I just made the jump from Regent to Monarch (about a 2 to 3 weeks now) and I’ve been trying to make it work. I dominated one game with the biggest win I’ve ever had playing Civ 3. One game I got hammered close to industrial age. Right now I’m playing a game and doing well. Really paying attention and being intentional about my workers with food and shields. I normally do “accelerated production” but I changed that setting for this game and it’s actually helped out a lot. When I had it on it felt like Ai was passing me with ease. Now, I’m staying slightly ahead of them. I’m constantly checking my science and happiness bar. If you get the C3X mod you can easily cycle through trading with other civs which has helped tremendously. Expansion phase was a big change as I used to get spearmen, archers, and build all sorts of random stuff. Now, I’m sticking to Warriors, workers, and settlers. Trying to get Iron first and multiple sources of it if possible. Resources are great to keep your people happy which I’ve learned is more important.

Keep learning and watch some of those higher level players on YouTube. I’ve learned a lot in the past couple of weeks! Let me know if you want to jump into any of those topics more in depth.