Civilization VI - Now available, so you can sink all your free time into it

[Nahel]

What makes Civ4 decline to previous episodes is the reduction of micromanagement choices across the board. In previous games, for example, if you have a Cow tile then you have the choice of whether to mine it or irrigate it for vastly different results in how it effected your game. In Civ4 if you have a Cow tile then you just have a Cow tile and you just put a road on it. If I remember correctly, of course. They completely munchkined the worker element of the game and made the whole concept of Settlers and Workers harder to attain with less use once built. My first time playing it I won every win condition first time on whatever the 'normal' difficulty is because there was nothing really nuanced about it, everything you did was kinda one-option/obvious-option. Maybe things get more nuanced on much harder settings, but in previous episodes there were vast gulfs between easy and normal and then normal and hard, and the reason for this was the sheer myriad of options and not-obvious things you could do.

Probably the dumbest post I have seen so far. If you have a cow tile you can freely build other improvements if the terrain allows it (mine in moutains, farm in plain etc). And wtf is easy and normal? CIV 4 has like 10 difficulties. I guess you played in the easiest one.

 

[Zarniwoop]

They all have those difficulties, from Chieftain to Deity or Neanderthal-god or something.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

Probably the dumbest post I have seen so far. If you have a cow tile you can freely build other improvements if the terrain allows it (mine in moutains, farm in plain etc). And wtf is easy and normal? CIV 4 has like 10 difficulties. I guess you played in the easiest one.

Right there, you just said it, mine in mountains, farm in plain, etc. Well... dur. In Civ3, for example, The option to mine or irrigate a cow on plains makes a huge difference just for a start, you also wouldn't find cows on mountains. Civ4 has cows on mountains? Now that I wont believe till I see it. From the Civ4 wiki:

Revealed by
N/A

Resource value
+1

Improvement
Pasture, available with Animal Husbandry

Pasture value
+1 +2 +1

Allows/Enables
N/A

Which suggests pasture is the only upgrade option and that option provides a bonus to both food and production (and the new health), in Civ3 you can't improve both food and production with an improvement, it's either one or the other depending on if you mine or irrigate.

Civ4 has the following difficulty conditions:

Settler, Chieftain, Warlord, Noble, Prince, Monarch, Emperor, Immortal, and Deity

And my run of VCs was on Warlord right off the bat. So it would be 'easy' for an experienced player, but, right off the bat? You're supposed to not fully get everything immediately in Civ games. For Civ3 a vast amount of even experienced players know there's a huge leap in difficulty between the 2nd and 3rd difficulty. My plan was just to learn the ropes and see what was what, but I just kept winning, by a huge margin, and I was barely thinking about anything, so by the time I'd 'learnt' what I was doing I was pretty bored senseless, it was all just 'going through the motions', least that's what it felt like. Many players of Civ3 who've never visited Civfanatics find the challenge of 2nd Difficulty of Civ3 more than enough to challenge them and the 3rd difficulty is like a brick wall. So if the 3rd difficulty of Civ4 is still a "too easy breeze n00b level LOL etc" then that tells you about the direction of the dumbing down.

 

[Snorkack]

You picked the perfect example - cows are a horribad food resource, especially on plains. In commerce cities with decent amount of food in the bfc, building a cottage instead of a pasture on a plains cow is perfectly reasonable.

There are many more resources where the default improvement often isn't the best choice. Ivory, Oil, the calendar resources,...

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

You picked the perfect example - cows are a horribad food resource, especially on plains. In commerce cities with decent amount of food in the bfc, building a cottage instead of a pasture on a plains cow is perfectly reasonable.

Ha, yeah, cottages, LOL, a mechanic that makes you 'level-up' worked tiles LOL. That's hardly altering your objectives is it, it's fairly darn hurr-durr that once you've got whatever you need from food and production then everything else can just have cottages stuffed on it.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

double post

 

[Snorkack]

You picked the perfect example - cows are a horribad food resource, especially on plains. In commerce cities with decent amount of food in the bfc, building a cottage instead of a pasture on a plains cow is perfectly reasonable.

Ha, yeah, cottages, LOL, a mechanic that makes you 'level-up' worked tiles LOL. That's hardly altering your objectives is it, it's fairly darn hurr-durr that once you've got whatever you need from food and production then everything else can just have cottages stuffed on it.

The fact that you don't like cottage spam doesn't make your initial statement any less wrong - There IS a meaningful choice when it comes to tile improvements.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

The fact that you don't like cottage spam doesn't make your initial statement any less wrong - There IS a meaningful choice when it comes to tile improvements.

What are you on about, you're 'choice' came with the proviso that "In commerce cities with decent amount of food in the bfc" you have a piddling little choice about whether to start building pure commerce instead. You can stick cottages on a huge variety of tiles, they're not restricted to just cow tiles. The fact that you can just spam cottages on everything doesn't negate the fact that the cow tile has just one inherent improvement, which boosts both food and production. What you're describing isn't "what to do with a cow tile", it's "shall I just spam Cottages everywhere". You need to acknowledge that the inherent cow tile improvements are either/or in previous Civs but +/+ in Civ4 before you can even begin to understand what I'm on about.

 

[Snorkack]

before you can even begin to understand what I'm on about.

That's honestly quite hard to understand, because you change your point with every post you submit, so let's just get back to this:

In Civ4 if you have a Cow tile then you just have a Cow tile and you just put a road on it.

By road I guess you mean pasture, and besides the fact that it's just plain false, your whole reasoning further completely neglects the fact that there are about 4 times as many tile improvements in C4 than in C3. Many of them are viable on a cow tile, as well as on other resources.

But I give you that: For someone who only plays C4 on Warlord, this overabundance of possibilities must be indeed confusing.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

Yes, in order to put pasture on it you first need to learn the relevant tech. When you have a cow tile at the start of the game you just stick a road on it, that's it. When you learn the new tech you stick pasture on it, that's it. You're not making decisions, you're going through the motions. I'm sorry if I'm dissing you're favourite episode in the franchise, but Civ4 was the title which really signalled in big neon lights the preference for dumb over micromanagement.

 

[baturinsky]

There is a lot of choice involved.
1. How should I position city to reach resource?
2. How soon should I research technology needed to use it
3. Should I improve it immediately, or there is better things to use Worker and/or city pop for?
4. Should I capture enemy city to get resource?
etc.

 

[Snorkack]

You just show lack of experience. You'te just wrong and I can think of a dozen situations where I'd prefer other improvements over a pasture. Is pasture on cow in most scenarios the best choice? Yes. Is it the only viable choice? Not at all. Do you really think this approach is 'dumbed down' compared to the binary 'mine or farm' approach of its predecessor? Well, my friend, I start to believe that it is you who have been dumbed down.

 

[ArchAngel]

With a superior army I could capture anything but it was quickest to do the Blitzkrieg to the capital, get AIs best city and then move outwards from there. That how I did it in all StackOfDoom 4x games. I would clear any armies on my way and get the best city first (only others if they are in direct way towards best city.

So you're saying the game is bad because it doesn't fully and slavishly copy the silly features of other games. You incorrectly assuming it will be identical to others is totally the game's fault, not yours. Gotcha.

No I am saying the culture in Civ IV was implemented by retards and liked by retards. Since I am not one I quit the game and enjoyed Civ 5 instead (and later EL even more).

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

There is a lot of choice involved.
1. How should I position city to reach resource?
2. How soon should I research technology needed to use it
3. Should I improve it immediately, or there is better things to use Worker and/or city pop for?
4. Should I capture enemy city to get resource?
etc.

And these are the very basic choices that you get in all civ games. You don't contradict a reduction in choices by simply listing all the other choices that the previous games always had anyway.

 

[Mr. Pink]

City flipping in civ4 was irritating and unrealistic. It should only happen if you have open borders with the other culture.

 

[GrainWetski]

No I am saying the culture in Civ IV was implemented by retards and liked by retards. Since I am not one I quit the game and enjoyed Civ 5 instead (and later EL even more).

That's cute since Civ 5 is the game that started Firaxis' path of only making games for the lowest common demoninator AKA retards.

 

[ArchAngel]

Beyond Earth was bad, that simple space 4x was worse. Maybe Civ 6 is going to be even worse but Civ 5 with expansions I consider best Civ so far. Still Endless Legend beats it in almost every way. But I play these games for combat first and if that part sucks, I don't care how complex other systems are.
I always hated SoD combat, so previous Civs have no chance. And Civ 4 with retarded culture made it even worse.
I prefer Civ 3 over Civ 4.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

But I play these games for combat first

How the hell did you lose that retarded tag?

 

[Average Manatee]

City flipping in civ4 was irritating and unrealistic. It should only happen if you have open borders with the other culture.

It was incredibly rare in the first place. IIRC there was some kind of formula that made the culture exponentially weaker the further from the city you got. Mostly just prevented you from planting a new city 3 tiles from a very cultured old city (which itself was a bit exploitative and allowed you to steal tiles). Otherwise even a culture-weak city was unlikely to flip or even lose its 1st tile ring unless it was very severely outmatched in culture. Ignoring Great Artists of course.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Exactly. It takes freaking ages to flip an established city, hundreds of years in game-time. How the fuck is that unrealistic?

 

[Zarniwoop]

Bbbbut MUH DOOMSTACK STRATUHGY!!

 

[Snorkack]

I don't know men. There are a few very simple rules to be followed that reduce the risk of city flipping to 0%.
Don't space out your cities too much. Don't fight a cultural war against a creative civ. If you conquer a city deep in enemy territory and you don't intend to conquer more territory quickly, raze the city rather than capture it.

 

[Zarniwoop]

And don't stack your entire doom inside it ffs.

 

[coldcrow]

Beyond Earth was bad, that simple space 4x was worse. Maybe Civ 6 is going to be even worse but Civ 5 with expansions I consider best Civ so far. Still Endless Legend beats it in almost every way. But I play these games for combat first and if that part sucks, I don't care how complex other systems are.
I always hated SoD combat, so previous Civs have no chance. And Civ 4 with retarded culture made it even worse.
I prefer Civ 3 over Civ 4.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

i tried dune wars revival.
it doesn't feel much different, maybe some small improvement here and there, nothing groundbreaking.
most of all, i'm having big issues with difficulty: i usually play monarch because i hate cheating ais but the computer utterly humiliates me. then i toned it down to prince and i struggled to keep myself in the middle of the ladder, the economy is just not enough, everybody have at least twice my army and produces more than i can ever destroy, it's all a gangbang on me (even without aggressive ai) and i can't survive even if i cheat with the world builder.
then i set it on noble and it's piss easy =_= after the first era i already have twice the points of the second most powerful.