Sid Meyer's Civilization

[Qwertystop]

I'd be up for it - BNW please.

[Seatbelt]

I don't understand how hot seat is fun? I'm envisioning like a turn a day? I thought finishing live multiplayer games was challenging..

[zabbarot]

yeah, it is ridiculously slow. but the other way to play multiplayer is find a group of people and put it on your calendar to clear that day for Civ. Games just take too long.

[Seatbelt]

yeah, it is ridiculously slow. but the other way to play multiplayer is find a group of people and put it on your calendar to clear that day for Civ. Games just take too long.

Thats usually how me and my friends do it. I only ever play with actual IRL friends, and it usually takes us 4 nights of 3-4 hour stretches to finish a game.

[psilontech]

Bought Civ V & Gods 'n Kings during the Steam Summer Sale.

HUGE amount of time put into Civ II & Alpha Centauri. Tried Civ III and didn't care for it, skipped Civ IV.

Having a few issues I'm hoping you guys can help me out with.

Starting up the game takes an unusual amount of time, as much as a full minute. I could load Planetside 2, Metro 2033, and Deus Ex: HR back-to-back and they would be finished before Civ. Most common 'fix' for this I've seen is to defrag, no dice. Between this is horrendously long time between turns is kind of irksome. I completely blow the rec. specs out of the water. Any advice?

SPIES. What in the world. I'm on my first serious match and the other civs are starting to hit medieval era and I'm being drowned in messages telling me I'm leaking technology to the competition like a sieve from my capital. My only spy is sitting there (in the capitol) being useless and I've told all the other civs to stop but to no avail. I teched towards the first 'anti-spy' building as soon as it started but it doesn't seem to have done much good. Suggestions on how to get it down to a reasonable level?
It's irritating when suddenly England goes from Composite Bowmen to musketeers because of the inadequacy of my sole intelligence operative is so severe I suspect him of being a quadruple agent.

[factotum]

I think the spy thing tends to happen if you're the most technologically advanced of the in-game civs, so just cut back your research and that won't happen anymore! (It takes quite a while for a spy to steal a tech anyway, so it doesn't grant the AI *that* much of a benefit).

As for horrendously long load times and turn times, they're still present and correct in Brave New World--guess optimisation is not something they thought was worth adding in the expansion! I think the main problem is actually city-states, though--their turn seems to take as long for the computer to process as all the other in-game civs put together, which is probably not too surprising given that city-states are essentially single-city civs. (If your start position is just right you can even see the settler that will go on to found the city-state just standing there at the start of the first turn).

[Todasmile]

(If your start position is just right you can even see the settler that will go on to found the city-state just standing there at the start of the first turn).

I wonder if you can capture that Settler before the state's even founded.

That'd be hilarious.

[factotum]

I wonder if you can capture that Settler before the state's even founded.

That'd be hilarious.

I suspect the game makes well sure that you're not close enough for that to happen--on the occasion when I noticed this the settlers were only just visible at the edge of the Fog of War even after I'd moved my starting Warrior 2 hexes.

[Studoku]

I suspect the game makes well sure that you're not close enough for that to happen--on the occasion when I noticed this the settlers were only just visible at the edge of the Fog of War even after I'd moved my starting Warrior 2 hexes.

It can happen if you use the advanced options to put an inappropriately large number of city states on a small map.

[OrcusMcP]

I wonder if you can capture that Settler before the state's even founded.

That'd be hilarious.

You can do it, but it counts as declaring war and annexing the city-state as far as diplomacy is concerned.

I've only really noticed it when you play on the "Earth" map, as the engine tends to crowd the city spawning locations really close together, especially in southern Asia.

[Mx.Silver]

I've only really noticed it when you play on the "Earth" map, as the engine tends to crowd the city spawning locations really close together, especially in southern Asia.

This is one of the reasons I stopped playing on 'Earth' maps. The others being natural wonder placements and the fact that the civ spawning points can be really, really bad.

[Vitruviansquid]

Ah. Finally got my first victory on King.

Played as Darius, starting on the same continent as Japan and Brazil, I was first worried that Japan would simply warmonger against me. Fortunately, that actually never materialized as Brazil sprinted to a lead on our continent, having at one point double the score as Japan or I had. Then, I got a Golden Age and put an end to that by tearing into Rio de Janeiro with swordsmen, spearmen, and ridiculously awesome movement 3 catapults. Now I'm the one doubling Japan's points, which must have cowed Nobunaga, because he didn't go to war with me once during the game. When Astronomy rolled around, I discovered Egypt on its own continent and Indonesia and the Huns sharing a continent. Egypt was a technological backwater, but Indonesia had the same score as I did when I found them. So I spent the rest of the game paying Attila to attack Indonesia while fighting them for control of the World Congress (actually, they had so many votes all the time, I was really struggling to keep them from having half the votes most of the time). Eventually, I got a large enough tech lead and just steamrolled into Indonesia, knocking out my only competitor. Finished the science victory a handful of turns later.

Hail to the King.

[Closet_Skeleton]

You're thinking of Pacal, the Mayan leader. Pachacuti is head of the Inca. Not to say the AI takes advantage of Pacal either, mind you.

The Inca are also really good with lots of cities, since they get free roads which means more money from having connected cities and Machu Pichu also boosts roads (not that you really have any bonus for building wonders your civ built in real life). When I won as Inca back in Gods and Kings I had so much happiness despite having too many cities.

[TubaMortim]

Ah. Finally got my first victory on King.

(Snip)

Hail to the King.

Congrats, next up is Emperor
I usually have trouble on that difficulty (falling behind in tech mostly) so better prepare for some lost games. I've tried Immortal after winning a game with Emp, but that's just masochism.
All the AI villagers are working on steroids - by the time you build a granary they've erected a standing army, the Classical era buildings, the Pyramids and a proverbial statue declaring that you just won't win with numbers. Or any other way either.

[factotum]

I'm coming to the opinion that naval units are OP. A battleship has 60 ranged attack and can safely blast a city from outside the city's own retaliation radius--I was able to capture Spain's capital (which was only a strength 47 city, admittedly) in a single turn using four battleships to knock its HP down and an Ironclad to actually take the city. Plus those naval units have move 7, so I could move them in from way outside Spain's borders in next to no time!

I know Artillery gives you the range advantage too, but they're slower and less powerful than the battleship...

[Closet_Skeleton]

Getting high tech units before the enemy can defend against them is over-powered, battleships are great but Great War Bombers are just as bad and completely wrecked me in my first Brave New World game.

A few Submarines easily render Battleships worthless. Its the AI's fault for letting your Battleships have free reign, not the Battleship's inherent power which is part of a tech race game not a 'units should be balanced' game.

[zabbarot]

Battle ships are also completely useless if the civ you're fighting has no coastal cities

I'm playing a game as the Shoshone right now on Pangaea. It started me dead center in a wide valley between two mountain ranges. There was an ocean just north of me but it turned out to be an inland sea, so no naval units for me.

[TubaMortim]

Battle ships are also completely useless if the civ you're fighting has no coastal cities

I'm playing a game as the Shoshone right now on Pangaea. It started me dead center in a wide valley between two mountain ranges. There was an ocean just north of me but it turned out to be an inland sea, so no naval units for me.

Unless you want to use them to defend your city/cities around the pond as ranged units the enemy melee can't engage

[zabbarot]

The inland sea to my north is literally 5 tiles top to bottom and about 10 across at it's widest left to right. I did use it to connect a trade route after conquering the Iroquois north of it though >.>

Where I saved I'm about 4 turns from military science and zerging the map with Comanche Riders. My defense is all offense this game

[Luzahn]

I'm curious, how many people stick to Prince (4) difficulty? I can beat 5 with little effort, but I just prefer the mode where the AI doesn't get blatant advantages. I've lost the Great Library to their tech boost far too many times.

Plus, I like to roleplay it a bit.

The inland sea to my north is literally 5 tiles top to bottom and about 10 across at it's widest left to right. I did use it to connect a trade route after conquering the Iroquois north of it though >.>

Where I saved I'm about 4 turns from military science and zerging the map with Comanche Riders. My defense is all offense this game

Just remember that you can send ships through city tiles. One of my favorite tactics is to link up a lake with the ocean and have a safe place to store my fleet. Or bombard enemy melee at range, of course.

The best bit is when you can link up multiple lakes to the ocean with a series of canal cities. I had a "coastal" city in the middle of a continent that way before.

[zabbarot]

I mostly stick to King unless I'm trying a civ I've never played and can't figure out what to do with them... Then I play prince. I mostly like to rp with it a bit too. Probably my favorite thing is when things, for no real apparent reason, work out in historically accurate ways. Like when I'm on the other side of the map and by the time I find Honolulu it's part of America.

I think once I finish this game as the shoshone I'll try to see if I can manage a conquest victory as Venice.

Just remember that you can send ships through city tiles. One of my favorite tactics is to link up a lake with the ocean and have a safe place to store my fleet. Or bombard enemy melee at range, of course.

The best bit is when you can link up multiple lakes to the ocean with a series of canal cities. I had a "coastal" city in the middle of a continent that way before.

No lakes between it and the ocean unfortunately. And since I'm on a Huge map the minimum distance between cities is 4 tiles. That is impressive though. It seems like it'd take a bit of luck on the world gen though. Maybe I could weigh the odds in my favor if I tried that as Monty, since I think he prefers to spawn near lakes.

[Driderman]

Bought Civ V & Gods 'n Kings during the Steam Summer Sale.

HUGE amount of time put into Civ II & Alpha Centauri. Tried Civ III and didn't care for it, skipped Civ IV.

Having a few issues I'm hoping you guys can help me out with.

Starting up the game takes an unusual amount of time, as much as a full minute. I could load Planetside 2, Metro 2033, and Deus Ex: HR back-to-back and they would be finished before Civ. Most common 'fix' for this I've seen is to defrag, no dice. Between this is horrendously long time between turns is kind of irksome. I completely blow the rec. specs out of the water. Any advice?

SPIES. What in the world. I'm on my first serious match and the other civs are starting to hit medieval era and I'm being drowned in messages telling me I'm leaking technology to the competition like a sieve from my capital. My only spy is sitting there (in the capitol) being useless and I've told all the other civs to stop but to no avail. I teched towards the first 'anti-spy' building as soon as it started but it doesn't seem to have done much good. Suggestions on how to get it down to a reasonable level?
It's irritating when suddenly England goes from Composite Bowmen to musketeers because of the inadequacy of my sole intelligence operative is so severe I suspect him of being a quadruple agent.

Tech drift is a feature, basically. Many games, you'll experience there's a potentially large gap between someone acquiring spies and you getting anti-spy tech, and even with the early anti-spy techs you'll still be vulnerable to spies. As I see it it's meant to sort of illustrate the enlightenment of the Renaissance and later, where the spread of science and technology increased wildly. You're not an island any more, and tech is difficult to keep hidden. Also, everyone gets a spy as soon as the first Civilization hits Renaissance, if I remember correctly.

[factotum]

Of course, if you make a habit of declaring war and crushing the AI like an eggshell every time they steal a tech from you, they soon learn to stop it.

[zabbarot]

Of course, if you make a habit of declaring war and crushing the AI like an eggshell every time they steal a tech from you, they soon learn to stop it.

Surprisingly, enough it seems like they'll stop it if you're good friends also. I don't think I've had any recurring spying from civs that I have forgiven and been friends with in BNW. I feel like BNW did a large overhaul on AI diplomacy.

[Driderman]

By the way, if people are interested in long-term multiplayer there's an app developed for Civ 5 called Giant Multiplayer Robot which allows for a sort of play-by-mail like multiplayer mode, and also supports mods for multiplayer, which seems like it could be pretty awesome.
http://multiplayerrobot.com/

[turbo164]

Won my first King the other day. Highlights:

*Morocco happily trades their Marble for my Spices, but claims that their Salt for my Sugar + Horses + Iron is "not even close to a fair deal" and "there's no way to make this work" without even asking for GPT or anything. They must love their French Fries over there...

*Morocco again (closest neighbor) randomly declares war. After maybe 10 turns of them zerging Pikemen through a mountain chokepoint into my meatgrinder of cities and camel archers...they offer peace in exchange for one of MY cities. Maybe 20 turns after that, they offer one of THEIR cities for peace. I actually replaced their city offer with their precious Salt, and they were finally happy to trade. Yay!

*During the war, Morocco proposed an Embargo on me, but peace was declared before the vote (and they really liked my peace offer). Both of us voted Nay on the embargo. They then complained that I "helped shut down their proposal." SO DID YOU!!!

*With 70 happiness, my Freedom ideology was still "dissidant" at -11. I guess that was from an enemy Diplomat or something? Not sure what they could complain about when I have every luxury on the map (including Salt!) and a ton of buildings/policies.

Also, some things I learned from watching a Lets Play:

*When your city produces each turn, it determines Food, then Population Increase, then Production and others. So if your city is one turn from Pop increase, manually asign your citizens and leave one Production hex empty, setting the city to "production focus." That way you'll get the food from the manually assigned Farms, then the new person, and the Production FROM that new person! If the new person is auto-assigned to a Farm/Banana/etc, you waste his turn since the Food phase happened before he existed.

*Settlers stop food growth as said in the tooltip, BUT a small portion of food is converted into Production for that settler.

*Great Admirals can cross oceans without any Tech; if you're desparate for a way to scout other continents early in the game, there ya go.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Plus, I like to roleplay it a bit.

I like that strange kind of Roleplay that's also horrible min-maxing. Like 'I'm going to make a science obsessed culture that only builds schools and no other buildings' and then I win because my science is so over-powered.

[Closet_Skeleton]

:

*With 70 happiness, my Freedom ideology was still "dissidant" at -11. I guess that was from an enemy Diplomat or something? Not sure what they could complain about when I have every luxury on the map (including Salt!) and a ton of buildings/policies.

'Dissident' has nothing to do with your happiness, its due to the tourism output of ideological enemies. Having 70 happiness just means that -11 happiness from your citizens not wanting to be free is unimportant. If you raised your culture and tourism you'd stop being dissident and have 81 happiness. You can pile on all the luxuries and sports stadiums you want and you'll still have dissidents if the Communists have all the good tourism wonders and great works.

[zabbarot]

By the way, if people are interested in long-term multiplayer there's an app developed for Civ 5 called Giant Multiplayer Robot which allows for a sort of play-by-mail like multiplayer mode, and also supports mods for multiplayer, which seems like it could be pretty awesome.
http://multiplayerrobot.com/

I brought that up at the bottom of the previous page, so it kind of got buried :P
The only person who expressed interest though was qwertystop. >.> I'd want at least 4 players if I was gonna bother with that.

I tested it with a modded game with just one friend of mine, and with just two players the turn around between turns is so fast you spend more time loading to play than anything else. With a few players there could be longer between turns so that long load isn't as bad @_@ it's just obnoxious when it's every 3 minutes.

[Driderman]

I brought that up at the bottom of the previous page, so it kind of got buried :P
The only person who expressed interest though was qwertystop. >.> I'd want at least 4 players if I was gonna bother with that.

I tested it with a modded game with just one friend of mine, and with just two players the turn around between turns is so fast you spend more time loading to play than anything else. With a few players there could be longer between turns so that long load isn't as bad @_@ it's just obnoxious when it's every 3 minutes.

I didn't notice that GMR had been mentioned. In any case, if you're actually available to play at the same time you're probably better off using the built-in multiplayer function (although it doesn't support mods), GMR is more like one of those boardgames where you play for a real-life year, only meeting once a week, which is great if you're living in clashing timezones and don't have time for extended gaming sessions.
At any rate, I could certainly be interested in playing,with either method, look me up on Steam where I go by Sartain if you want to.