"New guy" feeling lost

Hi,

I am reliatively new to CIV 5. Relatively means that I picked up game just after release, and deemed it unplayable game for morons (finished it once, easy levels, etc).

Now after 2 years, few patches and expansion I came back to the game and see how mistaken I was...

Hovewer the thing is:

I was playing CIV 1 during old days on Amiga, and CIV 2 a lot like decade ago (was comming back for short bursts of gaming later on). The thing is that basic strategy in those games was to GRAB AS MUCH LAND AS POSSIBLE and POPULATE IT WITH CITIES! More cities=more production+more rescharch+more money+MORE POWER

I hated CIV 3, don't remember 4. Hovewer now it seems that game actually benefits people who create FEW cities (4!?), which is really strange for me. After all major empires should be big. And so called cultural victories (IE dominating entire globe with your nation's culture) should not be possible for countries the size of Monaco (maybe I am going to far... 4 cities.... Moldavia? - don't want to offend anymone). I am VERY happy with hexes, culture, and one-unit-per-chex mechanics (I was proposing this when playing CIV 1! ), but now maps feel empty

You could always try overpopulating maps. I almost always play with more civs than the map recommends.

I`ll agree it is strange how you get more unhappy people the bigger a city gets. I can understand with captured cities, but your own cities?

Perhaps it`s realistic.

Also if I am not mistaken:

More cities= more unhappiness
Definately more cities= higher cost of cultural policies, and resarch.

Wide empires already get much larger boosts to science, gold, and faith, so I'd hardly call playing small advantageous. That being said, with the global happiness mechanism in CIV limiting growth, and thereby production as well, small empires can actually compete with their larger counterparts.

All in all, despite some "unrealistic" mechanisms, I'd call it balanced and you'll get more fun out of the game by learning how to play both styles.

It's not so much that small empires are preferred, just viable compared to large ones.

It's very problematic to compare scales between civ and the real world. One reason is that Earth is very big compared to a human, so big that our instincts about size start to fail us. Another is just that it is a game and has to make concessions to reality in favor of good gameplay.

Some things to consider vis a vis civ maps and the real world:
If the entire nation of Monaco is a city with two rings of tiles, a standard sized world map (including ocean) is the size of the island nation of Malta (land area only, not the water around Malta).
If Monaco is a single tile on a standard map, the whole world is a bit larger than Luxembourg
Monaco is a bad example, it's exceptionally tiny. If the five boroughs of New York City are a city and 2 rings of tiles then the world is a bit smaller than Nepal.
If NYC is a single tile the world (ocean included) is the size of India.
If the entire New York City Metropalitan Area (pretty similar in size to Moldova) is the size of a single tile on a huge map then finally you're in about the right ballpark for the map to be comparable to Earth, on an order of magnitude level anyway. You're still only about 60% of the way there.
On the flip side, Athens was just one city and it stopped maintaining its place as a cultural center thousands of years ago. New York is just one city, and a young one at that. How far flung is their cultural influence?


It's interesting to think about what a cultural victory would look like in the real world. In particular, it is interesting to think about what one that is partially complete would look like. There would certainly be a fuzzy line between a cultural and diplomatic victory. Political philosophy is a part of culture and legitimate democracies don't have any reason to go to war with each other. There's a decent argument to be made that America is partway to a cultural victory. America is a big place, but a lot of it isn't really the source of the culture. Most of the American style and philosophy that is spreading throughout the world is coming from a relatively limited part of the country.
For that matter, is it even American culture? It might be more accurate to say that France is on their way to a cultural victory and America is just a part that is farther along in the assimilation process. If one group puts their own slight twist on the culture then keeps passing it along that credit should probably go to to original. Maybe credit actually goes to Rome or Greece or Athens.
That's all getting off on quite a tangent, but the idea is that a cultural victory coming from a civilization of only a few cities is not that far flung.

I think using reality makes a game more interesting and even easier to play.

We all know reality instinctively, so why go against that?

The best games for me are the ones that makes realistic sense. That way I can just play the game without reading the instruction or going on a website wasting hours trying to figure out how the weird game works cos it ain`t logical.

Gameplay is about intuitiveness and logic, not making it so convoluted that nothing makes sense intuitively.

Wide empires don't have higher research costs.

In fact they tend to have better science normally than taller empires. Also if you have Gods and Kings - Faith and religion favor wide empires meaning you can use it to a stronger degree if you expand

I will try to play as large empire today on large map. Let's see how this will play out.

Remember to denounce and declare war on everyone!

I had a lot of trouble keeping wide empires happy before Gods and Kings, but there are some good options for supplementing your happiness in G+K (namely mercantile city-states and some religious beliefs) and I no longer find it to be an issue, as long as I keep track of my sources of happiness.

As others have pointed out, very wide empires are just as viable as smaller ones. It's just a benefits to cost analysis. Wide empires certainly have an edge when it comes to religion and science.

Socratatus said:

I`ll agree it is strange how you get more unhappy people the bigger a city gets. I can understand with captured cities, but your own cities?

Click to expand...

I've always thought of this as representing administrative costs and corruption. In a wide empire, you can't as easily supply resources and entertainment.

1) Social Policies are CRITICAL. Check them out and figure out what you want (Hint, you want the free Settler and worker). Increase your culture at every opportunity.

2) Only build two cities. Then when your nearest neighbor attacks you, take HIS cities and puppet them.

3) Go from there, but keep an eye on happiness before grabbing or starting a new city.