Civilization 5

[Doctor Penguin]

I will then declare in collapse in 2049 and take over the top score... easy victory.
or keep taking over the top AI until you win.

True, but that is why I suggested that you would take a penalty for it and why I also noted that it would be limited to single player games. I like the idea because it reflects the cyclical nature of civilizations and it also would encourage a bit of risk taking on the part of less experienced players. Its basically legitimizing a cheat mode feature from Civ 2.

As to the easy victory, in single player mode, who cares?

 

[Newbunkle]

Less realism would be more fun. I don't care if spearmen can beat tanks. It made for better game balance to have a more gradual power increase for units.

 

[Skallagrimson]

Lol................

 

[Sebiche]

I don't think less realism is more fun. I think its tauntingly LESS fun.

Damn it Gunship! Since when can a horseback knight with a sword kill you??

 

[Skallagrimson]

I don't think less realism is more fun. I think its tauntingly LESS fun.

Damn it Gunship! Since when can a horseback knight with a sword kill you??

Well if you throw the sword up into the propellers...

 

[carmen510]

Or the horse into the cockpit.

 

[Ankh-f-n-Khonsu]

A "horseback knight" sounds like a centaur to me. There's no telling what kind of magical powers they have at their disposal.

 

[nzcamel]

I've put the following into it's own thread, but thought it may get more exposure here:



As my saved game loaded it had among the tips 'Don't neglect your navy! Especially in the late game game. Controlling the sea can prove decisive(sic-didn't catch the whole last sentance)'

I don't think in any civilization game that this has really been true. Now admittedly I tend to play panegea games or continental games where navies are less important than say in an island game, where they are crucial. But evan then I think I should have to rely on a navy more than I do. I don't think a nation with a small navy and many enemies should beable to easily get resources across water. Especially during war time. Large parts of fighting in WW2 were around the allied supply chain across the atlantic. This would be true in any navel war.

This is something I'd like to see changed in any CIV5. I think the main reason navies are crucial in the real world is trade. I remember in Civ2 that if you wanted to trade just to make extra $ you had to send a actual unit across your roads (and seas oftan). Like the option you have on the merchant great person now. Sending it across seas oftan ment having a transport and a protective ship togeather. In this case you couldn't neglect your navy and navies were more important than they are now.

The problem with that I guess is that alot of people probably did what I did, and just opted out of building trade units cos there was too much micro management involved.
So I would like to see a middle ground, I think the trade itself should stay the way it is; not involving units at all. But I think that it should be more dependent on the viability of the trading partners to have some domminence over the the areas inbetween.

I welcome ideas because there is probably alot of different ways this could be done.
Maybe you could nominate some of your existing ships to be part of a merchant navy, which the computer would automatically control them doing a patrol of the waters that your trade depended on. If you wanted to stop an enemy you were at war with from getting resources from another island/continent then the way you could go about it would be to destroy this merchant navy. Without the merchant navy the trade would automatically stop as it would be assumed that with no merchant navy any unfriendly navy would have control of your shipping routes.

I feel this would bring navies into the game in a big/ger way than what we have seen in civilisation so far. It would reflect reality and make the game more interested and varied. Blockades have oftan been crucial in affecting the outcomes in war and I'd love to have it as an option.

 

[thordk]

civ5 should do away with this "global maintenance cost". the more cities the better has been a fundamental civ concept since civ1, why has this been changed? civ4 forced me to smaller empires what i don't like.

also civ4 seems too war lasty. if you don't win by conquest or domination anytime soon, the AI will pull a space ship victory well before the modern era really started. cater the builders once again, playing as builder should be a valid tactic, not someone who's forced to basically stop research somewhere around the medieval ages to get a cultural victory going.

after all it's civilization and not command & conquer: dark ages ^^

i'd also like to see colonies. a colony as a "remote settlement" that consumes a worker and let you get access to resources outside of your cultural borders.

while i like the ancient eras and such, civ4 currently stops at 2050, that's way too early. some future techs would be nice. a future era that fights wars with televangelists, laser cannons and satellite based global warfare.

that's something from the ctp series iirc. the televangelist, spamming an enemie city with propaganda till it eventually converts. and let me once again initiate revolts via espionage

so basically civ4 has been nice, but civ5 should be a resemblance of civ1, 2 and 3.

 

[Skallagrimson]

I think playing Civ2 on a huge earth map, non-random starting locations for all AIs, has been the most fun I ever had with my clothes still on. I can't say the same for Civ4.

 

[Sir_Lancelot]

I want barbarians to capture towns.

 

[Swedishguy]

I want the "Mastery" victory condition.

 

[thordk]

I want barbarians to capture towns.

i want barbarians to come with a diplomat and give up as soon as the diplomat is captured

 

[Ankh-f-n-Khonsu]

I want to be able to disband cities.

 

[zulu9812]

I want to be able to disband cities.

LOL!

That was in Civ3! Can't think why it's not in Civ4....

Having spent a good number of years in the Civ communty, I've identified certain issues that have always bothered players, and which have always been high on wishlists.

First, up...

Modding Ability

Civ4 is great for modding, in the sense that the source code is provided and this means that there is much less hardcoding than in previous games. The XML files are also easy to edit. However, the lack of a game editor such as in Civ3 is a big complaint. Overall, whilst one can do more with Civ4, it is harder to do so. Whilst Firaxis provided the source code (and many, many thanks to them for doing so), they didn't provide any modding tools. IMO, this was one step forward, one step backward, in terms of moddability.

Better Diplomacy

This always comes up. The best diplomacy models I've ever seen were in Imperium Galactica II and Call To Power 2. Civilization diplomacy has always been rather flat. Civ4 has improved the diplomacy, but not by much.

 

[Tomek]

Some things I would add:



Bigger maps - or the ability combine cities that are close together. I would like to play the game on a world map where England can have more than 3 cities on the home islands.

Notice that you can always buld cottages/towns - and these are also cities that you just cannot enter to do the micromanagement. Problem is not smaller maps - but general balance between global and micromanagement and map and time organization

I think a lot of inconsistencies and >>>ergo our discussions comes from the fact that in CIv that presents global view we have a lot of detailed management that it is not in accordance with the global scale

Just think of units - it is to detailed - Wars should be rather immediate process that looks like a quick calculation od odds and military power and gives a result (duration of war, casualities, city/terrain loss/gains etc.)

Of course we would lost so much fun gettin rid of war tactics and city micromanagement. But I'd like to hear a resonable solution to reconcile the global view with things like units walking between the cities for the hundreds of years, bulding mine 70 yetrs, training swordsmen 120 years etc. If anybody has it I would appreciate to hear that.

IMO it is impossible to create the game describing all elements of peoples' lives. And somewhere we should stop in going into details. As Skallagrimson said - one solution is to create algorithms for all micro processes and automate them. If you'd like to look at units walking day by day through the land or workers building the road , sieging the city you'll be able to do that taking the procersses from AI's hands but of course game will not be playable

Trully saying I have no consistent idea how this 'realism' should look like in perfect Civ we are talking about On one hand we want to have Civics, global financial and social feaures, politics, technologies, and on other hand have the war tactics more detailed than in Panzer General and workers management - so please enlight me

 

[osama84]

civ3 is by far the best one, it is the most realistic one, civ 4 is good but A. you need a siko PC (im runnin a 2400 series (ouch no AGP or PCI-E)), and it i dont like the look of it, the 2nd and 3rd ones are great!!!

but the 3rd one keeps crashing
why??????

 

[Spitefire]

In regards to the civics system compaired to past civ games its a step in the right direction in my opinion but i at some point got the idea for a better system in my opinion i only hope i can explain it in a way that is understandable.


This invloves doing away with present system of civics for something a little less rigidly defined.


If we take the way civ games have always started with the player under the most dictatorship like governments possable then the way it would start is as fallows.


A player will start with a few Laws/Government orders in effect at the game start one of witch names the nation or tribe as you start under the rule of one leader thay might be a few others in effect that would be unique to diffarant civs (if such is allowed custom civs would allow player to pick a few of there own chooseing to start with). as new ideas/technologys are aquired new pre made laws/Orders are made available (for folks who dont want to use the custom civic/law makeing system) the custom system however would allow you to to make new mini civics that can be applyed to an infinite number but each new law or order would have some kind of penalty aswell as perk. Each civ has a certain level of orginization that allows you to have a certain number of mini civics in effect at a time without some kind of added penalty, for example if you applyed one of these mini civics that you got from a tech and it was called Martial Law (i think i spelled that right) the first time you put the law in effect it might have an effect like 4 military units make 1 citizen point willing to work even when not happy (again this is working off of the currint civ system of population point heads) if you were to apply this mini civic again you would get an effect like 2 military for 1 citizen. However if you apply this law while you are at or over your current orginizational limit of the time (this can go up and down depending on technology and the nation expirience with complex systems) then there would be an added penalty eather it would start costing you more gold to to keep this law in play or for the case of this law it could hinder happyness or loyalty possably other things i havent thought of.


Now at a later time in the game play say you want to advance from a dictatorship to something the spreads the power in your empire around a little more so as an example this of course is also a involved in the law system now to do this in the smalest possable jump that comes to mind you will now let certain close allys in the nobility have a little more say this could have a many effects but most important in such a change is that if there isnt enough loyality among the ones you give power to this could weaken you in a way as to makeing rebelian easyer for them if thay dont like you enough but on the other hand you do need to spread the power around a little more as your empire gets larger (cant expect the emporer in real life to go to every city and tell it what to build) another effect of this change however still rare at this point is that the nobility that ou have allowed into power can now bring laws up for you to add remove or change of course if you dont agree with them it could harm there loyalty to you kinda how a AI now gets pissy if you dont agree to a demand of theres, in this stage you are still veary well in command of your empire, but if you choose a more reprisentative form useing the laws system.



Reprsentative systems when enacted you have a party of fellows you have to contend with in that when a law is shows up you no longer have absolute ruleing on them in some mixed form of reprsentation and dictatorship you may still hold a strong final ruleing on what happens to that law but you for the most part start getting your power relegated to a vote and in a mixed form only a high majority could stop your final ruling as you are no longer the only person bringing up laws in your land.


(at this point ill stop for a moment and say that this system would not force anyone to move beyond a dictatorship style government so for them folks that hate polotics your best bet is to stay absulte monarch if this type of government system was put into place as once you hit representative or above you really start to lose power over your nation little by little)



Direct Democracy this is at the oppsite end of the scale as dictatorship so at this point you and all them monkeys at the top are not the only ones makeing laws in fact in this mode you would frequently get laws that show up based on public mood by some random orginzation within your nation (or perhapes at this point collection of citys is a better term as under this form little other then common intrest and a veary high digree of loyalty hold the lands under one banner)


Please inform me if you have any questions it may take a few days to respond as i dont visit this site on a real regular basis sometimes i do and sometimes i dont get a look for a week at a time.

 

[Zireael]

I would get rid of tiles and make terrain and game flow more smoothly. I think someone already mentioned it before as quite progressive idea.. There would be no squares and coasts would be smooth same as every other terrain feature. One could place unit or city at any place on a map instead on just on discreate tiles..

1. I hate that even big modern cities are limited to 20 tiles around them and thay are dependent only on fields and mines that are adjacent to them. In real life there is no problem to have two huge cities right next to each other both with good food supply and production. With no tiles, cities could have circular radius that would be growing with the size of the city. Alternatively, food could be dependent on fileds you have in your empire and not in your city radius. Production could be dependent on the city size and buildings you have in the city. Or for example, whether it is connected by railroad to a coal mine.. Also I would get rid of workers and replace them with something like 'public works' concept from Call to Power. Thus you can order to build fields in some area or to connect two cities with a road without needing exact squares.

2. Unit movement would have to be different as well. Now, they oculd have maximum distance they can travel in kilometres instead of squares. So they can move in any direction to some distance. And of coure if the unit would move along a road it would get some bonus or controversly some deduction if moving across hills.

I guess such a innovation would quite dramatically change the whole civilization game but i think i would enjoy more such a fluent concept instead of the old checker-board style civilization...

 

[Skallagrimson]

I would get rid of tiles and make terrain and game flow more smoothly. I think someone already mentioned it before as quite progressive idea.. There would be no squares and coasts would be smooth same as every other terrain feature. One could place unit or city at any place on a map instead on just on discreate tiles..

Total War has a "fluid map" like that and it's my LEAST favorite new feature of that game. You can never tell how many turns it will really take for units to get wherever without several clicks to invoke a march-range finder, and interrupting game play. Annoying as the day is long.

1. I hate that even big modern cities are limited to 20 tiles around them and thay are dependent only on fields and mines that are adjacent to them. In real life there is no problem to have two huge cities right next to each other both with good food supply and production. With no tiles, cities could have circular radius that would be growing with the size of the city. Alternatively, food could be dependent on fileds you have in your empire and not in your city radius. Production could be dependent on the city size and buildings you have in the city. Or for example, whether it is connected by railroad to a coal mine.. Also I would get rid of workers and replace them with something like 'public works' concept from Call to Power. Thus you can order to build fields in some area or to connect two cities with a road without needing exact squares.

I agree that there should be a more holistic approach to city usage of resources. The ability to "work a tile" should not be range-limited, but rather borders-limited as you say. Also, the yields of tiles with or without resources should either be renewable as with a farm, or NON-renewable for mines. If a resource can deplete, give discreet numbers for how rich a mine is, such as how many tons of iron, etc., which would be used either in general production, or the production of weapons for units (and no, you should NOT be able to "mine archers" out of an iron mine!!!) There should also be a concept of resource distribution across cities, such that a breadbasket city can feed other cities, or a mining town can ship raw materials to industrial centers without their own mines. Uh oh, was that the "r-word" (realism) erupting again? D'OH!!!

I'm not familiar with Call to Power, but I want Civ2's Engineers back, who could transform deserts into arable land!

2. Unit movement would have to be different as well. Now, they oculd have maximum distance they can travel in kilometres instead of squares. So they can move in any direction to some distance. And of coure if the unit would move along a road it would get some bonus or controversly some deduction if moving across hills.

I guess such a innovation would quite dramatically change the whole civilization game but i think i would enjoy more such a fluent concept instead of the old checker-board style civilization...

I suppose I can live with it, and philosophically it's a step in the more realistic direction so I should be rooting for it, BUT, having played it that way I know it's a lot more work, more clicking, to figure out what units are going where and when. In a way a part of me dreads that change even though another part of me can acknowledge its necessity.