CIV3 vs others - should i play civ3?

[keldath]

Hello civ3 fans,

im a civ4 buff for 10+ years,
lately , ive been looking at the civ3 mods,
and i love to see that the modding scene here is alive.

so, i thought of playing civ3 with one of the mods, for nostalgia,
so, id like to hear some opinions on the civ3 vs civ4, i know allot has been written on this, but, what the heck, ill ask.


1. what do you think of the AI in civ3?
2. how fun it is to wage war in civ3 vs civ4? tedious? enjoyable? strategic? challenging?
3. the lack of varied improvements and governments? does that feels missing compared to civ4?
4. other thoughts?


hope i get some input,
thanks in advance,
Keldath the friendly modder.

 

[Nathiri]

The AI are all very similar unlike civ4 which has more modifiers influencing them. Civ4 tried to balance and improve everything from civ3; but in some ways I find it made it a bit too complex; but I do often look at civ4 and see how much it fixed things; but I have yet to get too involved in understanding the game more. I just enjoy civ3's scale, simplicity, and its micro. So the AI tend to mostly act very aggressive with just a few things varying from civ to civ; but overall they play very similar.

2. War can be quite fun in civ3, but the issue is the lack of variety in the military. On higher difficulties, you do use a lot of artillery, and you cant just obtain a massive stack easily; but there is still some truth to having lots of offense units to roll over the AI; but there is still some work involved in order to get there, especially on a high difficulty where the AI overcome you with tons of cheap units. There is still much micro with you trying to defend with much less in number and more expensive units. Mods try to fix this and making more roles and varying the shield cost of units. The AI do have some difficulty in using some of these other roles due to how they are programmed; so usually the modder tries to compensate for that and making them still challenging without it.

3. I more often try to think how to bring the pros of later civ games into civ3, instead of going to that other game. Most mods have tons of city improvements, filling in some of the "gaps"; but some of the benefits from those later civ games would be nice to bring back. Overcoming the lack and re-purposing is one of the goals of many modders. I think the modder feels the missing parts more than the player, but I could be wrong. There are some times where I wish a particular mod had more interesting systems. I do get frustrated with civ3 sometimes because of the lack when playing a mod; but sometimes I also get frustrated just because I dont understand the unique things the mod has and so cant play optimally, which I hate.

4. I love civ3, but I enjoy it even more in multiplayer with even just one player. I find that twice as fun in default civ3, even though you have less civs in MP. The lack is what I try to fix for myself in modding, and often that is achievable.

 

[Quintillus]

1. The AI is decent. Civ IV is a bit more challenging, and definitely more so with Better AI or other AI mods, but Civ III will challenge series newcomers (not sure about those new to Civ III, but not new to Civ), and is more challenging than the AI in Civ5. Essentially, the AI can't execute a strategic or tactical campaign as well as an experienced human player, and there are some of the more advanced rules it doesn't or very poorly takes advantages of, but it can keep a front interesting, will take advantage of poorly defended areas if it has troops nearby, and does okay (though not perfectly) on the domestic front.

2. It varies depending on the mod/difficulty/etc., but in general I'd say it's enjoyable. At an appropriate balance of difficulty for your skill, there are definitely strategic questions, as meeting all your objectives in the near term is not going to be possible. If an AI expands well against other AIs (especially on moderately high difficulties), it can definitely be challenging. At the same time, at the higher difficulty levels (Demigod/Deity/Sid), it becomes what many would consider to be tedious, simply due to the volume of AI units, and the limited number of tactics that are effective against so many units. I'd recommend starting off at Monarch (or the equivalent in a mod) as someone experienced with Civ4 but not Civ3. At that level, the AI gets small bonuses, such as 10% higher production, so it can be challenging, but you still have flexibility in tactics, and don't have to play perfectly.

3. I miss some things, like the flexibility in bonuses to science/production (Civ3 only allows 50%/25% increments for those, respectively). Civics, they're nice in Civ3, but they're something you change a few times per game, and Civ3 governments work well. To me they're both fun systems. But there are other things that Civ3 offers that Civ4 doesn't, or doesn't as well, such as a more flexible and realistic and flexible bombardment system (artillery is actually ranged, and ships can bombard non-city tiles, for example), and supporting larger, more detailed maps than Civ4 (due to using less memory, although at the largest settings AI processing time becomes an issue in III). So to me they both have advantages, and both belong in my library. My ideal Civ game would combined the advantages of both III and IV.

4. One of the noteworthy aspects of Civ III is indeed its modding scene, and in particular its historical scenarios, with many modders being historians or in fields relevant to the mod's focus themselves. One of the tradeoffs of Civ3 vs Civ4 in modding is that while Civ4 is more flexible, it also requires more technical skills to create advanced mods. Civ3 ships with a GUI-based editor that allows you to change much, much more than the World Builder in Civ4, and to change rules in a more friendly format than Civ4's XML files. So a person who doesn't have Python or C++ skills, and might not be well versed in XML, can create a considerably more detailed, intricate mod in Civ3. IMO, in practice this tradeoff usually works well for Civ3, even as modders occasionally are frustrated with its limitations. Once again, in my ideal Civ game, both would be combined - a graphical editor for 90% of what modders would want to do, with more advanced configuration and scripts for the other 10%.

 

[Civinator]

Hello keldath, welcome at the Civ 3 modding forum.

To answer your questions in short: I don´t think you have to switch to Civ 3 for gameplay.

I stay with Civ 3 (and Civ 2 ToT) because I really don´t like the 3D graphics, especially with that -in my eyes - very ugly table top presentation. I also have Civ 4-6, but I defenitely have no fun when looking at the mess happening on my monitor when playing these versions of Civ. The Civ 3 units in my eyes also are much more beautiful than those unhealthy looking Civ 4 units with every second pixel missing in the graphics and there are much more units available for Civ 3 than for any of the games with 3D graphics. As you are a 10years+ Civ 4 buff, this esthetic argument for you is not relevant, as it shows that you have fun with Civ 4 when looking at the screen of your monitor - and to have fun with the game is the fact that really counts.

The other argument for me, that modding and beeing creative is much more easy with Civ 3 than with Civ 4-6, for you is not relevant either, as you are asking for gameplay, not for modding.

If you really want to try a Civ 3 mod or scenario, I recommend the scenario 'Age of Imperialism' . Last year a civer who has converted from Civ 3 to Civ 4 stated, that such a scenario is not existing for Civ 4.

 

[keldath]

hello, all,
thank you so much for the detailed answers, i much appreciate your time in writing this.

i played civ3 up to c3c and rar mod in its first versions, i remember enjoying war quite allot,
when i play civ, i enjoy an aggressive ai, and wars happening around me and with me, so that aspect of civ always been important to me, thats why i asked about war.

i never for into modding in civ3, but i am familiar with all the possibilities, much easier than c4 ofc.

Civinator, funny, i didnt expect you to encourage me to stick with 4 actually what got me in asking these question is your TLC mod, which is appealing to me.
i love civ4 and the cartooni arts , but couldnt. get into 5 -6 .

Nathiri, interesting take on civ mp, i never tried that....
Quintillus all i want from the ai is to be able to pose a threat in wars, in civ4, i never got a feeling of epic wars, either the ai would stomp me with a supersize stack of doom or it would just be week (using kmod for a long time).

in the end 4 and 3 are different, your posts drive me more to try civ3 and try one of the mods here, TLC mostly and maybe the new RAR.

anyway, thanks for the input, i enjoyed reading your posts , i think on the weekend ill give it the old civ a spin

 

[Civinator]

Civinator... actually what got me in asking these question is your TLC mod, which is appealing to me.

keldath, the TLC mod is created by Oni Ryuu, not by me.

 

[keldath]

lol right - your RAR?

 

[Civinator]

lol right - your RAR?

I did the epic mods CCM1, CCM2 and RARR (what in most ways is a graphical update of RAR with parts of CCM2)

 

[Wolfshade]

lol right - your RAR?

Yeah. There was one of most popular mods for Civ3 - called "Rise And Rule" (RAR in short). Civinator updated it with new gfx and called his update "Rise And Rule Revisited" (RARR).
One of most popular archiving programs is WinRAR, right - joke is accepted.

From my perspective, Anthony Boscia's "Worldwide" mod is the best one to get into the Civ3. It's based on the common mechanics of the Civ3 + few interesting tweaks. If you move to the Civ3 from Civ4/5/6 you'll get in it very quickly.
Civinator's CCM1 + 2 mods are based on some special interpretations of the Civ3 mechanics - so they look quite different to other mods. IMHO these are the best mods for the Civ3 ever but they're much more (especially CCM2) challenging, especially for new players.

Additionally I'd pick up few other mods/scenarios which are my personal favs (alphabetical order):
* Age Of Imperialism Deluxe;
* Hegemon (rule the ancient Greece);
* Medieval European Mod 2;
* Rise and Fall of Roman Empire;
* Rood And The Dragon;
* Storm Over Europe;
* Third World War.

Note here: I couldn't get into the fantasy/anime fashion in my life, so I did mention historical scenarios. Surely "Zombie Island" and "Lord Of The Rings" and "Conquest Of Might And Magic" mods exist.

 

[Balthasar]

If you like flat-out constant battle and strategic gameplay, Escape from Zombie Island 2 Elite is worth a hard look.

 

[keldath]

thank you all for the recommendations.
i decided ti try out ccm2 first,
but before that, i started a normal game in conquest, after the initial shock , i remembered how much i enjoyed civ3.