this game is boring

[PawelS]

Maybe you're right that some people just don't like the quality of implementation of the new ideas (although I think the importance of the problems is exaggerated*), but also I've seen lots of Civ4 idealization in this forum. Perhaps compared to the problems they see in Civ5, they envision Civ4 as better than it really is.

* I'm not sure if I use correct English here, correct me if something is wrong

 

[Abegweit]

Maybe you're right that some people just don't like the quality of implementation of the new ideas (although I think the importance of the problems is exaggerated*), but also I've seen lots of Civ4 idealization in this forum. Perhaps compared to the problems they see in Civ5, they envision Civ4 as better than it really is.

* I'm not sure if I use correct English here, correct me if something is wrong

Your English is fine; it's the claim that is wrong. It is indeed the quality of the implementation which is the problem; what's more the problems are severe and I see absolutely no hope of fixing any of them. The only real hope is that mods will fix them and that Firaxis will incorporate their work into an expansion. Perhaps that was their plan all along.

I should say that I disagree with you about the slider. Removing that eliminated many interesting trade-offs between science and gold. Furthermore, it was NOT easy to get gold in Civ4 since you normally devoted everything to science. It's much easier in Civ5, partly because of the City State issue. As one example, I pretty much never upgraded units in Civ4 whereas it is normal operation in Civ5. Consequently tanks are useless in this same. Mech Inf is the way to go, and that's just wrong.

I should add that it's not just the implementation; many of the changes in Civ5 are simply without merit whatsoever. Trading posts instead of cottages. The destruction of bonus tiles and both irrigation and mining is criminal. Not to mention the replacement of roads with trading routes. Speaking of those, what happened to international trade anyway?

 

[Vordeo]

Ok, this is your most recent post on topic, let's see what we can do about it

Your English is fine; it's the claim that is wrong.

Your opinion. Not everyone's.

It is indeed the quality of the implementation which is the problem; what's more the problems are severe and I see absolutely no hope of fixing any of them. The only real hope is that mods will fix them and that Firaxis will incorporate their work into an expansion. Perhaps that was their plan all along.

A.) That's an extremely pessimistic viewpoint, and pretty unrealistic (if you're being serious about Firaxis' diabolical plan).

B.) You seriously think modders can fix integral problems and a team of professional programmers cannot?

C.) Just based off the list of changes in the next patch, I think Firaxis knows what some of the problems are, and is moving to fix them.

D.) I honestly think alot of the flaws are down to CiV being rushed, and given time the game will be up to standard. Could be wrong, and I agree with the viewpoint that the game shouldn't have been released yet.

I should say that I disagree with you about the slider. Removing that eliminated many interesting trade-offs between science and gold. Furthermore, it was NOT easy to get gold in Civ4 since you normally devoted everything to science. It's much easier in Civ5, partly because of the City State issue.

Again, slider preference is an opinion thing. I'm neutral on it, personally.

How do city states help you get gold? Am I misunderstanding that sentence?

Consequently tanks are useless in this same. Mech Inf is the way to go, and that's just wrong.

You could make the argument that every unit other than Horsemen are useless, though thankfully they're apparently patching that.

I should add that it's not just the implementation; many of the changes in Civ5 are simply without merit whatsoever. Trading posts instead of cottages.

They changed the name and took away the growth. I'm not a fan, but it's not that big a deal.

The destruction of bonus tiles and both irrigation and mining is criminal.

...what? Farms and mines can still be created. Yields are slightly lower, but that's the case for all tiles.

Not to mention the replacement of roads with trading routes. Speaking of those, what happened to international trade anyway?

Roads are still around, and aren't just for trade routes.

I do agree that international trade should certainly return.

 

[lschnarch]

B.) You seriously think modders can fix integral problems and a team of professional programmers cannot?

Didn't exactly this happen with the "better AI" approaches in Civ5?

How do city states help you get gold? Am I misunderstanding that sentence?

Now, this should be an easy one.

You pay 250 gold for 30 influence, degrading on average at -1 influence per turn.
So, you have to collect 250 per 30 turns to keep at the same level of influence.
250/30=8.33 gold per turn.
That means, 5 trading posts will grant you a net income.

Since maritime give you 2 food per city when allied, five cities with a trading post are enough to finance allied status with one maritime city.
Each city more gives you more net income.

Three maritime city states give any city, whereever located, enough food for 4 pop. That means, you have to have 15 cities with one tp to finance these relationships. Less cities, if more trading posts are maintained.

...what? Farms and mines can still be created. Yields are slightly lower, but that's the case for all tiles.

In general, farms are weaker than trading posts, as by trading posts you can substitute the farms (see above: how to make money with city states).
One can argue whether a mined hill or a tp'ed hill is better. Personally, I prefer the tp on the hill.

 

[Vordeo]

Didn't exactly this happen with the "better AI" approaches in Civ5?

Which mod specifically are you talking about?

Now, this should be an easy one.

*snip*

Three maritime city states give any city, whereever located, enough food for 4 pop. That means, you have to have 15 cities with one tp to finance these relationships. Less cities, if more trading posts are maintained.

Ah, was wondering what he meant.

I do agree that maritimes need to be nerfed, though even there if AIs competed for CS influence more I think the problem would be at least lessened.

In general, farms are weaker than trading posts, as by trading posts you can substitute the farms (see above: how to make money with city states).
One can argue whether a mined hill or a tp'ed hill is better. Personally, I prefer the tp on the hill.

Yeah, the maritimes throw everything out of whack. Again though, more AI civs competing for them would go a long way towards solving the problem, or at least they'd force people to start building farms if maritimes aren't readily available.

Not that Maritimes don't need nerfing in any case.

 

[charon2112]

Actually I don't recall one statement of any substance that you have ever made in any post. Virtually all your posts have been disagreements without any explanation why.

In both your cases, it has consistently been posts defending Civ V without any reasoning to back up your claim and these posts have almost invariably involved whining about whiners. These two example posts have been no exception to the rule.

If I see someone post an opinion that I disagree with, sometimes I post and say that I disagree. I don't have to somehow qualify or validate a differing opinion to you. Most of the complaints are people's opinions masquerading as some kind of fact. If someone says 'Civ V is boring', I might say, 'I disagree, I enjoy it very much'. I don't need to present reasoning to back up an opinion.

 

[Abegweit]

@Vordeo First off, my apologies for saying that you never make substantive posts. This one is pretty good. Now on to the points brought up.

That's an extremely pessimistic viewpoint, and pretty unrealistic (if you're being serious about Firaxis' diabolical plan).

I see no evidence whatsoever that Firaxis is fixing any of the fundamental problems in Civ 5 - including those you brought up. On the contrary, they seem to concentrating on reducing user options even more. There does seem to be an attempt to fix diplomacy. Forgive me if I am skeptical that they will actually achieve anything. The evidence of the initial program and the first patch does not inspire confidence.

As for Firaxis' diabolical plan, on seeing the results of Blake's works on the Civ 4 AI, Soren Johnson said that one of his hopes about opening up the Civ 4 code was that someone would do precisely what Blake did - and that he was pleased at the result. There is nothing wrong with this - unless you use it as a crutch.

B.) You seriously think modders can fix integral problems and a team of professional programmers cannot?

I think that there are basic core issues with Civ 5 that Jon Shaffer has zero ability to recognize them. He is far too committed to them. What's more the "team" has even less ability to override his faulty vision. I do have some hope that someone completely outside the company could come up an attractive alternative, say making 1UPT actually work, which the higher-ups at Firaxis would decide to adopt.

C.) Just based off the list of changes in the next patch, I think Firaxis knows what some of the problems are, and is moving to fix them.

I would honestly be astonished if anything came from the patch other than nerfing some exploits. Among other things, they seem to have zero recognition that, given the whole concept of this game, huge cities should be easily attainable - and powerful.

D.) I honestly think alot of the flaws are down to CiV being rushed, and given time the game will be up to standard. Could be wrong, and I agree with the viewpoint that the game shouldn't have been released yet.

We disagree completely on this. The game had bugs and such but Civ4 was far worse in that regard. My problem is with the concepts in the game, not memory leaks.

Again, slider preference is an opinion thing. I'm neutral on it, personally.

I see the replacement as being clearer inferior. Maybe another route might have worked but sliders led to interesting options. The prime problem with Civ 5 is that there aren't any.

How do city states help you get gold? Am I misunderstanding that sentence?

They give you food which means that your cities can concentrate on getting gold.

You could make the argument that every unit other than Horsemen are useless, though thankfully they're apparently patching that.

Actually the overpowered horsemen go against my point, which was that upgrades are cheap in Civ 5 and building units is expensive. Nerfing horsemen will only make this more true since horsemen don't upgrade well.

...what? Farms and mines can still be created. Yields are slightly lower, but that's the case for all tiles.

Slightly lower? Slightly? They have completely destroyed the usefulness of special tiles. Place your monuments on your sheep. The sheep are basically useless and some other tile might contain a future resource. Not to mention that they have also made farms and mines to be pointless. Trading post spam is the optimal plan now. One of the consequences is that city placement is largely irrelevant, which is just one of the many reasons why ICS works so well in this game.

Roads are still around, and aren't just for trade routes.

Wrong. Roads are pretty close to useless, except for trade routes. When units actually try to use road, they fall all over each other.

 

[Vordeo]

@Vordeo First off, my apologies for saying that you never make substantive posts. This one is pretty good. Now on to the points brought up.

Thanks. I realize that alot of the posts I've been making recently haven't gone into detail on the issues with CiV, but I do feel that those have been discussed ad nauseum, and I don't particularly want to go through those again (though it seems I always end up getting back into them anyway ).

I see no evidence whatsoever that Firaxis is fixing any of the fundamental problems in Civ 5 - including those you brought up. On the contrary, they seem to concentrating on reducing user options even more. There does seem to be an attempt to fix diplomacy. Forgive me if I am skeptical that they will actually achieve anything. The evidence of the initial program and the first patch does not inspire confidence.

Well, in the next patch they're supposedly improving diplomacy and nerfing horses, so I do think they're at least moving in the right direction.

Of course, we do need to wait til the patch is actually out before making any decisions, but right now it looks like they're at least recognizing what CiV's shortcomings are.

As for Firaxis' diabolical plan, on seeing the results of Blake's works on the Civ 4 AI, Soren Johnson said that one of his hopes about opening up the Civ 4 code was that someone would do precisely what Blake did - and that he was pleased at the result. There is nothing wrong with this - unless you use it as a crutch.

I think that there are basic core issues with Civ 5 that Jon Shaffer has zero ability to recognize them. He is far too committed to them. What's more the "team" has even less ability to override his faulty vision. I do have some hope that someone completely outside the company could come up an attractive alternative, say making 1UPT actually work, which the higher-ups at Firaxis would decide to adopt.

That's one way of looking at it, though for me it's more down to both the release being rushed (for economic reasons) and Schafer being inexperienced. I think the ideas he's had were good, but execution was very faulty, so hopefully once those get cleaned up the game will shine. I personally see potential in the engine, if nothing else.

I would honestly be astonished if anything came from the patch other than nerfing some exploits. Among other things, they seem to have zero recognition that, given the whole concept of this game, huge cities should be easily attainable - and powerful.

Again, we'll have to wait and see. I just find it encouraging that they're at least recognizing the right problems.

We disagree completely on this. The game had bugs and such but Civ4 was far worse in that regard. My problem is with the concepts in the game, not memory leaks.

Fair enough, though that's a matter of opinion.

I see the replacement as being clearer inferior. Maybe another route might have worked but sliders led to interesting options. The prime problem with Civ 5 is that there aren't any.

Actually, if you look at the slider as just representing alternate uses for gold, they have added alternatives. Gold is generally more useful in CiV because you can rush buy buildings (w/o waiting for a late game civic), bribe maritime states (for growth, culture or troops), and make research agreements (for science). You could make the argument that they've made gold too powerful (though alot of that is again down to maritimes), but at least they've given you more things to do with that gold.

Actually the overpowered horsemen go against my point, which was that upgrades are cheap in Civ 5 and building units is expensive. Nerfing horsemen will only make this more true since horsemen don't upgrade well.

Fair enough.

Actually, I get the feeling they've made units much rarer/expensive in CiV due to 1UPT, which I'm very much in favor of. Anything but the SODs.

Slightly lower? Slightly? They have completely destroyed the usefulness of special tiles. Place your monuments on your sheep. The sheep are basically useless and some other tile might contain a future resource.

I think that's mostly down to your being unable to trade anything but luxuries and strat resources, which I certainly don't agree with. Yields in general seem lower in CiV, which I guess was a design decision.

That said, who builds monuments? Burn the GA for a golden age!

Not to mention that they have also made farms and mines to be pointless. Trading post spam is the optimal plan now. One of the consequences is that city placement is largely irrelevant, which is just one of the many reasons why ICS works so well in this game.

Again, that's down to maritimes. It's IMO a case of one broken factor unbalancing the entire game.

Wrong. Roads are pretty close to useless, except for trade routes. When units actually try to use road, they fall all over each other.

*Shrug*

I've found them useful for warring, personally. Might just be me though.

 

[lschnarch]

Aside from technical bugs, everything else is just people's own opinions. You fire up Civ V and don't like it. I fire up Civ V and do like it. It's as simple as that.

It is not.
Many people fire up the game in anticipation of having a pleasurful entertainment product. Then they find countless weaknesses, surely more than they are willing to tolerate for their money spend.

And *then* they start to dislike the game.

I didn't say that there are no such things as facts. For instance, Civ V currently has a 90% rating on metacritic, so apparently someone likes it. But I'm sure you have some prepared excuse for that, right?

Fact is as well that the overall recognition of the game at fansites (meaning by people who actually are [or have been] playing the game) is much less enthusiastic.
A good 40% regard it as being weaker than the predecessor, lacking content, being less enjoyable, and what not more.
The typical fan rating seems to be somewhere around 60 - 70%, which means a third to a fourth lower than the "professional" estimations.

My personal opinion is that this is due to the fact that fans are less an object of economic pressure (advertising given to other magazines/websites) or of receiving "incentives" (first-hand information for new games, invitations to special performances, little gifts).

The fans are judging based on their personal experience with the game.

 

[charon2112]

'firing up the game in anticipation of a pleasurable experience and finding countless weaknesses', is just a wordier way of saying 'firing up the game and not liking it'...

It is not.
Many people fire up the game in anticipation of having a pleasurful entertainment product. Then they find countless weaknesses, surely more than they are willing to tolerate for their money spend.

And *then* they start to dislike the game.


Fact is as well that the overall recognition of the game at fansites (meaning by people who actually are [or have been] playing the game) is much less enthusiastic.
A good 40% regard it as being weaker than the predecessor, lacking content, being less enjoyable, and what not more.
The typical fan rating seems to be somewhere around 60 - 70%, which means a third to a fourth lower than the "professional" estimations.

My personal opinion is that this is due to the fact that fans are less an object of economic pressure (advertising given to other magazines/websites) or of receiving "incentives" (first-hand information for new games, invitations to special performances, little gifts).

The fans are judging based on their personal experience with the game.

 

[Vordeo]

It is not.
Many people fire up the game in anticipation of having a pleasurful entertainment product. Then they find countless weaknesses, surely more than they are willing to tolerate for their money spend.

And *then* they start to dislike the game.

That is opinion though, as other people have done the same thing and still enjoy the game in spite of it's flaws.

 

[obiter]

I'm a first-time Civ player (with CivV) but long-time strategy gamer, so maybe I have a good perspective for you in this debate.

CivV is definitely not "boring" but it was clearly designed to appeal to a broader range of gamers than the usual community of fanatical strategy experts (that's you guys). As a result, it definitely hits a point where there isn't much more to learn and so the learning curve flattens out in terms of new challenges or perfectibility. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but rather a matter of preference: casual gamers won't hit that point for a long time, if ever, whereas fanatical gamers will hit it quite quickly (and then find the game "boring"). Neither party is wrong to have this experience. In fact, they are both talking about exactly the same issue. But whether they like it or not is a matter of preference.

A good contrast is with the Europa Universalis series. That is a deep, complex game that is very difficult to master, but it is so difficult that most people won't even try it or enjoy it very much. The EU learning curve seems almost infinite, so there are always new challenges, new mathematical formulas to puzzle over, and always the opportunity to play the game more perfectly. By comparison, CivV is certainly easier and more superficial than EU, but in my humble opinion it is also a lot more fun. So what you trade away in terms of depth and intellectual challenge you gain in ease and amusement. Which you prefer is a matter of preference.

So which should you chose?

If you are the type of gamer who will take it upon yourself to analyze and accurately calculate the cost/benefit ratio of converting all farms to trade posts and arranging alliances with city states instead, you are NOT the casual gamer. You may argue that CivV becomes boring because there are "exploits" like this, or because there a lack of serious consequences or counter-balances for your actions. But you must also see that CivV, for better or worse, isn't created for people like you who are, I'm afraid, in the minority.

Whether or not that is a good thing is another debate. In my view, you need the dedication and enthusiasm of the fanatical base to keep a game strong and interesting. Games like Heroes of Might and Magic have gone way too far into the "mass appeal" category and so have lost their dedicated base and the fundamental mechanics that made the game interesting. It would be a shame if Civ did the same. What I think Firaxis should do is more clearly delineate between the "hardcore" version of Civ and the "light" versions, like Revolutions or their upcoming Facebook game. That said, I fully expect Firaxis to continually improve CivV. It is a whole new game with a whole new engine. From a project management perspective, it is a much better idea to get the core game done and then add to it rather than keep it in development forever.

For my part, having played many strategy games for the last 15 years and having put 90 hours into CivV (playing up to the King level of difficulty, so far), what I would say is this: the game needs a more strategic AI to make wars and the threat of (AI) force more interesting; a more robust and transparent diplomacy system to make the political relationships more interesting and dynamic, and to bring strong "causus belli" mechanics into the game; and, I think, greater consequences for going to war, i.e., not just unhappiness and the cost of units and the threat of a few pillaged tiles, but a sort of "war fatigue" to make war a riskier and more focused activity. These additions would also bring the game back towards the "hardcore" fanatical user base, which I think is a good idea.

 

[bitula]

Maybe you're right that some people just don't like the quality of implementation of the new ideas.

It's not just the quality of implementation. The new ideas are mostly bad Ideas per se. There are too much innovations compared to playable content. I'd say down with those far-fetched "Creative Innovations". I'm not against new content, but these are badly thought out ideas. Boring, Irritating and Sad (BIS). Tailored to the needs of casual players who do not want to be addicted for several years. From a marketing point of view that is okay, since the game can be bought only once. If it is just bugs and balance issues then I'm happy to wait an additional 3 years or so. But those Ideas, like City States and 1UPT may (or may not, the danger is that they may) doom this game before that happens. Although I know nothing about the development team, but would have been more fruitful to spend the time with implementation instead of thinking that much. I'm really disappointed with the quantity of ******ed ideas, too much thinking sometimes hurts... The other problem is, that the graphical engine doesn't look like a major advancement. I've expected much more regarding visuals as well. And this game is too "Thin", it's like it lacks a number zero expansion, so at least one more expansion is needed to make it a base game.

 

[lschnarch]

That is opinion though, as other people have done the same thing and still enjoy the game in spite of it's flaws.

Sure.
There are people who buy a car based on the colour, not on the technical details, too.

Fact is, there are many people who were relying on the reputation of the developing company and pre-release promises.
As we know by now, almost any of these promises has not been fulfilled, putting the advertising very close to blatantly lying.

As you said: some people are more excited about having something new and shiny than promises and expectations to be fulfilled and met.

If you are the type of gamer who will take it upon yourself to analyze and accurately calculate the cost/benefit ratio of converting all farms to trade posts and arranging alliances with city states instead, you are NOT the casual gamer.

Unfortunately, they (2K/Firaxis) announced pre-release that the game was aiming for satisfying the "hardcore gamer", too.
Since this kind of "hardcore gamer" was mainly what is described as long-time fan, they collected the money from these players, and then openly admitted that the focus had changed and the game was more designed to appeal to the mass market/casual player/play-once-and-leave-it-for-something-exciting-new.

Not only this, but as having said before, promises were given, expectations were risen and almost none of them were fulfilled or met.
Just to name few items:
Combat AI: weaker than words can express
Diplomacy (the thing all these "pretty" leaders are about: opaque, to say the least
Graphics engine (was praised to have been created from the scratch, with the assistance of Microsoft, to be tailored to the needs of the developers; furthermore was said to be scalable): very hardware demanding with very little in return
Multiplayer: AFAIK, doesn't work for non-standard release civs.

So, many things aren't working or at the very least severely flawed. And this is two months after release.

But, there are self-proclaimed "defenders" who articulate to be tired by these things being mentioned, who accuse the people who point these flaws out to be "endangering" the future of the franchise and what not more.

*I* say, these things cannot be mentioned often enough.
As long as the developers are not able, willing or funded enough to make the game meet the advertisings, we should not let them go with such a weak product.

 

[Vordeo]

Sure.
There are people who buy a car based on the colour, not on the technical details, too.

Fact is, there are many people who were relying on the reputation of the developing company and pre-release promises.
As we know by now, almost any of these promises has not been fulfilled, putting the advertising very close to blatantly lying.

As you said: some people are more excited about having something new and shiny than promises and expectations to be fulfilled and met.

*Shrug*

I agree with some of that, but that still doesn't mean your opinion is fact.

 

[sketch162000]

If you are the type of gamer who will take it upon yourself to analyze and accurately calculate the cost/benefit ratio of converting all farms to trade posts and arranging alliances with city states instead, you are NOT the casual gamer. You may argue that CivV becomes boring because there are "exploits" like this, or because there a lack of serious consequences or counter-balances for your actions. But you must also see that CivV, for better or worse, isn't created for people like you who are, I'm afraid, in the minority.

I think it's actually the opposite -- the more analytical you are, the more you like Civ V. If anything, the division in the fan base goes deeper than that.

I have NEVER taken it upon myself to calculate the cost/benefit ratio of converting all farms to trade posts, or anything of the sort. I guess I'm more a more casual player, but in general, I HATE, Civ V. From what I've seen around the board, people have been arguing that Civ V has done a considerable job of eliminating exploits and imbalances that were found in Civ IV. The devs have been talking about streamlining for the past few months, it seems like this tightening the loose game mechanics from IV was a design goal, which unfortunately also eliminated a lot of the atmosphere that drew some people into Civ IV.

 

[MSGT John Drew]

Current runs with CiV has left me underwhelmed. Where's the intrigue? Where's the politicking? Where's the carrot-on-a-stick AI mentality (for and against you)? Where's the rationality? It just seems that these AI just randomly hate each other, and you.

I miss setting #1 against #3 while I'm sitting comfortably at #2, with no one the wiser that - "It was me!"

I miss seeing the beautiful red lattice of a world war while I'm at peace with everyone when all along - "It was me!"

I miss sowing distrust and anarchy into Shaka's heart as I covertly influence a change in his religion and civics so that he won't be so chummy with his long-time ally Hannibal.

I miss making true alliances to those who I truly care for that I'd switch a civic just to get along, though I know they'd never betray me - I hope.

I miss the surprise of said allies gifting me free technologies when nothing would predicate such generous behavior. "You love me! You really love me!"

I miss relying on said allies as I annoy the living daylights out of my monster, vassal-lording, archenemy.

I miss the messed up feelings of fear, anxiety, and hatred to big bad's SOD crashing through my garden party.

I miss the glee I feel at seeing the spite in Suryavarman II's face as I wait for his most-humiliating capitulation while I'm kicking dirt in his face.

I miss... I miss...

Oh wait I still have BTS installed.

 

[Thorite]

Wow, this fact-opinion thing is really a drag.

I must say that when I started playing CIV and CIV BTS there's no way I'd waste my breath convincing some hater that it was a good game. They simply didn't *get it* and that was fine, i was too busy (and sleep deprived).

CiV supporters keep asking us why we're here? Its because we have nothing better to do since the most recent game of our beloved franchise is doo-doo. What the CiV supporters are doing here is what mystifies me.

And had I really wanted to wanted to change someone's opinion of CIV BTS, perhaps I'd describe how Shaka was next to me (oh no!) and I converted him to my religion (whew!) and sic'd him on that tech leader while I built up my military for the clean sweep!

Its so hard for a CIV lover to understand why a CiV lover loves!

And if I had really wanted to tell them I'd

 

[gilmore606]

And if I had really wanted to tell them I'd

I guess Shaka's SoD crashed into his capital in the middle of this sentence...

 

[Vordeo]

Wow, this fact-opinion thing is really a drag.

I must say that when I started playing CIV and CIV BTS there's no way I'd waste my breath convincing some hater that it was a good game. They simply didn't *get it* and that was fine, i was too busy (and sleep deprived).

No one's trying to convince anyone it's a good game or otherwise (at least I'm not), I'm just pointing out that saying CiV is boring is an opinion, not a fact.

What the CiV supporters are doing here is what mystifies me.

We are on the CiV board. Fans of CiV would logically post on the CiV board.

I guess Shaka's SoD crashed into his capital in the middle of this sentence...

Never trust Shaka.