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I guess I was stuck in some kind of mode; I've been playing CivIII since Day 1 with horrible results all around. My civs kinda sucked, I was "behind the curve" in terms of developing my cities, and my army was laughable. I started another game a few days ago as the Japanese. Large map, 3 other civs (still getting into the flow of the game): Chinese (nearest, to the south), Indians (2nd closest, south of Chinese), and Germans (waaaay to the north).
I started the game and everything seemed to be going OK. The cities were developing nicely, and I had a good relationship with the Indians and Chinese. The Germans were the last civ I contacted, a good ways thru the game. Around 1000 AD the Germans contact me and demand that I trade maps with them or they will "destroy me". I laugh it off; they're a ways away. But I trade with them anyway just to be on the safe side. Giving up my map: big deal. About 1400 AD they contact me again, this time demanding a tribute (can't remember what), and I turned them down, and they declare war on me. My ONLY source of Iron is the northern-most (and newest) city I had. I hadn't even had a chance to connect it to my road network before the Germans showed up in full force. I had a few military units already there, and held them off easily. However with the # of units they were bringing down, I knew that I'd never be able to connect the city to the rest of the empire, and that this "war" wouldn't accomplish anything other than wasting my time and resources, so I sue for peace; the Germans accepted.
Meanwhile, on the Southern front, all is going good so far. The Indians and Chinese have begun expanding closer to my boarder, so I quickly make a few settlers to build cities, which will stretch my boarders from one coast to the other, sealing a large gap right next to my empire off from the rest of the world, which I could settle at my convenience. The Chinese didn't like that: they wanted that land. So they picked the newest (read: practically undefended) of my cities, lined up 3 spearman RIGHT next to it and (you guessed it) declared war on me at the beginning of their turn and marched into the city, and razed it. Right out of the blue. I was ticked, but I still hadn't gotten the Iron connected to my road, so my military unit options were kinda limited in terms of what I could make. I rushed a few riflemen into production for defense, but the best offensive unit I could make was Horsemen (*yawn*). The Chinese picked the next city, and moved a TON of units to it; at least 15 units, mostly spearmen and warriors. My riflemen were able to kill most of them, but the shear numbers were overwhelming. The city fell, and I quit the game (I was mad, but I also had to work in the morning, so I had to get some sleep).
After doing some thinking yesterday, I went home after work at started the game from the last save position (I lost a LOT of advances, and a few cities), and went at it from a different strategy. Sure enough, the Germans made their demands again, 1st for world maps, then a tribute to keep me from their wrath. I gave into the 1st, and was about to tell them to take a hike on the 2nd one when I took another look at what they wanted: my territory map (sheesh, they can have it), and Chivalry. I'd discovered that almost 1000 years before. I gave it to them, because it kept me out of a useless war that I could have no doubt won, but the time it would have taken and the production wasted would have been too much; the Germans were a good bit away from me, on the other side of a massive jungle. There, that keeps the Germans off my back for a while. Instead of building a city to get to the one iron tile, I build a colony instead; easier to hook up to my road network, and no need to maintain it. The Germans won't be bothering me, so it needs minimal babysitting. Now to the Southern front; I keep a closer eye on the Indians and Chinese, and see that they're getting closer to making moves across my territory. Quick, get the settlers out, extend the borders and seal off the area; the meat of my empire is surrounded on all sides by water; the only way in by land is thru two small bottlenecks on the NE and SW side. Built the cities, already had workers on their way out to start developing the land, and had musketmen in production, ready to ship out to the front. Meanwhile, I see what the Indians are after: a lone square of saltpeter, in one of the pockets of open land right beside my empire. They came thru my territory and started building a road directly to it. I hightail a settler thru production, and get a horsemen to do some stall tactics on the worker. There's no settler with them, so it looks like their going to build a colony. I foil that option by putting a horsemen directly on the square. My settler gets built, and I run him up there and build a city. No gunpowder for the Indians! I then build another city to stretch my borders out to the newly built city.
So, a little better planning on my part, plus pay a LOT more attention to what was happening around me, and now I'm the king of the hill. I've built almost every Wonder so far; the only ones I didn't get were a few Ancient-era ones. The cities are chugging out so much wealth I'm able to increase my science spending, slicing 2 turns off each discovery, and I own every Happiness wonder, so I have very few unhappy citizens. Corruption is a small problem, but the sheer output of my cities makes it look negligible (plus I switched to a Democracy).
I'm still waiting for the patch to fix one thing: the lack of strategic resources. I recently discovered steam power and a few quick looks over the map shows TWO coal squares, both nowhere near my empire. When I saved and quit last night I was deploying a few horsemen out, with a lot of workers to go scouting for coal.
Only 8.5 hours until quitting time!
Chris
I started the game and everything seemed to be going OK. The cities were developing nicely, and I had a good relationship with the Indians and Chinese. The Germans were the last civ I contacted, a good ways thru the game. Around 1000 AD the Germans contact me and demand that I trade maps with them or they will "destroy me". I laugh it off; they're a ways away. But I trade with them anyway just to be on the safe side. Giving up my map: big deal. About 1400 AD they contact me again, this time demanding a tribute (can't remember what), and I turned them down, and they declare war on me. My ONLY source of Iron is the northern-most (and newest) city I had. I hadn't even had a chance to connect it to my road network before the Germans showed up in full force. I had a few military units already there, and held them off easily. However with the # of units they were bringing down, I knew that I'd never be able to connect the city to the rest of the empire, and that this "war" wouldn't accomplish anything other than wasting my time and resources, so I sue for peace; the Germans accepted.
Meanwhile, on the Southern front, all is going good so far. The Indians and Chinese have begun expanding closer to my boarder, so I quickly make a few settlers to build cities, which will stretch my boarders from one coast to the other, sealing a large gap right next to my empire off from the rest of the world, which I could settle at my convenience. The Chinese didn't like that: they wanted that land. So they picked the newest (read: practically undefended) of my cities, lined up 3 spearman RIGHT next to it and (you guessed it) declared war on me at the beginning of their turn and marched into the city, and razed it. Right out of the blue. I was ticked, but I still hadn't gotten the Iron connected to my road, so my military unit options were kinda limited in terms of what I could make. I rushed a few riflemen into production for defense, but the best offensive unit I could make was Horsemen (*yawn*). The Chinese picked the next city, and moved a TON of units to it; at least 15 units, mostly spearmen and warriors. My riflemen were able to kill most of them, but the shear numbers were overwhelming. The city fell, and I quit the game (I was mad, but I also had to work in the morning, so I had to get some sleep).
After doing some thinking yesterday, I went home after work at started the game from the last save position (I lost a LOT of advances, and a few cities), and went at it from a different strategy. Sure enough, the Germans made their demands again, 1st for world maps, then a tribute to keep me from their wrath. I gave into the 1st, and was about to tell them to take a hike on the 2nd one when I took another look at what they wanted: my territory map (sheesh, they can have it), and Chivalry. I'd discovered that almost 1000 years before. I gave it to them, because it kept me out of a useless war that I could have no doubt won, but the time it would have taken and the production wasted would have been too much; the Germans were a good bit away from me, on the other side of a massive jungle. There, that keeps the Germans off my back for a while. Instead of building a city to get to the one iron tile, I build a colony instead; easier to hook up to my road network, and no need to maintain it. The Germans won't be bothering me, so it needs minimal babysitting. Now to the Southern front; I keep a closer eye on the Indians and Chinese, and see that they're getting closer to making moves across my territory. Quick, get the settlers out, extend the borders and seal off the area; the meat of my empire is surrounded on all sides by water; the only way in by land is thru two small bottlenecks on the NE and SW side. Built the cities, already had workers on their way out to start developing the land, and had musketmen in production, ready to ship out to the front. Meanwhile, I see what the Indians are after: a lone square of saltpeter, in one of the pockets of open land right beside my empire. They came thru my territory and started building a road directly to it. I hightail a settler thru production, and get a horsemen to do some stall tactics on the worker. There's no settler with them, so it looks like their going to build a colony. I foil that option by putting a horsemen directly on the square. My settler gets built, and I run him up there and build a city. No gunpowder for the Indians! I then build another city to stretch my borders out to the newly built city.
So, a little better planning on my part, plus pay a LOT more attention to what was happening around me, and now I'm the king of the hill. I've built almost every Wonder so far; the only ones I didn't get were a few Ancient-era ones. The cities are chugging out so much wealth I'm able to increase my science spending, slicing 2 turns off each discovery, and I own every Happiness wonder, so I have very few unhappy citizens. Corruption is a small problem, but the sheer output of my cities makes it look negligible (plus I switched to a Democracy).
I'm still waiting for the patch to fix one thing: the lack of strategic resources. I recently discovered steam power and a few quick looks over the map shows TWO coal squares, both nowhere near my empire. When I saved and quit last night I was deploying a few horsemen out, with a lot of workers to go scouting for coal.
Only 8.5 hours until quitting time!
Chris
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