The Final Analysis?

[Atwork]

....local happiness....is limited by the size of the city that produces it.

I understand what you're saying -- but it isn't local happiness that is limited by the city that produces a happiness building. It is global happiness that is limited. The local issue is the city's population size, which serves to limit the amount of global happiness that the city can contribute to the empire.

 

[Cull]

I don't if its just because this is CFC and CFC=CFC, but for one person's opinion's, no matter how influential that person is, to create a 16 pg monster-thread(not by cfc standards, but..) in 4 days or so, is kinda ridiculous. Sullla is an excellent writer, great gamer, and knows civ imo. But maybe don't take one person's words to the point of this?

Or maybe this is just CFC, and I'm doing nothing saying this, but how about we all view and take the game in our own way.

But that's the point of a forum, isn't it?

 

[Zechnophobe]

I understand what you're saying -- but it isn't local happiness that is limited by the city that produces a happiness building. It is global happiness that is limited. The local issue is the city's population size, which serves to limit the amount of global happiness that the city can contribute to the empire.

Yeah, but I think the point still remains. When you think about the total happiness of your empire, you have to think of it in two ways, but Unhappiness in one way. Or rather, if you are trying to compute the 'flow' of happiness, you generally think of it sorta on a city or population basis. That is:

1 Citizen = 1 Unhappiness
1 City = 2 Unhappiness

A City Can produce Happiness = Population, locally, but it always will add 2 Unhappiness to the overall pool.

Because of that truth, you have to counteract 2 unhappiness per city in some way to expand.

You are dead correct that there are no local ramifications of unhappiness, but that doesn't mean each city doesn't have some kind of its own paradigm to be considering. Especially for effective play. It is similar to how in Civ 4 a city doesn't have local maintenance either, right? It all comes out of the global coffers. But that doesn't mean that some work shouldn't be done, or that it isn't important to think about whether it can pay for itself. And that is even more global than the happiness model, because now the city itself can only contribute a certain amount.

 

[Ayt]

I don't if its just because this is CFC and CFC=CFC, but for one person's opinion's, no matter how influential that person is, to create a 16 pg monster-thread(not by cfc standards, but..) in 4 days or so, is kinda ridiculous. Sullla is an excellent writer, great gamer, and knows civ imo. But maybe don't take one person's words to the point of this?

Or maybe this is just CFC, and I'm doing nothing saying this, but how about we all view and take the game in our own way.

But that's the point of a forum, isn't it?

That is exactly what is happening. Sulla's write up simply spawned discussion amongst people with various opinions.

What makes you think anything other than this is happening? It is as if you didn't read the thread.

 

[Skallagrimson]

This is as good a thread as any for me to sound off with my opinion. I purchased Civ5 but after a few initial plays will not be playing it and will not recommend it to others.

For me it all boils down to the graphics. Throughout the teaser interviews and the lead-up to the release there was endless hype about how stunning the graphics were going to be. Stunning? This is stunning? I see green crayon scribbles a 2 year-old could paint on a screen and the hex world looks like I've passed into an alternate dimension where all land is in geometric shapes. About halfway into a game my middle-of-the-line graphics card choked and so for these "stunning" graphics to last through a game, I have to drop $1,000 into Nvidia's thieving lap? NO THANKS.

Tis the poverty of urination, shall we say.

 

[ash88]

The truth is almost always in the middle

The truth is not always in the middle. That's just something that non-thinking people say to breeze over an issue - and unfortunately it is making us thinking people lazy. The fact is that there are "hard truths" that are not in the middle.

Everything in moderation, including moderation.

 

[JohnnyW]

Honestly, this is a really broken feeling system. It is also annoyingly hard to monitor.

Booyah. I hated this change right from when I saw it. Read my hatred of this change starting with this post.

 

[qyll]

Booyah. I hated this change right from when I saw it. Read my hatred of this change starting with this post.

I came in here to post something like this. Cap to local happiness means that you can't expand your empire unless you have the right social policies, wonders, resources, or natural wonders. Even so, you'll eventually hit a cap where you just cannot expand anymore even with all the happiness you can get. This is stifling to say the least, and really takes away the spirit of "land is power". Now, it's "land is unhappiness."

 

[JohnnyW]

I came in here to post something like this. Cap to local happiness means that you can't expand your empire unless you have the right social policies, wonders, resources, or natural wonders. Even so, you'll eventually hit a cap where you just cannot expand anymore even with all the happiness you can get. This is stifling to say the least, and really takes away the spirit of "land is power". Now, it's "land is unhappiness."

Precisely. It's mind-boggling to try to contemplate what the devs were thinking with some things, including this gem.

 

[Celevin]

I came in here to post something like this. Cap to local happiness means that you can't expand your empire unless you have the right social policies, wonders, resources, or natural wonders. Even so, you'll eventually hit a cap where you just cannot expand anymore even with all the happiness you can get. This is stifling to say the least, and really takes away the spirit of "land is power". Now, it's "land is unhappiness."

I find it does absolutely nothing to me. It's a non-binding constraint. Get a Maritime or two up, settle in greener pastures, and those cities won't even feel the colosseums or theaters capping. It feels like a band-aid fix that doesn't cover the hole at all. If anything, it just harms new players.


I always thought maintenance should be countered by city growth and infrastructure. That's how it is in Civ4... In Civ5, they changed it to "pay x gold for your culture/happiness buildings, and your new city is a net benefit". I don't like that design at all. It slows the expansion of small empires to a crawl, and doesn't faze big empires very much. If cities were a detriment until they reached a certain size / infrastructure level, then I think we'd have a better game.

 

[JLoZeppeli]

I didn't dispute that, read my comment. I said that Civ 5 is not BtS v2, which from all of his writings on Civ 5 is exactly what he wanted. He canes Civ 5 for NOT being BtS v2, which is unfair. Yes, Civ 5 has it's own share of problems, but not being BtS v2 is not one of them.

I agree: the problem about Civ V is that it isn't a good game, not that it isn't a Civ IV v2....

 

[JLoZeppeli]

There's still a couple of the Franky group who bother to visit this board any more, we do in fact take the best ideas back to the devs and tell them about it (it's a part of what we do for Civ 5).

And there's no need to be insulting, easy enough to make a point without insulting him.

I hope Frankie group will go to Hollywood next time instead of testing the game

 

[Tatran]

I hope Frankie group will go to Hollywood next time instead of testing the game

That's a good one.
Btw, that band had a high level of gayness.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I find it does absolutely nothing to me. It's a non-binding constraint. Get a Maritime or two up, settle in greener pastures, and those cities won't even feel the colosseums or theaters capping. It feels like a band-aid fix that doesn't cover the hole at all. If anything, it just harms new players.


I always thought maintenance should be countered by city growth and infrastructure. That's how it is in Civ4... In Civ5, they changed it to "pay x gold for your culture/happiness buildings, and your new city is a net benefit". I don't like that design at all. It slows the expansion of small empires to a crawl, and doesn't faze big empires very much. If cities were a detriment until they reached a certain size / infrastructure level, then I think we'd have a better game.

New cities should be Detriment to the empire until the empire has developed the proper policies+technologies to allow it to include that city.

City growth/buildings shouldn't be the only thing.

The ability to maintain an X city empire should be based on social technologies/policies.

Otherwise the outlying cities should be generating rebels... more rebels the more productive/populated they are.


Also... while Panzer General may be a great Tactical game... I don't want tactics in Civ... at all This is supposed to be a TBS game, strategy.. and particularly the strategy of Presidents and Emperors not Generals.

What Civ REALLY needs to do is get secondary ways of competing... the Culture flipping from Civ 4 should have been improved and strengthened rather than eliminated (rebellions should have been the core game feature rather than 1UPT).

 

[trivilization]

Each new city should take a fairly significant amount of investment to start, more than just building a settler unit. Gameplay or balancing aside, it just seems better for the immersion factor, rather than this ICS throwaway city style we have now. So basically, a more hardercore version of Civ4 I guess

 

[Celevin]

New cities should be Detriment to the empire until the empire has developed the proper policies+technologies to allow it to include that city.

City growth/buildings shouldn't be the only thing.

The ability to maintain an X city empire should be based on social technologies/policies.

Otherwise the outlying cities should be generating rebels... more rebels the more productive/populated they are.


Also... while Panzer General may be a great Tactical game... I don't want tactics in Civ... at all This is supposed to be a TBS game, strategy.. and particularly the strategy of Presidents and Emperors not Generals.

What Civ REALLY needs to do is get secondary ways of competing... the Culture flipping from Civ 4 should have been improved and strengthened rather than eliminated (rebellions should have been the core game feature rather than 1UPT).

Yeah, I agree that cities also need tech/policy backing. Can't believe I missed that. Otherwise, if they don't, we'll see the world covered in cities before people get through the Classical era.

I don't mind tactics in my Civ games. Quite frankly, Civ4 was less war focused than Civ1, 2, and 3 even with the BTS expansion. I think something that sets Civ apart from other games is its unique balance in war and builder aspects. I like to think about where my units are and how they affect my enemy. There's nearly as many war units as buildings, so you know it's important in some way! I don't think Civ5 is all about the war, instead I think war actually needs thought put into it now just like how building needed thought put into it in Civ4.

You're also right in that culture flipping should be in Civ5. I always thought it was just a neat effect in Civ4, and that it didn't have that much affect on gameplay. But regardless, people love seeing it happen. I dislike it when people call Civ5's culture system less robust than Civ4 (a lot of people have said this), and use this feature as a reason why. But why *not* have it?

 

[tylor]

In Travian, you need Culture to build new cities. I think it's a really interesting idea. Culture is really the main thing that makes separate cities think of themselves as one nation.

 

[NukeEm]

I thought Sulla's post was an interesting read. I don't agree with him completely but I can understand his point of view. What he considered no choice or just bad design I saw a little differently. Like maintenance costs to buildings. I personally like the mechanic. It also makes sense to me. A city with more infrastructure indeed does cost more to maintain and the Empire should have to pay to maintain those things. But I think the issue is... what am I getting in return? Sure the city is big and somewhat productive... but not much else. I would like to see more production bonuses for building large cities. So that in the modern era you can churn out more units for war.

His criticism of the Iroquois (and a stab at diplomacy)made no sense to me. It seems he had trouble distinguishing the difference between the game mechanics, and the AI's interest. The land wasn't settled: true. But that doesn't mean the Iroquois would prefer a rival.. so even if they are stagnant, no rival is better than a rival. So it made sense to me when they don't want him to settle there.

This was pretty hilarious, because the Iroquois had a whole island to themselves and made no attempt to settle it themselves! (See below.) What, am I supposed to just leave that area alone indefinitely? I mean, this is an empire-building game, right? And besides, if we're friends, then shouldn't he not care about that whole thing? I don't get it.

It seems to me, that it's easier to be friends because of distance. But when a friend start settling in land next to your own, that didn't belong to anyone.. one could argue that is aggressive.. because the ideal situation for the Iroquois is no local competitors.

So, while I do agree that there are some issues. Some of his problems with the game didn't resonate with me. Things he considered not fun, were fun for me... Nice read, but I'll keep playing. I'm enjoying myself and honestly that is all that matters.

EDIT: Oh and his rant about libraries.. he says they're balanced and it's evened things out.. and then simply just doesn't like the decision. I respect he doesn't like it. But for me, it really felt like he was more interested in proving everything was broken than an honest dialogue with anyone.

 

[Falk]

Oh and his rant about libraries.. he says they're balanced and it's evened things out.. and then simply just doesn't like the decision. I respect he doesn't like it. But for me, it really felt like he was more interested in proving everything was broken than an honest dialogue with anyone.

His point was that the patch fixed the balance problem with libraries, but took away another strategic option (i.e. specialist play). Bad balancing is bad, but not having options is bad, too.

And that's a valid point indeed.

 

[NukeEm]

Well, I think specialist play is still there. Just without scientists... you have great engineers, generals, artists... but scientists are a little later in game. I can see why honestly... great scientists are powerful. Personally I like the potency of the great scientist, but I think them coming in early game can really lead to major problems... having them later game is more balanced. I understand where he's coming from, however, it seems more balanced to me. But this, I think, is more about preference than anything.