and thus reduce the cost of a world map later.) The goal is to keep as much gold in your hands as possible so you can afford to run a deficit in order to research faster.

That's what I can think of off the top of my head, anyhow. This game, science went exceptionally well for me. I'm enclosing my save from 550 BC (if I have the year recorded correctly) right after I switched to Republic, in case anyone might find it instructive.

Nathan

[Harovan]

Originally posted by Velociryx
What are the barbs set to? Felt like raging, the number of times I got WHACKED by them....if so, could that have some bearing on the AI's emphasis on research (more barbs = a greater need for military focus = less emphasis placed on research?)

Barbs are at restless. I got several scouting warriors killed, as huts didn't give me anything useful (the best was a map, once), but only barbs. But I had not a single uprising.

Argh, guys... I can't play today and how it seems, for at least a week . My job cuts in my time for civing. But I'll keep a Poly window open and will read your spoilers. Maybe I can spare a few hours at weekend, but I doubt so far.

[Chemical Ollie]

I think I am far behind most of you guys, as I didn't go industrial until 1180. I'm only third on the map, behind Egypt and Germany. I think the main reasons are some strategic mistakes and bad luck in the early expansion. I went for the spices to the west, while the great land mass and strategic recources was to the east. I ended up with no horses or iron for a long time. More about that later. Perhaps I was also delayed by my wonder building in the capital. Despite my delay compared to you, this is one of my top 3 games when it comes to walking through the eras quickly.

Why are they called goodie huts? The only good things I got from them in this game was a constript warrior and 25 gold. And some training for my military which eventually turned out lethal for most of my scouting units

The barbs also killed my first worker and delayed my first settler. Despite this, I have beaten my own record in wonder-building, thanks to the great capital location. I moved one step north east before settling, to get a gold mine in my capital. Then I set up a few temporary cities within the capital borders. These were used as unit, settler and worker pumps. They were very useful until industrial times when they were abandoned because my regular cities needed more space. By then, they were quite useless anyway, at size 6 and only barracks. I used the temp cities for all settlers and made my capitol into a wonder factory. It has so far produced Pyramids, Great Library, Leo and Bach's. A coastal city has produced Colossus, Lighthouse and Magellan. Another city is currently just 3 turns from Suffrage. All this without a single leader! I can normally build one or two of the ancient wonders, but not this many. Unfortunately, I was beaten by just few turns to get Hanging Gardens, Sixtine, Sun Tzu, Smith's and Newton. The lack of those happiness wonders will be painful in later wars.

I saw the closest iron located just inside Japan's border and set up a city adjacent to be a culture vulture. My plan worked, but then the iron source ran out just a few hundred years later. I just managed to build five or six swordsmen. Then I had to buy my Iron from Japan until late middle ages. A horse hill was liberated to the east when Egypt razed a Japanese city. I rushed for it and got there just before Egypt. Then I placed another city on the flood plains where I built my FP, right on Cleo's border. I pumped out 20+ horsies but stayed in peace until medieval times.

In 400 AD, even before I got Lighthouse, I was able to cross the ocean on the first bold attempt! You can't have bad luck all times can you? Some tech trading gave me republic, which I entered about 500 AD (quite normal time for me). Around 800 AD, I sold contact to everyone for gold and tech, as the Europeans had researched navigation and would find my neighburs any turn. My golden age was triggered by Leo, even before I got chivalry! That was my first wonder GA ever.

I had an early medieval war with Japan and grabbed/razed a few cities. They started it, but I was just about to go for them anyway. To bad most of my horsies were lost in the war and I had to rebuild my military without iron. They made peace for some tech. The razing got me dozens of slaves and I already had plenty of own workers, so all my land was well improved. I had to buy iron expensively from the Japs, who were furious at me for some unknown reason. When my GA ended, I blitzed them again and grabbed saltpeter, wine and iron. I was just able to get 5-6 riders before the Iron deal was cancelled but had plenty of longbows. When I had razed their closest towns but before I had my iron mine up and running, they sent cavalery on me! Even if I had grabbed their only saltpeter, I found it appropriate to make peace for magnetism and military tradition. The goals of that war were accomplished anyway, and war disorder was not far away. Unfortunately no leaders turned up in the Japanese wars.

It is now 1350 something and I'm tech-rushing for Infantry and Hoover. Egypt has a large lead but I keep up in tech with them by selling them coal (which I probably have to regret later, but at least they are building railroads for my military). Germany is second. They have destroyed one neighbor and hold more than half of the European continent. Japan has 6 or 7 cities left on the south-east corner. My 20+ stack of cavallery is waiting on their border until the Suffrage is finished in just a few turns.

I have this plan for the rest of the game: I will blitz the Japs and reduce them to one useless city, then make peace to avoid total ruin of my reputation. Then I will take on Cleo. That will be tough one, but I hope to get help from Germany. The Egyptian wars will come in three waves with peace in between. The first wave is probably fought with cavallery and I will go for their ivory as main target. The second wave will be fought with tanks, and the final assult will be made with modern armor. Then I will try to stay in peace and milk the game until I get to future tech. By then, I expect that only Germany and China are left on the map, with one fully settled continent each. There will be an all-out WWIII with nukes, modern armor, stealth bombers and radar artillery. I have never even seen modern units like Aegis cruisers or smart weapons, and it will be fun to test and see what they are good for. They must be in the game for some reason, huh?

War plans seldom go as expected but time will tell. AI MPP:s could put you in unwanted trouble.

[Velociryx]

Played to 1695....England is extinct, France, America, and Russia may as well be....made a Mutual Protection Pact with Germany, and they were actually somewhat helpful, chasing down odd units trying to slip behind me and muck up my newly conquered territory. I'm rushing Libraries and Temples when possible to bump out my borders and solidify my holdings, which amount to the northern half of the continent so far (where Russia, England, and America used to have the bulk of their holdings). Gonna rest my troops for a couple turns, then hammer Germany and work my way down the peninsula where the last few remaining cities are. Might also wrangle peace with the Americans and strip them of their two cities over where Russia is (making peace with them for a couple turns so I can rush in an Airport on the island)....then....break the treaties and finish everybody off. Ran into some undesirable "features" of the advanced Civ3 combat engine when a freakin regular Longbowman on open terrain beat an Elite MA, and had a couple of other similar upsets (yep...including the ol' spearman vs. tank loss...OUCH), but at this point, I'm cranking out MA's in 2-3 turns at my war cities, and infrastructure development is proceeding apace at all my fringe cities back home....those offshore mining platforms are actually quite handy! Takes too long to get to them, but that's okay...gives me something to build while the army is off a conquering....

-=Vel=-

[Nakar Gabab]

Got Robotics yet, Vel?

Manufacturing Plant + Nuke Plant = 1 turn MA.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Nakar Gabab
Got Robotics yet, Vel?

Manufacturing Plant + Nuke Plant = 1 turn MA.

Yeah, but how many turns do you have to delay conquering the world to get your 1-turn MA?

The real world may be starting to intrude on my civving somewhat. The Supreme Court just came down with its voucher ruling (I'm a strong voucher supporter), so I may start debating vouchers on the misc.education newsgroup again as I've done at times in the past. I don't expect it to grind my civving to a halt, but it will very likely slow me down.

Nathan

[vulture]

And now, the rest end of my game...

Industrial era

As previously advertised, I took control of my continent in 1350 AD. Then I started building up forces for my invasion - mostly I needed transport boats and more defenders to stock captured cities. The invasion, which happened in 1485, eventually took 8 galleons with 8 elite cavalry, 4 veteran cavalry, 8 veteran infantry, 8 artillery and a 3 (vet) cavalry army. I picked out America as my beach head of choice for several reasons. One, it was the shortest crossing. Two, two of the coastal cities had luxuries (gems and spices) that I was currently having to pay for. Three, Washington had the Sistine Chapel. The fourth city in that little corner of America had the Colossus, which would look nice in my garden but wouldn't actually be any use (unless wonders count in some way towards a domination victory). As a bonus, America had just signed an MPP with Russia. The geography of the continet was such that America owned the western end, France owned the next chunk of land, and then Russia, Germany and England all bordered France, although England was the only large country (France was second). The reason that the MPP was a bonus is that Russia would declare war on me, and I could then bribe France to go to war with Russia (and America, via the MPP). France and America would both be fighting two front wars, and hopefully France and Russia would wipe out each others offensive stacks before I finished with America, so I would only have the city defenders to deal with.

The first war lasted about 5 turns, and went exactly to plan. I took the 4 cities I most wanted, gaining 2 luxuries, Sistine and the Colossus almost no American counterattack. The last American city I took was sporting some shiny new infantry, so I decided to make peace until tanks (only a few turns away). Meanwhile, Russia also MPPed with Germany, to give France more to think about. With those countries softening themselves up for me, I was happy, since I figured that taking all of them might just be enough for domination, and I'd never have to touch England. I didn't want England involved in these wars because it was so much larger that it would win easily and just become more of a problem for me later.

Built the Hoover Dam in 1530 AD.Tanks appeared on the scene, and I built 40 or so of them in short order, and then broke the peace treay with America, reputation no longer being an issue as I was only trading with England and didn't really need that anymore. Took out America, aside from a few towns scattered down the southern peninsula (which France eventually got).
Then went through France, taking about 4 cities per turn. Since Russia was down to one city, I nabbed that one too. Rushed lots of temples to consolidate borders and claim more land area. Captured the Univsersal Suffrage and another luxury in the process of invading France. Then I had a brief pause since modern armour was only 2 techs away. Got them and took all 4 German towns in 1 go. Only me, England and one French town left now. I have to say that the strategy of getting France, Russia and Germany to destroy each others infantry stacks (which is all that happens in infantry wars usually) worked an absolute gem. I saw only about 5 units from them all combined that weren't defending cities. Easy pickings.

Somewhere in the middle of this I got two more leaders - one for SETI and one for Manhattan, and of course had mech inf. Also had the heroic epic -> pentagon setup built. Only managed to produce two armies before the game ended, and none of it really had any effect. Didn't build a single airport or aircraft.

Still didn't have a domination victory, so I healed all my mech inf and went on the offensive against England. Came across an object lesson in the value of good intelligence (and the value of good railroads and MA). England had briefly joined the war against America when America had one town left, and had captured that town. The town was now entirely surrounded by me and cut off from the rest of England. Their entire offensive force was in and around the city radius - every square had between 2 and 4 units on it, mostly infantry. This was a bit of a surprise, and slowed me down somewhat since half my MA force got diverted to clearing out all the infantry sitting on hills. Eventually got everthing sorted out, tok 6 English cities in 3 turns and won via domination in 1730 AD. Engalnd, way ahead of the other (now extinct) civs for the end of the game, still didn't have steel or electronics (or they might have just got electronics). I never faced tanks or aircraft. As Vel said, the AI research never took off in this game, and on the replay, the 5 civs never really fought before we made contact - only one city changed hands before I started bribing them into fighting each other in the middle ages.

Unlike Vel, I never had a problem with Barbarians. I saw one uprising, which my elite warrior and single spearman took care of without the benefit of city walls. Didn't lose a single unit to barbarians, and they were never a factor. I was amazed at how slowly Egypt and Japan expanded given how much room was available on our continent. The AI played this game like a muppet, which is pretty unusual in my experience. Still didn't need to use any of the later modern era tecs for anything - I barely needed to industrialise, since most of my industrial cities were only producing wealth during my wars.

[vulture]

Japan Questions

I notice that some people chose not to attack Japan early on. This puzzles me somewhat, so I'm curious as to the reasoning. Was it a conscious decision to wait for later, or just a lack of decision to go to war?

For me it was pretty clear cut. Japan had horses and wines (that I wanted) in its territory. It hadn't yet connected the horses up to the net. So it had no good units. This game *has* to be won militarily, so I'll have to fight Japan at some point. It'll be worse if they get iron, and far worse if they're still an issue when Samurai appear on the scene. Plus the possibility of an early great leader, and the chance to add some developed cities to my empire. For me, absolutely everything screamed 'kill Japan now', and waiting appeared worse in every respect.

So, were other games sufficiently different that early that a different strategy appeared good, or were there other more important factors that I decided to gloss over? (Like building up infrastructure)