Civilization 5 - Ideas and Views

[Antilogic]

Which Civics are useless? If you are just running Hereditary Rule all game, then you should probably start switching and see what happens. Representation is insanely useful and probably the best of the bunch. The only one I don't use that often is Environmentalism because it shows up so late, but 19/20 (excluding the defaults) used is a pretty good ratio.

 

[rysmiel]

I do not like much the old system. It obliged you to build specialized units, some to defend your cities, some to attack. With the actual system, you can bring any kind of units in the battle. I disliked the fact that you had to build spearmen for defense, horsemen for attack. Now, a warrior can be either defensive or offensive. It allows for more reversals in multiplayer.

You seem to see something as a bug that I very much saw as a feature; offence-strong and defence-strong units as a vital strategic choice to make, rather than just spamming out units of a handful of types and grinding the opponent down boringly.

 

[Gamemaster77]

Units should be allowed to move on mountains.

 

[Dragonxander PR]

Units should be allowed to move on mountains.

Also, mountains should give a 1 (not sure if it should be of 2) bonus, -2 & require 50% extra time to build improvements. Mountains should allow the following:

-No road can cut down moving costs, railroads will only provide 1/5 of the movement cost. Roads & rails will still be needed for traderoutes.

-Only mineral resources, incense & sheep should be allowed in the mountains (also coffee if it were available as a resource).

-Mountain tiles would depend on a road in order to be workable.

-Forests should grow atop mountains (except tundra & ice mountains, these can have glaciers blocking their access); therefore forest preserves & lumbermills should be buildable.

-No windmills or cottages allowed.

-Rivers going through mountain tiles should allow traderoutes.

 

[Naokaukodem]

Which Civics are useless? If you are just running Hereditary Rule all game, then you should probably start switching and see what happens. Representation is insanely useful and probably the best of the bunch. The only one I don't use that often is Environmentalism because it shows up so late, but 19/20 (excluding the defaults) used is a pretty good ratio.

I always want to switch to Universal Suffrage but can't always due to unhappiness.
And Representation do not work when you have more of 5 big cities.

You seem to see something as a bug that I very much saw as a feature; offence-strong and defence-strong units as a vital strategic choice to make, rather than just spamming out units of a handful of types and grinding the opponent down boringly.

There's pretty much the same choices possible in Civ4. Archers and Longbows are not predestined to attack, even if they can do it reasonably. Horses can defend, but they don't get any bonus. The differencies between attack and defense are more subtile. And subtility is only what we can ask from a game like Civ.

And where is the strategic choice if you build 50% defense units and 50% attack units, where it should be? It just dumbs down your power by 2 in case of one or the other (defense or attack) With Civ4 system, your power is more directly linked to your production capacity.
Plus, defense units being able to attack honestly makes the counter-attacks possible, switching the player to a passive mode (with only Civ3 defense units) to an active mode (with only Civ4 defense units). This makes the city sieges more fun and unpredictable.

 

[rysmiel]

And where is the strategic choice if you build 50% defense units and 50% attack units, where it should be?

How much Civ 3 have you actually played ? Because seriously, that's not the most efficient way to play Civ 3 by a long shot.

Plus, defense units being able to attack honestly makes the counter-attacks possible,

"honestly" ? Counter-attacks are more "honest" than actual defence ?

switching the player to a passive mode (with only Civ3 defense units) to an active mode (with only Civ4 defense units). This makes the city sieges more fun and unpredictable.

If you have a player who uses only defensive units for defence, you might have a point. But as a Civ 3 player I don't, any more than I'd put only attack-strong units in an attacking force, because that's asking to get eaten by counter-attacks.

 

[Naokaukodem]

How much Civ 3 have you actually played ? Because seriously, that's not the most efficient way to play Civ 3 by a long shot.

I finished it in Deity. Don't remember how I did though.

"honestly" ? Counter-attacks are more "honest" than actual defence ?

It's not the counter-attack that is honest, it is the capability of all units to defend.

If you have a player who uses only defensive units for defence, you might have a point. But as a Civ 3 player I don't, any more than I'd put only attack-strong units in an attacking force, because that's asking to get eaten by counter-attacks.

If you put defense units automatically in every of your stacks, what's the point to have both attack and defense units?

 

[rysmiel]

If you put defense units automatically in every of your stacks, what's the point to have both attack and defense units?

That in different isituations against different enemies you might want different combinations of a) bombard units b) units to attack the city you're headed for c) units to defend the stack defensively and d) fast units to defend the stack by attacking potential attackers.

 

[god of crows45]

I'm not sure if this was discussed before, but I kind of want to see some real time battles. I am aware of the fact that then it wouldn't be Civ anymore; it would be a Total War game. But if they developed their own real time battle engine, I think it would make the Civ experience a bit more enjoyable for many people.

Also, I like the different skin color of civilizations in BtS.

 

[rysmiel]

I'm not sure if this was discussed before, but I kind of want to see some real time battles. I am aware of the fact that then it wouldn't be Civ anymore; it would be a Total War game. But if they developed their own real time battle engine, I think it would make the Civ experience a bit more enjoyable for many people.

For some of us it would make the game unplayable; real-time battle needs adequate reflexes, and a great selling point of Civ for me is that I can take as long as I like about anything.

 

[Panzeh]

For some of us it would make the game unplayable; real-time battle needs adequate reflexes, and a great selling point of Civ for me is that I can take as long as I like about anything.

Also, real time battles or even zoomed in turn based battles really extend an already long game, especially in multiplayer. I'd think long and hard before including a tactical module.

 

[tom123]

It would help if the OP had spelt things correctly!!
As for a business versions of the UN, like the European Union, as the OP said, that would be an interesting idea, although it shouldnt be a victory option. Maybe corperations could be developed further to include it?

One thing I would like very much is if everything was less oriented around America. For very young 'Civilization', it is ridiculous that so many wonders have their real-world counterparts in America.

 

[Antilogic]

I always want to switch to Universal Suffrage but can't always due to unhappiness.
And Representation do not work when you have more of 5 big cities.

Not that I agree with the rest of what was posted in the list (especially on unit design), but this is ridiculous. Are you telling me you have never run Representation with more than 5 big cities? Sure, one or two cities don't get the happiness bonus, so you have to build an extra few happiness buildings there or just deal with it some other way (example: spread multiple religions to the unhappy cities and build temples/switch to Free Religion). You still get the big bonus from Representation, the extra science per specialist, in all your cities.

If you can't always run Universal Suffrage due to unhappiness, then you have to look at alternate methods of getting happiness (new buildings, Nationhood + Barracks, Free Religion, etc.). I don't see this as a real argument that civics are unbalanced.


The first thing I would do with separate ADM values is make all A = D and put +X% bonuses back in. At least Civ2 had the HP/Firepower dimensions to differentiate the units. The Civ3 unit system was probably the second worst of the entire series (the worst being the all-or-nothing die roll of Civ1).

 

[rysmiel]

The first thing I would do with separate ADM values is make all A = D and put +X% bonuses back in.

What's the appeal of that first part, for you ? It seems to me to be a) drastically reducing a space for strategic variation in the game, and also b) for those who care about realism, I do not see any plausible argument that every weapons development through history has been equally beneficial to attacking and defending.

 

[Antilogic]

As some units have in Civ4, like the Grenadier (+50% attack vs. Riflemen), you can already mimic separate attack and defense values. Realism also dictates that not all weapons are equally good for fighting different types of units (use a Civ3 example: knights and longbows have the same attacking characteristics against pikemen, but historically this was not the case). Another reason why I don't like ADM is because of a lack of unit diversity; Civ4, for all its quirks and inaccuracies, is still far ahead of Civ3 on the realism dimension.

Also, viewing combat as one unit attacking the fixed position of the defender's unit is inaccurate for all but city defenses. One tile in Civ4 represents on the order of tens to hundreds of square miles (I did the calculation once on these forums, but I don't remember where). In that space, there is ample room for both sides to maneuver and fight (and thus the barriers between attacker and defender are more fluid), with any fortifications being represented as temporarily constructed defenses that can be used/fallen back on (justifying the fortification bonus).

 

[Naokaukodem]

That in different isituations against different enemies you might want different combinations of a) bombard units b) units to attack the city you're headed for c) units to defend the stack defensively and d) fast units to defend the stack by attacking potential attackers.

Those four are possible in Civ4...

 

[Naokaukodem]

You still get the big bonus from Representation, the extra science per specialist, in all your cities.

I very rarely use specialists, and yet, this is when the city advisor begins on this topic!

If you can't always run Universal Suffrage due to unhappiness, then you have to look at alternate methods of getting happiness (new buildings, Nationhood + Barracks, Free Religion, etc.). I don't see this as a real argument that civics are unbalanced.

Cities with 16+ pop may be far to be happy with a single barrack, some religions or anything. Trust me, in most of my games i end up with Heredetary Rules in the late game, but also I'm playing on Emperor, where it is tougher to conquer civs, so tougher to have more ressources.

 

[Hail]

As some units have in Civ4, like the Grenadier (+50% attack vs. Riflemen), you can already mimic separate attack and defense values.

grenadier receives his bonus when attacking and defending against riflemen, but it does not receive such bonus when fighting other unit types. that's an ingenious way to mimic separate attack and defense.

Realism also dictates that not all weapons are equally good for fighting different types of units (use a Civ3 example: knights and longbows have the same attacking characteristics against pikemen, but historically this was not the case).

if i'm not mistaken, in every game in the civ series pikemen receive a 100% bonus against mounted units.

Another reason why I don't like ADM is because of a lack of unit diversity

Civ4, for all its quirks and inaccuracies, is still far ahead of Civ3 on the realism dimension.

civ3 is the only civ-like game except civ4?

 

[ChiefTonfa]

firaxis please read this. i have been playing civ4bts for almost a year daily now, and consider myself a big fan and think i know the game pretty well, its my second fav game ever. i have one major problem that i hope is corrected for civ 5. cultural pressure is too strong. if you take over a city, culture pressure keeps it from being worth anything, and sometimes u cant stop it from flipping. i've never liked that and thought it was very unrealistic. if you take over a city, it should be worthwhile and still effective. it shouldn't be practically unusable because there's other cities thousands of miles away. not only does this problem mean that the human player has to take out multiple cities just to get one good one, which shouldn't happen, it also means that the computer is far less effective. for instance, i've noticed the ai often takes on empires that are far away. usually this results in them gaining a few cities that are so surrounded by culture they're hurting more than helping their owners. this is very unrealistic and limits gameplay by a lot. its easy to fix this and i feel it really should've been done before realeasing civ 4. if you own a city...you automatically get to work its immediate tiles. maybe not the outer tiles, but always the close ones. the fact that that is not standard bemuses me. it would make for a much better game. on another note, one thing i would like just for more fun and possibilities, would be for more UU to be overpowered like the praets.

 

[Antilogic]

Cities with 16+ pop may be far to be happy with a single barrack, some religions or anything. Trust me, in most of my games i end up with Heredetary Rules in the late game, but also I'm playing on Emperor, where it is tougher to conquer civs, so tougher to have more ressources.

Well, whatever works for you. I've managed to use all the government civics on Monarch quite effectively, and I'm having a hard time believing the jump to Emperor would invalidate all of the strategies I've put together.

grenadier receives his bonus when attacking and defending against riflemen, but it does not receive such bonus when fighting other unit types. that's an ingenious way to mimic separate attack and defense.

Nope, not defending. Just on the offense. Unless the last patch changed it.

if i'm not mistaken, in every game in the civ series pikemen receive a 100% bonus against mounted units.

I can verify this is true for Civ2 and Civ4. I thought they eliminated the bonus for Civ3 (look at the statistics for horseman attacking spearman with no terrain effects or fortification and it was 50/50).

civ3 is the only civ-like game except civ4?

Huh? Nowhere did I assert that Civ3 was the only civ-like game except Civ4. I was making an explicit comparison against the game's predecessor.