Is it just me or does the AI cheat their butts off in combat? I could be fighting mountains to plains and die 100% of the time Or be defending from a mountain while being attacked from plains and die 100% of the time. I've save skummed my way through the game enough to see that some battles on some turns are literally just MEANT to be lost no matter what unit you're using.

It's like a random dice roll. Or better yet, it's like that claw game at arcades where you try to win a stuffed animal. 99/100 times you put a quarter in, the claw has zero strength applied to it's motors, so it drops the stuffed animal every time. But that 1/100, the claw is given strength and you win the stuffed toy...

I've save skummed with artillery before and fought unarmed colonists in the open and have lost because as previously mentioned, I was literally meant to lose that turn. It's like the game uses a seeded chance each unit turn on whether or not if the next move is combat if it'll be a win or loss. And I've noticed that fighting units can alter this "seed" when fighting natives at least. If your next battle is rolled a total loss against a native village, if you turn around and attack a brave unit out in the open, your next turn will most likely or almost always be a victory against a village.

Something weird is going on with the game and I hate it. It makes me feel the game is not at all fair to play without cheating your way to victory with save skumming. I've tried it on every difficulty for 20+ years and I have always gotten the same result. I love this game, but is there seriously no fix for this so that combat is legit fair?

Last point I want to make is if you roll a turn that guarentees failure, you can literally almost guarentee a loss of every one of your units if you tell them all to attack. It's like the combat seed doesn't change unless certain events interfere to change the seed. Again, through save skumming, I've noticed I've lost OVER a dozen units in a single turn in what should have been landslide victories against the enemies if you take into account terrain strategies. But because of that dang combat seed, they ALL ended up getting lost or demoted one after another after another.

Anyone ever notice all this?

This is an issue that happens sometimes with the random number generator: The wiki has this info and other potential fixes (none of which is perfect).

Yeah, simple version, save scumming wont help. You need to restart the game entirely. Something about when you load it simply comes up with a long list of results and just uses the next one, period. So if you mountain man loses, its not so much that it wants you lose after save scumming, its just that you always end up with that negative result on its list.

For example, if you lose the mountain man fight as you describe and then save scum and decide to instead first attack a colonist in the open field with your Dragoon, you will lose every time. Side note, you should never be attacking with artillery in the open filed, thats a legit loss.

"Something weird is going on with the game and I hate it. It makes me feel the game is not at all fair to play without cheating your way to victory with save skumming. I've tried it on every difficulty for 20+ years and I have always gotten the same result. I love this game, but is there seriously no fix for this so that combat is legit fair?" This is a super odd statement from a guy talking about save scumming not working to get a desired result. Made me smile. No judgement, I save scum all the time as I cant stand losing absurd battles because in the end, its just about taking more of your limited time to play a 30 year old game. We all know who wins in the end.

The last point seems to just be anecdotal bad luck. Again, seed comes up bad, sucks to be you. The old restart is the way to go.



More complex, not needed answer: This is all from memory so take it with a grain of salt...

Game loads and generates a list of numbers, lets say 1-100, 100 being "best". The next result on the list is 99. It will use this value regardless of the calculation it is run against. So, you man in the mountain will only lose on a 98 or better. Well, you lost. And save scumming doesnt reset the sheet. Hence the game reload to create a new sheet. Thats the part that pisses everyone off. I am sure better soul than I at math can tell you why it matters, but it seems fair enough to me. My complaint has always been it slows me down when trying to scum :)

I love playing Civ IV Colonization and I've played it HUNDREDS of times, and have NEVER won independence. I am always overwhelmed by my home country (the freakin' Dutch!) no matter how strong my forces are. Its basically turned into a trading game until I just give up. What are keys to victory on the easiest setting?

https://www.gog.com/forum/colonization_sid_meiers/what_is_your_strategy_for_getting_a_high_score

Bunch of good stuff in here. But I can cram almost 30+ years of playing this game in one handy rule of thumb... Make Bells and gold. All issues are ultimately solved by those. And make sure to spend your money, no point at all in accumulating wealth until you wish to play games specifically for high scores.

Do all the following before you declare independence:

Make sure all your colonies, or at the very least all your coastal colonies, have a fortress.

Get rebel sentiment as high as possible in all colonies (preferably 100%) and keep it there - the higher the score, the harder it is for the Tories to capture a colony, and the more nearby troops will be upgraded to Continental Army.

Have lots and lots of artillery in every coastal colony.

Have lots and lots of dragoons outside every coastal colony. "Outside" is important - you only get the ambush bonus if you attack a Tory unit when neither your attacking unit nor the defending Tory unit is in a colony. Ideally position your cavalry on squares that force the REF troops to land on squares with a high defence bonus (which instead becomes an ambush bonus for you).

Make sure all your coastal colonies are heavily and roughly equally defended when you declare independence - if one colony is much more weakly defended than the others, the REF will land there, even if it's on the Pacific coast.

Make sure your colonies are well connected by roads so you can move troops and supplies between them quickly - if the Tories concentrate their attacks on one colony (which they probably will) you'll need to reinforce it.

Along these lines but perhaps simplified, abuse the AI. You only really need to defend one colony if you limit access to the rest. REF will only land on spaces open to them (unless there are ZERO available). In other words, you can plop a dragoon in every available landing spot but one you have specifically prepared the colony for. Ideally as mentioned, behind a fortress wall and packed with cannons.

For example, lets say you have 4 costal colonys. Put a dragoon (or whatever) on any open landing spot but one plain square that offers no terrain bonus right next to your Fortress of Doom. Every REF unit will land that as long as all the other spots are occupied. Handle as you will. Just make sure you dont open any other landing spots as they will land more than once.

Or you can plant just one costal colony, but that requires some forethought.