Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[VCrakeV]

FIN is often considered to be the strongest trait for players who aren't very experienced with high level play. For a long time it was considered to be universally the best trait, before people learned how to properly leverage some other traits.

You are still playing noble, based on this I can conclude that FIN is the trait that most likely will help you the most. The effect is completely passive and it doesn't require any special effort from the player to take advantage of the trait. If you play FIN, build a lot of riverside cottages and watch how you blaze through the tech tree way faster than the noble AI.

Thanks again! And sorry to everyone for asking so much lately, but there's probably more to come. Perhaps one day I'll go up in difficultly again (I've only recently went up from the easy ones. I believe Noble is normal/fair).

 

[VCrakeV]

So, I discovered how OP FIN is (wouldn't be OP if it wasn't so easy to use). I got to Renaissance by 1100AD... Why is it, if FIN requires no leverage/skill, FIN AI aren't so technologically advanced?

 

[ZombieMaker10]

Hi My name is Ryan and i need help with with a download i am doing of the newset patch for BTS. I downloaded it, now how do i apply it.

 

[Deckhand]

So, I discovered how OP FIN is (wouldn't be OP if it wasn't so easy to use). I got to Renaissance by 1100AD... Why is it, if FIN requires no leverage/skill, FIN AI aren't so technologically advanced?

AI technical advancement really depends upon the game level. Their land and neighbors is secondary.

FIN certainly does require some leverage/skill. Two examples of good things to do with financial: riverside cottages, Colossus.

 

[Michkov]

Hi My name is Ryan and i need help with with a download i am doing of the newset patch for BTS. I downloaded it, now how do i apply it.

Run the exe, point it to your BTS.exe if the patch doesn't find it by itself. Just click through the installer the rest of the installer.

 

[VCrakeV]

Can someone explain how percentage modifiers for city yields work? What about trade route modifiers? Are they all additive? If not, which ones multiply?

 

[VCrakeV]

Also, I keep running into border problems too early in the game... What should I do? I find I usually have to do isolated start (everyone has their own continent, but that feels like cheating) or doing something like 5 civs on standard size map.

 

[Samson]

Can someone explain how percentage modifiers for city yields work? What about trade route modifiers? Are they all additive? If not, which ones multiply?

They are pretty much all additive. The only time they are multiplicative is when one applies to raw commerce (I think only bureaucracy in the capital?) and others are on gold / research.

Also, I keep running into border problems too early in the game... What should I do? I find I usually have to do isolated start (everyone has their own continent, but that feels like cheating) or doing something like 5 civs on standard size map.

Hard to answer, but you are not likely to go wrong by trying to solve the problem with the sword.

 

[VCrakeV]

They are pretty much all additive. The only time they are multiplicative is when one applies to raw commerce (I think only bureaucracy in the capital?) and others are on gold / research.



Hard to answer, but you are not likely to go wrong by trying to solve the problem with the sword.

It's kind of hard to do that early game. You can't just pump out military units. And even if you could, it'd be a lot of maintenance. Plus, you'd lose out on early wonders, and have to postpone internal growth.

 

[elitetroops]

It's kind of hard to do that early game. You can't just pump out military units. And even if you could, it'd be a lot of maintenance. Plus, you'd lose out on early wonders, and have to postpone internal growth.

Once you realize that building units to conquer cities is way better than most early wonders or focusing on "internal growth", whatever that means, you will move up a few levels in difficulty.

 

[rah]

As long as they're close by. Conquering a few cities 25 squares away don't always help.

 

[elitetroops]

As long as they're close by. Conquering a few cities 25 squares away don't always help.

He was talking about border problems, so I would assume it was about situations with AI close by.

 

[rah]

Yeah of course, but you hear rush rush rush so often around here, some people stop thinking about the distance maint. And sometimes that closer city is one you don't want to keep anyway and their cap is farther away.

 

[Samson]

It's kind of hard to do that early game. You can't just pump out military units. And even if you could, it'd be a lot of maintenance. Plus, you'd lose out on early wonders, and have to postpone internal growth.

Much as others have said, if you can produce the pyramids worth of axemen before the pyramids is built you should be able to sort out your border problems.

If you want more specific advice, you could start a thread with an example game and ask for advice you are likely to gets lots of it. I would suggest posting an earlier save (50 turns?) and one where you are having the border trouble.

 

[ChaosSlayer]

Question.
I noticed that when asking for things from AI I can always "DEMAND" things, but sometimes I can ask "Could you spare for a friend?" But it doesn't always come up. Is it relation based?
AI has no problem coming over and begging (sort of nicely) for things.
Why is that?

 

[georgjorge]

You can only demand if Cautious or below, or aks nicely (beg) at Pleased and above. Whether a demand will be granted depends on your power ration (among other things) while begs - very generally - work at certain intervals for small amounts of gold (or small techs).

Note that if you or the AI make a succesful beg/demand you get an automatic peace treaty with that AI for ten turns.

 

[Deckhand]

"Pro tip" - When you see an AI fist come up (We have enough on our hands right now) - you can usually beg 10 gold from that AI to set the 10 turn peace timer if you think you might be the target.

The real pros keep track of how long between begs and get a lot of gold from pleased AIs. (not in my skill set)

 

[H_a_a_k_o_n]

Just a hunch, but the phenomenon you're describing may be a graphical effect, rather than actual forest growth. Huts on forest tiles appear to be unforested while the hut is still on it. When you move onto the tile, the hut opens and the graphic shows the forest “miraculously” growing under your unit.

If opening the hut spawned barbarians, it might appear that the forest and the barbarian attack are connected, when it’s only the hut that suppresses the graphic of the forest.

Thanks, you are totally right! Never checked the tile the huts are on, but (no surprise for you) it was forest. Thanks for good and fast reply.

 

[CSDanger]

Hello guys, although I am not a beginner about playing Civilization 4, I was long absent from the game and yesterday I just started a new game. Feels good to be back BUT there is one thing that annoys me as hell and I would like to ask if anyone has a solution for this. I've tried to search in this forum but didn't found anything and I think this problem is too "small" to create a new thread for this so here I go:

I was playing a game with a few different victory conditions (destroy all other civilizations, build spaceship, be voted for the UN). After some military campaigns I've destroyed all the other enemy civilizations and won the game. Despite the fact that I am just in the year 1450 AD (marathon game), I would like to keep constructing my empire. Civilization 4 allows you to keep playing a won game but on the bottom of my screen there is now this annoying message in white letters saying "CSDanger won the game in the category conquering!!!!"

So far so good but: How the hell do I shut down this annoying message because it does not vanish by itself (played a few more rounds to be sure)? Is there any way to shut it down? It annoys me very much, so if anyone knows a solution to this, I would be happy to read about it. It ruins any fun I would like to have in continuing playing my recent game. Thanks for any helpout!

 

[isenchine]

@CSDanger: strictly speaking, you can't get rid of this message. But if you are ready for a little bit of modding, there is a little trick that you can use.

Locate the text file Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Assets\XML\Text\CIV4GameText_Misc1.xml (or similar path). Note that this is a vanilla file, not a BtS one (BtS still reads this file).

Make a backup copy of the file before editing it with a simple text editor (TextWrangler if you're on a Mac). Near the top of the file, locate this:

	<TEXT>
		<Tag>TXT_KEY_GAME_WON</Tag>
		<English>%s1 has won a %s2 Victory!!!</English>
		<French>%s1 a remporté la victoire (%s2) !!!</French>
		<German>%s1 hat den Sieg in der Kategorie %s2 erzielt!!!</German>
		<Italian>%s1 ha ottenuto una vittoria %s2!!!</Italian>
		<Spanish>¡%s1 ha conseguido una victoria %s2!</Spanish>
	</TEXT>

Empty the language in which you're playing by just leaving a single space between the tags instead of the text. The "text" will still appear in-game but - as a single space - it shouldn't bother you so much!...