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Why? What was I doing wrong? Also right now  
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Mar 19, 2014 22:23
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Suzuki Method posted:Why? What was I doing wrong? have you tried upping the difficulty
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Mar 19, 2014 22:27
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As I said, the jump from Prince to King is really hefty for me and I can't manage to do anything. Guess I'll have to though if it's looking ridiculous to everyone else, haha.
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Mar 19, 2014 22:28
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Bashez posted:On Prince they won't have any money. I think Emperor is the first level where people will semi regularly be able to foot the bill for it. Usually I just give them enough money to pay for the agreement and then pay the agreement and all the extra on top of that for being so far ahead in tech. Research agreements got nerfed in the fall patch, if I recall correctly -- now each civ only gets the beakers of the weaker of the two civs, instead of each getting a proportion of their personal research output. In other words, you won't see much benefit in helping out your Industrial Age neighbor when you're in the Information Age. Given that, I have trouble getting excited about them any more. They take a significant up-front investment, and take a long time to take effect, and now it's much harder to quantify what the benefit will be. And yeah, if you have 8000GP then you should be upping the difficulty. At least to King. Emperor on up the other civs start getting huge starting bonuses (e.g. starting with two settlers) which rankles me a bit, but King isn't especially unreasonable.
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Mar 19, 2014 22:29
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If you're concerned about going up a level of difficulty, play something easy, like Inca on Highlands, or the Dutch on that all-desert map. Just go into it with the expectation you won't get many early wonders, and keep on playing even if nothing seems to be going your way. A victory from behind is the best way.
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Mar 19, 2014 22:49
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Suzuki Method posted:As I said, the jump from Prince to King is really hefty for me and I can't manage to do anything. Guess I'll have to though if it's looking ridiculous to everyone else, haha. Having 8000 gold is pretty dumb, you should spend that. Buy some units or buildings with it, bribe some city states... It does nothing just sitting in your treasury.
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Mar 19, 2014 22:57
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Suzuki Method posted:As I said, the jump from Prince to King is really hefty for me and I can't manage to do anything. Guess I'll have to though if it's looking ridiculous to everyone else, haha. Start small. Try a Duel map or something. The Prince->King jump is mostly a matter of recognizing which buildings you actually need (e.g. a Market is pointless in a city that's generating 3GPT, you don't need a Caravansary in non-trade-oriented cities, you don't need a Barracks in non-production-based cities, etc.), and being a bit more proactive about maintaining a military so that the AI doesn't jump on you. How do you end up not able to do anything? As noted, the AI will seize all the early wonders (in particular, give up entirely on the Great Library), but those are absolutely not required to do well at the game.
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Mar 19, 2014 23:06
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Start small. Try a Duel map or something. The Prince->King jump is mostly a matter of recognizing which buildings you actually need (e.g. a Market is pointless in a city that's generating 3GPT, you don't need a Caravansary in non-trade-oriented cities, you don't need a Barracks in non-production-based cities, etc.), and being a bit more proactive about maintaining a military so that the AI doesn't jump on you. It's because I struggle with the Happiness mechanic. I remember when I first tried Prince I was bombarded with the fact happiness actually mattered now, and when I try going past Prince I just can't keep up with the unhappiness. Gort posted:Having 8000 gold is pretty dumb, you should spend that. Buy some units or buildings with it, bribe some city states... It does nothing just sitting in your treasury. I am Allies with every single city-state (by throwing money at them) and I'm buying buildings a lot, there's not much to buy now though. Also I only have a ranged unit sitting on my capital (I only have the one city) and 1 exploring ship, I don't see the point of having a big army if the AI doesn't seem interested in going to war with me. And even if they did, I could just dump all the money into an instant army anyway.
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Mar 19, 2014 23:10
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Suzuki Method posted:As I said, the jump from Prince to King is really hefty for me and I can't manage to do anything. Guess I'll have to though if it's looking ridiculous to everyone else, haha. The game doesn't really change on your end from Prince to King (I believe Prince is the first difficulty where you aren't getting bonuses anymore). King's still easy enough that you'll be able to get any wonder you want if you make it a priority (barring edge cases) and will only get beaten to wonders that you put on the backburner. Just be a little more careful with barbarians.
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Mar 19, 2014 23:13
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Suzuki Method posted:It's because I struggle with the Happiness mechanic. I remember when I first tried Prince I was bombarded with the fact happiness actually mattered now, and when I try going past Prince I just can't keep up with the unhappiness. Quick and dirty rules on happiness. -Don't go wide. 4 cities is generally considered optimal but more or less can sometimes be in order. 9 cities is right out unless they're enemy capitals. -When you build a city, at a minimum it should have at least one unique luxury resource within a 3 tiles radius. 2 or more is optimal. -Other civs will trade excess luxury resources to you for 7GPT if they are neutral or friendly. -Focus on growing your capital. With tradition, your capital generates less unhappiness per pop then the satellite cities. Use trade routes to pump in food. -Be proactive with your happiness. If you see that your cities are gaining a pop every 2-3 turns and your happiness is only at 2. You better start building a coliseum or improving a luxury resource. -CS's are great for happiness, but make sure you focus on making allies with ones that have unique luxuries. -If you're still having trouble with happiness during the transition from industrial to modern era, delay entering modern era and building your third factory until the cultural leaders pick their ideology and then pick their ideology. This will help to prevent unhappiness from having chosen the wrong ideology. If you forget and end up being first, choosing Order almost guarantees you'll have no problem with happiness (AI loves Order). dayman fucked around with this message at 23:25 on Mar 19, 2014 |
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Mar 19, 2014 23:21
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Suzuki Method posted:It's because I struggle with the Happiness mechanic. I remember when I first tried Prince I was bombarded with the fact happiness actually mattered now, and when I try going past Prince I just can't keep up with the unhappiness. Ahh. Things you can do to mitigate unhappiness: * Build fewer cities. Unless you're trying to do a domination game (in which case you need to at least puppet every other civ's capital) you shouldn't need more than 4 cities in your empire. * Get luxury resources. Each unique luxury resource is +4 happiness. You can often trade with other civs to get access to their luxuries, though they generally won't want to trade away their last copy since that means they lose 4 happiness (since they no longer have "access" to the resource). ** An end-tree Patronage social policy gives you 50% more happiness from luxury resources gotten from city-states, which can be a big jump. ** Likewise, there are lots of happiness-fixers in the ideologies. Freedom's "specialists only generate 50% unhappiness" is a big one, for example. * Make a religion that focuses on happiness. You can get happiness from shrines, temples, and gardens, from having lots of foreign followers, from faith-buying Pagodas, maybe a few other things that I forget. * Build Coliseums, Stadiums, Circuses, etc. Each city can reduce some of its local unhappiness by building these, but they cost upkeep (except the Circus, but you can only build that if you have horses or elephants near the city). * Build wonders that help with happiness. Notre Dame, Forbidden Palace, Eiffel Tower, etc. Not very reliable given the AI's tendency to snipe wonders. * Finding Natural Wonders is worth +1 happiness apiece, so scouting them out early can be worthwhile. Some of them give you happiness if they're in your borders, but I wouldn't go much out of my way to achieve that. The big whammy is having lots of cities under your control; you pay a big cost for each city and a lesser cost for each population point in your empire. If you're on the warpath, you should generally raze or puppet cities rather than assimilate them. In fact as far as I'm aware there's zero reason to assimilate a city while it's still in revolt. Cities you do assimilate should get Courthouses built in them ASAP to remove the happiness penalty from being an occupied city. TooMuchAbstraction fucked around with this message at 23:29 on Mar 19, 2014 |
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Mar 19, 2014 23:26
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That is all very good advice, thanks! Also, I have never had more than 3 original cities (more only if going for Domination and taking capitals), I usually like to have only 1 or 2. Is there any big reason I should go for 3 or 4, or is my 1 or 2 okay?
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Mar 19, 2014 23:38
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You need at least 3 cities if you want early access to an ideology, because you need to build 3 factories for that. Ideologies are incredibly powerful so this is almost always worthwhile. But I always seem to get screwed out of coal (needed to build those factories) and end up having to wait anyway, at least until my city-state allies hook up their coal. Otherwise, so far as I'm aware all of the penalties for having cities/population scale linearly, so it's mostly that the average game has a happiness "carrying capacity" (in terms of total availability of luxuries, etc.) that readily accommodates 4 cities but makes it harder to sustain larger civs. Oh, incidentally, you pay, what is it, 5% more beakers/culture to unlock techs/social policies for each city you have. A good city will easily make up that difference for you, but it's something to be aware of.
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Mar 19, 2014 23:47
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Suzuki Method posted:That is all very good advice, thanks! Also, I have never had more than 3 original cities (more only if going for Domination and taking capitals), I usually like to have only 1 or 2. Is there any big reason I should go for 3 or 4, or is my 1 or 2 okay? More cities deacreases the amount of food you have to "pay" for each civilian to work. More population is good, going wider essentially trades happiness (and culture and science) for food, and results in higher populations to work. You want your next 3 cities to capture a unique luxury each. If you can't manage that then you should settle 2 unless that city that isn't going to bring a unique luxury in is awesome. You also want to get a settler out quickly. The earlier you get your settlers out to settle the more time the city has to grow in to something worthwhile. I like to build my settler when my cap gets to 4 or 5 population. Make sure you're trading your excess luxuries for AI's excess luxuries. Circuses also really really help the happiness crunch, along with the Circus Maximus.
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Mar 19, 2014 23:50
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Would it be worth it to go for Liberty instead of Tradition when starting a game for the settler/worker bonuses? Or would the 'free culture building in first 3 cities' in Tradition be a better thing to invest in?
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Mar 20, 2014 00:02
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"Woe to that man by whom the Tradition tree is betrayed! It would have been better if he had not been born." - Civ 5:2 e; just pretend the Liberty tree doesn't exist. It's better for you.
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Mar 20, 2014 00:24
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Suzuki Method posted:Would it be worth it to go for Liberty instead of Tradition when starting a game for the settler/worker bonuses? Or would the 'free culture building in first 3 cities' in Tradition be a better thing to invest in? Tradition beats all the other early policies. Take it in this order: 1. Opener 2. Free monument in first four cities 3. Growth bonuses in capital 4. Happiness bonuses in capital 5. Free garrisons and city attack power when garrisoned 6. Wonder production It's important to complete the whole thing because free aqueducts and flat growth bonuses are amazing. Liberty is a trap because 1 happiness per city is inferior to half unhappiness in the capital. It's child's play to get, say, a 30 size capital. That's 15 happiness. Are you likely to have 15 cities in your empire? Not really - perhaps in the very late game, but by then you have Ideologies, all of which have ways to give you vast amounts of happiness. I love how Civ 5 made a "Tall" empire possible, but they went too far and made it optimal basically all the time.
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Mar 20, 2014 00:26
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I achieved Yoink! (As Austria, acquire a City-State with 15 or more units through Diplomatic Marriage). when I wasn't playing Austria. I haven't played her in weeks. Maybe she was in my game?
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Mar 20, 2014 00:30
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When you acquire City-States as Austria through Diplomatic Marriage, do they go into Resistance and stuff? If so that's kinda lovely.
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Mar 20, 2014 00:41
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Suzuki Method posted:When you acquire City-States as Austria through Diplomatic Marriage, do they go into Resistance and stuff? If so that's kinda lovely.
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Mar 20, 2014 00:44
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Oh sweet. I might try out Austria tonight.
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Mar 20, 2014 00:56
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How do you make sure you get a religion before the maximum number of religions is reached (however one has to imagine that...)? I get the feeling the AI on Emperor rushes things like Stonehenge and somehow manages to get its religion a lot quicker than I do. Does it make sense to try to rush techs and to angle for the Hagia Sofia? Or should I try to get access to temples early on? This has been one of the things that I haven't yet managed after stepping up the difficulty.
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Mar 20, 2014 03:56
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I find the best way to get a religion is not to build shrines everywhere, but to get an early pantheon (via shrine, hut, or religious city state) that happens to give even more faith.
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Mar 20, 2014 04:10
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Hollow Talk posted:How do you make sure you get a religion before the maximum number of religions is reached (however one has to imagine that...)? I get the feeling the AI on Emperor rushes things like Stonehenge and somehow manages to get its religion a lot quicker than I do. Does it make sense to try to rush techs and to angle for the Hagia Sofia? Or should I try to get access to temples early on? This has been one of the things that I haven't yet managed after stepping up the difficulty. You can get Stonehenge if you really want it and have an appropriate start even on Deity. That said, I don’t recommend it unless you’re playing as Theodora. Get your pantheon by meeting city‐states and/or building an early shrine in your capital and choose a faith‐generating belief. If you miss out on a pantheon or don’t have suitable terrain for any of the faith‐generating pantheons, it’s no huge loss. Religions aren’t all that useful anyway, especially if your neighbour picks decent follower beliefs.
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Mar 20, 2014 04:23
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Bashez posted:I think Emperor is the first level where people will semi regularly be able to foot the bill for it. Usually I just give them enough money to pay for the agreement and then pay the agreement and all the extra on top of that for being so far ahead in tech. dayman posted:Quick and dirty rules on happiness. Suzuki Method posted:Would it be worth it to go for Liberty instead of Tradition when starting a game for the settler/worker bonuses? Or would the 'free culture building in first 3 cities' in Tradition be a better thing to invest in? Fur20 fucked around with this message at 05:26 on Mar 20, 2014 |
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Mar 20, 2014 05:23
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Phobophilia posted:I find the best way to get a religion is not to build shrines everywhere, but to get an early pantheon (via shrine, hut, or religious city state) that happens to give even more faith. Platystemon posted:You can get Stonehenge if you really want it and have an appropriate start even on Deity. That makes a lot of sense, and explains why I kept having trouble! I usually chose one of the pantheon options that didn't generate further religion, relying solely on shrines (and later temples, which come too late).  I'll try that in my next game and see whether I'll get on a bit better.
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Mar 20, 2014 14:43
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I generally don't bother going for religion unless I get enough of a desert start that I can get use out of Desert Folklore. (Also requires that I get Desert Folklore itself.)
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Mar 20, 2014 15:34
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Yeah religions can be very powerful but you need to allocate a lot of resources to it in the early game to gain any traction so you should learn early on whether or not it's worth your time.
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Mar 20, 2014 15:36
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The White Dragon posted:The free culture building is sort of nice, but the really important things in Tradition are +2 Food/+15% growth in your capital and the four aqueducts/+10% growth capstone. I think people don't really consider the monuments and the "faster border expansion" in the opener enough. Population is king, but it's decidedly less so if you run out of useful tiles to work when your cities start growing like weeds. Spending money on tiles to compensate is not a very good use of your income in the early game I find unless you're buying a key luxury or a national wonder.
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Mar 20, 2014 16:15
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I'm having a pretty crazy game playing as indonesia on a 'small continents' map, my favourite for when i pick sea-based civs. One of my islands has Mt Kilimanjaro, the other has the fountain of life. The first Kris swordsman I made got the invulnerability promotion (30% combat bonus defending, +20 hp healed), with the promotion and the fountain of youth bonus it heals 50hp every turn, I've given it every defensive upgrade, making it pretty much unkillable.
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Mar 20, 2014 16:39
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Super Jay Mann posted:I think people don't really consider the monuments and the "faster border expansion" in the opener enough. Population is king, but it's decidedly less so if you run out of useful tiles to work when your cities start growing like weeds. Spending money on tiles to compensate is not a very good use of your income in the early game I find unless you're buying a key luxury or a national wonder. The free monuments also save you on early hammers and maintenance costs for buildings that basically every city needs anyway, since you get zero border expansion without at least one source of culture. I generally find that my early cities have entirely acceptable border growth solely from the free monument.
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Mar 20, 2014 16:42
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In games where I go for Fertility Rites (usually only when I play Ethiopia) I'll try to follow it up with Swords into Plowshares for a total of +25% growth. That's like having a "We Love the King" celebration constantly, in every city. Building/capturing the Temple of Artemis and going full Tradition gives normal cities +50% growth, and the capital ends up being +60%. Actual "We Love the King" celebrations stack on top of that, to +75%/+85% growth rates. This in turn can let you power right through sick levels of unhappiness in the empire.
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Mar 20, 2014 19:01
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John_A_Tallon posted:In games where I go for Fertility Rites (usually only when I play Ethiopia) I'll try to follow it up with Swords into Plowshares for a total of +25% growth. That's like having a "We Love the King" celebration constantly, in every city. Building/capturing the Temple of Artemis and going full Tradition gives normal cities +50% growth, and the capital ends up being +60%. Actual "We Love the King" celebrations stack on top of that, to +75%/+85% growth rates. This in turn can let you power right through sick levels of unhappiness in the empire. Swords into Plowshares sounds great until some dick declares The Forever War on you from three thousand miles away and never relents. Anyone else miss War Weariness as a mechanic?
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Mar 20, 2014 19:42
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Gort posted:Swords into Plowshares sounds great until some dick declares The Forever War on you from three thousand miles away and never relents. Anyone else miss War Weariness as a mechanic? Hell no. I love Civ 4 but that was arguably the worst mechanic in the entire game.
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Mar 20, 2014 19:47
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Gort posted:Swords into Plowshares sounds great until some dick declares The Forever War on you from three thousand miles away and never relents. Anyone else miss War Weariness as a mechanic? This might be a bug but any time I try to make peace with a civ, they could have demanded three of my cities the turn prior, but if I ask for a straight peace deal, they'll accept.
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Mar 20, 2014 19:59
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Super Jay Mann posted:I think people don't really consider the monuments and the "faster border expansion" in the opener enough. Population is king, but it's decidedly less so if you run out of useful tiles to work when your cities start growing like weeds. Spending money on tiles to compensate is not a very good use of your income in the early game I find unless you're buying a key luxury or a national wonder. Yeah, the opener is nice, but I've stopped relying on Legalism since it doesn't apply to cities you've conquered after taking the policy.
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Mar 20, 2014 21:03
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dayman posted:This might be a bug but any time I try to make peace with a civ, they could have demanded three of my cities the turn prior, but if I ask for a straight peace deal, they'll accept. The AI usually demands more than it actually wants when it's asking you for a peace deal. Maybe this is intentional design meant to encourage the player to negotiate but it always struck me as odd behavior.
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Mar 20, 2014 21:34
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Super Jay Mann posted:Hell no. I love Civ 4 but that was arguably the worst mechanic in the entire game. War weariness doesn't actually do anything unless you actually trade units with that opponent. Someone declaring from far away only cuts you off from trade.
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Mar 20, 2014 22:43
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Phobophilia posted:War weariness doesn't actually do anything unless you actually trade units with that opponent. Someone declaring from far away only cuts you off from trade. Put a different way, Swords Into Plowshares should only be cancelled if a) you declare war on someone, or b) your units engage in combat, or c) or hostile units enter your territory. Merely being in a nominal state of war because some other civ doesn't like you is no big deal. I mean hell, hadn't the USA been at war with Mexico for the last century or something because people kept forgetting to sign the treaty? I seem to recall something bizarre like that going on. Maybe not with those two specific combatants though.
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Mar 20, 2014 22:55
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The White Dragon posted:Yeah, the opener is nice, but I've stopped relying on Legalism since it doesn't apply to cities you've conquered after taking the policy. Well it's not like there's much of a choice given the best policies in the tree go through Legalism.
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Mar 20, 2014 22:55
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