FAQ: Read this first!

[Glinda]

Here's my attempt at a FAQ. Please add more questions and comments on your answers. If we keep adding questions and answers to this one thread, maybe we can get a sticky, and cut down on all those threads asking the same questions.

I have broken the questions into 3 categories: bugginess, gameplay and strategery.

Questions related to bugginess

I can't join the civ I want to, I keep getting put into a different civ, why?
This is a bug that appears to happen most often at the beginning of the game. People may join a civ, or found a civ, and then when they refresh/rejoin the game, they are in a different civ. Lots of weird stuff happens as a result of this problem, too.

When I try to join a civ, I get the diplomacy timeout, but I wasn't IN a civ, why is this happening?
This is that same bug; the game thinks you were in a civ, and so when you rejoin, you get the penalty. Clicking more than once just increases the time you have to sit on the Naughty Stair.

The king of my civ is MIA, and appears to be a minister in another civ, what's up with that?
That's a bug. It appears to be related to the "can't join the civ I choose" bug. The missing king is probably getting credit for stuff your civ does, too. (See below.)

Why can't I build wonders? The cards keep getting bounced out, or the wonder gets credited to the wrong civ.
Yeah, that's another bug relating to the funky civ joining thing. Wonders are getting credited to civs that don't build them, too.

Why did the science I researched get credited to another civ?
That's that same missing king bug, again. If you have a look, you'll probably find the king's portrait in your civ belongs to a player in another civ, and that civ is the one getting the credit.

We won a battle, why didn't we get the tech and wonders?
That's that same missing king bug, again.

I put mans in a battle, but they disappeared, where did they go?
This is suspected to be a bug, but not entirely confirmed. If you have mans in the battle already (say archers), and you add more, they just stack with the ones you already put in there. If there is more than one page of slots for the battle, maybe your mans are on page 2.

In a related issue, if you have more than one battle, and the battles have different numbers of pages, there is a bug where you may have issues switching between the battles from page 2 or 3. This may or may not have something to do with the missing troops. More info is needed.

Why didn't our tech complete? We have over 100% of the science.
There does seem to be a bug with this, in that some techs won't complete even if they have enough science. Sometimes, though, it might just be lag. Wait a couple minutes and see if it ticks over.

Why is my chat buggy and/or laggy?
Yeah. Not much to offer on this one. Sometimes refreshing helps, but then you might have problems getting back into the game.

My land changed! Was there an earthquake?
No, this is another bug. If you find your land is reconfigured, don't move all your buildings, it will probably go back to normal if you reload your game.

[Glinda]

Questions related to gameplay

I beat the Barbarians, but I didn't get +1 population, why not?
You only get the prize if you were the MVP in the Barbarian fight (put in the most troops), and the Barbarians were fighting the civ you belong to. If your city has more than 8 mans, you get 2000 food, not an extra guy. Check to see if you got the food.

I moved a tower, where did all my hammers go?
Towers and Village Greens, which give you line of sight, never recycle at 100%, even for small ones. If you recycle a small tower, you only get 50 hammers back.

I recycled a large granary, where did all my hammers go?
Only small buildings recycle at 100% (with the exception of towers and Village Greens, which are always 50%). If you are experimenting with town layout, don't upgrade your buildings until you are perfectly happy with their placement.

I built a house, but it is an empty grey hut. Why is no one living in it?
You only need as many houses as you have population. The empty house means you haven't got anyone to live in it. You can pre-build houses if you are about to get another population; new houses will always spawn as farmers.

Why can't I build any more buildings?
There's a building cap around about 96 buildings (some say 100). If you can't build any more, try deleting something.

How do I improve productivity of my population?
Factors that improve productivity include happiness, distance, era modifiers and Great people. Check out GingerSnap's awesome guide.

Why does my globe say "dowry"? How does dowry work?
When you get a dowry, you can visit another player's town (click on his or her name in your civ list, or the player list) and get a bonus. If you hover over the houses, you will see what your potential bonus is. Choose higher producing houses for the best benefit. Both you and the person you marry get the bonus.
Marrying within your civ gives the highest return, but if your civ members all have houses with low production, it may be worth shopping around in other civs or independents to see if you can get more.
If you aren't in a civ, you can marry another independent for the max bonus, usually.

Why did my farmer's food production suddenly drop? (or worker, scientist, etc)
The most likely answer to this is that you changed era from one with a food bonus to one with a penalty. Each era has its own modifiers. For a list of eras and modifiers, check the wiki.

I moved a house/building, now that area is black and I can't place the building back, why?
You probably recycled a guard tower since you last put down the building; put down another guard tower or village green to reveal the map again.

My troops disappeared when I left my civ, what happened?
You cannot use the troops if you don't have the necessary techs. Join a civ with the needed techs and they will be shown again.

How come I have fewer armies after we researched (gunpowder, navigation, combustion, etc)?
The upgrade is made in relation to the production needed to make the new kind of troops, so that's 4 horsemen (50 production) into 1 tank (200 production), for example. Fractions are rounded up.

I seem to have accidentally left my nation?
Why do I keep getting oxen in the market?
Why do we keep invading the nation on the top right of the screen?
All of these are the result of clicking the "X" on the chat box when there is something else behind it. BE CAREFUL. Better yet, close the chat when you are on your city screen.

I had a bunch of puzzle swaps, and then they disappeared. Where did they go?
You most likely "lost" your swaps because you filled the culture bar and got a new Great Person. Swaps don't roll over, but you can sell your culture and use all of your swaps. Just keep an eye on when the bar is nearly full.

When do I get a new game?
New games will become available when your current game is close to finishing. After your first game, you will be able to join 2 games at a time.

How do I play in more then one game at a time?
When you first play you are only able to play in one game world. After finishing the game, or when it nears its end you may join in up too 2 games at one time.[/QUOTE]

How do I get in the same game as my friends?
Once you are far enough in to your first game, you will see that the option to join a second game give you 3 choices. If you have friends already in a game, and there is room, these games will be listed.

You can also co-ordinate with your friends by joining a game and sending an invite, although with games filling quickly, this may be tricky.

Why can't I zoom on the map?
BECAUSE.

Why did my game reset?
The game ended, and the server shoved you into any old game.

Shouldn't it have put me in a new game, not one already in a late era?
If you would prefer to pick a game, you should have a second game slot. If you pick a game before your first game ends, it won't put you in a random game.

Why do I have to do the tutorial again?
This is a feature added in the August 30 update.

Can I make it stop?
Yes, push Q.

[Glinda]

Questions related to strategy

How do I get to be a minister?
You get to be minister by winning a medal. You win medals as follows:
Interior: be the first in your civ to build a ginormous building of a particular type.
Finance: save your gold and be the first to accumulate specific amounts.
Defense: be the MVP in a battle (ie contribute the most troops).
Science: be the MVP in researching a specific tech.
Culture: contribute to a wonder, and one random person gets the medal.
Political: be the first in your civ to get your population to a certain level.

I have the most fame/medals in my civ, why am I not king?
Someone stole my kingship! How did that happen?
Unless it's related to the missing king bug, it's probably because some other civmate got more recent medal/promotions. Every time a civ member gets promoted, people above that person are dropped 1 place.

[Uncharted]

Love the guide.

I have one you might want to add as some people have mentioned not joining more then one game.

How do i play in more then one game at a time?
When you first play you are only able to play in one game world. After finishing the game, or when it nears its end you may join in up too 2 games at one time.

[Glinda]

Love the guide.

I have one you might want to add as some people have mentioned not joining more then one game.

How do i play in more then one game at a time?
When you first play you are only able to play in one game world. After finishing the game, or when it nears its end you may join in up too 2 games at one time.

I will add that under my one about how do I join a new game, thanks.

[Codex]

Guys, it's against forum rules to bump threads. I'm looking in to getting this stickied - Just hang tight and stop bumping.

Thanks.

[Glinda]

I have changed the first post to remove references to bumping.

[Spiritbw]

I have changed the first post to remove references to bumping.

Probably a good plan if thems the rules.

[Codex]

Speaking of rules, here they are. I would suggest taking a look at them before infractions have to be handed out. For now, since you guys want this thread to be good at consolidating faqs, I would suggest posts that are not on topic be ceased.

[Spiritbw]

I'll just add that 2KDavid, the 2K Games Community Manager, has responded to some suggestions. One idea for a confirmation button for joining/leaving a civ-faction and proposing invading other civ-factions was apparently passed along to the dev team.

Rather than add a new post I'll just edit. Could we add a suggestion for the search function if an issue is not here? Organizing threads probably would make all our lives a lot easier.

[2K David]

Thanks for posting this up! I went ahead and stickied it. Right now the devs are working on addressing a lot of the issues people have been asking about under the "Questions related to bugginess" heading.

[Ginger Snap]

Check out GingerSnap's awesome guide

Thanks for the love!

[JingL]

Great! Thank you so much Glinda!

The closing red X chat button is really a bug, as no matter how careful you are, the click still registers down to the layer beneath, at least in global.

A few more I can think of for now: (and please rephrase them if needed as English is not my native language)

Things related to gameplay:
I moved a house/building, now that area is black and I can't place the building back, why?
You probably recycled a guard tower since you last put down the building, put down another guard tower around.

My troops disappeared when I left my civ, what happened?
You cannot use the troops if you don't have the necessary techs. Join a civ with the needed techs and they will be shown again.

How come my troops downgraded in size after we researched (gunpowder, navigation, combustion, etc)?
The upgrade is made in relation to the production needed to make that kind of troops, so that's 4 horsemen (50 production) into 1 tank (200 production), for example. Fractions are rounded up.

Things related to strategy:

I have the most fame/medals in my civ, why am I not king?
Unless it's related to the missing king bug, it's probably because some other civmate got more recent medal/promotions. Every time someone get promoted, people above that person are dropped 1 place.

[Glinda]

Thanks Jing, I have added those to the appropriate posts.

[Uncharted]

Glinda, if it helps you out any with the guide I am, with the help of all forum posters, putting a list together of every single bug.
My Unofficial List.
Go ahead and use whatever from the list to improve the FAQ :-)

[angelar]

Well done on this, really comprehensive, and getting it stickied. Some things I've seen asked that will probably come up, and some comments on what you've written but you've already done the hard work. I used to maintain FAQs on usenet groups and look forward to happy months of people now not reading the FAQ, but at least we have just one link now to direct them to!

Why did the science I researched get credited to another civ?
That's that same missing king bug, again. If you have a look, you'll probably find the king's portrait in your civ belongs to a player in another civ, and that civ is the one getting the credit.


In our game (1014) it's not only the king, the civ getting the tech has two non-king players ghosting.

I'd screen cap it but I still can't log in.


With the X thing: Jing is right, it's not about care. There's something about the mapping that means it counts it as a click no matter how careful you are. It's also over buy 5 moves on the science screen, although that's only a problem if you have bucks.

Getting minister: win the auction is another way.

Things you might want to add:

Bugs
Someone has just won a "most producing" contest with a really high artist/worker etc. I've looked on their civ and they have nothing like that there and haven't been logged on while the contest was on.
This is a bug. If they have been logged on during this time they might have reconfigured their houses to win the contest.

Gameplay

I had more science than needed to research a tech but I lost it all, what's all that about.
When you complete a science your beakers (and moves) reset to zero. it's not a bug, it's intentional. Like puzzle swaps try and use your moves, sell excess science on the market and coordinate research with your civmates.

I was the Most Valuable Player on the science I was researching. It was completed but I didn't get a green tick. Why?
Either someone has joined your civ who had already researched that tech, or someone with more science than you jumped on and finished it.

[JingL]

If the following could also be added into FAQ:

I'm very lost with the whole combat system, how does it work?

1- The civ who voted for invasion uses the attack numbers, the civ defending uses the defense numbers for their troops, regardless of the individual round.

2- There is a limited amount of slots for units available, those numbers depends on the defending civ's terrain and size. In those slots, 1 type of unit of 1 player are stacked for their overall strength.

3- The overall strength of the civ depends on the total strength of all those slots together, that is the only strength that counts. At time 0 of each round, the civ with higher strength gets to push the tracker to their enemy side.

4- This total civ strength is also the determinant of which side gets an attack, some kind of algorithm makes the side with higher power more likely to be the attacker, but the relationship is not linear and somewhat random.

5- This total civ strength also determines the damage the enemy units get. It is not determined by the attacking stack's strength. The attacking stack does seem to attack similar troops more often through.

6- When a stack is on heroic, it gets 2x stronger. But if it does get attacked, it loses 3x than normal.
It is useful for when the unit has weather advantage, single unit, or when putting them to heroic would get the civ's overall strength above that of the enemy.

7- When a stack is on fortify, it is only at 1/2 strength, but if it gets attacked, it only loses 1/2 than otherwise.
It is useful when you have such an advantage in the battle that you only care about losing as little as possible; or when you are losing, but still hope for a change of weather or another civmate to show up with more troops.

My civ's going to be attacked by barbarians in 10h, but when I put in troops, how come the combat started right away?
Since barbarians can't reinforce, as soon as your civ's overall strength is higher than those of the barbarian, combat starts.

I'm getting different maze moves in different mazes, how are they generated?
You get moves depending on how expensive the tech is. Every time you accumulate about 250th of the tech's needed science, you get a maze move. This only apply to newly acquired science points by harvests, dowry, science gifted by civmate finishing maze, or science doubling event (auction or voyage of discovery), or bubble popping.

[AlibechM]

Wow, great work everybody!!!, thanks for taking the time to do this FAQ, it is much needed.

[MaxPower]

Is the building cap a feature or a bug? I'm getting charged for hammers but no improvements are showing up, I assume at least that part is a bug.

[mr.marco]

Questions related to gameplay

I seem to have accidentally left my nation?
Why do I keep getting oxen in the market?
Why do we keep invading the nation on the top right of the screen?
All of these are the result of clicking the "X" on the chat box when there is something else behind it. BE CAREFUL. Better yet, close the chat when you are on your city screen.

Or even better yet, don't use the 'X' at all. Toggle the chat window using the chat icon at the bottom of the screen. The only place you can't do this is when visiting another civ, but there is no danger in using the 'X' while visiting another civ.

[Costia]

please add buildings limit of 95 to the FAQ

[KnightHero]

Two new bugs? Or is it intended gameplay?

1. When one's stockpiled harvests grow to a certain number (18 or higher?) without being used, normal auto-resource generation from the palace slows or ceases altogether. I verified that the resource production starts up again when one uses some of these stockpiled harvests.

2. Factory does not provide any boost beyond an ironworks. The Wiki says that a factory will provide a boost to production "even more than" an ironworks (as well as lumbermill or stone mason). I tested this by building a Ginormous Factory on the other side of houses that bordered a ginormous ironworks and didn't receive any additional production. The distances were all the same, but no boost. This is a huge waste of resources as currently designed.

3. One old bug thrown in: when recycling ginormous buildings, one doesn't appear to get any more hammers than if they were modest buildings (village green was the one I finally noticed this on.

[Glinda]

1. Stockpiled harvests used to affect the trickle, but since it moved to a set 5 minutes, I though this was no longer the case.
2. Working as intended. Factory is a drop off for ALL resources, but no better than a forge, for example.
3. Can you verify this with screenshots?

[AlibechM]

3. Can you verify this with screenshots?

Village green recycled different than regular buildings, more like a watch tower, for a fully upgraded VG you only get 500 hammers back, so it's no a bug probably.

[prism_zet]

I was wondering if joining a battle that isn't part of your civ causes any detrimental effects, like for example my civ right now is in a battle all the slots are filled already but if i join another civs fight against barbarians or something do i get bonuses or detractions for helping?

[Uncharted]

you don't get any bonuses for helping. It is just usefull to do if you want another civ to be stoped from getting a victory

[KnightHero]

Village green recycled different than regular buildings, more like a watch tower, for a fully upgraded VG you only get 500 hammers back, so it's no a bug probably.

Actually, when you put the move/recycle square over a ginormous VG, it says it will give you 625 hammers. That calculates to 5/8 of the price of a modest VG. Somewhere else on the wiki or the forums I read that an upgraded VG should give you 5/8 back on recycle and a ginormous VG at 5/8 should be 1250 hammers.

[KnightHero]

2. Working as intended. Factory is a drop off for ALL resources, but no better than a forge, for example.

Then the wiki is incorrect and should be fixed so people don't go wasting resources to try to improve beyond a forge when it's not possible.

[Glinda]

Then the wiki is incorrect and should be fixed so people don't go wasting resources to try to improve beyond a forge when it's not possible.

Yes, it should. Unfortunately, even though it's a wiki, it's not open to players to edit, and whoever CAN edit it isn't.

[RandomGambit]

Fantastic Guide! Thanks for compiling it!

[KnightHero]

Two more bugs (or gameplay "features" :/ ) --

1. In battle screen, can't change leftmost mobile unit's status from Normal to any other status (observed when defending in a large battle)
2. Expired Wonders still provide their benefits to Civs after they're supposed to have expired (e.g. technology discovered that ends their benefits). Confirmed with Pyramids (production), Himeji Castle & Leonardo's Workshop (battle)

[BoMbaStiXxX]

When wonders "expire" (become obsolete as the wiki calls it) they still provide their bonus, they just cannot be build any longer. When a civ doesn't have it and wants it, it has to obtain it through war.

[KotovV]

I can not understand, I added a topic on the forum or not. How to test it?

[Denis Rogozhin]

How can I delete from the server to start on another?

[Glinda]

Finish your game.

[grinfish]

One graphical bug I've experienced a few times that may be worth keeping people informed about.

Occasionally, parts of the GUI fail to display - the main City screen may not show all the buildings, or the buttons on the panel, the graphics of the Merchant Caravan game, the picture in the Culture Puzzle Swap game, or your "ball" in the Science Maze.

The only "solution" I have found to this so far is to close down the game window and the browser it is operating in at the time. This seems to work, although the Puzzle Swap can still occasionally stay "Blacked out" until the next round of the game begins.

Whether it's related to the game coding (grrr Flash), packet loss on download, or people's own systems/software, I don't know.

Also, if the game is getting very laggy the longer you play, close it down and restart your browser. Flash seems to do this to me in just about every Flash-built game I've ever played, so not passing the buck onto 2K for that one

[BBfreak]

Hi,

i just had 700 maze movement points (won school of confuzius - double science = pls ~32.000). i finished one maze and the movementpoints droped from 700 to 30.

I had that some days ago after using 10 harvest in a row. Is that per purpouse?

[edit]
i found another post, that this is normal. But it felt wrong
[/edit]

Greetings!

And I like the gameplay very mutch till now. Great job!

[Kevin O'Brien]

I have a question regarding medal awards. I helped my civ finish a wonder, but I did not receive a culture medal. Is this working as intended?

[Xinhuan]

Yes. For wonders that require 3 or less GPs to build, a random player is selected for the medal. For wonders that use 4-6 GPs to build, 2 random players out of those 4-6 are selected.

[KnightHero]

Back when I first started playing the beta, there had been a bug related to the absentee king where if your civ discovers something, another civ gets credit as well and any Era victory instead of yours. Well, I just came across an instance where my civ just discovered Invention and duly received our era victory. However, in the same game year, two other civs discovered it immediately. Since they had no players online at the time, I find this to be too improbable to be a coincidence.

Any ideas what's going on?