v1.01 Challenging difficulty = unable to keep up with AI emps

from GalCiv3 Forums

(before I go on:  I know this game has a long way to go...but I'm lovin' it as it is)


TLDR summary:  is a "huge" galaxy too small for "challenging" difficulty setting for a casual player?  I'm really tired of seeing "you are weak" in the diplomacy summary and having 1/2 to 1/3 of leading AI empire score even before I've researched a decent weapon.


Howdy,

I'm a casual galciv1 & 2 player from the way back machine and was familiar with various game start strategies to compete against buffed AI empires.  In Twilight of the Arnor, I dimly recall my last expansion strategy was:

"do not scout too far...just enough to establish, say, a small globe of about 2-3 colonies of radius around the homeworld.  Stay quiet until I have several squads of popgun ships out there"

"set the govt spending to max, research/build a basic military and then sprint for Stock Exchanges before my money runs out".


On Galciv3, I've found Normal difficulty is too easy...I'm always 30-50% ahead of the AI emps on average.

*Challenging difficulty* however is a totally different story...I've never even been in shouting distance of the AI emps.  I'm always war bait for anyone with a different ideology and have to play defense immediately.  Early into the "age of war" research era, I sometimes see my "medium" ships going up against "large" AI ships and carriers, at which time I usually go and look at the empire score and throw in the towel.

When I "retire" I can see that the history graph always has my empire at the bottom....of nearly every stat.


My typical game setting:

1.  Custom race with just about every combo of bonuses tried

2.  Four AI empires (I may reduce this to three just to get some "distance")

3.  Huge/scattered galaxy, with common occurrence of: habitable planets, planets, stars.  Don't want any Empire being stuck in a poor neighborhood.

4.  No other game options changed except for Galaxy Difficulty set to "challenging" and remove the "turn limit" victory condition.

Thoughts:

1.  "Huge" galaxy seems quite small to me...I'm usually researching "weapon specialization" when I'm discovered.

2.  I've tried various startup plans:

a.  buy one colony ship, one factory, then set govt. spending set to 50% industry, 50% research, 0% economy

b.  Use up the starting cash entirely with plans such as:


- buy 100% factories and enough farms for 12-15 population on homeworld.  Set homeworld policy to 100% industry to crank out colonizers

- buy one colonizer, then buy the first factory on each of the next colonies until the money runs out

For now, I'm going to go back to Normal, but with self-imposed limitations such as:  set govt policy to max cash, don't build any ships, and press end turn for 10 turns.

2.  I may be too elitist for my weapon choices:  I don't usually bother building war ships until I have an Age of War weapon researched (particle beam, harpoon, etc.)


2.  I'm going to try some other buy-out strategies in my next games:

- buy 50% factories and 50% research buildings on homeworld, and set govt policy to break even but push industry and research as much as possible.  

- specialist worlds are chosen among the first four colonies:  homeworld = industry, then one colony for:  industry (second shipyard), research, and income.  The fourth is chosen based on circumstance.  Use cash to buy up three factories on each of these worlds to get them started and buy up the buildings with the remaining cash on these four asap.  Once fully developed...set each planet to max out the corresponding role.

Everybody wants to have war with me so it just a race to have enough armed ships to survive:  get one of the age of war weapons, and one defense type into small hulls asap.  But really trying for medium hulls with one each of the defense type.

- heck with it:  I will build scads of tiny hulled ships with laser and initial shield tech, much as it pains me to do so.  Will this get the "challenging" AI emp off my back so I can play a different sort of early game?



 

 

 

23,100 views 8 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

huge is bigger then any map in gal civ 2, what crack you smokin?

Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

You should take a look at your graphs. This will usually tell you  the area you need to work on. If your playing with tech trading on you need to trade as often as possible. If you are playing with it off make sure you have decent research I'd say no less then 50% for a beginner. 

Multiplicity - Control multiple PCs using one keyboard and mouse
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top

If you're only colonizing 4 planets, you're going to get smoked big time on a huge map if all other things are equal.  You'll need very powerful research centers to stay up with the AI's dozen planets.  That limited colonization behavior will set you way back in ideology points as well, and getting free ships and whatnot from them would be a big advantage to a larger empire on top of their increased production potential.

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I don't think "huge" map is that big really.  I use "common" star frequency so there is a lot of space between systems.  I reach "ion drive" tech and my default constructor has 10 speed and jets across the map in just a few turns.

I don't see how graphs will help...I have a much more basic issue if other players are having no trouble with higher difficulty and not being crushed in every category by turn 100.  But what the heck I will start looking at graphs (which I think are kind of a cheat...but I'm getting stomped in the early "challenging" game so need the help).


In last my "challenging" difficulty game on a "huge" map, which I'm giving up on, same result (way too far behind all empires too far ahead).  I tried having homeworld have 50% industry and 50% research tiles and setting global empire govt. to max industry/research and near zero income.

It is turn 90 (1 hour of play) and I've researched Particle Beams, small hulls, ion drive, and each of the defense techs.  I'm two turns away from medium hulls.

I retire the game and it is ugly:  the AI is way ahead in every dimension:

In 90 turns:

I colonized 9 planets and built 8 ships (i used the pragmatic ideology to get the 3 constructors for scouting), and have 74 population.

The AI empires have between:  19-24 planets, 61-72 ships, and 120-196 population.  I find it especially interesting that "treasury" timeline shows the AI empires bouncing all over the place, as if they are building/spending.  Wonder where they are getting all that cash...


This game I will try:  build first two colonies as industry and food complexes for churning out colonies.  I will (sigh) build the cheesiest combat ships at the very beginning (just laser/deflector tiny hulls).  Especially:  I will load very few population in each successive colonizer (1 pop point only) and try to keep the population very high in the these two producer planets.

 

Sorry if I mis-typed in the OP:  I meant:  focus on the first four worlds to be specialist worlds and then have the rest of the empire be generalist for the most part.

 

Next game, slightly better but still not a "winning" result:

Result of colony rush (1 pop per ship), homeworld and first colony set to max industry tiles and shipyard) and rush to small ships with pop guns (particle beams and min def all types), government set to 50 industry/50 research/0 credit income:

Turn 66:

I have 92 population (2nd in game, not bad).  AI emps had 55-116.

I have 11 planets (AI have 10, 13, 17, and 25, respectively) so STILL not able to out rush even when trying to be "Mr. Colonizer".

But this is why I give up:  I have 13 ships, AI emps have 33-43 each.

The use of a single pop per colonizer seems to have made a good improvement (50% or such)...guess my new colonists were having a lot of wild orgies.

 

 

Next game I will try:  .5 pop per colonizer and keep first two shipyard worlds near max pop.  Though it kills me to do it:  churn out ships with beam and shields asap.

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top

If tech trading is on, then they're probably not as far ahead of you as their scores imply.  It sounds like you are majorly behind in military buildup(quality over quantity will result in a false sense of doom here) and they've traded techs with each other to get way ahead.  Some cheese tech trading on your own part would catch you up with them technology wise(which is why I disable tech trading, it's horribly easy to manipulate to victory) and get you in pretty good shape if you end up in a war.

 

The deficit in population and planets taken is a major shortfall though.  I spend money on colony ships as much as possible, I do not spend money on anything else, and I don't touch that free planet for decades.  "Mars" only gets taken when there's nothing else to grab.  I do not research military techs either, I get myself up to move 3, then I take research/production/economy to get my best worlds the big boost from their respective capital improvement.  Only after this do I shoot up the weapon/defense tree to get some decent defenders out before the AI start hitting the troop transports.

Reply #7 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

For colony rush, I spent myself down to 700 credits in the first few turns getting colonizers and a few factories on homeworld...I guess I'll spend every dime next time and see if that helps.

Sigh, I guess I will have to wean myself off "get ion drive before really getting serious about weapons".

______

 

Took the advice regarding "speed 3 combat ships is fine for early game" and "get some ships built asap"

Got a much better result on this next game:

Strategy:  picked two planets (homeworld and a class 16) and maxed them for industry and built factories and enough food for 12-16 population.  Limited colonizers to .7 population each.  As income allows, stand up more "shipyard industry planets".  I had five of these shipyards by turn 100.

Got serious about a custom race that could shore up some of my play deficiencies such as:  I appear to like expensive research before actually using my shipyards for military purposes and am not building an early "small low tech" fleet:

+2 productive, clever, tough, fertile, economical
-2 poor traders, unpopular
-1 discontent

intuitive trait:  boy that is a sweet bonus...like four free techs! (I sure hope they don't nerf it)
prolific:  since I only put .7 population in a colonizer I need the double population



100 turns:  my 10 planets annexed vs. AI 10/18/19/19 planets.  They smoked me on credits earned though:  my earning 3k vs. AI earning 6k/8k/11k/13k.

Finally!:  my smallish 36 ship fleet (mostly small with particle beam and shield/pd, no engine) were counted as the #2 fleet among the empires.  I promoted my admiral to Sub-Bashar on the spot (can you spot the book reference?)

AI built 58/60/69/108 ships.  Those are still impressive numbers...but likely low quality.

Most importantly:  no one ever called me "weak"!  Huzzah!

Luck factors:  my nearest neighbors were peaceful and only started building a navy *after* I had already started.  And I stumbled upon a size 26 planet and promptly built this up to max industry shipyard, which only started coming online in turn 90 but could turn out a small ship in two turns (ah nothing like starbase with 80+ industry points)

Will give this scheme a couple more shots to factor out luck and peaceful neighbors.





Reply #8 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Well I think, with more than a bit of help from my forum homies, have blown off the rust.  Using the previous settings, I started in the middle of a huge map...and was comfortable the entire time:

Turn 91:  I had highest score at 218.  I was 1st in population with 212.  AI population was 83/85/112/161.  I was 1st in planets owned with 27.  AI had 10/12/19/24.

I built 57 ships.  AI had 16/63/69/72 and was highest on military power graph most of the time.

So I think that wraps it up for this thread.  Thanks for all the suggestions!  Like the guy in the movie The Color of Money, "I'm *back*!".

 

The keys for me were:

a. focusing on dedicated shipyard/industry planets with planet econ slider set to max industry.  Once the shipyard has been built on such a planet...colonizers and small ships should be spat out every 2-4 turns each, max.

b. keep colonizers at .7 population

c. empire econ slider set to make zero or 1 credit...otherwise 50% industry/50 research

d. start aggressive build of small hulls with decent weapons and no engines and stack them in their home shipyards once the first age of war weapon is researched along with shield and point defense  (i cannot figure out how to stuff armor into a small hull as well)

 

Disadvantages:

a. minimal constructors/starbases...playing catchup with the AI there.  Only grabbing relics and ascension crystals for the most part, and 2+ weapon ore locations whenever possible.

b. According to the "retire" screen, AI is crushing me at: 

- earnings:  I earned 3K, while the AI produced 6/8/11k.  Yet the economic timeline shows that I'm solidly the leader.  Strange. 

- research:  the timeline shows me at dead last, and not even an eighth of the Altarian total...well, the Altarians blow the top off the research graph in most of my games thus far.  Yet the "most researched" tech I seem to be have better or the best.  I guess I should chalk that up to the tech trading:  AI probably has lots of low score techs gained via trading.

- approval:  all of that population growth and lack of entertainment makes for unhappy people.  AI has much happier folks.