Early game + Economy

[Encanto]

This is helping a ton. I did not know there was a difference between commerce and gold. :/ What is it?

 

[Emptiness]

I strongly urge you to read the Civ IV manual, as well as the xienwolf's FfH2 manual. Trying to play FfH2 without a basic understanding of how Civ IV works will be unnecessarily frustrating.

 

[Nor'easter]

I strongly urge you to read the Civ IV manual, as well as the xienwolf's FfH2 manual. Trying to play FfH2 without a basic understanding of how Civ IV works will be unnecessarily frustrating.

Your questions really seem to relate to base Civ IV rather than to FfH specifically. You really ought to look at the articles in the Civ IV strategy forums, and consider playing a few games of unmodded BtS to get the hang of the game's basic mechanics.

 

[Encanto]

I do fine in BtS... What's the difference between commerce and gold?

 

[Zechnophobe]

You generate commerce from trade routes, tiles, etc. Your science slider then determines how much of that goes into gold, and how much goes into science.

I am *amazingly* skeptical that you are having such a hard time getting an economy going with the Lanun. That is what they DO. Here's a build order:

Settle near water
Start Fishing
Warrior
Scout
Warrior (should be about half done when fishing finishes)
Research ancient chants
Build workboats until capital is saturated with pirate coves, finish that last warrior, and then start on a Settler.
Research Mysticism
Switch to God King to help finish settler
Settle second city up the coast
Workboat saturate your Second city by building them in your capital
Warrior-warrior-Settler in capital
ElderCouncil in second city
Tech towards your religion of choice. (Or get festivals for market places)

Keep up that kind of expansion early on, and you will do quite well, especially at Warlord (And possibly all the way to Deity, though you'll need more warriors to defend).

Use early scouts to SCOUT THE COASTS. You don't care about that inland stuff, and you need to know where the juciest early city placements are.




The calabim are very different, but have one huge advantage: Production. Manor's give +1 hammer per population point, meaning even a small city will do okay after getting the manor up. You build these off of Code of Laws, which you'll want to tech pretty much right for, and then get aristocracy.

Aristocracy + Agrarianism + sanitation = +2 food, +2 commerce from farm improvements. Spam farms like crazy. Grow large (making your manors give a lot) and then feed on your population with vampires (to get high experience very quickly as well. Huge stack of vampires + Royal guards will win a fight pretty darn quick.

 

[Gaminic]

I do fine in BtS... What's the difference between commerce and gold?

I have a hard time reading those two parts of a sentence in one go. Commerce and Gold are exactly the same as in BtS!

A few other things I've noticed (I'm only a beginner too!):
a) You'll switch through improvements much more often. Keep forests early on and build lumbermills (Archery tech) for early 2/2 or 1/3 tiles. On hills, chop forests and place mines (same yield, but you get chopping hammers and mines get upgraded by a civic and an end-game tech). Workshops are worthless until Guilds (?) is researched, which is why non-hill tiles should keep their forests.
b) Trade is MUCH more important. You have much more routes than in BtS and many more buildings that increase the yield. Connect cities early and get those +route techs and +yield buildings. If the map is spread on several continents, Astronomy is a MUST.
c) Generating GP is much less a question of "getting enough GPP" than it is a question of getting pure GPP. If you're going for Altar (either as victory or just for the benefits), try getting some +Prophet GP Wonders in a dedicated city. Later in the game, I usually dedicate a few cities to Priest specialists, by spamming their Cross with farms, giving them several religions and place their temples for a Priest spot. I can not stress enough that 10 prophet GPP/turn is better than 10 prophet +1 merchant/engi/... point per turn. I'm pretty sure the game checks which GP you need and then gives you the other one against all odds.
d) Workers: You say you have 3-5 per city; that's way too much. Early on, I try to get 2 Workers in my capital (3 if elven/orc). By the time you produced your first settler and found your second city, sufficient tiles around your capital should be improved for its current size, so I usually send my workers along with the Settler and build a road on the way there: workers can do two steps, so they can land on the tile and quickly build a road and still keep up with your warrior escort.

Other than that: beelining is much more powerful in this game, because the tech tree is shorter and fatter. Pick one or two lines (Usually economy as one and your Civs favorite unit type as second) and stick to them.

 

[avalonnn]

I downgraded from Noble to Warlord after the stacks of doom on the most recent patch.

A few other questions -- what religion are you using?

Calabim really really need aristocracy because they lose a key building (elder council?) in the early going.

I strongly recommend trying Elohim and playing a generic strategy -- RoK and Melee units plus the giants from the cartography wonder -- because the Elohim give you the units of the civs you conquer.

On warlord -- especially as Calabim -- you should have an early conquest. You choice will depend on a large number of variables -- you can pick on whichever neighbor has the lowest score, but avoid attacking elves early if they have fellowship of leaves. If your neighbors include the Orcs or Sheaim, you want to get them early so they don't grow.

 

[MMX5000]

As a few people have already stated I'm not sure how you are not producing an insane amount of commerce as the Lanun, especially if you pick Hannah as your leader. Her commerce power is absurd if you build some pirate coves. Zechnopobe's strat is pretty solid, although I tend to switch over to City States pretty fast as I build outwards if I feel I can expand faster. Also if you are playing an island heavy map dont forget the bonus oversea trades give; having cities in different islands can add a great deal of commerce.

The Calabim play very differently than the Lanun. They tend to be much more aggressive in their military than tech and as people have already mentioned vampires are their most important tool. Make sure you have at least a few cities that are feeding banks. Between a granary, smokehouse, and breeding pit you can replace the lost population very rapidly, boosted even higher if you have AV for sacrifice the weak.

Also commerce is the resource which is produced by tiles or trade routes. It is then converted into either gold or science (or culture with certain tech I cant remember) at a certain ratio. Initially the ratio is 1:1 and depends on where you set your slider but can rise higher or lower. Also Id recommend never having less than 200 spare gold around; you never know when one of the random events needs some cash.

Also maybe I missed it but what religions are you using with each civ?

 

[Rhymes]

As a few people have already stated I'm not sure how you are not producing an insane amount of commerce as the Lanun, especially if you pick Hannah as your leader. Her commerce power is absurd if you build some pirate coves. Zechnopobe's strat is pretty solid, although I tend to switch over to City States pretty fast as I build outwards if I feel I can expand faster. Also if you are playing an island heavy map dont forget the bonus oversea trades give; having cities in different islands can add a great deal of commerce.

The Calabim play very differently than the Lanun. They tend to be much more aggressive in their military than tech and as people have already mentioned vampires are their most important tool. Make sure you have at least a few cities that are feeding banks. Between a granary, smokehouse, and breeding pit you can replace the lost population very rapidly, boosted even higher if you have AV for sacrifice the weak.

Also commerce is the resource which is produced by tiles or trade routes. It is then converted into either gold or science (or culture with certain tech I cant remember) at a certain ratio. Initially the ratio is 1:1 and depends on where you set your slider but can rise higher or lower. Also Id recommend never having less than 200 spare gold around; you never know when one of the random events needs some cash.

Also maybe I missed it but what religions are you using with each civ?

About 8 months to late .......