Get all worker techs (food, then bronze working, then pottery), chop forests, connect cities for the trade route commerce, build and work cottages to finance your REX. But if your land is shit just rush instead.

>Any mods that fix bugs or AI problems I need?
I like Advanced Civ, it's a mod-mod of K-Mod: Far Beyond the Sword. The aim of both mods is to simply improve the AI. It's like the dawn of skirmish mod for dawn of war.
Still, you should stick to vanilla a bit until you're comfortable with the game.

https://forums.civfanatics.com/forums/civ-4-advanced-civ.603/

Just watch two dozen hours of YouTube tutorials and read philosophical treatises compiled from CivFanatics forum posts.

>>1800129
henrik9658 at youtube makes some pretty nice videos on how to get good

>>1800129
Don't build buildings you don't need. Spam units nonstop.

>>1800129
watch AbsoluteZero, Henrik, and Lain
food is king
whip whip whip

>>1800132
This and early slavery, so you can just keep whipping. If you aren't whipping, you are playing this game wrong, or you are playing at Noble or lower difficulty (no shame in that, it's good to learn your ropes on Warlord)
But seriously: whip

>>1800129
20 years after Civ 4 was released, the final meta has been polished and narrowed down to:

1) slavery good (turn off random events though lol)
2) buildings bad (the only 100% mandatory building is granary)
3) build units, units, units, units, units, units, units, units, units (hereditary rule)
4) cuirassiers are the sex

>>1801228
and spam cottages

>>1801228
>4) cuirassiers are the sex
lol if you haven't got the game in the bag by miltrad

>>1800129
Depends on your start and how you want to win, but you typically want to snap up all the worker techs. Then after that you can do something like beeline aesthetics in order to build the great library.

>>1801228
>buildings bad
Lol, no. You have to be more selective about what buildings you place in your cities because IV is not V where you turtle on 4 cities and build every building in each one. You just don't build certain buildings in certain cities because its an opportunity cost otherwise.
>cuirassiers are the sex
If you're going for a Domination/Conquest victory and you rush the enemy you can can start long before this

>>1801359
>Lol, no.
Hyperbolic, I know, but it's essentially yes. Less buildings is more efficient on higher difficulty.

>you can can start long before this
Never said you couldn't.

>>1801229
Cottagecore fags need to get the rope.

>>1800129
get the incas, recruit many quechuas, skip the settlers, skip the buildings, you wont need them. You can recruit more quechuas later,

so how does Civ 4 hold up these days