My take on it

Then you need to turn up the difficulty level. Or try a strategy you didn't look up on the internet.

most people dont need to look up strats on the net to beat civ 5.
 
Moderator Action: Get back on topic...don't respond to problematic posts, report them or you too will be infracted.
 
Then you need to turn up the difficulty level. Or try a strategy you didn't look up on the internet.

But that's just the problem. The higher up you turn the difficulty, the fewer viable strategic options are available. You either out city-spam the AI and then destroy them one or two at a time, or else hole up somewhere and rely on their military incompetence as you coast to a culture or diplomacy win (or a tech win if you're in the mood to show off :lol:)

Even then, no matter how good you are, absolute blind luck can ruin you in the early game if the random AI's decide to dogpile you right away. Sure, that could happen in civ IV too, but it wasn't nearly as random as it is now.
 
There is the illusion of it being Civ5s victory being deeper than Civ4's but really, the depth of both games is about the same.
That's pretty much my impression as well - both games are well complex games with lots of depth (though large parts are hidden away in both, I'd argue).

The two games, however, feel quite different: The complexity of Civ5 arises from the interplay of non-reversible choices, staggered throughout the game. Civ4 is more about the synergies of options that are unlocked throughout the game.

One could say: Civ5 is about planning the advancement and upgrades of your Civ, while Civ4 is more focussed on unlocking and utilising more advancements. Both are ultimately deep and complex to master, but give a very different feel: Civ5 gives, together with the 1upt combat tactics a much more localised, hands-on and intense feel, while Civ4 creates more of a grander, toolbox-y feel.

What you like more is more a matter of taste than an objective measurement.

Cheers, LT.
 
Okay so lets describe what you need for a CIV5 cultural victory.

Normal size map:
- 3 own cities are optimal (+66% cost vs. +200% culture).
- need to prioritize culture buildings
- Wonders that you must/should grab: Stonehenge, The Oracle, Sistine chapel, Christo Redentor, The Louvre, (Sydney Opera)
- you need at least 1 world wonder in every own city (for Constitution bonus)
- the above means planning and getting at least 3 engineers
- need to beeline Philosophy, Theology, Acoustics, Archaeology, Radio; most of these are far away from military techs.
- need to somehow beat the UN-victory planning civs with lots of GPT
- need to somehow find time to build military units
- need to somehow find time to build science, happiness, support buildings
- need to outpace the space race once it starts
- need to somehow have enough money for buying out both cultural city-states and getting RAs

I just played and won a culture game and it wasn't boring for one second. I had one runaway civ per era that declared on me (Babylon, followed by Egypt, followed by England) and England had twice the score, ten times the military and double everything else (10 techs ahead me at all times) till the end of the game. I had no iron and I had to build archers for at least 30 turns (with 3 cities) to even win the first war (Archers and Immortals vs. Swords and Bowmen).

In Civ4 6 cities out of 9 can do whatever you need. In Civ5 you have three cities that need to do all the work.
In Civ4 all gold from your conquered cities can be pooled into culture. In civ5 puppets provide 1/10th or even 1/20th of the culture compared to your core cities.
In Civ4 most culture buildings are easy to build. In Civ5 they are very hammer-intensive (starting with Opera).

In CIV5 winning a cultural victory is hard, especially on higher levels. Fairy tales about 1000:c5science: per turn and 1000:c5gold: per turn in every game are just that - fairy tales. Stories where culture-running civs completely dominate the AI with their superior tactics and whatnot. The reality of it is that on a normal size map at least 3 civs will be running around with +1 era units most of the time and at least 3 of them will be in the 200-400 GPT bracket. And this is on Emperor, I can't imagine how it looks like on Immortal or Deity.
 
Even without science from population, it is possible to produce more than 1000 :c5science: per turn in the late game.

Yes, with RAs. However with population it would look like this:

Spoiler :
With 3 core cities and, say 5 puppets (which would be great) the formula would be the following:

5 puppets size 8 (usual size) with library, university, two with observatory (generous):
(8+4)*1.5=18 per regular puppet
(8+4)*2=24 per puppet with Observatory

Total :c5science: from puppets: 102
Total :c5science: required from core cities: 898
:c5science: per core city required: 299

Lets presume core cities have library, university, public school, research lab and that two have an observatory (again, very generous) and the third has the National College. That's a 200%:c5science: bonus in each city. Library and Public School add 150% per every citizen.

Required population in city required to reach 300(299):c5science:: 40 population
(40 for population + 20 for library + 40 for public school)*3

Good luck.


Public Schools are the only way to get 1000:c5science: in a cultural game with puppets (except if you have like 50 puppets :)).
 
Okay so lets describe what you need for a CIV5 cultural victory.

Normal size map:
- 3 own cities are optimal (+66% cost vs. +200% culture).
- need to prioritize culture buildings
- Wonders that you must/should grab: Stonehenge, The Oracle, Sistine chapel, Christo Redentor, The Louvre, (Sydney Opera)
- you need at least 1 world wonder in every own city (for Constitution bonus)
- the above means planning and getting at least 3 engineers
- need to beeline Philosophy, Theology, Acoustics, Archaeology, Radio; most of these are far away from military techs.
- need to somehow beat the UN-victory planning civs with lots of GPT
- need to somehow find time to build military units
- need to somehow find time to build science, happiness, support buildings
- need to outpace the space race once it starts
- need to somehow have enough money for buying out both cultural city-states and getting RAs

I just played and won a culture game and it wasn't boring for one second. I had one runaway civ per era that declared on me (Babylon, followed by Egypt, followed by England) and England had twice the score, ten times the military and double everything else (10 techs ahead me at all times) till the end of the game. I had no iron and I had to build archers for at least 30 turns (with 3 cities) to even win the first war (Archers and Immortals vs. Swords and Bowmen).

In Civ4 6 cities out of 9 can do whatever you need. In Civ5 you have three cities that need to do all the work.
In Civ4 all gold from your conquered cities can be pooled into culture. In civ5 puppets provide 1/10th or even 1/20th of the culture compared to your core cities.
In Civ4 most culture buildings are easy to build. In Civ5 they are very hammer-intensive (starting with Opera).

In CIV5 winning a cultural victory is hard, especially on higher levels. Fairy tales about 1000:c5science: per turn and 1000:c5gold: per turn in every game are just that - fairy tales. Stories where culture-running civs completely dominate the AI with their superior tactics and whatnot. The reality of it is that on a normal size map at least 3 civs will be running around with +1 era units most of the time and at least 3 of them will be in the 200-400 GPT bracket. And this is on Emperor, I can't imagine how it looks like on Immortal or Deity.

I don't see why you need to stop at 3 cities...that may be the "ideal" number, but generally I find 1-3 more is useful to help keep my science where it needs to be.

Science is very important in a cultural victory to unlock Piety and Freedom ASAP.

Also, like you said, you want to get to the cultural wonders as fast as possible too. I find the AI ignores Stonehenge for a long time so I don't build it as soon as I unlock Calendar and instead rush a NC. Yes, even when going for culture.

I play on Immortal for the most par btw, though I don't know how many of my cultural wins are on Immortal (all my games just blend together).
 
I don't see why you need to stop at 3 cities...that may be the "ideal" number, but generally I find 1-3 more is useful to help keep my science where it needs to be..

Hmm.. extra 3 cities would put the cost from 66% to 165% of the original. Getting the 100% :c5culture: bonus in 3 cities via Constitution+Wonders is relatively easy, but I can't imagine doing it for 6. How do you deal with the extra turns required for each policy?
Maybe its a bug, but I don't find national wonders to be working with Constitution.
 
Hmm.. extra 3 cities would put the cost from 66% to 165% of the original. Getting the 100% :c5culture: bonus in 3 cities via Constitution+Wonders is relatively easy, but I can't imagine doing it for 6. How do you deal with the extra turns required for each policy?
Maybe its a bug, but I don't find national wonders to be working with Constitution.
You need to take into consideration that cultural city states and puppets are culture that doesn't increase policy cost (unlike more culture from other cities). Those bonuses are brought to 60% effectiveness just from going from 1 to 4 cities. Granted, you're gaining more overall culture due to Constitution, but it will probably influence what the optimal number is.

I'll repeat, I really dislike having to decide if I want to go for a cultural victory from turn 1. I wish that was changed.
 
I'll repeat, I really dislike having to decide if I want to go for a cultural victory from turn 1. I wish that was changed.

Actually you don't have to decide from turn one. Prioritizing culture can have serious impact on other victory types as well. Early full Honor or Patronage comes to mind. The only Wonder you'd need to build is the Oracle, you can capture Stonehenge, Christo and/or Sistine. And later you beeline for Radio and Telegraph.

It doesn't matter if you go for conquests first, since unlike in CIV4 in CIV5 culture buildings will always get you there no matter when you build them. Might as well start at turn 150, since you can rush-buy all culture buildings if you conquered your continent (and thus save yourself 30 or more turns on building them). Also, if you start late, you can grab Free Speech first, thus eliminating the loss from not having culture buildings from start.
 
Hmm.. extra 3 cities would put the cost from 66% more to 165% of the original. Getting the 100% :c5culture: bonus in 3 cities via Constitution+Wonders is relatively easy, but I can't imagine it for 6. How do you deal with the extra turns required for each policy?
Maybe its a bug, but I don't find national wonders to be working with Constitution.

I don't believe constitution works with national wonders, only world.

I don't have a specific game I'm thinking of, but I generally don't build lots of cultural buildings until my science/production infrastructure is set up. I try to get good production sites for all of my cities (unless I'm just grabbing for that early luxury or a chokepoint).

I also try to avoid the middle techs and only grab a few in the bottom and rely on my defensive game to carry me until I unlock Freedom (grab Oligarchy if your hand is really really forced, otherwise stay in Piety and wait to slingshot into Freedom with +2 policies).

Once I get Freedom unlocked you are "free" to do whatever you need. Build military, focus more science (to go fro CR faster), build your culture up more. I generally end up rushbuying buildings like museums that provide big culture boosts for lots of hammers (when I can).

But basically I try to get that -% culture cost of policies SP ASAP when going for that victory. I don't usually worry about CR until much later because there are way too many beakers inbetween - which is also why I focus on my science over my culture for half the game.

It may seem kinda backwards, and I must put a disclaimer that I can't remember if I've done cultural on level 7, or only level 6. I just end up quitting on games now once I figure I've won instead of playing them out. :(

I've meant to do a writeup at some point of one of my games, but I can't stay disciplined enough to follow through. If I ever do one I'll try to go cultural on Immortal (and finish it). :)
 
To me, the simplification doesn't say that this is where they want the game to be. I read into it as leaving room for both DLC and expansion packs as separate entities.

That way DLC can be additional civs and scenarios, and expansion packs can be additional layers of mechanics, with less overlap between the two.

They'd never admit this openly, of course. But it's a business. :p

The problem I have with all of that is, They expect us to pay more of my hard earned cash in order to bring the game up to what it should have been from the start.

They'll slowly release DLC civs 1 or 2 at a time making us pay for each new thing 1 at a time.
Then IF they release an expansion pack it will be relatively light because most of the stuff like new civs and maps that would normally be in an expansion pack will have already been released as DLC. Yet even though the expansion pack is light, it will still cost the full price it would with everything else.

I'm more then happy to pay $100 for a game I like and then pony up another $40 or so for an expansion. But after paying $100 for an unfinished game, I will not pay bit by bit for supposed extra features and then another $40 for an expansion which only brings the game to the finished state it should have been in at release.

The whole DLC will save us thing just really annoys me. Firaxis is just trying to milk us for money pure and simple. That old saying "don't piss in my pocket and then tell it's raining" springs to mind.

That's my rant, I won't repeat it all over the forums so please don't complain about it.
 
The problem I have with all of that is, They expect us to pay more of my hard earned cash in order to bring the game up to what it should have been from the start.

They'll slowly release DLC civs 1 or 2 at a time making us pay for each new thing 1 at a time.
Then IF they release an expansion pack it will be relatively light because most of the stuff like new civs and maps that would normally be in an expansion pack will have already been released as DLC. Yet even though the expansion pack is light, it will still cost the full price it would with everything else.

I'm more then happy to pay $100 for a game I like and then pony up another $40 or so for an expansion. But after paying $100 for an unfinished game, I will not pay bit by bit for supposed extra features and then another $40 for an expansion which only brings the game to the finished state it should have been in at release.

The whole DLC will save us thing just really annoys me. Firaxis is just trying to milk us for money pure and simple. That old saying "don't piss in my pocket and then tell it's raining" springs to mind.

That's my rant, I won't repeat it all over the forums so please don't complain about it.

This post is dead on, they release an unfinished game the was not balanced or well tested, and strip the game of core components that made the prior game great, then expect us to pay for expos and dlc sadly this seems to be the trend with companys this season.
 
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