To use this guide, one must have a firm grasp and understanding of the mechanics of BC4000. Make every turn count, for placing a unit in the wrong place and time can bring the end of your civilization. Follow these steps and win every time. This guide only accounts for winning by military conquest, not by reaching Alpha Centauri.
After moving the Explorer, select a Settler and place it on a good settling spot to build a city. A good place to put a city would be on a special tile, in an area with many specials surrounding it, on grassland, or on the coast. After building your first city, immediately start producing Settlers. If the production of Settlers out paces it growth to becoming size 3, then produce coins until building settlers matches the number it'll take to grow. In the Research page, set the technology goal to Alphabet. Wait to see if there are other players on your continent before choosing a higher technology to research.
Continuously build settlers until most of the available land is taken. If you are not alone, use your explorer to block other settlers away form unclaimed land until you build on it. After building as many cities as possible, use other settlers as workers to change the land around cities farthest away from the capital.
Use the workers to irrigate plains and grasslands around cities, then build roads to add trade points. After that, use them to change Swamps and Jungles into either Grasslands or Forests. If a city has many forest tiles around it, turn them into plains then irrigate them. Having two workers on the same tile speeds up the transformation. After all the work is done and you decide to move the workers to another city, have them build a road on the way to the city. Building roads along Deserts, Plains, and Grasslands are faster than on hills, forests, and Mountains.
If you are on a small continent or island, set Map Making as the very first goal. Build Triremes to find more land to settle on.
If you come in contact with another player at this point, go ahead and set the tech goal to Monarchy. If otherwise skip the next section and research Trade.
If neighbours around you have a friendly attitude towards you, skip to the next section and research trade. Otherwise, after establishing the Monarchy, set the new tech goal to Iron Working.
The key here is to eliminate all hostile nations for the sake of your existence. Try to make a war end as fast as possible for it can give the enemy time to catch up technologically and hinder your progress.
Go to Tax Rates and set Science to 70% once the new government is established. Then set the tech goals as followed:
Iron Working -> Mathematics -> Chivalry
Legionnaires act as defensive and skirmishing units, able to withstand an attack from enemy Archers and have high enough attack points to destroy them. Catapults will be your main attacking force against walled cities. First amass a group of 5+ Catapults before sending them to attack an enemy city. Be sure they are defended since by Knights or Legions for they have a very low defence. Once Chivalry is discovered, stop producing Legion and start producing Knights, for they have more movement points.
Have your frontier cities and the capital walled and build Barracks, for they will be the ones building the units. Other cities far from the action should produce coins as to not go into debt.
If the war ends or you discover Chivalry, go on to the next section. Make sure to disband all military units after all hostile nations have been taken care of.
Tap 'City Control' / 'Trade Route Overview' to show the trade routes established by each city and tell you when the city will reach its max trade limit (4). Have half of your cities produce Caravans and others produce Coinage or Temples (if allowed). By Producing trade routes and entering a city's marketplace, you gain gold and research points. A trade route cannot be established with other cities up to 6 tiles away.
After Trade is researched, set the tech goal to Republic. Once Literacy is learned, have the city with the highest production to build the Great Library Wonder and other cities build Caravans to help build it.
Make sure that during the era, your cities do no grow too big. The more the city increases, the more unhappy citizens there will be and higher chance of there being a revolt. Slow down or completely stunt their growth by going to the City page. On the small map where it shows the resources being used by the city. Reallocate workers to tiles that produce more shields than food, or just dont choose another tile at all. By doing the later, those workers who would otherwise be working become entertainers and help keep your citizens happy and content. Don't allow a city to grow beyond 6, unless they have a temple, in which case the limit is 8.
Do not build Aqueducts, Colosseums, or anything with a an upkeep of 1 (except for temples) yet. Try not to get into any Alliances or wars, Be as peaceful as possible until the Modern Age.
Set the goal to either Theology or Economy first. Build the wonders as soon as they are available, and have surrounding cities build caravans as to complete it as fast as possible. Once all three are built start to build up.
The Chapels make unhappy citizens content, allowing for your cities to grow. Build aqueducts where they are immediately needed, build Libraries where it isn't the case. A. Smith's will allow buildings with an upkeep of 1 to be free of cost, taking a heavy load off the small tax burden.
Set the goal to Industry once Economy and Theology are discovered.
Once Industrialisation is discovered, do not start building Factories just yet. Set the new Tech goal to Electricity. Darwin's Voyage should be built during this time, so you'll be able to learn it quicker. Once discovered, build the Hoover Dam Wonder as fast as possible.
After completion, start building Factories in the biggest of cities and work down. Set the new Tech goal to either Explosives or Recycling. Pollution will soon pose a serious problem so be prepared for it.
Change your government to a Democracy when ever you please, but note that you can not change the Tax Rates to have max Science. Also it is a lot harder to appease the people, so after the revolution, it would be best to set Luxury rates to 10%
After Explosives have been discovered, upgrade all workers and start amassing an army of Engineers. Concentrate all Engineers on one tile to transform Deserts, Hills, Tundras, and Mountains around the cities into Plains that can be irrigated. Leave one Engineer to work on the transformed tile while the others transform more tiles.
Set the Tech goal to Refrigeration. Build Sewer Systems where needed. Have Engineers turn irrigated land into Farmland when available. Build the Supermarket as soon as you can. Build Offshore Oil Rigs in cities on the coast.
During this time, your population is going to skyrocket. Not only that, but all of the buildings mentioned in this section are very expensive. Both tax and Luxury percentages may have to increase in order to accommodate the growing population. To keep the research going at the same pace, build Universities and Wonders that increase science.
Once Engineers have flattened the land around all of your cities, disband all but a few in order to keep up with some pollution
Set Tech goals as follows
Combined Arms -> Robotics -> Rocketry
While researching these goals, lower the science tax rates little by little and put it into Luxury . Research speed will hardly be effected, and people will start to celebrate at around 30% Luxury rates. Having happy citizens is crucial to building an army in a Democratic state. Build Wonders like the Cure for Cancer or Shakespeare's Theater to help keep people happy and content. Build the Statue of Liberty so that way you can dissolve the Senate and declare war on who ever you please, then return to a democratic state on the same turn.
Build Barracks III in all cities, Airports in a few and Port Facilities in others. Bomb enemy cities with bombers carried by Carriers, invade them with a helicopter if there isn't a unit left in that city. Have transports carry armies of Tanks and Howitzers to enemy territory and start a Blitzkrieg.
After Rocketry, let the research handle itself and put the science rate at 10%. Once you start researching Future Techs, set science to 0%
At this point, you will be able to conquer the world and be the only player left standing. Note that Playing BC4000 is very tedious, sometimes requiring many days before finishing. Be patient and make careful decisions.