tropico 1 guide

[kittyspam]

so want to play all of those through in order but having a time with tropico 1. Thought I understood the game but boy am I getting destroyed as soon as I move from easy to moderate maps. Don't seem to be any general guides for the first game - love some basic assistiance!

[cmk7]

I haven't played in awhile, and I'm not recalling a guide. Here's some basics.

Make a trail of construction workers as you expand. Not only do they build, they also perform maintenance on structures to keep them from decaying. I usually want two right at the beginning, typically adjacent. This is just because I'll probably be building my main city right there. When you start moving out and expanding, find good midway points to place them in.

I also keep a decent amount of teamsters around. Anything that sits too long is either resources your people can't use, or things you aren't exporting.

Some people wait, but I like to get a high school and college going as soon as I can afford it. It sops up some people as they are going through school, but it pays off about 10 years in. Cuts down the cost of having to hire educated workers from abroad.

Compared to Tropico 4, I feel like keeping the factions happy is more critical in this game. If one of them is getting angry, fix it asap.

I play basically all sandbox mode, so my early game is usually get a good farming system in place, find a mine to exploit. Get a church and one of the medical buildings in play as soon as possible. From there, figure out what makes the most sense factories wise on the island.

That should get you some money coming in. As soon as this is in play and I'm no longer poor, I'll set up a small tourism area.

It's a basic strategy but it can get you through most games.

[kittyspam]

How many people can one farm usually support? I feel like in later games it was easier to tell when you were producing enough food and when you needed to build more farms...

[cmk7]

I think you need at least 1 farm per 50 people. I tend to have more, but I like filling up the map with farms.

[mfkndggrfll]

Play Tropico 2 first. Its easier to learn and get into the series.

[kittyspam]

Originally posted by mfkndggrfll:

Play Tropico 2 first. Its easier to learn and get into the series.

Oh I agree! Just trying to play them all in order - heh.

[neo1erk3]

I always build a second contruction workers building as my first building. I find u need a lot of construction workers to get things built at a decent rate(about 25% of my pop work construction thru most of the game).The most important tip, is to restrict immigration except for short periods. If you allow immigration, you are constantly playing catchup trying find housing and food for your people.
Farms can usually feed about 30 ppl on average, and having a variety of food improves the health of your people. If you only have corn and fish growing, your people will over run your Doctor offices.
Have spare teamster offices, that are empty. Running out of teamsters will bring your economy to a halt, and by the time it you get a new one up and running, your game could be lost.
In the economic tab on the almanac, you can see average caribean pay. If you fall below this(usually around 40-50 years into a game) you will find your ppl leaving and no new immigrants will come.

[xw2000alpha]

It's not that hard to feed your fella Tropicans, but to get them happy is another matter. If election is your problem, here are a few tricks. (Ignore this if you're a totalitarian.)

1. It's very hard to get everybody happy. But as we are practising "DEMOCRACY" in Tropico, we can at least get 51% of people happy just to stay in office. So that some people are well taken cared of, and some others are, unfortunately, to be dealt with later. The largest faction in the population, as expected, are the poor. And they are mostly communists. They could be equally religious, which is usually the 2nd largest faction.

2. What the commies ask for is usually 1. Farming economy 2. House for everyone 3. Job for everyone. See? To fulfill the requests and appease the commies is EXACTLY what you should achieve in the first 10 years. Completing these 3 objectives should bring you through the first 2 elections even at hardest political difficulty. If your background brings you some respect from your people or faction, that's even better. Then let's see the objectives one by one.

3. Corn is great fodder for your people. A well placed corn farm in green background can often feed up to 50~60 people. Other food crop farms or fishing wharf about 30~40, depending on the harvest. Remember the edict "food for the people", doubling food consumption but potentially raising food quality from ~67% to as high as 90%, provided that you have abundant food supply. Try to place some papaya and pineapple farms when land is suitable, they sell good price when there is surplus (note: papaya trees takes ~5 yrs to mature and bear fruit). Pineapple and fish can be canned in a factory, so they also offer a good basis for you to start an industry.

4. Housing is the 2nd most important happiness factor after food in Tropico. The housing quality of shacks is 6~7 while even a tenement offers a 20+ quality, which is a 3-fold increase at least. I often start with "diplomat" quality (free diplomatic office at start), pay $2000 for edict "Russian aid", and than start putting up 2~3 half priced tenements over the next 5 years. Remember to set the rent to a low price so that even social security recipients can afford to live in. (I had accidentally lost an election on an island with overall happiness ~70 when I torn down old tenements and left some people "temporarily" homeless.)

5. So to start a game, I often start with 4~5 farms, then build a tenement, a pub and a church, then build 2~3 more farms with cash crops or pineapples, then save up for a school and a clinic. That would allow you to set up a good basic community in 5~10 years. After that you may decide on whether to start an industrial or a touristy business to fund your upper social class and services.

[tgm79]

It's pretty easy, maximize raw products farming, turn them into goods, maximize prices and sell with profit. Mining industries are usually bad, unless you have a really good gold deposit. But iron and bauxite are pain in the ass, so don't bother. If you go tourism, either go only tourism, or make sure it is far away from your city and industry. And make sure you build airport fast and launch trade missions to get those sweet price bonuses.