Hi All,

No clue what I'm doing wrong so far. My first two games I've been quickly taken over by neighbor's culture. It's not clear to me what creates influence or how to buff mine so that I don't lose out so easily. Would appreciate tips but this is also feedback for devs that this is a completely opaque system for me.

Thanks.

Same issue for me. Any advice from other players?

Generally, the brown player picks the Olmecs and becomes an Influence powerhouse early on. The influence bottleneck in the Ancient era kinda shoehorns you into picking influence civics and tenets, as only main plazas produce it on their own. If nothing helps you could always scout rush an ai to establish dominance. ;)

I had thought that Natural Wonders were useless because they don't work at all like in Civ. They don't provide bonuses on their hexes, but if you have them in your territory you get influence, stability and gold, and in the early game it was a real boost. I didn't have to worry about pottery until I was in the Classical Age

I'm confused, if I had territory that was converted to another empires influence I didn't lose the territory I assume I just lost some money or something that influence earns. If I controlled other territory with my influence I also definitely didn't take over the territory.

Influence is weird.

I played this from launch but am back after a long break so some of the below info may be slightly innacurate.

The 2 main impacts of your territory falling under the influence of anther player is as follows

1 Cultural osmosis.  You will be forced to change your civics to match the other player.  If you decline this event you will get hit with a temp stability hit (50% I think).  This might not be so bad because it may be a civic choice you were going to make anyway (also its a free pick doesn't cost you influence, I think).

2. The other player gets a grievance that you are oppressing their people.  These grievances can be turned into demands to hand the territory over to them and helps fuel their war support.  Also while at war every territory you control under their influence grants them extra war support.

So basically the more of your territory falls under your neighbors influence the easier it is for them to wage war on you (in terms of war support.

If you find yourself loosing the influence war you have a few options.

-Don't trade.  Trade routed help spread influence.  The exporter gets the buff I believe so the more items you buy off them the worse it gets.

-Keep stability above 90%.  When stability is between 90% and 100% each pop produces double influence (2 instead of 1).

-Change to an influence civ if you are not 1 all ready.

-Look for any civics that boost influence production.

-Build as many EQ districts as possible, they all tend to generate some influence and there are civics that increase this.

-War.  Take as many of there territory as possible.

-There is an embassy agreement that effectively prevents either parties territory being affected by influence.  I forget what it is called or its exact details.  This requires the Together we Rue expansion.