Does anyone actually ever finish a game?

Hawkx9 · June 13, 2000, 23:12

How often do you actually finish a game completely? I'm finding more often than not that I'm unsatisfied with something about mid way thru my game and decide not to finish. For example, I'm finding maintaining more than 6-8 cities tedious - it gets old real damn fast. I'll set out to only build six but get suckered into building more when some nice land pokes its head out. "Wow, a great spot. I'll only build one more..." Of course, that turns into building another and another and before I know it I have 20 cities, all demanding my attention. It slows the game down incredibly.

I'm a perfectionist by nature so I suppose I should limit myself to a certain number of cities and stick to it. How many cities do you usually build? Hell, it must take the ICS guys a week to finsh one game. I don't have that much patience.

I think OCC has proven that the number of cities doesn't matter so what's the motivation to building a ton of cities? Isn't shooting ahead in tech and producing superior units what it's all about? I mean, if I can race to Democracy, build the SoL, and switch to Commie or Fundie and flood the enemy with a superior unit, isn't that just as good as doing it with 20-50 cities, just taking less time? The fact is, the more cities you have the less time those cities will be spending on infrastructure and caravans. Instead of producing the settlers to expand, you could be making caravans while allowing your cities to grow.

Speaking of caravans... when everyone talks about making a million caravans, are you forming trade routes right away? And with whom? your SSC? Do you keep re-forming the routes to get the initial bonus or are you using most of them for WOW construction? Early in the game, the bonus for forming a route is pathetic considering the effort it takes.

I've found that going for an early republic with the happy wonders and a small number of cities gets me ahead in science farther, faster. Six to eight seems to be about the right number of cities when I'm ready to switch governments. Any more and I'll have to delay the change because of support issues. Having a nice defender and one settler supported by each city, switching to Republic, and envolking WLT*D, racing all your cities to 8 is damn nice. Science'll go thru the roof - straight to SoL. Personal preference can take over after that... either shoot for a certain unit and switch to Fundie or "AC, here we come."

All comments are greatly appreciated.

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Peace
[This message has been edited by Hawkx9 (edited June 13, 2000).]

June 14, 2000, 01:07

So, how does the game finish?

June 14, 2000, 01:34

actually lately, I have about 4 games that are in limbo. It's the first time it's happened to me with civ2. I still have about 3 smac games in limbo. I can usually finish a civ game if I resume playing the next day. But with my work schedule sometimes I don't get time until my next weekend, by then I lost interest. What I'm saying is I need to be payed to play civ2 all day and quit my job.

MacUser · June 14, 2000, 06:35

YEAH! THAT'S THE TICKET!

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Different is GOOD!

AOL IM--JacSamDad

Ming · June 14, 2000, 07:44

Paid to play Civ... sign me up too

I've finish about half of my Single Play games. The other half are just games I get bored with.

OCC was a good challange, and made it worth finishing... and a few of the other challanges were interesting too.

But I mostly play MP now. I only play single play when I can't find a MP game and I need a Civ fix.

cavebear · June 15, 2000, 19:27

I play MP games with fixed shedules almost exclusively. 1 or 2 at a time, only. That way, I don't lose interest in any particular game, nor do I get burned out (a common affliction of late).

I'd rather play fewer games, but where I can keep track of them, than many starts. One advantage: I get games to later times more often that way.

Smash · June 15, 2000, 23:49

How many of you have actually finished a MP game?I mean by spaceship or MODERN day conquest/submission.

I've only managed to take a handful to modern times and not one of those was finished to my mind.

This is a big MP problem.Last good game was a 3 way game that went many sessions when the "saver" bought a new computer, lost the save in the process or something.That one was maybe 1 more 3-4 hour session from being finished one way or the other.There was gonna be a major,major 2vs1 world war with tanks,howies,battleships and bombers when the game got sunk.

That soured me abit to MP

kcbob · June 16, 2000, 08:07

Hey, Hawkx9, I have a question for you. Are you playing a small, medium, or large world? If you are playing a small world, you don't have room to grow in to 20 or more cities. By the time you reach 6 to 8, you've run in to your nearest neighbor.

But, I would say that more cities are good if you are trying to get ahead in science. I personally like to build out to my neighbor's territory and then subvert his cities. I gain his science beakers, he loses his science beakers, and I'm that much more ahead.

On the caravan issue, I mostly use them early in the game for WsOW production. (Is that plurification correct?) Later in the game when advancements are more costly, a caravan/freight is terrific in science production, not to mention money.

One last thought on small world games. I've only managed to make it to AC once. Every other victory has been by conquest.

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Frodo lives!

Better dead than "Red"... or green... or blue... or yellow... or orange... or purple... or white.

Hawkx9 · June 17, 2000, 15:58

kcbob,
I'm finding I enjoy a medium world with small land mass. That way there's a respectable distance between each civ but it keeps the AI from throwing up 50 cities, which I find to be a pain. Smaller land mass hinders expansionist civs like the Mongols but seems to help the perfectionist ones like Babylonians. This is more my kinda game - tech acquision/few units instead of the the ICS that happens on larger land-mass maps.

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Peace

[This message has been edited by Hawkx9 (edited June 17, 2000).]

Father Beast · June 22, 2000, 06:02

I usually finish my games and head to AC, but keep playing afterward. I have about 3 games going, includinbg one in which I'm well into the 2500's, slowly assimilating my neighbors.
Finish the Game? I don't know when to quit!

Civ-wrecked · June 22, 2000, 20:23

I only finished about 1 out of 10 games. I usually stopped a short while after researching Computer and build the WOW. At the time, the result of the game is pretty obvious so it's just a little chore to do the cleanup on the remaining AIs. I would much prefer starting a new game and enjoy the sense of exploration, strategic planning, WOW races, etc. in the early game.

tonic · June 22, 2000, 22:05

Only a slight tangent here, but not finishing a game can be an important learning method. I'm thinking about the comparison games from OCC. If you get behind in the early game (like a lot of beginners do) then there's no hope of catching up later. I've found it helpful to play in stages, stage one up to achieving Republic, stage two to Democracy and so on. This way it is easier to see where you have gone wrong. I suppose you could call it incremental learning.

[This message has been edited by tonic (edited June 22, 2000).]

June 22, 2000, 22:54

I often play to as late as 1200 AD before I can a game. But usually it'll happen before the odometer flips over.

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i will be the power surge