Keep your enemies down

[Howitzer]

I'm going to try and pass you my strategy experience on what to do to win a "comfortable" victory in a few words.

First of all in Civ 4 there can be NO comfortable victory.However having in mind certain things can make your opponents tremble you.

In ancient times: Try to expand and get your economy started.Create a couple of workers and automate them to do the job.Keep your defence high to deflect barbarians.Theocracy civic would be a nice idea to stop the spread of other religions in your grounds.Also keeping your borders closed until you HAVE TO open them or your safe to do so will warranty a peacefull and "easy" ancient era.Focus on culture and science to take an early advantage upon them.

middle ages: Keep your culture and economy your high priorities.Keep your borders closed and drive hard bargains with your opponents.Maintain peace at most cost.This is the most critical phase of the game.If you fail this era the others will take a good lead upon you.By the end of the era apply State property and bureocracy civics to keep low cost and high production.Pacifism would be a good idea if you don't have huge armies or it will raise costs to the sky.

Modern times:Win the war before you go to war.Hurry up and control oil and uranium resources all over the world.Fight if you have to.Start building a giant war machine, and run for the nukes.it's about time to open your borders.
Enemy can no longer expand through them and spreading his religion would cost you nothing with the free religion civic.After you've built 5-10 nukes, ask the opponents through UN to vote for non Nuclear proliferation.If they say no, let the computer be the president of UN.When he will propose,they will all vote yes Drive your armies to war and devastate your enemies or keep it going for the cultural victory

Either way you win

 

[Zombie69]

I stopped reading at automate workers. You can't do that and expect to be efficient.

And i disagree, it's possible to manage very comfortable victories in Civ 4. Maybe not on deity, but all the way up to emperor, sure.

 

[Drakcul]

whats the strategy here ???
u r just telling obvious points... strategy would involve telling how to actually implement them...
i am guessing tht u play at lower levels of difficulty

 

[Rowen]

Howitzer's points are all sound stratergy for an overview.
They follow the same methods of those military greats we impersonate.
Not to mention the fact that whilst micro-management can be necessary an overview is essential to keep in mind.

 

[Mathemagician13]

I don't see religion being spread as a bad thing, really. Sure, if your opponent has a holy city, then they get +1 gold, but really at the end of the day, they are giving you +1 happyness to that city (assuming you build the temple), and a research bonus if you build the monestary (if it is appropriate, I should say). Also, you can start to build relations so that you aren't the punk that they attack. Of course, the downsides are that you are giving them 1 gold (but your few cities that you're denying their religion doesn't make or break their finances, typically), and that when you go to war, those cities with the opposing religion tend to get a little uppity about it.

Also, if you keep your borders closed, you won't be able to accurately gauge the enemy strength. You won't know what their capital is like, or what resources they hold in the deepest parts of their cultural boundary. This sort of information is important for resource denail tactics like you discussed earlier.
Also, open borders means a friendship bonus, and you can keep your neighbors scouted for potential war-like activity.

Also, as noted previously, automated workers are simply too inefficient when games get serious.

 

[Dyvim Tvar]

I would have to add acouple more problems regarding the closed borders:
1. If you allow tech trading, you will soon find yourself far behind, even with a nation focused on research.
2. You will not have any trade routes to foreign countries, again leading to severe money and research problems.

 

[petey]

Here's one strategy that I just tried in my last game which I found to be quite effective. I was next to Louis, who is Creative - I think this works best with a Creative guy. I chopped rushed 5 Horse Archers and ran through his territory destroying every improvement and road that he had. I left his cities alone, since I didn't want to get into a fight with fortified archers.

Having to rebuild everything from scratch pretty much put him out of the game from then on in. However, it didn't weaken him so much that another AI just ran over him, but he was behind in tech from then on and wasn't able to build up any kind of force to attack me. There were a couple of sorties with obsolete units, but they were quickly put down.

His Creative trait still let him have a lot of territory, though, and this kept him between me and the more powerful AIs. Having this buffer zone gave me a bit more breathing room to keep everyone else off my back and I was able to cruise to a Cultural Victory.

 

[bobbelbox]

This must be the worst article on the strategy forum.

Your almost telling exactly what NOT to do…

It might be better to look at the more advanced subjects and learn from those.

 

[Jonny211]

Why not just write 'Start Civ4, watch pretty intro, play to win, sit back and feel gooooood'. Just about as useful I think!

What about city specialisation? Great People? Which wonders help you out if you're Catherine etc etc etc. This game has far more depth than 'expand in ancient times'. Now write something useful!

Jon

 

[clinton]

This must be the worst article on the strategy forum.

Your almost telling exactly what NOT to do…

It might be better to look at the more advanced subjects and learn from those.

Nah, its teh awesomeness way to winz!

That strat rulez da world d00d.

Its fully b0rken.

All your base are belong to us.

Cowabunga d00dZ!

 

[Howitzer]

Hey Guyz Ok for those who don't like it, don't use it

To make myself clear on close borders strategy:

Yes there is a friendship and trade bonus having open border and you can look at your oponents BUT:

Having closed borders protects you especially in maps of Europe and in early game from enemy expansion through your ground.Which is far more important I believe than any trade deal.

As for religion spread, it's a great STRATEGIC disadvantage as your opponent get's to see what kind of units you have in the city which has the same religion with his Holy City and can decide better where to attack.

In general your purpose on the game is not to go on with your opponents, but run over them one way or another.So being peacefull and cooperative, sooner or later will fail.This policy ensures that when and if diplomacy fails you'll be prepared enough to defend yourself succesfully - along with doing the common sense of course, build good defensive units - In other words open your borders ONLY when you have nothing to loose.Don't forget that the computer AI sells your map for gold to others when you have open borders.Why let him take that gold instead of you?And why don't have something easy to trade?

As for those who want to know what wonders to build etc etc, read your manual and civilopedia.This is a STRATEGY TIP

 

[Jonny211]

Yes and a pretty poor STRATEGY TIP! My opponents won't tremble as you say if I keep my borders closed... no trade routes, no spread of my religion (BTW choose theocracy so enemy religions don't spread to me) and anyway Montezuma will 'open borders' by steaming his troops across the border.

What difficulty level are you on? I'm stuck at Monarch and I'm sure closing the borders would be suicide.

 

[Mathemagician13]

Diplomacy and peaceful relations allow you to choose when to overrun your opponent, as long as you can still sleep at night when you betray Ghandi's trust.
Trying to exist in a shell only stacks the odds against you when you finally do attempt something, since the other Civs are more likely to gang up on you (afterall, noone likes the civ that doesn't attempt to like anybody)

I will admit that closed borders are useful in the very very beginning, when you don't want the AI expanding through you, but that's just about its only use, I think.

 

[Gromblmompf]

Whats wrong with foreign religions spreading in your empire anyway?

As soon as you go for Free Religion, you´ll actually want as many religions within your borders as possible... and if you want lots of culture (and who doesnt), you´ll need cathedrals. More religions = more temples = more cathedrals = more culture = good.

Screw those few gold coins your opponent gets from missionarizing (is that a word?) your cities... if that little gold is what decides about your loss or victory, you would have lost anyway.

 

[KillerCardinal]

In general your purpose on the game is not to go on with your opponents, but run over them one way or another.So being peacefull and cooperative, sooner or later will fail.This policy ensures that when and if diplomacy fails you'll be prepared enough to defend yourself succesfully - along with doing the common sense of course, build good defensive units - In other words open your borders ONLY when you have nothing to loose.Don't forget that the computer AI sells your map for gold to others when you have open borders.Why let him take that gold instead of you?And why don't have something easy to trade?

Heh, I'm gonna have to disagree here to some extent. Mind you I generally have been playing on prince, but I've been very successful lately. I've generally been winning with the UN lately, and to do that I've opened up my borders a lot. However, you need to selectively open borders to the people you want as allies. Don't open your borders to your allies' enemies(I've still been trying to figure out the best way to tell who is whose enemy) so that you don't get them pissed off by you trading with their worst enemy.

The wars I fight are normally intended to help relations, not grab land. Also, if I'm invaded, I'm normally able to pull in one of the allies I've been cultivating as a war ally. I know that this may or may not be a normal strategy, but this idea of keeping your borders closed seems like a BAD idea all around to me.

 

[Howitzer]

@Jonny - Of course it's a suicide now buddy, cause you open your borders at first place.I'm talking about NOT opening them until you have NOTHING to loose.

@Mathemagician13 - It's not you who will exist in a shell if you have your borders closed.It's them.They can't pass and if you hurry on building cities in places near your borders, this way blocking their exploration for new lands, you'll see exactly what I'm talking about.I've taken the Greeks in Europe's map.I've managed to keep Isabela of Spain,Ceasar of Rome, Luis of France and Frederick of Germans to their eggs.They only have 3 cities each and have no option than to sail away to find some living space.Oh and the year is 1457 AD.So not really an early game

@Gromblmompf - Free religion Civic comes late in the game dude So until then what will you do? Allow the missionaries convert you to their religion?And have full view of your cities from their holy city?And take away the advantage you'ld had if you converted the AI to YOUR religion?

 

[Yzen Danek]

Howitzer, what difficulty level are you playing on?

 

[goraemon]

Can you inform us of your difficulty level and post savegames and/or screenshots?

 

[jazwana]

it sounds like you're playing on a map with starting positions in a lot of peininsulas. There it would be good to close borders (especially if you're creative) so you can block expansion, but on the majority of maps that won't fly.

 

[eataTREE]

Re Open Borders: I refuse Open Borders requests only in the very beginning of the game, so I can define my territory. Once I have snapped up the juicy city sites, there's no good reason to not have OB: it gets you more money, makes the other civ less likely to declare war on you, and allows you to spread your religion to him via missionaries if you so desire.

Re Theocracy: There is basically no reason to prevent the spread of someone else's religion in your civilization. In fact, since you are probably going to go to Free Religion at some point towards the end of the game, having less religious diversity will actually hurt you eventually. The reason to adopt Theocracy is if you are fighting a war (or planning to) and want to produce experienced troops without dealing with the vast suckage that is Vassalage.

Re Nukes: In the real world, nuclear weapons are terrifying, horrible engines of destruction. That's in the real world -- in Civ 4 they're pretty lame. If you want to crush your foes, build tanks and bombers, not ICBMS.