Newbie probs.... I think

[HorizonXP]

I've been playing several Civs. Right now, the Babylonians on a Tiny map

I think I've got a lot more territory, more advanced, more Wonders, not much army, but that'll change soon. Playing on Chieftain.

Now, two things. One, it's 1600 AD, and I'm only researching Gunpowder. How do I speed up science research? I've got libraries in all of my cities, which is prolly more than 8.

And two, the computer doesn't keep up with me in tech, so I can't make good trades for resources and such. I wanna have big tank battles, and ICBM fights, and air missions and such....

so how do I speed up both?

 

[Ironikinit]

All I can tell you are the obvious things:

In cities with corruption problems, build courthouses and police stations (requires patch, which you really want anyway).

Build universities.

Crank up your research rate via your domestic advisor screen. Tip: when you have 3 or fewer turns of research remaining, check with your DA to see if reducing the research rate will allow you to still research at the same rate. This trick is a real money saver.

Sell your techs to the AI players, even if you don't get much out of it. I would normally hold out for a decent price, but you're after high tech enemies to fight, so sell them cheap if you must.

Avoid researching unneeded techs, unless you really want the unit or wonder associated with the tech. Certain techs aren't needed to progress to the next age, for instance: Monarchy, Astronomy, Military Tradition, etc. and can be skipped. The AI will probably research them, so you will have something to trade for, even if it's a loser tech.

Hope that helps.

 

[Brocky]

By boosting the difficulty level to Warlord or Regent you will find that the AI will be improve its research abilities. Also, picking opponents can help. If you are the Indians (Commercial and Religious) and you pick opponents who have different abilities, eg. Americans, then you can swap techs because you both have unique techs.

Hope that makes sense.

 

[Ironstone]

I had exactly the same problem when I first started playing. My first few games went all the way to 2050 and I only won by Histographic score, still relatively far back in the development stakes. I began to think that Space Race victory was never to be!

There didn't seem to be a simple answer to the problem, but as I got better all round I just seemed to go faster through the ages. Better city planning, better understanding of how to maximise resources, generating more money, learning to buy and sell, , etc all contributed to going faster through the process.

Learning to handle happiness with luxuries, temples etc all helped too - so getting the knack of trade and diplomacy was useful. This may not sound so relevant but in a good game I'd spend little or nothing directly on happiness with the slider so could crank the research side right over to max.

Good luck, and hang in there - it might take a while, but you should be racing up the tree aftre a few more games.

 

[homegrown]

I think Ironstone has hit on some things that I also have experienced. My first win came as a cultural victory on chieftain. It took many many starts to get that far and was the first game I'd made it out of the middle ages alive.

Then my next game (on Warlord this time) gave me my space ship victory in 1832 AD. This was on Marla's map (which is very food heavy but makes for a fun map). Everything from Banking was researched in 4 turns. I sold everything except the newest techs to the AI for gold and luxuries, usually asking them what they'd give me and if I liked it, went for it.

Now I'm on Regent and the happiness change is killing me in my start, but I'm getting there. I am getting better and founding cities on tiles that will give me a nice balanced city in the end. Enough food to at least go to pop 12, mine and railroad every worked tile. Cities on gold or other resources don't need the road and always produce extra gold which is how you pay for the techs in 4 turns. Building improvements in the proper order in your new cities can cut down the time from founding a city to it becoming productive.

Temple - expands border to full city radius, prevents conversion
Harbor or Airport - if needed to connect to Capital
Courthouse - cuts corruption
Library - increase science output
Police Station - last corruption stopper besides happiness
University - increase science output

In 6 turns (by rush completing each in one turn gold permitting) you have a nice city infrastructure and can move on to other things like Aquaduct and Hospital (growth), Market and Bank (gold/beakers), Mass Transit and Recycling (pollution control), or Factory/Power Plant/Offshore Platform (production/shields), depending on what you need the city to do.