War-Peace-War Strategy

[The diplomat]

The War-Peace-War Strategy

1. Early Game - War
In the early game, try to get iron quickly and start a war with swordsman.

2. Middle Game - Peace
When you have conquered a good deal and your empire has gotten big such that your science slider has fallen to 40% or 30%, make peace and switch to a builder strategy. Focus on courthouses, universities, Forbidden Palace, Versailles, bank. This will boost your science back up to 80 or 90%. With a large empire at 80% science, you'll speed once again through the tech tree.

3. Late game - War
Now that your large empire has a great economy, it's time for war again. With the advent of tanks and airpower, you can make a final push to expand your empire again and seize victory!

[Diadem]

I've been playing like that since civ1... I thought everybody did

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by Diadem
I've been playing like that since civ1... I thought everybody did

I think in civ4, this type of strategy is more important because of how civ4 handles maintenance costs. If you don't reduce maintenance costs, they will hurt you.

One of the big lessons that I have learned from civ4 is this: Just because maintenance costs reduce science of a big empire does not mean that you shouldn't have a big empire. A big empire is still very good because a big empire has more potential than a small empire. The secret is that you need to make a big empire work for you by taking the time to boost your economy and science.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

I don't seem to ever build swordsmen...I seem to go axeman->elephant->cav...

Other than that, it's not too bad...although I generally only do the first war part if there's a small empire I can kill off quickly and take over all the land they would have expanded into.