Condensed tips for beginners?

[natxavier]

So these are not the normal associated personalities for these particular characters?

 

[mystyfly]

^^ These are traits. Personality is stuff like WFYABTA limits, Talk delay, Peace Weight, etc.

 

[AngryGorilla]

For Charonicus:

Im actually a long time lurker on these forums and when I was new to the game I was in your exact same situation. I simply couldnt understand how the AI could mass the amount of units that he did.

What I learned was to (ab)use slavery extensively in the early game. You should normally be whipping in every city as long as the unhappiness is about to expire. You will see this from the cost of your next whip is 10+ whatever is left of your previous whip. So when a city says whipping will cause one unhappiness for 14 turns, then it is time to whip again.

Always try to whip for 2 population if possible. If you cant whip for 2 population, switch production to something like swordsman or a worker. Then you have to wait a turn, because hurrying production on turn one is twice as expensive. On the next turn however, you should be able to whip for 2 population and have a nice overflow into whatever you were making before.

If a city still manages to grow up to 6-7 population (above the happiness cap), just use this city to make workers/settlers while whipping for 2 population when oppression unhappiness is expiring.

 

[Charonicus]

Jeez, so much reading to do.
*rubs eyes*
I've read up on specializing cities. This is something I'm struggling to fully grasp but I'll get there.
I feel slightly more confident about my military preparations now and once I can confidently specialize a production city I should be able to *stay* high on the power graph. ¬¬
I've also read a bunch of Sisiutil's guides and am working my way through the ALC series. Entertaining, and he makes it look so easy. >_<
Now all I have to do is apply all this in game! Which I will do, in between reading more ALCs.

One slight question though that I haven't really seen covered anywhere is defensive units. Early game it seems viable to get away with your one warrior, then an archer or three... But as time progresses... just how many units does a city need stationing in it to be "safe"? (Let me guess, as many as economically possible? ) I also tend to keep a catapult handy in the border cities if I suspect an attack is coming, just to pummel the attackers down a little before they do the same to me.

 

[Sisiutil]

One slight question though that I haven't really seen covered anywhere is defensive units. Early game it seems viable to get away with your one warrior, then an archer or three... But as time progresses... just how many units does a city need stationing in it to be "safe"? (Let me guess, as many as economically possible? ) I also tend to keep a catapult handy in the border cities if I suspect an attack is coming, just to pummel the attackers down a little before they do the same to me.

First off, thanks for the citation/compliment.

How many defenders? For your inland core cities that are away from your borders, a single obsolete unit will do. It's on the coasts and especially on your borders where you need to concentrate your forces.

Diplomacy also comes into play. If you share a border with an extremely friendly and loyal AI leader or a reasonably strong vassal, you can treat those cities like your core cities and leave a single defender there. But keep an eye on that relationship--if it begins to sour, you'll need to build up defenses.

For your border cities with less chummy neighbours, several good defensive units are a good idea, and I also use your "defensive catapult" tactic. To my mind, though, the best defense is a good offense. In addition to one or more of those defensive siege weapons, I like to have several strong counter units that can attack a stack weakened by the siege units. This is also where I like to use mounted units the most. In other words, don't just rely on City Garrison-promoted units.

But how many units? That's impossible to say. It will vary depending upon the strength of your most likely attack point (say, if the city's on a hill and has a wall and castle), as well as how many units the AI will bring to bear. And that will vary depending on the era as well. Spying will do you a lot of good, allowing you to ascertain the size of the enemy stack before it approaches your city. Get all the info you can and then decide how many defenders you need.

 

[Charonicus]

Sound advice.
I generally keep 2 or 3 archers or longbowmen even in the core cities, usually left over from when I've been running the civic that gives the city happiness for having them there, and make sure most of my defenders are on dangerous borders and coasts. Yup yup.
I also don't let a stack go anywhere without two spearmen in early game (and try to get one or two in cities too) as I find quite a few of the AIs fond of horses. Chariots, horse archers and later cavalry/cuirassiers.

On my latest game, I'm Isabella. I had a pretty crummy start, coastal city with a food surplus but on a reasonably small peninsula. I pressed north and found Kublai and knew he'd try to seal me off down there so I expanded fast, planted one city north east where I found copper, and another to the further north west with some minor resources but horses and elephants that I didn't want him to get. It also meant I'd expanded my cultural borders far enough that I wasn't blocked in by him. Then I noticed he'd found the only source of iron for miles, his own stash of copper (at the rearmost part of his civilization) and stone and his own horses!
Disaster.
So I built two hefty stacks of axemen with a couple of spears each in anticipation of those horses. My sole chariot scouting him out didn't show any mounted units, but better to have them and not need them than need them and not have them.
I declared war on him right as Hatty found me (she must be pretty far west) and luckily she didn't mind. I took on her religion of Judaism to keep her sweet, noting her score half mine and declared war on Kublai before he decided to make use of his horses (and because swordsmen and longbowmen were appearing).
I think I waited too long and I made more mistakes. War is distracting. >_<
I dropped the research slider while I marched over to minimize my outgoings and forgot to raise it until after the war. I think that's gonna cost me later. But I wiped him out in around 875AD, found I had nearly a grand in my treasury and promptly sent a settler up into his ex-territory because I razed all his cities due to their poor locations.
I'm building catapults now and I'm gonna finish alphabet to get tech trading and get a few I missed off Hatty (no archery yet, whoops :S). Then I'm gonna aim for whatever gets me courthouses, resettle what used to be Mongolia and see where I can go from there.

To be honest, this is the point where I tend to start going wrong. I'm still learning the tech tree and sometimes find I've missed a vital prerequisite for something by not realising it was necessary. At least Hatty isn't a threat yet so I should have time to build up a better army before going after her.
All in all I'd say this is my best run yet on noble, but still far from ideal. Hatty is friends but too weak to be of any real assistance and I want to wipe her out before she realises she's next. And then the dreaded naval antics, which I'm still rubbish at. ¬¬
Least I have Kublai's iron now. Muwahahaha.

 

[Mack_Jagger]

Just wondering about gunpowder and mounted units. I allways get hesitant choosing promotions when facing curriassers or cavalry. Is pinch a throw away in that situation. Of course they are mounted units but hey, they do use rifles, don't they? And how does this apply to other gunpowder based units like cannons and tanks? Is pinch a universal promotion in the middle to late game or do only the specialized promotions apply?

 

[Paul Moore]

One thing I don't recall seeing discussed anywhere - how long, in real time, do people generally take per turn? I've read a lot of the game walkthroughs available here and elsewhere, and it seems to me that I could spend ages pondering where best to settle from my existing start position. Then again, there seem to be endless factors to consider for builds, tech choices, worker actions, etc.

When I actually play, however, I simply don't analyze things in that much detail, because I want to get moving! But then I find myself drifting towards simply choosing the recommended option all the time, and I wonder if it's me or the computer playing the game

So what's a normal type of rate for play? How long do people actually spend pondering these things?

 

[LiberiGlacialis]

Mack: Pinch works against Infantry, Rifles, Muskets, and stuff like that. You need Ambush vs. Tanks and Formation vs. Cav//Curriassers.

 

[LiberiGlacialis]

Paul: There's a RPC around here you should read done by Slobberin' called Dubya. It's a good read on why the Computer isn't always right.

Normal rate of play depends on the person: I take anywhere from a minute to 15 minutes to play a turn, depending on if I'm at war, if I'm trading, ect.

 

[Paul Moore]

Paul: There's a RPC around here you should read done by Slobberin' called Dubya. It's a good read on why the Computer isn't always right.

Thanks, that looks like a fun read. I know the computer isn't always right - I just find that I end up rushing things, and that means I take the suggestions rather than stopping to think. I guess I've spent too much time playing real-time (or near real-time) strategy games like Age of Empires and Rise of Legends. They tend to promote a "think fast" mentality that I need to shake.

Normal rate of play depends on the person: I take anywhere from a minute to 15 minutes to play a turn, depending on if I'm at war, if I'm trading, ect.

Thanks again, it's a hugely variable thing, obviously, but it's useful to know what other people do.

 

[CCRunner]

Thanks again, it's a hugely variable thing, obviously, but it's useful to know what other people do.

Take however long you need to do everything. At the start, my turns will take under a minute. Later (renaissance/ classical) my turns might get bumped up to three or four minutes. Modern era turns usually last about five minutes until I know I'm going to win and automate nearly everything but the core cities. I play faster than most though.

 

[nokem]

At the start, my turns will take under a minute.

My first 20/30 turns can take hours. As soon as I've got a picture of the geography and the characters in play I'll go to work on the strategy layer: dotmaps, early diplomacy options, economic choices, options for early rushing, possible victory conditions, tech paths, wonders I might need.... It can take me 30 mins easily.

Once the early religions are established and everyone's settled 3-4 cities (and maybe an early war under the belt) I'll repeat the exercise. If all's going well at Liberalism I may do it a third time.

I'm slower than most I think and I don't have a lot of time to play. It can take me weeks to finish an epic game. In fact I pretty much only ever play Game of The Month.

 

[vorlon_mi]

One thing I don't recall seeing discussed anywhere - how long, in real time, do people generally take per turn?

So what's a normal type of rate for play? How long do people actually spend pondering these things?

Like others, my real time / turn varies at different points in the game.
The first few turns (say, 5) go really quickly, because I'm just waiting for my initial city to build something. As I get close to popping out the first settler, I will take a break and look at the terrain that my warrier has been exploring. Turns where I'm at war will take multiple minutes, to make sure the siege units bombard first, and the right units attack in the right order. Turns where I'm at peace take less time, since I usually set up a build queue in each city of 2-3 items, so I don't have to babysit them. I never automate workers, so they do take time to manage during peacetime. OK, sometimes I will use the "railroad to" automation option, right after getting railroads, to save some of my mental cycles for military planning.

I choose to play the game in sessions of 2-4 hours each. So the first turn of each session is long -- 15 minutes -- while I go thru each city individually to remind myself of what is in the build queue, and ensure that its citizens are placed where I want. Pop growing, or stagnant? Rearrange the specialists?
I usually do a "sweep" thru the cities just after concluding a war, to switch from the war-time builds to peace-time builds.

 

[Jerrymander]

I generally take no more than 5 minutes at most for any of my turns before 1 AD. Then it takes longer and longer, some turns even taking upwards of 20 minutes to complete in the late game. The vast number of different stacks of units I have to move and cities to manage production in is killer.

 

[Paul Moore]

Another question - how bad is it to leave the computer to manage your cities? Not builds, just use of citizens. So far, I've left off trying to manage my citizens, but am I causing myself problems by doing this?

I seem to recall that in civ3, you could either switch of the advisers and do everything yourself, or if you tried to micromanage with the advisers on, they kept undoing your changes. Is it still as all-or-nothing in civ4?

 

[mystyfly]

You shouldn't do that. Especially spy specialists seem to get lots of love by the AI - which is often a bad thing.

Better check all the citizens after the city grows.

This can get messy easily, especially if you do lots of whipping. On a rainforest map for example, you can have lots of foodrich cities. If you use those for whipping, you can set those on "emphasize food" - the only function I'd use if any.

 

[Dresden]

For lower-level play the citizen governor can be pretty useful. (I play Noble and use them most of the time, only fully MMing my citizens in special situations.) You do want to occasionally check on what is happening and use the "emphasis" buttons and/or "forced" specialists to make sure things are running smooth though.

A forced specialist is when you use the little specialist + buttons while the citizen governor is active; forced specialists show with a yellow box around them. The governor will use that as a preference and if it's going to add a new specialist, it'll add one of that type so long as there is an open slot for it.

 

[AngryGorilla]

If you force one specialist, the AI will make any future specialist in that city the same type. Up till the limit ofcourse.

So you can let the AI decide for you to some extent. Lets say you have a descent sized city with 4 specialists. You then force 1 engineer and 1 scientist. If you only have a forge that allows you an engineer but have 4 slots for scientists, the AI will then put any "overflow" specialists as a scientist up till the limit of 4 in this example.

 

[fizbankovi]

how can u calculate how much money you get from pilliging?