What am I doing wrong?

[saturn]

What am I doing wrong? Or what should I be doing differently?

I am playing C3C as either Summerians or Mayans. Emperor level.

Before I can say boo, the AI has millions of cities, to my 5 or 6, is miles ahead in techs, and won't trade them.

And then, too add insult to injury, whenever I'm a turn or two from finishing a wonder (I so love the pyramids...), someone else finishes that wonder, and I get a barracks or worse yet, a spearman out of the deal.

In short, I stink.

What do I have to do to get my playing up to emperor level playing?

Saturn

[kailhun]

1. Play a lower level. The higher the level the more the computer 'cheats' in order to give the player a challenging game.

2. Expand rapidly. I have my cities churn out settlers and spearmen and build my cities very close to each other (2 squares between cities). In the early era's a city will use only part of its surroundings anyway.

3. Find iron, make swordsmen, conquer a nearby civilization. I run into other civ's fairly quickly and this would halt my expansion. So I attack one, destroy it's cities and continue my expansion (keeping the well placed or cities with wonders (if any)). The slaves either work for me, but mostly they become part of interior homeland cities.

4. Make workers and link all cities with roads. Luxuries are the happy drug and resources are needed for e.g. swordsmen.

5. Ignore wonders. AI civ's will often beat you anyway, so why waste the shields? Besides a conquered wonder will work just as well (except in culture).

7. Edit the rules to make the game fun. I have corruption set so low, it hardly has an impact. So far anyway.

6. Cheat. I use reload a lot. In C3 games I used to look at the world map and base my expansion on that. But I haven't found a program that allows me to view the worldmap for C3C yet.

The above usually works, but I think I attacked the Indians too early this time. I have knights, but I might not have enough to halt the elephants.

[vmxa1]

Well you did not give us much to go on. Obviously you do not stink or you wouldn't be playing Emp.

As the Mayans you should not get out rexed with a decent location. So that may be the first problem. You really need to get up a granary and at least 2 cities making workers and troops.
Settlers from another and maybe switch up here and there to keep the cities balanced.

Look at the strat forum for a couple of the playing emperor threads.
If all else fails, make a thread and post your game. A 4000bc save and 30-40 turns later is often a good way to go.

[saturn]

I've worked it out, thanks to all of you. On Monarch (king?) level, it is possible to build temples, barracks, etc. alternating with spearmen, settlers and workers.

On Emperor, can't do that. Deal with the units first. Get that iron, and while you're doing that, put in the buildings.

Then it is swordsmen (and Javellin throwers, of course all the way to the war (against the Babylonians who did't get to the aforementioned iron).

[vmxa1]

Cool

[lethe]

I've found two things to really get me going in Emperor games.

1) Let your capital suck. Until there is no more empty land it will only churn out settlers.

2) Specialize cities. Only build granaries that are going to be churning out settlers/workers non-stop.

If you have 2+ luxuries only build temples in border cities, and have them start on their temple when the settler is done shrugging of his backpack. (Ie, build nothing else before.)

A worker should never leave a square without having built a road on it. Two workers should never enter an unroaded square. If you are going to chop down a forest then do it before you build a road, unless it's the only route to a border city.

Help border cities with their temples by chopping down forests.

Don't go overboard on the spearmen. Use 1 spearman + 1 warrior as garrison in your border cities. The warrior can be upgraded to a swordsman. If you can't afford upgrades warriors serve as cheap garrisons in towns deep inside your territory.

Horsemen. An often overlooked early unit. But if you have a loooooong border against anyone but Carthage or Greece you should consider some horsemen. They can run 6 squares to reinforce. Ideally they should be used to attack and withdraw from approaching troops, to whittle em down before they arrive to hurl themselves at your walls. Roads from your border cities to their culture limit is good. Build some. It will also let you atleast attempt to trade luxuries with the AI.

Micromanage atleast the major production centers. When there is one round left to go on a build check and see if you can move a worker from a shield producing square to a high commerce square and still have only 1 round to go on the build. (Say you are getting 8 shields a round, and have 6 shields to go on your barracks and there just happens to be a lake with a fish in it. Same goes for growth.)

Forego all ancient era wonders, with the possible exception of The Great Library. Unless you get a Scientific Great Leader. Try the philosophy beeline, the AI seldom goes for it, and it nets you a free tech. And you can happily trade high end techs from that branch for more basic early techs from the AI.

[vmxa1]

That is good advice. The only thing I would quibble with, and it is only a quiblle, it the chop before roading.
There are lots of excptions. I have not looked closely at it so you may be right, but I submit the following:

roading yields commerce on a worked tile
forrest is yielding 2 shields
if I am working the tile and chop it first, I am left with fewer shields and need to now to get two improvement (road and mine or water).
So why not road first, then chop, now I only need one improvement. I can see the chop first if the timing of the shields from the chop is improtant for a build.

I pose this, not as a correction, but to see if I am thinking clearly this early in the morning.

[ErikM]

Either
- road & don't chop (2 shields may be useful for ie floodplain cities, so one may want to keep some forests around)
or
- chop & road.
Building roads on grassland = 3 worker-turns
On forest = 6 worker-turns
So you waste 3 turns if you switch the sequence.

[Tall Stranger]

Originally posted by ErikM
Either
- road & don't chop (2 shields may be useful for ie floodplain cities, so one may want to keep some forests around)
or
- chop & road.
Building roads on grassland = 3 worker-turns
On forest = 6 worker-turns
So you waste 3 turns if you switch the sequence.

Actually, this is not entirely accurate.

If you're talking about a forest (with no bonus resource) on plains, you need to chop, road AND mine a square to make it as valuable as a forest.

Here's the food/shield/commerce breakdown for a roading a basic forest square on plains over a 13 turn period for a single, non-industrious worker roading under despotism:

Turns 1-6: square produces 1/2/0, for a total of 6/12/0
Turns 7-14: square produces 1/2/1, for an overall total (icluding turns 1-6) of 14/28/8

If you only chop and road the square, the breakdown goes like this:

Turns 1-4 (chopping): square produces 1/2/0, but produces 10 shields at end, for a total of 4/18/0
Turns 5-7 (roading): square produces 1/1/0, overall total of 7/21/0
Turns 8-14: square produces 1/1/1, overall total of 14/28/7

Looks pretty close, right. But, obviously, the forest square will, for every turn after 14, produce the same number of food and commerce, but twice as many shields.

Finally, let's look at the same square, but worked the following way: Chopped, roaded and mined.

Turns 1-4 (chopping): square produces 1/2/0, but at end produces 10 shields, leading to total of 4/18/0
Turns 5-7 (roading): square produces 1/1/0, for an overall total of 7/21/0
Turns 8-13 (mining): square produces 1/1/1, overall total of 13/27/6
Turn 14: square produces 1/2/1, overall total of 14/29/7

Since, after turn 13, the chopped-roaded-mined square's production is identical to the roaded forest square, the ultimate value of the squares is very close. (The only reason you're "almost always" better off is that, if you're building a wonder, the 10 shields gained from chopping won't count to the build and are thus wasted.)

The reason the chop-road-mine method is more valuable, then, is the strategic value of rushing key buildings. You get more shields "up front" but don't sacrifice any over the long-term. HOWEVER, because they produce virtually identical f/s/c over time, I tend NOT to chop forests early on unless there's something in particular I want to rush. (Say, for example, a granery in a pump city or a barracks to ramp up for war.) Workers are soooooo valuable in the early game that it's (IMO) better to get them setting up road networks, mining grasslands/plains, etc. than chopping-roading-mining forests on plains.

BTW, this analysis is a little trickier for forest on grasslands, since you can't tell whether the grassland underneath is a bonus one or not. However, a 14-turn chop-road-mine routine for a regular grassland would result in 24/18/6, while a bonus grassland would yield 24/29/7. Given the value of population, especially in the early game, the extra food is well worth it. I'm more likely, then, to chop those than I am forests on plains.

[BulMaster]

I say chop the forests in later years. Usualy forests are on no bouns grass land, so if you chop it you loos all the shields from it but get one food more. In later years when you have sufficient prod, chop the trees, build a mine and RR this way the tile give 2 food and 2 shields. That concept runs for me as at that stage I need food and with more workers that whole process can take one turn and not upset the way the city works but instead give one food more!

[ErikM]

Fine analysis, but this is assuming you have no alternative to working a forested square. That's usually not the case - your laborers would work mined shielded grassland if available.

In the early game most likely you will never work a forest tile since it is only one food. Main use of forests, for me at leasts, are
(i) 10 shields from chopping
(ii) 2 bonus shields from the governor when city grows
(iii) 2 shields in food-rich, production-poor areas (floodplains, basically).

If I don't intend to work a forest square at all, chop+road is clearly superior. If by some reason I need forest two shields and the forest is on grassland, I won't chop it at all since I may not get bonus grassland.

If I need forest shields and forest is on plains:
(option A) chop+road+mine sequence changes the square from 1/2/0 to 1/2/1 and yields 10 minerals but I also lose 6 minerals while the tile is mined. This sequence takes 10+3+6 =19 turns in vanilla Civ and 4+3+6=13 turns in C3C;
(option B) road forest changes the tile from 1/2/0 to 1/2/1 in 6 turns.

Option A yields extra 4 shields over option B but also costs at least 7 extra worker turns. Since (as you mentioned) worker turns are so precious in the early game, lousy 4 minerals are not enough to compensate for 7 wasted worker turns. So I'll just road and won't chop at all.

There can be more complicated cases when you only use a forest square for a few turns during the growth cycle but due to scarcity of worker turns I doubt it is worthwhile to do a chop/road/mine sequence in the early game.

[vmxa1]

Well exactly what point in time you mean is the key. Day one, you have no tile improvements, so you you will go for food first.
Once you get a second citizen, it may well be that the forrest is you best bet to get the build done, be it a granary a settler a worker or what ever.
You may or may not have a second tile improved by that time.
So it comes down to the timing of you growth, and build. coupled with the worker actions.

Overall, it is quite normal to use a forrest for a long time.

[DrSpike]

It's all about adapting........there are few iron rules. I rarely use forests in the cap apart from timing issues, since early food is key. But if you hit desired size for the level early you can end up leaving a citizen on forest for a while. Also, cities other than the cap often are better off using forest squares early on.

[vmxa1]

Having the new pop being placed on forrest to get those 2 shields, is often pivitol to finishing a build that turn. Not necessarily working the forrest continually. If no forrest you may end up with 9 shields instead of 10.

[DrSpike]

True! 4 turn settlers are much easier with a handy forest.