The lack of "strategic depth" in Civ3

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by volcanohead
You're arrogant because you debate as if it's a game, in which you win a prize if you eventually out-talk other people, regardless of the true merits or otherwise of the case you make. You are striving for attention.

We have a telepath in our midst!

Actually, I don't think that. I, in fact, think you're dead wrong. I argue so much because I like to come to the truth. I've put several revisions into my thoughts:

I was wrong about the number of units in Civ3. I agree that Civ3 doesn't have as much "strategic diversity" - certainly and the "grand" level. I agree that it might be more accurate to say that Civ3 doesn't have as much "strategic" depth as Civ2/SMAC if we also say it has coorespondingly more "tactical" depth. I've made explicit that I think you need to edit the combat system and have a particular starting position to get good depth from the game.

I think I'm displaying LOTS of the good ol' give and take here. It doesn't seem to me that I'm just trying to "win" or simply seek attention. I do admit, though, that I've become even more convinced of certain things. Well, that's what happens in a good debate. You change some positions, some you don't. (Assuming your starting position had any truth at all.)

And simply because people do not repeat the same points ad infinitum "those points appeared to have dried up" it does not mean they are not valid.

Which is why I never said that. I do, though, think that Vel stopped giving it because he came up with a much better argument. Maybe we'll get back to techs - but maybe not.

I maintain that Vel made a good point in saying that the tech-tree is the crux of the STRATEGIC experience of Civ/SMAC.

And I think he (rightly) abandoned it because he had to agree that just because it isn't the crux of the strategic experience in Civ3 that doesn't mean Civ3 doesn't provide a good strategic experience. Maybe we wait for him to respond, eh? I wasn't trying to make a big deal out of it.

(1) The tech-tree is an important potential source of strategic decisions in a 4x game

(2) The tech tree in Civ3 is inferior to that of SMAC, with regard to generating the need to make strategic decisions.

I think #1 is completely correct, and #2 is mostly correct. With #2 I agree that the potential for strategic decisions is there, but I don't think the AI is good enough to really make your decisions matter.

I agree that Civ3's tech-tree isn't as diverse as other games, and that it doesn't lead to "vastly different" strategies. However, I _don't_ agree that there is no strategic depth to be found in Civ3's tech tree, or that a civ-type game _must_ have a "deep" tech tree to be deep. Do you? Why?

I'm sure you'll feel the need to say something.something

Yeah - like what I think will further discussion.
Look, I'm not particularly thick skinned, and I find it difficult to ignore comments like that. If you want to score points or get attention that's a usefull comment, but I don't see how it helps the discussion.

You know, a _lot_ of people seem to confuse the desire to continue a discussion for a long period (I think this thread has more posts than any other on the first page) with arrogance. And how long is long? Untill either agreement is reached or fundamentally incompatible positions are revealed. If everyone remains reasonable you _can_ do this.

I think the "arrogance" thing comes up simply because most people who argue for a long time are kooks, because most people can't argue for a long time without getting personal, because many people are just bad at it, and because many are trained to go with what the biggest "authority" says and stop talking.

[Libertarian]

...and now that Lib. has been reduced by my "rhetorical swagger" to mere ad hominem attacks on me, no one is really argueing [sic] that Civ3's lack of strategic depth comes from fewer options...

I have assailed your speeches and your posturing, not you as a person. I'm sure you're a decent fellow.

[volcanohead]

" And I think he (rightly) abandoned it because he had to agree that just because it isn't the crux of the strategic experience in Civ3 that doesn't mean Civ3 doesn't provide a good strategic experience. Maybe we wait for him to respond, eh? I wasn't trying to make a big deal out of it."

There is no discernible logic in this quote. Perhaps the 'just' is not necessary, I don't know. And why do you think further response from Vel is required? Nothing changes the points above. And what does it matter whether you were trying to make a big deal or not? You do seem to write an awful lot of irrelevant fluff.

And I'm afraid I've become rather confused as to what your point is in all this. Do you actually have any clear, defensible opinions? It seems that with the ease with which you apparently have changed your point of view during this thread that you had given the ideas discussed here very little thought previously.

Anyway, I'm sorry to everyone else for leading off-topic. I'll not waste more time on this.

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by volcanohead
" And I think he (rightly) abandoned it because he had to agree that just because it isn't the crux of the strategic experience in Civ3 that doesn't mean Civ3 doesn't provide a good strategic experience. Maybe we wait for him to respond, eh? I wasn't trying to make a big deal out of it."

There is no discernible logic in this quote. Perhaps the 'just' is not necessary, I don't know.

And why do you think further response from Vel is required?

Look at Vel's last post. Look at all his counter arguments to my "a Civ2/SMAC tech tree isn't necessary for good strategic depth" argument.

There are none.

What I'm trying to say is that I believe that Vel's last post didn't discuss tech because he agreed that a tech tree like Civ2 or SMACS isn't _necessary_ for a Civ-type game to have good strategic depth. But I might be wrong. Maybe he still thinks it's valid, but that the combat-argument is more obvious/stronger. If so, we'll go back to techs if and when the combat discussion is finished with. Thats it. I don't know, because I'm not a telepath.

[QUOTE]
And what does it matter whether you were trying to make a big deal or not? You do seem to write an awful lot of irrelevant fluff.[/QUTOE]

I response to the first sentence: I just wanted to point out that the post you were refering to was meant to be an offhand observation, not an argument. I was being "chatty."

In response to the second sentence: Maybe. I don't think so, but maybe. However, at least I don't insult you at the beginning or end of every paragraph, eh?

And I'm afraid I've become rather confused as to what your point is in all this. Do you actually have any clear, defensible opinions?

First: Have you read the whole thread?

It seems that with the ease with which you apparently have changed your point of view during this thread that you had given the ideas discussed here very little thought previously.

I still believe Civ3 has just as much "depth" as Civ2 or SMAC. That is unchanged. I have, due to some interesting, insightfull and informative posts from the likes of Vel, DrFell and korn refined my position. There's much to what they have said. Since the truth of the matter is what I seek, I'm glad when I can see the truth of their arguments and agree.
I hope that they have likewise been open minded and that their positions/arguments are not completely unaltered by what they have read here.

It seems to me that you confuse open mindedness and honest argument with being shallow.

Anyway, I'm sorry to everyone else for leading off-topic. I'll not waste more time on this.

Oh, please, let that be true. To be completely frank, I find it very difficult not to just call you an ***hole and leave it at that.

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by Libertarian


I have assailed your speeches and your posturing, not you as a person. I'm sure you're a decent fellow.

Untill you stop merely discussing how I speak rather than what I say that's close enough to "ad hominem" for me.

As for Firaxis consulting with Vel. I'm sure they find his opinions very "informed" - that doesn't mean he's always right. I think, that on this matter, he's wrong.

Now: Are you going to talk about Vel, or about me... about my style, yours, Vels? Or do you actually have something substantial to offer?

[korn469]

Look at Vel's last post. Look at all his counter arguments to my "a Civ2/SMAC tech tree isn't necessary for good strategic depth" argument.

There are none.

What I'm trying to say is that I believe that Vel's last post didn't discuss tech because he agreed that a tech tree like Civ2 or SMACS isn't _necessary_ for a Civ-type game to have good strategic depth. But I might be wrong. Maybe he still thinks it's valid, but that the combat-argument is more obvious/stronger. If so, we'll go back to techs if and when the combat discussion is finished with. Thats it. I don't know, because I'm not a telepath

ok i'll give you a few reasons why the tech tree in SMAC adds more strategic depth to the game than the tech tree in Civ3

1) The most important reason why the SMAC tech tree adds more strategic depth to the game is that a player can sacrifice an branch of the tree to gain an edge in one area of the game. In SMAC you can move deep into the tech tree if you are playing with directed research before you have to go back and research techs you skipped. In Civ3 because of the fact that you have to discover every tech in the era before you advance you cannot go deep into the tech tree before you have to back track.

2) The second most important reason why the Civ3 tech tree adds less strategic depth to the game than the SMAC tech tree is that in SMAC if you invest in your scientific infrastructure you will reap tangiable benefits, while if you don't invest in your scientific infrastructure you will be at a great disadvanatge. In Civ3 this doesn't hold true. First thing there is a cap both on how fast you can discover techs and how slow you can discover techs, so no matter how much you invest in your infrastructure you can only advance at most ten times faster than the slowest civ, no matter if you have invested 100 times as many resources into your research machine.

3) The third most important reason that the Civ3 tech tree adds less strategic depth to the game is that there is fewer advantages from being the tech leader. First there is no "secrets" tech which grants a free technology to the first player to discover them. Second Firaxis (Soren I think) has admitted that because of resource considerations the power gap between high tech units and low tech units is much less than it was in either SMAC or Civ2.

For example in Civ3 an unfortified regular warrior has a true defense of 1.1 and has 3 hitpoints vs. a regular modern armor which has a true attack of 24 and three hitpoints. In SMAC a regular scout patrol unit had a true defense of 1 and it had 10 hit points vs. a singularity nerve gas killing machine which could have a true attack of 36 and fourty hitpoints. Plus when you couple that with the greater number of combat errors due to the nature of the small sample size of civ3 units hitpoints then you see that tech matters less than it did in SMAC.

Also add in the fact that the first player to research a tech will pay much more than the last player to research a tech and you will understand that the Civ3 Tech Tree rewards mediocre players.

All of these things taken together tend to help the AI perform much better in the tech race even without using any cheats at all, but it comes at the price of Strategic Depth.

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by korn469


ok i'll give you a few reasons why the tech tree in SMAC adds more strategic depth to the game than the tech tree in Civ3

Whoa there. First, remember that I'm not aruging that Civ3's tech tree adds more depth than SMACs (well, maybe, but we'll get to that latter), just that the fact that while Civ2 and SMAC's tech trees might be more diverse/developed, that in itself doesn't mean Civ3 doesn't have as much strategic depth. (Or how about "tactical" depth?)

There's more to each game than the tech tree. In SMAC the tech tree is very important... in Civ3 it isn't as important. I just can't believe that the tech tree is the be all and end all in 4x "depth."

Ok, here's my concern with the SMAC tech tree: The AI. As you mentioned earlier good opposition brings out the depth in a game. Much as Vel seems to be arguing that the Civ3 AI isn't good enough at warfare to present a "deep" challange", I argue that the SMAC AI isn't good enough, over all, to bring out the full _potential_ of the SMAC tech tree. Now, against human players things are different. But as Civ3 has not MP, I think an AI-AI comparison is most appropriate.

1) The most important reason why the SMAC tech tree adds more strategic depth to the game is that a player can sacrifice an branch of the tree to gain an edge in one area of the game.

And that is good. But if it isn't backed up by a good AI I think its merely strategic "diversity", not depth. Sorry, not "merely" diversity, but without the good AI it doesn't add nearly as much depth as it could vrs. a human opponent. I enjoyed exploring the tech tree in SMAC, but as soon as I became more "practiced" with the game than the AI there was little actual (as opposed to potential) strategic depth to it.

In Civ3 this doesn't hold true. First thing there is a cap both on how fast you can discover techs and how slow you can discover techs, so no matter how much you invest in your infrastructure you can only advance at most ten times faster than the slowest civ, no matter if you have invested 100 times as many resources into your research machine.

Explain to me how you get from "No matter how much you invest in your infrastructure you can only advance at most ten times faster than the slowest civ" to "Civ3's tech tree has less depth."

3) The third most important reason that the Civ3 tech tree adds less strategic depth to the game is that there is fewer advantages from being the tech leader.

Isn't that the same as "less techs." Or are you refering to the combat system? I don't see the connection between "fewer advantages" and "less strategic depth." How does "fewer advantages" lead to fewer decisions of an interesting amount of difficulty? For me it just means I have to think harder about which small advantage to shoot for. And every small advantage really counts, because the AI is better (and I quit it my starting position was too good, yes, and I've fiddled with the units to make warfare not always the best course.)

Overall I _agree_, but the really important word in your argument is "less", not "zero." And you don't seem to be argueing that because Civ3's tree is less deep than SMAC's Civ3 therefore must be less deep, overall.

Also add in the fact that the first player to research a tech will pay much more than the last player to research a tech and you will understand that the Civ3 Tech Tree rewards mediocre players.

Yes? So its more difficult to take the run-away lead via tech, and thus in the whole game - so you have to use other avenues to dominate - good potential for some strategic depth. And if you are way behind in the game you have a better chance of catching up - there's good "depth" in digging your way out of a hole.

All of these things taken together tend to help the AI perform much better in the tech race even without using any cheats at all, but it comes at the price of Strategic Depth.

A pirce in strategic diversity in the tech race?
A price in strategic diversity overall?

No argument from me on either of the above.

But less "depth" in the overall game? No, I don't think so. I think that luxuries, strategic resources, and a better AI all make up for the loss.
Fewer tech-related decisions, but the ones you do make matter more (better AI.) Plus you also make decisions involving luxuries and resources.

Also - here's something: The tech trees are the same from game to game. As the best strategies are discovered and promulgated there's effectively less depth in the tech tree as time passes. The luxuries and resources, however, change in distribution from game to game, and a better AI is always more of a challenge. They don't change much (unless you change things in the editor), but they certainly change more than the tech tree.

[Tarquelne]

This far and no further

After a little reflection, I think my thoughts have changed as much as they're going to, and that I've presented the best arguments I can. The thread was a long time on topic ( ~130 posts) but there's more and more repition, and more and more off-topic (if not just insulting to me) posts, so here's my final position:

1) Civ3 has less "grand" strategic diversity than SMAC or Civ2, and arguably less diversity overall. (Depends on how much "diversity" you're willing to assign to the various small scale activities you take.)

2) Civ3 has at least as much "depth" overall, but it might be best to say that Civ3 has more "tactical" depth than Civ2 or SMAC, but not as much "strategic depth."

3) To get this "depth" out of Civ3 you have to make some significant changes to the game (almost all related to combat balance), and you have to have the "right" starting position - not so bad as to be hopeless (rare), but not so good that you aren't offered a good strategic challenge (common.) If, for whatever reason, the military option isn't the best strategic choice then Civ3 gets a lot more interesting.

(However, I have been thinking about all those Civ2/SMAC games where I've thought "Well, I can't win by , I guess I'll just kill everybody else." So I've become less sure about Civ3's relative combat cluelessness.)

And:
4) I've come to have some strong positions on the personality and intellect of some posters.... but I don't think they need to be explicitly stated.

Unless someone posts something really unexpected (A good argument from Lib, for example) this'll be the last I'll say on the subject. After all, its, like, the 12th post since I said "if you get one more, I get one more."

[korn469]

There's more to each game than the tech tree. In SMAC the tech tree is very important... in Civ3 it isn't as important. I just can't believe that the tech tree is the be all and end all in 4x "depth."

the tech tree isn't the be all end all of depth in civ3, but it is a major part of civ type games, not so much the tech tree but research in general, and choosing to devote resources to science is a strategic choice, which adds depth to the game

Much as Vel seems to be arguing that the Civ3 AI isn't good enough at warfare to present a "deep" challange", I argue that the SMAC AI isn't good enough, over all, to bring out the full _potential_ of the SMAC tech tree. Now, against human players things are different. But as Civ3 has not MP, I think an AI-AI comparison is most appropriate.

well since SMAC does have multiplayer, the strategic depth in the game isn't completely theoretical, but i do agree that the SMAC AI isn't good enough to force the player to play well, but the depth is there, and when a person takes advantage of that they can win in a spectacular fashion

But if it isn't backed up by a good AI I think its merely strategic "diversity", not depth. Sorry, not "merely" diversity, but without the good AI it doesn't add nearly as much depth as it could vrs. a human opponent. I enjoyed exploring the tech tree in SMAC, but as soon as I became more "practiced" with the game than the AI there was little actual (as opposed to potential) strategic depth to it.

well i disagree to an extent, because even if a game does have bad AI it doesn't mean that the strategic depth in the game disappears, it just goes unused, which is a very bad thing, good AI makes for good gameplay, so while SMAC may have more strategic depth it may not have better gameplay in the single player mode since the AI has no hope of competing

however in multiplayer mode, when two players are of about the same skill level then strategic depth adds to gameplay, and lack of it takes away...eventually civ3 will have multiplayer and SMAC/Civ2 already does, so while this argument might go on hiatus its certainly not dead

Explain to me how you get from "No matter how much you invest in your infrastructure you can only advance at most ten times faster than the slowest civ" to "Civ3's tech tree has less depth."

determining to sacrifice to achieve tech superiority is a strategic choice, no matter how many sacrifices you make you cannot exceed gaining tech faster than 10 times a civ who sacrifices nothing, you could have 30 size 20 cities all with libraries, universities, and research labs; you could have a super science city with every single science wonder and you could devote all of your resources to science; you could be a democracy and and have the trade bonus, yet despite all of that you won't be able to exceed ten times the science rate of a single size one city without any improvements at all and the government is a despotism

i consider that a serious lack of depth because devoting resources does not allow you to gain any benefit

Isn't that the same as "less techs." Or are you refering to the combat system? I don't see the connection between "fewer advantages" and "less strategic depth." How does "fewer advantages" lead to fewer decisions of an interesting amount of difficulty? For me it just means I have to think harder about which small advantage to shoot for. And every small advantage really counts, because the AI is better

the amount of techs have nothing to do with the benefits you gain from researching new techs
the reason why there is less strategic depth is that because there is no compelling advantage to be the leader in tech, nor any serious handicaps from being the laggard in tech then making the strategic choice between bricks (non science spending) and books (science spending) doesn't exist because books are worthless

So its more difficult to take the run-away lead via tech, and thus in the whole game - so you have to use other avenues to dominate - good potential for some strategic depth. And if you are way behind in the game you have a better chance of catching up - there's good "depth" in digging your way out of a hole.

being able to get a runaway techlead isn't a problem of strategic depth it is either a problem of balance or of player skill, in this case it is a problem of player skill because the AI is bad at grabbing a commanding tech lead, so that makes it a gameplay problem, a problem which was quite severe in SMAC and one in which they fixed to some extent in Civ3

having a tech lead does not close off the tech leader to other areas of domination, instead being the tech leader usually opens up other methods of domination...so as long as the game isn't unbalanced so that investing in anything besides tech is worthless (the brick part of bricks vs. books) then having an under developed research side of the game subtracts from the total strategic depth of the game

as far as catching up, just because it is much easier to catch up to the tech leader does not give it any more strategic depth than in SMAC, as far as i can see there is an equal number of ways to catch up techwise in both SMAC and Civ3, it is just much easier to do in CIv3 (simply purchase or trade for all of the tacks you lack, it won't cost that much)

while being able to come back does add depth in the fact that the biggest don't always win, in civ3 it's not that you can come back from being behind in the tech race, it's more of a matter that you never get very far behind for too long anyways

But less "depth" in the overall game? No, I don't think so. I think that luxuries, strategic resources, and a better AI all make up for the loss

my argument is that Civ3 has less depth overall, but that is because many of the subsystems are less deep, it does not all come from the research subsystem, that is just one of them (you asked for an argument as to why it is less deep)

though i do agree with you that luxeries, strategic resources, culture, etc add to the strategic depth of the game

good AI does not add to strategic depth, it is either there or it is not, but good AI does add to gameplay and it can force you to use more of the strategic depth in the game, but in many ways especially dealing with the tech tree, they made the AI better by giving it fewer choices that have less strategic impact, so while the AI performs better, the only reason for this is that the test is much simpler, SMAC was like an essay test, Civ3 is like a true and false test, even if you don't know anything about a subject you can still get lucky and pass on a true and false test, while on an essay test if you don't know what you are doing then you will certainly fail if the question has a concrete no BS answer

Fewer tech-related decisions, but the ones you do make matter more (better AI.) Plus you also make decisions involving luxuries and resources

my opinion on this is that you are making about the same amount of tech choices in civ3 as what you are in SMAC, except my whole argument is that each choice matters less, because

1) it is harder to achieve a tech lead and even if you do achieve a tech lead the advantages aren't as commanding
2) it is harder to fall behind in tech and even if you do fall behind the disadvantages aren't as severe
3) no matter which higher level tech you go for (middle age tech or later), the overall sequence will be virtually identical

Also - here's something: The tech trees are the same from game to game. As the best strategies are discovered and promulgated there's effectively less depth in the tech tree as time passes.

this is COMPLETELY wrong
while not every combination of a player's actions makes a good strategy, a game with good depth will have enough good strategies and counters to those strategies that a player will be able to pursue a large number of different action and still have a chance of winning, while a game will have a finite number of good strategies and counters, if the game has good strategic depth the player won't exhaust them anytime soon

what you are describing is lack of strategic depth, a game with only a few optimal ways to win doesn't have strategic depth, a game with many optimal ways to win does have strategic depth, it is as simple as that

Unless someone posts something really unexpected (A good argument from Lib, for example) this'll be the last I'll say on the subject. After all, its, like, the 12th post since I said "if you get one more, I get one more."

hehe there is still more to discuss if you want

[Libertarian]

Untill you stop merely discussing how I speak rather than what I say that's close enough to "ad hominem" for me.

Unless someone posts something really unexpected (A good argument from Lib, for example)...

The hubris.

[Pius Popprasch]

Civ3 has the tribe specific attributes which you can chose and it also has the strategic resources which also add a level of depth.
Civ3 is deeper than Civ2. But I don't think that the A.I. is better. It just cheats more.

[Velociryx]

There was a thread not terribly long ago which nicely de-constructed the game, and arrived at that same conclusion. That since Civ3 was simpler/more linear in its construction, the AI had an easier time coping with the in-game decisions, and thus was made stronger. I found myself partly agreeing with that assessment, and partly not (because I believe that the AI is stronger in part thanks to Soren's work on it).

However, that thread DID make a good point. Civ3 *is* a game with linear construction and game play. This can be seen in a great many areas, but the two we've been focusing on thus far have been combat and the tech tree.

I would talk further on the subject of the tech tree, but Korn beat me to the punch, and the points I would have made, he's already got covered.

I think though, at this point, it's beating a dead horse.

Based on Tarque's last couple of posts, we've officially moved off into an entirely new direction in any case, having pretty much all agreed that we're not talking about "strategic depth" with regards to Civ3, but "tactical depth" (two very different creatures).

I would also add that what Tarque and others have cast about as "diversity" or "Grand-Scale Strategy" I consider to be an integeral part of the very strategic depth we were once discussing (which plays in well with my earlier arguments regarding other 4x games, and how differences in the structure of their tech trees amounted to a deeper strategic level experience).

As to the new debate question: How much tactical depth does Civ3 have....we might wanna consider starting a new thread for that one....

-=Vel=-

[jones]

It's been obvious to me (that Civ3 has less depth and that there's every indication it'll move further in that direction) so whille I appreciate you guys trying to make it better I've Given Up on the franchise.