what is your highest difficulty level in g&k

[jimbbq]

I picked Settler just to see if anyone else picked it, and I guess not hehe

i wonder if it is possible to lose at settler level

 

[jimbbq]

Just to counter the impression that this forum gives - that everyone is playing on deity and that playing on any lower level makes you somehow less of a man - here's some stats from steam:

Won a game on:

Settler 18.8%
Chieftain 27.9%
Warlord 17.0%
Prince 15.5%
King 6.4%
Emperor 3.4%
Immortal 1.8%
Deity 1.3%

a bit surprised chieftain is the most played level. I am not a very good civ player, i started my first game at chieftain and i thought it was very easy!

 

[ggmoyang]

i wonder if it is possible to lose at settler level

When I was a kid, I played civ2 several time. had hard time on settler, didn't had so much idea about how this game works.

 

[Hpuk]

That statistic doesn't mean that 27,9% play at chieftain, it just means 27,9% of the people that own Civ 5 have gotten the achievement for beating the game at chieftain level.
I'm sure a large amount of people never even tried the lower difficulties, never getting the achievements for them.

 

[Slvynn]

MP games usually played on Chieftain or Prince.... So i bet those games are from GMR/MP....

 

[Becephalus]

That statistic doesn't mean that 27,9% play at chieftain, it just means 27,9% of the people that own Civ 5 have gotten the achievement for beating the game at chieftain level.
I'm sure a large amount of people never even tried the lower difficulties, never getting the achievements for them.

Yeah I think I tried my first game on Prince just because so much was different, and it was like Babytown Frolicks. I think I won by about million points. So I am pretty sure I have only beat all the levels from prince up.

 

[The_J]

When I was a kid, I played civ2 several time. had hard time on settler, didn't had so much idea about how this game works.

Not only you .
I didn't understand half of the concepts, I always played on Settler and was pretty lousy at it. Okay, I always won, but I also restarted when I was not alone on my island (and sure without barbs).

 

[Polycrates]

Not only you .
I didn't understand half of the concepts, I always played on Settler and was pretty lousy at it. Okay, I always won, but I also restarted when I was not alone on my island (and sure without barbs).

Yeah add me to that list too! I used to play Civ I on Settler or Chieftain as a kid. I hardly built any cities, and I always built the Colossus and then tried to delay Electricity as long as possible because my economy completely tanked as soon as it went obsolete and I didn't know how to compensate.....
Also it was ages before I realised that you could click on the city to go to the city screen, so I almost never built military units because they just kept building on an infinite loop and I didn't know how to change it...

 

[omnishakira]

I'm sure that's true, but with that comes this forum's sneering condescension towards anyone who has the temerity to ever play at anything lower than Emperor, as if they're the thickest most incompetent idiots to ever use a computer and their opinion is worthless

I dunno I think ppl on this forum are very respectful in general.

In some way, if you cant beat prince, your opinion strategy-wise and balance-wise are pretty much worthless. Just like in starcraft II, any strategic/balance opinion from ppl under master league are pretty much worthless. It's not meant to be mean it's just common sense

However if a less experienced player think something is boring, annoying, not user-friendly, etc, his opinion worth something

 

[existence0669]

i beat immortal once, earth map, standard.

 

[GhostSalsa]

I'm pretty sure the reason I was doing so well before was because the AI was not expanding properly.

The problem with automatic patching is I don't know if they did something to fix it. I have a feeling they put in a quickfix to the problem of AI's not expanding.

Now my question is: Why can't I expand as fast as them on Prince level without running into happiness or money problems?

On Prince level it is still (and always has been, at least since I started back in February) possible for one of the AI Civs to runaway and become just as unbeatable as your enemies are on Emperor. You didn't suddenly become worse. It really is just the small things adding up. Seed seven algorithm machines on a map and for one of them, everything will just click.

As for why the AI can expand at full throttle without happiness penalty even on Prince, that also is very terrain dependent: having a variety of lux tiles in low-friction expansion paths, meeting other Civs in time to flip surplus luxes (and, the AI never has any trouble getting even trades because even on Prince it doesn't have the same diplo penalties as you).

One of the reasons I stay on the level that's hard for me is because it's always possible to lose on Prince or King when things really click for the AI: Only, you feel worse when it happens.

-----
For the original question:

G&K has indeed made the computer a little less killable, a little slower to feed itself into a meatgrinder, so I have changed my build order a lot to maintain a much larger army proportional to my economy than I used to in Vanilla.

That said, G&K has also made some things easier for the human player too:

-The AI doesn't seem keep armies around its capitals. I took Onondaga when it was 84 strength with just some Canons, Gatling guns and musketmen, it was pretty surprising (since in Vanilla I found canons useless after cities passed 60 strength). (I also feel cities are weaker to melee units in G&K, or maybe the extra hit points just makes it less costly to attack; whereas siege and range units are a lot weaker to other range attacks, and 24-strength cities with a garrisoned seige unit can kill a trebuchet in one turn -- but I haven't heard other people say the same things.)

-The AI stupidly reconquers a city before annihilating your army. I exploited this after a sneak conquest that bagged Karakorum (when it was at 20 population), and Ghenghis rolled up with 15 units to my 4 that had lived through the seige. I bombarded him with the frigates I'd stolen (thanks privateers!) as he moved units around a couple turns, then kept my canon and Gatling gun pointed at the city, withdrew my Carolean one turn before he was about to recover the city: then retook the city myself the very next turn, killing a unit for free and enjoying the 25 recovered HP from my march promotion! Karakorum was in my hands and at population 1 when Ghenghis agreed to an even peace.

-No more full heal on promotion. The AI always benefitted from this more than I did (because I couldn't cycle units as fast, my units weren't on level 1 all the time). I am glad to see it changed.

-Garrisoning (and the attendant city strength boost) is automatic. This is a nice gift for players trying to make the most of a small unit count to fend of an AI horde.

 

[R17MCMLXXIX]

Won 1 science, 1 cultural (first time on king)

retried it with one city but failed by 4 turns, for a diplomatic victory to Alexander.

I've actually found Prince is incredibly easy to get through, King is about 1 steps up from Prince, but Emporer for me is about 3 steps up.

 

[Polycrates]

I dunno I think ppl on this forum are very respectful in general.

In some way, if you cant beat prince, your opinion strategy-wise and balance-wise are pretty much worthless. Just like in starcraft II, any strategic/balance opinion from ppl under master league are pretty much worthless. It's not meant to be mean it's just common sense

However if a less experienced player think something is boring, annoying, not user-friendly, etc, his opinion worth something

Yeah see this is exactly what I'm talking about. The opinion of a prince player on strategy could well be very helpful to another prince player struggling with the same aspects of the gameplay mechanics. Or to someone on warlord who wants to make that step up. Someone who maybe understands the sort of issues people on those middle levels are struggling with, because they've been struggling with it themselves, and who have maybe found a simple way of overcoming it.
Whereas the advice of a deity player who understands the fundamentals and the ebb and flow at such an intuitive level that they don't even have to think about "the simpler things" could be entirely useless for someone at that level. If I was to start playing Starcraft, I can guarantee that the advice of a mid-level player on how to beat mid-level players would be FAR more useful to me than the advice of the world champion on how to beat other world champions. And so it REALLY doesn't help when people come along and tell people that their opinion on strategy is worthless. A "strategy for difficulty level x" is just as valid as "a strategy for maptype x" or whatever, and I think it's pretty poor form to try and intimidate people from sharing these things because they can't beat deity blindfolded.

And I know this is going to be massively misconstrued, but if someone is only playing on deity, I honestly have to question their opinion on balance as well, because they're playing a version of the game that is as deliberately unbalanced as possible and as far from the gameplay experience of the average player as possible, and where there's really only a couple of "correct approaches". "Balanced" is not the same as "balanced for the top 1%", especially in a primarily player vs AI game like civ. So I see people saying "Byzantium is the worst civ" because it's so hard to found a religion on deity, whereas this is not an issue for the vast majority of the playerbase. Balancing them for deity by giving them a buff would unbalance them on any lower level where getting a religion isn't such a problem. Likewise selling luxuries for huge lump sums and making mass research agreements was super powerful on deity because of the huge AI gold surpluses, but not such an issue on prince because the AI never had so much money. Balancing entirely based on what deity players say would be a dreadful idea.

My point is that everyone is in their own little bubble of their own specific difficulty level, and that a diversity of opinions from these differing levels about what's balanced and what works gives you a much better overall sense of the gameplay as a whole. The opinion of a prince player on balance is just as valid as that of a deity player, perhaps even more so because it represents what is balanced for the skill level of a much greater proportion of the playerbase.
So this kind of elitism isn't just unwelcoming, it's also counterproductive. But hey, I don't go on any Blizzard forums or whatever, and I have no doubt this place is a font of enlightenment by comparison.

 

[Barghaest]

Immortal is the highest I've played and won without "cheating" (beat Deity for the achievement by having additional AI on my team but only one opponent).

I found Immortal extremely frustrating since the AI started with SOOOO much advantage, but I managed to win anyway because back then they were really stupid.... even without using Archipelago maps.

The highest with which I'm comfortable is probably King.

 

[jeamlands]

Yeah see this is exactly what I'm talking about. The opinion of a prince player on strategy could well be very helpful to another prince player struggling with the same aspects of the gameplay mechanics. Or to someone on warlord who wants to make that step up. Someone who maybe understands the sort of issues people on those middle levels are struggling with, because they've been struggling with it themselves, and who have maybe found a simple way of overcoming it.
Whereas the advice of a deity player who understands the fundamentals and the ebb and flow at such an intuitive level that they don't even have to think about "the simpler things" could be entirely useless for someone at that level. If I was to start playing Starcraft, I can guarantee that the advice of a mid-level player on how to beat mid-level players would be FAR more useful to me than the advice of the world champion on how to beat other world champions. And so it REALLY doesn't help when people come along and tell people that their opinion on strategy is worthless. A "strategy for difficulty level x" is just as valid as "a strategy for maptype x" or whatever, and I think it's pretty poor form to try and intimidate people from sharing these things because they can't beat deity blindfolded.

And I know this is going to be massively misconstrued, but if someone is only playing on deity, I honestly have to question their opinion on balance as well, because they're playing a version of the game that is as deliberately unbalanced as possible and as far from the gameplay experience of the average player as possible, and where there's really only a couple of "correct approaches". "Balanced" is not the same as "balanced for the top 1%", especially in a primarily player vs AI game like civ. So I see people saying "Byzantium is the worst civ" because it's so hard to found a religion on deity, whereas this is not an issue for the vast majority of the playerbase. Balancing them for deity by giving them a buff would unbalance them on any lower level where getting a religion isn't such a problem. Likewise selling luxuries for huge lump sums and making mass research agreements was super powerful on deity because of the huge AI gold surpluses, but not such an issue on prince because the AI never had so much money. Balancing entirely based on what deity players say would be a dreadful idea.

My point is that everyone is in their own little bubble of their own specific difficulty level, and that a diversity of opinions from these differing levels about what's balanced and what works gives you a much better overall sense of the gameplay as a whole. The opinion of a prince player on balance is just as valid as that of a deity player, perhaps even more so because it represents what is balanced for the skill level of a much greater proportion of the playerbase.
So this kind of elitism isn't just unwelcoming, it's also counterproductive. But hey, I don't go on any Blizzard forums or whatever, and I have no doubt this place is a font of enlightenment by comparison.

Greetings ,

I was a "king" and loved it.... BUT ...

Now , I am playing China on a giant YnAEMP G&K 180x96 "Deity" difficulty with 22 civs and 35 CS. After I played 2 full games it seemed impossible to win. The extra bonuses the AI got are making difficult to handle planning of a more then a few turns ahead, which leads confusion of what is the correct plan at ALL . Plus, because of the size of the map there is basically an AI player that I never meet and have no interaction with until the final stages of the game .... so in theory the "End game" could be vs an enemy that is almost unreachable and uncontrollable during the game.

To emphasize my point.... I have arrived at conclusion that the current scenario is unbeatable without save/load on any little detail ( my randomness is now a function of my own time and patience) and this forced me to take a good look at myself and measure, de-construct and reassemble EVERY though I had, which at this point just felt like a collection of reflexes rather than actual thoughts. It took me quite a lot of time to learn just to stare at a static screen of Civ 5 and do nothing but think on every word my mind produced to validate if its a reflex or a true thought.... the "action" would take place only when my mind fails to find another interconnection to further the analytic process.

The final result of my own mind reconstruction is that now I am at turn 145 of my game and I have no doubt in my mind that the only reason I am winning this game is not because I followed the save&load dogma but because I am a unique person with unique thoughts. My ability to see the results of an action after 300 turns while I hold hundreds of variables in my RAM brain can NOT be duplicated.

Now to the "claim" that a "diety" player can only communicate strategy to player in the same "bubble" ....

A player that would take on the exact same scenario which I am playing now,only without the knowledge of the difficulty level, would soon face the fact that none of his pre-planned thoughts works and the only way to win the game is to actually think.
A difference between "Prince" and "Deity" is that a "Prince" player will give up when the s**t hits the brains. ...while a "Diety" player would embrace the challenge even if the game cannot theoretically be won. The end result being that the "Diety" players have game concepts and morals much different than "Prince" players have.
Soooo....
If you think that calling players with advanced computation skills and highly developed game intelligence ...."elitists", is acceptable. You should also mention that "prince" players are lazy , weak minded and love the game for its pretty pictures.
Moderator Action: The 2 paragraphs above are in no way acceptable for this forum.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

In conclusion. Why would I want to talk a game strategy of my scenario with a "prince" player that thinks that the game was designed for 5 year old kids that click the "next turn" button whenever the current picture on the screen is boring them? Maybe, if I call them "worthless" all the time , one of them would actually wake up by reading my post for inspiration and decide to beat what now to him seems impossible and one day he can teach me a concept or two.

"It's not meant to be mean it's just common sense"

 

[DGDobrev]

Deity with Babylon, Netherlands and Korea. Deity is kind of an unfair level. The AI's units seem endless, and when it attacks, it tends to CoD very often - hence the great need of a decent location, and a mandatory hill settlement.

 

[stii]

Greetings ,

I was a "king" and loved it.... BUT ...

Now , I am playing China on a giant YnAEMP G&K 180x96 "Deity" difficulty with 22 civs and 35 CS. After I played 2 full games it seemed impossible to win. The extra bonuses the AI got are making difficult to handle planning of a more then a few turns ahead, which leads confusion of what is the correct plan at ALL . Plus, because of the size of the map there is basically an AI player that I never meet and have no interaction with until the final stages of the game .... so in theory the "End game" could be vs an enemy that is almost unreachable and uncontrollable during the game.

To emphasize my point.... I have arrived at conclusion that the current scenario is unbeatable without save/load on any little detail ( my randomness is now a function of my own time and patience) and this forced me to take a good look at myself and measure, de-construct and reassemble EVERY though I had, which at this point just felt like a collection of reflexes rather than actual thoughts. It took me quite a lot of time to learn just to stare at a static screen of Civ 5 and do nothing but think on every word my mind produced to validate if its a reflex or a true thought.... the "action" would take place only when my mind fails to find another interconnection to further the analytic process.

The final result of my own mind reconstruction is that now I am at turn 145 of my game and I have no doubt in my mind that the only reason I am winning this game is not because I followed the save&load dogma but because I am a unique person with unique thoughts. My ability to see the results of an action after 300 turns while I hold hundreds of variables in my RAM brain can NOT be duplicated.

Now to the "claim" that a "diety" player can only communicate strategy to player in the same "bubble" ....

A player that would take on the exact same scenario which I am playing now,only without the knowledge of the difficulty level, would soon face the fact that none of his pre-planned thoughts works and the only way to win the game is to actually think.
A difference between "Prince" and "Deity" is that a "Prince" player will give up when the s**t hits the brains. ...while a "Diety" player would embrace the challenge even if the game cannot theoretically be won. The end result being that the "Diety" players have game concepts and morals much different than "Prince" players have.
Soooo....
If you think that calling players with advanced computation skills and highly developed game intelligence ...."elitists", is acceptable. You should also mention that "prince" players are lazy , weak minded and love the game for its pretty pictures.

In conclusion. Why would I want to talk a game strategy of my scenario with a "prince" player that thinks that the game was designed for 5 year old kids that click the "next turn" button whenever the current picture on the screen is boring them? Maybe, if I call them "worthless" all the time , one of them would actually wake up by reading my post for inspiration and decide to beat what now to him seems impossible and one day he can teach me a concept or two.

"It's not meant to be mean it's just common sense"

This is the most elitist post I have ever seen.

You repeatedly insult these lower level players and explain how you are better than them. Using thing so vague as to be useless while admitting to reloading over and over.

I also have no clue what you mean about the AI's bonuses making it harder to think more than a few turns ahead, it seem to me that the bonuses don't prevent you from planning ahead at all just force you to plan for different things.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Time to move up to Emperor. Ended up utterly outteching and crushing the AI past Renaissance Era on King. Again.

 

[RCM88x]

I've pretty much mastered Prince, recently moved on to King. I've had pretty much a runaway victory every time I've played. Probably will attempt the move to emperor sometime soon, after I am able to win before turn 350 every time. I hear that the Emperor jump is much more difficult than the jump to King though.

 

[ahawk]

I've beaten Deity, but only a couple times.

I normally play on Emperor, King, and Prince, and have won a decent number of times on all 3. Deity is the sort of difficulty level I'll go for when I have a day off from work and no chores... I can sit and individually (manually) pick what tiles to work and not worry about how long the game takes. Deity is just too time-consuming most days. Whereas, on a work-day, I might still be able to finish a whole Emperor game without needing to save and load up again three days later when I have some more time. I hate having to finish a game days later (usually, I forget what I was doing enough to cause problems).

Beyond all that, at Deity, certain civs on certain starts are essentially doomed from turn 1:
Netherlands with no marshes or floodplains?
Inca with no mountains near-by and few hills?
Japan and no iron (okay, a bit past turn 1 there, but same idea)?

With almost any civ and start on Emperor, I usually stand at least a chance of winning, and almost always am competative much of the game. Deity, well, not so much. So although I can beat Deity on extremely rare occasion, I prefer Emperor.