Hi. I recently picked this up, and I'm no expert but I've collected a number of tips that the next beginner might find useful. Many of them have been listed already. Apologies for it being obvious ones to exp players:
- Pick nice surroundings when founding city, but don’t wander too long
- Explore area for nice spots for huts & relics
- Don't settle city on useful tile. Settling tile becomes useless (becomes normal city tile)
- Use hills to attack from and forrest for defence. Protect hills next to city (excellent attacking position for opponents)
- Note that battling across a river adds to defense of opponent (attack weakens) Rivers only gives your units -50% attacks (only catapults, artillery, bombers don't get this, and maybe I'm missing others)
- Note that attacking from Naval unit weakens your attack It's -1/2, different from -50% because a % is counted normally, let's say a legion is 2 attack, with veteran and infiltration, then it becomes 4. Attacking from a river, it's 3 (deleting one of 50% bonuses), instead, if you attack from a naval unit, it's 2, because you add 100% (infiltration and veteran) first, then you lose 1/2
- Don't leave cities idling. All cities should always produce (hammers/science/gold/trade)
- Expand – get more cities, and grow all cities (look for nice spots in exposed area nearby. Build border/choke cities with heavy defense
- Grow culture – easy way to get cities (culture flip) Not a good advice, only going for culture or improving this before military or economics (science/gold) thins would kill you, normally
- Combine strong attack with strong defensive units and move them together
- Remember "Form Army" option Remember also that if you got 3 units and all one got 1 moviment, and you know your units are better than the enemy, you can attack with the first two ones, then form the army without losing any movement, and remember you don't have to heal
- Attack with multiple units (pref. armies) to take city Well, it's normal, how would you conquer a city? And, waiting for many armies while you can attack before, is not always a good advice, then, it depends on situation
- Find choke points and exploit them
- Don't just build roads because you can. Ops/AI will also use them. If you do build roads, block them with a defensive unit in the middle. Do the same on Op's roads
- Use Spies (e.g. to steal GPs.) First send ring of spies, leave quietly, then send single spy
- Group of Caravans adds more to your gold but keeps other civ's tax the same
- Democracy is good for “Defend and Develop” approach but really bad for military approach
- Constantly check on Gold vs Science and switch some cities to your benefit when needed (a city can only do one of them, not both at the same time) If you read some of my "strategies", you can see also how to produce gold and science in the same time. Just "exploit" the market, you can still produce like 300 gold per turn easily with the right bonuses, while producing science
- Use ships for Naval support in battles to boost your chances
- Don't use GP immediately – wait first, and check options/progress. Also look at other city to settle GP in a city
- Consider option for Great Scientist to rush tech, but wait first to check progress. Use appropriately
- Consider option for Great Builder to rush Wonders. Wait first, start a wonder, then use super power
- Consider option for Great Thinker to flip cities Consider also to wait. If the enemy is attacking you, and you got a good culture, if he takes off one of your cities, you can instantly flip it getting his units. That's how I won a game against tanks, when I haven't got them before the enemy (cool game, against another top player)
- Check advantages of Civ you are using (like techs during eras)
- Get Nuke first and either fire it or defend that city heavily (Manhattan Project). There is only one. A capitol can't be destroyed, but perfect to sack after nuke.
- Use Diplomacy to gather intelligence And sell technologies to AI, whatever you can if you want, that won't be a problem for you, take care about your enemies however, they could attack the AI and get your tecnologies
- Militia can be used as scout in attacking force after exploration (put in same stack as armies)
- Check aircarft units for low fuel warning
Use it, don't use it. These are not hard & fast rules, just advice.