The Civilization series has captivated strategy gamers for decades. This 4X franchise empowers you to guide a civilization from its humble beginnings through the ages, provided you can navigate the complexities of empire management and global conflict. Civilization 7, the latest installment, delivers more than just a visual upgrade. It introduces a wealth of new civilizations, intricate mechanics, and diverse strategies to achieve victory. Veterans of the series will have a head start, but even they will need to adapt to the new dynamics. Newcomers, in particular, will benefit from these essential tips and tricks, saving them countless hours of experimentation and inevitable early-game defeats. Let’s ensure your Civilization 7 journey begins on the right foot.
Strategizing for Success: Choosing Your Leader and Victory Path
Like its predecessors, Civilization 7 offers multiple paths to victory: Cultural, Military, Economic, and Scientific. Each path presents unique objectives across different eras, culminating in a final victory condition in the Modern Age. While diversifying your efforts is crucial, starting with a focused strategy is essential.
This begins with leader selection. Civilization 7 boasts a diverse roster of leaders, each with two primary focuses (e.g., economic and militaristic), a unique ability, and an agenda that shapes their diplomatic interactions. Knowing your desired victory type streamlines this choice. Compare the unique skills of leaders aligned with your chosen path. While leader attributes are important, don’t overthink the finer details unless playing on higher difficulties or in PvP.
Remember, you’ll select a new civ during each age transition. This provides opportunities to refine your strategy or double down on your initial focus. Legacy Points, earned by achieving milestones within each Legacy Path, further enhance this customization, allowing you to reinforce your strengths or compensate for weaknesses.
New to 4X games? Don’t hesitate to select a random leader to explore the game’s mechanics. While a militaristic approach might seem appealing, it’s challenging for newcomers. Understanding the interplay of resources, diplomacy, and other systems is key to success.
Expansion and Optimization: Building Your Empire
Early expansion revolves around three key elements: exploration, capital development, and establishing new settlements.
Immediately produce a scout to uncover the map. Identifying resources, oceans, independent powers, and other civilizations informs your overall strategy. Prioritize exploring tiles marked with the VII logo, indicating points of interest. Utilize the scout’s ability to expand their sight range to avoid wasted turns.
In your capital, consider both resource acquisition and bonus tiles when expanding. Balance essential resources (especially gold) with strategic bonuses. Sometimes, adding structures to existing tiles provides greater benefits than expansion. Pay attention to building adjacency bonuses. While overbuilding settled areas is possible, it’s generally best avoided in the early game.
Founding new settlements is crucial. Use settler units or incorporate Independent Powers through diplomacy. Note the limit on new towns per age and prioritize resource-rich locations. Maintain a balance between towns and cities, considering the increasing gold cost of upgrading.
Resource Management and Trade: Fueling Your Civilization
Civilization 7 requires managing gold, happiness, influence, food, production, science, and culture. Each resource serves a specific purpose, and most buildings consume one resource to produce another. Specialize your settlements to balance resource output across your empire. While avoiding critical shortages in individual cities is important, prioritize maintaining a positive net gain for each resource across all your settlements.
Map resources are too dispersed to rely solely on domestic production. Establish trade routes with neighboring leaders as soon as possible to supplement your resource income.
Mastering Influence: The Art of Diplomacy
Influence, a new mechanic in Civilization 7, governs diplomatic interactions. It’s used to improve relations, accept proposals, secure wartime advantages, incorporate Independent Powers, and more. Manage your Influence income carefully, as significant actions can require substantial investment.
Achieving Victory: Following Your Objectives
Civilization 7 provides clear guidance towards victory through objectives displayed on the top left. These objectives steer you along your chosen Legacy Path. Prioritize fulfilling these objectives. While some require direct action, others might involve researching specific technologies not yet available. In such cases, consult the tech and culture trees to plan your research path.
These trees function like traditional skill trees, requiring progression through prerequisite technologies. Pay close attention to the connections between skills, as they don’t always follow a linear path. Double-check which skill unlocks your desired objective to avoid wasted research turns.
