The 'normal' game can be played fairly quickly, and given that the GOTM timeframe will stick to the monthly schedule, its worth asking whether the game should be played on 'Epic' speed instead.

The results of the poll aren't binding - so vote and also list you extreme fors/againsts in a post in this thread - sell your opinion!

I haven't played very much yet, but the idea of using different speeds appeals to me. Strategies will probably differ, and it will help keep things from getting stale.

I have no opinion yet on what the balance should be.

I prefer epic as the gotms always seem to end to soon

I would prefer epic speed. Having played many games on normal, I finished the game in 2 or three settings of a few hours each.

Epic games take me about a week to play, give or take a day depending on real life. I like the feel of the longer game, more thinking, and the combat, research seem to be more balanced in epic than normal.

I prefer Dynastic (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=136931). ;)

But I modded it so I'm biased.

I voted Epic. I like long games. :)

I chose epic. I'm normally into switching things up for variety, but I find the game is not balanced well for normal and quick speed. In fact I think epic is still a little too fast in the later eras and possibly too slow in the early eras. I know in past civs people complained that the early ages were too fast and the late ages too slow but IMO firaxis overtweaked it in the opposite direction.

Normal or Mix it up

I think we should try to attract players from all speeds. Obviously the Civ3 GOTM crowd will be biased towards epic.

In the big picture I can see how standardizing on epic makes everything more efficient. But it will also drive people away.

I prefer to play normal speed on the small map setting. This is more fun to me with the games design being smaller=better. For GOTM as long as we are doing standard map and one game per month I have to go with epic.

I like the idea of mixing it up, I'm looking forward to participating in GOTM to break the rut I got into of always playing the same type of game in Civ III.

Is this months GOTM normal?

this months is normal.

I just want to play. So, I don't care.

Mix it up a bit. I have a personal preference for epic...but it's good to try other things.

ya I like the mixed idea myself. Personally I like Epic but It's nice to have some variety in there to.

I voted for Epic even though I havn't tried it yet. I think that if we mix it up that would be good too though.

i finished my gotm in 2:50 hous, really too short
epic please for next gotm

Have an epic game every month and a normal game every 2 weeks maybe? I think something to appeal to both markets would be ideal. I voted for normal.

I haven't tried epic yet, but I rather like the way you can actually finish a normal game inside a day or so with CIV4. I'd like to participate in GOTM without sacrificing my whole life each month. So at least some normal/fast games would be good.

Also, with epic, I would have thought conquest/domination will become far more the victory condition of choice amongst the civ elite, as it allows more turns to line up units. With normal, it's reasonably hard to conquer the world by 1000AD.

As for the people who say they spent a few hours on this GOTM - you obviously weren't micromanaging enough ;) It took me more like 30 hours to play, but I do tend to micromanage a lot, especially workers.

Why not wait and see what playing in 2:50 does for your performance relative to the players who take it more slowly?

I voted for epic because I'd rather invest more time into one epic game than less in multiple short games (besides how can you have more than one gotM). Although I think my real reason is that the pace is too quick in normal which may just be a balance problem in all speeds (too quick in that buildings and units are never a useful investment before becoming obsolete).

On the other hand some of the Civ3 gotms are really excessive, I spent way too much time on last months diety and don't really want to see that repeated. Hopefully staff will be able to pull out the time for each game so we can examine it and make a more informed choice. I'd estimate 10-20 hours would make a good time investment, this was about half what Civ3 required which is one reason I wasn't able to submit more than sporatically.


At any rate, I'd like to hear from some other gotm vets on whether their games are flying by this quickly, mine sure isn't. I spent 2-3 hours just getting to 1000 BC and another 2-3 to 1AD.

Average time played for Civ4 GOTM 1 submissions to date (therefore probably heavily weighted towards faster players) is under 9.5 hours. The range is 50 minutes to over 60 hours.

Average time played for Civ3 GOTM is over 30 hours. The range is under 30 mins to 24 days. But some players leave their computers up and running for the whole month and just play when they can.

I'd say epic. If you want shorter games, you could go for a later start period. I'm in the middle of a fun little Industrial start pangaea game at the moment.

I'm the one who said I'll only play if its on normal speed. It's not that I think there should not be any epic games, but I think that will take too much of my time.

For Civ 3 it took me an hour each day for the entire month if I wanted to finish the game on time. Of course I could spent those 30 or so hours by sacrificing two weekends, or by playing each night, but I still can't hardly ever find the time. I was glad that my civ4 games (on normal) so far costed only about 10 hours each, but I think this will go up as I learn more of the game and hence will be able to think about more things.

In line with the suggestions of two games a month, maybe one normal and one epic?

BTW - two games / month is not a fait-accomplait.

Maybe offer the same game in all three speeds?

I would prefer normal to be normal. The game has changed and conquest / dominaton has new complications. We can learn to adapt and overcome them.

As for time played, I don't want to have GOTM be the only games I play. I am happy if they are shorter.

That said, I don't mind faster and slower games from time to time.

I guess I need to play some epic games and see what's what.

I voted 'normal' as that is my preferred speed, but it's not really a hard and fast thing. Mixing it up wouldn't put me off.

Variety is the spice of life. And GotMs.

I use epic almost exclusively in my personal games. The tech pace to unit move ratio in normals is way off. And im not even a conquerer. I didnt take one city in this gotm. I just hate the fact that im going to get 3 techs before i move this unit 12 squares. Doesnt make any sense. Bad balance imo. Not sure why people like it.

I guess im in the flamebait camp of "normal? gah why do you want to get techs before you can move between two cities without roads. It doesnt make any sense!"

Well, I voted for mix it up. I think the map designer should have the flexibility to come up with a good game without arbitrary restrictions being in place.

Having said that, my personal preference would be normal. I say that because I have not finished playing the first GOTM, yet. I guess maybe I'm just slow ... :(

Does epic add to the number of turns in a game or just lengthen the turns required to research and increase the hammer cost of construction?

Does epic add to the number of turns in a game or just lengthen the turns required to research and increase the hammer cost of construction?Both. The results are pretty similar to a normal game, but with more unit movement because of more turns.

Can I ask - how many of you have actually played both epic and normal? Reason I ask is that most of my games have been on normal. :ack:

As I said before I voted for epic even though I have only played on normal

Epic is generally agreed to be the best speed for high scores, because of the extra unit movement. There is also a bug that makes epic rush buying cheaper than other speeds.

If all the "serious" players want to play on epic, why not make the other speeds available for those with less time on their hands (and willing to take a small performance hit)?

Epic is the best for an enjoyable game, regardless of scores. Compared to civ3, civ4 slowed down unit movement while drastically increasing the speed of late game techs. That combination makes the game less fun, IMO. But yeah I don't mind if people want to play the same game under normal, but they'd be handicapping themselves and I don't know that people would do that willingly, even if they have time constraints. One issue with that, though, is that the game date doesn't really match up properly between speeds. So fastest victory would have to be calculated using turn number divided by max turns instead of game date, or something like that.

Epic please. :)

I'm new to the GOTM and now find myself having to wait until January because I ran through this game in a couple of days. Let's get that stretched out!

Can I ask - how many of you have actually played both epic and normal? Reason I ask is that most of my games have been on normal.

I've played both, but only one on Epic. However, I voted for Epic because I already know I'm going to prefer the longer games. I've only been playing on Normal to have quicker games in order to get more of a chance to try out different things. I'm also, so far, not liking the endgame on the Normal speed. The pace just seems way too fast for my tastes so that is another reason I'll probably end up prefering the Epic speed. It's really too early to tell though. I'm another one that thinks that maybe having a GOTM for all three speed settings would be a good idea. That is, if there is enough support for all three. I'm pretty sure there would be enough support for both normal and epic speeds...not sure about quick though.

-teck

I've played most of my games on Normal. One game on Epic which seemed too slow in the ancient ages. Therefore I voted for Normal.

However, I'd prefer the dual-approach suggested before. One game for Normal, one for Epic. Best of both worlds. Obviously preferably with different maps as comparisons are hard and people can't play both games then =(.

The shorter the better. One monthly game starting the 1st and other monthly game of a different speed the 15th would be perfect.

Having said that, I don´t think I will participate in any Epic game. I have never been able to complete a CivIII GOTM in a month, even in small maps. In fact, I took pains to be able to submit QSC in time.

Voted for "I don't mind".

I played several games on both normal and epic, and hardly noticed any difference in real time consumed. Map size is much more important. Duel maps I can conquer in 1-4 hours, but I never finished a normal sized map (with default number of opponents) under 15 hours. Regardless of game speed.

(btw, there was a successful gotm1 submission with 50min playtime?!? How is that even possible technically? 10 seconds times 300 turns = 50 min.)

I voted to mix it up, because that can certainly add to strategic choices in game. But I would really prefer mostly epic games. I just hate the end game unit - tech pace thing. Really annoying.

Hergrom

I use epic almost exclusively in my personal games. The tech pace to unit move ratio in normals is way off. And im not even a conquerer. I didnt take one city in this gotm. I just hate the fact that im going to get 3 techs before i move this unit 12 squares. Doesnt make any sense. Bad balance imo. Not sure why people like it.

I guess im in the flamebait camp of "normal? gah why do you want to get techs before you can move between two cities without roads. It doesnt make any sense!"

I agree 100% epic is definately a little slow in the beginning, but normal is really out of wack in the modern era. I know they patched it to fix, but I don't think they went far enough. Need to have more turns in the modern era and more beakers per tech.

I voted to only play if it's normal.

BUT, I know many people prefer epic so I'd understand if it went epic. My problem is I just don't have the time (or really, the attention span :crazyeye: ) to play a Civ game that takes more than 5-6 hours.

In this month's GOTM, I went at my usual pace and finished in just under 4 hours, which for me is just right. It's a nice waste of a Saturday afternoon. Any more than that, and I probably wouldn't have time to finish it.

Because of other games, a weekly standing Civ4 game with friends, and real-life, I just don't think I'd be able to spend 10-20 hours on a GOTM every month.

My personal preference is for two games a month (one normal, one epic) or some such that would still allow for a normal game, while giving the epic crowd their desire as well.

I voted for Epic, but wouldn't mind Normal speed games either. Normally I play Epic, and I like the tech speed much more, even if it could use a bit of tweaking. I think a good option would be a Normal speed game and an Epic one, but that could mean a lot more work for the mods/staff.

I just wish I'd played the GOTMs when I was still playing Civ3. Maybe then I'd actually have actually been able to beat Demigod regularly, after seeing all the different ways of doing things :p

One of the things that the Civ 4 GOTM should promote is getting more players to play at a higher level.

Would-be players won't attempt to play long, hard games as the learning curve to compete is to steep. How many would-be GOTM players would invest 15+ hours AND submit a loosing game EVERY month? Not many.

How many "fanatics" would want to play short, easy games EVERY month? Not many.

Make it accessible and competitive by mixing it up. I think it helps the community more in the long run.

I voted for mix it up.

Somehow I suspect that the game is best balanced for normal speed (whether players feel that way is up for debate but I'd think AIs do best on normal).

I haven't played any epic games yet and I'm usually inclined to war a lot. I'd think that epic speed favors warmongers moreso than any other speed?

I voted for normal but I would rather play epic than see a GOTM with all three speeds offered for the same game. I want to be able to compare scores and strategies and different speeds for the same game would make that impossible.

If I were to vote again, I would say mix it up.

I like the idea of mixing game speeds a bit and I voted for it. I would include only normal and epic speeds though, as the quick seems little 'too quick' to me.

I voted for 'mix it up'. The only way I'm going to get better is to try different game speeds/styles. The more the better.

I voted for epic, allthough idea of mixing length between epic and normal sounds very interesting.

I voted for epic because I think on normal (never played quick by the way so far) the tech pace is too high in the industrial age. I have played nearly all my early trial games on normal, but just finished RB-CIV4-1 the Honorable French on epic speed and have to say that I enjoyed the epic speed more. Nevertheless mixing gotms up with all speeds is OK for me. It will enforce different game play depending on difficulty and speed.

I'll probably only play if it's 'Normal' or 'Quick'. I don't have time to goof around with an Epic game.

never played on epic, I like fast play and rapid decisions - maybe couse I'm an ex hardcore leeeet pro old school quaker? :cool:
Anyway if you'll decide for epic I'll learn new strategies :)

There's no such thing as rapid decisions in a turn-based game. :lol: You get just as long to make decisions on quick as you do on epic...forever.

One of the things that the Civ 4 GOTM should promote is getting more players to play at a higher level.
We will definitely be playing on a variety of difficulties.

Can I ask - how many of you have actually played both epic and normal? Reason I ask is that most of my games have been on normal. :ack:

My first game was Normal and I felt it went way too fast. I then switched to Epic for all my other games except, of course, for the GOTM. The speed did feel fine in the GOTM, btw, but it sucks that the next one is weeks away... ;)

Having played mainly online where it is generally 'quick' I have found it rather hard adapting to normal speed which I assume this GOTM is...

I'll get into the swing of things again, but I don't see me ever clamouring for Epic or some such nonsense.

Oh, please mix it up! I think we have a great potential here to have a grand variety of games. Let's be creative with the IVOTM world and not unnecessarily constrain the types of games we all can compare on.

Based on the poll results so far I would say have 2 out of every 3 games epic speed and the other 1 out of 3 as normal speed.

If all the "serious" players want to play on epic, why not make the other speeds available for those with less time on their hands (and willing to take a small performance hit)?

I think your claim is awfully broad. I would consider myself a "serious" player and I definitely don't want all of the games to be Epic. I much prefer a mix, but that would include all three speeds: Quick also! I also don't think having the same game at multiple different speeds is a good idea at all. It does affect how the game goes, a lot, and defeats the point of being able to compare games with other players.

I voted mix it up, but I'd like to add that I mean use both Epic and Normal. I like my games a little slower so am not reeally interested in quick.

Of course that doesn't mean I would not play quick, I just wouldn't take as much pleasure in playing those ones.

I voted for Normal (but not only normal) given my own personal time constraints (i.e. I actually have a life outside of CIV... imagine that!).

Those who played the GOTM1 in 4 hours must not be warmongers... i guess it was an all-out peaceful race to the space victory. I find that domination/conquest games take quite a bit longer to work through due to all of the unit movement.

I do understand the balancing advantage with Epic given that units you build in Normal mode could be obsolete in 20 turns... just as you're about to engage an enemy. That part is frustrating for sure.

I suppose mixing it up is the best choice just for variety. I would definitely give the Epic games a shot, but I likely wouldnt be able to finish them very often.

I think a quick game would be interesting in the GOTM environment... a good test for the skilled player that's used to the epic game. Kind of like playing blitz chess... the masters really struggle with it.

I prefer epic myself, as units are more worth then (imho).

Also, would it be possible to launch two versions, with the only difference being one of them having OCC turned on? PLaying OCC with the 2-national wonders rule is a bit harsh, imho..

Also, would it be possible to launch two versions, with the only difference being one of them having OCC turned on? PLaying OCC with the 2-national wonders rule is a bit harsh, imho..

I was going to suggest this as well but forgot about it. This is definitely needed if you want people to try OCC's.

It seems to me that playing a variety is rather important given that the game plays differently on different speeds. And that includes quick.

Also, would it be possible to launch two versions, with the only difference being one of them having OCC turned on? PLaying OCC with the 2-national wonders rule is a bit harsh, imho..

It's weird that they went out of their way to create a special OCC option. You would think they could have just made a rule that you can build more than 2 national wonders if you only have one city.

@Daviddes: What would then happen with the wonders if you built a second city? I think it's a very nice feature, but I miss support for 5CC, and they could have made a seperate "Variant" page on the Play Now setup.

I find the way different units are spread out over the game is very uneven. In ancient / classical your units go out of date far too quickly, wheras in the modern era there are only a handful of useful units. Epic helps a bit in the early periods, but both speeds seem to suffer from this problem.

I'd marginally prefer Epic over Normal, since I tend to play my games quite quickly, but I think it should be different from month to month. If we play at different difficulties, why not different speeds?

@Daviddes: What would then happen with the wonders if you built a second city?

You could just let people do what they want. It's hard for me to imagine that people could somehow find the strategy of avoiding building more than one city in order to build several National Wonders in their one city, and then building some more cities, to work better than normal play. So what's the harm in permitting it?

I chose mix it up but, in truth I'm really not sure. I'm in so many SG's I haven't been able to really sit down and finish GOTM 1 so wonder how I'd do with an epic GOTM.

I believe I've only played one epic game (LK108) and didn't really notice that much of a difference in the way the game played out. I have as yet to have tried a SP epic game.

One thing I'd propose is what if while CivIV is still considered new we had a Quick game on the 15th for a couple months? Something that wouldn't require the staff to put a lot of time in but at least appease all of our new players. Just a thought.

I think a bit of everything, but mostly normal.

I voted for epic.

All my initial games were played at normal. The games were fun, but unrealistic and a bit frustrating. The tech pace vs. unit movement on pangaea maps wasn't too bad, as war could be waged before the tech pace accelerated. Not so for continent and archipelago. If you wage a WWII Normandy-style assault in a normal game, it's possible to ship off macemen and catapults in galleons, and about the time they arrive, everything can upgrade to cannons and grenadiers. A few cities later, it's time for infantry and artillery. I have to wonder how it didn't get tweaked at some point during playtesting. I would never ask for (or want) total realism, but the current late-game tech pace is just insane.

Now I have played a few games at epic speed and like it more in every way. Research vs. unit movement is more balanced, and it doesn't seem to make games much longer. However, I am a slow player. If I play a "normal" game meticulously, it has taken anywhere from 10 to 24 hours depending on the victory condition pursued. I played one epic game in 8 hours (diplo), and another in 16 (domination), so it doesn't seem to make much difference--at least for me. That may partially be because I have gotten better at using my city adviser screen, and I don't spend as much time checking each city individually.

Unfortunately, I think the different game speeds affect the "fun" level depending on what type of victory you pursue. Epic speed makes military games more fun because you get to do more with the units you invested in. Peaceful victory conditions at Epic aren't as fun because the turns are more tedious. If you are a fast player, you just hit "end turn" a lot more often than in a normal game—no big deal. But for a micromanager you have to go look at a few cities on most of those extra turns, and that's a lot of added tedium. I fear this difference in the fun-factor is going to make players who usually play for peaceful victories heavily favor Normal, and warmongers favor Epic.

I like to play for a different victory condition every month, and I am hoping most games end up being Epics for the following reason: the extra time spent checking cities in a peaceful game is more bearable than only getting 10 turns to use a unit before it is obsolete in a military game. I fear I will tire of the latter very, very quickly.

I haven't played "Quick" yet, but I have a vision in my head of sending a swordsman off to a distant enemy city, and at the time he arrives, building an infantry in my capitol. I can't imagine ever wanting to play a "Quick" game—unless, perhaps, it's to test that theory.

I voted for epic.
Unfortunately, I think the different game speeds affect the "fun" level depending on what type of victory you pursue. Epic speed makes military games more fun because you get to do more with the units you invested in. Peaceful victory conditions at Epic aren't as fun because the turns are more tedious. If you are a fast player, you just hit "end turn" a lot more often than in a normal game—no big deal. But for a micromanager you have to go look at a few cities on most of those extra turns, and that's a lot of added tedium. I fear this difference in the fun-factor is going to make players who usually play for peaceful victories heavily favor Normal, and warmongers favor Epic.

I voted 'mixed' for exactly this reason. Although I must admit that I have only played 'normal' speed sofar.

I voted for "mixed". Diversity is never bad.

I voted for epic, I think tech peace at other levels is too quick. If you want to speed the game up you can play on smaller maps.

But that is just me; I actually think it should be a mixed selection although that’s not my preference.

I vote for Epic but I shoud have vote for

Mix it up a bit - all speeds.

All my initial games were played at normal. The games were fun, but unrealistic and a bit frustrating. The tech pace vs. unit movement on pangaea maps wasn't too bad, as war could be waged before the tech pace accelerated. Not so for continent and archipelago. If you wage a WWII Normandy-style assault in a normal game, it's possible to ship off macemen and catapults in galleons, and about the time they arrive, everything can upgrade to cannons and grenadiers. A few cities later, it's time for infantry and artillery.

I voted epic because my own experience of normal has much in common with this, though maybe it is better in 1.52.

If you wage a WWII Normandy-style assault in a normal game, it's possible to ship off macemen and catapults in galleons, and about the time they arrive, everything can upgrade to cannons and grenadiers.

You do know that you can chain ships together, right? If you have several galleons spaced across the ocean, you can load units onto the first, move it to the second, re-load the units onto the second, move it to the third, etc. So you can basically cross any ocean in one turn. And galleons are pretty cheap.

Also, if you send the units overseas, and then you do discover new technologies, you can upgrade them in the field (once you capture at least one city), so technological progress really isn't a big deal; you just have to budget for it.

I don't object to epic speed, either, but I think the problems that you describe at normal speed are mostly very manageable. Unless you want to be able to conquer the entire world in a single sweep without ever advancing in technology.

Ship chaining doesn't work anymore. Units lose a turn every time they load into a new ship.

Ship chaining doesn't work anymore. Units lose a turn every time they load into a new ship.

I know this isn't true, because I've done it. You can load a unit onto a ship (which does leave the unit with zero movement), move that ship on top of another, empty ship; activate the unit, click the "load" button, and select the other ship, which re-loads it onto the second ship; move the second ship with the unit onboard; etc.

P.S. I haven't tried it yet in 1.52; maybe you are saying it changed with the patch? I'm still playing 1.09 until I finish this annoying GOTM1.

Even so, as with Civ3, ship chaining doesn't help your main army move any faster, it's just for getting a very small number of units someplace fast - bringing a great artist to the front line for a culture bomb, for instance.
As for being able to upgrade units anywhere in your own territory; yes that's nice, but it is still savagely expensive. I think I might try some graphs comparing the price of each unit's upgrade to the price of the tech required; I'm sure the ratio of upgrade/tech price is much higher in Civ4 than Civ3.

Even so, as with Civ3, ship chaining doesn't help your main army move any faster, it's just for getting a very small number of units someplace fast - bringing a great artist to the front line for a culture bomb, for instance.

I don't agree. It just depends how many ships you have. One galleon can move 3 units a distance of 4 spaces in one turn (5 with Magellan). You can move 15 units a distance of 16 spaces, with 20 galleons. You just have to decide how much you want to invest in sea transport. That's a tradeoff just like any other in the game.

But, the original complaint was that units become obsolete during the time they are being sent overseas. Using ship chaining makes a big difference in this regard, because units don't spend so much time "in the pipeline". You can build a few units, and then send them quickly, then build a few more advanced units, and send those quickly as well, etc. Rather than building a huge army of identical units that all become obsolete at once.

I know this isn't true, because I've done it. You can load a unit onto a ship (which does leave the unit with zero movement), move that ship on top of another, empty ship; activate the unit, click the "load" button, and select the other ship, which re-loads it onto the second ship; move the second ship with the unit onboard; etc.

P.S. I haven't tried it yet in 1.52; maybe you are saying it changed with the patch? I'm still playing 1.09 until I finish this annoying GOTM1.I believe you are right, and units may be moved out of the ship and into another just once per turn (I could be wrong here).

The advantage of ship-chaining in Civ 4 wouldn't be worth the trouble. It was great in Civ 3 though (strategically).

The advantage of ship-chaining in Civ 4 wouldn't be worth the trouble.

I strongly disagree with this. I'm not going to get into comparisons with Civ3, because the games are quite different, but I think it's extremely important in Civ4, because (as mentioned earlier in this thread) technological progress is fairly rapid, and units stuck in transit for several turns are losing the "window of opportunity" to be effective. Also, because units become obsolete, most often when I want to attack overseas I'm not starting with a completely prebuilt force, but I'm loading the units onto the ships continuously as they come off the production lines. This presents an ideal opportunity to have a chain of galleons/transports and send the units across in a continuous, rapid stream. Chaining wouldn't be so useful if you had all of the units ready at once, because then you would have to choose between sending a few quickly or many slowly. But, when you are sending a few at a time, the tradeoff is between sending a few quickly or a few slowly, and that's an easy choice.

P.S. It's not true that a unit can only chain ships once per turn.

@DaviddesJ: :lol: We have completely opposite playstyles then. I was prebuilding units (catapults and footmen) while waiting for Astronomy to be discovered, thus I could take full loads at a time. Ship-chaining would become beneficial after all the "full loads" of units were over, but not all that beneficial to me.

So you're right.

Allowing ship chaining isn't a very good solution to the flaws with respect to technology and combat unit obsolescence.

Ship chaining is exploitive of the turn based mechanism.

Allowing ship chaining isn't a very good solution to the flaws with respect to technology and combat unit obsolescence.

Gosh, I didn't think this was the "How should we design our own game" forum. I thought it was about how to play the game we've got.

I agree, ship chaining is exploiting and should be banned. It should never have been allowed in civ3 either.

I agree, ship chaining is exploiting and should be banned. It should never have been allowed in civ3 either.

I don't know why you think this, but, if this is going to turn into the "should ships chain" thread, then I'd definitely say that allowing ship chaining is more "realistic" than disallowing it. It doesn't take a ship 50 years to cross the ocean once. The long time periods for movement in the game represent many, many transits, which cumulatively carry a given cargo. So it entirely makes sense that a fleet of ships should collectively be able to carry cargo all the way across the ocean in a single turn.

But, (re)designing the game isn't my thing. This is the way the game works, and I'm fine with it. If the designers were to implement it a different way, or choose to change it in a patch, then I'm fine with that, too. But, meanwhile, we'll all play the game the way it actually works, not the way some people wish that it worked.

ship chaining is exploiting and should be banned
Exploiting what? The designers knew that ship chaining was possible in Civ3, and didn't disable it in Civ4. There's no way it's a bug or an unintended side effect in the software. One ship can still only carry x units a distance of y tiles per turn, so there's no disproportionate misuse of resources.

Ship chaining has advantages, but it also has drawbacks. If you start with nothing in place you need the same number of turns to get your first units to the other continent whether you use ship chaining or not. But using chaining means you deliver one boatload in that turn instead of having all the ships deliver boatloads in the same turn. Since there seems to be an emphasis on combined arms in Civ4, it sounds like delivering more units in the first turn of a battle would be a good thing.

As DaviddesJ says, let's play Civ4 as it comes, not some other game that no one else plays.

Sorry, there's no way that's a design feature, it's an oversight. I hope civ4 doesn't turn into a manipulating poor design game like civ3 was. That was one of the biggest reasons I stopped playing civ3. RoP rapes, palace jumps, ship chaining, etc. Those type of strategies ruin a good game.

The designers knew that ship chaining was possible in Civ3, and didn't disable it in Civ4. There's no way it's a bug or an unintended side effect in the software.

Sorry, there's no way that's a design feature, it's an oversight.

I think it's funny that you are both so certain. You can't both be right! And, to me, either seems possible.

But the idea that a game is "ruined" because you can build more ships and use them to transport units overseas more quickly, strikes me as pretty ridiculous. With that attitude, I'm sure you're never going to be satisfied with any game.

Since GOTM2 requires the latest patch, how about adding Marathon to the choices on the poll.

I hope civ4 doesn't turn into a manipulating poor design game like civ3 was. That was one of the biggest reasons I stopped playing civ3. RoP rapes, palace jumps, ship chaining, etc. Those type of strategies ruin a good game.

I am afraid you might want to stop playing civ4 too after we explore it more. IMHO all these 'exploits' are evidence of 'the fanatics power', not 'poor design'.

RoP rapes, palace jumps, ship chaining, etc.Those type of strategies ruin a good game.I don't think those ruin the game, they are just additional strategies to consider. Although there was some banned exploits which were game-ruiners.

I am afraid you might want to stop playing civ4 too after we explore it more. IMHO all these 'exploits' are evidence of 'the fanatics power', not 'poor design'.

I think that ROP exploitation in Civ3 was poor design. And it's not an example of an unexpected and subtle discovery: it was immediately obvious that you could do this when you first play the game, and the designers must have known it as well.

One big difference between Civ3 and Civ4 is that the developers seem both more able and more willing to patch (perceived) game balance issues. There are things that never got fixed in Civ3, or that were never fixed correctly, while similar problems (like production overflow) in Civ4 have been promptly patched. Perhaps this is a result of the improved implementation framework of Civ4 making it easier to make changes. In any case, from what I've seen so far, I think we can expect much more in the way of patching perceived problems in Civ4, than we saw in Civ3.

Ship chaining has advantages, but it also has drawbacks. If you start with nothing in place you need the same number of turns to get your first units to the other continent whether you use ship chaining or not. But using chaining means you deliver one boatload in that turn instead of having all the ships deliver boatloads in the same turn. Since there seems to be an emphasis on combined arms in Civ4, it sounds like delivering more units in the first turn of a battle would be a good thing.

Pretty much the only situation I can think of in which this is advantageous, is when you have a large existing army that you want to transport. It's probably pretty safe to say that in most situations ship chaining will offer an advantage instead.

As DaviddesJ says, let's play Civ4 as it comes, not some other game that no one else plays.

I'm seems more logical that it wasn't intended as they tried to minimize excessive micro management and this definitely sounds like an instance of that (and added to that the actual way of doing it is not very intuitive). And even from a realism point of view it's pretty unrealistic. You can transport a unit from one side of the world to the other side in one turn (in the middle ages).....

But you do have a point with just waiting until they patch it (as it doesn't seem to be a major exploit). Maybe start a bug thread? ;)

And even from a realism point of view it's pretty unrealistic. You can transport a unit from one side of the world to the other side in one turn (in the middle ages).....

I really don't get why you think this is unrealistic. If you have ships that can cross the ocean at all, then they don't take 10 years to do it, much less 50 years (5x 10-year turns). What's unrealistic, imho, is that you build a unit with current technology, put it on a ship, and by the time it arrives overseas, the technology is 50 years obsolete.

The movement rates in the game reflect the fact that when you're advancing through enemy territory (the case where they matter most), you have to fight all along the way and bring along supply lines, and this limits how rapidly you can advance. None of this is an issue when sailing overseas. I think ship chaining is a pretty reasonable way to avoid making the ships themselves unrealistically fast, and yet to provide a decent transport capability and speed. I do agree that it's cumbersome and fiddly to use, though.

The main bug thread is here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=138058

If you think it's a bug, you should certainly feel free to report it.

The movement rates in the game reflect the fact that when you're advancing through enemy territory (the case where they matter most), you have to fight all along the way and bring along supply lines, and this limits how rapidly you can advance. None of this is an issue when sailing overseas. I think ship chaining is a pretty reasonable way to avoid making the ships themselves unrealistically fast, and yet to provide a decent transport capability and speed. I do agree that it's cumbersome and fiddly to use, though.

Realism indeed isn't a very strong argument against it. Not so much in that ship chaining is realistic, but more because realism isn't a very strong argument related to movement. Most of it seems unrealistic ;).
--> I'll retract that realism argument.

The main bug thread is here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=138058

If you think it's a bug, you should certainly feel free to report it.

Done. Do note that that thread doesn't seem to get updated anymore, I reported a few other bugs and possible bugs that didn't get added to the main list in over a month. Some of those got fixed anyway though, so maybe someone from Firaxis looks at it.

Half of the banned civ3 exploits weren't as powerful as the not-banned ones. It's not fun to "game the game" by manipulating obscure game mechanics for a large advantage over the AI's. Things like capturing the great library in the late industrial or modern age. Or building cities in a perfect circle so corruption was equal with all cities. These most definitely do ruin the fun of the game. But if you don't use them then you can't compete in the GOTM. I did the palace jump in one of my gotm games for civ3. That was the only game I received a fastest finish reward...but I didn't feel good about it and felt dirty, like I was cheating, because I was. Because regardless of what the GOTM rules say, palace jumping was exploiting, no doubt about it.

edit: And sorry for taking this thread way off topic. All further posts will be in a different thread, should I have further posts to add.

I perfer normal speeds.

If it helps at all, on my completed Normal-length games, I have had average times of around 3.5 hours. I would probably take a bit longer on GOTMs, and most likely about 1.5 that time on higher difficulties, but I would estimate taking no more than ~10 hours for a CivIV GOTM on a difficulty level I have not yet beaten (assuming I actually survive to the end!)

Ship chaining has been in every civ since the beginning. I have no idea why the Firaxians like this "feature" but apparently they do. I don't like it but, as Alan says, it's part of the game and should certainly not be banned.

The only real exploit discovered so far is Moonsinger's anarchy domination trick. Leave it to her to find things like this :mischief:

You do know that you can chain ships together, right?

Actually, I didn't. I felt sure the designers would have removed this in Civ4 so I didn't even test it. As you say, chaining is effective in saving game time, but cumbersome. I don't know whether to be happy or sad that chaining is still around.

Ship chaining violates the turn mechanism because you create an instantanous action by using the movement of many different units in series. I have no real problem with it, but it is a pain in the ass. However, for consistency there should be an APC so you can accomplish the same effect on land.





Gosh, I didn't think this was the "How should we design our own game" forum. I thought it was about how to play the game we've got.

Then you didn't think very deeply then did you? Look at the domain name up there ^^^. Then go directly to webster.com or dictionary.com and look up the word fanatic. I think that frames the context in which Civilization is to be discussed on these forums.

Well, I'm convinced (by this thread) that the choice that ship chaining allows - between transporting your army in one slow, massive group, and transporting your army quickly but in peicemeal fashion - is a strategically interesting one. So, I'm in favour of chaining in principle, it's just the fiddly implementation that is the problem. Mind you, I think it works a bit better in Civ4 than Civ3. I haven't yet had any of those galley juggling moments where I try to get two units from one galley to another, but end up with one unit in each galley, endlessly swapping places :lol:
I wonder if a good interface would be to allow one to waypoint units across fortified ships. Indeed, give transport ships their own fortify command whereby they lose all movement points until awoken. Instead, their transport capacity becomes a variable which reduces by 1 every time a unit hops across them. Hmm, interesting... <Paperbeetle strokes his beard, muttering, lost in thought>

Normal, please.

Epic is just too long. In an epic game everything leans toward military solution. Think about it. It takes longer (in turns) to build units and build improvments, so if an enemy gets into your territory and starts destroying things, he can do it at a faster rate relative to unit and improvment building. So, you need to build more units up front to counter the possible enemy attacks. And, he needs to build more units earlier to stock up for an attack. The game doen't feel balanced.

Normal, please.

Actually, I didn't. I felt sure the designers would have removed this in Civ4 so I didn't even test it. As you say, chaining is effective in saving game time, but cumbersome. I don't know whether to be happy or sad that chaining is still around.

Ship chaining is NOT possible in Civ4 as it was in Civ3. The act of waking a unit and moving to another ship counts as a full turn of movement. You can only jump from one ship to another, not over and over ala Civ3.

Go test it.

StanNP :cool:

Ship chaining is NOT possible in Civ4 as it was in Civ3. The act of waking a unit and moving to another ship counts as a full turn of movement. You can only jump from one ship to another, not over and over ala Civ3.

You can chain between any number of ships. As I wrote above, I've done this many times. Other people have done it too. Do you think we're all lying?

It's true that loading a unit onto a ship uses all of its movement. But a unit with no movement remaining can still be activated and loaded onto another ship. And again, and again, and again.

As I wrote above, I've done this many times. Other people have done it too. Do you think we're all lying?

Of course not. I just remember it not working for me.

Ship chaining is NOT possible in Civ4 as it was in Civ3. The act of waking a unit and moving to another ship counts as a full turn of movement. You can only jump from one ship to another, not over and over ala Civ3.

Go test it.

StanNP :cool:

Moving ot loading? If loading does not count as a full turn movement, than I do not see a difference with civ3 (cannot test it at the moment)

Moving ot loading? If loading does not count as a full turn movement, than I do not see a difference with civ3 (cannot test it at the moment)

Loading does expend all remaining movement (as has been stated many times above). But it does not require that you have any movement left.

I don't like epic because it took me 50 hours to finish gotm2! The game was too much of chore. Is there an award most hours for playing one game?

I spent 3hrs more for 4otm2 than for 4otm1 and IMHO this was not so much due to epic, but lakes. I do not think that the game speed significantly affects the real time. If your research is slower, it means only that you can win earlier in terms of tech tree.

I don't like epic because it took me 50 hours to finish gotm2! The game was too much of chore. Is there an award most hours for playing one game?


I am in the same boat as you. It is taking me FOREVER to finish this game. I play 1-3 sessions of it as time allows each day. I am pretty sure i am well past 50 hours. However, unlike you, I LOVE that part. The thing I do not love is going to these forums and not being able to read the spoiler 2 thread. We need a spoiler thread for each era.

Also 2 GOTM's would rock. One built for fast play and one built to take some serious time. This would accomadate more people and keep up the huge interest in these games. The spoilers for the fast games could be opened quickly while the spoilers for the long games could be opened later. Too much work?

Or an official "practice" GOTM released when the first screen is released. This game would have all the same or similar settings the the GOTM. This would let all the players play and openly discuss the practice game in the down time in between the official game without the spoiler blues.

I spent 3hrs more for 4otm2 than for 4otm1 and IMHO this was not so much due to epic, but lakes. I do not think that the game speed significantly affects the real time. If your research is slower, it means only that you can win earlier in terms of tech tree.

I tend to agree with you somewhat. As Shillen noted, all the ice tiles at the top and bottom of the Lakes map means you have to pretty much have to either control ~90% of the 'useful' tiles, or else build a lot of useless ice cities to reach the domination limit. That means you probably had to take over at least 1 extra civ than on a different sort of map. If you tend to micromanage everything like I do, that adds a great deal of time to the game. I'd like to see what epic feels like on a continents map for comparison.

@Grogs - I almost post a reply here, when I realized that I am about to commit a crime :nono: . See my reply in the 2nd 4OTM2 spoiler, post #46.

Definitely Epic - maybe even Marathon. I always finish the GOTM around the 11th, 12th (sometimes earlier).

I spent 3hrs more for 4otm2 than for 4otm1 and IMHO this was not so much due to epic, but lakes.

I agree that playing lakes added time to the game. How many hours did you spend on gotm2?

25 versus 22 in 4otm1

I voted to "mix it up a bit".

I wasn't able to finish gotm1 or many early games due to v1.09 crashes (the late game variety) that seemed to have resolved themselves in v1.52 so I can't compare. However, gotm2 does feel longer, but maybe it's the map script.

In any case, just as we mostly use Standard sized maps in Civ3 with a few small or large thrown in for variety, I would also prefer that Civ4 gotm use Standard/normal size/speed maps most of the time (maybe 30-40%) and then change it up with large/epic or small/fast maps (or other combo's). imho, by keeping size/speed variable along with difficulty level & map scripts, Civ4 gotm will stay fresh for a very long time :)

I voted Epic. I have played at least one game on all speeds, and I prefer Epic well above any of the other options. It just seems more balanced. On normal it seems like any time I want to build a unit, I'm sitting there debating whether to wait 4 turns for the next tech that will make that unit obsolete. On Normal, every game seems to be a race to space. :rolleyes:

At least with Epic, you have more of a choice of which way you want the game to go, instead of being pressured into one due to time restraints.

I probably wouldn't play any GOTM on other speeds, unless I was very bored. I just don't enjoy the other speeds nearly as much, but that's just personal preference.

Time played is more of a factor of how much you MM (or leave your comp on). I think my GOTM2 says 65+ hrs logged, but only was really about 5-10hrs. It's very possible to play quick games on Epic speed, unless you're just sitting there trying to milk every point you can.

Milking games is actually one of the reasons I decided to stop playing GOTM's back in C3, along with other nonsense like palace jumps and...ship chaining. Got tired of seeing all the "Best" players pulling these stunts in their reports.