Galactic Civilizations IV Cheats and Tips
Manually Control Probes
Exploration is the key first component of any grand strategy, as it’s vital to get an understanding of the geography and expansion opportunities. The most common scout unit to help explore the vast expanses of space is the humble probe. They move quickly and have unlimited range to go wherever you want them to go.
In later stages of a playthrough, it may be wise to turn probes on auto-exploration, as you’ll have many more things to manage and consider. However, in the early game, manually controlling probes is far more efficient for both exploring the fog-of-war and avoiding threats. The probe’s auto-exploration AI isn’t top-notch and you can easily lose many probes to the same group of pirates or roaming raiders, so your efforts will be greatly rewarded for directing the initial scouting efforts.
Colonize Rapidly
The main purpose of scouting as early and as quickly as possible is to reveal where there are prospective planets to settle. New colonies will form the backbone of your empire’s burgeoning economy and the more worlds under your control the more your faction will be able to do.
However, there are other considerations to keep in mind aside from simply improving the economy and your production capacity. The AI is quite aggressive even on lower levels of difficulty and they’ll definitely claim worlds that are up for grabs.
You can safely assume that any world your probes discover, the AI has their eyes on. If you don’t want the AI to outpace you in the long run, then follow the expansionist mantra – colonize, colonize, colonize.
Ensure a High Growth Rate
Going hand-in-hand with the previous advice, to colonize planets you’ll need to embark your Citizens on colony ships. Essentially, players will be moving populations from one planet to another to spread their influence and control. To ensure your empire can keep up the rapid colonization efforts, it’s highly advisable to enact policies, assign political liaisons, and do anything you can to increase the population growth rate of your starting.
Focus on Manufacturing
Speed is the name of the game in Galactic Civilizations 4. A higher Manufacturing rating on your Core Worlds means your empire will be able to do more things more quickly, expand across the galaxy, and provide security to your colonies.
This means for your Core Worlds that Manufacturing Districts or improvements that directly increase the planet’s production rating will be especially useful, though don’t go too overboard as these districts also increase pollution, which will in turn reduce overall resource output levels. For prioritizing planets for colonization, worlds with higher Mineral ratings are preferable, as these Mineral Inputs will be shipped to the closest Core World and directly improve its Manufacturing rating.