Am I the only one....

[Chad]

Who can't seem to win 1 single game? I swear, I've even played on Settler and lost. It starts to go evil on me after a while. I get to around 1900 AD and I'm in first place (At this point I'm thinking that I might actually win) then somebody will declare war on me and I'll go falling down into second-to-last-place.
My question is: What should I do? What's the best settings to have to really ease me into the game? Civ 4 rocks, but I'd like to be able to win once and a while.

[sooooo]

Maybe you could upload a save game or two and we'll take a look? You can attach them to posts as zip files.

[Drugged_Unholy]

I've even played on Settler and lost.

That reminds me of when I died playing a tutorial in a fps.

[Raven_Lore]

Maybe you should build up your military ? Or try thinking of a way to win before-hand. Some early mistakes I made during the beginning was the "peaceful builder gmae." But as you start to mature, you begin to understand that peaceful doesn't really work

[Drugged_Unholy]

It sounds stupid, but learn how the game works.

Figure out why cottages improve your research rate, why you should use unit X against unit Y, etc...

[Mjolnir]

Take a look at Sulla's Civ 4 Walkthrough. I also recommend that you look at the game manual so you learn how the game works.

[Chad]

This is kind of off-topic but, this picture is from a game that I've been playing over the past two days or so.
http://img186.imageshack.us/img186/5021/...nnyct4.png
Looks like somebody is a bit behind

[sunrise089]

That reminds me of when I died playing a tutorial in a fps.

OP - If you're loosing in settler, and often due to a late-game war, you aren't building up your military near enough. It's easy as a player to get caught up in a space-race and late-game wonder building fest, but you have to remember how strong those modern armor and mech. infantry units are. The AI players will be making them, and if you don't have good relations, they'll steamroll your defending riflemen and grenadeers.