Nation balance

[Ironikinit]

Arrian

Well, I know better than to assume that you screwed the pooch on leader generation by military mismanagement or letting a leader sit idle.

My last game was with the Babs and they generated plenty, more, I'm sure than I've generated some games with militarists. However, the only games I recall that never generated a single leader were with non militaristic civs.

Cheap barracks, harbors and airports might be small comfort when having trouble generating leaders as a militarist, but it's better than the big fat zero expansionists get if the early game hut lottery goes badly, IMO.

And I knew better than to assume because you're a true afficianado, IMO.

General comment,

Of the starting techs, I most favor bronze working. It gives access to iron working and allows building defensive units early. I may not build spearmen right away, but it's good to be able to if the neighbors are troublesome types.

[Aeson]

I haven't noticed a difference with the Expansionist trait since the patch. Was the increase in settlers just with the bugged first release of the patch? I've played through 3 Ancient Eras with the patch, all with Expansionist Civs on Huge/Pangaea/Deity maps. Each game I popped about 30-50 huts. I got 2 settlers on the last game, but I had done that a couple of times on Deity with 1.16, once even getting 3. The techs were just about the same too, getting through all the Ancient Era techs before the huts ran out. Expansionist is by far the most powerful trait on these settings, and Scouts make a mess of the AI on any settings if used right. I noticed that the AI is much quicker about giving the initial "get out" to the Scouts, but doesn't seem to demand their removal much if any quicker.

Militaristic is a bit more powerful with the patch. Your units will be higher experience on average, which gives your mobile units a better chance to disengage, and your defenders a better chance to keep the enemy from doing the same. Barracks are no longer a good idea to pop rush, and so the 20 shield difference actually matters, saving half the build time. Leader generation is hit or miss in most games, but the chances are better with a Militaristic Civ.

Religious is again the winner though, as earlier government switches are a good idea. Losing even a couple extra turns to Anarchy in the Ancient Era can really put a civ in a hole (compared to where they would be with a Religious Revolution) for the rest of the game. Being able to pop rush a temple for only 1 unhappiness allows for it to still be viable as the temple will take care of it's own unhappiness. All the other Civs take a happiness hit when trying to pop rush a temple.

I don't think any of the other traits have been affected by the patch. I still think the Zulu are the most powerful Civ in the game, but thats just because they fit my playstyle perfectly.

[KithrupFugitive]

Patch effect on expansionist

Originally posted by Aeson
I haven't noticed a difference with the Expansionist trait since the patch. Was the increase in settlers just with the bugged first release of the patch? I've played through 3 Ancient Eras with the patch, all with Expansionist Civs on Huge/Pangaea/Deity maps. Each game I popped about 30-50 huts.

Hi Aeson:

Call it a sample of 1, but in my latest game as Iriquois (Regent, Huge, Continents) the first three huts I popped gave me settlers. I had like 7 or 8 cities by 2900 BC.

I had a similar experience playing as the Americans on a huge Pangaea.

I do have the patch with the latest editor, so I never experienced "The Inuit gave us a skilled army," but the propensity to spit out skilled settlers seems like a matter of design.

I'm still workin on my REX technique in order to move up the difficulty ladder, but this ought to make that strategy aspect much easier

[Pius Popprasch]

Originally posted by Arrian
The reason I don't think militaristic is really all that special is that getting leaders is really hit-or-miss anyway. I played the Germans once, and I got a grand total of 1 leader while destroying 3 AI empires (yeah, I used him right away, so it wasn't like he was sitting around preventing another leader from showing up).

Militaristic will provide you more Elite units which would otherwise be only Veterans. The promotion Veteran-to-Elite happens way more often and in the long run isn't a question of mere luck. >25% more Elite units should be normal for a militarist player with Barracks in his cities. The Expansionist trait is heavily based on luck, though. I usually don't open more than 3 or 4 of those huts and it's a dice roll.

[Thrawn05]

Originally posted by Arrian
I've just gotten the fourth. I'm not yet sure what I will do with him).

Wait for the UN and go for the win!

[Arrian]

Thrawn,

Actually, he did become the UN. I then fought some more, got a fifth, who became my Forbidden Palace. Number six became... umm... oh, yeah, an Army (I just wanted the Heroic Epic in Thebes so it would hit 100 culture/turn). Number SEVEN, my last one, was used for an airport in London, a 100% corrupt city.

Seven leaders in one game, with a non-militaristic civ, w/o the heroic epic (except for #7, as the epic was built by then). Wow. This is what I mean by "hit or miss" leader generation.

I actually did eventually call a UN vote and win, but I am going to revert to save and continue on to a SS win... or maybe domination, I haven't decided.

-Arrian

p.s. I have never waited as long as I did to build a forbidden palace. I'm anal about optimal F.P. placement. It just so happened that I didn't control that "optimal" place until partway through the Modern Age.

[Aeson]

Arrian -

7 leaders with a non-Militaristic Civ sounds great, best I have ever done is 6 (large/pangaea/monarch). My last game with the Zulu's though, I was getting a leader every single turn I didn't have an active leader... until there was no one left to fight. This was due to the sheer number of battles going on, as usually I would get the leader well before all my Elites had fought their battles for that turn. With that many battles going on, the leaders would have come with or without the Militaristic trait. I like Militaristic and Expansionist, but it has more to do with Impi. Until Knights show up they are practically invincible out in the field, and when Knights do show up the AI shouldn't have any Iron because they can't move Impi stacks off of the deposits. Just have to kill those Indians before then, but even Elephants/Knights have just a 42%-58% chance of killing an Impi on an Iron deposit (Mountain%-Hills%). That's with even experience levels, which the AI almost never seems to be able to keep up with. And trading 20 shields for 70 is always a good deal. The Zulu have become my crutch... ick

[Arrian]

Aeson,

That tactic with the Impi is awesome. I still don't think I can force myself to play the Zulu, but I'm impressed. That game you played w/the Zulu's where you had hundreds of impi and horsemen running around chopping up AI civs was just insane (in a good way).

As for leaders w/non-militaristic civs, I have had games with only 1, despite trying my best for more, but I usually end up with about 4. 1 leader per war, on average.

The blitz ability of Tanks and especially Modern Armor means you will generate more great leaders in CivIII's version of "garbage time." Like racking up points in basketball or football when the outcome of the game is no longer in doubt. Ever notice that if you win two combats in a row, you get a promotion no matter what? Well, I often create elite Tanks by picking off old or beat up AI units 2 at a time. Then, I continue to do that with my elite units, as 2 elite victories are better than 1. Plus, there is a better chance of survival.

3 of the 7 leaders in my Egyptian game I mentioned were generated from Tank combat. (let's see, #1 was from a swordsman, #2 a horseman, #'s 3 and 4 from Cavalry). Of course, the fact that post-nationalism you have to kill more AI units to win (conscription) might also play a role. More battles = more leaders.

-Arrian

p.s. I call the modern era "garbage time" not because of tedium, as the patch has dealt with a lot of that, but because there isn't much left to use leaders for. Well, after the UN and SETI are built, anyway.

[Ironikinit]

I use them for armies mostly, or moving the palace around. I don't like leaving them laying around because it's not unlikely to get a couple in a single turn in the modern era. It's a pity they can't be airlifted. ICBMs are expensive and transportable, of course. SS parts, too.

[Aeson]

Re: Patch effect on expansionist

Originally posted by KithrupFugitive
Call it a sample of 1, but in my latest game as Iriquois (Regent, Huge, Continents) the first three huts I popped gave me settlers. I had like 7 or 8 cities by 2900 BC.

It seems the contents of huts are somewhat determined by difficulty level. 3 settlers in a row is a nice haul even at Regent level though! I once had 3 out of 5 in a Deity/Huge game, but usually average 1 on that difficulty. Emperor/Huge I get 1 or 2 settlers, Monarch/Huge almost always 2, and I got 3 settlers on the only Regent/Huge game I've played. They were spread out over the course of exploring the whole Pangaea landmass though.

Arrian -

Your points about Modern Era leader generation fit exactly with my experiences. The game I was able to get 6 leaders with the Greeks, 4 of them came from Modern Armor. All of the leaders were generated on the second attack in a turn, though that could just be a coincidence. I wonder if there is a better chance for a leader with blitzing units? In any case, leaders lose their luster about midway through the Industrial Era, as by that time the player should be able to build just about all the remaining Wonders in most games. I've used leaders to rush Airports, Harbors, Cathedrals, and military units in a couple of cases, because they had no other use at the time.

I finally finished that Zulu/Emperor game just a couple days ago, probably took close to 250 hours to complete it. My goal in was to show that the 3950BC Deity conquest 36060 score could be beat. There seemed to be a lot of people on the HOF thread that thought the early conquest bonus were the end all be all of Civ3 scoring. Managed to get 37779 points by 2050. It should make the next update of the HOF over at CivFanatics.

[Arrian]

37779 points.

I am familiar with the way you played that game, and it supports my opinion on the scoring in Civ III: it favors conquest - early and often. The scoring is based upon territory and population. The more you have and the longer you have it, the higher your score. It also appears to have no adjustor for the map sizes, so the best scores will be Huge Map games where the player has 65% of the land area very early and builds it up until 2050.

I'm not trying to devalue your score, btw. It's impressive, to say the least, and required a lot of patience. My best on a random map was a bit over 3500 (normal map, Monarch).

-Arrian

p.s. I remember slogging through a Civ II game (on the Europe map that shipped w/MGE) that took weeks, just so I could max the score. 1642%, IIRC, which pales in comparison to what others have done.

[Aeson]

I agree that the scoring system is completely out of whack, and I don't pretend that my 37779 score is indicative of a "well" played game even. All it really took was a lot of patience, and an understanding of how to maximize pop-rushing efficiency. I normally play on Deity, just chose Emperor because that is the level where the scoring is most out of proportion to the difficulty. The jump up in AI power from Emperor to Deity is much more than the 5:6 scoring ratio between the two.

SirPleb played a roughly similar game to mine, only on Deity, and scored in the mid 34k range. He had played with a lower landmass setting (Huge/Continents/70% water instead of Huge/Pangaea/60% water), which probably cost him at least a few thousand points. All in all I've played much better games that scored much much less... this game was just to exploit the scoring system for all it was worth, and to show the dominance of Impi!

[Jaguar]

IMO the game is well balanced for a normal size map, but on huge map the french and greeks are too powerful, and on tiny maps you can't beat the zulus, persians, japanese, and aztecs.