Did my starting point kill me?

wvfoos · October 28, 2002, 19:53

I'm trying to figure out where I went wrong, and how should I have dealt with both the aztecs and the romans.

Background. I needed the iron in rome's possession. So I took over a couple of cities, got them to sue for peace. This left rome with only about 5 cities, in a strip north of me between the egyptians and the aztecs. Then, I got bullied by the aztec and had a small war, but nobody did much of anything, and after a couple of turns, we signed a peace treaty. Their troops were coming overland through roman territory.

So, after the peace, several centuries went by, and the aztecs came back and started leaving units around my territories. By this time, I'm in a democracy. So i told them to get out, and they declared war (if i understand, this right, there's no war weariness in that situation). I had a huge reserve of cash built, like maybe 6G. They sent in an armada of ships, caravels, frigates, ironclads etc. Land attack and defense, I was ok, with riflemen and calvary, but naval warfare? I had like 1 ironclad and 1 caravel. So i had to rush several harbors and ironclads used up a good portion of my cash. I killed several ships of theirs at sea, only like one ship made landfall and its units were destroyed quickly. I probably came out on the winning edge in pieces lost. When I saw they started to out produce me, I quickly got peace. Feeling bloodthirsty from having to back down to the aztecs, I pummelled the poor romans so i could get their dyes and another iron source. Thats where I'm at now.

But techwise, the aztecs have outstripped me, and prolly are outproducing me too.

I guess my big question is, did my starting point, with lots of plains, and little grassland, compared to the aztecs seeimingly whole continent of grasslands doom me from the start?

vmxa1 · October 28, 2002, 21:00

Sorry I did not pay attention to the level for this game. I do not think you are doomed here.
I would wonder why you are working on combustion and not bee line to Hoover. You have 39 workers but every city I looked at had citizens working a tile that did not even have a road yet. That cost you income. I looked at a few cities and saw things like Herakleia that had 42 food for 13 pop? It had 5 tiles not mined. That is fine if you need the food, but you have it to burn. So you are losing shields here that could allow structure to get built faster and other useful things.
22 archers and 13 swordsmen? I of course do not know what all happened, but I would never build 22 archers, unless they were put into action. I mean that I may build them, but they are not going to be surviving.
It maybe too late to beat them to Hoover now, I am guessing. You are not that far back in techas most of the ones they have are going to be cheap to research.
If you are not recovering from WW, I would see if I could get few MPP and go after someone. I would prefer to make it the Aztecs as they are mostly on another land mass and will have trouble counter attacking. I saw stacks of workers in fours? I would have to look, but that may not be the most effective use.

vmxa1 · October 28, 2002, 21:08

Also look at the cities that are not growing an d fix that. The ones I saw could be growing. One just needed a harbor. I would want to get some use out of my calv here before they become rear action units as tanks will soon be on the field.

wvfoos · October 28, 2002, 21:31

Thanks for the quick reply........

Its the middle level, whatever that is. Regent?

The archers? Well, when i went after rome the first time, they were my archer rush. I thought about taking more than just a couple of cities the first war, but when i got the resources i needed (iron) and rome immediately asked for peace, i took it. In other words, i didn't use all the archers like i had planned. I think i only lost like one unit taking two cities (or maybe it was three, i forget). That left me with a very weakened rome as a buffer between me and the others, so i left it as is. I prolly should have taken them all out then, as opposed to going back later.

The food? I was just trying to grow the cities as fast as possible. Oh, that one city must be the one with the wheat i irrigated. Yeah, i guess I could do a bit better on city micromanaging. I sort of do it a bit slapdash sometimes. I should pay better attention. It just seemed when the aztecs threw down, they were way ahead of me, with bigger cities, and seemed to be cranking out the boats. I sort of got distracted when they tried to invade from the sea, as evidenced by the zillion ironclads roaming my shores.

Combustion, for tanks. I figure there's going to be a fight with the aztecs coming and wanted to be able to take those cities on the north part of my continent.

vmxa1 · October 29, 2002, 00:19

Yeah I figured the archers was somehing like that. The road to tanks from were you are is long, if you could get Hoover, that is free hydro in all continental cities. I go all out for that as I do not make coal plants. Chances are you will have to fight Aztecs before you can get tanks, maybe not. I have little respect for the AI coming across the sea for me, even if it has better and more units. I may sink some and those that land will feel my whole army if need be. That is why I say hit them now to slow them down, by taking the cities on your land mass. Anyway you are not dead yet. Lots of fun to be had.

wvfoos · October 29, 2002, 02:13

Well, theres now a whole world at war, and I'm doing my best to stay the hell out of it, until i can get some decent units.

Its 1010 ad now, I did manage to get hoover, so tha was a nice call. Thanks.

I'm like one advance from tanks. Aztecs declared war on the babylonians to my northwest, and china jumped in on aztec's side, along with egypt. I'm wondering, since I can't take on aztec by myself, and I'm in clearly no shape to deal with them now (theyve got bombers, marines, tanks, battleships, and god knows what else, as i've noticed as they plow through my north territory to get to babylonia), maybe i should join in and attack babylon, and take some of their cities, as i've already got all my units on the continent. Plus my FP is up close to bab territory in rome, so i could maybe not lose all those cities to corruption. I might try and let aztec do the heavy lifting, and maybe I can steal a couple of bab cities at their expense, cuz its pretty clear whos going to win aztec/china/egypt vs. bab.

I told the aztecs to stay out of my territory once, and they immediately declared war on me, so i just said, my calvary against tanks, bombers, marines? I'll just reload and pretend I don't see them marching through my territory.

vmxa1 · October 29, 2002, 02:55

Sometime it is wise to ignore troop crossings. I would say that any opportunity to expand, needs to be grabbed. Check for MPP's that could trigger retaliation and go for it. You can;t be too concerned about corruption now, just expanding. A corrupt city yielding one shield and some land is better than nothing. The main thing is it removes it from their hands.

Kampus majore · October 29, 2002, 08:31

Hm, you should disband your archers. They cost you money and aren't worth it. Same goes for swordsmen. Instead build infantry. Until tanks it is better then cavalry, especially if you're weak....

Strakorfsky · October 30, 2002, 22:02

Heh...

Archers...

Archers are good in like an early bronze rush with militray civs like germany, aztecs, chinese ect... Once you get into 1000BC on, its swordsmans or massive horse rush (late one if need be). I would try maximizing every city, you let a few of them go for strang reasons.

Even those small, isolated towns can grow into booming cities if you give them a little love and harbors

As for the 23 archers, what were you thinking? Archers are obsalete once you get into 1000BC. Sheesh, just disband everyone of them and get the small production from each disband to make more units.

Oh well, i would just amke new game and start over, but thats me