>I always chop outside the boundaries first, especially on monarch
Thanks for the tip; I didn't know this. Very useful.
>Woo. researching Fibre Optics in 1790AD and only 3 turns to achieved !!
The research you see here is actually slower than it would be because, playing as a philosophical civ, I canned state property and went back to mercantilism for the great people. Even with the Forbidden Palace and Versailles built, this added 127 in city distance maintenance, in addition to paying the relatively civic high upkeep of mercantilism and losing some trade revenue from the absence of any foreign trade routes. After inflation, I was paying between 220 and 250 a turn for the privilege of mercantilism. If I were to revert to state property, the tech rate would climb 10-15% -- but it's kind rather a mute point as the AI players are all about 15 techs behind. Plus I'm maintaining a large army that may be rather excessive: about 90 military units, which cost extra upkeep since I have pacifism.
>It's seems you have around 40 cities ?
>What the ratio cities construct / cities conquered
Let's see -- I have eliminated the Germans and Aztecs and conquered most of the Spanish (all but 2 cities) and all of the Egyptians but 1 city. 18 or 19 of the 40 or 41 cities have English names, so this suggests that the ratio of constructed: conquered is nearly 1:1. As I have nearly eliminated 4 rival civs, you can see that I constructed far more cities than any of my rivals -- putting my score at 2.5-3.0x theirs before the first war hit. Now after the wars it is approximately 5x.
>I see that the Oracle is generating 16 Culture ?????!!!! The manuals say the >oracle is generating only 8 culture..... Same for Stonehenge
Excellent observation. You are probably correct that it is likely an ancient wonder/tourist attraction like in Civ3. It does appear to be a real effect and is not related to cultural multipliers buildings as other wonders show their base cultural values while only the oracle and stonehenge have an increase. Probably an undocumented effect of CIV which other players will undoubtedly corroborate in time.
>One suggestion that would help me out greatly
>is if you would reference the technology(s) needed for the improvement
>upgrades and civics you reference early in the guide.
Thank you. Will try to get this in the next update.
>What's the purpose of the culture specialized city?
Specialist cities are generally not unique; I try to have about 3 military cities, several great people cities, etc. If you want a cultural victory, you need 3 cities. For a detailed strategy of how to consistently achieve a cultural victory on Monarch level, I recommend the thread of walkerjks here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=138647
>farms are neccesary to get access to grains (rice, corm, wheat) and yield
>+2 food
I haven't commented on improvements needed for special resources, as I assume that the player will always build plantations for bananas, pastures for horses and cows, camps for deer, farms for rice, corn, wheat, without special note in the strategy guide.
I have noted that the yield of farms is +1 food, which increases to +2 with the biology tech...very late in the game. In the mid-game (pre-biology), windmills and watermills (only if you have state property for watermills) are a better alternative to farms as they offer the same +1 food bonus while also providing production and commerce (depending on your other techs).