AOM3 Is Out

[angrybowen]

Well finally at last, tacit admission that people like me and Angry and others are right and have a right to complain. Especially as this is NOT spelt out in the system specs.

But also, a 4+ yr old video card is mention in the min system specs, one that has been off the shelves for well over 2 years. That can only create the illusion to the intending buyer that video card is not a big issue. Chuck in some uninformed information from people who want to sell something and don't really know and you now know whay I and a lot of people got angry.

Yes, Generaldoktor is righ, lets get back on topic. My apologies as well.

I copied and pasted this from the AOM forum, posted by stancarp. It will give you some ideas.

"I have a few milestones in my strategy.

Turn 50; at least 5 cities (I budget on one from ruins), explore as much as possible, avoid conflict, get ceremonial burial and projectile weapons ASAP, go for stonehenge.

Turn 70. 4 defenders minimum including a slinger for every city if possible. I sometimes pull back a few explorers if necessary, especially if they are close and I have enough units out exploring. Avoid war.

Turn 100. 8+ cities, going for Code of Hammurabi, Temple of Solomon, Valley of the Kings. Avoid war. Switch to 10% PW after getting Stonehenge or before if you have to because of barbarians hitting the cities. Think about a nomad for military advances (copper smelting/horse riding) if you have lousy neighbours.

Turn 150. 12 cities, getting close to VOK, going for Hanging Gardens, Avoiding war. Hammurabis is killing barbarians for prisoners and slaves. A nomad or 2 for military advances.

I find if I remain peaceful (and that really hurts my ego as David (Hex) will tell you), I can go for many of the good wonders. Go to war and that means military units and PW and less effort in wonders. Don't rush buy after the first 3 units (using about 1500-1700 gold). Save to bribe AI and beat the AI to wonders by rush buying. Only rush buy units and only if absolutely desperate.

Outposts are the best tile improvement, so I build little else until after the Dark Ages. Especially on goods. Even better on a good in the city radius. Around turn 175 I start thingking of a few caravans for the best trade routes.

To avoid war, give 100 gold immediately to an AI on meeting. Avoid tresspassing on their land as this will drop their regard for you very quickly".

[stankarp]

One final comment re game balance in AOM, all versions.

Before it was shipped, I spent nearly a year with Hexegonians help tweaking the balance. I have personally FINISHED 20+ full campaigns in AOM and played the first 250-350 turns another 150+ times.

Through SLIC I am unable to over program the ai. Attempts at this led to more and more instability and less and less of the code worked. So I provided all sides with boosts. You can argue that everything is a cheat or an exploit for some one, but I aimed to try and balance everything as much as possible.

The Barbarian spawns hurt the AI more than the human because the human responds more quickly to the threat from the spawn points. With wonder units, heroes and slave masters, the human can turn a barbarian incursion into a plus, much more effeciently than the AI. BTW, that is how Caesar got his start in life. If you have good defences, even Attila will often go off and attack the AI. It happens to me in many games, up to 50%.

[angrybowen]

I judge a game by way it plays out, I don't much if anything about programming.

AOM is not intense all the time, but you go through periods where it has that little feel about it. The scripted events actually divide the game up into mini games of 100 turns or so and puts just a little pressure on you to achieve something by that next step. I have no problem with that, I really like it. The first 50 turns which give you a happy exploration time before things clamp down is one of the best parts of game, helps add to the variety in the game in a big way. No 2 AOM games are the same because of the whole range of things that come into play IMHO, even if you pick identical settings for every game.

Whereas with Civ 4, Dale claims things are not scripted. But admits the selection of opponent types is based on difficulty level, one aggressive/expansionist type for Emperor level. That explains to me why my 4 basically completed games of Civ 4 were so similar. In 2 I was peaceful to the point of biting my tongue and yet one AI just declared war on me when I was getting near the top. (Nikolai must absolutely love that). In the 2 other games I was super aggressive and not one AI said BOO (I will conjecture that one of my early targets was the aggressive ai). So IMHO the whole course of each game is EFFECTIVELY, pre srcipted.

For variety IMHO from game to game, AOM leaves Civ 4 absolutely for dead.

BTW, Australia 3, Japan 1 this morning.

[Generaldoktor]

Thanks to Smithldoo and AngryBowen for strategy hints; its not true all Australians are rude buggers with big knives and beer constantly drooling out of their mouths.

However though, I'm still having trouble adapting to the AOM environment, which doesn't shake my interest and respect for the game, I can't win at that other game, which we [shhh] won't mention any more either and I'm too uncoordinated for shooters, so it doesn't matter. More about this in a minute. Thanks btw also to Dale for taking the Great Debate About Whose Game S-cks Worse someplace else. Thanks again to StanK for finishing the masterpiece.

Now, problems. Please don't laugh too loud about this, experienced winners, ( ) , but I dumbed down the game while leaving "pollution" and "bloodlust" on to try to win one time early in my experience, using some semblance of the AOM rules and I didn't come close. My experience is similar in the AOM II games I played. The production times don't seem unrealistic given the scope of the game, but it is hard to get nomads out, so all this talk about "expanding" to the city cap and building lots of outposts on strategic goods, (nomad required,) seems pie-in-the-sky to me. Warriors/hoplites take a lot of planning to get out in sufficient numbers too. Then are the flanker/missle guys and some most be horses, because a walking warrior before turn 50 can cover, well, 49 squares and that don't tell you much about the world. I'm not seeing any ruins and when I do encounter other civs, they tend to attack me within a few turns even if I give them 200 gold. Embassies and receptions don't seem to help much either.

In my last game of AOM II, I was defeated in the field by Babylon, in part because I didn't besiege the cities with the proper units, which was my fault, but I was having trouble producing them in sufficient numbers, though my war tech was good. Babylon seemed to have plenty of units and built city walls during our lengthy war, though they didn't finish any wonders either. They were coming back the other way when I abandoned the game. I guess I could have "rush-buyed" more stuff and I'm experiementing with that now, but gold doesn't last forever either.

In the first AOM III game, I got the break of the century (actually several centuries,) by being isolated in the north by mountains, swamps and tundra. No AI could find me, but the barbarians who spawn first about turn 200 in plentiful numbers did. I think I did get a little complacent about building military when I didn't see anybody, (I had three princesses die on me with nobody for them to marry, boo hoo! ( ) I was particularly complacent about only building one horse, when it is clear they are the only reliable scouts. My scouting was inadequate and I feel, though that seems to contradict the advice here, that I should have saved my nomads for more cities instead of building on strategic goods to build up military tech for units I wasn't producing anyway. Phalanx in particular seems to be a two-edged sword (or spear ) , as I tripped frenzy and maybe the barbarians too by acquiring the technology, but only had two of the units by the time of my fall to barbarian invaders, (having never met any other civ. )

I've perceived some of my own mistakes, (i.e. not scouting enough, thus not enough horses, not building big enough, which doesn't make me one with the critics--"bigger is better," who cares? , not enough "rush-buy" of units, not attacking cities properly, triggering frenzy with military tech I wasn't prepared to use, not enough army in general.) But my perception of how to survive at this point seems to be at odds with some of the romantic notions I've read about the early game.

The way I see it and this is with the kiddie difficulty with the five nomads, all of which I use to build cities, hopefully rapidly; it seems they then must all 1) build a spearman apiece, then 2) build a warrior apiece, then 3) specialize as follows; with one building nomads, this must rotate due to the pop loss for them, one building infrastructure (granary, shrine, wall, etc.) this also rotating, one building horses, when available and one building auxiliaries, (javelin, slinger, peltast: ) when these are available and anybody not doing that is building the current front-line unit, (warrior, advanced warrior, swordsman, whatever.) Wonders get built ( ) whenever! Horses are the scouts, nobody else can cover the ground. Nomads, contrary to the view expressed here, should build up to the city cap first, building outposts on strategic goods has to wait, except maybe for horse improvments. Public works should be at 60% to pay for necessary improvements like roads and the inevitable battle losses. (I have built also, somewhat early, some farm/mines to try to boost the cities' growth and production, but this may be a mistake, too.)

I don't see how else to survive the barbarian incursion at turn 200, let alone the ones to come later. It still begs the question how to develop a truly decent field army later and what to do about the Wonders. (The only early wonders that really interest me are Stonehenge, Hammarabi and maybe VOK. I don't think Pyramids are worth it in this game.) I don't want or need to be led by the nose how to win, but I do think strategy responses in threads are useful in helping newbies survive long enough to get more enjoyment out of these games.

I do think it's funny I can't come close to winning in this game, even at low levels. That must mean its a good game.

Specific questions:

1. Do city walls augment the earlier version of walls? What about stockades, (most of the time I have stone-working before wood-working,) is their any point to them after you have a "wall" with stone-working?

2. Do roads have to be built through tile improvments (if you do build them,) like farms and mines or are they there, when built? I recall something said that for AOM III, border forts and outposts at least do have intrinsic road in their square, after build.

3. How strong are barb spawn-point/leaders. I find them, then massacre a lot of my own troops trying to kill them.

4. My perception is that the cities get their "spear-militia" one time when built; and this is not a "city watch." City watch appear if the militia is killed and the town is left otherwise ungarrisoned. Also, what happens if you don't disband a city watch after creation?

5. If a city shrinks below "9", then grows back, it appears to spawn a new suburb. You can end up with a lot of squares taken up by suburbs that way, if using it to build nomads a lot or under fire, but the city isn't effectively larger than nine (with the extra burbs.) Would there be any penalty, other than a gold price, for razing these extra suburbs to get use of the squares again? Is this a good idea? What about this for pillaged (razed) suburbs?

6. Is it stated anywhere how good a king is in battle, if one is risky enough to let him join? I got the impression he functions sort of like a "general," but I couldn't be sure from the battles I've had with them.

7. Am I not seeing ruins because I dumbed down the difficulty? I seem to see none and this was not my CTP experience.

8. How do you get an "ultra-gigantic" map? The biggest size with the CTP framework is "gigantic."

[stankarp]

Ah, some good questions about strategy at last. Thanks for the compliment about Australians BTW.

1) City defences are cumulative, so each one adds its own bonus to a city.

2) Farms, mines, trading posts etc do not boost movement. Suburbs, border forts, watch towers, forts, wonders etc do. Roads have been adjusted so you can move 4 tiles on a plain etc, 3 in hills, forests etc, and 2 in mountains.

3) A barbarian leader has the defence of a hoplite and ranged attack of a slinger. 2 warriors and 2 slingers will take him out in open terrain. Chuck in a King and another spear/warrior and that will get rid of him in hills etc.

4) Correct. Militia are created only once. If you disband the TW, you get a small production back. But do not do so if you have no other unit/s there as another one is created and you loose a pop point. For this reason if a level one city is left empty, it disappears.

5) It is a quirk in the city code that produces a suburb each time a city reaches 9 or multiples of 9. Suburbs are good if you are on a grass/plain because they boost production and gold for a loss of food. If you have too many suburbs, yes pillage them away, the gold is the only penalty. I usually earmark cities that have higher pop because of slaves to build nomads. Suburbs collect 2-5 gold per turn depending on the type.

6) The King is useful in battle and pretty tough (has the same stats as a Barb leader). He raises a stack to veteran and has a 25% chance of a prisoner. I use him early in the game where there is little risk to attack only barbs entering the empire. Otherwise he stays at home and generates happiness, PW (20 per turn) and is 150% more likely to be randy (i.e. have a Princess). A King from ruins early in the game is a gift from god.

7) I have not played with barbs on low for so long I am not sure, but I think you are right, there are no ruins.

8) Ultra gig is an old term used in Cradle. The current gigantic map in AOM is actually an ultra gig of sorts. It is about 60% longer and wider than the original gigantic that CTP2 shipped with. So if you select gigantic, you are getting that.

A couple more points;
1) If you cannot use the Princess in the near future (click on the King button and you will know how long before she becomes too old), disband her in one of your cities. You get a handy production boost and +1 happiness for 10 turns. Very handy to get a boost for a wonder or a nomad.
2) I do not build buildings in any city till after turn 150 at least. I build buildings only if at or over my city cap and am not in a serious war. Build Nomads and defenders for cities until you get to the city cap, that is the first priority if not at serious war.
3) After I build and send out my first explorers, each city builds a nomad. I then build units in each city except my best production city which I hope is then starting on Stonehenge (straight after the nomad). When all cities have 4-5 defenders, most cities build another nomad. If a city has hills and less food production, I may earmark that to produce units while cities with better food produce nomads.

So by turn 50 I have 4-6 cities (6 if I picked up a city from ruins early enough to build a nomad before turn 50). Around turn 80 I have 10-11 cities. As each nomad from the 2nd round is built, I send 1-2 defenders with him to escort him and his build city then replaces the defenders first.

If you are attacked by the ai while exploring, my tactic is to avoid that area around their empire and not attack them. Scout and defend the approaches from their direction. If your frenzy level is below 50, they will rarely send more than an odd stack of 6-7 in your direction. After a while they will ask for a cease fire which you always counter with a map request. Defences have a big advantage in AOM if you are in a city.

Because you can resupply from a city with pw points, move out to the attacker, attack and run 1-2 rounds of combat, then retreat to a city. Next time the enemy stack is weakened and easier to deal with while you have healed from your supply.

Hope this helps.

[Generaldoktor]

Yeah, that helps a lot. (I was kidding with the backhanded "compliment" about Australians, by the way; as a group, all of you have always been decent to me, but you do get to hear a lot of odd, self-serving stereotyping here in the world's only alleged "superpower.")

It's too bad that detailed an explanation is necessary. I suppose it is always best to find your own way to win, but I probably would have to have had 50 more starts to get some of that clear, particularly production priorities. This gives me a start, I know there's more trouble coming after with Attila and the Dark Ages and then Genghis, but hopefully with a solid start I can struggle through that myself. If complaints continue to come up about newbies struggling out of the gate in the early moves, maybe the strategy guide needs to be expanded, not necessarily by you, StanK, who has done enough.

Of course, maybe we'll have some more decent strategy threads going here by then.

Edit: I just wanted to say also that I always liked CTP's FutureWorld, another improvement over that "other game," where Sid and the gang were evidently uncomfortable with it and dropped it after C2. I heard some satisfied and otherwise players here saying that they liked to win AOM early so they didn't have to drag the game out into the post-medieval, modern and future eras. I must respectfully disagree, With this rich a system for combat, trade and Wonders, I'm looking forward to it.

[smithldoo]

One thing about AOM that catches a lot of civ and ctp2 players is that you are under a little pressure early in the game to achieve certain things, otherwise you can loose a game early on. For example, you need to have a slinger and at least 2, preferable 3-4 defenders per city by about turn 65+. Or take a risk of loosing an early city which of course is a disaster in any civ game.

Others panic a bit because several ai attack them when exploring. I find that unless you provoke the ai with lots of tresspassing/pillaging or take some cities, it is rare for the ai to send more than 1-2 stacks of 4-6 units against you early in the game. The longer you can last without going to aggressive war with an AI, the more likely they become involved in wars with each other and when you strike, your target may already be weak from another war.

I have gradually gone from being super aggressive to being a builder for the first 150-175 turns. Wonders are important and you cannot get the good ones if you are at war.

My test game for stan of AOM III ended when I had railroads, machine gunners and bi planes in about 1700 AD. Since then he made it even a little harder.

I do not build buildings in cities until turn 130-150 +, only if I am at or are building nomads to get me up to my city cap and have enough troops for defense or war. Then I gradually start on buildings. I try for stonehenge in my best production city after it builds its first nomad and try to avoid building pw until it is finished or I have enough gold to rush buy in case. Then 10% pw until after I know I can get Valley of the kings.

[stankarp]

Since I shipped AOM III, I found a small error that may, in some circumstances, cause the human to loose the game after turn 400 due to re-current rebellions.

It is available at the AOM Homepage.

http://www.theagesofman.net/

The enclosed file is to replace the existing one in ctp2data/default/gamedata.

If you do not have a current game going, just copy and paste into the gamedata folder to replace the existing one.

If you are less than 120 turns into a game, you can copy and paste the file into the required place to replace the existing one, then go into the cheat editor and hit reloadslic. It will not have any effect on the game in real terms.

If you are well into a game and want to finish it, the error only triggers if you have accumulated 150 triumph points (25 for capturing a capital and 50 for killing an ai) between turns 400 and 700. You can continue to play as long as you don't reach that 150 points.

My apologies for any inconvenience.

Stan Karpinski.

[smithldoo]

Well, Well, Well

I was doing some house keeping and I found this saved in a folder from some time ago.

Apolyton Civilization Forums Miscellaneous Archive CtP2-Creation-AI-Mods-Scenarios-Archive A simple question___.htm

////////////////////////////////////////
// //
// History of Mankind! - A CTP2 MOD //
// //
// By Dale Kent //
// //
// Concept incepted 20th August 2002 //
// //
////////////////////////////////////////

/////////////////////
Design Documentation:
/////////////////////

General:
--------

- This MOD is to be a complete rewrite of the general CTP2 settings.
- It will use as its base: Original CTP2 settings
- This MOD will represent history from 8000 BC to 2000 (10000 years).
- The time hops will be less:
Epoche 1 8000BC - 3000BC: 20 year turns (250 turns)
Epoche 2 3000BC - 0AD: 10 year turns (300 turns)
Epoche 3 0AD - 1500AD: 5 year turns (300 turns)
Epoche 4 1500AD - 2000AD: 1 year turns (500 turns)
This makes a total of 4 epoches, and 1350 turns of gameplay.
- Epoches will have specific goals for humans:
Epoche 1: Survival and establishment (Pre-History)
Epoche 2: Meeting the neighbors (Anchient)
Epoche 3: The quest for Empire (Medieval)
Epoche 4: Civilisation and Global ambition (Modern)

Individual MODs that will be used:
----------------------------------

- CityCapture
- DiploPhotos
- Ultra-gigantic maps (though not as big as what Apolyton Pack had)
- VisibleWonders
- NaturalWonders
- CityExpansion
- CityMod
- UnitUpdater
- GoodMod (for the goods)
- Some of the current AI cheat MODs (TileImpsForAI, FortsForAI, PWCheatForAI)
- Some new scripts that will be written for this MOD:
AgroBastard - Script to enhance the attack of the AI
GreedyBastard - Script to enhance the economics of the the AI
SmartBastard - Script to enhance the science of the AI
GrovelBastard - Script to enhance the diplomacy of the AI
PanicBastard - Script to enhance the defense of the AI
WetBastard - script to enhance the navy of the AI
SwoopingBastard - script to enhance the air useage of the AI
- Other new stuff that I'm going to add in:
More city sprites (on top of CityMod) like the Civ3 types
New units (EG. chariot)


Ages of Mankind:

by Dale.

Dale proposing a game which is 1350 turns long and on about the size of the AOM gigantic map. With most of the things that are basically in AOM v1-3 (which BTW is 30 % shorter).

He forgot to mention elite units, wonder units, heroes, disasters and bonuses, a new level of economics with outposts, religion, new ways of getting advances etc, etc, etc.

What about new units like advanced warrior, chariot archer, javelineer, peltast, phalanx, heavy cavalry, hun raider, heavy swordsman, just for the early ancient period.

My, my, how things have changed.

[angrybowen]

At the risk of stirring up the hornets nest I am going to say that the best thing that I could say about some of the verbage that Hexegonian and Dale produced had me bemused. Many of the claims about AOM were to me, way off the mark.

Both complained that AOM is too long and repetitive when both did or planned to produce games that were longer and more repetitive.

I found Cradle to very repetitive, and once you got to 15 cities, you were under no threat. Getting there was a challenge at times, only because you were so screwed down at the start, you could not breathe, to the point that even the goody hut scramble was removed. It was also longer than AOM and I think i never actually managed to finish a game.

The details on the Ages of Mankind by Dale point to a game 50% LONGER than AOM, and a lot less depth. Wonder what ever happened to it.

Makes stan's effort even more noteworthy.

[Generaldoktor]

Guys, I would never tell anybody what to post, but I bet you're going to get the controversy going again, which isn't good for the threads.

Stan, reference the correction; where is the cheats editor? Is it in the game disc or on the program files (if the latter, which folder? I do have a game going >120.)

[Maquiladora]

IIRC that mod never got released, so whats your point? Dale obviously changed his mind about it well before AoM.

[hexagonian]

Too much work this week (as well as my daughter's softball games every night this week) did not allow me to keep up with this thread.

Looks like it is really hopping here!

I will say this...
If civ4 forced me to have 60+ cities as the norm as the only way to win any of the different victory conditions, I wouldn't be playing it either.

..and I do find it ironic that I get accused of nitpicking on a game, while others feel it is open season on another game, and their criticism is not nitpicky as it relates to gameplay. Preferences, based on playstyle, and what is important to THAT player...nothing wrong with that.

(...Other than the performance issues, which could be considered a breach, but it also is in the gamer's interest to research those things BEFORE purchase)

Originally posted by smithldoo
I think your a bit arrogant by demanding people read and analyse in detail your voluminous verbage and its their own fault if they don't get your message...

Hmmm, I highlight the important stuff to make it crystal clear...I break the post into manageable sections so that the reader does not have to suffer through a huge block of copy...

If you cannot bother to read my posts, that's not my problem...and ironically, it leaves you with no excuses either. If you debate, you'd better be informed about what your opponent is saying.

That's a tenet of gaming too...know your opponent.

...but I'd expect that from someone who could not be bothered to check into actual player reports regarding gameplay and system performance before rushing out to get civ4. What difference is a few weeks of waiting???

I learned that lesson YEARS ago!

If you cannot take the time, your best bet is to simply ignore. And I have no problem with that.

My discussion regarding civ4 before it's release was merely to get some insight on civ4, based on what had been reported so far, so players would at least have some groundwork. Then it is up to them to get the actual gameplay reports WHEN it's released

Crap, I never thought I wielded so much power to sway people.

Must...use...that...power...for...good

Originally posted by angrybowen
At the risk of stirring up the hornets nest I am going to say that the best thing that I could say about some of the verbage that Hexegonian and Dale produced had me bemused...Both complained that AOM is too long and repetitive when both did or planned to produce games that were longer and more repetitive.

Wake up again...

Cradle was produced in 2001. Having playtested it extensively, I burned out on it because among other things, the grinding gameplay - as well as any other epic-style game that follows that formula as the PRIMARY focus. I have stated that fact for the past year... as well as numerous times in this thread.

Again, no excuses.

I guess the preference for some people to play epic-style games does not carry over to epic-style reading.

However, that's not my problem...

And I maintain that AOM is a good game - it is ALSO not for me at this moment.

[stankarp]

Generaldoktor, go to options (top middle of game screen), select cheat mode from the drop down list. When it opens up there is a reloadslic button.

Alternatively you can press ' to bring up the chat box. Type
/reloadslic
and press enter again.

If your game is later than turn 120, I recommend not reloading slic, start again. Or don't conquer 2 entire ai (i.e. capture their capitals as well)

I never saw the "Ages of Mankind:" thread. I was interested and motivated by a thread called "the best of both worlds".

[angrybowen]

IIRC that mod never got released, so whats your point? Dale obviously changed his mind about it well before AoM.

by maquilladora.

Pretty obviously.

Both complained that AOM is too long and repetitive when both did or planned to produce games that were longer and more repetitive.

Thats was my point.

If civ4 forced me to have 60+ cities as the norm as the only way to win any of the different victory conditions, I wouldn't be playing it either.

by Hex.

This is where I have to post something (sorry Generaldoktor, I knew I would stir up the hornets nest again).

1) As Stan said, you do not HAVE to have 60 cities to win, you can play on a smaller map version of AOM II(which no one ever commented on(source stan)), or just play on a smaller map and allow the original victory conditions to apply.
2) There is an in built penalty in all AOM versions for going big after Tribunal Empire, middle ages governments are more ineffecient (as noted in another thread). So if you choose the conquest route, it is a FREE DECISION that involves the game getting very bit. This is far from the "only way to win" that Hex goes on and on and on about.
3) If you want to play just a builder/peaceful game, there are 2 victory options that don't involve conquest (diplomatic and science). The first target for a science victory is on turn 400. A perfectly manageable game. A well resourced Trib Empire focused on science should be able to give this a shake. What I have noticed is that AI agression is tied to frenzy (after all that is why frenzy was written, because the ai was too timid). If you are being peaceful and building, your frenzy level will never be very high, so the AI will never crank up to its full aggression, particularly against the human.

Sorry Generaldoktor, some things need to be said. Some people are perpetuating a MYTH that you can only win AOM by playing on ultra gig maps with 10-12 opponents and drawing your sword on turn one. This myth is untrue and is being perpetuated out of ignorance, thats my main point Maq. OK.

Thanks.