Advice: Oscillating War

[Radiation Zero]

In the game I'm playing as Germany, I won descisive wars against France and Babylon, forcing them both to give up much in war reparations.

I have a larger army, yet suddenly Persia comes along and threatens me for Industrailization.

Bismarck doesn't take that kind of crap. >

Yet even though France is also at war with Persia, it seems my reaction to Persia angered the world, as now everyone is furious with me.

Persia dragged the Zulu into the conflict, and I still have New Zimbabwe, an addition from an old World War

I'm not worried about them, however.

I'm pretty sure I can take the Persians, but I'm mad that neither of my 'vassal-states' are acting very vassal-stately.


Anyway, down to the question, do I try and beat down Persia and Zululand by myself? Or do I bludgeon France and Babylon into humility first, then make them buy tech off me, and give them back gold so they can field units to help e fight?

If I do the former, I can always use the armies I've raised to do the latter, but then it's almost a moot point..

1. Continue war against Persia & Zululand
2. Use force to gain France and Babylon's loyalty for war.
3. Do neither, turtle.
4. Other (details?)

[Martock]

i'd just continue as you are. i doubt that france and babylon would be of much help if you pummeled them nicely into the planet's core.

[The Bloody Baro]

Stay at war with both but there is a trick. Take the weaker one out first. have alot of extra units stay put to protect against the stronger one. Then you can fully concentrate on destroying the stronger one.

[Radiation Zero]

Thanks for the advice.

I ended up trimming France a bit, but I settled things with the Persians before war broke out.

Then the Aztecs decided to start annoying me just as I was pumping out factories. So once I have an army ready, they're in trouble.

[King of Rasslin]

It doesn't matter who you attack if they have the same type of defender in their cities. If they both have infantry then it doens't matter who you go for.

Focus on both of them. Take cities that are the most productive, hopefully less than size q13. Ignore little cities and go for the big ones. Raze them to shut down their production of units, don't try to conquer them late in the game. If you kill off the big cities first the small ones will be easy to kill later.

[Radiation Zero]

In V 1.21f you can use military to prevent flipping. So, instead of razing those cities, I'd rather take them, fill them up with units untill I get some culture in them, then use those units to spread inward.

Thanks for the advice. Though sometimes it does sort of matter who I attack, because if whoever it is has a bunch of units out at sea, they can attack the workers I have running around, which really irritates me.

Plus, it's hard to keep up a war on three fronts.

[planetfall]

Originally posted by Radiation Zero
In V 1.21f you can use military to prevent flipping. So, instead of razing those cities, I'd rather take them, fill them up with units untill I get some culture in them, then use those units to spread inward.

I used to raze all. Then I went to saving all, 1.21 is great I can manage each cities existence on a case by case basis.

Present steps:
1. capture city
2. inspect improvements and resister population
3. Decide to keep or abandon city
4. If keeping with resisters and have movement left,
a. move capturing unit out of city
b. change all production to entertainment
c. assume recapture will be necessary after next turn.

Biggest value to keeping cities is movement restriction on AI. If raze city, they can move thru the former city tiles as if they were their own. I like doing all I can to restrict their counter punches. It often does not require much to hold city. Don't need to hold long, this is just timing. You are trying to hold back the third front while you go to town on the other front(s).

Forget focusing on civs, focus on strategic resources. Get all rubber and your panzers will be unstopable. Your goal should be to have 150-200 panzers before modern armor comes on the sceen. If you don't have it this game, go back to saved game or start a new game. German UU is mighty if you prepare for it. If you stage production right you should be able to crank out 4-8 panzers each turn before panzers and modern armor.The panzer multiple attack is hard to stop. Prior to panzer blitz build you'll need, {this must be your primary focus in industrial age}
-- cathedrals in most cities
-- marketplaces if have more than 3 luxuries
-- factories in as many cities as possible
-- barracks in cities
-- hospitals in all pop 9+ cities
-- Hoover if you can get it
-- Iron Works if can get it
-- military tradition {for armies of panzers}
-- Battlefield Medicine
-- military academy
-- pentgon if possible. Prebuild armies with leader only so you can add panzers when they come on line
-- transports and protecting BS if need to traverse the seas

Once panzers come on line, you need to plan for 1/2 to 2/3rd your production to be panzers. Columns of 10 panzers are fun to play with and AI has horrible time dealing with 5+ columns. If you replay and have panzers ready you could even conduct a three front campaig with 5 columns on each front. That is only 150 for offense and you should have about 50 extra for testing new tactics.

You might consider posting the sav file.

[planetfall]

Disregard sav file comment. Got them.

[King of Rasslin]

A religious civ can just switch to communism instead of making all of those cathedrals. But cathedrals are cheap for religious civs anyway, so it isn't a big deal.

But as for Germans, the cathedral costs 160 shields, I think. That is like making a small wonder. Forget the cathedrals and pump up the luxury bar. If you have panzers the war won't last long anyway

Marketplaces are also essential if it is a republic or democracy war. You need so much gold to maintain an army of 200 panzers. You really should consider going communist or monarchy if you want to wage such a massive war!

And you don't use 200 panzers for capturing resources. You use that much power to wipe other civs off the planet.

[planetfall]

Originally posted by King of Rasslin
A religious civ can just switch to communism instead of making all of those cathedrals. But cathedrals are cheap for religious civs anyway, so it isn't a big deal.

But as for Germans, the cathedral costs 160 shields, I think. That is like making a small wonder. Forget the cathedrals and pump up the luxury bar. If you have panzers the war won't last long anyway

Marketplaces are also essential if it is a republic or democracy war. You need so much gold to maintain an army of 200 panzers. You really should consider going communist or monarchy if you want to wage such a massive war!

I don't slide luxuries more than 30%, goal is to run long war with 0-10% luxuries. Rest is either for hurry production or research, depending on the situation.

To support this army, you need to reduce/avoid warfare in industrial era and build like crazy: {not in build order}
cathedrals { reduce WW}
marketplaces {increase happiness}
courthouses { reduce corruption/WW}
factories
nuclear power {shields, disable mountdown}
maybe colluseums {if less than 3 luxuries}
hospital {work every city tile}
RR

And you don't use 200 panzers for capturing resources. You use that much power to wipe other civs off the planet.

OH, did I forget to mention this is EndGame.
Strategy is to start war with 20+ panzers adding 5-10 each turn until reach between 200-210 panzers. Above 210, panzers are wasted build choices. Goal is to reduce civs to one city and then either quit or try for HOF score.


RadZero
Ok looked at your game, the second sav. Here is my view. FYI I play at warlord level.

Good
-- Empire has expanded to 2 land masses.
-- Good infantry defense
-- only at war with one other civ
-- Power will increase when cities expand

Suggestions
-- improve war production capability. This is more important than getting panzers. You need to able to afford them.
-- Did you need all of those wonders? Could one or two been used for increasing empire production levels?
-- Expect another civ to attack the closer and closer you get to panzers. Your production capability is low they may wait until late before attacking. I almost always get attacked 20-15 turns before panzers. It usually takes me 4 turns/tech and it seems like the AI calculates the length of time before panzers at present tech research history in deciding on preventitive strike. They really don't want you to have many panzers.

Check out my sav game at 1750ad. End game and play history to see how my strategy unfolded. This game was only vs 4 other civs as I wanted stronger AI competition.

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=53249

Enjoy

[King of Rasslin]

By the time you have nuclear power you are so close to getting modern armor panzers just don't seem as good. You NEED to attack before computers are discovered! You don't want to mess around with mech infantry.

[planetfall]

Originally posted by King of Rasslin
By the time you have nuclear power you are so close to getting modern armor panzers just don't seem as good. You NEED to attack before computers are discovered! You don't want to mess around with mech infantry.

Maybe, could be a question of style, agree generally do not want to wait for mech inf.
The strategy is to buy the cheaper unit with the production of 1 city and upgrade with production of all cities. The strategy is the same regardless of units:
warrior->swordsman
spearman-> pikeman
panzer->Modern armor
cannon->artillery


Doesn't help this player. He doesn't have any panzers yet and will have limited capability to buy armor in about 18 turns.

Advantages of panzers:
1. cheaper than MA so more armor available
I purposely delay tech for MA so I can have more cheap panzers.
2. almost as effective. Stacks of 5-10 panzers are hard to stop.
3. can be upgraded to MA via cash instead of waiting for shield production. If AI has tanks/MA, then by all means upgrade, if not use your number advantage to attack 2 cities instead of 1 in your turn.

Only advantage of mechs is ability to keep with armor (MA/panzers) so blitz can work better. Pointless to upgrade all inf to mechs. Just do a few to accompany the armor.

[King of Rasslin]

Wrong. The advantage of mechs is that you cannot retreat from them.

[planetfall]

Originally posted by King of Rasslin
Wrong. The advantage of mechs is that you cannot retreat from them.

Very interesting, suddenly mechs are important. Is this something I missed in documentation or something you learned in game play?

[dawidge]

You cannot retreat when attacking mobile units. It's somewhere in the manual. Mechs have two mob, ergo you cannot retreat from mechs.