Of Settlers, fortresses and Empire borders

AeonOfTime · December 18, 2000, 14:31

Hi guys,

I recently ran into a problem that's more or less been nagging at since the first civ was out: Settlers from the other nations and their tendency not to give a heck to empire borders.

Of course in the meantime we have been blessed with the possibility to expel settlers, diplomats and other non-offensive units with ease - but you have to see them first, and that means radar coverage. No problem, I hear you say, build listening posts! Right, but they are not what I'd call cheap, especially early in the game, and I'd rather spend those public works on something useful.

In my current game, I'm playing on a gigantic map, with 8 other civs and there are no oceans, only a few lakes. That's a good way to make it very crowded very fast - and very interesting early in the game as you fight for space...

So I build as many cities as I possibly can until I hit on the borders of the other civs, and if I'm lucky enough one may be belligerent enought to dare attack me, and hop! a few more cities. That way I've soon reached the maximum nr of possible cities. Damn... it's still quite a way until I get a government type that will give me more than 20 cities max...

That's where my border-extension campaign starts. I stop creating cities, but build a few settlers already in preparation for the government change, and start extending my borders where possible by building fortifications.

That's neat, even if it's quite public works-consuming. (Now hold it, I know what you're thinking... 'That's not consistent with not wanting to build listening posts' - right. but between seeing better and extending empire borders, I definitely prefer to spend public works on the latter). But that's also where my problem starts. The fortifications have a sight radius of 2, but funny enough they can't see units. Aaaaargh!

So those little sneakers just walk straight into my borders, and build cities like rabbits dig holes. Easy, I thought, even though I was beginning to be less enthousiastic - I started building the cheapest military units I had at my disposal, to place them strategically inside my borders to watch for any encroaching settlers. That worked quite like I expected, but my military support costs literally exploded as my borders were far from small. That ended that, as those resources cut down public works and city production. Damn. Less units were simply not efficient enough / the net was too small otherwise.

Second step: I finally gave up on my no listening posts policy, and started into a listening frenzy - I built enough of them to cover what areas I had left to protect :-( I was starting to get a little sullen about the whole affair.

Then I was happy for at least 4 turns before those little troublemakers started a settler invasion that sent me sprawling to the floor. I then noticed that having listening posts is not enough - you have to have enough units running around to catch them before they can do anything. And I had dismissed them just before that!!! I guess you just can't learn enough...

Now I've created a start of a border protection plan, which I'd like to share with you guys- maybe you have a much, much better idea and if you do, I'd be pleased to hear it :-)

The border protection plan:

- Build fortresses to extend your borders
- Build listening posts strategically
- Build a few, cheap, fast-moving units, and place them as strategically.
- Build a small network of roads leading to the different 'hot zones' so that the units can get anywhere fast.

That's it! A side-effect of this is, that you can ever protect your empire much better...

For those who may think I'm making a big fuss of this, I concur - I do make a big fuss of this. I can't help it! But seriously, one of the drawbacks of building many cities, is that your public works are soon spread quite thin, and you can lose development speed through it - the computer opponents most of the time have less cities, but they are better tended than your own, generally bigger. (In my games, at least... :-))

All right, I'll stop here before you keel over from exhaustion reading this...

Give me a green, soft mushroom and I'll rule the world!
- Aeon of Time

MrFun · December 19, 2000, 22:10

This reminds me of the current crisis with Palestine and Isreali settlers in our real world.

Alpha Wolf · December 20, 2000, 01:43

I just had a similiar problem. I finally bordered off an entire largish island. All of a sudden all these American settlers showed up. When I demanded they stop trespassing, they simply formed cities. Some I negoitied their turnover to me, but ultimately I was forced to attack some of these undefended cities. I wonder if taking off its civilian status in units.txt will help.

------------------
History is written by the victor.

Saperlipopet · December 20, 2000, 07:12

I always used the same strategy to keep borders clean : i build a lot of small units (even fighters early in the game).

With those dozens fighters i first explore, then they come back home and keep the borderline, fortified in the key places to prevent enemy units to enter.
The cost for small units is very low, it allows you to kick ass of civilian units and helps in saving PW.

Many player disband those units, i believe using them efficiently is much more accurate.

I also use those little units when i'm attacking, to block ways to reinforcment, so enemy loose turns to attack them. I finally use them to usually plunder some mines or fortify on them when attacking a city with lot of production...

Baptiste

Dragonfly · December 20, 2000, 23:37

I started posting sleeping leftover Diplomats and Corporate Franchises with my Warriors and Hoplites on my borders later in the game. On the assumption that the Diplomat and Corporate were stealth units, could see other stealth units, and then the Warriors and Hoplites could kick any infiltrators out.

No one came by to join the party, though, so I don't know if that works.

colorme · December 21, 2000, 00:56

Build lots of warriors and station them all over your empire. They're fairly cheap and see a lot.

Didymus · December 21, 2000, 10:33

quote:

Originally posted by Dragonfly on 12-20-2000 10:37 PM
... On the assumption that the Diplomat and Corporate were stealth units...

Dips are not stealth.

claytonres · December 21, 2000, 15:08

I was recently having a similar prob with the Germans, but I had radar and was smart enough to "stop" settling at a choke point (mountains on my right, water above and below me). I saw his settler move in and quickly expelled him with a tank. You CAN NOT tell him to move because he WILL plunk down and settle! KICK HIM OUT!