[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Civ II player puzzled by ICS strategy (long)

[Greg Wooledge <greg@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

aliaga (aliaga@xxxxxxxxxxxx) wrote:

> Admitedly, those AIs weren't very smart, and maybe I missed something
> important, but my "foolproof sure-winning strategy" in civII was as close as
> ICS as I could manage, yet I was never able to win by "smallpox" alone. And
> I tried a lot.     ;-)

Fast expansion is a good strategy.  But you can't carry any single
strategy to its extreme -- you need a somewhat balanced approach.

> Even so, my "ICS" reached a point of absolute stall when corruption hit.
[...]
> So I was forced to get Monarchy to help reduce corruption and boost trade.

What?  You tried this with Despotism?!?  I always switch to Monarchy ASAP
in Civ2/Freeciv; the only reason I wouldn't is if I were already running
Republic.  (But my playing style favors Monarchy over Republic in the early
game.)

> But expenses increased. So buying settlers was harder. So expansion would
> get slower. Even so, I managed often to get 50+ cities and become a Republic
> and continue growing somehow.

When you start to feel the effects of too many cities, it's time to stop
making new cities. ;-)  Use those Settlers to build roads, farms and mines
(and later railroads).  Use your huge city base as the basis for vertical
growth (make 'em bigger).

> Another point may be that I increased corruption by slightly lowering the
> distances involved. Thus Communism would get some corruption, after all.
> Thus Anarchy/Despotism and even Monarchy would get too high losses to
> corruption. Thus even a Republic would become stalled. Thus only Democracy,
> Communism or Fundies (barely) would be desirable for late stages.

"Fundies (barely)"??  You were definitely doing something wrong!
If you get Fundamentalism, the game is essentially over -- you just
won!  The rest is mop-up.

All those "very unhappy" citizens are now productive workers; all
the Elvises go back into the field; all those Temples you built in
the core of your empire are now *giving* you gold instead of costing
gold.  (And if you still need more free gold, build a Cathedral... or
better, Michelangelo.)

And that's just the start of Fundamentalism's disgustingness.  Take all
your 50+ ICS cities and multiply by 10 units per city -- *plus* all
the Fanatics you care to build, supported for free.  So what if your
science is cut in half?  That's what the Diplomat/Spy is for.  Or just
conquer a city to get tech, then let the AI retake it, then conquer it
again for more tech.  And once you get rolling you'll still be putting
out enough research points to pass the AI.  Remember, you don't need to
spend any of your trade on luxuries, or turn any workers into Elvises.
You get the *full* output of your hordes of cities (minus what you lose
to corruption, but that's negligible under Fundy).

-- 
*** Please note new address. -->  |  Greg Wooledge
                                  |  greg@xxxxxxxxxxxx
"Truth belongs to everybody."     |  http://wooledge.org/~greg/
  Red Hot Chili Peppers           |  old page: http://www.kellnet.com/wooledge/

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