1BC Civ Forums / Civilization IV Discussion / I Need Help!

Language

Foxbat2k — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 18:38:24 GMT

I have loaded the game three times. I select English every time I load the disks. Everything seems to load fine. When I start the game the advertisements are in English but when the game actually starts everything is in Japanese or Chinese I have no idea which.

CIV4 save position on vista error

Luksa004 — Sun, 04 May 2008 19:12:22 GMT

Dear all,
I have problem to save the position during the playing,there is plenty of free space on my drive.Autosaving is working, but later I can not load the file and I have to play from the beginin geach time what killes me.Vista home is my operating system.I've downloaded last patch from internet it didn't help and it is even worst.It was not possible to run the game at all.Can somebody help me please?

What the %$#& did they do to this game?

off_track — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 21:06:58 GMT

Aaaaarrrrrgggghhhh !
I am back and on my knees, begging for help. I just tried a warlords game upload but that didn't even work. :pinch: :pinch: :pinch:

Some of you may remember me a long time player and old head poster. Apparently the Civ and perhaps the 1BC gods are angry with me. I received the game for Christmas from my lovely wife and have been in torture for almost two months. I have played and won three games but that is about the only thing I can say for myself. The wins have been ugly late and on the wimpy wimpy level.

Some my remember me as warmonger, as I prefer domination only games with scorched earth and total annihilation as my preferred wins. After all its only and game and I do it for relaxation, or used to. The last incarnation of this devil of death (Civ IV warloards) is just miserable. If I wasn't so danged stubborn I would pack it in and go back to Civ II (unlimited terra-forming) or Civ III (where warmongers had a chance).

How I long for the Bolan-longpants days of cavalry riders crushing all in their paths. Now if I manage to build the cavalry sometime around the twenty first century, some idiot with a pointy stick will come out of the city and annihilate him. Forget the tank versus spearman occasional win, these guys win from a city virtually every time. Just tell how this is even possible? First the rider would have to ride directly into the pointy stick, and why would he even consider that when he can shoot the rifle from yards away where no risk is even possible.

Sorry takes deep breath ... (remember it is only a game, only a game) ...

Back to the problem at present, remember the game I can not upload, but I do love the new built in spell checker. Way to go Sean you and the site are still the best! In the current game to speed my progress I attempted a settlers and workers build. Somehow I built myself into deficit spending and a perpetual strike. The result of this is I now have nothing but abandoned towns! All of my workers and the few military I had being liquidated for back taxes. I have no idea how I got into it or how I get out of it. My science is zero with no workers, no buildings and I still loose money.

Which brings me to the new city screen does anybody understand this thing? Does anybody understand religion? How about resources (no Al

Destroying roads / buildings

luciensan — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 11:07:01 GMT

Hi,

is it possible to remove roads/railways or buildings in a city?

Greetings,
Pascal

How to use the alarm feature? It won't even turn on.

Yurdle-The-Turtle — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 16:50:57 GMT

Just bought Civ 4 and Beyond the Sword a couple of weeks ago, it's a great game and all.

One thing I'd REALLY like to use is the alarm clock thing; the only problem is, it won't even turn on! I turn on the clock, and it works. However, whenever I tick the box for "Alarm on", it never turns on; I go back into the options and the box is back to unticked!

What am I supposed to do to make the alarm work? Also, how do you put in the numbers for the "Alarm Hours" and "Alarm Minutes"? Would "4:30 pm" be '4' in "Hours" and '30' in "Minutes"? Or 04:00 and 00:30?

Yes, I have updated to the latest patch, 3.13 I think it's called.

Edit: Also, is there any way to play Civ in windows mode? If there is an option button then I must have missed it.

Some questions came up in my first Civ4 game

Bolan Longpants — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 06:21:07 GMT

Hi all,

I am pretty far advanced in my first civ4 game since I just entered Modern Era. Of course I have some questions:D

1. Why will others not trade with me? Since a few hundred years I have lost 2 of my best trading partners concerning tech trading. Only one civ is welcome to trade techies with me. In the meanwhile they are trading techies amongst themselves so I have a very hard time catching up. I tried everything to improve relations; change some civics, send missionaries to them, open borders and even giving them resources. They still do not want to trade techies. I am doing 4-5 turns/tech and I still cannot keep up.

2. What do you consider the best great people? It looks to me like the Great engineers are much more meaningful to my civ than others although the scientific ones can be useful too. I did a cultural bomb with 2 artists that I did not want but it doesn't do much. I should have saved them for a golden age.

3 What's the consequence of sending missionaries to far away lands? I know it improves my relation to other leaders.

4 I have a city that has 2 different religions. Is that a good or a bad thing?

5 What determines the income of your trade routes? I know harbors and some civis increases this rate but I would like to know what I can do to increase it even more.

I will have more questions soon. :P Hopefully some of you guys can help me out here.

Skip turn at city level?

Objectiv — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 12:19:27 GMT

I know how to skip a turn for units, but how do I skip a turn for an entire city? In other words, I want my city to stop producing units/buildings/etc.

Cheers

BTS Outworld scenario

Masochi — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 17:46:45 GMT

How do you beat this game? I've played CIV for years, but after 4 tries I'm stumped at the end of this scenario.While I can get Sever to get to the squares to open the barricades, the rest of my team can never get past the room with all the savege bleeders. No matter how many weapons I load up on , I end up surrounded by 20 bleeders who focus on one character and kill them. I've tried blowing holes in walls unsuccessfully, and can't seem to follow Sever. Any clues ?

Severe Lag Issues

1thecheet — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 21:02:10 GMT

OK, I bought civ 4 beyond the sword yesterday and when I tried to play it today it is lagging terribly. Everything seems to run just fine in the menus and movies, however when I start a game it takes forever to do anything no matter the size of map or the settings. It also takes 4 times as long to start civ 4 BTS. BTS also take 5-6 minutes to load the menu. I had no problem with Civ 4.

All my drivers except for my RAM are up to date. My system specs are:
8800 GTS Nvidia grafix card
2 GB non duel core RAM.
64 MB duel core AMD processor

I have no prgrams such as AVG or security programs running.
I launch both Civ 4 and Civ 4:BTS via Steam (if any of you know what that is) however I am certain it is not a problem with Steam since Steam has literally nothing to do with the game except as a way to download games and use a friends chat in game.

I also noticed that the frame rate in game appears to be exactly 1 frame a second

I'm Lost?

Snaggle — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 23:32:07 GMT

Greetings - This is my first post and I'm glad I found this forum because it appears that the majority of the posters here comprehend aspects of the game I don't even know exist. As an avid player of various PC RPG's, I find this similiar to "Age of Empires" but with little or no interaction to the created "units" with a much deeper infrastructure to fine details. Realizing that this is "Turn Base" I find that that's my problem and I'm missing the true purpose of the Game. I've played only 3 games so far, 1 being the tutorial, and have won rather quickly in each. Having no clue of what I'm doing which is what really pisses me off. I simply agree to all the recommendations of research, just keep building military units one after another letting my city fail or be self sufficient upon computer recomendation, because I don't understand how to manage it, and just keep attacking the other people before they develope. To make a long story short it seems as all I'm doing is clicking the end turn button as fast as I can. The abridged Manual which came with the game doesn't seem to provide enough detail for me to follow and know "WHY?" I need to do certain things.

I think that this game could have alot of potential and be really fun to play but at the moment I'm missing the point - it seems to run itself. Is there an idiots guide to Civ4? I hope no one takes offense or thinks I'm bashing the game - I'm just missing the point.:crazy:

im always wondering what im doing wrong

stokie — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 00:18:45 GMT

hello there everybody,i have been playing civ4 for some time now and in the past i have downloaded scenarios for civ4 and just double clicked on them and kicked straight in,but somehow on most its to do with zipping and im not sure about it realy.i just want to play a modern 1980s plus scenario and play as britain with the british flag not the english flag as this is more realistic.on the scenarios i downloaded before the british flag was on there too.any idears and help would make very gratefull.also i could use a scenario where the old empire countrys are independent.australia.canada.etc im hoping to get the bts pack soon.

Installation issues.

Kazuka-iskoise — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 23:33:11 GMT

I am having issues re-installing the game. every time I try it says that I already have the new patch and I can't figure out how to delete the patch. If any one can help me I would be very thankful.

how do i control crowded cities??

harrison — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 19:17:55 GMT

Hello. I'm very new to CIV IV and am only on my third game. I keep getting unhappy citizens claiming that the cities are too crowded. I have tried a variety of things (build more cottages, farms, and turn on avoid growth, etc.) to no avail.....any ideas??
Having crowded cities will subtract points, right?
THANKS.

War and Vassels

Apparatchik — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 12:28:19 GMT

Not for the first time, I am at war with a nation A and suddenly, at war with nation B. What happened is that my enemy (A) obviously offerred to be a vassel of another nation (B, who agreed) and therefore I am suddenly at war with B. Sometimes not a good thing!

My question is, shouldn't I have the option to stop the war with A if due to the new relationship between A and B I would be at war with B now?

On a side note, I am often asked to become another nation's vassel, and when I say yes, all of a sudden I am at war with the nation he was currently at war with. Sneaky mouse! My fault for not being aware that my (potential) vassel was at war, but shouldn't some menu pop up or something informing me of this? I'm the boss...need the info (gratuitous Dr. Evil quote, ha) ;)

Confusion with Custom Games

jorgie1 — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 14:46:43 GMT

I have been trying to play some games in both Civ IV and Warlords where I select certain participants and close the extra ones off. Unfortunately somehow additional "enemies" are turning up. Any ideas?

Jorgie;)

Can you have AI only (no humans)

covert_gamer — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 17:26:16 GMT

Is there some way to let the game play with Artificial Intelligence only (no human players) (both for single player games and multi player games). Even though AI is not always very intelligent, AI verses other AI would be a good way to test different civics, starting locations starting conditions, etc. with equally qualified opponents.

Sometimes, it would also be interesting to let AI replace humans in a game that is under progress when the outcome is still under doubt, but some of the human players have to quit.

Distorted Monitor

raynkel — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:43:59 GMT

When I load CIV3 my screen resolution goes wacky and the sides bow in towards the middle. The first time I loaded it it was way off center, but I was able to fix that.

Any one else have this issue?

Thanks

How do I move a Hot Seat to a Play By Email Game?

DarthGalt — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 20:04:31 GMT

I started a hot seat game with a couple of fellas and want to move it to an play by email game. does anyone know how to do that?

Creating a scenario/mod

soccitoem — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 15:04:55 GMT

How do you create a scenario/mod on civilization 4?

Beyond the Sword 1936 Europe mod

camisk — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 14:00:09 GMT

Ok, so I'm playing this mod as England, and even though I have access to oil in the Middle East, my cities back in the UK can't access it so I can't build planes, ships or tanks there. What am I missing/overlooking?

Thanks.

Running Apps on External HD?

Scipio Africanus — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 09:04:07 GMT

My laptop HD has been close to full capacity for too long, so I bought a 650 GB external HD. Now got all my files from my work, home, and laptops onto it, but have not copied programs to the external. I'm in a Windows XP environment. My questions that perhaps some of ya'll might answer:

(1) If I copy a folder from my laptop Programs folder onto the external HD using a USB cable (say for example my Infogrames/Firaxis/Civ3 folders) could I then run the application off of the HD using the laptop? Meaning, after I transferred the folder to the external, lets suppose I deleted the folder off the laptop, then used the .exe icon on the external to try to startup and run the app?

Or,

(2) do I need to actually install the app using the laptop CD drive to install it (via the USB cable) onto the external HD?

A newbie game review

Copy and Paste — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 05:22:50 GMT

Well…

Like some of you might know, i’m not new to civilization games, i used to have a quite decent win ratio on higher levels at both civ2 and civ3… (that was some years ago though)

But…

But since i met civ4, i can’t sleep anymore (lol).
I got civ4 and BTS at the same time, and i began straight on BTS.

And…
I have like 0% win ratio on Noble difficulty…
It is sometimes on the edge, but i’m still getting owned (including by crazy nuking indians).

I think i am aware of some of my major mistakes, i red a lot of game reviews on civ fanatics and got some precious strategies there (wich are not all matching together actually, but its still nice points of view on how to win at high levels).

But despite that, i’m still wedged at warlord level, i’m still feeling i am missing something big, i’m still not doing the (big) step between civ3 and civ4.

So, i decided i was going to make a game review of my next game here.
This way, if ever some of you had the bravery of reading such a review on such low level game, i might get some precious and concrete advices on the mistake that i make and that i am not aware of.

I’ll begin that game when i have the time to, probably next Saturday.
The first piece of review can therefore be online Sunday or Monday.

Thanks by advance for any comment on those reviews.

Regards,

Creating Embassies

Cape — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 12:13:16 GMT

Haven't really figured out what there is in building embassies other than permanent contact. Several times when i did build them other part came first (one embassy construction seem to cover both nations) and i can't complete it then but get the resources converted to gold - so no loss that way.

By now i let other part do the work in single play, since AI prioritize embassies highly and that suits me fine.

Are there any benefits of being the one that complete the embassies ?

available uranium not being creditted !

Cape — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 10:40:32 GMT

I'm doing a RFC scenario as Viking and have a good grip of the world around 1904. ¨

I'm close to nuke: can make tanks and have several uranium mines. But i do not have the uranium at the city screen.

Now since i have a sound espionage rating i can look at the other civ's city screen and some have uranium.

Do i only get credit if i have fission research completed or am i bugged ?

I constructed my first uranium mine as soon as uranium was revealed.

How to get settlers overseas?

rxg — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:58:47 GMT

Hi guys, I have just started playing Civ4 and have mainly be using the continents maps but I want to try others but I'm sure how you get settlers to lands across the sea from my main cities. I've built caravels and can transport scouts etc... but not settlers. Please help!!!!!

PBEM password settings

Copy and Paste — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 05:26:02 GMT

I have an issue with setting password to each user for a 3 players PBEM game.

i am the one creating the game, and the other players are away.

Is there a possibility for them to set their passwords themselves ?

as i can't obviously set their password for them when creating the game.

PS : i'm sorry if such a question was asked elsewhere on the forum, but i didnt find it.

Hammers left-over

Copy and Paste — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 01:35:26 GMT

Hi all.

i have a couple of question today.

i know that in civ 4, to reduce the micro-management (thank to game conceptors), the hammer and science left-over after finishing a construction or a research is now added to the next thing we build or research.

but !

but does that surplus cumulates ?

allow me to explain my question with a simple exemple :

a city with a 150 hammer production that is chain producing a unit that ask 100 hammers :
- is the surplus added to the next unit and then lost at each turn ?
- or does it gather turn after turn ?

and so to keep that exemple, after 10 turn producing this unit i build a 2000 hammers wonder, what will be the amount of the surplus ? 50 or 500 ?

thanks for any aswers !

regards.

Raze or not to raze ?

Copy and Paste — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 04:31:56 GMT

In the October GOTM topic, a discussion raised about city razing,
and i have some questions about that "game concept".

The first of all is the exact consequences of razing a city.
and by this i mean all aspects, like :
does it have an effect on other empires opinion about the razing dude ?
does it give any second hand advantage to the owner of the razed city ?

and, the second question is a very precise exemple in my current game where i razed a city. and i'd like to have your opinion about it.

its a prince level game on large map, with 8 civs.
i'm 2nd in the run behind the bizantine empire.
3rd comes the indian wich is the only civ i have very good relation with
4th comes the Zulu empire that has enslave 2 other empires (mali and spain) (capitulation)

the other civs doesnt matter.

the byzantine empire, around the year 1910 sneak attacked me, i was expecting this for several turns and i had a consequent army to recieve them, the war lasted for a while and after i took 1 or two small strategical cities i wanted (oil and uranium ressources in tundra), the war ended.

at this point, my military power was at a very low level (so was the byzantine army) after a quite tight war.

thats at this very moment that the zulu empire rushed me in with his two vassals openning a two front war that i couldnt afford.
however, i felt this coming and signed few turns before that a defensive pact with the idian empire, hoping they will make the malinese front easier to face.

i changed civics to a 100% aggressive settings, turned off my research to increase the culture setting so i can draft like mad without getting my cities break production.

they took one of my frontier major city in spite of my efforts preventing it.
after taking it back, the military balance was changing side, and finaly turned in my (relative) advantage.

here is the situation and here is the decision i made :

the space race was about to begin, and indians had a significant advantage, i thought there was no way to me in this game to win by domination or conquest, so i wanted to end this war, wich was possible now that my military power came back, and now that the zulu army broke on my defence.
in the other hand, i wanted to "punish" the zulu empire significantly without losing time and money with a city that would revolt back to them anyway in 10 turns.
so i rushed in their land and sieged a 18 size city, and razed it.
i thought that loss will defeat them more efficiently then anything else as they had like 6 cities + their 2 vassals.

after that i ended the war with them offering 390 gold and 14gold per turn.

i changed back my civics, began to build my army back by chain producing units in my 2 production specilized cities and began the space race... whatever.

does that raze choice make sens ?
if the situation exposal is precise enough, what would you done in such a case ?

thanks for any comment,
regards,

City Management Question

americanlt — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 14:37:47 GMT

I don't automate my workers to make improvements anymore. However, I still like to use the city management menu. My question is if you want to emphasize production, food ect.. do you have to have the citizen automaton button turned on?
It seems that when I light that button up a few turns later it gets mysteriously turned off? What's going on?

Thanx For Any Help

no war???

ralibar — Fri, 24 Nov 2006 17:28:23 GMT

None of my units will move into areas occupied by other empires, and none of my units will attack enemy units-there are no options that enable me to do either of these. I'm befuddled.........

Computer Suggestions??

americanlt — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 00:42:55 GMT

Why is it that after I build an improvement on a tile, I will see the "blue circle"?? I am assuming the computer wants me to tear down that improvement and build another??

I tend to discover many religions. If I discover Hinduism and Taoism can I build 2 separate shrines? I am thinking this would bring in a TON of gold??

Thanx For Responses

Newbie Questions

americanlt — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 13:14:43 GMT

I have a couple of questions that I can't seem to comprehend from the manual. What exactly does the civic Slavery do and is it a good civic? How do I cross the ocean into another continent??

Help with rushed units

Bruin5 — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 01:48:32 GMT

Hello all,

I came across something today and was unable to figure it out. I was trying to occupy an enemy's capital but was unable to do so because of the amount of defenders they produced. I would attack with an army or two, take the enemies defenders down to maybe 1-2 but then the next turn came around, they would produce 4-5 defenders out of the same city.

Even with 4 more cities to build out of, better technology, and double their civ rating, I simply could not generate enough attackers to keep up and take out the capital.

I thought about slavery and drafting but this went on for 3 hours. No matter how much I attacked with, they always had more.

So my question is, how was the AI able to produce so fast out of 1 town??

First Strike Promotion

DumbDaddy — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 12:13:42 GMT

What does this unit promotion do?

We Love the King Day

Beowulf — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 13:25:15 GMT

I am new to CIV IV, but an old hand at earlier versions (CIV I and II, I skipped III).

I know what We Love the King Day was in earlier versions, and it was a remarkably useful thing to strive for...

But in Civ IV, I cannot find any reference in the Manual or Civilopedia describing how it occurs, or how it affects my city when it happens.

A couple of times I have had a We Love the King Day occur, and so I immediately switch to the City screen to see the effects. But I can see nothing out of the ordinary...

Can someone give me a synopsis of what this does?

Beowulf

Need help with Keytabs

kevynrae — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 14:38:46 GMT

I just bought a Macbook and knew I had to get this game cause I was so addicted to Civ 3, but I haven't even been able to figure out how to move my units since I don't have a left/right button mouse, just the touch pad. I know in the last version you could use key strokes instead of the mouse if you wanted, but i have read everything and have not yet found what they are for basic movement. I am dying to play but don't want to have to go out and buy a mouse just for this game. Any help?

The 1939/36 Beyond the Sword Mod.

Skellum — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 23:10:44 GMT

Alright, Im able to play all the historicly accurate leaders from every country of importance in WW2 except one. My question is, why on earth was Hitler left out, and how would I go about editing the mod to change the leaders name to what it properly should be.

Im not a fan of his, im not a nationalist socialist. I just really feel that this historicaly close mod should be where it should be.

corrupt text?!?!

Dark Hadou — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 08:52:52 GMT

the text on the battlefield/city names are not legible, but everything is clear, only when you run the mouse across a city name it is all blurry, maybe something with the xml file?????

No audio option

manu317 — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 08:08:00 GMT

Hi,

I bought Civ4 and BTS. No problem with the install. The game works.

But when I go in audio options, I Have an empty window.

This is normal?

Bye

Emmanuel

(Win XP-ATI Radeon1600)

Civ 4 and Windows Vista

bluej33 — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 13:38:45 GMT

I just recently got an HP laptop, nice specs, so I decided to install Civ Four, which didn't work on my crappy desktop because of horrible specs. I've got Vista, naturally. Anyway, I tried five or so times, but I had tons of troubles. I never got any pop-up screen telling me about installing the game, and when I tried to check the CD-ROM drive on the computer area to see if I could somehow install the game manually, everything froze up, and I had to remove the battery to actually get the computer to get back up (I know, horrible for the computer). So, the point is: Is Civ Four even compatible with Vista? If so, does anyone have any suggestions for how I can get the installation to work? And if it's not possible, is there some sort of patch that will allow Civ 4 to work with Vista? Thank you so much in advance for your help.