Whytebio

Join Date 11/2009

So...super powers.

Hey all,

I've recently come back to Civ 3 to see how it's progressing. For the most part I like it - I love the new starbase method of upgrading. Really like it; it's much more fluid and automated and less tesious micromanaging.

But after playing 2 games I've started to notice that there is an odd way that the NPC's act.

Now I don't know if this is the Drengin specifically, but in the two games I've played they've been the one to do this. But basically the game hums along like normal. All the nations of the galaxy, myself included, typically stay within about an 800 power point spread.

In the current game I'm in, I've got 2900 power, and 4 other civilisations are within about 800 of that. Okay, so far so good.

Except the Drengin. They're 17,000.

wtf?

In my previous game (which I quit), I was at 100 power by the time I made contact with my first civilisation. The Drengin. Who were at 1300 power.

What is going on?

This has gotten to the point where I'm just removing Drengin from the next game I make because this is completely ruining the game as they just become so ludicrously powerful and war-happy that as soon as I encounter them they're hostile and they declare war within a few turns. A war which is just a one-sided massacre. There's no fun to it, no strategy involved, it's just a strategy game where I'm counting down the clock until I get d***-punched by the Drengin.

Keep in mind I'm not a player that spends lots of time on the forums or checking patch notes etc. I just load steam, boot up Civ 3 and start playing. So did the Drengin get a massive buff or something? Or is something else going on here? Because this is twice in a row now that it's happened, and all other civilisations are within a certain range of power of each other, while the Drengin are so far beyond they're not even in the same ball-park figure. This has also happened before about a year back with the Krynn. Everyone else was within about 500 power points but the Krynn were 20 times the next competitors score. This happened repeatedly, game after game, until I just removed them because it was sucking the fun out of it.

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It is probably a combination of galaxy and game setup and a good starting location that gave the drengin in your games such an advantage.

In the games I played the Drengin were a middle power at best and several times they were one of the weakest and first to go. I play bigger maps with around 20 or more factions where the initial military advantage the Drengin have does not help them much, because on those maps you need to focus more on economy and a more long term development.

However, it seems to be normal that one or two factions run away and have a much higher power rating than the others.

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Ive seen this many times in my games.

like, i saw that if they are allowed to get to mid game un disturbed they will explode above everyone else. Onply happens early game if they have a good spot.

they have a ton of power, but the way I play makes me win 99% of the battles against them, and when I get ready to fight they drop by hundreds of points.

For example, just earlier today I was at 30 points and they were past 1,000. 50 turns later I'm 600 and they dropped from 1,500ish to 800 ish in 5 turns time.

just get carriers and you win against them since they tend to have weaker ships Then you do.

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The civ power score is very heavily weighted towards offensive ship strength. Any civ (not just the Drengin) who builds a ton of ships and/or has good offensive weapons tech will get a power score that really is not reflective of reality. The previous poster is absolutely right, after a few battles, their power score will drop dramatically.

The other thing going on may be that the Ai makes very little effort to expand it's planet count through any means. They all behave that way. In my last game, I played 7 opponents in a huge galaxy on genius difficulty. I won via research on turn 270. I captured or annexed a total of 23 planets in that time. The combined score of the other 7 civilizations was 1. Yes, ONE.

Obviously, if yours is the only empire expanding (gaining more planets), you will win.

Now, the Drengin build a lot of ships and have good ground troops, so it is possible that they actually managed to capture and hold some planets, or got a surrender (if you have that enabled), despite the Ai's overall terrible military strategy failings. That will give them a few more planets than the others, and possibly you, which will allow them to pay and build a lot more ships, giving them a bigger power score.

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Larsenex

Join Date 04/2009

+212

Quoting hfxnikolai,

reply 3

^^^ This.

I started a new game last week. I am at power 178, and Drengin are at 84 <<< yes 84. Now as soon as he stops the colony rush he will ZIP past me while I continue to rush for colonies around him. I have NO warships at all! NONE. I typically get at least missiles and beams and all 1rst tier defesnses and medium hulls before I start building. I have 25 planets and ONLY 2 SHIP YARDS!! My home system has 5 planets tied to the shipyard I got lucky and had 2 nearby to not affect the distance loss.

I expect the Drengin to DOW me in about 50 turns, by then Ill still have NO warships but will be able to crank out ships quickly to turn the tide.

Build some ships which counter his. Build like 3 4-ship fleets and see if that helps.

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You won by turn 270? Against 7 opponents? How's that possible?

Even if I fiddle with the Governing, rush some planets and have a focus on research, even by turn 90-100 I don't have the tech needed to build good war ships, sustain them, research invasions, build invasion ships and have the population to do it and reach their planets - all with the economy to support it and the production to build them.

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Population is key. Build more farms per planet, small 2-3, medium 3-4, large 4-5. Also some one over on the steam forum menationed taking the 3 free constructors pragmatic ideology first, then upgrading them to colony ship (340 credits each to upgrade). After than the Benevolant free colony ship. That probably the best tip I have seen for early colonising. This coupled with building 2 more colony ships with the rest of your cash is 5 colony ships(when you launch these set the pop to 1 or 0.5) by turn 2 + the benevolant one once you use said ships to colonize a world.

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