Honey...I'm home!

[Helmling]

Hello all...

I've been trying to avoid Civ4 like the plague. My Civ addiciton has cost me way, way too much time in the past. Besides, I told myself, I don't even have a PC capable of running it!

But then this weekend I found myself in possession of a borrowed laptop from work and the knowledge that there is now a demo for Civ (that's a first, if I'm not mistaken).

So I gave it a quick spin.

Damn, do I want to play. I've had to fight off the urge to run to the store and buy it--just for one night before I have to haul this laptop back in tomorrow. I think running the demo was a mistake.

Anyway, I had a few questions after looking around here for the last few minutes:

Is it nearly impossible to be a warmonger now? I never was--well, not never--but it sounds like they've made it very hard to manage a conquered empire? That could be good. Winning by conquest was too easy in Civs past.

And it appears one of my pre-release fears has come to pass--only ONE great wonder per city?!? I always enjoyed stacking my capital with tons of 'em. Usually at least ten on Emperor.

Um...I'm sure I had more questions, but it just occured to me that I shouldn't even be talking about this!!! Ah, addiciton is so unpleasant.

 

[EdCase]

Umm not played the demo...but World wonders, you can build as many as you like in any city. National wonders on the other hand are limited to 2 per city.
Warmongering hard? yes and no. Yes if you attempt it in the Civ 3 style.. Not so much if you embrace the "concept" of 4 ( Hint..religiously funded is a good way to go)

 

[Helmling]

Oh, the demo said "1 allowed" next to the Pyramids...I thought it was a Wonder limit, must've meant only one city can build the Pyramids.

Darn, that only makes me want to play more.

But I'm not going to...must be strong.

 

[Skippa]

Helming I just read your sad history Civ post and now this . . . I can't believe it

Well I guess I can

Stay strong my friend. I've gotten dragged in by the civ bug and my wife says, without, reservation that I'm addicted.

I also have exams for my grad courses this week, so I'm really trying to stay away from the game so that my break time won't change from 30 mins to about 4 hours, if you know what I mean.

 

[EdCase]

Give in to the darkside... feed your addiction..

I had a city just tonight with Stonehenge,The Oracle,Pyramids and the Parthenon....looked lovely it did <insert evil chuckle>

 

[calyth]

Fighting wars are not impossible. It just make the newly conquered empire hard to manage, especially if you really expanded a lot in a short time. The newly conquered cities would have reduced city radii and have high maintanence costs, possibly bankrupting the empire.
You'll just have to bring more than one type of units and know when to stop fighting.

 

[Nigel Stutt]

Fighting wars are not impossible. It just make the newly conquered empire hard to manage, especially if you really expanded a lot in a short time. The newly conquered cities would have reduced city radii and have high maintanence costs, possibly bankrupting the empire.
You'll just have to bring more than one type of units and know when to stop fighting.

Wars are pretty difficult to me - you have to have loads of units which can take years to accumulate. Becuase the enemy can produce units like mad and you go through loads just taking one city. Also you tend to get civs ganging up on you if you start a war with someone which can spell your ruin. And sometimes it impossible to end a war. The trick seems to build loads of units, strike fast and hard with a definite plan in mind, and stop before any other civs get too angry, and sue for peace whilst youre up. Its tricky but not impossible. But long, drawn out wars are very costly and usually end up with you losing the game.

 

[Colonel Kraken]

You have to build enough artillery type units to sacrifice on attacking cities. Then, the enemy units will be damaged enough by collateral damage (even though you lost your catapult, etc.) for you to make successful attacks with foot units.

 

[oagersnap]

And being technologically advanced gives you a very big advantage when fighting wars.

 

[Bob1475]

As always it depends on the level. I was doing great until I hit a few bad games on one level and dialed back and decided to try each type of map. In doing so I have become a bonafide warmonger which I was not in CIV 3.

Keys to the war game are:

Siege weapons - artillery, cannons, whatever - build plenty and make sure you have replacements as you will sacrifice them.

Prepositioning - Gone are infinite movement railroads so you best have units prepositioned to attack multiple enemy cities (also gives AI a headache in massing defense)

Medic units - at least one or two per stack

Keep moving! - Cities rarely flip back

Keep active defense reserve as AI is now proficient at counterattacking with transports

Take out strategic resources early