Civ 5 Playthru -How to Conquer the World by being Poor, Upset and Massively Outgunned

[lemmy101]

EDIT: I've dropped this thread move thing, don't want to dwell on it in the thread anymore

 

[RockTheCazbah87]

I guess RockTheCazbah87 meant Bismarck. Thanks for the continuing the most awesome thread I have seen in quite a while!

Ha, yes I did! Thankyou. Although it was interesting learning about Sulei's situation also... man, I hope we see some GDRs.

 

[lemmy101]

Oh change the record, Bismark.

 

[Q cumberR]

Loving the thread so far, Lemmy. Can we look forward to a sequel? =)

Interestingly, by removing curruption (Civ 3) and distance-to-city maintainace (Civ 4), there's nothing to prevent large civilizations to snowball in tech.

One thing that I liked about previous civ games (and Alpha Centuri, University race?!) is that a small civ with a single or couple of cities can often out-tech large empires. This is due to the fact that additional, distant cities grow more and more expensive and only marginally improve your research (or even cost more maintainance than they make!), while more cities increase the research cost.

In Civ 5, you get 100% of the research from cities, no matter how distant it is from your capital. Double the side of your empire? Double research! The only downside to overexpanding is that your culture bar would be absurdly high and you'll never get that many social policies, but that hasn't even hindered me in my (single) playthrough of Civ5. Social Policies are just nice little bonuses, it doesn't matter if you don't have them if you are teching at triple the rate of everyone else.

So I think you are falling victim here to China's glorious snowball. They have a large population, they tech faster, they have better units, they take cities, they have a larger population, they tech even faster....

Actually, now that I think about it, I guess every civ game had a snowball, its just that in the past it was more like, you have a high commerce income, you tech faster, you can now build better buildings/wonders, you have a even higher commerce income, you tech even faster....

From what I've seen of Civ 5 (though I am Australian, so I haven't played anything aside from the demo yet), this game has a much reduced snowball effect than Civ4/Civ3.

A larger population, as you say, means faster teching, but it also means less culture and therefore social policies. This requires that tiles be purchased rather than earned, or a lot of culture buildings need to be made, which can potentially directly cripple your economy. It also requires that you either settle near luxury resources or build happiness buildings (which cost a lot of gold at higher difficulty levels).

If you don't properly manage your happiness levels, your cities will not grow. If you overextend yourself, you will not get the new social policies to remedy your situation (as some very well can). If you build too many happiness buildings without a strong economy, your research will directly suffer.

A smaller civ can easily keep up in tech through use of Social Policies, especially the Freedom line. Specialists - more specifically, great scientists - are extremely powerful in this game, as are golden ages.

I do agree with the general conclusion that larger empires are almost always the way to go, but it's not as though a Gandhi going for his Bollywood achievement is going to be in the medieval era against nukes.

 

[Threedog43]

From what ive seen so far (demo only), it's a more natural restriction of size.

Edit: though maybe not as effective.

 

[sovarn]

congrats you made the front page

keep it going, would love to see the AI try a naval invasion. also a couple of nukes

 

[lemmy101]

Sweepstake time! It's 2077 (yes I had the foresight to turn off time victory)

How long before China decides to erase me from the map?

Bear in mind she's systematically cancelled every trade and pact we had, some of which have endured for the past 500 years. She has 15x the military of myself. She also only has two Ottoman cities left near her, owns the entire of Europe, Asia and Africa, and I have the only two unclaimed capitals (beyond hers)

 

[iceandfireking]

Great thread, thank you for all the posts.

Could you please make a screen shot on one of your most developed city, just to get some idea about how many hammers/foods/commerce we can have from a well developed city.

 

[Threedog43]

4 turns and you're done for

....not that I have no faith in you.

 

[lemmy101]

Great thread, thank you for all the posts.

Could you please make a screen shot on one of your most developed city, just to get some idea about how many hammers/foods/commerce we can have from a well developed city.

Here is my capital. To have a well developed city I suspect you want to take each of these values and multiply it by about 8.

 

[lemmy101]

You're having a go at me for preying on the weak?

Is this what's happening now?

Jesus, Suleiman get a grip. Have you been paying any attention at all to world events?

Bismark did call me puny, you know. And it was like about 500 years ago and everything.

 

[Donovan Zoi]

Congrats, lemmy. You just made CFC's front page. A worthy compromise, I hope?

 

[lemmy101]

Air what now?

You mean some kind of craft in the sky? Or something crafted in the air? Something that carries something that is crafted in the air? What new devilry is this??

I know nothing of these 'Aircraft Carriers' of which you speak.

I'm not sure I thought this nuclear assault through.

 

[lemmy101]

This can only mean good things.

 

[Delgar]

Spoiler :

Yep that's his entire empire now.

Oh yes, I'm not completely screwed at all.

Oh my word. China has almost 14 times greater military might than Babylon....this should make for a very exciting endgame. Unleash them nukes!!!

 

[lemmy101]

Oh an air-craft. A flying car of sorts. I get it now. Good work, boffins!

So about these 'carriers'?

BUY BUY BUY

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

This can only mean good things.

LOL, I love your penchant for irony & sarcasm Lemmy-it's what makes this thread so entertaining to read !

Aussie.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Oh an air-craft. A flying car of sorts. I get it now. Good work, boffins!

So about these 'carriers'?

BUY BUY BUY

LOL . Love it Lemmy-you're such a joker !

 

[Threedog43]

This is destined to be one of those threads that goes down in the CFC annals of history as one of the greatest of all time

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

This is destined to be one of those threads that goes down in the CFC annals of history as one of the greatest of all time

I concur, I haven't read a thread so entertaining since Sullla's Civ4 walk-through about 5 years ago ! As with then, this thread is definitely increasing my interest in buying the game (as an Australian, I still have another 5 days to go ).

Aussie.