Desparately need tips on speeding play for Civ 4 BTS

[Willem]

Originally posted by mmontgomery
Each time I move a unit, it is like a one second delay for the next unit to zoom and select. I think part of it is moving the current unit. Is there a way to make my units move instantly? I have seen cases where the animation to move a unit onto a transport is still ongoing when I move the transport away from the shore. It makes it look that the unit jumped into the ocean. I thought 2 Ghz dual core was plenty fast, but maybe something else is slowing down my computer.

Obviously your computer isn't quite up to par as those things shouldn't be happening. You might want to upgrade your video card and get some more RAM, as both of those will help. The RAM probably more so. You should really have at least 2 gig with this game, that will make a big difference.

[TriMiro]

The problem is neither how many turns the game lasts nor ho fast the computer is. The problem with waiting one second between moves is a bug of some sort, since it can be temporarily fixed by reloading the current game or restarting the civ application altogether.

[snoopy369]

It depends on the problem, Trimiro. It's possible for there to be an issue as you say, but that is by no means the only explanation for the problem; an inadequate graphics card, for example, can also cause that problem. I highly suspect that is the case here, particularly if the problem occurs early on.

[TriMiro]

I cannot speak for mmontgomery, but I am having the issue myself. It takes a long time for the units to move in order. I suspected the graphics card driver. I do have the latest version. It is interesting that I do not see that happen on other games strategy (heroes of might and magic) or FPS (STALKER). It helps if I reload every now and then.

As to how fast before it happens, it depends on the map size and how much micromanagement I am doing. When I queue the production and go into the city less often, it seems to work fine longer. It kind of sucks when I play RFC or something else that required a lot of micro.

[Bkeela]

Civ IV is quite different to SMAC, in that I almost never bother to conquer a continent separate to my own, especially if I have started alone while most of the other civs are together. With SMAC I always conquered every continent - and it was easy, even on the hardest difficulty setting.

In Civ IV, war is very time consuming. I guess the cultural defense is what slows things down somewhat. In SMAC, you didn't have to worry about seige weapons to soften a city, and you could also develop flight relatively early and attack actual units. It was too easy. Anyway, I don't necessarily mind time consuming war campaigns. It is fun...

I prefer being a builder though, and will always go for a culture victory if I can. Those games go relatively fast.