How to Improve at Sid Meier's Civilization Mid Game

For purposes of this strategy guide, mid-game in Civilization starts the very moment you establish your 20th city. It is at this point you have to make a decision on how you plan to win the game.

If you are going for a military victory, it is very important that you determine as soon as possible what era your unique unit appears in. If you are playing as the Aztecs, for example, your unique unit, the Jaguar, appears very early in the game, and will be available long before you've built your 20th city. For the Aztecs, the decision on what strategy to employ should happen sooner, because an effective military strategy should take advantage of a civilization's unique unit.

If you're a more deliberate player, you'll probably find the Japanese are a little more convenient, because their unique unit, the Samurai, doesn't usually become available until mid-game, around the time that iron is discovered. Samurai also have the advantage of fast movement without horses and an extra defensive ability.

If you want a more extensive buildup to conquest, the Germans would be a better choice, as their unit, the Panzer, doesn't become available until much later.

Once your unique unit becomes available, you want to be in a position where you can deliver those units amphibiously using whatever the best ferrying unit is available at the time. Therefore, it is highly recommended that you have at least three port cities, or fewer if they can be placed such that they provide easy non-circuitous access to at least two of the other major land masses on the map. If you manage to achieve a military victory with your unique unit, it is possible that it will trigger a 20-turn golden age, which can greatly aid your economic situation during your initial battles.

For a cultural victory, you're going to need one city with a culture score of 20,000. Most of the time, this will be your capital city, although many games are won with what is known as a "culture" or "wonder" city. This can often be your third or fourth city, and you'll notice it because it will grow faster than cities do normally. You'll want to make absolutely sure this city has everything that can possibly make the population happy, as the key to a culture victory is the fast production of very expensive improvements. Also, since most of your trade will be invested in science and improving your city, you will need a solid defense and some significant investments in diplomacy in order to limit the potential for aggressive neighbors to start wars.

At the very minimum your culture city will need fresh water and one good resource like cattle or incense. Build on flat land if at all possible. One good strategy for a culture city that is not the capital is to consider that any city except the capital can build the Forbidden Palace, which provides more cultural value over the entire length of a Civilization game than the Palace itself.

The first priority for your culture city is to build the Great Library. It's going to be a mad rush to literacy to make sure you get there first. Do not trade it away either. Most of the time the computer players will choose other research paths and bypass literacy until they find out you have it, then they will attempt to trade for it as often as possible. Once you've built the Great Library, it will free up a lot of your scientific resources for buildings instead of science, since the Library will keep you "caught up" pretty much until the end of the Middle Ages.

For a diplomatic victory, the mid-game key is to build roads to anything you can trade, and then to build more roads to any civilization you can see. Establish embassies as quickly as possible with every civilization on the map and then put on a big smile, because you're going to be schmoozing until the end of the game.

The reason you need all those trade routes is because the key to making friends and influencing people is to research and build trade agreements with all of the other civilizations. Don't rely on only a few relationships either. The reason for this is very simple. You need their votes when you build the United Nations.

The trade routes will also help you accumulate a lot of cash which you can use to buy technology that you won't have the trade resources to research on your own. Giving away technology is an excellent way to make friends, even with belligerent computer opponents, but short-term trade agreements are even better.

With a good strategy and careful management, you should be in a position to sew the game up by the end of mid-game. However, if things aren't going according to the perfect plan, there just might be enough time in the end-game to still win. So, let's move on to the Civilization Strategy Guide for the End-Game and hope that you are pretty close to building railroads. You need railroads. Lots of railroads.