Vel's Strategy Thread - Part Three

[Hastus]

A little bit about the Americans and the Greeks.

First a question about leaders.
Is it possible to get a new leader when you already have one? When one is already sleeping at your capital for example.

This may be answered already by someone in some thread but then I have missed it. I have always used up my leaders as soon as get them when I am at war because I suspected you can not get another leader before the one you have is used.
I hope I am wrong.
Grateful for an answer to this.

Moving on. I played the Americans recently and found out that they are pretty amazing if you combine their two traits
( Expansionist and Industrious ) .
Most Expansionist Civilizations if any ( I can't remember ) do not have Industrious as a trait.
What I did was that I used my first worker to build mines around my first city,just two or three and on grassland with shields and on a cow. Since those Industrious workers build so fast I got the benefit from the mines quickly and was able to finish my granary as first build in my town without losing to much of expansion to the AI. Because when the granary is complete and since the city already got mines around it. It becomes a settler factory with speed. Quickly gaining up any lost grounds.
However this may depend if you start on a island or not.
If you start on a continent with several AI's you will be able to benefit most from this.
As speed is the essence of gameplay in the early start the Americans are able to box in their rivals quickly.
They are however weak military in the ancient times so you need to try and stay friends with all. Maybe its just still random but it feels like the AI's are more aggressive after the 116f patch.
One good thing that came with the patch is that if you are into the war in modern times, I can tell you those F-15's just rocks.

Just would like to add a note about the Greeks as well, I played them a couple of days ago and their special unit The Hop's
(I know,I can't remember the whole name ). At the game I had a medium empire compared to the most of the AI's but was able to harass and dominate the ancient era. All thanks to alot of pillaging and harrassing. The computer will quickly want to sign peace with you when his capital drops from pop 12 to pop 3 from pillaging. And they ain't very happy about attacking a unit or several with a defense of 3 standing in hills,forest,mountains etc.
Most of the time the computer did not even try to attack since he knew he would lose 4 - 5 units against 1.

As always, thanks to all who keeps posting great ideas.

[Velociryx]

midnight ramblin'....

Had a chance to organize a few additional thoughts, so I thought I'd hit ya with a ramble....

Metagame
What is it, exactly?

Depends on who you ask.

In the classic strategy game, Magic: The Gathering, the Metagame essentially meant intentionally doing what the other guy wasn't. If somebody hit you with a black speed deck, you went the opposite direction, looking for ways using white/green (black's oppositional colors) to defeat the deck and it's inevitable avalanche of copycat designs.

If somebody went creature-heavy, you whipped up an elaborate trap deck, or focused on heavy direct damage and mass-effect spells (never met a weenie deck that could stand up too well to a few well placed earthquakes or hurricanes!).

So....that's part of it, sure.

Another part of it is finding keys.

What is it, exactly, that's making the "other guy's" strategy work. WHY is it working the way it is.

Find a way to beat the key, you beat the rest of your opponent's game by default.

The metagame is, in the same breath, about changing the venue and forcing your opponents to play the game your way....on your terms, and about taking subtle control over the gaming envrionment itself. It's more than just superior strategy....it's more than excelling at tactical maneuver.....it's more than having better micromanagement skills, though all those things certainly play a role.

Ultimately, it's about control.

Finesse.

So....until a real pro comes along to show us how it's done, I'll jot down the odd bits I've been learning about it, and how to use it in Civ-terms to improve your game.

Here goes nothing....

OoO

Balance.

If you have it, and your opponents don't, you are in a stronger position, even if you have a weaker army and fewer cities.

So....keep your opponents off balance, and maintain your own center while you do it.

If you want to use the metagame to your advantage, then the first step is to understand that small moves....tiny changes made in the early game create huge imbalances later on.

This is why the "Oscillating War" paradigm works so well.

Let's do a quick compare. You start a game and find yourself surrounded by four other civs, so you immediately start gearing up for war with one of them. You do the usual stuff....REX expansion, build up an army and....thrash a civ.

You capture lots of cities, and get stronger, relative to everyone around you.

And when the last city of your target civ falls, you take a quick survey and discover that, while you've been busy kicking butt, your other near rivals have been growing and building.

Sure, you can maybe go to war again with one or more of your neighbors, but they're entrenched now. They've gotten bigger and stronger while you were culling the herd.

Compare that to fighting an Oscillating War.

In this case, you pick one of the four (the smallest, actually...the one you choked off with your REX expansion) and make him a junior partner for your festivities.

You trade with him, build up good will with him, and while you're doing that, you're plotting your attacks.

First guy, you hit like a hurricane, but with every city you take, you call him up, trying to make peace. You also invite your junior partner to participate, granting RoP and drawing him closer.

Why do you do this?

First, you do it so that one of your targets doesn't invite him to join the war on their side.

Second, you do it precisely because he IS smaller, and your troops are better positioned.

Odds are good that he'll not actually take a city anyway, and if he does, then so much the better for you.

Third, you do it as insurance. If the other civs on your contintent decide to gang-bang you....you can rely on at least one ally.

After one or two cities fall....he caves in (point: we're talking about the VERY early game....if he's only got 4 cities and you cut him in half, he WILL come to the table), and despite the AI's production advantages at the higher levels of play, he's considerably set back.

Without pausing, you immediately turn your attenion to Civ#2 on your borders and execute a repeat performance.

After a city or two, he likewise comes to the table, hat in hand.

And again, without pausing, you turn your attention to the third neighbor and repeat.

Now compare:

Same basic approach....ancient era warfare, but....instead of grabbing half a dozen cities from the same civ and delivering a single, devastating knockout blow, you grabbed two from three of your near neighbors.

Now, NONE OF THEM are in any shape to hurt you, or your junior partner.

Without actually wiping any civ off the face of the earth, you have just take firm control of the continent.

At this point, it is unlikely they could seriously threaten you even if they were to all gang up.

This, DESPITE their production advantages.

With the continent yours to command, you are free to do as you like, developmentally.

Select one civ to slowly waste, every twenty turns or so, re-declare war and eat a few more cities. On the higher levels of play, this will give you a steady supply of techs and keep you on par. By selecting one civ to target for destruction AFTER your round of warfare with all of them, you grow your empire in a singular direction....important for the eventual placement of your FP and possible palace relocation.

So that's the first step....taking firm control of the continent. Then play the surviving, weaker civs against each other, engineering wars via diplomacy....building one side up by trading favorably with them, denying others all access to your steadily growing base of resources.

Kingmaker....while you, the EMPEROR, and undisputed master of the continent sit back and enjoy the show.

Ahhh, but the fun doesn't stop there.

When contact is made with the civs on a neighboring continent, it's time to take your kingmaking games to an all new high.

Fact is, on the higher levels of play, a Democratic or Republican civ can out-pace you in reserach....

But if they're all fighting, they'll switch to Monarchy or Communism (a bit later).

And if they're all in corruption ridden government forms, then despite their production and research advantages, you can outpace them.

So you make a few friends on that far-off continent.

Engineer a few wars....HELP the AI civs get to the industrial age, where they can enter into MPP's.....watch them weave a tangled web....and then, light the match that sets off the powder keg.

Join in for a while if you like.....maybe establish a presence on yonder continent so you can exert more direct influence and control.

Or...sit back and watch as they tear each other to bits....always taking care to bolster the underdog, so that no one civ comes out clearly on top....

You keep them paralyzed at their same size and power....or cause a few of the more threatening ones to self destruct, while you grow more and more powerful with each passing turn.

Set up global trade embargoes against your targets....starve them technologically, and keep everyone at everyone else's throat, while you remain largely aloof and above it all.

THAT's the power of the metagame....

OoO

Don't get straightjacketed
A specific example of this: Don't allow yourself to become so enamored with 2-move troops that you forget about the power of combined arms.

It's true, we've had a lot of good discussion about the power of the horse-based troops, but don't let yourself get too accustomed to using that strategy....that habit could be hard to break....and keep in mind, Jeff started his thread for a reason, and the majority of posters came down pretty solidly on the power of 2-move troops....so if you get addicted to using them, and something changes with the release of the next patch, you'll suddenly find yourself having to re-learn.....

Economy
I went to school to study economics, but THOSE kinds of economics aren't exactly what I mean.

Learn to use economy in all its forms in your games.

The economy of production.....don't waste shields! None of them carry over, so watch your build queue. Micromanage. If you're going to finish that swordsman next turn, but six or eight shields would go to waste, then reallocate your production to get a bit more growth out of your city.

The economy of effort.....let your workers do the quickest stuff first. Don't tie them up on projects that will take fifteen turns when they could accomplish three other important tasks in the same timeframe.

The economy of motion.....make every move your troops and workers do ACCOMPLISH something for you.

All of these things create turn advantage, and on the higher levels of play, turn advantage is the best defense you've got when it comes to countering the AI's production.

Where possible, use the strengths of your enemies against them.

Intentionally DON'T settle in certain areas where you have extreme cultural clout. Let the quick-building AI civs found cities for you, and eat them with your superior culture.

If you want to destroy a neighboring civ....engineer a war between them and some other rival....get their army off balance and fighting another quick-building foe, and then move in surgically.....with care and precision, minimizing your troop losses, and steadily gaining ground against them.

Most of all....trust your instincts. Don't try to know every damned thing about a given situation. Learn enough so that you're not over your head, and then run with it. You're flexible, the AI is not. You can change plans in mid-stream. Use that to your advantage to create opportunites on the fly.

Good luck!

OoO

On Nukes: I have actually never built the first nuke. It's true that they could be a pretty massive stick to talk to the AI with, but if you have a strong early game, then no such stick is needed. It is possible to take such firm control of the gaming environment early on, that nukes don't even enter into the equation.

Besides that, they're *dreadfully* expensive for what they do.



-=Vel=-

[Aeson]

Despotism without the Pop Rush

I feel pop rushing is unbalancing, only because food is not effected by corruption. I can often build 5-10 cities (depending on map size) that will outperform pop rushing efficiency while in despotism. The problem is that any other cities I build are substantially less efficient than they would be through pop rushing. Having corruption effect excess food production would cause pop rushing to decrease in efficiency as you expand, just as other production methods do.

Pop rushing isn't necessary to win at Deity level, and actually puts the AI at quite a disadvantage if it is used and its many other weaknesses are exploited (military, pre-patch treaties, tech trading, upgrading ect.). As it is, the AI's expansion at deity can be almost matched if done correctly. I've built cities at a 5:6 ratio a few times with comparable terrain. Militarily, the player should always have an advantage over the AI, as their tactics are no better than at lower levels. It isn't uncommon for me to have 1/5th the casualties of an AI opponent, if that. This certainly is enough to overcome the expansion and production advantages that the AI does have, and pop rushing isn't needed if you never lose troops.

As far as communism goes, I never have been able to switch to it and have it make a difference. By the time it is available, gold is so abundant that rushing infrastructure is more efficient in monarchy, republic, or democracy. Also for larger empires (50+ cities, which I have in most games by then) communism often will lower commercial rates when compared to even despotism. It turns your "good" cities into junk, while barely improving unproductive cities. Overall I think monarchy is the best government for Deity games, although if I'm not playing a religious civ I usually just stay in despotism until the game is in hand.

I would use combined arms much more often if swordsmen had something they could upgrade to. As it is, when I build a horseman, I'm actually building a knight and later a Cavalry unit. When I build a swordsman, its only a swordsman, and quickly becomes extinct even if it doesn't die. At least the catapults upgrade. It would be nice to have a middle age offensive footsoldier of some type, but even if swordsmen just upgraded to defensive units that would increase their value in relation to horsemen somewhat.

[Aeson]

Oscillating War with the patch

I agree completely that rotating between Civs to beat upon is the best approach. Has anyone been able to do this successfully after installing the patch though? I've had AI Civs, down to their last city, still refuse to communicate for up to 30 turns. It certainly is best to weaken all your opponents instead of just one, but at the same time, its not a good idea to start a multi-front war very often. The only times I try are when the other opponents are already involved in a conflict.

A note about graneries, are they really worth it? I find I expand fastest when I don't build them. In the time it takes to build a granery, 2 settlers can be built. Would I rather have 2 more cities or a granery? With how early corruption sets in, I think graneries slow down the expansion to that limit. If I am going the pop rush route, I would rather have 2 units early than a granery and a steady stream of units later. 2 early units could very easily turn into extra cities each producing more units. They will meet with less resistance than your later units would. And more often than not, those earlier units can help lead to capturing that nice city that just built the pyramids for you, negating any long term advantages to building graneries I've never built many graneries when I play, but lately I haven't been building any at all, and doing better.

[Black Sunrise]

in a recent (regent) game, I had 11 cavalry still sitting around next to my 50-odd modern armor. They were my elites.

One word:
Poland.

Or, if you aren't a fan of modern military history (get thee behind me!), WWII Poland.



Indra

[Skeletal Dragon]

Hey Vel, you play magic? So do I. Anyways, I see you haven't put up a review for the Greeks yet (At least, from what I've read ) So I guess I'll put up my own...

Greeks: Commercial/Scientific

Strengths: Science and money. They can stay ahead in the science and income race consistently.

Disadvantages: Needs a large empire to function effectively (being non-industrious and non-militaristic puts them at a huge disadvantage when fighting wars).

UU: Hoplite. I find this to be one of the better UUs in the Ancient Era, since the higher defense makes it almost untouchable against other units up until Swordsmen/Immortals.

Best way to play: I've found that the best way to play Greeks is to be mainly passive. In the Ancient age, your main goal is to expand quickly in the beginning (using settler and worker farms). However, when you're trying to gain more territory by trying to fight wars, its another story since the other civs will generally be out-producing and out-muscling you. Basically, fight the weaker civs until you seize a large amount of cities to fund your research and upkeep costs. After that, crank up your research and trade your techs for a large amount gpt/luxuries and buy research/culture buildings. By the end, you can win easily with the UN victory since most civs will be gracious to you by the end of the game. However, this will give you a relatively low score, so if you play for score, don't try this method.

Ok that's about it... I'll most more if I have time

[mattcj]

It'll be interesting to see some of these strategies in play when multiplayer comes out. I know I would have a military alliance with the nearest 2 or 3 civs to wipe out Vel from the start so we wouldn't have to deal with his strategies. Does the AI never team up against any of you when you play these early cripple the nearest civ games. In my current game, the AI attacked me almost immediately and my early military alliances kept me in the game and propelled my little fledgling civ into the sprawling empire it is today. It's a shame that they don't team up against those type of strategies. The AI seems so MPP driven when Nationalism (right?) is discovered, yet it seems to stay away from the military alliances (I've seen only 1 AI-AI military alliance so far).

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Skel Drag

Your stab at a write up of the pros/cons of the greeks is a good first stab. It would be remiss though if it didn't include guerilla tactics. The excellent hoplite unit is begging to be used as a pillager. Put one of those units in the heart land of your enemy civ and let the unit pillage to his hearts content allowing the unit to become the equivalent of Sherman's march to the sea. Let the enemy thow away his units at your hoplite, all the while your reducing his civ to rubble ensuring his inability to become a viable threat to you.

Og

[mattcj]

"Ogletorpe... ??"
"Oglethorpe" (--clarifying)

-- Couldn't resist... I love that movie.

[CampedCrusader]

Originally posted by Black Sunrise


One word:
Poland.

Or, if you aren't a fan of modern military history (get thee behind me!), WWII Poland.



Indra

If I recall correctly WWII Polish Cavalry wasn't exactly sitting around WITH tons of modern armour, in fact they were trying to ATTACK tons of then modern armour.

You see the picture MAY be a little different

[Black Sunrise]

The polish calvary was indeed assisting modern armor.
They had less armor, and their calvary was actually mounted riflemen, ie a rifle unit that used forses to move from point a to point b, then dismounted and fought, but they nonetheless used both.
Or I could point out that in '39 large quantities of german artillery and especially anti-tank weapontry was still being pulled by horses.
Just something to think about.

[Quurgoth]

Civ traits and the land grab

It has been said that knowledge of the land in an area will tell you everything you need to know about its history.

*Note: I play "purist," no pop-rushing, paired cities, or such. This means I do well at Regent, mediocre at Monarch, in general.*

After playing the Americans and Egyptians in recent games, and dominating with each, I began to consider why they fared better than my forays with other civs that seem stronger on paper (Persia, Babylon, even France). I think the primary reason is that I choose maps with a high proportion of land, usually the highest land proportion in "continents" (occasionally pangea as well).

The advantages of an expansionist civ are clear in a large continent: lots of goodie huts, which translate to tons of tech and occasional extra settlers, as well as an advantage in finding and settling on critical resources and luxuries. REX is easiest for the expansive.

Almost equally obvious is the advantage of industrious civs: they can build roads rapidly, getting the aforementioned resources and luxuries tied into their network quickly. They get those crucial mines set up early, allowing for buildings in cities between production of settlers.

Less obvious, at least for me, is the advantage of an industrious/religious civ. My usual build orders are to create settler farms out of all early cities, perhaps throwing in a barracks or two. This leads, in my well-spaced purist city approach, to lots of islands of cultural envelope, with spaces between the radius of each city. Having a religious civ changed everything!

With the Egyptians, during those turns between building settlers, I was able to put temples into each city... and my cultural envelope became huge, with unprecedented freedom (in my experience) to expand out from my frontiers. Controlling even wide land bridges becomes easy when you can build a temple in 15 turns... cities can manage a cultural envelope capable of strangling even the rabbit-on-viagra AI reproduction. On the large Earth map, I was able to dominate Africa, despite a weak starting position (on the East horn, across from Saudi Arabia) and the presence of Persia and England on my continent.

Egypt also has the advantage of an early UU that is highly useful in pruning cities from rival civilizations.

Velociryx: perhaps an addition to each civ's strategy section? Something along the lines of that civilization's ideal land formations, advantages/disadvantages in REX, etc.

[Arrian]

The patch

Well, I finally got the patch and I've gotta say that it is forcing a change in my strategy. See, I expand early on at the expense of ALL other things... my settlers get a warrior escort most of the time, sometimes nothing at all. This has allowed me to keep pace with the AI expansion for a while on Monarch, at least until I've grabbed what I want. However, with the Patch, the nasty SOB's will attack you EARLY. Really, really, early. Which means I actually have to waste time and effort on some semblance of an army while I'm still trying to put down cities. Arg.

The second thing I've noticed is tech trading. The deals seem harsher, particularly for the warrior code. I used to be able to buy that for 35 gold or so... now they don't seem to want to give it up. I'm pretty sure this ties in with the fact that the AI will attack you early on... it doesn't want you having archers. I've had similar trouble getting horseback riding out of them.

Anyway, I've only started a few games (which went badly) thus far, so I have by no means explored the patch's changes fully, but this version certainly seems harder - for my style of play. If your strategy already involved lots of ancient warfare (oscillating war, for instance), you may not change much. But I generally spend the ancient era building up and preparing for a middle ages-industrial ages breakout. The patch, in my opinion, hurts that strategy a bit, as well as weakening the Babylonians, my favorite civ.

So I guess I have to be more aggressive early on, and beat the AI to the punch, because every time I have sat back peacefully, they have attacked me. I may go back to the Persians or Iroquois for a bit, as they're better at ancient war than the Babs.

Does this jive with what you all have experienced post-patch?

-Arrian

[Skeletal Dragon]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
Skel Drag

Your stab at a write up of the pros/cons of the greeks is a good first stab. It would be remiss though if it didn't include guerilla tactics. The excellent hoplite unit is begging to be used as a pillager. Put one of those units in the heart land of your enemy civ and let the unit pillage to his hearts content allowing the unit to become the equivalent of Sherman's march to the sea. Let the enemy thow away his units at your hoplite, all the while your reducing his civ to rubble ensuring his inability to become a viable threat to you.

Og

The problem is that I rarely use pillaging as a winning strategy in Civ 3. The reason? I'm going to be capturing the enemy cities and rebuilding the terrain improvements takes too much time if I'm not industrious. I'd rather capture a good quality city than a crippled city as well since it can contribute to the war effort too (Great places to stop and heal up if you don't have Battlefield medicine, or to build additional troops). If I end up razing the city, I start to over-extend myself since there would be no places for my forces to regroup.

This is why I have a problem with Bombardment in its current stage. It hits city improvements and civilians way too much, and doesn't hit defending units as much as I want them too. Usually, if I bombard them out and then attack them, the city would usually be size 1-3 with no city improvements whatsoever. And this is from trying to hit the defenders so that my attackers can get through with minimal damage (Prime example is a large city with Infantry defenders with veteran Cavalry attackers with no strategic terrain... it's very hard to hit the infantry.).

[Quurgoth]

Post patch expansion

Arrian: I'm sure you've considered this, but military strength is a large factor in the AI decision to attack or not.

Build more cheap units, give the appearance of strength, and you should be able to get out of the ancient era without getting attacked.

In a few of my early iterations with Egypt, I got attacked too often. The next run through, I built a number of chariots... and not only was I left alone, I was eventually an aggressor.

This does hamper the REX, warrior/settler strategy (which I also follow). It requires having at least one city to crank out units with regularity. Toward that end, I usually put my fifth (or so) city in a low-food area among hills, mine/road the hills, and let that city crank out my military.