Vel's Strategy Thread - Part Two

[Gamer at heart]

It is my experience so far (I admit this experience is somewhat limited to around 7-10 full games. I an TRYING to fight the addiction right now... ) that defensive wars take a lot longer to affect your population's morale. If you don't have any troops in the enemy territory, war weariness might as well take 10 or more turns to show up. But, becoming the aggressor, even in wars that were declared TO you and not BY you, will speed the rising of unhappiness.

Great call on the late-game AI weaknesses. I would add the war tactics to the tech catching problem. I've always had a whole different kind o' success in my late wars, even when not having a tech lead. The AI tactics are very well designed for ancien wars, not so bad for middle ages wars and downright not good in the modern warfare (maybe that has to do with the lack of artillery use).

I admit that my urge to play all the time is somewhat reduced by the lack of ambiance in the game. I mean, the whole "feel like the leader" spirit is really there, but not the hatred for rival civs or twisted feeling resulting of using twisted strategies...hard to explain, but not too hard to understand, I hope!

see you later guys, happy civing!

[Arrian]

Fitz,

Ok, so catapults are not completely useless. I just tend to like an extra attack unit instead. That's just impatience, I think.

I just realized that using bombard units early on may have an added bonus I hadn't thought about when I decided against catapults. The reduction of defenders to 1 or 2 hp prior to attack obviously makes things easier on your attack units, but I hadn't really considered the added survivability of your Elite units in particular. I have lost elite units in situations where a catapult softening defenders may have altered the outcome. EDIT: to explain, I used to try to "soften" defenders with non-elite units first, but they often WIN, killing the defender and leaving my elite unit nothing to kill. So I ended up hitting with elites first, and thus losing some.

Given the INCREDIBLE power of leaders, perhaps I should bring some catapults along next time I fight an ancient war.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

The AI at war

Gamer,

Yeah, the AI gets worse and worse at war as the game progresses. This is due to the increasing complexity of war. In the ancient era, it's pretty straightforward, and thus the AI doesn't have to be all that adept.

Build large stack of swordsmen (or your UU, or whatever). Kill.

Fast-forward to the Modern Era. Build large stack of Tanks. Charge! I will chew those Tanks up and spit them out, because I understand how to use all of the Modern Era weapons, whereas the AI does not. Artillery is the best example, but I maintain that it also misuses Bombers and Ships, not to mention its mobile units. Yes, it can be annoying when an AI ship/bomber breaks a road. But it would be much more annoying if the AI ship/bomber (or rather shipS/BomberS) beat the hell out of my defenders and then used their mobile attack units to take cities away from me - if only for a turn or two before I retake them...it would still hurt me.

I don't bring these things up to whine and complain. I do not expect the AI to equal me in strategic or even tactical thinking - it's a computer program. This is why the higher difficulty levels give the AI production bonuses. However, there are some relatively glaring things that maybe, just maybe can be patched or modified in a later version of the game (hey, they did make the CIV II AI nastier in the MPG edition... though not smarter). The use of artillery would be one, and it could be major. Imagine having to deal with enemy bombardment of your cities... breaking your 1000 year old temples and beating up your defenders. Oooh, I'd be mad.

-Arrian

[Fitz]

Actually, I forgot to mention that Arrian, even though I certainly intended to. I was experiencing the same problem, although I have yet to get a leader from an elite.

However, another key point of artillery is the overrun. If you are trying for a quick push through several cities to your objective, or even just a fast moving military campiagn, with swordsmen/longbowmen (infantry based units) catapults help. With horsemen, they may not. Example:
Turn 1, catapults advance on the city, along with infantry.
Turn 2, 1/2 catapults pound the city. Infantry attacks, taking minimal damage. Unharmed infantry advance into the city capturing it. After the first unit captures it, the rest move through the city, alon with the other half of the unused catapults towards the next city.

Now, the you can do the same thing with infantry alone, but you will potentially take many more losses, and certainly have much more healing to do. The number of infantry who advance through the city will be much less, since more were damaged in the assault.

Compared to my first game, in which I never used catapults for attacking, my advances into enemy territory have been lighting fast in this game.

Enough catapults garuntee you won't lose any of your attacking force. I don't think that extra infantry will do the same. Basically, if I start with 20 swordsmen & ten catapults, I'll probably end with the same (assuming early game opponent). If I start with 30 swordsmen, I may or may not end with even 20 swordsmen.

[vmxa1]

Speaking of MPP's, in Civ2 you could agree to enter a war for your friends and then never do anything and they did not object, does that work in Civ3? If I have an MPP with a civ that is not on my land mass and they get me into a war with a foe that is not on my land mass, what happens if I never send troops? Will they take note? I normally do not agree to sing MPP's, I will ask for them, but not join.

[Gamer at heart]

catapults

I agree with Fitz on that subject. They DO make offensive wars easier and minimize casualties. And for a really small cost also! That 20 shields make them a worthy investment, plus they can later be upgraded to cannons. I will usually build them in small cities that produce one shield/turn so they at least BUILD something. I like the 1catapult/20 turns more than the 1swordman/30 turns in those cities. The other great thing about catapults is they can help on defence. Of course, you have to make sure your city is well defended enough so you won't give 'em to your opponent, but they will insure minimal losses on the defender side. That makes me fortify one or two in cities that are more at risk of being attacked, and sometimes more when at war.

Arrian, I'm with you 'bout the AI! I really think Soren and al. did an excellent job overall, but it would be foolish to think the AI perfect. I was just trying to point out a few things that could be made better. I've never played civ2 in MP, but if the AI was indeed improved, I hope they'll make a MP for civ3! I admit it might be a little scary tho'...

[pchang]

If war exists between you and an AI, they WILL attack you. Sure, you can sit back and do nothing if you like, but in a few turns the AI WILL come to you. So, if you are in a war, be prepared to fight. If not on his ground, then at least on your own. Also, the AI is much less inclined to get a peace treaty if the war is going on in your territory, even if you are pasting him.

[cousLee]

Something I noticed about catapult defenders. I had a stack of units with 2 of them in it. the AI attacked the stack, and when the first AI unit attacked, one catapult took it's free shot, the second one did nothing. when the second unit attacked, then the other one fired it's shot. The third ai attack, neither of them did anything. I didn't lose any of the 3 battles, but it is something to keep in mind when deciding on a catapult defense strategy.

Mid game defensive strategy idea: I recently came to this conclusion, but havn't tried it out yet in full swing. In my current game, I can build musketmen, but they are shield expensive. I put an island town down and of course it was not connected to the strategic resources. I am able to build spearmen in that town. Since cash is easier to come by than fighting corruption, I was thinking of using that as a cheap unit base, and haul them suckers back to a "good" base and upgrade them. Now because this is mid-game and the isalnd is killed by corruption, it won't work as well as I want, but what if... Mid game you found a city near your capitol or FP, and leave that sucker NOT road connected. build cheap, upgrade. rinse, repeat. Of course you would have to keep that in mind when building your core cities, to keep a reserve area set aside. (thinks of a mountain base with that extra iron on it). If your not cash-strapped, it could work real well.

[Arrian]

Gamer - The AI in CIV II Multiplayer Gold Edition wasn't really improved. It was just meaner than the original CIV II. It hated you. If you were strong, it HATED you. Diplomacy was non-existent (except - maybe - for first contact). None of that mattered, because the AI was inept (again, not bad for 1995) and easily beaten once you understood it. Diety became at matter of "can I break 1000% in this game?"

What I meant was that Firaxis will probably make a Multiplayer Gold CIV III at some point, and maybe they can tweak some relatively minor things in the AI. Maybe, maybe not.

Anyway, we're supposed to be discussing strategy for beating the AI as it is now. It seems to me, if you don't want to use despotic rush/base pairing/ics - type strategies to overcome the AI bonuses above regent level, you must take advantage of the AI when trading. This means, of course, that you need to somehow get a bunch of luxury resources so that you can trade them for money and tech. That involves carefully planned expansion and a certain amount of luck, or a war... or all three. Also, it means finding that other continent asap (obviously not the case if you're playing pangea maps) so that you can trade with the civs over there. It may be worth it to risk a galley or two to get over there and make contact.

Tech trading is tricky - usually I don't want to give up a tech that will give the AI a nasty unit or allow it to build a wonder you're working on. However, there are several techs that I love to trade to the AI, if I get them first (on the higher levels this is tough, of course). Ecology is my favorite. Harmless (well, it is on the way to Modern Armor, but in and of itself it's harmless) and the AI will pay through the nose for it. Music theory is another, since I never build Shakespeare (although I wouldn't waste time researching this on Monarch or higher, so I wouldn't have it before the AI anyway).

More to come on upper-level strategy once I've gotten some more games under my belt.

-Arrian

[Velociryx]

I decided to take a break from the serious testing and have what I refer to as one of my "Yahoo!" games, where I don't really think much....no deep strategy (well...okay, some), and mostly spin out a good story.

I started a story from one of my really early games, but scrapped it when I realized that I really didn't know enough about the game at that point to make it a good one....heh...this one should kick....

-=Vel=-

[arborman]

Despot rushing-long term

In my current game I selected two cities to be whipped, and the rest to be builders etc, for the most part. It's now almost 4000 years later, and 2000 years after I stopped using the population rush and left despotery behind me, and they still can't forget the tyranny I wrought upon them back in 3000 BC. I try to tell them the Iroquois were invading and we needed the swordsmen, but they are still angry, after all the temples etc. Ive built for them. I try to tell them we are an enlightened democracy, that I ve changed my ways, but they still harbour a grudge. So... there is a downside to pop-rushing, if you do it too much. However, the upside is I survived the invasion and managed to kill the Iroquois and take their cities.
This minor effect may not be a big deal in maps where you can build an unlimited number of cities. However, I like to click that random button and see what happens, and in this case it's almost 85% water, and the largest civ has maybe ten cities. I have nine, but they are well connected. Also, only one civ has any freshwater, which meant we all had slower growth. Maybe in the huge tracts of land games the whip effects are less important, but I need those cities to produce.

[Quurgoth]

I don't think the gold/turn trades for tech are broken.

Later in the game, if I want to buy a tech straight up from the AI, it costs ~1000-2000. If I want to sell a tech to the AI, they usually offer 50ish gold/turn... which comes out at 1000 total. Seems fair, no?

Then again, I sell the tech to everyone else, too, getting quite a bit more out of it than the combined AI benefits from the 1000gp purchase I make when THEY hold the tech.

[Arrian]

Man, this Monarch game I've got going is taking me forever. It would probably have ended last night (I'm building the Spaceship) if Joan of Arc wasn't such a wench.

As I've mentioned, I'm a democracy, everyone else is communist. At this point, the English have ceased to be, and the Aztecs have two cities on an island. That leaves me, Shaka, Catherine and Joan. I have cities on the Franco-Russian continent, for resources (silk, rubber, aluminum). These are either captured Aztecs towns or raze/rebuild jobs on top of old Aztec towns.

Joan moved a stack of riflemen/infantry onto my land. Now, she DID have a coastal city that was surrounded by three of my Aztec protectorates (thus giving her no way to get troops there, except through me). She was, I think, at war w/the Aztecs, who as I mentioned were on an island off the coast. Still, I didn't trust her and ordered her to leave. Guess what she did.

Luckily, I had been airlifting 4 units per turn over there, so I had a substantial army of tanks/mech inf. lying about, not to mention the bulk of my bomber force. Joan convinced Cathy to join her against me (maybe it had something to do with that spy I tried to plant in Moscow ). I signed up Shaka for my side of things. This, I later decided, was a mistake. I was unwilling to "betray" Shaka by making peace before our alliance was up. That meant 20 turns of war. 20 turns of war in a democracy, shortly after finishing a different (longer) war, is brutal. Absolutely brutal. First off, I had been selling all sorts of things to Russia, so my budget get REALLY tight. Second, I had been importing a luxury from France, the loss of which hurt even more. Further, as we have been told, war weariness is harsher if you enter the AI's territory to fight. But if you remain defensive, the AI won't make peace with you. This is a catch 22. So I bombed the hell out of Joan's tanks (a stack of 8 showed up at the gates of what was formerly Tenochticlan) and mopped them and the Russkie Cossacks up with my Tanks. I then set about creating a "no-man's land" between my cities and theirs, by bombarding all the connecting roads and razing a couple of cities. Then I hunkered down and tried to wait out the 20 turn alliance thing. Ouch, did it hurt. We're talkin' 40% luxury spending, no science, barely in the black (+100/turn, and that's with several high-production cities producing "wealth"). This, with 5 native luxuries (not to mention Univ. Sufferage and police stations). I eventually built a city where a Russian one had been to snag dyes, which upped my luxury count to 6, and helped a bit. I also, just before the war ended, grabbed the only uranium deposits on that continent, along with the former English city of Coventry, which had Leo's - not that I need that now. Thank GOD I got the uranium, since Joan built the Manhattan Project during the war. I tried to sabotage it, but it would have cost me:

low chance of success - $5000
medium - $10000
high - $20000

Um, yeah. So anyway, it appears that war weariness accumulates kinda like the "cruel oppression" of the whip, and takes some time to dissipate. If you get into another war after 1 turn of peace, you're right back where you were. This is a good thing, but tough to deal with as a democracy. If you're religious, a switch to Communism may be worth it. One thing I don't like is the fact that other people's oppression becomes your problem when you capture cities. An example of a french town that was unhappy (1 citizen, temple, 5 luxuries, 20% luxury spending at the time):

33% Stop the agression toward our mother country!
33% Give peace a chance!
33% Hell No! We won't go! Stop the draft!

Guess who did the drafting? Not me, I assure you.

Think long and hard before you enlist an ally to help you with a war. This locks you in for 20 turns, unless you're willing to take the reputation hit that comes with making peace early and "betraying" your ally. I decided to stick it out, as that ally shared a continent with me, and I like him "gracious." This did, however, cost me half the population of my capitol, as I had a nuclear meltdown on turn 17 of the war. Curiously, the nuclear plant is STILL THERE. All it did was create a ton of pollution (which I cleaned in 2 turns) and kill some population. The city then went into "We love the Emperor day." I didn't find that particluarly amusing at the time.

-Arrian

[eMarkM]

Yeah, I've had my first real taste of how bad war weariness can be in my current Monarch/Egypt game. I'm in "MPP hell". No, I don't have MPP w/ anyone, it's everyone else who has MPP against me.

In this game I own about half the world's resources. I have everything, have drained everyone's treasury selling to them, and have dominated the game. So I'm getting ganged up on by the remaining powers in modern era. I want to stay Dems to keep ahead in tech, but I'm being forced to go Commie.

Here's the situation. France has MPP with Iroq & America. America declares war on me. I take an island city of theirs, so France is dragged into war. France and Iroq sign alliance against me, so I'm fighting against 3. They're all on other continents, so it's one of these "bombard my roads constantly" type wars. Occasionally they send a transport full of their outdated Archers. No biggie. My army outclasses all of them combined, but the civil disorder becomes a real problem.

So I'm kinda desperate for peace, not because they're a threat, I just want to go back to Dems. I sue w/ France finally after taking a city on their continent. So I want to do this to the others so my citizens will be happy again. But I make the mistake of attacking America and France's MPP is triggered all over again. Eventually I get peace w/ America and France, but Iroq continues to be a thorn. But now I can't attack them directly because that will trigger the France MPP. I have to play defensive only. Arrrrggh! Very frustrating not being able to sail an armada to the very weak Iroq land and teaching them a lesson.

It's taken decades, but I finally have peace w/ all of them. It was very difficult to juggle w/ this when you're trying to make peace, but can't attack aggressors to force them to the table. They go on and on refusing my envoy. If you attack, you bring the other AIs right back into the fight. OTOH, it's made for some challenge in an otherwise won game.

e

[Arrian]

Mark,

Pretty similar to my situation, except that you sound a bit stronger. My enemies did eventually come up with Tanks and Bombers, which is annoying. If I was willing to put in the effort, however (my Power takes up about 1/2 the histograph), I could wipe France and Russia (France first) off the map, but I want to build the Spaceship. Conquest gets boring after a while. I can't build the damn spaceship during the war b/c I can't affort to continue research (I have a 3-5 tech lead on the opposition, but not all the spaceship techs). War weariness is really bad after a while - my capitol that blew up had 5 entertainers to go along with the 5 luxuries, 40% lux. rate, Univ. Suffrage and police station. Wow. War, particularly late in the game, is a pandora's box of problems.

A suggestion for those of you who, like me, want to win via the spaceship: Stay out of MPP's and alliances, and always keep a strong army available, complete with navy and transports. This way, if you do get into a war, you can end it as quickly as possible, with overwhelming force. My problem wasn't the force bit, it was the alliance. I didn't need Shaka's help... it's just that initial French strike force (turned out to be just about all Joan had) kinda worried me. My mistake.

-Arrian