Newbie Not Getting Into Civ 4

[Simon Magi]

I bought Civ 4 vanilla a few weeks ago. Played a lot, and have gone through about 5 scenarios.. There are a few things that I am not sure about and maybe I have missed..

1. Is there a way to send out diplomats or initiate diplomacy? I get offers from neighbouring states but I can't seem to send out diplomats.

2. Do you always have to start right from the beginning building up villages...? it is getting very repetitive.

3. Where can I change the victory conditions? I get into a scenario, build up my civilisation, and then the scenario finishes because someone won the space race or something.....!

 

[krikav]

I bought Civ 4 vanilla a few weeks ago. Played a lot, and have gone through about 5 scenarios.. There are a few things that I am not sure about and maybe I have missed..

1. Is there a way to send out diplomats or initiate diplomacy? I get offers from neighbouring states but I can't seem to send out diplomats.

2. Do you always have to start right from the beginning building up villages...? it is getting very repetitive.

3. Where can I change the victory conditions? I get into a scenario, build up my civilisation, and then the scenario finishes because someone won the space race or something.....!

1. You right-click on the AIs to initiate trades, if that is what you are looking for.
To trade technologoies, you or the AI needs to have alphabet.

2. If you start a custom game, you can check the "Advanced start"-option.

3. If you start a custom game, you can alter what victory conditions will be enabled.

 

[Ondskan]

Hey dude.
By clicking the diplomat screen in the upper right corner you come to a big place with like peoples faces and lines from them. Click on peoples faces.

No you can download mods here on the forum with new scenarios where you start like in Vietnam with the whole country already built up.

Yes you can, don't click play now

 

[duckstab]

Welcome to Civ4 and the CFC forums!

1. Is there a way to send out diplomats or initiate diplomacy? I get offers from neighbouring states but I can't seem to send out diplomats.

I think diplomats may have been a feature of earlier versions of Civ. All you have to do to initiate diplomacy in Civ4 is click on the leader's name in the scoreboard in the lower right. If you've turned off the scoreboard intentionally or otherwise, you can turn it back on by clicking one of the round buttons in that area of the screen.

2. Do you always have to start right from the beginning building up villages...? it is getting very repetitive.

If you start a Custom Game you can select the starting era to be later. You'll start with more units, typically 2-3 Settlers and some military/recon units. When you found new cities they'll have a larger population and you'll also have some buildings already built.

3. Where can I change the victory conditions? I get into a scenario, build up my civilisation, and then the scenario finishes because someone won the space race or something.....!

Again, if you start a Custom Game you can enable/disable certain victory conditions.

 

[Simon Magi]

OK, I can fiddle with the victory conditions but I haven't found the option for advanced start or for starting anything beyond two guys and a village....

What is the actual option called? On the custom game options there isn't any option like this. Advanced options is only about unit movement and display....

Thanks for the suggestions so far!

 

[CocoIsKing28]

Click single player, custom game, and in the bottom middle column there is an option called advanced start that has a box with numbers in it beside it. You have to check it off, and then change the era you want to start in, which is in the left column.

 

[Simon Magi]

When I click on single player, custom game options, I look at the middle column and get these choices in order (I abbreviated some):

No City Razing
No City Flipping
City Flipping
No Barbs
Raging Barbs
Aggr AI
Random Personalities
No Tech Trad
Alliances
Always War
Always Peace
One City
Permanent War/Peace
New Random Seed
Lock Modified Assets
Req Complete Kills

I am using Mac App, vanilla Civ 4.

 

[calibur]

Advanced start is a bts option, sorry.
Victory conditions should be to the right of these.

 

[Simon Magi]

OK, thanks for the answer. I don't know when the Mac App Civ 4 expansions will be released....

 

[CocoIsKing28]

Ah, that's your problem. But you can advance in time by choosing a different era to start in. However, you will still start with only settlers and no cities, but you get soldiers and multiple settlers depending on the era.

 

[Doshin]

Warlords and BtS are both available for the Mac.

 

[Simon Magi]

While both expansions for Civ 4 are on the Mac they are not on the Mac App store. The Mac App Civ 4 game does not work with the retail expansion games or any other version. Feral did say that they would release the Mac App expansions but they haven't yet....

 

[Doshin]

Oh, I see. Well, as another option you can buy and download the Complete Edition from other sources (Amazon, Steam) if you're willing to spend $20-$30. That goes down to $15 during a sale.

 

[Culture Bomb]

You could buy the complete game, but really if you find the early game repetetive, then maybe Civ isn't for you..

Many players find that with randomly generated maps, the most variable part of the game is responding to the circumstances they find at the beginning, and that playing and developing the early resources and land is the time when the most interesting and important decisions are made.

Maybe you should try playing the early game differently each time just to see how it turns out.

 

[shlks]

The beginning is most definitely the most important part of the game to playing well, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's the most fun part of the game for everyone, which is a subjective thing. I play really long games, and at a certain point I almost invariably want to finish it. But that could just be a phase for me.

When diplomacy and trading options starts to appear in the classical era it's fun. It's fun when you start sailing the seas and brokering maps with everyone. It's fun when you start industrializing your civilization and start seeing huge numbers everywhere...

You might like advanced start in BTS, op. You can set any amount of starting gold to purchase your first cities, techs, buildings, improvements, units, population, culture, vision, anything. You can give yourself a small start or a big one, yet even a small one advances the game way farther than expected (no turns producing your first worker/ settler in your first city). It's interesting but I think it's slashes away much of the AI's advantages at higher levels.

 

[Luthor_Saxburg]

You could buy the complete game, but really if you find the early game repetetive, then maybe Civ isn't for you..

I disagree!

I play Civ a lot (too much even) and I haven't started from scratch for... for.. for a loooooooong while! Can't even remember when it was the last time!

I don't know how it works for MAC, but for PC there is many many scenarios (most of them downloaded from Civfanatics), which gives you an an advanced start already defined. And there are quite a few MOD's as well, some of them feel like an entire different game!

 

[s.bernbaum]

OK, thanks for the answer. I don't know when the Mac App Civ 4 expansions will be released....

Can't say about the Apple Mac App store but CIV Warlords and BTS have been available for several years for the Mac on disc and also from various online providers. Look for it as disk on Amazon for example or as a download from Steam for example.