How did Civ 4 turn out? How much time is spent controlling workers?

[wodan11]

Originally posted by jbp26


the bhruic update, or official patch?

I don't remember. I think it was in the official. Look in the changelog if you want to find out where it was.

the real problem is that the changes in specialist, even the way you described,dont 'stick' under certain situations,

Like what? I'm not aware of any such situations.

especially anything that changes specialiist assignment or population

I think you probably don't have the governor on. Make sure it has a yellow border... it's the icon on the right just beneath the DRAFT button.

(If you click on specialists too many times, I believe it turns the governor off because it figures you know what you're doing. So... every time you click, make sure the governor still has a yellow border.)

Just some suggestions!

Wodan

[Jaybe]

quote:
the real problem is that the changes in specialist, even the way you described,dont 'stick' under certain situations,

Like what? I'm not aware of any such situations.

The specialist preferences stick as long you are using the governor (your specified prefs are bordered in yellow). Once you turn the governor off, those prefs are forgotten (and the borders are no longer glowing), so you have to reset them if you reactivate the governor.

IF the governor was on and is LEFT on, then they will stick as long as you don't have more specialists than are allowed for that type. Flip the guv the bird just for a second though, and they come unglued.

[nato]

Thank you everyone for the replies. It sounds like the workers are still a nuisance, but better. Especially if "more improvements" means more choices (like mill vs cottage) rather than more iterations (like road to railroad).

More choices definitely would hurt the chances of a really good worker AI.

If anyone feels like answering, I have a few more questions please:

• In Civ 3, corruption really limited your empire. You ended up with a "core" based on your Palace and FP. Overseas colonies were out. Is this true in Civ 4? Or can you have an overseas empire like Spain, Britain, France, and so on?
• Is your army basically one giant stack?
• Is combat still one unit at a time (1 vs 1), or stack combat like Call to Power, MoO, or MoM had?
• Is religion and the society stuff deep, or is there generally one optimal choice (like Democracy for government)?

Lastly... how do you like it? I'm just curious what happened.

Thanks!

[Colonâ„¢]

Originally posted by nato [*]In Civ 3, corruption really limited your empire. You ended up with a "core" based on your Palace and FP. Overseas colonies were out. Is this true in Civ 4? Or can you have an overseas empire like Spain, Britain, France, and so on?

By far the greatest improvement in Civ4 and the biggest reason why I prefer it over previous iterations, is that corruption is gone.
So yeah, you won't end up with a core, where all other cities are essentially a drag. Every city contributes equally.

The way it now works is that you pay an overhead maintenance for every city. The more cities you have, the proportionally larger the maintenance will be. Distance from capital also increases maintenance. The result is that you're required to be careful with expansion, yet that you also won't reach a point where it's basically pointless to expand any further. Firaxis worked it out extremely well.

[Seedle]

Originally posted by nato
Thank you everyone for the replies. It sounds like the workers are still a nuisance, but better. Especially if "more improvements" means more choices (like mill vs cottage) rather than more iterations (like road to railroad).

It is more choices, not more iterations. And with the "road to" function, railroading is much less of a hassle in Civ4, or you can even let the AI do it for you.

[*]In Civ 3, corruption really limited your empire. You ended up with a "core" based on your Palace and FP. Overseas colonies were out. Is this true in Civ 4? Or can you have an overseas empire like Spain, Britain, France, and so on?

In addition to what Colon said, which I agree with, it should be noted that in Beyond the Sword, overseas colonies incur an extra maintainence penalty. However, this only becomes problematic if you have more than 5 or so cities on a single overseas landform. So having one or three cities on an island or different continent is easily doable.

[*]Is your army basically one giant stack?

It doesn't HAVE to be, but that is generally the way it works out. Siege units (Catapults, Trebs, Cannons, etc.) now do collaterall damage to multiple units in a stack they attack, and mounted units can do "flanking" damage to siege units in a stack they attack, so there is some minor incentive to keep stack sizes down. However, the benefits of stacking still generally outweigh the drawbacks.

[*]Is combat still one unit at a time (1 vs 1), or stack combat like Call to Power, MoO, or MoM had?

Yes, it is still 1 vs 1

[*]Is religion and the society stuff deep, or is there generally one optimal choice (like Democracy for government)?

The civic system is very deep. Which civic is the optimal choice depends largely on your strategy. All (well, almost all) civics can be useful given the right game situtation. For instance, free market is a good economic civic if you run corportations, but state property can be better if you have no corportations. Or, you might run Organized Religion as your religious civic if you are building lots of buildings, but Theocracy is a better choice if you are building lots of units. Furthermore, your civic choices can influence which tile improvements your workers should be buidling. Free Speech likes lots of cottages (well, towns, but cottages automatically grow into towns) but State Property wants workshops and watemills, while farms to feed specialists are usually best with the Pacifism civic. It is very dynamic, and the ability to mix and match civics instead of running monolithic goverment types is fun and interesting.

As for religion, it isn't incredibly deep, but it adds to the game. Its main function is as a happy booster. However, it also influences diplomacy, interacts with religious civics, and with wonders can add commerce and production to your empire, or even give you access to a victory condition. It isn't complex, but you can't ignore it, it is an important, and dynamic, part of the game.

Lastly... how do you like it? I'm just curious what happened.

I love it. Best Civ game, and one of my 5 favorite games off all time. As I said in my last post, this game takes all of the good ideas that Civ3 had, but, imo failed to execute well, and gives them a good execution.

[snoopy369]

There is 'stack combat' in the sense that you can grab a stack of units and attack another stack of units (so, 1 click); but the combat is processed unit-by-unit, yes.

You have incentives not to have one giant stack (collateral damage, ie a catapult/cannon/tank etc. can hit several other units at once), but stacks overall still make more sense.

Religion does have several choices with it, and the civics are definitely deep - you have multiple different 'right choices' based on your strategy in that game and/or game circumstances - you will often switch to one set for fighting a war and then switch back. The different religions are nearly identical in that each religion gives the same bonus (the only difference is what resource gives a bonus to the cathedral being built), but there are different ways to use religion.

Civ4 'maintenance' (cost in gpt per city) is definitely a much better way to handle limiting cities than Civ3 corruption - you don't lose any productivity, you just have more expense to control.

[nato]

This all is sounding very good.

I still think workers are bad! So much so I left over it. But I was pretty much the only one arguing against them, way back then. Maybe this will work out better.

I really like that you can again have productive overseas cities. That was a painful loss in an empire building game in Civ3.

The civics and religion sound very promising. I always wanted more society-building details.

Combat sounds like it is much the same. I can remember back when Civ3 came out being really disappointed it didn't have Call to Power style stack combat. Oh well.

I am going to give it a try! Better late than never. And maybe it will be nice, like if you joined Civ3 after the patches and stack movement had already been put in.

Thank you very much for taking the time to type out answers.