noto2
Emperor
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2008
- Messages
- 1,715
Sure, religion and vassal states could have been improved upon, but they work to make the game more interesting and force the player to make choices, which is what Civ is all about.
I personally like managing health in my cities - again, decisions. (factories? Settle on the river?)
I don't really care either way about hexes or squares but from the pictures I've seen of Civ 5 it does look like hexes make a more realistic and better looking map - fine, I suppose hexes are better
And finally...stacking. I've said this before and I'll say it again - you can make a tactical game (like chess) or a strategic game (like Risk) or if you're feeling very ambitious you can combine the two very carefully (Rome:total war, MOO3, Star Wars Empire at War) but notice that in MOO3 the tactical battles were extremely simple and it was 90% a strategic game, and with star wars empire at war the strategic level was very simple and it was 90% a tactical game. Trying to do both in one game is completely unnecessary and will most likely result in a badly designed game. If I want war tactics I'll play Starcraft or Warcraft. I play Civ for a strategy game. I don't want to be micromanaging battles and deciding whether or not to pull back pikemen or which units to shoot at with my archers. Those decisions belong in Warcraft. Not Civ. I'm happy having my battles reduced to an abstraction based on chance - like in Risk, and in Civ 4 there are already enough tactical options (terrain, different unit types, etc).
To further illustrate what I mean, has anyone played Rise of Nations? Now, I do like that game and I spent countless hours playing it, but it suffered from a serious flaw - and that is it's economy was 100x more complex than warcraft, and it's battles were also more complex. It was impossible to optimally manage the strategic layer while micromanaging battles at the same time. To play that game very well you would need a team of 2 players - one managing the economy and one managing the military.
I've never played the Total War games but I imagine their strategic layer is simpler than that of Civ. How many battles do you have in an average game of Civ? Tons. Can you imagine having to micromanage each one? To put a tactical battle layer into a strategic game, both turn based, is just bonkers.
I don't think Civ 4's combat system is perfect, or even good, but it's a hell of a lot better than Civ 5's. Civ 5's combat is worse than Civ 4, worse than RON, worse than Moo3, it's just an epic failure. It was supposed to be the best part of the game but I find it the worst.
I personally like managing health in my cities - again, decisions. (factories? Settle on the river?)
I don't really care either way about hexes or squares but from the pictures I've seen of Civ 5 it does look like hexes make a more realistic and better looking map - fine, I suppose hexes are better
And finally...stacking. I've said this before and I'll say it again - you can make a tactical game (like chess) or a strategic game (like Risk) or if you're feeling very ambitious you can combine the two very carefully (Rome:total war, MOO3, Star Wars Empire at War) but notice that in MOO3 the tactical battles were extremely simple and it was 90% a strategic game, and with star wars empire at war the strategic level was very simple and it was 90% a tactical game. Trying to do both in one game is completely unnecessary and will most likely result in a badly designed game. If I want war tactics I'll play Starcraft or Warcraft. I play Civ for a strategy game. I don't want to be micromanaging battles and deciding whether or not to pull back pikemen or which units to shoot at with my archers. Those decisions belong in Warcraft. Not Civ. I'm happy having my battles reduced to an abstraction based on chance - like in Risk, and in Civ 4 there are already enough tactical options (terrain, different unit types, etc).
To further illustrate what I mean, has anyone played Rise of Nations? Now, I do like that game and I spent countless hours playing it, but it suffered from a serious flaw - and that is it's economy was 100x more complex than warcraft, and it's battles were also more complex. It was impossible to optimally manage the strategic layer while micromanaging battles at the same time. To play that game very well you would need a team of 2 players - one managing the economy and one managing the military.
I've never played the Total War games but I imagine their strategic layer is simpler than that of Civ. How many battles do you have in an average game of Civ? Tons. Can you imagine having to micromanage each one? To put a tactical battle layer into a strategic game, both turn based, is just bonkers.
I don't think Civ 4's combat system is perfect, or even good, but it's a hell of a lot better than Civ 5's. Civ 5's combat is worse than Civ 4, worse than RON, worse than Moo3, it's just an epic failure. It was supposed to be the best part of the game but I find it the worst.