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[Slavik81]

Does anybody play with Hatshepsut? I've been playing this game for years, and I still can't figure her out - especially her unique building, the Obelisk. Egypt seems so geared towards religion, yet they don't even start out with Mysticism. So your best shot at a religion is probably Judaism, which will hamper all of your early teching. And it's not like you have a lot of population to spare in the beginning to assign 2 Priests anyways.

Egypt. Worst... civilization.... ever. Or Russia.

Does it really make that much of a difference? Or does it become more apparent on the higher difficulty settings?

Thus far, the differences between the Civilizations have seemed very minor.

 

[Zyzyxxz]

Does it really make that much of a difference? Or does it become more apparent on the higher difficulty settings?

Thus far, the differences between the Civilizations have seemed very minor.

In Civ4 if you are playing on the higher difficulties then you will really need to make every turn count.

Take Ghandi for instance, his ability to get religions early on can easily help him discover all religions and all the other races will be handicapped by not having one.

 

[Dedalus]

You can't go wrong with Sisiutil's Strategy Guide for Beginners. I also recommend giving the strategy articles forum another look once you get more comfortable with the game.

Wow that was surprisingly helpful. I never really put that much thought into city specialization and just built everything I could, not to mention neglecting my military (regularly had Warriors/Archers in the modern era). I'm already partway through a new game and can instantly see the results from specialization, although there is a certain finesse that I can't seem to grasp and I just know its vital for pushing up the difficulty level. Oh gaf, what have I done, I'll never get any sleep now :lol

 

[chuckddd]

Does it really make that much of a difference? Or does it become more apparent on the higher difficulty settings?

Thus far, the differences between the Civilizations have seemed very minor.

It makes a massive difference. You have to choose leader traits that fit your style. If you're in a fighting mood, I suggest picking Caesar, unlock the traits and then choose Aggressive and Charismatic. You'll be rolling around with a big group of Praetorians just beating everyone's ass until the middle ages.

 

[XiaNaphryz]

All according to keikaku.

Spoiler

Keikaku means Tokugawa.

So has anyone ever actually gotten good relations with the Aztecs in these games? :lol

 

[Aaron]

Does it really make that much of a difference? Or does it become more apparent on the higher difficulty settings?

Thus far, the differences between the Civilizations have seemed very minor.

It's almost a different game at the higher difficulties. You need to pick your Civ with care, and actually plan out your goals far in advance. The race to build wonders first is particularly brutal.

 

[Zyzyxxz]

So has anyone ever actually gotten good relations with the Aztecs in these games? :lol

I once had them as good friends for a few centuries and then out of the blue they make a minor demand which I deny and its war.

 

[sparky2112]

You can't go wrong with Sisiutil's Strategy Guide for Beginners. I also recommend giving the strategy articles forum another look once you get more comfortable with the game.

I just wanted to pop in and say THANK YOU for this post. That guide is fantastic; it's really enhanced my enjoyment of the game. I feel like I'm playing with purpose, rather than just kinda clicking around and watching what happens. It's a new game now...

 

[PoweredBySoy]

So has anyone ever actually gotten good relations with the Aztecs in these games? :lol

I always play a Custom Game, and awhile back I started turning on Random Personalities. I love it. It makes the game much more fun when you can't predict what the other civs will do.

 

[Fragamemnon]

Monty is designed to be erratic and highly aggressive. If you get him as a neighbor, you will be going to war at some point, so you pretty much always plan on doing so on your own terms and timings and not his. Geghis is the same way.

Getting next to the Aztecs is always a treat because it really forces you to totally change your game plan.

 

[Danj]

This thread is making me want to dig out and reinstall my copy of Civ4 and its expansions. What are the latest patch versions and where do I get them?

 

[ghst]

This thread is making me want to dig out and reinstall my copy of Civ4 and its expansions. What are the latest patch versions and where do I get them?

far as i can tell, firing up beyond the sword in multiplayer will prompt and automatically update to the latest version.

 

[Johann]

Does anybody play with Hatshepsut? I've been playing this game for years, and I still can't figure her out - especially her unique building, the Obelisk. Egypt seems so geared towards religion, yet they don't even start out with Mysticism. So your best shot at a religion is probably Judaism, which will hamper all of your early teching. And it's not like you have a lot of population to spare in the beginning to assign 2 Priests anyways.

Egypt. Worst... civilization.... ever. Or Russia.

With, Hatshepsut you're looking at mainly these victory conditions:

You can use the War Chariot to gain an early military advantage. It's basically an un-upgraded Axeman with better mobility, no infantry promotions, immunity to first strikes, and lower cost. Depending on your neighbors's Spearman/UU, a War Chariot rush maybe able to build enough a lead to dominate the rest of the game

With the Obelisk, you'll be to get a leg up on Great Prophets before other civilization can even assign specialists. This will even allow you to run many priest specialists without resorting to the caste system labor civic. Depending on your food resource bonus, you'll be able to get Great Prophets out relatively quickly. This means that you can have a near-monopoly on religions by using the Prophet's ability to lightbulb religious techs. You can leverage religion into your economy through the religious wonders. This sets up the game for a diplomatic victory through careful manipulation of religion. A space race victory is also a possibility if you plan out your tech choices and leverage a religious economy. The Obelisk is more important to Ramesses II. He doesn't have the creative trait, which makes the Obelisk a bigger priority.

Hatshepsut, in particular, heavily favors a cultural victory. She'll be able to combine the cultural power of religion with the creative trait's building discounts. Once she starts going she is almost unstoppable since happiness and commerce cease to be a major problem. You have temples and the culture slider to take care of that.

Does it really make that much of a difference? Or does it become more apparent on the higher difficulty settings?

Thus far, the differences between the Civilizations have seemed very minor.

They get much more pronounced at higher levels when you have to understand the traits and timing windows for their unique units. You'll really feel the difference when you can't rely on the financial trait or the Roman Praetorian.

So has anyone ever actually gotten good relations with the Aztecs in these games? :lol

He's a rabid dog like Isabella. You can use him as dumb muscle as long as you share the same state religion. However, you have to baby him and keep him 'Friendly' or else he'll attack you at a drop of a hat. His belligerence makes it difficult to pursue diplomacy or trading with other civilizations in fear that you'll get a diplomatic penalty with Monty. I've had a couple of games in which I've tag-teamed a domination victory with him. Most of the time, he's too much of a risk to keep alive.

 

[PoweredBySoy]

With, Hatshepsut you're looking at mainly these victory conditions:

You can use the War Chariot to gain an early military advantage.

Yeah, War Chariots are great - I agree. But they also are dependent on your having access to horses, which isn't the most common of resources.

With the Obelisk, you'll be to get a leg up on Great Prophets before other civilization can even assign specialists. This will even allow you to run many priest specialists without resorting to the caste system labor civic.

But I just don't see the way to have that population to spare for Priest specialists. By the time my cities are big enough to allow Specialists, I'm not that far away from Astronomy anyways.... The only way I could see it working is if you settle in floodplains for a huge population boost. Of course then the urge to whip is pretty strong.

Hatshepsut, in particular, heavily favors a cultural victory. She'll be able to combine the cultural power of religion with the creative trait's building discounts.

Creative is definitely my most favorite trait - especially for the fast buildings it provides. I'm sure Hatshepsut is perfectly viable, and I'm sure the way I play the game is fairly narrow-minded, but I've just never got her to feel right in regards to her unique building and starting techs.

I'm also pretty anti-religion in this game. I've always felt the game put a bit too much emphasis on how much other civilizations hate you if you don't share their religion. I understand it's the basis of most war, but it seems to overdo it a bit much.

 

[chuckddd]

far as i can tell, firing up beyond the sword in multiplayer will prompt and automatically update to the latest version.

There's a button on the main menu that says "check for updates".

 

[Mobius 1]

So has anyone ever actually gotten good relations with the Aztecs in these games? :lol

I did... but I was playing in the easy setting (don't remember which one, just to get back into it), and the Aztecs were my next-door pals.

Probably because of the overwhelming military might of my portuguese civ. It was so easy that I won a cultural victory by 1980, then proceeded to nuke everyone else.

 

[Zyzyxxz]

I did... but I was playing in the easy setting (don't remember which one, just to get back into it), and the Aztecs were my next-door pals.

Probably because of the overwhelming military might of my portuguese civ. It was so easy that I won a cultural victory by 1980, then proceeded to nuke everyone else.

Too bad using nukes doesn't cause global warming like in Alpha Centauri. Then again it would only work if you could build cities floating on water.

I thought that was so cool that using nuclear weapons could impact your own nation negatively by raising sealevels and screw up your coastal cities resources.

 

[jepense]

Too bad using nukes doesn't cause global warming like in Alpha Centauri. Then again it would only work if you could build cities floating on water.

I thought that was so cool that using nuclear weapons could impact your own nation negatively by raising sealevels and screw up your coastal cities resources.

At least in some of the old Civ games, nukes caused nuclear winter. Pollution caused global warming.

 

[UltimaPooh]

Anyone know where I can get a download of this for the Mac?

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

semi noob question

What does "It's too crowded!" entail exactly? I've been trying to move up in difficulty and i've noticed this very frequently in both the lower difficulties and the I think Warlord difficulty(the 3rd one)

thanks in advance for anyone that can answer

 

[arstal]

semi noob question

What does "It's too crowded!" entail exactly? I've been trying to move up in difficulty and i've noticed this very frequently in both the lower difficulties and the I think Warlord difficulty(the 3rd one)

thanks in advance for anyone that can answer

Population increases add unhappiness. Solve by building happy buildings or other happy effects.

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

oh I see

I was hoping there was some kind of way to not get it but I guess not.

Thanks either way

 

[Zyzyxxz]

oh I see

I was hoping there was some kind of way to not get it but I guess not.

Thanks either way

its a balancing feature to prevent someone from getting lucky and being surrounded by super farms and building a super cultural city.

You need the tech to provide buildings, and then you build those buildings to increase the happiness limit. You can usually risk a little unhappy but just don't over do it unless you want a high chance of riots

 

[Johann]

Too bad using nukes doesn't cause global warming like in Alpha Centauri. Then again it would only work if you could build cities floating on water.

I thought that was so cool that using nuclear weapons could impact your own nation negatively by raising sealevels and screw up your coastal cities resources.

Actually, I'm pretty sure prolonged nuclear war in the game causes global warming. It turns otherwise food producing tiles to desert and other arid terrain. If anything, it should cause a nuclear winter.

Anyone know where I can get a download of this for the Mac?

It doesn't look like there is a Mac version on the game for Direct2Drive or other services. You could always buy the retail Mac version and apply the latest update that removes the CD check. The patch is only for Beyond the Sword though.

 

[Boss Doggie]

Oh God.

OH MY GOD.

I am never a fan of turn-based strategy games that involves a large scale (e.g. Age of Wonders, I'm fine with Advance Wars for instance), but man...

This game, despite having a large scale with micromanagement and being turn-based, it made me waste hours upon hours of being absorbed in the world!

Any hints for me? I really want to get better in this amazing game.

 

[arstal]

Actually, I'm pretty sure prolonged nuclear war in the game causes global warming. It turns otherwise food producing tiles to desert and other arid terrain. If anything, it should cause a nuclear winter.



It doesn't look like there is a Mac version on the game for Direct2Drive or other services. You could always buy the retail Mac version and apply the latest update that removes the CD check. The patch is only for Beyond the Sword though.

Do not buy this game from D2D! Every other DD service has it minus DRM. D2D has a very narrow SECURomed activation limit to this day.

 

[Technosteve]

not as good as SMAC unless there is CIV4 SMAC mod

 

[Dipper145]

I find that my ability to succeed in this game directly depends on how the map decides to create the terrain and resources.

I'm not very good at the game. I always run into the same too crowded! thing, and my cities get all mad. Does this have an effect on the production or anything of the city? Should I try to limit the cities growth so that they don't get mad (or sick)? Should I wait until I get more buildings/resources that cause happiness/health?

How important is diplomacy/trading resources and stuff? Do the AI characters often trade between one another?

off to play another few hours of it...

 

[Shalashaska]

Just started playing it a bit today, I'm so overwhelmed. Really going to try hard to stick with it though, these games aren't my forte but I really want to get into it.

 

[chuckddd]

not as good as SMAC unless there is CIV4 SMAC mod

Don't go back and read through the thread or anything.

Actually, it's probably for the best. This way, you won't lose several weeks playing.

 

[Aaron]

I find that my ability to succeed in this game directly depends on how the map decides to create the terrain and resources.

I'm not very good at the game. I always run into the same too crowded! thing, and my cities get all mad. Does this have an effect on the production or anything of the city? Should I try to limit the cities growth so that they don't get mad (or sick)? Should I wait until I get more buildings/resources that cause happiness/health?

If you're too crowded early, you're not expanding enough. Creating settlers and workers eats into your food supply, and keeps a city from growing too fast. Religion is a major source of happiness early on, while aqueducts and harbors help with sickness.

How important is diplomacy/trading resources and stuff? Do the AI characters often trade between one another?

Depends on the difficulty. Since it's hard to out tech the AI on the higher difficulties, I find trading and making strong allies essential for success. AIs do trade resources and tech with each other, at least at the higher levels.

 

[Ember128]

Just start a custom game with a small world, fast speed and tips on. You should get the hang of the most important concepts fairly quickly. The details can wait until you ramp up the difficulty.




If you press 'G' and hover the pointer over an enemy unit, you should see the percentage chance of victory if you attack it. Also try to figure out the combat modifiers; terrain can give bonuses to defense, attacking over rivers or from a ship gives a penalty, different types of units have different bonuses against different types (melee, ranged, cavalry, gunpowder, etc.) If all else fail, weaken the enemy down with artillery. Also, never attack a city unless you have at least twice as many attackers as there are defenders. (Unless you have tanks and they have sharp sticks)

The second paragraph becomes the most awesome and in depth bit of stuff EVER. Explore it. Using Guerrilla tactics and cheer ass-bastardness I stalled 3-4 computers attacking me. They ended up having to deal with all these guys that could travel faster and heal in their territory, which diverted guys from their main offensives, which gave me just enough juice to stall their advances and push back.

 

[Technosteve]

I saw the link to the mod. In the morning I will rebuy civ and play SMAC. Don't go the Drones need you =(.

 

[Aaron]

The second paragraph becomes the most awesome and in depth bit of stuff EVER. Explore it. Using Guerrilla tactics and cheer ass-bastardness I stalled 3-4 computers attacking me. They ended up having to deal with all these guys that could travel faster and heal in their territory, which diverted guys from their main offensives, which gave me just enough juice to stall their advances and push back.

By being the founder of Hindu and controlling the whatever palace, I was able to force the far more powerful military AI to continuously halt his advance by turning his people over to my religion. The one city he managed to conquer, I was able to force him to give it back even before it settled down, and then took another one of his cities in the same manner. I also started a holy war against another AI rival, which completely screwed him from winning. I don't think Ghandi would have been pleased with my strong arm tactics, but it was still non-violent resistance. Not what you'd expect from Otto Von Bismark.

 

[sparky2112]

I find that my ability to succeed in this game directly depends on how the map decides to create the terrain and resources.

I'm not very good at the game. I always run into the same too crowded! thing, and my cities get all mad. Does this have an effect on the production or anything of the city? Should I try to limit the cities growth so that they don't get mad (or sick)? Should I wait until I get more buildings/resources that cause happiness/health?

How important is diplomacy/trading resources and stuff? Do the AI characters often trade between one another?

off to play another few hours of it...

Again, the strategy quide linked to in this thread will do you a WORLD of good. You WILL be a better player for having read and absorbed it.

 

[PoweredBySoy]

I'm not very good at the game. I always run into the same too crowded! thing, and my cities get all mad. Does this have an effect on the production or anything of the city? Should I try to limit the cities growth so that they don't get mad (or sick)? Should I wait until I get more buildings/resources that cause happiness/health?

Unhappiness or Sickness definitely has an effect on production. Any citizen who is unhappy or sick will not be producing anything. Meaning, these citizens won't be able to work a production square (in the city screen) or be available as Specialists. Having a state religion and building temples is a good counter in the early game - just be aware that it also has the potential of creating nearby enemies if their state religion differs. Heredity Rule (Monarchy) is also a great early-game counter to unhappiness. Acquiring the right resources is the most straight forward counter to unhappiness and sickness - and certain buildings will further the benefits.

Of course, in the early game, never forget the greatness that is Slavery! If you have cities with fast growing populations (floodplains are great for this), or not enough resources to keep your citizens content - use Slavery and sacrifice them into production. Slavery will always take the discontented citizens first, lowering your population to more manageable levels. For example, if you have two citizens which are unhappy, "whip" them to finish production of your current building. This can save you many turns - and those unhappy or sick citizens weren't doing your city any good anyways. As a general rule I only whip when I have discontent citizens, and I never whip more that 2 at a time per city. If you hover over the sacrifice button in the city screen, it will tell you how many citizens it will consume to finish your current project.

But overall Unhappiness and Sickness are normal. Just try to halt population growth until you get the problem taken care of. Either acquire the necessary resources, build a building, or adopt a civic.

How important is diplomacy/trading resources and stuff? Do the AI characters often trade between one another?

In the early game you first have to worry about open borders. Generally I'll accept an open border request - especially if that civilization has a religion I want. If you open borders with them, there's a greater chance their religion will spread to you. But in the early game, there's also a fierce land-grab going on, and one of the most important strategies is to settle cities that cut off your nearest neighbor from valuable land (the Cultural trait is awesome for this). I always expand towards my nearest neighbor and try to soak up as much of his (valuable) land as I can. And while I'm cutting him off, I don't want his settlers crossing my borders and settling behind me - so I won't accept Open Borders until my cities are fairly established. Also be aware that land-grabbing like this could potentially cause him to invade, if he's feeling too squished. But it's worth it in the end.

As far as resources, unless I can help it, I won't trade with the currently highest ranked civs. Trading resources that they need will only help solidify their lead. So for example, if I'm in first place (looking at the scores), I won't trade with the #2 or #3 civ. Instead I'll see if the lower ranked guys have anything worth trading. Sometimes though you'll be desperate for a resource and may need to break this rule, but it just all depends.

You also have to kind of be careful with who you trade with, and you can piss other civs off if you trade with their enemies. Religion is the most influential factor when it comes to relations, but trading can have it's effect too. So put a bit of thought into it instead of just accepting every trade request that comes on your screen. In general, I try to keep my nearest neighbors the happiest (the same guys who are probably upset at my close borders) and not worry about those on other islands, etc... Or of course if you're looking to go to war with a neighboring civ at some point, then who cares what they think about you.

The AI does trade amongst themselves. When I play a custom game, I always set No Trade Brokering - which means you can't trade any technology which you didn't research yourself. So if your traded Astronomy, you can't later trade that Astronomy tech to a different civilization for something else.

 

[Johann]

Oh God.

OH MY GOD.

I am never a fan of turn-based strategy games that involves a large scale (e.g. Age of Wonders, I'm fine with Advance Wars for instance), but man...

This game, despite having a large scale with micromanagement and being turn-based, it made me waste hours upon hours of being absorbed in the world!

Any hints for me? I really want to get better in this amazing game.

These are probably the two best guides for beginners:

Sisiutil's Strategy Guide for Beginners

This guide covers just about everything. In particular, there are important lessons about city planning, the tech path, tech trading, city maintenance, and city specialization. You can see just from this thread that people walk away from the guide with a much better understanding of the game.

Civ IV Intermediate Tactics and Gambits

This guide is more for people who can win consistently on the noble difficult and want to move up to harder difficulties. It goes over the mentality you need for these new difficulties since the AI players get handicaps. You won't be reliably pull off the same old tricks used in lower difficulties or have a near-guaranteed tech lead. You'll have to place a bigger emphasis on adapting your strategy and being more open to strategies you've dismissed in the past. The guide also goes more in-depth about the role of religion in the game, carefully selecting wonders best for your strategy, the finer points of diplomacy/trading, the technology races, opening gambits, and much more.

I find that my ability to succeed in this game directly depends on how the map decides to create the terrain and resources.

I'm not very good at the game. I always run into the same too crowded! thing, and my cities get all mad. Does this have an effect on the production or anything of the city? Should I try to limit the cities growth so that they don't get mad (or sick)? Should I wait until I get more buildings/resources that cause happiness/health?

Too crowded is a normal occurrence as the city grows in size. This will be a larger or smaller penalty depending on your difficulty level. You'll either need to stagnate the city's growth or get happiness resources/buildings/civics for the city. However, you have a problem once the unhappiness exceeds your happiness limit. You end up with people in the city who eat up the city's food, raise the costs of the city, do not work in the city's fields, and are not available for specialization. You can trade/find happiness resources, build a happiness building, build happiness producing Wonders, adopt a state religion, adopt the Free Religion civic (assuming you have many different religions in your cities), adopt the Heredity Rule civic, adopt the Representation civic, or adopt the Emancipation civic (that is much later in the game and the civic just removes a penalty) in order to have usable workers. Alternatively, you can starve the city to a smaller population or use the Slavery civic's rush production ability to cut down on population. Note that the slavery civic runs the risk of your cities having an occasional and often costly slave revolt. It really comes down to what is the most cost effective decision in your situation

Good city health is not nearly as important. You can get some easy health bonuses by placing a city near (by near, I mean a tile in the city's workable cross) a forest or adjacent to body of freshwater (river/lake). You get health penalties building near jungles and flood plains. At the very least, you can chop jungles. Flood plains are too valuable to avoid.

How important is diplomacy/trading resources and stuff? Do the AI characters often trade between one another?

off to play another few hours of it...

Diplomacy gets much more at higher difficulties since you'll need to exploit other leaders in other to win. You'll have to be more careful with who you open borders with, trade with, and share religion with. You'll have to choose your friends and enemies. In general, you'll have to think long term since a war can change the player standings quickly. Good relations go a long way in using this to your advantage or avoiding the collateral from this.

Assuming you're playing without randomized AI personalities, here are a few things to note about AI leaders:

- Financial leaders tend to build a tech lead. In particular, Mansa Musa is an incredible trading partner since he is willing to trade major techs even if he has a major negative standing with you. These leaders tend to make excellent vassals since they can tech towards other techs and the two of you can swap notes. Beware, that there are limits on how many techs you can trade depending on the strenght of your relationship.

- A few Industrious leaders, especially usually Huayna Capac, will build wonders at the expense of a military. Unlike with tech leaders, you can't trade wonders with them or have the Wonders effect you through vassalage. You can treat them as an animal ready for slaughter by allowing them to fatten themselves up. Let them do the Wonder building for you and use your military advantage to claim them later.

- Unless you are Friendly with them, Shaka, Montezuma, Genghis Khan, Ragnar, and Alexander will attack if you are weaker than them. With how the game calculates military power, this could mean you are in actuality stronger than them since you have fewer yet more advanced, more experienced troops.

- Different civilizations have different military tactics. Napoleon tends to spam units with nationhood while the tech civilizations prefer fewer, more advanced troops.

- Isabella and Montezuma have lower thresholds for declare war on other civilizations, especially 'infidels.' Even if they are at a military advantage, they attack you if your accrue enough negative diplomacy points with them. You could use this to an advantage by buying them into a war with your enemy with a small sum of money.

- Montezuma tends to be the deadliest civilization in the hands of the AI. You'll have to keep him in check or have a buffer civilization/ocean between the two of you.

- The best vassals tend to be either tech hoarders (Mansa Musa, Cyrus) or dumb muscle (Shaka, Genghis Khan). You can also use religion to manipulate a few leaders, such as Isabella.

 

[Boss Doggie]

Darn, the site is down.

 

[Earthstrike]

If anyone is interested in some online games (played with quick speed and a turn limit to make things reasonably fast, say 1-2 hours) just drop me a line.

 

[Althoran]

Why was this thread made. Too many great Civ things in this thread. I will probably reinstall this now and lose a lot of time again

 

[-tetsuo-]

Must...... resist....... playing...

 

[Hellcrow]

I just lost 5 hours to this game on an easy mode. I played Ghandi, thinking I would try a diplomatic game. Turns out my starting continent is a thin snake, and Russia early has locked me in. Ended up with me going on a crusade down the snake continent, taking over every city I could down the way. Now after destroying Russia and the Aztecs, I control the snake continent, and my deadly arms have now found a huge continent ready for war.

For some reason, I managed to research SAM infantry before standard infantry and planes. This was around the year 1600 and my opponents has recently discovered macemen.

I should play at higher difficulties.

 

[Alex Connolly]

Picked up Civ IV Complete on Gamersgate just then for a cool 20. It's Sid Meier week over there, for all who are interested.

 

[Manos: The Hans of Fate]

Is it just me or does anyone else get a sudden urge to play Civ whenever someone mentions the game. I must resist....for now.

It's like Deus Ex in that way. This thread made me re-install the Civ 4 complete set I got. I love that it's DRM free (no CD-Check even), makes it easy to play at any time (which can be a very bad thing :lol ). Hell, I re-installed Civ 3 (which is somewhat close to Civ 2), since I can't find my Civ 2 disc. I also have no clue where the hell my SMAC is! Why isn't SMAC on steam?

It's a shame I can't install classic Colonization under Windows 7 (I even have the CD still).
Did any of the expansions significantly improve Civ 3? Not that it was bad or anything, its just Steam has it for 5 bucks right now,

 

[Zyzyxxz]

So who is playing Colonization?

I recently reinstalled CIV4 complete (thanks to GAF sigh...)

And I decided to try Colonization.

The problem was I could never win even on the lowest difficulty.

Can someone recommend some good tips and strategies for certain countries?

 

[Lkr]

i really need a tutorial, i have no idea how to play. the basic in game one doesn't teach enough

 

[Zyzyxxz]

i really need a tutorial, i have no idea how to play. the basic in game one doesn't teach enough

really? I thought the in game tutorial was actually pretty decent albeit a little basic (at least it has one unlike older civ games)

Just play a custom game on a tiny map with 2-3 other AI opponents until you get the hang of things.

Also spend your time highlighting features and use the in game encyclopedia. That was how I did it since Civ1, I never used any guides I just learned as I went over time.

 

[Sibylus]

Whenever I visit my cousin, we spend a lot of time playing this. Time pretty much goes out the window in a most alarming fashion.

Civ III has a lot of that addictive quality as well.

 

[Zyzyxxz]

Whenever I visit my cousin, we spend a lot of time playing this. Time pretty much goes out the window in a most alarming fashion.

Civ III has a lot of that addictive quality as well.

the thing I don't like about CIV III is that it gets boring fast.

 

[Bear]

I finally got around to buying this game during the Steam sale (after weeks of obsessive recommendations from a friend of mine). Is there any reason to play the game vanilla or should I just install all the expansions from the get-go?