I've never played CTP1... Now tell me about about CTP2 - in Civ2/SMAC Terms!

[UltraSonix]

I think they could be quite a few people like me - I've never even touched or looked at a single turn of CTP1, but have played heaps of Civ2 and SMAC. And basically, I would like to know how CTP2 compares to both SMAC and Civ2.

And before everyone starts screaming, yes, I have read all the reviews - but most of the reviewers keep comparing the game to CPT1 and not the civ games I know so well.

For example... I've heard that the diplomacy system is much better in CTP2 - but can the AI actually handle it?
Does the game have different civs like SMAC has different factions?
Does the game offer as much replayability as SMAC (which had those SE choices)?
Are the units as balanced as the Civ2 ones (as in CTP2 doesn't have "weird" units)?
What's with this slavery thing?

You know, these sort of things!

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary... (And no, koalas don't usually speak!)

[Kinjiru]

I am in the same boat, the player reviews of CTP1 scared me off so I happy played SMAC. But I broke down an bought CTP2 so here are some brief thoughts...

Variability of Civs:
- The civs are all the same in the fact that you get no inherent stenghts/weakness as you do in SMAC (for example, Yang's automatic perimeter defense).

- There are a few different 'attitudes' for teh various civs. Some are 'aggressive imperialist' and will detest you if you infringe on their territory. Others will much more easily get into treaties and such.


Diplomacy:
- It looks like the potential of the diplomacy engine is much greater in CTP2 than SMAC and certainly CIV2. However, I am not sure that the engine has been refined enough. It may just my inexperience using it though. For MP games, CTP2's diplomacy options are leaps and bounds above anything else seen (except for the game Diplomacy...)


Unit balance:
- Well, again, the potential is there for CTP2 to be very balanced. There will likely be some tweaking for various units, especially the ranged/flanking units.

- i would say better balance than Civ2, but about the same as in SMAC.

- One balance issue that I am very happy about is the Air Power does not tip the scales so massively as in SMAC and Civ2. Bombardment from above is certainly helpful in CTP2, but is not going to win you the battle.

- Armor ratings largely prvent things like archers taking out a tank.


Unit Variety:
- Once you get to the later stages, CTP2 does have some 'weird' units, but most are quite plausible given real technology see in the world today.

- Non combatant units are quite important in CTP2. Civ2 had diplomats and spys, SMAC has probe teams. CTP2 has a much greater variety available, each of which has unique powers. The slaver can artifically boost your population through the roof. The lawyer can bring another civ to its knees, by stopping production.Etc...

- The slaver in particular can be a lot of fun. It is available pretty early. If you send the slaver to a foreign city, his attack will conduct a slave raid, whcih basically adds a population point to his home city. If you stack a slaver in with an army, if you win a battle, you also get a population point. Sounds too powerful right? Well, if you have more slaves (population points due to slavery) than you have defenders, the city can revolt. And I don't mean stop it's production for a turn, I mean actively join another civ. Plus there is a wonder (The Emancipation Act) which will free all the slaves the world over, at once.


These are just my opinions of course, but hope they help...

[UltraSonix]

Excellent post - the slaver concept sounds especially interesting.

Anyone willing to offer more?

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary... (And no, koalas don't usually speak!)

[MrFun]

Sure - I'll add my two cents for you guys.

With Settlers in CTP II, they only have one function - to found new cities. You will no longer use them to set tile improvements.

For tile improvements in CTP II, you need to set a percentage of your production that you wish to add to what is called Public Works. From Public Works, you assess different sub-menus where you select a tile improvement you wish to place.

No more having an army of Settlers just to improve tiles!

[Simpleton]

I have played Civ1,2 CTP1,2 and SMAC. Putting them in order of greatness from best to worst. (1)civ2 (2)civ1 (4) SMAC ...(10) CTP2 (29)CTP1.
I have been playing CTP2 for a few weeks now and I will say it is vastly better than CTP1 but does not hold a candle to the CIV's. Why? well here are some of my points
(1) Atmosphere --> there is something about the Civ's that kept you immersed like no other game. The different civilization leaders had personality. Although the diplomacy was primitive I would still say it's better than CTP2 because of this "personality" In CTP2 its bland, not even any threatening sound effects when they contact you which they do rarely. You also can't view your cities which was perhaps not a much used option but at least you could in Civ2 which further added to the class of CIV2. Another nice touch in CIV2 was the periodic "so and so completes the greatest civilizations of the world" reports. They were always a neat interlude.
(2) interface --> as much as the interface has been improved in CTP2 it is still very inferior to the one used in CIV1,2. In the CIV's city screen you could see everything you needed to see to manage your city (what units were there, who was happy or not, what you wanted to build) but in CTP2 you have to flip through little tabs only being able to view one thing at a time (e.g. You think you might need another military unit in the city to defend it? Well first you check your units tab and see what units you already have there. Next you click the build manager button and choose your unit.) The same thing with unhappiness in you city. (e.g. click status tab and check your unhappiness --> then click the build manager button to choose the correct improvement) After using an improved yet cumbersome system like this it really makes you appreciate the interface used in the CIV's
(3) Wonders--> CIV1,2 used many real wonders with imaginary effects but at least they were real and the others were still well thought out. In CTP and CTP2 many of the wonders are stupid. (e.g. (1)The agency--> grants every city the protection of a spy --> ok but how is this a wonder? (2) Forbidden city --> closes all embassies in all foreign civs --> big deal and there are others which are even kookier.
(4) city improvements --> (a) there are a lot, in fact too many. Most of them have duplicate effects. (e.g. CIV2 had a factory 50% increase in production and then Manufacturing plant 100% increase. Well in CTP2 you have a Mill +10%, factory +15%, fusion plant+25%, robotic plant +25, nuclear plant +20%, nanite factory+25, etc. and that's just for production! Never mind gold or science) It seems that instead of thinking up original effects an improvement could have they just added many with the same effect in hopes of keeping us interested. (b) some of them seem silly --> building a drug store allows your city to grow! What? Body Exchange also allows your city to grow. How? Your just recycling the person's body so there aren't less of them! Oil Refinery --> you can build one anywhere even if you don't have access to oil resources! Huh?
(5) Basically all CTP2 is, is a large patch of CTP1. That's probably the most annoying thing about it! You pay full price for a crappy game (ctp1) and then have to pay full price for a PATCH! CTP2 is definitely not the huge change from CTP1 that CIV2 was from CIV1. Really CIV2 was a completely new game and well worth it. CTP2 is perhaps 30% new material!

I have been hard on CTP2 and in it's own defense its not a bad game just not a great game. It only looks bad when compared to great games like CIV1 and 2.
My advice to the Activision team is play Civ1 and 2 again. Maybe you can get some ideas to make CTP3 a truly great game!
There are other things I could rant about but to keep this somewhat short I won't.
My final word is if you can wait for CIV 3 do so and save your $. If you can't wait maybe go in with a buddy and split the cost. The game works without the CD in minus music.

[Didymus]

I didn't play CtP1 either, so here is my take on CtP2:

Cities are different. The radius of effect grows with city size, which makes for different long-term strategies. I kinda like this part. I also like public works.

The pollution model (IHMO) cripples larger cities, because you have to cut back production or generate dead tiles. I'm trying it with pollution off to see how I feel about that.

The AI seems pretty passive compared to SMAC.

Units on automove will cheerfully attack your allies if they stumble into your path. Moronic crap like this taints the game.

I just can't see it comparing to SMAC, long-term. But if you have $$ and/or time to burn, it might be fun to play around with. Also, when the Apolytoners come out with a mod pack, it might help some of these problems.

Oh, I forgot to mention: the combat system is vastly superior to Civ/SMAC. Units have ranged and face-to-face combat ratings, so an artillery units behind a marine will pound the crepes out of your enemies, but when the marine falls, it becomes almost helpless. That sort of thing.

[This message has been edited by Didymus (edited December 06, 2000).]

[UltraSonix]

quote: My final word is if you can wait for CIV 3 do so and save your $.

But that might be a while!

quote: The AI seems pretty passive compared to SMAC.

Excellent info, just what I was looking for.

I wonder if people have anything more to add?

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary... (And no, koalas don't usually speak!)

[marc420]

I'm another Civ, Civ2, SMAC player with whom bad reviews kept me away from CTP1. But the reviews for CTP2 sounded a little better, plus I was bored so I got CTP2.

I haven't played it enough to know for sure if I like it or if I'll get tired of it after awhile, but I can pass along some first impressions.

I generally don't care about any of the bells and whistles stuff the like sound effects or leaders pictures or wonders being based on real things, so I don't consider the Civ games to be any better because of those. However, there is something just missing to this game that I can't quite put my finger on. I do find myself getting bored with the game after several hours of play. It doesn't quite have the "keep-you-up-till-4-in-the-morning" feel that the Civ games had. I'm not sure I could tell you why, but this game is easier to put away and go to bed at night than any of the civ games I've played. With Civ, Civ2 and SMAC, I was in serious danger of missing work when I first got the game. I'm not with CTP.

The AI is a more passive. This could be a good thing. I've beaten the tar out of the Civ2 and SMAC AI just playing rope-a-dope to its stupid attacks.

Also, a lot of this game is customizeable. There seem to be a lot of .txt files that can be edited. The one Mod I've been playing with so far is being able to let the AI think longer on its turns in the hopes that this trading of a small amount of quickness of turns will allow it to play better. So far this may be true. It took a couple of my cities when I left the defenses weak. Fortunately I was able to quickly retake them. Now its sitting in a city on my continent. Its not attacking out, and my first try and attacking it just failed. I was worried about a quick counter attack after my attackers died, but nothing happened.

I do like the Stacking and the Army rules. You can now have 12 units in a square. They can move together as an "army", and they fight together on a combat screen that appears. This combines to give the campaigining a much more historical feel than any of the Civ games. You send an Army out to do battle with an approaching enemy Army now in CTP2, and I like that.

The changes in "public works" help this too. A portion of your budget goes to "public works". This is used to build farms, mines, roads, etc. No more settler or engineer units to do this. You just point at the square where you want the improvement and it starts building. One effect this has is that roads now have to come out of that same budget, and they don't add commerce. So I now tend to build roads only where I need to connect cities, instead of all over the place just because I already had a settler/former in the square so why not build a road. Again, this helps the military campaigning because now not only do you move Armies, but there is one road connecting the cities, so that tends to channel the action. Again, it feels more like historical campaigning to me, or at least more so than a Civ game.

I like the way the buildings work in the cities. The early buildings give smaller boosts to a city. So you don't get the big discontinuities when a city builds an improvement. Instead its a more steady city growth. Building that Bazaar in an early city adds 10% to the commerce of the city. A nice boost, but nothing like the 50% a marketplace gave you. For some reason I like this better.

And like I said, virtually everything seems to be something the players can change in the .txt files.

BTW, the multiplayer in this first version is said to be CRAP. But Activision is already doing a patch to try to fix it. But version 1.0 is pretty much single-player only, unless you like lots of crashes and resychs. And no sign of PBEM or Hotseat play if you like either of those options.

But again, even though there are things about this game I like very much, for some reason there just seems to be something missing. I can't put my finger on exactly what, but I have a harder time picturing myself playing this game for a long, long time the way I've played Civ, Civ2 and SMAC.

[rwz]

marc420 wrote: "I'm another Civ, Civ2, SMAC player with whom bad reviews kept me away from CTP1. But the reviews for CTP2 sounded a little better, plus I was bored so I got CTP2."

Same here and I also agree with you about there is something missing, maybe time will change that. I love the battle screen, its fun to watch, but I do not think I'll be playing this like I did Civ2 or SMAC. I'm getting bored in the late game.