Civ3 Gameplay Issues List

[Dire Wolf]

I just finished playing Civ 3 for about 12 hours in one sitting...don't ask. (If you must know I finally decided to take a day from working/programming and spend time relaxing)

Anyhow, I've had Civ3 for about 1 week and so far I have mixed feelings. I've played Civ 1, 2, and CTP 2 so I do have something to compare Civ 3 to.

Below are just some of the problems I have with Civ 3. Feel free to agree or disagree.

Problems with Civ 3 (in no specific order):
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* Cruise missiles cannot be loaded into Nuclear submarines. This is utterly ridiculous. Two cruise missles or tac. nukes should be allowed, at the minimum.

* Can't destroy naval units with airplanes. This is just silly. Being able to destroy boats with airplanes is so important to the gameplay that not including it is just wrong. Many modern naval units have aircraft defenses (SAMs) not to mention their own aircraft. I like how ground units can't be destroyed though. It makes sense. I'm not sure if Cruise Missles can destroy naval units or not.

* Tactical Nukes only affect one naval unit in a stack (and possibly the same for ground units.) In my opinion, each naval/ground unit in a stack should be damaged, or have a chance of being damaged, by the tactical nuke. This may already happen but I've yet to see it.

* Polution seems to be out of control until you discover Recycling. The game becomes a battle against polution instead of other civilizations. I like the concept and challenge of managing polution but I feel they went a bit overboard.

* The same stupid "knight-beats-tank" battle results occur. I've seen very silly battles so far. I've had a Knight beat my Mechanized Infantry, a Frigate/Galleon beat my Destroyer, a Spearman beat a Musketeer, and a Galleon beat a Submarine. There are other incidents like the ones listed above and they have occurred enough to be more than just "freak" luck.

* AI seems to get a bonus when attacking cities or defending units. This is just speculation.

* AI can expand rapidly and yet still build and maintain a massive army. This statement is more from experience/observation than speculation.

* Workers are sometimes absolute morons. If a city is starving and you replace a Mine with Irrigation, if you put a Worker on auto, he will eventually end up replacing the Irrigation with a Mine and therefore starving the city again.

* Resources tend to expire/dry-up too quickly. There also seems to be a scarcity of "important" resources like Oil. The real world has quite a bit of oil. This is just my opinion.

* Sometimes the AI will want to trade World Maps with you but ask for some advanced technology as well. Then they act all insulted when you say no - even though their request was utterly non-sensical.

* AI never seems to want to continue trading past 20 turns.

* AI seems to know when a city is unoccupied, even when there are no units in range to "see" a given city is unoccupied.

* Sometimes you can never establish a "spy" in another civilization no matter how long or often you try.

* The years go by too quickly. On average I've not been able to get Modern Tanks or even Flight until the game is almost over (2000+). It seems the game doesn't switch from "2 year" turn increments to "1-year" turn increments soon enough.

* 2050 seems way too soon for the game to end.

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Now don't get me wrong - I'm really enjoying Civ 3 but the issues above are really bothering me (and my wife). To be honest, I think CTP2 had a lot of improvements in the gameplay that Civ3 should have incorporated.

Feel free to disagree

Best regards,

Dire

[Alex 14]

I guess Firaxis saw how the game worked out if it went past 2050 in an example of CTP2 - it must of scared them. I am however disapointed that it doesn't end at 2020, by 2050 we will have much much better technology than in Civ 3 at the time.

I havent got the game, but can cruise missles be loaded into any ship?

Resources are most likely different to what they are like in real life, I think they are trying to get you to trade.

[Dire Wolf]

Yes you are almost forced to trade at some point. Regarding the loading of cruise missiles onto ships: supposedly it is possible by loading them onto aircraft carriers. You cannot load them onto subs though. They have to be fired from land (which is very silly.)

Trust me, you wouldn't want the game to end at 2020 By that time you'll be lucky to even have Submarines or Battleships. Time seems to go by way too quickly.

[IBNobody]

>* Sometimes you can never establish a "spy" in another civilization no matter how long or often you try. <

GRRRR! I hate that, too! What's the point of trying to spy if you can't even plant one?

- Nobody

[Dire Wolf]

Another minor (but annoying) issues:

* After you get industrial age/modern naval units (Iron Clad and higher) your cities seem to only want to produce Privateers (which are useless.)

* Submarines/Nuclear Submarines are very weak when attacking other ships. Today's modern submarines are quite adept at sinking ships...plus they can carry Cruise Missiles. Oh, wait. I've already mentioned that.

[Alex 14]

Originally posted by IBNobody
>* Sometimes you can never establish a "spy" in another civilization no matter how long or often you try. <

GRRRR! I hate that, too! What's the point of trying to spy if you can't even plant one?

- Nobody

Maybee your not advanced enough.

[SITS]

Also I noticed that having the combination of The Great Lighthouse and Magellan's Voyage doesn't give your naval units +2 movement which I find very strange. Also, and I don't know if this is just on Warlord level but Galleys have never sunk on the ocean square even though according to the manual it should if it finishes there...

[Sarxis]

I have had galleys sink.

I think there is supposed to be an issue of Lighthouse(d) galleys not sinking in ocean squares, when they should. The Lighthouse is only supposed to let them travel in sea squares safely.

[blorq]

long time lurker, first time poster.

i've got some other gameplay issues:

1) automated workers don't know how to "pass"

when you have lots of workers automated, and they've done everything they can at the time (railroad all squares within borders, irrigate or mine as well, clean up pollution) they return to a city and end their automation! why is this? when one is going through the industrial ages and creating lots of pollution there will be times when one has nothing for ones workers to do, in which case one must manually "pass" for all of ones workers, and then automate them again later to clean up pollution. how annoying!

2) modern armies attack once

if tanks and modern armor are allowed multiple attacks per turn, why do armies that consist only of those units only get one attack per turn?

3) closing windows is difficult

that little X is awfully hard to hit sometimes. it would be nice if the entire box was clickable (yes, yes, i know i can always hit esc).

4) some visual cues are missing

as has already been noted, if you close the "start embassies" window after you develop writing, the only way to return to it is ctrl-e. there's no button on the screen and no entry in the civilopedia to tell you this. ditto with city governors.

5) fortified artillery doesn't auto-bombard

fortified artillery units don't seem to 'auto-bombard' aggressive enemy units that enter their range of fire. they only shoot before being attacked. if tanks excercise a "zone of control" by shooting at passing enemies, shouldn't artillery units do this too? this means constant fortification/unfortification (to manually shoot) since they removed the "sentry" command! bring back "sentry," or make them auto-bombard.

6) fighters on "air-superiority" don't auto-bombard

this might be nit-picking, but shouldn't fighters based in cities that have been put on "air-superiority" missions also bombard enemy ground units entering their operational range?

7) outrageous trade demands cause anger

enemy civilisations get angry when you reject their trade offers. granted, it might be worth your iron, coal, and 40 gold per turn to get that 7th luxury you're missing, but why do they think i would be willing to give them my map, three techs, coal, and 40 gold per turn to get their lousy little territory map?

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so far these are my biggest gameplay issues. they're more or less ranked in descending order of annoyance. naturally i'm also unhappy that there's no prompting when cities are in civil disorder (since it seems the governors don't know how to handle it) and no prompting when you finish building a military unit and the governor changes it to some random other military unit of no use.

other than some problems like those, i'm really enjoying the game.

but are there any plans on fixing any of the above problems for the first patch?

[Andreiguy]

when the AI makes a dumb demand, just click "make counter-deal" (or whatever the first option is) and simply take out everything they asked for and put in your own terms...

PLUS
I have had MANY galleys, and even caravels, sink!

[Arachno]

Yeah, don't reject offers they make you, just make a counter proposal and make it decent.

Also, sometimes they'll accept 20$ per turn for something but not 21, but they still accept to give you "lumps" of gold if you ask, and a lot ! Looks like these two things are totally separated in the AI's mind.

[blorq]

thanks, i'm well aware of "propose counter-offer," but i find that unless my advisor says "they will probably accept this deal" that they will never accept that deal. it might just be a coincidence, however.

the problem is when they start with an outrageous demand, they won't settle for anything less.

regardless, it wasn't my biggest complaint, and it was quite low on the list.

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Dire Wolf
* Workers are sometimes absolute morons. If a city is starving and you replace a Mine with Irrigation, if you put a Worker on auto, he will eventually end up replacing the Irrigation with a Mine and therefore starving the city again.

Use shift-A to automate and disallow replacing existing improvements.

* AI never seems to want to continue trading past 20 turns.

You have to re-negotiate, usually at the same exhorbitant rate at which the deal was struck the first time around.

* The years go by too quickly. On average I've not been able to get Modern Tanks or even Flight until the game is almost over (2000+). It seems the game doesn't switch from "2 year" turn increments to "1-year" turn increments soon enough.

* 2050 seems way too soon for the game to end.

What level are you playing on? I thought the advances were coming too fast in my game on Warlord level; I know the game will be over one way or another long before 2050 (or 1950 for that matter). I'm hoping Regent levels the playing field for me. So take it down a level or two until you get used to the game. And remember: it's different from Civ2. Throw out your old strategies.

[Dire Wolf]

I was playing on the Warlord level and doing VERY well. I had the largest population, the most cities (25), the most technology etc. It took me until 2100 to get Advanced Flight (if I remember correctly.) My technology "slider" was at 60-70% most of the time too.

Regarding the trading - yes I know you have to renegotiate and most of the time they won't. There have been the occassional times where they will but only after I give them some Luxury + Resource + World Map + 2 Technological Discoveries. Puh-lease
It is usually at that point that I'll end up destroying one of their cities that owns the resource I need

[Boris Godunov]

* Cruise missiles cannot be loaded into Nuclear submarines. .

-Yeah, this is dumb--but can this be fixed with the editor? That might involve making it carry all air units, though, which would not be good...

* Can't destroy naval units with airplanes. This is just silly.

Personally, I think the whole bombard thing is a little un-useful. If bombing/bomardments were even more likely to succeed, that would be a little better. Artillery has been reduced to a defensive weapon, which is unrealistic.

* Tactical Nukes only affect one naval unit in a stack.

Really? Hmmm...haven't gotten that far, yet...

* Polution seems to be out of control until you discover Recycling.

I haven't had this problem. In my games it is a nuiscance, but hardly a disaster. Maybe that's because I didn't build coal plants at all--got hydro power via Hoover Dam...

* The same stupid "knight-beats-tank" battle results occur.

I honestly have not had this be a rampant problem. Occasional, yes...but by and large, my tanks are whooping butt.

* AI seems to get a bonus when attacking cities or defending units. This is just speculation.

I don't think this is true...I haven't seen anything to indicate this on the easy (non AI cheat) levels.

* AI can expand rapidly and yet still build and maintain a massive army.

AI expansion is phenomenal, but does keep things interesting...without it, a player might be content to be too relaxed in the gameplay

* Workers are sometimes absolute morons.

Shift+A

* Resources tend to expire/dry-up too quickly. There also seems to be a scarcity of "important" resources like Oil. The real world has quite a bit of oil. This is just my opinion.

I have only had a few resources dry up, which I think is realistic. Oil=Well, oil is indisputably a finite source. And as for a scarcity--in the real world, look how OPEC holds everyone else hostage over oil prices, since they control the vast majority of the world's supply. I think the game is pretty realistic.

* AI never seems to want to continue trading past 20 turns.

Well, this is perception. If an AI is content keeping a deal, it won't tell you--it will just keep going with it. It will only tell you when it wants to stop trading. And why not try and renegotiate a trade deal to get more goodies from you? Seems sensible to me...

* AI seems to know when a city is unoccupied, even when there are no units in range to "see" a given city is unoccupied.

Don't know how you are determining this...but keep in mind the AI can Investigate Cities, too.

* Sometimes you can never establish a "spy" in another civilization no matter how long or often you try.

Yeah, this seems to be a problem. Might be a culture issue, though.

* The years go by too quickly.

Use the editor to change the tech rates on the different-size maps. This will speed up/slow production to your heart's content. There is no need for Firaxis to worry about this.

* 2050 seems way too soon for the game to end.

Yeah, it would be cool to be able to determine the end-year date either via the editor or preferences. Or have it like Civ I, where the higher the difficulty, the earlier the end date.

Cheers.

[Dire Wolf]

Thanks for the tip on changing the tech rates. Any guidelines on what I should change the values to for a standard sized map so that I have modern equipment by at least 1930s? Is there anyway of calculating this?

[SITS]

Originally posted by Anunikoba
I have had galleys sink.

I think there is supposed to be an issue of Lighthouse(d) galleys not sinking in ocean squares, when they should. The Lighthouse is only supposed to let them travel in sea squares safely.

I have a galley still trolling around in the ocean and so do the other civs and they seem to be ok. I don't know if this is because of being on the Warlord level....

[Pyrodrew]

Use the editor to change the tech rates on the different-size maps. This will speed up/slow production to your heart's content. There is no need for Firaxis to worry about this.

I believe Dan said that Soren said a 32 turn limit is the max. A player was trying to get this 32 raised since they claimed they were able to get the 32 down to 5 (too low for him) in ancient times.

* AI never seems to want to continue trading past 20 turns.

This is SMART for the AI to do. As I explained elsewhere often as time goes on the AI will meet other civilizations. So instead of paying for your horses at 25 gold/turn it might find the Iroquois offering horses at 15 gold/turn. Thus he's shopping for the best deal. And I've experienced the opposite which is smart too. I was paying them 17 gold/turn for spices after 20turns the AI ended it & now wanted 19 gold/turn. The AI made me somewhat dependent on those spices AND since I was now earning more (from having a larger & more successful society) it was very logical for me to pay 19 gold/turn. We want a SMART AI.

Tactical Nukes...

are EXTREMELY weak unfortunately. It's like dropping a cloud of smoke which costs $1billion dollars.

AI seems to get a bonus when attacking

Soren already said many many many times the AI gets no combat bonuses.

AI seems to know when a city is unoccupied, even when there are no units in range to "see" a given city is unoccupied.

This must be fixed if true... someone mentioned how they used this against the AI by constantly tricking it. I'm more worried about people exploiting this rather than whether it would be considered AI cheating.

I think there is supposed to be an issue of Lighthouse(d) galleys not sinking in ocean squares, when they should. The Lighthouse is only supposed to let them travel in sea squares safely.

The Civilopedia states the Lighthouse makes all of the owners ships travel safely in ocean & sea squares. They did this because the Lighthouse *sucked* in Civ2. Now it's actually a good wonder.