very new to civ

[civfour]

New member here. Just wanted to say hi. Great site you have here.
Never played Civ before. Got Civ4 as a gift last week.

Last night I started to go thru the tutorial and it got so complicated so quickly, it was just overwhelming . Felt like I should have taken notes. I never knew it was so technical. I figured it would be like the old SimCity games I used to play back in the day, boy was I wrong.

Any recommendations on simple ways to get familiar with Civ4? I just don't want to get discouraged at the start because of the complexity of the game.

I am definitely looking forward to learning the game and making it an obsession like many of you have.

 

[Suspiria]

It's fair easy to get the hang of. Use Sids Tips to help you throughout the game when you start and refer to this board for commonly asked Q & A.

Civ4 complex? If anything, i find it at times too simple and wished for a somewhat more complex game.

 

[Shigga]

Welcome!

Well, start with the lowest difficulty, a huge map and like under 10 AI to compete with you. This gives you a lot of time to grasp the basics of running your empire (gets boring once you've done that, tho). Next game, go for normal number of AI to learn the diplomacy and warmongering side of being a leader.

 

[carl corey]

If you've never played Civ before certainly start at a lower level. I've only played Civ 2 for a little while, so when I started Civ 4 I sticked with Chieftain and worked my way up. It was only when I reached Prince that I found this forum and started getting a little bit more organized and experimentative.

So don't worry. Use some of the "easy" civs and play on the lower levels and feel free to post any questions you have here. You'll probably run into interface questions pretty soon, don't be afraid to ask. Oh, and the "easy" leaders (in my opinion) are:
- Gandhi with his fast worker, Industrious trait for wonder building and Spiritual for instant change in civics when you need them (you don't have the usual Anarchy if you are Spiritual)
- Caesar: the Praetorians are probably the best Unique Unit (UU) in the entire game, and on lower levels they are the perfect tool for early wars.
- Elizabeth: Financial for increased commerce and Philosophical to give you a taste of Great People, and also the Red Coat UU that can be quite a force

Also try to choose easier maps, like Pangaea (one big continent) where you'll meet everybody early on and have enough info about them, or Terra where everyone starts on one continent and provided that you get a healthy lead you can go and settle the other all for yourself. Game speed you could go with Epic or Marathon at first, as on Normal your units get obsolete too fast and you won't be able to get the feel of each type of unit. I only played Huge, Large and Standard sized maps, but I don't think it will matter that much which of these you choose. Smaller maps may mean more decisions early on, so you'll probably want to avoid them.

Welcome and enjoy!

 

[russinmn]

Use Sids Tips to help you throughout the game when you start and refer to this board for commonly asked Q & A.

When I use Sid Tips to place a new city, is he telling me that this is an optimum location or just that no resources will appear later in the game? Also, there appears to be a restriction on placing cities too close to each other. What is that restriction? 2 spaces or something?

 

[Nestorius]

2 spaces at least between cities.

Sid's tips are recommendations, and not always the best locations.

If you get Warlords, I imagine the 'Barbarians' scenerio would be an excellent introduction to combat.

 

[carl corey]

Someone looked in the SDK and said that the city choices given by Sid's Tips don't take into account anything that is not yet discovered. So if you don't have Bronze Working yet to reveal copper it will not take future copper resources into account. Same with horses, iron, etc. I turned the Tips off after a while as I'm going with my choices which are different than Sid's most of the time. I try to group resources, settle in the middle of floodplains, block other AIs, etc. While Sid only cares about something like the best sum of food/hammers/commerce in a given area.

 

[AncientPlayer]

The best and most fun way to get familiar with Civ is to just play -- but don't take it seriously and don't even worry about finishing/winning/losing -- just play.

First time or two (no more) play at the lowest level. Then move up one level and play for awhile there. The first level is set so much to your advantage that you have to be careful not to draw too many conclusions while there. Suggest you stick with the standard game length for awhile--the slower games are (to me) more fun but will eat more hours for you to experiment.

Anyway, just try stuff and see what happens--in some ways this is the most fun of all, everything is new, fresh and fun. Start games playing very different types of leaders. Try founding lots or religions or none. Try staying peaceful, builder. Try going after everyone around you. Only after a bunch of games just trying things and getting comfortable with the mechanics would I suggest you then try a game that you think you'll pursue to a full length.

Enjoy!

 

[Pitboss]

Welcome aboard the forum & the civ world

Put you workers on automatic trough the options menu.
It'll save you some work.
And try out a pangea map as a settler.

 

[Holycannoli]

Use automated workers for a little while, while you're getting used to the basics. But don't take their example! They really don't build what's needed; seems the AI values food and high population cities above anything else.

I've found this thread invaluable; I still reference it. It tells you a lot about how to plan your cities and what improvements your workers should build. For instance, you normally won't want to build farms on floodplains especially if there's many of them in that city's cross, unless you want it to be a Great Person farm or you want population for slavery.

This game is overwhelming at first. It's much more about thinking and planning than most other games.

 

[civfour]

I played for about an hour the other day, made two cities, learned how to build workers, settlers, warriors, etc.

A few basic questions:

How do you access Sid's tips?

I noticed that I can promote my warriors from time to time. What event makes the promotion option appear? And what does promoting consume if anything?

 

[carl corey]

Promotions: They appear when your unit has reached the next "level" of experience. In the regular edition of Civ you'll have levels at 2XP, 5XP, 10XP, 17XP, 26XP, etc. Each level requires an increased amount of additional XPs, points that you can either get from the buildings and civics when you build the unit, or from battles.

When battling the barb animals you can go up to 5XP, against normal barbarians up to 10XP and then you'll have to fight against other AIs' units to gain more experience. Some promotions trigger others. There's a big sheet of paper that contains all the promotions, their prerequisites and their follow-ups. There are no other costs to promotions, unlike upgrades. You can promote just after you received the XPs for the next level, or you can wait, since there's no way to lose those XP. Waiting is useful in order to see what forces your opponent has, so that you then promote to counter those forces. No use promoting Axemen to Shock (bonus against melee units) if the enemy has Archers, for example.

Upgrades: look in the tech tree window. You'll see that some of the techs there give you access to a new type of unit. Hover over it to see what are its requirements in terms of techs and resources. Then you can upgrade your units along some lines:

- Warrior -> Axeman -> Maceman, etc.
- Archer -> Crossbowman or Longbowman -> Gunpowder units, etc.
- Chariot -> Horse Archer -> Knight -> Cavalry -> Gunship

and some others that you'll find on your own. Macemen for example require both Civil Service and Machinery, and also Iron IIRC. If you want to know more enter Civilopedia (top right hand corner) and select a unit to see to what it can be upgraded. Notice that upgrading a unit will not affect the level of the unit (a level 5 Axeman will turn into a level 5 Maceman) but it will affect the number of XP. Every time you upgrade the unit reverts to 10XP. So if you have an Axeman with 16XP it's better to use him in a battle and gain an additional XP and thus the next level before upgrading him. Also, since upgrades cost money sometimes it's more efficient to build new units then to upgrade old and unpromoted ones.

 

[Rabbit_Alex]

Welcome to the forums! I have had Civ4 ever since it came out and am just really getting the hang of it. It can take time but don't be discouraged.

You should look at the customization section of the forums and try downloading some new scenarios if you like playing them. I can't play without the SmartMap map-generator script by Surt. It lets you customize many more options than the normal map generators will allow.

You can turn on Sid's tips in the options menu. I think the tips are usually right.

Good luck and have fun!