Civilization 7 received a lot of new updates compared to its predecessor, but before you can explore all of that, you need to found your first city.
It comes with a Settler feature that every civilization receives at the start of the game, and it is the only Settler that can help you instantly find a City instead of a Town in the game.
With the help of this feature, you can create a city that will help you proceed further in the game, only if you know about some tips for starting a new city.
Our guide explains various useful strategies that can help you found your first city, such as which resources you should prefer, settings to enable, environmental factors, and terrain types to consider. It will help you decide whether to continue your current game or start from scratch.
Enable Yield and Resource Icons
Right after you load the world, make sure you turn on these three lenses: Yields, Resources, and Settler View. To see Resources and Yields, go to the Lenses button above the bottom-left minimap and enable Yield and Resources Icons. You will find these Icons under Decorations. In this options menu, you will also find the option to enable Settler view; turn it on.
Once all of them are enabled, you will get to see the current Yield of every tile in the game, and the Resources icon will show the location of any potential Resources in a unique icon. These two provide a real-time view of your surroundings and help you decide the best location when settling a city.
Turning on Settler view recolors the map in red and green, where red indicates the areas you cannot settle and green shows the areas that are okay for a settlement.
The ideal spots are highlighted by a deep green or a small city icon. When you take your cursor over this icon, it will provide you with a brief summary of why this spot is perfect to settle.
Follow the Three Tiles of Resources Scheme
In Civilization 7, cities can only expand work tiles in a 3-tile radius; that is, you can only work tiles and resources to three tiles around your city center.
The resources outside of these tiles are out of your reach, and you can’t incorporate them into your empire.
Players are only able to place three tiles in any direction when founding the first city. If there aren’t enough resources available in the initially revealed area, you will not be able to expand your city beyond this area, and you will not be able to access resources hidden in the fog of war.
If you are playing on PC, you can enable the debug console and use a cheat to remove the fog of war.
Pick Your Yields and Resources Wisely
Civ 7 comes with many yields and resources that are suitable for a particular timeframe.
For example, in the early game, your main focus should be growth. For this, increasing Food and Production using resources like Cotton and Sheep is much more helpful. On the other end, Resources like Gold and Silver are quite helpful in the late Antiquity Age.
Along with prioritizing the resources, you must also try to create a Legacy Path and gradually build towards Victory Condition.
For this purpose, some Resources are quite helpful. For example, Incense grants +10% Science in Settlement while in Antiquity, Silk grants +10% Culture, Iron boosts your unit strength civ-wide, and Jade multiplies Gold by +15%.
Look for Fresh Waters & Coasts or Rivers that are Navigable
If you study the greatest civilizations of all time, you will find that they all developed near fresh water or navigable rivers.
Same is the case in Civilization 7; you need fresh water for proper growth and development of your city. Fresh water boosts Happiness which is critical to have when your city grows. Civ 7 will not let you spawn in an area that doesn’t have fresh water, but you can find it a tile or two away from the spawn point.
Having access to the ocean through a nearby coast or Navigable River is essential to thrive in Exploration.
In the Antiquity age, players cannot enter the deep ocean, but you can explore the coasts of your home continent with the help of units. Another thing worth mentioning here is that your founding city doesn’t necessarily have to be located near an ocean or a navigable river.
When you have progressed well in the Antiquity age, you can find towns near oceans or navigable rivers and upgrade them into Cities for Exploration. But having an ocean grants more happiness and unlocks some Exploration Age unlock requirements, for example, Songhai.
Terrain Types and Environmental Factors
The last strategy we have for you for founding your first city in Civ 7 is to critically consider the terrain and environmental factors around.
This is much like normal life, as progress usually halts when conditions get unfavorable or rough. In Civ 7, units will immediately stop when they come across a Rough Terrain tile. If your starting location has “Rough” prefix tiles, your units will face a much harder time progressing.
If you have enabled Settler view, as we explained in the first tip, you can see the tiles impacted by natural disasters like Volcanic Eruptions and Floods.
These can boost the natural yields of the land, but they can also damage buildings and hurt your units if they are on an affected tile.
Rough terrains and natural disasters don’t require you to start the game again, but they can be troublesome to deal with once the game progresses and you establish Roads between settlements.
Victory-Specific Build Orders
Tailor your research and civic choices based on your chosen victory path:
| Victory Type | Key Technologies | Key Civics | Build Priorities |
|---|---|---|---|
| Culture | Writing, Irrigation, Masonry | Discipline, Code of Laws | Wonders, Culture buildings |
| Military | Animal Husbandry, The Wheel | Discipline, Organized Military | Infantry/Siege units, Settlers |
| Science | Sailing, Pottery, Writing | Code of Laws | Libraries, Science buildings |
| Economic | Sailing, Currency | Oligarchy | Markets, Merchants, Trade Routes |
How to Deal with Other Civilizations and Independent Powers in Civ 7
The Barbarians and City-States are replaced in Civilization 7 by an independent powers mechanic with more interactivity; they can be hostile, neutral, or friendly.
Scout independent powers early on. Recognizing Independent Powers will allow you to assess whether they will be a threat or an opportunity very quickly. Hostile ones will raid adjacent districts, like Barbarians did in earlier titles.
You have two main choices when dealing with Independent Powers:
Spend influence to start the “Befriend Independent” project that takes 30 turns to complete. If the project is successful you will turn them into City-States. This unlocks special bonuses in Science, Culture, and more.
Once an Independent Power becomes a City-State, you can spend some more Influence to absorb it into your civilization to create a permanent Town.
The second main option is to use the military approach that destroys their capital’s defenses and use Disperse action them get rid of them entirely. However, some leaders, like Tecumseh, will penalize you for this action.
