View Full Version : Civ4 Q&A thread
Shabbaman
03-11-2005, 13:52
Especially for n00bs and the like ;) a thread for all your short questions!
Perhaps our esteemed admins could make a subforum if this thread fills up too quickly.
How the hell do you rush things with cash in this game?
What techs and where do you find the button to do so?
erm, cant really answer the question, but I did wonder the same thing. I suspect you need a tech/civic state before you can cash rush (like in Civ3, you need an appr. government) but I dont know if that's correct. Mostly because I never read manuals. :)
thanks for the answer [hmm] I guess [mischief]
barbu1977
03-11-2005, 15:32
I think you need slavery civics before being able to pop-rush.
true... I'm looking for cash rush though
Shabbaman
03-11-2005, 16:49
If you want to rush with gold, you need the civic Universal Sufferage. This comes with democracy. A tip: take a look in the civics screen and look what the differences are.
Wow that takes quite a while to get to then !
I appreciate the help though
Shabbaman
03-11-2005, 17:33
Indeed. It's even "after" nationalism this time! But the pyramids unlocks all civics, so if you really want to...
You can speed up your production with engineers as well. You need a forge (also increases production) which comes with metal casting, right after bronze working. So there's a way to increase production way before the industrial revolution.
Kemal was a beta tester for cIV? Wow. was that cool?
bed_head7
04-11-2005, 04:14
quote:Originally posted by Mistfit
Kemal was a beta tester for cIV? Wow. was that cool?
Where did that come from?
Ginger_Ale
04-11-2005, 13:34
I asked for a list of beta testers @ CFC and Civrules posted: [url=http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=3235123&postcount=12]
Congrats Kemal.
Anyways, any of you can answer this question: WHEN WILL AMAZON SHIP WHAT I PREORDERED 2 WEEKS AGO??
Melifluous
04-11-2005, 13:56
I have the games now on DVD.
However its asking me to insert the correct CD to run??!?!?!
Tech Support says to insert Disk 1 [lol]
Will their stuff ever work? ITS ON 1 FUCKIN DVD YOU IDIOTS!!
Deodorant anyone?
Melifluous
I have a question: is the only advantage of spawning a religion that you don't have fog of war in the cities with that religion? The advantage of that is strategic/military, which is rather opposite to that AI being nicer to you when you have the same religion, isn't it?
Secondly, the more religions you have in a city, the more temples, monastries and cathedrals you can build. So isn't it a good thing to have as many religions in as many cities as possible?
Thirdly, you don't have to pay maintenance for buildings?!
Fourthly, why would you want another civ to take over your civic? What's the tactic in that?
killercane
05-11-2005, 17:36
1. Once you have the shrine built, every city in the world that has your religion contributes gold to your economy. I think its 1 gpt per city but not sure.
2. I think so, especially when you can change to the Free Religion civic later on.
3. Maintenance is calculated by distance from the capitol, and number of cities you possess. Buildings are essentially free.
4. Better relationships is the only thing I know.
Don't forget that if you possess the holy city and have the shrine for that religion built, every city with that religion in the entire world will get you +1 gold to your income via the shrine. Also, the AI will sooner convert to the religion you have been spreading in its cities because it has more cities with that religion that way, giving you the friendship bonus and thus better trading options.
True, except that if an AI has a shrine, it will get money from your cities as well with that religion. On the other hand, in free religion, with a lot of religions present in a city, the happiness bonus can get quite big. Plus, there are the religious buildings, as you pointed out.
You don't pay maintenance for buildings, only for cities and units.
Having a civ take on other civics can be quite potent, it could for example destroy a large relationship bonus it has with another 3rd party civ because of "you have chosen your civics wisely" bonus, thus weakening relations between those 2 civs. But also, some empires are profiting more from certain civics than others, having the AI change civics can seriously hamper or encourage their development (and even your own). A good example would be having a civ adopt mercantilism, which (iirc) prevents all foreign trade routes, meaning every other civ gets hit commercially because it loses trade routes with that civ.
Anybody have a clue how to disband a city??? (my manual is still at the office [cry])
Thanks for the answers on my questions. It does make me wonder how the difference will be between AI and humans in tactics, since humans don't care whether they have the same religion or civic as you. It still matters of course, but differently.
Markstar
06-11-2005, 11:15
quote:Originally posted by ProPain
Anybody have a clue how to disband a city??? (my manual is still at the office [cry])
Yep, I was wondering about that, too, and I even had the manual right in front of me (I stopped playing after a couple of hours because, well, it sucks. Constant crashes [bosd] and slooooow game [whatsthis with a 3800+ PC is just not appealing to me). :([mad2][mad][rant][saiyan]
I already ranted at CFC http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=136983 so I'll spare you this time except this: How this game could have been released (after internal testing, feedback from betatesters) is beyond me. Some nice ideas but SO many things just simply screwed up it is unbelievable, even for a pessimist like me (if you remember my pessimistic expectations before cIV was released). Worst of all it all the gaming sites that hailed the game. I will henceforth NEVER trust in a magazine again and play a demo/copy (you can rent computer games here for 1.25€/day) before even thinking of buying it. Sad world, really. [sad]
Cities cannot be disbanded once they are built. Only way to get rid of cities permanently is razing on capture, iirc.
Shabbaman
06-11-2005, 12:55
quote:Originally posted by MarkstarHow this game could have been released (after internal testing, feedback from betatesters) is beyond me.
Is that a question? ;) I have really no problems at all running the game. The problems do sound very familiar, initially I couldn't get battlefield2 to run stable. Apparently BF2 has some issues with nvidia cards, whereas civ4 has issues with ATI cards. Adding a lot of RAM and increasing the page file helped a lot as well for playing larger maps. Note that the minimum system reqs might be the absolute minimum for playing the tiniest, ugliest and slowest map possible.
It's impossible to test every combination of hardware. These days it's common practice to release something and then let the public betatest it again for some time. Compared to EA games Firaxis is really fast with new patches, if it is of any condolance.
On a more serious note, let's keep this thread for QUESTIONS.
P.S. Unable to disband cities sucks, I want to get rid of those tiny useless crappy cities that flipped to me!
Once in Slavery civics, how do you whip cities ? Please !
That (translated) manual is totally unreadable...
Shabbaman
06-11-2005, 13:47
I haven't tried it yet, but I know that in the lower left of the city screen there are several rush options available.
Not being able to disband a city is a serious problem imo. I suppose this is done to prevent some 'abusive' strategies but I think disallowing abondement as a while is a measure out of proportion.
Not really Q&A but some things I found out the hard way:
- irrigation spreads through farms but only when the connection to the fresh water source is intact. I could build a new farm next to an old one after disconnecting the original farm next to the river. Not sure if this is a bug or a feature, for sure it is different than Civ 3.
- desert can't be irrigated. Damn annoying as well, especially when you cant disband cities. So no option to 'irrigate-jump' a hill or desert by building a temporary city. [cry]
- I experienced a lot of crashes in wonder sequences and battle zoom. Disabling the movies in the ini file and the battle zoom in the options worked wonders.
- The tech tree is confusing imo. Pottery needs the wheel, but there's no line between them, they're just positioned on the same height.
- When I read the civpedia about religion I thought that you can see all cities that follow the religions that you own the holy cities of. Apparently that only works for the religion that is your state religion and you own the holy city of as well.
As for the tech tree, don't forget that mandatory tech requirements are noted in the upper right corner of the tech they are required for, via a little tech icon. You always need those techs in the upper right corner to research that tech, whereas the lines, iirc, indicate that the tech the line comes from "leads to" a "new tech" (you only need to possess one tech of those that have an arrow leading to the "new tech" to research that new tech, not *all* the techs that have arrows pointing to this "new tech").
Socrates
06-11-2005, 14:50
quote:Originally posted by DavidC
That (translated) manual is totally unreadable...
I think I'm entering the world of games-in-English users. ;) Still, I'm surprised you got the game in French (manual and tech tree), or am I missing something ? You have Civ3 in English if I'm not mistaken.
It's funny, it seems I know the game better than some people here (at least on some features, like the required techs which made PP wonder about it), despite not having purchased it yet. I guess I have too much time reading the forums on my hand. [blush]
I never read fora or manuals beforehand. I believe in learning by doing.
Also I believe that advisor screens like a tech tree should be made in a way they can be understood intuitively.
Socrates
06-11-2005, 15:29
I don't believe in anything. It just occurs to me that you can learn the game by both playing it yourself and reading the forums or the manual. So I do both. :)
quote:Originally posted by ProPain
- irrigation spreads through farms but only when the connection to the fresh water source is intact. I could build a new farm next to an old one after disconnecting the original farm next to the river.
So, which one is it?
quote:Originally posted by ProPain
- desert can't be irrigated. Damn annoying as well, especially when you cant disband cities. So no option to 'irrigate-jump' a hill or desert by building a temporary city. [cry]
That's just a matter of getting used to. Desert is now as useless as tundra is in both Civ3 and 4.
quote:Originally posted by ProPain
- The tech tree is confusing imo. Pottery needs the wheel, but there's no line between them, they're just positioned on the same height.
I agree! There's a tech tree screenshot on CFC where they added the lines of alternative paths; they should've used that. The icons in the upper right corner are not distinctive enough.
barbu1977
06-11-2005, 16:07
quote:Originally posted by DavidC
Once in Slavery civics, how do you whip cities ? Please !
That (translated) manual is totally unreadable...
Right under de draft button in the city screen.
quote:Originally posted by Matrix
quote:Originally posted by ProPain
- irrigation spreads through farms but only when the connection to the fresh water source is intact. I could build a new farm next to an old one after disconnecting the original farm next to the river.
So, which one is it?
I got it now. You can only build a farm when connected to irrigation (connected to water directly via other farms after researching Civil Service). But all the farms you disconnect from a water source won't work anymore! Well, it does make sense. :)
I have to choose between using my only source of stone with a mine, or irrigate it, so that the backland (plains) has water. :(
I have the same with my marble source
The only way to get rid of a city apparently is to gift it to an AI and then declare war and raze the city.
I'm again completely puzzled as to how corruption works. It is there and it is very high on higher difficulty. Very notable on Monarch. Have not tried anything above that yet.
Reading the fora now is pretty much useless since the only thing that the articles do is just retype what is in the manual and poster with tech tree. The only exception seems to be Arathorn's/BomberEscort article on combat mechanics. There is already a calculator online made by some Russia guy (apparently Gramphos).
Actually, the manual is rather unreadable in English as well. It is a very boring read. I've felt asleep yesterday trying to get through the worker actions. But it seems to be rather comprehensive so far.
Just curious. Don't you find that the game is a hybrid of civ2 coupled with TAM mod? Or course, there are huge new features, especially religion. But overall it all looks more like civ2/TAM mod in terms of gameplay.
Also, early development seems to really even more important than in civ3 (unlike civ2). Seems that having some bonus food and good terrain on start is critical. I've never abandoned any start in civ2. Here, I mean in civ4, some locations are completely unplayable. Also, seems that the map generator tries to be more gentle with the human player. I've noticed AIs are sometimes given complete wasteland as a starting location. Anyone else noticed this?
I'm playing a monarch game atm, but apart from 2 very quick and short starts that were meant to get some feel for basic gameplay I didndt play anything.
Monarch is still pretty easy though.
Lt. Killer M
07-11-2005, 11:43
hm, I am so far stumped by a few things, but I always try to get as many religions as possible and that seems to help a lot with upkeep, due to the gold I earn.
Kingreno
07-11-2005, 19:33
My expansion rocks even on higher levels. Problem is cash. Seem to get broke way too fast.
Lt. Killer M
07-11-2005, 20:00
KR, build many hamlets, and also see that religion brings you cash. I always go Hinduism and start it ASAP, build a temple ASAP, this spreads Hindu far and wide. 1st religious leader rushes the Hindu Religious wonder - atm, e.g., I have a game on earth where I earn around 17/turn only by paying cities from other civs! All but Persia have Hindu as state religion, too, btw.
Kingreno
07-11-2005, 22:39
My game crashes when I build a wonder, so I've avoided them...way to win now seems to chop all the forests and build a huge mili. Some forests generate 40+ hamers! I could beat Emperor if it weren't for not having wonders.
@KR, the wonder crash most likely is caused because of the wonder movie.
How you guys handle tech trading with the AI?
@KR like BEam says, it most likely the wonders movies, those were killing my laptop as well. Go to the ini file and look for the disable wondermovies setting (or something) and set it to 1
Lt. Killer M
08-11-2005, 08:05
KR: I have had forests give up to 79 hammers - or more, I usually do not look. 79 is just the highest I saw.
as for the wonder movies: beam and PP are probably correct! When I build one, the screen turns 'mashed picture' for a second, then plays the vid correctly. but the short interval of weird display shows there is something fishy. Maybe wrong codec or so - I often think #oh, shit, it will crash' (but it always works).
Pastorius
08-11-2005, 08:28
hm. if firaxis are still using the bink codek, that particular stuff is available for free on the creator's website.
dont remember the site, but google for bink and smacker. IIRC.
also, you could try to reduce hardware acceleration. screen properties -> advanced tab -> a slider which I cant rememeber the name of
I tried that when warcraft 3 was acting up. Of course, I also tried to update my vidcarddriver, which worked even better, so it might not be that this solution would help with anything. at all.
Melifluous
08-11-2005, 13:27
HOW DO YOU DISBAND A CITY!!! [rant]
Melifluous
You cant. Other than by gifting it then retaking it.
Melifluous
08-11-2005, 14:49
Now thats just dumb.
Ok next hint then, seeing as Maintenance is based on distance from capital dont ever take a city far from home. The maintenance costs are sodding crippling.
Melifluous
digger760
08-11-2005, 15:22
I notice worker options for build mine and chop forest is ~7 turns but chop forest alone is 4 turns. Does that mean if i choose to build the mie, does than mean i get the forest chop after 3 turns?
And I guess i could WTFM, but has any body figured out the build road from - to option?
Melifluous
08-11-2005, 15:26
ALT-R for the road to option.
Melifluous
My impression is to keep conquered cities if they have useful wonders then the maintainence cost is worth it.
@Digger I don't think you get the benefit from a chop. That brings up the question which are best to chop? Off river plains tiles first? I think another forest can grow if it's connected to forest tiles too.
It seems the hill river forest tiles give pretty good production and should be left alone.
Forest management seems huge in Civ4.
Melifluous
08-11-2005, 17:24
You do get the benfit of the chop.
Melifluous
quote:Originally posted by Melifluous
Now thats just dumb.
Ok next hint then, seeing as Maintenance is based on distance from capital dont ever take a city far from home. The maintenance costs are sodding crippling.
Melifluous
Well now. They are in the early game but thats definitely not true later on. In 1900 I have a pretty good cash flow and every conquered city is able to build stuff in a reasonable time once I've got a courthouse in there. Big empires are still possible once you've got your economy sorted.
I agree. Besides, I really love the civic "State property" where maintenance by distance from nearest palace is always 0. ;)
Melifluous
08-11-2005, 17:53
But basically they are saying if you go on the rampage early dont bother holding on to your newly acquired cities unless you dont wanna research. (I noticed that negative cash gpt at 0 gold doesn't seem to do anything?)
I bet that really early Dom wins are a thing of the past now then [:P]
Melifluous
PS. Yes Matrix I saw that, also the Pyramids are even more worth getting now! Access to ALL government civics? Thats just sick.
quote:Originally posted by Melifluous
....
I bet that really early Dom wins are a thing of the past now then [:P]
...
Well, it might be somewhat tricky but still do-able, I mean before 1000AD on lower difficulty levels especially and a powerful start.
Same thing was feared when civ3 came out but was proven wrong. IIRC, somebody in GOTM got a domination win on Standard map at 50BC on Regent difficulty though. And a few Deity level games with Iro as a human player ended by Conquest around 200AD.
I'm still thinking granaries and pottery are the top priority regarding growth and growth is the key to everything in civ4. Religion however seems to be rather important as well but I'm still trying to explore the options here.
Thanks Mel on the tip on mining a hill counting as a chop. But doesn't a forest hill have pretty good production and would be a secondary chop versus other forest spots?
Akots do you think grans are still that important? In a current game I had to build one for health (unhealthy at Pop 2 on flood plains :( )but it seems some of the other worker techs like Bronze working (for early chops) and animal husbandry (for pastures and health) are really important for early expansion.
Well, I'm playing the game just for 3 days and not for 24-hours, need to go to work occasionally. So, really, don't know. When a city comes to a growth halt due to unhappiness, just build a settler or worker or try to make specialists. But it takes horrendous number of turns for the city to grow even with a food bonus. It would be a great possibility to speed up this process. [confused]
grahamiam
08-11-2005, 19:35
unfortunately, i have the same problem as akots, too much work [lol] and not enough civ. well, and also keeping up my bargain as a Roman citizen ;)
@whomp: health is an interesting concept for c4. forests give 0.4 health for each one within your borders. that makes the key number of forests 3 and 5 (for +1 and +2 health) so I try to be selective in my cuts, at least till I have a lot of health resources hooked up. you also can't plant them so once they're gone, they're gone (unless the RNG smiles and a forest expands, but I have yet to see that happen).
granaries are good also, as they give bonus health if you have the right resource and also cut the food required to grow in half. so, akots, i believe they'll speed up your growth and increase health (with the right food resources). harbors increase health as well (from crabs, fishes, whales, etc)
@killer: i have only seen forests give 30 hammers, never more, but I have to look closer too
@meli: i'm also curious what negative research does. I've been a bit lazy the past few days, and the treasury drops to zero and rate to -gpt, but I don't think I pay a penalty for it??? (well, other than being bankrupt)
Kingreno
08-11-2005, 19:36
Buiding a setler halts growth yet does not take away pop upon completion does it?
quote:Originally posted by Kingreno
Buiding a setler halts growth yet does not take away pop upon completion does it?
It seems so. Then, just build another settler or worker and continue. Kinda civ4-type worker/settler factory here? Unfortunately, the available land for expansion is rather limited. It feels cozy at least and I'm being cornered very early even on Monarch.
On growth, granaries are as solid as before, however (on higher difficulties) I think happiness will become a limited factor real soon, especially if your luxes are calendar-type luxes. After all, what good is a granary if your cities cannot grow past size 4?
On the forest chop: maybe game speed (epic/normal/quick) explains the difference in shields a bit? Also, I suppose when shields are added to a build that your civ-traits give double prod speed for, the amount of shields from the forest is multiplied x2.
Socrates
08-11-2005, 21:44
(Still no game here, but following the thread nonetheless, dunno why.)
I think Kemal makes a very valid point : many features are tweaked by a various amount of settings : leader traits, map size, game level, game speed, etc, etc... I think it would save us some huge time if everyone made a little extra effort, ie. tell their settings when they speak of something occurring in their games... except if we're sure that no setting can be factored in any tweaking (dumb example : road movement points (and I'm not even sure ! ;) )). The first thing to do would be to compile a list of settings though. :)
Melifluous
08-11-2005, 22:53
quote:Originally posted by grahamiam
@meli: i'm also curious what negative research does. I've been a bit lazy the past few days, and the treasury drops to zero and rate to -gpt, but I don't think I pay a penalty for it??? (well, other than being bankrupt)
Well eventually all my workers went on Strike. Nothing! All workers went home and wouldn't do shit. Dunno if it's related and couldn't find shit in the civilopedea.
Nevermind.
Melifluous
1. Your units go on strike when running a deficit, so this is related yes.
2. There is no entry on shit in the civilopedia... ;)
Don't forget health, poor health is as bad as poor happiness (doctors might link the thing RL, this is just about in-game lol).
@kemal, another proof the civilopedia is fucked up [lol]
About food and granaries: I have only played 3 quick-starts and 1 half game untill now, but I dont think a granary is always usefull.
- Especially in worker/settler factories granaries are a waste of hammers, during worker/settler construction your city growth halts so you only reason to ever need a granary in a w/s factory are if you're in dire need of health.
- When you build a settler/worker your excess food is counted as producion hammers, so having lots of food is still beneficial in a w/s fact, but not better than having an equal amount of hammers which will result in the same building speed. A lot different than Civ3 where food mainly determined the possibility of w/s fac. With the mining improvement available only later in the game your chances of getting production bonuses with workers in the beginning are small while farm and pasture upgrade are available a bit sooner, leaving food in a slightly more beneficial light for ealry exp, I still think it's less important than in Civ3.
- Should you be so lucky to start at a sea edge with a bonus resource: go workboat. During the construction of a workboat your pop keeps growing (unlike when you build a landworker!) and you can use the boat to boost your growth by turning it into fishing nets on the resource. This consumes the workboat (while a landworker stays alive) but I feel it's well worth it cause of the early growth you get.
I've experimented a bit by playing Greek World mod as Rome. I know, it is not a good idea to start with a mod especially since it is quite different from the actual game. It is poorly documented though. OK, it is a large map with limited techs and limited victory conditions (Domination and Conquest). Playing on Monarch. I was able to rapidly conquer the Italian lands and started on Granaries in all cities. Marble, Stone, and whatever food bonus is there were hooked up rather rapidly as well. I can tell you that Granaries rock and rock big. It really boosts the growth and dramatically. So, after playing for about 3 hours and through about 100 turns, all my core cities have reached their growth limit due to happiness problems. There is little sense in building temples because they are ridiculously expensive and provide happiness only to those cities which have State-adopted religion. However, I'm having a nice collection of wonders in Rome including Great Library, Heroic Epic, National Epic, Academy, Flavius wonder (analog of Great Wall) and have also built Stonehedge wonder in Antium. Already generated great merchant and great scientist. Merchant went for cash in Athens and Scientist rush the Academy.
But the victory conditions are only military win. So, I have to build apparently a bunch of pretorians and cats and hammer the surrounding enemies. BTW, Persia had already been destroyed and Jewish civilization as well. So, I'm sitting in the corner with Phenicians and Alexander. Road movement is only 2 and boat movement is 2 as well and I still cannot hook up horses. So, how am I supposed to win this on a large map? Guess these all wonders have been a large waste of everything (except Heroic Epic which double the build rate for military units) and I should have built only units instead.
Very annoying features inherited from Civ3:
1) I was RoP raped by Alexander. We then agreed to peace after some hammering of each others units (no cities taken there). The son of a bitch came back in about 10 more turns and asked for open borders!!! This is ridiculous, you know. If this is a feature, fuck it up. Especially annoying is that I'm supposed to have a trade route with Athens which was a Persian city when my great merchant travelled there. Now it is Greek. [argh]
2) There is a problem with cities having uneven amount of food. They have to starve once they grow over the limit.
3) RNG is extrememly improtant. And yes, you can lose Pretorian (strength 8) to warrior (strength 2) either attacking or defending. And not once but multiple times.
4) Barracks help but very slightly, mostly 10% bonus.
5) Very hard to keep track of units, F3 advisor does not jump to their locations.
6) Very annoying feature - cannot fortify cats or boats in a city.
7) The manual says, you would need many workers. The hell I do. I've built about 1 per city. They work faster and all my land is improved and they are all building roads in the open lands.
8) It is really tough to expand. City maintenance is horrible burden on the budget. Settler are extremely expensive. Overall, it looks like playing TAM mod. However, there is no upgrades and culture is extremely expensive and there is literally no way to rush anything. Might be it is just that this scenario was poorly playtested. Also, I need 7 Courthouses to build a Forbidden Palace. Note that each Courthouse costs 120 hammers. Note also, number of turns in the game is really limited.
9) Techs are extremly expensive apparently due to the map size.
10) Endless unpassable and unworkable mountains everywhere. They are not that all unpassable and unworkable in the real world! Some cities have only 6 tiles to work. not my doing, that were all barbairan cities.
11) There are a few other points, but not really important except that imho all this religion and wonder stuff is really meaningless unless going for a cultural victory. I could have build 3 or even sometimes 4 Pretorians in every 5 turns (numbers variable because of production going to next build) in Rome and am going to kill them all if time permits. Need a bunch of galleys though which are also ridiculously expensive. BTW, I'm number one in everything even in military service.
12) Stonehedge is supposed to give a free obelisk in every city. Well, it does not, at least not in this scenario. I have specifically abstained from learning the Calendar tech. it did center the world map though. Lack of obelisks might have something to do with State Religion although this is not documented anywhere.
13) Barbarians are not just a minor annoyance like they are in Civ3. Beware of them. Fortunately Pretorians are a good unit. but still I've lost a bunch to axemen and even more to horse archers.
14) Cannot take screenshots, it just does not work.
15) AI sucks and sucks big. Again, they don't build any improvements, mostly units and nothing else. not even barracks.
16) Worker automation is horrible, everything is messed up. I've tried for about 5 turns and they build cottages on hills and near river. They do build pastures on pigs and cows but never hook them up by roads. They chop forest and build workshop on it which is a ridiculous waste.
17) Governor sucks big again. As warned in the manual, so this is expected. However I was unable to find the global option of turning the governor off.
18) Micromanagement is really a horrible job without Mapstat on a large map. It is do-able but way more hard than in civ3. may be just need some time to adjust to it though. It woudl be nice to know which cities have grown this turn and need attention.
Overall conclusion: Granaries rock especially if it is possible to chop forest towards them or pop-rush. Pop-rushing is not as horrible as it is in civ3. Penalty is shorter and if there is enough happiness, it does not harm the growth. It also seems the only way to build early wonders on more or less decent difficulties.
Good features imho:
1) Very nice performance. My specs are: AMD Athlon 1500, 1 Gb RAM, 128 Mb ATI Radeon 9200, apparently unlimited HDD, XP + SP1 (no SP2 here). Everything runs very smoothly, no slowdowns, interturn time about 10-20 seconds, way faster than Rise of Rome in Civ3 on my machine. No memory leaks as well.
2) Nice graphics, nice animations, very decent music.
3) Very different game, lost of intriguing feautres. Unfortunately very poorly documented in the manual.
4) Actually, combat system is really way better. Still there is room for compaining but it is way better.
I still think your 'granaries rock' statement is way too general. Please explain what you consider the use of a granary in an early worker/settler factory. I'm now building a few warriors to achieve some groth and MP and then switch to w/s prod in 1st or 2nd city.
1) I was RoP raped by Alexander. We then agreed to peace after some hammering of each others units (no cities taken there). The son of a bitch came back in about 10 more turns and asked for open borders!!! This is ridiculous, you know. If this is a feature, fuck it up. Especially annoying is that I'm supposed to have a trade route with Athens which was a Persian city when my great merchant travelled there. Now it is Greek. [argh]
Are you sure you had Open Borders? With Open Borders you can stand on the same tile as your 'friend', so it's impossible to declare war by attacking.
And if you declare war via the diplomatic war you have to cancel Open Borders first, which kicks out all your units out if their territory.
If what you're saying is true, it's a bug.
3) RNG is extrememly improtant. And yes, you can lose Pretorian (strength 8) to warrior (strength 2) either attacking or defending. And not once but multiple times.
Hasn't happened to me a single time, even though I had built a lot of Praetorians. Perhaps they were damaged?
4) Barracks help but very slightly, mostly 10% bonus.
Depends on what unit you build. 1st or 2nd strike helps a lot, as well as being able to retreat.
6) Very annoying feature - cannot fortify cats or boats in a city.
Pressing <f> will turn them to sleep. They don't have a defensive bonus, so you can't call it fortify, but that's just it's specification.
12) Stonehedge is supposed to give a free obelisk in every city. Well, it does not, at least not in this scenario. I have specifically abstained from learning the Calendar tech. it did center the world map though. Lack of obelisks might have something to do with State Religion although this is not documented anywhere.
Obelisks are obsolete by discovering Calender. If you build Stonehenge after discovering Calender that was quite useless. [tongue]
14) Cannot take screenshots, it just does not work.
You don't have to paste it in an image program; the screenshots come directly in the directory: <My documents>\My Games\Civilization IV\ScreenShots\
15) AI sucks and sucks big. Again, they don't build any improvements, mostly units and nothing else. not even barracks.
This is not my experience, playing at Noble difficulty!
18) Micromanagement is really a horrible job without Mapstat on a large map. It is do-able but way more hard than in civ3. may be just need some time to adjust to it though. It woudl be nice to know which cities have grown this turn and need attention.
What is there to micromanage?
I agree with all the issues I left out. ;)
grahamiam
09-11-2005, 15:40
@Matrix: how do you send screenshots to that folder? Is there a special setup? I keep using the "Printscreen" button and pasting into MS Paint, then saving. If I can take a screenie without exiting the game, that'd be nice :)
Ribannah
09-11-2005, 15:57
Micro-management is just as necessary as in Civ3. First, the game will often change the tiles worked, for instance when borders expand. And often enough you want to do that yourself, e.g. to time growth or a chop with Settler/Worker production, to hurry something, like a granary before the city grows, or to maximize leftover hammers, or to maximize gold if you want that religion or the music tech.
Grahamiam, in the ini change "AllowScreenShots = 0" to 1. Then pressing PrintScrn will automatically place the screenshot in that directory I mentioned. :)
That's awesome Matrix! Thanks.
digger760
09-11-2005, 16:25
quote:Originally posted by Melifluous
ALT-R for the road to option.
Melifluous
I cannot get this feature to work. I get a dotted like and a cirle with a number on a destination sqaure, but when i right click on it, the workers do nothing
EDIT i notice the "road to" icon is not high-lighted either, but it does not tell that i need a tach to do it.
@matrix:
1) Yes, he was teleported but not towards his capital but in the opposite direction where he was not expected. Nobody was expected there!!!! Fortunately I had an archer there with some experience which miraculously survived.
2) Not only my pretorians were unscratched, they even had some upgrade!! It was 8.8 against 2.3 or something like that.
6) Thanks, good to know, I was keeping them on spacebar. [bash]
12) I did not know calendar tech.
14) Tried that.
15) This is a sure thing about "newborn" nations in this scenario (Greece and Persia). Some pre-existing cities (barbarian and other unplayable civs) have some improvements.
18) [lol] There is way more before the city grows that it were in Civ3. [lol]
quote:Originally posted by Kemal
On growth, granaries are as solid as before, however (on higher difficulties) I think happiness will become a limited factor real soon, especially if your luxes are calendar-type luxes. After all, what good is a granary if your cities cannot grow past size 4?...
Unfortunately, this is true. [sad] I've just tried a single game on Deity. And hence in this case granaries are completely useless because by the time granary is ready, the city is already size 4 and all land is taken by AI.
digger760
09-11-2005, 17:58
I think i have found a graphical bug. The city screen seems to show only food on the workable tiles. and only half the food is what is actually being produced. on the map view by mousing over the squares i can see the real food/sheild and gold values. I guess this could depend on my system as well.
Melifluous
09-11-2005, 18:02
quote:Originally posted by digger760
... but when i right click on it, the workers do nothing
left-click dude [:P]
Melifluous
barbu1977
09-11-2005, 18:53
quote:Originally posted by digger760
I think i have found a graphical bug. The city screen seems to show only food on the workable tiles. and only half the food is what is actually being produced. on the map view by mousing over the squares i can see the real food/sheild and gold values. I guess this could depend on my system as well.
You probably have a GF4 MX420 or similar. I have the same problem.
Discussed here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=133141
I have GF4 MX420 [scared]
barbu1977
09-11-2005, 20:21
Hey! on the plus side, I did not experienced any crash.
And patch might fix the problems :)
Ok, now I have a stupid question:
Why Fascism is a requirement to build Mt Rushmore wonder?
Also, while reading Hits section of the Civilopedia there is a following hint:
"Never fight a land war in Asia"
digger760
10-11-2005, 10:59
I have the GF4 MX440 on my desktop, which is when i saw it at the time. I also noticed tree-lined hills look different on my desktop than my laptop. On the desktop with the GF4 440MX the trees form a circle around the base of the hill. On my laptop (GF Go 5650) they cover the whole hill. Apart from that it is much easier to see things on the desktop monitor, a very slight jitter when scrolling. But still think i prefer to play on the desktop
quote:Originally posted by barbu1977
quote:Originally posted by digger760
I think i have found a graphical bug. The city screen seems to show only food on the workable tiles. and only half the food is what is actually being produced. on the map view by mousing over the squares i can see the real food/sheild and gold values. I guess this could depend on my system as well.
You probably have a GF4 MX420 or similar. I have the same problem.
Discussed here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=133141
Melifluous
10-11-2005, 11:25
quote:Originally posted by akots
Also, while reading Hits section of the Civilopedia there is a following hint:
"Never fight a land war in Asia"
I guess this is either aimed at America (Vietnam) or France (Napoleans famous push into Russia).
I notice that the next hint says "Snacks are good in moderation"
[goodjob]
Melifluous
Shabbaman
10-11-2005, 11:35
So how do you finish a game quickly?
quote:Originally posted by akots
Why Fascism is a requirement to build Mt Rushmore wonder?
The only thing I can think of is the time that it is applied (1935-1945) and built (1942).
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
So how do you finish a game quickly?
I usuallu just wait for my system to crash.
Shabbaman
10-11-2005, 13:18
Interesting. What score do you get with that?
quote:Originally posted by Matrix
1) I was RoP raped by Alexander. We then agreed to peace after some hammering of each others units (no cities taken there). The son of a bitch came back in about 10 more turns and asked for open borders!!! This is ridiculous, you know. If this is a feature, fuck it up. Especially annoying is that I'm supposed to have a trade route with Athens which was a Persian city when my great merchant travelled there. Now it is Greek. [argh]
Are you sure you had Open Borders? With Open Borders you can stand on the same tile as your 'friend', so it's impossible to declare war by attacking.
And if you declare war via the diplomatic war you have to cancel Open Borders first, which kicks out all your units out if their territory.
If what you're saying is true, it's a bug. ...
Apparently what happened in my case is the same thing (bug) which is described in this thread at CFC:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=139618
Got it and I have the problem digger and barbu mentioned... nothing else, didn't even crash a single time :D
It seems the actual combat system is way more complex than I posted about in answer to Matrix earlier in the thread.
For those looking for the formulas: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=137615
Maybe you want to dig up a copy of your old high-school maths books as well.... ;)
While it is a good thing that it makes spear/tank situations almost impossible (except perhaps some praetorian/warrior fights ;)), the huge difference in chances that a small increase in the A/D ratio can make is a bit disappointing imho, seems you now need to MM promotions/combat values rather than cities.
Yes, this is exactly the case.
One might assume that intuitively, strength ratio of pretorian to warrior (2 versus 8) is similar to spearman (4) versus lets say riflemen (15 iirc). Indeed, pretorian is substantially more likely to lose to warrior than infantry (or tank) to spearmen. Helicopter though is relatively likely to lose to longbowmen. In this regard, closely watching for the promotions (especially first strike, flanking, and general combat) is extremely important apparently on higher difficulty as well.
The combat system is not that intuitive as it seems and chances displayed by pressing Alt do not clearly reflect the probability of winning the combat in conventional percentage like it is in a combat calculator.
I must say I'm puzzled by your statement akots. Why would a praetorian have a substantially (?) bigger chance to be defeated than an infantry to a spear?
Taking your example of 8.8 vs 2.3 vs an unpromoted inf against a plain spear (20 vs 4), isn't it so that the praetorian would, according to the formulas, do around 33.5 points of damage per win at a 79% chance of winning each round, vs the warrior doing about 11 points of damage per win at a 21% chance of winning each round. Thus, the praetorian only needs to win 3 times, and the warrior 10 times.
For the inf, he does about 40 damage per win, at 83% chance of winning, and a spear does 10 damage per win, at 17%. So, the inf needs to win 3 times, and the spear 10 times.
Both these cases look very similar in chances to me, despite a much better ratio for the inf/spear compared to the praet/warrior) (5 vs 3.82), the inf only has 4% more chance per round to win, while in both cases the attacker and defender need an equal amount of wins to defeat the other party.
Furthemore, while I'm no mathematician and thus have not calculated these exact chances, it seems to me both are nearly impossible to lose for the attacker.
Or am I applying the figures in a wrong way somewhere here, perhaps?
It seems your calculations are correct. It is strength ratio which mainly determines the outcome together with first strike.
It looks like it is impossible to win/lose but still these things happen. May be somewhere on the way I had something similar to a rollover bug ( http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=137350 ) which is apparently not the bug itself but some confusion with the numbers. I will try to repeat it or look through autosaves of that game. [confused]
Actually, it is essentially of extremely low probability to lose if ratio between stronger unit strength and weaker unit strength (with modifiers) is more than 2. However it is not that impossible apparently.
Is the combat calculator http://c4combat.narod.ru/c4c_v0_13.htm correct?
quote:Originally posted by Kemal
... Why would a praetorian have a substantially (?) bigger chance to be defeated than an infantry to a spear? ...
The difference is indeed small and should not matter overall. It is about 0.003% which is actually a negligible number and one has to fight about 1000 battles to see it in practice. I think I was confused trying to apply the ratio of chances in both case. Which would be approximately 5-times higher in the case of your example for the weaker unit to win.
Sorry, editing again:
8 vs 2 weaker win chance : 0.0012%
4 vs 20 weaker win chance : 0.00022%
0.0012/0.00022 = 5.5
Kingreno
11-11-2005, 21:52
So anyone has the "perfect" first 50 turns computed yet? Should be more standard in civ4 as in civ3 as the start in many cases has a 3 food-square. I'd say warrior(scout)-warrior-setler-worker-warrior-setler-worker. Producing a worker before the setler is an option if you're industrious, otherwise it is not too beneficial.
Pastorius
11-11-2005, 22:07
Depends on how close opposition is and on proximity of resources IMO, but I have produced worker before settler a couple of times. This was in noble games on pangaea and continents
Socrates
12-11-2005, 14:40
quote:Originally posted by Kingreno
So anyone has the "perfect" first 50 turns computed yet? Should be more standard in civ4 as in civ3 as the start in many cases has a 3 food-square. I'd say warrior(scout)-warrior-setler-worker-warrior-setler-worker. Producing a worker before the setler is an option if you're industrious, otherwise it is not too beneficial.
Sirian (18 months of work for Civ4) keeps on telling anyone that there is no single strategy in general, it all depends on the starting position and the settings of the game. While it leads to some nice considerations on gameplay in general (I'm fond of that and have already started argueing with him about it), I hope there is more variety in Civ4 than in Civ3. That doesn't mean the quest for an optimal strategy is void... I hope it is longer though. ;)
Kingreno
13-11-2005, 09:37
The starts are FAR less diversed then in civ3 (no more 3 cow bonanza), this is good as it finaly balances the starts. This will lead to a far quicker path to the perfect start though. I have had a floodplain or other 3-food-tile in most cases, and often more then one. And since setlers/workers sum up food and shields it does not realy matter which ones you have! again easining the perfect start.
Shabbaman
13-11-2005, 10:32
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
So how do you finish a game quickly?
[bump]
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
Interesting. What score do you get with that?
Not too much, a few hundred I'd say.
But playing smaller maps helps to increase score :)
quote:Originally posted by Kingreno
The starts are FAR less diversed then in civ3 (no more 3 cow bonanza), this is good as it finaly balances the starts. This will lead to a far quicker path to the perfect start though. I have had a floodplain or other 3-food-tile in most cases, and often more then one. And since setlers/workers sum up food and shields it does not realy matter which ones you have! again easining the perfect start.
I totally agree with you, it should be far easier to determine a optimal build order, especially as all extra hammers and food count for settler/worker building.
I know tend to build warriors/scouts untill I reach city size 3, then build a settler and a worker.
Exception: being on the ocean with crab/fish/clam nearby: build a workboat 1st. Alhtough this worker is consumed, it doesnt affect city growth, so I;m thinking it benefits you in 2 ways:
- fast +1 food for faster growth
- faster growth because boat doesnt halt city growth.
I do have the impression that resources are more abundant and more evenly spread. I rarely have a city without bonus resources and similarly I rarely have 1 with 3 or more resources. Should be pretty easy to make an excel table that works with 2 bonus resources for every city and say 2/3 turns between settler build and settling. Just add in the worker improvements and you're set.
Floor permitting I might look into it today :)
Several other observations:
- Seems a standard civ4 map contains less tiles than a standard civ3 map. Didnt count but it does appear that way to me
- there's an axtra required tile between cities
This leads to substantially less cities on a map than in good old Civ3. Combined with wonders that require a certain number of buildings present (uni's for Oxford, banks for Wallstreet (?)) this will severely restrict the candidates who can build those. Although I played very little, I do suspect the AI can't handle this, giving the human player an advantage to build these wonders.
Tech trading between AI and humans is more difficult than in Civ3 but the good old AI's appear to techwhore like the they always did. PLayed a continents map where I was on a continent alone and all the ai where on 2 continents close together. Prince dif level only . By the time I found the AI they were about 10 techs ahead of me. I traded with 2 of the AI's, next thing I know the other's wont trade with me: I traded with their worst enemy [lol]
Well, I agree with Sirian really, your starting decisions do depend on map, and especially on settings a lot. I do not believe there is a "perfect start" such as was the case in civ3.
I've just tried 5 games in a row with the above mentioned suggested build strategy, and got trounced bad 5 times (emperor difficulty, standard, 7 AI). Then again, if I use other tactics, I usually get trounced too.
Maybe things have changed from beta to retail (still haven't got the retail version yet), but imho, the step up from monarch to emperor is huge, I really have to stay focused 100% of the time to have a chance to compete at this level.
Usually I even struggle to keep the barbs off my back (always nice to end turn next to a bear/lion with your warrior/settler combo), let alone a more advanced and productive AI that has no problem whatsoever smelling and taking out a weaker civ, it seems.
I;m not saying the mentioned strat is best, but I do think an optimal strategy can be approached. Once you determine the number of cities you normally can build in a certain (map) setting, you just have to retrack and calculate the fastest way there. This still doenst garantuee that you can compete though, I tried one emperor game and got my ass handed to me as well :)
I guess it comes down to finding the right balance between military and expansion, but that will shift depending on opposition and barbarian activity, a sureproof expansion strategy independant from the specific ingame situation seems, at least to me, an illusion so far.
Once you know your surroundings, sure you can and should make strategic decisions on how to best settle the land and protect yourself. It is just that it won't be the same decisions everytime on each map, I think.
In a year or so, things could be totally different of course, as we will be seasoned veterans by then, having a lot of experience on AI/game behaviour.
I have to agree with Kemal here, I jsut played my first game on Noble and since then have been playing Emperor level only and I only get to winning positions about 50% of the time.
The jump from Monarch is big.
Also forget about the opening strategy no way you can write that down !
What I found though is that my losses on Emperor were heavily influenced by my starting position : a start with no cows or good balance between shields with food (forest) and bonus food
makes the game VERY difficult, especially flood plains start with desert and no good shields.
The huge question remains when to produce the first settler and even more the first worker. My experience is that producing those with small cities is not good.
You need to wait until size 3 or even better 4 so that you have decent shields and can halt your growth for less longer time, thats the main factor I would say.
Indeed the Emperor level seems to be a huge step. It is however rather possible to grow to size six or even 7 before 2000BC with at least one bonus tile near the capital if beelining to Monarchy and building a few warriors for military police. But then the nightmare starts. AIs are building wonders more rapidly than on Sid in Civ3 and all land is then taken. I've seen Fredercik in one game on Emperor building Stonehedge, Oracle, 4 cities, Pyramids, and Hindu shrine at 1800 BC on a tiny map.
Also, barbarians are extremely brutal on this level and it might be good idea to play without them apparently.
Another thing, I'm not sure how good is the map generator script. But on all archipelago or continents map I've tried (about 15-20 games started looking for a reasonable positions), I have not got within a reasonable reach a) Stone; b) got Marble only once in all these games; c) Either you get a few sources of iron or a few sources of copper but not both; d) only once got a non-calendar luxury (ivory) near the stating location. It seems that luxuries are even less abundant than in C3C; e) always got horses. Other luxuries/resources seem to be rather random, have not noticed anything unusual.
Another and extremely annoying feature for continents and islands is that the starting location is never in the middle of that island or continent. It is always somewhere in the corner, near the coast. Which basically forces the player to build Palace somewhere in a more reasonable location in the center later in the game. Well, at least there is usually lake or river in the vicinity of the start.
Since the script is apparently less random than in civ3, there is little point in screening through the maps trying to get something playable. That was apparently the purpose of the script. But the maps are often very awkward.
Good thing is that the archer-grenadier upgrade strategy is working. I've treid it only on Monarch though. If you can survive to Chemistry. Not that AIs are trying to kill you, it is just lack of resources which forces to abandon the game sometimes. Another good way of generating cash is building wonders and being beaten to them by AIs. Them there is a rather generous reimbursement for wasted production.
Do you all notice that the automatic workers suck. If you put them on improve nearest city they go to sleep once the workerd-on tiles are done. They do not attempt to go to another city or build a trade network... They also do not work-ahead/improve everything in the radius.
It forces you to check on your units anyways. To prevent wasted turns sleeping
I bet you have to do/check tile-choice (food/shields) of the governor too.
This sucks as they promised something very different! :(
edited!
Well to be fair, if you ask them to imrove the nearest city, then thats what they do. If you automate the workers completely then they generally make reasonable choices.
I found the city governors quite good. You can choose what they prioritise for each city and they choose tiles pretty well to conform with what you asked for.
Lt. Killer M
14-11-2005, 11:32
I find the governour are OK up to Noble, but to survive on higher levels you need to MM eacht own each turn. After all, the idiots will STAY on growth even when the city is unhappy and production of a happy building is chosen, despite the ability to choose no-growth, emphasize production. They only change if I FORBID growth - which means I have to enter the town each turn, as usual :(
Pastorius
22-11-2005, 10:25
I wanna enable floating camera mode. How to?
Shabbaman
22-11-2005, 17:08
Are there any differences between the religions? It certainly looks as if the later religions (christians, muslims) spread faster by themselves (not through the free missionary I mean).
Pastorius
22-11-2005, 17:11
if so, then it is a game mechanism to even out the playing field for the different religions. Since the first ones have a clear advantage (not necessarily though).
Nothing to back it up with, and it could be coincidental.
Hard to say without empirical evidence.
digger760
22-11-2005, 17:21
I think they spread faster due to more trade routes (roads etc...). Check the manual or civilopedie iirc it explains the factors that affect the spread.
digger760
24-11-2005, 10:39
Q1 - Am i imagining things or is the military advisor useless? It only shows the total number of units i have. No info on other civs (except what ther leader looks like). I suspect this feature is broken and we will get more in patch or god forbid an expansion pack.
Q2 - I got the pyramids but the Universal Suffarage civic does'nt look appealing to me, unless you have have towns. The cottage-hamlet-towns development takes so long, would you bother to build the pyramids to get get this feature early. I much prefer the civic that gives +3 happy faces and +3 beakers to each scientist (at least early to middle ages anyway)
Q3 - The diplo advisor shows techs that people will trade and supposedly techs that i can trade to them. But often i go to each leader to trade and dont have any techs to trade with any of them. The features seems broken. Besides that its awkward to use, because each time you exit from the 1 on 1 chat it does'nt go back to the F4 view [mad] {EDIT ok thats not a question...just a gripe]
Q4 - Is there anyway to get the tech advisor to automatically scroll right once you have all the earlier techs
Melifluous
24-11-2005, 10:43
Q1 - Never looked at the Mil Advisor Page.
Q2 - I love the pyramids, besides the fact its never obsolete, it allows the perfect civic for early game, the +3 happy people in top 5 cities. Takes a while to get more than 5 cities trust me :) Also added chance of Engineer and the culture boost is awesome.
Q3 - It shows all techs that you have that 'someone' else doesn't not what they all dont, I admit it could use some work (and yes not going back to the F4 page is bloody annoying after a chat)
Q4 - As far I was aware you go back to the place where you last left it. I more annoyed that the ESC key doesn't clear the F6 screen...
[meli]
Melifluous
24-11-2005, 10:57
quote:Originally posted by Melifluous
Q3 - (and yes not going back to the F4 page is bloody annoying after a chat)
Not fixed in patch [sad]
quote:Originally posted by Melifluous
Q4 -I more annoyed that the ESC key doesn't clear the F6 screen...
Fixed in patch [party]
[meli]
If you select an enemy leaderhead in the F4 screen, you will be shown the techs you can trade with them behind your own leaderhead. If you do not select any, then all techs behind your own leaderhead are techs that at least one other leader doesn't have.
Mil advisor is useless as it stands now yes, unfortunately.
Pastorius
24-11-2005, 11:10
Kemal, what was the intention behind the mil advisor - to show the difference between civs in terms of units?
Lt. Killer M
24-11-2005, 11:13
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
So how do you finish a game quickly?
[bump]
select highest difficulty.
restart until you hit a start with stone in the 21.
sit back and wait a few turns for the early beating.
:D
Pastorius
24-11-2005, 11:15
[lol]
Shabbaman
24-11-2005, 11:16
What has the stone to do with that? [???]
Oh, and very helpful. It's a serious question after all, modern era is boring.
Melifluous
24-11-2005, 11:21
Well have you tried the
1) Build barracks
2) Use initial warrior to find the AI.
3) Build lots of warriors (pick a civ with early UU)
4) Build quite a few.
5) Beat seven shades of shit outta the AI...
[nowait]
[meli]
Shabbaman
24-11-2005, 15:19
quote:Originally posted by Melifluous
[br3) Build lots of warriors (pick a civ with early UU)
4) Build quite a few.
5) Beat seven shades of shit outta the AI...
So in my current game I am beating the crap out of the AI with axemen. But now I've captured all those cities my science rate is dropping due to higher maintenance. Should I just raze those size 7 highly productive cities?
Melifluous
24-11-2005, 15:33
Yup.
Burn em to the ground.
They suck! Did you build them? Then they must be inferior!
Trust only your own cities my friend.
Hope this helps [:P]
[meli]
Shabbaman
24-11-2005, 15:56
No.
Lt. Killer M
24-11-2005, 16:09
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
What has the stone to do with that? [???]
AIs love to have stone. If YOU have it, they don't. Thus, they are quite likely to change that...... [harharhar]
Shabbaman
24-11-2005, 16:32
Hm. Are their sentiments toward stone stronger than towards other (strategic) resources? Marble for instance?
digger760
25-11-2005, 14:26
quote:Originally posted by Paalikles
I wanna enable floating camera mode. How to?
I was curios about this last night, but all the manual says is that you can view from 45degree angles using shift left arrow or rigth arrow.
I heard somewhere that floating camera idea was dropped cos of the additional GPU requirements..or maybe that was a diff game all together.
Socrates
25-11-2005, 20:38
One question. I started to make screenshots from the game (so far I'm stuck at 4000BC in my 1st game !). The ones from Civ4 seem to be of slightly lower quality than the ones I make (with PhotoFiltre, a free program), even if they come from the same button pressing. The former are lighter in kB, but oddly they have a greater 'pixels per inch' figure (96 to 72) in both directions. [hmm] I use the standard compression at 90% with that program. Isn't it weird ?
The question actually : Do you think we should use screenshots from Civ4 or from our own image programs for spoilers ? From the pics I took the ratio varies from 1.45 to 1.60, which is quite much.
Pastorius
26-11-2005, 15:25
Just in case someone hasnt seen it:
The CivIV wiki (http://civ4wiki.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page)
Could become a good source of info
Does anyone know what the hot key is to rename units? It's not shift-N anymore.
Pastorius
26-11-2005, 19:58
IIRC, if you mouseover the unit, it will tell you
I found out you can change it in the lower left hand corner when it says IE "warrior" it will pop up "rename unit" and you can click warrior and rename it. However, it doesn't work for me it goes back to the tile terrain in near the "rename unit" area.
Lt. Killer M
27-11-2005, 13:47
quote:Originally posted by Shabbaman
Hm. Are their sentiments toward stone stronger than towards other (strategic) resources? Marble for instance?
well, stone is usefull right at the beginning. Thus, high interest. Marble also is usefull early on, thus I suspect you'll get similar results.
horses are too common for this to work, in my experience.
A brave Destroyer got a good deal of promotions, somebody got a clue how to use the 10% vs. Mounted Units OMFG?
http://www.civ3duelzone.com/forum/uploaded/Beam/200512204032_destrmounted.jpg
125.03KB
I am desperate!!111111111111111!!!!111!!ExplanationMark 111111111111111
Ginger_Ale
02-12-2005, 01:15
Not sure if you wrote 'explanation mark' intentionally or not, but it fits pretty well since you want an explanation. ;) It's actually 'exclamantion'. Nice pic though.
Pastorius
02-12-2005, 09:23
RTFM n00b!!11!
Probably wont work to have +10% against mounted units. 2 extra first strikes sounds ok, since you could be attacked by some maniac at sea...
Socrates
12-12-2005, 22:54
Question : Does someone know the exact theory about the granary in Civ4 ? For once, it doesn't seem to work like in Civ3. What is the algorithm behind it ?
It depends on how you look at it. May be a bug, may be a feature but certainly somewhat unusual. I think that somebody at CFC in that granary thread had nailed it. Anyhow, this is how it works. May be I'm wrong here though.
Let say you have a city with +2 food size 1. It needs 22 food to accumulate to grow so growing in 11 turns. On size 2 it needs 24 food to grow to size 3 (12 turns). On size 3 it is 26 food to grow to size 4 (13 turns). So, growth is incremental. The bigger the city is, the longer it takes to grow. In civ3 there were jumps from town to city to metropolis, so now the growth is gradual but the net result is similar.
Now lets take a city at size 3. On turn 0 it has 0/26 food in the bin and growing in 13 turns at +2 fpt. Then you build a granary and it has no immediate effect. However, when the city becomes size 4 (0/28 food, 14 turns without granary), your food bin is already half-filled with 13 food (13=26/2). Now it can grow in 8 turns with 1 food transferred to the following cycle (28-13=15, 16/2=8 and 1 left over since you need only 15 to get to 28 from 13).
Lets say we build the granary not on turn 0/26 at size 3 but on turn when there is 7 turns to grow to size 4 and there is 12/26 food in the bin. This means that all the rest of the food which you produce (26-12=14) goes to granary. but since the granary can handle no more than 13 food at that city size (half of 26), you get 13 food in the bin when the city reaches size 4 which is exactly the same situation as it is when you build granary on turn 0/26 of size 3.
Now, if the granary is built at size 3 when there is 6 turns to grow to size 4 and there is 14/26 food in the bin, then when the city reaches size 4, you get 12 food in the bin (26-14=12) and will have 8 turns to grow but without surplus 1 food. During the next growth cycle to size 5 the granary does get full of course. If the granary is built at size 3 when there is 2 turns to grow to size 4 and there is 22/26 food in the bin, you get only 4 food (26-22=4) at size 4 and will have 12 turns to grow (28-4=24, 24/2=12).
It is somewhat counterintuitive and not documented but more or less evident imho.
Now, starvation is a different story, I don't know how it works. Apparently similar to civ3, you'd have to eat up the granary first before actually starting on current food supply but I have not tested it yet.
This means, for maximal benefit and minimal head ache, might be a good idea to finish building granary early in the growth cycle or before the middle of the growth cycle of the city (or shortly after middle). That should give the most benefit for growth.
Socrates
13-12-2005, 03:57
Thanks. [goodjob] I've read most of the threads speaking of the granary at CFC, but it was rather confusing. You know what ? Your post is confirmed by my 2 latest experimentations, where I was shocked to see so little food in the foodbar just after growth (I completed the granary a la Civ3 ;) ), because I didn't know it was different. I had seen some weird results in my first game, but thought I was just a n00b with a "first feeling" (TM) and maybe it wasn't fixed in the patch. [mischief]
Anyway, to complete your post, and so that it fits with my 2 latest results :
- the granary starts working (storing food) AFTER being completed, not on the turn it is completed, which is what it should be ;
- the granary stores all the food that is gained on the turn when the city grows, and immediately gives it back (with the food gained during the previous turns of course) to the new foodbar, ie. the 'overflow' food is computed like if it wasn't 'overflow', and this is how other things in Civ4 work ('overflow' hammers and beakers retain their previous modifiers).
One consequence of that is that you shouldn't be afraid of going full growth on the turn the city grows, and you shouldn't delay growth in order to "not waste" food for growth. On the contrary, stopping at growth minus 1 bread, and then going full growth gives you the most extra food. But you'll lose some 'growth' with that delay anyway, so it isn't something to do all the time. Of course it only works when the granary has just been built (otherwise you have reached the granary's limit anyway).
Not sure how virtual starvation (losing breads) and physical starvation (losing population) affects the granary and all that was said...
All in all : The granary stores food as it is gained through the turns, up to half the current foodbar. I think that sums it up nicely, no ?
I think the main question regarding the granary, in the case you want to build one, is whether to build it as fast as you can or not. Not sure, but maybe the answer is :
- if your foodbar is in its first half when you start the granary, put as many hammers as possible into the granary, so that no extra bread is gained ;
- if your foodbar is in its second half, let the city grow once (full growth ?), and then go for a maximum of hammers too.
Of course it can depend on circumstances (the close relationship between breads and hammers in the vicinity of the city).
Disclaimer : This was a n00b speaking, all of that can be wrong.
Shabbaman
14-07-2006, 16:32
Question.
I am at war with the aztecs, who in turn had wiped out the egyptians for all but a single city on a very remote island. I raze a coastal formerly egyptian city with marines, and about 20 turns later I capture an aztec city that has been rebuild on the exact same spot. To my surprise this city contains 6% egyptians. What's going on here? Is that the ethnic representation of the city the settler's from?
Tubby Rower
14-07-2006, 17:04
I think that tiles retain culture from any civ that has ever laid claim to that tile. I've seen some in SP have up to 6 nationalities be in that list. but in theory everyone could be on the list.
In combined games such as the one me and rob vs tubs and whomp. Are resources shared? or can we trade them between each other?
I'd like to ask you guys for your opinion.
It's come up in a Pitboss game whether a out of game 5 turn notification peace treaty supercedes a in game Defensive Pact. Which carries precedence?
I won't influence this with my opinion.
Tubby Rower
17-11-2006, 18:17
I answered it over in Igloo's thread (http://www.civ3duelzone.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3958&)
I answered it too....confusing human diplo with coded diplo. One is inforceable...one isnt.
Shabbaman
17-11-2006, 19:37
Wow, this thread has been read over 1900 times! Would that all be bots or would some people actually visit this site and read all our spa... err... I mean info?
i think people are more just shocked to see a thread dedicated to civ 4 amidst all the spam so read it anyways and leave disapointed
Melifluous
21-12-2006, 13:01
Gah keep getting an Internal Server Error when trying to look at the last page of this thread.
Will see if posting in it helps :)
[meli]
I installed the BUG mod (which worked great at first and I'd recommend it to everyone if not for the following) and it gives me this on the 2nd load.
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u204/CFC_Beorn/WH02-03.jpg
Help!
socralynnek
31-10-2007, 16:20
If you install BUG, you deserve to get bugs...
Sorry, couldn't resist...
Deinstall/reinstall?
was it the latest version? of both patch/mod?
3.13 on both.
The mod guy said it's probably my game that has issues, which is far from unlikely. I'll do a fresh install when I get the chance. With being able to tell when AI's get techs like in old CA2, I might play this much more. But I still prefer C3C by a large margin.
Civ3 PBEM anyone?
You can tell when AI get tech :s just press the f4 screen then technology...
noob question: mauer and I are in a PBEM, he has his email configured and everything, I don't. He has already sent me the game by in-game auto-email but I'm still wondering how to put the smtp thing in. This is probably among the most basic questions this thread has seen but if anyone can give me my first clue, I'll be grateful enough to try and develop more by myself [:p]
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=249788&highlight=SMTP
has only just come out but looks like a good program to use :)
edit- oh and the original question, my understanding is that smtp server basically means @hotmail.com or @gmail.com or whatever :)
Ok, so this is not trivial. It sounds so simple though. Shouldn't it just *work*? From what mauer told me, that's pretty much it on his end. It works, period. Should I post a screenshot or does everyone know where this is, under the My Details for a game?
barbu1977
06-11-2007, 22:12
If you use outlook express to take mails and not only a web mail based service, use the same information that is configured in the outlook express options.
However, I heard it may and may not work depending on the ISP you have. I tried it with the vanilla game and it did not work for me. (I have Videotron)
I use gmail, just like the guy in the CFC thread, so that might be it. I'll use his proggy and I guess this is where it'll end.
WhAT DO the little black towers (and the percentage number) above the city icon signify??
From what I gather, black towers means there are units fortified in it (might not be exact) and it's useful to check from the F1 screen what city has defenders and which hasn't.
The percentage is a culture modifier to defense. The higher your culture, the higher this number gets. I'm not sure whether walls and castles are included in here - probably are - and any unit defending that city gets that much as a tile defense bonus to strength.
Indeed. The percentage is the amount a defender gets against an attack. The value is dependent of the presence of walls & castles and culture. Each cultural level adds 20% to the defense, walls and castles each 50%. And Chichen Itza 25% (to all cities).
So a city with walls, a castle, >50,000 culture and Chichen Itza will have a 225% defense bonus. [mischief]
Then if the city is on a hill, defended by a mech. inf. with City Garrison I/II/III and Guerilla I/II, attacked by a regular warrior, the odds would be...
2 vs 32*(1+225%(city)+25%(hill)+75%(garrison)+50%(gueri lla)+10%(melee)) = 2 vs 155.2
Can anyone tell me how much chance the warrior has? :D Or better: how many warriors are necessary to defeat the mech inf? http://www.straland.com/images/smilies/ROTFLMAO.gif
I think this is worth a worldbuilder test. Well worth it.
Any bets? I'd go for 500, if the mech inf can't promote. Otherwise, well over 2000.
Edit2: crossing a river, you add an extra to the % I guess: 166.4 shows for me. 158.4 without crossing. Maybe there's some upgrade that gives an extra little % to melee units... either way, after over 350 hits, guess how much strength remained in the Mech Inf?
166.4.
After 5 GGens were born, the Mech inf increased in strength to 168, probably just the fortify bonus. Either way, this is not conclusive. I would dare believe you cannot scratch the unit past a certain point. Somewhere below 160:2 would be a safe initial hypothesis.
Oh, indeed, a river and fortification both add another 25%. But you can't have Chichen Itza and mech. inf., so that brings it too...163.2
Well, you *can* have both, you just need to do it from the world builder ;)
How many expansions do you get in a city hit with a culture bomb from an artist?
BFC +1 expansion? or more?
You get 4000; BFC is 10, +1 is 100, +2 is 500, +3 is 5000. So in a city with some culture potential, you get close to BFC +4. In a 0 culture city, you get BFC +3 and (in war-time when you just captured the place) you automatically quell the resistance.
For me this is a tactic that I may try out for my HoF games at CFC.. trying to win Domination games.. I figure on a small map each culture bomb may account for as much as 5-10% of land area.. I just need to see how quickly I can generate Great Artists to see if it will help in my quest :)
Once you get caste system, if you can build up a big GP farm (maybe with a mass-warrior HR happy abuse) it should go really fast. Arboria maps might be friendly for that because of the forest health and deers.
I do not have the game in front of me atm but how any tiles will a BFC+2 city cover?
9
+12
+12+4
=37, off hand.
who should I play first in BTS? I installed the bugger finally and want some suggestions on who should be honored as my first attemt.. also any "Gotta play 'em" maps?
Darkness
11-04-2008, 20:01
Any financial civ is usually a great start. I like Elizabeth a lot. Financial and Philosophical is a good combination...
I guess I should specify.. I want to play one of the new Civ in BTS.. I have played Vanilla and all of its Civ's and I am just looking for someone new now that I have BTS
Darkness
11-04-2008, 21:12
Ah, OK. Then it should of course be Willem van oranje. Decent traits. Great unique building on a map with lots of rivers and sea. And he's Dutch... :)
I like Sitting bull, his traits Uu and Ub mean that you aiming for a quick conquest victory!
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