(POLL) In which difficulty level do you find the balance between enjoyable and challenging?

In which difficulty level do you find the balance between enjoyable and challenging?

  • Prince

    Votes: 29 9.5%
  • King

    Votes: 75 24.7%
  • Emperor

    Votes: 124 40.8%
  • Immortal

    Votes: 54 17.8%
  • Deity

    Votes: 22 7.2%

  • Total voters
    304
None, since tall is even harder on prince than wide on deity. I'm now trying to at least win deity once (and i'm pretty sure i will be able to do it, except if they change it with a major patch), and i will probably continue to play on immortal / deity, also dependant on the civ and which victory i'm going for.
 
Emperor if I want a more peaceful game (where I mostly don't capture/take AI cities and just build my own), and where I can do things like found a religion and try some new beliefs, build a bunch of useless-but-pretty wonders, etc. Immortal (or sometimes deity) if I want a more aggressive game and will start out primarily with neighbor-rushing.

Emperor I get ahead too soon if I start out with lots of conquering, and immortal/deity I feel like I have to be primarily considering 'optimum' play, which I don't really enjoy doing. Maybe the most recent patch will change this balance a bit though.

I also tend to enjoy settling tons of cities, which given the game's current meta, makes things easier.
 
I went with Immortal, as I see many others have so far as well (6/10). For me, it is, in my playtesting at least, actually somewhere between Emperor and Immortal, but it is closer to the Immortal end of that range. Maybe there should be a new level, like Emportal or Imperor :p (similar to Smarch... lousy Smarch weather).
 
I'm currently playing my first proper game since the patch on Emperor and found it pretty forgiving, but not a walkover, especially if you don't archer rush. Deity I find manageable, but like others have said, you need to get off to a good start. I've yet to try Immortal itself, but I have a feeling my answer would be somewhere between Emperor and Immortal.
 
I have yet to try a game beyond King. So far, King has been an even challenge for my style of play and seems rather immersive.

Based on what I hear on this forum, higher levels would force me into strategies I might not enjoy. Though I suppose at some point I will rise to the challenge for the challenge's sake alone.
 
Emperor I get ahead too soon if I start out with lots of conquering, and immortal/deity I feel like I have to be primarily considering 'optimum' play, which I don't really enjoy doing.
This is where I am. I enjoy a game with some wars sprinkled in, but the AI cannot play the game. At Immortal, combat gets tougher but then the game bends in other directions that I don't enjoy. I've been messing around with the all of the game's start settings, trying to find the best start conditions for me, and now, after a year of trying, I'm being frustrated by new bugs.

So the answer to the OP's question is, "None, and I'm getting tired of trying."
 
I unfortunately haven't been able to find any such difficulty due to the way the AI's bonuses are front-loaded. Any difficulty where the late game is challenging has dramatically constrained options in the early game (competing for early wonders/great people requires an investment disproportionate to the reward, and attack by a numerically/technologically superior force is essentially inevitable). At any difficulty with a good early-game balance between the human and AI, however, the AI ceases to be a relevant consideration by the midgame. There's no way (at least above prince) to set up a human vs. AI game that has a consistent level of challenge at all game stages.
 
I unfortunately haven't been able to find any such difficulty due to the way the AI's bonuses are front-loaded. Any difficulty where the late game is challenging has dramatically constrained options in the early game (competing for early wonders/great people requires an investment disproportionate to the reward, and attack by a numerically/technologically superior force is essentially inevitable). At any difficulty with a good early-game balance between the human and AI, however, the AI ceases to be a relevant consideration by the midgame. There's no way (at least above prince) to set up a human vs. AI game that has a consistent level of challenge at all game stages.

This is the number 1 reason why I only play a couple of games of Civ after every patch, rather than continuously enjoying myself. Couldn't put it better myself.
 
I unfortunately haven't been able to find any such difficulty due to the way the AI's bonuses are front-loaded. Any difficulty where the late game is challenging has dramatically constrained options in the early game (competing for early wonders/great people requires an investment disproportionate to the reward, and attack by a numerically/technologically superior force is essentially inevitable). At any difficulty with a good early-game balance between the human and AI, however, the AI ceases to be a relevant consideration by the midgame. There's no way (at least above prince) to set up a human vs. AI game that has a consistent level of challenge at all game stages.

Would be kind of neat if there was one setting where basically each era, the AI's bonuses increase. So they start out ancient era at Prince, then basically classical at King, etc... That way, you start out the same as the AI in terms of building out and exploring, so it's not like you're down 2-3 cities to the AI right from the beginning, but as you get later on in the game, it gets more and more challenging. Or if there was a difficulty setting which was more like an adaptive difficulty, so that the further ahead you are, the more they bonuses. Something like they get the Deity bonuses if they're an era behind you, but get bonuses more like King or Emperor if tied in era. And they maybe get a combat bonus depending on troop differences, or are simply given free builders or settlers occasionally if they fall behind. Could even do it totally arbitrary based on each individual level - so if you have no faith production, they don't get a bonus there, but if you're beating them in science, they would get a larger science multiplier.
 
I play on King and sometimes Prince if I want to do weird stuff. Though King gives some room to test out odd stuff too.

I generally like to play quickly, finish a game in a few hours, take some screenshots, and then post on the forums about my stupid escapades. Then I can go play another game and do something different. Oftentimes, I usually start a game because I read something on the forums and tried to do it in game.

I also dislike micromanagement of most kinds and of all honesty that's probably why I never manage to get too high in any civ game and also struggle somewhat in places I probably shouldn't. All incarnations of Civ generally have something that makes me not want to work with it; it's just too much effort and Firaxis has never made a working UI. Sometimes even getting the game to do what you told it to do is an impossibility and that tends to be what I think really holds back the franchise as a whole. I did try a few deity games where I took out civs and kept getting fed settlers because the AI was too stupid to protect them from Barbs so I was quite ahead and ended up with way more cities than i could have at a lower level. Ended up quitting because I thought it was stupid, though I imagine I'd find some way to screw it up.

I do have a bad tendency to want to be #1 in everything, so seeing the AI always ahead for so long tends to annoy me. (Except for religion, I can't even maintain the rest and keep up with that on Prince....)
 
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Emperor is my pick, combined with a mod to eliminate AI's free settler, because its the last difficulty level which allowes a bit of roll playing. I can beat deity easily by warmongering but I don't want it to be the only way to play this game.
 
Emperor for mostly peaceful games, Immortal when feeling like conquering cities. Due to this my Emperor games are actually harder to win, since conquering other civs is actually by far the best strategy.

I do dream of a Civ game, though, where the AI was good enough to not require game-changing bonuses.
 
I play on King and sometimes Prince if I want to do weird stuff. Though King gives some room to test out odd stuff too.

I generally like to play quickly, finish a game in a few hours, take some screenshots, and then post on the forums about my stupid escapades. Then I can go play another game and do something different. Oftentimes, I usually start a game because I read something on the forums and tried to do it in game.

I also dislike micromanagement of most kinds and of all honesty that's probably why I never manage to get too high in any civ game and also struggle somewhat in places I probably shouldn't. All incarnations of Civ generally have something that makes me not want to work with it; it's just too much effort and Firaxis has never made a working UI. Sometimes even getting the game to do what you told it to do is an impossibility and that tends to be what I think really holds back the franchise as a whole. I did try a few deity games where I took out civs and kept getting fed settlers because the AI was too stupid to protect them from Barbs so I was quite ahead and ended up with way more cities than i could have at a lower level. Ended up quitting because I thought it was stupid, though I imagine I'd find some way to screw it up.

I do have a bad tendency to want to be #1 in everything, so seeing the AI always ahead for so long tends to annoy me. (Except for religion, I can't even maintain the rest and keep up with that on Prince....)

I didn't think we were allowed to play on Prince anymore.... you know, since he died and all.
 
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