Civ Gold Questions

[Caesar Jon]

I have been playing Civ Gold for dome time and have been getting increasinly frustrated by the following:

1) The AI's are always mad! I can never get any diplomancy acomplished except if I'm a way ahead in techs. Is there any way to chill them out any?

2) It seems that many of you talk like it is very easy to acomplish a 2-3 turn tech advance but I can never get this unless I play on cheiften level. I have yet to beat the AI emperior level. Are the AI's just harder in the gold edtion?

3) Is their a url for faq on the gold edition?

4) Are there any patches for the gold that make it play like the 2.42 version which most of you seem to be playing.

Thank for everyone help. This is my first post but I have lurking for 2 years.

Jon

[Smash]

ok I'll have a lash

1.No.The MGE ai is more hostile than any other version.Takes a steady stream of gifts to maintain good relations.Pretty much every turn.Its good if you like warfare but not so good if you want something more "realistic"

2.Not harder just more hostile.The Super Science City(SSC) does most of a civ's research.This city has Collosus,Cope's,Sir Ike's and possibly Shake's(not as vital in non OCC games but good).
Caravans also make up a large portion of science.You get a beaker bonus equivalent to the amount of gold for delivered caravans as well as trade routes

3.I'm not aware of a faq but the subject of hostility has been discussed here.The latest player to get miffed by this is Lazlo.Search his handle and you find some threads about MGE ai.I should add,that I am in total agreement with his position.

4.No.The patches address multiplay bugs for the most part.No ai patch has been done that I know of.Don't expect one either.


MGE is probably the buggiest game I have ever owned.It is also the most heavily used game I have ever owned
[This message has been edited by Smash (edited May 23, 2000).]

[Empress]

I totally agree with Smash, civ II MPG is VERY addictive!!

[Ming]

1)No... they are just angry little campers all the time. As suggested, you do have to give them something every stinking turn... but in the long run, don't bother unless you REALLY need something they have.

2)The AI isn't really any harder. The only major difference is as you pointed out above.
To win at the higher levels... build caravans for trade routes... and when you have built enough caravans, build some more.

3)None that I've seen. But if you go the CivII section of this site, they have two strategy sections you can look at. Or just cruise the threads here... set your default to view all threads, or check out the Civ II Strategy Archives.

4)As stated, the latest patch available from this site or the Microprose site only fixes SOME of the bugs, but it won't make it play like the earlier version any more than it currently does. However, load it anyway. Besides fixing some terrible bugs, if you plan on playing MP, everybody in the game must have the latest patch.

Keep on Civing, and good luck!

[Smash]

SC-Call it whatever you like.I can answer yes to every one of your questions.

What? do have shares in Microprose or something?

stable?ya right.Thats why there have been so many patches.
[This message has been edited by Smash (edited May 24, 2000).]

[Steve Clark]

Oh that's right, you have the Mac version.

[Aurelius]

I haven't found any of the civ versions particularly buggy. But like Steve Clark, I have a PC. Aren't Mac Civ versions a recent event? That's what Smash uses to my recollection?! You guys are comparing apples and oranges... I'd say that PC Civ is a very smooth/stable simulation given the complexities of the game. And no doubt the game will evolve in artificial intelligence.

Still, if any version of Civ is unstable, it is MGE online--strange things happen there.

AU--oh yeah, there is no such thing as allied forever in MGE--AI's are ornery parasites.

[Sten Sture]

oops, I should probably mention that I have a few shares of Hasbro, the parent company for Microprose. But not because of Civ selling a ton of copies, obviously. So far I have made enough, after transaction costs, to offset the cost of a dusty copy of SMAC.

[Smash]

well, yes, the MAC version was butchered by some shoody company that did the conversion.They just translated without any knowledge of the MAC OS.

however,the first MAC version was supposed to equivalent to 1.3

1.3?Thats at least 3 PC patches

[Steve Clark]

Actually, I played without the 1.3 patch until very recently (I had forgotten about it). Ming (and the readme) said it tweaked some MP stuff, which is not applicable to me anyway. That's over a year's worth of civing right out of the box with absolutely no problems. So I can say that it has been the MOST bug-free game I've played, not accounting for some bad programming.

[Ming]

Steve... You must never have used a "go to" command then

Yes, more of the fixes were related to the MP application.

[Aurelius]

oh yeah, or perhaps we've all accepted the 'go to' bug as a way of life.

[Steve Clark]

Go To?!? You mean giving up control to the AI?? Why in the world would anyone let the stupid AI do something for you? So if one never uses this, is it a bug?

[rah]

Try moving large armies when there is a time limit, you learn to appreciate the go to command. Sometimes it burns you but sometimes its the only way to move all the troops. You also learn when it's most likely to do what you want and when it sill screw you up. Never when you're near the map wrap point.

RAH

[Lazlo]

quote: 3.I'm not aware of a faq but the subject of hostility has been discussed here.The latest player to get miffed by this is Lazlo.Search his handle and you find some threads about MGE ai.I should add,that I am in total agreement with his position.

From Smash

Thank you for your support! We are getting more and more!!

quote: If you are going to play an alliance dependant scenario that was designed for FW or CiC, using the MGE version you have a couple of options: 1) play by yourself in hotseat mode as allied civs. 2) edit the scenario to include language that sets the alliances every turn and corrects the attitudes - how this is done is spelled out in the Scenario League. 3) If you are playing as a civ that is overly strong, you may be able to reduce your implied strength by disbanding some extra military units. 4) Pretend the US nuked London in WW2.

From Sten Sture

I am especially interested in your second option. So you can change attitude levels using the events.txt? I did not know it. For one thing, it is not documented as far as I know!
I think this is the most viable option to go. Too bad you would have to edit all the scenarios!

To Steve Clark:

I am sorry to say that I do not completely agree with your definition of "bug". After some studying of the AI behaviour, I am compelled to say that it is a bug. In my definition of bug, bad AI programming is a bug. Or if you don´t like to call it a bug, well, lets call it "bad AI programming". Should it be corrected in a future patch? Yes!

I completely agree with rah about the go to command. That, for instance, is a thing that should work right. It really helps you in the game when moving large armies.