What Have I missed?

[egavactip]

I got Civ 5 when it came out and was distinctly underwhelmed. It seemed inferior to Civ 4 in almost every way. I played it a few times and went back to Civ 4.

I presume there have been patches and/or additions? Is there any reason to give Civ 5 another try again, because of additions or changes? I would appreciate your input.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

I think that someone who likes playing Civ V should comment instead of me ... perhaps Nikolai?

[Dinner]

It's still much worse then Civ4 and the few patches that have been released have only tinkered around the edges instead of dealing with the game's numerous and overwhelming design flaws. Maybe an expansion pack can save the game but I don't think it will.

[mkorin]

As I have said previously, the game is now playable as if it was the vanilla game. They are still working on it and I believe they will get it right. The new concepts make it a much better game (conceptually) than IV. The programming is still way behind, but we all b***ed about IV for the first year. You can't compare the programming level of IV with many patches and two expansions with V.

Why do I say it is conceptually better:

1 UPT is a huge one. This makes you think more tactical than SODs ever did.
Gold Spending actually means something
I like the special abilities are different for each civ. IE some have UB some UU etc
See the top features list at the top of the forum page for things I'm not thinking of of the top of my head
Damage is more consistent. IE if I attack a X with a Y, the damage is fairly predictible with a rarer chance of the critical hit or miss.
No espionage
Social Policys make culture meaningful.

Yes, it has big flaws, but I like it better than IV.

Mike

Mike

[bantams]

Its got "Awesome Multiplayer" maybe it was a typo but 2k greg said it has

[Ming]

Its got "Awesome Multiplayer" maybe it was a typo but 2k greg said it has

Yeah... a typo...

[rah]

Damage is more consistent. IE if I attack a X with a Y, the damage is fairly predictible with a rarer chance of the critical hit or miss.

for me this is a negative. RL combat is not predictable. **** happens. While I got irritated in IV losing a 99% when you do 100s of attacks it's going to happen.

[Dinner]

Sid's speech at some developer contest about a year before Civ5 was released (it's on youtube some where) was pretty depressing. He was saying people complain if they lose at long odds so he wanted to make it so that there are almost never those random freak events. Like Rah I enjoy seeing those random spearman beats tank battles as long as they're rare.

[mkorin]

The point is rare. In IV, they happened way too often. I said consistent with rare upsets both ways. If I say a spearman beat a tank 1 in a 1000 that would be barely acceptable. I miss the attempt at reality they had in III.

Mike

[Ming]

I will disagree with you... ask anybody that's actually been there, combat is unpredictable. I don't think it happened "way too often" in Civ IV. I thought they had a good balance. With the ability to stack hundreds of units, each unit just isn't all that important. So what if you lose a few because of luck. The luck went both ways, so was more than reasonable. You do enough battles, and strange stuff would happen, no big deal.

[mkorin]

Ming, I've been there since Civ II. I may not be a beta tester, but I've played a lot of games and if a spearman beats a tank it is stupid. I can live with it rarely, but it happened why too much in IV. This is just my opinion, I didn't keep track. Speaking of beta testing, do they even listen to you guys. I am almost certain you (and others) reported how bad this was before it came into production.

Mike

[wodan11]

if a spearman beats a tank it is stupid.

Personally I don't feel it's "stupid". Improbable, yes. Stupid, no.

When people think of "Spearman" they think 200AD. However, in the game, we have to realize that the Spearman in question would certainly be aware of the capabilities of the tank, and how to possibly beat it. So, the Spearman in question is more akin to a worldly and knowledgeable Australian Aborigine. If you've ever met one of those guys you know they are far from stupid, and if they had to go against a tank, they would use anything and everything at their disposal, as well as every sneaky trick in the book.

And so, improbable, but not stupid.

[rah]

And feel free to mouse over a tank attacking a spearman on open terrain in IV. I'm sure the odds will display at 99.9% So yes, I have to agree with "IMPROBABLE", but not impossible. And certainly not stupid.

[mkorin]

Sorry, poor choice of words. Unrealistic and improbable are better. I can always count on the word police here. :}

Mike

[wodan11]

Well, unrealistic works too.

Heck, it'd be unrealistic to say it was impossible for an aborigine to ever defeat a tank. 1/1000 odds make perfect sense to me.