Starter tips for Tropico 4

 So, campaign over. Somehow, it felt shorter than that of T3...

Tropico 4 is basically Tropico 3 with a few twists. So, to save me typing work, I want to refer you to the guide I wrote for T3 (you'll find it here). Everything not covered in here didn't change.

Basics
Making El Presidente
Very simply, there is one basic setup that works great for every mission. Why? Because every mission gets tackled the same way. Since there is no time limit for most missions (at least in the beginning, where time limits would really hurt, later you can simply buy problems out of the way. There is only one mission where this doesn't work so well, I'll go into detail for that one), the general idea is to get your economy running first of all, and as soon as the money is pouring in, start dealing with the mission goals. So whether you have to build a certain building or get a certain amount of tourists on your island, just ignore it until you have the money to tackle it.

The presidente makeup in T4 is actually quite different from T3 where farmer was the background to go with. In T4, farms aren't as critical and you can let a factory take off quite early since you needn't produce the raw materials first, you can import them now. It's also not as critical that the USSR likes us since the standing with the superpowers doesn't take a dive as quickly as in T3, so elected as socialist is no longer a critical rise to power path. Also, there are no "good" and "bad" traits anymore, you just pick 3 traits that may have negative effects to balance out the positive ones. Personally, I didn't change much here from the old setup. Also, they "level" now, with each island you play with a certain advantage, this advantage gets better, so on island 5, you can already have the three we will need at maximum. Neat.

The way I setup El Presidente is simply this:

Background: Self-made man
Rise to power: Elected as Capitalist
Traits: Administrator, Enterpreneurial, Hardworking

As you can see, most of the benefits aim at industrial productivity and export gains. This is where we'll get money from.

In the beginning... money, money, money
The first million is still the hardest, that didn't change at all. The first things you should do, other than in T3, are:

Build ministery and hire a foreigner as Foreign Minister.
Build a marketplace and keep it on "allow imports". Instant no more meals skipped and nobody dies from starvation.
As soon as the ministery is built and the minister is in his place, issue the "USSR Development aid" edict.

You see, it's a similar start as in T3, just that you need a ministry and a minister instead of the diplomatic office. Else, same business. Oh, and you need no farms for food. In fact, ignore them altogether, at least for now. They may come handy later when you have room and need to get some cheap work places quickly to keep your people busy, but for now, no farms. No farms AT ALL. Check the corn farms on your island and see whether you can turn them over into something more sensible than corn, i.e. whether something else grows there, too, that sells for more dough. Unlike T3, you needn't worry about food. We'll import that (this is why we have the marketplace). You also needn't "save" the iron and gold for later so you can build weapons and jewelry out of them, so simply mine them and sell them. If our mines run dry, we'll simply import what we need. It's easy and fast money. Other quick sources of early money are logging camps and fishermen wharfs, but I'd keep the logging camps to a minimum, your environmentalists will eventually ask you to destroy them and they make them REALLY unhappy. And they are one of the problem factions and quite hard to entertain (unless you plant pesky little trees all over your island in the gaps between the houses, and I hate that kind of micro management). Farms would produce more money than mines, but they need a LONG time before they start to make money, and your people might simply eat your profits (quite literally) if you're planting edible crops. Also, by the time they finally start paying off, you usually could have built industry buildings that make at least five times the money. Yes, after import expenses. And salary.

Also unlike T3, try to keep your balance positive, or at least try to make sure you will have a positive balance once everything in the dock is sold. The reason is simple: You can only buy imports with a positive balance. Another thing you'll want to do is set the import amount to infinite, you will want to buy as much as you can, your economy will depend very heavily on importing raw materials. Exports/imports work like this: The ship docks, then your dock workers throw your goods into the ship which is instantly converted to cash (about 45000 per "trip" of the dockworker, watch the dock when a ship is anchored and you see what I mean). After that, just before the ship leaves, imports are bought. If, and only if, there is a positive balance. If your industry would need goods worth 30k and you only have 25k, only goods for 25k will be bought, you can't go into the "red" with imports. This is also the reason why you'll want to keep from building until the ship has left, that way you can buy imports (with positive balance) AND construct your buildings (with up to 10k negative balance). And you DO want to make sure that you get as many imports as you can, your income depends on them!

Next things you want to build soon is a high school and a college, as well as a customs office (set on export). If any faction offers you any blueprints in exchange for exports, take it and start with that industry. If that doesn't happen and you manage to get the roughly 20k together, build a weapons factory. Not only will it make the middle east happy (and they're generally quite unhappy due to a lot of churches), it is a true cash cow, especially if you produce landmines. Yes, it makes the US and the USSR unhappy, but since we keep the capitalists and communists happy, that won't matter too much. If needed, build a foreign office. Do not forget to set the industry to allow imports (and don't forget it for any other industry building you create). Staff the high school well, you'll need a lot of high school graduates (and some of them will be "lost" to the college). If necessary and you have money to spare, hire a few teachers from abroad. If you feel like it, build an academy and set it to research grants, it will make the various blueprints cheaper and also give you another presidente to improve the various buildings (unfortunately not under your control, but hey). It's not really strictly a requirement, the blueprints are dirt cheap anyway, but considering the time you'll spend between buying them, it does in the end pay off. The rest can be found in the T3 primer.

Farms are not strictly a necessity, since you can import everything. If you have too many people and some space to spare, they're a nice way to get them employed, but otherwise, just don't bother building them. In fact, I usually demolish the ones I start with eventually to make room for more sensible buildings. Yes, that means I'm fully dependent on imports, but soon after you start building an industrial empire the main problem will be that your dock workers can't shuffle the goods in time on board before the ship leaves... So build another dock. And if you have to, another. And as long as you have money, you'll have raw materials. Oh, and make sure that the docks are set to import infinite amounts! 5000 isn't even pocket change later (my imports range in the 50-80k usually).

New buildings, what's good, what's bad
Basically, the rest is similar to the T3 tutorial. There are a few new buildings, though.

Wellfare:
Shopping Mall: Another happiness modifyer, I think it affects entertainment quality but in the "thoughts" lists it has its own entry. Not strictly an early must-have, but eventually you should build one. Up to 3 can be built.

Customs Office: A very useful building to increase the export prices. Build it as early as you can spare the 10k, usually after 2-3 industrial buildings are up and running it makes sense to build the CO.

Stock Exchange: Allows you to build "private" building. Quite similar to the privatization edict, you have to build them, they will hire your people (and since they usually pay more than you do, your people will prefer to work there). Not really useful. Early in the game, when you could use the rent, they'd take away valuable workforce, later in the game, the benefits (in terms of entertainment value, money or resources) can easily be covered on your own. Not worth it, IMO.

Weather station: Very useful building, with the addons it allows you to get early warning for disasters, which leads to fewer/no casualties and/or ample warning time to prepare for the impact, e.g. to build a few fire stations quickly if a volcano eruption is about to happen. Earthquakes can even be avoided sometimes. Really worth it once you have a lot of buildings and searching for the broken ones would be a nuisance. 

Entertainment:
Museum: A cute little thing, very high entertainment value but also very high cost to keep it running. Fortunately, if you're getting low on cash, you can simply switch it to domestic art and make a few bucks that way. Good building to start entertainment with.

Cosmic pin: Yet another restaurant. 'nuff said. Yes, I still don't think too highly of tourists.

Government
Ministry: Must-have building for some other buildings and nearly all edicts. Usually the first building I create in the game to get the USSR aid edict up and running early for cheap tenements.

Fire Station: VERY useful building if your island is under a volcano or plagued by frequent droughts. Not strictly an early requirement (most buildings you build early on can as well burn down, they're cheap), and needs high school staff which is quite tight early while you're trying to get your industrial economy up and running, later you should have a few of them around your island, especially near volcanos.

Education:
Academy of Science: Basically the tool to make the blueprints cheaper. Not strictly a requirement, but later you want to have one, first to make the blueprints a bit cheaper (40% is enough) and then to let almost everyone study.

Food/Resources:
Salt mine: Yet another mine. Yes, it affects nearby ranches and canneries, but since the salt deposits are usually where you don't want to put a cannery, don't worry about it. It's a good early source of money, nothing else.

Horticulture station: Would be cool if you had logging or farms. Since you don't, don't worry about it.

Industry
Chemical Plant: More than yet another factory. You can improve your hospital quality here, so it should be one of the first industries you develop. Also, it's one of the few industrial buildings that need no raw materials, so even if your exports plummet and you can't import, this will still run and generate revenue.

Infrastructure:
Nuclear power plant:
A very powerful power plant that produces near infinite amounts of power. At least I never managed to squeeze it dry. Still, you should start with a normal power plant (on gas, not coal). The reason is that running a nuke plant is expensive. Very, very expensive to run, uranium is pricy! You need a fully developed industry to afford it. Start with a normal power plant and build the nuke plant as soon as energy starts running low.

Landmarks:
Mausoleum: Not only is it good for the loyalist standing and it entertains your people and tourists, it works as a trap for rebels. Not often and not well, but once you have the money to build it, tack on the addon, the odd rebel will stumble over it.

The new tourist attractions are new tourist attractions, nothing else. Read the mouseover description to see who benefits from them.


Spoiler alert
There are a few missions (ok, actually just two) that require some deviation from the usual plan. If you don't want to spoil the fun of unfolding the story, stop reading here. Have fun and enjoy Tropico 4!

The first nonstandard mission is the one where the UN and Van Hoof takes control of your island and doesn't allow you to issue edicts. Here, everything is done as usual, though the ministry isn't as critical since you won't hire a foreign minister and won't issue the USSR edict. Else, standard plan.

The other nonstandard mission is the last one, where your second task is to amass 50k in the bank within 5 years. Not easy. Not easy at all. But you can keep the first mission goal, 100 people on the island, from being fulfilled by building an immigration office and setting it to "Tropico first". Build the ministry as usual, then build mines on the iron, bauxite and gold deposits left of the main town (with "left" being left if turning the map so that the dock is below the town). On the hill is a salt deposit, built a salt mine there. Put a garage next to every mine so people can quickly get to and from. A marketplace and a wharf, as well as a church and a clinic to get the religious and communist faction from going bananas, a childhood museum for the loyalists, then get the immigration office up to make sure you can keep the immigration under control. You will lose people due to bad healthcare, so you will periodically have to switch to skilled workers, just make sure you stay below 100 people. As soon as you have the money, get a weapon factory up, unless you get a free blueprint from a mission. Jewelry works well too, if you can get that up before you have to go over 100 people. You will have too few people to keep everything staffed well, so after the weapon factory and the jewelry is up (and on "allow import"), and you have a few bucks left, open the doors and crank out the money. Try to get away without printing any, the cost explosion would later cripple you most likely. You have only until 2012 to complete the whole game, so don't tardy too much. Later, you'll be asked to set the minimum wage to 20. This is not trivial. Make sure you have at least 5-6 factories running before you issue this, your treasury will bleed dry quickly once you turn it on. By then, you should also have a second dock up to get more ships coming and smooth out the money generation. Expand and build mines wherever you have a deposit, build your industry near the shore and sprinkle some teamsters liberally between them to make sure your goods get to the docks. In general, once you mastered the 50k in 5 years obstacle, it's quite straightforward, though money can become a bit of an issue. Watch out that you don't go too deeply into debt that you can't pay for imports anymore, you need to keep your economy running on full power!

Other than that, it's pretty straightforward. On, one more tip, in the mission with the spies, when you're told to eliminate, don't shoot them silently, eliminate them (else new ones will just pop up, happened to me since I wanted to have my secret police cap them... the game didn't like that).

Good luck and have fun!

ps:

The following Presidente also works, and gets you high trained people at an insane pace:

Background: Professor
Rise to Power: Installed by the CIA
Traits: Diplomatic, Hardworking, Scholarly

Though to be honest you could substitute out Installed by the CIA if tourism and US relations are less important to you.

I have one thing to add, though: if you are running an export-heavy economy, you have to make sure there are no traffic jams around your docking areas. There is nothing worse than spiraling into debt while 110k+ worth of exports sit in the dock(s) because the dockhands couldn't get there in time due to being stuck in a gridlock elsewhere. 

Ergo, build the docks at the different locations on your island.

P. S. Industry ad campagin edict works miracles with this setup.