Is there a general "I suck at CIV IV" strat/tips thread?

[fluffy_bunny]

Howdy all,

My name is fluffy_bunny and I suck at CIV IV

I have been playing it on and off since it came out - including the Warlords and BTS expansions and my game just doesn't seem to be improving. I'll play for a while, get tromped by the AI and not understand what I did wrong - then get frustrated and stop playing for a few months. Wash, rinse, repeat.

I typically plat at Noble - I have attempted many games on Prince and constantly get trounced. On CIV III (which I played a lot) I could usually count on a win on Emperor and I have won on Deity before.

I am really not sure what my problem is. It doesn't seem to matter how fast or slow I expand, most of the AI's are well ahead of me by city count, score, military strength, and tech by 1200AD. I don't understand how the AI can get so many cities built and still stay up on tech and have a strong military - it seems whenever I try to make a lot (or conquer a lot) of cities I end up broke and with my science slider at 50% (or worse) to stay in the black. And if I try to do a slow steady expansion I end up boxed out by the other AI's early on so I'm hopelessly behind by the late game.

Often I will do my first global map trade only to learn that one of the AI's has an impossible lead by territory and city count and I'll just throw in the towel.

I think I'm missing something basic here. I was hoping some of you veterans of these boards could direct me to a general "I suck" type thread or guide that I can read through and hopefully I'll pick up on something that I've been doing wrong.

Or maybe one of you had a similar experience and can tell me how you got better? Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

[snoopy369]

General suggestions for most people:
1. Start a thread about a game you are playing, put screenshots and/or savegames in the thread every 50 turns or so. It's pretty easy to tell what you're doing right/wrong from that

2. Most general mistakes are the following:
a) Not fast enough expansion
b) Not enough workers / worker improved plots
c) Not enough focus on commerce (particularly Currency)

3. If you're keeping your tech rate above 60% the whole game, then a) is your problem. A winning Civ4 player will have a 20% tech rate at some point. 20% of 1400 is more than 60% of 300, remember, and even if you're producing 'less' (20% of 800), the hammers make up for it. Also, make plenty of marketplaces (more so than libraries, unless you need the culture), and also make open borders with at least a few AIs (more trade from trade routes this way).

4. Use slavery and specialists to your advantage. Slavery = using that food that goes to waste early on and making it into hammers. This is key. Specialists = At a minimum, cities with high food levels early on should be running 2 (or more) scientists in order to more efficiently use that food (turning 2 surplus food into a science specialist).

Prince is much harder than Noble, and that's the step where a lot of this is needed.

[Hauptman]

Well we will stick to the basics...

First off, have a plan. think about what you want and do THAT. If you want an unstoppable tech lead, plan ahead. If you wanna be big, just plan for it. Ive played this silly game everyway i could think of, from 3 or less cities cranking beakers to huge empires using hammers to win. Its all doable if you think about what to research and when.

Lets start with my "basic" game plan. Huge maps marathon speed, LOTS of other civs.

First, scout your imediate surroundings looking for those "perfect" city sites. This is when you see who is around and what your land has to offer... the time when i decide to regenerate map or not..

If you have a fish start, get those workboats out asap. otherwise build a worker right off the bat. this early barbars aint gonna be a prob so you can leave your city undefended. Then begin researching the worker techs that will benifit you NOW, not later. get the resources hooked up and get 2 - 3 military units as your city grows.

Once the capital is size 4 or so, build that first settler. send it to the most benificial site first, say you discovered horses, gold, or just a great city site. by this time i have the worker techs i need, and have started mysticism, or finished it. Build a monument first at max hammers, culture is more important now than growth, so work a forested hill if possible. defend this city with one of your earlier built warriors, because soon the barbars turn into trouble.

after you research your way to priesthood, decide how important archers are now... if Montezuma is close (or shaka), or NOONE is close, thus making barbars a problem, research archery. If you have no agresive civs nearby, bypass it and start writing (note if you needed animal husbandry do writing after mysticism). Usually your capital will be better off than any of the AI's at this point, so you can usually build wichever wonder you need most atm. I recomend the oracle, especially if you have marble. After writing start towards bronze working.
build 1 more city IF there is a great spot. stay smaller than 4 cities or your gonna fall behind later.

Now asuming you built the oracle You can now choose Code of Laws, take it. and now you have both your very own religion and a new civic that will help in the next step. Set the capital to as many scientists as possible without starvation while you begin your library. Once you have bronze working have the workers start chopping down forests to get the library built, and hopefully hook up some copper. after 15 - 30 turns you get a great scientist or a great prophet in your capital. either is GREAT. have the scientist create an academy in your capital or a prophet can make the shrine in your confuciast capital. If you got a prophet keep the scientists going, it takes a bit longer but wait for that great scientist, otherwise start working the tiles again.

If you had no copper go straight to ironworking, otherwise now is a good time to get alphabet. Once you have alphabet, trade techs with everyone you've met. try and save Code of Laws for the good techs, like currency, calandar, mathmatics etc.. But trade for everything you can. You should now be the MOST advanced civ in the game. barring a few techs that "they dont wanna give away just yet"

to be continued...

[Hauptman]

Now we begin our next phase of expansion. Get some REAL units in your cities, axes and spears. and have a look around. If there is still some room for more cities then build a settler or two (usually with 18 civs the land is full up by now.)

Keep building axes and spears, because someone is coming. Unless everyone around you is now confucian someone will attack, you must be ready. Tech or trade your way to construction and get a few catapults. Build a city attack stack of axes swords and cats, maybe some chariots (or horse archers if you got lucky) and decide who is first if noone attacked yet. Take a couple of border cities from a neighbor and get those defended, even if they are your friend. Once you have a decent attack force and well defended cities, build up that infrastructure. Buildings, workers etc. after you get a couple cities rebuild your attack stack and wait for the next fool to attack. Keep it close to the most threatened border and let it wait.

After construction you want to get Civil Service. then head towards Machinery. Get Beurocracy running as soon as its available. This makes your capital as good as or better than 2 other cities. With both a library and an academy PLUS the 50% bonus of the civic, beakers just Pour in. By now you should have had that prophet pop from the oracle and you have a shrine too. 100% research with 5 - 7 cities you should be the one everyone hates. You might get swarmed by more than 1 neighbor at a time, just keep your head and preserve units.

Machinery. Get as much cash as possible from all civs by trades for lowball techs or "could you spare this for a good friend" DONOT i repeat DONOT trade civil service OR machinery. Chances are You should now have a force of city attack maces and defensive crossbows at your disposal. Use them NOW, go balistic. Anyone who even looked at you funny, start taking there cities. and research towards engineering. You need trebuches to take longbow held cities so stay away from those until engineering is complete.

Stop capturing when you reach well defensible possitions or 10 - 15 cities, or if everyone else catches up in military techs and you have no more easy targets.

Now settle in and get all the land improved and city buildings built. Beat off their paltry attacks (as you should have a well trained army because you kept as many old units alive by sacraficing the catapults and trebuches, not the mellee)

research towards education and liberalism. make sure you have optics and take astronomy as your freebie.

more to come...

[Hauptman]

Once liberalism is yours its OK to trade away education, paper, and liberalism for techs like Guilds nationhood banking etc.

Begin your industrialization. This is the time of the Pax Whoeveryouare. Generally is dont expand much Unless I've got a great tech lead and lots of $$ flowing in from the shrine. If you have Rifles before everyone else feel free to take more cities, but its not that important. You should be teching straight towards Railroads after liberalism because this gives you a HUGE advantage. The AI civs always head towards the scientific method branch first leaving them with low production capabilities and reduced tech from obsolete monastaries. In fact i often can build Machine guns BEFORE riflemen. The only reason for war is coal. Make sure you have it. Take it if you have to. Cannons make this easy enough to do.

Once rails are built on all your mines and woodmills you can now ride this production advantage right ontowards victory by using it to build buildings and research or military power. Thats all upto you.

[Hauptman]

Oh and a side note. Dont throw in the towel just because someone got huge... Usually the big ones dont pose much of a threat late game (unless its Mansa Musa or Huyana Capac). If your woried about them, Just invade, or get thier neighbors to.

[Dis]

I'm just curious if there are any strategy guides updated for BTS. I need help beating Noble again, as I used to be able to beat it, but now can't. I haven't played in a little while though, I still have to resolve this sound issue. There was a fix for the static sound, but I can't remember what it is.

[Wittlich]

Solid guidelines Hauptman!

But on a side note, the game is dynamic - which means that every game you play will be different from the ones before - I believe this is the attraction of playing Civilization...there are NO easy fixes that will work for ALL occasions. There are only guidelines and these guidelines are just that: Guides. It all depends on numerous factors within each individual game that will dictate if a certain tactic will work or not - So be dynamic during your gameplay and be willing to change your tactics if needed.

[Wittlich]

Dis: Off the top of my head, I don't recall any strat guides that are strictly BtS.

As far as I know, most (if not all) of the BtS strategies are added into existing CivIV and/or Warlords write-ups...

[Theben]

Interesting... I put a higher value on Monotheism than Writing for the -25% building cost, and almost always use Oracle for Metalcasting than CoL. I do find I have a slight tech lag around the 1st 100 or so turns but I quickly make up for it.

[Nugog]

Originally posted by Wittlich
Solid guidelines Hauptman!

there are NO easy fixes that will work for ALL occasions.

Except for three giant stacks of Praetorians...........




One of the things I found difficult when I first started playing was the expansion/tech balance. I always tried to keep the tech slider too high - when a short term loss of tech rate for more commerce in the long run seemed to be a bad argument.

In general I have learnt to manage that better - but it is a Wittlich says - it is different for every game - depending on what you encounter.

[The Priest]

Lots of good things have been said.

One personal tip though and that is that you need far fewer units for much of the game than most people seem to think.

I think the issue is that if you play MP, then you definitely need lots of units. But for SP the risk just isn't the same.

The AI will almost never invade until there is no space left to expand. Barbarians stop being a threat when your borders are up against the AI's. Even before then the barbarians rarely come in force, just a steady stream.

I think people copy the number of units per city that the AI has, but it has them because it is too stupid to be able to defend properly. And many guides are written by people who play MP.

For much of the early game, unless you have one of the agressive neighbours, a unit per city and 3-4 in a roaming defence (join your cities up with roads) is quite sufficient and saves you lots of build time to put into buildings.workers which make you stronger in the long-term.

[Ming]

If you are playing the aggressive AI setting, which many people do... 3 to 4 units as a roaming defense won't be enough. The AI's will be way ahead on the power graph, and they will come at you.

[The Priest]

Quite agree, but if you are not using the agressive AI setting (i.e. which folks who are having trouble won't be) don't be fooled into wasting the resources early game - while there is room to expand in SP they won't come unless you are ridiculously under powered or they are one of a couple of civs. Invest for the future!

[Nugog]

It would again all depend on what settings you use - on Pangea maps - lots of early units are usefull if you want to warmonger. If you are on a crowded map - again - useful. Again it depends on what AI'syou are facing.

It is one of the great things about civ - no game is the same.