IV or V: which should I get and why?

[Zevico]

I've played IV and found it alright, albeit it suffered from some late game blues (we all know what I'm talking about here). I lost the disc ages ago and am considering getting another copy from Steam.
Is Civ V an improvement? Should I get it? Your recom's?
Addendum: Also what about Civ IV's expansions? Steam has a good price for them as part of the total package (extra $10). Are they good?
Thanks.

[rah]

If you're going to play IV, Beyond the Sword is a must. So look for a bundled package. V isn't up to snuff yet. Give it at least another year.

[wodan11]

IV has some must-play mods, too: Fall from Heaven, Planetfall, etc.

[Boracks]

Although I just play V now, I'd say go with IV with all the expansions, BTS was more like 4.5 and really was what IV should have been.

One does hope the pattern is followed and an expansion or two turns V into the game it should be as well. But it isn't there yet.

[Dinner]

Buy 4 because it doesn't suck.

[Brael]

Like the others have said. Go with 4, it's a better game.

[Krill]

CIV is just better, but some of the mods are awesome. There are also a few smaller sites out there that cater to a more gentle MP approach, if you want to try that out.

[Zevico]

Thanks guys. Got CIV IV.

[ElDonReal]

There's no way to turn back time, and if there was then get Civ2 :-p

[Zevico]

I bought CivII twice. Kept losing the discs. Luckily it's very easy to dl online, and I don't feel guilty cos I already bought it twice. Simple google search can find it, if memory serves.

[Ell_man]

Whats with everyone saying BTS was so great? Although I only started playing once BTS was out, as I look back at the features of BTS I don't see anything essential. In fact, I usually play without some of the features of BTS.

This is whats new in BTS according to this:

10 new civs, 6 new leaders for existing civs
Unique Buildings
6 new buildings like levee, customs house, espionage related buildings, public transportation, industrial park
13 new units
5 new wonders
2 new national wonders
6 more techs
Corporations
Espionage
Random Events
Apolistic Palace victory
Colonies
11 "mods"

Colonies are pointless imo. Colonies, or vassals I forget, also screw up maintenance on islands forcing you to use colonies . Random events I usually play with off. Corporations offer little in the way of strategy(there's no tradeoff usually, always spread the corp) but make the economic civic choice more interesting. Apolistic Palace victory is cheesy. Espionage is the most interesting spy system yet developed in civ but still feels weird. I don't think the AI has any idea how to utilize it as well as a human could. The Final Frontier mod is fun. I've played through a few games and enjoyed myself but its not very balanced or deep.

The new buildings, civs, leaders, etc. are nice but not so amazing you have to play with them. Its an expansion. If you find out you love civ4 I think you should buy it but civ4 is just fine on its own.

[rah]

It's not just those items, it's also about game play. In vanilla, collateral damage units could destroy units. In later versions they couldn't (even though it would have been nice to adjust the AI programming for that). But overall the AI programming was improved over that in the vanilla package.

[Krill]

Whats with everyone saying BTS was so great? Although I only started playing once BTS was out, as I look back at the features of BTS I don't see anything essential. In fact, I usually play without some of the features of BTS.

This is whats new in BTS according to this:

10 new civs, 6 new leaders for existing civs
Unique Buildings
6 new buildings like levee, customs house, espionage related buildings, public transportation, industrial park
13 new units
5 new wonders
2 new national wonders
6 more techs
Corporations
Espionage
Random Events
Apolistic Palace victory
Colonies
11 "mods"

Colonies are pointless imo. Colonies, or vassals I forget, also screw up maintenance on islands forcing you to use colonies . Random events I usually play with off. Corporations offer little in the way of strategy(there's no tradeoff usually, always spread the corp) but make the economic civic choice more interesting. Apolistic Palace victory is cheesy. Espionage is the most interesting spy system yet developed in civ but still feels weird. I don't think the AI has any idea how to utilize it as well as a human could. The Final Frontier mod is fun. I've played through a few games and enjoyed myself but its not very balanced or deep.

The new buildings, civs, leaders, etc. are nice but not so amazing you have to play with them. Its an expansion. If you find out you love civ4 I think you should buy it but civ4 is just fine on its own.

AP, colonies, Corps, Espionage, and random events all suck and make BtS worse than it could have been.

The new leaders and civs means that there are only 3 triat pairs that don't exist in the game. This is a Good Thing(TM).

Unique buildings come from Warlords expansion.

The main benefit of BtS is the better AI (although that exists in warlords as well).

BtS is over rated. Warlords 2.11 is actually the most balanced version of the game.

[Hunter Hutchins]

There's no way to turn back time, and if there was then get Civ2 :-p

And how. Civ IV was what Civ III should have been. V...well...judging by the record, any Civ. can benefit from more time in the oven!

[Boracks]

And how. Civ IV was what Civ III should have been. V...well...judging by the record, any Civ. can benefit from more time in the oven!

This may explain why V came out half-baked. Maybe all the roasting its now getting will do it some good.