17-04-2002 21:48									#1
	For the builders among us: Got spare money?

Seeing some threads recently that revolved around warmongering strategies, it got me to thinking in the opposite direction and a variant possibility. By variant, I mean that often I'll play imposing certain restrictions upon how I play. So I developed an idea I called The Pacifists, even though that's not entirely accurate. Here are the restrictions I am playing with, although these aren't ideal in terms of purely winning strategy along these lines:

1--May not build any forces that have higher attack values than defense values. This means no horsemen, no archers, no knights, you get the idea.
2--May not declare war
3--Must accept peace if other civ asks for it. (This is not ideal if one wants to have the possibility of a UN victory. So if one wants to keep that open, ignore this option.)


With that in mind, I started a game, Regent level, standard sized world, continents, average terrain conditions. I chose the French for the Industrious trait, along with the musketeers, since they could give a little counterattacking punch if needed at a potentially important time. I also feel the Egyptians could be good for this strategy, with the attributes of Religious/Industrious, that means cheap cultural development, and the rapid workers.

Now, before I start playing with variant restrictions, I always try to figure out what my strategy should be. First, I borrowed from a common victory method of OCCs, the 20,000 point culture city. So I decided that I would do everything I could to build cultural improvements and wonders in Paris. Second, I would need to expand rapidly through settlers because I would be getting little terriotry through any millitary conquest. That made the Pyramids a priority as well.

I got a decent start location. Horrible luck on goody huts though, every time I popped one I would get barbarians or 25 gold. There was a thicket of jungle to my south, which was good in that it gave me a defensive barrier. However it was bad in that it meant slower development for cities there. As it turned out, due to the nature of the map, I lucked into having an isthmus to the south and west: a great chokepoint that could be used to secure a good stretch of land. But in a fit of idiocy, I failed to recognize that, and ended up in a city cultural battle with the Romans and Iroquois down there.


I am now in the year 1800 with the game. It looks like it's going to be a spaceship launch: Paris won't accumulate 20,000 culture until around 1950, and the techs for the spaceship are being researched presently. I feel pretty good about the position--I've got plenty of mech infantry and artillery to fend off any attacks. That sort of combination, defensive units plus a good force of bombardment units has been key. I've been sneak attacked by the Iroqouis, Romans, and Americans, in that order. Against the Iroqouis and Romans, I immediately bought millitary alliances with everyone else available. With the Americans, because I had damaged my reputation by accepting peace while in the alliance against the Romans, I couldn't get any alliances. And with Abe in an MPP with Otto, I fought a strictly defensive war, pounding Abe's invasion forces with artillery and mopping them up with infantry.

Due to the culture building emphasis, plus some aggressive city placing, I have flipped about ten cities over to my side.

Forbidden Palace placement wasn't ideal. Since I knew that I had very little chance of spawning a great leader, I decided that I would need to build within the range of cities that aren't totally corrupt. So I ended up with a little bit of overlap, but it was worth it.

So I'm fairly convinced this is a viable enough strategy at Regent level. It's not going to yield a huge score, but it is satisfying, I think, to those of us of the builder persuasion. This is as pure of a builder game I ever played. The irony is that it took some warmongering to figure it out.

	17-04-2002 22:31									#2
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randommushroom, I tried a game once with exactly the same rules as you mentioned. I was the Babylonians. I remember reaching the Industrial age, then I woke up the next morning. I must have dozed off in boredom. I was doing pretty well (on my way to a Cultural victory), but the incessant placing of Workers and altering build queues with no combat really got me down.

If you enjoy this type of game, more power to you. Personally, I've accepted that Civ3 is a game with a heavy war component. I quite like crushing my enemies.


Dominae

	18-04-2002 18:15									#3
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I think it could be better to have your second city be the wonder building city. You miss out on the Palace´s culture, but instead you can prebuild wonders by switching to build palace. There is nothing more disturbing than having put almost 600 shields into a wonder and get beat to it by a few turns.

	19-04-2002 21:25									#4
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Yah, the second city could be considered for wonder building, although it turned out to be a non-issue in my game. Paris was a good enough shield producer that I was often able to build wonders without too much worry, or start prebuilding with standard stuff a little before the tech came along.

The game ended with a very easy spaceship victory. I suspect this strat could be used at monarch level, but emperor level might be beyond its capabilities.

	20-04-2002 05:16									#5
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Randommushroom, I think the really tough part of your kind of game is your restriction to defensive units only. Without that, I think your kind of game is viable on Monarch, maybe even Emperor if you're lucky.

One question, did you find yourself lacking in any resource?

I remember a game where I was lacking in coal, which meant no railroads. Luckily my nearest neighbor, the Russians, had two coal squares within their borders, but only one was connected via road. After getting a RoP, I sent a worker there and built the road myself. Then I traded for the coal. Later on, however, I decided to just take over the Russians and not be at their mercy with resources. But by then, I was in the Modern Era, and coal wasn't important anymore.

I wonder how my game could have turned out had I continued being a peaceful civ. I think the only viable victory in that sort of game is the Space Race, which to me seems all too easy, even on Monarch.

	22-04-2002 08:14									#6
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Randommushroom, how many cities did you build in your starting (and presumably only) land rush? That would be my main reservation, especially on Emperor.

I just played an Emperor game as the Babylonians with only 17 cities, and launched in 1745. However, only the first six cities came in the starting land rush. After that, I fought two wars with the Persians and one with the Zulus, in order to cut them down to size and reach the number I was shooting for, while extorting some of the techs I wasn't researching. After about 500 AD, I engaged in no more combat for the rest of the game. The Babs quickly took over the science lead, thanks to strong science and minimal corruption, despite having no happiness wonders. Along the way, my resource problems included no saltpeter and (three turns from the end!) no more aluminum, but traded for both using my huge tech lead. The tech lead also helped me max out my research and pick up lots of luxury resources, as I would occasionally trade a tech a couple of steps down for whatever I needed, including gold to finance faster research. Three civs hit me up for tribute before I had cavalry - I paid it - but after I built railroads and eight cavalry, I quit capitulating, and no one declared war on me... not even the French, who were more than twice my size.

I don't see the point of not building offensive units for a better defense, but even with that change in your rules, I wonder if a game could be won on Emperor without conquering any cities. (This might be an opportunity to make use of the Lighthouse, as Cort Haus suggests elsewhere.)

	22-04-2002 20:20									#7
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Txurce,

What a challenge - win Emperor w/out capturing cities. This would mean a war to get a GL, (the only way to build early wonders on Emp) then go on an overseas land-grab. I don't have enough experience on Emp, but I suspect that you'd need a dual-core civ to keep up. To achieve this you'd need an island or island group that can support 8-10 cities (assuming only six can be won in the initial land-grab), plus another GL for the FP. That means a lot of war without the usual benefits of weakening the opponent by depriving him of cities. Sounds like a job for a militaristic Civ (cheap harbours too).

	22-04-2002 22:01									#8
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I got about 18 cities in my initial land grab. I had one city that was great for pumping out settlers, plus a couple of others that were good for that. The industrious trait seems important to this, I love fast workers. And with the Pyramids, I pretty well mined all the grassland, which I think makes sense since the necessary food production is halved. That is, if you do some irrigating and it means your city grows in say 4 turns without the Pyramids, but with mining it would be 8 turns without the Pyramids. In the former you save two turns with the Pyramids, in the latter you save 4 turns, and have closed that gap. So I'll take the extra shields.

I was bad, and did conquer a few Roman cities in my game after they attacked me. With infantry and artillery, I pounded the Roman cities down to size one and the units inside to one hitpoint each. In one case, I took a size 12 city down to size one in a couple of turns.


But yah, throw in a sprinkling of offensive units, and one could make it much easier.

	23-04-2002 22:31									#9
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Havn't got game yet (ETA is tomorrow) But whenever i play strat games i aways play slowly and attack on my own turms, I also only try to kill somebody if they have tryed to kill me first or have attacked my allie, my counter-strikes arn't just attacks they are full blown invasion forces. So this is probubly the same way as i am probubly going to play anyway!

I wish you could get a nobel piece prize for bringing a war to an end wether its you vs sombody, or your allie/nutral dude vs sombody