Invasions: stage or all at once?

[planetfall]

DDay +7

DDay plus 7 turns. Year 1766.

Recaptured flipped city to W. Nice growth in conquered cities. Oh, Persia just game me a new leader. Could have been someone other than Hitler, but I can still use him up.

[planetfall]

DDay +8

DDay +8, year 1768.

Persia no longer on AzPer. Aztecs have one
city left. But will any cities flip?

[planetfall]

DDay +9

DDay plus 9 turns, year 1770.

Hey, 3 Persian cities flipped. I thought they were stuck on the big island.

Now, was that planned or accident?? Is this a strange tactic or a setback?

[planetfall]

DDay +10

DDay plus 10, year 1772.

This is all the further this game has gone, but it is far enough for the DDay challenge.

Oh, Persia is back on big island. Yes, in this case the flips were a desired goal. No new leaders, but hard to complain with more armies than can effectively use.


PS This is the LAST image!!

[planetfall]

DDay Challenge Preferences

If you are going to play the DDay Challenge,
you might like to know bic preferences. My understanding is these are saved with the SAV file.

Major preference changes:
-- corruption is devalued
-- modern ships move farther
-- planes move further than ships
-- battlefield experience is rewarded
-- carriers load similar to WWII


Preference details
-- Corruption, 60%
-- Optimal number of cities, 50
-- transport/destroyer/battleship, 6 tiles
-- carrier, 5 tiles
-- jet fighter/bomber range, 8 tiles
-- carrier load, 20 units
-- elite, HP increased from 5 to 6

[HazieDaVampire]

press Alt + Print page, then open up MSPaint, then paste, and save the file and post it!

[HazieDaVampire]

in my next game i really gunna change some of the values, i hate pollution (the orange pollution, i do however think global warming is cool) and i'll make the carrier hold more.

anybody think the industreil age ships should be able to hold 1 unit, i know that loads of ships in the industreil age carryed some infantry onboard to defend against boardings!

[HazieDaVampire]

wow, didn't take you to long to take over most of the land! My average wars are 20 years! And if i'm on a 'continent invasion' and i'm not planning on stopping it can take me loads of turns!

[planetfall]

Originally posted by HazieDaVampire
wow, didn't take you to long to take over most of the land! My average wars are 20 years! And if i'm on a 'continent invasion' and i'm not planning on stopping it can take me loads of turns!

Love
1. them there panzers dudes. They get wounded, but keep on coming back and back again.
2. hurrying libraries to restrict AI ground counter attack.

Naturally before this point, game is boring as build up wartime production capacity.

Also lost one landing zone. But, but, this is my first attempt at a massive continent invasion. I know I could have the entire continent by 10 turns now. I think very good players could do it in fewer. This is why I posted the DDay 10 turn challenge. I would like to know how much room for improvement there is.

[JoeDaddy715]

Personally, I would have dropped all of my invading force on the large island in the centeral south sea. I'd have used naval units to prevent them from reinforcing, and I'd have then used it as a staging area for a second, larger invasion of the mainland. Obviously your strategy worked fine, but it kinda looks to me like your enemies were a bit overmatched anyway.... I always concentrate my troops on one spot first, placing ALL DEFENSIVE units on ONE tile, so that the AI can lose much of its attack power within the first part of the invasion. Secondly, I land artillery (if available) to wreak havoc on the defensive units, and finally I add attack units to do the final deeds. One major difference in the strategies I use is that iron is a required resource for ALL units after swordsman except longbowman. (how anyone thinks they can build infantry without iron, I'll never know) SO.... I use my attack units to cut a path to the iron, then have defensive units set up shop on the resource and pillage it. My infantry units will build fortresses on the resources, and I'll use these areas to stage bombardments et al. Yes, my infantry is altered to be able to build fortresses. Anybody who has been in the infantry knows good and well that infantry units are trained to build fortifications and entrenchment. This is more than just finding cover in the available terrain (fortifying) This is building trenches and foxholes and anything else that 500 highly trained and disciplined men can do collectively together....

[cracker]

Planetfall,

You are located near me in Colorado, so I hope we stay in closer contact.

For your DDay challenge: You are using a severely distorted modification of the game that really makes it so that this game example is sort of like "Running a race against opponents who have two broken legs and that have been shot in the head at close range just to disable them."

I picked up your save game in 1745 and would have probably pushed it to the side after just a turn or two if it were not for you being in Colorado.

The problem with all these modifications is that the AI players are not programmed to use the features and therefore it gives you these tools while your opponents are essentially unarmed. The worst unbalancing feature in this game is the Panzers which are your UU and only available to you. None of your opponents has anything that remotely balances all the extra horsepower given to the panzers and this makes them just like bowls of Jellow waiting to be slapped into oblivion.

The Panzer mod features include adding the 5 extra hit points of power plus raising the base hit points for the experience levels. Your modified Elite panzer has 11 hit points at an attack strength of 16 and THIS IS WAY TOO POWERFUL. This many hit points does not just make the panzers strong, it makes them lethal enough to kill three riflemen or infantrymen in almost every turn.

In fact, your panzers are so over charged that Modern Armor is a substantial downgrade of power and Including panzers in armies is a severe strategic mistake in most cases. Four free ranging Panzers with 11 hit points per turn can kill 10 to 11 enemy units per turn while the panzer armies can only kill three units per turn. I ended un using the excess empty armies to disband and rush things in the captured cities. I wasted several early turns figuring this factor out because frankly I have never seen anyone implement modification rules that created this type of a kill the opponent unfairly scenario.

The artillery modified to have two movement points is also unbalancing because the AI is not programmed to use artillery well even in the default game. With your mod factors the artillery can move into enemy territory and fire all in the same turn and the AI doesn't know how to do this.

The carriers with a capacity of 20 bombers are overpowering.

There is also someting wierd going on in this game because the AIs have horses but have never built any offensive strike units such as Knights of Cavalry. This will truly be fatal for them and is not typical.

It took me several turns just to figure out how severely you had set things up to kill the AI players.

Also, never, never, never, never use the Automated worker functions to play the game. These automated functions waste worker movement turns at about 30% waste or more. It took me about 3 turns to figure out that you had most of your workers locked into this time wasting part of the strategy game. You also needed airports in many, many more cities to make this invasion strategy really click and it took 3 or 4 turns for me to figure that out as well.

All this set to the side, The Persians are your real enemy in this game but you do not seem to have an embassy or spy to better visualize how your enemy is arrayed. You have most of your invasion resources targeted at Montezuma.

The other problem factor in the game is the offshore islands. These provide culture refuges that prevent you from adopting Bill Sherman's "Cut loose and slash them into oblivion strategy."

I took your invasion forces in 1745 and whipped them all ashore at the best possible places I could find withing the next movement range of the transports. This put the upper invasions on two opposite sides of the continent working to link up across the mid band of the continent from Malinalco to the hils between Tamuin and Tiacopan.

You southern invasion force, I consolidated and sent ashore on the hill west of Arbela.

I rushed three extra transports to finish transporting the panzer armies across the oceans plus immediately returned the transports from the south back to your #17 city to reload them and hit the Persian big island with a 3 transport task force of panzers and mechs.

I burned the transports on the northern zones to rush the airport in the same turn as the initial assault 1 turn after landing. Saved one transport from Malinalco to deal with Behistun offshore problem.

In all the cities at home I converted production away from bombers and over to ground units of the best appropriate type to use the available shields and prodcue the maximum number of units per turn. Used many of those old obsolete units on the home front to balance and short rush units in almost every city so I could get 1 panzer, 1 mech, 1 cavalry, or 1 longbowman, or one swordsman per city in almost every turn.

Never rush the full or inital shield balance of any unit or any improvement, the cost is doubled by the program.

I did not use mobilization because I wanted to preserve the ability to build culture improvements in the forntier cities as needed.

Killed Persia completely by about 1760, and cleared Monty from the contininet 1 turn later because all the units could be freed up from holding the Persian cities.

I am out of town this week but will post some pics for you later.

I would strongly reccomend playing back closer to the base Civ3 game because you will have some very bad habits to break if you expect to survive on the more fun and more challenging upper difficulty levels without using the mod factor crutches.

Good luck,

[planetfall]

Originally posted by cracker
Planetfall,

You are located near me in Colorado, so I hope we stay in closer contact.

Thank you, thank you for taking the time of reviewing this game and providing some feedback. I really, really appreciate it.

For your DDay challenge: You are using a severely distorted modification of the game that really makes it so that this game example is sort of like "Running a race against opponents who have two broken legs and that have been shot in the head at close range just to disable them."

I picked up your save game in 1745 and would have probably pushed it to the side after just a turn or two if it were not for you being in Colorado.

The problem with all these modifications is that the AI players are not programmed to use the features and therefore it gives you these tools while your opponents are essentially unarmed. The worst unbalancing feature in this game is the Panzers which are your UU and only available to you. None of your opponents has anything that remotely balances all the extra horsepower given to the panzers and this makes them just like bowls of Jellow waiting to be slapped into oblivion.

The Panzer mod features include adding the 5 extra hit points of power plus raising the base hit points for the experience levels. Your modified Elite panzer has 11 hit points at an attack strength of 16 and THIS IS WAY TOO POWERFUL. This many hit points does not just make the panzers strong, it makes them lethal enough to kill three riflemen or infantrymen in almost every turn.

In fact, your panzers are so over charged that Modern Armor is a substantial downgrade of power and Including panzers in armies is a severe strategic mistake in most cases. Four free ranging Panzers with 11 hit points per turn can kill 10 to 11 enemy units per turn while the panzer armies can only kill three units per turn. I ended un using the excess empty armies to disband and rush things in the captured cities. I wasted several early turns figuring this factor out because frankly I have never seen anyone implement modification rules that created this type of a kill the opponent unfairly scenario.

Opps, I did not remember upping panzer settings. I must have run a test of panzer vs MA and forgot to reset back. Definitely will fix before next game. Great catch.

The artillery modified to have two movement points is also unbalancing because the AI is not programmed to use artillery well even in the default game. With your mod factors the artillery can move into enemy territory and fire all in the same turn and the AI doesn't know how to do this.

Good point. I have not used that strategy. I only use artillery for defense. I guess this is just a programming problem to get use to. At one point I tried increasing range by 1 for each land bombardment advance. catapault=1, canon=2, artillery=3, radar art=4. But that horribily messed up the game, so I simplified to range 1 for older unit and range 2 for modern units. Since there is this programming problem, it would not effect my play at all to revert back to range 1.

The carriers with a capacity of 20 bombers are overpowering.

I was trying to include all three dimensions: land, sea, and air. The problem is the game really really slows down if for a 20 bomber force you have to move 5 carriers instead of one. I was thinking back to pearl and 20 bombers seemed like a small force for a carrier. You could be right about this schewing the game play.

There is also someting wierd going on in this game because the AIs have horses but have never built any offensive strike units such as Knights of Cavalry. This will truly be fatal for them and is not typical.

I don't think they are researching the necessary techs. I may have reduced AI tech trading too much. IN other games I have seen AI knights and cavs.

Also, never, never, never, never use the Automated worker functions to play the game. These automated functions waste worker movement turns at about 30% waste or more. It took me about 3 turns to figure out that you had most of your workers locked into this time wasting part of the strategy game.

Actually I use Shift-A. So it is faster to manually control workers. I thought Shift-A, speeded up game play. But if it slows it down, it definitely will not be a loss to keep on manual. I will try next game on manual and see what that does to total game play time.

You also needed airports in many, many more cities to make this invasion strategy really click and it took 3 or 4 turns for me to figure that out as well.

I thought I had the minimum number of feeder airports. Granted sometimes I had to move armor across the continent to find a free airport. But I could always airlift as much armor as I could produce at first. I slowly added airports.

All this set to the side, The Persians are your real enemy in this game but you do not seem to have an embassy or spy to better visualize how your enemy is arrayed. You have most of your invasion resources targeted at Montezuma.

I really didn't want to start the war this early. It was on the attempt to plant a Spy in Persia that they declared war. At that point I figured what the heck and kept it going.

Montezuma was a result of getting lost. I wanted one landing zone in W Persia and W Aztec, but ended with 2 going to W Aztec. Do not like the idea of restarting when a mistake is made, so I continued with delayed W Persia landing.

The other problem factor in the game is the offshore islands. These provide culture refuges that prevent you from adopting Bill Sherman's "Cut loose and slash them into oblivion strategy."

This was a test game. Normally I would go for the extremes of the empire and work inward. I wanted to know what happens if hit the center and mop up the outer borders later.

I took your invasion forces in 1745 and whipped them all ashore at the best possible places I could find withing the next movement range of the transports. This put the upper invasions on two opposite sides of the continent working to link up across the mid band of the continent from Malinalco to the hils between Tamuin and Tiacopan.

You southern invasion force, I consolidated and sent ashore on the hill west of Arbela.

I rushed three extra transports to finish transporting the panzer armies across the oceans plus immediately returned the transports from the south back to your #17 city to reload them and hit the Persian big island with a 3 transport task force of panzers and mechs.

I burned the transports on the northern zones to rush the airport in the same turn as the initial assault 1 turn after landing. Saved one transport from Malinalco to deal with Behistun offshore problem.

In all the cities at home I converted production away from bombers and over to ground units of the best appropriate type to use the available shields and prodcue the maximum number of units per turn. Used many of those old obsolete units on the home front to balance and short rush units in almost every city so I could get 1 panzer, 1 mech, 1 cavalry, or 1 longbowman, or one swordsman per city in almost every turn.

Never rush the full or inital shield balance of any unit or any improvement, the cost is doubled by the program.

Good reminder, rarely do this. I like to wait until next turn to rush

I did not use mobilization because I wanted to preserve the ability to build culture improvements in the forntier cities as needed.

I have never tried war mobilitization as I usually don't want to give up culture improvements

Killed Persia completely by about 1760, and cleared Monty from the contininet 1 turn later because all the units could be freed up from holding the Persian cities.

I am out of town this week but will post some pics for you later.

Anxious to see your pics, as assumed you did a better job on the campaign than I did.

I would strongly reccomend playing back closer to the base Civ3 game because you will have some very bad habits to break if you expect to survive on the more fun and more challenging upper difficulty levels without using the mod factor crutches.

Good luck,

To summarize your suggestions:
1. elite HP +1 is not used fairly by AI, reset to std
2. correct mod of panzers having to much force. Reduce by 5.
3. AI does not use increased range for artillery, reset art. and r.art back to range 1.
4. AI doesn't expect carriers to have full load, so reset back to load 5 so it has a fair chance.
5. Restore some AI tech trading ability.

Strategy lessons:
1. Panzer army is bad, bad, bad.
2. Shift-A slows down game way too much.
3. Join some excess workers into cities as you don't need the expense.
4. Don't play for score, just plan an eliminated the other civ.
5. Game is more fun if progress to higher levels and set preferences closer to std options AI was programmed to use.

Did I miss anything?

Again, don't forget the images. I want to learn tactics too.

Great learning opportunity. Still think it would be fun to have a wide variety of people creating 10 play weekend scenarios for us all to play and learn.

[Panag]

hi ,

good work Planetfall , ....

, keep posting .

have a nice day

[HazieDaVampire]

i find once i've got my transportation of tanks coming over the water sorted out, the game gets boring. If the AI actualy knew to attack my transporters some how it would easily stop me invading!

[Panag]

Originally posted by HazieDaVampire
i find once i've got my transportation of tanks coming over the water sorted out, the game gets boring. If the AI actualy knew to attack my transporters some how it would easily stop me invading!

hi ,

the AI has nothing to throw at you , ..... poor AI , ...

and because of you , the AI has no techs neither , ....

bad-boy , ......

its your own fault , ...

have a nice day