Steamroll

[Fidel]

Is it just me, or does the game now favor a steamroll. AI battles on another continent inevitably produce a superpower, seemingly unaffected by any unhappiness or cost of SP. Was this perceived as a problem, or is this designer's attempt to get rid of tedious endgame by rolling over it with the equivalent of a ten ton truck?

[Hauldren Collider]

The combat was always about steamrolling. It's actually less about steamrolling now because of the one-unit-per-hex which means you have to be careful about your force composition since it's a liability to have too many hexes full (can't maneuver). It IS much easier to pull off an amphibious invasion, however, which I see as a good thing.

[Fidel]

Hm. As I understand it, various penalties were put in place in order to discourage steamrolling. The all-important happiness appeared as a check. However, AIs seem to be going for broke, their huge unhappy empires have a ton of cash, purchase armies and obliterate their happy and full-strength smaller enemies. It is like a tide that sweeps everything, of course until they meet something like a peninsula or a citadel where AI will happily sacrifice the whole army at the feet of the human player.
I am sure AIs pulled out this overnights (left on their own to play it out during the testing period). I do not remember such juggernaut in IV. Either the penalties for large empires are not scaled well, or I am completely lost and this outcome was actually something designers (and even beta testers) viewed as desirable.
I really like the game, but the more I play it or think about it, the less I am sure that its design is robust enough. If happiness is the mosts important value now, it seems strange that a miserable empire can stand the test of time by winning it all or even winning cultural victory.

[Hauldren Collider]

Hm. As I understand it, various penalties were put in place in order to discourage steamrolling. The all-important happiness appeared as a check. However, AIs seem to be going for broke, their huge unhappy empires have a ton of cash, purchase armies and obliterate their happy and full-strength smaller enemies. It is like a tide that sweeps everything, of course until they meet something like a peninsula or a citadel where AI will happily sacrifice the whole army at the feet of the human player.
I am sure AIs pulled out this overnights (left on their own to play it out during the testing period). I do not remember such juggernaut in IV. Either the penalties for large empires are not scaled well, or I am completely lost and this outcome was actually something designers (and even beta testers) viewed as desirable.
I really like the game, but the more I play it or think about it, the less I am sure that its design is robust enough. If happiness is the mosts important value now, it seems strange that a miserable empire can stand the test of time by winning it all or even winning cultural victory.

Happiness had nothing to do with number of units. It was war weariness. This actually encourages the steamroll tactic because it means wars don't last long.

I still don't fully understand happiness in CV but I am careful to keep it in the green, unlike in CIV where I would whip the **** out of my cities.

[Fidel]

I am afraid I have not understood your last post. Care to explain, please?

[pdxsean]

I play large maps with continents, and I don't believe I have had a game yet where both continents don't get steamrolled. I should do a pangea game, just to see how that goes.

In IV iirc you'd usually end up with 2 major powers (and often 1 minor) on any given continent. All depending on settings of course, but it seems like in IV that there were occasions when every starting civ would make it to the end.

[Proteus_MST]

Yes, in my current game, on the other continent it is Siam that one after the other kills all of his rival civ.
On my own continent it probably would be arabia, at least if my own empire wouldn´t exist

[pdxsean]

Wow, Siam? Good for them. In all of the games I've played, they've always been the whipping boy and usually the first to fall. Glad to see he stood up for himself for once.

I've never had anyone invade from the other continent, they do seem content to stay there themselves. On the other hand, I've only made it to the modern era three times so it's not like I have much of a sample size.

Still, I don't imagine the AI can pull off a naval assault, I'm more concerned about losing the space race at that point.

[Fidel]

The problem is not only that they get massive and eliminate others, but that you simply cannot cope with their gold AND science surplus. There has to be a balancing fix for this. Perhaps, as far as science is concerned, science should be tied to the number of not-unhappy citizens, as opposed to the whole population, as it is now? As for gold, there should probably be a substantial income penalty once your unhappiness gets into nadir.
As it is now, once I discover another continent, it is always an AI mopping up the others. However, they do not explore, there is no map trading and those superempires never invade on the other side.

BTW, I saw Siam do a lot of damage if it gets a hold of elephants...

[Fidel]

and this from the official 2k forum, someone has just posted

So it's not a big secret that the AI loves warmongering in Civ V. I can almost forgive this, if only the AI could defend against itself! Against a human player it's mostly just an annoyance. The attacking AI isn't so smart about the way it sends units at you. A solid defense can hold them off. But AI vs. AI is laughable.

The warmongering AI just steamrolls the defending AI. It's a major issue on larger maps when the human player is trying to win via culture. Culture victory means you need to keep your empire small. So I can't be out there keeping the warmonger in check. I simply can't spare the production from culture buildings (which cost too must for only contributing to one victory condition, but that's another post) to pump out military. If I start devoting materials to defend other AI from the warmonger, the other AI will start to pull ahead from my cultural lead.

This leads to my latest game where I'm India and Rome has now conquered the entirety of the known world. Of the 8 civs that started, 3 remain. I have 4 cities, Russia has 3, and Rome has somewhere close to 30, maybe more - I stopped counting. This makes the game CHUG in between turns because the Roman AI has so many choices to make it becomes a processor hog. Instead of a few seconds between turns I regularly have to wait 30 sec to a minute. It may not seem like much, but with over 150 turns remaining, I don't feel like losing 1-2.5 hours sitting there waiting on the AI. When the AI engine has this big a hit on performance, there are some issues.

If the other AI could more adequately defend against warmongering AI invasions, this performance problem likely wouldn't happen.

http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=90268

[Cyberian]

I think you are able to counter this.

Current Immortal Large Earth game: When going to war I was always picking the best Civ first because I was aware of the fact that it would otherwise get too big. I was nearly always at war with the best Civ from turn 80 on. Usually killing some attack waves and razing some cities before declaring peace for cash and stuff. Of course you will be subject to massive attack waves when bashing the best instead of the worst Civs, but you should be able to defend anyway.

By giving units from city states (which had no experience and morale promotion so I usually gift them anyway unless I desperately need them to defend) to the clearly underpowered civs in war with the larger civs I was also able to slow down their collapse to the point that no civs got eradicated by Turn 250. I was also not eradicating Civs myself just taking their capitals so that they could spam some settlers again but never would be dangerous again anyway.

I think you need to balance your AIs yourself. Don't know if this will work on deity also but I will try this soon.

[MxM]

The problem is not only that they get massive and eliminate others, but that you simply cannot cope with their gold AND science surplus. There has to be a balancing fix for this.

So, now we are complaining that AI plays too good
But in principle I agree. And while I do like to have occasional successful steamroller in the game, it should not be that much successful in each game.

Perhaps, as far as science is concerned, science should be tied to the number of not-unhappy citizens, as opposed to the whole population, as it is now?

I believe there is no happy/unhappy citizens in Civ V (i.e. you do not see them in city screen as in Civ IV), there is only general unhappiness.

As for gold, there should probably be a substantial income penalty once your unhappiness gets into nadir.

Sounds like good idea. It could be set that once happiness is below -10, then you pay 1 gold per unhappiness. Also, the unhappiness from conquered cites may be higher when they high in number...
But more important, there should be severe penalties on combat ability of the units. I know there are some already in the game, but they should be higher.

Good solution could be a group city revolt, like a total revolt and forming different state. But because it is random event, it goes against the designer goal of having less randomness in the game, because it would be perceived by steamrolling player as computer making his life difficult if part of his empire revolts. However I do think it is good idea if implemented correctly. For example, there could be separate screen that shows group of cities that will revolt and "time to revolt". You may also pay money to suppress it, on the same screen. I prefer this way, because it is closer to what happen in real life (e.g. American colonies vs British Empire), and will generate new states in the game. Yet, with right interface it can be predictable enough. But, this can happen only in expansion of the game - I doubt that this will be done in normal patches.

[Fidel]

@cyberian : Yup, but the problem I am describing here is that I cannot sail to another continent on turn 80. By the time I explore it, it is already someone's playground.

[Fidel]

So, now we are complaining that AI plays too good
But in principle I agree. And while I do like to have occasional successful steamroller in the game, it should not be that much successful in each game.

I believe there is no happy/unhappy citizens in Civ V (i.e. you do not see them in city screen as in Civ IV), there is only general unhappiness.

Sounds like good idea. It could be set that once happiness is below -10, then you pay 1 gold per unhappiness. Also, the unhappiness from conquered cites may be higher when they high in number...
But more important, there should be severe penalties on combat ability of the units. I know there are some already in the game, but they should be higher.

Good solution could be a group city revolt, like a total revolt and forming different state. But because it is random event, it goes against the designer goal of having less randomness in the game, because it would be perceived by steamrolling player as computer making his life difficult if part of his empire revolts. However I do think it is good idea if implemented correctly. For example, there could be separate screen that shows group of cities that will revolt and "time to revolt". You may also pay money to suppress it, on the same screen. I prefer this way, because it is closer to what happen in real life (e.g. American colonies vs British Empire), and will generate new states in the game. Yet, with right interface it can be predictable enough. But, this can happen only in expansion of the game - I doubt that this will be done in normal patches.

Nah, I am not complaining that the AI is too good. I would love it if the combat AI were much, much better. Rather, it is that once one civ gets SOME advantage over the others, they stand ZERO chance of survival.
You are right about hapiness. But anyways, science rate (as is now) is directly tied to the raw population numbers. I guess it should be modified by happiness, too, so once you go into a deep minus those raw numbers would be severely diminished. As it is now, the best tactic is to plunge into unhapiness and steamroll. Works well for AI and human alike.

[MxM]

But anyways, science rate (as is now) is directly tied to the raw population numbers. I guess it should be modified by happiness, too, so once you go into a deep minus those raw numbers would be severely diminished. As it is now, the best tactic is to plunge into unhapiness and steamroll. Works well for AI and human alike.

Well, there are special buildings like library and university that significantly modify science output. I would rather make it difficult for AI to build those buildings due to financial problems (either directly as penalty for unhappiness, or indirectly because you need to suppress revolts and that would be costly or both) than limit science output based on happiness in addition to other penalties. The fundamental rules should be as simple as possible. One penalty in the rules of the game (like financial penalty) is preferable than many rules (like financial AND science penalty). It is just the question of the magnitude of that single penalty. It should not be possible to run empire with -30 happiness without hard consequences, and right now there are nearly none.

And if we look to RL, there are two consequences of large unhappy empires
1) Revolts
2) Extra spending for bureaucracy and security forces.
They should be relied in the game as well for reducing steamrolling.