First Impressions

Two questions.

1. How much of an impact does religion have on the diplomacy? How important is it when forming diplomatic blocks and how long does it take to set-up and have an influence on diplomacy?

some impact but not as bad as civ4

2. Is Espionage the disappointment that some of us feared it would be? Is stealing techs and plans everything you can do with it?

city-state coups and rigging elections are other things you can do
 
Started Game with Boudicca, have three near forests and found Uluru close by. Chose one with nature, so now that tile's worth 2 food and 10 faith. Plan is to get a Settler ASAP and then settle next to it and try to get the first religion. Only got a little way before sleepy time, will play more later today.
 
Well, my own first impressions...

I've played a game to the cusp of the Renaissance Era as Boudicca.

She's a Religion house. Assuming she starts next to a Forest, she is nearly guaranteed the first Pantheon (as you might expect). If you focus _at all_ on Religion, you will almost certainly get the first Religion.

I was lucky, and also got Sinai early (8 Faith).

But, to give an idea of how much Faith I'm producing, I believe I'm making about 80-85 per turn with about 6-7 cities. My Religion has +1 Culture / Pasture, +1 Happiness / Following City, Holy Warriors, Monasteries, and Faster Spread (I started with Incense and Pastures all around me).

Pictish Warriors aren't the bomb, but they're certainly useful. Holy Warriors is, IMO, _the_ Warmongering Follower Belief. Consider that, currently, Trebuchets cost me ~400 Faith (IIRC).

I will echo other people's comments here. First, Happiness is easier to come by (but note my Founding Belief), and Money is harder. I think the Money stems from the fact that you have Shrines and Temples costing upkeep as well as your Culture buildings.

Also, something else I've noted is that Religion spread snowballs, and it's very noticeable. My capital was the only city for a while, and then in the space of 10 turns, the dominoes fell on the others. It's quite effective, and Missionaries work very well.

Finally, something to note, personality-wise, is that Theodora (Byzantines) is a wonder-spammer.
 
You cannot liberate the city-states she marries, as explained in one of the introductory videos; they no longer exist as city-states. The marriage costs her though (dowry?) and how much is probably be where any balance adjustments would be made.

Kind of depressing, I always drop city states to half reccomended number!! Guess I will have to remove her folder. IMHO this was a toast UA. Really seems to ruin the point of city states. A Human player, will run rough shod over AI or Human if they can focus on gold.
 
The fact that it costs her is kind of negated by how much gold the AI tends to have on higher difficulties though, surely. If she can ally and marry CSs in the same turn she can expand her empire at a snap with enough gold.

This sounds like something in major need of an early balancing patch.
 
Austria scares me. How exactly does the marriage thing work? I take it she can only do it to cities which she's already allied with, but can she ally with them and 'marry' them in the same turn?

Black: In fact, the Austrian unique achievement on Steam is to do exactly that: Ally and Marry a CS in a single turn.
 
Ed Beach not have access to Civ IV's audio files concerning Religions?

Little put down that "Embassy" is not an actual unit and just a first encounter.
 
On watching MadDjinn's CS/diplo video it looks like this is a new special thing that Militaristic CSs do; they will give you UUs from Civs which aren't in the game provided you have researched the technology. There was an example in the video where one CS window mentioned that it had the technology for Keshiks.

Definitely. I was playing as Byzantium and Budapest kept gifting me Conquistadors (Spain was not in the game). Very disconcerting at first but it was very useful for expanding to other continents.
 
My first impressions:

Played a fairly normal game: Byzantium/Theodora, Standard size, Continents Plus (so all the city states are on islands off of the main continents), Normal speed. Prince difficulty.

Austria and the Netherlands were on the same continent as me, but the Netherlands grew wary of my cities near their border and asked me to stop settling near them. I agreed and after about 20-30 turns a message popped up saying that I had now fulfilled their request. Granted, I still got the negative diplomacy attitude of "They covet your lands," but nothing negative related to the promise to not settle near them.

As for religion, I went with Buddhism and a Pantheon belief that gave me production from fishing boats, as I had lots of crabs. :lol: Religion really does drive your future settlement considerations as you think about ways to leverage your pantheon abilities. I went straight to settling coastal cities as I knew that I could get that benefit.

Maybe other reviewers can bear this out, but there seems to be a difference between civs keeping their own religion and spreading it to others. I found that Maria Theresa never sent a Hindu missionary to either William or me - any Hindus in my lands were there because of city pressure. She did use inquisitors to remove Buddhists from her capital and other cities as well. Conversely, I later met Boudica on another continent, and she had spread Confucianism far and wide to two other civilizations as well as two city states. Perhaps some civs are satisfied with leveraging their own religion while others seek to convince you of their awesomeness?

The AI is much better and defending tactically, though strategically it can still be a bit lacking. William successfully repelled two waves of my attacks on Amsterdam, :sad: making sure to pick off the most wounded of my troops, but he had only placed two or three units at Utrecht, despite knowing full well that most of my troops were there with his message of "I see your troops..." Navally, the AI also focused down my weaker embarked units instead of attacking my powerful dromons.

Small notes:

  • My missionary that was captured by barbarians stayed a missionary when I recaptured him. He didn't turn into a worker or something, thankfully.
  • Missionaries can even spread religion while embarked. (Say, to a 1-tile island city state)
  • AIs only get pissed off at you if they founded their own religion and you're trying to supplant that. Though the Netherlands did not like me (as he had DoW'ed me) he and Sweden both accepted Buddhism without any problems as they didn't even have a pantheon. Hindu Austria on the other hand actively purged their cities of Buddhists each time new ones popped up in their cities.
  • Some city-states have "project" quests, in which gold gifts give 20% or so more influence. It lasts for about 20 turns and is similar in effect to one of the starting social policies in the Patronage tree.
  • Units gifted by friendly militaristic city states now are delivered directly to the closest tile owned by you. This is probably because open borders are much harder to get now, requiring an Embassy and correct me if I'm wrong, Civil Service. It's fairly late especially compared to the earlier unlock at Writing. It's a nice improvement over having to transport them over an ocean or mountains.
  • I'm not sure, but it seems that Friendships are now more "durable" than before. I wiped out the Netherlands from the map, an action in vanilla Civ V that would usually result in whatever friends I had denouncing me, saying that it was a mistake to work with me. Not so in this run through - my friends Sweden and Carthage had no new negative attitudes towards me, though the antagonistic Ethiopia started to see me as a war-mongering menace.
 
I'm sure the answer is no, but is there a ''no espionage'' button in the advanced settings?

If not, let's hope someone mods it in :)

There is! When I started my game this morning I noticed it in the Advanced Setup options. There is also an option to eliminate unit movement animations, like how it is in multiplayer. I recon this won't be very popular.
 
Food for thought:

Spoiler :


-50% attrition
 
I am sure it will be either balanced later by official patch or here by Thal ;)

Probably Thal's work will be patched in :)

The fact that it costs her is kind of negated by how much gold the AI tends to have on higher difficulties though, surely. If she can ally and marry CSs in the same turn she can expand her empire at a snap with enough gold.

This sounds like something in major need of an early balancing patch.

Even before G+K, the AI gold bonuses are problematic in benefiting successful civs too much and unsuccessful civs too little. The bonus should be higher when AI is losing gold and lower\eliminated when AI is making a lot of gold. Seems like Austria's UA simply makes the existing problem all the more obvious.

There is also an option to eliminate unit movement animations, like how it is in multiplayer. I recon this won't be very popular.

Even better, the option is in the in-game menu :D

I keep combat animations but took away movement.
 
Actually, the answer is YES. There is a "No Espionage" on the advanced options.

No "No Religion" option, though. Athiests just have to deal, I guess. haha

Awesome! That's actually the best news yet, this will be much fun :)
 
The AI uses embarkation defense a lot better.

Here's an Austrian Mobile Sam attempting an amphibious attack on my artillery.

Spoiler :


using the frigate as a meatshield cover, it kept poking my artillery to red and then when I withdrew the piece, it went after my infantry. Only after its escort was destroyed and the remaining frig was in deep red... it withdrew into the fog of war.
 
What's the upgrade path for missile cavalry in G&K?

What do Chariots Archers/Horse archers upgrade into? I believe all units are meant to to have a viable upgrade/promotion progression now but I'm not sure where these are meant to go.
 
Haven't played yet but very happy to see that they kept the 'No espionage' in. Also, as I feared, happiness does not seem to be an issue in decision-making anymore. :(
 
-Diplomacy makes much more sense now, but people will go from being at war with you to Friendly in a single turn still. There's room for improvement, but it's a big step forward from Civ V vanilla.
It's not like that doesn't happen irl :lol:
 
I'm still working on my first game. Got in an hour last night and an hour at my lunchbreak at work. Continents (cold/wet), Standard time, Standard map (with 10 civs and 18 CityStates), Prince level. I'm Japan.

I had a challenging start. All marsh and jungle with Citrus (in the jungle) and Sugar in the marsh. I needed a lot of technology to get my luxuries, and I couldn't move well. So far I've met Carthage (met Dido first), Denmark, Persia, Polynesia, Germany. The AI's been really quick to be friends. It always makes me flinch whenever Bismark claims he wants friendship.

I quickly discovered the Celts must be in my game because some AI *belted* through getting a Pantheon and a Religion. I think they had a pantheon on turn 4. I built a Shine as fast as I could (which was difficult, because my area has *very* low production), and founded a Pantheon that gives me culture in jungles (which I hope to combine with trading posts [man, they come really late now!] and university science).

Arabia seemed to be having some trouble. As I passed by them, I noticed a Settler who seemed to be running from a Brute. I did a quick DoW on Arabia, took the Settler and killed the Brute. Arabia didn't seem to see that coming and had a worker exposed, which I gladly added to my workforce. Peace was quickly offered. I don't think Arabia ever recovered; when I mopped them up later with Swordsman, tiles weren't improved and his military was laughable.

Combat has been noticably more difficult, though it's nice I can attack with my damaged units and not worry too much about them being one-shotted in return (plus...Bushido!). You can still one-shot a Barb archer with a warrior, but without the anti-Barb bonus, a Civ's archer will survive even a swordsman. Cities...wow. Arabia's capital only had 17 defense and a archer, and I barely managed to take it with 5 swordsman [14 attack] and 2 archers. One of my most promoted swordsman died right at the end. I would strongly advise taking a siege weapon to take cities. Even my fortified units were being blasted to bits, and had to fall back. I took Arabia's weak capital without seige, but I'm pretty sure I couldn't take a city like my capital without one.

Killing Barbs with Honor has rewarded me with a ton of culture. In general, culture seems easier to come by. Plus, my continent has a ton of CityStates on the interior (like Zanzibar and Milan, which are totally my buddies). Killing a Barb encampment will make nearby CityStates supremely happy. If it's on the CS's border, you'll have an instant ally. The quests are fun and I won a 30 turn tech completion challenge (and surprisingly lost a 30 turn culture challenge to Germany). Influence seems to dwindle very quickly, however. Money can be used in a pinch for influence and is still reasonably effective. I also easily demanded tribute from Cape Town, but with Singapore - even with 3 swordsman and a composite bowman in their territory - they just refused to capitulate. Some CSs may be more diffcult to bully than others.

As I left my game, I've built the Great Library and the Oracle and I've hit the Medieval era. I seem to be a leap ahead on science, but it's a nice, slower pace. I have 3 cities and am about to found my forth (I didn't realize how much I rely on the Liberty free settler, which has been moved to later in the tree!). As I was on my way, I've discovered sneaky "friendly" Bismark seems to have a substantial army hiding in the fog of war and seemingly heading my direction. The AI has been smart overall (except for Arabia), but not overly/suicidally aggressive. The composition of what I've seen of his army seems sound. He just asked for Open Borders, though, so hopefully he's passing through on his way to Denmark...won't count on it, though!

That's my game so far, hope it entertains some folks.
 
You cannot liberate the city-states she marries, as explained in one of the introductory videos; they no longer exist as city-states. The marriage costs her though (dowry?) and how much is probably be where any balance adjustments would be made.

That seriously needs to be changed. You should ALWAYS be able to return a city to its original state.
 
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