DoC 1.15 Released!

[Imperator Knoedel]

WTH is that city placement?

 

[Leoreth]

Capital Siwa is a venerable old RFC strategy.

 

[need my speed]

Tell us more?

 

[mysterious_stalker]

That's a nice setup. It's just this Akhetaten that bugs me... it doesn't look like a very useful city, wonder how it got there

Edit : Probs to steal the cow from Ethiopia and get the health boost.

 

[Visard]

Tell us more?

Egypt has health problems because of the floodplains, so the best capital with access to stone is Siwa, it also has extra commerce from Cotton.

The initial Militia can collect the money from the 3 goody huts in Africa before you need it for happiness.
I started by building Worker, which improved in the order: Stone, Marble, Wheat, Camel, Floodfarm, Ivory, Gold, more farms,...
Next in Siwa I built Granary, Militia, Sphinx, Temple, Pyramids, Worker, Settler(Men), Militia, Militia, Militia, Worker, Worker...
Research order was Masonry(Slavery), Mythology, Pastorialism, Tanning, Sailing, Seafaring(OP with Greece), Leverage (Road to Per-Atum), Ceremony, Divination, Calendar(Manorialism), Shipbuilding, Navigation, Property, Writing,

After turn 143 Siwa built only War Chariots, until Theatre and the Great Library.
First Nubian invasion was on turn 149.

I settled Ptah-Hotep in Per-Atum and used Ineni to hurry the Lighthouse there.

Men run out of things to built after Harbor, so I built an extra Settler with a plan to get a Cow, after I destroy Ethiopia.
But instead of annihilation I was able to capitulate them and since you cannot demand cows I decided to found city next to it.

It is not easy on Emperor, you have to hope that Greece doesn't beeline to Navigation and you will still need an Engineer.
Babylon seems to prefer the Oracle as a first Wonder.
The last goal is trivial, since you already got many wonders and +50% from buildings.
I don't think Egypt is possible on Paragon.

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Oooooooh, Men is the name of a city, for half the post I was wondering what men you keep talking about.

 

[Leoreth]

#NotAllMen

 

[IndisPC]

1.15 impression:

The unit additions are mostly welcome. Arquebusier -> musketeer --> rifleman path is more realistic. On the other hand, new cavalry units, including light cav, and artillery may be warranted, but these additions come at a cost of elegance and simplicity. Some units have been radically overhauled, longbowmen now get attack bonus versus forest and hill. Again, perhaps this is warranted, but this is a departure from vanilla Civ that comes at the cost of elegance and an increased learning curve.

Tech tree overhaul is acceptable, although dramatically increases the learning curve. There was a certain charm and simplicity to using the vanilla tech tree with few changes. There are many different tech trees, and every version of Civ seems to create a new one. Any tech tree can invariably be subject of debate, which I will save for another thread(s).

For some reason the default difficultly level has been made impossible at normal game speed. It was already hard enough in previous versions, but now it's just out right impossible to achieve most UHVs (at normal speed). To me this casts doubt on the game's balance when playing for UHV (and I always play for UHV). It should be somewhat easy at default difficulty/speed. Otherwise, what's the point of having 5 difficulty settings when the 2nd easiest is already impossible (at normal speed)?

Overall, it's a radical overhaul that has brought many welcome improvements. The game seems more balanced. Turks no longer become a dominant super state every game like they did in 1.14. But I fear the many changes have introduced new bugs on top of those that already existed. I sort of miss the simplicity of 1.14 and the way it incorporated vanilla Civ concepts like the tech tree with a few minor but elegant changes (such as bombards). Nonetheless, given the enormous scope of the DoC project, I'm giving the authors the benefit of the doubt, anticipating v 1.16.

 

[Lokki242]

UHVs are, in my opinion, nigh-impossible in the current build. Rebalancing is probably a top priority AFTER the new map is implemented - otherwise it's a waste of time.

 

[star15389]

Which civs are you playing that have an impossible UHV? Fair number of them are easier now, if anything, though many of the ones that require expansion+technology are harder

 

[Enyavar]

Which civs are you playing that have an impossible UHV? Fair number of them are easier now, if anything, though many of the ones that require expansion+technology are harder

Impossible on Monarch difficulty and Normal speed are: Kongo, Babylon, Egypt, for example.
Greece and Rome are only possible if you make a China start and migrate to Europe. Carthage and Polynesians need the player to follow a pretty strict strategy.
As I have played the civs roughly from ancient to modern, it looked for me like nearly all UHVs were impossible when they are only really really hard.

I have not played everyone yet, but it seems like the medieval and late civs are comparably easy.

 

[Jipsu]

For some reason the default difficultly level has been made impossible at normal game speed. It was already hard enough in previous versions, but now it's just out right impossible to achieve most UHVs (at normal speed).

Most of the UHV's I've tried in 1.15 have succeeded and I play Monarch on normal speed. Some, like the Japanese, required several reloads of 50+ turns though (turns out that the tech goal requires proactive imperialism starting from Exploration era). Some, like Khmer Korea and Rome, seemed a bit daunting so no experience there. The latest develop version towards 1.16 is probably impossible though, like Lokki242 said.

It should be somewhat easy at default difficulty/speed. Otherwise, what's the point of having 5 difficulty settings when the 2nd easiest is already impossible (at normal speed)?

This is a good point. I think of UHV's as an optimization puzzle where failing and re-tuning is part of the process. But for new and returning players there should perhaps be easier levels to choose from than Heir and Regent. Someone who just bought the game might appreciate difficulty levels that allow more sandbox-like gameplay while still remaining competitive. Weaker enemies, cheaper things all around, easier maintenance, negligible stability penalties (risk of collapse is communicated in a small icon at the corner, too easy to miss compared to its importance).

 

[IndisPC]

Which civs are you playing that have an impossible UHV?

Since downloading 1.15 I played the English 3 times, but at best only got 3 of 8 Industrial techs first, and still needed 5 more colonies in Asia anyway...
Then I tried Rome, and again couldn't get the techs first. Even if I destroyed Greece right away, someone else (China?) was getting them.
Russia starts with only a few horsemen and gets slammed by barbarians in Ukraine right away...

Tried Canada last night, and it may be an easier one. Hard part is to get the English out of St John without war...

If difficulty level 2 (Regent) is the default, and it goes all the way to 5 (emperor), then regent should be easier....

 

[star15389]

Rome can be done, you just need to get lucky with China's tech choices. Which makes it bad gameplay but not impossible

 

[IndisPC]

Rome can be done, you just need to get lucky with China's tech choices. Which makes it bad gameplay but not impossible

Yup, I think most of them can be done. They're not literally impossible, but in many cases it depends on luck or reloading saves until the random seed gives you want you want :/

 

[Leoreth]

Oooooooh, Men is the name of a city, for half the post I was wondering what men you keep talking about.

#NotAllMen

I read the above post thinking it was recent and wanted to make this joke only to find out the post is from March and I already made the joke. I hate myself.

 

[Lokki242]

I don't know, I've been playing Civilization IV for almost 14 years at this point and I still can't complete a lot of UHVs. Am I just bad???

I know there are some other long term players like @1SDAN that also tend to struggle, so maybe the median difficulty needs to be lowered.

 

[1SDANi]

I don't know, I've been playing Civilization IV for almost 14 years at this point and I still can't complete a lot of UHVs. Am I just bad???

I know there are some other long term players like @1SDAN that also tend to struggle, so maybe the median difficulty needs to be lowered.

Yeah, I generally have zero idea what's the optimum way to play and so have taken to playing sandbox style.

Perhaps some of the better players should make gameplay guides. You know, when should you build a new city, how many workers should you make, what each civic is useful for. I only recently found out why Elective is balanced in DoC. Same with why Vassalage is not inferior to Citizenship or why Despotism is not OP.

Seriously, some guides going over decision making and such would really help. Not everyone wants to do theory crafting and optimization testing from scratch, and I'm not sure how accurate Civ 4 tutorials would be with how much RFC and DOC have added.

 

[IndisPC]

I don't know, I've been playing Civilization IV for almost 14 years at this point and I still can't complete a lot of UHVs. Am I just bad??

I won UHVs on previous versions of RFC including England, Germany, Babylon... maybe a few others, but it took a LONG time and many, many reloads. Strategy guides are very helpful, but mostly obsolete now that 1.15. is out and everything has changed...

I understand that it's also easier to get UHV if you play on Epic or Marathon since you get more turns...

 

[Enyavar]

Strategy guides are very helpful, but mostly obsolete now that 1.15. is out and everything has changed...

What good are 1.15 strategy guides once 1.16 is out? Nevertheless , I posted several playthroughs in the guide section, including the "impossible" ones.

Also, I dare everyone to post a 1.15 UHV Babylon victory guide. Egypt and Kongo: I can remotely believe them to be possible if the Ai works close together with the players intention; but in the case of Babylon it's provable that whichever tech path China goes, Babylon will lose.