My style of play is very common (or maybe not?).

[Ision]

We are the classic builder/warmonger compromisers! At times we have very early wars, but only because the opportunity was perfect. Any 2 early game wonders (Pyramids, Great Library, Hanging Gardens preferred) make us feel we had a good Ancient age, but 1 will do. Otherwise we build and wait for the standard – ‘right after I go Republic/Monarchy comes my big quick war with heavy Unique Unit numbers’. Soon as that war ends comes the – ‘exploit at least half your GA grabbing wonders phase’. Players like us are somewhat of wonder hogs (but not totally), in any case we are obsessed with Sistine, JS Bach’s and Universal Suffrage. Why these 3 you say, - because our style is an attempt to have the best of both worlds (war and culture). We never want our short but frequent 3rd and 4th age wars to interfere with having half our cities building culture. Happiness rules supreme if one is to ‘have it all’. The thought of having to change out of Republic/Democracy to Commie is unthinkable.

There then follows the infrastructure build up lull of the middle of the 2nd age. Then follows the ‘late 2nd early 3rd age war’ of resource/luxuries colonization on that ‘other’ continent. Yes there’s always another continent. We don’t play Pang or Arch maps – no extremes for us with maps; it interferes with ‘balance’. By the time we make our all out lunge towards TOE, a quick view of the world map shows our Civs color dominating at least half our own continent and 3 or 4 heavily fortified ‘coastal colony cities’ on the other continent. We keep lots of allies at all times, we fight our foreign continents wars with lots of allies. On our home continent we fight one on one. We time our wars meticulously – 20 turns of war, 20 turns of peace (building) – back to 20 turns of war – wash, rinse repeat. Once we have Hoovers, we race towards the modern navy techs. Our late game wars our filled with Battleships, Carriers, Bombers and Fighters. We strike from a distance; we annihilate cities with a reign of bombers or coastal guns. The goals are no longer conquest – its balance of power. Us way on top, all others equally well below us. God help the 2 civs directly below us on the Histograph!

The game is won in the early modern age and diplo, space, and culture wins are the order of the day. We use to take one more turn after winning, just to launch the nukes and watch…we stopped that after 3 or 4 times.

We tinker with the editor, adjust for our idea of play balance. We play Monarch only. We tried and won at Emperor a couple of times, but we hated the change the level demanded in our play style. So we settled 1 level back. We don’t like world domination or conquest victories, and yet we could easily pull them off by the mid Industrial age. We tend to play the same 2 Civs all the time. We tend to play large maps with 11 opponents. Our opponents are pretty constant as well, because they are our idea of who the strongest AI’s are. At times we love to set the AI’s in world wars with each other, and play resource broker. Other times we use the dog pile method. Every now and then we play peaceful builder or full warmonger the rest of the game right after our first war. Not because we want a change of pace, but because something has gone wrong in our plans and we feel that it is necessitated. We enjoy these games, but always go back to our normal style the next game.

We are the balance fanatics – the builder/warriors – the patient Civers –

[Alex]

My style of play is very common (or maybe not?)

Yes it is.

[Spiffor]

I belong to the builder/warrior caste, except that I am more of a builder. I don't aim at having a 20 turns - 20 turns balance between war and peace, but I use war whenever I can't make my already owned territory more productive. I love Sistine, JS Bach's and Universal Suffrage simply because I love having productive cities when war must come.

There are four main reasons for me to go to war:
- Expand the riches. I go to war whenever I can't make my production more intensive (i.e when tiles are improved, when there are marketplaces / libraries everywhere etc.)
- Dragged into war. I generally go on the offensive at full power when someone declares unwarranted war on me.
- Take a critical resource. When I have no Iron or no Coal, I can go to war to grab it. I can go to war for luxuries too, when I have a bad starting position, and when I need as much trade as I can to keep up.
- Prune a rival for victory. When I'm threatened by a rival to get to victory, I can sometimes go to war. But sabotage does the trick well (although it's viciously expansive). I remember a game where I spend ~4500 gold to sabotage the Indian production of the UN, one turn before it was completed

I tend to be a builder until one of these reasons is met.

[mimi]

Hmmm... sounds a lot like me. Sigh...

But I have to say that I HATE when the AI sneaks over an attacks me or demands stuff. I never give in to demands and never give a peace treaty unless I get something from the AI in exchange for peace. Don't care who started the war! I get mad, then I get even. I've actually lost wonders in my vengeance.

Why does a silly game upset me when the random number dictate I lose a city?

[Datajack Franit]

VERY common

I do that too

[Kaos XIII]

Originally posted by Ision

......................We tinker with the editor, adjust for our idea of play balance. We play Monarch only. We tried and won at Emperor a couple of times, but we hated the change the level demanded in our play style. So we settled 1 level back....................

We are the balance fanatics – the builder/warriors – the patient Civers –

This is so true! As is, most of it.

But you forgot to mention about going to war, simply because we are bored.

[Flip McWho]

I'm probably a classic builder. I build everything and then go to war. Well that is what is preferably anyway. I only really build units when i ain't got nothing else to build in my cities. Preferred means of victory is space race really.

War usually happens when they declare war on me. Then if I don't feel like war i just wait around for peace. Oh, I play on warlord - thats why i can get away with some of the stuff I do. I know, its pathetic but hey I wanted to finish an actual game before i went up to regent. I'm probably ready for regent but yeah. All in good time.

But you forgot to mention about going to war, simply because we are bored.

However, I do fall prey to this every now and again. Theres nothing like going to war when your bored.

[Sovereign]

I always build up my capital city first, with workers, while my warriors or scouts explore the terrain, then I plop down cities in a puzzle fashion.

Then when I have a respectable economy and tech level, such as knights and musketeers, I go on the offensive, if there's any enemies around.

I keep throwing units aganist the enemy like the Borg in Star Trek, basically clobber them into submission.

The highest level I've beat the game is Reagant, not Monarch and above. The only reason why I don't play higher difficulty levels is because I hate my cities rioting at low population sizes.

The only times I play higher difficulty levels is modify the rules to make all temples and cathedrals cost no maintainece, or change the rioting so that people will riot at size 6, 7, or 8 like in Warlord, not at size 1, 2, 3, or 4.

[zorbop]

I am a builder/warmonger of some sort.
I build everything and expand until one of the following conditions is met, in which case i destroy a couple neighbors and get back to building.
- I Run out of things to build in my top couple cities, and build units instead.
- I need the territory for my score
- I get really pissed off (IE: i don't get Sun Tzu, enemy constantly moves a settler through my territory)
- I become bored
- It is time for my UU (normally sipahi, rider or samuri)

I only build a few specific wonders: Sun Tzu, Universal Sufferage, Hoovers, JS Bach or Sistine.
I am always a republic, except for a few rare cases where my empire is so large i need communism.