Trade vs. Manufacturing

After reading chapter 4 of “The Making of Economic Society,” I started to think about my successful civilization game. Trade was very helpful for me at the beginning of my game but when I started to dominate there was nothing my allies had to offer that was of any use. I became so advanced that I already had all of the trading goods that others had to offer. Just like the industrial revolution in England, I was in demand and I had broken off from rest of continents because there were of no use to me. Just like England, I became interested in new technology (gadgets, devices, and machines) to give me an edge amongst surrounding civilization.

As a result, I have observed that trade was very important on getting ahead at the beginning of my game but manufacturing was key to bringing my civilization to a whole new level. My battleships, cargo ships, and fighter planes were a result of my advanced manufacturing that helped lead to my success. I am not saying that trade is bad, its just that it became of new use to me once manufacturing took place just like the industrial revolution.

new game success

After starting my new game using my new strategies I have not been able to stop playing. I created tons of cities in my civilization early for growth and then I built them all up. I traded with other leaders to speed up my research to get the technology I needed for a strong military. Once the Galleon cargo ship was enabled, I loaded up all my military on them and started to surround my biggest enemy. I also took my men on land and surrounded the borders of my enemy. I chose this enemy because they were centered on the equator. I got all my military and ships in position and declared war. It was a blowout. All my cities have done well the whole time, even during war because I made sure I built a strong culture before I built an army. Building tons of cities at the beginning of my game was the main reason for my success. There were so many cities that allowed me to create such a big military while also maintaining culture when needed. After I built up everything at the beginning, it was all a joke from there. It would really take skill to mess up my empire and military. Next time I play I need to play on a much harder difficulty. I beat the game and had four times the amount of points than my strongest enemy with 11,261. Because the game mode was set for easy, all I really had to do was learn from my early mistakes last game and build as many cities as soon as possible. Next game should be much harder where my mistakes will show a lot more.