I know its personal but I just cant find decide on a size. I'd like to play with 12 civs but just thinking about moving my units across the world worries me. Is it really just dependent on what kind of victory you are going for or is that not a factor?
What map/civ size is ideal?
- Thread starter refmon
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Ryoga
King
- Joined
- Oct 12, 2010
- Messages
- 993
For conquest victories it is a factor. Smaller maps and fewer opponents are easier for conquest for obvious reasons.
For science, diplomatic and cultural victories it doesn't matter that much, but generally speaking the bigger is the map the higher is the risk that some civ far away will become strong and beat you into victory while you can do very little to stop it.
That apart it really depends on your preferences.
Zezima
Professional Troll
Generally, more civs makes the game more difficult. More civs means you are more likely to have a variety of AI personalities on the field, which increases the chance for wonder-hogging, missionary-spamming, runaway-ing... etc.
Personally, I consider standard size with 8 civs to be a "vanilla" or standard game of civ. It feels like there is just enough civs and just enough world space to expand, trade, engage in diplomacy... basically participate in all of the different facets the game has to offer.
It's really hard to define any "optimal" or "ideal" settings, because it really depends on your definition of the word. Does "ideal" mean most enjoyable game experience? Does it mean the earliest path to a certain VC? You get the idea.
Personally, I consider standard size with 8 civs to be a "vanilla" or standard game of civ. It feels like there is just enough civs and just enough world space to expand, trade, engage in diplomacy... basically participate in all of the different facets the game has to offer.
It's really hard to define any "optimal" or "ideal" settings, because it really depends on your definition of the word. Does "ideal" mean most enjoyable game experience? Does it mean the earliest path to a certain VC? You get the idea.
I was going for most enjoyable but yeah it is a hard question to answer
Torisen
Professor
With bigger maps, it takes longer to travel around so I generally feel that if you're going to play on the largest maps you really need to play on a slower turn rate. I don't think it's fair to the warmongering civs to play the biggest maps on less than marathon.
A big map on a slow speed feels more historically accurate to me, but boy those games can take a long time to complete, especially if you're addicted to building lots of cities.
A big map on a slow speed feels more historically accurate to me, but boy those games can take a long time to complete, especially if you're addicted to building lots of cities.
acetoolguy
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jan 12, 2006
- Messages
- 60
I like to explore, so I play a large map but knock down the CS to 18 and civs to 9.
I generally find that the best balance is Huge 16, with my usual deal on map sizes other than Huge is Default +1/4, rounded down. I also usually play at a 1.5 CS/Player ratio to keep them important, so if another player decides to gobble up a few City States as either allies or by conquest, you actually have to care instead of shrugging it off and simply finding another, as I find is too common in the middle and end game when a few players have been eliminated and there's such a surplus of City States still dotted all over the place.
I like the idea of huge maps, but my computer really can't handle it well and it ends up taking a full minute or so to process a turn in the lategame. Even though I have dual monitors and usually do other things while turns process, I just eventually lose interest when it takes 15 minutes to build a lategame wonder. It doesn't help that the AI seems to do worse at warmongering on bigger maps, especially if there's a lot of water.
8 players seems to be the best combination of depth and gameplay.
8 players seems to be the best combination of depth and gameplay.
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