newbie questions

[jazion]

Been reading through the group, hope I'm not repeating any questions. Don't have much time online.

Here's my first post (and question) ever in the group (oh boy).

I got all faction "comlinks" guess you can say (stuck on smax talk). But, french picture doesn't appear on the screen. She contacts me once in awhile. I have NO option to contact her. Hmm? Something I'm doing wrong?

I had one game I was playing on easiest level .. had a tank take on a warrior. I lost. Huh? I did see this in smax though.. had a few airplanes get destroyed taking out a teraformer (but that was trancend level). Probably the same concept to keep us humble. Just hoping I'm not the only one that experienced this.

Last question. My culture is outstanding in the game I'm playing now (warmonger something.. second level). I have all kinds of stuff built to inhance my culture. The loser "faction" south of me.. with only 5 cities, population 2 or something (she's really sukin).. her culture is starting to take over my land. Huh? reason for this?

That's it.. thanks!

jazion

[kmj]

according to the civ combat calculator, an attacking tank has a 99.7% chance of defeating a warrior... an attacking warrior has a .9% chance of defeating a tank. These are with both regular units, no modifiers. So, it's bound to happen eventually. Some people think this is good, some think it's bad. You'll find hundreds of threads debating (actually, flaming) this issue.

About the french: can you see any of their territory or units on your map? Are you playing with more than 8 civs? have you tried clicking on the little 'D' button in the bottom right corner or the screen?

About culture: do the cities have culture improvements of their own (very important!)? How close are they to her capital, as compared to yours? To see how your culture compares to hers, you can press F7 (maybe F8, definitely one of the 'F' keys) to view the histogram, and compare your score, power, and culture to your opponents'.

Hope some of this helps!

[jazion]

you helped.. thanks.

My culture still rocks though.. not sure what's up with that. Probably not a "bug" though. I have all sorts of stuff. She has nothing. I'll figure er out.

The "culture" stuff is the only thing right now making me scratch my head.

Well.. a few other things too, but.. going to read through the groups more, try to figure it out, lol.

[Moraelin]

Bear in mind that there are other modifiers, too. For example if your tank is attacking an elite warrior, fortified in the mountains, and across a river, the odds get skewed a bit. Admittedly, I've never seen it with a warrior, but it's possible to lose a tank when attacking ancient hoplites, or when attacked by imortals.

(And yes, it is realistic. In fact, the tank without infantry support should IMHO have half the defense rating it has in Civ3. Any primitive culture can make a molotov cocktail.)

As for the culture, bear in mind that it's not the global culture that matters, it's a city-vs-city cultural melee. If she has humble temples and libraries right on the border, while you have cathedrals, universities and world wonders in your capital, but your border outposts have no culture of their own... yep, your border towns will decide they've had enough of living in the dark ages, and bugger off to join her civilization. I mean, from her they might at least get a temple or library, while from you they got nothing.

If you must squeeze a city right on the border -- or worse: in a pocket right between two or three enemy cities -- building culture will be as much of a priority as making troops. If not a bigger priority. Get those guys some library and temple ASAP, or you've effectively built a city for the enemy. Rush production, if you can afford it.

[jazion]

Originally posted by Moraelin
Get those guys some library and temple ASAP, or you've effectively built a city for the enemy. Rush production, if you can afford it.

That's like the first thing I build (after I spit out about 10 cities or so). I'm totally focusing on culture. I build a temple first thing.. then a library .. maybe a worker after that or a settler.

I know she can't have much. My populations are like 8 .. 10 .. 12 .. I got fireworks going off (we love the leader!) and universities and all sorts of crud built. She has about 5 cities that are really sukin south of me (populations 2 to 5 or so) and still her culture is starting to bud into mine. I'll give it some tiime though, my capital is a little ways away. Haven't played it again since posting this (wow, I went almost 24 hours without playing, hope for me yet) .

[GreekyGoodness]

But she isn't taking your cities right? Simply pushing your borders back right? I've seen this several times. When your borders are huge (3 away from your city center), they can be pushed back one full square and the corners can also be taken by a nearby city whose culture has caused its borders to expand. What you should never see (I've never seen it b4 I end up assimilating the enemy city) is their borders expanding into the workable 5x5 - corners area of your city. So what your seeing is normal as long as you aren't losing land that you can work with your pop.
Anyways, if they are so tiny, those cities will soon be yours anyways

[wisecat]

Mind you, the age of cultural improvements also matters. For example a thousand- years-old temple has much greater cultural value than freshly constructed one.
Also when you conquer cities you usually only get 1 square radius of territory - especially if this city is deep within enemy territory

[Cookie Monster]

Hi,

I was glancing through this thread and noticed the "civulator".

KMJ

Does this program exist in a form that I can download?