Civilization 5 Rants Thread

[tarsier]

does anyone else have a problem with AI being either too easy or rediculously hard to the point where you have to use exploits (navy, early conquest etc) to win?


i'm pretty new to civilization, but find that emperor is a bit too easy. especially on the island maps.


on immortal, you struggle like crazy while the AI civs have almost infinite happiness, mass production, mass technology etc... you try to make friends with the daddy civ, but they won't have any of it and soon you'll find yourself at war with one or more MASS military civs.

seriously, in my last game i was attacked by greece who allied all of the city states surrounding me, and they had a city close-by with no fewer than 9 fighter jets. then just blitzed my cities and mopped up with mechanized infantry (my cities even with arsenal's only had ~40 defense). even with average technology on the scoreboard, i was still without artillery, anti-aircraft guns etc while this was happening.



imo the happiness = mass expanding strategy of the AI's on higher difficulty is broken. the mass expanding civs always scale about 10 times faster and you can never keep up unless you're exploiting the dumb navy pathing.

 

[Thormodr]

does anyone else have a problem with AI being either too easy or rediculously hard to the point where you have to use exploits (navy, early conquest etc) to win?


i'm pretty new to civilization, but find that emperor is a bit too easy. especially on the island maps.


on immortal, you struggle like crazy while the AI civs have almost infinite happiness, mass production, mass technology etc... you try to make friends with the daddy civ, but they won't have any of it and soon you'll find yourself at war with one or more MASS military civs.

seriously, in my last game i was attacked by greece who allied all of the city states surrounding me, and they had a city close-by with no fewer than 9 fighter jets. then just blitzed my cities and mopped up with mechanized infantry (my cities even with arsenal's only had ~40 defense). even with average technology on the scoreboard, i was still without artillery, anti-aircraft guns etc while this was happening.



imo the happiness = mass expanding strategy of the AI's on higher difficulty is broken. the mass expanding civs always scale about 10 times faster and you can never keep up unless you're exploiting the dumb navy pathing.

Welcome to the forums tarsier.

You have described Civilization 5 very well and have a good grasp on the situation.

Broken diplomacy and moronic AI (even with all the cheating it does) makes for a very unsatisfying game unfortunately.

 

[Truthy]

But civ4 never had DLC in between expansions.

To make the comparison as fair as possible, one would look at the on-sale price of all DLC at or around the time the civ5 expansion is released. If you buy DLC regularly for civ5 then I don't think the comparison against the no-DLC model of civ4 makes much sense.

For people who must buy everything, including DLC, the day it is released... yeah of course they're going to pay a premium, and that premium may end up being a bit more or even significantly more than what they would have paid for civ4.

Those with more patience can easily get 66% or more off the price of the game and DLC. So the early adopters are subsidising the purchases of the more patient customers. This is my attitude towards people who pre-order games as well. Personally I think pre-orders are almost always pointless from the customer's point of view, but there are plenty of people who gobble them up and I don't mind that because it makes the game more likely to be profitable (a success) without as much input from me.

The DLC may be expensive and "milking" customers, but that's the choice of those customers. Us who wait can get the stuff for a lot cheaper, so we win.

The other issue about DLC which concerns me is that it allows the developers to release half finished games and then slowly tack on more content with DLC. It in a way acts as feel good food to the player who will hope the DLC will enhance the game. It enables them to be even more abusive to the customer and this trend has not only taken place with Firaxis.

DerrickCB:

The AI only cheats significantly at the higher settings. Arguably, the Deity AI is borked because it's declaring war when it shouldn't be, because its production bonuses are adversely affecting diplomatic behavior that's meant to be functional at normal settings. See? Phrased this way, this particular "rant," could make its way into a Deity AI patch, or be acceptable outside this thread. Again, just a suggestion. You can keep ranting here if that's what you really want.

Do you think all I know how to do it rant?

Apart from that, you can keep building troops and keep them as garrison without cost if you have the right SP. This meets the AI's requirements, and you still only need to mobilize 6 to 8 troops to completely maul it. The AI is no less constrained than you by the hex grid. Any troops it can't position well is essentially useless.

1UPt is quite effective in exploiting the tactical weakness of the AI, isn't it?

Finally, I can't see how anyone can find moving 8 units (at the highest) a chore, when you routinely had to Draft upwards of 30 units manually in Civ4 to assemble anything like a reasonably sized army. There's a Go-To function so you don't have to manually command movement across large distances. Are you using it?

Production values are reduced dramatically and science is increased. This ensures that the game goes by faster so that the player cant have more units and has less time to build. It also ensures that the player must have a small number of cities, in an empire ,which by definition, is barely an empire. Also in effect are maintenance costs and systematic penalization. Almost anything you build you build based on the hope that it won't hurt your economy.

It is the only game in the civ series where the goal is not to build. It is the only game in the series where as a tactic it is useful to delete your own buildings. Everything must be kept slim and there is only room for a couple buildings in city and a couple cities in your empire. Hence a lot of the boredom that many people on these boards complain of.

I'm sorry, I don't get the gist. Are you implying that you don't like 1UPT fundamentally?

Correct. What I am saying here is that 1UPT makes it so that with many buildings it harms you if you build them. In previous civ games the primary reason not to build something was the opportunity cost, everything you could have done with that time. In civ v, building too much will destroy your economy. This makes the game very disengaging because you are often too worried about what not to build rather than what to build.

Neither does 1 UPT.

Yes it does. If civ v allowed for very large empires then you would always have too many troops and every tile would be overflowing with units. Therefore, all aspects of the game were downscaled in order for 1UPT to fit into the picture.

Frankly, i have no idea why they would have thought that it is a good idea to nerf everything in a game to make room for one mechanic, but hey, Im just the gamer. Not everything is supposed to make sense to me. I guess the series is just moving too fast and Im getting too caught up in what it used to be.

I've said this to you before, and it's a charge no one has yet answered. Changing the value of Granary to 1000 hammers affects nothing except that one building. Changing the hammer values of units relatively speaking should not (and does not) affect the hammer values of buildings.

Building must also take longer. If you build everything you would have too much time to produce units.

 

[Tabarnak]

Production values are reduced dramatically and science is increased. This ensures that the game goes by faster so that the player cant have more units and has less time to build. It also ensures that the player must have a small number of cities, in an empire ,which by definition, is barely an empire. Also in effect are maintenance costs and systematic penalization. Almost anything you build you build based on the hope that it won't hurt your economy.

It is the only game in the civ series where the goal is not to build. It is the only game in the series where as a tactic it is useful to delete your own buildings. Everything must be kept slim and there is only room for a couple buildings in city and a couple cities in your empire. Hence a lot of the boredom that many people on these boards complain of.



Correct. What I am saying here is that 1UPT makes it so that with many buildings it harms you if you build them. In previous civ games the primary reason not to build something was the opportunity cost, everything you could have done with that time. In civ v, building too much will destroy your economy. This makes the game very disengaging because you are often too worried about what not to build rather than what to build.

I often build everything in most cities and still build a lot of units. There is some ways to do that, you just need practice. In mp mode the 1UP feature is very nice. I agree that the AI sucks at it. You can have a big civ if you properly make the right steps in each eras.

What ciV is missing is not production or unit stacking, it's only more features like spies and maybe religion(or other nice ideas). I played cIV since his release and took some breaks among years. ciV brings the little more fun that i didn't have from the previous version, and i just can't stop playing it.

Not a rant post, i agree, but i think more features can be added for a next expansion.

 

[Roxlimn]

Derrick CB:

1UPt is quite effective in exploiting the tactical weakness of the AI, isn't it?

Shrug. Not in particular. The war AI in Civ 4's so bad that manages to mess up stack combat just fine. War is the singlemost consistent factor in the player's favor in Civ, and that includes both Civ 4 and 5.

Production values are reduced dramatically and science is increased. This ensures that the game goes by faster so that the player cant have more units and has less time to build. It also ensures that the player must have a small number of cities, in an empire ,which by definition, is barely an empire. Also in effect are maintenance costs and systematic penalization. Almost anything you build you build based on the hope that it won't hurt your economy.

This is completely off-base. Hammer and gold values have been redone. Happiness has been redonce. If anything, the problem right now is that you can have everything and not really pay much in return. A globe-spanning empire has never been stronger than it is now in Civ 5. Almost every building is a net benefit - you just have to juggle order to manage the curve.

It is the only game in the civ series where the goal is not to build. It is the only game in the series where as a tactic it is useful to delete your own buildings. Everything must be kept slim and there is only room for a couple buildings in city and a couple cities in your empire. Hence a lot of the boredom that many people on these boards complain of.

Correct. What I am saying here is that 1UPT makes it so that with many buildings it harms you if you build them. In previous civ games the primary reason not to build something was the opportunity cost, everything you could have done with that time. In civ v, building too much will destroy your economy. This makes the game very disengaging because you are often too worried about what not to build rather than what to build.

Really need to play Civ 5 again after the latest patches. You can keep saying this if you want, but it totally flies in the face of the game's current mechanics.

Yes it does. If civ v allowed for very large empires then you would always have too many troops and every tile would be overflowing with units. Therefore, all aspects of the game were downscaled in order for 1UPT to fit into the picture.

Building must also take longer. If you build everything you would have too much time to produce units.

No. It is self evident that if every building costed 1 hammer without any gold maintenance, you would be able to build every building in the game, and this would still not help you to flood the map if every single unit costed a thousand hammers apiece. Of course, the actual costs are not like that, but it demonstrates the principle adequately.

Civ 5 DOES allow for extremely large empires with many cities of large populations. This does not make it any more advisable to waste your money and your hammers by making useless troops.

 

[kiwitt]

I gonna make a comment which may shock many die-hard fans of Civilization, including myself.

With This comment and this article, the PC-era is ending. And we all know consoles now dominate the gaming world.

And the Civ 5 design with 1UPT lends itself well to point with a finger and moving a unit to another location. It will be more difficult to do that with multiple units on a tile. You can just use finger taps on the screen to bring info and actions up. This ipad generation is huge and the Civilization franchise will live a long time, if it embraces it.

Us technical players will still play Civ IV, etc., knowing the Golden Age is over.

So there you have it and now for the comment. "Civilization is heading in the right direction to continue to stay relevant." - and it is something the 2KGames, Firaxis, (and Civfanatics Admins know as well, who give Civ 5 equal footing to the other versions).

It it really is no use ranting about it

 

[Roxlimn]

kiwitt:

Can't disagree more, but this is not the thread for it.

 

[Thormodr]

I gonna make a comment which may shock many die-hard fans of Civilization, including myself.

With This comment and this article, the PC-era is ending. And we all know consoles now dominate the gaming world.

And the Civ 5 design with 1UPT lends itself well to point with a finger and moving a unit to another location. It will be more difficult to do that with multiple units on a tile. You can just use finger taps on the screen to bring info and actions up. This ipad generation is huge and the Civilization franchise will live a long time, if it embraces it.

Us technical players will still play Civ IV, etc., knowing the Golden Age is over.

So there you have it and now for the comment. "Civilization is heading in the right direction to continue to stay relevant." - and it is something the 2KGames, Firaxis, (and Civfanatics Admins know as well, who give Civ 5 equal footing to the other versions).

It it really is no use ranting about it

Your vision of the future sounds quite "contemporary".

Sadly, you could be right.

 

[Eskel]

So, the Civ5 hasn't improved yet?
Damn! I was just intending to give it third chance, but you guys discouraged me.

Anyway, i want to drop my 2 cents into "future of gaming" discussion.
I dont share your pessimism, Kiwitt. Why? Because the fact that something becomes popular (even most popular) doesnt make automatically all people love it. There is always a niche: despite a lot of people who like Lady Gaga music, there are still people who listen to jazz.

Thats why I think 2K went into wrong direction. They had a niche - oriented franchise, and decided to push it mass market. It was a risky move, and might prove to be a dead end. Well, they cashed-in their former successes for now. But I doubt if they can make the same trick twice. At least I dont intend to help them, and know some people who think exactly the same way. I won't change my tastes just because some marketing guys 3000 thousands miles away had come to this idea. I wish them success, but in the meanwhile will patiently wait for the product that will meet my expectations and nicely fill-in empty place left by Civilization...
And I am pretty sure, that sooner or later someone will target that niche.

 

[Thormodr]

So, the Civ5 hasn't improved yet?
Damn! I was just intending to give it third chance, but you guys discouraged me.

Anyway, i want to drop my 2 cents into "future of gaming" discussion.
I dont share your pessimism, Kiwitt. Why? Because the fact that something becomes popular (even most popular) doesnt make automatically all people love it. There is always a niche: despite a lot of people who like Lady Gaga music, there are still people who listen to jazz.

Thats why I think 2K went into wrong direction. They had a niche - oriented franchise, and decided to push it mass market. It was a risky move, and might prove to be a dead end. Well, they cashed-in their former successes for now. But I doubt if they can make the same trick twice. At least I dont intend to help them, and know some people who think exactly the same way. I won't change my tastes just because some marketing guys 3000 thousands miles away had come to this idea. I wish them success, but in the meanwhile will patiently wait for the product that will meet my expectations and nicely fill-in empty place left by Civilization...
And I am pretty sure, that sooner or later someone will target that niche.

This is an excellent post. Could even be post of the year.

 

[Exoma]

I think the Arabian Empire needs an ARAB ruler for once..

I remember Civilization IV had Saladin (A Kurd)
and now Civilization V has Harun Al-Rashid (A Persian)

 

[wcbarney]

So, the Civ5 hasn't improved yet?
Damn! I was just intending to give it third chance, but you guys discouraged me. ...

Dang, Eskel -- if you really wanted to give it a third chance, then for heaven's sake don't start by reading the Rants thread! I've been playing Civ V since it came out, and am pretty good at it, and like it. But everytime I feel like a downer, I glance at the last page or so of this thread.

 

[Thormodr]

I think the Arabian Empire needs an ARAB ruler for once..

I remember Civilization IV had Saladin (A Kurd)
and now Civilization V has Harun Al-Rashid (A Persian)

Not to mention Alexander the Great being Macedonian and not Greek.

Overall though, I think they've done a decent job in this area. Other parts of the game are severely lacking however as quite a few of us are well aware.

 

[TheMarshmallowBear]

In Civ 3 Abu Bakr was the leader of Arabs.

 

[bitula]

No. It is self evident that if every building costed 1 hammer without any gold maintenance, you would be able to build every building in the game, and this would still not help you to flood the map if every single unit costed a thousand hammers apiece. Of course, the actual costs are not like that, but it demonstrates the principle adequately.

But how is this a counter argument. All you say is.
1) No - because, well, why would you agree, if you dont want to...
2) Make a claim which is true in itself, but has nothing to do with the original argument.
What Derrik says:
1) Firaxis game developers realized themselves, that having too many units alongside each other - called here "carpet of doom"- makes gameplay boring, because of for example non-immersive micromanagement of these units.
2) So to avoid this - they (themselve) - had to penalize other aspects of game to artifitialy lower the number of units which could be produced.
Do you get this?
The problem is in 1), 2 is just a way to fix it - and actually the worst way. The problem itself is the carpet of doom, because if Firaxis wouldnt limit other aspects of game, you would still not build those units. You see, you yourself wouldnt build them - even if they cost 0 gold - to avoid the boring end game, which would inevitably follow. You dont even need to play the game to understand this, it logically follows from the 1UPT concept itself. So I am still really looking forward to anyone making a proper counter argument here.

 

[Brichals]

But how is this a counter argument. All you say is.
1) No - because, well, why would you agree, if you dont want to...
2) Make a claim which is true in itself, but has nothing to do with the original argument.
What Derrik says:
1) Firaxis game developers realized themselves, that having too many units alongside each other - called here "carpet of doom"- makes gameplay boring, because of for example non-immersive micromanagement of these units.
2) So to avoid this - they (themselve) - had to penalize other aspects of game to artifitialy lower the number of units which could be produced.
Do you get this?
The problem is in 1), 2 is just a way to fix it - and actually the worst way. The problem itself is the carpet of doom, because if Firaxis wouldnt limit other aspects of game, you would still not build those units. You see, you yourself wouldnt build them - even if they cost 0 gold - to avoid the boring end game, which would inevitably follow. You dont even need to play the game to understand this, it logically follows from the 1UPT concept itself. So I am still really looking forward to anyone making a proper counter argument here.

So buildings are expensive because units are expensive? You have a point because the game has been balanced/paced that way. Do you want more buildings? That has never been Civ, that's Sim City. They could expand tech trees and give more buidings later but it doesn't necessarily improve the core game.

 

[bitula]

So buildings are expensive because units are expensive? You have a point because the game has been balanced/paced that way. Do you want more buildings? That has never been Civ, that's Sim City. They could expand tech trees and give more buidings later but it doesn't necessarily improve the core game.

In Civ1, Alpha Centauri and Civ4 (these are which I played for a long time) you always had an ever growing empire. The more you advance into time, the more thechs you have, the more buildings you have, the more units you haver or capable to produce. This "ever growing" empire is one of the main point of the Civ series, you have the feeling you have more and more, better and better and better stuff, where as in Civ5 you just get more-and-more frustrated as you play further. Ok, this is a different type of game, should be played differently, but I dont want a different TYPE of game - I always bought the Civ games, because I like exacltly this type of game - it was a unique game - and now turned into a cheap or at most mediocre tactical game.

 

[Thormodr]

In Civ1, Alpha Centauri and Civ4 (these are which I played for a long time) you always had an ever growing empire. The more you advance into time, the more thechs you have, the more buildings you have, the more units you haver or capable to produce. This "ever growing" empire is one of the main point of the Civ series, you have the feeling you have more and more, better and better and better stuff, where as in Civ5 you just get more-and-more frustrated as you play further. Ok, this is a different type of game, should be played differently, but I dont want a different TYPE of game - I always bought the Civ games, because I like exacltly this type of game - it was a unique game - and now turned into a cheap or at most mediocre tactical game.

Civilization 5 came up small in the literal and figurative sense of the word.

Fancy graphics were obviously more important as they helped lure in the casuals and soccer moms to the franchise. They also made huge maps obsolete.

 

[Roxlimn]

bitula:

You've got the incomplete idea, probably because you just paid attention to the one liner. It's important to get the context of the whole position.

What Derrik says:
1) Firaxis game developers realized themselves, that having too many units alongside each other - called here "carpet of doom"- makes gameplay boring, because of for example non-immersive micromanagement of these units.
2) So to avoid this - they (themselve) - had to penalize other aspects of game to artifitialy lower the number of units which could be produced.
Do you get this?
The problem is in 1), 2 is just a way to fix it - and actually the worst way. The problem itself is the carpet of doom, because if Firaxis wouldnt limit other aspects of game, you would still not build those units. You see, you yourself wouldnt build them - even if they cost 0 gold - to avoid the boring end game, which would inevitably follow. You dont even need to play the game to understand this, it logically follows from the 1UPT concept itself. So I am still really looking forward to anyone making a proper counter argument here.

The problem is that (1) is a supposition. We don't know that Firaxis though that Carpets of Doom were a problem. Derrick CB supposed that himself, because that's what he does, and he found it a problem.

In point of fact, as I said before, Carpets of Doom are indicative of bad play. If you are building more than 10 units, you are playing badly. 1UPT means that position is just as important as having the unit itself. If your unit is stuck out in the back because there's nowhere for it to go, it is absolutely and completely useless. In fact, it's worse that useless because you're paying maintenance for it, and you sank hammers into it.

The second point you make (and Derrick CB paraphrases for Sullla) is even more senseless. There is no point to lowering general productivity to fix a problem, with say, the Granary. We do not advocate fixes to a Granary problem by adjusting tile outputs! It's a stupid way to fix the problem, and I can't understand why we're assuming that the guys at Firaxis are so clueless as to behave in such an insane fashion, apriori.

If there is a problem with the Granary, you fix the Granary! Obvious, right?

Ergo, if there's a problem with units being cheap, you make the units more expensive to make. I do not understand how it makes sense to deduce that the unit costing was the reason for how the tile outputs were balanced. If YOU had a problem with unit costing, would you have adjusted tile outputs to account for it? No! You adjust the hammer cost of the unit, right?

The entire line of reasoning is ridiculous and senseless. I can't understand how anyone could put stock in such nonsense.

In Civ1, Alpha Centauri and Civ4 (these are which I played for a long time) you always had an ever growing empire. The more you advance into time, the more thechs you have, the more buildings you have, the more units you haver or capable to produce. This "ever growing" empire is one of the main point of the Civ series, you have the feeling you have more and more, better and better and better stuff, where as in Civ5 you just get more-and-more frustrated as you play further. Ok, this is a different type of game, should be played differently, but I dont want a different TYPE of game - I always bought the Civ games, because I like exacltly this type of game - it was a unique game - and now turned into a cheap or at most mediocre tactical game.

I play Civ V and I always get more and more and better and better stuff as I advance to the Modern Era. Maybe you're not playing it to your satisfaction because of internal assumptions? I don't get it. My modern Cities are powerhouses, and my modern Civs are amazingly strong.

There has never been a Civ where bigger is always better - save for Civ V. There is no stopping the snowballing in Civ V, and it amuses me to hear ranters ranting about the exact opposite, when it's the snowballing that's the problem in Civ V, not the reverse!

 

[markusbeutel]

bitula:
The problem is that (1) is a supposition. We don't know that Firaxis though that Carpets of Doom were a problem. Derrick CB supposed that himself, because that's what he does, and he found it a problem.

Although not specifically stated as "carpets of doom," the lead designer of CIV V talks about how the number of units playable at any one time needed to be significantly reduced to mesh with 1UPT and it's space restrictions.

http://www.weplayciv.com/forums/sho...zation-V-quot-with-Jon-Shafer-and-Pete-Murray

It's worth a listen as it details many of the issues cropping up here in the Rants thread. That, and it's also a great podcast.