How to best gain technological advantage?

[johnmcd]

Originally posted by RedSox7
Yikes, I just realized I'm undercutting my finances by being a bit of a Xenophobe. Is it reallly true that you don't get as many city-to-city trade routes if you have closed borders?

I think I have retained some of the territorial possessiveness from C3. Sometimes you can slow down someone else's growth I guess.

If they are the only other civ on your continent then yes, you can help assure you are both stone age tribes when Cortez comes calling by not opening borders. If you’re not alone, then you’re cutting off your nose to spite your face because everyone else will be opening trade routes up. It's why Tokugawa is always last.

You don’t need to be as possessive about your land as you used to be too, cultural takeovers are easier than before and the AI doesn’t like to put town without ‘line of sight’ to it’s capital, they will certainly be the last it founds anyway, meaning you have time to mop up those sites.

[Bill3000]

Even just increasing your gold income is helpful, such as religious shrines or banks. Doing so will allow you to have the highest science percent possible to get the full force of your breakers per turn.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by RedSox7
Yikes, I just realized I'm undercutting my finances by being a bit of a Xenophobe. Is it reallly true that you don't get as many city-to-city trade routes if you have closed borders?

Yeah, I kind of realized that as well. Of course Open Borders leaves you open to the "You traded with my worst enemy" stuff. Ah, decisions. This game is great .

[MrPhil]

Originally posted by Bill3000
Even just increasing your gold income is helpful, such as religious shrines or banks. Doing so will allow you to have the highest science percent possible to get the full force of your breakers per turn.

I am learning this quickly. I am trying to build banks and grocers in all my cities as soon as I can spare the turns......

[MrPhil]

Originally posted by One_more_turn
I've used only one strategy so far: pick industrious civs, build pyramid, select Representation very early on, beeline for military technologies, crush a couple civs, bribe others with some resources, consolidate, and repeat.

I did this in anger after my last disaster of a game where I bascially got steamrolled.

I am at about 100 AD and I have already wiped out Isabella, Montezuma and am almost done with Cyrus.

[MrPhil]

Originally posted by Willem
Be careful not to over expand, city maintenance costs will drain your treasury very quickly if you're not careful, leaving you with no money for research. If your research spending is falling below 40-50%, it's time for a break until what you have starts paying for itself. Keep it even higher if you can but in the early game at least it's a bit of a trade off.

And build lots of Cottages. Unless you need the food to run a Mine or a Specialist, turn all you Grassland into Cottages, at least in the early part of the game.

Mind you, I'm one to be giving advice! I tend to be behind in my games as well. I haven't quite got the knack of being a tech leader yet, but I'm getting better. At least I'm learning what not to do.[

I have seen this too Willem. In my current game I have managed to keep spending at 60-70% most of the time while taking out three neighboring civs.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Yeah, I kind of realized that as well. Of course Open Borders leaves you open to the "You traded with my worst enemy" stuff. Ah, decisions. This game is great .

Once you made contact with everybody on the continent and have researched writing, fend off the urge to get an Open Borders agreement with all of them. It's time to find out how these other civs feel about each other. Take in consideration of who you are going to eliminate at some point in time. If Monty is there he's probably your #1 target. Saladin and Gandhi are cool though so they can stay around for awhile.

Once you know who likes whom and who needs to be eliminated, you then know whom you want Open Borders with. Pushing "It ain't happening" won't net you red points.

[Dominae]

Alphabet and tech trading.

You get incredible value from tech trades on everything up to Immortal. It requires a little know-how and patience, though. Just check the F4 screen every so often, and try not to be too stingy. Soon you will find yourself in at least in first or second place technologically, at which point you can rely on Cottages, etc. to pull ahead.

[Yosho]

Originally posted by DaveV
An addition to Arrian's trade route tips: you'll collect a lot more money if you can make a few friends and sign open border treaties (and don't run Mercantilism). Foreign trade routes pay at least twice as much as domestic routes; another reason why Writing is valuable.

(shrug) It depends, though. On a standard sized pangea map, (with everyone on one continent) even the best trade routes with lots of open borders agreements seem to only give one or two gold per turn. On a map like that, mercantillism can be better, especally if you're also running representation.