I bought my copy last week and to tell you the truth I hated the tutorial after 15 minutes. The best thing you can do is to began an Grand Campaing (GC) or better still and Improved Grand Campaign (IGC), playing as Russia. You will learn faster. After a few decades you will need to began another game, but we’re just learnig, aren’t we? I think the turorial is a waste of time.

No you are not a slow learner and try babysitting games. A lot of people here including myself stumbled in the beginning. It just like all things, trial & error will gain you the most knowledge. I agree with Rothschild don’t bother with the tutorial go straight for the Grand Campaign as Russia. At least as Russia a navy , and worrying about a colonial empire is not gonna be high on your list from the start (unlike England,Spain,or Portugal).

Just jump into the Grand Campaign (GC) or Improved Grand Campaign (IGC). I prefer the latter, it is more accurate historically and you can download it free. As for money, even as Russia you are going to be somewhat cash-strapped. Play with the sliders, appoint tax collectors, and expand. Don’t forget to send colonists to Ingermanland (in the IGC) to make it a city and gain a colonist, so you can populate Siberia.

Well, you aren’t a slow learner, the tutorial game is just very difficult, because the basis of your empire is very small. In all the other scenarios you have a stronger home base. Furthermore, there hardly is any trade, so you income is very low. I ended up as an owner of almost entire western europe, but after you’ve colonized so much, you are too weak to fight the opposition. If you don’t, they’ll expand so far, that your base is too small. I’d suggest starting with a normal scenario, which is much more informative.

As mentioned before, IGC is advised here. Download it ASAP. Russia is a good starter, as is Turkey. Both countries are very powerful on the military front and you can make numerous mistakes without damage due to the cheap troops and rich provinces. Both countries will also provide you with a little bit of colonization. Another advisable power is France. It’s the strongest country is western Europe with a powerful army & navy. Colonization is also yours once the game gets under way. The remaining majors: Spain, Portugal, England, Austria (or Sweden if you have Swedish version) & Poland-Lithuania are less advisable for a first game. Spain & Portugal need a lot of coordination because of the colonization-mania of these countries, England has near to no money at start and is hated by France & Spain, two big powers. colonization will not kick in till the mid 1500’s. Austria is my favorite and you COULD try them also. Expect lots of diplomatic moves and war. You don not need to worry about colonization & navy with them a lot and mac games download. Poland is imho the most difficult major after Portugal. Big country, but not that rich, pinned between Brandenburg, Prussia, Teutonic Order, Russia, Golden Horde, Crimea, Turkey, Bohemia & Austria. None of these like you alot. Hungary seems to be indifferent. Later you can switch to minor countries, using the IGC Config tool.

I want to especially thank Pirate Scum, who provided a start-game strategy and even took the trouble to specify the URL. So last night, I dutifully abandoned the Tutorial scenario. I started a new game as Russia, after downloading the IGC. [I especially appreciate the "Free Ireland" option, btw.] I find that I still tend to go broke very quickly, but I guess that’s not too bad, since I gather that its peferable to invest in trade centers, tax collectors, and colonists with an eye towards expansion, versus sitting on a big pile of gold, right?

By the way, if you continue as Russian and left the “Russian Unrest” option on, brace for some nasty surprises. It represents the chaos and disruption that bad czars and usurpers/pretenders brought on poor Russia. I won’t tell you anything else so it lurks in your conscience, unless you happen to know about this period in Russian history.

Only 1000? What have you been doing for 200 years??? You should have explored and colonized like crazy, maybe a war or two to spice things up a bit. But annex France and maybe some others as well, you might be able to beat this score, i’d say.

You’re at least a thousand points below a typical AI performance as Spain-I too would like to know what you’ve been doing. Killing them in a major war will be a big help-or even doing it in a few major wars-enough lost battles and provinces and their score will start looking a little sicker. Probably not at the rate you’re going. Download new great virtual villagers 4 game with great tips. But seriously, didn’t you explore all of central america and west USA?? You should have got tons of points for that. If you choose to hack away at France, keep in mind that you don’t really need 700 points, because if you beat them in battles, YOU gain points and THEY lose points. So if you gain say 50, and they lose 50, that’s a 100 point gain.

Let’s keep Skane out of it-I’m enjoying the discussion in the History Forums just fine, thank you very much! We don’t need another! Must play as Spain soon-I’ll soon have those damned Frenchies on the run! Spain’s explorers put her over the top in the VP race. I bet you didn’t discover half the TI as the AI (due to the ship attrition advantage) and that’s why you came up short.

If you want to catch France just kick thier asses in wars. Simple , yet effective. Make sure you get provinces in the peace aggrements. Also if they are colonial(non-european) provinces all the better. It dosen’t add to your BB value as oppesed to receiving European provinces. Why didn’t you just annex france in the beginning. I mean, france is eseyer to annex by Spain than the other way around. Because they have no stupid island. That’s IMHO, though.

I just finished the GC with Spain and had over 6200 VP, France didn’t even make the top five list. I had most of the American west coast (both North and South), all of Central America, most of the Southern US, most of the Carribean, Southern France, all of Italy, all North Africa except Algiers (they had a province I could never find), I conquered the Manalukes and the Nubians, and still had time to get some of the Phillipines. The AI China beat both England and France.

Actually, we have a lot of problems with those «stupid islands» today, especially since they are rulled by autocratic «barons» that get ‘re-elected’ to run them since forever and a day, and now treat the isles like their personal fiefs… while demanding ever more money from the continent. As for the smaller isles around Africa, they are useful in the virtual villagers 4: the tree of life game (great ports with no natives), and in real life (have great beaches, and even… ah… did I mention beaches?).

Actually I own the entire west coast, and between rebellions all the gold, of both New World continents. Quebec, Mass., etc. A good chunk of central Europe. And all of Italy except Venice which extends down Yugoslavia into the Greek isles. Plenty of manufacturies. Hacking away at France doesn’t do what some of you suggest. They loose points, but so do I. Only Ile de France and the colonies remain. Think it must be I’ve got a bad boy status.Taking Rome and all.Back when I was leading I why-bothered all alliance offers. Now no country in the world will ally or marriage.Each time I declare war on France, countries I’m not even thinking about pay me for white peaces.Time to start over. When I won as France, Spain was anemic. I got most the gold, and New Spain never happened because bcause she was French. Spain’d never touched her. By the way, what a joke, PCGamer’s 50 greatest issue just out naming CivII the second best game ever, and EU not even making the list.Unless it somehow missed inclusion in their archive, they never even review EU.

I keep stating here that I don’t do mapswapping, too easy. How come u never seen that yet? And I hardly ever come into contact with the Iroqois and if I do I ally. He could just type in Columbus ifit bothers him too much obviously. I uncovered them once. Sheer fluke, I think…. if you own land next to TI there’s always a faint chance you’ll uncover it, but in this case it’s pretty faint.

I have (much too easy and well, quite dull, too isolationist for me but I like the ships but I could also go that way with Castille). When England I allied with the Iroquois. Another reason I like to play Spain instead of other colonial nations is that it can be harder than the others if played historically. I know Spain is easy, like all those nations but still, but I add lots of restrictions. And roelplay historically. Fight purely for religion (force converting England) and stick to South America and Mexico. Although the godl is there the rest are actually quite shitty provinces when compared to the colonial richess in the Far East. When I play another nation just race to India and voilà. That’s where the real wealth is IMO. Now Spain can get the gold and the spice trade before someone could say “boo”. It’s not like Portugal can stop u. And u have the conquistadors. But instead of that by sticking to the historical patterns I leave that other wealth open to be tapped by the enemy and build cities in South America. Ultimately quite crappy ones slowing my research.

Cartainly true taht if played historically, there are problems. Of course I have not let taht stop me. Once Spain has control of Mexico, Incas and INdia it is interesting since every time I declare war on anyone, evryone else decalres war on me.

If you do hands off virtual villagers 4: the tree of life game (with Columbus cheat, of course), you see the ai has a fascination with the Great Lakes. The whole area gets heavily colonized, while leaving tobacco provinces uncolonized. Naval war on the Great Lakes and rivers and Lake Ticonderoga is probably too detailed for EU. You could strongly argue for EU 2 game that colonial war costs or effectiveness need to be increased a lot, though. I’m just pissed of with the Dutch. They declare independency, I annex them, and the Dutch nationalism is still there! It’s the second time I annexe them, it’s getting pretty anoying.

The edict of tolerence? That’s a long time to wait, and I don’t want to let them make colonies. What I will do is always keep Hollands, their capital, so they will never declare independence at least. But when you annex them, you’ll get all their TPs-it’s rare that the Dutch build a colonial city. It’s a nice cheap way of expanding your empire, if you’re not bothered about your BB rating! I normally wait for The Netherlands to get a couple of colonies going.Then I attack and take them from them in the peace treaty. I also reduce them down to 2 provinces in Europe so they can afford to send out colonists rather than just traders. A model strategy, Xanadu-many Spanish players take them down to just one as soon as they declare independence.

All I got in peace treaties were trade posts. If I did wait for 10 years there could be a colony going once in a while, but mostly trade posts dot the Earth. Leave them only with Holland, and wait till they start colonizing the world. Then perform the annexation and you’ll get a nice empire.

The lakes WERE a strategic water point. The American beated us with their fleet, it was becauset the english didn’t give any ressorces to canada to build a “conter-fleet”. On this point of view, you’re right. But for the purpose to EU2, these Great lakes seems a bit too tiny to see many ships. Can’t remember exactly. Is it the case?

I’m not sure if I posted this earlier or not. I don’t think fleets should be allowed on the Great Lakes in EU II. Or actually, if the virtual villagers 4 game system allowed one to cross certain bodies of water (like the Great Lakes) with some substantial cost being incurred, then it would be OK. This would partially abstract the real costs of building “throw away” fleets to gain superiority/transport troops. On the other hand the British and Americans were constantly building fleets on Lake Champlain, a much smaller body of water, to invade New York or Quebec depending on who it was. This is not reflected in EU, either. Maybe there needs to be a new class of terreign - “wilderness”. Very high movement costs and attrition, at least to Europeans.

It would also lead to another annoying “good” random event: you’d get your 10 free ships arriving in Detroit, when that’s the only province you own remotely anywhere near the Lakes and the only thing you can do with them is watch them sink. This has been extensively argued on another thread-perhaps there should be some limitation on the total number of ships you can build on such inland lakes/seas, to prevent the AI wasting all its’ money if this is ever implemented. But I doubt that it will be. I expored the Great Lakes in the 1600’s in an igc as Spain with the USA from 1492 option on. Found the lakes after I annexed the USA and without messing with the Iroquois.Could be the USA had messed with the Iroquois, don’t know. I think the Great Lakes are represented somewhat in EU. I mean here is a place where you can send in a colonist in the middle of a land mass. The St. Lawrence River/Great Lakes allows us to reach these internal provinces easily. Over-represented really, in this sense, since it lets you slip colonists past a nation that controls the entire North American coastline (if one such exists).

The idea that what eventually amounts, including the countryside, to several thousand colonists in real life can slip through is equally ridiculous. Especially given the neccessity of slipping troops through as well to protect the colonists. Remember the reason New France eventually gave up the fight-the British could ship in reinforcements, whereas the French couldn’t. Ideally, the game should reflect the limitations that countries had, but as long as it’s played on a grand scale some simplicity is required, else the player will become bogged down in “trivial” actions.

Just roleplaying. IF I play Spain for instance I will play the staunch catholic and beat up on dirty protestants. When playing Persia, I’m the bringer of the true Islam faith and so on. Religion was huge back then and I play as such. Withing the realms of historical plausibility. This does mean that at times I just shoot in my own feet. Monarchs back then did so too. Intolerance didn’t serve them in the long run and we know that. I don’t (ab)use that knowledge.

It depends. I usually play historical. But now I’m playing Navarra and I turned reformed to get colonists. And as I only have 4 national provinces, it’s easy to get the catholic heretics converted.

I aslo prefer to keep to the historical choices. I therefore tend to be staunchly Counter-Reformist until possible, and I do keep my tolerance silder really low for those protestant (and especially reformist) heretics down to zero until about 1648.

I suppose you can imagine what fun it is to play Spain with the Dutch Nationalism, as the provinces easly go into 50% revolt probabilities (and basically all North Germany and Helvetia are just waiting to DoW me). I exact revenge by re-catholicising them whenever possible, until the Edict of Tolerance. Download new virtual villagers 4 game now.

Most leaders of the time were pragmatists. Henry IV thought Paris worth a mass - Henry VIII of England would have happily remained Catholic if the Pope had annulled his marriage - the Pope refused to do so for fear of offending Spain, since he didn’t want Spain to turn Protestant - and so on. The big difference is that they didn’t have the hindsight to know that intolerance weakens your own country in the long run. It’s much more likely, for instance, that Spain would have turned Protestant and started persecuting Catholics, than it is that they would have remained Catholic but ceased to persecute Protestants.

Perhaps I’m dense, not being a native English speaker, but I’ve never been certain what was meant by this phrase. What does it mean that jolly Hank 4 thought Paris was worth a mass? And, by the way, when I roleplay England, I feel historically justified in rationalizing any religious tolerance (among heathen Arabs and Indians, for example) by claiming that the glory of the crown and the religion of *profit* over-rules anything else, much as the real-life, post-Elizabeth England behaved (liberally ignoring nutters like Charles II and Mssr. O.C.).

I noticed that the atheism subject was left on the side pretty quickly hein? But it would be stupid to inculd that religion, because I migth me wrong but, atheism was not the state religion of any nations.

He probably would have separated the English church just to get the money from church holdings. Also, note that Protestant beliefs were spreading rapidly throughout England and his would-be second wife and some of his advisors were sympathetic to them. The last of the French Civil Wars of Religion was the War of the Three Henries, fought between King Henry III, Henry Guise (leader of the ultra-Catholics) and Henry of Navarre (leader of the Protestants). During the war Henry III had Guise murdered and was in turn assassinated by an ultra-Catholic. This left Henry of Navarre not only as the last one standing but also the closest heir to the French throne. However, most Frenchmen were still unwilling to have a Protestant on the throne, so in order to be recognized as king and end the civil wars he converted to Catholicism (thus becoming Henry IV).

I really mess up the religion system of the game. In the world of reality I am a religious Catholic. In the game no matter what nation I play as, I am a religious Catholic in the 15-18th centuries. I have played a very successful game with a Ctaholic England, and an even mor successful one as Austria converting the Balkans to Roman Christianity and harassing the German states. It is just wayyy too much fun to abuse those slimy heretics than be pragmatic. I really wish that i could be the Papal States, that would be fun… oh well there is always an EUII - and atheism is not a religion… It is a lack of spirituality something very necessarty in a RELIGION.

Atheism is a religious position - it is a positive belief in the non-existence of godlike beings. As opposed to people who don’t believe anything, merely because they’ve never devoted any thought to the problem. Both would be tortured as heretics by the Inquisition, but only the atheist has an active position.

I’m a non religious person myself, so when i play i normally adopt the state religion my country wishes. Basically i add up the number of provinces i own for each religion, with the the capital and core provinces having more importance and then adopt that as state religion. I then put the sliders in order of how many provinces i own with that religion, and if theres 1 or 2 provinces that are wildly different i put an army there to stop revolts. This tactic is obviously one which carries good virtual villagers 4: the tree of life game sense since it cuts down on your religious revolts. I would also have thought that good rulers of the time would have adopted this policy despite their own religious views. If you are going to run a sucessful country it always worth listening the views of the majority of people in it. I play it like N. or even Mussolini, I recognize that the majority of [nationality] are [religion] and then go about my political and economic goals. I also usually try to keep myself within two religions (or three counting pagan) it is much much easier that way. I would like to see secular states (the technical France, the US) be able to have more tolerance for all religions.

In my IGC I’m playing Prussia. It’s 1620 and my goal of making the Baltic my own personal lake is about 2/3 complete. I have left to take two Swedish, two Finnish, and one Polish territory. It’s very difficult to fight up in those cold, northern areas with such high attrition!

You need to have some good relations, and start with a 1 d 1% loan and increase. Then you offer like up to 1000d at 10% and your good. Good luck with your Prussian Baltci lake.

The best deal to steal other countries is to propose 10d for 10% interests (for 300 months). Do this as many times you want. Instead of refusing a big loan of 70d at 10%, he will accepted 7 10d at 10%. I was wondering about that too. I kept trying to offer my friends money and they wouldn’t take it. I was like “What the heck”? Download virtual villagers 4 game free.

I just exploit 100% of the game which isn’t bad. My investment must be rewarded. It seems to me that inflation would make even a 10% interest rate unprofitable. Sink this into upgrading your infrastructure or some other use, and you’ll be ahead. I was disappointed at how reluctant my allies were to accept loans in wartime. Rather than making repeated 250D gifts, I wanted to loan them a giant wad of cash with low interest over a long term. No dice.

If you want to exploit the game engine, see thread “Make your own gold mine.” All you could ever want to know about the loan system in EU I.

Base Victory Points, Dynamic Missions and Victory Conditions

I have searched the FAQs, and the whole board in general, but I found no specific answers to my questions: This I do know- To be assigned VP’s you need to have Base Victory Points set to ON. Dynamic Missions set to ON will have your Monarch assign missions. What I don’t know is: If Base Victory Points are turned off- do you still recieve ANY points for doing ANYTHING, or are just Missions disabled (such as holding a province for 5 years)? If Dynamic Missions and/ or BVP are turned off- do other country’s still select missions (such as holding a province for 5 years)? If I set BVP to off- can I still set Victory conditions such as who will win by the most points at the end of the game? Finally, what is a Level 7 City? How many people?

Most people don’t play with missions at all, and victory points should only compared with your own games. The missions are mostly idiotic, and there are too many ways to cheat with the victory points. Just play the game a while, and you will agree with me.

I’ve never ever seen the AI doing missions, don’t know why. By doing so, I ended up thinking that it was a little bit unfair for me to get loads of easy VPs by doing missions, and ended up not doing any of them. Never heard about cities referred by levels. You must be talking about colonies or trading posts. With colonies, you must take them beyond level 6 colonies (600 inhabitants) to make a city out of it. I’ll take a look at the rest of the issues you talk about.

I got the number City Level 7- in the Tool Tips display while setting up the Victory Conditions. One condtion is you set the amount of Cities built (sorry it may have said colonized- and the rollover stated that “This is the amount of Level 7 Cities you need to win”). Did it mean Colonies- or maybe Level 6 cities- if that was the case- I figure it would be difficult to raise X number of cities above 200,000 polulation! If I disable BVP- are any points tabulated- for instance- do you still recieve Diplomacy or Economy points? I know that the AI does missions. When you surrender and look at the scores, you will see points for the computer nations under the missions column. I have not played with either of the options mentioned, so do not know if that affects AI mission behaviour.

An interesting point I noted from a number of hands-off virtual villagers 4 games is that the AI will only do (or get points for) missions if you yourself are accumulating points from them-if you haven’t got very many or are in negative points, the AI is rooted to the spot, all AI nations having zero points!

Colonist Success Rate

Does anyone know how to make the success rate of setting up a colony the same for minors as it is for England, Spain etc? The bonuses are hard coded to the tags, apparently, as are other things like religion. So, the only way to give a minor country the bonus is to swap tags. This is highly inadvisable, although BiB and I recently discussed the possibility of doing it for England. Since keeping them from going Reformed might actually improve the AIs’ performance!

Conquistadors and explorers help. 3 times their manouver rating added to the succes rate. Obviously killing all the natives helps too. Best bet is playing with the traditional colonisers.

Some provinces will have a higher success rate than others. Before you place a colonist, look for the chances of sucess in the left side window of the colonization screen. Having a conquistador stationed in the province _before_ you dispatch your colonists will also improve your chances for sucess. Killing the natives is a hotly debated issue. As a general rule, you will not need to worry about passive natives. But must either kill off the highly agressive ones, or keep a modest garrison of troops in the province to keep native killing sprees to a min. But killing natives isn’t alway such a good idea, since it means less people in your colony when it becomes a city.

Well, everyone, conquistadors, explorers, checking odds, killing natives etc. will help-but without cheating, they’re not going to do for a minor what he was asking. You can edit extra colonists, but you can’t give them the bonuses that makes England and Spain so successful as human colonisers. So, I rest with my first suggestion-however, it is a most unwise thing to do!

Natalie Brooks: Mystery at Hillcrest High is a full featured hidden objects adventure game by Alawar Friday’s Games. The game play is actually styled as more of an adventure game that the other games in this series. You are spending so much time working to solve both inventory and item manipulations that you forget that you’re playing a a hidden object game until a hidden object scene suddenly appears to remind you.

The game has ten chapters that take place in locations consisting of a handful of rooms. When you mouse over the background, tool tips are revealed that describe exits, additional characters, objects, and more. The mouse pointer might convert to a magnifying glass when an object can be examined further. If a set of gears is revealed, the object can be handled physically, and a doorway points to an exit that Natalie can access. The player can add useful object to Natalie’s inventory by clicking on them.

Most puzzles are solved by clicking on an object from the inventory before clicking on the screen where you want to use it. You can use a set of keys to unlock doors, pop balloons using darts, access wrenches to remove bolts and all the other staples that are expected with adventure gaming. Natalie Brooks is unstoppable in her quest to fix all the gadgets she comes across during her investigations. She somehow knows that all these items will be helpful to her in the future.

On the bottom right corner of the screen you can view Natalie’s goals so you will have an idea of what you’re trying to accomplish. If you’re in doubt, just click on everything in sight. You will find clues in the most unlikely places!

Since its fairly standard for this hidden object games genre, hidden object scenes occasionally pop up. You might be expected to find 10 objects in a terribly cluttered room or a purse that’s stuffed full to the point of looking hilarious. Some of the objects you find will be added to your inventory to use later. It should be mentioned that there’s no penalty for clicking randomly. If you’re unable to find an object, don’t worry, hints are plentiful. You simply click on the hint button, which incidentally doubles to give clues for the games multiple item manipulation puzzles.

Each chapter contains several logic puzzles or mini-games. You might have to connect some wires, steer a boat to a designated rendezvous, or use a spider as bait to catch some maggots. These puzzles can be skipped after several seconds of effort if you don’t feel like doing them or if you’re seriously afraid of maggots.

The clean, crisp graphics seem to pop from the screen and the majority of the rooms have that nice smooth, curvy look with a comic book appeal. Some are of course better than others, but Natalie Brooks: Mystery at Hillcrest High seems to be somewhat inconsistent but not enough to come off as amateurish. The game is rather lengthy, but not particularly strong on replay value. I really enjoyed listening to the background score and wish it was available on iTunes.