On-Topic Off-Topic Forum Thread: Rate'em! Civ's I-V

[self biased]

My problem with 1UPT is UNIT ****ING MEATBALLS.

JM

fixt

[korn469]

4 > SMAC > tie 1/2 > 3

I haven't ever played Civ 5 because work/life has kept me busy and the reviews kept me away. I may try it at some point, but I think that 1UPT for a 4x game is a really bad idea. Also hexes aren't a big deal to me, but the graphics did look nice.

Civ4 had problems with SoD, but I think that an improved versions of armies from Civ3 would have fixed the problem. However, it's solid with many interesting strategic choices.

Civ3 I think was the product of flawed developmental cycle. Brian Reynolds and several others left to form Big Huge Games mid way during the development and it reflected on the final product. I think it's worst problem was it lacked interesting choices and railroaded the players into making the same choices every game. However, it was a bridge between SMAC and Civ4. So many of the best ideas in Civ4 made their first appearance in Civ3. The two things I would love to see from Civ3 make an appearance in Civ6/SMAC2 would be the Regicide mode and the air unit rules.

SMAC was buggy and had a brain dead AI, but damn did it have personality. It gave the player an abundance of interesting choices while providing a rich back story. I'm not exactly sure if I spent more time playing SMAC or Civ4; however I haven't played it in years. I worry that many of the clunky things about the game would ruin some of my positive memories of the game. Though I did buy it from gog a few months ago. The game really set the stage for a believable scifi universe. Though, I think SMAC's story is more interesting when the aliens were more mysterious than in SMAX where they were wedged into the story. If firaxis announced SMAC2 it would fill my soul with joy. Too bad EA has the rights to the game instead of 2k.

Civ2 I think took the concepts from Civ and perfected them. At the time it came out I don't think there was a better turn based 4x game. The scenarios were great. I absolutely loved the partisans idea from Civ2 and hope that it will make a reappearance in Civ6.

Civ while not a perfect game was truly groundbreaking. I think it has done more to define the 4x genre than maybe any other game. Ever. Every game in the Civ series is probably better than it (I have my doubts about Civ3 and Civ5) but all of them stood on the shoulders of this giant.

[Aeson]

This is fixed by allowing units that are defeated to have a high chance of retreating 1 tile instead of being destroyed. Chance goes down with lower initial health.

No. That wouldn't address the issue at all.

[Ben Kenobi]

I still don't like culture. It's annoying to build up a large army in Civ3, fight a difficult seige, win the seige and then immediately see the now culture poor city flip with all your units in it. That was the end of Civ3 for me.

[Elok]

Commando? FFS, that requires four combat promotions, isn't available to anything but spies until the game's half-over, and is never available to siege weapons of any sort. If I want to have any specialized abilities (medic, city raider, barrage, shock/cover/pinch, march, amphibious, flanking, whatever) when I finally get there, I basically have to be Boudica running Vassalage and Theocracy with West Point and the Pentagon. Plus maybe a couple of settled GGs...that's not what I'd call a solid option for a full invasion force. Great for cavalry doing chevauchees, doesn't do much for the "damn this invasion takes forever" issue.

[giblets]

One of the good things about Civ5 is that since even the slowest units have two moves each turn, invasions aren't quite so agonizingly slow.

[Aeson]

Commando? FFS, that requires four combat promotions, isn't available to anything but spies until the game's half-over, and is never available to siege weapons of any sort. If I want to have any specialized abilities (medic, city raider, barrage, shock/cover/pinch, march, amphibious, flanking, whatever) when I finally get there, I basically have to be Boudica running Vassalage and Theocracy with West Point and the Pentagon. Plus maybe a couple of settled GGs...that's not what I'd call a solid option for a full invasion force. Great for cavalry doing chevauchees, doesn't do much for the "damn this invasion takes forever" issue.

The reason your invasions are slow is becoming obvious. You ignore all the available options to focus myopically on the one that's least suitable, and then don't even get that one right.

[Aeson]

One of the good things about Civ5 is that since even the slowest units have two moves each turn, invasions aren't quite so agonizingly slow.

Given the pacing of the rest of the game, I have to wonder why you think invasions are slow? Taking out an AI in less time than it would take to build one of the units in the invasion isn't that uncommon.

[Hauldren Collider]

I think wars just take too long in Civ IV, period. By the time a war is over, I'm completely bored with it. Also, it seems like the AI always has twice as many units as me.

[Krill]

That's cos your bad.

[-Jrabbit]

Nah, more likely just waiting too long. At least, that's one of my biggest Civ4 problems.

[Elok]

The reason your invasions are slow is becoming obvious. You ignore all the available options to focus myopically on the one that's least suitable, and then don't even get that one right.

The reason I used to have you on ignore is coming back to me: you're obtuse. Buh-bye.

[Aeson]

The reason I used to have you on ignore is coming back to me: you're obtuse. Buh-bye.

I offered you several good options in a helpful and friendly manner. Your response was obtuse, taking one option (out of context at that) and building a histrionic paragraph out of it based on how incompetent you are at playing and discussing the game intelligently.

Now you will ignore me because you can't stand a fair fight even when it's of your choosing. (Again, like your problem with the game.)

[Elok]

I think wars just take too long in Civ IV, period. By the time a war is over, I'm completely bored with it. Also, it seems like the AI always has twice as many units as me.

The really annoying part, for me, is that the war takes forever even when you have a massive technological lead, because three-quarters of it is spent moving stacks through unfriendly territory one square at a time, whether any given city falls in one turn or three. You can speed things up a little by taking cavalry to raid all their strategic resources at the start, so they can't replace anything but the archers--but it's still too long. Maybe I'm just spoiled by CivII and SMAC.

I would do what I sometimes did in those games and give them peace once I've broken their back--let the war-weariness recharge, rebuild my economy and beef up the cities I've taken--but dealing with lingering cultural effects is generally not worth it. I only do it if their empire is ridiculously bifurcated. It's still a fun and interesting game, but war does turn into work about halfway through every time.

(I freely admit that I'm not the best player, but I don't see how any amount of skill could get siege weapons through three tiles at the border in less than three turns)

[Elok]

One of the good things about Civ5 is that since even the slowest units have two moves each turn, invasions aren't quite so agonizingly slow.

That would help--though I imagine they put it in to make 1UPT more manageable by letting units slide past each other.