Civ 4 vs. Civ 5?

[YungPtolemy666]

I apologize if this isn't the right place.

I'm deciding between the Civ 4 and Civ 5 as my next Civ game. I've played 2, 3, Revolution, and Alpha Centauri.

In your honest opinion which would you buy if you were only getting 1?

 

[kaspergm]

I'd go with Civ5, but both are great games. It depends, really, on how much you enjoy the "classic" civ war style with stacks of doom. Civ5 deviates much from the classic formula with its 1 unit per tile rule which makes combat radically different. Some people really dislike that, personally I prefer it. Upside is it makes wars more strategic, downside is AI performs fairly badly with it, so it depends on how important AI challenge is for you (personally I enjoy the game even knowing that I could easily steam-roll the AI going full military, if I wanted to).

 

[YungPtolemy666]

I'd go with Civ5, but both are great games. It depends, really, on how much you enjoy the "classic" civ war style with stacks of doom. Civ5 deviates much from the classic formula with its 1 unit per tile rule which makes combat radically different. Some people really dislike that, personally I prefer it. Upside is it makes wars more strategic, downside is AI performs fairly badly with it, so it depends on how important AI challenge is for you (personally I enjoy the game even knowing that I could easily steam-roll the AI going full military, if I wanted to).

I'm more interested by the storytelling, how lush the world I'm creating feels. Which one would you say is more absorbing on a narrative level??

 

[Olodune]

With BNW, and all the patches, Civ 5 is solid strategy game. But so is Civ 4. Both are great games. Civ 5 is tuned to an easier level than Civ 4, so if you are a Civ 3 Deity player that wants a challenging AI I'd lean towards 4. Civ 5 Deity is still challenging compared to most games.

I actually find Civ 5 harder to play well after a couple of beers, so there is a lot of complexity there The skill cap is high.

Probably the biggest difference for a Civ vet is stacks-of-units vs. 1-unit-per-tile. If you like 1UP (similar to Panzer General) go with 5.

Edit: For a lush world I'd go with 5. The world map looks great, and the civilizations allow for more variety in narratives, at the expense of balance.

 

[YungPtolemy666]

With BNW, and all the patches, Civ 5 is solid strategy game. But so is Civ 4. Both are great games. Civ 5 is tuned to an easier level than Civ 4, so if you are a Civ 3 Deity player that wants a challenging AI I'd lean towards 4. Civ 5 Deity is still challenging compared to most games.

I actually find Civ 5 harder to play well after a couple of beers, so there is a lot of complexity there

Probably the biggest difference for a Civ vet is stacks-of-units vs. 1-unit-per-tile. If you like 1UP (similar to Panzer General) go with 5.

So with the 1UPT you can't defend your settlers and workers? Like they have to walk alone with a defender in front of or behind them? Also how does the hex effect gameplay, as far as city territory dispersal and combat? Are there more angles to be attacked from??

 

[Olodune]

So with the 1UPT you can't defend your settlers and workers? Like they have to walk alone with a defender in front of or behind them? Also how does the hex effect gameplay, as far as city territory dispersal and combat? Are there more angles to be attacked from??

Good questions:

1) 1UPT applies to combat units and non-combat units separately. You can protect your settlers and workers

2) It is a hex grid and many units have ranged attacks -> in most cases there are plenty of angles of attack. Some maps have natural choke-points that act as defensible positions, but can be difficult to march through with a large force.

3) These days you can find complete sample games played on Youtube. For Civ 5 I'd recommend Acken (rezoacken on YT), Moriarte (Moriarte1982), or MadDjinn (SBFMadDjinn). Easy way to see some sample GP. I'm not as familiar with Civ 4 and youtube but Chris67132 seems solid.

 

[Olodune]

Also city territory has changed from the grid-based BFC to a ring based system where tiles are aquired 1 at a time. That is a small change that is easy to adjust to.

One more: Tech tree voice-over is much better in 4.

 

[YungPtolemy666]

Good questions:

1) 1UPT applies to combat units and non-combat units separately. You can protect your settlers and workers

2) It is a hex grid and many units have ranged attacks -> in most cases there are plenty of angles of attack. Some maps have natural chock-points that act as defensible positions, but can be difficult to march through with a large force.

3) These days you can find complete sample games played on Youtube. For Civ 5 I'd recommend Acken (rezoacken on YT), Moriarte (Moriarte1982), or MadDjinn (SBFMadDjinn). Easy way to see some sample GP. I'm not as familiar with Civ 4 and youtube but Chris67132 seems solid.

Also city territory has changed from the grid-based BFC to a ring based system where tiles are aquired 1 at a time. That is a small change that is easy to adjust to.

One more: Tech tree voice-over is much better in 4.

Ranged attacks? Like bombardment in Civ 3?

 

[Olodune]

Ranged attacks? Like bombardment in Civ 3?

Yes. Like Artillery in 3, but Civ 5 Ranged allows for total kills. Generally these need to be protected from melee attacks since ranged units are weak to melee.

Edit: It always takes me a while to appreciate the changes in a new Civ. I initially disliked 2 -> SMAC, SMAC -> 3, 3 -> 4, and 4 -> 5. It was actually the 3 -> 4 that took me the longest to adjust to.

 

[YungPtolemy666]

Yes. Like Artillery in 3, but Civ 5 Ranged allows for total kills. Generally these need to be protected from melee attacks since ranged units are weak to melee.

Edit: It always takes me a while to appreciate the changes in a new Civ. I initially disliked 2 -> SMAC, SMAC -> 3, 3 -> 4, and 4 -> 5. It was actually the 3 -> 4 that took me the longest to adjust to.

Interesting.

 

[HughFran]

Don't forget also that cities can defend themselves in Civ 5 and are harder to take than in Civ 4 or earlier. That is another big difference

 

[WackenOpenAir]

It was actually the 3 -> 4 that took me the longest to adjust to.

I never did.
I played civ3 a little too extensively and still think it is an awesome game.
Then i got civ4 and after a few tries threw it out of the window.
A 6 year beak later now i tried civ5, got used to it and am starting to think its actually better than 3 in some aspects. I mean 3 was awesome but it all came down to pure brutal aggression and ICSing 100s of cities no matter your win condition or difficulty level. Even on deity level, it was always about a super early conquest and then if you didnt want to win by conquest, you'd ICS micro 200-500 cities for max science output. Civ5 is so much more balanced and refined.

 

[rschissler]

I'm more interested by the storytelling, how lush the world I'm creating feels. Which one would you say is more absorbing on a narrative level??

Based on that, Civ IV. The Civ V diplomacy, global happiness, embarkation, bland tile and resource yields, long production times, and lack of cottages, kills that feel.

 

[ShakaKhan]

I'm more interested by the storytelling

Civ4 has Leonard Nimoy, civ5 doesn't. 'Nuff said.

 

[YungPtolemy666]

I'm going to get Civ4.

 

[Olodune]

Don't give up on it right away if it feels odd I think its worth the "burn-in" period.

 

[Primacide]

Awwww, nother one goes down. Cmon man!

Civ iv was a great game and you won't regret the purchase, particularly since you can get the game and all expansions for way less than just the base civ v.

I will say that I was sooooo happy to be done with stacks of doom in civ v. 1upt isn't perfect, but at least it made combat interesting again. I have played civ since the first game (I'm old!), and I was just really over having 200 tanks in a stack, hitting city after city. People complain that there isn't enough variety in the end game of civ v, but I really felt like the end of iv was identical across playthroughs. I just got tired of it. 1upt at least makes you pay attention to where your troops are and how they are disposed. (I.e. Don't expose artillery on the front line).

 

[ShakaKhan]

1upt at least makes you pay attention to where your troops are and how they are disposed. (I.e. Don't expose artillery on the front line).

We're all entitled to our opinions, and I agree that 1UPT adds a consideration that wasn't there before; it's as if SoD's were just strategy but 1UPT is strategy AND tactics. However, in terms of cost:benefit, the benefit of this added tactical consideration is extraordinarily outweighed by the cost of routing being basically removed from the game. Any time I give a unit more than 3 moves worth of routing, I'll get a disruption message and have to tell him the same instructions again. Honestly, this element of the game is the single reason that I prefer playing peacefully in CIV5 - not because it's a better strategic choice (at high levels it's the opposite) or because that's the role-playing experience that I want, but to avoid the migraines and strokes caused by a game design. And even in peaceful games, there's the "just got archeology, time to spam archeologists" moment where I make so many of them, trying to remember which sites I've sent one to and which ones I haven't is hard enough to remember, now Archeologist#6B-delta needs me to remember which one i told him to go to 8 turns ago. I'M OLD TOO!

 

[kamex]

We're all entitled to our opinions, and I agree that 1UPT adds a consideration that wasn't there before; it's as if SoD's were just strategy but 1UPT is strategy AND tactics. However, in terms of cost:benefit, the benefit of this added tactical consideration is extraordinarily outweighed by the cost of routing being basically removed from the game. Any time I give a unit more than 3 moves worth of routing, I'll get a disruption message and have to tell him the same instructions again. Honestly, this element of the game is the single reason that I prefer playing peacefully in CIV5 - not because it's a better strategic choice (at high levels it's the opposite) or because that's the role-playing experience that I want, but to avoid the migraines and strokes caused by a game design. And even in peaceful games, there's the "just got archeology, time to spam archeologists" moment where I make so many of them, trying to remember which sites I've sent one to and which ones I haven't is hard enough to remember, now Archeologist#6B-delta needs me to remember which one i told him to go to 8 turns ago. I'M OLD TOO!

This really annoys me too. One of my personal favorites is not being able to get a missionary adjacent to a CS because they won't move their units out the way. Even if the CS has a quest to spread the religion there

 

[kaspergm]

This really annoys me too. One of my personal favorites is not being able to get a missionary adjacent to a CS because they won't move their units out the way. Even if the CS has a quest to spread the religion there

You gotta play with whoward's DLL mod and the "No more civilian traffic jams" mod - I tell you, you'll never ever want to go back to unmodded civ again, it's such a life-saver.