Help! This game is a little different than Civ 1...

[warsong]

I admit that I really haven't gotten into the civ games since the first and I'm finding it overwhelming to learn. I'm playing Noble level right now with standard-sized terran map. Here are some issues that I hope some of you can help with:

• Distance from capital and number of cities costs: are these fixed for each difficulty level? Should I just learn the limits and not build any more cities when I reach it? Should I wait until I get a civic that helps with this? Are courthouses worth building in the early stages?
  
• The early years: Ideally, one would want to build a settler early on. Since this stops the growth, should I wait until my first city grows to size 3 or 4 and use this city to build all settlers and workers? Should I build a worker before I build my first settler if I have good resources in my fat cross? Your thoughts?
  
• Which techs to take? One civic that I found early on in the game was organized religion. If I got all my cities under one religion and started on buildings, the 25% bonus would be a great boost. Are there many worthwhile buildings in the beginning or should I wait for org. religion?
  
• Is it a good idea to exploit my civ's traits? Let's say I had creative - should I skip building obelisks? Should I build cottages with finiancial civs rather than farms? Should I go to war asap with an aggressive civ? Or is it best in all cases to grow my cities first and then concentrate on these?
  
• When trading resources with another civ (e.g. rice for cow), are you just trading the +1, +1 stats or do all the square's resources get traded to them? If it's just the lesser stats, why would a civ trade an identical resource?
  

I'm sure there's more I need to learn, but this might be good for a start.

[Dubhghlas]

Trading resources

If they already have a resource, say dye, which gives +1 to Happiness, and they develop a second dye square, they will be willing to trade it to you, if you have silk, also a +1 to happiness, and they don't. That way, they have +2 to happiness, and so will you if you also have another silk resource improved.

Same with rice and cow, only it is the +1 to Health that is involved.

[Diadem]

You should only trade resources of which you have more than one, unless you are really desperate for a particular resource.

Just one supply of a particular resource will service your entire empire, regardless of size, difficulty or tech level. So if you have multiple, trade them away, or keep them as a buffer against pillaging enemies. (if you loose one you'll still have the other).

It is in general a good idea to exploit your civs traits. As an aggressive civ you want to war early on. Not too early of course, or you'll be too far behind the others in building up, but not to late either. I can't give you a definite timing. It all depends.

The same holds for the other traits. A creative civ doesn't need obelisks. A financial civ wants as many tiles with 2+ trade as possible. But what exactly your strategy is enormously depends on what map you are playing as well. Play on an archipelago map is completely different than on a great plains map.

Which brings me to your second question, the early years. Again, all depends on how you start, which civ you are, etc. If you start with mysticism, you probably want to get an early religion. If you start on an archipelago map, fishing and sailing might be a good idea. The pyramids (you need masonry for them) are always great, though the great lighthouse can be better on archipelago maps. Definitely try to get some early wonders if you are industrious, otherwise focussing on early expansion might be more interesting. Especially if you are creative, since they expand more easily.

Pretty hard to give a complete strategy guide here. I suggest you do some reading on these forums, there's a lot of information here. There are threads about many specific starting situations, which you might find useful. Once you understand them all, you should understand the game good enough to create your own strategies

[padillah]

Those are all really good questions and, fortunately, no one has the definitive answers.

If you've got the brain-pan for it check out Vels Strategy Thread

It get's pretty detailed and addresses a few things like building early setlers and when to research what tech and what that gives you.

Tom P.

[warsong]

Originally posted by Diadem
You should only trade resources of which you have more than one, unless you are really desperate for a particular resource.

Just one supply of a particular resource will service your entire empire, regardless of size, difficulty or tech level. So if you have multiple, trade them away, or keep them as a buffer against pillaging enemies. (if you loose one you'll still have the other).

It is in general a good idea to exploit your civs traits. As an aggressive civ you want to war early on. Not too early of course, or you'll be too far behind the others in building up, but not to late either. I can't give you a definite timing. It all depends.

The same holds for the other traits. A creative civ doesn't need obelisks. A financial civ wants as many tiles with 2+ trade as possible. But what exactly your strategy is enormously depends on what map you are playing as well. Play on an archipelago map is completely different than on a great plains map.

Which brings me to your second question, the early years. Again, all depends on how you start, which civ you are, etc. If you start with mysticism, you probably want to get an early religion. If you start on an archipelago map, fishing and sailing might be a good idea. The pyramids (you need masonry for them) are always great, though the great lighthouse can be better on archipelago maps. Definitely try to get some early wonders if you are industrious, otherwise focussing on early expansion might be more interesting. Especially if you are creative, since they expand more easily.

Pretty hard to give a complete strategy guide here. I suggest you do some reading on these forums, there's a lot of information here. There are threads about many specific starting situations, which you might find useful. Once you understand them all, you should understand the game good enough to create your own strategies

This is helpful so far. I like to pick a random civs and have all victory conditions enabled. I tried skimmed through the strategy guides (including the Gamespot one) and they were very helpful, but I trust the hardcore players' opinions more than anything.

When picking maps, does the AI know what kind of map it is and adjust its strategy? Does it adjust also for the size of map and terrain/climate?