Easier or harder to be peaceful in Civ V ?

[Haig]

Ok so none of us have played V yet, but based on all the info and reviews, do you think that it's easier or harder in Civ V to be a peaceful player and go for cultural victory then in Civ IV ?

I was just worried about reading in IGN's review how the reviewer felt like it was hard not to get in wars a lot of the time, but that was only one occasion I've read that.
I wage wars quite a lot but I'd like to try to be a peaceful nation and concentrate on diplomacy and culture too.

 

[Brota]

It's easier to be peaceful when you have a decent sized military to back it up. At least that's how the AI weighs their actions toward you.

 

[Zhahz]

My guess is the IGN reviewer didn't build a enough military, which is pretty noob for any 4X. Even if you're peaceful you need to build enough troops to discourage aggressors. Otherwise all you're doing is building up nice fat prizes for someone to pluck. You might be able to get away with it with a lot of generous diplomacy but I wouldn't count on it.

As a player, if you noticed an AI next to you building tons of wonders, building up fat cities, and building almost no units, what would you do?

 

[cassembler]

Probably easier, given that cities have their own defenses and it _should_ be easier to judge opponent's disposition...

 

[Brota]

Also gameplay wise, it should be easier since AI cant send stack of doom anymore. I've read some aweful stuff regarding to AI's ability to wage war. I guess the BetterAI crew will be busy.

 

[ShaqFu]

Easier. You can defend your empire with a few good units and smart maneuvering, instead of Civ4's anti-SoD SoDs.

 

[MkLh]

Harder if not impossible. In Civ4 it was possible to get almost 100% safety by diplomacy. Now the AIs will attack no matter how much they like you (if there are such a relations at all).

 

[Veshta]

If you look through the history of civilization, peace/safety is a very rare commodity, not a single state has not waged war at one point or another.
Civ4 went a little overboard with its diplomacy/religion allowing near perfect harmony if you ask me

Civ5 may not have the perpetual peace option, but from what I can gather from the manual the various civics (or whatever they call it) can give significant bonuses to prosperity and defensive wars which is a lot more 'accurate' when you think about it ..
I think I am going to be very happy with the 'builder' options being much more pronounced in Civ5 (ie. available to all through choices) as opposed to previous versions where traits and UUs/UBs could have a huge impact on the viability of the different ways to play.

 

[bishopDC]

I was just worried about reading in IGN's review how the reviewer felt like it was hard not to get in wars a lot of the time, but that was only one occasion I've read that.
I wage wars quite a lot but I'd like to try to be a peaceful nation and concentrate on diplomacy and culture too.

These were my thoughts too. Sure, we don't know how the IGN guy built his empire talking about building troops for defense.

But I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about it when I read this review because MkLh has a got point to adress the diplomacy option. After all the IGN review states that no diplomacy option could help to prevent war after all.

Of course (as OP mentioned) this is only one review out of few but it very well mirrors that Firaxis kept iterating on and on about the new combat system. So perhaps they want EVERY player to use it by default

 

[mmix2000]

well, given how much was added to combat and how much taken from everything else it makes no sense not to go to war if you are looking to actually play the game. I would imagine this game without war is even more vanilla then plain vanilla.

 

[MkLh]

It's easier to be peaceful when you have a decent sized military to back it up. At least that's how the AI weighs their actions toward you.

I doubt this will work in any higher levels, like it did not work in Civ4. When AIs start to get production bonuses, you'll need to build units all the time and pay huge maintenance costs to be in par with them, which means you will fall back hopelessly.

With a decent army you can defend an attack, but you can't prevent it.

 

[kaltorak]

I also don't like it, but there seems to be many players there who prefer a fighting sandbox where the AI just tries to win the game than having a complex diplomacy system. So I guess they see it as a pro, and not as a con

 

[Robovski]

I reckon harder on the basis of the city states - more players in world politics = more trouble. Sure they aren't major threats and they aren't "playing to win" but the intrigues comming from them should be war-inducing.

 

[Iceciro]

A diplomatic victory without war would be like winning a conquest victory without carefully managing your diplomacy to prevent being dogpiled.

A good civ game is going to require you to balance your options and decisions across all the pathways regardless of which avenue you take.

As far as a minimal-war victory goes, you'll probably want to look at the Utopia Project over the UN. The UN victory will be hard to win without a military to liberate and protect City States, since each City State has a UN vote you will want to secure for yourself.

 

[Grotius]

For me, easier. I'm up to 1848, and I've only had to fight one war, even though I don't have the biggest military. I mollify my adversaries by trading luxuries to them, and I deter them with just enough units. In the one war I did fight, it was a lot easier to defend, partly because of the new hexes/1upt, and partly because I've chosen Social Policies and Wonders that favor homeland defense. So for me, easier.

 

[12agnar0k]

Well I played 100 turns on Diety on the demo, keeping to myself and not offending anyone, always being nice to everyone, and no one payed me any attention. . Doesn't sound like a great way to play through a full game though, kind of boring.

 

[The Leviathan]

In my current game, I haven't gotten into a single war

and the only time I even got close was when my military power dipped after losing a unit or two to a city state. Really a big enough army is usually the deterrent to stop yourself from getting attacked, if you don't have the military power the AI will pick on you.

It's that easy

 

[The Leviathan]

I also don't like it, but there seems to be many players there who prefer a fighting sandbox where the AI just tries to win the game than having a complex diplomacy system. So I guess they see it as a pro, and not as a con

Yea god forbid the AI tries to win and provide a challenge, instead of being completely manipulated by a gimmick relationship system.

 

[Rhygar]

The way the new Happiness system works it is difficult to reach a stage where you just steam roll everything in your path, even if you are almost impossible to invade. The more cities you have the more infrastructure you have to build which slows down your rate of expansion. If you over expand you will be crippled by unhappiness and your units get a combat penalty and other Empires will be able to defeat you.

 

[kaltorak]

Yea god forbid the AI tries to win and provide a challenge, instead of being completely manipulated by a gimmick relationship system.

manipulating relationships with a good diplomatic strategy so you can more or less have an idea of when and where to attack

vs

no relationships, no info, just random attacks

oh yeah, it is indeed more challenging, but even static bonuses are better than plain randomness