OK, so I recently started playing Civilization: Beyond Earth. I like the game a lot, but I'll say that as a new player to Civ as a whole, I have a hard time figuring some things out. The "tutorial" isn't very helpful at explaining things TBH. My main issues are with yields, as they all seem to behave differently.
This is my understanding of them, please help me out with them if you can:

 

Energy:

It's basically "money" you can use to buy things instantly without waiting out their production times. These can be units, tiles, etc. You can accumulate it, over turns, check out exactly how much you "have".

 

Culture:

Money used to purchase Virtues. It stacks like Energy. Maybe not, not too sure about this one.

 

Science:

It's an ever-increasing value, the higher the value, the less turns it takes to research new technologies

 

Food:

This seems to determine how fast your colony grows. More food=more rapid expansion. If you produce a surplus, your colony grows, if you run a deficit...I don't know what happens. It's not a stock like Energy, you just see how much you're producing, so I suppose the excess goes into growth. Yet there is this thing when your city levels up, you can keep some "reserves" and you lose others? The game seems to treat it like a stock in this case, yet you can't see how much you "have".

 

Production:

Completely lost on this one. Supposedly, it tells you how quickly you produce units, build buildings, etc. BUT the game obviously treats it like you have a stock of it. For example, you can excavate ruins and it may give you "+60 production", but what does that even mean? I thought this was an indicator, not something you "store".

 

Some clarification would be greatly appreciated.

OK, so I recently started playing Civilization: Beyond Earth. I like the game a lot, but I'll say that as a new player to Civ as a whole, I have a hard time figuring some things out. The "tutorial" isn't very helpful at explaining things TBH. My main issues are with yields, as they all seem to behave differently.

This is my understanding of them, please help me out with them if you can:

 

Energy:

It's basically "money" you can use to buy things instantly without waiting out their production times. These can be units, tiles, etc. You can accumulate it, over turns, check out exactly how much you "have".

 

Yep

 

Culture:

Money used to purchase Virtues. It stacks like Energy. Maybe not, not too sure about this one.

 

Yep

 

Science:

It's an ever-increasing value, the higher the value, the less turns it takes to research new technologies

 

Yep

 

Food:

This seems to determine how fast your colony grows. More food=more rapid expansion. If you produce a surplus, your colony grows, if you run a deficit...I don't know what happens. It's not a stock like Energy, you just see how much you're producing, so I suppose the excess goes into growth. Yet there is this thing when your city levels up, you can keep some "reserves" and you lose others? The game seems to treat it like a stock in this case, yet you can't see how much you "have".

 

Yep, when you run a deficit in a city population will fall.

 

Production:

Completely lost on this one. Supposedly, it tells you how quickly you produce units, build buildings, etc. BUT the game obviously treats it like you have a stock of it. For example, you can excavate ruins and it may give you "+60 production", but what does that even mean? I thought this was an indicator, not something you "store".

 

It distributes the +60 across active productions, not sure if it's nearest city or across the empire... but yeah, it's essentially the amount of work your city does each turn towards whateer building / unit you are making, and each unit / building has a certain amount of production it needs to fulfil.

I'm assuming they've removed faith from the space one?

All right, thanks!

 

I'm assuming they've removed faith from the space one?

 

The future looks pretty bright

Please note, I do not own this game, but I have seen some video's. I do have Civ V.

 

Energy => money, correct.

 

Culture is for virtues indeed, note that each next virtue (regardless of path) costs more. Sorta like tech, but in just in general that the next virtue unlocked (regardless of position in the tree) is +x% cost of the former one.

 

Science is for tech, note that each "field" is divided in 3 sub-catagories you need to research seperatly, but from each "unlocked" field you can continue on. Tech costs rises the further you are from the center, but your own output should jump aswell, kinda like culture

 

Food is per colony, you need a certain amount per colony size (to sustain the population present) and any surplus will lead to growth over time (with each growth being +x% the former).

 

Production is per colony aswell, you basically "stack up" on production time done per project (building, unit, ...) and when you reach the needed production amount it finishes.

 

You forgot:

 

Health (previously happiness), you need to keep this in the green (positive), it is influenced primarly by buildings (positive) and colonies/population (negative). It works like hapiness from previous games in that any negative health will mean your civ starts to slack behind in all fields (colonies losing production, slower growth, less combat effectiveness). But what has changed is that positive health now gives you bonusses! Rack up the bonusses can be extremely helpfull for your civ!

 

 

And yes, don't think "faith" is present anymore, but you know have 3 "affinities", basically you want to go down 1 path of the 3 and rack of the bonusses they give (one is techy, one is war, one is cultural).

 

The spy system got a massive overhaul aswell and can get cheaty

I havn't played in a long while or that particular one. Essentially you go down one objective and keep chugging. Unless your me and do whatever I feel like doing that turn. I found a few flaws in the versions I've played. Assuming the AI is planning to screw you, cause it is and was very reactive to whatever you do. Though if you get a good start and you get a lead in tech it's hard for the AI to do anything to hurt you I found.

So I played a few games, and I think I got the hang of it now.

 

How far can your territory grow from your capital? Is it 4 hexes max?

Think in Civ V it was 5 hexes away with just a 3-hex radius thats workable. Takes a looooooooooong time to get the full 5 hexes

Yes it does, damn this game can be crazy long. I was asking, because I wanted to purchase a tile with an Alien nest on it (supposedly this would make them friendly to you), but it was JUST out of reach

yeah buying only goes to a radius of 3, then its wacky PC chose time!

So, now that I've sufficiently learned the ropes, anyone up for a game?

I have this on steam but I haven't played it yet lol

I have this on steam but I haven't played it yet lol

Well, we could play against the AI if you want

 

I have this on steam but I haven't played it yet lol

Well, we could play against the AI if you want

 

I haven't bought the expansion yet.

 

Is the game good? If it's like Civ V, I'm waiting for the expansions before playing the game.

To be honest, I never played Civ 5, or any other Civ games for that matter. While I could appreciate the strategic depth, the setting didn't really do it for me. I kinda always thought the mechanics would be better suited for a new planet/sci-fi environment, and Beyond Earth is just that.

 

Now, I'm really enjoying it, but I also admit I have nothing to compare it to. As I understand, old time fans are not so enthusiastic about this addition, but also say Rising Tide is a big improvement over the base game. If other expansions come out in the future, I'll surely get them.

There are some similarities between Civ V and BE, but I have more time into V since BE occasionally will stop wanting to load when I try to play it.

 

From what I've seen of BE, the tech tree is different, but seemed to be better to understand in my opinion

Yeah, the tech tree is a web, so if you want to research in a specific direction you can sidestep certain technologies you don't find as useful in your given situation. Also, the techs sound pretty awesome and exciting, like "transgenics", "swarm robotics"', "artificial evolution" etc...

 

I also love how the affinities affect the units and the look of your character. You start out nothing special, then gradually acquire a badass and menacing look.

Yeah I thought that style of upgrading units was really nice

Did they fix multiplayer in BE?

I haven't tried multiplayer there, but I haven't really read anything negative about it lately so they may have finally gotten it fixed