How to combat AI's ICS? And ... what's up with Great Engineers?

[markusbeutel]

Once again your answers aren't exactly helpful.

Don't know what to say, vonbach, other than lower the difficulty level. Playing on marathon or epic will make the game easier, as will playing without CS's and on smaller maps. Its had over 100,000 downloads, and overall there have been more complaints about the mod being too easy as opposed to being too difficult.

When I get home from class I'll post some early strategies that might help out those of you that are struggling, but I won't be lowering the overall difficulty anytime soon.

 

[BTAxis]

Don't get me wrong though, I think your effort in making and maintaining this mod is great and, by it, you've done a lot of people a favor. I'm a big fan of game modding in general, so I quite respect anyone who spends time and effort on making mods in the way you've done. It just doesn't seem your mod is for me, at the moment.

 

[vonbach]

Can you fit through doors with that head?
If the mods not balanced its the programmers
fault not the players. Sorry I've heard the
"L2P N00B" routine before.

 

[Teholb]

The mod is not entirely balanced.

That said, it is VASTLY superior to vanilla, and I can attest to the fact that time, patience, and learning will improve your score with time. Just like any other game. NiGHTS is essentially Civ v5.5, imo, and so cannot be treated as a simple mod. You're playing a new game, give yourself time to learn.

I was frustrated with the mod at first, too, but if you keep grinding away at it, you'll find strategies and patterns emerge. I wont list any of my play strategies, as I play on Prince, and am still learning myself, but be assured that the mod is fairly well balanced- not ENTIRELY, no game ever really accomplishes that. But it comes close enough to be completely playable and FUN!


Edit:
Vonbach, I think your pride is the real issue here if you take someone advising you to lower the difficulty as them being arrogant or brushing you off. It's entirely plausible that you simply haven't given yourself enough time to learn the mod. Insulting the author for what can only be seen to be your own lack of competence really is quite inappropriate and childish. If you don't like it, either leave constructive criticism, or move on. No need to get vitriolic.

 

[markusbeutel]

Can you fit through doors with that head?
If the mods not balanced its the programmers
fault not the players. Sorry I've heard the
"L2P N00B" routine before.

What Teholb said, the mod isn't entirely balanced - and neither is vanilla Civ V. Its currently too easy to get gold and buy city states, which makes the mod too easy, if anything, on higher difficulty levels.

Having said that, this mod currently has a development team of one, and I balance working on it along with a full time job and school. Its not perfect by any means, but that doesn't negate the fact that you're clearly inexperienced at playing it based on your comments and based on the fact that there are people out there that can dominate the mod at immortal, while you struggle on lower difficulties.

 

[vonbach]

What Teholb said, the mod isn't entirely balanced

Then balance it.

Vonbach, I think your pride is the real issue here if you take someone advising you to lower the difficulty as them being arrogant or brushing you off. It's entirely plausible that you simply haven't given yourself enough time to learn the mod. Insulting the author for what can only be seen to be your own lack of competence really is quite inappropriate and childish. If you don't like it, either leave constructive criticism, or move on. No need to get vitriolic.

No the issue is the author is being arrogant and insulting to me.
Constructive criticism is what we are trying to do. We got told
essentially to L2P N00B. Sorry its not a helpful answer.

 

[Kirschi]

Then balance it.

Oh, so you already created a lot of mods and know how easy that is?
I am playing a game on Marathon currently and I think it's almost perfectly balanced. Not so much on lower speeds but negligible to win a game in this awesome mod.

No the issue is the author is being arrogant and insulting to me.
Constructive criticism is what we are trying to do. We got told
essentially to L2P N00B. Sorry its not a helpful answer.

After reading that I had to read all previous posts again and I have to say that the only one who is insulting is you. Markus tried to be helpful all of the time and there are no more simple tips to win a game, except perhaps that you download the "IGE" mod. With that you can cheat and gain all advantages you want, maybe that reflects your playstyle.
I already tried a lot of mods and when I didn't like one of them I tried another one instead of complaining how much better the author could do. Constructive criticism yes, but not what you do. NiGHTS is the best mod out there even though it is still in beta stage and I would refuse to play civ without it.

 

[vonbach]

Criticism is what we were trying to do. I'm tired of fighting
with you people. Honestly if you don't want to hear it, fine.
Its pretty much the only issue I've seen with this mod to be honest.
Other that its a good mod. I especially like the UB the civs have.
All I'm looking for is a normal difficulty game with this mod really.

 

[Lord Chambers]

I tried responding here and wrote something too long to fit. If you're having trouble try playing like me. How to Break Civ NiGHTS.

 

[MetalPhilosophe]

A large, sprawling empire will always dominate small/tall empires - especially when population = science.

I second this, and that's a very good point. Honestly, ICS is only a problem in vanilla Civ V because of the bizarre way that the base game implements happiness. The fact that it's empire wide isn't a problem, but the fact that high populations prevented you from expanding makes no logical sense. The ICS strategy takes advantage of this idiocy, meaning that an empire that caps growth at 4 or 5 people per city and spews out settlers will mop the floor with one that tries to model actual history and increase it's population naturally.

In NiGHTS, the problem isn't anywhere near as serious as far as I can see. My general strategy, and one that almost always works, is to expand in the beginning with an emphasis on growing my borders and gaining resources. I can space them pretty far apart and do just fine. Once I've expanded geographically a good deal, I find that I've got a metric ton of excess happiness after a while, so I just start plopping new cities down wherever it makes sense within my borders. Due to NiGHTS' abundance of specialists, you don't have to worry too much about unemployment like in older Civ games.

Basically this mirrors reality. More cities = more business = more productivity = more beaurocracy/micromanagement. When there are more workers than there is work to be done, specialists are created, which in reality increases the number of intellectuals and people in "service" industries. Practically, this means that a few tall cities will produce more science (and be easier to manage), but must not neglect their defenses, because a civilization with a ton of cities can crank out more military units. Makes sense to me.

Have I mentioned that I love NiGHTS? In fact, I love it enough that I'm not buying Gods and Kings until NiGHTS works with it. Keep up the good work!

 

[debufferman]

I want to start by saying I love the mod and appreciate the work done on it. I play for several hours, every day.

With that said, I agree with some of the earlier comments. I have started a game on warlord (easy) with Austria (free apothecary) several times. I immediately get a scout, worker, settler, then start stonehenge. Rush to feudalism, get the free settler in social policies and have 3 cites pretty fast. Meaning, 3 free apothecaries gaining science. After this point, I try to maintain expansion while trying to grab a wonder when I can. Eventually, some area suffers, as you can only build one item per city at a time. I have games, where I'm leading the board in science, and researching with a goal (not just scattershot), and the AI has the wonder built before I even get the tech.

Early wonders don't come cheap (turn-wise). And I'm not saying they should. However, it is quite mathematically impossible for the AI to spend 30+ turns building a wonder, AND have the massive troops that it has, AND build the buildings required to support those troops with happiness and gold. Oh yeah, AND somehow finding time build settlers/workers to keep pushing out more cities.

The way the AI jams the cities so close to each other, they have to be sharing work tiles. By sharing work tiles, this should limit their pop limit, hammers, food, gold on a per city level. A less efficient city should not be able to pop a wonder 5-8 turns after getting the tech for it. It should take longer, as they don't have as many tiles to work. For example. The AI city working 11 tiles because it is jammed so close to other cities, should easily be beat to a wonder by a city working 18 tiles, given equivalent terrain. In the case of the AI expanding so fast, keeping city size smaller and cramming them close together, the AI would have to be way ahead in science so it could start the wonder, well in advance, of a Civ building large cities.

 

[lindanealmck]

Just got back to playing Civilization Nights. (Celts, prince level, normal speed, continents) It was very challenging, it seemed like England just kept beating me on most of the Wonders. Fortunately, I spread to 6 cities and had enough units that the AI left me alone. I invested heavily in the patronage tree, and had almost all of the city states as allies, when England completed the UN. They also had 48,000 gold in reserve. Noone else had much gold, so I allied with 1 more city state and declared war on England. Cheesy, but effective.

Going to play on warlord level, next game.

 

[markusbeutel]

I second this, and that's a very good point. Honestly, ICS is only a problem in vanilla Civ V because of the bizarre way that the base game implements happiness. The fact that it's empire wide isn't a problem, but the fact that high populations prevented you from expanding makes no logical sense. The ICS strategy takes advantage of this idiocy, meaning that an empire that caps growth at 4 or 5 people per city and spews out settlers will mop the floor with one that tries to model actual history and increase it's population naturally.

In NiGHTS, the problem isn't anywhere near as serious as far as I can see. My general strategy, and one that almost always works, is to expand in the beginning with an emphasis on growing my borders and gaining resources. I can space them pretty far apart and do just fine. Once I've expanded geographically a good deal, I find that I've got a metric ton of excess happiness after a while, so I just start plopping new cities down wherever it makes sense within my borders. Due to NiGHTS' abundance of specialists, you don't have to worry too much about unemployment like in older Civ games.

Basically this mirrors reality. More cities = more business = more productivity = more beaurocracy/micromanagement. When there are more workers than there is work to be done, specialists are created, which in reality increases the number of intellectuals and people in "service" industries. Practically, this means that a few tall cities will produce more science (and be easier to manage), but must not neglect their defenses, because a civilization with a ton of cities can crank out more military units. Makes sense to me.

Have I mentioned that I love NiGHTS? In fact, I love it enough that I'm not buying Gods and Kings until NiGHTS works with it. Keep up the good work!

Thanks MetalPhilosophe - there've been a few changes in G+K's, but I think the overall experience is probably better balanced now than in vanilla, (although I kind of wish religion/faith was more than a rehash of culture/policies).

I want to start by saying I love the mod and appreciate the work done on it. I play for several hours, every day.

With that said, I agree with some of the earlier comments. I have started a game on warlord (easy) with Austria (free apothecary) several times. I immediately get a scout, worker, settler, then start stonehenge. Rush to feudalism, get the free settler in social policies and have 3 cites pretty fast. Meaning, 3 free apothecaries gaining science. After this point, I try to maintain expansion while trying to grab a wonder when I can. Eventually, some area suffers, as you can only build one item per city at a time. I have games, where I'm leading the board in science, and researching with a goal (not just scattershot), and the AI has the wonder built before I even get the tech.

Early wonders don't come cheap (turn-wise). And I'm not saying they should. However, it is quite mathematically impossible for the AI to spend 30+ turns building a wonder, AND have the massive troops that it has, AND build the buildings required to support those troops with happiness and gold. Oh yeah, AND somehow finding time build settlers/workers to keep pushing out more cities.

The way the AI jams the cities so close to each other, they have to be sharing work tiles. By sharing work tiles, this should limit their pop limit, hammers, food, gold on a per city level. A less efficient city should not be able to pop a wonder 5-8 turns after getting the tech for it. It should take longer, as they don't have as many tiles to work. For example. The AI city working 11 tiles because it is jammed so close to other cities, should easily be beat to a wonder by a city working 18 tiles, given equivalent terrain. In the case of the AI expanding so fast, keeping city size smaller and cramming them close together, the AI would have to be way ahead in science so it could start the wonder, well in advance, of a Civ building large cities.

The AI do settle much quicker than in vanilla, but I've also made it so that the rate at which they settle is accelerated if they start off on weak terrain, (tundra/desert) - so if you see an AI early on with 5 cities to your 3, all of his cities are mostly small and/or weakly defended (although their rate of expansion has been slowed a bit in G+K's, and I think I've found a good middle ground now between rates of expansion in IV vs V).

Just got back to playing Civilization Nights. (Celts, prince level, normal speed, continents) It was very challenging, it seemed like England just kept beating me on most of the Wonders. Fortunately, I spread to 6 cities and had enough units that the AI left me alone. I invested heavily in the patronage tree, and had almost all of the city states as allies, when England completed the UN. They also had 48,000 gold in reserve. Noone else had much gold, so I allied with 1 more city state and declared war on England. Cheesy, but effective.

Going to play on warlord level, next game.

It can be challenging - especially if you have an AI that's also playing the wonder game. I've had it a lot where I'd be continually beaten by like 3-5 turns on various wonders. Although I'd prefer this to vanilla, where if you really want to get Stonehenge or another early wonder, you'll get it. Likewise with city locations, I found that after playing vanilla CIV V (and vanilla G+K's), if I really wanted a city location, I would get it. The AI just wouldn't be able to beat me to it - and that really took a lot of the tension/strategy out of the early game for me.

On the diplo-front, once the .dll comes out, hopefully something can be done about the UN so that it doesn't come down to just how much gold you have.

 

[Mindovg]

i dont rightly understand how can you have any problems at all on lower difficulties; hell, even on immortal I outrun all AI civilizations by production, science, gold, and expansion. Of course you need to have a decent start with production-boosting tiles near the capital at least.

After the last game, when I've earned about 50k gold to turn 190, I feel like I''l be able to handle a large deity map as well. Even though my experience with NIGHTS is little I can safely say, that in many ways it's a lot easier to play than vanilla g&k

 

[Balerune]

i dont rightly understand how can you have any problems at all on lower difficulties; hell, even on immortal I outrun all AI civilizations by production, science, gold, and expansion. Of course you need to have a decent start with production-boosting tiles near the capital at least.

After the last game, when I've earned about 50k gold to turn 190, I feel like I''l be able to handle a large deity map as well. Even though my experience with NIGHTS is little I can safely say, that in many ways it's a lot easier to play than vanilla g&k

A lot depends on the map, the civs and starting resources. I've been trying "not yet another earth maps pack" on "large europe" as Arabia with the usual CS settings (and I gave up on that as you only have one (1) CS near you) and various other settings -- the best I've had so far is all goes well into @ 1850 and then some AI or other pulls away in points and more importantly in science which I believe they mostly get from their CS.(and of course Austria being on the map marries everyone -- they should call her the "whore of Babylon" )

So if you are having an easy time or if you want something different I'd suggest that map.

But I confess I don't like to war and there must be something in warring to stop the AI from science as well as expansion which is what they seem to do amongst themselves but I'm not really sure if it works the other way 'round.

PS I haven't played vanilla since it came out or G&K vanilla as I thought the original was very disappointing and have only played this mod as I think Nights is closest in spirit to what the Civ series is.

PS -- use all the civs, I think 19 on that map

 

[DSChapin]

Having to expand like crazy at the higher difficulty levels isn't crazy, it's how CIV V should've been designed in the first place based solely on the fact that it's always optimal to have as many cities as possible.

You're certainly correct that Civ V is designed in a way that makes ICS ideal. But why is that necessarily a good thing? I would hope that one of the things you could do with a comprehensive mod like this one is add some real tradeoffs that mean ICS is not the best-and-only strategy for every situation.

Certainly, making it so that the AI does ICS too makes the game more challenging. But I still don't feel like it's the ideal solution.

YMMV, of course.