Quote:
Originally Posted by Yskonyn
Be careful people, we're wandering off in the acronym pile of noise interference here... 
I'll be taking the advice so far to heart and try a pretender build. I'll try to have my choices documented in a post and put them up for discussion. |
Respectfully, I disagree with your dismissal of 'the acronym pile of noise'. If you want to master a competitive multiplayer game, you must be willing to learn the jargon its players use. Only the kindest experts will be willing to couch their terminology in explanations for you.
As for the Original Post, what I recommend more than anything is practice. Multiplayer practice is ideal; singleplayer only works with specific goals. For example, can you achieve 20 or even 30 provinces by Early Spring Year 2? With multiplayer practice, focus on simply playing as much (as many games) as possible. The slow pace of Dom3 lends itself to perfectionist play, but perfectionist play is not helpful to a new player.
For example, here we are talking over the specifics of Caelum strategy. Rather than that, just go start up a small singleplayer game, say... 3 Impossible AI + you on a 60 prov map, and try out thunder strike spam tactics for yourself. While perfecting pretender design in this thread will help for the multiplayer game, it doesn't teach you how Caelum actually plays.
Of course, for most tactics it's impossible to adequately evaluate them in a singleplayer game, but you can get a taste. I personally recommend small-scale multiplayer games, since that will allow you to play more at once and finish them, win or lose, quicker. Blitz games on IRC are also helpful in this regard.
A good read is the Beginner section of this book, specifically the Getting Started topic:
http://www.sirlin.net/ptw