What am I doing wrong??

I also traded resources for which I had only 1 source, I shouldn't have.

Did it occur to you to try playing the Tutorial?

One of the problems is that you can research montheism and superconducters at the same time.

akillias said:

No, I understand, but it definitively didn't hinder my growth. I built hospitals in some. However, even the cities I captured had higher population than the cities I built.

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Then your problem was food. You need to found your cities in high-food spots. Just because you can get a few non-food resources in a cities BFC doesnt mean you should. If the city doesnt have a constant source of EXCESS food, it cant grow.

So maybe you did need a few farms scattered about in cities where you didnt have adequate food. There are basically 3 types of food tiles. +, -, and neutral. +food is your farms, your seafood, certain pastures. - food is your mines, your plains resources, most of your metals. Neutral food is any tile that provides 2 food (it takes 2 food to feed a citizen). So a cottage on a grassland is food neutral, working it wont help you grow. A farm on a grassland is +1 food. You will get 1 extra food for that tile. A Gold Mine on a plains hill is -2 food, it provides 0 food, but costs 2 food for the citizen to work it. It should also be noted that each specialist is still a citizen, and eats 2 food. So in order to grow, you need to have more food coming in than is going out. This means you cant run specialists until the food-bar says "stagnant", you must put one of them on a food tile of some kind, even just a grassland cottage.

Someone told me to spam cottages so I spammed them all across my territory, except for 8-12 tiles, early on, but I realized that I really fell behind and my cities were underpopulated so I began to farm sabotaged tiles as Churchill was relentlessly doing so.

I nearly . .. .. .. . in my pants when I saw most of my rivals' cities had 2 times the pop of my capital.

civplayah said:

One of the problems is that you can research montheism and superconducters at the same time.

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It amazes me that a civilization can research superconductivity while it cannot even fish.

akillias said:

Someone told me to spam cottages so I spammed them all across my territory, except for 8-12 tiles, early on, but I realized that I really fell behind and my cities were underpopulated so I began to farm sabotaged tiles as Churchill was relentlessly doing so.

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Ha ha, you pulled up your seed before harvest. Cottages are extremely good, but they take a long time to mature. Early on they aren't that strong, but if the city works them throughout the centuries they get better and better and soon start really paying off in the renaissance era and becoming extremely powerful in the industrial/modern era. (They get lots of bonuses later in the game... +1 commerce from printing press, +2 commerce from free speech, +1 hammer from universal sufferage, x2 growth speed from emancipation) If you farm them over, congratulations, you just destroyed your advantage in the second half of the game which you were building up!

Granted farms and city size are important, a cottage doesn't grow or help you if the city isn't big enough to work it, and while floodplain cottages are superb the rest are just food neutral (grassland) or worse (plains, tundra). Sometimes a good strategy to speed things up is to cottage over your farms, so the city grows fast to work cottages.

But of course you don't want to fall behind in the early game, right? Then you can run some specialists in high food cities to boost your science. You know how to use specialists, right? At any rate, you want libraries or caste system. Some people take this to the extreme and it can last you the entire game (though while strong at the beginning, cottages are better late-game, so there's a ballance here)

Once for fun, I played a small duel-size continents map on monarch. It was a pretty good island and every city had either floodplains or a food resource, so I cottaged every single flat ground area I could. Resources were worked, hills were mined, but everything else was cottaged (forests were chopped). Crazy little island of cottages. Had fun teching into oblivion and ended the game by running over my opponent's musketmen with tanks.

Well, in my last game half my cottages couldn't even be worked on. LOL I am just building more farm in order to have the best growth possible. Cottage . .. .. .. .ing sucks without a decent city. lol

OK... I will edit this post to give you a comprehensive list of everything that you did wrong. I will pull no punches.

I reccomend you find a game, and follow it, looking at ALL the saves. You have done EVERYTHING wrong... I don't know how you are still alive!!

I have screenies to help.

I give no apologies if you have to go crying away... you don't seem to listen to everyone, you start 100000 threads, all which could be solved by looking at the Civiliopedia, and you give 'tips' and 'hints' which actually are REALLY bad.

I don't claim to be an authority... but you should PROBABLY shut up, and go do some real research. Look at a few games, maybe a couple at Warlord difficulty, another at Noble, and a few at Monarch, so you can see tips you can use.

I am rarely rude. I am NORMALLY nice. But you seem to be border-line trolling, and contantly doing the same thing which annoys everyone, asking for help, and not listening. Giving tips, and not listening why they are wrong...

One last thing. You know you are doing something wrong when you have 6 resources in each city... in the Modern Era.

[Edit]Here it is, a comprehensive list. The only problem is... where to start? I will rank everything from 0-10. 0 meaning "There are no redeeming charactoristics, and you have done everything wrong", and 10 meaning "Well done, everything is perfect"

I apologise for my poor spelling. If anyone could give a link on how to fix Firefox 3's spell checker (which... isn't running!?) please tell me. I am tired of having to 'guess' spellings for words. In the meantime, the words are spelt, more or less, phonetically.

Lets start at the most IMPORTANT THING IN CIV: Power. In Civ IV, you need ESPIONAGE to see the power graph. You have no espionage. As a result, I cannot see the power graph. So, I retired (gave up), and looked at it. (Click on thumbnails to make them bigger)

See the dark blue line, arcing away to infinity? Thats where you want to be. That is NOT where you are. You are that pathetic little line at the bottom. If BUG would let me see your power, you would probably be less than 1/10th of Pacal.

You should NEVER, under ANY circumstances be the weakest person in the game, as long as you don't want to get your cities destroyed REALLY quickly. You DECLARED WAR ON ENGLAND, with no more than 1/5th of his power. That was stupid, dangerous, and one of the many things you did wrong.

What about resources? That is another important thing. Here is your city:

And your land:


OK... thats not so bad. The land is low on resources, but with good trading, that shouldn't leave you with so few resources. Speaking of which... where are your surplus resources?




Right... your trades are... unusual. To say the least. Line by line:
GPT7 for rice. Trading a resource for GPT is stupid, ESPECIALLY when you are running at 80% science already. It would be a million times better (no exagguration) for you to trade for some other resource.
5GPT for copper. Above. In addition: This is a STRATEGIC RESOURCE. NEVER give a strategic resource away for GPT, unless the resource is obsolete. The only 2 resources that do this is Copper (At the Reinessance), and Iron (At the Industrial era)
19 GPT for silver, silk. You do realise that with the silk, all your cities could grow by 1 population EACH? And 2 population, with a Market? NEVER trade away luxury resources, if you only have 1 of that type of resource. Only trade singular health resources away if you can get a luxury resource in exchange, and you don't mind having more farms.
*Cue large series of giving GPT to Inca*. WHY!? Oh god... WHY!? You are giving 10 GPT to Inca for no reason. In addition, the AI never asks for GPT, so this means you gave it of your own free will. If you are not going for a diplo win, there is no reason why you need to give resources away of your own free will if you cannot tech trade, and that civ is already pleased/friendly with you!
7GPT for Marble. 14 GPT for stone. Again, this is a strategic resource!! This allows you to build most wonders at double speed!! Keep it!
12GPT for Horse. WTH!? You gave your ONLY source of Horse, which is useful right up until the mid-Modern era, away?? Why? Mounted units are the strongest units by a pure 'strength' basis, anyway! In addition, with a Barracks and a stable, they pop out with 2 free promotions!! Horse is a critical resource, and you are selling it for small change... I wouldn't sell as horse for any less than 30 GPT, and only if I have more than 1 source, and I have all the luxury resources and health resources already!!

All in all... you have only traded resources for GPT. This is VERY bad... resources should be traded for resources. And don't trade strategic resources for luxury and health resources except in dire circumstances, although I am sure even you aren't stupid enough for that.





OK... this isn't quite as bad as the other topics. Your tech rate, however, is terrible. Your tech choices are... terrible. The only redeeming charactoristic is that you are in the same era as the other civs.

Firstly, what are you researching? Superconductors? WHY!? Sweet mother of all things holy, WHY ARE YOU RESEARCHING SUPERCONDUCTORS WHEN YOU CAN GET SO MANY CHEAPER, BETTER TECHS!?

You are missing critical techs... Organised Religion, Monarchy, Guilds, Banking, Rifling, Constitution, Democracy... the list goes on. And you are researching a tech that takes so long for... a Space ship part you can't build, and... Laboratories. I honestly wouldn't rank you as early-modern era. I would rank you as late MEDIEVAL/EARLY-REINACCANCE. Try not to beeline techs so insanely, when you have no tech trading on!!

Also, turn tech trading on. You are good with making civs happy with you, use it!! You like beelining (like me), so you should tech trade to fill in the gaps you haven't researched.


Now, remember him missing important techs? Odds on what civics he is running? I opted for Despotism/Barbarism/Tribalism/Decentralisation/Paganism. Thankfully, I was wrong.


Gratz on running Reperestentation. Thats one of the best Government civics out there.

Now... go research some techs, and get out of the default civics!! Seriously... by the medieval era, the ONLY civics that are in the default section should be the economic civics... and you should never go back!!

Slavery... you should be whipping!! Not too much, but whipping is a VERY effective form of production. Read up about whipping while in slavery.


Finally... something which I can congradulate you on. Relative to your other... abilities... you are very good at city placement. Just one question. Whats up with this city?



Its 1 tile away from the shore. Just a quick rule-of-thumb: Try to avoid being 1 tile from the coast. You cannot build lighthouses, and un-improved coast is little better than river-side, unimproved tundra.

You lose 2 marks for having so few workers. You ideally should have between n, and 1.5n workers in your empire, where n is the number of cities you have. I go closer (but never below) the n range, whereas some of the better players go towards the 1.5n range.

(PS. You built 12 workers. You have 4 workers. 4 Workers were killed(Lost). That leaves 4 workers that you DISBANDED (!?) Again, WTH were you thinking!?)



You are building... terribly. You are in war, and need UNITS for PROTECTION (not that grenadiers can hold up to Infantry and Tanks...) Why are you going for research? Stop researching Super-conductors, research some Medieval era techs, or there-about, and build hordes of siege units (thankfully, you can build cannons). These will hold up better against Infantry than Grenadiers. If you can, build Machine Guns (I think you can) instead. Stop with the Airships... everyone else has fighters, which eat Airships for breakfast, lunch, and tea. And whats up with the Manhatten Project? Seriously? You are last in the production, you lack the ability to build nukes anyway... and you want your RIVALS to get them instead? WHY!? The Manhatten Project gives nukes to EVERYBODY!

You lose 1 more point for poor building choices.


So... lets have a summary of your wars. You have only warred against Churchill. You are pinched in, weak, with few resources. The only way out is to attack England. You attack, luckily win a few decisive battles, capture a few cities, and...
Raze them?
WTH!?

Why did you raze no less than 7 cities... you needed MUCH more land, and more resources, and you chose to raze EVERY SINGLE CITY YOU CAPTURED.

You are aware that keeping cities keeps half the non-culture producing buildings? Right?

I have seen people over-expand, but NEVER seen anyone raze every city that they capture!! Cultural pressure isn't even a valid reason... you have No City Flipping From Culture turned on!!


Not bad. You shouldn't wonder-spam when a non-Industrious leader. That said... you really struggled in that game. Your base score is 5/10. You got 2 wonders, the Hanging Gardens (arguably a poor choice... but in your situation, the +1 health is invaluable), and the Pyrimids (A great choice, and with you avoiding civic technologies like they have cooties (!?), that is the reason why you have more than 3 non-default Government Civics...

However, you lose 2 points for trading away your only stone and marble. That resource is all important!! And you traded it for small change too >.< (14 GPT, when it could go astronomically higher...)




This is the demographics screen. I don't understand most of it, but it has a general idea of where your civ is on the world scale:

GNP: This is (probably) the amount of GPT / Commerce you make. You have so few cottages, and so small cities, that you are almost nowhere compared to the other civs (ranked 8th out of 8 civs)

Manufactoring Goods: This is the amount of production you can pull out of your cities. Your cities are working almost solely on making specilists, which is horrible for your production. You are producing nearly half the production of your nearest rival!!

Crop Yield: This is the amount of food. Your low population means that the few food tiles you are working is barely impacting, compared to your rivals.

Soldiers: This is the most important line, and the one that you are lacking. This is the POWER rating of your civ. If it is low, you will be attacked soon... If it is high, then you are safe.

You have 712,000 soldiers. Your nearest rival (Weakest AI), has 1,604,000 soldiers... over TWICE your power rating. The strongest rival (Strongest AI) has no less than 4,646,000 soldiers!! That is... 6.5 times stronger than you. You stuffed up big time in your military. I honestly have no idea how you are still alive!!

Land area: You are losing land area... but you are still 3rd. Aggressive early expansion payed off. Unfortunatly, you should have captured most of CHina easily... instead of razing it to the ground...

Population: The size of your cities. This is insane... you have 5.5 million people. I have that many people in the late re-inessance era, in a BAD game >.<. Your nearest rival has nearly *3 times* as many people, and your strongest rival has over 10 times as many people!! For shame... The reason for this is simple... you have too many farms BTW... but you don't have anywhere near enough luxury resources / health resources.

Approval Rate: Your happyness. At 49%, it is the lowest of all the civs (again -.-) A lack of resources, the fact you STILL haven't researched Democracy and adopted Emancipation (which is giving you +3 to +5 in all cities), all add up to a very angry civilisation.

Life Expectancy: Your healthiness. At 53%, this isn't the worst in the world (7th out of 8). Thankfully. Unfortunatly, the sole reason this is, is because your cities are FAR too small. Your healthiness should be quite significantly lower than your happyness in the late-industrial era, with Coal / Oil and Factories in production cities.

Export-Imports: Your trading. You are giving tons of GPT from this, meaning that you are ranked 3rd. I have no idea what this means, however, whether it is good or bad...

Anyway, that's it. You stuffed up almost everywhere. Where possible, I have given explainations on how to fix it in later games. No-one could win a game like that. Its simply impossible.

Slavery + Hereditory Rule = Epic early game civics. Remember that.

digitCruncher said:

I reccomend you find a game, and follow it, looking at ALL the saves. You have done EVERYTHING wrong... I don't know how you are still alive!!

I have screenies to help.

Click to expand...

Best advice I have seen. Even if you mess up part, skip it, get the next save in line, and try to play from there. Replaying educational games is a great way to learn.

I have edited the above post to say everything you did wrong. There was so much, that I decided to leave most of the more subtle things out.

Suggestion: Read at least 3 games before continuing, so you know how to play the game.

OR

Play a Warlord difficulty game, with Tech Trading (but no tech Brokering) on. You can leave the other settings unchanged if you so desire. Enable all victory conditions, so you can learn how the AI goes for them / how they are won. If you lose that, don't complain here (as you are obviously not going to listen), and instead go down another difficulty level, until you can win some games. Then, as those difficulty levels get too easy, then just raise the difficulty level.

Noble games are provided here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=273515

And Here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=282227

Well that was well summed up. Not rude at all, just straight forward. The guy want´s help, or so he says, and you gave it to him, big time.

Here is another helpful thread. You don't need to read the whole thing, but at the same time, you can use it to prevent starting an entire thread with some vague, asinine question you might have.http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=134903