No caravans -- what do I build now?

[Dimension]

As I'm sure was the practice for most people, in SMAC/Civ2, when I was done building all my infrastructure for a city, I mostly produced Crawlers/Caravans/Freights/whatever. Now that these things aren't available, I'm looking for new ideas of what to do with all my extra production in the mid- to late-game.

For example, right now I'm in a game where I've taken over all of North America, and I don't really want to expand anymore. Most of my cities are size 12 with a temple/cathedral/library/university/marketplace/bank, and an aqueduct and harbor if appropriate. I can't build sewer systems yet, so what do I do?

I've built more defensive units than I should have, and I don't want to build any more military units right now that will just require support. I can make workers with my size 12 cities, to build up my smaller cities, but that's still not enough to keep me busy. If this were SMAC, I would be building an energy park and making a lot of clean units. If this were Civ2, I would be building tons and tons of caravans.

But this is Civ3. I can't make an energy park. I can't make clean units. I can't make tons of caravans to rush things later. The "Wealth" option is certainly a poor alternative because it's so inefficient. I could just chop down all my forests and irrigate, giving each city tons of food and pull off as many workers to make scientists as I can... but specialists are also ridiculously inefficient. What the hell do I do?

[Leonid]

At this point go communist and take over the world. Then start a new game.

[Dimension]

That would be great, but I'm in the tech lead and haven't even discovered communism yet.

All my cities have a Temple/Cathedral, and I've got the Sistene Chapel and Hanging Gardens, but I guess I'll start building Coloseums just for the culture since I have nothing else to build.

[Lord Maxwell]

I usually build all buildings that give culture. And if cash flow allows it everything else as well. (Maybe skipping barracks in cities deep inside my territory.)

But once the build que empty out you have nothing to do... And wealth is really sucky... Which is sad, because you end up watching your cities going on wealth for a long time... Even with a total tech lead and a tech every 3 turn or so there are still too few buildings... Pretty boring imho...

Well, back to culture buildings. If you want to make sure not to win a cultural victory you should hold off on building em. You win if you pass 100k total culture, and is also atleast twice as cultural as the runner up. Which is easily accomplished on a big map... So easy in fact that you have to watch out so you don't spoil your chances for a SS victory or whatever you are really aiming for.

[Auslander]

Originally posted by Dimension
As I'm sure was the practice for most people, in SMAC/Civ2, when I was done building all my infrastructure for a city, I mostly produced Crawlers/Caravans/Freights/whatever. Now that these things aren't available, I'm looking for new ideas of what to do with all my extra production in the mid- to late-game.

For example, right now I'm in a game where I've taken over all of North America, and I don't really want to expand anymore. Most of my cities are size 12 with a temple/cathedral/library/university/marketplace/bank, and an aqueduct and harbor if appropriate. I can't build sewer systems yet, so what do I do?

Build "Wealth." It's in the build box and available since the beginning of game.

8 shields = 1 gold until you discover economics where by 4 shields = 1 gold.

[randomturn]

Play at a higher level.

[ChrisShaffer]

Build workers. Then, when you get Sanitation, build hospitals. Then, pump the workers back into your population - you'll have cities at 20+ in no time.

I did this at the aqueduct barrier also - I built six workers per city, then got aqueducts and jumped to 12 population in one turn. Nice.

[gfrazieror]

So far, I've found it's impossible to have an army that's too large. Use some of the cities to produce wealth to finance your field armies...the ones you use to cow your rivals.

[Matthew]

This game had so much potential, yet it would seem that it is mostly wasted.

Defeating the AI, so far at least, is much more challenging than in Civ III. This is the only reason sufficient for me to play this game instead of Civ II.

1. Trade routes. It went from being a major part of the game in civ II (you could even base your hole strategy on maximizing caravan bonuses), to somewhat of an automatic afterthought in SMAC inwhich one got trade simply for having peace treaties and a decent commerce rating, to practically non existent here. We can barter some silk for some spice, and maybe 1 gold per turn. And of course if the other civ has it, no trade. And there is nothing even remotely akin to being able to convert shields into goods to trade with other cities, except for workers, perhaps.

2. Tech Tree. There is now much less flexibility in persuing a given tech route, both because later techs cost more and because you now must have most the techs of a given era before moving to the next. Also, since Astronoby comes much later, as does the College, the SSC is far less valuable. Of course the immasculated specialists and trade system don't help much in this reguard.

3. Leaders come from war, and are the only way to rush a Wonder. In spite of culture and nationality, this gives a huge overall advantage to warmongers, further reducing flexibility.

4. It takes quite a while to have many build options for infrastructure. Often one is left with nothing to build but troops, workers, and settlers.

5. How about this for future multiplayer? Not only are the two major happy wonders still closely linked in tech, but now you must also get Monotheism if you want Astronomy !!!! So the same alliance with the first opportunity to build the big happies also has first crack at the science wonders.