Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[ruff_hi]

I like settling GGs in coastal cities with Dry Docks. Rolling out ships with 6XPs opens up lots of options.

 

[Live trash can]

Is a large force in your city likely to deter an enemy force from attacking that city and look for another city with fewer troops?
I am thinking Monarch dificulty level.

 

[rah]

I've emptied out a city to bait an enemy SOD towards it to open terrain to be destroyed.

 

[ArchGhost]

Is a large force in your city likely to deter an enemy force from attacking that city and look for another city with fewer troops?
I am thinking Monarch dificulty level.

In my experience, generally the answer is no. They pick a target city based on many things, such as proximity and the value of the buildings in it. Probably a lot more things. Then they direct pretty much all offensive action into a single attacking stack and push it toward the target. But the size of the garrison doesn't seem to do much to influence this targeting after the fact and they definitely don't swap targets because of stiff resistance; they almost always target the same city until they take it or lose their stack trying. It is possible for them to reform and send another stack elsewhere, but not often since they don't like to change targets, as mentioned. You can often see which city they are targeting in the diplo window as it's usually the one they want in compensation for ending the war.

A large stack in a city can deter the attack itself, depending on the unit courage of the AI attacking i.e weenies like Gandhi may park their stack next to the city but never be brave enough to attack it if the garrison is powerful (as opposed to high courage AIs like Monty or Napoleon, who will gladly suicide everything into it no matter how stupid). But it's not like they'll walk around and go elsewhere. Or at least I've never seen it.

 

[Live trash can]

But it's not like they'll walk around and go elsewhere. Or at least I've never seen it.

That's exactly what I was wondering! If they would walk past it and start causing mayhem in your territory. Thanx!

Another question popped up though: If one of your cities is captured. Does the enemy get a defense bonus from culture in that city if it is attacked? How exactly does the culture in a captured city work?

 

[AcaMetis]

When an AI captures a city for the first time it'll have 0 city culture for them, and as such no cultural defences. If someone recaptures a city they have city culture in, however, they will get whatever defensive bonus that amount of culture provides. Mind, though, that cities in revolt provide no defensive bonus no matter what, so a recaptured city might have to get out of revolt first before the cultural defence it provides comes into play. There's a threshold where a city won't go into revolt when you (re-)capture it if some percentage of the city's culture is yours, but I don't know the exact numbers/mechanics of that.

You can get cultural defences in a city you've just captured if you have a Great Artist create a great work in that city, since that'll get it out of revolt immediately and give it enough city culture for 2 or 3 border pops, but don't expect the AI to ever pull that trick on you. Likewise it's possible to get city culture in a city you don't control by using spies, and that city culture will be there if you then capture that city, but again, don't expect the AI to ever pull that trick.

 

[lymond]

Don’t ever let your cities get captured

 

[6K Man]

Don’t ever let your cities get captured

Yup.

I once thought to try the "move my stack out of my city, let the AI stack capture it, then crush the AI stack in my former city with my City Raider promoted stack" trick. Felt smart, baiting the AI into a battle on my terms.

Of course, the AI razed the city.

 

[Oblivionyx]

Yup.

I once thought to try the "move my stack out of my city, let the AI stack capture it, then crush the AI stack in my former city with my City Raider promoted stack" trick. Felt smart, baiting the AI into a battle on my terms.

Of course, the AI razed the city.

I tried that once, and it worked. It was in a mod though, so I don't think that counts.

 

[Live trash can]

Yup.

I once thought to try the "move my stack out of my city, let the AI stack capture it, then crush the AI stack in my former city with my City Raider promoted stack" trick. Felt smart, baiting the AI into a battle on my terms.

Of course, the AI razed the city.

That's hilarious

I thought there would be chance of that! But how likely is that actually to happen, on Monarch? Do you remember what civ did it?

You see I was planning on doing just that trick!

Would it be smart to choose "no city-razing"? Are there any big down-sides to it? One obvious down-side is that you cannot raze barbarian city that you capture (or is that only possible in Civ 3?)



I am glad to hear that you don't get defense bonus from enemy culture. And that's the only way it should be, really!

 

[rah]

Due to really stupid AI city placement, I refuse to play with no city-razing. Sometimes a city is so poorly placed that it's not worth keeping. Especially early in the game when you're having maintenance issues.

 

[6K Man]

That's hilarious

I thought there would be chance of that! But how likely is that actually to happen, on Monarch? Do you remember what civ did it?

You see I was planning on doing just that trick!

Would it be smart to choose "no city-razing"? Are there any big down-sides to it? One obvious down-side is that you cannot raze barbarian city that you capture (or is that only possible in Civ 3?)



I am glad to hear that you don't get defense bonus from enemy culture. And that's the only way it should be, really!

I don't remember which AI it was. One of the Greeks or Romans, perhaps. And it wasn't a huge city, which might be why the AI razed it.

City razing is a must for when you do early rushes, or you wind up owning a ton of crappy size-2 AI cities in 500 BC and crashing your economy.

 

[ArchGhost]

I once thought to try the "move my stack out of my city, let the AI stack capture it, then crush the AI stack in my former city with my City Raider promoted stack" trick. Felt smart, baiting the AI into a battle on my terms.

Of course, the AI razed the city.

This tactic is much more valid when using their cities They won't raze those very readily. Can be be especially helpful when doing stuff like mounted war offensives and you don't want to get your entire stack (that can't get defensive boni anyway) smashed by the reprisal. Snag a border city, leave a token defense to bait the stack to it, smash the stack.

There can be hiccups since they get all defensive boni back when they recapture it and might park the stack inside the city, and cultural borders spring back which can reconnect road routes that your/somebody else's border culture expansion prevented full movement when the city went down.

Due to really stupid AI city placement, I refuse to play with no city-razing. Sometimes a city is so poorly placed that it's not worth keeping. Especially early in the game when you're having maintenance issues.

I got chastised for doing this in a NC game once, lol. I don't see the point of keeping the AIs cities early on when they are really far from home, or under developed because I axe rushed them, or when I can place the city in a better spot close enough to still use all the improvements put down already. I'm bad enough at managing my own expenses because I expand too much on my own, and that's why I'm saddled comfortably in Immortal with no plans for Deity yet.

 

[sampsa]

If you need to raze a city, you should re-consider attacking it, or even re-think if starting a war is a good idea. Razing and re-settling is nearly always bad, just because settlers aren't cheap, buildings aren't cheap and every pop is worth at least 30.

 

[turbaanilegenda]

Hey, huge fan of the game here and I've been wondering if anyone knows if it's possible to play a normal custom match against AI with only one available worker unit for each civilization? Like basically a "one worker challenge" throughout the game. Thx in advance!

 

[Redcoat1]

Reinstalling Civ 4 via Steam on new PC running Windows 10. Base Civ 4 with no patch seems to run well.
But when I try to extract the files on the downloaded 3.19 zip file I get an error message. Says, " an unexpected error is keeping you from copying the files." Error 0x80004005 Unspecified error. I have installed Direct X 9 and restarted the PC.
Any suggestions on installing 3.19?
I cannot install BAT Mod til this is sorted out.
Thanks.

 

[lymond]

Reinstalling Civ 4 via Steam on new PC running Windows 10. Base Civ 4 with no patch seems to run well.
But when I try to extract the files on the downloaded 3.19 zip file I get an error message. Says, " an unexpected error is keeping you from copying the files." Error 0x80004005 Unspecified error. I have installed Direct X 9 and restarted the PC.
Any suggestions on installing 3.19?
I cannot install BAT Mod til this is sorted out.
Thanks.

Civ IV on Steam is already patched up. Do not attempt to install patches on the Steam version.

BAT, as most mods, will not work on Steam unless you run the "original_release" beta version.

 

[Redcoat1]

lymond,
Thanks for the help!!
I am now trying to add Bat Mod. Do you know where I can get the "original_release" beta version?

 

[lymond]

lymond,
Thanks for the help!!
I am now trying to add Bat Mod. Do you know where I can get the "original_release" beta version?

It's a thing you do in STeam, like with other games. Go to BTS in Steam > Right-click > Properties > Betas > Choose "original_release". Game will basically redownload.

(Deal is Steam jacked some things up with Civ IV a few years ago with the MP server transition by modifying some assets to the game for compatibility with there MP. Let's just say that did not go so well. So they released the original version as a beta)

Another recommendation is to not run BTS from the Steam Library. Run it for the executables like you did before Steam.

(Might suggest deleting that new thread..no point in it and technical this forum is really the right place for technical question, though its no big deal at all. There is actually a tech problem subforum here)

 

[f1rpo]

@turbaanilegenda: Making the Worker unit a national unit (like Missionary) should work. You'd have to set iMaxPlayerInstances to 1 (instead of -1) for UNITCLASS_WORKER in Beyond the Sword\Assets\XML\Units\CIV4UnitClassInfos.xml. You may want to backup the file first or create a mod.