How to Avoid the Plague

A few tips to all RFC gamers in all versions of the game (RFC, RFC DoC, RFCE, RFCE++, SoI, RFCA) :

In terms of plague:

1) As soon as plague hits one city in the world, move all of your units to a tile 3 spaces away from every city. So if you count tiles from your city with the plague: One, Two, and then on the Third space put all of your units, they won't be touched by the plague. If that plot is in your borders, you won't lose money for units in enemy territory, and if it isn't, well it'll be ok for a few turns to lose some money.

2) It's pretty obvious but if it's possible, change all major production tiles to major food tiles. It slows down production for the plague period, but it might be enough to save at least one or two population as it lets your city starve less quickly. If your city can't do that, well good luck.
The AI does some of this, but most of the work should be done manualy to get it right.

3)Not really applicable to RFCE, but for vanilla and unlocked RFC, the small pox plague goes away once a city is conquered by a European Civ. I will do more research on it, but I don't believe that units are harmed either with this plague.

4)Close Open Borders and cancel exsisting trade routes to cities with the plague. It might help, it might not, but it can't hurt your chances of not getting plague.

5) Build Aqueducts!! If you're playing RFCEurope, build Aqueducts along with Apothcaries.

6)Trade or conquer resources that give you health bonuses, and build the buildings required to make the bonuses better (like RFCEurope, with barley and breweries)

7) Research technologies that give your cities helth bonuses, like Medicine.

If you have any more helpful plague hints, post them and feel free to discuss.

You can add closing open borders with afflicted civs and destroying roads to afflicted cities to that list- in RFC plague is spread by trade too. Also conquering places for the health bonus resources can help in a lesser chance for plague and helps mitigate it if you do happen to catch it.

this is a pretty small suggestion because it's already in the civilopedia and it's not likely to help until the last plague anyway, but research medicine as soon as you can

Make sure your cities have aqueducts!

The more trade routes you have, the more plague will spread. Embassies can even spread plague.

I had overlooked those. Thanks, and they will be added to the list.

I can see it's possible to reduce the effects of plague.... But can an Old World civ seriously avoid it completely?

bras0778 said:

I can see it's possible to reduce the effects of plague.... But can an Old World civ seriously avoid it completely?

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I doubt it. The only possibility I see of it working is if one were to horde health buildings and resources, not have open borders, and destroy any and all roads leading out of the civ. But that might not work either.

I think the only reason that roads are important is because of the trade routes, but I can't say for certain. But can you avoid the plague completely? No, I don't think it's possible. Too many factors. But you can minimize the damage, minimize your exposure time, and avoid any long term detriment to your empire. That's what I'm trying to get at with this thread.

bras0778 said:

I can see it's possible to reduce the effects of plague.... But can an Old World civ seriously avoid it completely?

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Not really. This is just to minimize the damage it does and possibly miss an occurence.

I have a couple more tips - as soon as the plague starts to appear in a city or a neighbors cities, whip like Monty on Crack. The cities you whip have fewer people causing unhealth, and the bigger the difference between health and unhealth the less the chances of a given city getting the plague. If you whip away 4 pop the plague may pass the city by. In RFC, with the extra resources, cities grow fast. I've tried this and it works pretty well minimizing the damage.

In regular BTS I often delay Scientific Method because of the research hit. In RFC you don't want to do that, you want Biology to chop forests and Medicine is a priority tech.

As far as I remember, to reduce impact of plague:
- Cut trade with your sick neighbours. This is often tough in Europe where opposing cities will often be within three tiles of your borders, and cutting trade won't help.
- Slavery will help. As soon as plague spreads to other civs, start whipping like the poster above said. Whip buildings that will help your health. Even if you end up getting the plague anyway, the higher healthy:unhealthy ratio in your cities will make the plague last less time in your empire.

Be careful whipping if you're unstable though, as your stability will already be dropping as your population and cottages die. Whipping might be the last straw for a collapse.

Concerning units:
- Great persons are not damaged.
- Naval units are not damaged.
- Siege unites are damaged.
- All other units are damaged including spies, workers and settlers.

- IIRC only one (EDIT: the weakest) unit in a stack is damaged.
- The strategy of simply moving units out of your cities is not working, when there is not enough space (e.g. France), or if there are too many barbs (ancient civs), or if you are at war, or if you are too lazy to do it.
-> Solution: Build 1-2 warriors in each city to save your more expensive units. If this is not possible, build your cheapest unit (incl. spies and workers). If you have not done this, just get your workers in your cities when plague hits you (1 worker/city ofc).

El Bogus said:

Concerning units:
- Great persons are not damaged.
- Naval units are not damaged.
- Siege unites are damaged.
- All other units are damaged including spies, workers and settlers.

- IIRC only one (EDIT: the weakest) unit in a stack is damaged.
- The strategy of simply moving units out of your cities is not working, when there is not enough space (e.g. France), or if there are too many barbs (ancient civs), or if you are at war, or if you are too lazy to do it.
-> Solution: Build 1-2 warriors in each city to save your more expensive units. If this is not possible, build your cheapest unit (incl. spies and workers). If you have not done this, just get your workers in your cities when plague hits you (1 worker/city ofc).

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Yes, naval units are damaged. I have had them go down before. But I play RFC and RFCE, so it might be different. And I ammend my first post, your units must be at least 3 spaces away, and it's helpful if it is outside of your cultural borders. It all depends. I've had them 3 spaces away and they all die, and I've had them 3 spaces away and they don't get a scratch.

And I have had the plague stike all of my units, not just the one or two weakest ones. And if I just leave them in my cities, they all die. But that's just what I've personally seen.

This picture should show what I mean with naval units. The galley in Brest is completely undamaged.

Buddhafish said:

And I have had the plague stike all of my units, not just the one or two weakest ones. And if I just leave them in my cities, they all die. But that's just what I've personally seen.

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I meant, each turn the weakest unit in one stack is damaged. If this unit dies the next unit is damaged. I have never lost more then 2 units per stack in a plague, often even only one. It helps if you have a stronger unit with the medic promotion in your stack to heal the already damaged unit.

bras0778 said:

I can see it's possible to reduce the effects of plague.... But can an Old World civ seriously avoid it completely?

Click to expand...

All you lot do not play RFC enough.
If you have cities on different continents (not real life continents, but those specified by rhye, like Africa is cut in half).
You can force plague to only hit cities on different continent.
Try playing as MALI, if you build Timbuktu(which is south continent) and also build Carthage(which is north continent), plague will only hit Carthage. This makes it all too easy because then your cottages wont be destroyed.

i think it's more a matter of distance, isn't it?

Oh yeah, here's something: New civilizations cannot get plague. For example, if plague hits when Portugal spawns, they won't get the plague (even if they have open borders with Spain and other Europeans with the plague.

trexeric said:

Oh yeah, here's something: New civilizations cannot get plague. For example, if plague hits when Portugal spawns, they won't get the plague (even if they have open borders with Spain and other Europeans with the plague.

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Is this new? I remember a game I played a while back where Portugal got the plague immediately. Must have been pre-patch.

I don't know, bout whenever I'm Portugal I never need to worry about the plague.