Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[Sisiutil]

Courthouses: Is it possible to build a Courthouse in a city that's too close to the Capital, such that the maintenance required for it outweighs the benefits (in other words, it's more expensive than it if hadn't been built at all).

The Tips advisor keeps telling me to build them in cities that are close to my Capital. One time, it even suggested it for the Capital itself. It does the same for the Forbidden Place and Versailles.

I almost always wait to build the FB until I establish/conquer/obtain a city on another continent (one that's far from my Capital, which it almost always is) . . . . Versailles I don't rely on as it's a race to get it.

Remember that city maintenance increases with the size of the city, so building a courthouse will eventually pay off, even in a city close to the capital. And each courthouse contributes 2 espionage points as well. Finally, if you spread a corporation to that city, the maintenance payments will be crippling without a courthouse present.

But you're correct, you get more bang for your hammers from a courthouse built in a more distant city. Don't think of it as an either/or choice, but as a matter of priorities.

 

[Ignorant Teacher]

Right, but the +1 is better than the -1 or -2 from refusing. Worthwhile if you're Spiritual... or have the Cristo Redentor... or - sometimes - if you're in a golden age.

That's true. Thanks for reminding.

 

[Ignorant Teacher]

Quick question:

I usually play on Marathon / Emperor. I was thinking of playing a couple of games on Quick due to having less time now. What difficulty do you recommend? I tried it on Noble, but it was too easy. On Emperor it's too hard.

 

[r_rolo1]

That depends a LOT of what do you want to do in the game In terms of warfare, quicker speeds tend to favour less the attacker than the defender, so if you are thinking on warfare maybe it is advisable to tone down the dificulty. OTOH culture is absurdely easy on quick, due to the imperfect scaling of the involved variables on quick.

 

[Roland Johansen]

Courthouses: Is it possible to build a Courthouse in a city that's too close to the Capital, such that the maintenance required for it outweighs the benefits (in other words, it's more expensive than it if hadn't been built at all).

In addition to Sisiutils excellent remarks, I wanted to make sure that you understand that this version of civilization doesn't have building maintenance. There are no costs associated to buildings other than the opportunity costs of not building something else that might have greater value.

Courthouses reduce city maintenance which is dependant on distance to the capital (or alternative capital), size of the city and number of cities in the empire. Next to that courthouses reduce colonial maintenance (the cost for building oversees cities) and corporation maintenance. As Sisiutil correctly remarked, these costs are often far higher than the city maintenance and make courthouses absolutely essential.

 

[Ignorant Teacher]

That depends a LOT of what do you want to do in the game In terms of warfare, quicker speeds tend to favour less the attacker than the defender, so if you are thinking on warfare maybe it is advisable to tone down the dificulty. OTOH culture is absurdely easy on quick, due to the imperfect scaling of the involved variables on quick.

Thank you. I've read TMIT's game on quick in one of the NCs (the one he shared the continent with Churchill, Mao and Hammy) this week and it's totally insane. I'll play Sid's LHC on Quick / Emperor. If I get too frustrated with the outcome, I'll play again on Marathon.

 

[dalamb]

Two minor reasons for building courthouses near a capital, albeit much less important than what Sisutil and Roland said:

1. If you need to move your capital to a better-located city, you need a minimum # courthouses to do so.
2. Similarly, you need a minimum # courthouses to build the Forbidden Palace.

It's kind of like building library/university in low-commerce cities, just to have enough to qualify for Oxford.

 

[IAM]

Courthouses near the capitol may also be useful if you lose your capitol in war. Those cities may not be near your new HQ. Not that I have lost my capitol

 

[CivIVMonger]

I am having trouble with production. I play on normal continents most of the time. It seems as though it should not take 6 turns to complete an axeman, w/ out whipping.
My cities usually don't have enough food to work out enough production. Please help me on this matter, the hammer is the one thing I would have in abundance in this game!!!

 

[IAM]

Farms, irrigation, windmills?

 

[Silv Something]

If your capital gets destroyed during war, which city become your new capital?

 

[bestbrian]

If your capital gets destroyed during war, which city become your new capital?

Ooooh, good question. I've often wondered about that.

 

[CivIVMonger]

I think it is the next largest city that becomes your new capitol?

The computer can't predict the potential of a city, only it's size.

 

[Lord Parkin]

I think it is the next largest city that becomes your new capitol?

That's correct. I'm not sure what happens if two cities are equal in size... possibly it's a random selection, or possibly it's the oldest city that gets chosen.

 

[CivIVMonger]

That's correct. I'm not sure what happens if two cities are equal in size... possibly it's a random selection, or possibly it's the oldest city that gets chosen.

I'm sure it's the oldest founded. From experiance...

 

[henrebotha]

I FREAKING FINALLY GOT CIV IV COMPLETE

Can you tell I'm excited?

Anyway, question: I'm in the middle of a Vanilla PBEM (two, in fact). If I just install the BtS 3.19 patch, does that update my Vanilla install as well, or do I have to install 1.74 separately?

 

[Roland Johansen]

I am having trouble with production. I play on normal continents most of the time. It seems as though it should not take 6 turns to complete an axeman, w/ out whipping.
My cities usually don't have enough food to work out enough production. Please help me on this matter, the hammer is the one thing I would have in abundance in this game!!!

In the very early game when you're still building axemen, your cities will not be developed well and will get most of their production from slavery whipping and forest chopping. The production from slavery whipping can be increased by getting more food (farms), a granary and using 2 pop whips so that the regrowth of the city and the end of the unhappiness period coincide better. If you don't use 2 pop whips, often your cities will regrow too quickly and you get increased stacked unhappiness if you keep whipping. Using 2 pop whips for axemen is a bit tricky as you need to do it very early in the construction process of the axeman but after it has received some hammers to avoid the production penalty. But since an axeman is only slightly more costly than a single pop whip a double pop whip will finish an axeman and almost finish the second one.

You might found one of two cities near some hills and food resources or irrigable floodplains and grassland that can get a decent production without whipping in the very early game just by using mines and farms. It takes until caste system + guilds until workshops can get a decent level of production in ever city whether it has hills or not. Before that time (and for some players even after that time) whipping is the main source of production.

Whipping becomes dramatically less productive as the city grows but cities get a far better output of commerce and production as they can use more tiles, so most players gradually move away from whipping as they let their cities grow. Whipping production gets the production bonuses from forges and organized religion and other production multipliers. It is also influenced by the negative rushing modifiers for wonders: rushing wonders is relatively expensive, you get less hammers per pop.

 

[Silv Something]

I FREAKING FINALLY GOT CIV IV COMPLETE

Can you tell I'm excited?

Anyway, question: I'm in the middle of a Vanilla PBEM (two, in fact). If I just install the BtS 3.19 patch, does that update my Vanilla install as well, or do I have to install 1.74 separately?

I don't think you will need to do any patching for Vanilla if you only playing BtS. But that's just a random guess.

And nice to see you again, henrebotha. And thanks for helping out on my Gandhi game.

P.S. you need to update your signature.

 

[ori]

installing BtS by itself will patch Vanilla to 1.74
in complete Vanilla is at 1.74, Warlords at 2.13 and BtS at 3.13 (EU-complete) or 3.17 (US-complete).

 

[jmas]

What determines 1) how long anarchy will last for a civic change and 2) that "magic" point where you can change an additional civic (at the same time) without an additional turn of anarchy? Is there a guide on this?

Example: In my current game (near completion) I won't be changing civics except in my forthcoming final golden age, because changing 1 civic will cost 3 turns of anarchy. And each additional civic I could change would incur another turn of anarchy until change #3 or #4 (I forget which). I assume this is related to my having..."acquired" a total of about 40 cities on a Standard map (with a fair amount of water). But can someone shed light on the above 2 questions?