New player perspective

from GalCiv3 Forums

Quick background: Long time fan of 4x games but have only played them very causally. Played GalCiv 1 and 2 but only at easy and normal and not all that much. I play MMOs and RTS more competitively and am a pretty serious min-maxer in them.

I bought Gal Civ 3 last weekend and played two games on easy after one level of the tutorial. Lost the 1st and won the 2nd culturally. I vaguely noticed that there was some thing to control global and planetary production but I decided to just ignore it the first go around. I figured I'd need to figure out how to be more efficient at harder difficulties but I was probably ok on easy to just get a feel for technology and units and some other stuff.

I come in this week and noticed a patch but I don't read the notes. I don't know enough about the game to really know what they'd mean anyway. Try another easy game. See some new options under planetary governors so I decide I'll try to specialize my planets this time. I use the governors to automate building on my planets and choose to focus on manufacturing on my home. I pick a few worlds with bonuses to make 2 research and 2 wealth worlds alongside my 3 or 4 manufacturing worlds on a small galaxy. This goes ok until the AI starts circling around my planets with fleets and fleets of ships constantly. Ok... lesson learned I shouldn't ignore military completely. I try another game, similar strategy except I start cranking out enough ships to keep the AI off my back. I cannot keep my economy afloat. The AI has TONS of ships roaming space and I'm dead broke trying to keep some resistance up on my planets. My production is pretty good so I pepper the universe with starbases to try and boost economy and research but without much luck. Decide to figure out the sliders but putting it up in favor of wealth so I'm not losing 30 credits/week just puts my production at a glacial pace.... Hmmmm ok decide to read up on any guides to figure out what I'm doing wrong. How does the AI have SO many ships and still able to research/produce? I expect that my weaksauce attempts to be efficient should be lacking at higher difficulties but 3 games I can't win on easy now.

I spend hours on these forums and trying to watch YouTube videos and find that all the info is either really really basic (here's how to build a starbase!) or here everyone's debating the removal of the planetary sliders. I haven't played enough to be able to weigh in on the changes but I feel like the metagame is so well known to players of this (or maybe other 4x games) that everyone who plays it has an understanding of it... and I'm not getting it. There not much info to give some general strategy. Tile adjacencies, cool that makes sense but should I be building more farms? Should the auto-planet governors be good enough to do take care of my planets and give me a good example on easier difficulties? Are they useless and my planets suck? By not messing with my spending sliders early in the game is that what's wrong? I don't mind having the dig and try to improve to beat higher difficulties... but I can't seem to figure out easy as a new player all of a sudden.

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Reply #1 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

  They changed it a while back that every new planet costs 4 bc/turn.  All buildings also cost maintenance.  It is now very easy to run out of money.

   Morale is vital, 100% is a 25% boost to planetary production across the board.  more farms = more people = higher production, but lower morale.

   Tourism and trade routes are good for money.

Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Thanks, I appreciate the info. I need it. I reckon I'll try slower building with more economy emphasis and trading. I haven't done anything with tourism yet.

I should have ended with my bigger concern though: how are players supposed to learn the meta game info? There don't seem to be in game resources and the community seems pretty established such that there isn't a good way to enter as a new person and learn how to play.

Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top

There is at least one GCIII wiki available. I'm at work and can't post a link, so just Google it.

 

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

One thing that might not be obvious is that planet specialization is very important.  That is, pick what you want a planet to "be" (manufacturing, research, or economy world) and build the world to be good at just one thing.  The governors should do a good job of this, but I haven't tried them (I enjoy planning my planets myself too much) so I don't know firsthand.

Little tips:

I almost never use the global production slider, unless I really need something done fast.

If you've encountered any minor races, trade them your tech for credits.  Easy money.

Unlock some diplomacy tech and build some embassies, if you need your neighbors to be nicer to you.

More population = more production, but keep morale in mind! Low morale hurts production, and high population lowers morale.

Reply #5 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Durantium diplomacy.

 

Trade them durantium for the stuff you need, in particular their special resources, and maintain open borders with as many civs as you can, to preserve relations.

 

This allows you to rinse and repeat with the durantium.