Probs with civ3.....

[awesomedude]

I'm not sure if this goes in here or help but anyway.... (Long post)

I just got the game last week. I own Civ2 and played it for quite some time so I'm not a total newbie, but not as diehard as most of the people around this board. I'm having a few questions and problems with the game you might be able to help me out with:

1. What's with the research of this game? In my first (and so far only game in civ3) I've kept a constant pretty high scientific rate of 60-70%, through republic and democracy. My little empire is far from huge (isolated on a smaller island with no luxuries whatsoever argh), but my AI opponents and I are about at the same research level, but still VERY backwards. In Civ2 I would usually have gotten destroyers and such by the 1600s (which is fine by me, although not realistic, but you at least get to play with all units before the end of the game), but now I'm at 1970 and I just got em!! I will have no chance of finishing the research tree in this game, barely even make it to modern age!! I'm trying to speed the research as much as I can, all the improvements built since long etc, but still it takes about 10 turns to research every new tech.

2. Does the mutual protection acts work? I currently have one with the English (mightiest of all, gracious with me), and when the persians declared me war, NOTHING happened, no notice no nothing. Did they turn me down? Wouldn't you at least expect a popup telling me so? And when I checked the active agreements, the pact was still amongst those. Later in the war (most civs sided with me), the english declared war upon the persians due to their pact with the zulus.

3. How would you cancel agreements? When I check the agreements box, all I can do is renegotiate peaceterms.

4. What's with the foreign advisor screen? The three first civs I met did not show up as faces on that screen, although 2 of them were present in form of invisible, but useless "rings". Only half of the civs in my game (on a large map) finally showed up on that screen.

5. Is there anyway to decrease the number of years per turn? This has always annoyed me greatly. It seems that 20 years passes every turn until something like 0 - 1000 AD, then it's 5 turns until as long as 1800 and then it's 2 turns until the 1950's where it finally slows down to 1 turn. This makes the game way to quick.... is it really supposed to be this way??

And btw, I have the 1.16 patch installed (installed directly after installing the game to begin with).

Any help greatly apprectiated!!

[awesomedude]

Oh, btw I'm playing on warlord (ok ok not very tough).

[vmxa1]

If you have an active trade or agreement, select ACTIVE instead of the default NEW and it will show you any agreements and you can change them. Just go to the screen for trade advisors and open negotiations.
The screen for other civs has some bugs, but you need to have an embassy. Go to you capitol and buy one for all civ you have contacted.

[vmxa1]

The patch made research go from 32 to 40 turns. It is quite normal to finish the game and not get all research. If you want to force it to go the distance disable culture, and other forms of victory and leave only conquest. Otherwise you will win before all tech has been gotten, even at chieftain.You can get farther by having a civ with a good starting point with large land mass and of course Science trait.

[awesomedude]

Originally posted by vmxa1
If you have an active trade or agreement, select ACTIVE instead of the default NEW and it will show you any agreements and you can change them. Just go to the screen for trade advisors and open negotiations.
The screen for other civs has some bugs, but you need to have an embassy. Go to you capitol and buy one for all civ you have contacted.

I'm sorry if I didn't state this clearly in my post, but I am well aware of switching between NEW and ACTIVE during negotiations. The problem is however, where to go from there. Say I have a peace treaty, a mutual protection act and a trade deal with another civ, still I can't do nothing at the ACTIVE screen but renegotiate peace terms.

[awesomedude]

Originally posted by vmxa1
The patch made research go from 32 to 40 turns. It is quite normal to finish the game and not get all research. If you want to force it to go the distance disable culture, and other forms of victory and leave only conquest. Otherwise you will win before all tech has been gotten, even at chieftain.You can get farther by having a civ with a good starting point with large land mass and of course Science trait.

I'm in the 1970s, I already cancelled the space race before I started the game. By the look of things, no civ will win by domination or culture, since we only had pretty much one big world war. And still I'm only halfway through the industrial scientific age, and none of my AI opponents are much further ahead (maybe 1-2 techs). Techs are taking more than a decade to research (ie 10-15 turns), although almost all of my about 15 cities (not many, but the map is packed with other cities, mine being fewer due to isolation), are around 25 in population, and my science rate is at 70%. If this continues I might just hit the modern age by 2050, which is way too late. Is it supposed to be this way, or is it just me playing poorly? You would think however that the AI would be way ahead of me then, or is it adjusting to my performance?

[Padma]

I haven't played above Regent, yet (and it's still kicking my butt! ) But this is my understanding: (and I'm SURE someone will correct me if I'm wrong )

On the easier levels, research/science is actually SLOWER than on the harder levels. I think this has to do with the AI being biased in your favor at these levels. An advance is easier to research if others have already discovered it. With the AI somewhat crippled here, YOU end up doing all the basic research, so it costs you full price in time and money.

The guys that beat Diety talk about getting Panzers in the 1200's and such, because the AI is pulling out all the stops on research.

[vmxa1]

It is true that at lowest levels you will end up doing the basic research. Other factors are on larger land mass you can get a ton of techs from huts so it speeds things up. You get more cities, so more production to put into science.
If I followed the question on the trading, if I have a trade and it has gone pass the 20 turns, I can select active and redo it. I have done that in the past although not often as I either forget about the trade or I see they do not have any money or we go to war and the deal is dead. With the patch now wars after industrial age seem to end only with annihilation. The AI is much slower to ask for peace now no matter how much you batter it. Plus I am guessing that once you are down to no real open areas to settle you must get new land by force. This means war even if you are in an inferior postion. As to MPP, I almost never make them and never make ROP any more.

[awesomedude]

Originally posted by vmxa1
If I followed the question on the trading, if I have a trade and it has gone pass the 20 turns, I can select active and redo it. I have done that in the past although not often as I either forget about the trade or I see they do not have any money or we go to war and the deal is dead.

The question is rather about cancelling deals that hasn't yet reached the 20th turn (and paying the reputational price). Thanks anyway.