So I've played about 10hrs. total, and have better idea of the concepts involved.

Wanted to know what build order is working/not working for you.

I realized too late for current game about the importance of bell production -
my fault, didn't read manual all the way thru! :rolleyes:

I think it's a great idea to purchase the missionary and fisherman specialists as soon as they pop up in the homeland. And the silver mining specialist, if you're lucky enough to find silver on the map.

The missionary for converting natives early in game, and the fisherman because I try to settle on coast with multiple fish/crab. Of course, change this to expert farmer if you got lot of wheat instead.

Now, here's where a lightbulb went off for me: very early, after buying/obtaining those specialists, build a school so you can start training
more of them instead of expensively buying them. Course, keep in mind that the particular specialist you want must be in the same city as the colonist being "schooled."

Thoughts? Share some hit/miss build order strategies.

Bell production is a big thing definitely :) I was lucky in my first game and got an elder statesmen very early on, off the docks. Very nice. :)

Priests are more important than expert missionaries, I think, as you can just get a bunch of regular missionaries off the docks. Yes, definitely start with schools reasonably early, though Indian training is more important early on I think - it's quite easy to do and usually is appropriate for your local raw materials anyway.

Where is the Indian training explained? I didn't see it in the manual.

Had no idea you could do that! :blush:

Could you elaborate? I take it you send a missionary to an Indian village, then what?

edit: training not trading

Where is the Indian training explained? I didn't see it in the manual.

Had no idea you could do that! :blush:

Could you elaborate? I take it you send a missionary to an Indian village, then what?

edit: training not trading

Send someone to an Indian village (can be a scout), and talk to the Chief (there's an icon for it, but the game will prompt you also). The Chief will tell you what they'd like to trade for (We Need Guns! ... yeah, good luck with that Monty), and what that particular village will train (Expert Fisherman e.g.). Send a native convert or ordinary citizen (not sure if indentured servants or petty criminals can be trained, hopefully someone else will update with that info) to the village, they'll be asked if they want to be trained. Say Yes. After several turns (not sure how many), voila, you have an Expert.

If you're big on picking up native converts, a good thing to do is put a mission in a village with something you need many of (if you have a lot of coastal cities, an expert fisherment for example). Then once the native is popped, have him train immediately in that village. It saves the time of moving a unit to the village to train.

Where is the Indian training explained? I didn't see it in the manual.

Had no idea you could do that! :blush:

Could you elaborate? I take it you send a missionary to an Indian village, then what?

edit: training not trading

You just move a non expert unit into an Indian camp and they will offer to teach him a skill. Each camp offers a different skill. After a few turns he comes out an expert of whatever skill the camp is known for.

Changes from the original I noticed.

You can have more than one unit training in a camp at a time though it may slow down how fast they are trained. None the less made schools not as important since I could just shuttle around units to whatever tribe offered the skill i needed, though larger maps would probably force schools.

Also it looks like it is unlimited on how many units each camp trains. I started my first base off next to two camps, one that trained expert fisherman and one that trained expert farmers. Definitely an awesome way to get started.
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As for missionaries the only thing I have actually seen them do is they generate crosses in Indian camps, and when these crosses get to a high enough level an Indian unit will join you. It is like the European immigrants but specialized for only Indians. Also if it is like the old col. then missionaries improve relations with that camp.

Don't bother training native converts. They are already specialists at raw material gathering and food production. Just have them do all the "outside" jobs, and let your Euro colonists work inside growing lazy and fat. :)

Don't bother training native converts. They are already specialists at raw material gathering and food production. Just have them do all the "outside" jobs, and let your Euro colonists work inside growing lazy and fat. :)

*sigh* can't you let us come up with our own strategies? :mischief:

Question (while you're here): natives get a production bonus working tiles. If a native is made an expert, do they get the same bonus, or are they indistinguishable from a colonial expert? I'm guessing it's the latter.

Now to make sure my question is seen.

What is the deal with Jesuit Missionaries? I played the Dutch and they were not available to recruit on the European screen! I looked twenty times nothing.

How do you get them? I was only able to get three from the one founding father that offered them.

*sigh* can't you let us come up with our strategies? :mischief:

Question (while you're here): natives get a production bonus working tiles. If a native is made an expert, do they get the same bonus, or are they indistinguishable from a colonial expert? I'm guessing it's the latter.

I am 95% sure they are treated just like a colonial expert.

*sigh* can't you let us come up with our own strategies? :mischief:

Question (while you're here): natives get a production bonus working tiles. If a native is made an expert, do they get the same bonus, or are they indistinguishable from a colonial expert? I'm guessing it's the latter.

If you make a convert an expert, he is no longer a native. He's a specialist colonist. So the bonuses are the same as a Euro-specialist. That's why I say don't bother training them as they can cheaply and very efficiently replace your farmers, fishermen, ore miners, planters, lumberjacks. Infact, in most cases they produce more than the Euro version. :)

You'll get more money having Indians in the fat square, and the Euro colonists growing fat and lazy in the buildings. And money is the key to winning the war. :)

Now to make sure my question is seen.

What is the deal with Jesuit Missionaries? I played the Dutch and they were not available to recruit on the European screen! I looked twenty times nothing.

How do you get them? I was only able to get three from the one founding father that offered them.

You don't "buy" missionaries.

Double-right click and hold on the docks and left-click missionary (severely mangled this process is). Or once they hit the new world just select missionary from the occupation button in a colony. :)

If you make a convert an expert, he is no longer a native. He's a specialist colonist. So the bonuses are the same as a Euro-specialist. That's why I say don't bother training them as they can cheaply and very efficiently replace your farmers, fishermen, ore miners, planters, lumberjacks. Infact, in most cases they produce more than the Euro version. :)

You'll get more money having Indians in the fat square, and the Euro colonists growing fat and lazy in the buildings. And money is the key to winning the war. :)

Wait, Indians produce the same as Experts? That doesn't jibe with what I was seeing last night. If so, I need to rethink what I'm about to do ...

You don't "buy" missionaries.

Double-right click and hold on the docks and left-click missionary (severely mangled this process is). Or once they hit the new world just select missionary from the occupation button in a colony. :)

That is to make regular missionaries. Jesuit Missionaries are "expert" missionaries that generate 50% more crosses inside Indian camps. You can look it up on the civopedia, but basically in the old one you would buy them like elder statesmen from the European docks screen.

Wait, Indians produce the same as Experts? That doesn't jibe with what I was seeing last night. If so, I need to rethink what I'm about to do ...

Yeah if it is like the old colonization Indians make more per tile then free colonists but experts make even more per tile than indians.

So it would be something of the order of:
1)free colonists - 4 furs

2)Indian - 6 furs

3)Expert trapper - 8 furs

I thought thats how it was working in COl. 2 as well but I guess we need confirmation.

That is to make regular missionaries. Jesuit Missionaries are "expert" missionaries that generate 50% more crosses inside Indian camps. You can look it up on the civopedia, but basically in the old one you would buy them like elder statesmen from the European docks screen.

I had a Jesuit Missionary appear on the dock at the start of my game (it was one of the three I could hurry). I don't remember if they were purchasable.

That is to make regular missionaries. Jesuit Missionaries are "expert" missionaries that generate 50% more crosses inside Indian camps. You can look it up on the civopedia, but basically in the old one you would buy them like elder statesmen from the European docks screen.

Yeah you can't buy the expert missionaries. Those only appear. Just use regular missionaries. 3-4 feed 6 cities very well. From that number you'll get a convert every couple of turns for the whole game. :)

Wait, Indians produce the same as Experts? That doesn't jibe with what I was seeing last night. If so, I need to rethink what I'm about to do ...

When it comes to raw material gathering, they produce more than the standard Euro-version. The experts still make more though in some cases. So:

Standard-version < convert <= Euro-expert.

I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

Yeah you can't buy the expert missionaries. Those only appear. Just use regular missionaries. 3-4 feed 6 cities very well. From that number you'll get a convert every couple of turns for the whole game. :)

I was afraid you were going to say that. Just seems like a very odd choice to take that out. Were The Jesuit Missionaries overpowering if they were able to be bought? There would be a high price for each so it seems unlikely that game balance would be a problem. So why the change? Or are we underestimating their power, especially when possibly combined with founding fathers? :confused:

I like to get a seasoned scout on the first trip - better results from "huts" and you want to talk to all village chiefs (like hitting a hut and learn what they train) asap. I found two settlements quick and return to europe for scout lottery.

Getting a jesuit early is nice too if you want converts (I'm playing french and between converts and free cols via all my food specialists trained by natives it's a colonist bonanza). Other than that I'm hoping for a lumberjack, carpenter, or some other production specialist I can put to immediate use.

It seems quick and easy to have natives trains fishermen and farmers (1-2 turns on normal as french - it's glorious). So, I don't usually bother with food gathering specialists from europe unless they're freebies.

For buildings at this point I'm thinking warehouse first - storage seems to be the only issue I run into early. I'm clueless and learning though, so who knows.

When it comes to raw material gathering, they produce more than the standard Euro-version. The experts still make more though in some cases. So:

Standard-version < convert <= Euro-expert.

I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

Ok, here's what the Civilopedia says (and I tested it):

For every raw material, a converted native gets +1

For food, an expert produces +3, with an additional +2 on a resource tile (crabs, corn, etc)

For other raw materials, an expert produces +100%

So the only time a converted native is worth the same as an expert is when there's one non-food resource as a base. Every other time, the expert is worth more.

So I think training converted natives is definitely worthwhile.

Cool, glad someone did the maths. :) So yeah, train those natives (if you have the right training available). :) :goodjob:

Dale I thought you'd know with all my Champlain usage that I particularly liked training converted natives to become experts :P.

However in some cases it might be difficult to find a native village that trains in a particular area, and its not available from Europe. In which case converted natives are the way to go if you really want to gather that resource.

Don't bother training native converts. They are already specialists at raw material gathering and food production. Just have them do all the "outside" jobs, and let your Euro colonists work inside growing lazy and fat. :)
Actually, not.
Native convert: +1 flat bonus on outdoor job
Farmer/Fisherman: +3 bonus and extra +2 for a food resource
Other specialist: *2 multiplier

Obviously, specialist is always better if you use him for the right job job.

I found that automating a Seasoned Scout was very useful in the start. He will explore the map, explore any "ruins" he comes across and he will visit the various native villages. Pretty soon youll know where to go to train that whatever expert you need. Also, and i found this extremely useful, he will now and again find treasure in the 1000-2000 gold category AND alot of the chiefs he meets will give smaller gifts of gold that go right into your coffers. In my current game im pretty sure the seasoned scout generated most of my income for perhaps the first 50 turns.

I spent the money on the cheapest immigrants i could find and sent free cols, pettys and intendured servs right off the boat into the fitting village and I thought this was working very well for me until i realized that i had forgot completely about crosses and bells. Im gonna restart and work some preachers and statesmen into it and see how it works out.

Anywho, I feel that getting that scout working early on can give you a real good boost in the beginning.

You don't "buy" missionaries.

Double-right click and hold on the docks and left-click missionary (severely mangled this process is). Or once they hit the new world just select missionary from the occupation button in a colony. :)

Seriously, I dont get this. Changing a scout to a dragoon therefore requires moving the scout into the colony and out again :mad:

I've only played for a few hours, but it seems that a viable strategy would be to specialize your settlements - I haven't heard that before in a Civ game - and build wagon trains to move goods between settlements and to coastal cities for transport to the homeland. In this way, you don't have to build everything in each settlement. You need to add only the appropriate specialists in each settlement. This also implies that you should get five or six settlements up and running as soon as possible and near diverse resources.

Also, this would allow you to pick one settlement with production capability to train your soldiers.

I will continue trying this and post any results I obtain.

Seriously, I dont get this. Changing a scout to a dragoon therefore requires moving the scout into the colony and out again :mad:

You don't have to go in and out of the colony, as long as the unit is on a city plot just click the jobs button and change jobs.

I didn't see this mentioned any where so I wanted to add. In Col1 you could only use a native village once for training. I was able to use the same villiage multiple times to train my free colonists last night.

Also, converted natives can not be changed into soldiers. So keep that in mind when your struggle for independence starts.

I didn't see this mentioned any where so I wanted to add. In Col1 you could only use a native village once for training. I was able to use the same villiage multiple times to train my free colonists last night.

I think I posted something along these lines in another thread but I have no doubt it got buried. And thanks for the heads up about converts. I haven't tried doing that yet and is good to know.

Another change from COl1 is that you can send multiple colonists to the same village at the same time and they will train together, though the training may take longer - I havent timed it, it just seemed that way.

Another change from COl1 is that you can send multiple colonists to the same village at the same time and they will train together, though the training may take longer - I havent timed it, it just seemed that way.

I tried this last night. It seems to queue them up so that it does one, then the other, not both at the same time.:goodjob:

Haven't had a lot of experience yet, still on my first game but my advice is warehouse in coastal cities where you can pickup goods to export back to Europe. Once you have a non coastal cities make sure you build a wagontrain to get the goods to your port cities for export. Another thing I learned was in your non coastal cities when you automate your wagontrain it will ask you what the minimum goods you want in, I made the mistake at first to export all my fur and coat production and the problem I had was I exported too much and this was more than the warehouse in my coastal city cold hold in their ware house so you might want to make sure you keep a minimum until you get your export logistic worked out to ensure you don't overload warehouse capacity.

As someone else pointed out on this thread specializing certain cities makes a lot of sense, this is like CIV4 in that in regular CIV you might have hammer production cities, and science city etc...

Hope this helps, will add more as I figure things out a bit more

I've only played for a few hours, but it seems that a viable strategy would be to specialize your settlements - I haven't heard that before in a Civ game - and build wagon trains to move goods between settlements and to coastal cities for transport to the homeland. In this way, you don't have to build everything in each settlement.

Sounds logical. :)

Can wagon trains be automated, you say? That's pretty cool. Is there a way of selecting the amount of cargo to go on a ship/wagon train, or does it just fill it up to the max automatically? Oh, and is it possible to transport food from one settlement to another? If so, that would make it possible to make huge specialist cities (like the capital) where all the goods are processed..

Sounds logical. :)

Can wagon trains be automated, you say? That's pretty cool. Is there a way of selecting the amount of cargo to go on a ship/wagon train, or does it just fill it up to the max automatically? Oh, and is it possible to transport food from one settlement to another? If so, that would make it possible to make huge specialist cities (like the capital) where all the goods are processed..

Yes to all of your questions. Manage the imports/exports through the city screen. I bought food several times in Europe for a 1 or 2 per 100 and dumped into one of my cities for instant new colonist. You can also just gather food from all around your colonies as you suggested.

You gotta watch out for the specialist cites. If one gets taken, say you send all commodities to one production city and this city gets taken you are SOL!

I tend to specialize in this manner. Each city has one or two complete production lines. example: cotton - cloth, tobbacco - cigars. That way things are spread out a little more.

Yes to all of your questions. Manage the imports/exports through the city screen. I bought food several times in Europe for a 1 or 2 per 100 and dumped into one of my cities for instant new colonist. You can also just gather food from all around your colonies as you suggested.
What's the point? You can recruit 1-3 specialists for the price of 200 food.

What's the point? You can recruit 1-3 specialists for the price of 200 food.

I should have mentioned that I was in the middle of my war for independence. I snuck a galleon to Europe and filled it with guns and food. I needed several new colonists asap. By the late game it cost well over 20,000 gold to hurry a colonist if your crosses are not near full. So it was alot cheaper to buy the food and spawn a colonist.

I should have mentioned that I was in the middle of my war for independence. I snuck a galleon to Europe and filled it with guns and food. I needed several new colonists asap. By the late game it cost well over 20,000 gold to hurry a colonist if your crosses are not near full. So it was alot cheaper to buy the food and spawn a colonist.

It would have been even cheaper to just buy a lumberjack from the specialist menu.