Sid Meyer's Civilization

[Cikomyr]

The demo is limited to three civs(greeks, persions, and Egyptians), a small map, up to medieval tech, and cuts off at 100 turns.

Yikes

Then he misses on about 2/3rs of the game, minimum

[factotum]

Well, a full normal game is 500 turns on standard speed (it's more if you choose Epic or the other one whose name I forget), and if you get all the expansions, you have more than 40 civs to choose from (each with their own leader, 2 special units and 1 special building). Even on a Small map I think there would be more than 3 civs present, and on larger maps you get more, as I said earlier.

[Artanis]

(each with their own leader, 2 special units and 1 special building).

Minor nitpick: I think it's either 2 units or 1 unit + 1 building, depending on the civ.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Further minor nitpick, some Civs have unique improvements instead of unique buildings.

[Cikomyr]

Further minor nitpick, some Civs have unique improvements instead of unique buildings.

Furtherer minor nitpick, all civs have a special ability, some more powerful than others

[Qwertystop]

Let's just consolidate this into a consistent description:
Every civ has three things. One is an ability that applies to all units when relevant. One is a unit that replaces a standard unit. The last is either another unit (replacing a different standard unit), a building (replacing a standard building), or an improvement (standalone - for a situation that standard improvements do not cover).

To crunch that to one sentence:
Every civ has one ability and two unique things.

[Cikomyr]

Let's just consolidate this into a consistent description:
Every civ has three things. One is an ability that applies to all units when relevant. One is a unit that replaces a standard unit. The last is either another unit (replacing a different standard unit), a building (replacing a standard building), or an improvement (standalone - for a situation that standard improvements do not cover).

To crunch that to one sentence:
Every civ has one ability and two unique things.

Actually, some abilities apply to the civilization as a whole. Ex: Poland's Free Policy when changing age

[zabbarot]

Apparently we can't seem to get a good description up in a single try, so the take away here is that the game is very complicated, and you're missing out on the majority of the complexity. If you can afford it, I highly recommend grabbing it. Especially the gold version, which comes with most the DLC now I think.

[factotum]

Actually, some abilities apply to the civilization as a whole. Ex: Poland's Free Policy when changing age

Aren't the special abilities technically part of the leader rather than the civ? Of course, you can't actually pick a different leader for the civ, so it's a fairly redundant distinction...

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Yeah one civ ability that can dramatically change the way you play the game. This can range from how diplomacy, units, resources, city-states, or even the fundamental rules work. Then you get 2 uniques: at least 1 unique unit and then another unique unit, great person, building, or improvement.

For example, Greece gets 2 unique units and their ability makes it much easier to become and stay allies with city-states. Persia gets a unique unit, unique building, and get better golden ages. England gets 2 unique units and extra movement on their naval units (and G+K on also gets an extra spy).

[Studoku]

Aren't the special abilities technically part of the leader rather than the civ? Of course, you can't actually pick a different leader for the civ, so it's a fairly redundant distinction...

It's a holdover from Civ IV where some Civs had multiple leaders with different abilities. It doesn't work in Civ V though- even with modding a Civ cannot have more than one possible leader.

[AttilaTheGeek]

Does anyone else have experience with Montezuma of the Aztecs being a complete backstabbing traitor? I'm partway through the Renaissance and I have two cities, one of which is just a couple hexes from his capital. But I'm not worried, because we've got embassies, open borders, and a couple turns ago I even got a public declaration of friendship. However, he then says to me "Your weakness is my opportunity. Any trust you had in me was misplaced. Prepare to die!". Now, I'm thinking I'm screwed because I have zero military whatsoever, and he's coming at me with three pikemen, three crossbows, four trebuchets, and a great general. I figured it was hopeless, and I hadn't come this far on my first Epic game to die now, so I reloaded an autosave twenty turns back to see what I could muster up (something I'd never do), but no luck.

Perhaps his flaming altar of skulls should have tipped me off that he wasn't the friendliest guy. Still, it caught me off guard. What do I do?

[Xefas]

Some Civs have very high backstabbing propensities. If I recall correctly, Montezuma, Napoleon, Bismark, and Nobunaga are the worst offenders, with high biases towards warmongering, and towards lying about diplomatic status. Montezuma stands out as also having a strong bias towards pure offense, rather than things like defending himself, or not being batballs crazy.

I can't find my original source, but it was a very helpful thread on CivFanatics about the AI behavioral coding. It was pre-BNW, though, so potentially no longer as accurate. Amusingly, I recall reading that Rome, and not Montezuma, is the most likely to opportunistically pick on weak Civs just because they're weak, and Gandhi is the quickest to resort to nuclear weapons if you get on his bad side, should the means be available to him.

edit: My rule of thumb is, if I have someone like Montezuma or Alexander as a neighbor, I make getting to Construction a priority. You'd be surprised how effective 3-4 Composite Bows with some good terrain and clever positioning can be. I've seen them stand up to many an angry Alex's Hoplite + Companion Cavalry rush.

[AttilaTheGeek]

What I've done before is to try to be really nice to everyone so I don't need a military and I can sit back and focus on science. "Sure, we can have open borders." "Yeah, I'll totally help you in your time of need." "You spied on me? Ehh, I forgive you." Then, when everyone else is just entering the industrial era, everyone I forgave but secretly promised my long-term revenge on (like someone who spied on me) gets nuked into oblivion. It's incredibly satisfying, but strategically not too smart.

[factotum]

In every Civ game I've ever played, right back to the original, there is at least one AI civ in the game who will attack you if you don't have much of an army--this is why I always try to keep myself fairly high up in the demographics for "soldiers", because they're less likely to try it on if you have a strong military (and if they *do* try it on, you can punish them for it). Just sitting with no standing army is the fast track to defeat unless you're in a location where the AI can't easily reach you.

[Vitruviansquid]

I read somewhere that the AI in Civ games will always try to win as a higher priority than playing to your diplomatic relation with them.

This means that almost any civ will try to stomp and rob anyone who displays weakness, and it's doubly true for those civs who receive greater payoffs for fighting, such as Montezuma who gains culture for killing people, or Nobunaga whose units are more effective than other civs', or Caesar who can incorporate conquered cities into his empire easily.

... so yeah, peace through strength is the way to go.

[zabbarot]

http://civilization.wikia.com/wiki/Montezuma_(Civ5)

Look at the list of AI traits, you'll notice that "likeliness to declare war" is high and "loyalty" is fairly low. That is why Montezuma is a backstabbing psychopath.

Some civs have high loyalty stats and will hang out with you for the whole game. Like Sweden.

[Qwertystop]

http://civilization.wikia.com/wiki/Montezuma_(Civ5)

Look at the list of AI traits, you'll notice that "likeliness to declare war" is high and "loyalty" is fairly low. That is why Montezuma is a backstabbing psychopath.

Some civs have high loyalty stats and will hang out with you for the whole game. Like Sweden.

Actually, what we see is "This page needs content. You can help by adding a sentence or a photo!"

You forgot a close-paren.

[zabbarot]

For some reason the Insert Link button likes to kick the last parenthesis outside of the URL tags it was there, just not part of the link because reasons.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Isabella is likely to backstab as well. I've had her backstab me and then later try to be my friend again later. I knew it was a ruse so I just wiped her out.

[Silverraptor]

So, when the steam sale was available and the whole thing (Except Brave New World, which I didn't get) was on sale for $12.50, I thought about my dad, and how he loved to play Test of Time until the disk broke. So I bought it for him and plan to set up an offline version of my steam account on his computer so he can play Civ V any time he wants.

And then one of my friends also got the Civ V steam sale and got me to start playing. I love Germany, at first for the historical value. And then their pikeman's being so cheap, on my god! I've been declared war on in several different playthroughs by complete backstabbery and unpreparedness. But having a decent unit each of your cities can make in 2-4 turns as well as only costing 5 gold to upgrade your spearmen into them? Yes please. I would literally zerg them enough until my higher production cities could produce ranged and siege units, by which case they would be worn down enough that I can counterattack, reclaim the cities I lost, and take a couple of his before taking really good deals, and I mean "Really" good deals. I once had Siam give me all their gold, all their gold income, and all their strategic and luxury resources for peace on a war *THEY* started. But due to the fact that since I was playing Germany and had the mandatory war on 2 fronts (Got declared war in my North-Eastern Border while this was going on with Siam in the South West), I accepted to get my troops up there rather than kill them right there and then.

My favorite moment however was when I spawn on a rather large peninsula. This thing had almost EVERY resource, including the great barrier reef. It also spawned me right next to... Attila the Hun. I was wary, but he was friendly, and he even asked me for a little gold so he could make troops as barbarians were pillaging his land (I set it to crazy barbarian spawn modes). So I just build a few cities, grabbing the different resources, and then he declares war on me with a huge force of warriors, spearmen, and archers and took one of my cities. My response, be ancient era Germany at them, and by that I mean, take advantage of all the many barbarian encampments that were spawning and seize the troops. I literally had so many barbarian troops that my gold income was in the negatives, but I had taken so many encampments, I had 1000+ gold in the bank. So I did my usual German strategy of zerg them while I had my cities produce ranged units/catapults. I launched a massive counter-attack, got my city back, and then proceeded to take his capital as the only city he had.

My friend and I have a alliance idea we want to try. I'd be Germany, he'd be Japan. I grab a lot of barbarian early on, and then when they get injured, give them to him. We'd war up the Ancient era, then I go land and he'd rush for submarines. We'd do our own things for a bit, before making our last conquer finish with me sending panzers with his zeros for air support.

Now, how do I tell if I am considered a "Warmonger" I don't know how I can check. Also, I really don't know how to react to the city states. Anyone got some tips for city states?

[Fargazer]

According to a link on this thread on civfanatics, an updated Brave New World chart for all leaders can be found here.

I'm playing in a game as Rome on king difficulty, and am sandwiched right between Pachacuti and Japan on an island. The entire game so far has consisted of those two being "friendly," backstabbing me, sending an invasion force, being beaten back, giving me a huge tribute for a peace settlement, going right back to being "friendly," backstabbing me...

You can check if you have a warmonger penalty by going to the diplomacy screen and hovering over the attitude a leader is showing towards you. If you have the penalty, there should be a message in red saying "they consider you a warmongering menace to the world!"

City-states are problematic in that taking them by conquest can end very badly, as for all diplomatic purposes by other civilizations they are treated as a full civ. Thus, by taking them you are almost guaranteed a warmonger penalty, which is obnoxious because it seems to cause most people to hate you immediately and forever.

[Cikomyr]

I ALWAYS randomize personalities in my games. Because knowing who is a backstabbing SOB vs figuring it out the hard way is part of the fun..

I started doing that in Alpha Centauri. Just because I liked Yang, and having him backstabbing me every 20 turns got old quickly.

[Silverraptor]

Wait, Civ V has Alpha Centari? I built all the spaceships in one of my playthoroughs and that just gained me the science victory. I didn't know you could go to the alien planet in Civ V?

[Cikomyr]

Wait, Civ V has Alpha Centari? I built all the spaceships in one of my playthoroughs and that just gained me the science victory. I didn't know you could go to the alien planet in Civ V?

Nah. I just mean the old game. It gave you the option to randomize personalities and social agenda. I didn't like the idea of shuffling their social agenda (after all, they defined who they were) but I liked the idea of a treacherous Zhakarov and a Trustworthy Miriam

[Fargazer]

I ALWAYS randomize personalities in my games. Because knowing who is a backstabbing SOB vs figuring it out the hard way is part of the fun..

On one hand, I perfectly understand why you would do this. It is a bit silly that you know straight from the start that Oda is going to backstab you, and rather defeats the purpose of that sort of diplomacy from that start.

On the flipside, their default personalities are designed to fit to their strengths. An Egypt that doesn't want to build wonders is going to be pretty bad, and a Japan that doesn't declare war at all isn't going to get anything out of their UA either.

[druid91]

Some Civs have very high backstabbing propensities. If I recall correctly, Montezuma, Napoleon, Bismark, and Nobunaga are the worst offenders, with high biases towards warmongering, and towards lying about diplomatic status. Montezuma stands out as also having a strong bias towards pure offense, rather than things like defending himself, or not being batballs crazy.

I can't find my original source, but it was a very helpful thread on CivFanatics about the AI behavioral coding. It was pre-BNW, though, so potentially no longer as accurate. Amusingly, I recall reading that Rome, and not Montezuma, is the most likely to opportunistically pick on weak Civs just because they're weak, and Gandhi is the quickest to resort to nuclear weapons if you get on his bad side, should the means be available to him.

edit: My rule of thumb is, if I have someone like Montezuma or Alexander as a neighbor, I make getting to Construction a priority. You'd be surprised how effective 3-4 Composite Bows with some good terrain and clever positioning can be. I've seen them stand up to many an angry Alex's Hoplite + Companion Cavalry rush.

Oh come now, Bismark has been a total pal, much nicer than Britain, Rome, or Egypt.

Greece and Germany VS Egypt and Rome. It wasn't a hard war at all. Though, oddly enough it seemed like I was doing all the fighting.... Still more rewards for me.

[factotum]

So I bought it for him and plan to set up an offline version of my steam account on his computer so he can play Civ V any time he wants.

Why didn't you just get him to sign up for a Steam account and gift him the game?

[Silverraptor]

Why didn't you just get him to sign up for a Steam account and gift him the game?

I'll make an appropriate analogy. It would almost be the same as trying to convince my grandmother to stop using the type writer and use a computer (although, atleast she's using an electronic type writer, but still).

[Qwertystop]

Also, this way he gets to play the game.