Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[Lord Parkin]

4 - In Civ 3, I remember you could watch combats between AI players within your vision range. Now even though I have "Show AI moves" on, the combats don't show. Is there any way to enable that? It's very hard to make sense of foreign wars without being able to see who's killing whom.

I don't believe there is a way to watch AI to AI combat. (At least, I've never figured it out.) It isn't really much of a big deal though, in my opinion... most of the time it's fairly easy to work out what went on where anyway.

5 - I'm having trouble with the "Aggressive AI" option in Warlords. If you don't turn it on, nobody ever declares war on anybody, the game consists of 6000 years of complete peace and you're bored out of your mind. If on the other hand you do turn it on, the AIs still don't fight each other, except now some three or four of them all gang up on you at some point and you're frustrated out of your mind. Is there any way to have the AIs stop discriminating against the human player, while at the same time being aggressive, exactly like it used to be in Civ 3 (Yeah, I still like Civ 3 better so far)?

You're probably just not playing the game in the right way to encourage wars. There are many things you can do to "fix" this without bothering with Aggressive AI.

A few suggestions:
- Knock up the difficulty level. Noble is the minimum for decent AI, and if you want some serious competition and aggressiveness then you'll need to notch it up even further.
- Crowd the maps a bit more. If you're playing in wide open spaces with plenty of room, nobody's going to feel much of a need for declaring war on one another.
- Play with leaders like Montezuma and Alexander. If they don't declare war on anyone during the course of a game, I'd be very surprised.
- Keep up your military. In Civ3, it was very easy to maintain a minimalistic military while holding the AI at bay. In Civ4, that is no longer the case - if your military is significantly weaker than another civ, they'll notice you right away, and will instantly start picking on you - demanding this and that. A few turns of keeping that up and they'll eventually just take advantage and declare war anyway. (Sometimes you won't even get the warning demands first.)
- Finally, every game is different. Some seem to naturally lead to peaceful ways between most of the civs, while others end up as massive dogpiles and greedy domination. Don't think that Civ4 is "all peace" just because you've had one or two such experiences.

 

[BlueSoxSWJ]

4 - In Civ 3, I remember you could watch combats between AI players within your vision range. Now even though I have "Show AI moves" on, the combats don't show. Is there any way to enable that? It's very hard to make sense of foreign wars without being able to see who's killing whom.

5 - I'm having trouble with the "Aggressive AI" option in Warlords. If you don't turn it on, nobody ever declares war on anybody, the game consists of 6000 years of complete peace and you're bored out of your mind. If on the other hand you do turn it on, the AIs still don't fight each other, except now some three or four of them all gang up on you at some point and you're frustrated out of your mind. Is there any way to have the AIs stop discriminating against the human player, while at the same time being aggressive, exactly like it used to be in Civ 3 (Yeah, I still like Civ 3 better so far)?

My friend who's a Civ3 veteran (I'm not) had the same problem. One thing to note is religion. His problem with diplomacy turned out to be that he underestimated how important religion can be. If you anticipate being ganged up on, consider converting to the religion of a couple of the more powerful players to get them friendly with you, so you can call them in to help you if/when you get attacked.

 

[a4phantom]

Thanks for settling whether the Medic3 bonus enhances or replaces the Medic2.

When deciding how much they're willing to pay for peace, do AI's consider your diplomatic relationship or just how close you are to creaming them? For example . . . Monty and I have a great relationship. Shared religion, open borders, trade, etc. He randomly declares war on me because he's Monty. Several turns later, I've taken his capital and two other civs have declared war on him (not at my urging but because everyone hates Monty and he's already losing a war). I've razed no cities of his, so the only negative modifier on our relationship is the war. Is he going to give me more for peace or be more likely to capitulate than if we were in the same military situation, but I'd declared the war, had a different religion, razed several cities and had brought in the other civs as war allies?


Also, does every GG cost twice as many XP as the one before? Then if I am doing the math correctly (always questionable), the Imperialism trait only gives you one additional Great General. You produce your first when you would only be halfway without Imperialism, produce your second when you would produce your first, produce your third when you would produce your second, is that right?

 

[big-d-999]

Are there laptops that Civ IV will play correctly.

It seems the problem is the built in video drivers but I am not sure. We have 3 Laptops but none of the work and as far as I know I can update the video in a Laptop.

Just bought a Dell Inspiration 1501 notebook with all the upgrades available for video and memory about $899 Canadian. Loaded CiV IV and the 1.61 patch it works fine could't get it to crash.




This was very frustrating because I had just upgraded my Dell Dimension 8300 3.06 P4 Dualcore Hyperthreading 2.0gb DDR400 ram GeForce 128Mb 6600GT AGP video card because of crashes in the 20th century memory overload.

It now crashes after 5 minutes or less....

Still trying to fix or solve

Any suggestions or help would be appreciated as Civ IV is my favorite game of all.

Merry Christmas

big d

 

[a4phantom]

Just bought a Dell Inspiration 1501 notebook with all the upgrades available for video and memory about $899 Canadian. Loaded CiV IV and the 1.61 patch it works fine could't get it to crash.

Make sure all the drivers and BIOS are all updated. I eventually got my Dell Inspiron 6000 to run Civ, and I think the 1501 is identical ot the 6400, an upgrade to mine.

 

[Welnic]

...


Also, does every GG cost twice as many XP as the one before? Then if I am doing the math correctly (always questionable), the Imperialism trait only gives you one additional Great General. You produce your first when you would only be halfway without Imperialism, produce your second when you would produce your first, produce your third when you would produce your second, is that right?

The second great general costs twice as much as the first, the third cost 3 times, the fourth 4 times. I don't know if there is another bump after 10 like the regular great people have.

So if it was 50 for the first, the normal progression would be:

50, 50+100=150, 150+150=300, 300+200=500, 500+250=750, 750+300=1050

Imperialist:

25, 25+50=75, 75+75=150, 150+100=250, 250+125=375, 375+150=525, 525+175=700, 700+200=900, 900+250=1150

So it always cost half as much to get the same number of generals with Imperialistism, but you don't get twice as many generals for the same price.

 

[Roland Johansen]

The second great general costs twice as much as the first, the third cost 3 times, the fourth 4 times. I don't know if there is another bump after 10 like the regular great people have.

So if it was 50 for the first, the normal progression would be:

50, 50+100=150, 150+150=300, 300+200=500, 500+250=750, 750+300=1050

Imperialist:

25, 25+50=75, 75+75=150, 150+100=250, 250+125=375, 375+150=525, 525+175=700, 700+200=900, 900+250=1150

So it always cost half as much to get the same number of generals with Imperialistism, but you don't get twice as many generals for the same price.

You are correct (as far as I know). As a charismatic leader, you will get about square root of 2 (that's about 1.41) as many great generals as a non-charismatic leader for the same price.

(Short mathematical explanation for people who want an explanation for that number: The increase in cost of great generals is linear, therefore the original cost function is quadratic. The quadratic cost function for the non-charismatic leader is twice as large as the quadratic cost function for the charismatic leader. If you enter a number 'a' in the non-charismatic cost function, then it will give the same outcome as a number 'square root of 2 times a' will give in the charismatic cost function. It's not completely exact because the cost function is only evaluated at discrete points, you can't have square root of 2 (1.41) great generals.)

 

[Welnic]

Except it's Imperialistic, instead of Charismatic. I find that at work if I mess up an equation, I'm usually off by the square root of 2.

 

[a4phantom]

So you'll usually be one ahead of the curve, and have gotten yours early.

So you get your first GG when you'd only be 70% of the way there without Imperialistic.
When you'd have two without Imp, you still have two but are 82% of the way to your third.
When you'd otherwise have 3, you have 4 and 23% of the way to another.
When you'd otherwise have 4, you have 5 and 64% of another.
When you'd have 5 without Imperialistim, you finally jump 2 ahead.

Imperialism doesn't look so strong, if I'm doing that right.

 

[ggganz]

And except that it is 30 for the first.

 

[Lord Parkin]

So you'll usually be one ahead of the curve, and have gotten yours early.

So you get your first GG when you'd only be 70% of the way there without Imperialistic.
When you'd have two without Imp, you still have two but are 82% of the way to your third.
When you'd otherwise have 3, you have 4 and 23% of the way to another.
When you'd otherwise have 4, you have 5 and 64% of another.
When you'd have 5 without Imperialistim, you finally jump 2 ahead.

Imperialism doesn't look so strong, if I'm doing that right.

The earlier you get them, the more useful they are though. A Great General arriving on the spot a couple of turns earlier can turn the tide of what would be a lost battle, if any more time was delayed. Case in point - compare Julius and Augustus Caesar with the Praetorian strategy. Or Genghis and Kublai Khan with a Keshik/Axe/Spear/Sword strategy. You'll often find that getting those Great Generals to the fronts a couple of turns earlier can really help to turn the tide of a war, and remove a pesky AI that would otherwise be around for many more turns. The turns saved might allow you to fight before a cultural border expansion, before some extra defenders are built in the city, before some of the units have had the time to get their 25% fortify bonus... it all adds up.

If you used the same map, and played out identical strategies with each of the two different leader combo's I mentioned, you'd find that the Imperialistic ones enjoyed a slightly higher success rate.

And besides, the +50% settler production is not to be sniffed at either - that can be a very nice bonus, especially in the early game.

 

[a4phantom]

Fair enough, and the sooner you plant a great instructor the more units will come out with two promos.

 

[Rusamalia]

Hi,

I am new to Civ4, although I registered long ago, this is my first time I am actually here and reading.

I bought civ4 couple weeks ago and I patched it to the latest Vannilla patch... my questions is this:

I am playing as Saladin and I want to be the first to get to Islam, the Question, I was the first to found Hindiusm and Budhism .... I have not adopted them... because I want to get to Islam and rule Muslim State...

Does it matter? Can I adopt The First Religion I find and then the next and the next Until I get to Islam or I am only Allowed one religion....

 

[Lord Parkin]

I am playing as Saladin and I want to be the first to get to Islam, the Question, I was the first to found Hindiusm and Budhism .... I have not adopted them... because I want to get to Islam and rule Muslim State...

Does it matter? Can I adopt The First Religion I find and then the next and the next Until I get to Islam or I am only Allowed one religion....

You can switch religions as many times as you wish during a game - there is no limit. There is only a slight penalty, and that is the amount of turns that you spend in anarchy when switching religions, which can limit your production if done too often. However, this isn't even a problem for Saladin, since he's a Spiritual leader and can switch religions as many times as he likes with no anarchy penalty whatsoever.

 

[bosamar]

I got Civ4 for xmas this morning and plan to install it today. I downloaded the 1.61 patch and will load that too.

How do you recommend I get started? Should I read the entire book first or just jump straight in? Is there anything here at the Forums you recommend I read first?

I've played the previous 3 versions througout the years, but never getting past basic levels of expertise....

 

[cabert]

I got Civ4 for xmas this morning and plan to install it today. I downloaded the 1.61 patch and will load that too.

How do you recommend I get started? Should I read the entire book first or just jump straight in? Is there anything here at the Forums you recommend I read first?

I've played the previous 3 versions througout the years, but never getting past basic levels of expertise....

read the book, then "play" the tutorial then play a low level game, then read a few articles in the war academy

 

[billybgame]

I've just elevated to Prince difficulty. I'm not faring so well, and each game, my tech is going into the toilet.

I know it's hard to balance things, sometimes, when you want to cordone off neighbors with new cities, or get premo city sites, or resources. You don't want to build too many, too fast, though, or costs will get too high. I learned pretty good how to do it in Warlord difficulty.

But, now, in Prince, it's not working. I've quit two games, now, that seemed like good setups, because my tech got down into the 30% and 20% range, for a long time. I only had 6 or 7 cities, at the time, too. And, I made cottages, pretty early.

What am I missing? Do things like inflation, upkeep, etc step up as difficulty increases? Or, is it something else? And, how do you counterbalance that?

I sure don't think sticking to 4 cities for a long time, and watching your neighbors get all the resources and city sites is the way to go. So, I hope there's something I'm missing.

 

[ybbor]

Hey, jsut got warloards (unpatched), and I seem to be having unusually good combat odds (I.E. winning mulriple battles where my chance of sucess is about 1.6&#37. Is there a bug in warlords where combat odds are a little off, or am I just having unsually good luck (to counteract all my problems in )

EDIT: well my luck seems to have run out, but I'm sure Rome wille eventually fall The streak was still extremely unusual, so tjhe question stands.

EDIT2:Okay, maybe Rome won't fall. but I'm okay with that

 

[ggganz]

Hi,

I am new to Civ4, although I registered long ago, this is my first time I am actually here and reading.

I bought civ4 couple weeks ago and I patched it to the latest Vannilla patch... my questions is this:

I am playing as Saladin and I want to be the first to get to Islam, the Question, I was the first to found Hindiusm and Budhism .... I have not adopted them... because I want to get to Islam and rule Muslim State...

Does it matter? Can I adopt The First Religion I find and then the next and the next Until I get to Islam or I am only Allowed one religion....

Why do you want to have Islam so much? The effects of each religion are all the same. You just want the religion that is present in most of your cities/your most important cities.

Hey, jsut got warloards (unpatched), and I seem to be having unusually good combat odds (I.E. winning mulriple battles where my chance of sucess is about 1.6%). Is there a bug in warlords where combat odds are a little off, or am I just having unsually good luck (to counteract all my problems in )

(I am assuming that this is all just one game.) To put it into the terms I have heard it in:
All of the "luck" is determined by a number called the "random seed". Basically, the dice are thrown at the beginning of the game and stay throughuot the game. If the save exact combat values are used strength, with the same modifiers (special abiliteis, promotions, defensive bonuses), then the outcome" will always be the same. Combat works like this: There are "combat rounds" in which the strenghts and modifiers are put against each other, with the random seed in the middle, and the random seed decides which unit will win that round. That unit then kills a certain number of "hit points" that the losing unit has. The next round starts, and the process repeats until one unit loses all of its hit points, and dies, or one unit retreats. Hit points lost in one combat round do not affect the strenth of the unit for the next combat round in the same battle; you have to wait until the next unit that unit fights for the loss of hit points to take down the of that unit.

 

[Lord Parkin]

I've just elevated to Prince difficulty. I'm not faring so well, and each game, my tech is going into the toilet.

I know it's hard to balance things, sometimes, when you want to cordone off neighbors with new cities, or get premo city sites, or resources. You don't want to build too many, too fast, though, or costs will get too high. I learned pretty good how to do it in Warlord difficulty.

But, now, in Prince, it's not working. I've quit two games, now, that seemed like good setups, because my tech got down into the 30% and 20% range, for a long time. I only had 6 or 7 cities, at the time, too. And, I made cottages, pretty early.

What am I missing? Do things like inflation, upkeep, etc step up as difficulty increases? Or, is it something else? And, how do you counterbalance that?

I sure don't think sticking to 4 cities for a long time, and watching your neighbors get all the resources and city sites is the way to go. So, I hope there's something I'm missing.

It's difficult to know what might be the problem without a savegame. Things like inflation and upkeep do indeed increase on the higher difficulty levels, but the Noble-Prince jump should not be anywhere near that significant. What size are the maps you are playing on? If smaller than Standard, then 6-7 cities might be too many, and hence why you are losing so much money and having to lower the science slider so much. Are your citizens working the cottages you have built? If not, then they're not going to grow. Are your cities as large in population as happiness will allow? This will give you the maximum opportunity to enhance your commerce. Do you have a very large military sitting around and not doing much? If so, then this will be costing you a lot of gold.

But like I said, it's tricky to know what might be the problem just from what you have posted. However, I assure you that when playing a "normal" fairly peaceful Prince game, the science slider should most definitely not have to be at 20-30%, so there is certainly something going on wrong there. (In a warmonger game though, it's often common for the science slider to be this low, especially if you're keeping a lot of the cities that you capture.)