Game Winning Strategy Question

[tinyp3nis]

Monarch sucks so bad. Change to democracy.. also disband units u dont need. -188 to units on monarch sounds u have several houndred units more than that

[Ijuin]

Re: Okay...info...

Originally posted by Aslan

# of Cities: Approximately 50







Income on Tax: ??? I took down these numbers...not sure if they are what you're asking for...Income: +909 from cities and +5 from taxmen. Output of Resources: -239 to science, -267 to maintenance, -174 to corruption, and -188 to units.

Ok, now that you've given us these numbers, we can finally get somewhere. Take note that only about 25% of your income is going to science--to keep up in the later ages you need to be able to maintain 400 science per turn or so. Corruption seems to be running about 20% for you. Make sure that all cities that are more than ten squares away from your capital have both Courthouses and Police Stations. Also, if you have a large grouping of high-corruption cities somewhere, then you want to build the Forbidden Palace in the middle of them.

Secondly, you seem to have quite a bit of deadwood in your military--with fifty cities, you have a military of about three to four hundred units. You really need only two or three defensive units plus maybe one arrillery unit stationed in each city, plus whatever expiditionary force you keep for fighting the AI civs. If you keep your military up to date, you can probably keep it down to five or six units per city total unless you are fighting a major war on multiple fronts.

Thirdly, I notice that you do not have any money coming in from other civs. Shame on you! If you have any extra luxuries sitting around, then you need to sell them to any AI civs that you are at peace with, and for as high a price as you can get! A large AI civ will pay up to thirty gold per turn for a luxury it needs in the late game if you are on good terms with them.

Fourthly, PUT ROADS EVERYWHERE! Every square within your city radii should have a road on it, no exceptions! In Civ III, EVERY terrain type gets a commerce bonus from having a road on it, not just the flat, open terrain like Grassland, Plains, and Desert like in Civ II.

Fifthly, BUILD TAX AND SCIENCE BUILDINGS ASAP! All cities generating more than 10 commerce should have Marketplaces and Libraries (and Banks and Universities when you can get them). As soon as you have five banks, BUILD WALL STREET! As long as you have at least 1000 gold in your treasury, it will earn you 50 gold per turn.

Sixthly, create a "science city". Build the Colossus, Copernicus' Obervatory and Newton's University in the same city, and build a University there as well. If your city has a population of 12 (the highest you can get before you can build Hospitals), then you will get a MINIMUM of 96X science per turn in that city if X is your science funding percentage (base commerce 24 + 50% [library] + 50% [University] +100% [Copernicus] +100% [Newton] = base +300% X science rate of 50% = 48 science per turn).

Seventh, and last, if you think you can avoid getting into prolonged wars, then switch to Republic in the Middle Ages, and to Democracy as soon as you can get the Universal Suffrage wonder built (to counteract War Weariness). Don't worry about unit maintenence costs--the added commerce income will more than make up for it.

Anything Else I can tell you: Okay...It's 2014...I'm the English...I think I am a Monarchy...my cultural value is about 48,500, I have around 50 cities, I've conquered the Babylonians and taken a great deal of land from the Germans in an earlier war...but then I needed them so they still exist, My science expenditure is from 30-40%, score is 520, at 30% science expenditure I gain +22 gold per turn...at 40% science expenditure I lose 47 gold per turn, nearest opponent's score is 367, and I am reseraching Steam Power.

Do the above to boost your cash. You should be able to hold a profit with a 40% science rate.

[Aslan]

Okay, I see..

Just to clarify though,

My usual military per medium to large cities is 3 defensive units and an artillery unit. For smaller cities I usually get by with just 1 defensive unit. In the particular example above, I had a greater number of units because I was trying to build up an army to invade the Greeks on their island. They were pretty weak and I needed their ivory so I was loading troops into ships and sending them off...unfortunately in the earlier time periods...assembling a large mass of troops and sailing them across the map is a bit tricky...even if you can negotiate ocean squares.

The money from other civs is interesting. I usually run into problems with other civs because I do something they don't like. The other problem is that they are always very "stingy" with me. They'll offer me virtually nothing for my excess luxuries. For example, I'll offer spices for furs and the computer will counter with furs for my spices, incense, ivory, and a technology.

As to the science and commerce buildings...after granarys, barracks, and aqueducts...I usually always build marketplaces...then Harbors. So are you saying that building universities in most to every one of my cities out weighs the disadvantage of support? That's sort of one of my lingering concerns.

I'll try to do that "science city" thing and see how it works out.

As to Monarchy...I used to always go for Republic then Democracy...but I was having war weariness issues that made wars virtually impossible. The minute I went to war...even if invaded...nearly every city in my territory would uprise and start destroying stuff. And to add insult to injury...without the Monarchy tech I wouldn't get to builing the Hanging Gardens before the other civs and thus lose that happiness bonus. Plus, like I talked about before...trading to get more luxuries became increasingly more important (and costly).

Thanks for the tips...I'm trying to continue to use them as I move along in my current game.

One question about the Forbidden palace though. Usually I am able to build a forbidden palace fairly quickly...should I wait to build it until I have a great deal more territory and therefore I can build it further away from my regular palace? Also, what criteria do yo guys use to decide on when or if to move your palace?

Aslan

[Txurce]

Aslan, the ideal setup for a palace and FP is one where none of your cities suffer unduly from corruption. How that fits the parameters of your games will vary, obviously. An empire can easily get big enough to have plenty of corruption, no matter how well-placed the palaces. Building the FP in the ideal place often requires either a GL (your first one, usually) or the patience to build a few shields at a time. Given that corrupt cities don't help you win anything other than domination games, I would build an FP soon after you are advised to, projecting ahead somewhat as to the ultimate shape of your core empire. As to moving your palace, Sir Ralph has written extensively about how to effectively accomplish this. If your capital is at one edge of your empire, it's certainly worth the effort.

If you are attacked while in Republic, have one happiness wonder, temples and cathedrals, and a few luxuries... which I assume you do, given your big lead... then you shouldn't have a problem fighting a war, as long as you don't let it go on forever - at worst, you may raise your luxury rate from 0 to 20%. If a war is interminable, then monarchy may be required; but if you're playing for any sort of win other than domination/conquest, you don't need to be warring interminably. Build a 20+ city empire, focus on science, and you should be able to hold your own militarily while winning the science race centuries faster than you have been... if you make several adjustments:

It seems to me that you may be doing a few things less than optimally - like not trading with the AI because they offer bad deals - but the key to your lack of science lies in 1) using monarchy 2) with very low science spending 3) on a huge world 4) at chieftain level. Each of the factors I listed limit science output - together, they just about strangle it to death.

[Ijuin]

Originally posted by Aslan
Just to clarify though,

My usual military per medium to large cities is 3 defensive units and an artillery unit. For smaller cities I usually get by with just 1 defensive unit. In the particular example above, I had a greater number of units because I was trying to build up an army to invade the Greeks on their island. They were pretty weak and I needed their ivory so I was loading troops into ships and sending them off...unfortunately in the earlier time periods...assembling a large mass of troops and sailing them across the map is a bit tricky...even if you can negotiate ocean squares.

That is fine then. You probably don't need more than about a hundred offensive units at once though unless you are trying to conquer large amounts of AI territory.

[/QUOTE]The money from other civs is interesting. I usually run into problems with other civs because I do something they don't like. The other problem is that they are always very "stingy" with me. They'll offer me virtually nothing for my excess luxuries. For example, I'll offer spices for furs and the computer will counter with furs for my spices, incense, ivory, and a technology.[/QUOTE]

NEVER offer luxuries, resources, or tech for luxuries. Do a straight cash-per-turn trade. If you give them any one-time gifts, then they will just cancel the deal after 20 turns. With cash per turn they will be willing to keep selling it to you as long as you are at peace with the, although they may ask you to raise the price occasionally as your civ grows. Buy needed luxuries and resources in cash only, and THEN try selling your own surpluses separately.

As to the science and commerce buildings...after granarys, barracks, and aqueducts...I usually always build marketplaces...then Harbors. So are you saying that building universities in most to every one of my cities out weighs the disadvantage of support? That's sort of one of my lingering concerns.

Any city generating more than ten science with a library will gain more from the university than it will lose from support, plus the culture points are good too.

I'll try to do that "science city" thing and see how it works out.

The best thing about a science city is that if you make citizens there into Scientists (which benefits you in Monarchy or Communism, but having them generating commerce by working tiles is better in Republic or Democracy), then the Scientists will benefit from the multipliers as well. If a Scientist generates a base 2 Science per turn, then with a Library, University, Copernicus, and Newton, he generates 8 per turn (sixteen when you add SETI!).

/QUOTE]One question about the Forbidden palace though. Usually I am able to build a forbidden palace fairly quickly...should I wait to build it until I have a great deal more territory and therefore I can build it further away from my regular palace? Also, what criteria do yo guys use to decide on when or if to move your palace? [/QUOTE]

Ideally, your Palace and the Forbidden Palace should each be surrounded by cities, and they should be separated from each other by about half the width of your empire to get the maximum effect from them.

I agree with Txurce where he says that you need to up your science spending. You need to maintain at least 50% science most of the time to keep up. Sell extra luxuries and resources to other civs for cash--this also has the added benefit of keeping the AI civs cash-poor. Build Smith's Trading Company, which pays upkeep on Banks and Marketplaces--with no upkeep costs, you can afford to put them in EVERY city. Build Wall Street, and get interest on your saved gold. Finally, build those wonders that give an improvement in every city--that saves you on maintenence costs (like Pyramids and Sun Tzu). These strategies will maximize your non-tax income, leaving you free to devote more taxes to Science.

[Aslan]

Great comments guys!!

I will start using them immediately!

Any idea when that new Civ III expansion will be due out? Anyone know what stuff it will add to the game?

Aslan

[Bella Hella]

i'm sorry if these comments have already been made - lots of posts here.

i consider science to be one of the most important things in the game. i always try to be at least 1-2 techs ahead of the AI. i'm certainly not an expert, but here are the things i do to maintain a lead in tech.

- pick a civ that has a bonus like commerce (more cash), science (uh... duh), or industrious (faster workers are great because they can keep up with all your production needs and build roads faster).
- yup, have those workers build roads everywhere. every single square within the production radius of your city needs a road.
- i'm not a warmongerer, so i'm usually peaceful until the modern era when i have awesome units, railroads to get me places quickly, and planes to do recon missions so i can see if anyone's coming. anyway, the early peacefulness allows me to build money and science enhancing improvements instead of lots of military units.
- in a newly founded city, i always build a temple first and then a library. i'd make military units in a city that already has the needed improvements, and just send those units to my new bases. this of course allows you to build up science in new cities more quickly.
- about workers again - make sure they build roads FIRST. you'll immediately get commerce bonuses, AND you'll be able to get your workers to the area that much more quickly.
- you don't need say, a courthouse in a city that has little or no corruption, like your capitol. same goes for police stations. invest some shields into "wealth" instead.
- oh yeah, use wealth! if your city is just sitting there and you've built everything you can, and you have enough of an army, just do wealth. this lets you REALLY boost your science spending. i'd rather make money than build another unit to use another of my hard-earned dollars.
- yes, go to democracy. the benefits are awesome.
- yup, science buildings in every city. since i put science at top priority, i'll usually build enough happiness enhancers to keep the people from rioting, then go right to work on science. remember that science structure increase your culture, too.
- i agree with the super science city concept. find out which is your best science city and build any wonders there that enhance science in that city by x%.
- on harder difficulty levels when you just can't keep up in techs, go STRAIGHT for the great library. otherwise you'll have to buy those techs or trade for them, and it sucks so bad to not be able to do that because you're broke.
- at least 50% to science at all times (unless maybe right at the beginning when you're scrambling for money and panicking like me and have to lower it to 40%).

some thoughts on "wealth" and the tax slider:

by the time i reach the modern era, my main cities will have just about every improvement (except courthouse or whatever) and i can set production to wealth and up my science until i get the next tech advance. then i switch from wealth to whatever improvement i can now make (recycling centers for example) and adjust that tax slider to where i'm at least breaking even. you can't keep it at 80% if you're not building wealth in all your cities anymore. as soon as i'm done the recycling center, it's back to wealth, up the science, rinse and repeat. i have to make sure i'm staying positive on my money. also you can just build a few recycling centers at a time and keep the rest of the cities doing wealth, and switch when the first cities are done the centers and go back to wealth. but i find this difficult to keep track of.

when adjusting that tax slider, sometimes you could put in on 60% OR 70% and you'll still discover the tech in, say, 6 turns. just up it to the minimum percentage to get the tech in 6 turns, in this case, 60%. as far as i know, you get no bonus if you do 70%; you just lose money.

if you have a lot of dough, you don't always have to use it to hurry production. i rarely do unless i really need to. another option for excess cash is to just use it for science! if you have 2000 gold, you can afford to take a loss every turn for a little while. that way you could set it all the way up to 100% for a couple turns if you wanted to. i don't usually do this, but it's an option if you have some extra dough.

some people might consider this an exploit, but here goes. say you're rolling along, discovering a tech. finally, you have one more turn to go. go to your tax slider and reduce the percentage to the last increment that will still give you the tech in one turn. heh heh... more money for you! you can also check your tax slider at any time during the research period to see if you can lower the science percentage and still discover the tech in the same amount of turns. a lot of times you can.

ok, all done! as a builder, i highly recommend switching production to wealth after you've built all the improvements in your city. it will help a lot. just keep an eye on that tax slider and your income and you'll be fine!

finally, i agree with moving up to warlord, young jedi. increase the difficulty level you must. with you the force will be.

[jshelr]

I just skimmed through the posts but it sounded like Asian is not trading techs enough. If you can find another civ that is going down a different branch of the tech tree, trade. If you can get a little ahead, sell prior generations of tech to the ai for gold to keep research going faster. This speeds up the whole story for all the civs. In fact, the AI does this in spades itself at higher levels, making us all whine about the difficulty of keeping up.

[Aslan]

Results

Okay Folks...Here are the results of my game I just finished where I tried to use all the strategies you all reccomended:

I have included my difference from my previous best game in () so that you can see the improvement/disimprovement.

Iriquois Monarchy Population 949,000
Year 2049
CV Score=61,630 (+13,130)
#cities=40 (-10)
Score=533 (-92)
Nearest Other Civ Score: 291 (-58)
Researching: Atomic Theory (Steam Power)
% Science=80%-90% (30%-40%)
159 Units (-203)
Most Cities Have Barracks, Granary, Aqueduct, Temple, Colleseum, Marketplace, Liabrary, Courthouse, Bank, University, and Cathedral.
INCOME from interest = 16 (+16)
INCOME from cities = 959 (+50)
INCOME from taxmen = 10 (+5)
INCOME from other civs = 31 (+31)
599 in Science Spending (+360)
261 in maintenance (-6)
183 in corruption losses (+9)
19 in units spending (-163)

I had the top 3 cities and 4 of the top 5. I created all wonders except for the Great Liabrary. I extinguished 2 other civilizations and aidied in the demise of 2 others. I ranked #1 in population, GNP, Mfg. Goods, Land Area, Life Expectancy, Annual Income, and productivity.
I ranked 11th in disease, 11th in military service, and 12th in pollution.

So...strategies that I employed were as follows. I tried to build Universities, Marketplaces, Banks, and Liabraries in every city to increase gold and science. I also tried to build a "science city" using the science wonders. I also turned a greater number of my cities to "Wealth" rather than continue to build improvements in them until I could build no more. I also tried to sell luxuries as often as I could.

So, where am I still going wrong? I still could not come close to modern times and that continues to frustrate me. I will be starting another game...this time I will bump up the difficulty level and I continue to await any additional advice you might have.

Oh...and I'm not "asian"...that "i" is an "L".

Thank in Advance.

Aslan

[nbarclay]

If you've stayed in Monarchy all game, you've placed yourself at a HUGE research disadvantage. Gross income is generally well over 50% higher in Republic or Democracy, although you do lose some of that back in the cost of unit maintenance (and possibly in having to put some gold toward entertainment or buying luxuries, although a good tech lead provides an alternative way of getting luxuries if it's managed correctly).

If war weariness annoys you too much, try playing a religious civ. Then you can change into Republic or Democracy when you're at peace and change back out with just one turn of anarchy if war weariness starts to become too much of a problem. With a religious civ, each change just costs you one turn, so you should come out far ahead overall unless you're changing governments all the time.

(My own military strategy is heavily, some would say ridiculously, overbalanced toward using offensive units. I leave practically no garrison in my rear areas - no M.P. value in Republic or Democracy anyhow - but that's only a problem if I start losing. And if I time my war to coincide with a significant technological advantage - swordsmen before the enemy has pikemen, knights before he has musketmen, or cavalry before he has riflemen - I can do a lot of steamrolling before war weariness becomes an issue.)

Also, are you doing a good job making sure your city sizes don't get too far ahead of your number of improved tiles? As others have noted, if you have significantly more people in your cities than you do improved tiles for them to work, you need more workers. Some lag is normal, but too much is a huge waste.

Another thing I noticed is that you list your interest income as only 16. Once you get Wall Street, you should rarely if ever let your "bank balance" drop much below 1000 gold. If you keep 1000 gold or more in the bank, you max out your interest income at 50. Anywhere below that, you're wasting potential interest income. So you should only drop below 1000 if getting something done a couple turns earlier will make a big difference, and if you do drop below 1000, you should cut science spending until you get back up there. You might lose ground in the short term, but getting back up to 50 gold per turn interest income will make up for it in the long term. (There are exceptions if you come up against the four-turn limit on how quickly you can gain tech.)

One last thing: Someone expressed doubts about trading tech for luxuries, but if it's managed properly, it can be a gold mine. (I've done quite well with it under the right conditions even at Monarch level.) There are three keys to making that trick work. (1) You have to have a big enough research advantage to trade away some of your research and still stay ahead. (2) You need to synchronize things so you make your deals with all the other civs at once, so you can trade the same one or two techs (maybe sweetening the pot a little if necessary) for several competitors' luxuries. (3) Pure paid-in-advance deals end automatically during your turn, but if you provide something like gold per turn or a resource as part of your payment, it won't end automatically. That means unless you catch the deal right when it ends and renegotiate, the AI will renegotiate the deal during its turn, messing up your efforts to trade with everyone at once. Watch the turns remaining count and renegotiate the turn after it hits (1). (Or, if at least one of your deals is something you pay for completely up front, you should be able to use when that deal ends to know when to renegotiate the others.) Yes, I know it's an annoying bit of micromanagement - especially if you forget and have to suffer the consequences of forgetting. Oh, and when negotiating such deals, keep in mind that techs are worth the most to your first customer and go down in value from there, so sell to the prospective customer who can give you the most in return (whether technology, luxuries, or gold) first!

The really neat thing about trading tech for luxuries is that it makes people happy (increasing your score) without costing you gold that you need for your own science. It's not necessarily a good move for domination or conquest victories, since it involves helping your next prospective victim get better technology to defend himself, but it can be fantastic for space race games once you've done about all the expanding you intend to.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

By the way, by the time you start researching Atomic Theory, you really ought to have hospitals and factories in most or all of your core cities. Hospitals let cities grow past size 12, which in turn gives you more laborers producing income to be boosted by the marketplaces, libraries, etc. (Unless you pack your cities so tight they can't grow productively beyond size 12, in which case there may not be much point.) And factories give you higher production, which you can use either to build more other things or to spend part of the time with the city building wealth.

Nathan

[Txurce]

Nathan addressed the two glaring omissions you made, Aslan: staying in monarchy, and not getting your population over one million. I don't even know how you could have 40 cities and less than one million people, but these two factors are killing your tech rate. Boost your pop much earlier than you seemingly are, and switch to representative government as soon as you have enough happiness wonders, facilities and/or luxuries.

[nbarclay]

Another possible issue with regard to population may involve relying too much on the city governors. City governors are often very shortsighted in assigning population to tiles that provide good short-term production but hurt growth. I find myself frequently moving laborers to lower-production, higher-food tiles on the theory that while I'm giving up some production now, my long-term production and wealth generation will be better. (And I also don't automate my workers, since I don't trust the computer to make as good a decisions for them as I can. Many people wouldn't put up with the micromanagement I do, but I think everyone would be wise to do a fair amount of management during the early part of the game and to at least look in on things occasionally through the rest of the game.)

Long before 2050, every tile within the radiuses of core cities that can possibly be worked should be being worked. A few cities might not have enough grassland and plains even with the combination of irrigation and railroads to support using all their hill and mountain tiles, but such places should be rare exceptions.

Nathan

[Zachriel]

Re: Results

Originally posted by Aslan
Oh...and I'm not "asian"...that "i" is an "L".

Aslan

Cool moniker.

PS. You can't expect much from Civs if you are winning by a large margin as they will be poor.

What population is your capital city? Be sure to build hospitals and factories as soon as you reach the Industrial Age, which should not be hard on Monarch level.

Finally, try to switch to Republic.

[SirSebastian]

My usual military per medium to large cities is 3 defensive units and an artillery unit. For smaller cities I usually get by with just 1 defensive unit.

Okay, there is never a need to have 3 defensive units in your large cities if they are secure. Supressing unhappy citizens is pointless compared to going Republic. Defend your frontier cities well (large or small) and just leave 1 defensive unit in interior cities (large or small). Do this, and slash your military in half and be better defended than you were. Should be good for 10%-20% more in Science.