Game speeds: Pros & Cons

[Georgi Khan]

Hello fanatics,
That's my first post and definitely not the last. I've been roaming the Civ IV forum for some time now and I recently signed up to be able to ask those questions that I only found partial answers to etc.

My observation is that people mostly play on Normal speed. My experience up to now (being mainly a Monarch player) is that any other speed different from Marathon does not let me enjoy the units long enough before I switch to a new Era and thus new units.

On the other hand I read that Marathon gives the human player some kind of advantage -> please clarify why?

In conclusion, I'd appreciate a quick break down of the game speeds and their pros and cons and that would be all!

Normal + vs - , Epic + vs - etc.

Regards all!

 

[Strickl3r]

The biggest contra for marathon for most players is obv the time you can afford to play civ 4

Also you are slower in developing your game and move up the difficulty levels, so marathon is no good for every player who wants to get better in the near future.

 

[Kallikrates]

I never really tried slower than normal (one abolished earth 18 game on epic speed seemed to take forever...). What's more, I think the different aspects of the game are better balanced on normal speed. War-mongering may already be slightly overpowered on normal and in any case a major point of any civ game was getting ahead in the tech tree quickly and with certain goals, not primarily ruling the world with horsemen or knights.

 

[GKey]

I've tried 2 marathon games and deity felt like noble (not kidding). There are many threads on the topic. Mara gives human player immense advantage.

 

[JustBen]

Most of the posters on this forum play normal speed and standard size. A smaller but persistent group play marathon. Players who prefer Quick or Epic speeds are quite rare. If you're interested in having a shared experience of Civ4, normal speed does so best with marathon a distant second. I believe normal is also the typical setting for the games of the month.

I'm not being dismissive of marathon speed, just pointing out that there are fewer people to share it with. For example, the threads on maximizing score on marathon speed are quite serious.

 

[Zx Zero Zx]

The slower the game speed the easier the game becomes. Deity is piss easy on Marathon, it is like playing Deity in Civ5.

 

[Fippy]

Hmmm let me try..
slower game speed "forgets" adjusting all game mechanics. Units still move like on normal, so you can conquer at same speed while the game moves slower.
This makes AIs even worse at countering attacks than they already are, and focused research on milit. advantages last very long. So it's easier for players who know how to control that.

Only thing that might be harder: Barbs (they also move fast..).
Epic speed is more balanced than Mara, so maybe you can use that.
You would still lose on Deity thou if you play Monarch, it's not *that* easy

 

[blunderwonder]

marathon is also really slow, it gets annoying hitting the spacebar that much, i tried it and hated it, though i understand when you play like a huge map, it becomes more necessary to slow the speed down, or by the time you get to the civ next to you with an army, hes already to the next age.

 

[Manco Capac]

The discussion would be far more interesting if talking about Quick speed instead of marathon speed. People may not remember, but there was a game AZ played on quick with Hatshe where he was constantly infuriated and was stuck at war with Saladin like the whole medieval period and even more due to quick speed being too fast for units.

Noble level, c'mon gkey boy.

 

[Zx Zero Zx]

The discussion would be far more interesting if talking about Quick speed instead of marathon speed. People may not remember, but there was a game AZ played on quick with Hatshe where he was constantly infuriated and was stuck at war with Saladin like the whole medieval period and even more due to quick speed being too fast for units.

Noble level, c'mon gkey boy.

Quick is really difficult, it is like learning a whole new game. I can't imagine winning a non culture victory on Quick Deity. But Mara Deity is more like Monarch than Noble.

 

[GKey]

You may believe me or not, but it did felt like noble. OTOH the start was OK and we know that good start on Deity even on normal speed lowers difficulty significantly.

 

[Kallikrates]

I don't know about the highest levels, but on normal speed between Noble and Emperor, I'd say that the map and/or leader/neighbor synergies can make about one level of "felt difficulty difference". And it is a far larger factor than the differences between the Add-Ons as well. When I started playing warlords I went back to prince for the first game and it felt too easy, although I didn't play very well back then.
Similarly when going recently from warlords to BtS, but here I had an extremely lucky map, so monarch felt easier than many warlords monarch games. Because of the higher happiness/health caps in BtS, I actually think that monarch/emperor may be slightly harder on warlords, especially the early stage of the game, despite easier warfare, a fewer quicker beelines and no enemy spies destroying mines.

 

[Kingjester1]

I used to play nothing but Epic speed games but switched to normal a little while ago. There really isn't a lot of difference. You get more lifetime out of units before technology makes them obsolete, but you typically have to make more units because AI army sizes are larger, so this isn't as nifty as it sounds. Some micro strategies are different due to the increased turn amount, e.g. workers road in 3 turns rather than 2. Personally Normal speed is almost identical to Epic except the game takes less time to play and army sizes are smaller. It is also much easier to compare your game to others since you don't have to mentally convert turns and army sizes from the game reports of folks that play on Normal.

IMO, go with normal unless you have a strong desire to play the same maps for longer without much change.

 

[keiselhorn13]

I used to play epic in the past as I also thought there was a longer lifespan for units in a certain era, but then I started playing GOTM regularly since last year and I had to get used to normal speed.... it was a bit of a shock in the beginning but after a couple of games I got used to it, and now I find normal speed more entertaining than epic.

 

[happyturtle]

I haaaaaate Marathon. It's just way too slow. Epic or Normal speeds are the ones I typically play at.

 

[qazq2]

I personally like epic. Epic allows for an increased unit lifespan and micromanagement, also it allows you to really feel each era. It also does not slow the game down as much as marathon. It is worth mentioning that I do like long games and do like micromanagement so epic may not be for everyone, however marathon is just too long for me.

 

[duckstab]

Most of the posters on this forum play normal speed and standard size. A smaller but persistent group play marathon. Players who prefer Quick or Epic speeds are quite rare.

I've always thought a large number of players, like myself, prefer Epic. This poll is quite old, but it supports that conclusion.

 

[rfcfanatic]

I wonder if anyone has ever beaten Quick Deity on Huge map.

 

[Zx Zero Zx]

I wonder if anyone has ever beaten Quick Deity on Huge map.

Of course, it's just not easy to win anything besides culture. Everything else takes for ever. Like the HoF Conquest date is 1922, and the Domination date is 1954. The slower the game speed the easier military victories become, Space is a military victory 99% of the time, and the faster the game speed the easier peace becomes. This is due to unit movement not being balanced to the game speed, or map size. So on Quick Huge it literally takes hundreds of years to move troops around before the very late game.

 

[Kupi007]

I m emp/imm player and never played diffrent than normal speed on vanilla/BTS, but recently switched to Realism invictus mod, (reccommened/realistic) setting is 1600 turns and i enjoy it a lot, AI is much stronger, to extent that i would say its not comperable to vanilla games, NEVER suicide stacks on well defended cities, switch targets if one is too well defended, choke you at beginning of game, is very opportunistic in attacking you, but in good sense. Also there is no tech gaps that allow beelining strategies from vanilla to work, like musket 9str and rifleman str 14, everything is much more fluid, and gives new experiiance, especially in warmongering. If someone have time i would recommend it.