So yeah, Appolo is pretty much a CIV V immortal difficulty.

[cazaderonus]

...or even weaker.

I wanted to start that thread yesterday when i launched the game and picked the difficulty setting.

Have you noticed the little phrase that pops when hovering the difficulties ? Well, look carefully and the descriptions are the same as in CIV V (equal, minor AI advantages etc..)

Well, for soyouz, it's the emperor description from CIV V if i remember correctly and Appolo is a mere "important advantages".

So what happened to the "Only top players will prevail" thing from Deity in Civ V ? There is still the same amount of difficulties but it's obvious they're not scaled the same way.

I kept track of the AI cities evolution and i was always on par POP wise when it was almost impossible at start in Civ V even in immortal.

So yeah, Appolo wont cut it to create a challenge. Especially with the more open environment BE offers that allows player to outplay AIs on many more gameplay levels.

Already had the feeling when watching Mad's LPs but playing it makes it even more obvious. Still got to watch out for early rush though. But 4 rangers on a border will push back any kind of early attack.

 

[Acken]

I would even say it's not even immortal.

 

[cazaderonus]

I would even say it's not even immortal.

...or even weaker.

Yeah, might very well be.

 

[Razor Rex]

I'm not surprised. CIV V vanilla is way easier than BNW.

But I'm sure ya'll knew that already!

 

[GoodSarmatian]

I only tried Vostok since the AI already had bonuses due to the description. It was quite easy, but by the time I won (promised land) there was already one civ with a mindflower and my best buddy built his exodus gate five turns after I had built mine. So, at least the AI seems to pursue victories with some competence.
I think it's easier because of the non-linear tech progression. In Civ 5 there are some early key wonders that can cement your dominance for the entire game (Stonehenge and the Great Library being the most obvious), but that you just can't get above Emperor. The tech web and wonder balance seems to prevent OP openings that become AI exclusive on high difficulties.

 

[Gamewizard]

Wait until you roll a tough starting location. Tundra and no river makes the game much harder.

 

[Karmah]

Since they reused A LOT of civ5 mechanics , we do feel quite quickly at home , so it might not be as hard as going into vanillia out of the blue. We know how to optimize science ,gold , how to fight in 1UPT...so fireaxis might have overlooked our training

Yet I have a lot fun with all the new mechanics around and I don't feel like optimizing as much as in civ5 , here the creation part of your civ is quite big

 

[Acken]

Wait until you roll a tough starting location. Tundra and no river makes the game much harder.

That's also the case for civ5. So that's not really relevant when comparing the two. You could take civ5 and roll an almost impossible start.

It's just sad that I'm able to beat Apollo on my first game ever while playing like a clown.

 

[Dasta]

I noticed the difficulty being much easier in BE as well.
I can beat Emperor on CiV, though the early game is always shaky for me.
Rolled into BE, figured I'd drop down a difficulty and go with Vostok, learn the game...
Big mistake.
217 turn win with no challenge at all.

Soooo... I'll get back to you after I crank it up to Apollo and see if I get facewrecked there.

 

[joncnunn]

My own two thoughts are I wouldn't depend upon the description given, that's probably just cut and paste from Civ V and they might even gotten off a line or two when doing so.

In addition, I would recommend also trying Apollo without the staggered start if Apollo feels too easy with it. It's very likely that snow ball effect from landing first is the main reason that standard Apollo feels easier.

 

[Acken]

In addition, I would recommend also trying Apollo without the staggered start if Apollo feels too easy with it. It's very likely that snow ball effect from landing first is the main reason that standard Apollo feels easier.

Possible but my game was so void of challenge I seriously doubt it.

Time to make a commented LP.

 

[Aeson]

My Apollo game ended in total Domination (no other factions left) on turn 222. Trade Route and Phasal Transporter cheese. But still was fun

 

[Gort]

Well, managed to win on the top difficulty first time. (I originally played on Mercury because it was listed as "Normal" but by turn 160 I had six times the score of the second-placed player and stopped enjoying it)

It felt kind of like a reversed game of Civ 5 - the AI actually got more dangerous as the game went on. ARC became a runaway and dogpiled me along with some other nations while I was settling my Earthlings for the promised land victory. They went for some cities that I'd already conquered from Koslov instead of the actual Exodus Gate, so I was never in danger of losing, but I've never lost six cities in a single turn before.

The AI is actually kind of reasonably good at warfare in this game - they can shovel a wall of move 4 hovertanks at you like nobody's business, and since there are no penalties for attacking cities with tanks your cities are pretty vulnerable.

I was playing the Kavithan Protectorate, and I took along Artists for the extra culture since they synergise well with KP's sponsor bonus. I also took along a worker - you can never have too many workers in this game. I had thirty by the end of the game, twice as many as any AI player, and half my tiles still weren't improved.

Trade routes are overpowered as hell, and the AI has no idea how to use them properly. Check out these graphs of food and production - the AI has no hope of keeping up with trade route spam:





The game's pretty enjoyable - I like how lategame wars are viable since all your units become hover-units and can just float over the sea. Purity's unique units were a bit of a let-down - I found hovertanks to be the best military units in the game due to their speed and versatility.

-----

I noticed a number of bugs in my playthrough:

1. Hovertanks can fly over oceans and canyons without slowing down, but they still have to end their move after going across a river.

2. Ships use their (terrible) melee defense to defend against ranged attacks, meaning ship-to-ship battles are all one-shot-kills. It's also funny wrecking enemy fleets with your hovertanks.

3. You can see air units stationed in cities you can't see.

 

[Jimbo30]

Trade routes are clearly gonna make the game a joke, just don't exploit them or you'll never enjoy it.

Frenzied aliens might just be getting in the way of the AI.

You're gonna have to find your own fun with this until it's patched. I'm actually losing, heavily, a Gemini game where I got a tundra start and lost my first colony pod (with ranger escort) to a beetle. I'm not exploiting trade routes either, they are ludicrous.

 

[Gort]

Trade routes are clearly gonna make the game a joke, just don't exploit them or you'll never enjoy it.

The trouble is, where's the point where you're exploiting them too much?

Frenzied aliens might just be getting in the way of the AI.

I don't play with frenzied aliens (or raging barbarians) for this reason - humans are better at dealing with them than AIs.

You're gonna have to find your own fun with this until it's patched. I'm actually losing, heavily, a Gemini game where I got a tundra start and lost my first colony pod (with ranger escort) to a beetle. I'm not exploiting trade routes either, they are ludicrous.

Shouldn't be escorting units with ranged units or you're asking for this to happen.

 

[Wizard-Bob]

...
You're gonna have to find your own fun with this until it's patched. ...

Agree 100% and that is not so bad So far, I am finding lots of FUN things to do.

 

[Lucius_]

Wait, I thought those charts didn't exist?

 

[GhostSalsa]

My Apollo game ended in total Domination (no other factions left) on turn 222. Trade Route and Phasal Transporter cheese. But still was fun

Did you have to fight for sat space over target AI territory, or was it just handed to you as in the MadDjinn KP vid? I'm curious if the AI is guarding its sat space because if not, phasal sats seem really broken.

 

[Jimbo30]

Shouldn't be escorting units with ranged units or you're asking for this to happen.

Yes I know, but the point is if you're not playing optimally then you're still going to have a hard time. I deliberately set out to play haphazardly and I'm having a hard time because of it. A lot of lower-tier players will be the same.

If you have already watched all the videos and were all set for spamming trade routes in every city then yeah, you're gonna win the game with ease even on Apollo.

Trade routes are just so stupid they need hotfixing immediately.

 

[Gort]

I wonder what yield trade routes would have to give to actually be balanced.

Let's look at the Recycler building - 76 hammers for +2 production and +1 production per Internal or Station trade route. So, best case, you're getting 5 production a turn from your Recycler. So it takes about 15 turns to pay itself back.

Trade convoys cost 60, so maybe those should give a maximum yield of 4? So a trade route would give you:

+2 Food and +2 Production if sent to a city in your empire.

+2 Energy and +2 Science if sent to a city outside of your empire.

I'd be OK with Station routes being left as they are - those should be extra-valuable.