New to the Civilization series

[Manick]

I just found this forum and I've been playing the game for only a week now, and I've got loads of questions to ask but for now I'll only bother you with just two. ^^
I just expanded the edge of my boarders to a corn tile which I upgraded to a corn farm, but for some reason I cannot place a civilian there to get the food. I made a road there to get the health bonus from the corn but I still can't access the food. This made me notice that the city boarders don't necessarily mean you have access to harvesting those tiles. What determines this?
Also, I don't quite understand how money works yet. I added up the total of my 4 cities maintanance cost, which was about -8, but my gold decrease per turn shows at -11. Is there another factor that im missing?
Thanks in advance.

 

[v8_mark]

I just found this forum and I've been playing the game for only a week now, and I've got loads of questions to ask but for now I'll only bother you with just two. ^^
I just expanded the edge of my boarders to a corn tile which I upgraded to a corn farm, but for some reason I cannot place a civilian there to get the food. I made a road there to get the health bonus from the corn but I still can't access the food. This made me notice that the city boarders don't necessarily mean you have access to harvesting those tiles. What determines this?

The tiles your city can harvest are represented by the BFC (Big Fat Cross). In reality, these are all the tiles two spaces away from your city, with the exception of those that are two diagonal spaces away. If you double-click your city, you'll be able to see which tiles are included in your BFC, because they'll be selectable.

If your farmed corn is more than two tiles away, you'll need another city two tiles or less away from it to be able to work it for the 6 .

Also, I don't quite understand how money works yet. I added up the total of my 4 cities maintanance cost, which was about -8, but my gold decrease per turn shows at -11. Is there another factor that im missing?
Thanks in advance.

Press F2 - this will give you a rundown of how much money you're making and how much you're spending. The city maintenance shown on the city screen is only one part of your upkeep - there's also civic upkeep, which depends on the civic options you're running (F3 screen), and unit upkeep, which is the cost in gold to maintain all your troops.

BTW, welcome to the forums!

 

[Brian Boru]

I just expanded the edge of my boarders

That caught me too when I started playing CIV There are two different borders--city borders and cultural borders.

They're the same for the first two expansions--immediate and when city reaches 10 culture.

When a city reaches 100 culture, you get the third expansion. Now the culture border is larger than the city border.

City borders only expand to the BFC as Mark explained, and that's it. Cultural borders keep expanding beyond that, up to four more 'circles' of expansion--reached at 50,000 culture at normal game speed.

You can also use the Insert key on your keyboard to open the city screen of the nearest city, I find that easier than double-clicking the city. That screen is where you see which tiles your city does/can work.

 

[Manick]

Thanks for the help guys