Civilization 5

[Vael]

Ah yes, because clearly games that sold less couldn't possibly have good ideas.

There's certainly nothing wrong with borrowing ideas from games that sold less, but it sounds like you're suggesting replacing a CORE feature from one game with a CORE feature from another. Personally, I've greatly enjoyed the Civ games and the Paradox games, but the fact that they ARE so different is part of why I like playing both. For that reason I'd hate to see them become too similar to one another.

 

[johny smith]

I want to add one statement that is true from my opinion. Civilization 2 sold me on the Civilization series. I bought Civilization 3 because of Civilization 2's concept. Than I heard good reviews of Civilization 4.

So when we are talking about games in general I usually buy a game by second hand reviews. I can not try every game out there. At first Civilization 4 had great graphics to me compared to before and the promotion system was needed. Units stacking on one plot was needed.

I never bought Sid Meier's Railroads because of what I heard was removed for example to simplify the game. This looks like the case on Civilization 4 as well in many areas. Now some simplification can be good. Not saying that simplification is always bad, but I immediately was looking for things left out of the older games.

Some things like units surprise attacks by allowing units to enter other lands without open borders were removed for gameplay tweaks that really was an easy solution for crappy AI implemented. The other day I had one single worker unit received from a goody hut and the borders of my neighbor expanded and the worker could not get back to my city without open borders. I had not discovered writing yet. That is just silly in this case to me a unit that clearly is not a combat unit can not travel one plot in through the other civs land.

So anyway I think many of the so called improvements were easy ways of removing flaws that should of had better AI. Now I would like Civilization to come closer to reality. Not to the point of worried about which tank was used by who. I don't really even care about the unique units at all.

I want more detail in the game period with the possible of simplifying for users who do want the details. The tech tree I mean is flat out wrong. If is was a simplification of time that would be ok with me. But it is not. It is the perspective of America and Europe on history and leaving off most of what happened in the rest of the world.

For example the Medieval era is very Eurocentric. I think something could be done to show for example China inventing paper or the compass, or the Arab caliphates many advancements like improvements in alchemy that were the beginnings of chemistry. Now I am not wanting to restrict the what if's, but I am saying that the game should show of some actions that can lead down a line of simulating a collapse like in the case of Rome. I would say by overexpansion being one thing.

The modern era is flat out boring. I think because one the techs lack much detail, and two because your civ is so big at that point that you start building things in rush to hurry up and end the game. If modern was tempered with the idea that you having negative things happening that makes your civ revert or collapse more often I think it would bring more life to it.

I would rather have options of your civ changing through time based on civics, culture from other lands, religion, trade, resources, and etc. Basically presenting how Rome fell and how Italy began. I do not mean historical. I mean things that trigger this that can be generic. I also would like to see the each new civ title coming with unique bonuses in any area not just some unit or building. So for example Rus becomes Russia so you get a different trait maybe.

The present belief for example of believing one group has been there over eternity is just silly to me. What if America was in 4000 BC is just silly to me. I would rather see you start as some European civ. Then you can possibly become England and receive new bonuses, and then possibly America. This would make for units or buildings for a civ easier to be made and balanced. I mean instead of waiting till the modern era with America to finally get your one unique unit. The concept of Civilizations in Civ 4 presently is stupid. You can stone me now.

 

[morss_4]

There's certainly nothing wrong with borrowing ideas from games that sold less, but it sounds like you're suggesting replacing a CORE feature from one game with a CORE feature from another. Personally, I've greatly enjoyed the Civ games and the Paradox games, but the fact that they ARE so different is part of why I like playing both. For that reason I'd hate to see them become too similar to one another.

I don't think adding armies into Civ would turn it into EU3. EU3 still does not have settlers, or workers, or tile improvements, or a tech tree like Civ, or culture like Civ, or Sid Meier's face hidden all over it like Civ, etc.

I personally find managing 200+ units in the late game tedious. I can't be the only one. Civ has already implemented a feature to allow you to move units in groups. Letting them fight in groups is the next logical step, and I'm not seeing the downside. CtP introduced this and it worked well as far as I could tell. You could still keep the unit promotion tree, experience, and all that stuff. Just let the units fight in parallel instead of in series.

You don't even have to give any extra advantage to the larger force if you don't want to (although that would make sense). Removing flanking, back row artillery and morale from EU3 for example would achieve similar results to the current Civ system except that 30 mouse clicks would be replaced with 1.

 

[warpstorm]

Hey dude don't knock Majesty. That was a great game.

...that wasn't done by Paradox. It was done by the more-or-less defunct Cyberlore Studios.

 

[warpstorm]

Letting them fight in groups is the next logical step, and I'm not seeing the downside.

Have you tried stack attacks in Civ 4?

 

[morss_4]

Have you tried stack attacks in Civ 4?

Stack attacks are a step in the right direction. I'd still rather see an army system though, if for no other reason than that it makes organizing units into groups easier and more intuitive.

 

[EmperorFool]

Have you tried stack attacks in Civ 4?

This is just a UI feature--it doesn't change the gameplay or outcome in any way. It is no different then selecting a stack of units and attacking with it as many times as there are units in the stack. All of the same attackers and defenders will be chosen in the same order.

 

[warpstorm]

True, but I was addressing this statement:

for example would achieve similar results to the current Civ system except that 30 mouse clicks would be replaced with 1.

Which it does.

 

[rysmiel]

1) A hexagon grid over the current square type.

No. The distance inequalities in a square grid are part of the point.

2) More unique units. I don't feel that the game ought to be saturated with them, but each civ in my opinion could use a few unique units instead of just one. Anything that adds more variety to the civs without forcing them down a certain path or style of play is a good thing in my opinion. Unique units is a great way to do that.

I disagree, because I feel that even one UU is skewing the options for style of play available to that civ.

 

[rysmiel]

I personally find managing 200+ units in the late game tedious. I can't be the only one.

200 units in the late game sounds annoyingly small and constrained, actually; if Civ 5 is not up to supporting games on a scale where you're closer to 1000 units at the end, then it will lack in appeal to me.

 

[morss_4]

200 units in the late game sounds annoyingly small and constrained, actually; if Civ 5 is not up to supporting games on a scale where you're closer to 1000 units at the end, then it will lack in appeal to me.

Having 1000 units and having to manage those 1000 units individually are two different things.

1000 units split into 10 100 unit armies would not be so troublesome.

 

[Ndynslvr]

I think instead of having a stack you should be able to group them together and have a battalion that specializes against certain units.

Also I wish to see an order of operations where the players moves come first, I would like to be able to tell a unit to move away from an adjacent enemy next turn and not be attacked first. The order of operation should be in my opinion:

Before Radio:
Animals move last
Barbarians move first
Prioritize units closer to own city, if distance is the same then use an RNG to determine attack order.

After Radio:
Barbarians move last
Units move according to the order of their civilizations reaching radio. If same Prioritize most advanced civilization.

 

[rysmiel]

Having 1000 units and having to manage those 1000 units individually are two different things.

1000 units split into 10 100 unit armies would not be so troublesome.

Yes, but you would lose so much fine detail control. I want to maintain the option to control every unit individually by default; it's a large part of the fun because it makes accomplishing stuff feel like a real accomplishment, not just pushing a button and having the computer do it for you.

 

[morss_4]

Yes, but you would lose so much fine detail control. I want to maintain the option to control every unit individually by default; it's a large part of the fun because it makes accomplishing stuff feel like a real accomplishment, not just pushing a button and having the computer do it for you.

I think you are making a mountain where there is not even a molehill. It is no less of an accomplishment either way and there is no less "fine control." You can still tell individual units where to go. You can even tell individual units to attack if you like, although the success or failure of that may depend on the battle system you construct around armies. Things are just less clunky.

If the computer can do something to the exact same effect as the human, then there's no point in making the human do it. That's not strategy. A trained monkey could do it. Let the human concentrate on strategy, not mouse clicks.

 

[EmperorFool]

Re: a hexagonal grid.

No. The distance inequalities in a square grid are part of the point.

Hmm, from your other posts I would have guessed that you would prefer a hex grid. What point does treating the longer diagonal distances as if they were the same length as the shorter horiz/vert distances serve?

 

[Naokaukodem]

I think you are making a mountain where there is not even a molehill. It is no less of an accomplishment either way and there is no less "fine control." You can still tell individual units where to go. You can even tell individual units to attack if you like, although the success or failure of that may depend on the battle system you construct around armies. Things are just less clunky.

If the computer can do something to the exact same effect as the human, then there's no point in making the human do it. That's not strategy. A trained monkey could do it. Let the human concentrate on strategy, not mouse clicks.

If we look at CivRev, there's no reason to think that army will not be included in Civ5. (eventhough i didn't play CivRev yet, what shouldn't last too much from now on)

The idea behind armies is that 3 horsearchers into an army are more powerfull than 3 individual horsearchers.

 

[morss_4]

If we look at CivRev, there's no reason to think that army will not be included in Civ5. (eventhough i didn't play CivRev yet, what shouldn't last too much from now on)

The idea behind armies is that 3 horsearchers into an army are more powerfull than 3 individual horsearchers.

I wouldn't look for too much insight from CivRev. The reasons for this are two fold:

1. CivRev is different from Civ in a lot of ways.
2. In this particular case, recall that armies were present in Civ 3. From this one might conclude that armies would be in Civ 4. Obviously this was not the case.

 

[rysmiel]

If the computer can do something to the exact same effect as the human, then there's no point in making the human do it.

If there existed an AI that could do everything I wanted to do with a stack of units depending on the circumstances, that would be the case; there does not, that I know of. Even with something as simple as the Civ 3 model, there's the issue of trying to wound enemy units with your veterans but kill them with your elites, to maximise opportunities for a Military Great Leader. There's what you do with the units left in a stack if you have overjudged and you win the fight that the stack is engaged in at the beginning of the turn two-thirds of the way through that turn. And so on; the more sophisticated Civ 5 is, the more options there might be here.

 

[morss_4]

If there existed an AI that could do everything I wanted to do with a stack of units depending on the circumstances, that would be the case; there does not, that I know of. Even with something as simple as the Civ 3 model, there's the issue of trying to wound enemy units with your veterans but kill them with your elites, to maximise opportunities for a Military Great Leader. There's what you do with the units left in a stack if you have overjudged and you win the fight that the stack is engaged in at the beginning of the turn two-thirds of the way through that turn. And so on; the more sophisticated Civ 5 is, the more options there might be here.

You can still tell individual units where to go. You can even tell individual units to attack if you like, although the success or failure of that may depend on the battle system you construct around armies. Things are just less clunky.

Regardless you are ignoring the potential that there could be other interesting strategic questions to answer with armies that are not present with individual units. What those questions would be would depend on the system you use.

If we look at games with armies or fleets (in the case of Gal Civ) I would say that, compared to Civ, I find war to be more enjoyable and no less strategically interesting.

 

[johny smith]

I can not believe how much discussion over something so small. Look Civ 5 needs something new. It needs to more options to have some real tactics in battle. Not squares and one unit at a time beat the other to a pulp, or spearman even having a chance against a tank. There needs to be some tactial map for a battle.

It needs to be a realistic world map. The square does not work sorry for a close map of the planet. It also needs resources that are farmed appearing on spot and changing versus a thousands years of corn from one square. Corn does not come out of the ground like water. It is planted and farmed with seeds that can be spread. One basic idea of game is flawed with resources never changing.

Anyway since I have posted in the ideas section I have seen only little small things talked about. I really hope Civ 5 is not planned to be only an expansion. Armies or units it does not matter if you do not have a choice to tactically deciding somethings for the battle. It is just simplification either way. Simplification should be available for some people who do not like to think a little more tactically as an option I think. But just a stack of death with army flag with some extra powers or not without the powers does not matter to me at all.