Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[JujuLautre]

1/ The list is sooooo long I advise you to go to the BTS forum and see the post about the changes.

2/ If you've got warlords (or even only vanilla) and are not completly familiar with the game, I advise you to play without BTS at first. There are so much new features that even for the veterans it's overwhelming

3/ A city don't "need" a specialist, it's all about what you want to do with it. Amongst the main interests of specialists:
- reduce growth
- generates great people
- get beakers from constitution
- give something your city don't have (foe ex. an engineer in a production-poor city)
And some other, but they are minor.

4/ too much to say here. I advise you to lurk into the strategy forum, the strategy article forum and the war academy.

5/ This is all about how the game function please specify clearer questions

6/ On this website, in the download section

7/ Everyone is a beginner one day

 

[ggganz]

7. Is the Civilopedia good thing and how does it help me? o_o

7/ Everyone is a beginner one day

You didn't really answer his question.

The civilopedia shows you EVERYTHING in the game, every building, unit, civ, leader, wonder, everything. But, in BtS version 3.03, it crashes a lot.

 

[JujuLautre]

You didn't really answer his question.

Exact; I missed the 7th and answered directly to the 8th

 

[Cyrus_the_Great]

7. Is the Civilopedia good thing and how does it help me?

The Civilopedia is a gold mine of information. You can use it to study game concepts in general or use it to target a specific study such as terrain improvement. I like following tech links and mapping out strategies with what I learn.

On another level, the historical essays are a joy to read if you love history. I sometimes go to the Civilopedia without loading a game to play just so I can read up on some of the new civs.

To sum up, the Civilopedia can be used for many reasons and all of them will help you in some way.

 

[ggganz]

On another level, the historical essays are a joy to read if you love history. I sometimes go to the Civilopedia without loading a game to play just so I can read up on some of the new civs.

U-huh, right.

Huayna Capac. Lived 1493-1527...When his father died in 1483 and he became emperor in his own right...

And the Genghis Khan entry spells Khan "Kahn" 4 times.

 

[mike76]

Civilization IV: Quick Answers

​

Hi everyone!

In this thread, feel free to ask basic questions about Civilization IV. This should make it easier for you guys to get answers quicker, and it should also separate discussion threads from more basic questions. With time, this will make it possible for us to put together an official Civilization IV FAQ article as well. If you aren't in a rush to post any questions, make sure to read through the available information, which is likely to answer a lot of questions itself.

Just post your questions here without worrying about if it's already covered somewhere else, and hopefully some of the experts will answer them.

I encourage everyone to participate here, answering questions they can. Thanks!

HI i am a new member to civfanatics.com and I have a real beginners question. I am between PC's at this time and am planning my next purchase.
My question is, is it possible to enjoy CIV IV and all it's expansions on a MAC or should I go for a PC.
Please put aside your fanatical devotion to your own preferred format, I am after a technical response of pro's and con's more than an emotional one.

Thanks in advance for your considered opinion.

you can answer to mike76hynd@hotmail.com if you want.

Regards

Mike 76.

 

[ori]

HI i am a new member to civfanatics.com and I have a real beginners question. I am between PC's at this time and am planning my next purchase.
My question is, is it possible to enjoy CIV IV and all it's expansions on a MAC or should I go for a PC.
Please put aside your fanatical devotion to your own preferred format, I am after a technical response of pro's and con's more than an emotional one.

Thanks in advance for your considered opinion.

you can answer to mike76hynd@hotmail.com if you want.

Regards

Mike 76.

There are Mac Versions for Vanilla and Warlords - BtS is not yet released for Mac. Have a look at the Civ4 - Mac Subforum - some people seem to have had problems getting the Mac Version to run (though some Windoofs people (especially with Vista) are having problems as well).
Quite a lot of Mods need to be reworked to run on Mac - so you would probably not be able to use most of them if that is important for you.
And most importantly:
Welcome to CFC !

 

[Sisiutil]

HI i am a new member to civfanatics.com and I have a real beginners question. I am between PC's at this time and am planning my next purchase.
My question is, is it possible to enjoy CIV IV and all it's expansions on a MAC or should I go for a PC.
Please put aside your fanatical devotion to your own preferred format, I am after a technical response of pro's and con's more than an emotional one.

Thanks in advance for your considered opinion.

you can answer to mike76hynd@hotmail.com if you want.

Regards

Mike 76.

To add a little to ori's post:

I don't own a Mac, but I would say that you should only go that route if you're a patient person. From what I've seen on the net, the most common question from Mac owners regarding games is, "When will the version for the Mac be available?". As ori noted, BtS is not out for the Mac yet. It's not that it won't get there, it's just that since it's a smaller niche market, it's a lower priority; in fact, I think some software developers never even bother with Mac versions of their products. That's not going to change, it's a business reality and has nothing to do with the usual near-religious war of words over the two platforms.

So if you're the sort of person who doesn't always have to have the latest and greatest as soon as it's available, you'll probably be fine if you go the Mac route for whatever other reasons you have. But if you're the sort that lines up outside Best Buy the night before the next expansion pack is released, I think you might find Mac ownership a little frustrating in that regard.

 

[BrantleyL1]

Question about the "Heroic Epic"... Little by little, I am trying to increase my knowlege of the benefits of things in Civ. The civlopedia says that the costs of building warrior-type units is reduced (halved??) in cities with a Heroic Epic".

What is (else) required to build it? The Civlopedia says that you have to have a warrior with an experience level of 4. I have one and have built a heroic epic in at least two of my cities. Thinking that maybe he has to be present in the city, I moved him to another city (actually a couple of different ones) - but I could not build it. It was not an option, not even grayed out...

So, what am I missing??

 

[Sisiutil]

Question about the "Heroic Epic"... Little by little, I am trying to increase my knowlege of the benefits of things in Civ. The civlopedia says that the costs of building warrior-type units is reduced (halved??) in cities with a Heroic Epic".

What is (else) required to build it? The Civlopedia says that you have to have a warrior with an experience level of 4. I have one and have built a heroic epic in at least two of my cities. Thinking that maybe he has to be present in the city, I moved him to another city (actually a couple of different ones) - but I could not build it. It was not an option, not even grayed out...

So, what am I missing??

You don't have to have the Level 4 unit present in the city. In fact, the unit can be dead! So long as you got a chance to give the unit its Level 4 promotion, it qualifies. And it doesn't have to be a Warrior, it can be any military unit.

You can only build the HE in one city (it's a national wonder). A Barracks is needed in the city where you want to build it, so that may have been the issue you ran into.

 

[ggganz]

I have one and have built a heroic epic in at least two of my cities.

That's impossible.

 

[Matty R]

That's impossible.

They must have built the National Epic and Heroic Epic.

 

[Roland Johansen]

Question about the "Heroic Epic"... Little by little, I am trying to increase my knowlege of the benefits of things in Civ. The civlopedia says that the costs of building warrior-type units is reduced (halved??) in cities with a Heroic Epic".

What is (else) required to build it? The Civlopedia says that you have to have a warrior with an experience level of 4. I have one and have built a heroic epic in at least two of my cities. Thinking that maybe he has to be present in the city, I moved him to another city (actually a couple of different ones) - but I could not build it. It was not an option, not even grayed out...

So, what am I missing??

To add to all of the answers, I will describe the functionality of the National Wonder.

When you have build a Heroic Epic in a city, then that city gets a 100% production bonus when building military units. You can test it by selecting a military unit to be constructed in this city and then holding the mouse over the hammer count in front of the production bar. You'll see all kinds of production bonuses added to the production total and one of them is a 100% bonus for building military units. That bonus is from the Heroic Epic. Therefore, it is a good idea to build this wonder in a good production city.

 

[Sisiutil]

Therefore, it is a good idea to build this wonder in a good production city.

And just to add a little more, if you think naval units will be helpful (which can be map dependent), you may want to place it in a coastal city.

 

[steve malsher]

how do I get civ 4 to work with windows vista

 

[ggganz]

Welcome to the forums!!!

As far as I can tell, some people get it to work on Vista and some don't. It seems to just be a matter of luck. Maybe you should try asking this question in the Technical Support forums.

 

[GorbTheShepherd]

Trade Routes...

I don't quite understand trade routes. I've never paid much attention to the addition or limitations of trade routes through things like airports(+1), castles(+1), mercantilism(no foreign), free trade(+1/city), great lighthouse(+2), and whatever else I'm forgetting. A unique one is harbor(+50% trade route yield).

I haven't ever had a time where I was held back or noticed a gain from getting extra trade routes or losing foreign trade routes. I do understand the concept of connecting my cities to form a route for resources.

Could someone explain routes a bit to me? Thanks a lot.

 

[ggganz]

Welcome to the forums!!!

Okay, I'm not really sure about all this, but here goes.

If a city of yours is connected to another city of yours or another civ's (or multiple cities) by roads or rivers or coast/ocean then both cities can have a trade route bonus, which is just getting extra from that. You can only benifit from a fixed number of trade routes in each city and I think they will choose the most profitable that aren't already used in another city.
If your capital city is connected to another civ's capital city, they are part of your Trade Network, which means that you can trade resources via diplomacy.
Adopting Mercantillism will cancel any foreign trade routes (you can't get the bonus but still you get to trade resources).

If I am wrong about any of this can someone please correct me?

 

[JujuLautre]

you can also have trade routes with other civ's cities. These trade routes are more profitable than domestic trade routes, hence the limitation of mercantilism. The importance of trade routes is related to the size of the cities: the bigger the city, the more profitable the trade routes. The program automatically assign trade routes so that the most profitable are created (so, expect to see trade routes between the biggest of your city and the biggest of an opponent's city).

BTS adds three things:
- intercontinental trade route more beneficials
- trade routes can be blockaded
- on the foreigner advisor, in the part "informations" (I think), you have a column with the amount of commerce you gain via trade routes. This amount can be very important, so think a little bit before switching to mercantilism.

 

[Sisiutil]

That sounds about right, that's my understanding of it as well.

A while back aelf played one of his Emperor Masters' Challenges as a trade route game. This was shortly after Warlords came out and he was leveraging the new Temple of Artemis wonder (as well as building the Great Lighthouse). It was, apparently, quite powerful for the early game.

To see the power of trade routes, try this in the late game: check to ensure that practically all civs are running an economic civic that allows trade routes, including you--preferably Free Market with its +1 trade routes per city. Basically, anything but Mercantilism.

Now switch to Mercantilism and watch what happens to your GPT. (It helps if you're Spiritual or have the Cristo Redentor and can see the effects immediately.)