RevCast Episode 04: "Bring It" (Part 1)

[DanQ]

It's brought. Regular co-hosts Annalee "Cartimandua" Barney, Joe "joebreeves" Reeves and Alexander "Alexander I" Strub drive the fourth episode of RevCast (RC), the newest Civilization podcast on the PolyCast (PC) network from Apolyton Civilization Site (ACS), focusing on Civilization: Revolution on its various platforms. "Bring It" (Part 1) is now netcasting with a runtime of 14m59s.

RevCast is the second spin-off of the Civ strategy-centric PolyCast on which Barney serves as a regular co-host as well; the modding-centric ModCast was the first such spin-off. Unlike either of its older siblings, RC has no defined segment categories and will now transition into its monthly production and publication schedule.

This is RevCast's first two-part outing. Concentrating on units, military and combat, its conclusion is to be released in two weeks time. To date, ACS is the only known community on the Web to produce its own Civ podcasts.

[DanQ]

- 01m19s | Topic #1
Examining general and civ-specific units throughout the game's eras: strengths, weaknesses and strategies.
- 10m43s | Topic #2
Answering a listener's letter who wrote in response to the second episode.

- Intro/Outro | Miscellaneous
Interacting with the audience, who has an itchy trigger finger, and who is getting in touch with their feminine side.

[Grayson]

lol, thanks for the shoutout

i think you guys are selling yourselves short, you may have 5+ listners (at least if you count me and your hosts) j/k

on a more serious note, I like the content you guys produce, and for a CivRev junkie, it's awesome that you guys are producing content for fans.... there are plenty of us out here and maybe you guys will get a nice console-gamer based following rivaling what you have established for the PC civ community (long way to go though, hopefully there will be more console civ installments, any news on that???).

I'll agree with what you guys said on the episode about getting to know all the civs, not just the most popular ones. This is what makes the game fun for me this far from the release. The AI stops being fun after a while once you learn to never lose on Diety. Then after handicapping yourself on Diety to make that more challenging, then the AI is more like a lab for new strats to try out online...

After climbing to the tops of leaderboards on both PS3 and Xbox360 (man i need a life, or at least that's what my wife keeps saying) using the power civs such as China, Aztecs, Americans, and Spanish (zulu also in this category, but it's kind of the "dark-side" in the MP community), bref, after all using those civs into the ground, it's fun to challenge yourselves to use the harder-to-play-with civs...

There will be weeks where I'll use only the Indians, or the Mongols, or the Russians.... The Russians and Indians are fun to use, and I found the challenge of using these civs online to make the game new again, and was able to write up strategy guides on 2Kforums to help others play with these civs that don't get a lot of love...

but here's the point I don't think I or many other's will budge from: all civs aren't created equal. China and Zulu in particular are a step above the rest. This comes from lots of game expierience personally, and those shared on the 2kforum and on civfanatics as well... On some maps, other civs can rival the power of the top 5 civs, but usually the top 5 civs can dictate their strategy regardless of the map... The bottom tier civs such as the Russians, French, and Mongols have less of a chance to dictate their strategy unless they get an extremely favorable map and a weak opponnet....

but this is a debate that has been going on since the release of the game. I think purists wanna believe in what Sid said that he wants all civs to feel like they are overpowered, that would be nice, but it doesn't seem like the case.... but regardless, I do like playing with all civs, and for the last few months, i've been loving smashing on players that only use China, Zulu, Aztecs, or Americans with the more "challenged" civs...

anyway, keep 'em coming, i'll try to let the other civ addicts over at 2kforums and civfantics know about these podcasts...

and i'd love to jump in on a revcast if you'd ever have me, so you guys could destroy me in person.

thanks

grayson

[elthrasher]

Thanks to Grayson, you can add me to the growing tally of listeners. He posted a link to your podcasts on the 2k forums.

Before I give you any feedback on the podcasts, here's my civrev life story in brief. I got the game last summer when it was fairly new and played SP a lot. King was challenging. Deity was impossible. I got better, found the 2k forums and got even better. I got on xbl to do some mp games, won some, lost some, starting looking at strategy a bit more. Now I'm maybe not a top player, but I'm a decent player. I try to get in a few MP games per week and sometimes I just beat the heck out of the AI on Deity after work to blow off steam.

So I guess I'm hoping maybe the revcasts will follow a similar evolution. Right now you're still kind of covering the basics, which is fine. There are probably some players out there who will appreciate hearing that stuff. For more experienced players, you're not offering a whole lot yet.

I'd be interested in topics relating to online play, like how you start off in a MP game, how to expand quickly, what to do when you can't reach the 100g benchmark early, how to come from behind. Even just war stories would be interesting to me.

I'm not sure if the revcast hosts have played a lot online. Either way (and if you are on xbox; I do not have a ps3), feel free to hit me up for a game some time (instructive, competative, peaceful, violent, whatever) or just jump right in to some ranked FFA games and I'll see you there. My gamertag is El Thrasher.

[DanQ]

i think you guys are selling yourselves short, you may have 5+ listners (at least if you count me and your hosts) j/k

anyway, keep 'em coming, i'll try to let the other civ addicts over at 2kforums and civfantics know about these podcasts...

I have been starting and managing threads about these episodes on CFC as well as here on Apolyton. But thanks otherwise for your informing efforts on CFC, and for what you have done already over on the 2K forums.

and i'd love to jump in on a revcast if you'd ever have me, so you guys could destroy me in person.

I think the regular panelists may just take you up on that.

Thanks to Grayson, you can add me to the growing tally of listeners. He posted a link to your podcasts on the 2k forums.

Greetings, new listener!

(If you're wondering who in the heck I am , I'm this show's owner and editor.)

[Grayson]

I'd thought suggest some show ideas if you need more:

Expanding and its importance: this is what set you apart from the AI and newer players. Building lots of cities (usually 7-10 in the BC) is what the top players are doing to gain an advantage. Maybe a how to, specifically what resources to use and how to expand with specific civs while balancing defense and tech.

Horserushing: this is a popular strategy online, lots of people love it, many people fear it. Maybe discuss what civs are the better horserushing civ (americans, aztecs, chinese, arabs IMO), and ways to defend against it.

Multiplayer freezing/glitches: the problem has persisted from day one. Patches made some improvements, but the many different bugs/glitches that exist currently have plagued the game. People have found exploits to freeze and lock up the game. PS3's MP is a lot more afflicted than XBOX 360's, with about 1 in games locking up, sometimes less if both players have good connections. Xbox is a little more stable, but it still has its errors, rank resets, glitches, and freezers.

Maybe a discussion on the tech tree and what tech paths players use. Most players in the early game are getting either bronze working or horseback riding, then going for the irrigation bonus (pottery, masonary, irrigation, 1st to research gets +1 pop in all cities) or teching up to code of laws (alphabet, writing, code of laws). After that, people ususally target Navigation (math+writing) to get galleons, or currency, invention, or monarchy, feudalism, and others. Most people also wanna know how to get tanks fast, because getting to combustion first usually means an easy domination victory.