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Welcome to the Civilization FAQ. Minor update - 17th July, 1994
For those with limited newsreaders, the FAQ can be obtained from
wcl-l.bham.ac.uk:/pub/djh/faqs/civilization.faq
It has been brought to my attention that most newsreaders have a way to
quickly hop from section to section in a digest, by skipping between
Subject: lines. Therefore, each section has been formatted like
Subject: 1) How can I tell which version of Civ I have?
and
Subject: 2) Which is the best version of Civ?
and so on. For example, rn uses ^G to hop from Subject: line to Subject:
line; GNUS uses ^C^N and ^C^P, and so on. Very useful.

Before I get into the nitty-gritty of the game, I would like to thank
personally a few people without whose help this FAQ would not be
possible. In no particular order:
Albion Mark Lilback
Devin Ben-Hur Matt Malone
Ron Bense Skip Meister
Ralph Betza Bob O'Bob
David Gosselin James Ollinger
Bryce Harrington Mark Steer
Robert Johnson Garth Sweet
Roger Kemp Earnest To
Special thanks are due to Maurice Schekkerman and Elliott Kleinrock,
who sent me a large number of posts they had collected before I began
compiling this FAQ.
Note: Elliott sent me the most comprehensive collection of tips I've
yet seen, and much of the information that has been credited to "Rome
on 640K" was sent by him. I have yet to see this book, but it is on
order at my local bookstore, and I look forward to reading it as much
as I look forward to having time to play Civilization, instead of
compiling the FAQ. :) If you don't have a copy of "Rome on 640K" yet
(see below)---why?
If I've left anybody out of the credits, I am terribly sorry; I do
appreciate all the stuff that has been sent in, and if I've made any
omissions, please let me know.
If you have any questions, comments, criticisms or tips, I'd like to
hear about them. I can be reached at djh@wcl.bham.ac.uk [Dave].
What is Civilization? Civ is a computer game published by MicroProse, and
is available for the PC and Mac. However, having said that, to me it's not
so much of a game as a way of life. Just ask anyone who has played
it. The aim of the game is to take a tribe, settle them, and try to create
a civilization. Along the way you develop new sciences, meet other tribes
(some warlike, some not), and visit new continents, all for the aim of
trying to get into space, and/or to be the dominant civilization.
A lot of the information in this document is designed to give not only the
new player an insight into the game, showing the various strategies and
tricks, but to also provide the experienced player with information on how
to make his civilization stronger with the aim of getting a higher score.
In compiling the FAQ, I have both discovered features which have not only
improved my understanding of the game, but have made the game even more fun
to play.
I will now proceed...
Note: A : in the left-hand column denotes alteration, and a + denotes new.
Section A: General Information
1) How can I tell which version of Civ I have?
2) Which is the best version of Civ?
3) What is the Advisory Bug?
4) What is the Undefended City Bug?
5) What is the Civ score Bug?
6) What is the Bomber Bug?
7) What is the Date Line Bug?
8) What is the Ghost Civilization Bug?
9) What is the Tale of One City Bug?
10) Where is the map editor?
: 11) Where can I get an updated version?
: 12) What if I don't have FTP access?
Section B: Cities
1) How do I make a city?
2) How do I make my city grow?
3) Should I have many cities or just a few?
4) Is there a limit to the size of my city?
5) How do you keep a city from getting unhappy?
6) How do I make an Elvis (or Taxman, or Scientist)?
7) How much money does a Taxman collect?
8) How many light bulbs does a Scientist create?
9) What is the difference between subvert a city and revolt?
10) Which is the best government type?
11) How does the computer cheat?
12) What is the highest population for a single city?
13) Why do I appear to get unhappy citizens for free?
14) Should I sell obsolete improvements?
15) What power plants are the best, and when can I build them?
16) What is the maximum number of happy people in a city?
17) What is most important in developing the assets of a city?
Section C: Different game strategies
1) a) General strategies.
b) Despotic Conquest.
c) Democratic Ostrich.
d) Flexible Evolution.
e) Republic.
f) Pyramid.
g) High Tech.
h) Rich.
i) Mercenary.
j) Balanced.
k) Peaceful.
l) High Tech Conquest.
m) Hide in a Corner.
n) Archipelago.
o) Diploblitz.
p) Trading Cities.
q) Take No Prisoners.
r) The Helping Hand.
s) The Rock.
t) Replay.
u) Go see them or they will come see you.
v) Pillage to the Max.
w) Take the Best, Discard the Rest.
2) Colossal City Strategy.
3) President's Day Sale.
4) What is the best way to take an enemy city?
5) What are the best wonders to build?
Section D: Tips and information
1) Final score.
2) Light bulb formula.
3) Money-saving tips.
4) Military advice.
5) Miscellaneous tricks and tips.
6) The Canal trick.
7) Railroads at sea.
8) Interaction with the various civilizations.
9) The pattern of special resource squares.
10) Defence and attack queries.
11) Appearance of new civilizations.
12) How do you calculate pollution?
13) How is the trade route income calculated?
14) How is the trade bonus calculated?
15) Any other trade information?
16) How is global warming calculated?
17) How is corruption calculated?
Section E: Cheats
1) The Shift-56 cheat.
2) The Movement cheat.
3) The Settler cheat.
4) Ship movement cheat.
5) The Shipping Lanes cheat.
6) The Unloading ships cheat.
7) The Save game cheat.
8) The Settler movement cheat.
9) The Spaceship cheat!
10) The Settler/Railroad at sea cheat(?)
11) Hacking the .SVE file.
: 12) Is there an easier way to hack the .SVE files?
Section F: The future
1) Will there be a Civ II?
2) Civilization-Like Games.

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G E N E R A L
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Subject: 1) How can I tell which version of Civ I have?
--------------------------------------------------------
When you run Civ it asks various setup questions. The version number is on
these screens. The number is 474 plus an increment, so v5 is shown
as 474.05. If you have an older version, you can get the latest version by
anonymous FTP from some of the big game sources such as ftp.uwp.edu.
Note: Version numbers may be 475.X or 474.X, with the only difference
being the distribution media.
Subject: 2) Which is the best version of Civ?
----------------------------------------------
There has been much debate on Usenet about the various pros and cons of the
different versions. The only two versions worth considering are 474.01 and
474.05 (versions 1 and 5). The easiest of the two is v1. If you are playing
with v5, and not having much luck, revert back to v1. This is also the
version that allows the Shift-56 Cheat, which can be a good way of learning
the ins and outs of the game. However, if you like a challenge, then v5 is
really the only one to play. A further impetus to upgrade is that v5 contains
far less bugs. If you do get the latest version, the chances that the game
will not crash are far greater :) . The biggest problem with v1 is the
Instant Advice bug, which is better known as the "Advisory Bug". This can be
temporarily avoided by turning Instant advice off.
The following version information was compiled with the help of MicroProse:
v1: The original game.
v2: This version attempted---and failed---to fix the Advisory Bug. It did
fix the Score Bug, and removed the Shift-56 Cheat.
v3: Once again tried to fix the Advisory Bug, and failed again. Added some
new pictures. Added "very unhappy people." Removed free barracks. No
longer able to disband a population-1 city at Chieftain level by buying
a settler. Transports no longer made people unhappy under a Democracy
or Republic. Overall, the game became harder for veteran players. This
version is harder to play than previous versions, mainly for people
playing Despotic Conquest.
v4: No changes; just converted for HD disks.
v5: The most recent failed attempt to repair the Advisory Bug.
Note: There is no other difference between v3 and v5.
For those who want more information about Civilization, there is a book
called "Sid Meier's Civilization, or Rome on 640K a Day," by Johnny
Wilson and Alan Emrich (ISBN 1-55958-191-3, US$18.95). If your
bookstore doesn't have it, tell them to contact St Martin's Press, 175
Fifth Avenue, New York NY 10010, (212) 674-5151. This is a highly
recommended book.
Subject: 3) What is the Advisory Bug?
--------------------------------------
I have never met this bug, but it is known by MicroProse, and has been
reported by a number of sources.
If you leave the "Advisors" option on, then if the Domestic or Military
advisors can't think of anything to suggest, the program dies. This
will happen if your city has pretty much everything it needs or could
build.
---Adam Ginsberg
Subject: 4) What is the Undefended City Bug?
---------------------------------------------
Occasionally, when I have a lot of cities (around 50), I have one city that
shows up as undefended in the map display (no dark border) but in the city
display, shows fortified units inside. I usually take all of the units out
and then all back in to correct the situation. Sometimes I get the "Romans
plunder ..." message when I re-enter such a city and the population
decreases by one. If a computer civilization attacks a city that is shown to
be undefended, they capture it despite the fact that units are present in it.
This has been detected in both v4 and v5.
Subject: 5) What is the Civ score Bug?
---------------------------------------
Originally I thought this was connected with the advisory bug, but it
turns out that it is something completely different.
Bob O'Bob points out that every time he looks at "Civilization Score"
that he gets scrambled oceans, or extra land at the North Pole, and
that if he tries to move there, the screen goes crazy. As a result,
he's learned not to look at the Civilization Score anymore, because
once the screen loops out, the save files become corrupted
unrecoverably. He suggests that if you must see your Civilization
Score that you do a save *first*, and a restart afterward.
He also points out that you can see the corruption in the small map:
some of the people from the score screen remain on the map, and he
believes that this is what screws up the .MAP file. Occasionally,
there's lots of new grassland around the North Pole, and even some
"mystery houses." Finally, he points out that you can go get the 50 coin
prizes, if you care to go to the trouble, but that your system may not
be as forgiving as his is.
This problem occurs when your population increases over some number of
millions, and the full width of the screen is used. They then get written
into that portion of the map screen for some oddball reason. There is an
advantage or two to gotten from doing this, although the game becomes a
pain to play. Some of the grassland created becomes a mystery terrain type,
with 112 food production (113 with irrigation, if you ever get that
finished, plus 50% with railroads), 105 production (+50% with railroad) and
99 trade (+50% with railroads). It takes forever to build roads/railroads
on these squares, and I went back to an old save game where I didn't have
this city, as the game developed too many problems to be playable, for me,
at the time, although I should be able to have a city size of 1764 (roughly
55 size classes per square, as 2 food is required per size).
Note: your pollution would be impossible to deal with even two of these
squares being utilized, as each produces 99 resources.
---Ron Bense
Subject: 6) The Bomber Bug
---------------------------
This bug has been reported recently. It appears in v1 and 5.
When a bomber has finished its turn, if you try to reactivate it, it
will be destroyed.
Subject: 7) The Date Line Bug