Noob questions.

[ShakaKhan]

OK, not really noob. As I said in the other post, I played some, not lots of Civ4, was alright, certainly not a pro, but was beating immortal every game, and probably played about 20 games. Been playing Civ5 since it came out and am now returning to CIv4, and am a little rusty. About to finish my first game. Started a game as Isabella on emperor, but emperor was just too easy- the AI were just too far behind. I had electricity and biology completed before anyone else had education. So stopped and went to immortal, and this seems like a good place. Have a few questions about strategy and whether or not there are some mods that may address some annoyances I have:

1.) How many cities? It seems like the more the merrier, as long as you can keep your economy in order. There are also some obvious number-of-city needs based on victory conditions, culture victories need 9 so each of your 3 cities can have 1 of each cathedral-ish building, domination requires you to paint the map with your cities. But for space, conquest and diplo, how many cities do people build? Again, it seems like the more you have, the better you'll do, as long as you can stay on top of your economy. But as a micro-addict, it'd probably be more enjoyable if I can have less but still compete. Do people do space race games or dom games with 3, 4, or 5 cities?

2.)the AI and wonders. OK, I know that I'm only playing immortal and not deity. But coming back from civ5, it seems like the AI just doesn't build wonders. It's not fair to compare civ5 deity to civ4 immortal, but even on emperor in Civ5, you need to be lucky with a production start and a worker steal, and then beeline the tech AND have some chops if you want one of the early game wonders. In civ4, they seem to just not be interested in wonders. Case in point was when I was playing as Isabella (granted, it was only emperor), I was expansive so didn't really need Hanging Gardens; actually forgot about it since I didn't need an aquaduct until well after civil service and consequently didn't even see it. So, I could have built it somewhere around 1000 BC, but it was still available and I completed it close to 1200 AD. Do the AI just not build wonders? Did I happen to be going against a set of AI that have a low wonder flavor?

3.)the spiritual trait I'm having trouble playing civs without this trait. Early game, it's a nice bonus to not have that one turn of anarchy when switching civics, that plus up to 7 half-priced happiness buildings puts it on par, or maybe a little behind, the other top notch traits (philosophical, organized, financial.) But late game, it's more of a need than a want. When things like your choice of either mercantilism or free market become available, or pacifism, or state property, you need to switch to take advantage, but then it is multiple turns, and at that point you're making hundreds if not thousands of beakers, dozens if not hundreds of hammers, etc. The cost of a single turn of non-productive cities is absolutely huge. You lose too much when switching, so I try to just figure out what the end-game civics are going to be and beeline the techs to unlock them and get all the anarchy in one, extremely expensive, anarchy session. This works, except for the big problem in 4. below:

4.)war weariness From what I'm experiencing, I'm guessing the rate at which war weariness increases is based on population of cities and maybe number of cities. The way this works early game seems fair and makes sense; after you've been involved in a war for 20 turns or so, your citizens become anxious and you'll lose a happiness point. 4 or 5 turns later, they're wanting you to wrap things up so maybe it's another point of unhappiness (2 total), and so on. Late game war weariness is so ridiculous it essentially prevents late game warring (unless you're spiritual, above) You get about 3 turns from the time you declare to finish the war, and on the 4th turn you get hit with 2-4 unhappiness and it adds one just about every single turn. I know that Mt. Rushmore + jails + police state means no war weariness, but switching to Police State kills your research, which is ok for a spiritual civ who can switch to PS and then back to rep when it's over. For non-spiritual civs, I guess you just decide, "I've got warring to do in this game still, so I'll stay PS for the rest of the game, or at least until I'm done with my city taking/removal needs, and just sacrifice my research the whole time?" Are there any mods, not that remove war-weariness, but make it function late-game similarly to how it functions early game, where it's still a cost of war, but one that's realistic? This really stinks because I'm finding it means that you research so hard for so long to get these really cool units that you can never use.

5.)Percentage patch Is there a patch that addresses the RNG? I have no problems with warring, I understand sometimes I'm going to lose a knight to an axeman in open terrain, and I'm fine with that. I can always make another knight, and in my HE city it'll only be a turn or two. I do have a problem with the Great Person percentage RNG results, though. One situation that happens every single game is the problem of National Epic giving +1 artist points. So every game, my NE city is 99% scientist (or whatever I need) and 1% artist. I've gotten artists WAY WAY WAY more than 1 out of 100 times. Like I said, I played about 20 games before, and the NE city probably spawned 10 great people per game, so I should have gotten the unwanted artist twice over the course of 20 games, or about once every ten games. The actual results were more like the unwanted artist 3 or 4 times per game. It's the sole reason why I save-cheat (save, manually adjust the citizens/specialists to hit one turn early, if it's an artist, reload and wait a turn to try again, if it's still the artist, manually remove specialists to hit one turn later.) I don't like cheating like this, but having such improbable results forces me to. What I'd really like is a mod that makes whatever the highest percentage great person to be automatically spawn; that's the one you've set up to get, that's the one that your strategy needs to get, that's the one you should get. Is this mod out there?

 

[lymond]

play BTS

no set # on cities, but space games it helps to have more. Dom games you can start with 4 or so cities and run the map, but you will be taking cities (In Warlords and BTS, you can vassalize the map though)

war weariness was eased up quite a bit in BTs with much of the impact coming from the new Statue of Zeus wonder. It's still there regardless, but far less crazy than it was in vanilla/warlords.

RNG is RNG..it may have been tweaked some over the course of patches and versions, but it can still give you some odd results. Everyone encounters this.. Don't know about rng mods, but if you want mods most are BTS..this is the definitive version of Civ IV.

Also, BTS allows anarchy free switches during golden ages which is a common tactic. Late game, the new Cristo Renditor wonder can be built which not alone gives free civic switches but you can do them every turn.

Wonder rate/quickness generally goes up with difficulty. AIs do have different wonder flavor though, and resources or lack thereof can factor, but AIs do build wonders. Hanging Gardens going in 1200AD on Immortal is quite bizarre. From my understanding in previous posts you are not even on the latest version of vanilla Civ IV so not sure if that is a factor or not. I know if you were playing a fully patched BTS that would not happen.

 

[elitetroops]

Do people do space race games or dom games with 3, 4, or 5 cities?

Space and diplo work great as One City Challenges on all levels, but that's a different kind of game. If not OCC, you'd need a bit more for space. At least enough to unlock Oxford University, so 6 good cities on a standard sized map. Should be very possible to win space with that amount. But, the more the merrier. Large empires simply tech faster in the later stages. Early on, you tech faster with fewer cities.

Domination requires a lot of cities, obviously. But if you go for early domination, there's not much micro in most of them. You can start your final war from 2-3 cities. Or sometimes even 1, if going for extremely early conquest/dom.

Do the AI just not build wonders? Did I happen to be going against a set of AI that have a low wonder flavor?

Maybe it was a bunch of AI who didn't favor wonders. But AI wonder dates vary a lot. It's just a question of when they get the lucky RNG roll to start building it. If they have the bonus resource, they are more likely to do it. A wonder like Hanging Gardens can vary even more, since the AI requires 2 correct RNG rolls to build it. First aqueduct, then HG.

The cost of a single turn of non-productive cities is absolutely huge. You lose too much when switching, so I try to just figure out what the end-game civics are going to be and beeline the techs to unlock them and get all the anarchy in one, extremely expensive, anarchy session.

Change civics while in golden age and you have no anarchy. Oh wait... Lymond says that only works in BTS..? Anyway, play BTS.

4.)war weariness From what I'm experiencing, I'm guessing the rate at which war weariness increases is based on population of cities and maybe number of cities.

It's based on battles you've fought. Increases with every battle, amount varies depending on if it's a win/loss, or if it's in domestic/foreign territory. think it also depends on if you are attacking or defending. Not 100% of all factors involved. But it gets crazy later because stacks are bigger and more battles are fought.

I do have a problem with the Great Person percentage RNG results, though. One situation that happens every single game is the problem of National Epic giving +1 artist points. So every game, my NE city is 99% scientist (or whatever I need) and 1% artist.

Is it really? Are you running 33 scientists? If not, the artist percentage is higher.

 

[Seraiel]

1.) How many cities? It seems like the more the merrier, as long as you can keep your economy in order. There are also some obvious number-of-city needs based on victory conditions, culture victories need 9 so each of your 3 cities can have 1 of each cathedral-ish building, domination requires you to paint the map with your cities. But for space, conquest and diplo, how many cities do people build? Again, it seems like the more you have, the better you'll do, as long as you can stay on top of your economy. But as a micro-addict, it'd probably be more enjoyable if I can have less but still compete. Do people do space race games or dom games with 3, 4, or 5 cities?

For Space Races you only "need" as many cities as will get you the techs fast enough and build the Spaceship before someone else wins. In an ideal Spacerace though you'll try to conquer as much of the map as possible with as minimal resources as possible so i. e. only whipping out an army when having a strong unit like Elepults or UUs (on lower levels HAs are also great, on Deity those fail too often imo. ) or generally when the situation is right and when a lot can be won for a little. Prioritizing is the most important and growing the cities is mandatory for that, however additional cities also give additional so it's basically "get the best deal" like 10 cities with 10 Elephants and 5 Catapults or so.
The last stands in contrary towards domination-like playing where it doesn't matter how small cities are and where one doesn't need to pay heavy attention towards saving as many resources as possible to have a higher research rate from a certain time onwards.

For domination there is one very interesting mostly peaceful approach where you conquer one or two civs to get twice the land of the other civs, then build 1.5 times to 3 times their army (depending on whether you're a land-target = 8 tiles shared borders or not) and get such a good diplo that they're willing to vassal peacefully. Then it's only needed to vassal as many civs as possible, once you're near the domination limit though further conquest is needed because civs won't vassal peacefully if the player is too close towards the domination-limit already. This playstyle can save a lot of turns but is not easy to pull off.

2.)the AI and wonders. OK, I know that I'm only playing immortal and not deity. But coming back from civ5, it seems like the AI just doesn't build wonders. It's not fair to compare civ5 deity to civ4 immortal, but even on emperor in Civ5, you need to be lucky with a production start and a worker steal, and then beeline the tech AND have some chops if you want one of the early game wonders. In civ4, they seem to just not be interested in wonders. Case in point was when I was playing as Isabella (granted, it was only emperor), I was expansive so didn't really need Hanging Gardens; actually forgot about it since I didn't need an aquaduct until well after civil service and consequently didn't even see it. So, I could have built it somewhere around 1000 BC, but it was still available and I completed it close to 1200 AD. Do the AI just not build wonders? Did I happen to be going against a set of AI that have a low wonder flavor?

AIs build wonders in CIV. Just try out a game on Deity, take Isabella and Asoka in your game and watch Oracle go before you'd even have the chance to research Priesthood even if you would have beelined it.

There are specific situations in which wonder-builds are reduced like when a civ is at war with a land-target then it's unlikely to start on new wonders and all leaders also have specific wonder-build-ratings which you can find listed in the "CIV Illustrated #1 - Know your enemy" guide.
HGs are a special Wonder because they need an Aequeduct so it's two builds for the AI and the AI chooses its builds mostly randomly so the HGs are a wonder where the player has a maximum advantage. Getting smaller wonders by techs that many civs research is much harder (i. e. Notre Dame which almost gets instantly built after a civ gets Engineering) .

3.)the spiritual trait I'm having trouble playing civs without this trait. Early game, it's a nice bonus to not have that one turn of anarchy when switching civics, that plus up to 7 half-priced happiness buildings puts it on par, or maybe a little behind, the other top notch traits (philosophical, organized, financial.) But late game, it's more of a need than a want. When things like your choice of either mercantilism or free market become available, or pacifism, or state property, you need to switch to take advantage, but then it is multiple turns, and at that point you're making hundreds if not thousands of beakers, dozens if not hundreds of hammers, etc. The cost of a single turn of non-productive cities is absolutely huge. You lose too much when switching, so I try to just figure out what the end-game civics are going to be and beeline the techs to unlock them and get all the anarchy in one, extremely expensive, anarchy session. This works, except for the big problem in 4. below:

You can switch during GAs without anarchy. SPI is an extremely strong trait though, I not seldomly argue that its the strongest of all traits if leveraged right and in specific scenarios like i. e. playing for domination, culture or diplo.

4.)war weariness From what I'm experiencing, I'm guessing the rate at which war weariness increases is based on population of cities and maybe number of cities. The way this works early game seems fair and makes sense; after you've been involved in a war for 20 turns or so, your citizens become anxious and you'll lose a happiness point. 4 or 5 turns later, they're wanting you to wrap things up so maybe it's another point of unhappiness (2 total), and so on. Late game war weariness is so ridiculous it essentially prevents late game warring (unless you're spiritual, above) You get about 3 turns from the time you declare to finish the war, and on the 4th turn you get hit with 2-4 unhappiness and it adds one just about every single turn. I know that Mt. Rushmore + jails + police state means no war weariness, but switching to Police State kills your research, which is ok for a spiritual civ who can switch to PS and then back to rep when it's over. For non-spiritual civs, I guess you just decide, "I've got warring to do in this game still, so I'll stay PS for the rest of the game, or at least until I'm done with my city taking/removal needs, and just sacrifice my research the whole time?" Are there any mods, not that remove war-weariness, but make it function late-game similarly to how it functions early game, where it's still a cost of war, but one that's realistic? This really stinks because I'm finding it means that you research so hard for so long to get these really cool units that you can never use.

I only read War Weariness. War Weariness comes mostly through cities conquered. Your options are to conquest faster, to run Police State and as a last sort of emergency in very late game you can additionally build Jails + Mt. Rushmoore negating 100% of all by WW.
Sry, read the whole paragraph, no idea about mods but War Weariness is most easily delt by with having small cities and simply conquering enemies fast and efficient. When a war drags out the culture-slider is also often advertised as an option, I never used that one though because I never needed and I also don't like spending money on keeping my people happy, I prefer conquering so many happiness-resources that my cities are happy even with 10 additional people being unhappy because my glorious empire is taking back what righteously belonged to it from T0. ( ) .

5.)Percentage patch Is there a patch that addresses the RNG? I have no problems with warring, I understand sometimes I'm going to lose a knight to an axeman in open terrain, and I'm fine with that. I can always make another knight, and in my HE city it'll only be a turn or two. I do have a problem with the Great Person percentage RNG results, though. One situation that happens every single game is the problem of National Epic giving +1 artist points. So every game, my NE city is 99% scientist (or whatever I need) and 1% artist. I've gotten artists WAY WAY WAY more than 1 out of 100 times. Like I said, I played about 20 games before, and the NE city probably spawned 10 great people per game, so I should have gotten the unwanted artist twice over the course of 20 games, or about once every ten games. The actual results were more like the unwanted artist 3 or 4 times per game. It's the sole reason why I save-cheat (save, manually adjust the citizens/specialists to hit one turn early, if it's an artist, reload and wait a turn to try again, if it's still the artist, manually remove specialists to hit one turn later.) I don't like cheating like this, but having such improbable results forces me to. What I'd really like is a mod that makes whatever the highest percentage great person to be automatically spawn; that's the one you've set up to get, that's the one that your strategy needs to get, that's the one you should get. Is this mod out there?

Don't ask for a mod all the time, deal with the mechanics and how the game is scripted. If you build the NE you get a huge advantage, that advantage comes at a slight disadvantage though which is GP-pollution. Having gotten up to 6/18 Prophets when playing an extraordinarily good competetive culture game (that got ruined by this) is the reason why I i. e. do not build Oracle in certain culture games or also diplo games. I also don't build the Mids in a culture game, all because of GP-pollution. When I play games that have a massive scale like the current GM-144 in which I run 5+ different GP-Farms I pay a lot of attention towards gathering only 1 or 2 types of GPs and also plan with the different possibilites so have 2 solutions and i. e. create more GPs to make sure that the one solution that I definitely need has more than 100% summarized chance to happen. Fails are always possible but when restricting onesself to really 100% clean GP-pools the games aren't as good as they could be imo. . I'm thinking about building the NE in an Artist-wonder-focussed city there though, gives less extra but the difference in that scenario is not that great and when running a chain of Golden Ages is the aim then Artists are very good GPs.

 

[Lazteuq]

War weariness can be tough, but fast, clean, decisive wars will minimize it.

 

[lindsay40k]

Number of cities: I go for nine, on a standard map. If a Culture game presents itself, it enables triple Cathedrals etc. If a long game presents itself, I shouldn't have to wait long for the final University to enable Oxford. And I should have a site with plenty of virgin forest to chop into Taj Mahal. Try to get the Bureaucap, GP farm and NE city developing before Medieval. Future Ironworks city should be well established (or earmarked for conquest) by Renaissance - it needs a lot of hammers to get online and commence late wonder rushing. Likewise Globe city, if you're going to draft - it only needs a Granary and GT, but the latter takes a while to build.

 

[Rodney Nelson]

In my present deity game I lost Stonehenge to Bismarck one turn before I had it complete. So yes, the AI does build wonders.