Newbie needs help badly...

[Cutwolf]

I just picked up the game a couple of days ago and I love it. However, I completely stink at it. I've browsed through the War Academy and stuff but I can't really find guides that answer my questions/problems.

Here are my problems:

1. I can never make much money. If I lower my science funding to the 30% or so that would allow my treasury to grow, I fall behind technologically. If I raise my science funding to keep up with everyone, I lose tons of GPT. What do I do?

2. I see people mention taxes and raising/lowering them. On my income sheet, I am getting 0 from taxes. Adding a tax collector doesn't do much. It takes 2 or 3 tax collectors to just add 1 GPT. How do I work taxes?

3. My cities don't grow! With my luck, I always start in areas with low strategic resources, low food, and high luxuary. I build mines and irrigate tons and build roads everywhere, yet at times half of my cities won't grow. How can I keep a constant growth?

4. Is it better to have my new cities borders connected with each other or dot around my area and wait for the culture to combine them?

5. 99% of the game, my GPT gradually decreases. How do I stop that?


Thanks in advance and I'm sure I'll have more questions.

-Cut

 

[BassDude726]

Build roads as often as possible. They add extra commerce to your tiles and thus income. Also, switch your form of government from Despotism to Republic as soon as possible. This allows your irrigated squares to produce much more food, thus more growth.
Also, try to place your cities 5 tiles apart... this keeps their resource tiles from overlapping, and allows them to expand your border faster when the culture increases.

 

[dgfred]

@ Cutwolf- You might want to give the Celts or Iroquois a try. Both grow
nicely being Agri. Both have GREAT UUs that really butt. The
religous trait for the Celts helps with culture growth and the commercial trait
helps growth and income with $ savings . Your money problems are
probably the result of not having expanded enough early and lack of cities.
More growth will equal more money and more everything, you will be .

 

[Padma]

Welcome to CFC.

First, I must point you to the War Academy. It is full of useful information and articles. In particular, check out cracker's article about improving your opening play. A bit technical, and a bit to wade through, but it is all good information. You will find yourself returning to it again and again, as you get a better feal for what is happening in the game.

Also be sure to check out the Succession Games forum. These are games that people play as a group, and are a good source of tips and tricks. There are frequently new games starting up, and you may decide to join one.

Be sure to also look at the Strategy & Tips forum. It is the source of the articles that go into the War Academy, and includes much more information.

For the quick and dirty answer to your basic question, build roads. And make sure your citizens are working on roaded tiles. That will increase your gold coming in. Build your cities from 3 to 4 tiles apart. Building them 5 apart sounds like a good idea, but you can't *use* 21 tiles until you have built Hospitals, and they come rather late in the game. Three tiles apart lets you move troops safely between cities in a single turn on roads.

Most importantly, read these forums and ask questions.

 

[TedJackson]

One thing that Padma didn't mention is the importance of trading with the AI Civs; for technology in the early game and later for resources as well.

Have a look atGK2- The Training Day Experiment over in the Succession Games forum. Read the discussions, download the saves and play the turns out yourself. This will help, I'm sure, to get over those first hurdles.


Ted

 

[Cutwolf]

Sheesh, that GK2 post is huge and since I'm a newb, I'm not sure what I should be looking at.

Is there any full games I can download and watch? Like a replay type thing where I can see what people do and maybe see some of the glaring things I'm doing wrong?

 

[TedJackson]

Start at the beginning, read the discussions prior to each set of turns, download the save and play out the turns yourself - either copying the moves posted or trying out different choices. It's just meant to give you a yardstick to measure yourself against.


Ted