RegentMan
Deity
You obviously haven't been around.Bad Brett said:
Try the link to his site in his signature and see the lost games he's come back to win. He's one of the best players I've seen.
10 Reasons Why Conquests Went Wrong
- Thread starter Sullla
- Start date
Try the link to his site in his signature and see the lost games he's come back to win. He's one of the best players I've seen.
SirPleb
Shaken, not stirred.
My top one reason why Conquests went wrong:
1. Firaxis and Atari don't give a damn.
Of course Firaxis doesn't want to release a game with many serious flaws. But do they care enough to make any real effort to fix it if that's what happens? It seems clear that they don't. I suspect that they lost interest in Civilization III even before Conquests was published. I think they'd actually rather not even know whether there are serious flaws or not.
Some players think Conquests is ok. I'm happy for them, really. But I do wish they'd respect the right of other people to be upset with Conquests and that they'd see that it can be reasonable to be upset. There are many things which do not work as well in Conquests as in previous versions of Civilization III. If a player cares a lot about one or more of the things which no longer works as well then of course they're upset - from their perspective the game has been broken in some important aspect.
In case it isn't totally obvious, I am one of those people. I find Conquests less fun in many regards than the final version of PTW. Gameplay in Conquests is not as rich for me. I can win too easily by using things which have serious flaws, or I can avoid those flaws and play a less interesting game. (No barbarians, no armies, no archipelago maps, etc. It gets a bit dull when all the areas with problems are avoided.)
A difficulty in identifying what the important issues with Conquests are is that different people are affected differently (or not at all) by different problems. So the list of top issues varies depending on who is making the list.
Early this summer I reviewed a huge number of posts about Conquests on CivFanatics and on three other sites and created a consolidated list of issues. (Yes, Firaxis has received a copy.) The list had about 170 items. Most of them were Conquests issues, some were suggestions, some were issues carried forward from earlier versions of Civ.
There were four items on the list which seemed nearly universally agreed to be bad news in Conquests and which I'd therefore rank as "musts" in a patch:
1) Invisible units triggering unintended wars
2) The problems with armies
3) Scientific Golden Age not working
4) Barbarians are broken
A fifth item I added to the "must" category is restoring compatibility with pre-1.22 save files. This is important to some users but moves to the critical category because it is important for working on many other issues. (There's a huge volume of online information and supporting save files from helpful users about many of the other issues. Almost all of that material is pre-1.22. Without restoring backward compatibility it is almost impossible to take advantage of that information.)
After those five top items things become a bit fuzzier but not too bad. Tradeoffs must be made in terms of prioritizing issues, finding solutions which will satisfy the most people, and doing a minimum of work. I think there about 20 issues which can and should be addressed to satisfy a strong majority of players. These issues include things like lethal land bombardment, retuning strategic resource allocations, adjusting goverment strengths, fixing the F3 crash, etc.
People who were on the private post-beta Conquests forum already know about the proposal I made to Firaxis in spring. In brief, I proposed that they farm out the job of producing a patch for a "good" version of Conquests to me, at a price of $15,000, to be paid only if I successfully completed the task.
Since that time I've had a bit more conversation with Firaxis on the subject. I am limited in what I can say about that but I will say that:
1) I know enough to be confident that I could do the job, i.e. that I could produce a patch which a strong majority of Civ players would agree was good and did not have any remaining major flaws.
2) Cost is at least a part of the reason Firaxis hasn't taken me up on my proposal. They have a hard time rationalizing spending $15,000 on such a patch for Conquests.
The final result as I see it:
a) Firaxis delivered a flawed product. Conquests is not what it should have been and I think that Firaxis knows that.
b) Firaxis won't fix the problems internally. They've lost interest and consider the new tasks they've assigned people to to be more important. And this was true from before Conquests hit the shelves - they didn't even have a contingency allocation for things which might need fixing.
c) Firaxis won't spend what it would take to get the problems fixed externally.
Personally I consider both Firaxis and Atari to be responsible for this sad state of affairs. If either of them really cared about the hardcore fans and/or about product quality then we wouldn't be in this situation where Conquests will probably be forever Incomplete to many of Civilization's hardcore fans.
1. Firaxis and Atari don't give a damn.
Of course Firaxis doesn't want to release a game with many serious flaws. But do they care enough to make any real effort to fix it if that's what happens? It seems clear that they don't. I suspect that they lost interest in Civilization III even before Conquests was published. I think they'd actually rather not even know whether there are serious flaws or not.
Some players think Conquests is ok. I'm happy for them, really. But I do wish they'd respect the right of other people to be upset with Conquests and that they'd see that it can be reasonable to be upset. There are many things which do not work as well in Conquests as in previous versions of Civilization III. If a player cares a lot about one or more of the things which no longer works as well then of course they're upset - from their perspective the game has been broken in some important aspect.
In case it isn't totally obvious, I am one of those people. I find Conquests less fun in many regards than the final version of PTW. Gameplay in Conquests is not as rich for me. I can win too easily by using things which have serious flaws, or I can avoid those flaws and play a less interesting game. (No barbarians, no armies, no archipelago maps, etc. It gets a bit dull when all the areas with problems are avoided.)
A difficulty in identifying what the important issues with Conquests are is that different people are affected differently (or not at all) by different problems. So the list of top issues varies depending on who is making the list.
Early this summer I reviewed a huge number of posts about Conquests on CivFanatics and on three other sites and created a consolidated list of issues. (Yes, Firaxis has received a copy.) The list had about 170 items. Most of them were Conquests issues, some were suggestions, some were issues carried forward from earlier versions of Civ.
There were four items on the list which seemed nearly universally agreed to be bad news in Conquests and which I'd therefore rank as "musts" in a patch:
1) Invisible units triggering unintended wars
2) The problems with armies
3) Scientific Golden Age not working
4) Barbarians are broken
A fifth item I added to the "must" category is restoring compatibility with pre-1.22 save files. This is important to some users but moves to the critical category because it is important for working on many other issues. (There's a huge volume of online information and supporting save files from helpful users about many of the other issues. Almost all of that material is pre-1.22. Without restoring backward compatibility it is almost impossible to take advantage of that information.)
After those five top items things become a bit fuzzier but not too bad. Tradeoffs must be made in terms of prioritizing issues, finding solutions which will satisfy the most people, and doing a minimum of work. I think there about 20 issues which can and should be addressed to satisfy a strong majority of players. These issues include things like lethal land bombardment, retuning strategic resource allocations, adjusting goverment strengths, fixing the F3 crash, etc.
People who were on the private post-beta Conquests forum already know about the proposal I made to Firaxis in spring. In brief, I proposed that they farm out the job of producing a patch for a "good" version of Conquests to me, at a price of $15,000, to be paid only if I successfully completed the task.
Since that time I've had a bit more conversation with Firaxis on the subject. I am limited in what I can say about that but I will say that:
1) I know enough to be confident that I could do the job, i.e. that I could produce a patch which a strong majority of Civ players would agree was good and did not have any remaining major flaws.
2) Cost is at least a part of the reason Firaxis hasn't taken me up on my proposal. They have a hard time rationalizing spending $15,000 on such a patch for Conquests.
The final result as I see it:
a) Firaxis delivered a flawed product. Conquests is not what it should have been and I think that Firaxis knows that.
b) Firaxis won't fix the problems internally. They've lost interest and consider the new tasks they've assigned people to to be more important. And this was true from before Conquests hit the shelves - they didn't even have a contingency allocation for things which might need fixing.
c) Firaxis won't spend what it would take to get the problems fixed externally.
Personally I consider both Firaxis and Atari to be responsible for this sad state of affairs. If either of them really cared about the hardcore fans and/or about product quality then we wouldn't be in this situation where Conquests will probably be forever Incomplete to many of Civilization's hardcore fans.
Fixing lethal land bombardement is possible: Just uncheck the boxes in the editor, voila.
But the H'wacha remains a problem: It probably needs lethal LB, because otherwise -> no GA with that unit. But the Koreans can be modded to have a different unique unit...
But really, BreakAway Games, Firaxis, Atari -> they now launch Civ3 Complete soon, but have no plans of further fixing Civ3.
Really bad.
But the H'wacha remains a problem: It probably needs lethal LB, because otherwise -> no GA with that unit. But the Koreans can be modded to have a different unique unit...
But really, BreakAway Games, Firaxis, Atari -> they now launch Civ3 Complete soon, but have no plans of further fixing Civ3.
Really bad.
Aggie
Deity
Although I don't consider the complete top 11 as critical issues, I must say that I agree with Sullla that things went wrong with Conquests. Lethal bombardment, AI use of armies, (EDIT: changed bombardment rules), Statue of Zeus (Multiplayer) and Scientific Leaders (Multiplayer) are for me the worst items from Sullla's list. It strikes me that the developers of Conquests implemented several changes without thinking it through.
Other examples:
-It is nice that workers can be captured by non-amphibious troops from ships, but the AI can't coop with that. It will consider it impossible to land on a tile occupied by a worker. So a human is still perfectly capable to defend an island with workers.
-The seafaring trait increases the chances of survival on sea and ocean squares, but the AI doesn't know what the concept of a suicide galley is.
I totally agree with the 'must fix' list of SirPleb. But I'm just as negative about the chances of implementation of a patch. There's no financial gain. CIV3 is at the end of it's economical lifecycle for Atari and Firaxis...
Other examples:
-It is nice that workers can be captured by non-amphibious troops from ships, but the AI can't coop with that. It will consider it impossible to land on a tile occupied by a worker. So a human is still perfectly capable to defend an island with workers.
-The seafaring trait increases the chances of survival on sea and ocean squares, but the AI doesn't know what the concept of a suicide galley is.
I totally agree with the 'must fix' list of SirPleb. But I'm just as negative about the chances of implementation of a patch. There's no financial gain. CIV3 is at the end of it's economical lifecycle for Atari and Firaxis...
TrailblazingScot
I was kittenOFchaos
The question an innocent to programming like me asks is why are they so protective of their source code considering there are many fans who are programmers who could sort out a few of the problems. That code is out of date hopefully if they are doing the right thing by Civ4 and programming it from scratch leaving behind the detritus and chaos of Civ3.
Heffalump
Proboscidea Heffalumpus
1) I hate lethal land bombard and have long since disabled it.
2) I like the increased range
3) Agreed, I don't like this change either
4) Haven't been much of a factor either way for me.
5) Agreed. Armies are kaputt.
6) No strong feelings here
7) Disagree. I like a little bit of randomness now and again. Although I could see it being a bit unfair by MPP
8) Great. If only the AI could use them properly...
9) I like the new terrains.
10) I like both govs, especially feudalism, although as someone else said they're really "niche" governments. But again, the AI needs to be able to handle them as well and that's the core problem of the expansion. Lot's of things added that help the player but the AI was never brought up to speed....
11) Love the new map trading rules. BIG improvement.
2) I like the increased range
3) Agreed, I don't like this change either
4) Haven't been much of a factor either way for me.
5) Agreed. Armies are kaputt.
6) No strong feelings here
7) Disagree. I like a little bit of randomness now and again. Although I could see it being a bit unfair by MPP
8) Great. If only the AI could use them properly...
9) I like the new terrains.
10) I like both govs, especially feudalism, although as someone else said they're really "niche" governments. But again, the AI needs to be able to handle them as well and that's the core problem of the expansion. Lot's of things added that help the player but the AI was never brought up to speed....
11) Love the new map trading rules. BIG improvement.
grs
nameless one
1. agree
2. would not be a big problem if 1 was fixed
3. agree - always wondered why I did never destroyed pop or improvements anymore
4. you can turn them off in the options - so no issue
5. the AI does not build any armies at all in c3c (at least in 1.22 I have not seen a single one) - so it is even worse
6. I dont agree here. While from a logical view, what you say is correct (i.e. a trade-off-deceision is destroyed, making the game flatter). I see it the other way around. Even with the MDI horses are often a better option because they upgrade to knights. Swords without any upgrade possibility are only a use-once-discard later unit, which you could and should basically avoid in favour of the fast units. It has gotten more balanced with MDI.
7. agree on the ivory issue
8. the new specialists are great, don't see much of a problem here, besides the AI not being perfect at using them, but it isn't on other things too.
9. no problem with marsh tiles or volcanos, this seems to me like a personal preference of yours (and some others), we all have these, but it's not as broken as other things, even if you consider it broken.
10. if you talk about government, you should talk about republic. It is so good that there are only very seldom instances other governments can compete (AW). Fascism should be thrown out, but that is my personal preference like yours in 9.
11. is one of the biggest improvements c3c brought
2. would not be a big problem if 1 was fixed
3. agree - always wondered why I did never destroyed pop or improvements anymore
4. you can turn them off in the options - so no issue
5. the AI does not build any armies at all in c3c (at least in 1.22 I have not seen a single one) - so it is even worse
6. I dont agree here. While from a logical view, what you say is correct (i.e. a trade-off-deceision is destroyed, making the game flatter). I see it the other way around. Even with the MDI horses are often a better option because they upgrade to knights. Swords without any upgrade possibility are only a use-once-discard later unit, which you could and should basically avoid in favour of the fast units. It has gotten more balanced with MDI.
7. agree on the ivory issue
8. the new specialists are great, don't see much of a problem here, besides the AI not being perfect at using them, but it isn't on other things too.
9. no problem with marsh tiles or volcanos, this seems to me like a personal preference of yours (and some others), we all have these, but it's not as broken as other things, even if you consider it broken.
10. if you talk about government, you should talk about republic. It is so good that there are only very seldom instances other governments can compete (AW). Fascism should be thrown out, but that is my personal preference like yours in 9.
11. is one of the biggest improvements c3c brought
warpstorm
Yumbo? Yumbo!
Longasc said:But really, BreakAway Games, Firaxis, Atari -> they now launch Civ3 Complete soon, but have no plans of further fixing Civ3.
Really bad.
Breakaway has been out of the picture for many months (since before it hit the streets). They were contracted to do a job for a certain amount of time for a fixed amount of money and they no longer have anything to do with it.
warpstorm
Yumbo? Yumbo!
kittenOFchaos said:
I can think of a few reasons.
One, they made quite a few games based on this code base (parts of it go back to before Firaxis split off from Microprose). Even though it is crufty and a bit hard to work with, it is a valuable code base. Believe it or not, they could sell this for good money (they have in the past).
Two, people might find out just how poorly their favorite games programming gods actually program
Three, (well, this is related to 1) the programmer-players may actually make a free game (or mod Civ3 to the point where it is essentially a new game) that competes with their future products. There is a term for this in the industry. It's called shooting yourself in the foot.
Much as I hate these not-really-free open source licences, it is a shame they could not realese it under some sort of "you can look at it but we retain the IP so all changes have to be given back to us" sort of licence (is not the microsoft community licence something like this).
I really do not expect this to happen though. It is just not how the games industry works, and could in the end help their competitors. Think how much use it would have been to whoever developed Call to Power,
My solution, let us all go and help free civ out compete civ 4, then we can change the way the world works (only half joking
).
planetfall
Emperor
Hi all,
I don't think C3C is unplayable. I am playing it instead of C3 or PTW out of choice, but I would agree it is deeply flawed. I think the basic problem was outsourcing to Breakaway.
They may be good programmer and cheap but they did not understand the game concepts.
For me the most broken parts of C3C are:
1. the corruption model: you no longer have to plan where to put the FP. The corruption model in PTW was better.
2. the lack of balance between units: no longer need to seriously consider which is more important, offense or defense, or improvements.
3. the unbalance of governments: I am getting tired of always seeing Despot->[Republic/Monarchy]-> Democracy -> Communism {when WW hits}}
4. Some units need tweaking in editor as default values don't make sense:
a. cruiser - who needs battleships?
b. Longbow - who needs med inf?
c. guerrilla - who needs artillery?
d. courthouse/police stations cost
e. SSN -- is too weak
f. frigate is too weak on offense
5. The bug in Indust/Modern Era where when you have a ton of units the game will crash.
The best working parts of C3C are:
1. F8 showing what turn you are on and closest civ
2. the time you spend playing the game
3. new units, especially: mobile SAM, stealth fighter and SSN able to target carriers/transports.
Got to run, but you can see the minus outweight the pluses. Main value of C3C over C3 or PTW is it is still newer. It will remain to be seen if C4 is any better, or just more of the same.......
PF
I don't think C3C is unplayable. I am playing it instead of C3 or PTW out of choice, but I would agree it is deeply flawed. I think the basic problem was outsourcing to Breakaway.
They may be good programmer and cheap but they did not understand the game concepts.
For me the most broken parts of C3C are:
1. the corruption model: you no longer have to plan where to put the FP. The corruption model in PTW was better.
2. the lack of balance between units: no longer need to seriously consider which is more important, offense or defense, or improvements.
3. the unbalance of governments: I am getting tired of always seeing Despot->[Republic/Monarchy]-> Democracy -> Communism {when WW hits}}
4. Some units need tweaking in editor as default values don't make sense:
a. cruiser - who needs battleships?
b. Longbow - who needs med inf?
c. guerrilla - who needs artillery?
d. courthouse/police stations cost
e. SSN -- is too weak
f. frigate is too weak on offense
5. The bug in Indust/Modern Era where when you have a ton of units the game will crash.
The best working parts of C3C are:
1. F8 showing what turn you are on and closest civ
2. the time you spend playing the game
3. new units, especially: mobile SAM, stealth fighter and SSN able to target carriers/transports.
Got to run, but you can see the minus outweight the pluses. Main value of C3C over C3 or PTW is it is still newer. It will remain to be seen if C4 is any better, or just more of the same.......
PF
This is just a minor thought but with the first persons complaint about the over powering airpower in C3C, It would have been very easy to keep the planes as they are and still fix the problem just change it so each unit has to be payed more or less maintance, think if a stealth bomber were high gold amount to maintaine you wouldn't want that many due to serve maintance
Hooray
Civ3 Cartographer
1. Yes, lethal bombard is insane. I always thought planes should have lethal sea, at least, but lethal land is too much. Bombardment should only weaken an enemy, not utterly destroy them.
2. Yeah, I thought the range was fine before. I don't really ahve a problem with the way it is now, though.
3. Although I like this feature, it does make sense to destroy buildings and such as well as units. I mean, it's not like your catapults have much control whether they smash a temple or a spearman. My biggest problem with this change is that walls ALWAYS get destroyed first. On rare occasions, an AI might actually fire a Trebuchet or something at one of my cities and will destroy my walls, which is very frustrating.
4. Meh, I like the leaders. Sci leaders are extremely rare anyway.
5. I like the new armies, too. In vanilla and PTW, they weren't very useful. The best thing to do is maybe take away one or two of their advantages, and make the AI less afraid of them.
6. Disagree totally. There's no reason why Swordmen shouldn't upgrade, while Horsemen should. I say either let all units upgrade, or none of them. TOW is fine, too, but perhaps it ought to be a bit weaker. No reason why a Modern civ with all techs should be limited to Riflemen just because they have no Rubber.
7. The Statue of Zeus is fun, but you're right, it's too unbalancing. Ivory as a requirement is a bad idea, and the civ which builds it pretty much has the game handed to them on a platter.
8. Nah, I think these are a good idea. It makes no sense for a distant city to be utterly worthless. Now, with some effort, you can get some small production from them. Who cares if the AI can't use them effectively? They get enough bonuses at higher levels anyway.
9. Volcanoes and Marshes are worthless, I agree. Volcanoes, especially, are nothing but a nuisance with no real benefit. Marshes wouldn't be so bad if not for being unable to build cities on them. It only hurts the stupid AI which will avoid marshes, making it too simple for a human player to snatch large swathes of land with no competition.
10. Now here's where you're wrong. Well, okay, Fascism does suck. However, Feudalism is a great addition. I've been in plenty of games where I could hardly build any cities above size 6, whether because of lack of fresh water, or lack of luxuries and my cities would be too unhappy at any higher size. Monarchy and Republic would both be bad in this situation. Feudalism provides an excellent alternative.
11. Yes, map trading (and contact trading) come much too late in the game. It harms both the player and the AI. The only benefit is that it makes the Expansionist trait a little better, though many will argue it was strong enough to begin with.
And can I add one, pretty please? I've been wanting to get this off my chest for a while.
12. Why, oh WHY was tobacco added?! This resource is utterly worthless. It provides a measly 1 commerce and that's it. And it reduces the number of REAL resources which I could actually be using. I'm tired of finding plenty of tobacco (and tropical fruit, which I also despise), but almost never having any luxuries except one or two at best.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. But they did a bit too much fixing with Conquests, I reckon. Overall, it *was* a fun addition to the game. It just would've been a little more fun without some of the unnecessary changes and additions.
Maybe someone should making a thread pointing out the *good* additions in Conquests, too. Like, say, the new F8 screen, and the nine wonderful scenarios.
2. Yeah, I thought the range was fine before. I don't really ahve a problem with the way it is now, though.
3. Although I like this feature, it does make sense to destroy buildings and such as well as units. I mean, it's not like your catapults have much control whether they smash a temple or a spearman. My biggest problem with this change is that walls ALWAYS get destroyed first. On rare occasions, an AI might actually fire a Trebuchet or something at one of my cities and will destroy my walls, which is very frustrating.
4. Meh, I like the leaders. Sci leaders are extremely rare anyway.
5. I like the new armies, too. In vanilla and PTW, they weren't very useful. The best thing to do is maybe take away one or two of their advantages, and make the AI less afraid of them.
6. Disagree totally. There's no reason why Swordmen shouldn't upgrade, while Horsemen should. I say either let all units upgrade, or none of them. TOW is fine, too, but perhaps it ought to be a bit weaker. No reason why a Modern civ with all techs should be limited to Riflemen just because they have no Rubber.
7. The Statue of Zeus is fun, but you're right, it's too unbalancing. Ivory as a requirement is a bad idea, and the civ which builds it pretty much has the game handed to them on a platter.
8. Nah, I think these are a good idea. It makes no sense for a distant city to be utterly worthless. Now, with some effort, you can get some small production from them. Who cares if the AI can't use them effectively? They get enough bonuses at higher levels anyway.
9. Volcanoes and Marshes are worthless, I agree. Volcanoes, especially, are nothing but a nuisance with no real benefit. Marshes wouldn't be so bad if not for being unable to build cities on them. It only hurts the stupid AI which will avoid marshes, making it too simple for a human player to snatch large swathes of land with no competition.
10. Now here's where you're wrong. Well, okay, Fascism does suck. However, Feudalism is a great addition. I've been in plenty of games where I could hardly build any cities above size 6, whether because of lack of fresh water, or lack of luxuries and my cities would be too unhappy at any higher size. Monarchy and Republic would both be bad in this situation. Feudalism provides an excellent alternative.
11. Yes, map trading (and contact trading) come much too late in the game. It harms both the player and the AI. The only benefit is that it makes the Expansionist trait a little better, though many will argue it was strong enough to begin with.
And can I add one, pretty please? I've been wanting to get this off my chest for a while.
12. Why, oh WHY was tobacco added?! This resource is utterly worthless. It provides a measly 1 commerce and that's it. And it reduces the number of REAL resources which I could actually be using. I'm tired of finding plenty of tobacco (and tropical fruit, which I also despise), but almost never having any luxuries except one or two at best.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. But they did a bit too much fixing with Conquests, I reckon. Overall, it *was* a fun addition to the game. It just would've been a little more fun without some of the unnecessary changes and additions.
Maybe someone should making a thread pointing out the *good* additions in Conquests, too. Like, say, the new F8 screen, and the nine wonderful scenarios.
troytheface
Deity
- Joined
- Mar 26, 2002
- Messages
- 3,262
i have conteded in a much earlier thread that ptw was a better expansion. It offered something new-mp- wheras conquests just added variations to the old.
I have no problem with the lethal air bombard, statue of zues, knights of tmplar, navy units improvement, terrain...some of those additions were inspired- but where are the
"new" play choices? Trade routes, air and navy war are more important strategically than all that other stuff- but these were bandaged- not addressed. And i wholeheartidly agree with the TOW complaint....as a regiment machine gun units were more important historically.. "new" and "fun" was turned to "more and "more" -and i suspect one reason was the use of Fan material/suggestions/beta testing....bad idea
let the creators create- ideas are a dime a dozen-doing something with an idea is something else and this should be left up to the creative process-not a fan base-where one is liable to get an incestuous mutual back patting.....
I have no problem with the lethal air bombard, statue of zues, knights of tmplar, navy units improvement, terrain...some of those additions were inspired- but where are the
"new" play choices? Trade routes, air and navy war are more important strategically than all that other stuff- but these were bandaged- not addressed. And i wholeheartidly agree with the TOW complaint....as a regiment machine gun units were more important historically.. "new" and "fun" was turned to "more and "more" -and i suspect one reason was the use of Fan material/suggestions/beta testing....bad idea
let the creators create- ideas are a dime a dozen-doing something with an idea is something else and this should be left up to the creative process-not a fan base-where one is liable to get an incestuous mutual back patting.....
- Joined
- Aug 15, 2001
- Messages
- 20,050
Sulla said:
They even proved more dangerous later in the game. Once we hit the age of cavalry with a few cavalry armies it was game over! All game planning went out the door. Walk 2 or 3 armies up to a city. The AI ignores the army. Raze the city, then rest. Repeat until the AI is devastated.
The game was a real struggle until then. At that point the game was a blow out. It proves beyond a doubt that "army immunity" is too strong of an advantage for the human.
I notice many of the succession games now placing limits on army usage.
================================
Sulla said:
I agree with you 100%. I hosted an Always War succession game at emperor. The AC units were very powerful, and the AC army was divesting. It went out by itself and razed several cities to the point of crippling a neighboring civ.
================================
Sulla said:
It is more unbalancing then it seems at first. Once you have rails together with civil engineers you can build a temple in a handful of turns. You don't have the old tradeoff of slowing down research to rush temples for the domination push. No disbanding units to speed up temple production. Just go out and hire specialist and still keep the cash flow going.
This allows human edge of rails to become more powerful since the extra food has value in junk cities!
I was disappointed with c3c as well. I have stopped playing and I will cover the reasons why... I will start with Sulla's top 10 list:
1) Lethal Bombardment: I think this is a good idea but poorly implemented. Lets say that a stack could only get destroyed down to half the units in the stack per turn and then before the lethal bombard and after the units are starting to get killed, the units get an aa attack. Not more than half of the units could get destroyed per turn... alternately, only 1/4 could get killed per turn.
2) Airplane Range: I like this but with lethal bombard, you have a super weapon.
3) New Bombardment Rules: not an issue of #1 is changed.
4) Leaders: I was disappointed on this one. I agree that a random leader really makes the wonder building race frustrating. I do think that leaders should be able to add X number of shields to a project. Lets say 100 in AA, 200 in MA, 400 in Indy and 600 in ModE. Also, what is the point of advertising a scientific golden age and this does not give any benefit. On higher levels, do people actually research?
5) Armies: I like the idea of armies being much more powerful however Sulla's points are valid. The pillaging thing without movement cost puts armies over the top from my perspective.
6) The Medieval Infantry: I understand your point here. The "upgradeable" thing makes Leo's workshop much, much, much more powerful. Hey, the babs can upgrade bowmen to tow if they did not GA.... with Leo's!
7) The Statue of Zeus: Good point. This city boosts shields in an age when everyone is shield starved. Maybe the possiblity of winning and losing are hinged on this wonder. This will carry over to which civ is dominate.
8) Specialists:I complain long and hard about the evils of micromanaging. When I saw these specialists and the "requirement" for micormanaging... THAT WAS THE END OF MY CIV PLAYING. Micormanaging became a necessity and not an edge. I understand how to micromanage but that is not what I consider interesting or fun.
9) New Terrain:I understand your point and on wet maps this is an issue... This is, in my opinion, a minor issue or even flavor.
10) Governments: I have mixed thoughts about this one. The saying... the more things change ... the more they remain the same ... applies here. SSDG
11) Map Trading:I honestly like the map trading change. However, what this does is speed up tech pace on panageas and slows tech pace on island maps. On higher levels, you are forced into one style of play for a map type. Perdictablity and pigeon hole tatics...
There are other problems that I take issue with.... Lets say your on a panagea. The civs meet each other fairly early and tech rocks forward. So, you finally get to iron and the ai has settled it all... So you fight a war that puts you further behind until you get to gun powder. Then you fight another war... pike V cav... to get gun powder. Then you get to coal... fight yet another war to get coal against tanks.... and so it goes....
Lets say that you settle on iron before you know that you have iron! You get iron working and the biggest baddest bully on the block declares war on you and you realize why.... you have iron! After a point, this got just plain annoying.
1) Lethal Bombardment: I think this is a good idea but poorly implemented. Lets say that a stack could only get destroyed down to half the units in the stack per turn and then before the lethal bombard and after the units are starting to get killed, the units get an aa attack. Not more than half of the units could get destroyed per turn... alternately, only 1/4 could get killed per turn.
2) Airplane Range: I like this but with lethal bombard, you have a super weapon.
3) New Bombardment Rules: not an issue of #1 is changed.
4) Leaders: I was disappointed on this one. I agree that a random leader really makes the wonder building race frustrating. I do think that leaders should be able to add X number of shields to a project. Lets say 100 in AA, 200 in MA, 400 in Indy and 600 in ModE. Also, what is the point of advertising a scientific golden age and this does not give any benefit. On higher levels, do people actually research?
5) Armies: I like the idea of armies being much more powerful however Sulla's points are valid. The pillaging thing without movement cost puts armies over the top from my perspective.
6) The Medieval Infantry: I understand your point here. The "upgradeable" thing makes Leo's workshop much, much, much more powerful. Hey, the babs can upgrade bowmen to tow if they did not GA.... with Leo's!
7) The Statue of Zeus: Good point. This city boosts shields in an age when everyone is shield starved. Maybe the possiblity of winning and losing are hinged on this wonder. This will carry over to which civ is dominate.
8) Specialists:I complain long and hard about the evils of micromanaging. When I saw these specialists and the "requirement" for micormanaging... THAT WAS THE END OF MY CIV PLAYING. Micormanaging became a necessity and not an edge. I understand how to micromanage but that is not what I consider interesting or fun.
9) New Terrain:I understand your point and on wet maps this is an issue... This is, in my opinion, a minor issue or even flavor.
10) Governments: I have mixed thoughts about this one. The saying... the more things change ... the more they remain the same ... applies here. SSDG
11) Map Trading:I honestly like the map trading change. However, what this does is speed up tech pace on panageas and slows tech pace on island maps. On higher levels, you are forced into one style of play for a map type. Perdictablity and pigeon hole tatics...
There are other problems that I take issue with.... Lets say your on a panagea. The civs meet each other fairly early and tech rocks forward. So, you finally get to iron and the ai has settled it all... So you fight a war that puts you further behind until you get to gun powder. Then you fight another war... pike V cav... to get gun powder. Then you get to coal... fight yet another war to get coal against tanks.... and so it goes....
Lets say that you settle on iron before you know that you have iron! You get iron working and the biggest baddest bully on the block declares war on you and you realize why.... you have iron! After a point, this got just plain annoying.
Hygro
soundcloud.com/hygro/
I agree and disagree with much of what you said, sullla, but there are a couple of things I would like to comment on.
While the change is bad for artillery and mobile artillery, it is good for catapults through cannons. The reason is simple: they were useless before, and now they are moderately effective--enough so that a ghengis khan type utilizing siege engines was a military genious, not a moron for wasting his resources.
Now to point something out about how unbalancing the Statue of Zues is. Multiply the number of hit points by a unit's attack or defence stat to know how good it is.
Regular knight has 12 offensive power, 9 defensive
veteran knight has 16 offensive power, 12 defensive
elite knight has has 20 offensive power, 15 defensive
Regular swordsman has 9 offensive, 6 defensive
veteran swordsman has 12 offensive, 8 defensive
elite swordsman has has 15 offensive, 10 defensive
regular ancient cavalry has 12 offensive, 8 defensive (about the same as a knight, comes way earlier)
veteran ancient cavalry has 15 offensive, 10 defensive (closer to veteran knight than veteran swordsman)
elite ancient cavalry has has 18 offensive, 12 defensive (inbetween elite knight and elite swordsman).
They are potent until cavalry and riflemen.
While the change is bad for artillery and mobile artillery, it is good for catapults through cannons. The reason is simple: they were useless before, and now they are moderately effective--enough so that a ghengis khan type utilizing siege engines was a military genious, not a moron for wasting his resources.
Now to point something out about how unbalancing the Statue of Zues is. Multiply the number of hit points by a unit's attack or defence stat to know how good it is.
Regular knight has 12 offensive power, 9 defensive
veteran knight has 16 offensive power, 12 defensive
elite knight has has 20 offensive power, 15 defensive
Regular swordsman has 9 offensive, 6 defensive
veteran swordsman has 12 offensive, 8 defensive
elite swordsman has has 15 offensive, 10 defensive
regular ancient cavalry has 12 offensive, 8 defensive (about the same as a knight, comes way earlier)
veteran ancient cavalry has 15 offensive, 10 defensive (closer to veteran knight than veteran swordsman)
elite ancient cavalry has has 18 offensive, 12 defensive (inbetween elite knight and elite swordsman).
They are potent until cavalry and riflemen.
Justus II
General Staff
gmr7494 said:
That's certainly true for the individual, but remember these represent units, not individuals. Artillery and air support aren't designed to eliminate units, just weaken them, disrupt their cohesion, etc., making them easier targets for the ground offensive. In fact, the U.S. Army's fire support doctrine defines an artillery Destroy mission as inflicting 30% casualties. (Suppress is 10%, disrupt is 20%, IIRC). The prior implementation of non-lethal bombardment fit that quite well. Lethal sea bombardment is more reasonable, as I do look at ships as representing individual ships or small flotillas, and they can certainly be sunk from the air.
Aggie
Deity
More importantly...artillery hitting only troops in the cities make it way to easy for the human player to capture cities. Realism is nice, but I rather have a balanced game. Artillery was powerful in Vanilla Civ and PTW, but it is probably twice as powerful in C3C. If you add the lethal bombers and the uber-unit army, you get a very flawed game. Very difficult variants in PTW are two levels easier in C3C because of this.
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