Marathon Game Speed

[Stinson]

I'm open to anything that makes the game last as long as possible. I get the most enjoyment out of games that seem to go on forever, rather than burning through it and winning as quickly as possible.

When I get the game for Christmas... I know I'll be going straight to Marathon game speed.

 

[Jaybe]

I was hoping for Normal build time, longer research so your units don't become obsolete quickly...

According to the release notes posted, they also adjusted many research costs, so your hope was probably fulfilled with the patch.

 

[colony]

Well I haven't had any experience with fighting a war on marathon speed yet, as the game I started yesterday as the Romans has ended up dumping me on a continent on my own. Might be the sort of challenge I'm looking for, to get me ready for the move up to Emperor, as I expect I'll be either a bit or a long way behind in techs when I meet everyone else (currently researching machinery, so not far off optics).

Of course I'll probably end up playing on Epic instead anyway if the tech costs have been changd enough

 

[Ben E Gas]

I'm open to anything that makes the game last as long as possible. I get the most enjoyment out of games that seem to go on forever, rather than burning through it and winning as quickly as possible.

When I get the game for Christmas... I know I'll be going straight to Marathon game speed.

My thoughts exactly. I can't wait until X-Mas.

 

[koldar]

Well I haven't had any experience with fighting a war on marathon speed yet, as the game I started yesterday as the Romans has ended up dumping me on a continent on my own. Might be the sort of challenge I'm looking for, to get me ready for the move up to Emperor, as I expect I'll be either a bit or a long way behind in techs when I meet everyone else (currently researching machinery, so not far off optics).

Of course I'll probably end up playing on Epic instead anyway if the tech costs have been changd enough

What were the problems before with the epic tech costs (I've only played normal)?

 

[Stratofortress]

Having played my first game with the 'Marathon' speed I still prefere the FexFX - Bigger & Longer mod, because his mod actually makes the ancient and pretty much every time period more fun (especially in warfare) and not repetitive.

 

[colony]

What were the problems before with the epic tech costs (I've only played normal)?

To me they still seemed to be a bit too cheap, and the Industrial era just flew past, getting you to the modern era far too fast for my taste (the much repeated "my units are obsolete by the time they get to another continent" complaint), although it wasn't as bad as when I played on Normal

 

[bob the builder]

Oh my god, I think I just found the way I want to play the game.

Thanks for the files.

no problem dude, have nice time playing

I'm open to anything that makes the game last as long as possible. I get the most enjoyment out of games that seem to go on forever, rather than burning through it and winning as quickly as possible.

try my 6050 turns speed to then.

 

[GinandTonic]

Wow finally a chance to step off the builders treadmill and use some of those units!

 

[eddie_verdde]

But there are still some differences: your units got much more turns to move/fight so you actually get to use them before them become obsolete.

Bingo!!!!!!

 

[CiverDan]

I have played about 200 turns on Marathon game speen on Settler as a test. Couple of observations:

1. Really overpowers Philosophical civs and those that starts with a scout. Getting free techs, cities and workers are HUGE here. It is currently about 280 AD I have 18 cities 10% science (expanded about as fast as feasible without bankrupting myself and leaving cities open to barb attack.) and am in Late Renassiance tech wise now. Have had 11 Great People so far from cities, 2 Artist, 1 Engineer, and 9 scientists. Capital is running 300 beakers. with 6-7 turn techs.

2. Fighting is much more tactical based on what units you already have. No one turn knights here. If an enemy launches a sneak attack at an underdefended city and yout not running slavery or universal suffrace and have a LOT of cash. you are in trouble. Expansion and War planning requires a lot more forethought. Properly staged early rushes become much more deadly, and cutting a resource of any period of time, especially early, is critical.

3. I would also believe that this would be the hardest to win on Diety. Much harder to catch up. Though perhaps superior war planning and action via resource and road cutting can act os a neutralizer to some extent.

 

[xgamer]

I just finished my first marathon game in approx. 10 hours winning a domination victory in ~1480AD (terra, noble, standard settings) and have to say it is balanced quite good imo.

Every unit type can be used to a great extent and using some big production cities plus ironworks and national wonder, you can actually build most interesting units in about 2-4 turns, whereas researching takes a lot longer.

So I have been able to stack quite big armies of grenadiers (most with city raider 2 or 3 due to upgrades - btw you can get lots of xp in the start by killing animals and barbarians using terrain features to your benefit) and take the four big barbarian cities in the new world (one size 11 with hanging gardens ) without losses against axemen and archers. After settling the whole continent I got about 90% of the land mass there and about 50% of the old world (eradicated three oponnents till about 1000 AD - the last one using riflemen) winning a domination victory. At that moment I just made it to SAM-Infantry producing about 1200-1300 (or was it even more?) beakers per turn during the whole time.

That means I played from about 1100AD to 1300AD with grenadiers as the most actual unit. (2 years per turn => 100 turns using nice stacks of upgraded grenadiers; I actually used them 1100-1400 = 150 turns!)

Then I researched railroad, getting machine guns - but I didn't bothered to use them as most enemies still used longbowmen or musketeers, only single riflemen. Just a few turns before winning I got sam-infantry.

Overall I have to say the game time is just balanced great for my purposes in marathon. I only played noble+standard size to get a feeling for the time, so it finished quite early and think that some higher difficulty on a bigger map will lead to quite a long game (I bet on something around 20-40 hours or more for really big ones) with nice military possibilities.

greets, xgamer

 

[Buligo]

try my 6050 turns speed to then.

Bob, basically, what are you saying is that you made an virtual endless game?
I just got my copy 2 days ago. Before that, i played the demo and was pi$$ed quite a bit because of the 100-turn limit. Most paper-reviews stated that the game has a 'stinky' attitude to end way too soon. 100 turns were really not enough to me (learning to play).

I hear the newest patch improved the game in that aspect.

So:if i install your files and start a new 'epic' game, my turns will mean 1 year and not 40 as before? And, the game will run exactly as before, just way way earlier in the timeline (like getting jets in say, 2000 BC?).Or is the research-timeline also modified and how? I don't really care about the timeline, i would just like to have a game that will go on and on, to my heart content. And then, when i am ready, i would start to play quick games on small continents. Until then, i think i will keep my unwashed villagers for long, long time!!

Cheers.

Buligo.

P.S.

@CiverDan and Xgamer(and the others too): thanks for your input, found it very useful and informative.

 

[Proteus]

I´m currently playing a game I started at the day the patch came out (Friday AFAIR) on Marathon speed (huge map, 8 civs, noble difficulty).
It´s great.

When I got the tech to build cossacks I started a great war against my english neighbors (which had more cities and more population than myself but a somehow lower tech level, being able to field everything but gunpowder units]).
It lasted for maybe 100-150 turns (until the last english city fell) and during the whole war my cossacks remained the main attack force (the only difference was that at the beginning of the war they fought against pikemen and longbowmen and at the end of the war against grenadiers).

Another observation I made is, that the length of anarchy and great ages have increased.
Anarchy now even for a change of only one civic lasts 3 turns (meaning that the spiritual trait becomes more useful during marathon-sessions).
Golden ages now last for 15 turns.

And of course, due to the longer research times, wonders also last longer until they become obsolete.
I think this is the speed setting I will take in all of my future games

 

[Kamamura]

Perhaps Firaxis will include the discussed "Super-Epic" time-scale into a future official patch? I mean - no harm for anyone and more challenging/immersive option for the veterans...

 

[Wodan]

Decided to play a "Marathon" game. One thing I've noticed already is that the 10-turn penalty for Slavery oppression in a city, and the 1-turn penalty for Anarchy in your entire Civ, are much less of an issue.

Wodan

 

[Proteus]

Decided to play a "Marathon" game. One thing I've noticed already is that the 10-turn penalty for Slavery oppression in a city, and the 1-turn penalty for Anarchy in your entire Civ, are much less of an issue.

Wodan

The length of the anarchy might increase however, the larger your civ gets.
After I conquered the english (which let my civ grow to ~30 cities) the normal number of turns for anarchy for the change of a single civic was 3 turns (which lets me think that maybe the calculation for the duration of anarchy in marathon mode could be: [number of civics changed] *[number of cities] / 10 )

 

[Kieran]

It takes a very long time to construct buildings on this speed. If you can afford it you can pump out lots of units. Research is still too fast IMO.

 

[FexFX]

Having played my first game with the 'Marathon' speed I still prefere the FexFX - Bigger & Longer mod, because his mod actually makes the ancient and pretty much every time period more fun (especially in warfare) and not repetitive.

Thanks for the Vote of Confidence...
I was wondering if Marathon would outmode my Gamespeeds or not...
Looks like it may not...
I will therefore be adjusting my mod to work with 1.52...
I find it interesting some of the changes 1.52 makes to the existing balances tho...

My FX-Epic(875) Game changed the Unit production balance so that over the course of the entire game you should produce 1/6th more units
My FX-Grand(1000) game changed the Unit production balance so that over the course of the entire game you should produce 1/5th more units.

The Changes in 1.52 makes it so that in Epic you will produce 1/5th more units...Looks like someone else thought this was a good ratio...

I am dubious about Marathon however, as it increases the Unit Production ratio by 1/2!!!
I am trying this myself, But I suspect this is just too much.
Also it will be interesting to see how people feel abotu Marathon on different difficulties and map sizes!

I discovered very quickly that simply increasing the research and production numbers in CIV4GameSpeedInfo.xml was not enough at all since there are research speed modifiers in CIV4WorldInfo.xml, CIV4HandicapInfo.xml and CIV4EraInfos.xml! As a result, I had many people reporting that they were ending up with riflemen in 720AD even tho I had increased the reaserch percentage by 5% MORE than the relative number of turns in the Default game speed...

Before the patch I was testing a second version of my mod to fix these problems. It will be interesting to see how their numbers play out...

 

[FexFX]

I have played about 200 turns on Marathon game speen on Settler as a test. Couple of observations:

1. Really overpowers Philosophical civs and those that starts with a scout. Getting free techs, cities and workers are HUGE here. It is currently about 280 AD I have 18 cities 10% science (expanded about as fast as feasible without bankrupting myself and leaving cities open to barb attack.) and am in Late Renassiance tech wise now. Have had 11 Great People so far from cities, 2 Artist, 1 Engineer, and 9 scientists. Capital is running 300 beakers. with 6-7 turn techs.

I should have kept reading...
This was the kind of thing I kept hearing about in my mod...
Looks like they didn't balance it properly!


The Modifiers in all of those files makes it more complex to balance things in a longer game.

Definitely watch for FexFX--Bigger-&-Longer(v1.52)!