Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[Kaegan1950]

I have CIV4 complete. When I try to play FFH2 it keeps asking to insert the BTS disk. How do I get around this. The CIV4 disk is in the drive. I am a complete beginner so talk slow

 

[kosiosko 1]

Can you load Civ iv BTS? insert disc /play (make sure its disc one --- I've spent 1/2 hour trying with disc 2 ONCE)

if you then go to advanced / load mod/select FFH2 load

your saved games folder allows you to START save game / autosave etc from My doc.s without the disc

 

[jfooobet]

any way to change the game rules after start? I want to kill them all!

 

[Baldyr]

any way to change the game rules after start? I want to kill them all!

What "rules" do you wanna change?

If you mean custom settings you could open the World Builder and save your game as a scenario. Then open up the scenario file in Notepad and edit the custom game options. You could simply delete options you've chosen or add new ones (you can find them in CIV4GameOptionInfos.xml).

Then reload the game using World Builder, quit and continue playing.

 

[Baldyr]

I have a question about workers- I have "automated workers leave old improvements" checked, but still automated workers are obsessed with building forts on every mine, pastor and plantation I have. Why won't they leave them alone? And after some time they stay in the cities without doing anything even though there are still tiles to improve. Why don't they continue working?

I don't use Worker automation myself, but its conceivable that the Forts go up on resources outside of your cities' reach. Because, technically, a Fort is better and you still get the resource just the same (in BTS at least).

Workers being idle could be a case of all your cities already working improved tiles - so there wouldn't be any need for additional improvements - or so the AI would reason.

Also I'm really struggling with military and espionage.. I'm good at the tech race (well, at Noble ) and good at culture but I can't manage to have a decent military force.. usually my cities have a warrior or a swordsman. Then the AI come crushing in and I lose practically every city. How do the AI manage to balance it all?

How the AI does it is beyond me (as are most things mathematical ), but as a builder type player you could try and view units as a part of the cities your building. Make a rule about every city having every new unit that becomes available, and make it somewhat of a priority. (Build the new units first, only then the new building.)

When war comes you will be able to summon all those units and have an effective active defense, with mounted units for flanking and siege units for causing collateral damage on the invader. You might just win that war!

And since I don't really find espionage that important I end up getting my mines blasted or my water supplies poisoned every round. Should I train one military unit and a spy every 5 turns or something?

You don't have to run any "active" spy missions or spend any on to get a handle on the situation. You could however change the priority order of the you inevitably are allocating towards you rivals. Pick a couple of rivals and focus all or most of your on them. This is achieved in the Espionage Screen and once you get the hang of it its really easy to do.

Secondly, you could include the Spy unit into that goal about building all units in you cities as suggested above. This way every city will have an elevated chance of catching those enemy spies before they manage to do any harm. If its a low priority city you might wanna move the Spy on a strategic resource instead. Note that you can Fortify/Sleep the Spy units and don't have to do anything else to achieve this.

Thanks a lot for the quick replies But another aspect of the game I don't get is specialized cities. I don't understand how to choose them, and in the end all my cities end up pretty much the same with all the same buildings

If you know your way around the City Screen you probably should start looking at specialization. Press F1 to open Domestic Advisor and look at the columns for , , and . (Click on the title bar to sort the cities after yield.)

The cities producing most would be your top production cities and you should enhance that further by prioritizing Forges, Factories, Power Plants and the like. Also, this is where you would employ your Engineer specialists, as they would be more efficient in these cities. Your top city also gets the Iron Works national wonder.

The cities producing the most are probably your coastal cities (or riverside cities that have Cottages/Towns), and they would also produce the most and . Pick the ones producing the most as your research cities and add Library, University, Observatory and so on (and Academy given the chance). Your top producer gets the Oxford University. Scientist specialists also go in these cities. The same with the cities that produce lots of : Build Market, Grocer and Bank - and save the Wall Street for your top earner. Don't forget about running Merchant specialists instead of working unimproved tiles (or Ocean tiles).

And there you have it, your specialized empire!

 

[jfooobet]

What "rules" do you wanna change?

If you mean custom settings you could open the World Builder and save your game as a scenario. Then open up the scenario file in Notepad and edit the custom game options. You could simply delete options you've chosen or add new ones (you can find them in CIV4GameOptionInfos.xml).

Then reload the game using World Builder, quit and continue playing.

Yes, I want to turn of the % of area and population. Does this work for the Play now! game type as well?

Thank you.

 

[Baldyr]

Yes, I want to turn of the % of area and population. Does this work for the Play now! game type as well?

The victory condition for Domination? I believe so...

 

[Silu]

^ Beware though, that method (making a scenario and starting it) resets a lot of stuff as not everything is saved in the scenario file. Stuff like tile culture, diplo bonuses/penalties, GP thresholds, hammers invested in builds and beakers invested in techs are gone.

 

[dalamb]

I have CIV4 complete. When I try to play FFH2 it keeps asking to insert the BTS disk. How do I get around this. The CIV4 disk is in the drive. I am a complete beginner so talk slow

You may need to install the 3.19 patch to BtS, which removed the need to have a disk in the drive. But I thought Complete already had that.

 

[Baldyr]

^ Beware though, that method (making a scenario and starting it) resets a lot of stuff as not everything is saved in the scenario file. Stuff like tile culture, diplo bonuses/penalties, GP thresholds, hammers invested in builds and beakers invested in techs are gone.

Yeah, a very good and valid point...

edit: The best way to do it would probably be to make a scenario out of the initial autosave, and then replay the entire game with different options.

 

[DrakenKin]

Or you could be just lazy, let yourself win, then click "one more turn" and keep annihilating what's left of the enemy.

 

[jfooobet]

^ Beware though, that method (making a scenario and starting it) resets a lot of stuff as not everything is saved in the scenario file. Stuff like tile culture, diplo bonuses/penalties, GP thresholds, hammers invested in builds and beakers invested in techs are gone.

Yeah, a very good and valid point...

edit: The best way to do it would probably be to make a scenario out of the initial autosave, and then replay the entire game with different options.

aahh.. am too far into the game for that now i think, but thanks for the help both of you!

 

[jfooobet]

Or you could be just lazy, let yourself win, then click "one more turn" and keep annihilating what's left of the enemy.

hehe.. lazy tactics sounds good

 

[BrantleyL1]

When you've got an opponent that you are trying to take, and they think they are "ding just fine on our own"... How do you convince them otherwise?

Given a choice of cities to attack... would taking their capital do better than taking another city?

 

[Lord Parkin]

When you've got an opponent that you are trying to take, and they think they are "ding just fine on our own"... How do you convince them otherwise?

Given a choice of cities to attack... would taking their capital do better than taking another city?

I think that taking the capital certainly does a lot to help to convince them to vassalize (or capitulate) to you. Probably also taking larger and/or older cities helps as well, if the capital isn't easily accessible or if they're still not willing to vassalize.

However, I must admit I'm not sure of the exact mechanics of how vassals work, because I actually don't usually use them much. Personally, I prefer to conquer all of the land for myself.

 

[Silu]

When you've got an opponent that you are trying to take, and they think they are "ding just fine on our own"... How do you convince them otherwise?

Given a choice of cities to attack... would taking their capital do better than taking another city?

Have double their land, double their population, over 1.5 times their power, and bash them enough so their power is below average among all Civs (or eliminate the weakest other Civs ). Also if they have a vassal of their own that beefs their ego up a lot. Not having those things in order gives that response.

Taking the capital doesn't help by itself, except it usually has high population and culture (= potentially reducing their land area by a lot).

 

[Lord Parkin]

Have double their land, double their population, over 1.5 times their power, and bash them enough so their power is below average among all Civs (or eliminate the weakest other Civs ). Also if they have a vassal of their own that beefs their ego up a lot. Not having those things in order gives that response.

Taking the capital doesn't help by itself, except it usually has high population and culture (= potentially reducing their land area by a lot).

Ah yes, that sounds familiar. It's been forever since I've taken a vassal... probably not since the early days when I first got BTS and was trying it out for the sake of it.

 

[DrakenKin]

How are great person probabilities calculated?

Right now I have a city with no national or world wonder, just a library, granary, forge and an obelisk.

All my GP points are coming from the 3 artists specialists I have there. Yet it reports 77% chances to make a scientist, 15% for artist, and 8% for prophet.

 

[bestbrian]

How are great person probabilities calculated?

Right now I have a city with no national or world wonder, just a library, granary, forge and an obelisk.

All my GP points are coming from the 3 artists specialists I have there. Yet it reports 77% chances to make a scientist, 15% for artist, and 8% for prophet.

It means that at some point before you started running artists you were running Scientists and a Prophet.

 

[kosiosko 1]

How are great person probabilities calculated?

Right now I have a city with no national or world wonder, just a library, granary, forge and an obelisk.

All my GP points are coming from the 3 artists specialists I have there. Yet it reports 77% chances to make a scientist, 15% for artist, and 8% for prophet.

Try looking in your city each turn, mouse over the GP slider bar, you will see the changes over several turns , it soon becomes apparent how it works

your most Likely get a prohet. "MURPHY'S LAW"- if something can go wrong -IT WILL