I'm VERY pleased with it. I find that, despite a few little glitches, the AI really puts up a fight, unlike Civ II. What do the rest of you Mac civvies think?

mac civvies - isn't that a type of VD? :p

Mac civvers?

Mac civnuts?

Intelligent and discriminating people who play Civ III on the world's finest computers?

Am I the only one actually playing this sucker? Come on, folks!

I'm playing on a borrowed PC. My iBook SE 466 doesn't support the required resolution. :(
When I get a new computer (not for a couple of months), I'm in.

I'm playing it.... waaaay too much. I almost wish they had a few major 'stopping' points via a movie or something. I might be inclined to put it away till tomorrow instead of playing 300 turns or so until 4 in the morning.

I'm new to this type of game. The closest I've played to it was the original simcity.

I have a question... what is the resource I'm short on, or the action I've failed to complete when the city 'stops' growing?


Also, what is the significance of the color changing from yellow and then red (I know it's not good... but don't quite understand what exactly is wrong) on the city's population total?

Still figuring out the little details....

Aoxomoxoa

I'm playing it.... waaaay too much. I almost wish they had a few major 'stopping' points via a movie or something. I might be inclined to put it away till tomorrow instead of playing 300 turns or so until 4 in the morning.

I'm new to this type of game. The closest I've played to it was the original simcity.

I have a question... what is the resource I'm short on, or the action I've failed to complete when the city 'stops' growing?


Also, what is the significance of the color changing from yellow and then red (I know it's not good... but don't quite understand what exactly is wrong) on the city's population total?

Still figuring out the little details....

Aoxomoxoa

I LOVE it. Massively addictive and the "just-one-more-turn" syndrome is worse than ever.

Aoxo - if your city stops growing, there are two possible reasons. Lack of food is one - go to the city screen and check that there's a surplus (whole loaves on the right instead of chomped ones on the left). The other is lack of a certain building. To grow past size 6, a city must either be adjacent to FRESH water or have an Aqueduct (research Construction). To grow past size 12, a city must have a Hospital (research Sanitation, an early Industrial tech).
And if the number is white, the city is growing. Yellow, no growth. Red, starving and the population is falling.

Thanks for the reply. I also read the manual a little closer (that thing reminds me of the 'Handbook for the Dead' from BeetleJuice... and discovered I could move the citizens of a town to work on a more productive square. Who could have thunk it!! :D

Aoxomoxoa

Okay gfeier, I'm in.

I've had Civ3 for a month now and its fantastic. I'm currently playing my third game, first at warlord level. A game is taking me about 1.5 weeks, playing everytime I get a chance.

I must confess, I'm playing far too conservatively. Each of my first two games at chieftain (first - Iroquois; second - Persians) I won on total points. So far in game three (Japanese) I'm leading in points by about 200 over England. However, I had to take out Persia to control a second continent. In my first few battles against them, the Persians punished a wave of 10 cavalry. I was thinking, "Oh ****." Fortunately, I had MPPs w/ England and the Zulu and later India. This took its toll on Persia. England took out Persia's last city.

Now, I share the continent w/ England (3 cities) and India (1 city). A Britich city of 7 just flipped to me, and it contained JS Bach Cathedral. I love this feature. Im expecting the other cities to flip soon.

To win other than through total points, I'm definitely gonna have to start asserting myself. However, I prefer not to start fights.

Game-play is really fine. Only in my first game did I notice any slow down between turns. I've experienced zero crashes, but I am suffering from the common problems --- inconsistent music and special effects. I'm looking forward to the patch w/ stack movement, etc.

First, Civ 3 is terrific! :goodjob:

The only bugs I know of are the common ones already listed in great numbers on all the forums...Music, sound effects is one of the biggest to me right now...

As far as gameplay, Civ 3 is a HUGE improvement over Civ 2. The AI plays "smarter" and though it's still not a human opponent, it gives you a pretty good challenge during war. I still remember the amazement in my very first game when I saw 35 Aztec warriors come screaming across my border, not blindly, but probing my defences looking for weak spots, just like I would do...no more 5 tanks take a country stuff here. You have to think, you have to coordinate your attack. Bombard, bombard, bombard. Much closer to real warfare.

One thing I could do without, or at least have toned down a bit is city-flipping. It's just not very realistic. I know, I know...it's a game, but when someone has, say, 2 armies stationed in a city and suddenly it flips and those armies are nowhere to be found :rolleyes: ...this begins to smack of AI cheating. I'm not saying it should be impossible, just VERY difficult. Imagine the French resistance trying to retake Paris on their own during WW2...it would not have happened.

It sounds as though the next patch is going to answer many of these types of game play issues, which really aren't unbearable and just require a new strategy as does this whole game (as I find out in my first couple of games, "This ain't your Daddy's Civilization!") :groucho:

Overall the game is great and just like Beamup said...you just have to play one more turn...I can squeeze in just one more...after all, I can work on 3 hours of sleep...

ok, 2 hours...:sleep:

Do you guys have city flipping frequently? I NEVER had one. I have currently three Roman cities inside my borders, one of them completly inside; they have been taken from the Zulus, so they have nothing inside but Zulus guys. I have a much greater culture than any other civ; I have build a LOT of improvments in nearby cities, so they are culturally smashed: 10-12 of their 21 squares are mine... still no switch, and this is from more than 30 turns!

Side note to Rustus M.: actually Paris HAS BEEN retaken by resisters by the end of WW2, before allied troops reach it (but after 6th june); I'm French, so I know about that ;). So switching occur in real history (and there are other examples).

I've experienced enough city flipping to know I really like the feature. Probably because I've never had one of my cities to flip. I have had conquered cities flip, but thanks to some threads I read before I got the game, I was able to take them right back with my troops stationed just outside the city.

Now I simply build settlers and workers to supplant conquered citizens, by adding them to the city. I've been thinking about giving away, or selling, my nationals (workers) to civs that have "flippable" cities near my lands in hopes they're added to their cities. This might only be feasible during the later stages of a game where the civ's lands are developed and their workers are sleeping. What do you think?

Originally posted by dojoboy
Now I simply build settlers and workers to supplant conquered citizens, by adding them to the city.

I basically reduce the city I'm about to conquer to 2-3 foreigners by repeated bombardment before the conquest, and after qonquest, I either starve the city or build (foreign) workers or settlers from the conquered city after the conquest. I use foreign workers for free labor, and occasionally if I need to get rid of 2-pop units, I build settlers and simply disband them in another city for shields. This reduces the chances of flipping.

I've been thinking about giving away, or selling, my nationals (workers) to civs that have "flippable" cities near my lands in hopes they're added to their cities. This might only be feasible during the later stages of a game where the civ's lands are developed and their workers are sleeping. What do you think?

Neat idea dojoboy! If you can get this to work, post it to the thread "Sneaky peacetime tactics" I think in Strategy and Tips, and see what others think...

Originally posted by tlr
Side note to Rustus M.: actually Paris HAS BEEN retaken by resisters by the end of WW2, before allied troops reach it (but after 6th june); I'm French, so I know about that ;) .

Look, the resistance rose up because they saw the inevitable...the Allies were marching in force toward Paris and the Germans were losing battle after battle. With the success of operation 'Dragoon' on August 15, 1944 on the southern coast of France, nearly 200,000 German troops were "pinched" in the 40 mile long, 11 mile wide Argentan-Falaise gap. Hitler would describe that day as "the worst of his life". He knew the end was nigh. The German military had been severely weakened by the time the French resistance began their uprising. They were able to succeed because of the massive losses and defeats the Germans were suffering in Western and Southern France. The point? Without the Allied invasion and subsequent military pressure the German grip on your beautiful city would have grown tighter and tighter. It "flipped" because of military factors...not culture.

What does all of this have to do with city-flipping? It's based soley on culture and military presence in the city has little or no influence.

I won't rehash what I've already stated in another thread on this subject, just click the link below if you want to read it.
click here for full post (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=16438&perpage=20&pagenumber=2)

The cities I have had flip have done so, despite being FULL of massive numbers of troops (compared to the population of the city) and flipped back to a civ that had far less culture than my civ. Going by Firaxis' model on culture the Native Americans should have been running in droves to join up with the much more "cultured" cities of "the white man". It just doesn't work that way.

Originally posted by Rustus Maximus


The cities I have had flip have done so, despite being FULL of massive numbers of troops (compared to the population of the city) and flipped back to a civ that had far less culture than my civ.


I did not experiment that. Putting a large number (ten or so) of troops in just-conquered cities always prevented flipping for me.
Anyway, if I understand well, the 1.17 patch is also supposed to correct that:
From the readme
* It is now possible to completely suppress a city's cultural reversion with enough military units.

I think the graphic is great, although I really hope the new patch will speed up the game. I tried to disable Quartz, but the game crashes in the middle ages :(
The game is potentially very good, but I have a few complains (maybe our fellows PC-maniacs already posted something similar):
1 - I want to be able to raise taxes as it was in Civ, Civ II and SMAC. In the real world Governments raise taxes without being forced to found new cities or develop the terrain.
2 - The idea of cultural influence is great :goodjob: , but it should not constitute the border of a civilization. Moreover, the invention of television should increase the chance of influencing another civ with tv.
3 - As in SMAC I'd like to be able to choose not only the type of government, but also the type of economy and society.
4 - Some scientific breakthroughs are almost useless, e.g. printing press. The invention of printing press should promote a big impulse to culture civ-wise by building the Gutenberg Small Wonder. It makes sense, doesn't it?
5 - I want to be able to buy tiles of terrain or entire regions with cities in them. After all, USA purchased Alaska from Russia and Louisiana from France. No war, just business.

OK, now it's time to play. maybe I'll think of something more. Anyway, in the general forum some guys had excellent ideas to improve the game.

Originally posted by Cincinnatus

1 - I want to be able to raise taxes as it was in Civ, Civ II and SMAC. In the real world Governments raise taxes without being forced to found new cities or develop the terrain.

You can raise your income in the Domestic Advisor screen - at the expense of either happiness or research. Page 184 of the manual.

Originally posted by gfeier


You can raise your income in the Domestic Advisor screen - at the expense of either happiness or research. Page 184 of the manual.


Thank you for your advice gfeier (there are also the tax collectors/specialized workers), but in the real world a government can raise taxes without touching research or happiness, especially if you start from zero happiness. I want to be able to raise taxes to finance more research and/or happiness. Of course there must be a limit before people start rioting. Indeed, happiness and taxes may be somewhat linked, but research must be independent.
US (the real one, not the civ in the game) recently decided to raise their investments in scientific research, without touching taxes. Eventually they will have to raise taxes to keep up with the expenses for research and the war. What I mean is that BOTH taxes and research go up. Maybe happiness will decrease, but they do not start from zero. Actually, happiness should be the consequence of collecting high or low taxes, not the cause.
I'm sorry, but if Civ III was meant to simulate the real world better than previous civs, well, it did not work out quite well.
OK the AI is way better, but some concepts in this version are wrong.
Luckily there's always room for improvement.

Civ isn't necessarily meant to accurately simulate the real world. Where convenient, they made it do so, but in any case where realism and gameplay conflicted, they chose gameplay. That's just the philosophy of the product - it's a game, not a simulation.

I got my copy of my Civ3 about a week and a half ago and so far I've loved it. I've been playing solidly for the whole time and I'm supposed to be job hunting! Anyone out there looking for an Enironmental Manager?

I'm desparate to get Korn 468's modpack installed but it will not seem to run on the Mac. If any Mac user out there has any advice or has tried it, whether the succeeded or not, I'd love to hear what you think and how you did it. I'd also love to have the Editor but that should come soon I hear.

I agree with the comments that the AI realy gives you a better fight and is a far more strategic opponent.

My present game is at Warlord level and started with eight opponents including me, on a large pangaea. I am the Russians and I love those Cossacks. We're down to six civs now and we all have well defined cohesive civilizations. (having the borders is a superb idea). It's the mid nineteenth century and while I am the most technically advanced having just got airpower, I am far from the largest.

After years of posturing China and I finally went head to head and despite having infantry and artillery to their riflemen and scattering of cannon AND the Cossack as my UU, their cavalry ran rings round me. I had fallen straight back into my entrenched Civ2 tactics. It was only by some fast thinking, creative use of that artillery and remembering to go to a wartime footing that I only lost one city though that was a strategically important one in the heart of the Chinese Civ.

I love the absence of the ZOC, which I always found so restricting, but by God have I been slow in learning to appreciate how it radically changes the way combat works. Given the time span for even the fastest turn it is ridiculous that one unit can trap another for centuries of game time.

The trading screen is very flexible though I get the impression that the AI bargains less from a an urge to get the lowest price possible and more from a willingness to spend anything at all up to the limit of its treasury. Not very realistic.

The graphics are great and I don't even mid the yellow everyone complains about.

i think the game sucks and is less of an advancement over Civ II then the creators would make out. i argue this on four points.
1.) The game is slow, which would be forgiveable if the other three slights were not so bad...
2.) The ability to create true scenarios is a truncated, even a castrated ability compared with Civilization II. There is NO WAY to create a scenario. You can't choose where you want Civ's to appear on the map or begin a game at any point other than the blind beginning. This means that you can't create WWII scenarios, Alexander the Great Scenarios, etc. There is not even an editor for the Mac yet, but i have seen it on the PC and it is laughable in its complexity as it is in its uselessness.
3.) You can't choose your starting locations. i find it especially annoying that when i play the Egyptians i am in North America battling the Incas or in Australia battlling the Americans right next to me. This is nothing short of ridiculous. In Civ II if you chose the world map you could at least have your civ start at a historically accurate location if you chose the world map and have other civs around you that were historically accurate as well.
4.) i think the politcal screen is useless as well. This has been touted as a great advancement over the previous game. i wish they would have went with the superb screens foun in Alpha Centauri. If it is so powerful and advanced, why is it that a player can't negotiate peace between allies. In addition, why can't i engage in a military alliance without going to war? This game is a ridiculous hasbro version of the original--made for children with gummy hands and empty heads. The game is dumbed down and i hate it. i am sick of reading all the rave reviews about the game written by people who obiously never played the first two versions of it.
5.) In addition to the above, PC games are not able to be played on the Mac.

It seems to me that cities flipping should be divided into 2 catagories: Cities flipping during
wartime and cities flipping during peacetime.

During peacetime I can imagine a culturally
impoverished city flipping even with a military presence. This is especially true during the
ancient period...a barbarian city going over to the Romans etc. I feel that if one of your cities is about
to flip there should be some notice that discontent is brewing. This type of flipping should cease once
nationalism is invented except in extreme cases. Doing so in modern times just seems unrealistic. I
can't help but feel that many North Korean cities would have long since flipped otherwise.

During wartime flipping could be a kind of resistance movement. If you have conquered a city of 17 and
fail to garrison it strongly then the 9 resistors should be able to rise up and through out your troops.
Perhaps taking up arms as conscript infantry or riflemen after their success. Right now I'm afraid to leave too many troops in a city for fear that it will flip. I just had a city flip with 3 infantry and 12 or so tanks...

I once had a city flip but had saved the game so I went back to experiment. The city had only one
inhabitant and I had 2 riflemen and 4 tanks in the city. I kept flooding the city with troops but to no
avail..it flipped anyway. I emptied the city of all troops and it didn't. Very odd.

Has anyone noticed the diminishing effectiveness of bombardment as the game progresses? When I first
acquired artillery 5 or 6 would rain down destruction on my foes. Recently I attacked a city of 12 with 28
pieces of artillery and 60% "failed".

TimR

Forget artillery....

Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks Tanks

and more tanks....

Aoxomoxoa

Originally posted by TimR
Doing so in modern times just seems unrealistic. I can't help but feel that many North Korean cities would have long since flipped otherwise.
An excellent example, and right on the money as to why culture flipping is such a crock. Maybe "culture flipping" could be better implemented by giving a bonus to population growth in your empire to represent increased immigration to your gleaming, alabaster cities. More and more I'm realizing that CIV 3 is still in beta in many aspects of the game.
Originally posted by TimR
I kept flooding the city with troops but to no
avail..it flipped anyway. I emptied the city of all troops and it didn't. Very odd.

Yes, how very odd indeed. Logic would dictate that the opposite would be true.
Originally posted by Beamup
Civ isn't necessarily meant to accurately simulate the real world. Where convenient, they made it do so, but in any case where realism and gameplay conflicted, they chose gameplay. That's just the philosophy of the product - it's a game, not a simulation.
Not a simulation? That's exactly what this game is supposed to be. A strategy game based on the simulation of mankind's progress through the ages. "Can you do a better job than the legends of history? Can you build a civilization to stand the test of time?" It's a stylized simulation, but a simulation none the less. Now, if you mean that Firaxis has created an inaccurate simulation of history (when it should be), you're right (ex.: Bombers not being able to destroy naval vessels and vice versa). In a simulation/strategy game like CIV 3, if gameplay compromises realism, then you are going to have problems such as the above example and the numerous others which are being discussed in length on this forum. Such as the tech tree and wacko combat results just to name a couple...

In many ways this game is a step back from CIV 2 and SMAC and that's a shame since both of those games contained elements which would have been great were they included in this version of CIV.

Exactly... it is billed as a simulation. i too think the game is a dramtic step back from Civ II, and this is what makes me so angry. i first started playing this game with Civ I and it was, indeed, the first reason i even purchased a computer to begin with because i so loved the game. What absolutely kills me is that the creators of Civ III took it upon themselves to take out of Civ III advancements in the game of Civ II that added so much to enjoyment of the game... such as the ability to create real world scenarios. Although the graphics are much improved, everything else is completely a setback from Civ II. Then i read all these rave reviews of the game that pawn it off as such a revolutionary game. In Civ II one could pick the map of the earth to play and civs appeared in culturally appropriate locations. The game is billed as a simulation, and even the civs that one plays are from this world, not some other, so why did they only include the map of earth as a scenario rather than built in... and why that extremly annoying misplacement of civs... i detest playing the egyptians right next to good ole abe Lincoln. I don't know, for the life of me, why they did not choose to go with a more robust diplomacy screen... which they could have advanced upon, like that found in SMAC. i mean, it would seem more realistic if i am an ally with one nation that i would not be forced into going to war if i create an alliance with them, but would be able to broker peace between two allies or even a nation i was in peace with. The game does not even give you a choice in going to war if you are allied... it immediately declares war, or if you have a mutual protection pact then you HAVE no choice in the matter. The complete abscene of a scenario editor, which was great in the previous version of the game, is mindboggling to me. The ability to create scenarios and replay world events--which, btw, is how the game is advertised--was one of the things that made this game so darn enjoyable for me. i loved the Civ games and i am truly angered that this one has been billed as Civ III, which indicates an upgrade of sorts, when it is REALLY a DOWNGRADE from the previous version. i am also amazed that in all the game reviews this fact is not mentioned, but instead Firaxis is lauded for having such cool graphics and gummy things in the game, when it has actually been completely DUMMED DOWN. As a loyal fan i feel cheated out of my money, and i feel the creators of the game did not REALLY listen to the fan base that made the game the huge success that it really is. i want the creators to know of this disatisfaction... that it is NOT acceptable, but with all the hype this tendency toward downgrading software and putting it in pretty packaging is still being hailed as so "cool". There is no response area on the Civ site to even send complaints of this sort to... not that it matters, as the rewards and sales surely have given the creators the idea that yet again they have written a successful game... which they have... successfully duped the public that is. oooh i am sooo angry. i have wasted my money only to continue playing Civ II.

Rustus Maximus and Gottesfreunde,
I totally agree with you. As I wrote earlier, Civ III has great AI, graphic and some interesting ideas, but the game itself is not that good. I think that Sid Meier and his crew would have done a better job by merging Civ II and SMAC and adding the improved AI and graphic of Civ III, without changing so much in the game. Merging Civ II and SMAC would have already been a great leap forward.
I acknowledge the great improvement in the technology of the game, highly praised in all the reviews on specialized journals, but the game, as it is now, is not worthy the money I paid for it.
Personally, I think that SMAC is still the top of the line product and I really hope that there will be a Mac OS X upgrade patch.

Originally posted by Cincinnatus
Personally, I think that SMAC is still the top of the line product and I really hope that there will be a Mac OS X upgrade patch.

There already is - check here:

http://homepage.mac.com/boliver

:)
Thank you Brad. I'll try it ASAP