L of A's observations on his latest Monarch game

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Level: Monarch
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Continents
Player's Civ: Americans (Ind/Exp)
AI Civs: China, Babylon, Zululand, Germany, Japan, France, Iroquois

My continant was made up of two big ovals connected by a Peninsula. Instead of initially Rex-ing, I build 3 cities, then cranked out archers. The Chinese were just a little to the north. I took them out, and got all of their techs. Then I rex-ed. It was like a kinda delayed rex. When I reviewed it on the retire screen, I acquired more cities by capturing them, than any other AI civ did by building them. I also got 2 workers. So heres observation one.

1. If the nearby civ doesn't have an early game UU, you can destroy them. It is more profitable them just REX-ing because you get all of their cities (if you play it right) and you get techs (I got 3) and a few workers.

After taking out the Chinese, I started to settle the entire oval. I put a city on the Peninsula at a point where there is only one Square (therefore ships can pass east to west.) I called it Philadelphia. My starting city was the best place I have every had. It was on a river. To the west there were 4 square of forest, 2 of them which had game. On the river were two cattle square. Then I build the Great Library. I got mapmaking, and sent out a ship to find all the other civs. Also sent explorers to the southern oval. Soon I had found all of the worlds civs. This gave me a wealth of information. Point 2 and 3 follows.

2. Exploration is the key to staying with everyone else tech wise. Civs pay a bucketful of gold for contacts with other civs, and for a reason: they can sell techs to the other civs. If you know were everyone is, but no one else knows where they are, you can act as a middle man. During Roman times, the Arabs were those middle men, which increased the price of the spices/silks/etc that the Romans got. You too can act as a middle man and get rich that way in the ancient era.

3. From this game, it seems to me that the Great Library is more important than the Pyramids. The Pyramids is a wonder for those civs who are isolationist. The Great Library is an international sort of wonder, but only reaps its full benefit when you have contact with every civ. If you don't know everyone, then you should pay for contacts with other civs. This will be payed back triple by all of the free techs that you get.

So I cruised along peacfully through the middle ages, until Education. Once I lost the Great Library, I started to fall behind by about 2 techs. I had the second highest culture. (Babs were first.) All of my cities were straining to build universities and libraries. Washington managed to build both Copernicus' and Newton's Wonders. That pushed me back up to around the leader tech wise. Unfortunatly, all of my cities were building improvements, and not units. My power slipped and I slipped to 2nd on the standings. None of those buildings seemed to increased my science drastically, which brings us to point 4, and 5.

4. Build both Corpernicus' and Newton's in the same city. It is quite hard to do, but if you beeline for those tech's, you may have a chance.

5. (might be controversial ) I thought that universities in every city would make a big difference, but they did not. What seems to do the trick is to take you best 4-6 cities (called core cities) and build lots of improvmenets in there. This is where your science/productivity/culture/population is centered. Build your wonders, universities, factories here because they will have the most effect. You are always looking for more bang for your buck.
The next set of cities, one step down, can be called your specialist ciites. For example, if one city is close to lots of forests, build things like factories there. It specializes in productivity. Out of these cities will come the bulk of your units. To keep your power graph up, you can create cities which are designed for the output of units. Cities with barracks, and high productivity, medium population, and rather low culture. You might even put a Heroic Epic, or Military Academy, or the Pentagon here, if your core cities are too busy with other essential things. Other specialist cities might be commerce (put marketplaces, banks.) These might be where you get quite a lot of money (not as much as core cities, but more than any other ciites.) They may eventually grow to be core cities, but you shouldn't push them too hard. The lowest level of cities are the ones build in bad lands (desert/tundra/jungle.) These are your resource cities. The only reason you build them there is because there might be some oil in the city's area. Because they will never grow, you should put the bare minimum in them. Temples, maybe a library, and city walls. If the AI has also put cities in the desert, the little culture that you have *may* be able to assimilate them.

As the game progressed to the Industrial age (around 900 AD), I again made the mistake of building factories everywhere. Philadelphia was the center of huge battles between the Babs and my civ. I managed to hold off their Infantry with my Riflemen, and I got a leader (George Washington). I made an army, and then layed siege to a Bab city which they had founded on my oval. I made an army of Infantry. I made 10 artillery units, and then bombarded the Bab city. After reducing it from 12 to a 1, my 10 cavalry attacked and only managed to get the two defending Infantry to Elite, and to give the Babs a leader. (they did not manged to bring him out for some reason. The Babs had put half of their fleet in there which meant like 5 battleships, and 3 cruisers. I did not have a single ship to my name. Maybe Soren could do something about this. ) The in two turns, my army crushed the opposition and sunk half of the Babylonian Navy. I got a bunch of techs from them, which again put me back up to par with the leader.

6. Use massed bombardment units. Those 10 artillery units really destroyed that city. Later on, when you get Bombers, fighters, Radar Artillery, you should built tons of these puppies. As you will see, later on massed artillery renders armies obsolete. A good infrarstructure also helps because you can rush the units from one end of your civ to another. With my Industrious workers in Democracy, you can build railroads over plaines/grassland in one turn, and build roads on hills and forests in one turn.

7. Using the leader to make that army was the best thing I've ever done. Usually I use it to rush a wonder, but in this case, it payed off to make an army, win a battle, then be able to build Heroic Epic and Military Academy.

I put the Heroic Epic in Beijing, and the Military Academy in Washington. Again, this was a mistake. Later in the game, I was building the Apollo Program in Washington, the Zulu declared war. Then I wanted to build an Army, but I couldn't because it would waste too many shields. 1700 AD, the end of the Industrial age, was also the end of the Babs and the Germans. The Babs were taken out by the Zulu and the Germans by the French. It was around this time, that I decided that the only way to win would be either spaceship or diplomatic. I didn't build the UN, and I did not have 25% of land or people, so that option went out of the door in a hurry. So I was left with the Spaceship. I got Rocketry and Fission from the Babs right before they died (using the trick I described in the PTW cheat tread.) To reduce the number of turns it takes to discover Spaceflight, I reduced science to 0 for a few turns. After 5 turns I had over 1200 gold. Then I cranked up science to 90% (the other 10% being luxeries) and I ran a huge deficit. However, it took only 5 turns to get spaceflight. (5+5=10 turns total, much less than the traditional method of research) After spaceflight, I went for Satellites. Around this time, the Zulu attacked me. They brought in about 30 modern armor and mech infs to invade Philadelphia. I moved my 10 artillery there, along with my 5 bombers and 3 f-15 fighters, and 2 workers to repair the roads in case they bombed them. The terrain around the city is jungle and hill, so I had two turns to attack this group with artillery. All those airstrikes and artillery so decimated them, that they turned back. Chicago made a tactical nuke, and I waited for them to come again. This time, they had litteraly over 70 units. When you clicked on the stack, you could scroll and up and down forever. Since they were 2 sqaures away from Philadephia, I used a tactical nuke on them. All of the units there except for 20 of them died outright. The remaining twenty were at 1/2 strength. The Zulus power chart took a hit, but everyone declared war on me. Next turn, the vote for Secretary General took place, and Joan of Arc won with 3 votes (Shaka had 1 and I abstained.)

8. You core cities should be decentralized, and allow a great deal of flexibility. Identify beforehand where you are going to place those wonders, so you can build the Military Academy elsewhere. Unless you are going for a cultural win, the don't worry about putting everything in one city. This decentralization of wonders in your core cities will keep those either/or decisions from happening.

9. Tactical nules: god bless em. Because when it comes to talking about the Zulu, thats the only thing worth talking about. Everything else doesnt do the trick to stop em. Of course, everyone else declared war on me, but since I had every single Resources, and 3 huge piles of luxeries I did fine. (also having all 4 of the worlds uranium also helped prevent *ahem* drastic measures by the AI.

Hope this helps your game.

Final Score: 1195 (yeah I know its low. Its not my highest either)

[Lawrence of Arabia]

The winner had only 1900, and the Zulu had 1300.

[Cookie Monster]

Interesting read. Definately learned a lot from your game. One thing that I do differently is to not neglect the non core cities cultural buildings. I'm a big believer in building up culture. This means that when I capture cities I have a better chance to keep them.

And yes, You gotta love tactical nukes. I use nukes whenever I get the chance to and when I feel like I can take on the world for my actions.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Originally posted by Haupt. Dietrich
Interesting read. Definately learned a lot from your game. One thing that I do differently is to not neglect the non core cities cultural buildings. I'm a big believer in building up culture. This means that when I capture cities I have a better chance to keep them.

I also believe in big culture, but I feel that in a desert, where the AI cities will also not have a lot of culture, putting a temple and maybe a library is sufieicent to keep them from going over to the dark side. I try to work on the belief that every city needs to be in the green. Sometimes I add up the upkeep costs of the city, and take the total gold it makes, and subtract. For those specialist cities, when I said rather low, I meant that temples, libraries in all of them for sure, and then either university and or cathedrals. In a city which doesnt produce any gold, don't make a university. Its a waste of money/time/shields. Instead, give it a cathedral, and then you can make it grow up.

Next i'll make a list of units I found useful, and ones I found to not be worth the money.

[Cookie Monster]

Ahh, I see now. Thanks for your clarification. That is definately sound thinking and worth trying in my current/next game.

I think that I see now why I don't ring in the cash as fast as other players do. Building uni's in cities that don't really benefit from them is a waste.

[Lord Merciless]

At highest difficulty levels, it's imperative to play like a psychotic bastard. You can't out-research the AI, you can't out-build the AI, and you can't out-expand the AI. That means you got screw those AI civs up. Early wars can get you slave workers, cities that are easily assimilated, GLs, and mostly important, the strategic initiative. What I mean by strategic initiative is that you can control the events, manipulate the AI Civs, and no longer have to react to AI actions.

My current emperor level game is around 1770 and has a score of 4800. I'm 8 turns away from Motorized Transportation. The only Civ left is the Iroquois.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Useful Units
-Settlers
-Workers
-Warriors
-Spearmen
-Archers
-Swordsmen
-Horsemen
-Musketmen
-Longbowmen
-Cavalry
-Artillery
-Riflemen
-Infantry
-Marines
-Paratroopers
-Bombers
-Fighters
-F-15
-Mechanized Infantry
-Modern Armor
-Battleship
-Nuclear Submarines
-Cruise Missiles
-Tactical Nukes

Units I didn't build
-Knights
-Pikemen
-Helicopters
-Submarines
-Destroyers
-Cruisers
-AEGIS Cruisers
-ICBM
-Stealth Fighter
-Stealth Bomber
-Tanks
-Cannon
-Catapult
-Ironclad
-Frigate
-Privateer
-Carrier
-Transport
-Galleon
-Caravel

[delsolsi]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
I used a tactical nuke on them. All of the units there except for 20 of them died outright. The remaining twenty were at 1/2 strength. The Zulus power chart took a hit, but everyone declared war on me.

I usually play on Regent so Monarch may be different but what I usually do if I'm worried about the other civs declaring war on me is buy a millitary allegence against the civ I'm at war with from the other civs. So far this has always worked for me, and a couple of times it also helped my rep.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

I'd also like to do that, but other civs are always furious with me and none of them want any sort of alliance, and if we make one, then if drags me into a war I don't want.

[punkbass2000]

Originally posted by Lord Merciless
At highest difficulty levels, it's imperative to play like a psychotic bastard. You can't out-research the AI, you can't out-build the AI, and you can't out-expand the AI. That means you got screw those AI civs up.

I don't believe this true.

[The_Hawk]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia


I also believe in big culture, but I feel that in a desert, where the AI cities will also not have a lot of culture, putting a temple and maybe a library is sufieicent to keep them from going over to the dark side. I try to work on the belief that every city needs to be in the green. Sometimes I add up the upkeep costs of the city, and take the total gold it makes, and subtract. For those specialist cities, when I said rather low, I meant that temples, libraries in all of them for sure, and then either university and or cathedrals. In a city which doesnt produce any gold, don't make a university. Its a waste of money/time/shields. Instead, give it a cathedral, and then you can make it grow up.

Next i'll make a list of units I found useful, and ones I found to not be worth the money.

IMHO, I don't tend to agree with you. I always seem to find a way to have a big treasury. Yet, I would build a Uni in a small city in a heartbeat, especially if that city is next to another nation and a potential Borg threat. I find that even though that city's maintenance costs might exceed the gold it generates, the cultural value of a Uni in that city far outweighs the relative strain on my treasury. That University is a big culture boost and the earlier its built the better, because of the 1,000 year factor.

I always make up the deficit with building Universities and the like in those small cities in my negotiations with other nations. I find that they will tend to give me more money for things I sell, and need less in return for things I buy if my culture is superior. I can squeeze out a few more gold/turn with the culture value those Uni's bring. So, in a way, it benefits your treasury in the long run. The only downer is that those cities seem to take forever to build them if you're not playing a scientific nation. Oh well.

[Lord Merciless]

Originally posted by punkbass2000


I don't believe this true.

What's your experience then at Emperor+ level games?

[nbarclay]

1. How important the Great Library is on Monarch depends heavily on how good you are at research. With a good starting position, I can get a tech lead on the AIs and trade for what I don't research, so the Great Library would be worth very little to me. But I have to do quite a bit of micromanagement to pull it off. Of course bad starting positions, or especially terrible ones, could be rather different.

2. Universities tend to be on down my build queue a bit, but if a city has enough production to build everything else I consider higher priorities, it definitely gets a university. First-tier priorities are generally courthouses, marketplaces, and temples/libraries (depending on my civ traits and happiness situation). Police stations and factories are generally next if I have the techs since they help build later improvements. Then come banks and universities, or universities and banks if I'm scientific. Cathedrals tend to be high priorities than banks/universities if I need WLT?D in a city (especially if I have Sistine) but lower priorities otherwise. (Being religious also makes cathedrals more attractive.) Aquaducts and granaries also fit in somewhere, but how big I want cities to get can depend on the local happiness situation and on how badly WLT?D is needed.

3. Desert cities can get quite large once railroads become available. Irrigated, railroaded desert produces just as much food as irrigated, unrailroaded plains, or as unirrigated grasslands. Desert cities will never be among your best, but they shouldn't be written off as never being able to amount to anything either.
Similarly, jungle is grasslands (sometimes with shield) just waiting to be uncovered by your workers. Clearing jungle is a long-term project, but very worthwhile if a city isn't totally corrupt. Coastal tundra can be an interesting proposition: it will never have much production, but with a harbor, it can have lots of gold and science. If I have spare gold, investing in improvements in such areas can be quite worthwhile if corruption isn't too bad. (The same goes for coastal areas with only hills and mountains available on land.)

4) When you pulled the trick of going zero science for five turns and then 90% for five turns, were you building research labs by any chance? If science improvements were coming online, I can definitely see how spending later might leverage the same amount of gold into more science. (Similar tricks may also be useful earlier in the game when libraries start coming online, and then when universities start coming online, but I've never done any serious experimenting in that area.) Otherwise, I'm a bit skeptical.

Nathan

[Cort Haus]

As nbarclay says, these terrain are all worth settling in the long run - when they can yield Saltpeter, Oil, Coal, Rubber.

Especially important for those that aren't planning on getting resources by military means.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

1. I either try to get Great Library or Colosus. Otherwise I have a hard time keeping up.

2. On my bigger cities, they all usually have Universities, Libraries, Temples, Banks. Marketplaces, Graineries and Barracks usually dont get built. However, after this latest game, I think I will build more barracks and marketplaces in my not so productive cities, and less expensive things like universities, and banks.

3. I agree with that, but I never have the time to build lots of tile improvments there because my workers are tile improving my bigger cities

4. Yes, I was building those Research labs.

Those terrains are worth setteling, but don't put too much stuff in them because it will cost you more than you benefit.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
2. On my bigger cities, they all usually have Universities, Libraries, Temples, Banks. Marketplaces, Graineries and Barracks usually dont get built. However, after this latest game, I think I will build more barracks and marketplaces in my not so productive cities, and less expensive things like universities, and banks.

My rule of thumb is that cities rarely build a barracks until they're ready to build military units, but they essentially always build a barracks before building any military units. Veterans have a better chance of winning and are a lot more likely to eventually produce leaders.

Granaries aren't that big a deal up to size six, or when happiness would be a problem if cities get too big. But they can help cities grow bigger faster to generate more wealth and production in the long term. That's especially true with cities that have a relatively limited food surplus.

3. I agree with that, but I never have the time to build lots of tile improvments there because my workers are tile improving my bigger cities

The solution to that is to build more workers. In non-corrupt areas, there should be enough work crews to at least almost keep up with the expansion rate in size and number of cities. Otherwise, a lot of potential wealth and production gets thrown away.

Those terrains are worth setteling, but don't put too much stuff in them because it will cost you more than you benefit.

I strongly disagree. An extra worker to clear jungle costs ten shields (plus wastage) and a pop unit to build and one gold per turn for upkeep. The pop unit is virtually a non-issue if you build in a max-population city that's ready to grow again; build the worker, and one turn later, your population is back to full. As for the shields and the gold, you'll get them back with interest.

Even with 75% corruption, four mined grassland tiles (or less if some of the grasslands have shields) will pay back the cost of building the worker at the rate of one shield per turn. Depending on government, either two or four road tiles will pay for the worker's upkeep for the entire rest of the game. And the worker can keep on working beyond that, providing a greater and greater profit over time. (Oh, and those financial figures don't count the eventual marketplace bonus.) The cost/benefit ratio of irrigating desert can be even better if it lets a desert city grow bigger than it could have otherwise.

Clearing jungles certainly isn't a job that belongs at the top of the priority list, especially early in the game when there's a trade-off between building workers and building settlers. But once the higher-priority work is done (and if you have jungles, you probably want enough workers to get caught up on your other work relatively quickly), you definitely want to clear any jungles in areas where corruption isn't completely ridiculous.

Nathan

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So how many workers/city do you think I should build?
Jungles have high commerce so maybe you should leave one or two.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
So how many workers/city do you think I should build?
Jungles have high commerce so maybe you should leave one or two.

I don't pay attention to the ratio, and I've never really tried to develop a specific algorithm (set of rules) to govern my worker building pattern. What follows is the best approximation I can come up with off the top of my head. Maybe when I start a new game sometime, I can pay more attention and see if I can provide a more detailed pattern.

What I look for is whether my workers are keeping up with the number of tiles my cities are working. If the workers are just a little behind but not falling farther behind, I'm okay, although adding workers wouldn't hurt if it's convenient. If my workers are very far behind (sorry I can't quantify it more) and not catching up much, or if the number of tiles my cities are working is growing faster than my workers can improve tiles, I need more workers. If I have jungles around, I most likely won't put workers on clearing jungles right away, but it does provide an incentive to overbuild on workers compared with what I might otherwise. Then when the workers get caught up on their other work, I can divert some to jungle clearing. (And I'm especially likely to start clearing jungles relatively early if I have a good settler/worker pump city and no more land to settle.)

By the way, if I have a city completely surrounded by jungle, warrior/worker/warrior/worker is a fairly attractive build pattern. That way, the city can produce its own workers to clear some of the jungle around it instead of getting stuck at size two.

Also, jungle does NOT provide any special commerce bonus. It's possible you saw a jungle tile with rubber on it and used that as a basis for valuing commerce from jungle tiles, but normally, jungle is about as worthless as terrain can get. It produces one food, and a road through jungle can produce one gold, and that's it. (A river next to the jungle can provide an extra gold, as usual.) Worse, jungle can make anyone who lives in it sick. Whoever came up with the value of jungle in this game most certainly wasn't an environmentalist out to sell the merits of keeping jungles intact!

Nathan

[King of Rasslin]

Useful Units
-Settlers
-Workers
-Warriors
-Spearmen
-Archers
-Swordsmen
-Horsemen
-Musketmen (!) These aren't cost effective...
-Longbowmen
-Cavalry
-Artillery
-Riflemen
-Infantry
-Marines
-Paratroopers (!) Too weak.
-Bombers
-Fighters
-F-15
-Mechanized Infantry
-Modern Armor
-Battleship
-Nuclear Submarines
-Cruise Missiles (!) What?
-Tactical Nukes

Units I didn't build
-Knights (!!!) How could you not use them?
-Pikemen
-Helicopters
-Submarines
-Destroyers
-Cruisers
-AEGIS Cruisers
-ICBM
-Stealth Fighter
-Stealth Bomber
-Tanks (!) You used MA, but not tanks?
-Cannon
-Catapult
-Ironclad
-Frigate
-Privateer
-Carrier
-Transport (!) Not a fan of invading other continents?
-Galleon
-Caravel

I think you need to take a look at what you made and what you didn't make. You made some poor units and ignored the good ones! I mean, who doesn't use knights extensively?

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So, instead of musketmen, what should I make? Should it be more spearmen, or pikemen?
I didn't use tanks because by the time I got them, everyone had MI already
As for transports, I had my hands full with the Babylonians and Zulus who were on the same continent.
As for why I did not build knights, I'm not sure. It might be that you need like 10 of them to take out one musketmen in a size 8 city.

nbarcklay

Alright. I think that I'll do that next time. Thanks for the help.

[Lord Merciless]

Units I didn't build
-Knights -- How could you miss this well-balanced unit?
-Pikemen -- 2 Pikemen are better than 1 Musketeer, but cost the same.
-Helicopters
-Submarines
-Destroyers
-Cruisers
-AEGIS Cruisers
-ICBM
-Stealth Fighter
-Stealth Bomber -- Best mobile artillery in late games
-Tanks -- The best unit during the industrial age. They cut finally break the offensive gridlock caused by the Infantry. You can also upgrade them later to MA for 20 bucks each.
-Cannon
-Catapult
-Ironclad
-Frigate
-Privateer
-Carrier
-Transport -- I guess you never play on water maps. They are the most valuable unit in cross-continent invasions.
-Galleon -- same as Transport.
-Caravel

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Ok, so two pikemen, both 1/3/1, cost the same as 1 musketmen, who is 2/4/1. How are they better off?
I never got the technology for stealth, so I couldn't build any.

[Lord Merciless]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
Ok, so two pikemen, both 1/3/1, cost the same as 1 musketmen, who is 2/4/1. How are they better off?
I never got the technology for stealth, so I couldn't build any.

First of all, 2 Regular Pikemen have 6 total HP, 1 Musketman only half of that. One greatest strength of an Army is its HP. That means the survivability of 2 Pikemen is far greater than 1 Musketman. In addition, Pikemen get bonus against mounted units. It's very likely that Pikemen's defensive strength against Knights is greater than Musketman's. I have to remind you that Knights, Riders, Samurais, and Cavalries are preferred units of most players.

Second, if you are not under democracy or republic, 2 cheaper units give you better police power for the price of 1 expensive one. Most players, by this stage, are very likely to be under Monarchy.

Third, Pikemen can put a new city under protection quicker than Musketman.

The only negative I see here is potential increased unit support cost. If you think you are paying too much for unit support, then go ahead with Musketman.

[Catt]

I would add to Lord Merciless' explanation of the benefits of 2 pikemen over 1 musketman what I consider the most improtant argument: that, other than an army, there is no unit with the blitz ability (multiple attacks on the same turn) until tanks - this means that no matter the strength of the attacker in comparison to the pikemen / musketman (i.e., cavalry), it will take at least two victorious attacks to destroy the garrison of pikemen and only one victorious attack to destroy the musketmen.

Originally posted by Lord Merciless
In addition, Pikemen get bonus against mounted units. It's very likely that Pikemen's defensive strength against Knights is greater than Musketman's.

Is this true or just your belief based on anecdotal evidence? Where do you find the authority for this point?

Catt

[Lord Merciless]

It's anecdotal evidence. My impression is that my Cavalry has more problems beating Pikemen than Musketmen. But again, that point is not too important compared to my first 2 points and the one you brought up.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Lord Merciless
It's anecdotal evidence. My impression is that my Cavalry has more problems beating Pikemen than Musketmen. But again, that point is not too important compared to my first 2 points and the one you brought up.

Agreed - the least important point. My horsemen seem to have more trouble with spearmen than with swordsmen - just anecdotal and I've now convinced myself that it is merely the human mind playing tricks on itself - but I wouldn't be flabbergasted to learn of some quirks on inter-unit offense / defense stats (okay, I might be flabbergasted that it could go on this long without proof by someone or comment by Firaxis, but I wouldn't be completely flabbergasted .

L of A - add my name to the list of folks amazed that you made do without knights!

Catt

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So more is better. I understand now.
I think that one of the reasons I did not have any knights is because I was seriously lacking in the war department: no barracks in any city. Next game I will put barracks in cities, then I can upgrade instead of having to rebuild from scratch.
Also, no more musketmen, and more knights.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia

Also, no more musketmen, and more knights.

No hard and fast rules - I will frequently upgrade pikes to musketmen, and will build musketmen as needed - don't abandon them completely, just remember to think about the most effective use of your resources.

[rush]

L of A, I am also amazed that you are not using Knights, Tanks, Cannons, Cataputs, Ironclad.

1. Knights, Tanks - I usually start Wars at 3 different stages in the game, when I have sufficient number of
i. Swordmens (3,2)
ii. Knights (6.3)
iii. Tanks (10,6 i think)
All these units have strong attack points relative to the defence points enemy units have, at their eras.

2. Cannons, Cataputs - I have loads of them. 80% of them attacking enemy cities. 20% in strategic bottlenecks & conquered cities to encounter enemy attacks.

3. Ironclads - I never use them until ... in one of my games, the Russia sent about 10 Ironclads bombing away happily at my coastal cities and improvements. They end their turn at least 2 blocks away from my coast. So, I can't bomb them using Cannons. And my frigates are just too weak to handle them.

Just my 2 cents worth ...