- Tactical combat is off by default.
- Ctrl-Click the "Zoom" button to get the map generation key.
- Spies can be used to accelerate technological progress.
- "Tribes can be colonised by Great Powers. In IMPERIALISM II, colonisation refers to a 'peaceful' takeover that could be the result of economic power over the Tribe, an unethical treaty, or bribery of the Tribe's leaders. Colonies retain some independence and control over their own land."
- Command over half of the provinces of the Old World to win.
- A Great Power can be defeated by taking its capital but its remaining provinces will fall into anarchy. They cannot act on their own but will defend themselves against attempts at conquest. No declaration of war is necessary to make such attempts.
- Convincing a Minor Nation or Great Power peacefully means all of their military units will be transferred to you and, with them, their appetites.
- "[Y]ou can receive profits from the activities of your Merchant units and other civilian units in those Minor Nations and Tribes where you have established embassies. These profits are added each turn to your cash reserves and are called Overseas Profits on your balance sheet."
- Re: choosing a site for a capital on Normal or higher difficulty levels: "Generally, you should search for a tile near plentiful food with easy access to timber and wool to assist your early development. Capitals built on a river in a province with no coastline are much safer from seaborne invasions."
- "Once the technology called National Bureaucracy is discovered by your empire, a Builder unit may upgrade a town or a capital city, if it is connected by road or rail."
- "Rivers wind from mountain terrain tiles to the sea coast, passing through other terrain along the way. With two exceptions, a tile with a river is identical to a tile without one. First, a port may be constructed on a river tile by an Engineer. Ports may not be constructed in hill or mountain terrain. Second, rivers, like coasts, produce one unit of fish per turn for adjacent ports."
- Fleets from more than one Great Power may occupy the same sea zone simultaneously.
- "Hostile fleets in a sea zone near a port may intercept transport and trade originating in or directed to the port."
- Zooming out can be useful for moving fleets or civilian units long distances.
- The Game Information panel is useful to see how well you're doing vs. other Great Powers.
- Civilian units can't defend themselves and will die if present in a province lost to a hostile attack.
- Unlike military units, civilian units do not eat food and do not require a unit of population for their construction.
- "All civilians may move any distance each turn. However, only a Spy can enter land controlled by other Great Powers. Only Explorers and Engineers can deploy to Minor Nations and Tribes prior to the existence of an embassy with that Nation or Tribe. Civilians can always deploy to land you own by conquest or colonisation, even if it is overseas. There is no need to conduct a landing or use any ships to get a civilian across water."
- "You can [...] type W and use the Wake all Civilian Units keyboard shortcut, to wake up all sleeping units and return them to the cycle."
- Try to combine exploration and prospecting when exploring the New World.
- "Roads gather resources from their own tile and from all the tiles around them. At the beginning of the game the primitive roads can only gather one resource from each tile. Later roads can gather more. For more details on how roads work see page 71."
- Ports can be built in cities.
- "Like roads, ports gather resources from their own tile and the surrounding ones. Unlike roads, however, they are always capable of gathering the maximum number of resources (4) from a single tile."
- Increasing the gathering of resources from a given tile has an exponential increase in costs.
- "One of the most important results of using a Merchant is that the purchase of land in a New World province protects that province from invasion unless the other Great Power is willing to declare war on the Great Power that bought the land."
- Spies can be used to get accurate reports regarding an enemy garrison. Accordingly, it doesn't seem to make much sense to assign a Spy to the city in the province he's spying in.
- If you are currently researching a given technology, spies can be placed in enemy territory to greatly increase your chances of acquiring said technology if they already have it. (Who has what is indicated by the little flags in the technology screen.)
- Lastly, Spies deployed anywhere in your own country greatly increase the chances of capturing or killing enemy Spies at work in your lands.
- Remember to reassign spies when finished
- Once you can build railroads, a Rail Builder can be used to build railroads which can transport four resources from the tile they're on and adjacent tiles. Rail Builders will not quit building by default until they come to a fork in the road.
- "Fleets are represented in two ways on the map. A fleet on station at sea is portrayed as a large ship with a wake. A fleet at anchor appears as a ship with furled sails near the port tile where the fleet is based. Often a fleet is shown with an accompanying icon, which tells you what type of mission the fleet is on."
- "Once a fleet is defending, you must use the selection cursor or the Wake all Naval Units keyboard shortcut (N) to restore the fleet to the unit cycle."
- The aggression settings for a fleet can greatly alter the fleet's behavior. High aggression does not seem super useful but low aggression seems to have wider applicability.
- "As a reward for naval expansion, you may acquire new flagships. Flagships are always the most powerful ships available at the time the reward is received."
- Ships can be upgraded.
- Cargo ships can but shouldn't fight.