Let's try this again: Ok, so I finally got BtS

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Tried to post this here earlier, but a Poly glitch put it elsewhere. So, take 2:

Having played vanilla Civ4 for the last few months, I'm happy to say I finally picked up BtS (happy both because it's a way cooler game and because now my wife and I don't have to fight over Civ disks -- she's sticking with vanilla).

Anyway, yes, fabulous expansion -- but having played my first a game all the way through (on chieftain, so I could try out as many new features as possible), I do have some questions:

1) The Apostolic Palace is made obsolete by mass media, but those Apostolic Palace votes just kept coming, long after I'd discovered mass media. Am I bound by AP votes even when I have the tech that makes it obsolete?

2) Is there a limit to the number of corporate execs you can make at any one time? It seemed that way.

3) Do you have to wait until the game asks you if you want to turn overseas possessions into colonies, or can you be proactive about that?

4) In spite of my awesome power, I could never get anyone to agree to be my vassal; what do I have to do?

I think that's it for now. Thanks in advance!

[#07]

Your wife plays civ. Cool.

1. I think it becomes obsolete when the builder reaches that tech (or the person who controls it)

2. I think so, like missionary's you can only have a couple in operation at the time

3. Go to the city report screen, press on the fist thing. It should then give you the option to grant overseas colony independence.

4. For someone to become your vassal without beating them into submission, they have to love you. Same religion, same civics, you having huge power and them not can do it but its rare. Usually you will force them into it by war - if the capitulation option is available in the diplomacy screen, then they'll be your vassal.

Did I mention that its cool your wife plays civ?

[Krill]

1) Play without diplovictory or gift the owner up to mass media.

2) 3

3) press F1, select cities, and there should be a liberate city button on the bottom left. Or play without vassals for no colony maintenence.

4) You need significantly more power and land area IIRC. Not sure, I almost never play with vassals.

[CerberusIV]

1) As said, the AP goes obsolete when whoever owns the city it is in gets Mass Media. (Not sure what happens if someone that doesn't have MM then captures the city?)

2) 5 corporate execs of any type (mostly that stops the AI's building hundreds of execs that they cannot then afford to use).

3) F1 screen - liberate cities button at the bottom left - this brings up the options you have and AFAIK you can only do the options offered. In a recent game I wanted to release a barb city on another continent as a new civ but could only gift it to the nearest AI so I had to found a new city and release both as a new civ.

4) Good relations, a relatively weak AI and being very powerful - only ever happened once to me.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Thanks, all, that's very helpful!

[Willem]

liberate cities button at the bottom left

Bottom right actually. It looks like a small fist in the corner there. Just click on it and the option will come up.

In a recent game I wanted to release a barb city on another continent as a new civ but could only gift it to the nearest AI so I had to found a new city and release both as a new civ.

You need at leas 2 cities on the other land mass in order to be able to create a colony.

4) Good relations, a relatively weak AI and being very powerful - only ever happened once to me.

In my last game both Ghandi and Pacal offered to be my vassals. I was pretty amazed, especially considering that Pacal wasn't exactly a sloach as a civ. We had been running neck and neck for awhile. It's rare enough to get one civ to offer, but two in the same game!

[joncnunn]

I hereby promote you to the highest level you've ever won Vanilla Civ IV at. BTS is at most one difficulty level higher while learning the BTS features. Anyway,

1. All wonders expire when the person owning the wonder gets the expiring tech. I have not determined what would happen if a wonder had expired but then gets conquered by someone who does not have the tech that obsoletes it. I do know though that if I conquer the Oracle centuries after it was built, I do not get a free tech.

2. On the CD version of BTS, you can build as many executives as you want. With the latest patch it's five per corporation at a time; similar to the 3 missionaries per religion. The 5 per limit was put in to protect the AI from itself.

3. You can turn any landmass your palace isn't on that has at least two cities into a colony. Unless you've maxed out number of civs allowed already.

4. To voluntarily be your vassal, they generally must be much smaller than you. (The AI must feel like it is NOT doing well enough on its on.) There's a few other reasons why they might not agree, just highlight over the red.

This is not something I regularly check; I just make a spot check whenever I first get Feudalism in the game and if no one would agree I generally don't check again but sometimes get pleasantly surprised when an AI calls me up wanting my protection.

Tried to post this here earlier, but a Poly glitch put it elsewhere. So, take 2:

Having played vanilla Civ4 for the last few months, I'm happy to say I finally picked up BtS (happy both because it's a way cooler game and because now my wife and I don't have to fight over Civ disks -- she's sticking with vanilla).

Anyway, yes, fabulous expansion -- but having played my first a game all the way through (on chieftain, so I could try out as many new features as possible), I do have some questions:

1) The Apostolic Palace is made obsolete by mass media, but those Apostolic Palace votes just kept coming, long after I'd discovered mass media. Am I bound by AP votes even when I have the tech that makes it obsolete?

2) Is there a limit to the number of corporate execs you can make at any one time? It seemed that way.

3) Do you have to wait until the game asks you if you want to turn overseas possessions into colonies, or can you be proactive about that?

4) In spite of my awesome power, I could never get anyone to agree to be my vassal; what do I have to do?

I think that's it for now. Thanks in advance!

[Traianvs]

Enemy leaders asking to be my vassal occurs from time to time in my games, it's not that rare. Usually they seek protection against their arch enemies if they see things are going badly. Of course that also works the other way around. If you pummel a civ into submission, it might become a vassal of a powerful enemy civ!

It's usually seldom worth accepting, because you receive little extra benefits, but are likely to gain a few nasty enemies. Like the defensive pact, it gives a negative relation hit towards other leaders.

OTOH it's just cool to be a mighty overlord, so I usually try to get as much vassals as I possibly can

Also, having Mansa Musa as a Vassal/defensive pact partner is actually pretty good. He's a techwhore, so he's likely to give you his techs or at least trade em cheaply!

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Ok, getting the hang of it -- winning on Noble -- but a couple more questions arise:

5) All my cities with the same corporation derive the same benefit (e.g., same # of hammers from th Mining Co.), but the amount of gold that cities give up in return varies. What determines the amount of gold a city pays for a corporation?

6) Related: if I spread my corporation to a foreign city, I get more gold at corporate headquarters; does the foreign city derive any benefit?

7) Tanks have a collateral damage promotion, but no longer seem to do collateral damage when attacking cities (they did in vanilla; my whole domination end-game strategy, such as it was, was built around tank collateral damage). Anyway, what's that collateral damage promotion for?

Thanks in advance!

[joncnunn]

#5 Base cost is based on number of resources & population of each city. Free Market cuts corporation costs 25% across the board while Environmentalism increases them 25%.

#6 Your corporation headquarters city gets the same gold from a foreign city that it does from a domestic one.
They get the benefits in their city based on what resources they have. (And their cost is based upon their resources, population, and cost as well.)

#7 Bug introduced in BTS 3.17 that kept the promotion when removing the benefit that was fixed by the unofficial patch. (And many other mods that incorporated the unofficial patch.) This bug is now fixed in the recently released 3.19.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

#5 Base cost is based on number of resources & population of each city. Free Market cuts corporation costs 25% across the board while Environmentalism increases them 25%.

Ok, I though it was something like that. But -- further question -- don't all cities in your civ have access to the same resources, provided they're hooked up to your trade network? So does that mean that size of city is the sole factor in explaining teh difference between city contributions?

#6 Your corporation headquarters city gets the same gold from a foreign city that it does from a domestic one.
They get the benefits in their city based on what resources they have. (And their cost is based upon their resources, population, and cost as well.)

Ah, so spreading your corporation beyond your own borders could help rival civs. That's worth knowing, thanks.

#7 Bug introduced in BTS 3.17 that kept the promotion when removing the benefit that was fixed by the unofficial patch. (And many other mods that incorporated the unofficial patch.) This bug is now fixed in the recently released 3.19.

Great, I will look for 3.19 (3.1.9?). Thanks again

[joncnunn]

There's one exception: The city that you built National Park is does not have the Coal resource(s) the other cities in your empire do.

And as you also mentioned if you have cities disconnected from your trade network it would also very.

The corporate headquarters city gets a flat 4 gold per city with the franchise. (When then gets multiplied by things like banks, marketplaces, Wall Street) It's local corporate maintenance that varies.

Also it appears I forgot to mention that cities without Courthouses pay twice as much corporate maintenance as Courthouse cities.

[Jaybe]

Ah, so spreading your corporation beyond your own borders could help rival civs. That's worth knowing, thanks.

Bear in mind that when you "help" other civs by spreading your corp to them, they may want to cancel trades of the corp's resources to you.

[wodan11]

Generally you aren't founding a corp to get gold. You're doing it to get the corp benefit in your own cities. Given how much it costs to spread a corp to a foreign city, it's a rare game I do it.

[TriMiro]

BtS patch 3.19 is a no-cd patch, there will be no fighting with your wife even if she moves to BtS as well.

I for one enjoy the ability to play Civ on my laptop without the need to carry a cd when I travel.