This is the hardest series to learn

[ohmybob]

Never have i been so overwhelmed. There are just so many choices to make and things to upgrade. It's very hard to know what to do.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I think you are probably right. There are a lot of systems in there. I know people for a while talked about "Dumbing down" the series, but even if someone doesn't like how the pieces in 6 work it is not the case here.

 

[lqwertyp]

Never have i been so overwhelmed. There are just so many choices to make and things to upgrade. It's very hard to know what to do.

I feel you! It's a very steep learning curve, but it's worth it. Imo the best game from the series!
Watching some let's plays or livestreams on twitch does help a lot.

Have fun learning

 

[DeutschDachs]

God help you if you ever try playing a Paradox game!

But yeah Civilization must be rather difficult to learn as a brand new game. I'm lucky I had my dad to help back with Civ II

 

[Softly]

Don't let it overwhelm you. I would suggest ignoring certain systems like religion, tourism and diplomacy on your first few playthroughs. If you are playing on King or lower you should have no problem keeping up with the AI even if you don't have a full grasp of the game yet. The mere fact that you know to escort your settlers and place your campus district near mountains puts you miles ahead of the AI in this game.

 

[ohmybob]

even stuff like when to declare war and all that is hard to know. The guides for these games are like novels...

 

[iammaxhailme]

I tried jumping from Civ to CK2 and EU4 a while ago. It didn't go well.
Civ is easy by comparison

 

[TheMeInTeam]

God help you if you ever try playing a Paradox game!

But yeah Civilization must be rather difficult to learn as a brand new game. I'm lucky I had my dad to help back with Civ II

Pdox and Firaxis share the complete nonsense practice of not actually ensuring their games state the rules consistently. That creates an artificial barrier to learning that should not exist. It's not respectable practice in a strategy game.

The complexity would be there w/o the shenanigans like "sometimes a unit is greyed out, sometimes it just won't appear" or "how much WW does this give me and how does that translate to amenities needed in 10 turns" being something you can't just see in game.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Yea Civopedia, more like Civowiki. :S

 

[ZubieMaster]

I know people for a while talked about "Dumbing down" the series, but even if someone doesn't like how the pieces in 6 work it is not the case here.

I think people meant "dumbed-down" just in the sense of the actual game challenge (that it's a lot easier to win at the highest level). Certainly there's plenty of bells & whistles to more than please the sandbox & SimCiv crowd. I think all can agree it's really entertaining, rich & complex if you play in those modes. The "dumbed-down" is not meant to offend, just some players view it as despite all the initially overwhelming choices and new systems of complexity, they don't add up to a bigger challenge to win, for those that prefer to play in that mode.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I think people meant "dumbed-down" just in the sense of the actual game challenge (that it's a lot easier to win at the highest level). Certainly there's plenty of bells & whistles to more than please the sandbox & SimCiv crowd. I think all can agree it's really entertaining, rich & complex if you play in those modes. The "dumbed-down" is not meant to offend, just some players view it as despite all the initially overwhelming choices and new systems of complexity, they don't add up to a bigger challenge to win, for those that prefer to play in that mode.

I saw it most during the initial period of Civ V that was a little . . . minimalist in its rules.

 

[Civlearner]

I recommend the you tube channel quill18 although he plays on deity most of the time there is a small series called Civ 6 for absolute beginners it helped me quite a bit and also the tips and references section on here. I struggled initially but am getting better so don’t lose hope.

 

[Disgustipated]

If you play a low enough level it isn't too bad. But some of the mechanics in Civ4 could be difficult too if you really wanted to master the game. I never did do a lot of specialist manipulation to get certain great people. I couldn't be bothered to learn the system, and that much micromanagement isn't fun for me. Corporations I eventually learned how they work, but in the beginning I just sort of winged it. Civ4 is still a more difficult game, especially if you want to play peacefully.

 

[UWHabs]

Not hints for winning at Deity, but at least for getting a basic gameplay going:
-You want every city to contribute to you winning. It's pretty useless to put a city in a horrible spot and not do anything to help it. But you also don't want to spend a ton of effort on a marginal gain.
-Remember that cities will not work every tile. That means that you don't need to put cities at a "max" distance from each other, but can pack them in a little closer. You also don't need improvements on every tile, either!
-Chopping is your friend. A simple beginner's guide should really be "chop every non-river forest and every jungle", and right there you're probably 50% of the way towards winning
-Generally speaking, feel free to take a very limited view to your actions. Your science is falling behind your culture? Build a campus/library. Running out of money? Commerce hub, or next time you choose a trade route send it to a city-state instead of an internal route. Running into the housing cap in your city? Build a granary. Low on amenities? Build an entertainment complex. Or even simpler, just place whatever district has the highest bonus available. You have a spot for a +3 industrial zone? Just take it
-Make sure you are ready in case an AI declares war on you. It can be as simple as keeping a couple archers around that you can quickly upgrade, or even just having enough cash/faith available to rush a couple units.
-When placing districts, place commerce hubs on rivers, campus/holy site next to mountains, and harbors next to the city centre, ideally adjacent to at least one seafood resource too. Try to place for the best adjacency that you can early, but later in the game, don't worry about that nearly as much. If you're pulling in 100 science per turn, the difference between a +1 campus and a +2 campus is basically a rounding error. The exception is that now getting a +3 or higher campus gives a bigger bonus to buildings if running the cards.
-Think in triangles: Farm triangles are the simplest way to get the food bonuses as you move along the tech tree, and district triangles get increased bonuses too.
-When fighting, bring twice as much range/siege units as you think you need, and half as many melee units.
-Don't be afraid to declare war and not immediately advance on an enemy. My current game I declared on Scythia, and despite me being way ahead in tech, I started moving in towards her city. But then she came back at me with a ton of archers and horsemen, and actually managed to pick off a couple of my advancing crossbows. Sometimes it can pay off to declare way, take a cheap city on the border, and then wait for their army to advance on you. Once you kill their first wave of units, they don't usually come with many more, so at that point you can be a little more aggressive.

The true Deity players would disagree with a lot of what I said here, I'm sure. But if you follow these simple rules, it should work well enough. And just remember, if in doubt, build a campus. Too much science is never a problem

 

[Bad Wolf]

Just play and Prince and you should be fine. The AI isn't very good so you don't need to worry about them steamrolling you.

If you feel overwhelmed by all the choices, impose some limits on yourself. You need to specialize your cities, since most cities will only be building one or two districts at least early on; this significantly cuts down on the number of building choices you have to make. Generally speaking you want at least one production city (build an industrial zone), a gold city (build a commercial hub), and most importantly a science city (build a campus); there can be overlap but you definitely need to have all of these bases covered. Religion cities (holy site) and culture cities (theater square) are nice but optional especially if you're not going for a culture victory. If you're playing on a map with a significant amount of ocean it's nice to have a port or two as well.

For your production city you'll want a lot of hills, and preferably plains. The science city should be near mountains or jungle if possible. The gold city can go anywhere.

Go for a science or domination victory to start with - they're the most straightforward. One just involves winning or at least keeping up in the science race (which you should always be trying to do no matter what type of game you're playing, especially on harder difficulties) and the other can happen almost by accident if you go on a conquering spree.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

If you play a low enough level it isn't too bad. But some of the mechanics in Civ4 could be difficult too if you really wanted to master the game. I never did do a lot of specialist manipulation to get certain great people. I couldn't be bothered to learn the system, and that much micromanagement isn't fun for me. Corporations I eventually learned how they work, but in the beginning I just sort of winged it. Civ4 is still a more difficult game, especially if you want to play peacefully.

I'm not sure. I feel like I could manage CivIV deity a bit more, and like you I'm not much of a micromanager.

But I was thinking more about the number of things going on, not difficulty in getting a win. For example, even if we have issues with how they work (or how important they are), systems such as religion or civics were but a skeleton compared to what's going on now.

 

[Stringer1313]

Just play and Prince and you should be fine. The AI isn't very good so you don't need to worry about them steamrolling you.

If you feel overwhelmed by all the choices, impose some limits on yourself. You need to specialize your cities, since most cities will only be building one or two districts at least early on; this significantly cuts down on the number of building choices you have to make. Generally speaking you want at least one production city (build an industrial zone), a gold city (build a commercial hub), and most importantly a science city (build a campus); there can be overlap but you definitely need to have all of these bases covered. Religion cities (holy site) and culture cities (theater square) are nice but optional especially if you're not going for a culture victory. If you're playing on a map with a significant amount of ocean it's nice to have a port or two as well.

For your production city you'll want a lot of hills, and preferably plains. The science city should be near mountains or jungle if possible. The gold city can go anywhere.

Go for a science or domination victory to start with - they're the most straightforward. One just involves winning or at least keeping up in the science race (which you should always be trying to do no matter what type of game you're playing, especially on harder difficulties) and the other can happen almost by accident if you go on a conquering spree.

I would not even worry about specializing cities. Pick an easy AI level and just have fun with it, roleplay, build whatever you feel like building and sounds cool.

And yes, paradox games are a nightmare compared to this (which is why I don't play them)

 

[ferretbacon]

Just play and Prince and you should be fine. The AI isn't very good so you don't need to worry about them steamrolling you.

I'm not claiming that the AI is a genius now, but it's definitely perked up with the R&F patch. Combine that with being a new player struggling to learn the systems, and I would not recommend Prince.

Definitely try one of the three lowest difficulties, pick a simple/straightforward civ that's easy to understand the bonuses of (Greece, Rome, Germany, Japan, or Russia are probably good in this regard), and focus mostly on surviving and getting your cities to work efficiently rather than gunning after a victory condition.

Like others have suggested, watch some Let's Plays on YouTube, catch a livestream, or look up guides to learn more.

 

[Bad Wolf]

Haven't played R&F yet so I can't attest to this. But yes, Rome is probably the best beginner civ - free roads, free monuments, powerful early unique unit that stays useful for a long time (until gunpowder), and pretty nice unique district as well; all of its bonuses are very straightforward and easy to understand, and they kick in from turn 1.

 

[Very Mad Max]

I beg to differ. Civ 4 was easy to pick up, but very hard to master. Civ 6 has very simple mechanics when you actually play while it may seem advanced on paper.