Rant : The annoying BS factor of CIV IV

Hooliday

Chieftain
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
14
Now, this post is more of a rant than anything else. If you find aggressive methods of talking something not suitable for you, back off. This is thread is sincerely meant to talk about the bulls*it factors of the game. I am only a casual player and after a lot of reading here I felt need to bring some things up.

Arguement :
The actual level of play. It's horrid. It's absolutely horrid. Anything below Emperor is meant for players who do not understand the game. Don't be offended. It doesn't mean you are incapable of learning or stupid if you don't agree with my sentence. Majority of players cannot beat emperor.

Answer : People need to realize the key to playing CIV is understanding the game. Not simply pulling through a strategy in 6000 years long struggle. The biggest morons are the ones who choose Rome, Egypt or Persia to pursue your goals. You use cheap tactics (UU Is horsecrap) to beat the weak AI. It cannot compete against your save-reloads and perfect starting spot. The AI Cannot beat you in game that is made to favour you. Especially on lower difficulty levels. Even immortal level AI is so handicapped with its huge armies its unbeliveable. Emperor computer can find barbs hard, you understand where im getting into? You need to learn to adapt. You need to understand whats the best way to safe the first 10 turns and have long sight on your actions. You have to understand and manage the events that will occur in the game, not time your strategy perfect. A clever player doesn't go through his/hers game thinking about "The pyramids, i cannot play without them". Good player thinks, Where are the pyramids? Could I possibly conquer them and double my landmass. A good player is greedy in his/hers actions.

Understand the fact each grid in the game serves a purpose. Don't think about the city in 200 turns. Think about it in the following 10-50 turns. The fact you need to be able to exploit it as soon as possible even if it means ignoring resources. You do it because you need swift advantage over the AI. Your science rating will go up by degrees. Meaning making calculated decisions and conquering a lot of land from the AI. Many people think you need to place to city to contain as many resources as possible. No, you need the city to be an early powerhouse. In near future you'll build another next to it. 2 Moderate cities. This is of course if you make it long enough. Smart people will understand this will almost triple your future potency when the conquered AI and your old landmass is combined.

Arguement : AI Cabality

AI is a gigantic ass and a moron in CIV IV. It's only there to be exploited. I was earlier playing a game on immortal level, where i had standard sized continents map. I started out having 3 cities, there was no need of building more. Any more would have only had damaging effect on me. I battled the nearest AI with major (But affordable) attacking force and completely overwhelmed it. The AI had nothing to attack with, it never does when you do things right. The looser walled and locked himself in even when he had me surrounded in landmass. There wasn't no casual attacks on mines or resources. Not even border cities. I had everything guarded and securing the main strategic points of the map kept the AI at bay. (Yes, the AI does a lot of math and calculates if attack is worth doing). Like i said, you only exploit it. I conquered everything with hardly any losses. My total landmass increased to 10% from a few %. Next to me was Washington who had meanwhile surrounded me all over, with biggest landmass of 15%. I launched assault on towards his strongpoints and easily gained his most important holdings. Even with all the cities surrounding me he was not able to launch not single counter attack. Meanwhile i had only been teching and super-rushing the conquered lands with whipping and chopping. Using the right grids. I turned a malfunctioning . .. .. .. . empire into gigantic powerhouse in matter of a dozen turns.

Now what did i have there? Do the math.

Time to tech my homeland
experienced, strong attacking force, defensive force
Conquered capital and the best chosen locations for extra cities. I razed all the stuck-up cities.

What i didn't have : Few barely able-to-upkeep-themselves cities with pyramids and weak force to call upon the AI to launch its mass invasion from all border areas. To cripple you, not conquer. You have to take the fight to him/her.


Arguement/Answer : Strategies

This is the biggest BS factor of the game. Chariot rushes, egyptian chariot rushes, praetorian rushes. And top of all quechua rush. I'd laugh my ass off if you were forced to win just one game when all your luxuries and choosings would be taken away. Play leaders like montezuma or alexander to understand the game. Spirituality is the stronggest trait of the game for a leader that doesn't hold any aces in his pockets. Philosophical is a great trait. I hate coin economy. I only do specialists. Financial is . .. .. .. .. Play with your cottages if you wish to. Whipping/Civics/Specialists are the art. Allow you to swiftly turn wasteland into cities. You might find it funny to exploit easy money, I don't.
If you have to rely on anything but a random civ, you really just aren't good. I do choose my civ, but i can manage without. I play "seemingly weak" leaders. Oh, im sorry you don't have your praetorians conquering all the world for you. Whats the point of that? Play equal fight on equal battlefield and show your better than your opponent. Unique buildings are a great thing, generally. Any building is. People do not understand the value of half-priced universities or promoted units but only look at the simple side of the game. The overall grinding of the map. Play random civ, first start if you want to prove anything to yourself. I see a dozen of games here that groups play. Let me first say, they are ass. A chariot rush never fails or scout lives all the way to 2000 AD. On immortal your likely to run into at least two animals at once every turn, meaning you have to slow down the scout or seek for 75% cover. Last time i was on forrested cliff i ran into a lion and a 2 Speed puma finished it on the same turn. Thats life guys, you lose sometimes. Your telling me you don't reload? I laugh at that, stop cheating yourself. The scout is likely to die, its just matter of how hard you can make it for the enemy to kill it. Use skip turn, walk one turn, seek for cover. You might get him to live and do the important part of fogbusting when you rush with a settler. Then again, he might die too. Your chariots might die too, crippling you. Likely they will die at immortal. Maybe you should build immortals? You know, AI can't beat them. Proven it a million times. With immortals you don't criple yourself even if you have to pull back from a war because you just go for the weakest opponent with best cities. Get real, you don't have to rely on luck. Rely on knowledge and math. Know your opponent, know what he can be or cannot beat. It's not sad to rush with swords and catapults. it's the right thing to do. I think most people here prefer it to as "Axe rush". I just dont like to give any offensive tactic a name. It means its been used once. You adapt. Maybe you need siege weapons maybe not. You need to know it before going in.

There are dozens of threads about cultural victories and and stuff like that. are you guys cowards or something. the worst part is when you lose with your strategy against a weak computer, lol. With creative minds, this can be taken as far as beating deity. But admit it. As an average player you probably did it by copying somebody here. New players don't think about cultural victories :). My buddy can beat a prince computer after i showed him a quarter or game-well-played. He didn't even understand the meaning of buildings. He just chose to use praetorians when he found them from civiliopedia. I had so much fun watching him whip the AI's. And people actually here tell its hard. Im not saying my friend is a monkey or stupid, but he adapted in matter of hours. It's because he was taught to understand the game. He couldnt perform great but he didnt do amateur mistakes either, that are greedy settling of cities and building the wrong things in them. Use them for their purposes.


Conclusion : THIS IS A RANT. I am not a genious. Im actually very stupid person but i could take immortal level computer on BTS on first try. And that was after 6 months pause. Im ranting, for your good. To make you a better player. I don't care, i barely play CIV anymore. Besides with a couple of friends in internet. I suck, bad. But i understand the game, and thats what its all about.

Thanks!
 
Hi, Welcome to the forum :goodjob:

I only got one argument why I play civ. I think its fun
 
You know, some of us like a little variety in our play. Maybe we just don't feel like bashing someone's head in. And your arrogant, "you are all cheaters" attitude is offensive. You are calling many strategies employed year either gimmicky crap or stupid. You called the Cottage Economy, used by a huge amount of players, as too easy, as far as I can tell. You call what you do art and optimal, while you dismiss what everyone else does.
I see a dozen of games here that groups play. Let me first say, they are ass.
And there you accuse most of the SG teams of cheating. Because you think they are too succesful to be real. Obviously you did not see some of the games that ending with defeat.
Civ is a complex game. There are many ways to win and there is no "optimal strategy." But most importantly, it is made to have fun. You don't need to call everyone stupid because they don't follow what you feel to be the best way to play.
 
This is a rant.

The points jump from one to another, it is hard to follow. are you arguing for your arguments or against?

Anyways, welcome to the forums
 
Some words:
-Stop playing rome, inca or egypt if you find it overpowered
- AI still don't match humans ( and probably we'll be pretty buried and eaten by worms in the day it happen )
- If you managed to win Immortal first try, respect those who doesn't.... ( and prat rush in a duel map is a liittle too much )
- As a player of some SGs, I think you should realize that there is more than one people thinking in the game.... this makes that a group of Monarch players can tacke a immortal game if they play their cards wisely. And I suppose that you didn't read that well things: rushes fail ( sometimes miserabily ) and scouts are eaten by the first animal they get in front of them ( seriously ,I would like you to say to me what SGs are you talking about when implying that all the SG community is "ass" and a dirty cheater)
- This one is my favourite
(Yes, the AI does a lot of math and calculates if attack is worth doing).
First you say the AI doesn't try to attack you and then you state that you occupy the main strategical points, making a AI attack a suicide... I wonder if you would attack if the situation was the other way around ( I really don't think that you would call a AI clever if they launched zillions of troops against well fortified positins without hope of victory... )

Well, this is only a rant.... if you feel offended , just look at other thing
 
Hi, Welcome to the forum :goodjob:

I only got one argument why I play civ. I think its fun

:clap: Yes!!! That is why I play the civ games, FUN!!! Not for some intellectual stimulation or debate about AI or whatever!
 
I should probably comment something here.

Many seem to be angry at my comment about the community. I don' directly point them being cheaters. I just find too many of them success perfectly. I learned this game from Aelf.
 
I suppose that happens because there aren't much of risky plays in SGs ( nobody likes to hinted as the guy that derailed the game...); if you read the reports, you'll see that almost none of the SGs has a early rush ( the kind of all or nothing move... if it fails you're in deep $hit ) and all the moves are very careful. That, combined with teammates and lurker's advice , normally leads to a less flawed game than a normal offline game with the same player
 
First of all, I would like to say that I don't play on multiplayer, and all of my recent games are single player, random civ with a leader attached to it, and often on a random map type. I find Monarch a bit too easy, but Emporer a bit too hard. (I win maybe 1 in 5 on Emporer)

Now, due to the rants construction, it is a little hard to follow. What you seem to be saying is that the game is easy to win because the AI is so bad at fighting. (A statement I do not really disagree with), and that therefore, you don't even need to be one of the "early conquerors" to rush the computer off the map.

Now, as for this.......

AI is a gigantic ass and a moron in CIV IV. It's only there to be exploited. I was earlier playing a game on immortal level, where i had standard sized continents map. I started out having 3 cities, there was no need of building more. Any more would have only had damaging effect on me. I battled the nearest AI with major (But affordable) attacking force and completely overwhelmed it. The AI had nothing to attack with, it never does when you do things right. The looser walled and locked himself in even when he had me surrounded in landmass. There wasn't no casual attacks on mines or resources. Not even border cities. I had everything guarded and securing the main strategic points of the map kept the AI at bay. (Yes, the AI does a lot of math and calculates if attack is worth doing). Like i said, you only exploit it. I conquered everything with hardly any losses. My total landmass increased to 10% from a few %. Next to me was Washington who had meanwhile surrounded me all over, with biggest landmass of 15%. I launched assault on towards his strongpoints and easily gained his most important holdings. Even with all the cities surrounding me he was not able to launch not single counter attack. Meanwhile i had only been teching and super-rushing the conquered lands with whipping and chopping. Using the right grids. I turned a malfunctioning . .. .. .. . empire into gigantic powerhouse in matter of a dozen turns.

So if you had 3 cities a "few" percent of the landmass, to get you up to your opponent (who is unnamed) had to have maybe twice as many cities as you to get it up to ten when you absorbed him. (maybe more, you mention razing his more worthless cities later), and Washington would have had maybe 9 to have fifteen by himself.. That's at leat 15 cities in total. I fail to see how it is even remotely plausible to even get to all these cities in a dozen turns, even had they been completely undefended. And even if they had a puny defense of two archers/longbowmen (An era would be nice in that example) with a culture defense of 20, you would need some ability to bombard or some high leveled up swordsmen/macemen to crack these nuts, AI stupidity or no.

Also, I fail to see your comment about "The AI using mathematics to calculate whether an attack is worth doing or not." I do that myself, and so does everyone else who plays civ. (presumably) The alternative is to put a blindfold on and attack at random, which I have never tried, but nonetheless assure you is quite a poor strategy. So I'm not sure what the point of bringing up that anecdote is.


There are dozens of threads about cultural victories and and stuff like that. are you guys cowards or something. the worst part is when you lose with your strategy against a weak computer, lol. With creative minds, this can be taken as far as beating deity. But admit it. As an average player you probably did it by copying somebody here. New players don't think about cultural victories . My buddy can beat a prince computer after i showed him a quarter or game-well-played. He didn't even understand the meaning of buildings. He just chose to use praetorians when he found them from civiliopedia. I had so much fun watching him whip the AI's. And people actually here tell its hard. Im not saying my friend is a monkey or stupid, but he adapted in matter of hours. It's because he was taught to understand the game. He couldnt perform great but he didnt do amateur mistakes either, that are greedy settling of cities and building the wrong things in them. Use them for their purposes.


And this paragraph makes no sense. You seem contemptous of anyone who uses a culture win, it being "too easy" but at the same time extol the virtues of domination/conquest wins, and cite the patheticness of the AI as a reason for your warmongering. At the risk of arousing the re of the civ 3 fans, the major thing I hated about that game was that there was a "correct" strategy of spamming settlers, building nothing but troops, settlers, workers, and maybe a library and a market. Civ's a brilliant game, a great game. But it's not designed to be a wargame, and quite frankly, if that's all you play for, there are better wargames out there. What makes civ so brilliant is the multitude of options available to win. I have won every single victory condition, not just conquest. (except score.) Indeed, if I have a beef with the game, it's that it rewards you for playing an "idiot savant" civ. If you go for a spaceship, you focus exclusively on tech, for conquest, military, for culture, it's religions, etc. I would like to see some sort of system where going the middle of all roads at once would be rewarded, as opposed to being a surefire way to lose like it is in Civ. Building wonders shouldn't be an idiotic blunder, but nor should it be a game-breaker.
 
Thank you, another good comment.

And to my game, i had a significant attack force. Consisting of half a dozen siege weapons to half a dozen high level (Used the empty space i didn't build cities on that were wasteland in my opinion as feeding area) war elephants. Phalanxes and a spearman. I conquered 3 major cities. One capital, one holy city and razed 1 city that was mostly used as military base for his somewhat pathetic attack force. He has me outnumbered 6 to 3 in cities. But like i say, cities build on dirt waste your time and buy your opponents more time. Always build optimal places and when they run out rush out attacking force to attack the nearest opponent.

It's not smart to overexpand. Most people see it as something that tells your upkeep is higher than your ability to keep up with the game pace. Overexpanding in my eyes means building cities that waste more turns than gain. every lost turn spent on extra worker is a few war elephants off your attacking force. And yes, it's enough on higher levels. It didn't happen in a few turns. About 7 turns to walking and sieging every city. But its a few turns compared to the 15 turns i need to build a settler from a sad city. To understand my point, i had about 1/3th of my island unpopulated behind mainly by my cultural borders. It was wasteland which Washington tried to populate :) He did most harm to himself by that than good. Bringing his forces out for me in weak cities.
Making any sense? Im not doing this to make mockery.
 
I might post again later to address other points in the rant, but I think the reason people pursue cultural victories is because it's fun and even challenging, not because they're cowards or because it's perceived as being easy.

As you noted yourself, humiliating the AI in a war is sometimes too easy, as long as you're prepared militarily. Part of going for a cultural victory is emphasizing culture over military (and sometimes research), which can leave you open to attack. You can have an army ready to fight them, but the threat of a serious threat coming at you is invariably much higher when you're going for a cultural victory. Afterall, when you're going for world domination, you pretty much constantly have a huge army at your disposal, each rival you conquer is one less threat against you, and if you lose some border cities it probably won't cost you the game. You'll have less cities and a smaller army when going for a culture win, so losing even a single city may cost you the game.
 
Moderator Action: Whilst we appreciate all viewpoints (including rants), we do require that discussions be progressed in a civil manner. This includes NOT insulting posters or groups of people in general.

Please ensure that this thread is conducted in a suitable manner.

oh - and watch your language, please ;)
 
I want to apologize, i tend to talk things over in a rough manner.
I respect all players, i just wished everybody would have equal chances of success in the game and it doesn't happen in CIV IV. Im just like this, stuck up. I don't play much games but civ gets into me. And im a perfectionist too, i guess. Anyway your free to say how you feel. If even one soul agrees with me thats pretty good i guess. All comments are welcome. My interest in civ has been kinda failing lately and i find all the abusive ways of gameplay making it even worse. doesn't anybody actually resist the temptation of picking the best leader. I know best is relative, but one that you feel is the best.

Does anybody enjoy playing montezuma?
UU That has potential, mixes up the gameplay and allows flexibility of strategies at best, even if it is a bit weak.
UB definitely the best in the game, mixed with with spiritual and aggressive, forming the best combination of the game for play that doesn't base on any particular unit. I found myself switching civics everytime i was allowed.

How about a waring gandhi, thats a sight. Fast workers give early edge for a player who understands how to deal things.

Or alexander, who has almost everything at his disposal from cheap tech buildings to strong military, i find him too easy.

No idea, do you just always pick the same leader and keep doing the same strategy? I thought people talked about fun, thats not fun is it?
 
How about a waring gandhi, thats a sight. Fast workers give early edge for a player who understands how to deal things[....]
No idea, do you just always pick the same leader and keep doing the same strategy? I thought people talked about fun, thats not fun is it?

I have played Gandhi before just for the fast workers. Actually, I like to pick different leaders and tailor my strategy to either the map, or something new I haven't tried. Each map type (and each civ and each leader) lends itself to a different style of play. I like to play with unrestricted leaders, so often I will pick a civ OR a leader and set the other to random. I also like random AI personalities. :) Of course, individual maps vary too, so while I may set out with the aim of trying a specialist economy, I might have to do a cottage economy. And depending on, say, the random sea level on Islands, I could have to adapt to do an early rush (if it's low) when I've picked a Civ with a late-game UU, or to just sit back and build until Astronomy (if it's high).

Anyway, that's me. Some people really do enjoy playing the same leader/civ over and over. I find it's really good to teach you the basics of a new strategy, but I personally enjoy playing around with it a little. If you play Magic: the Gathering, think of me as a Timmy/Spike hybrid. If you play D&D, think of me as a powergamer who loves to put restrictions on my character's mechanical build because "her backstory says she grew up with elves, so she has to know Elven -- even if that means taking cross-class ranks in Speak Language, or taking the points out of Dex to put into Int for the bonus language."
 
For non-domination/conquest victories, they're fun - especially planning for them from early-on.

I like playing games like the RPCs - which places even more artificial restrictions on what I do. It makes the game more interesting and allows you to do more than continually use the same time-tested conquest/domination strategies.

Oh, and as far as poo-pooing 'strategy' and instead stating it's about 'knowing the game' - I think you are defining 'strategy' as 'gambit'. Gambits are gambits - they can be fun, they can be effective, they can be silly but useful - but they aren't strategies. Poo-pooing gambits as things that don't help you learn the game I would agree with if you add the caveat that learning them doesn't hurt you (and may teach you a bit about game mechanics), but becoming dependent on them does.

Your comment:
A clever player doesn't go through his/hers game thinking about "The pyramids, i cannot play without them". Good player thinks, Where are the pyramids? Could I possibly conquer them and double my landmass. A good player is greedy in his/hers actions.
...shows me that we probably agree, and that this is a disagreement about terminology - but in this case, my terminology is right, and yours isn't. Without strategy, this game cannot be won on Warlord.

It cannot compete against your save-reloads and perfect starting spot.
What if I never save/load or regenerate maps?

What i didn't have : Few barely able-to-upkeep-themselves cities with pyramids and weak force to call upon the AI to launch its mass invasion from all border areas. To cripple you, not conquer. You have to take the fight to him/her.
I'm curious where you got the impression that "what I didn't have" is what other people normally have? Do you think taking the fight to the AI is a new concept for we unenlightened fools?

Chariot rushes, egyptian chariot rushes, praetorian rushes. And top of all quechua rush. I'd laugh my ass off if you were forced to win just one game when all your luxuries and choosings would be taken away.
So.... I shouldn't use distinct leader/civilization advantages because doing so somehow makes me less of a player? What? Does that even make sense? Let me re-phrase what you said so you can see how silly it is: "If you're a football coach and you have an awesome quarterback, and you use him to win, then you actually suck even though you won because you used your awesome quarterback as a crutch. Loser."

People do not understand the value of half-priced universities or promoted units but only look at the simple side of the game.
If by "people" you mean "people who don't play the game", I would agree with you. I'm pretty sure most of the people on this forum understand how valuable half-priced buildings are.

It's not sad to rush with swords and catapults.
I would call that an "attack" as opposed to a "rush", but where did you get the idea that people give the stink-eye to waiting until swords/cats, especially in BtS? A super-early rush is only sometimes worth doing, and if it's worth doing, you're probably playing sub-optimally to not do it.

There are dozens of threads about cultural victories and and stuff like that. are you guys cowards or something
or something. I'm not sure if video-game cowardice actually qualifies as an insult, even if it does apply, which I'm pretty sure it doesn't. News flash: some people enjoy the game differently than you do.

But admit it. As an average player you probably did it by copying somebody here.
You spit on people for "copying", then say you learned the game from Aelf. A rant is one thing, but self-contradictory statements mostly just leave me with a general feeling of 'der?' I bet you build worker-first a lot - you gambit using, strategy abusing, copy-cat sillynanny! I amazed you were able to finish your post without breaking out into wracking sobs of pure, pathetic shame.

Im ranting, for your good. To make you a better player.
It sounds to me like you're ranting because you want to point out how great you are and what foolish simpletons the unwashed masses are. All of your good points (and there are a few) have been made a hundred times on these forums. I'm a decent player, not a great one, and your rant added nothing of value to my playing ability.

If you were doing it for our collective good (as opposed to just stroking your own ego), you would have enlightened us with information many of us don't already know. You didn't do that. If you were trying to do that, you failed.

I don't care, i barely play CIV anymore.
If you actually didn't care, you wouldn't have posted.

I'm fine with people stroking their own ego (we all need a good stroke from time to time), and I'm not even remotely offended by your writing style (though I see how others could, and therefore agree with your warning at the top of your post) - but if your intent was to educate, enlighten, or improve the average CFCer, you failed miserably.

If, on the other hand, your intent was to troll a bit to get a rise out of people, you'll most likely end up with reasonable success. The strange thing is, I'm pretty sure you don't think you're trolling. Heh.
 
Thanks Morgrad, you said a lot of what I was thinking but could find a way to say it without getting banned from the forum. I have a hard time taking anyone serious when the first thing out of thier mouth is calling me stupid and incapable of learning (oh, but don't be offended) besause I don't play the game the same way they do. I may not make a lot of posts here but I at least try not to insult people.

Oh ya, welcome to the forum
 
Thanks Morgrad, you said a lot of what I was thinking but could find a way to say it without getting banned from the forum.

Some patronizing advice from me: don't ever take anything on the internet seriously enough to have more than a two-second anger reaction to it. But, you're welcome. :)

I have a hard time taking anyone serious when the first thing out of thier mouth is calling me stupid and incapable of learning (oh, but don't be offended) besause I don't play the game the same way they do.

He did the civfanatics forum equivalent of standing in the middle of a busy intersection wearing nothing but stained underwear and an open pink bathrobe yelling "I'M THE GREATEST GUY HERE! YOU MORONS SUCK! ALL OF YOU SUCK! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

I don't think it's hard to take him seriously, I think it's impossible.

I may not make a lot of posts here but I at least try not to insult people.

I don't mind being insulted (I operate under the general assumption that I'm a buffoon. My wife agrees). I just can't hang out with Quixote without pointing out that the knights are actually windmills.
 
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