I'm new to the game and don't know how to approach it

[Faccina]

Hello everyone, I'm new to the series and I'm spending some time learning the basics in BNW.

I practiced the early game for a while and managed to reach modern era in my 5th try.
I feel like I need some direction before I mindlessly keep trying, so I'm looking for some help.
Could you please suggest an easy to execute strategy, focused only on a few concepts, so that I can improve?

Hope I posted in the right forum.

 

[Timally]

Try found 4 cities only to start with. Build 2 and then get National College before building the second two. Take the tradition policy tree.

At least one city should be on the ocean so you can use trade ships which will help your economy. Trade routes are very important.

Then you have to decide how you want to win. If it is culture, try grab some culture/tourism wonders. Military, military wonders etc.

Try keep your science high. That is important for every victory type. Try keep your army in the middle of the pack.

Use one civ to start with, an easy one that will help your victory type. Greece and Siam are good for diplomatic victory.

Don't feel the need to build every building available.

Try specialise the cities. With 4 cities, one for hammers, one for science, one for trade and gold, and one for culture

Luxuries are very important for happiness. Try settle each city near at least one unique luxury

 

[Cyzyk]

Hard to analyze without more details or some screenshots of what you're doing, but in terms of general advice, I'd suggest looking through the Help/Civlopedia and running your eye down the index real quick. If there's a whole section that looks unfamiliar, or you're not sure what to do with it, like religion or trade, try focusing on implementing that in your current game.

There are certain strategies that people seem to generally use (some civs, social policies, and wonders are seen as far better investments than others), but just following what others do takes a lot of fun out of having a personal playstyle, not to mention can be inefficient if you don't understand the reasoning behind those strats.

Still, if I had to suggest a basic mode of play for the lower difficulties:
Build about four cities
Focus social policies (SPs) on Tradition, Patronage, and Rationalism

Keep research somewhat balanced, try to get most of the techs in an era before moving to the next. When you start a new era, focus on getting the ones that boost research (let you build things like Libraries and Universities) first

Stick the guilds (Art, Music, and Writing) one each in your non-capital cities, keeping your capital (it's usually your best city) with fewer specialists so it has higher production for wonders

Stay friends with your AI neighbors, and experiment with bribing them to go to war with one another. Really important strategy to understand on higher difficulties.

As far as a civ goes, Arabia does everything decently well, their unique building gives craploads of money, and their UU is neither too early nor too late to be relevant. Poland's unique ability is so generalized as to be helpful regardless of what you do, and doesn't require you to focus on it in any way.

 

[Faccina]

Thanks a lot, general advice is totally what I'm looking for.

What about starting builds? I saw several people suggesting Scout -> Scout -> Settler but I'm not sure about it. What should I do in the first 50 turns?

 

[Cyzyk]

Depends on your map type. On the small map size, small continent games I usually play, one scout and your warrior are enough to scout the local land. As a result I tend to do Scout-Monument/Shrine/Worker-Settler, or even stick in a granary before the settler. Happiness is an issue for me starting out more often than not, so I'm not always in a rush to get that extra city built and growing if there aren't the luxuries to support it.

 

[Jatta Pake]

Thanks a lot, general advice is totally what I'm looking for.

What about starting builds? I saw several people suggesting Scout -> Scout -> Settler but I'm not sure about it. What should I do in the first 50 turns?

Completely depends on how you want to build your Civilization. I don't think there is a single, optimal start build. Everyone has personal preferences but I've won games building Shrine -> Warrior -> Monument -> Archer.

If you find yourself getting creamed, dial down the difficulty until you have a handle on the mechanics. There is a lot to understand now! War has offensive and defensive components. Culture has offensive and defensive components. Diplomacy has offensive and defensive components. Progressing through the Science tree also takes time to learn. Ideally you are discovering techs as you are ready to use them but timing things can be a challenge.

 

[Faccina]

A question about science: I ended up being way behind other AI civs and my industrial level units were bombarded by USA's planes. Is that normal or is it me being slow in researching stuff?

 

[Jatta Pake]

A question about science: I ended up being way behind other AI civs and my industrial level units were bombarded by USA's planes. Is that normal or is it me being slow in researching stuff?

You can catch up significantly by placing spies in more advanced civs' cities. Take advantage of Research Agreements. If you find yourself weaker than a military superpower, make the superpower happy or bribe them to attack someone else.

 

[mrwho]

So you just started playing Civ 5 with Brave New World? If I were you I'd go into the DLC option in the main menu and uncheck any expansions so that you're playing Civ 5 vanilla. Learn the Civ 5 basics before jumping into all the extra intricacies of Brave New World and Gods and Kings. Also lower the difficulty level if you're being so far beaten with tech. Just don't play vanilla for too long as things to get changed around in the expansions. Then when you're more confident you can add back the expansions. No wonder you're finding that you need help if you've never played Civ 5 before and you're starting on the second expansion pack. I think that'd overwhelm anyone!

Thanks a lot, general advice is totally what I'm looking for.

What about starting builds? I saw several people suggesting Scout -> Scout -> Settler but I'm not sure about it. What should I do in the first 50 turns?

As others have said there's not really an optimal starting build. Generally it's best to start with a scout and usually two if there's a lot to explore. But a settler right after? That seems odd to me - you sacrifice a lot of early growth by doing that. I usually wait a little longer before spawning my first settler (although I'm no expert). Assuming you switch to vanilla I'd probably go for a monument in most circumstances as my third thing I build. Then I'd probably go for a library. But it's very situational.

 

[Timally]

A question about science: I ended up being way behind other AI civs and my industrial level units were bombarded by USA's planes. Is that normal or is it me being slow in researching stuff?

What level you playing at?

A good thing to do would be to try build a science city. So lots of food. Build all the science buildings in it, change the focus on the city screen to science

Could you post a save, or maybe a couple screenshots of your cities

I generally start Scout, monument, shrine, granary, settler. I steal a worker from a city state as soon as I can. My usual start with policies is open tradition, open piety, take half price religion buildings from piety, then back to tradition for the 4 culture buildings and cheaper wonders. Teching, I start with Pottery, then animal husbandary to find where the horses are. I then find the techs that will let me improve my luxuries, take bronze working to find the iron. Then I sprint for national college

My second city I build shrine, library

 

[Audiyoung]

I am new too, usually when I play this game at level5 with raging barbarian, start with 1 scout to check around the environment, finding my neighbor and luxury resources near my capital. Based on who and what resources i encounter, choosing my future path.

If i got aggressive neighbor like Ghinghis or Attila i will open honor and start build axes, and try build archer ASAP. When I get 4 archers and several axes, i will march the army to one of the nearest rival capital and decide whether steal a worker to slow them down or just conquer them. I really think it would be much better to be brutal at beginning stage by stealing a city or worker than building them, which will give more room for your empire along with the luxury resources and a powerful army at that time and make the game easier afterwards.

But ofc, farming is nice too, but it goes harder actually if we don't have a clear plan for it.

 

[Randall_Flagg]

My suggestion is learn to barb hunt!! The 2 level ups you can get on barbs is great. The gold will let you run a little - on gold per turn.

Scout your local area, it is never to early to look for 2nd city spot. Happy, will plopping that 2nd city ruin your happiness. Will plopping that 2nd city add to your happy? Find out how many cities you plan to build early game. Than focus on your plan.

Science is what you want, and that is what you should be learning to get going ASAP. I would suggest if you have all of the DLC play as Babylon. They get a free GS with writing, and that is almost always my 2nd tech. Plant him and use that to get a tech lead.

 

[rferrao]

Thanks a lot, general advice is totally what I'm looking for.

What about starting builds? I saw several people suggesting Scout -> Scout -> Settler but I'm not sure about it. What should I do in the first 50 turns?

I like to go Monument->Scout->Granary/Shrine->Stonehenge! It's not conventional and you will have to bring your warrior back to defend soon enough before barbarians coming in waves, but I love building Wonders and that engineer point from the beggining will get you a good head start, also it does'nt hurt you to have a strong religion. I tend to go liberty so I don't bother building workers or settlers early, and then tradition or patronage depending on the way the game is developing.