Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[TheRealBitter]

What does the green/grey/red background behind the number next to a city mean?



Bitter.

 

[Gwynnja]

another AP question: do I lose the hammer bonus if I switch to free religion?

 

[JujuLautre]

What does the green/grey/red background behind the number next to a city mean?

Where exactly and in which screen?

another AP question: do I lose the hammer bonus if I switch to free religion?

Yes

 

[Lord Parkin]

In single player games, the option of becoming a vassal is only open to the AI and not to a human player. I guess that means that it isn't available to human players in multiplayer either. The code to become a vassal as a human player just isn't in the game.

No, human players can most certainly become each others' vassals. The only disallowed option is for human players to become the vassals of AI players.

 

[RulerOfDaPeople]

I think what the OP was getting at was that you're rampaging through the master's lands. So I agree, it makes sense if:

1. The vassal capitulated to its master (i.e. it wasn't a voluntary vassalization);
2. The vassal is anywhere from "Furious" to "Cautious" with its master;
3. You damage the master to such an extent that the vassal is able to break free;

Then yes, you should at least earn a diplomatic bonus with the former vassal for "Liberating" them.

But no, to the best of my knowledge, it's not in the game. Which is too bad.

Yes, that is exactly what I meant. Thank you for explaining it better than I did.

 

[ocram000]

Hi everyone, i am new to Civ 4 and have very little experience with Civ 3.
What i do rememeber was that in Civ 3 when you opened the city menu there was a button i think in the shape of an eye that let you view your city like the actual buildings and everything.

My question is, is this still possible in Civ 4 because i cant seem to find a way to do that in Civ 4?

 

[JujuLautre]

There is no such option anymore in CIV. But you can view the building on the main screen, by zooming on the city.

And welcome to cfc

 

[Gothfather]

I seem to have done something to the game so that resourses and improvements like farms or mines even villages do not show up on the map. I can't see forest either.

I have search through options and the manual trying to figure out what i changed to cause this problem. I must be missing something I know when the game first came out I could see these objects on the map. I stopped playing for ages because I had issues with teh game crashing in 1.00.

I was cleaning up files on my computer when i found the firaxis folder and realised I never uninstalled the game so I search for any patches and found one then started the game up. No stability problem now but now I can't see tile improvents and resources.

Anyone got some help for me?

Ta.

 

[ChazFox]

No, human players can most certainly become each others' vassals. The only disallowed option is for human players to become the vassals of AI players.

Thanks for letting me know Now I at least have a last resort if an opponent declares war on me and proceeds to wipe the floor with me Or is it the attacking Civ's choice whether or not to capitulate me? I suppose if I pleaded with an opponent to stop attacking in exchange for capitulating my Civ, that might work

 

[TheRealBitter]

Where exactly and in which screen?

On any screen where you see the city, the name of it, and what it is building. TO the left is a number in a circle (or star), and behind the number is a color. red, green, or grey. what do those colors stand for?



Bitter.

 

[Sisiutil]

I seem to have done something to the game so that resourses and improvements like farms or mines even villages do not show up on the map. I can't see forest either.

I have search through options and the manual trying to figure out what i changed to cause this problem. I must be missing something I know when the game first came out I could see these objects on the map. I stopped playing for ages because I had issues with teh game crashing in 1.00.

I was cleaning up files on my computer when i found the firaxis folder and realised I never uninstalled the game so I search for any patches and found one then started the game up. No stability problem now but now I can't see tile improvents and resources.

Anyone got some help for me?

Ta.

You may want to post this in the tech support forum, along with details about your computer. I had problems like this initially too, and had to upgrade my RAM (to 1 GB) and video card (to one with 128 MB video RAM) to get the game working.

 

[Crowqueen]

I disagree with the "always a chance of failure" part - as I recall, there's a 100% chance of success if the city has no religions already present in it.

But the chance is there if there are. You are right but one should be aware that unless you can't spread the religion there - ie the other player has Theocracy and a different religion to you - the symbol is always illuminated but that in certain circumstances you fail to spread it because of already existing religions.

 

[Crowqueen]

On any screen where you see the city, the name of it, and what it is building. TO the left is a number in a circle (or star), and behind the number is a color. red, green, or grey. what do those colors stand for?

Red: City is starving (uses more food than it can produce or acquire. When it uses up its resources, it will shrink to the next size down; i.e a starving city of size 10 will eventually become size 9. I'm not sure what variables govern what happens next, but in my games they usually become stagnant after that. I play on low levels (chieftain) so I don't know whether it becomes harder at higher levels to keep a city from starving itself completely down to size 1.)
Grey: City is stagnant (uses as much food as it produces/acquires)
Green: City is growing (uses less food than it produces or acquires, and thereby has a surplus contributing to further growth).

 

[TheRealBitter]

Red: City is starving (uses more food than it can produce or acquire. When it uses up its resources, it will shrink to the next size down; i.e a starving city of size 10 will eventually become size 9. I'm not sure what variables govern what happens next, but in my games they usually become stagnant after that. I play on low levels (chieftain) so I don't know whether it becomes harder at higher levels to keep a city from starving itself completely down to size 1.)
Grey: City is stagnant (uses as much food as it produces/acquires)
Green: City is growing (uses less food than it produces or acquires, and thereby has a surplus contributing to further growth).

Thank you very much. What would you suggest I do to keep cities in green?



Bitter.

 

[Sisiutil]

Thank you very much. What would you suggest I do to keep cities in green?



Bitter.

First off, when founding any city, check its food production capabilities carefully; if necessary, adjust the city's location to ensure it will have enough food to grow to the needed size.

Once the city is founded, to keep the city growing, increase food production in the city's fat cross. Reassign citizens from low-food tiles (or from working as specialists) to high-food tiles, convert some tiles to farms or windmills, replace workshops with other tile improvements that don't reduce the food output of the tile. Beeline to Civil Service to spread irrigation so you can farm tiles not adjacent to water. Beeline to Biology to increase the output of all farms. Later in the game, spread food-increasing corporations like Sid's Sushi or Cereal Mills to that city.

Also keep an eye on health, as this will limit your growth or even put the city into starvation if it gets bad enough.

 

[kev_philliskirk]

Hi
Can anyone help
I have been bought the game for my birthday and have tried playing it only it crashes aftre a while I think thats because I have windows Vista is there anything I can download to sort this or shoul I just take the game back to the shop
Thanks
Kev

 

[TheRealBitter]

First off, when founding any city, check its food production capabilities carefully; if necessary, adjust the city's location to ensure it will have enough food to grow to the needed size.

Once the city is founded, to keep the city growing, increase food production in the city's fat cross. Reassign citizens from low-food tiles (or from working as specialists) to high-food tiles, convert some tiles to farms or windmills, replace workshops with other tile improvements that don't reduce the food output of the tile. Beeline to Civil Service to spread irrigation so you can farm tiles not adjacent to water. Beeline to Biology to increase the output of all farms. Later in the game, spread food-increasing corporations like Sid's Sushi or Cereal Mills to that city.

Also keep an eye on health, as this will limit your growth or even put the city into starvation if it gets bad enough.

Sorry, I am extremely new to this game, and it is all greek to me, haha. How can I spread irrigation, reassign citizens, and build cereal mills? I am playing on chieftain and I finished a game and got a time victory, but I just feel like continuing.



Bitter.

 

[ggganz]

Spread irrigation:

Farms produce extra food on those tiles. Build them with workers. They need to be "irrigated", near a fresh water source like a river or small lake. Once you have Civil Service, farms "spread" irrigation, so that tiles next to farms have fresh water, even if they wouldn't without the farm. With Biology, you don't need irrigataion.


Reassign citizens:

double click on a city and each white tile is being "worked" by a citizen. The number of population determines how many tiles can be worked. The center is always worked. Click a circle to remove it, then click another tile to move the circle there.


Cereal Mills:

You may not have the Beyond the Sword expansion, and if you don't, you can't do that. But if you do, you mush research the required techs for Cereal Mills, then get a great person that can build that corporation. They spread similarly to religions, and they cost extra maintanance to be in your cities. They give other benefits, like one corporation turns corn into oil. You can find out more about corporations in the civilopedia probably.

 

[Roland Johansen]

Hi
Can anyone help
I have been bought the game for my birthday and have tried playing it only it crashes aftre a while I think thats because I have windows Vista is there anything I can download to sort this or shoul I just take the game back to the shop
Thanks
Kev

Vista shouldn't stop you from playing this game, the game works with Vista. If the game only crashes after a while, then it could be that your system is a bit weak for the game. But that's not a certainty, there could also be other problems. But Vista does tend to require more system memory and such leaving less for games.

The best way to get help for technical problems with the game is to ask your question in the Technical Support forum. Note that some problems which occur regularly are already mentioned in the top sticky threads. It seems that many players who run Vista get into trouble because they haven't installed the latest directx which is mentioned in the first sticky of that forum. Maybe that's your problem.

Oh, and welcome to civfanatics!

 

[TheRealBitter]

Hi
Can anyone help
I have been bought the game for my birthday and have tried playing it only it crashes aftre a while I think thats because I have windows Vista is there anything I can download to sort this or shoul I just take the game back to the shop
Thanks
Kev

I am using Windows Vista and it is running just fine. I don't believe Vista is what is causing the problem. Check if you have all updates possibly.
And welcome to Civ Fanatics!



Bitter.