Condensed tips for beginners?

[Pluton]

now I'm no expert, but i certainly agree with this.
the only time the science slider is at 0% is with a SE, but even then raising it to complete a tech in a shorter time is a good idea.

There is research technique called "binary research".
It works by putting the slider to 0 if you know, you will very soon have more science multiplier than before (like you started the building of univeristiy or oxford uni).
You spare the money until the unis/oxford are built and now you are able to research at a higher rate (100%) for a short time with better multiplier and without rounding.

 

[dalamb]

Apparently the rounding now is far less of an issue. The main place to use a 0% slider is when you're building a science multiplier like a library, which will let you build up some cash and let you run at 100% science for longer while getting the multiplier. Or, if you want to delay a tech anyway for a while to see what techs the AI has come up with in the meantime, so you could trade for something you might otherwise have had to research on your own.

 

[yanner39]

Apparently the rounding now is far less of an issue. The main place to use a 0% slider is when you're building a science multiplier like a library, which will let you build up some cash and let you run at 100% science for longer while getting the multiplier. Or, if you want to delay a tech anyway for a while to see what techs the AI has come up with in the meantime, so you could trade for something you might otherwise have had to research on your own.

Is there an article in the War Academy about binary research?

So as I am building a library, I run my slider at 0% and so I am not researching anything. Then, once the library is built, I jack the slider at 100%? I put the slider at 100% the turn before the library is done?

 

[Sian]

you put the slider at 100% after the library is built ... then you get the +25% from the Library for that much more Commence than you would have done if you hadn't killed the slider before building it (if Philosofical it's even feastable to wait with putting the slider at 100% after you've built an academy in your capital with your first Great Scienist which you get as far as possable)

 

[yanner39]

you put the slider at 100% after the library is built ... then you get the +25% from the Library for that much more Commence than you would have done if you hadn't killed the slider before building it (if Philosofical it's even feastable to wait with putting the slider at 100% after you've built an academy in your capital with your first Great Scienist which you get as far as possable)

Thanks. When does the slider go to 0% or does it matter? Say run the slider at 0% for 4 or 5 turns before the library is built?

And by doing this, whatever tech you were researching is researched faster once the slider is moved up to 100%? That's pretty good. Is there a time not to do this? It would seem like a nice advantage over the AI.

 

[DarkLordStevoII]

hi all, ive generally played with bismark, and am comfortably winning at noble, and just starting out on prince. after reading lots of info over the past few days, im starting to think Bismark may be a bad choice. which leaders are considered strong and why? Or does it come down more to your style of play, and the type of victory your trying to achieve?
thanks

 

[adrianj]

About the binary research thing, while the slider is at 0% the idea is to accumulate enough gold so that you can research your current chosen tech in a single block of 100%. The idea here is to spend as little time investing in a tech as possible in case there is an opportunity for trade with the AI, or it simply gets cheaper once more AI know the tech.
Something like:
1) Put the slider to 100% research to see how many turns it will take. Eg, 5 turns.
2) With the slider at 100%, see how much gold you are losing per turn, eg -25 gold, then work out how much you'll lose over the 5 turns of 100% research, eg -125 gold.
3) Put the slider to 0% until you have 125 gold (maybe allow a buffer if Random Events are turned on)

The other reason is to accumulate gold while a research multiplier building, eg library is being built. In this case, realise that the benefit of the building is applied at the END of the turn before it is built. So when the library build says 1 turn remaining, you could put the slider up to 100% on that turn and the benefit is included.

The same applies to all buildings, eg National Epic multiplying GPP, or wonders giving you GPP.

 

[rwil]

Is there a thread or a guide covering how the AI leaders generally behave? Also, what's the difference between a save and a quick save?

 

[cabert]

Is there a thread or a guide covering how the AI leaders generally behave? Also, what's the difference between a save and a quick save?

quick save is a particular save, with a predefined name, a shortcut to save and another to load.
Thus you can only have 1 quicksave.

OTOH you can save multiple times over the course of a game, without deleting the previous save, if you just save and give a new name

 

[adrianj]

(I'm going to assume we're talking about BtS here... for Vanilla and Warlords I fear that some things might be different, but I don't know exactly what)

Is there a thread or a guide covering how the AI leaders generally behave?

The AI leaders generally behave according to the CivLeaderHeads XML code - found in the assets/XML/Civilizations folder. The challenge is understanding what each of the fields actually mean in practice.

Obviously there are many different parts to answering your question.

How the AIs behave regarding war is IMO very well answered by this post by DanF5771. There is also an attached zip file that is especially useful, and has an excel spreadsheet of the LeaderHeads XML.

The 'Thresholds' fields are particularly useful to know. These are the attidute limits that you must EXCEED before a particular option comes up in trade. Eg, for Alexander, the TECH threshold value is ANNOYED - this means that he will only trade techs with you if you are CAUTIOUS or better.

Slightly more complex is bribing an AI into war with another AI. In this case you must exceed the DECLAREWAR threshold as well as their relationship with the AI must not be as high as the DECLAREWARTHEM threshold. Eg, Alexander you must be CAUTIOUS or better and he must be PLEASED or worse with the target AI.

There are some exceptions, eg, Tokugawa won't OB with you under any circumstances unless you've shared a war with him. (At least I think that's how it works) I don't know off-hand what all of these exceptions are. And I think some of these are also modified when the 'Aggressive AI' option is set, as you'd expect to encourage more war.

The 'NoWarProbs' fields are a useful guide to keeping out of wars with an AI. Again, they are explained well in Dan's post, but in general they give you a % chance that an AI will NOT consider a war with you at each of the attitude levels. (Although from my own experience it's not quite bulletproof.

Another useful section are the 'TradeVals' fields. The iNoTechTradeThreshold governs the number of techs an AI can see you receive in trade before they reach the "We Fear You Are Becoming Too Advanced" limit. This is quite well explained in this thread by VoiceOfUnreason.

There is also the iTechTradeKnownPercent which specifies the percentage of other AI who also know a tech before an AI will offer to trade. Eg, if an AI has a monopoly on a tech then they would only trade it if their threshold is 0 = Mansa Musa. For Alexander agagain, if there were 12 players total in the game, him, you and 10 others, then he would only trade a tech if 30%, or 3 other AIs know that tech.

Finally, I have found the Civ4 BTS Reference Sheet by dj_anion especially useful. In fact, I think I might send him a postcard

 

[Sian]

There are some exceptions, eg, Tokugawa won't OB with you under any circumstances unless you've shared a war with him.

wrong ... he'll open borders just fine as long as he's pleased with you

 

[kcd_swede]

About the binary research thing, while the slider is at 0% the idea is to accumulate enough gold so that you can research your current chosen tech in a single block of 100%.

No need to do single block. Just run at 100% until you don't have enough in the treasury to cover it - then switch to 0% until you have accumulated enough to push it all the way to 100% again. For 10 turns, alternating every other turn at 0% and at 100% does the same thing as 5 turns at 0% followed by 5 turns at 100% - and might even get you possibility to trade a lesser value tech for the tech you are working on sooner. But the best thing is, you don't have to think at all.

Either method though is superior to running at 50% for 10 turns. But my method you avoid having hostile AI demand your treasury as the price for peace.


BTW--With BUFFY mod, this is very simple 1-click to go to 0% or 100%. I wouldn't bother to alternate without it (10 clicks! Yuck!).

 

[adrianj]

wrong ... he'll open borders just fine as long as he's pleased with you

Ah, right you are.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

No need to do single block. Just run at 100% until you don't have enough in the treasury to cover it - then switch to 0% until you have accumulated enough to push it all the way to 100% again. For 10 turns, alternating every other turn at 0% and at 100% does the same thing as 5 turns at 0% followed by 5 turns at 100% - and might even get you possibility to trade a lesser value tech for the tech you are working on sooner. But the best thing is, you don't have to think at all.

Either method though is superior to running at 50% for 10 turns. But my method you avoid having hostile AI demand your treasury as the price for peace.


BTW--With BUFFY mod, this is very simple 1-click to go to 0% or 100%. I wouldn't bother to alternate without it (10 clicks! Yuck!).

If you don't have any surplsue moeny, you can't benefit from the random events that you need moeny to exploit. And the extra money can beused to upgarde your units so the hostile AI thinks twice about tryign to balckmail yuo again.

My experience is that giving in to blackmail *once*, early on, can make sense; but after that you simply need to build up an army strong enough to evade such demands.

 

[eden_daintree]

Hey everyone.

I'm fairly new to Civ. I started out playing on Warlord but now it's getting a bit too easy so I tried Noble, but ouch!
Everything I've read through on the tips seems to say GET A RELIGION STRAIGHT AWAY, but that seems to get me killed a fair bit >__<
I usually found Hinduism (coz Buddhism gets discovered too quickly), but then everyone else will be Buddhist or Jewish or something and then they all hate me for falling under the sway of a heathen religion. I actually had 6 AI civs declare war on me at once!!!

So yeah, so far I've learnt RELIGION = BAD, but all the hints posted say otherwise. What am I doing wrong?

 

[Dragonxander PR]

Hey everyone.

I'm fairly new to Civ. I started out playing on Warlord but now it's getting a bit too easy so I tried Noble, but ouch!
Everything I've read through on the tips seems to say GET A RELIGION STRAIGHT AWAY, but that seems to get me killed a fair bit >__<
I usually found Hinduism (coz Buddhism gets discovered too quickly), but then everyone else will be Buddhist or Jewish or something and then they all hate me for falling under the sway of a heathen religion. I actually had 6 AI civs declare war on me at once!!!

So yeah, so far I've learnt RELIGION = BAD, but all the hints posted say otherwise. What am I doing wrong?

When you get adviced to get a religion in the mid-difficulty levels (Noble to Monarch), it means to ADOPT the DOMINANT RELIGION of the neighboring AI players, NOT a religion founded by yourself (sorry if the capitalized-for-emphasis words make this reply feel too harsh).

To further explain that strategy, let's say you're in the classical era (1500 BC - 400 AD), you know 5 neighbors (2 budhists, 2 hindu & 1 Jew); in that situation the choice is straightforward, going budhist (if you have a city with that religion), or hinduist (if you have the religion in a city). If you have both, you should adopt the religion of the neighbors you should dread more as enemies (mainly warmongers or the more advanced civs). For instance, let's say that Montezuma & Shaka are the Hindus; while Asoka & Elizabeth are the Budhists. If you have both religions in your empire, go with Shaka & Monty, if having a weak military; but if you have a strong military, going with Aso & Lizz won't be so bad.

 

[eden_daintree]

Oh cool, thanks for that!

Also, is it better to have lots of OK cities at the start or just a few real good ones? Coz on Warlord it was easy enough to just go EXPAAAND (especially with the Portuguese dude, he's sweeeet) and grab up some heaps good resources and then late game you're just pwning, but that seems a bit hard to do in Noble. Should I just practice til I get better at it, or should I change the attitude there and focus on just doing fewer but better cities and build up awesome military?

Sorry for all these noob questions, I'm just finding Noble so hard! I don't know how it would even be possible on the higher levels XD

 

[DMOC]

Oh cool, thanks for that!

Also, is it better to have lots of OK cities at the start or just a few real good ones? Coz on Warlord it was easy enough to just go EXPAAAND (especially with the Portuguese dude, he's sweeeet) and grab up some heaps good resources and then late game you're just pwning, but that seems a bit hard to do in Noble. Should I just practice til I get better at it, or should I change the attitude there and focus on just doing fewer but better cities and build up awesome military?

Sorry for all these noob questions, I'm just finding Noble so hard! I don't know how it would even be possible on the higher levels XD

I would recommend aiming for the best cities early on, and ignoring the ones you don't really need.

It's certainly possible on high levels to expand, I and many other people have posted write-ups with screenshots of their games here. This game has an enormous learning curve, it took me months (maybe even more than year?) to play deity.

 

[yanner39]

No need to do single block. Just run at 100% until you don't have enough in the treasury to cover it - then switch to 0% until you have accumulated enough to push it all the way to 100% again. For 10 turns, alternating every other turn at 0% and at 100% does the same thing as 5 turns at 0% followed by 5 turns at 100% - and might even get you possibility to trade a lesser value tech for the tech you are working on sooner. But the best thing is, you don't have to think at all.

Either method though is superior to running at 50% for 10 turns. But my method you avoid having hostile AI demand your treasury as the price for peace.


BTW--With BUFFY mod, this is very simple 1-click to go to 0% or 100%. I wouldn't bother to alternate without it (10 clicks! Yuck!).

So just to be clear, binary research will shave turns off the acquisition of your techs? So if a tech takes 20 turns, you can get it in what, 15 turns? Does this type of micromanagement make it worth it?

Do more experienced players use this method to research all techs?

EDIT: Never mind. I read the posts above. Forgot about those.

 

[kcd_swede]

So just to be clear, binary research will shave turns off the acquisition of your techs? So if a tech takes 20 turns, you can get it in what, 15 turns? Does this type of micromanagement make it worth it?

Do more experienced players use this method to research all techs?

.

The effect of binary research is not as pronounced as reducing 5 turns from a 20 turn tech. More like reducing 1 or two turns at best.

The most experienced players time their 0% research with periods before they have research multiplier buildings finished, and then switch to 100% (running deficit, generally) when the academy, library, university, Oxford or whatever is finished. That way the effect of the 100% research is multiplied.

Lets pretend there is a 2 city empire, with one city specialized with library, university, and academy (research multiplier 1+0.25+0.25+0.5 = 2), and the second city is specialized as a commerce city with market and bank (multiplier 1+0.25+0.50 =1.75). Each city has gold from cottages or camps or whatever worth 20 per turn. When you have the slider at 100% research, you will get 40 beakers from your science city and 20 beakers from your commerce city (your market and bank do NOTHING). When the slider is at 0% you get 20 gold from your science city (your library etc does nothing) and 35 gold from your commerce city. 2-turn total is thus 60 beakers and 55 gold for binary research. If you do 50% slider, you get 20 beakers from your science city and 10 beakers from your commerce city AND 10 gold from your science city and 17.5 gold (rounded down to 17) from your commerce city. For two turns. 2-turn total is thus 60 beakers and 54 gold for 50% sliders.

So the difference isn't so great. But in a larger empire, it adds up fast allowing you more turns at 100% research thus speeding your research times by a turn or two.

Binary research will NOT make or break your game, though. Binary research is too tedious for me to bother with in most cases. I like to play fast and loose (I'm playing at emperor level mostly). The bigger advantage is gained by, as I stated, using the slider at zero while building the library, so you can keep it at 100% research longer once it is built. (Because the 100% is multiplied if you wait, but not if you expend it now).

EDIT: Never mind. I read your edit.