I’ve got Warlords but not Beyond the Sword. Have gotten a little bit of it but not sure how to make money. How many forests should I cut down around my cities? How many villages to build? How specialized should my cities be?
It depends what level you want to play on, because all sorts of things change.
For Settler + Chieftain, I usually get 8-10 cities.
For Warlord + Noble, I usually stick at 5-6 cities.
On Monarch + Emperor, I go for 3-4 cities.
The reason for that is the financial penalty for each new city, which becomes progressively more severe.
Cuting down forests brings in shields, but can affect your health. Again on easier levels, you will have higher starting health.
Villages are good becasue over time you work up to 5 gold income per turn. Some terrain is not very well adapted for other things, so a village works well.
The specialisation for your cities depends on the special resources nearby. A city with a couple of food squares grows quickly, and can be used to build Settlers and Workers.
A city with good mines is usually where you build your military units.
Your initial city is typically the largest, so that’s where Wonders can be built quickest.
I usually have one city building Settlers and Workers, my Capital building Wonders and everyone else building military units.
You shouldn’t be running out of money at the easier levels. One technique that I’ve found that really helps is having your first city the cultural center, and build all the wonders that improve the chances of a Great _____ appearing. Then, when a Great Artist/Engineer/whatever appears, I choose to have them join the city as a Super Specialist, giving (typically) about 3 shields and 5 gold per turn to the city.
When you add a Market or Grocer or Bank to that city, those +gold figures are multiplied.
I do all of this without building a single cottage, yet am usually rolling in gold by the 1800s, even on Prince.
There’s a great website for all things Civilization at http://www.civfanatics.com/
Some of the guides are a bit out of date since they’re for vanilla Civ, but most of it is great advice. I’m still struggling at the Noble level.
Yes, but Great Persons each have a special ability (Engineers can rush Wonders; Prophets can build holy buildings etc).
Cottages are easy to build and soon bring in 5 gold per turn…
I don’t like cutting down forests, because later on they are very useful for keeping large cities healthy, plus once you can build lumbermills they are worth a lot of production. Now, if your city is entirely surrounded by forest I might cut down a few (unless I’m playing as the Ljosalfar in the Fall From Heaven mod, they like trees), but that’s pretty rare.
I also make a point to found at least one religion, preferably as many as possible. Controlling a holy city shrine gives you 1 gold per city with that religion. Monasteries give good culture and science boosts in the early to mid game, and there are several religious wonders that give substantial boosts in different areas.
If you’ve gotta cut down forests, go for forests next to rivers first. River tiles get a commerce bonus unless they have a forest on them.
And this thread made me realize why I can’t play Civ 3 or Civ 4 above the second, maybe third level. I don’t really “specialize” my cities, as it were. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I always have the city with more production, the one that make more gold, the one that grows fastest, but I have it in my head (and I’m a bit OCD about it) that every city needs every improvement. And it would be a “waste” of time for one city to do nothing but churn out military units, when instead it could build a granary, so it can grow faster, and then a temple, to get more culture, and so on. So I make all my cities build everything, with some “time outs” for wonders, since they have a big effect. But I don’t amass armies, or vast coffers of gold, or anything. So I’ll get to the “modern” age and have no army. Half of my defensive units guarding my city (oh, and each city will only have one or two units in it…because units cost resources and I can’t waste production and food on a fucking phalanx or rifleman!) I also will have almost zero offensive units.
Sometimes I decide to go to “war,” if for instance I am very far ahead scientifically, so my units are more advanced, but I do it very poorly. I’ll make like half a dozen attackers and think that’s fine and go try to conquer a civilization.
I wouldn’t say that Civ IV requires specialization - it’s just a more effective way to play. I agree that there are plenty of buildings that help your empire regardless of any particular focus: Granaries, Grocers, Banks, Courthouses… All things that, ideally, I want in every single one of my cities. Much of the fun of Civ, to me, is knowing when to reprioritize.
Another good way of getting money early is founding a religion. Not only does it keep the plebes happy, but if you get a Great Prophet, you can build your religion’s holy building and end up collecting yearly contributions from every city on the map that worships under your religion.
Also, try build at least a couple of coastal cities. They get bonuses to trade, and can get Harbors (and, in BtS, Lighthouses) that increase their profitability.
I had to look up and make sure this wasn’t a zombie thread and that wasn’t my post - it’s so exactly my problem. Doesn’t everybody need a granary?
Yeah, me too.
Also, I always find myself essentially researching technologies at random. I’ve pretty much researched everything by the time the end game comes along. I tend to not play a warmongering game since I always get trampled. I’m not sure what logic to use in the process of research, which limits my abilities to specialize.
Ditto government. I pretty much convert to whatever is the most modern version and the implications of each are pretty much lost on me. I know objectively what the costs and benefits of each are, but I can’t seem to learn how to apply them to what my Civ’s needs happen to be. I figure that when in doubt, the modern one is best.
It’s only on the lower levels of difficulty that you can afford to build every building in every city.
My Capital usually gets most (if not all) buildings, because it’s usually the biggest - so with a lot of light bulbs a Library is worth having.
But a city with one or two light bulbs doesn’t benefit from a Library.
Similarly only my cities producing military units get a Barracks and a Stable.
Try playing Saladin of the Arabs (or Isabella of the Spanish) and heading for the Engineering and Guilds technologies. Have one city building Wonders, one making Settlers + Workers and every other city with Barracks and Stables.
Once you get Engineering, build some Trebuchets, then once you get Guilds, make Camel Riders (or Conquistadors).
Then raze every city in sight and sit back admiring a job well done.
I like playing as Wang Kon (Korean leader, you need either of the expansions to get him). He has Financial which brings in more money, and Protective which gives all eligible land units a free City Garrison upgrade. The Hwacha replaces the catapult, and launches a bunch of primitive rockets all over the place. The Seowon is an upgraded University with more science output, and I think more culture too. The early going is a little rough, but once I get established I have a strong tech lead, I can pay to upgrade old units more easily, and they are better defenders so I don’t need quite as many.
This I never entirely understand. In Civ IV you rarely want more than 5 or 6 cities as was mentioned and as such you only ever need to build 4 or 5 settlers. You really don’t need more than a couple workers for the first couple cities and never more than 1 per city since the first city maxes out it’s improvements long before you build up your last couple cities to use more than a couple of it’s tiles.
Based on this logic your Capital is almost certainly going to produce your first 2 settlers and the first handful of workers just to get things under way. Why would you need to specialize a city to build these guys ever?
If you have say 6 cities on the Noble level. Your Capital is going to be making settlers, workers and early defensive units for the first several turns until you have 3 more cities that are self sufficient. Then it becomes your cultural center, fine. The next city is your big manufacturing center to crank out military units. Hopefully it’s on a location that has lots of shields and food stores to grow and produce quickly. What else is there? You have 4 more cities that are just left to grow and produce money. What do you have them building? Just commerce buildings? Any units at all?
I always feel like I have more cities with more chances to build stuff than I have requirements. Do you just have them producing money? Research? Maybe I need to use specialists more.
I too could have wirtten this. I also have way too many cities, or are captured cities OK in addition to th 5/6 you build yourself?
Dear bouv, you speak for us all. Civ was the game that rammed home for me that I’m just rubbish at games in general.
One other thing that bugs me about Civ is not having Earth maps included with the game, which seems a bit odd, but is at a tangent with this thread.
I’ve noted that in later stages of the game, my citizens enjoy having national forests. I have a lumbermill in every forest, so I get the health, happiness, and production benefits from them.
I, too, like to put every improvement in every city.
I frequently use my Great People to expand the borders of my newest cities, by building an academy, creating a great work of art, or simply joining as a Great Person.
I have Civ IV Warlords.
I usually spend my very first city’s production on nothing but warriors. Once I’ve got a decent stack, I go conquer the nearest rival, then switch production to settlers/workers and backfill the area with cities/roads.
All bets are off if I have a world that contains the Japanese. I don’t know why, but they always seem to attack me before I can make any real gains. I have actually spent an entire game building friends to help me conquer them.
Oh, and the upgrade to longbowmen, macemen, riflemen, infantry are worth it. Knights/cavalry too.
How many defenders do I need? I was laying as Roosevelt the other day and got a nasty shock when I discovered that, oops!, I forgot to adequately defend one city which let Brennus march and one-hit KO it with Trebuchets. Given that was my big science city, this was bad.
I closed that game in shame.
Likewise, anyone know a way to permanently set it to use the default leader name instead of my effin’ computer name? I am getting pretty darn sick of being called Computer_Owner for 6000 years because I clicked past the stupid leader title. Which idiot programmer thought this was a good idea?
This is an interesting description and I need to reply with more detail. 
I usually start with a couple of exploring units (Scouts are nice if your Civilisation has Hunting), plus a unit or two to defend my Capital.
Then I build a Worker to enrich the resource squares, then another military unit, then a Settler.
Depending on the nearby terrain, the second city either builds Workers + Settlers, or military units. (The Capital covers the other requirement, then switches to Wonders.)
It’s true that you may only need 4-5 Settlers and 3 Workers - at that point the city rich in food can hire Specialists (by taking someone off farming).
What the next few cities do depends on how you see the game going:
- if you are playing a Military Civilisation, then they build BArracks, Stables and military units
- if you are going for technology, then they build Libraries
I do like to get an early religion (choose a Spiritual Civilisation for this because it leads to both Buddhism and Hinduism quickly), and build a Temple in all my Cities. If the terrain is harsh, then Granaries may be needed.
Getting Wonders and Specialists leads to Great People, which are a real boost to your Civilisation.