Any plans for Civilization V?

[Anwar]

I'd try, but work and other things have really messed up my gaming in the last year. Of course this is good because it means I read and work more...

Anywho, I wouldn't have the nukes act like the planetkillers did in Alpha Centauri and leave a huge water hole in the ground but an ICBM should turn a 20+ city to a single tile crater at least.

 

[Spider]

Civ3 was pretty good. It simplified things a bit, but the dramatically improved UI combined with civ traits made it a more fun game, imo. Civ4 was an even more dramatic departure, which I think improved things for the better.

BTW, anyone interested in a Civ3 or Civ4 play by e-mail game (or pitboss game if you know how to set it up for Civ4) of trekbbs members? Do we have enough people for one of these?

The most irritating thing about civ3 was the pollution, and having to have a bunch of workers running about all the time. In Civ4 I think they did a much better job with the "health" aspect of it.

So, for all you die hard civ4 fans, got a question for you. For your economy are you a cottage spammer or do you try to do it with specialists and great people?

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Cottages, usually.

I'm not a very good player and I'm still in Civ3 mode, so I'll build too many workers and too many cities and then I'll have my workers build cottages so my economy stops sucking. Then they'll have nothing to do, so they'll start doing random improvements to pass the time (usually build roads).

I do try and build some specialized cities for commerce or science, but I usually get the great people through a wonder of some sort and adapt from there.

 

[Canadave]

Civ3 was pretty good. It simplified things a bit, but the dramatically improved UI combined with civ traits made it a more fun game, imo. Civ4 was an even more dramatic departure, which I think improved things for the better.

BTW, anyone interested in a Civ3 or Civ4 play by e-mail game (or pitboss game if you know how to set it up for Civ4) of trekbbs members? Do we have enough people for one of these?

If it weren't for the fact I'm utterly terrible at Civ, I'd be up for it. It's one of those games where, as much as I enjoy the gameplay, I've just never mastered it.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Civ3 was pretty good. It simplified things a bit, but the dramatically improved UI combined with civ traits made it a more fun game, imo. Civ4 was an even more dramatic departure, which I think improved things for the better.

BTW, anyone interested in a Civ3 or Civ4 play by e-mail game (or pitboss game if you know how to set it up for Civ4) of trekbbs members? Do we have enough people for one of these?

If it weren't for the fact I'm utterly terrible at Civ, I'd be up for it. It's one of those games where, as much as I enjoy the gameplay, I've just never mastered it.

I'm hopeless at the game myself - anything above Chieftain level seems to be beyond me. I still love it, though.

 

[Commander Vaughn]

Civ3 was pretty good. It simplified things a bit, but the dramatically improved UI combined with civ traits made it a more fun game, imo. Civ4 was an even more dramatic departure, which I think improved things for the better.

BTW, anyone interested in a Civ3 or Civ4 play by e-mail game (or pitboss game if you know how to set it up for Civ4) of trekbbs members? Do we have enough people for one of these?

The most irritating thing about civ3 was the pollution, and having to have a bunch of workers running about all the time. In Civ4 I think they did a much better job with the "health" aspect of it.

So, for all you die hard civ4 fans, got a question for you. For your economy are you a cottage spammer or do you try to do it with specialists and great people?

They don't call them Great Profits (Prophets) for nothing.

 

[Canadave]

Civ3 was pretty good. It simplified things a bit, but the dramatically improved UI combined with civ traits made it a more fun game, imo. Civ4 was an even more dramatic departure, which I think improved things for the better.

BTW, anyone interested in a Civ3 or Civ4 play by e-mail game (or pitboss game if you know how to set it up for Civ4) of trekbbs members? Do we have enough people for one of these?

If it weren't for the fact I'm utterly terrible at Civ, I'd be up for it. It's one of those games where, as much as I enjoy the gameplay, I've just never mastered it.

I'm hopeless at the game myself - anything above Chieftain level seems to be beyond me. I still love it, though.

My problem always is that I never have as big an army as I thought I did, so if I don't have any technological advantage, the AI's huge stacks always kick my ass.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

It's OK, none of us are any good so it'll be perfect.

 

[Jadzia]

I think it's quite common in strategy games to underestimate the strength you need to win. If you ever think "what I have acquired will suffice" then you'll be wrong.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

If it weren't for the fact I'm utterly terrible at Civ, I'd be up for it. It's one of those games where, as much as I enjoy the gameplay, I've just never mastered it.

I'm hopeless at the game myself - anything above Chieftain level seems to be beyond me. I still love it, though.

My problem always is that I never have as big an army as I thought I did, so if I don't have any technological advantage, the AI's huge stacks always kick my ass.

The thing with Civ4 I find is to focus on a few goals, not all, tailored to your civilization. Playing as the Mongols, I prefer to focus on technology and take advantage of the early special unit to crush my enemies, see them driven before me, and hear the lamentations etc. (even though it's pretty useless as a city raider) rather than focus on religion or culture based city improvements in particular (just enough to get by, I guess). This was a departure from how I played as the Germans, for instance, which was essentially building and researching and develoiping Wonders as quickly as possible, while maintaining a decent army.

On the other hand, getting a few more units than your immediate enemies by the first few 60-80 turns of the game always helped me by the time war is necessary, especially as you can choose who to crush, and I often find I can wipe out a fair few enemies quickly, if inefficiently.

Variety is the way to conquest too - using a wide variety of attack units means you'll have a suitable counter to those axeman-killers or those horsemen-killers who whip your arse each time. Units causing bombardment or collateral damage in particular are your friend, and not just for city raiding either.

When I play Civ 4, whenever I get pulled into a war (or, more often than not, whenever I choose to start a war ), I think "What would Churchill do?" and essentially drop everything and drive every city towards a war footing (even if it means changing civics to Serfism and Theocracy), producing as many armed units of whatever variety as possible. It usually works (especially using the Dougie Haig strategy of "sending all your young men to their doom" ), and often I end up with a few spare.

I remember once an enemy AI declared war on me on the lowest setting. Bastards sent over a huge stack of galleons and ground troops. Fortunately I had discovered airships and old-style fighter aircraft by that time. Still, it took me by surprise and I did lose one city. (Got it back, though. )

 

[Alidar Jarok]

I remember in Civ3 when I finally got up to Monarchy difficulty, a neighbor attacked me when I was unprepared. I lost two cities before I was truly prepared. But it was right around Nationalism, so I began to draft units. They were terribly weak, but I held on and, after a long, bloody war, managed to conquer them.

In Civ4, things are different. I still haven't quite found out the balance needed to win half the time so, even when I have limited goals, a war will stalemate forever. The problem with a stalemate is that, when I'm at war, my economy is usually entirely devoted to that war. I rebuild when I get peace again. Which is fine when the war is 10 turns and I gain a couple of cities (maybe a few techs). When the war is 50-75 turns and I'm only losing units (stacks of units too, I never send them piecemeal anymore), it becomes very bad for me.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

At least Civ 4 had less of the "Spearmen Defeat Tanks" scenario. (Although, if you throw your spear at the right angle at the right moment... )

Actually, I do like the Battle Odds facility in the difficulty level I've played it on; gives me an opportunity to see whether it's worth sending in the troops or just keep the staring contest going for another turn.

 

[Spider]

I usually try the peaceful route and try a cultural or spaceship win, but that doesn't always work out. I still keep large armys for defense, but waging war is not my thing, I'm more of a builder than a war monger.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

I usually try the peaceful route and try a cultural or spaceship win, but that doesn't always work out. I still keep large armys for defense, but waging war is not my thing, I'm more of a builder than a war monger.

My military strategy basically consists of "get the hell off my continent!" All else follows should I be successful, including the rebuilding and the science bit. Although, should my clipper ships on their circumnavigation missions discover some punk-ass other civilization, to avoid boredom I often find I make plans to invade them anyway if I have the military strength.

I have tried using nukes in one game, which I found quite overrated, although the day-glo radioactive dust left behind was quite pretty.

I have taken a diplomatic victory once, which was quite embarrassing.

I've never had a spaceship victory in Civ 4. I actually find it one of the harder victory conditions.

 

[Lindley]

The last time I played Civ 2---a couple of years ago---I went Communist, which meant lots of money flow and a fair war footing. Very little science.

However, I became best friends with my neighbors the Americans, who were science-heavy. So while I bought or bombed all of my enemies' cities, I had the Americans feeding me all of their tech upgrades pretty much free of charge, which was awesome.

Sadly, it did eventually come down to just the two of us, and I had to take them out in a rush using a combination of spies bribing their cities, spies planting nukes, and the occasional conventional occupation.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

The spies in Civ 2 were awesome. Combining a spy offensive with the ridiculously overpowered Fundamentalism government (tons of money through tithes), and you were pretty much unstoppable. It also worked well if you played Democracy correctly and were raking in the cash from your developed cities. Either way, I essentially bought the entire world, one city at a time.

 

[Anwar]

When I want a military style game in Civ IV BTS I ten to start early. I build up around 3-4 Warriors and have them attack the nearest city to me (that civ's only city if I'm lucky). If it works (I try to have at least one with the City Raider promotion) that means I have two medium sized cities at the very start while others have small cities because they're building settlers or workers. Gives me an early egde.

Recently, I won a Noble game on BTS (I hadn't played the game in months, if not a year) and got Winston Churchill as my score at the end. Highest I ever got, really. Won via a spaceship victory, though I'd conquered around 60% of the planet first.

 

[Commander Vaughn]

When I still played this game, I always beelined for axemen and went to town. Took as much of the world as my economy would let me afford until the AI got longbowmen. I'd throw a spearmen or two into the stack to keep my opponent from going after me with chariots or horsemen. I'd also mix in catapults when they're available.

You usually can take down 1+ civs in before the AI advances too quickly. After they get longbowmen, you get macemen and trebuchets and repeat. Then you consolidate your empire, wait for rifelmen and cannons, and go again. Then wait for tanks and go again.

If you repeat the cycle of strong melee units and siege weapons you can take out everyone. The strategy works up through Monarch. If you play as the Romans and use Praetorians it works on Emperor too if you get the right breaks.

 

[Anwar]

Axemen aren't that good at attacking cities, they're meant for defense. Swordsmen and Chariots are the way to go for early conquests.

Good strategy would be to try and build the Great Wall (for the defense, lack of barbarians and the Great Spies it will generate). This means good espionage early in the game, and then you should go for the Oracle and gain Code of Laws immediately which may give you your own religion (if you didn't get Buddhism, Hinduism or Judaism), courthouses to save money and the Chicen Itza of you can make it fast enough. ALl in all this ups your defenses to the point you're ready for outer conquests.

 

[Commander Vaughn]

Swordsmen, chariots, and the Great Wall also require a good deal of teching, resources and infrastructure to get. By the time you do all of that, the AI is far too advanced for you to seriously challenge.

You've got to strike early and hard on the higher difficulties. Axemen aren't ideal city attackers, but if you promote them properly they get the job done.