This is not right - Civ5 AI

There are a number of factors. There are great modders for Civ5 and the game is theoretically very moddable and there are some notable mods even if the platform is so slow to work with. I think another factor is that the AI in Civ4 intuitively felt like it could be improved rapidly. The AI in civ5 needs so much work. The AI is playable but 1UPT means the workload on the coding is ten times what it was in Civ4 (I mean that).

Glider1, to quote heisenberg (breaking bad):

"You're god damn right!"

The issue isn't just telling the AI what to do. It's telling it what to do within a timeframe that doesn't murder turn times and at the same time retains the ability to support mods.

What some players who don't make mods don't understand about the AI in this game is that it is not hard-wired. The AI has to work in a game where the rules can easily be changed, and to do this it is has to independently weigh every unit, building, technology, and terrain feature. It's not just a matter of telling the AI that National College is a good building and you should go there and build that right away because depending on the mod "National College" may not even be a thing or the requirements for building it could be different.

Anyway, I think complaints about the AI at higher difficulties not playing "smarter" rather than with "more cheats" kind of shift the goalpost. AI is an obstacle in this game in the same way that flying turtles and bottomless pits are obstacles in Super Mario World. If Mario falls off a ledge or runs into a spike trap there is only so far an argument about unfair advantages of the AI can go.

Socratatus said:

Now due to greed (and much in part to stuff like Origin and Steam) modders are much more restricted in what they can do, even though they get repeatedly told they`re playing the `most moddable game ever`.

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The use of Steam or Origin has ZERO impact on the moddability of a game. It's up to the developer and the publisher to decide if modding is allowed and to what degree.

Civ 4 is available on Steam and can be modded just like the non-steam version. There are tons of games on Steam that have a very active mod community.

I understand that the switch to Steam made many "old school" players upset, but blaming Steam for the moddability or lack thereof based on your own dislike of the platform is not a good argument.